Chapter Seven: 7,000 Years Later - The Seeds
1000 BC - Timeline B
The Grand Festival had begun. Everyone was gathered from around the globe, and a few people from around the galaxy. There was dancing, food, and socializing. In one area Princess Shayla, attempting to put on a happy face despite her rather saddening experience with Merrick earlier, was telling stories to several children. Stories of legends from long ago.
"...And then Zordon and Rita fought, each certain they would be the one to leave that fight alive. That dastardly witch had called the truce solely to trick him, but Zordon had one more trick up his sleeve!" Shayla said, putting her heart into the story. "Although Rita trapped him in a Time Warp, he trapped her in a mighty capsule, banishing her forever!"
"How did he do that if he was already in the the Time Warp?" One child asked.
Shayla stopped for a moment. "I... I don't know... that's a good question! Maybe we can ask Master Mao when we see him here!"
Another child raised her hand. "What's a 'mighty capsule'?"
"Hmm... it's like... umm... a big dumpster! For trash like Rita Repulsa and her gang!" Shayla said, laughing.
The first kid raised his hand again. "Why was Dai Shi considered evil? He just wanted to give equal rights to Animals, right?"
Shayla raised an eyebrow. Sheesh! Kids these days!
"Actually, that was his stance, yes, but he wanted to eliminate all other forms of life. That would include Humans, too!" Shayla explained.
The kid frowned. "Oh... he was evil... Will he ever... you know... come back? Will Rita ever come back?"
Shayla laughed. "Oh, heavens, no! Rita is trapped by Zordon's powerful Magic! There is no way she's getting out. And Dai Shi is imprisoned and being guarded by the Pai Zhua. Trust me, there is no getting out for either of them."
Another of the children raised their hand. "And what about The Master?"
Shayla swallowed hard. Although it was customary to bring up how Octomus had been defeated seven thousand years prior due to the lack of sightings over the years, it was in the back of the minds of Zordon, the Pai Zhua, and the Ninja Academies that eventually he would rear his ugly head again. Until then, to not leave the people with unnecessary fear in their minds, everyone was to disregard him and his Underworld minions.
"The Master is too afraid, sweetie." Shayla said, both to appease the children and herself. "He saw his empire be crippled and after witnessing the power of Zordon and those on Earth, he ran away. There is absolutely nothing to fear!"
From behind some bushes, just outside the Grand Festival and near to where Shayla had been speaking, Koragg had been listening. He scoffed in anger. "Ha! If that is what they wish to believe, to lull themselves into a false sense of security than so be it. It will make The Master's return even more triumphant. Fools... 'all is well in our utopia', they think. Well, soon they will see their folly! The Org Nexus is fully charged and ready..."
Throwing the green seeds of horror at the ground, Koragg laughed. "Time for the power of The Master!" The Magic The Master had given him erupted from the Eye of the Master, embedded in Koragg's Wolf Shield. It hit the seeds, causing a primordial soup to surround the seeds. From the sludge, bubbles started popping. Koragg knew it meant that the chemical reactions had begun in the unholy abomination Octomus had concocted.
Satisfied that the spell was working, Koragg yelled, "Uthe sastos!" A magical emblem appeared beneath him, teleporting himself away. As he disappeared the only thing left testifying that he had been there were the sludge covered seeds. The seeds that were giving life to the evil Orgs.
. . .
Deviot shapeshifted into a man wearing a white cloak. The man he had picked was Fulbert, member of the Royal Guard. He approached the men who were guarding the entrance to the Ancient City.
"Guardsman Fulbert." The head guard said, saluting him.
Fake Fulbert nodded. "I must go in. I am on secret assignment from Master Mao."
The guard nodded. He stepped to the side and let Deviot through. Once inside the Great City, Fulbert became Deviot once again.
"What are you looking for?" Bio Silver asked Deviot over the Alpha Shapeshifter's earpiece.
