The Mistake: From Five Different Perspectives

By: PernDragonrider

Disclaimer: I do not own Power Rangers that honor goes to BVE (Buena Vista Entertainment), Toei, Saban Enterprises, Disney, and Ranger Productions. No money being made on this work of fiction based on the television series Power Rangers.

Author's Note:The idea for this tale came about when Panache issued a FIVE THINGS challenge. This is my offering for that challenge. I do hope that it meets the challenge. As always, please read and review. Pern.

The Mistake – Billy Cranston's Point of View

I sit here, on an alien world, reflecting on my life. I was never one to make friends easily, but surprisingly I have ten other people that I am closer to than my own blood relatives. Jason, Trini, Zack, Kimberly, Tommy, Adam, Aisha, Rocky, Tanya, and Katherine have been a great influence on the way my life has gone. Books were my friends, my only friends after my mother died, until an accidental meeting with Trini in first grade. Quite to my astonishment, Trini understood me perfectly and became the instrument by which Kimberly, Zack, and Jason accepted me into their close-knit group.

Better friends I could not have every hoped for. Jason, the protector, leader, and big brother to us all. Kimberly, the cheerful, playful, little sister, and heart of our group. Zack, the happy go-lucky clown that always could make us smile and was always ready to try anything we wanted to do. Finally, Trini, the peaceful negotiator and the light of my life. They were my friends, my confidants, and my world. Until the day what seemed to be an earthquake rocked the Youth Center. We found ourselves teleported into this place with a float head and a semi-autonomous android; Zordon of Eltar and his robotic assistant Alpha 5.

We became more than teenagers that day, we were given the power to protect our world in ways most would never believe possible; we became Power Rangers. The five of us didn't want to accept Zordon's offer, at first; however, I suspect that had Zack not called Jason out; he would have stayed. Instead, big brother that he was, he came with us. If we didn't agree then he wouldn't, no matter where his heart truly lay. In the end, we did accept the powers and under went the metamorphosis from normal teenager to Power Ranger. We had the powers, represented by extinct dinosaurs and mammals. Jason, red, the tyrannosaurus; Kimberly, pink, the Pterodactyl; Trini, yellow, the Saber Tooth Tiger; Zack, black, the Mastodon; and me, blue, the Triceratops. Together we became a fighting force for good. We beat Rita Repulsa's monsters time and again. Then she sent down our worst nightmare. The Green Ranger and he wasn't on our side at all, at first. An attack on our Command Center, our headquarters, caused us to lose contact with Zordon. We were all scared kids, but persevered as best we could. Jason was taken away, to further demoralize our team, but we got him back. Eventually we discovered the identity of the person inside of the Green Ranger's armor, Tommy Oliver. A new kid in town that was as capable of a combatant as Jason was. We succeeded in freeing him from Rita's control and welcomed him to our team. Now we were six, six teenagers protecting our city, our world, from the machinations of evil.

As with life, all things must change, and our team changed. Jason, Trini, and Zack were accepted to a prestigious Teen Peace Summit in Switzerland. With their leaving, my life was changed irrevocably. My big brother, my fool, and my confidant were thousands of miles away now. Adam, Aisha, and Rocky, three friends like the five of us were, from childhood, came to replace the three we were losing. Eventually we ALL became friends, but it was a very uneasy time at first for me and I think for Kimberly and Tommy too. Tommy's loss and regaining of the Green Ranger's powers and his eventual complete loss of those powers is what I believe to have been the turning point for Jason in remaining a member of our team. Tommy, before Jason left, became team leader and with a new power, one that couldn't be taken from him by evil, he became the White Ranger. Under his leadership, and with the new members, we forged together and our friendship was forged not of long-time acquaintance, but in nearly daily battle. Still, that friendship remains until this day, I think; no I know it remains. There were many battles and many times we thought we'd not win; but we did. Master Vile was the worst evil we fought. He took the Zeo Crystal and used it against Ninjor and us too. During the time of Tommy's leadership, we had to upgrade our powers to that of the Ninja. No more where the Tyrannosaurus, Mastodon, Pterodactyl, Triceratops, and Saber Tooth Tiger, now there was the Falcon, white, the Crane, pink, the Ape, red, the Frog, green, the Bear, yellow, and the Wolf, me and blue in color; Tommy, Kimberly, Rocky, Adam, Aisha, and me, respectfully.

