Chapter Text
"Can you believe it's been five years since our first parade together?" Fern asked as she looked up from a chart of various floats and organizations.
"Hmm, does that first one really count?" Izzy asked, turning away from a map of Pine Ridge covered in pins and rainbow coloured string.
"Oh come on, Iz." Fern stood up and gave her a girlfried a hug. "Just because you were incognito doesn't mean you weren't there with me." She gave her a quick kiss. "I still think that was really sweet, by the way."
Izzy grinned. "Yeah, but now I have to think of something even more amazing to try and one-up myself at some point. I set the bar too high!"
"Oh yes, and it's not like you're a track star who excels at jumping over high bars," Fern snarked.
Izzy chuckled at that and kissed her again. "Ugh, I wish we weren't stuck at Buzz Blast doing all this planning."
"And we really should get back to that, because this parade route is not gonna sort itself out," Fern murmured between kisses.
"Can't believe we're the most competent lesbians in town," Izzy replied as the two leaned over a couch in their little office.
"Yeah, we never should've been put in charge of the whole Pride celebration," Fern moaned as she ran her fingers through Izzy's hair.
There was a knock at the door, which honestly, the two should've expected – not just because they were still in a public building, but because as rangers they were used to things interrupting little moments like this. The two groaned and giggled, but stood back up and went to the door.
"What's up J-Borg?" Izzy asked.
"You two have visitors!" J-Borg declared. "They fell out of the sky!"
Fern poked her head into the door frame. "What does that mean?"
The answer came in the form of J-Borg being nudged out of the way as a beautiful dark-skinned woman came into view. "It's kind of a grid thing, you know?"
Ah, one of those phrases that immediately got the attention of people in the know. Izzy and Fern were well-versed in "grid things," so they quickly invited the woman and her hunky male companion into their office, thanking J-Borg for bringing them over. "So what's the grid thing?" Izzy asked, all-business.
"Oh, it's fine!" the man insisted. "No trouble, we're just stopping by from another dimension."
"Yeah, and my lovely husband miscalculated the teleportal coordinates, which is why we had to do a dicey landing from two stories up," the woman sighed.
"I said I was sorry!" the man said, putting a comforting hand on his wife's shouler. "Besides, I know you like some excitement now and then." Then he turned to Izzy and Fern. "Hi, I'm Tyler Navarro-Watkins, Dino Charge Red."
"And I'm Shelby Watkins-Navarro, Dino Charge Pink."
Izzy and Fern shook hands with the rangers. "Dino Fury Green – and I guess Cosmic Fury Green for a hot minute too."
"Cosmic Fury Orange. I never had a Dino Fury moment."
"Oh, we know who y'all are," Shelby said. "I've got an extension to follow other dimension's instagram, and can I just say, the two of you are adorable."
"Thanks!" Fern beamed. "But now that you mention it, aren't you two a little early? I know we invited your whole team over, but the parade isn't until Saturday."
"Oh, this is bigger than the parade," Tyler said earnestly.
Shelby nodded and collected herself. "We caught wind of you two organization a bunch of stuff for this week, including booking hotel rooms for our team. So we've come from another dimension to request your help in orchestrating artificial bed scarcity."
"This is a dream come true," said Fern immediately.
"I don't know what that means," Izzy said at the same time, then turned to Fern. "What's happening now?"
"It's a fanfic thing," Fern said, her smile growing wider by the minute. "Or not even that, just a romance trope – two people who are kind of into each other, but they don't wanna admit their feelings, you know?"
"But then they end up in a scenario where they have to sleep and there's only one bed," Shelby joined in. "So when they're sharing the bed, the close proximity makes all their feelings boil over. One thing leads to another -"
"- and before you know it -" Fern continued.
"They're in love," the two sad simultaneously.
Izzy shot a confused look towards Tyler, who held his hands up. "I don't have firsthand experience with it myself, but the reasoning's sound and I'm in favour of using it as part of a scheme to get some friends together."
"You've met Riley, right?" Shelby asked.
Izzy nodded. "Yeah, he's the one who encouraged me to be in the parade a few years back. He's stopped by a few times for other parades, too."
"Yeah, he's great, and he's been encouraging a bunch of us to come over to your side with him this year," Tyler said. "It's gonna be him, the two of us, our teammate Koda, and our other teammate. Chase."
Oh, Izzy knew that name. Riley had let it slip once or twice after a drink. "That's the guy Riley had a crush on for ages."
"Still does," Shelby chimed in.
"Yup," Tyler nodded. "And honestly? We're all pretty sure he's into Riley as well, and just doesn't have the self-awareness to realize it."
"But now that we're all travelling out of town, and specifically travelling to a queer event, we're thinking this might be a great opportunity to...arrange things," Shelby suggested.