Deviot laughed. "Just a little something I had heard rumors of. I was planning on using the Zeo Crystal as the final ingredient to power the end result, but the Grand Festival occurring right now gave me an even better idea..."
"That... did not answer my question..." Bio Silver said, monitoring the area around Deviot to ensure no one stumbled onto him and blew his cover. He knew Deviot could not stay "shifted" in another form for very long without compromising his powers, so knowing Deviot would be in his base form he needed to monitor him to see if anyone would find the Cyborg and warn him so his cover wouldn't be blown.
"Well, it's... Oh. Interesting!" Deviot said, bending over and looking at an urn.
"What is it?" Bio Silver asked.
"Well, when I was a Morphing Master, Ivicar had once told me something Sentinel Knight had confided in him. It was about a Morphing Master named Jakon who had gone rogue. There is a familiar energy coming from this urn. Ivicar had told me Jakon had been imprisoned in an urn and hidden in the Great... er... Ancient City. Well, it seems like I've found him." Deviot replied, looking at the containment capsule for Ninjakon.
"Are you going to unleash him, to add him to your army?" Bio Silver asked, considering the possibilities of having a former Morphing Master join their cause.
Deviot shook his head, standing upright and walking away from the urn in search of the objects he had in mind. "No, no. I remember him a bit and he was a hardheaded, intellectual type. He would sooner backstab me than go along with my plans. I don't want to deal with that. Maybe if I can gain more power, than yes, but now is not the time."
"Well, what are you looking for!?" Bio Mech Silver demanded, growing impatient from being kept in the dark.
"A mask, and a machine." Deviot replied. He then laughed as he entered the tower that once housed the laboratory of Zen Aku.
"What mask!? Stop teasing me and tell me!" Bio Silver said, growing whiny.
"This mask..." Deviot replied, finding it on a table next to a machine. It was a prototype of the same red apparatus that Lokar had used to rip out the Werewolf gene from Zen Aku, while also betraying him and taking out his free will. That action had turned that machine into Zen Aku's Lingering Will, that was unfortunately still infected with the Werewolf virus he had received when attacked by the Alpha Werewolf, Fenrir. The mask that had been one of Deviot's objectives.
"So, what is that mask?" Bio Silver asked.
"It is a source of great power. Ivicar told me that there was a mask that emanated great power. He said he could feel it calling to him, ready to cause the power to flow freely through him. The problem with it, though, was that he could feel that it housed a powerful being in it that would possess anyone who would put it on, and take over his body."
Bio Silver shrugged, not caring Deviot couldn't see him as he was in space. "So, why do you want it?"
"Well, I'm an Alpha. My genetics do not allow me to be possessed. I can put on this mask and have the knowledge of the power this mask." Deviot replied.
"Why haven't you done this sooner?" Bio Silver asked with reason.
"Well, like I said... I've been waiting to get the Zeo Crystal. That was my number one goal. I was going to come and get this afterward. I have a plan to use this mask and the machine next to it..."
"Now, what is that machine?"
"It is another thing that Ivicar found. He looked into it and found out it was a machine that seemed to be able to separate things from inside of a person, like if they had a disease or something. He found no use in it and left it here. I, however, have been planning a way that I could use it." Deviot said. As he did, a parchment appeared in one of his hands.
"What is that?"
"It's an old document I found a while ago in the Moon Palace when I was first investigating the Caves of Deception. It is what the scientist that used to live there, Finster, had been studying. It is called the Scrolls of Zordina. They are schematics to powerful zords built by Zordon thousands of years ago. I had been planning on using the schematics to build zords around the Zeo Crystal. Alas, that plan has been shot down... but, like I said, the Grand Festival gave me another idea!
"You see, when I remembered the Grand Festival and it being hosted this century in Animaria, I thought about those of the Order of the Crystal. You know, those who wield the Animal Crystals in their Crystal Sabers. Well, I figured I could use the device Ivicar had found here and tweak it a bit. Instead of separating illnesses or anything like that, I would use it to separate someone from their free will!" Deviot proclaimed.
