Deinonychus, a power rangers fanfic

Power Rangers & All associated trademarks are property of Hasbro

I claim no ownership of anything except my own original characters.

I am making no money from this.

Deinonychus

However the story ended, all across the multiverse and in an infinite amount of times, places and instances the story began within a variation upon a single theme that ran through them like a grand cosmic leitmotif; in the course of the great battle between good and evil Rita Repulsa escaped and the being known as Zordon recruited a team of five teenagers with attitude. What followed from there varied greatly across each of the countless iterations stretched across an impossible amount of realities that were birthed and destroyed by the creation and subsequent collapse of possibilities, each choice spawning new branching alterations until one version of the story of the Power Rangers was unrecognisable from the next, a cosmic and multiversal rumour and legend that altered upon each telling.

In this instance, upon a benighted and ruined version of planet Earth the legend had become a horror story that would feed the nightmares of any who had not lived to see it first hand and were simply told as it was plain to see from even the briefest of glances that whatever had happened to this timeline was deeply, fundamentally and yet inexplicably wrong.

The story had begun here as it always did, some brave and intrepid astronaut had walked the surface of the moon and tampered with an ancient, alien artefact that the hands of humanity were never meant to touch and inadvertently sealed their own fate when they had released Rita Repulsa and her retinue of her closest disciples from their prison. From there Zordon had reacted as destiny dictated that he always would and gathered his champions, five teens armed with the Eltarian relics known as the Power Coins who would go on to form what any outsider looking in at the events of this timeline would recognise as an incarnation of the Power Rangers; the Red Styracosaurus Ranger, Blue Mosasaurus Ranger, Yellow Megatherium Ranger, Pink Spinosaurus Ranger and Green Archaeopteryx Ranger who had fought heroically and defeated each of the monsters that Rita Repulsa sent to Earth in turn; her conquest on the world in the name of the Dark Empire she owed fealty to being narrowed and reduced to a series of small scale battles between elected champions that despite her heinous intentions could almost be described as honourable to some degree.

The first divergence and twisting of the natural flow of events came, as it had in many other timelines in the form of Tommy Oliver.

Rita Repulsa had abducted the wayward teen and nominated him to be her greatest weapon against her enemies, a Power Ranger of her own armed with the Sword of Darkness and the Black Dragon Power Coin yet her plan did not proceed as expected; rather than ending the only real resistance to her might in a single fell swoop her Black Ranger found his strength met an equalled by Zordon's Rangers and so had waged a series of skirmishes that had steadily evolved into a campaign of propaganda and disinformation as he acted where the Power Rangers would not, ending human wars, halting natural disasters and other such things that Zordon had declared were outside of the Power Rangers' remit until slowly Rita began to see the artistry of her new disciple as entire nations began to willingly submit and ally themselves with her. It was at this moment however that the Black Dragon Ranger showed the true scope of his ambitions and declared himself the rightful ruler of Earth, though rather than simply crush all opposition beneath his boot as he had done in timelines where he had taken on the mantle of Lord Drakkon, here Tommy Oliver had consolidated his territories and began to seek out allies.

His fatal mistake had been freeing the demon Diabolico and attempting to form a pact.

The demons he had unsealed dispatched the Black Ranger without mercy in a hellish firestorm and from there had set out to stake their own claim to the world they returned to, their arrival coming far sooner than it did in other realities and the demise of Tommy Oliver providing the impetus for a cascading collapse of the natural flow of events. Earth had been plunged into a civil war, nations that had chosen to willingly surrender themselves to Rita Repulsa and her Black Ranger were purged with righteous fury by those that had not whilst at the same time the witch herself continued her campaign, only to be met with fresh resistance in the form of the newly unleashed demons; Lord Zedd had arrived on Earths' moon to assume direct command of the war-zone yet even his terrible might had insufficient and the battles had raged on until finally vast swathes of the planet were permanently benighted hellscapes consumed by the magical discharges of an apocalyptic battle between Master Vile and Queen Bansheera; all the while the Power Rangers Zordon had recruited continued to do what little they could, saving lives and preventing the end of their planet with the occasional aid of new teams of Rangers, teams formed by various governments and shadowy organisations with less honourable and benevolent goals, often times directly stating that they existed to act as a countermeasure against the Power Rangers in the event that another of their number went rogue. Eventually however the crippling blow for Earth had not come from some gross deviation from the natural order and in fact human society as it had once been had entered its' death throes at the commencement of an event occurring precisely when it was supposed to.

The Machine Empire were precise in all things after all.

King Mondo and Queen Machina, manifestations of the binary computation and avatars of the Machine Empires' will had led their forces with singular purpose and ruthless precision, no quarter had been offered and no terms or offers have surrender had been entertained; the Machine Empire had simply come to dominate, enslave and process all of the planets' natural resources including its' myriad lifeforms, sentient or otherwise and after a series of protracted and gruelling campaigns against one another neither Lord Zedd's forces, Bansheera's demonic hordes or the bloodied and disparate nations that had remained in tact thus far could offer anything more than a token, pitiable and easily crushed defence against. Cries for help went unheard, the actions of the Black Ranger and those nations who had sided with him having doomed Earth as a whole by painting it as an enemy to the galaxy at large and co-conspirators to Rita Repulsa and in just a few short months the Machine Empire reigned supreme, beginning the process of meticulously stripping the planet of everything of value so that it might be repurposed into raw materials for their endless war machine.

There had been a miscalculation however.

Computerised minds, by a product of their own limitations had little understanding or respect for the arcane, magical or paranormal; such things lay outside of their ability to quantify and were largely disregarded outside of their immediate and tangible applications at any given moment, a mindset that was further compounded on Earth by the ease with which King Mondo had destroyed the demons and sorcerers which stood against him. What the Machine Empire had not foreseen in its' arrogant single-mindedness was that their reduction of Earth to little more than a forge, smelting pool and assembly line staffed by the denizens of city-sized labour camps which choked the planet in acrid smog until the sun could no longer be found would be the catalyst that ushered in a new breed of otherworldly monsters; the pollution that poisoned the planet allowed the once-sealed Orgs to return and as swift and brutal as the Machine Empires' conquest had been its' defeat and dismantling had been far swifter as the hateful spirits flooded into the bodies of the mechanical warriors sent to combat them along with any other machinery in their path including humanities' remaining weapons of mass destruction which had been used with murderous glee until the forces that had taken control of Earth tore themselves apart in a series of horrific death spasms.

It was here that the galaxy at large finally took action, yet rather than come to the aid of the beleaguered remains of humanity the interstellar organisation known as Space Patrol Delta had taken stock of the situation only to realise with abject horror what the consequences of the Org menace spreading out into the galaxy through the use of the Machine Empires' warships or teleportation systems would be and acting accordingly to ensure the survival of the wider galaxy. Targeted strikes against remaining Machine Empire fortifications and spaceports had destroyed any immediate means for this new enemy to leave the planet whilst the systematic destruction of all satellites around Earth regardless of their origins had served to ensure that the Orgs could not lure in any unwitting travellers, though it had silenced communications on the planet at the same time. From there an armada had been levied and put in place around the world forming an exclusion zone to ensure that nothing entered or left its' orbit; there were rumours amid the galaxy that some of humanity had made it off-world, either aboard a single spacefaring colony or taken as slaves by and subsequently escaping from the now reeling Machine Empire however for the species as a whole the future seemed bleak.

The Power had not protected them and they were trapped on a quarantined and condemned world where monsters roamed freely.

Yet still the story had not ended and there were those who continued to fight for what little good remained in this twisted and broken iteration of reality, including a lone figure often regarded as a myth or an illusion fuelled by desperation known as the Purple Deinonychus Ranger.

The sound of a faintly chirping alarm brought Caiden out of his slumber to full wakefulness in barely more than an instant as if it had been that of an explosion tearing through his surroundings, yet in such times paranoia was often a virtue and ones' ability to react quickly could be the difference between life and death and so, upon realising that he was in no immediate danger the man, who was somewhere in his mid-twenties though he had lost track of time so completely that anything more certain that that was impossible to tell simply sat and took a moment to gather his thoughts as the surging adrenaline that left his blood thundering in his ears began to subside.

Caiden, whose surname had been forgotten through disuse and irrelevance with a fresh name being supplied to all who asked for it when the situation required was tall and gaunt with broad shoulders a pale, pallid complexion which highlighted every bruise and scar that stood against it borne of the lack of sunlight caused by both the currently choked atmosphere and his own odd hours which often saw him go for days without sleep. His features were sharp, chiselled and angular with a narrow, almost raptorial nose which had been broken in more than one place and dry, cracked lips offset by piercing and icy blue eyes all framed by hair and a short but bushy beard which had once been a deep, rich brown but were now beginning to show signs of premature whitening in a case of what may well have been Mary Antoinette syndrome; his hair was cut close and shorn to almost nothing at the back and sides of his skull with a wavy mass falling dramatically about his face though it would likely be tied back into a simple bun in a matter of moments.

