Of Love and Bunnies
Of Love and Bunnies by Crazy Girl 47, Freyja SilverWillow and, in later chapters, Bryn Spikess is a Power Rangers fanfic. Set shortly after the conclusion of Power Rangers Dino Thunder, when Angel Grove decides to hold another Power Rangers Day. The original Power Rangers decide to have a reunion, Tommy accompanied by the Dino Rangers. Hilarity Ensues.
Described by the author as a cleverly disguised crackfic, this fic was begun in January of 2005 and as of March of 2012 it has 119 chapters and remains ongoing. Features all manner of insane (but hilarious) hijinks, ridiculous (but hysterical) flashbacks, and the bizarre (but awesome) repercussions of Tommy and Kim's UST. While initially focused primarily on the original Mighty Morphin' Rangers and the Dino Rangers, there are increasingly frequent appearances and references to to other rangers as well.
- Accidental Kidnapping: When Carter (yes, the super-serious Lightspeed Rescue Red Ranger) gets drunk, he starts kidnapping people, including Ethan.
- Arc Welding: Though this story primarily focuses on the first MMPR gang and the Dino Thunder one, soon, every group in between comes in as well as mentions of SPD, Operation Overdrive, and Mystic Force.
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking
...the Rangers could care less if the Putties ran off and terrorized the elderly, kidnapped the citizens of Angel Grove, or opened a lemonade stand.
- Badass Normal / Badass Bystander / Heroic Bystander: The citizens of Reefside, who are able to hold off a horde of Tyrannodrones and Triptoids until Rangers arrive to deal with them.
- Ballroom Blitz: The already somewhat wild "Ranger Kegger" (attended by almost every Ranger on the planet) gets even wilder when space pirates attack.
- Battle Butler: Among the Reefsiders fighting off the mook hordes is Anton Mercer's elderly butler.
- Berserk Button: Whenever Zack laughs, Tommy tries to kill him. This is because it induces a PTSD flashback of the "Rangers Parade" fiasco, in which Tommy was literally mobbed by so many women that his uniform was covered in lipstick and half of it was ripped away.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Trini, like many Yellow Rangers (and Yellow Ranger-types like Hayley), is the most caring and maternal member of the team. But when she's pissed, her fury is incandescent.
Tommy: She can drag anything out of anyone! Always the person you go to when you need someone to listen! Always the person who knows what to say! Always the person who could get a murder confession out of an innocent nun!.
- Blood-Splattered Wedding Dress: After a trip to Wal* Mart goes horribly, horribly wrong, Kira ends up spending the night in a holding cell with two other women, one of whom is wearing one of these.
- Brotherhood of Funny Hats: The Reefside-set sidestory gives us Doctor Oliver's Royally Kissable Stalkers (D.O.R.K.S.), a collection of high school girls with crushes on Tommy.
- Brain Bleach: The Dino Rangers initially found themselves reaching for it a lot at the idea of their science teacher having a sex life. But they get used to it eventually.
- Later, Kira gets it really bad after having a romantic dream about Conner.
- And the original Rangers need some serious Brain Bleaching when they realize Bulk has a girlfriend. A hot girlfriend. Who is pregnant with Bulk's child.
- Butt Monkey: Conner. This is completely in line with his canon portrayal, though.
- Call Forward: The "buttery toast" catchphrase of SPD's Bridge is first uttered by Zack after seeing Trini's souped-up hair dryer, which is capable of making toast.
- Cassandra Truth: Sort of. Kat Manx is mostly resigned to the interstellar community not listening to her and Doggie about how dangerous Gruumm is.
- Chainsaw Good:
Jason: I love my wife. And she needs her chainsaw.
- City of Adventure: Related to the Weirdness Magnet entry, Angel Grove and Reefside have become used to the antics of the Power Rangers.
- Clueless Chick Magnet: Kimberly and Trini speculate, amid wailing laughter, that Tommy is this when they find out that he has a fanclub of lovestruck teenage girls.
- Complaining About Rescues They Don't Like: Tommy at full stop while trapped with Kimberly in Jason and Trini's Secret Chamber.
