Power Rangers Fan Fiction ❯ Bitter ❯ Prologue ( Prologue )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

A/N: Yes, an MMPR/InuYasha crossover. Your eyes are not deceiving you. If you're only familiar with one half of the whole - please, don't worry. I intend to flesh out both back stories in a way that is not a lecture. The setting is in the MMPR-verse… so this is AU for InuYasha fans.
 
 
Prologue
 
 
Early December, 1996
 
As Kimberly Hart was dragged backwards into a dark alley, a disgustingly moist hand covering her mouth, she wished with all her heart that she had never given up her power coin, had never left the Power Rangers, had never left California.
 
Or that she had never gone with her friends out for a night on the town.
 
Or that she had never decided to walk back to the training compound alone.
 
Come to think of it, she had a lot of regrets… and this was not exactly her best day.
 
Nonetheless, the petite gymnast was not going to just roll over and be a willing victim.
 
She spun in her captor's grip, wincing as the hand scraped across her cheek - his nails were ridiculously long, she thought in the recesses of her mind; the observation was pushed back as she remembered her boyfriend and her best friend teaching a self-defense class.
 
Rule number one - shout. Draw attention to herself. Her mouth now free of that revolting hand, she let loose. “Let go of me!” Her cries echoed off the walls - good.
 
`Think of him as just another putty,' she tried to convince herself. `They don't scare me.'
 
Her time with the Rangers had served her well. `I can do this.' Kimberly brought her arms up between them and pushed, trying to get her leg up between them for leverage.
 
Dank breath washed over her face as her attempts to break free were thwarted; she cringed at the scent of rotten meat and something worse, something metallic… something she couldn't, or wouldn't, identify.
 
She flailed again, this time attempting to duck, to flip him over her shoulder. He clutched her to him, squeezing the breath from her lungs, and wrapped a leg around hers with a dark chuckle; this man was ridiculously strong.
 
Kimberly shrieked as the man used his hands - his nails - to slice the back of her light hoodie; the man took the opening and shoved his tongue in her mouth.
 
`No! No, no, no… TOMMY!'
 
He wasn't going to save her this time. He couldn't save her this time. Her white knight was three-thousand miles away; completely oblivious to the fact that his girlfriend was fighting for her life.
 
Her courage was renewed at the reminder that she was stronger than this - that she'd been through worse and come out fine; she chomped down on the tongue gagging her. The man howled - a real howl, not a shout - and she slammed her forehead against his nose.
 
He growled, like a wild animal, and Kimberly's eyes locked on his teeth. Was the little light seeping in off the street glinting off fangs?!
 
Enraged, the man ripped her form-fitting tank top down the back, nails - claws - scraping painfully across her back. Then he embedded those teeth - fangs - into the junction of her neck and shoulder.
 
She yelped, eyes shut against the pain, unaware that she was glowing bright pink, lighting up the alley around her. She smelled burning flesh and nearly gagged but didn't dare open her eyes to figure out why. The sound of a whip, of an echoing scream of pain in her ears - her eyes flew open as her captor's arms dropped and she hit the ground.
 
Kimberly's first impression was of white - `Tommy?' Her savior had an elegant hand wrapped around the attacker's neck, glowing green.
 
Green… white… `Tommy?' Hope surged through her veins.
 
The attacker's eyes bulged and she let out a terrified sob as he flailed weakly… and hit the ground, blood streaming from a puncture wound in his throat. He coughed once… twice… and was silent. Dead.
 
Tearing her eyes away from the gruesome sight, Kimberly looked up, up, up at her savior. He was taller than Tommy, leaner… less muscular but for all the world looked like he could crush her in an instant. Yellow-gold eyes stared down at her.
 
Eyes used to sizing up monsters swept over the man in front of her. Pointed ears. Colored streaks on his face, a moon on his forehead. Long white hair billowed in the slight breeze. He wore eye shadow… at least eye-liner, and she covered a smirk. A cross-dresser, maybe? He was wearing a long, white trench-coat - it was immaculate, even in the alley. He shifted and she noticed two things in his belt… `Swords. Who the heck carries swords?'
 
He spoke - a deep, lilting sound - in a language she didn't recognize. Was he an alien? A new creature fighting for Zedd? The thought of the monster that had been so fixated on her made her shudder. `No - Tommy said Zedd and Rita were gone. Something about… machines?' She couldn't remember, the shock of the night wiping other thoughts from her mind short of flashes of memory.
 
The creature - he couldn't be human - narrowed his eyes. Kimberly realized he'd stopped talking, and that she'd been staring.
 
“Um, no offense or anything, but I don't understand you.”
 
He looked like he wanted to roll his eyes and Kimberly did. “What? It's not my fault. Speak English.” She'd encountered plenty of Spanish-speakers in her time in Miami but this wasn't any Spanish she knew. Creole, either. When he didn't respond, she sighed. “Fine, well… thanks, anyway.” Her eyes drifted to the body again. “I should probably call the cops. So, you might wanna get out of here. Yeah, you saved me and all and I really appreciate it but I bet the cops will be upset.” He didn't move. “Shoo! Scram! Look, it's not that I'm not thankful or anything, but you'll get in trouble if you stick around.”
 
What was he waiting for?
 
“Get the shard.”
 
Kimberly blinked. Well, that cleared up whether or not he spoke English…
 
“Shard?”
 
“Surely you feel it. Follow the power and get the shard.”
 
She tilted her head, noticing that his eyes were on the body. Her eyes swept over it… and noticed a faint pink glow in his shoulder. “The pink thing?”
 
Kimberly was drawn to it but loathe to turn her back on the thing that killed her attacker with one hand… she backed down the alley, sneaking glances over her shoulder so she didn't bump into anything and look like more of a ditz than she had.
 
Unwillingly kneeling near her attacker, she reached out to it. “Ewww…” The creature who saved her rumbled low in his chest and it echoed - she shuddered. It was a scary sound.
 
Kimberly reached out to touch the glowing thing and was surprised - and disgusted - when it slid easily from the skin. It looked like a piece of rock… pink with black shadows swirling around inside… and after she held it for a moment, the black slipped away.
 
Her hand pulsed, the feeling she'd had when she'd first been given her morpher, and she gasped.
 
A chuckle reverberated through the alley. “Excellent. You, miko, belong to me now.”
 
“Excuse me?”
 
“You will serve me… or meet the same fate as the wolf.”
 
“What are you?”
 
“Nothing you foolish humans would understand. If you must give me a title - I am Sesshoumaru, general of demons.”
 
 
 
 
Disclaimers:
Anything from Power Rangers (and their affiliates) belong to Saban and Disney. I don't have permission to use them. I don't get any money for this, either.
 
That being said, I don't own InuYasha and Company either. The “real” InuYasha belongs to the genius of Rumiko Takahashi (and Viz and all those other companies involved).