estirise

Title: Meteorite of Inspiration
Author: EstiRose
Fandom: Power Rangers Dino Thunder
Rating: 8+
Notes/Spoilers: Set a week or so after "Leader of the Whack"
Summary: Sometimes people in unusual situations inspire others.
Word count: 655

"Hey, bro." Eric folded his arms and looked at Conner pointedly, causing Conner to look blank at his twin brother. He'd had a long day; between classes and everything, he was *tired* and he looked it. Hell, Kira and Ethan had pointed that out to him. And Dr. O. But he couldn't help being wiped; between soccer and practice and Mesofreak, he was pretty busy, and that wasn't counting busy or what remained of his tattered social life.

But there was nothing he could do about it. He had the Gem, he was the Red Ranger, he had to defend the Earth. He'd tried walking away from it, but he couldn't. Dr. O would say it was because he was a hero; he wasn't sure that was it, but he did what he had to do. Besides, he had Ethan and Kira and Dr. O to support him too. Ranger teams were apparently like that.

"What's up?" he asked. His twin leaned back on the counter; mom would *kill* him if she saw him like that, especially since she was complaining that the countertops needed work and where were they going to get the money, and so forth.

"I just wanted to ask, the other week... you looked all...." Eric struggled to find the words for a moment, and then seemed to chase them down. "Scholarly. You know, with books and that jacket and that accent you were effecting."

The meteor incident. The one that had turned him into a bookworm, Kira into a shallow girl, and Ethan into a bodybuilder. That had been weird, to tell the truth. He hadn't expected that side of him to show up, and he had no idea that he was such a scholar... though Hayley had said it was deep inside or something like that. But that was hard to explain, especially to an outsider like Eric, even one who had helped save the Earth and gone to a secret Ninja academy and had teachers who *had* saved the Earth.

"It was nothing," Conner said, taking out the bottle of apple juice and pouring himself a glass. It had been nothing. They were back to normal, everybody was back to normal, none of it mattered.

"You were weird, but interesting," Eric said. "I... I thought of how great it could be if I could be like that."

"You... did?" Conner put his glass down, staring at his twin. "You, of all people?"

"Sensei always said that you had to have the strength of mind as well as the strength of body and the strength of heart," Eric said wryly. "Um. The three of us didn't quite have that, but I'd love to. I'd love to be a scholar. I just don't have the patience."

Yeah, Eric didn't have the patience. Eric was also a bit of an airhead, which was why he was probably now an ex-Ninja student. Conner wished he could give Eric a taste of what he'd been under the meteorite, just so that Eric would know how it had been.

"Dude, I don't know what came over me, but...." he trailed off, not sure on what to say. The meteorite had made him somebody he thought he'd never be, either. Why should he discourage Eric? "You can do it. Because you're my brother."

Eric broke out in a grin. "Yeah?" It was like he'd never considered being scholarly before, never considered books and libraries and all that dusty stuff. Conner didn't desire to go back to it, at least not at the moment, but if Eric wanted to? That was great. As long as he didn't turn into a total geek, that was fine. Eric might have been a dork sometimes, but he was a good dork. Conner liked him. Most of the time. He was Conner's twin, after all.

"Yeah," Conner said, grinning back. He never thought good - well, outside a couple of things - would come out of that meteorite. But maybe they would.