Zack: Jeez, you'd think he'd never been kidnapped before.
- Contest Winner Cameo: Not exactly a contest, but two people who wrote in to the author at various points during the story to give significant input ended up getting cameos starting at chapter 60 as Stone Canyon police officers pulled into the wackiness by force.
- Contrived Coincidence: The explanation for the Letter. As the author admits.
- As is Tommy meeting Anna on the Ferris wheel all those years later. These are almost always lampshaded, though.
- For some reason, Andrew Hartford lives next to Tanya. The author's explanation: "Hey, people move."
- Cosplay: For some reason, several Power Ranger Day attendees are dressed up as DC superheroes, Sailor Scouts, Street Fighters, or Power Ranger villains. And of course as Power Rangers. Can't forget that.
- Covered in Kisses: In one flashback, Tommy being thrown into a horde of fangirls results in this. Trauma ensues.
- Cranky Neighbor: Sort of. Tanya's neighbor Andrew Hartford (who will one day be Operation Overdrive's mentor) is quite fond of her. His butler Spenser on the other hand...though you can't blame him with all the property damage.
- Culture Clash: Kat Manx is utterly baffled by the human practice of friendly sparring matches. On her home world, they train in hand-to-hand combat by fighting enemy prisoners of war to the death.
- We're told that at Jason and Trini's wedding, one of the Alien Rangers attacked a bartender; since the Aquitians don't have alcoholic beverages, he assumed the guy was trying to poison him.
- Deconstruction: It's fairly well hidden by the humor, but pretty much everybody in the fic is in varying stages of working through the massive psychological issues resulting from either being a Power Ranger or living under constant threat of monster attacks.
- Deus Ex Machina: Not exactly, but Tommy seems to see Hayley as his one true solution to all his personal problems, much to her ever-increasing annoyance.
Tommy: But… but… but you're Hayley!
Hayley: I have my limits, you know.
- Did Not Do the Research: During Zeo, Billy revealed his secrets to his family the first time he went to Aquitar (to deal with the Hydro-Contaminators). In this fic his father is unaware.
- Actually, all that was ever stated during Zeo was that Billy's parents gave him permission to go to Aquitar; there was no mention of what Ranger secrets he divulged, if any.
- Embarrassing Nickname : Back when they were dating, Kim decided to call Tommy "Cinnamon Buns" to see how he'd react.
- Erotic Eating: Kim does this with French Fries to screw with Tommy's head. While he's driving. It goes as well as you'd expect.
- Escalating War: What Tommy's re-courtship of Kim turns into.
- Everyone Can See It: And by god, they're going to help them back, no matter how much the couple in question protest to it.
- Everything's Better with Monkeys: Bulk and Skull steal a monkey from the zoo, claiming that they could sense that it wasn't happy seeing how they themselves were monkeys once.
- Flanderization: Every character is Flanderized to some extent for purposes of humor.
- Flash Back: Happen with great frequency, and are often hilarious.
- For Halloween I Am Going as Myself: Rocky attends Power Rangers Day in a store-bought Red Ranger costume and his real Red Ranger costume's helmet.
- Glowing Eyes of Doom: When Tommy's eyes flash green...oh boy, he's either very pissed or he simply wants something very badly and nothing will stop him. Or both. Whatever way, run.
- Grievous Harm with a Body: In order to get away from everyone else, Kim hurls Hayley into the others.
- Happily Married: Jason and Trini. Billy and Cestria would be, if Aquitians had marriages.
- Hero Worshipper: Later Rangers tend to do this to the earlier ones, at least at first, especially the Reds.
- Marah and Kapri do this to those Rangers who used to be evil. Particularly Kat.
- Hilarity Ensues: The main characters can't go to a Wal-Mart, the mall or even a freaking carnival without mayhem breaking out. It's usually Zack, Conner or Tommy who starts it.
- Idiosyncratic Episode Naming: Each chapter title is the name of an episode featuring the original rangers or the Dino Rangers.
- Idol Singer: Tanya is now a pop star. Kira is a HUGE fan.
- I Need to Iron My Dog: Kim panics when she sees Tommy in his old White Ranger suit.