Rita returned and aligned with Zedd to try and take the people of Earth slaves to their evil. We fought off their combined powers with our Ninja powers that Ninjor bestowed upon us. It was apparent, to me, that Kimberly was restless. When a famous gymnastics coach came to Angel Grove looking for new talent, Kimberly did her routines for him. Eventually, Kimberly went to train with this coach, nearly decimating my world, and Kat came to the team. Katherine Hillard, a one time victim of Rita's evil, like Tommy, now fought against that evil with as much zeal and fire as Tommy did. Thinking back to this time, it was I left without my family and it was no wonder that while I still fought with my new friends; inside I was miserable and missing Jason, Trini, Zack, and Kimberly very much. I hid it from the others, burying it inside of me as I always did before Trini and the others. Tommy was flirting around Kat, but everyone knew Kimberly was still his heart and soul. Kat knew this too and they formed a friendship based on a mutual past of being used by evil.

Master Vile, Rita's father, came to Earth. He used a device and turned back the clock for everyone in Angel Grove only. We were physically ten years old, but with our memories of being teenagers and Power Rangers; unfortunately, our ten year old bodies couldn't handle the powers. Zordon called in the Rangers of Aquitar. Aliens came to our assistance and with our help, even though we were ten, succeeded in keeping Master Vile, Rita, and Zedd's evil attacks at bay and the Earth safe. Near the end of this time I invented a device to return all of us to our rightful ages so we could assist the Aquitain Rangers. I used the untested device on myself first. It was powered by our power coins. I succeeded in returning to my rightful age; however, Rito and Goldar destroyed the device and our power coins at the same time. I was distraught, terrified of what the others would think of me, and relieved at the same time.

I know that is a complete contradiction, you think; but I was upset. I knew the others would find a way to get the powers again, Zordon would see to that. But for me, the relief was there because I had decided that my time as a fighter was over. I knew, within my heart and soul, that there would be NO power for me when Zordon gave out the new powers. I wasn't upset over that, because it was MY time to leave. I was the last of the original team left. I know, you say that Tommy was one of us, but although he was my good friend he wasn't Jason, Trini, Zack, or Kimberly. The relief of that decision stayed with me throughout helping the Aquitain Rangers as well as my ten-year-old teammates. When they went on their separate quests for the parts of the Zeo Crystal, I was the one to help send them back in time to find the scattered pieces of the Zeo Crystal and I was there to greet them when they returned, successfully.

We had a time of great upheaval for me and for our entire team. Goldar and Rito managed to sneak into the lower levels of the Command Center and plant an implosion device. When it activated, it decimated the entire Command Center interior and exterior. Somehow in the wreckage, I saw the Zeo Crystal shine and pointed it out to Tommy. When he picked it up and exposed it to the light – the ground beneath our feet fell away. We fell, but not to our deaths, since I am writing this tale, but into an unknown depth of the Command Center. We heard Alpha's voice and followed it to a swirling green vortex. Crossing the vortex we found ourselves inside a previously unknown back up Command Center. We stood amazed as the power of the fully assembled Zeo Crystal rebuilt the place around us. After the rebuilding, there were changes, and the Command Center was now known as the Power Chamber. The other change was that Tanya Sloan came back in Aisha Campbell's place. The second set of life-long friends had been torn apart by our secret lives as Power Rangers.