Caiden slept mostly clothed, a precaution in case of emergency as it would not do to have to flee from the confines of his small and heavily reinforced quarters in his underwear should he find himself attacked and as such he was currently wearing practical black cargo pants which he would soon reattach a harness to in order to provide him with additional storage, along with armour plated black boots which reached his calves and a faded, ragged sweatshirt with a hood and half-zip chosen for warmth that had once been a deep purple colour and sported the logo of a university that had been destroyed long before he could have attended it whilst his hands were covered by black gloves that had just enough of their fingers remove to give him a degree of dexterity. With a sigh he rubbed his bleary eyes and swept his gaze across the dark, metallic confines of the cramped and largely featureless box of a room that he slept in to find the rest of his attire where he had left it; a heavy but loose fitting and oversized coat with a fur collar and enough flowing folds to give the man a dramatic appearance in even the slightest breeze which had once been jet black in colour but had slowly faded to a bleached grey hanging over a chair, a heavy and reliable pair of goggles combined with a gas-mask laying on top of chest of drawers in which the few personal belongings he owned were stored whilst beside was his most pried possession.

His Morpher and the Power Coin it held.

Much oh his early life was a blur and regrettably Caiden knew that somewhere within that miasma of pain, uncertainty and loss were the answers to the question of just how he had come to be a Power Ranger and just what cruel joke whatever beings arbitrated such things in the absence of Zordon were playing when they had bestowed such a double edged sword upon a child.

What Caiden could assume and infer from the jumbled and fragmented remnants of his early memory was that his childhood was much like that of his entire generation, those born on the cusp of the end-times who had seen just enough of the world that was to truly mourn and grieve when it had torn apart by war, monsters, aliens and the actions of a lone, rogue Power Ranger; his family or whoever had claimed guardianship over him had resided in one of the many cities brought to ruin by the magical conflict between Master Vile and Queen Bansheera's forces, eking out a living as best they could, foraging the ruins for whatever they needed, forming alliances and small communities which collectively sought to evade the mutated wildlife, buildings and other unspeakable things, all whilst quietly hoping for a rescue that never came only to be perversely offered a measure of protection from the subsequent attack of the Machine Empire as the very air had been charged with arcane energies to such a degree that the first few waves of mechanical automatons were unable to function properly, allowing the people they sought to flee. From there Caiden remembered the slowly dwindling group that he had been a part of trying to cross the ruins of the once United States in order to find a fabled bastion, a rumoured gleaming refuge where the Power Rangers, Zordon's original champions and those who had picked up their mantles with each Ranger that fell had used the power of something called the Zeo Crystal to keep all foes and invaders at bay.

Naturally they had failed to reach it before disaster came for them.

Truthfully Caiden could not even recall exactly who or what had been responsible for the attack that had obliterated the caravan of nomadic travellers, though it was a safe assumption that it was the scouts and elimination teams of the Machine Empire simply based on the time period. What Caiden could and would likely remember clearly for the rest of his life was what had happened when the monsters had come for him; a lone figure made of pure, manifest darkness surrounded by blinding light that seemed to unmake reality around them, like a black hole given form and thought had halted the tide of enemies with little more than a thought and loomed over a much younger Caiden as he slipped into unconsciousness, booming words about a gift and destiny ringing in his ears and when he had awoken he had been clutching his Morpher in both hands. He had hidden the thing at first, knowing even then that there were many who would either try to take the device for themselves in the faint hope that they would be able to activate it and many more who simply wished to see any Power Ranger suffer for the sins of Tommy Oliver and the various lesser teams of Rangers who had waged war against one another in the name of the governments that had founded them and in his childish yet entirely justified fear at had taken him several years to attempt to utilise the power that had been placed in his hands; years spent flitting from one ragtag group of nomadic survivors to the next as they were besieged and cut down by the various enemies of humanity until finally Caiden had realised the destiny levelled upon him and become a Power Ranger, a young man in search of justice, hope and answers.

Thus far the only answer he had found was that his Morpher and Power Coin were not in fact the genuine article but replicas made by an unknown, but clearly powerful source. That information had come at a price far too high for the Purple Ranger's liking as he had found the Power Rangers, those who continued Zordon's legacy in order to form an alliance and retake several, now largely automated and unguarded Machine Empire camps so that those trapped within them might be freed only for him to be mistrusted and sent away; learning months later the original Power Rangers had not been seen since and were presumed to have been defeated.

Pushing the bleak and hopeless memories aside Caiden focused on discerning what the first of the days tasks would be.

"Computer, status updates on all major and secondary systems" he stated in a tone far more friendly than one expect him to use when speaking to a machine as he rose to his feet and collected his Morpher. In truth the kindness and familiarity he showed was understandable as, at this point in his life the computer which operated and oversaw his base of operations; an extremely advanced AI that had likely been made using reverse engineered alien technology was the only constant and the closest thing to a friend that he had. Where other nomads had a partner or trusted pet Caiden had his base, which was in fact an unfinished spacefaring craft once dubbed the 'Mega-Shuttle' strapped and welded to a massive trailer whose immense, terrain-crushing treads gave it a degree of mobility which was in turn fastened to his own personal Zord, the Deino-Zord which had spent much of its' existence relegated to the role of a glorified sled dog rather than the colossal weapon of war it had been envisioned as.

"Teleporter remains inactive, shields and weapons are at sub-optimal levels, life support is being rerouted whilst still in atmosphere to maintain operational levels of ten percent. Deino-Zord power output has dropped to thirty eight point two percent. Advise replenishing" the computerised but distinctly feminine voice of the AI operating the shuttle, which in of itself was perhaps the size of a small apartment declared and Caiden cursed under his breath out of habit before chiding himself as he realised with a pang of sadness that there was nobody to reprimand him for his foul language and that there hadn't been for a long time.

"Understood" he ground out, voice a low rasp with a metallic edge due to disuse as though the wastelands around him had been given a voice "Prepare control room" with that he left his quarters and strode the short distance through the body of the repurposed space shuttle into a cockpit that what was slightly too large for the name where systems that had lain dormant to conserve power and resources were brought slowly into life with a dull, buzzing thrum. Lights flickered on hesitantly and Caiden took a seat amidst the drab greys on the control room that they had attempt to liven up by adorning with posters and other artwork of what had been considered pop culture before the world ended in an attempt to break the monotony and preserve a sense of humanity.

"Activate long range sensors, results on screen" Caiden instructed as he made himself comfortable, take a swig of a cup of coffee that had been left at his station the night before only to instantly regret it; the AI hesitated for a moment, mechanical innards whirring uncertainly as they tried to connect with satellites that no longer existed before using other methods that the Purple Ranger freely admitted that he did not understand in order to complete the request. Finally a map displaying the immediate and surrounding areas was displayed and Caiden let out a low and gruff rumble of discontent as he surveyed the information that it had provided in with an increasing lack of pleasure. Since harnessing his powers the Purple Ranger had wandered the tattered the remains of the United States, seeking answers and helping others wherever he could, though his help often came in the form of small skirmishes with monsters and assassinations of packs of savage raiders rather than the heroically epic battles that had become synonymous with the Power Rangers; his Zord allowed him to traverse most terrain with relative ease even with the teleportation system of his base disabled yet he had found himself prowling the west coast of the country for several years now due to some unshakeable sense of something drawing near despite having no idea what it might be other than his own sanity finally departing; rarely venturing further than the mid-west, or the City of Silver Hills in Washington to be precise.

Which was the first location he suspected he might find what he needed that he dismissed with only a cursory glance.

"Temporal fracture" he muttered the words as if he understood what they meant beyond and unshakeable sense of doom. Simply put there were places in the world where time was beginning to break and unravel where events repeated or simply ceased and people were either stripped from existence or torn asunder as multiple iterations of themselves were forced to occupy the same quantum space, the ripples expanded out from an ever shifting epicentre and it was guessed that they would one day expand outwards across the galaxy and force those who had abandoned Earth to take notice. Caiden had heard it all from a man named Billy Cranston who claimed to have once been a Power Ranger until he had been irradiated by a Machine Empire weapon and left incompatible with his powers, the half-crazed scientist positing that the temporal fractures were proof positive that they existed within a reality that was never meant to be and that time travel was not only a possibility but a necessity as individuals who were destined to travel back in time were not doing so and retroactively unthreading reality as it currently existed.

Caiden had simply smiled and changed the topic of conversation whilst making certain to divulge nothing of what he knew in that particular field.

