Marriage Finder

By: Harlequinranger

Summery: Fun and games at lunch time with a certain paper game of Kelsey’s, leading to a few revelations in the love lives of the three girls of LSR.

A/N: Rated Universal, suitable for everyone. I’m good like that. J . Anyway, this isn’t totally centred around Dana and Carter, although a good chunk of it is, just to warn you. The pairings are as follows: Dana/Carter, Joel/Miss Fairweather, Kelsey/Chad.
Disclaimer: Dana, Miss Fairweather, Kelsey and all others mentioned in this fic ain’t my property (although boy I wish I owned Carter…J ). They belong to this weird guy called Saban and this other weird company thing called Disney… Heard of them?

Features: Dana, Miss Fairweather and Kelsey, with a breif appearance from Carter, and mentions of Joel, Chad and Ryan.

(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*

Dana looked on curiously as she sat down opposite Kelsey at lunch in the mess hall that afternoon, with her tray. Kelsey was hunched over something in her lap, apparently writing something down with a pen.

"What are you doing, Kels?" She asked, picking up her sandwich.

Kelsey picked up what she was writing on and gave a triumphant grin. "Marriage finder!"

Dana realised, with a sinking feeling, that it was one of those little paper games that school kids were forever folding, where you were asked endless questions until you got to an eventual answer as to what kind of person you were/what type of animal you would be/which type of chocolate you had bean in a previous life/who you were going to marry, etc.

"Took me ages." Kelsey smiled with an air of mischief, her eyes glittering.

Here Miss Fairweather arrived, also carrying a sandwich. "What are you two doing?" She asked, innocently.

"Want a go on my marriage finder?" Kelsey waved it at her looking hopeful. "It’s fully guaranteed and fault proof."
"And you know this because…?" Dana asked, moving her hand in a forward motion.

"Oh come on…" Kelsey wheedled, "One go, please?"

"No!" Dana folded her arms. Kelsey turned to Miss Fairweather.

"What’s you’re favourite colour?" She asked.

Miss Fairweather raised her eyebrows. Kelsey looked pleadingly at her. With a resigned sighed, Miss Fairweather replied: "Blue."

"Alright!" Kelsey began counting as she flicked through the game, her nimble fingers making light work of the job. "Intelligent or good looking?"
"Ooh…" Miss Fairweather smiled and considered. "Good looking."

"Okay." Kelsey again started flicking.

"Why good looking?" Dana was curious.

"I’d rather not have a man any more intelligent than me." Miss Fairweather smiled. "Besides, if you don’t get on with him, at least he’s nice to look at."
Dana shrugged. "True."

"Right, your star sign, please." Kelsey said.

Miss Fairweather thought about it for a second, before deciding: "Gemini."

"Here we go…" Kelsey smiled and lifted a flap. "Now that is interesting."

"Who?" Dana and Miss Fairweather both leaned forward.

"A certain sky riding cowboy…" Kelsey gave her a mischievous grin.

Miss fairweather choked on her water as Dana collapsed into laughter.

"Joel?" Miss Fairweather groaned. "You can’t be serious!"

"Why not?" Kelsey asked, "he’s not that bad."
"Are we still talking about the same guy here?" Miss Fairweather arched an eyebrow.

"You have to admire his persistence." Dana pointed out, recovering from her fit of giggles enough to speak.

"Okay, so I’m marrying fly boy," Miss Fairweather said, flatly, "It’s Dana’s turn now."

Kelsey turned to Dana, eagerly. "Favourite colour?"
"Pink." Dana answered instantly.

"That’s original." Noted Miss Fairweather, with a sarcastic smile.

"P-I-N-K," Kelsey spelled out, giving her paper marriage finder a flick of the fingers for each letter, "Okay, Intelligent or good looking?"

"Um…" Dana thought about this for several seconds. "I’ll go for intelligent."
"Out of curiosity, why?" Miss Fairweather asked.

"I like a man I can argue with." Dana smiled. "If he’s good looking but just too stupid to have a good conversation with, what’s the point?"
Miss Fairweather shrugged and smiled back. "Depends how much money they’ve got."

Dana started laughing as Kelsey asked: "What’s your favourite word?"
"My favourite word?" Dana was incredulous. "What’s that got to do with anything?"

