Chapter Ten:
Denji Palace
Doctor Kuchar wandered the sprawling castle that had sprung up out of the ice covering the north pole a little over a day before. The castle was massive, with wide open corridors, grand halls, and spires reaching up to the heavens, all with an air of warmth that permeated the castle and kept him alive despite the freezing temperatures outside.
As he paced, he ran his hand along walls that seemed similar to marble, probably made of an equivalent material for the beings who built the place. He remembered how it had come to life out of nothing the moment Sean had pressed the five gemstones to the ice. It had reminded him of reports of how the pyramid at Giza had transformed into a flying fortress. Except that while the fortress had been full of black and purple and gray, with twisting thorns and membranes that almost seemed alive, this castle seemed to have been carefully hand-crafted out of this alien marble, everything a glistening blue color.
He had been wandering the castle for hours, since the moment Sean had left to do whatever it was the Pharaoh Mask had wanted him to do, searching for some kind of answer, something he could do to stop this invasion from coming.
The walls were covered in murals that seemed to shift as he watched them, images depicting what he assumed was the entire history of the castle's builders. Here and there, entire rooms seemed to be devoted to various planets they had visited, aliens they had befriended. But the most common theme among it all was a princess that seemed almost humanoid, glowing with a bright aura, a gemstone gleaming at the top of her head. In most of her depictions, she was surrounded by a group of what looked like bodyguards, each bearing another glowing gemstone at their wrists. As Doctor Kuchar looked at them, he couldn't help but notice that the gemstones were all the same colors as the five power rangers. He'd never been one for fate, or destiny, or anything like that, preferring science and cold hard fact, but looking at this mural of five warriors from another time and another planet, he couldn't help but wonder.
An alert sounded. Doctor Kuchar looked out through the iridescent windows to see two figures approaching fast. He retraced his steps back to the central chamber to greet them, a massive open atrium with a domed ceiling decorated with stars: the stars surrounding Earth specifically. In the center stood a machine, a gigantic circular ring that would soon be the portal the invaders would come through. At one end, a protrusion stuck out like a console, the five gemstones set inside it.
A hole opened at the very top of the dome as the two figures raced inside. Doctor Kuchar stepped back from the console so as not to drum up suspicion just in case. The two figures landed on the floor before him, one the Pharaoh Mask, looking just as he had before, except that now his armor had a distinct glow to it, and its rough edges had been repaired. The creature standing beside him, Doctor Kuchar had never seen in person, but he knew him by description well enough.
The Fuhrer rose to tower above the doctor, a grayish-green alien face surrounded by four tentacles plated with black segmented armor. His body was far from humanoid, with large, sickle-like limbs, one of which was stained a reddish-brown. The creature scuttled on its legs a bit, like a spider, as it looked around the massive room. "Ah, the Denji Palace," he said, in that same soft, soothing voice he was known for. "Identical to the way it looks back on my world, except for the constellations of course. They're different."
Doctor Kuchar bristled his mustache and stepped forward. "Where's Sean?" he demanded.
The Fuhrer pulled his gaze down from the ceiling. "Why, Daniel Kuchar," he said. "It's so nice to finally meet you in person." The creature crawled his way around him, one of his tentacles brushing the doctor's face. "I'm a big fan of your work. Truly, I am."
Doctor Kuchar scowled. "Where's Sean," he demanded again.
"Sean?" the Fuhrer said. "Why, you mean the blue ranger? Sadly, it seems he has been freed from our control. Your ranger team is quite resourceful. You should be proud."
Doctor Kuchar stared, stunned. Sean was free? Could it be true?
"Don't think that means you are freed from our service, slave," Khamun said, stepping up behind him.
"Now, now, my friend," the Fuhrer said, cutting him off. "Let us not be tyrants. Doctor Kuchar has done good work for us. He is free to go."
Doctor Kuchar looked at him suspiciously. "Really?"
"Of course," the Fuhrer said. He glanced out the window at the cold barren landscape beyond. "You will have to find your own way back, of course. You can manage that, right?"
Doctor Kuchar stared up at him. The Fuhrer smiled back, his alien mouth showing rows of sharp teeth. He turned away and swept over to the machine, spreading his three-fingered hands across the console, making sure the five gemstones were set in place. "It's all ready to go?" he asked.
Doctor Kuchar nodded. "It is," he said.
The Fuhrer looked up at him. "I assume you tried to sabotage it while you were here," he said.
Doctor Kuchar swallowed, looking between his two enemies. He took a deep breath and nodded his head. "I did," he admitted.
The Fuhrer smirked. "I expected you would try," he said. "And how did it go?"
"It didn't."
"No, I don't expect so. The Denji were master builders, every design of theirs a work of genius, never a flaw in sight. No human or Vader alike could ever hope to disable something of theirs. It's just a shame that they always lacked the killer instinct to use it all the right way."
He studied the panel for a second. Grabbing the blue and green stones, he shifted them and their slots one hundred and eighty degrees along a circular grid. He then took the yellow and pink stones and turned them ninety. Finally, he twisted the red stone a full three hundred and sixty and pressed it inward. The panel started to glow, the light spreading to the ring beyond. The ring shifted, lifting itself off the ground and starting to spin.