Kim: (immediately after fleeing the room) We've got to get me out of here! Quick, Trini, tell everyone I'm dead!
Trini:Three years as a superhero making excuses for strange behavior, and that's all you've got? Tell them that you're dead?
- Intoxication Ensues: Aquitian water, beer and interrupted REM sleep do not mix. Tommy ends of posing as a suicidal ninja stripper, Rocky starts singing deranged versions of "I'm a little tea pot" every five minutes, Adam dreams of belly-dancing mastodons...
- Intrepid Reporter: The original character Carrie was a lowly sportswriter, who after an encounter with Jason led to her being promoted to proper reporter, eventually deduced the Ranger's identities, which she has kept under wraps.
- Ironic Echo: When Tommy starts forcibly searching her pockets and Kira wonders what she did to deserve this, she steadfastly refuses to acknowledge that none of this would have happened had she not searched his pockets and stolen his phone.
- It's a Long Story: When Jason asks why Time Force's first tier team is B-squad and their second-tier team is called C-Squad, he recives this response. Doubles as a mythology gag for SPD.
- It's also the catchphase for most of the Rangers.
- It's a Small World After All: Turns out that Tanya and Adam's next-door neighbor is Andrew Hartford, and that he's an old friend of Anton Mercer's.
- The night manager of the Angel Grove Inn is friend's with Secret Keeper Carrie the Reporter.
- Now it's more like a small universe. Turns out Kapri and Marah are Divatox's nieces.
- It Seemed Like a Good Idea At the Time: Sure, Billy, a little psychiatric evaluation and therapy will be good for you. I mean, it's not like the local media will get the idea that the Red Ranger is a mental patient and run with it, ultimately fingering you in a big "Who is the Red Ranger?" story.
- Sure, Conner, locking up Tommy and Kim together in Trini's lab will do wonders for their relationship!
- The entire sequence with Bulk, Skull and Conner trying to return Farky the chimp to the zoo is an epic string of these.
- Kavorka Man: Sort of. Zack and Rocky are both very good-looking, but they're such total goofballs that their success with women is baffling.
- Conner seems to be on his way to becoming a junior version of this, if his flirting with Kat is any indication.
- Kid From the Future: Sort of. Time Force's Yellow Ranger is a descended from Ethan.
- Keep-Away: Conner, Ethan, and Kira play this with Tommy's phone while talking to Jason and ultimately force their enraged teacher into bringing them along to Angel Grove.
- Late to the Punchline: After finding Conner and Kat flirting, it takes Rocky the whole rest of the chapter to realize why Jason and Adam are rolling on the ground laughing.
- In chapter 46 Conner is about ten seconds behind the rest of the rangers during Kim's double entendres.
- Meanwhile Back At The: While most of the action is going on in Angel Grove, there are repeated shifts to Reefside, where an increasingly unhinged Angel Grove Police Officer attempts to prove that Tommy's a Ranger, Bulk and Skull (who came along with him) annoy Hayley and ruin Hayley's business by accusing random customers of being Rangers, and various characters get stranded in Mesogog's decaying lab, ultimately resulting in a horde of Mooks swarming the city.
- Meanwhile Scene: In the latter half of the story, we have frequent cuts to other Ranger teams getting in an array of situations, mostly relating to heading for the "Ranger Kegger", Tanya and Adam are hosting.
- Memetic Badass: In-universe, all galactic villains know of one Katherine Mary Hillard of Earth, who singlehandedly defeated the first Pink Ranger, seduced the White Ranger to her bed, and infiltrated Zordon's inner-circle. There are still some debates over whether she really underwent a Heel Face Turn or is still a mole, but at least reformed villainesses look up to her in awe.
- Misery Poker: The Dino Rangers have a quick game of it after a particularly random night. Kira wins easily, by virtue of seeing Tommy in nothing but boxers.
- Mistaken for Gay: When Adam and Tanya inform their maid that, when decorating for the Ranger Kegger, she should think "rainbows", she starts hanging Gay Pride banners.
- Apparently, back in the day, there was a period when half of Angel Grove High believed that Jason and Zack were a gay couple. Zack thought that was hilarious. Jason did not. This goes as far as the football team accusing Trini of being The Beard for Jason.