When the time came I, gratefully, gave up my place to Tanya. I watched with varied emotions happiness, sadness, envy, and relief were just some of the emotions playing through me that day, as Zordon passed out the Zeo powers to Tommy, Kat, Rocky, Adam, and Tanya. My plan was to concentrate on my last year of high school and then look forward to college.

As they say about plans – well my plans didn't go as I'd envisioned. I became a the technical, behind the scenes, person that made the success of the Zeo Rangers against our new foe, King Mondo and his Evil Machine Empire, successful. Not only that, but within weeks of starting, what was to be my senior year of high school, I was called into the principal's office. I was handed a diploma, congratulated for graduating a year early and then basically kicked out of school. No ceremony, no acknowledgements of my scholastic achievements; nothing but a handshake, an apology for my not being able to participate in the ceremony at the end of the last year, and a request to clean out my locker and return any books I might have that still belonged to the school. At the same time, Aurico came to Earth for help against the Hydrocontaminators that were killing his world. I traveled back to Aquitar with him accompanied by one of my inventions that we successfully used to stop those monsters attacking Aquitar. My trip back from Aquitar, a surprise for my friends, didn't quite go as planned and King Mondo attacked and attempted to take me a prisoner. He succeeded and sent a robotic version of myself down to Earth to hurt my friends. Thankfully, the impersonator was discovered, I was rescued, and back to working with Zordon and Alpha building the next set of Zords that would be needed in the future; the Turbo Zords.

Unknown to Zordon, my teammates, or me something was happening to me, something dire. It started just after I attempted, at the urging of my teammates, to accept the Gold Powers from Trey of Triforia. I was happy for Tommy and for Jason when Tommy bought him back to the Power Chamber and could accept the powers. My happiness was short-lived. I started aging, slowly at first to where I didn't even notice it, until it started accelerating to the point I was dying of old age, at the chronological age of seventeen.

My final days on Earth were filled with the pains of old age, but I still did what was necessary to help my friends. Aurico and Delphine came to Earth, again, and this time I returned to Aquitar with them, not to help this time, but to be helped by the pure, healing waters of the Eternal Falls of their world. During my time on Aquitar, while healing, I decided that returning to Earth while ANY of my teammates; friends were holding the power would not be a good idea. I requested that Cestria, Cestro's mate, stand with me to send a message to Earth. She and Cestro both agreed when I laid out my reasons to them. They weren't happy with my deception, but understood my need to remain away from Earth for a while.

I stood with Cestria and we sent the message to the Power Chamber that I would be remaining on Aquitar, presumably to my friends, as Cestria's mate. Now I am planning a return to Earth. Aquitar cannot support the life of an Earth human for an extended period. It was for my health that I traveled here five Earth years ago. It is for my continued existence that I know return to world I was born on. I can only hope that after I do tell my friends, my family, my reasons for remaining away as long as I have; that they forgive me and accept me back into the fold.

Billy looked up from the paper he was writing. His hand shook slightly, but he smiles as Cestro and Cestria's son came running into the room ahead of his parents. "It's time, William." Cestro told him with a very slight bow. "We will miss you, my friend, but it is your time to leave our world."

"I know, Cestro." Billy replied with a happy smile. "I will never be able to thank you and Cestria enough for letting me remain after I came for treatments. I couldn't go back, not as long as any of my friends held the power. It was my time to leave the team, but they wouldn't have let me leave. The needed to know they could stand on their own; without me around."

"Your friends always knew they could, Billy." Cestria told him with a gentle hand on his shoulder. "Come, Andros has docked to return you to Earth. He has business there so you must hurry. You do have everything packed, do you not?"

"Yes, Cestria, I am fully packed and ready to go home." Billy said as he stood up, took the printout from the computer, picked up his luggage, and walked to the docking port. He looked back, smiled, and waved as the elevator doors closed and started rising to surface.

XXXXX The End XXXXX

A/N 2: I hope everyone likes this tale. Please leave me a review and let me know what you think. Thank you to everyone for reading.

May the Power Protect You!

Pern