"Just tell us your favourite word." Kelsey said, patiently.

"Antidisestablishmentarriasm." Dana grinned, just to be difficult. Kelsey gave her an exasperated look as Miss Fairweather giggled.

"How do you spell that?" She asked.

"A-N-T-I-" Dana began, but Kelsey cut her off.

"Alright!" She waved her hand at her, "I’ll spell it myself." And she started flicking away, tolerantly.

"So," Dana, realising they could be there for some time, turned back to Miss Fairweather, "what exactly don’t you like about Joel? Would he make a bad son in law?"

"Oh please don’t start." Miss Fairweather groaned. "I am never going to marry that man!"

"What would be so bad about it?" Dana persisted. "He’s quite nice and knows how to make you laugh, I’ve seen you flirting so don’t say you don’t!"
"And flirting means I’m going to marry him?" Miss Fairweather asked, sarcastically.

"You never know." Dana smiled sagely. "He’d be nice, I bet he’d make a good date. He’s polite, he opens doors, he carry’s things, he buys flowers. He’d be just about every girls dream come true!"

"Well why don’t you marry him?!" Miss Fairweather cried.

"Because," Kelsey smiled over the top of her marriage finder, "According to this, she’s destined for someone else."

"Who?" Dana asked, looking up.

"Take a wild guess." Kelsey replied, whilst exchanging a glance with Miss Fairweather.

"Carter." Miss Fairweather said, confidently.

It was Dana’s turn to choke. "What?!"
"Ding, ding, ding!" Kelsey clanged an imaginary bell by her head. "Cooooorrect answer!"

Dana began to cough loudly to hide her embarrassment. Miss Fairweather smiled.

"I’m surprised we even needed this thing to work that one out." Kelsey said, waving the marriage finder.

"Meaning what?" Dana felt herself growing hot.

"Oh come on," Miss Fairweather laughed, "Dana you two were made for each other!"

"What?!" Dana wasn’t sure whether to laugh or cry. Carter? Made for her? Yeah right. Like that would happen. The guy didn’t know she was alive.

"Besides," Kelsey put down her game to give Dana an ‘I-know-what-you’re-think-and-you’re-wrong’, look, "Carter likes you."

"He does not!" Dana knew she sounded like a five year old but couldn’t think of anything more articulated.

"Dana, honey, wake up and smell the zinc oxide." Miss Fairweather sighed. "In that briefing yesterday, if Carter had been gazing at you any harder he would have started drooling."

"And I know you like him," Kelsey added, delighted by the mental image of Carter drooling during yesterday’s briefing.

"But I don’t!" Another comment that sounded like something a five year old would say, but what else could Dana have cried at that moment in time. Her crush on Carter was the most carefully guarded secret in her life, and suddenly it appeared her best friends had known about it since day one?

"Dana duck." Miss Fairweather ordered, calmly.

"What?" Dana snapped out of her thoughts.

"You’re blushing the colour of you’re power ranger suit and Carter’s coming this way." Miss Fairweather replied.

"Oh god!" Dana put both hands to her cheeks, realised Miss Fairweather was right, saw Carter approaching from the other side of the room, and dived beneath the table.

Carter arrived at the girls table. "Hi Kelsey, Hi Miss F, have you seen Dana?"

"As a matter of fact she’s un-" Kelsey was cut off by a elbow in the ribs from Miss Fairweather, who finished for her.

"We haven’t seen her."

"Oh." Carter raised his eyebrows as Kelsey rubbed her bruised ribs with a hurt look on her face. Then he saw the paper toy in Kelsey’s hand. "What’s that?"
"Marriage finder." Kelsey replied, still rubbing her ribs. "Apparently Miss Fairweather’s going to marry Joel and Dana’s gonna marry- OW!"

She was silenced this time by a kick from Dana, still hidden beneath the table.
"Okay…" Carter was by now thoroughly bemused. "Right. So, if you see Dana tell her I was looking for her. I’d better go. I’m supposed to be training."
"Sure thing, Carter." Kelsey nodded, this time nursing her ankle.