Bio Mech Silver sighed. Whenever Deviot began explaining his "grand scheme" ideas, he began to be hard to follow, jumping around and not explaining key points to the idea. "So... How does this relate to the Crystal Sabers... And how does this relate to the Scrolls of Zordina and creating 'zords'?"
"Right, right... Well, I figured I could make the device Ivicar found into an apparatus that would accept Animal Crystals! I would 'borrow' some Animal Crystals from the Order of the Crystal and insert them into this machine. I would take their free will from them, and then you and I would turn them into machines, or zords! Based on these schematics, I could make a megazord, just like the ones that had been used back in the days of the Resistance!" Deviot declared.
Bio Silver nodded slowly. "I think I'm following you... steal Animal Crystals, attach them to the device, take their free will, turn them into zords, and control them. Why the mask again, then?"
Deviot shrugged. "More power. That's all."
"Okay, well... it sounds like a plan to me, then." Bio Mech Silver said. "What next?"
"Next? First I am going to do this..." Deviot said. He touched the red apparatus and, focusing on his shapeshifting abilities, caused the red apparatus to change its form. Deviot lurched over in pain, due to the excessive amounts of energy that required. Breathing heavily, he looked over and was pleased at the result: the red apparatus had turned into his own version of an Crystal Saber. On it were not one, but three slots for Animal Crystals. He had also programmed it to be similar to what he remembered Burai's Dragon Dagger to be - a flute that was able to summon the Dragonzord. He remembered always finding that to be a unique and intimidating way to summon a zord and had promised himself if he were to ever have a zord of his own, that would be the way he would have wanted it to be summoned.
"What was that power surge from your location?" Bio Silver asked, tensing up.
"I just created my own Crystal Saber. I will call it my Flute Knife. And now, to get some Animal Crystals..." Deviot said.
"And how will you do that?"
"Ransom, of course. Next stop: Animaria. I'm going to kidnap Princess Shayla..." Deviot said, laughing as he morphed back into Fulbert.
. . .
Zordon looked down at Alpha 4. "Do you have any locks on Deviot?"
Alpha 4 shook his head sadly. "No, Zordon, unfortunately I don't."
"Please keep looking. I know we can bypass his stealth technology. I believe in you, Alpha." Zordon said. "Keep working on it. I will return."
Shutting off his external monitor, but keeping the hologram open to be able to monitor the Command Center, Zordon looked to Saba. "It was a good idea you had to keep a monitor over the Zeo Crystal. I wouldn't have imagined that even after all of these years, not only would people remember that it existed but be able to pass the Caves of Deception."
Saba nodded. "Well, I figure that as long as there is evil in the universe, there will be someone trying to take things like the Zeo Crystal."
Zordon sighed heavily. "I see the wisdom in your words. I suppose that is why Gosei puts so much into defending the secret of his Ranger Keys."
"I agree with his tactics, though I still do not think he is reliable. There always seems to be some sort of glitch in his operating systems." Saba said.
"Yes, but Dr. Goier is there to help with that."
Saba shook his head. "But he is always out of the planet helping someone else. He's hardly around to help here on Earth."
"Well, I trust Gosei. He is a good man." Zordon said.
Saba rolled his eyes. Not wanting to continue the debate, he decided to change the subject. "Okay, that's fine. Oh, I forgot to ask you: what did you end up doing with that giant grey beast that tried to take the Zeo Crystal?"
"Well, I scanned him and could see that he was a very simple minded beast. He is immensely powerful, though, so I teleported him very, very far away onto a planet in a solar system where there are no other signs of life. I have the planet being monitored, so if anyone ever comes upon it I will know. I'll move him if that ever happens." Zordon replied.
"That's pretty despicable of Deviot to use an innocent creature to further his plans." Saba said.