Passing over Silver Hills Caiden turned his attention closer to home, he was currently on the border between Oregon and California and that provided him with several options; though none of which were particularly appealing to him.

The nearest settlement was named Corinth, a minor miracle of a place that had survived the threat of Orgs and the barrages of SPD despite being built upon one of the Machine Empires' larger facilities. Corinth was currently under the command of a machine named General Venjix who had been left in charge of the efforts to reclaim the lost world after the demise of Prince Gasket and had, in the intervening years decided to use unconventional tactics which included freeing all of the humans in his captivity and instead offering them shelter, food and a degree of protection; thus negating the threat of uprising by turning slaves into willing cannon fodder willing to fight side by side with the machines in order to protect their home. Caiden was unwilling to risk venturing into Venjix's domain as the machine overlord had waged a successful indoctrination and misinformation campaign that would likely see him ambushed by humans who saw Power Rangers as their greatest enemy within moments of his arrival and his Zord added to the robot Generals' arsenal.

Then there was Angel Grove, the home of Zordon's Rangers, whilst not the home of their fabled Zeo Crystal powered fortress against the hellish reality of their world it still boasted an impressive resistance movement which utilised guerilla tactics to a horrifying level of effectiveness; the issue however came with the current head of this moment. Andros was an alien who had slipped through the blockade surrounding Earth in order to seek answers from Zordon who had not been seen in years and, based on everything Caiden knew of the Red Astro Ranger's tendencies it was likely that he, as a Ranger wielding a Morpher intended to ape those forged by Zordon would be treated with extreme hostility in Andros's own search for truth.

Caiden's eyes wandered next to the coastline of California, to cities such as Los Angeles and San Diego; both currently lay in ruins after there populations had been harvested by the Machine Empire though the thought of remnants of that particular enemy was not what gave the Purple Ranger pause.

"Bandit country" he muttered distastefully, in attempt to free themselves from the clutches of their various enemies the people had fled to massive aircraft carriers acting as arks, sailing out to sea where they had hoped to find safety only to be beset by an unholy union of a Chinese made imitation of the Power Rangers, a man known only as either 'Space Deleter Black' or even more presumptuously as 'The Perfect One' and his allies; namely a young man possibly younger than Caiden himself known simply as Mack who had stolen a prototype Morpher made by an American billionaire with grand designs to become the Black Overdrive Ranger and an alien space pirate known as Divatox who upon finding herself stranded on the planet she had intended to loot had repurposed that stolen technology to become the Crimson Overdrive Ranger; the trio laying claim to everything in range of their vessels' guns and ruling a swathe of the coast with an iron fist.

From there Caiden looked to the city of Mariner Bay and simply shook his head.

"Org territory" he muttered in disgust, the protean and shifting horrors had branched out from the domain that Master Org had initially planted his flag upon, spreading like a plague or creeping roots across the face of the planet yet mercifully spreading themselves too thin to be an overwhelming threat in more than a few places at once; though those few places were a hell of Earth that defied all description.

"Guess that only leaves one place" he sighed as he glanced at the city of Turtle Cove, nominally a ghost town since it had been evacuated and magically purged of any taint of evil by Princess Shayla whose floating island hung high in the air above it like a silent sentry.

Caiden was loathe to enter that cursed graveyard as much for the threat of the Wild Force Rangers as anything else; Shayla's champions were a furious bunch and eccentric at that, being perfectly willing to pass over an entire convoy of living, breathing humans in order to save one rare plant if their Princess asked it. Each of them had told the Purple Ranger during their few, tense interactions that they were guardians of the planet, not its' people despite the fact that they allowed the Animarium to be used as a refugee camp; most of them had spent time in Machine Empire captivity and firmly believed that humanity had brought itself to ruin and saving one particular species was no longer a priority.

There was also the matter that Turtle Cove was still on the edge of Org territory even after being purged and the idea of taking a Zord into such a place was lunacy as the fate of the Japanese team dubbed 'Special Missions Unit: Go-Busters' and the subsequent devastation of Tokyo had proved.

"Computer…." Caiden sighed, trailing off uncertainly as they weighed the necessity of their choices against a simple, primal unwillingness borne of a fear that they struggled to master until the synthetic voice intervened

"Awaiting instruction"

"Enter lock-down protocol, secure all exits, prime self destruct sequence in event of Org possession, initiate adaptive camouflage and prime all weapons and countermeasures" the purple Ranger rolled their neck with a satisfying pop before adding "And prep my bike"

The skies of Turtle Cove were always dark, a by-product of industrial smog that would take years to clear, the floating island hanging in the air above it blocking what little light might have reached the ruined city for much of the day and then the storm clouds which swirled above the city and crackled with magical lightning that shifted between several unnatural shades as the arcane afterglow of the final, climactic blow against Master Org continued to permeate and saturate every fibre of cities' gutted husk.

Caiden prowled through the streets of the emptied city, ragged and billowing coat flying out behind him with the speed of his bike even as he silently cursed every sound its' alien-forged engine made as the noise echoed through the silence it shattered causing the bearded young man to wince beneath his goggles and gas-mask.

The bike was a compromise used when he need to cover ground swiftly but the risk of Org possession was credible enough that the Deino-Zord could not be used which had been found and restored during a foraging expedition that had drawn perilously close to the edge Angel Grove, Andros's guerillas spread their influence far out into the neighbouring city of Stone Canyon and it was there that the Purple Ranger had learned from a man named Carlos that the alien leader of the faction who, whilst ruthless were ultimately acting in the best interests of humanity had Morphers other than his own in his possession and entrusted them to his closest human allies on rare occasions; Carlos had been one of those allies and Caiden had revealed his own existence to the Black Astro Ranger to save him from being overwhelmed by Vypra who had managed to amass a sizeable contingent of the remaining demon forces; Carlos had given the bike as a gesture of good faith though Caiden had still found over a dozen tracking devices placed on it upon exception which had further cemented his reluctance to trust the Astro Rangers again.

Those details were currently unimportant however as he brought the bike skidding to a halt and took in the sight of a prize he had not dared to dream of.

Laying prone, motionless and silent, belly torn open and titanic mechanical ribs bared as it lay in a colossal crater likely of its' own making whilst surrounded by the ruined remains of skyscrapers and tower blocks that had been partially collapsed, tilted dangerously or in more than one case uprooted entirely was the corpse of a Wild Zord; a Green Hippopotamus Zord that Caiden could not remember having seen before, though he did recall some vague rumours about a survivor from the doomed Go Buster program managing to travel the globe. He had come here for resources with which to repair and maintain his Zord and it would seem that his bravery had been rewarded with a greater boon than he would have hoped or imagined in his wildest dreams and that the only thing separating himself from the possibility of bringing the Deino-Zord back to full power, possibly even making it capable of destroying the pirate fleet ravaging the west coast was his own morals and inhibitions.

"The Princess won't like this….her Rangers definitely won't like this" he rasped out, no more than the ghost of a whisper and still feeling as though he was risking too much with every breath he took here. The idea of cannibalising a Zord was abhorrent and rightly so, especially those Zords used by the Wild Force Rangers which more than any other fleet of Zord were patently more than simple machines and the longer Caiden stared at the Hippopotamus Zord the more it seemed plausible that others of its' kind had been destroyed and their remains lay nearby and that Shayla's act of supreme destruction may have been done entirely to protect the honour and sanctity of these fallen allies, yet the stark and cold reality of the matter remained unchanged and Caiden began mentally preparing himself for what needed to be done. The Mega-Shuttle had facilities to convert most kinds of fuel to something that could be used by a Zord but results would always be limited at best and ran the risk of eroding and damaging components that could not be repaired by human hands, the answer to this was as simple as it was uncomfortable; for Caiden and any other wandering Rangers acts of Zord vampirism were the most effective way of continuing their efforts to save humanity.

Though it was unlikely that Princess Shayla or her Rangers would see it that way.

"Let's do this" Caiden breathed out, cautiously optimistic yet still wary as he clambered off of the bike, not daring to bring it any closer or to try and traverse the ruined buildings on it and hoisting a backpack filled with the tools he would need for his sickening task over one shoulder before trudging slowly, resolutely onwards towards the corpse of the Wild Zord. Before he had crossed the threshold of the many ruined buildings that kept him from his goal he came to a halt, dropping his bag and widening his stance as the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end, lightning and ice coursing through his veins and driving him to a higher state of alertness as he the faintest trace of movement, a flicker of a shadow within shadows that he knew better than to trust and in a single fluid motion that carried none his previous hesitance the nomadic Power Ranger flung his mask and goggles aside whilst his free hand flew to his Morpher and a single word left his lips in a fierce, rasping war cry.

"Deinonychus!"