"Book a hotel, make sure that they're roomed together, make sure there's only one bed, and hope for the best."
"You two have officially become my favourite hets," Fern beamed.
"Eh. Het passing," Tyler said sheepishly.
"Even better!"
Izzy was still frowning. "I don't know. This all sounds...really sweet! I'm sure y'all have the best intentions. But it also seems kinda weird to basically force these two together. Wouldn't Riley get really self-conscious if he has to room with the guy he's still crushing on?"
"We've thought about that," Shelby said. "We know Riley pretty well, and we're pretty sure he'll be willing to tough it out at least one night. If he can't take it, we'll figure out a room swap and get him out of there. We're just optimistic that we won't have to."
"Okay. But wasn't the main reason that Riley never made a move on Chase because he was confident Chase is straight?"
At this, Fern's expression also fell. "Ooh, that is a good point. I love a closet-key moment, but this could put Chase in an awkward situation too. Either he's strictly straight and he's being forced into a situation he's incompatible with, or he's forced to confront more than just his personal feelings for Riley."
"I mean, Chase does say he's straight, but like..."
"There's a vibe," Shelby said.
Izzy frowned. "A vibe?"
"A bisexual vibe." Tyler confirmed. "Like, you look at the way he sits."
"Or the way he wears his hats."
"He's been doing finger gun a lot more lately."
"And the way he talks about Riley is almost indistinguishable from how he talks about girls he likes." Shelby sighed. "I get what you're saying. It's a weird scheme. But they're both our friends, and if you saw them together as much as we did you'd see that there's something there. We're trying to give them a chance to find that spark, and we thought this could be a safe space to do it."
"They're good people," Tyler smiled. "I'd trust them both with my wellbeing, whether it be emotional stuff or alien bounty hunters. Even if something goes a little more...awry than we expected, I think they'd be able to get through it without issue."
"Like, we wouldn't be roping you two into this unless we were really confident that this was something that could work out well. For everyone." Shelby smiled, thinking about her friends. "We just don't want them to cut themselves off from a chance at love."
Izzy and Fern shared a look. Everything Shelby and Tyler had said was clearly coming from the heart, and even through the logistics of everything (and everything that could go wrong), both could see the desire in the other's eyes to help.
"Can we have a moment to talk it over?" Fern asked. The visitors nodded, and she took her girlfriend outside the office to have a quick, hushed conversation.
The decision was: they needed video evidence. "To see them the way you two do," Izzy had said back at Buzz Blast.
So now they were back at their apartment, watching a video Shelby had sent over on Fern's tablet. It was of the Dino Charge team trying to decorate their museum for Christmas, with all the chaos and silliness that such a task would entail. Chase was easy to spot – he was built, he had a backwards baseball cap, and when Riley asked him to help him with the lights he really did throw up finger guns. It wasn't long before the two of them were tangled up together and falling over to the floor, eliciting laughter from everyone around them. With such close proximity, Izzy could spot Riley with the same kind of blush she'd seen on anyone with a crush. And Fern could see Chase almost settle in around Riley as their friends tried to untangle them – clearly the physical contact wasn't an issue for him, even if it was platonic.
The video cut ahead to another moment, with the team exchanging gifts. Despite it being a seemingly-random secret Santa, Chase and Riley had wound up with each other's names (Shelby did mention in her message alongside the video that this was another scheme, albeit a lot more subtle). Chase opened his first, revealing a book. "Show us!" Shelby called out. Chase smiled and complied – it was a cookbook, with a TikTokkr Izzy recognized from their own dimension (wild). "Baking Across America! Aww, Riley, I've been looking for this everywhere. I thought it sold out!"
"I'm pretty sure I found the last copy," Riley said sheepishly.
"Oh, he's down bad," Izzy commented.
Then things went over to Riley's gift, which was long and awkwardly shaped. "Well it's definitely not what I think it is," Riley said with a smirk before starting to unwrap it. He got about halfway through before he stopped and looked at Chase. "Is this what I think is?" he asked quietly.
"I mean it's a replica, not the actual prop but uh...yeah," Chase said with a soft smile.
"What is it?" Tyler asked in the video.
Riley open up the box and pulled out a really fancy looking metal sword. "Andúril, Flame of the West!" he declared with a massive smile on his face.
"It's from Lord of the Rings," Fern commented.
"That's what I figured," Izzy replied.
In the video, Riley did a few slow rotations with the sword, getting a feel for it, then did some test swings and slashes in the open air. They could hear the person recording the video tell him to be careful, and a muffled response of "Yes Dr. Morgan!" But Fern and Izzy were focused on Chase's expression. He didn't take his eyes of Riley, smiling proudly, eyes filled with pride, and light, and...
"Okay, we gotta get them together," Izzy admitted.
"Yes!" Izzy cried out.