- Mugging the Monster: Things only go as well as expected for the guy who tried to steal a former Power Ranger's purse in front of her over-protective former Power Ranger ex-boyfriend.
- Mundane Solution: When Tommy and Kimberly are trapped in an impenetrable room with the only key being fed to the dog, the Rangers consider every option except the mundane solution of making the dog vomit.
- Mundane Utility: Justin's car breaks down on the way to the Ranger Kegger, so he summons Storm Blaster.
- My Sister Is Off-Limits: Played with. Tommy acts this way about Hayley, even though they're not related.
- No Bisexuals: Actually, nobody queer whatsoever. Which wouldn't stand out so much if it weren't for the fact that the authors are taking every opportunity to pair off as many of the 50+ rangers and rangers-to-be they've had show up in the story as possible, and not a single one has exhibited the slightest interest of anyone who isn't of the opposite sex.
- There's the off chance that Cassie is bi when drunk; Tommy lists off "Cassie's on her third margarita" among the people who could have been, but weren't, having sex with Hayley at the party, but that may have been more more ruling out Lucas than implicating Cassie.
- Noodle Implements: We never quite find out what Kim's revenge prank before the "suicidal ninja stripper" incident was going to be, but it involved somehow reenacting Tommy's hair accident using a woman's razor and some marinara sauce.
- Noodle Incident: Averted. Any past events referenced occurred on one of the shows, will be explained in detail, shown in flashback, or some combination thereof.
- In a strange case of a Noodle Incident within an averted Noodle Incident, we never do find out why Goldar needed that copier...
- A guess can be made though; he complained that it only printed paper with what he wanted copied on it (the 'medallion'), so he most likely wanted to duplicate another genric McGuffin (god knows the original series had a ton of them)
- The attempts to return Farky to the zoo are only relayed in hindsight, but they seem to be The Hangover-level of craziness.
- In a strange case of a Noodle Incident within an averted Noodle Incident, we never do find out why Goldar needed that copier...
- Not What It Looks Like: Happens frequently.
- Kim wearing Tommy's shirt (she forced him to give it to her)
- The entire Ranger Kegger is a string of these moments.
- Ethan and Katie sneaking off to discuss his having children (she just told him she's his descendant)
- Conner and Tommy find Andros (who's married to Ashley) in the same room with a naked Hayley. Everyone is horrified except Tommy, who actually logically figures out what really happened, much to Andros's relief. Hayley really was having sex with someone, though.
- Alyssa in the bathroom with Trent (Trent was showering, she wasn't, and they were both trying to get the smell of alcohol off of him)
- Of course, sometimes it is what it looks like, such as when Tommy and Zack get caught spying on Kim and Trini.
- One Steve Limit: Averted. One chapter begins from the perspective of Kat Hillard, the second Pink Ranger, and then switches to the perspective of Kat Manx, who will be SPD's tech person. An OC named "Taylor" shares a name with a Ranger who later appears, and two OCs are named "Carmen." It's worth noting that instead of "Ziktor" (which was never mentioned in the show), Hayley's last name is Tate, the same as the future SPD Blue Ranger.
- It's either this or a running gag, but every restaurant seems to be named Diana's or Dinah's.
- Only Sane Man: Trent, most of the time. Except for the hamster identity crisis.
- Kira, Ethan, Adam and Billy also have their moments.
- Justin turns out to be this as well.
- In Ch. 110, Hayley declares that she, unlike everyone else, is not a whack job.
- Ordinary High School Student: Surprisingly deconstructed. Their time as superheroes in high school led to the Power Rangers--both past and current--being fairly screwed up.
- Outrun the Fireball: Subverted after the above mentioned Ballroom Blitz; when Kat Manx notes that the Troobian ship will likely self-destruct, the Rangers run for cover...only to find the ship harmlessly fall apart.
- Paparazzi: Jason has a deep loathing of the journalistic profession, due to the media's relentless pursuit of the the Red Ranger's identity after the "Ranger Parade". The one exception is Carrie the then-Sportswriter, who wrote a series of editorials that shamed her colleagues into stopping. For awhile, anyways...