The unnatural darkness was split open by a flash of deepest purple and Caiden was transformed in an instant. Whilst the Morpher bestowed upon him in barely remembered circumstances had been deemed to be an imitation of Zordon's work the results it granted matched and exceed the original in every way.

Caiden's armour was a deep shade of glossy, faintly metallic violet like the colour of spilled wine and its' overall design borrowed heavily from that worn by Zordon's Rangers. The same belt to hold his Morpher and white boots emblazoned with a purple diamond pattern running around their circumference, the same pattern being inverted and repeated across his chest whilst the armour covering Caiden's arms was a pale silver, adorned with an intricate design like minute interlocking locking scales which reached to a little below his elbows where they were replaces by purple gauntlets adorned with the same white diamond pattern as his boots and fingers that ended in sharpened silvery claws.

A sizeable amount of the Purple Ranger's torso armour was hidden from view by an additional lay of protection that came in the form of an armoured vest which covered his back flanks and shoulders though an unguarded section at the centre of his chest gave it the appearance of an unfastened jacket. The armoured vest was a glossy shade of pure obsidian with wide shoulder pads, faint silver trimmings and subtle, yet stylised design worked into it that gave it an appearance of armoured scales larger than those adorning his upper arms. The vest itself reached to just above his waist yet from within and beneath it flowed a ragged purple-grey cape the colour of roiling storm clouds which had always appeared damaged and whipped around the Purple Ranger in a wind that affected it alone.

The Purple Ranger's helmet was of an equally iconic design, the stylised mouth-plate had been replaced by an angular panel of metallic armour, a mirrored black visor with an angular, almost jagged and yet still sleek shape about it was lined with stylised silver fangs whilst the entire top of the helm was sculpted to resemble the snarling maw of the Deinonychus, complete with deep amber eyes a streamlined snout and a single, swept back crest running along its' centre and finally Caiden's weapon manifested across his back, an oversized, curved and stylised scimitar whose ebony blade seemed to drain the light from its' surrounds known simply as the Power Talon.

Thus prepared Caiden took a single step forward, icy blue eyes scanning the lightning-stricken darkness around him for any sign of what lurked within the ruined buildings; flying into motion the instant he heard a shrill, murderous shriek from above followed by the sound of shattering glass even as he realised its' cause and allowed himself the slightest sigh of relief.

Of all the things that he could have encountered here, Tengu warriors were amongst the least of his worries.

With the demise of Master Vile the avian horrors had spread and multiplied across the planet, feeding on the carrion of a thousand battlefields and harassing anything possessed of flesh and blood to such a degree that the Machine Empire had allowed them to exist largely unrestricted, calculating that they would be more of a problem of the enemies of the machines. Caiden had no idea how many of the omnivorous beasts there might be roosting within the nests that he had obviously disturbed but the first wave to attack him consisted of only six, which he decided were favourable odds and promptly attacked.

The moment the Tengu Warriors glided down to the scorched earth, landing in a loose semi-circle with their talons extended Caiden drove into the first of their number with a travelling sidekick thrown from his left leg that shattered hollow bones and sent the creature hurtling back with a final, agonised squawk. Two of them came from ahead and to the right the moment he had planted both feet on the ground again and Caiden pressed his advantage without hesitation, catching a wild and uncoordinated slashing claw in his left hand whilst pivoting at the waist to pull the Tengu off balance and send his right elbow hurtling into its' beak with a sickening sound of shattering bone that echoed through the darkness. The second of the pair fell only a moment later as the Purple Deinonychus Ranger carried their momentum forward into a spin which they then used to throw themselves into an acrobatic, leaping manoeuvrer that saw them avoid their enemies' lunging attack and whilst completely inverted, place one hand on the ground and deliver a kick to the top of the avian beasts' skull that cracked the ground beneath it.

Leaving three Tengu Warriors remaining all of which were currently behind it.

"Y'know the worst thing about everything tasting like chicken?" he demanded in a mocking sneer as he flung himself upright in a wild, almost flailing motion intended to keep the enemy at bay "It's having to consider what you guys would taste like with barbecue sauce….and then realised I don't have any sauce" whether they understood the taunt or not the Tengu Warriors shrieked amongst themselves for a moment before one of their number, possibly a leader or simply more brazen than its' cohorts sprung forwards to attack.

It fell to the ground, bisected from shoulder to waist as Caiden unslung and attacked with the Power Talon in a single, invisibly fast movement that spattered dark, alien blood across the ground.

"I'm only supposed to use my powers for defence….you've had the option to walk away the entire time" he informed the final remaining pair of Tengu coldly, knowing what their answer would be and resigning himself to it; deep purpled lightning beginning to fork and crackled across the midnight black surface of its' blade whilst reality itself seemed to warp and ripple around its' edge, a brilliant white light spilling from a minute gash in visible space until finally he and the Tengu Warriors attacked in perfect synchronicity, Caiden's single slash carrying him forwards in a meteoric blue of motion and violet light, surging passed his opponents' whose ruined and decimated bodies crackled and arced with lightning before simply ceasing to be as they imploded and exploded at the same time.

"Why do they never just walk away?" he asked quietly, knowing that now was far from the time to ponder the fundamental nature of evil or the sheer arrogance of his foes yet being baffled by it all the same. Glancing over to his bike to ensure that it had not been damaged in the brief skirmish Caiden prepared to once again begin his assault on the ruined Zord in the distance, resting the Power Talon over his shoulder rather than properly sheathe it at his back only to once again be forced to a halt after only a few steps as avian shrieking filled the perpetual night.

This time to a far greater degree.

"Shit" he rasped out simply, finding no other words in his lexicon that would suffice as the tops of each of the ruined skyscrapers surrounding his goal appeared to erupt into showers of rubble, glass and other debris whilst the masses of darkness that flocked from within them showed Caiden the depths of his own hubris as it became clear that he had intruded upon a colony of scores of interconnected Tengu nests with hundreds, possibly thousands of members in total making them a larger settlement or society than many of humanities remaining bastions.

And now that colony had dedicated the entirety of its' being to killing the Purple Ranger.

He widened his stance and readied the Power Talon, bracing himself for what he knew to be inevitable. Running was hopeless, the terrain would make even his alien-forged bike an easy, lumbering target for the flying beasts and so his only remaining option was to fight and hope to at least acquit himself decently before he was overwhelmed by sheer weight of numbers and rent apart by cruel beaks and talons; at which point the only mercy he could hope for would be to be killed before the Tengu began to feast.

Caiden found himself spared this grisly end by a streak of oddly colourless light and a whoosh of air rushing outwards in all directions, a displacement of the atmosphere that did nothing to slow the horde now descending upon him yet when the light subsided the Purple Ranger was given fresh hope in the form of another Power Ranger.

"Caiden Black. We need to leave" the voice that addressed him was all business and filled with utter conviction, enough that it stunned Caiden out of his fear to such a degree that he could appreciate knowing his own surname with a degree of certainty. The Power Ranger was a slender woman clad in glossy black armour that spoke of technology far beyond that which humanity as Caiden knew it had ever achieved, a simple refined sleekness adorned with silver bracers at the forearms and white armour on her upper torso which was detailed with an angular, stylised and downward facing arrow which was repeated on the visor of her helmet; in the woman's hand was an enormous and flat edged cleaving weapon yet this contributed surprisingly little to the sense on relied Caiden felt.

As the first of the Tengu flock neared the Purple Ranger gave a small, somewhat awkward wave and smiled beneath his helmet.

"It's good to see you again….whichever you it is this time"

The Time Force Black Ranger had been something of a regular fixture in Caiden's life and the Purple Deinonychus Ranger would likely have considered them a friend; were it not for the circumstances of their interactions meaning that the Ranger from the far future never recognised Caiden and each meeting was in fact the first meeting with an entirely different iteration of the person beneath the armour.

Sometimes it was a different person altogether.

By some oddity that Caiden was hesitant to attribute to something as profound as destiny it most often either Cyra Drake or Jen Scotts beneath the helmet, though Cyra's brother Alex, a women by the name of Katie Walker and someone by the name of Nadira who had claimed to not be entirely human had all worn the guise of Time Force Black Ranger. The reason for these discrepancies was, as it had been explained to Caiden, the same fraying of time that had been causing temporal fractures and in fact those points where the flow of time and space had begun to unravel were often indicators that a Time Force Ranger would soon appear.

Today it was Cyra Drake, though once again a different Cyra Drake to the ones Caiden had met previously.

"So….how did you know where to find me this time?" Caiden asked, hoping to break the awkward silence that had lingered in the dusty ruins of what had once been a clock-tower since the two of them had teleported there to relative safety.