Miss Fairweather, barely able to contain her laughter, managed to nod. The minuet Carter was out of earshot, she collapsed in to helpless spasms of mirth, as Dana reappeared, also beginning to laugh.

"You didn’t have to kick me that hard." Kelsey grumbled.

"You wont tell him, will you?" Dana asked, suddenly worried.

"Well…" Kelsey seemed to consider.

"Kelsey you can’t!" Dana grabbed her friend’s shoulders in panic, "I would die! Please don’t!"

"Ah, so you admit you have a crush on the guy." Kelsey smiled.

"I never said that." Dana returned, starting to blush again. "It’s just… Oh Kelsey please don’t!"

Kelsey sighed. "I wont. But only if you admit you like the guy."

"I…" Dana looked to Miss Fairweather for help. The scientist only looked back at her coolly. "Well I guess… I sort of…"
"Uh-hu…?" Kelsey leaned closer and made an encouraging movement with her hand.

"It’s I… he… I…" Dana stammered, unsure of how to put it.

"Spit it out!" Kelsey cried, loosing patience.

"Alright!" Dana threw her hands into the air and gave up, "Alright! I’ve had the worlds biggest crush on the guy since the day I met him, okay?! Is that what you wanted to hear?!"
"Just so long as we finally got it out of you." Kelsey gave a satisfied smile.

"Oooh." Dana lay her head down on the table and groaned.

Miss Fairweather lifted her glass’s off her forehead. "So why put yourself through all the misery, Dana?" She asked, "Can’t you tell him? Ask him out?"
"Tell him?" Dana looked like she had just bean given the choice between hanging and the guillotine. "I can’t! I really can’t! I mean, what if it doesn’t work? Carter’s one of by best friends, I don’t want to ruin that. It could break up the team, I could loose him, and I don’t think I could take it if he rejected me."

"So what you’re really saying is… you’re scared." Miss Fairweather said, spreading her hands diplomatically.

"No!" Dana cried.

"Then why don’t you want to tell him?" Kelsey asked.

"Because…" Dana found herself at a loss for excuses. "Alright, I admit it, I’m terrified. But what am I suppose to do? I don’t want to upset the team, not at a time like this. And really, seriously, would Carter ever like me?"

"I told you," Miss Fairweather said, "The guy was practically drooling yesterday."

"He thinks you’re the best thing since sliced bread." Kelsey added, putting it another way.

"Sliced bread." Dana repeated, flatly.

"Okay, since…" Kelsey scratched her head, searching for something appropriate to compare Dana to. "Television!"
Dana groaned. Miss Fairweather giggled. Kelsey gave a helpless shrug. Taking the opportunity for distraction, Dana grabbed the marriage finder. "Your turn!"

Kelsey looked aghast. "No way!"
"Oh, no, you’re not getting out of this." Dana narrowed her eyes with mock menace. "You put us through it, now you have to go through it too."
"Come on, Kelsey," Miss Fairweather grabbed the yellow rangers arm to prevent her from making a swift exit, "get it over with quickly, and we can continue teasing Dana about Carter."

Kelsey raised her eyebrows in thought, then nodded. "I can do that."

Dana sighed. She wasn’t going to get out of this Carter thing very easily. But she could hope this might lead to a distraction long enough for them to forget about it. "Favourite colour."

"Guess." Kelsey said, folding her arms.

"Y-E-L-L-O-W." Dana spelled out. It didn’t take a genius to work that one out. "Intelligent or good looking?"

Kelsey grinned. "Intelligent, definitely."

"Why?" Miss Fairweather asked, curiously.

Kelsey’s grin widened. "He can do all the bills for me!"

Dana laughed, rolling her eyes, and continued flicking the paper toy. "What’s your favourite word?"
Kelsey considered carefully, tapping her lips. "Rhododendron." She decided, eventually, "I was the only person in class at school who could spell it."
"How come?" Dana asked, pausing.

Kelsey shrugged. "It’s quite easy if you work it out. RHO-DOD-EN-DRON. Simple. Plus, there was the small matter of me having a dictionary on my lap at the time."

Miss Fairweather began to laugh again. Dana shook her head.
"Repeat the spelling again."
Kelsey repeated it for her, and Dana arrived at her conclusion. "Ah, now, I might have been able to predict this one, as a matter of deduction."