- Poor Communication Kills: Ties in with Contrived Coincidence. If he whole gang hadn't been so keen on avoiding discussing the breakup directly, they would've found out about the fake letter years ago, and saved lots of drama.
- Real Life Writes the Plot: A few incidents in-story were based on the hijinks that actually happened to the author.
- Retroactive Wish: The team tries to invoke this after Conner goes missing from the mall, since Ethan pulled it off on PRDT. He tries... and a Red Dino Thunder Ranger action figure plops down into the broken mall fountain. They're all amazed, until a toddler on the next level up cries out that he dropped his toy.
- Reunion Kiss: After Jen informs Wes that she and the rest of her team will be staying in the present for the foreseeable future, they engage in a passionate liplock.
- Rookie Red Ranger: When Time Force shows up, they are accompanied by Marcus, an OC, who was assigned to them as a replacement Red Ranger. He's very green. Which doesn't stop Hayley from having sex with him.
- Room Full of Crazy: While exploring Mesogog's lab, Devin and Cassidy (and later Anton and Elsa) discover that Zeltrax's personal quarters has both a shrine to Elsa, and a wall of defaced photos of Tommy.
- Running Gag: Tommy as the "Orange Ranger" when he gets old. Zack (and Conner) eating Play-Doh. Objects falling down the shirts of female Rangers. The media mistakenly identifying Rangers as other Rangers.
"You're not helping."
- In the more recent chapters, "moving as nonchalantly in the same direction" (essentially, following/stalking).
- Scary Black Man: In his initial cameo, T.J. (Red Turbo Ranger/Blue Space Ranger) plays this trope to the hilt in order to make certain a purse-snatcher doesn't ruin a Secret Identity preserving cover story.
- Screw the Rules, I Have Connections: Conner uses his Ranger status to get his twin Eric re-instated at the Wind Ninja Academy.
- The Rangers use offers of backstage passes to Tanya's concerts to bribe their way out of more than one jam. This backfires when they try to bribe the same woman twice with tickets to the same concert...
- Secret Keeper: Over the story, several characters (including Ernie, Billy's Dad, and several original characters) are told, figure out, or are revealed to have previously figured out or been told, the identities of various different Rangers.
- When the Rangers realize that other people know, they freak out. This is apparently common to all Rangers; Carlos refers to it as the "twenty-minute panic attack".
- She Is Not My Girlfriend: Tommy and Kim frequently do this.
- Subverted when a dream-interpreting fortuneteller assumes Adam is Kira's boyfriend (mostly because Kira was sitting on Adam's lap at the time). Since they aren't even remotely a couple (dating other people, vast age difference, barely know each other), they're rather confused by the assumption.
- Shipper on Deck: Seems like everyone ships Tommy/Kim.
- Hayley finally joins the bandwagon once she realizes that them being together may lead to her only chance at some semblance of honest-to-goodness sanity.
- Shout-Out: The title is a reference to The Prank War, a Harry Potter fic by the same author which is itself essentially a proto-OLaB.
- Zack wishing that Rita and Zedd got trapped in a snowglobe is a Shout-Out to the first movie.
- Shotgun Wedding: After Andros realizes Zhane and Karone have been getting it on, he starts chasing Zhane around demanding that they marry.
- Slap Slap Kiss: Tommy attempts to invoke this after deciding to get Kim back. It doesn't quite work.
- Squee: Conner does this a lot about hanging out with Jason. Surprisingly, Kira of all people does some serious squeeing when she realizes that the Tanya the older Rangers keep talking about is world-famous pop star/philanthropist and personal hero Tanya Sloan. Also Shane and Hunter do this when they meet Jason as does Dustin when he meets three of the past yellow rangers.
- Stable Time Loop: Late in the story, the Time Force Rangers return from the future to recruit people for the Earth branch of SPD, which will evolve into Time Force.
- Stalker Shrine: D.O.R.K.S. is busily building one to Tommy.
- As mentioned above in Room Full of Crazy, Zeltrax's personal quarters had one of these designed for Elsa and was even compared in the narration to the one built by Helga Pataki.