"In the future that's where we find your bones" Cyra admitted bluntly as she removed her helmet and shook out her blonde hair, revealing a scar that the last Cyra Caiden had met had sported on the other side of her face "When humanity retakes Earth we manage to identify a lot of the fallen Power Rangers from DNA samples matched with records recovered from the pre-Machine Empire era….your Morpher would have become a relic for that nest of Tengu to pass down from one warlord to another, you were supposed to die today"

"Well….that's cheery" Caiden managed a lopsided grin, offset by a tired sigh as he removed his own helmet and allowed his hair to fall free over his face and shoulders whilst he rubbed his beard.

"You know who I am?" Cyra asked tentatively, clearly unsettled by the notion as she began to deduce what it might mean "How do you know who I am?"

"We've met before...a few times" Caiden's voice was filled with sudden, profound sadness as the loneliness of his nomadic and isolated existence weighed upon him "The first time we met you were coming from the year twenty ninety-six-"

"I left the year thee thousand and seven" Cyra objected, which Caiden nodded along with.

"The first you told me about something called the Cranston theorem, I've met Billy Cranston since and he's just crazy enough to be right" he allowed himself a faint smirk before continuing "Events aren't happening the way they're supposed to, you never tell me more than that but whatever you're doing to try and course correct isn't working and humanities' recovery keeps being pushed back a little more every time a time traveller doesn't show up in the right place or at all….it's honestly good to see you though Cyra, the fact that you're here means that there's still a future to save"

"That….matches with the information I have available to me" Cyra nodded slowly, expression clouding over as she tried to mask something from Caiden before plastering a businesslike look of collected coolness over her face "But you want to see the future saved that's good; there's a way you can help-"

"I didn't promise anything" Caiden interjected bluntly. Hating himself for the mercenary tone of his next words but uttering them nonetheless "And I'll expect payment….There aren't many Power Rangers left, aren't enough resources for us either"

"You need fuel for your Zord" Cyra nodded in understanding "I have an adequate source of power….that won't require you to dismantle the Wild Zord husks in Turtle Cove"

"Excellent….that's a start, but in your future is Blockbuster still in business and are comics still a thing?" the Purple Ranger gave a wide, slightly unhinged grin at his own joke before seeing that it hadn't been received as intended "Hey, someone's gotta remember who we were before all of this….you can't get all the answers from scanning dead peoples' bones"

"I'm not going to dignify that with an answer" Cyra ground out tersely "Are you going to help me or not?"

"That depends on what you're planning" the two Rangers, weary daggered and grizzled before their time by the extremities of their circumstances locked eyes for a few, lingering seconds before nodding in silent agreement before Cyra brushed her blonde locks away from her eyes and tentatively began.

"I was sent back in time to investigate with an anomalous signal being broadcast from Mariner Bay-"

"Absolutely not" Caiden cut her off firmly "If your plan involves going anywhere near that city then I don't wanna be part of it….it's Org territory now, if anyone's there then they're a lost cause and that's a big if; it's more likely that your signal is an Org trap to lure us in-"

"No" Cyra said simply "This signal is being broadcast across time and space, possibly even the multiverse as a whole….that's not Orgs, if they had that level of technology at their disposal then there wouldn't be a future for me to come from. More importantly the energy signature of this signal-"

"Morphing Grid energy?" Caiden rasped out, daring to hope as thoughts of the feeling of something approaching that had plagued him of late began to surface.

"Something close to it that I can't identify" Cyra answered "Maybe another Ranger, maybe something else….I don't know"

"Then why haven't you gone to Mariner Bay?" Caiden asked, gesturing to dust hanging static and motionless in the stagnant air and knowing that if he were to look beyond the clock-tower he would see events occurring in distorted loops "Why are we here in the temporal fracture in Washington?"

"Because it's the only place that's safe for me, I don't have time anywhere else"

"Oh" Caiden breathed out gently, suddenly realising what Cyra had been trying to keep from showing on her features a moment ago.

"Something is happening and I think the signal I was supposed to investigate is part of it" she murmured "But either way I've lost contact with Time Force…..the time-stream has been changed again by something either happening or not happening, it's been corrupted or overwritten somehow and now the future I came from doesn't exist"

"How long do you have?" Caiden asked hesitantly, he had been made painfully well acquainted with death in all its' countless forms over the course of his life but being simply unmade and never existing at all outside of recollections that somehow survived the restructuring of time itself was sinister in a way that the Purple Ranger had no words to describe.

"I don't know" Cyra admitted "Outside of this temporal fracture the time displacement ripple would likely reach me in under an hour relative to when it rewrote the future….Even coming to rescue you was a risk. I doubt I have more than a day before I'm erased"

"You think it might be saving me that caused the change?" Caiden asked, icy blue eyes downcast; Cyra who was herself slowly coming to terms with the fact that she was in fact one of many versions of herself to have tried and failed to save the future through various means simply let out a low, bitter chuckle in response.

"Would saying yes convince you to search Mariner Bay for the source of that signal" Caiden let out a wordless hiss, no curse at his disposal feeling quite adequate at that moment. In truth he wanted to say no, to leave this version of Cyra to fade away and hope that the next Black Ranger from a distant future that he encountered had a plan that was less patently insane and likely to see him meet a horrible demise but that was fundamentally not who Caiden was; he was a Power Ranger and even here and now, in this desolate, hateful and broken world that meant that there were certain standards to be upheld and obligations that hi conscience would not allow him to waver from.

Which in this instance meant that there was only one answer he could give.

"Teleport me back to my Zord to prepare and give me all the information you have, I'll carry this on even if you're not here" Caiden assured Cyra as he reared up to his full height and donned his helmet once more, half-turning before adding "Where exactly in Mariner Bay is the signal coming from?"

"The Lightspeed Aquabase" Cyra answered without missing a beat and upon hearing that Caiden almost reconsidered.

The Purple Ranger perched in the empty window frame of what had once been a high-rise building of some description, staring out into the perpetually frigid darkness to take in the sight of what the once prosperous and thriving port city of Mariner Bay had been reduced to, a particularly nightmarish example of monstrous depravity even by the standards of this timeline.

Project Lightspeed had been an initiative of the United States government, an effort to reverse engineer and recreate the technology of the Power Rangers that had shown unprecedented levels of success, to such a degree that the entire city of Mariner Bay had become a beacon of hope during the civil wars that had ruined the planet, countless people flocking to the city which had been protected by an Aquabase built by reverse engineering alien technology and whose location had kept Bansheera's demonic hordes at bay entirely. When the Machine Empire had arrived they had found the base so firmly entrenched and well prepared that they had simply annexed it as best they could and kept refugees from flowing to it rather than try to combat the Lightspeed Ranger directly.

Then the Orgs had come.

Where Bansheera's demons were incapable of traversing the depths of the sea to attack Lightspeed and its' fortifications directly this fresh breed of abomination suffered no such restrictions and so had fell upon the bastion of humanity with a ravenous and murderous frenzy; infesting the Aquabase with their corrupting presence and dooming Project Lightspeed in its' entirety along with their Rangers as their attempts to recreate Zords came to life and began their berserk rampage even as the hungering and remorseless spirits began to take control over vital systems of the Aquabase itself, sealing exits and airways, flooding vast sections of the base and warping the very structure of the various domed buildings until nothing but a watery tomb remained. As the years had passed countless more Orgs had flocked to the Aquabase, making it one of the largest conglomeration of the demonic spirits since Master Org had led his forces in person and with each new Org to take up residence within it the base had been twisted and contorted even further until what remained was something that Caiden had heard described as akin to old urban legend of a 'Rat King' scored of entities wrapped and tangled around one another, trapped and steadily merging until what remained was a single, monstrous entity, chimeric and cancerous which resembled a tumour of living metal and pulsating, morphing flesh whose constant sloughing and regeneration was so violent that it caused thrashing waves to batter the coast above it whilst at the same time the influence of the Orgs had spread further through the decimated city like a rot; following the countless secret tunnels from the Aquabase into various parts of Mariner Bay where it had erupted and taken hold across the city, the gestalt Org consciousness enveloping entire buildings and granting them sentience only to subsume the new mind into the collective and leave the towering monsters that the process birthed rooted to the spot and screaming as they were digested and reabsorbed back into the hellish pit from whence they had come.

Every moment Caiden spent here filled him with an undefined but undeniable sense of wrongness.