It spun faster and faster, wind picking up around it as light sparked inside and sharp bursts of lightning were funneled into towers along the side. Doctor Kuchar covered his face and stepped back.
"It has begun," the Fuhrer said. He turned his attention to the Pharaoh Mask. "You have done well, my friend," he said. "How are you? Did the stone regenerate your body as we'd hoped?"
Khamun stepped back from him as the Fuhrer reached up to try and remove his mask. "No," he said. "It did not, Soto. Behind this armor, I am merely a walking corpse."
The Fuhrer tilted his head. "A shame," he said. "I had hoped it would work." He raised a tentacle. "Please, let me see you anyway. I wish to see my old friend again."
Khamun hesitated, then nodded. He reached his hand up and fiddled with the clasps on his mask. As he pulled it away, a horrid smell filled Doctor Kuchar's nose and dust fell away. Behind the mask, the pharaoh's face was a nightmare, reminding him of old black-and-white horror movies of the living dead. The flesh was all still there, but it was dry, preserved by ancient Egyptian embalming techniques. His nose was gone, and his eyes were pale, glassy spheres rolling around inside his sockets. It took everything the doctor had in him not to look away.
The Fuhrer studied him for a moment. "You have grown old, my friend," he said.
Khamun nodded. "I know," he said.
A tentacle rested on his shoulder. "Fear not, my friend. When this invasion is over, and this world is ours, you will be restored to your youthful glory."
Doctor Kuchar crossed his arms, his face turning a beet red with anger. "How can you do this?" he said. "I don't understand."
The pair looked at him, and the doctor stepped up to face the Pharaoh Mask. "You are selling out your own planet, your own people. Everyone is going to die because of him, and you're just letting it happen. Why? Can't you see he's using you. That's all he's ever done is use the people who followed him. You're all just his puppets. In the thousands of years since you lived, there hasn't been a single human he hasn't used up for all that they were worth and then thrown away when he was done with them."
The Pharaoh Mask's gloved hand struck the doctor hard across the face, knocking him to the floor and making him bleed. "You will hold your tongue, worm," he said. "You think just because I am human that I owe humanity anything. From the moment I was born, I was beaten and starved and enslaved. Only when I met Soto was I truly free."
"And Diego Jordan was a homeless orphan," Doctor Kuchar said. "Until the Fuhrer used his desperation against him, offering him food in exchange for his service."
"Enough!"
"It was the same with the Sun Mask. The Fuhrer fueled his yearning for power and turned him into a monster."
"I said enough!" Khamun reached into his robe to draw his scepter, only to remember it had been broken.
"What about the Golden Mask, a struggling actor rejected from every playhouse. Until the Fuhrer took notice of his talent. And the Iron Mask, a scientist whose work was constantly being overlooked, except by him. Or even the Volcano Mask, grandson of a former Nazi, his family forced into hiding. The Fuhrer fed their anger, their discontent, their backwards outdated beliefs, keeping them all alive until he could offer them a chance at 'redemption.'"
Khamun grabbed Doctor Kuchar by the collar and forced him back against the wall. "I said enough!"
"And then there's Leon Hunnisett, and Cecil Carlin, and frankly most members of the Black Cross. They were merely political dissidents, people who disagreed with unification and felt displaced by their sudden loss of a nation to call their home. Your Fuhrer used them all and look what's happened to them. You think you're special, Pharaoh, but you're just the first."
Khamun scowled and lowered Doctor Kuchar, getting up close enough that the doctor could smell his putrid breath. "Do you really think I don't know that?" he asked. He tapped the side of his head. "It's all right here, every last bit of it. I. Don't. Care. I would rather be a puppet to him than any of my own kind. Do you understand me?"
He let Doctor Kuchar go, dropping him back to the floor. "You have outlived your usefulness to us. If you want to go on living, I suggest you shut up and stay out of our way."
Doctor Kuchar forced himself up into a sitting position, rubbing his shoulder. "I understand," he said.
Khamun turned away without another word, stepping back up to stand beside Soto. The Fuhrer's eyes watched him as he approached, Khamun's own eyes meeting them, the staunch look of devotion there unwavering. Soto smiled and turned with him to face the portal. "It won't be long now," he said.
"No, it won't," Khamun agreed.
The light grew brighter and brighter as the wind grew stronger and lightning flashed, all contained within the ring, another aspect of Denji design the Vader Clan had yet to master. Suddenly, the light plunged inward, forming a vortex. "Here they come now," the Fuhrer said.
Doctor Kuchar got back to his feet, pressing himself against the wall. He looked around, desperate for anything more he could do. His hand touched the wall, and to his surprise, five stars on the ceiling lit up across the room, just outside of Khamun and Soto's view. Five stars forming a slightly twisted "W" shape, a constellation the doctor knew well: Cassiopeia.
He turned his head left to right, but none of the other stars glinted the way these did. But what did it mean?