"I agree. I didn't see that coming. It just brings to my mind the fact that although we can have are million and one back up plans and protocols in place, we can't predict everything that will happen." Zordon said, furrowing his brow. "I can only hope the next time that we are caught off guard that it won't be something which we can't easily stop..."
. . .
The Org Sludge continued to bubble. Suddenly, a burst of Black and White Energy shockwaved from it. As it did, Goom staggered, feeling it pass through him.
"What's wrong!?" Baskin said, running over to help Goom up.
"I... I don't know. But, I think it's something bad..." Goom said darkly.
Meanwhile, among the Animal Realm giants who were sitting and chatting around the Grand Festival, the member of the Falcon Tribe, Chester, laughed at a joke his wife from the Phoenix Tribe, Isis, made.
"That's right! That's exactly how Goom sounds!" Chester said, laughing hysterically.
As he did Lionel, who was standing within earshot, frowned. "That's not funny, Chester. We need to respect our leaders."
Chester gave Lionel a mock concerned look. "Oh, I'm soooo sorry, Lionel." He then laughed. "You really need to lighten up. Be more like your brother, Leon!"
"You better watch your tongue, Chester. Even in jest." Black Lion said, walking into the group circle.
"Black Lion!" Chester said, bowing in a panic. His wife, Isis, stifled a laugh.
"Lionel has achieved greatness due to his commitment to our ways and rules." Black Lion said roughly. "Leon, on the other hand..."
"What, Dad?" Leon asked in anger, just arriving at the festival with Nago and Ingat. Galcon flew overhead. "I'm a loser? Reject?"
Black Lion curled a lip, revealing his fangs. "You haven't lived up to honor our family."
"How is that? Because I won't do everything exactly as you would like!?" Leon yelled. "I just barely got here and already I'm being harassed! Not only do you bar me from fighting, but you slander me behind my back!"
Faor, the mighty Rhino, stepped in between the two. "Leon! Stop this right now! Black Lion, sir? We are trying to celebrate the Grand Festival... I suggest that perhaps we focus on they, don't you think?"
Black Lion grunted. He then turned around and walked away, heading toward a group of Animals including Lobo, Harrison, Ave, and Hammer. As he did, Chester let out a sigh of relief.
"Wow... Man, do I not envy you, Leon." Chester said.
Isis sighed and looked to her husband. "Honey...? Perhaps your mouth should stay shut for a bit, hmm?"
Lionel sighed and looked to his brother. "I apologize for that, Leon."
Leon rolled his eyes. "You know, you say you want to make amends, yet you don't stick up for me?"
"Come on... you know it wouldn't do anything but agitate him further." Lionel said.
As he and Leon continued to speak, Ingat the Wildcat whispered to the massive Gorilla, Nago. "Since when have they been trying to patch things up? This is news to me!"
Nago nodded. "To me, too. Man! Imagine if they actually mend their relationship!"
Overhearing, Galcon the Condor landed at their side. "After all of these years? Now that is something I want to see!"
All the while, the Org Sludge finished its bubbling. As it did, a fist popped out of it. Slowly but surely, the being the fist was attached to pulled himself out of the glop, revealing what looked like a man with a massive horn protruding from his crown.
He had bushy, wild grey hair. His skin was chalk white, with a redness around his lips and eyelids that gave him a sickly look, as if he suffered from insomnia and dehydrated lips. On his forehead, above and in between his eyes, was a third eye. It seemed to blink at a different, unnatural rate compared to the two eyes resting on the man's face. He wore a large, trashy looking robe seemingly made of beige, tanned leather that was layered. It extended down to his bare feet, which were the same color as the rest of his skin.
He bellowed a massive roar. The roar was so loud that everyone within a hundred yards of him stopped what they were doing in a fright. They turned their eyes in the direction of the sound and watched in fear as the man made his way out of the brush.
Shayla told the children to rush to safety, away from the scene. "Who are you!?"
"I am the beginning of the end of this dream that you all have been living! I am Master Org!" The man/beast yelled in a voice sounding only slightly different than that of Octomus. Blasts of power were emanating from him. As it did, the plant life around him began to wilt away.