"Damn it all" he hissed through clenched teeth, grimacing beneath his helmet as he planned his next move. Cyra had, as every version of her that he had thus far encountered was, been as good as her word and provided Caiden with the resources and equipment he would need to bring the Deino-Zord and the Mega-Shuttle which served as his base of operations up to almost full functionality; though the teleporter had remained inoperable and that oversight had cost time, several days in fact as the Purple Ranger had refused to even consider the notion of bringing his travelling home anywhere near to the Org infested ruins that he had been tasked with investigating and crossing the blighted terrain between where his Zord had been stationed and his current location had required several detours. During the intervening time contact with Cyra had been lost and Caiden knew instinctively that the Time Force Black Ranger had once again been scrubbed from the face of existence by the fluctuations of the flow of time and allowed himself to mourn her, briefly and without any real ceremony as he would have any comrade who had died a true death and during that short period of introspection and remembrance he had considered the idea of simply reneging on his agreements, part of him reasoned that there was no longer any need to risk himself only for a far larger and more insistent part of his psyche to argue that they were better than that.

He had made promises to Cyra, to the disembodied voice in the light which had bestowed his powers upon him and to the ghosts of those that he had failed to save and now that he knew that the signal his time-displaced friend had spoken about was real he could pretend no longer; the key to fulfilling his promises was ahead of him and it was time to act.

A distant shriek, like tortured metal trying to imitate a bird of prey snapped him out of his momentary reverie.

"Okay let's go" he breathed out, tapping a gauntleted hand to the side of his helmet to adjust a setting of his visor and make proper use of his vantage point. Upon abandoning the bike that Cyra had recovered from Turtle Cove for him once he had reached a point in his journey where the vehicle was not to be trusted Caiden had found a sizeable building with no trace of Org infestation and now, as he stood in one of its' many shattered windows the sensors of his armour made him aware of several things at once.

Firstly the signal that Cyra and now he were responding to, a simple and wordless beacon intended to attract the attention of any capable of recognising it that was, as the Black Ranger had noted broadcasting using something remarkably similar to the signature that would identify a fellow Power Ranger. Secondly Caiden's armour showed the pulsing, writhing masses of Org tissue stretching from their epicentre below the sea as they spread out and infected the city around him, their presence being annotated with something resembling a heat signature which filled with Purple Ranger's visor with an ominous shade of red.

Finally his visor and its' sensors displayed the most strategically viable route towards his location and Caiden waited only a moment longer, taking a deep, steadying breath before putting that information to use.

He leapt out of the window.

"Surf's up!" he yelled to nobody in particular, feeling that he could abandon caution to a degree as the Orgs certainty already knew that he was here as their many forms had eyes in places that he could not imagine; yet such worries were at the back of his mind as the Power itself coursed through every fibre of his being and allowed him to sail through the air in a great arc that cleared several buildings in a single bound before landing in a crouch on single, narrow and twisted strip of rebar protruding from the ruined remains of a skyscraper which he used as a platform from which to vault forwards again.

The Purple Ranger was a blur of movement streaking through the perpetual and unnatural gloom with a series of thundering impacts as he hurtled from one demolished building to the next with a series of acrobatic gestures that left him with an exhilarated sense of freedom, all as he avoided the large Org infested which had once been buildings or entire streets which lurched and grasped at him with movements that were tectonic in their scale and sluggishness whilst on the ground below swarms of lesser Orgs, those that were dubbed 'Putrids' and were too meagre to infest anything at all and existed simply as shrieking, sludgy and largely humanoid shaped chased after the luminous contrail that Caiden left in his wake. For a few fleeting moments it seemed to the Purple Ranger that he might reach his goal intact and untroubled, that his only worries would be those pertaining breaching and surviving the Aquabase itself.

In this cursed timeline such hopes were always misplaced.

The same, metallic, mechanical and simply unnerving shriek that he head early sounded again yet now the clarion call came from far closer, the sound of some screaming and clearly monstrously possessed and twisted propulsion system following the initial sound only a fraction of a second later to indicate just how perilously close the still unseen enemy had gotten.

"Shit!" Caiden snapped, realising midway through a powerful and far-reaching leap that he was now entirely prone and that the he was being stalked by an Org that had likely possessed something from within the Aquabase itself which had allowed to avoid being detected and registered as a threat by his suits' sensors. Just as the Purple Ranger reached the apex of his aerial arc, several dozen stories above the ground the truth of his frantic theorising was realising as a shrieking, vaguely avian mass came hurtling into view faster than Caiden could hope to react to.

The two collided and the Purple Ranger felt himself be sent hurtling off course before his world was consumed by darkness and pain.

Caiden was still alive, his suit having maintained its' cohesion despite his own flimsy grasp of consciousness until he struck the solid ground below at which point his Morphed stated had failed him. All of this was an assumption that the Purple Ranger could within seconds of the world coming swimming agonisingly back into focus, the working hypothesis based solely on the fact that he was alive rather than being reduced to a bloody smear of the ground; though as he struggled to his feet the young man's entire body seemed to scream in protest and the lances of pain that shot through his chest as he spat out mouthfuls of blood with as series of sickeningly wet coughs suggested that he was not entirely without injury.

He was forced to disregard those concerns in favour of a more immediate threat as the metallic scream of the Org that had attacked him reverberated through the sky.

"Deinonychus!" he gasped out, the exclamation painful to give yet still he morphed again; body enveloping in violet light as he transformed. The world around him snapped into much sharper focus as his helmet reformed around his skull, heightening senses and dulling his pain at least a fraction which allowed him to not only know almost instinctively that the swarm of Putrids were drawing ever closer and also to pick out the details of the ruined street, lined with the gutted husks of buildings that he had landed in. Mere seconds after the light of his morphing had subsided an impossibly fast movement at the very edge of his vision sent Caiden surging into motion, drawing the Power Talon and using the flat edge of the curved blade to block the blurred form of his attacker as they came swooping down on him from above. The two forms impacted with a dull boom, unleashing a shock-wave that cratered the ground beneath them that sent the already injured Purple Ranger flying backwards with force that would have sent him crashing through several buildings had he not reacted quickly and drove the blade of the Power Talon downwards, sinking into the asphalt and allowing him to come skidding to a halt whilst crouched on one knee glance up at his attacker, biting back a curse as he saw exactly what this Org had possessed and drawn its' form from.

The Rescue Bird used by the Lightspeed Rangers.

The monstrous creature stood taller than Caiden even with its' hunched forward and skulking gait, its' entire body alternating between glossy blacks, dulled and rusted metallic colours than might have once been silver and the greenish hues of corroded and weathered copper. It's build was an unsettling mix of humanoid, avian and mechanical in ways that leant it an even more ghoulish aspect; its' torso a skeletal mass from which loose wires and sparking and twisted components dangled like entrails whilst it supported itself on digitigrade legs which ended in powerful hydraulic claws that continued to function despite rippling and inhuman muscle bursting through their mechanisms, cutting into the ground with each shifting of the Org's weight. Its' upper body boasted four limbs, a pair overlong, grasping, sinewy and taloned arms littered with jagged shards of metal which peeled away like oddly diseased skin and a pair of wings graced its' back, formed from the splintered remains of the cutting tool of the former Rescue Bird, distended and with strips and tattered flesh now growing between each of its' mutated segments. Finally the Drill of the Rescue Bird had formed the Org's skull, twin pairs of hellish red eyes glaring out from an almost conical head which still bore the spiral thread of the drill bit though it had been split down the centre to form a jagged gash of a maw filled with serrated fangs.

Caiden had no quips or ultimatums for this monster and the Org, with an absence of humans to terrorise had seemingly never learned to speak and so, with no words needing to be said the two lunged at one another.

The Purple Ranger earned the satisfaction of first blood in the true battle, despite the sneak attack that had brought him to the ground, as the two converged on each other in what had seemed to suggest a collision in the midst of the ruins the Rescue Bird Org's leaping, bounding gait had given over to short bursts of gliding and, seeing an opening Caiden had weaved to the side with a graceful pirouette which left the blade of the Power Talon tearing through the right wing of the monster. The victory had been short-lived however as before the Purple Ranger could fully redirect his momentum and press the advantage the grounded Org had used the spiralling movement of its' own crash to turn and face him, distending its' maw and opening it impossibly wide to reveal a pale light gathering within its' chest cavity and welling up in the beasts' gullet.

At which point Caiden realised what had happened to the laser component of the Rescue Bird.

The weapon discharged and the Purple Ranger was hurled backwards, brickwork crumbling beneath them as they were smashed through several walls, vision stolen by the afterglow of the attack and their already injured ribs consumed with fiery agony as their armour was reduced to a charred and blackened ruin at the point of impact.

"Okay, need a plan, need a plan and fast" Caiden gasped out as he forced himself free of the rubble with a groan of pain, taking several staggering steps forwards before sinking to his knees and using the remains of the Power Talon to force himself upright again, in doing so realising that its' blade had been broken at the mid-point to leave a jagged stump.

Which was quickly put to use as the Org attacked again, giving no quarter.

