"Alarmed and Dangerous"
Original Airdate: 5-13-1997
At the high school, Justin is taking a science test. Another student asks Justin to turn his paper so he can see Justin's answers. Justin refuses to help, because as a twelve year-old in high school, he has exactly zero instinct for survival. The teacher finally notices and throws out the cheating students as well as Justin. Justin protests to no avail. In the hallway, the other students complain that Justin wouldn't help them cheat, Justin suggests that they should study harder. At this point, I think Justin wants to get the shit beaten out of him. One of the bullies proposes that his "fist study [Justin's] face." Credits! (Shift! In! To! Tur! Bo!)
A fire alarm suddenly goes off, and Kat, (she's a student teacher, remember? Well, nobody else does either.) wonders where Justin is, because that appears to be the primary purpose of her character this season. Kat searches for him and finds him leaning on a stairwell. Some pissed off fireman show up to be bitter about the whole false alarm. Justin looks away guiltily. Justin, deciding that a beating deferred should not be a beating denied, rats out the two bullies who were with him.
From her space-sub of love, Divatox has a new plan involving false alarms, human emotions, and a, I'm going to go ahead and guess that a bomb with a very slow timer is also involved. Divatox orders a Piranhatron to trip as many fire alarms as possible. At the juice bar, Tommy, Adam and Tanya do some martial arts training. Tommy does his signature grunt which, for those who haven't heard it, sounds like "Saint Eu-Ya!" A fire alarm goes off. The Rangers stand around and ponder the oddity of said fire alarm. It's worth noting that through two fire alarms so far, the reaction from the Power Rangers has been to stand around and contemplate the unexpected nature of the alarm bell ringing. That's probably not the best example for kids.
The bullies descend on Justin at school and call him a 'narc.' They are not wrong. The bullies are displeased with Justin ratting them out. Justin moves to leave, but the bullies have other plans. Justin starts to pull out his morpher, which doesn't seem to be very sporting. A fire alarm goes off and Justin claims to not be a narc. Justin is a narc, and should get beaten up twice for denying it. Get him, lads! Kat shows up and the bullies retreat. Cowards! Then schools gets called on account of malfunctioning fire alarm bells. The bullies promise to get Justin later. I can only hope.
At the juice bar, Tommy and Adam seem to be coming to realization that ChimpBulk and ChimpSkull are more than mere apes. Tanya tamps down such notions, and ChimpBulk and ChimpSkull lament their fate some more. The space-sub's periscope come out of a nearby bucket, and ChimpBulk misses around with it for a while, eventually knocking out Elgar in an epic battle of good comic relief vs. evil comic relief. Lt. Stone comes in to announce that the alarm seems to be broken, but for the sake of safety, every alarm must be treated as if it were real. Inevitably, Lt. Stone gets doused in water for a fire bucket as penalty for his attempt at giving good advice. All present laugh at his misfortune and continue to ignore fire alarms. The Rangers figure out that Divatox is probably involved somehow and head to check it out.
Down deep, Divatox orders Elgar to plant a bomb that is in the shape of a fire extinguisher and hide it. Divatox prematurely gloats. Elsewhere, Kat and Justin are talking, and Justin rats out the bullies some more, as he is also not good at conflicat avoidance. Kat suggests making friends with the bullies. Apparently being out of high school for ten episodes has leeched all memory of her life as a high schooler out of her brain. They stumble onto a couple of Piranhatrons setting off a fire alarm. The Piranhatrons lose. Justin and Kat head to the Power Chamber. Elgar and Rygog plant the bomb on a fire truck. It's not the worst idea they've ever had.
The Rangers recapitulate the situation, and Justin remarks that it's "too bad you can't send Piranhatrons to detention." Shut up, Justin. The Rangers figure out that Divatox's plan involves her distracting them while a planting a bomb, because, well, that's always Divatox's plan. The Rangers split up. Justin wanders around the park, when the two bullies from before find him. Justin tries to run, but the bullies finally, finally corner and appear to be poised to beat the crap out of him. Justin somehows gets the upper hand and chooses to run away. The bullies give chase. Justin hides in a tree. The branch he's standing on starts to give way, but then he teleports out right before he falls. The bullies are somewhat confused by this turn of events.
Back at the Power Chamber, Justin is chastised for using his powers in view of civilians. Kat and Justin talk about the bully problem some more. Alpha 6 threaten to "hurl" if they don't "cut it out with this mushy stuff." On the one hand, I agree with the sentiment. On the other, the way it was said makes me want to ram my head into a wall. I'm torn. Anyway, they're tracking the bomb's signal, but it's apparently moving. This confuses Kat and Justin because this would only be the third or fourth time a bomb was placed on a moving vehicle. Divatox prematurely gloats some more, as the bomb's timer is down to thirty seconds.
Two minutes later, the bomb actually goes off before the Rangers disarm it. This makes the fire engine turn into a monster. Wait, it does? The evil fire engine flies through the city firing lightning at buildings because...I couldn't even begin to guess. Divatox's other goons show up, looking noticeably different in their Japanese forms. The Rangers threaten to beat them up, and the goons go as quickly as they came. The Rangers shoot the evil fire truck down with their blasters, and that returns everything to normal. Divatox tries to get a handle on what the hell just happened, but just sends Eltar to be tortured instead.
At the school, the bullies confront Justin yet again. In the spirit of sportsmanship, they give Justin a five-second head start. Justin refuses to fight, and bonds with the bully over their common parental abandonment, and they instantly become friends. The moral of today's story is that bullies are all emotionally damaged people, and if you find their vulnerabilities, you can manipulate them into being your friends. Show Over!
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