As Master Org began to walk forward, he smiled a hideous smile at Princess Shayla. Watching him approach her and the rest of the party, the only thing Shayla could do was watch in terror.
. . .
1998 AD - Timeline A
Xasjon laughed as he kicked a Triforian Rebel away from him. As the man fell, he pointed a blaster at him and vaporized him.
"Xasjon to Dark Fortress. The last rebel has been eradicated from this sector." He reported.
"Excellent." Basax said. "The Dark Fortress has found another rebel outpost protecting the Ranger Keys. Get ready to go there."
Xasjon rolled his eyes in irritation. "Will do. Beam me there when ready."
As he awaited further instructions, he thought over his plans. I'm sick and tired of pretending to be Ultimecia's puppet! Soon, though, after we find all of the Ranger Keys, I will be able to take her down after I gain the Greatest Treasure in the Universe... her Extreme Crystal will be mine!
Unbeknownst to Ultimecia, Xasjon had grown a Heart, and Will, of his own. It was due to the fact that he had taken the Corona Aurora after striking down Sentinel Knight. Its presence in his possession remained masked to Ultimecia, due to its inherent power. After a very short time that he had obtained the Crown of the Gods it had begun to influence Xasjon, giving him his own mind though hiding that from Ultimecia. It even accelerated the process by which Xasjon had received his new Heart. All of that culminated in a new, vicious being ready to overthrow Ultimecia the first chance he got.
Suddenly, Xasjon found himself being teleported using Ultimecia's superior technology to a solar system in another galaxy. Arriving in the midst of a battle alongside Neo Goldar, Xasjon laughed.
"Change Ring! Solar Flare!" Xasjon declared, morphing into the Dark Star Ranger. He then proceeded to mow down the last of the valiant fighters in that sector, to secure the three Ranger Keys they had. Once he accomplished that, he knew what the next step was: Ultimecia would destroy the planet, just as she had with Earth and countless other planets that had gotten in her way.
. . .
Zordon looked at The Guardian. "How are the calculations coming?"
The Guardian sighed, staring into a Time Crystal. "Slowly. I'm trying to pinpoint a time that will work, but with the variance created by that rogue Watcher... I don't know yet. I've been able to narrow it down to a point within the last fifty thousand years, but I want to narrow it down even further to save as much lives as I can..."
Orion sneered. Although technically a Nobody, his Lingering Will had allowed him to at least fight for the causes in which he believed before losing his Heart when he first joined up with The Guardian. After a few years though, with help from the acceleration granted him by the Trizyrium Crystals in the Hall of Legends, he had regrown his Heart.
Normally a Regrown Heart will cause a Nobody to becomes a new, different person than they were before they lost their Heart. The new being would have a new Spirit and a new personality, aka they are a new person.
Due to Orion's Lingering Will and it connecting to the Nobody known as Rioxan, however, the Heart that was regrown in the body that technically belonged to Rioxan was programmed with all of the original Orion's desires and intents. This rare phenomenon caused Orion's original Spirit to return from the Afterlife, thus eliminating Rioxan and allowing Orion to continue his life. It had been wisdom in Rumple when he had given Orion the advice to cling onto the Emotional Spectrum's portion for Willpower (Green Energy) to help Orion survive the crushing of his Heart.
"Although we may be able to go back in Time and stop Ultimecia in the long run, we still lost." The bitter man Orion had become said. "We all know the consequences of Time travel. If you go back to the past and change something, that's it! You've destroyed everyone. I just don't understand how you lot can justify it. That's universal genocide!"