"Damn it!" Caiden almost yelped, the fear in his voice something that would have been shameful were it not so all-consuming. He lashed out with the ruined remains of his weapon and watched in almost slow motion as it tore a bloody gash into the inside of the monsters' left arm before piercing into the point where the limb met torso with an eruption of nauseating black ichor yet the metallic scream that escaped the Rescue Bird Org in response was one of rage far more than it was one of terror. Faster than Caiden could react the oversized limbs of the monster lashed out, smashing him backwards with enough force to knock the air from his punished lungs before it grasped him by the shoulders and leapt several dozen feet into the air, managing to gain an admirable amount of altitude despite the damage to its' wings and strong enough to disregard the Purple Ranger's thrashing and struggling entirely until, in a gesture that spoke of deep, almost primal spite Caiden was thrown bodily back towards the ground which cratered beneath him as he struck it.

Yet the still the Rescue Bird Org did not relent.

Caiden lay flat on his back, stunned, dazed and motionless as he simply stared at the looming shape hurtling ever closer until the Purple Ranger's senses returned to him; too late for him to do more than half-rise into a sitting position with pure terror overcoming every ounce of his being before the Org struck him.

The pain was unlike anything he had felt before.

Metallic talons tore through his gut in a spray of crimson that left his armour rippling and fluctuating from the point of impact, tearing screams of pure agony from Caiden as the sharpened digits that had once been hydraulic tools burst from his back and scored grooves into ground below as the Org held him in place.

From there the Org used its' other leg to stomp down on Caiden's skull and the Purple Ranger watched as warnings flashed insistently across the surface of his visor until the pressure being exerted on his helmet shattered its' surface with an ominous creak of metal; Caiden feeling the cold surface of the Org's claws rend through his helmet and begin to press against the flesh of his face even as blood burbled up into his mouth from the grievous injury to his abdomen.

He was going to die here, Caiden knew and understand that for the simple fact that it was yet as the shadows of the Putrids beginning to swarm around him flitted into his slowly blurring and dimming vision, the Rescue Bird Org screaming in warning and defiance as it sought to keep him as its' own grisly trophy the Purple Ranger spared no thoughts or pity for himself; only lamenting that he had failed to complete Cyra Drake's mission in her absence and that whoever or whatever was using the power of the Morphing Grid to broadcast a signal across time and space would likely go unanswered.

Yet there, in those final moments the impossible happened.

"BE GONE!" a glow like weaponised sunlight, pure and brilliant yet terrible erupted from a million angles at once yet focused into a single point in an open defiance of all logic and Caiden let out a final howl of pain as his wounds were cauterised by the Org that had impaled him been incinerated in an instant, the lesser Orgs gathered around them being destroyed without thought by the being which formed from and possibly within the light, their mere presence enough to convince Caiden that he truly had met his end and that his sanity had departed from the mortal realm ahead of the rest of him.

"It….it can't be" he choked out, his own blood still clogging his throat as he peered through the remains of his helmet at a figure surrounded by light yet comprised of pure, manifest darkness; like an event horizon given form and it was then that the Purple Ranger was certain that he was staring upon the same being that had saved his life once before, granting him his powers in the process. The being floated over the prone and bloodied Ranger, seemingly staring down at him, though without eyes it was impossible to be certain and then it spoke again; its' deep voice felt as much as heard and soothing in a way that went beyond the merely physical.

"Your destiny is upon you child….yet it does not lie here; not in this time, nor this place" Caiden tried to swallow his fear, some irrational part of his mind screaming that this was some mythical reaper come to claim him before the being continued "You were chosen for a reason and the time is now at hand….the key to saving your world lies elsewhere Caiden Black; it's time you met the others that I have chosen to be my Rangers".

With that Caiden's world was consumed by a flash of brilliant white and for a brief moment the Purple Ranger was at peace.

Caiden sucked in deep and desperate gulps of air the moment he realised that he was indeed still alive as the world began to reform around him, spinning and awash with sounds and colours yet his mind was so addled by what he had endured in the previous moments that the information his senses provided was simply disregarded.

After a few, futile attempts to process anything at all Caiden ripped his helmet away and were he in any fit state he would have noticed that not only was the helmet fully restored but his wounds had been healed; his armour was entirely intact and the gaping holes that should have left in the wake of the Org's talons were entirely absent; as it was he simply found himself on his hands and knees with his hair falling about his face as he retched and heaved violently.

"Where….where the hell am I?" he finally managed to gasp as he pulled himself up onto shaky legs that seemed unwilling to cooperate, a cold sweat clinging to him as he took his first look at wherever the being in the light had transported him to.

To Caiden it was a paradise.

The sky was a bright and sunny blue with a few clouds of plain, almost fluffy white littering it and drifting by at a leisurely pace which reminded Caiden of his earliest childhood memories, of the times before monsters, aliens, demons and humanities' wars amongst itself had blackened the atmosphere. The proximity of those clouds revealed that wherever Caiden had found himself was high above the ground, with his first thought being that it was the Animarium only for that possibility to be entirely precluded by the sight of a domed barrier keeping those dwelt here safe; Princess Shayla would never allow such technology to exist on her sanctuary for that was what the barrier was, a product of human science and ingenuity with no room for doubt despite the way the familiar crackling thrum of magical energy that radiated inwards from it, managing to feel for the first time in Caiden's memory soothing rather than being a static tremor that set his nerves on edge.

Still stunned, now into an awed silence the Purple Ranger swept his gaze around slowly and almost sank to his knees in utter disbelief at the sight that greeted him as he turned; upon this floating island borne aloft by the fusion of science and the arcane arts was a city, yet it was one unlike anything that had ever existed on the Earth he had known.

"How?" he croaked out, ice-blue eyes wide and filling with tears of joy at the first real hope he had felt in years and a faint sense of bitterness at the fact that the idea of his own world ever being so peaceful or idyllic was a laughable and distant fantasy.

In the distance vast buildings of stone, like ancient castles but orders of magnitude larger rose from the ground, each of them housing several smaller domes or orbs of some clear material like glass within which a self contained biome representing an area of Earth as it had once been and in some cases other worlds entirely. As massive as the stone and earthworks were, each and every one of them was cast into shadows by trees unlike anything the Purple Ranger had seen before which rose from their midst, giant organic skyscrapers with vast bridges and other thoroughfares weaving between them and even from this distance Caiden could see vehicles, impossible floating things that resembled the descriptions of the future given by the various Time Force Black Rangers.

Just as Caiden was ready to accept that he had found himself in some sort of afterlife in reward for his services as a Power Ranger the air shifted behind him, the familiar outward push that accompanied teleportation as the local atmosphere was minutely displaced. He had only half turned when the image of fiery and bloody red behind him sent the Purple Ranger, whose nerves were clearly still frayed to the point of manic hysteria into a frenzy of motion; a primal roar escaping him as the Power Talon, which had been entirely absent from its' resting place on his back simply appeared mid-slash in his hand.

"WAIT!" a decidedly feminine voice exclaimed and, for reasons that Caiden could not explain to himself the panicked, naive innocence of the speaker cut through his half-crazed fury enough to bring him to a halt, crackling energy that had been gathering around him beginning to dissipate as he allowed his entire body to sag with bone-deep weariness, blade of his weapon cutting into the ground at his feet and his expression becoming one of relief, confusion and total loss as he took in the sight of three Power Rangers he had never encountered before.

To the rear, standing what seemed to a respectful distance away yet still close enough to intervene was a Blue Ranger, a woman wearing a manner of Ranger suit that Caiden did not recognise, sleek and stylised in its' design with an additional layer of armour over it which could best be described as tactical and overall had the air of being a precursor to the Time Force armour, a sentiment completely at odds with the archaic scythe which positively pulsed with magical power that the woman wielded. Beside her was a Ranger wearing what appeared to be the silver armour of the Lightspeed Titanium Ranger albeit with a high collared cape which fanned out behind her in some artificial breeze, as did a mane of golden hair which went unrestricted as this Ranger wore no helmet at all.

The speaker however, who stood far closer than her allies was a Red Wild Force Ranger who was certainly not the Ranger Caiden knew from his own world.

"Uh….hi?" she managed a small wave to complement her nervous greeting though Caiden was simply unable to answer her as he took in the sight of a Ranger Suit that almost identical to that of the Red Wild Force Ranger he knew save of the additions of a skirt and a pair of feline ears adorning her helmet, additionally upon closer inspection the lion emblem adorning her chest did not sport the expected mane. After a moment the Purple Ranger's mind seemed to kick into gear and he forced himself to form words, Jumbled and disjointed as they were.

"Who?….what, where?"