"Hmmm," Miss Fairweather rubbed the end of her nose in heavily over acted thought, "Ryan or Chad, Ryan or Chad…"
"I’m not marrying Ryan!" Kelsey cried, indignantly. "No offence, Dana."
Dana grinned. "You wont need to, because, according to this, you’re going to marry Chad!"

"Yes!" Kelsey punched the air.

Dana and Miss Fairweather exchanged a glance. Kelsey looked at them. "What? It could be far worse!"

"Are you saying that marrying Carter-"

"Or Joel-"

"Would be a bad thing?" Dana and Miss Fairweather rose up to defend their assigned future husbands.

"No!" Kelsey laughed. "Just… I like Chad better."
"Really…" Dana, like a hunting leopard who had just spotted a defenceless gazelle, began to prowl towards her prey. (Not literally, of course).

Miss Fairweather leaned forward to look Kelsey in the eye. "Just how much do you like Chad more by?"
"A bit…" Kelsey was fiddling with a spare scrap of paper, concentrating on folding it into a smaller and smaller square, obviously getting slightly embarrassed about the subject.

"Ah ha!" Dana pounced in delight. "You have a crush on Chad!"
"I don’t!" It was Kelsey’s turn to sound like a five year old.

"You do!" Dana cried.

"Kelsey and Chad…" Miss Fairweather pondered quietly, over her friend’s cries of triumph, "Chad and Kelsey…" She raised her voice slightly, to gain the attention of her friends, "I think it might work."

"Huh?" Dana, momentarily off balanced by the sudden interruption of her metaphorical victory dance round Kelsey, who had, until now, managed to retain her image as someone who didn’t get crush’s, had a split second of trying to work out what Miss Fairweather was talking about.
"Chad and Kelsey." Miss Fairweather repeated, patiently, "I think it might work."
"Well of course it might work!" Dana cried.

Kelsey stopped, frowning. "You… you really think so?"

"Yes!" Dana nodded.

"Really?" Kelsey asked.

Miss Fairweather nodded, too. "Chad’s quite quiet and shy, but quiet people generally like more talkative one’s because they feel drawn to their confidence."
"And you’re bright and bouncy and so full of life that you bounce off walls within seconds of being told to sit still!" Dana added, "Chad would make the perfect boyfriend for you because he would slow you down a little and act as someone to provide a little guidance to those randomly directed, wild plans of yours!"

"And think about it," Miss Fairweather continued, logically, "You’re always there for him, and he’s always willing for him to be you’re shoulder to cry on, isn’t he?"
"Chad really admires you!" Dana enthused, "He thinks you’re strong and confident and can do anything!"

Kelsey was turning all this over. Until then, she had never really thought that the possibility of a relationship with Chad was more than a mere fantasy on her part. They seemed to have so little in common. Yet, suddenly, as her friends rationalised it for her, she started to see that maybe there was a chance of it working. "Maybe… I guess it could happen."
"The only problem would be to get Chad to work up the confidence to ask you out…" Miss Fairweather said, frowning slightly.

"Why wait for Chad to ask Kelsey out?" Dana asked. "Kelsey could as Chad out!"

"You say that like it would be easy." Kelsey said.

"It might be." Dana pointed out.

Kelsey sighed. "Dana, how easy would you find it to ask Carter out?"
This silenced Dana in an instant, her cheeks turning crimson again. Kelsey smiled in satisfaction, then sobered again. "And what about Marina, anyway?"
"Ah." This pulled them all up short.

"I hate it when this happens." Dana muttered. "You finally find a guy you like and then, bam, a mermaid rises out of the water and steals his heart."

This earned a week giggle from Kelsey. "Yeah. Happens all the time."
"Oh, cheer up!" Miss Fairweather cried. "She’s a mermaid, for goodness sake! She lives at the bottom of the sea. Chad had a puppy dog crush on her. It’s not as if he’s going to spend the wrest of his life hung over on a mermaid!"

Kelsey smiled and nodded. "I guess."
Dana smiled, "But, my friends, all this leaves us with one, vital question."

"What?" Kelsey asked.

Dana smiled, mischievously. "Who’s going to marry Ryan?"