The Guardian sighed. He knew what Orion was saying. They had been studying for the previous five universe years the effects of Time travel. Their research had led them to discover that if they did in fact travel backward in Time and change anything, something that they were able to do since the Hall of Legends resided physically outside of the universe in a domain without Time, that they would overwrite everything that had originally happened in the Timestream that would have followed after the altered events. With the overwriting of Time, every being alive from that point onward would have a different Spirit and different personality than their counterpart from the previous timeline. The Guardian theorized that if left alone, the universe would reach equilibrium and merge once again with the previous timeline, and at a certain point the events happening in the new timeline would mimic the events that had originally happened. They had come to call those effects Universal Equilibrium.
The Guardian, Alpha Ranger, Zordon, and Orion had decided that they would do all they could to research the mechanics behind Time travel. The end goal would be to cause so many changes that it would be impossible for the universe to have a negative outcome, like it had during their timeline. That in and of itself The Guardian and Alpha Ranger quickly discovered was a daunting task, but what made it even more difficult was the fact that September, the rogue Watcher they had mentioned in their conversation, had allowed the Nathadians to escape their universe, along with Lothor, Killian, and Regina, into the universe The Guardian and his crew inhabited. That and the presence of the Jumper, Mythical Master, along with the eventual arrival of Zordon himself and Saba a few centuries later from the Nathadianverse helped cause a ripple effect which the Freelancers and Watchers knew as the Time Anomaly. The Time Anomaly was a phenomenon which shot the universe off a course, which apparently the Watchers and Freelancers had learned to calculate, that allowed Time to be predictable to those who could read Time. Because of the Time Anomaly, any one scenario had less than a one percent probability to occur and were equally as likely as another to happen. This caused The Guardian to have to "crunch the numbers" over and over for several different scenarios. Starting with Regina's entry into the universe, Alpha Ranger and The Guardian had tried to figure out what event could be changed in the universe to make an absolute certainty that Ultimecia would never be created. After five years, as previously stated, their efforts helped them create a range between the current point of Time in 1998 to fifty thousand years beforehand.
Realizing the flaw in Orion's logic, The Guardian spoke up. "No, Orion. It's not universal genocide on our part. If we don't change the past, then every single person there is meant to be destroyed anyway. Burai, Sentinel Knight, Ninjor, all of them lost their lives on Earth when Ultimecia blasted Earth away to be able to dock the machinery housing the Greatest Treasure onto the Dark Fortress. So, when we go back in Time, we won't be erasing anyone who wasn't already destined to lose their lives."
"What about me, then?" Orion said. "I survived Earth. So did Zordon. Will we just cease to exist?"
Zordon was the one to answer, shaking his head. "No, no we won't. When we overwrite the timeline, from that point onward every being alive will receive a new Spirit, as we destroyed the previous timeline and created a new one by placing the new one atop the old one. For you and I, if the point we choose happens to be after we're born our duplicates from the new timeline will be genetically identical to us, but that is it. New Spirits will enter their bodies. Although everything that happened to us from before that point will be in their minds as their memories, those Spirits technically did not experience those events. They solely 'remember' them, because they inherited our lives.
"From that point onward? They will become their new selves. Who knows? Maybe my new timeline duplicate will be evil. I don't know, because that new Spirit will have its own Will to choose how it will lead its life from then on.
"It's like... say I build an army with certain weapons and fighters. I then leave behind a book of tactics for someone else to inherit. The new person comes in (representing the being taking over my life in the new timeline) and reads and memorizes to a 'T' my book of tactics and how this army I left behind for him is set up.
"He is a different person, though. He has different inclinations than I do. A new Spirit brings with it a new, different intent. He will have been 'raised' exactly like me, but will choose from the moment of his 'birth', or when we change the timeline, onward how he will use the tools I leave for him.
"And thus it will be for anyone else born from this timeline. I would have a physical clone of myself running about, but outside of that and being raised identically from birth to the creation of the new timeline... we are different people and after some time to allow the Spirit to get past its biological and sociological programming, one would see little by little how different the new person really is... You know, it would be interesting if we indeed were able to have the timeline change be after I was born. I would love to see how different I would be..."