- Stalking Is Love: Yes, kidnapping Kim is a perfectly normal and healthy way to rekindle a relationship, to say nothing of a smitten Hunter literally stalking after Vida after she expresses an extreme desire to have nothing to do with him.
- Whoever said the Rangers were normal and healthy?
- Strange Minds Think Alike: Zack, Rocky and Conner's minds all synch up when they're in proximity of each other. This can only lead to trouble.
- Stripper Cop Confusion: This is what starts the chain leading to the "suicidal ninja stripper". Not only is a stripper mistaken for a real cop, but the White Ninja Ranger is mistaken for a stripper.
- Taking a Third Option: Averted, they don't even act like it is a possibility to make Tommy the dog throw up.
- Tempting Fate: A series of events forces Adam to dress up as a monster to be defeated by the Rangers. He thinks it will go smoothly. Judging by the past 119 chapters, he is mistaken.
- Ten Minutes in the Closet: Conner locks Tommy and Kim into Trini's lab hoping that this will force them to make up. It only worked for a couple minutes...then things got worse. To top it off, nobody can get the door open.
- The Chessmaster: Trini is a master manipulator; fortunately, she uses her talents for good.
- The Glomp: Rocky enters the story by giving hugs that bear an astonishing resemblance to flying tackles to Billy, Trini, Kim, and Kira...despite never having met Kira before.
Rocky: Random girl! (glomp) (beat) Hang on, I don't know you, do I?
- The Missus and the Ex: This pops up at times with Hayley as the former and Kim as the latter, although Hayley and Tommy's relationship is purely platonic. The other Rangers constantly worry about this popping up with Kat and Kim (essentially the Second-Ex and First-Ex).
- Those Two Guys: Rocky and Adam. Like many things in this story, it's very in-line with canon.
- Title Drop: Tommy bitterly mentions that life isn't all "love and bunnies" when Jason urges him to get back with Kim.
- Too Dumb to Live: Conner. You can probably make a drinking game out of how many times a Ranger glares at him for saying something really, really stupid.
- Rocky gets like this now and then.
- Translator Buddy: Naturally Trini is this towards Billy, Ethan takes this part as well. Also in one funny instance in Chapter 58 Billy translates for Trini.
- Traumatic Haircut: In one flashback, we learn that Tommy's hair once got set on fire when he was in college. Said fire was doused with marinara sauce and a vast excess of fire extinguisher foam. He then proceeded to have a nervous breakdown.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Jason, Zack and Trini waiting to speak with the mayor...while wearing their MMPR uniforms.
- UST: Getting Tommy and Kim to resolve theirs is a significant part of the plot.
- Victoria's Secret Compartment: Kira decides her bra is the safest place for her hotel key card to be in when Tommy goes berserk trying to get to Kim. Good thing too, cause it really is the only safe place to keep the key; after finding that the key wasn't in any of her pockets, Tommy goes for her socks.
- Leading to Kira's classic line, "How much do you like your job, teacher man?"
- After the Chinese takeout employees escape from Mesogog's lab, they rid themselves of the weapons they grabbed for protection. The female employee pulls out knives from her bra.
- Weirdness Censor: Power Rangers have existed for well over a decade in this 'verse, and Wes, Eric, and Taylor get arrested by the one guy who puts Rangers in the same category as the Easter Bunny. The three are understandably dumbfounded.
- Weirdness Magnet: Lampshaded. Repeatedly. If you are, were, or will be a Ranger, weird stuff will happen to you.
- The whole town of Angel Grove has this to the point that the locals are almost blase about it.
- Reefside is starting to turn into this as well thanks to the Dino Rangers.
- Where It All Began: A fantastic flashback explains just how five disparate teens became best friends. In kindergarten.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Conner completely freaks out when he realizes that the lady sitting next to him on a mall bench is a mime.
- Also, Trini has a thing about clowns.
- Which can be seen as fridge brilliance since her cousin was kidnapped by a Monster Clown.
- Also, Trini has a thing about clowns.
- We Named the Monkey "Jack": Jason and Trini's dog is named Tommy.
- Zany Scheme: Many of them.