"I'm Wild Force Red, the Blazing Lioness Ranger….but you uh, you can can call me 'Hugs', everyone does" the Ranger before him answered, voice nervous and youthful as she gestured over her shoulder at her mismatched accomplices "Those are Lita and Skye"

"Caiden….Caiden Black, Purple Deinonychus Ranger" he managed to croak out, pausing before giving his full name, eyes lighting up as he remembered that it was actually a certain thing now.

"Woah, a Power Coin….one of the originals" the Red Ranger, apparently named or simply nicknamed 'Hugs' mused aloud upon identifying his Morpher "You're the first person to turn up here with one of those"

"Where is here?" Caiden managed, to rasp out; uncooperative mind suddenly honing to a razor edge and turning his words to a low snarl.

"This" Hugs puffed up with apparent pride as she gestured to their surroundings "Is Skyway City….After the Orgs started winning the war humanity got clever, we pooled the technology for Terra Venture, all of our green energy and magic together to create floating, pollution free cities up here where the Orgs can't reach us….Skyway is humanities' first artificial Animarium"

"Orgs?" Caiden rasped out, voice darkening further still until it sounded like a thundercloud had been given the power to speak "Orgs are here too?….Then that's why I was sent here-"

"We don't know that" Hugs shook her head

"The person, being….thing in the light! They saved me from the Rescue Bird Org and sent me here, talking about destiny-"

"And the others have similar stories" Hugs interjected again before gesturing to the pair of Rangers remaining some distance away "Lita, Skye and others….There've been Rangers from all across the multiverse arriving in Skyway City lately, people from different Earths, different time periods and even other planets entirely….That being in the light you saw, whoever they are they're hand-picking people to make some sort of super Ranger team"

"Then there's been a mistake….I'm not, I can't…." Caiden trailed off, looking away as he thought of his own Earth "I….my world, we lost; we lost everything"

"Oh" Hugs breathed out simply before reaching out and placing a hand on her fellow Ranger's shoulder "I understand….this, everything we have here, it didn't come easily or cheap. The surface is….well, we save what we can"

"Is that what we're being gathered here for?" Caiden demanded.

"I don't think so" Hugs shook her head again "I think that whatever brought you and all the others here knows that something is coming, something bigger than the Orgs….something that could wipe out all out all of our worlds; why else would they bring so many of us from across the multiverse"

"No" Caiden growled simply, the idea of carnage on a cosmic scale rattling him to his very core and causing a deep, righteous fury to bleed out of him "No more….Nobody else dies for nothing"

"Agreed" Hugs nodded, demeanour becoming an odd blend of businesslike and playful as she made a show of pondering to herself "So….do you want a proper introduction to our team or do you want to learn on the job?"

"Are you asking if I want to go and fight some Orgs on the ground while we wait for this multiversal threat?" Caiden chuckled darkly and upon seeing the Red Ranger nod he merely let out a low, rumbling growl of a laugh whilst his face morphed into a feral smile and his discarded helmet disappeared from the ground before manifesting in his hands.

"Well then" he looked at the helmet and realised that if he was, as Hugs had said the first of the Mighty Morphing Power Rangers to appear in Skyway City then he had a legacy and an obligation to fulfil.

"Back to action!"

Author's Notes.

Okay, so this was a fun change of pace for me to write.
I said I was done with Power Rangers fan-fiction after I wrote Aegis and I hate to disappoint anyone but this will continue to be the case.
Caiden Black/The Purple Deinonychus Ranger is an OC I created solely to use in an OC Centric Discord server that I'm a member of and this story is a one shot that I used to develop some ideas that I had for him and the timeline that he hails from.
Basically I wanted to create a Ranger from a world where everything went wrong, with hints of Mad Max, Old Man Logan, Marvel: Ruins, The Last of Us and other Post Apocalyptic media.

But anyway, let's summarise shall we?:
I like the idea that the Power Rangers are a multiversal constant and that messing with them messes with the natural order, like the Justice League in the Dark Multiverse.
A slightly different MMPR just so you know it's a different universe, besides a Megatherium Ranger would be cool and you know it.
I said this on Tumblr but I honestly find it weird that we've never had an official Black Dragon Ranger, I say official because I don't really count Drakkon.
I liked the idea of Tommy and Rita using a disinformation campaign and taking advantage of Earth's politics to get a foothold….Cos if the Dragonzord starts clearing out the wreckage of a natural disaster then the Rangers can either let it happen, or be seen attacking the person trying to do relief work.
And now we get into the meat of what went wrong with this timeline, basically I wanted to create a world that was like a prompt I saw once "All of the apocalyptic scenarios happened, but they cancelled each other out" the universe of Power Rangers is a house of cards and all you have to do is change the order of the villains slightly for things to go wrong.
Also yes, this is the second story where I've killed Tommy from the beginning….I feel like having Tommy around removes any sense of stakes because he'll just pull some bullshit if he's alive.
The Orgs would absolutely wipe the Machine Empire and the idea of Orgs with alien tech including teleporters and spaceships is terrifying.
Planet wide quarantine, yay topical.
The single colony was obviously Terra Venture.
Caiden, the name means Fighter.
Finding a suitable face-claim for Caiden was difficult, eventually what I settled on was basically 'What if Aizawa from MHA was white and dressed like a wasteland nomad?'
Do not be the guy having to run for their life in their underwear.
So there's no Zeo Rangers here, instead they used the crystal to make a forcefield and create a hidden refuge.
Yay for ominous and mysterious backstories.
So the mysterious figure wasn't Zordon, that much is clear.
His base is the mega-shuttle, on a flatbed, being pulled around by his Zord….which is admittedly pretty cool.
Think about it this way, in canon the Rangers went back in time to the Wild West….that obviously never happened in this timeline and so the effects of that trip also never happened, where time travel is involved time works in a loop, which has been broken here.
Also, Billy got done dirty here too.
That's Forever Red Venjix, not RPM Venjix.
Look Andros is a season bad-ass who's canon introduction was an assassination attempt, people need to remember that side of him more.
Yes I'm throwing in references to other Toku series here.
I had to fudge Mack's age a little here but oh well, you can't tell me the idea of the pro thief working alongside a stranded Divatox isn't interesting.
I'm sure you could imagine the kind of things I was gonna do with Orgs in Mariner Bay.
Honestly the attitude of the Wild Force Rangers in this timeline fits well with Animus.
Go Busters felt like the perfect choice for a Japanese government backed team.
So there is no In Space 'Team' as such here, Andros lends out the Morphers on a case by case basis and takes them back afterwards.
The Green Hippo Zord and its' Ranger are actually a nod to the Go Buster Movie.
And finally we get to see the Purple Ranger, the suit takes influence from MMPR, the Solar Rangers, the Green Samurai Ranger and Purple Kyuranger.
I like the idea of the Machine Empire being more calculating than we saw in canon, because it was a kids show and things like "Let our enemies literally each other" wouldn't have gone over well.
I had to have at least one bit of banter in this story and the sauce line was only other canon character to appear in person in this story and it's Cyra Drake, a comics only character.
Caiden is from a world that never had Netflix.
Yeah Cyra was here just to get Caiden to head to Mariner Bay, beyond that she's disposable to the plot and honestly the idea of Rangers just be straight up erased by glitches in time serves to show had bad things have gotten.
This is what I mean by changing which villains face which team causing disaster, the Aquabase was perfect to keep their villains out….Against the Orgs it was doomed.
The game Prototype was source of some inspiration for what's happened to the city itself.
I gave a hint to what kind of Org we were gonna see before I ever showed it.
"Surf's up!" had to throw in an MMPR skydiving scene reference….and every ruined post-apocalyptic city needs a parkour scene.
I probably could have had a continuous scene here but the cut just felt better.
In my head that collision between Caiden and the Org was just pure anime.
Rescue Bird Org, because of course.
I could have had this be a massive fight scene but honestly the idea of showing Caiden being outmatched without a team to rely on felt right….And also I've been writing this after work whilst tired, so there's that.
That gut stomp was just brutal when I imagined it though.
I know that this was Dues Ex Machina, but that's honestly kinda the point because the being in the light is an important character in the lore of the servers' story.
And yay for more mystery.
Look, if there's a time when you're allowed to throw up in public without judgement, this is it.
Now, welcome to Skyway City….An alien/Sci-Fi/Solar-Punk/Magical man-made Animarium that exists as the main setting of the servers' OC story and exists solely because of a discussion of how would humanity, with the experience that it had up to that point in the PR universe adapt to an enemy like the Orgs if they became a protracted a widespread issue.
Hugs, Lita and Skye are other peoples' OCs.
And this is the crux of the OC servers' story and idea, a mismatched team of Rangers, kinda like the Solar Rangers being assembled from across the multiverse to prepare for a coming threat.
I didn't know how to end the story but one of the classic lines is always a solid bet.

As always thank you to everyone that reads this, with a special thanks to those of you that follow, favourite and review.