Orion threw his arms up into the air. "Gosh dangit! I have no idea what you just said. It sounds like philosophical hogwash to me. All I know is that when we make this new timeline, everyone in the old one is dead. Now whether or not they would all have died anyway is moot to me. In the way that we do it, we're the ones causing their destruction, not Ultimecia."
"Orion... You just don't understand..." The Guardian said. He then looked at Zordon. "And as for your final thought, we may or may not get a 'chance' to look at Orion's Time clone, but we are actually guaranteed to meet yours."
"How is that?" Zordon asked curiously.
"Well, if we go back in Time, we would revert the universe back to a state when you and Saba were floating, stuck in a Time Bubble within the universe caused by your father's universe hopping machine. Regardless of when we go back you will either have already landed on Eltar, or will be in stasis awaiting for your chance to fall on Eltar," The Guardian said.
Zordon nodded. "Fascinating... Well, hopefully this new guy gets a shot at keeping those he loves... Trinity and I didn't even get a chance to have a child together..."
Suddenly, the voice of Alpha Ranger echoed through the Hall of Legends. "From my monitoring of the universe, I can confirm that Ultimecia has found three more Ranger Keys. That's a total of one hundred and three for her."
Orion shook his head. "Only two hundred and twelve to go. Do you think what's left of the Masked Rider Warriors can keep their Keys hidden from Ultimecia for long?"
The Guardian sighed. "I can only pray they can. I need them to stall for as long as they can because if Ultimecia can get to the Greatest Treasure... she'll be in here faster than you can blink. And with her power, imagining her with access to the Hall of Legends' ability to manipulate Time and having access to a Power Egg is no good."
Zordon looked at Guardian. "Mentioning the Masked Rider Warriors, that brings to mind anyone else who is yet alive in the universe as well. Wouldn't this be technically destroying them? If they are able to live their whole lives up to the point when we go back...? Wouldn't this technically be them stalling just so that we end their lives anyway?"
"We can't think like that." Guardian said. "If we don't stop Ultimecia they're as good as destroyed. If we don't stop her, everyone will eventually be destroyed. End of story. It's a fact. Everyone who is still alive and stalling her is living on borrowed time anyhow. The best they can hope for is for us to go back and change the past. If we can alter things enough, many if not all of them will be reborn into their same bodies, but in a new timeline, giving them a second lease on life but without their memories of this horrid timeline. If we play our cards right, the only people who will lose their lives will be those who were alive at the time of the change. Theoretically, anyone after that point will just be recycled into the circle of life and be given a new shot at life. The only thing that could stop it is if the new timeline plays out so that certain people never get the opportunity to be born to begin with, but with how Universal Equilibrium seems to work, the likelihood of that happening is next to none."
"That is the way I understand it, as well." Alpha Ranger said. "But, it's all hypotheses. We will have to wait and see how things develop when it actually happens. This is a war, and if some people need to lose their lives to save the multiverse, then that is what needs to happen."
Zordon nodded, although a piece of him agreed with Orion. He felt uneasy about it all. My whole life has been filled with sadness... I've lost everyone, starting with my real family down to my wife. Now, my whole universe? My whole timeline? Incredible...
"But, until then, we still have work to do." The Guardian said, focusing once again on the Time Crystals. "We need to go out and help stall Ultimecia. How is that Power Ranger suit coming along?"
Zordon looked down at the Trizyrium Crystal he was slowly converting to be filled with Nathadian Magic. "It's going surprisingly well. Just a bit longer and this gem will be ready to power a suit to help Orion go into battle with a piece of my Nathadian powers."
"Thanks again for that." Orion said. "Something about this place has really extinguished my Light powers. Being able to suit up will hopefully be enough to help you out as Meledon Ranger, Zordon."
Zordon nodded. "Well, soon you'll be able to go out with me as the Nathadian Ranger. Hopefully then we can slow down Ultimecia's Empire long enough to have The Guardian figure out how to fix the timeline. Until then, I guess all we can do is fight back."