Shattered Peace

Jason stood up, feeling like he was Atlas with the weight of the world balanced precariously on his shoulders. He didn't have the luxury of being a god. Already he could feel mortal blood spilling from his veins. He knew what it was like to fight and kill actual men. He knew what it was like to look at the face of an enemy that looked and felt just as he did. Jason had seen a man die at his feet that wasn't a creature created by some alien creature bent on domination. It made it that much harder to face death.

A shadow was rising to replace the sun. Their enemy had already claimed the lives of all on Triforia and Aquitar who had not escaped to the stars. He didn't know who they were, or where they were coming from , but he knew that they came under the banner of starting a new beginning. They wanted to destroy the universe, to create it again in a new image from the ashes.

"Come to bed, Jase," Emily told him. "Just come to bed."

He couldn't stand to look at her. Every time he did, he kept replaying the day's events in his head. He kept thinking about how he had to leave her.

"Jason, look at me."

Jason turned around and looked at his wife. "I don't know how we're supposed to stop this, Em."

She took his hand. "You guys are the best, you'll figure it out."

"We're only so many, how can we defend the whole planet."

"You used to do it all the time, Jason."

"That was different. Rita, Zedd, Divatox, they were jokes, Emily. They were stupid perverted creatures with a thirst that was quenched with a little destruction. They always stopped with one or two swipes at a building and came back another day, this, I don't think that this will stop with a few buildings. I think this is going to spread until the whole world is gone." He closed his hand around hers. "The world will burn until there is nothing but ash and smoke and everything that we know and love is utterly destroyed. There will be no water to quench the fires, for they will raze even the oceans."

"You won't let that happen, Jason."

"How can I stop it?"

"Concentrate the attack. You know it's possible. If you can, get them all here, all the soldiers, you are strong enough in a large group to fight them, Jason."

He turned to face her. "I think I know what you're talking about. You're talking about a suicide."

"No, I mean detonate your morphers, release their power on them. Finish it, Jason."

"There isn't enough power in them."

"Zordon told you that your Power came from your hearts. You can do it Jason. A concentrated blast in the central part of the city, just enough to stop them."

"It might work, theoretically. That is, supposing that they all attack Angel Grove, and not the rest of the world as well."

"Give them what they want."

"That's insane."

"Give them destruction, give them their rebirth. Let them raze Angel Grove. Let them come for the cheese and be caught in the trap."

"We would have to evacuate."

"If you evacuate, the plan won't work."

"I can't believe you're suggesting this!" Jason shouted. "You're suggesting that we use innocents as bait."

"I'm suggesting exactly what I know you were thinking, Jason. A few deaths to save the rest of humanity. That is a casualty well worth it."

"I won't use you as bait."

She wrapped her arms around his waist. "Jason, you and I both know that martial arts and fancy suits alone aren't going to save us this time. The Power Rangers can't do this without help."

He knew she was right. "What if things don't go as planned?"

"You know what the alternative is, Jason. Don't fail."

He nodded. "All right, I'll tell the others our plan."

"Now come to bed, Jason."

He relaxed. "One last night?"

"No, just an ending to a chapter." She let her blonde hair out, tumbling down her shoulders. She turned out the light and lit the candles so that they cast firefly shadows in the darkness.

Somehow Jason would have to get the others to agree to his plan.

And they had to execute it to an uncanny precision.

If they failed now, the entire world would pay the price. Every last living being would exhale one last time and feel the life leave their lungs like the summer sun shrinking beneath the everlasting clouds.

"Wes?" Jen woke to find him standing near the window, fully dressed. He turned and looked back at her, his face drawn.

"What's wrong?" she asked, jumping out of bed and coming to his side.

He turned away and continued staring out the window. "I keep thinking..." he said quietly. "What if we weren't meant to know about this, because we die."

"I would never keep that from you."

He turned back and stared hard into her brown eyes. "It goes against everything we stand for. You can't know your future, or you change it and everything is wiped out. Billions of lives will never exist. You might not realize it, Jen. But if you knew my fate, you wouldn't tell me. No one would."

"I've broken the rules before, Wes. If I could see what is going to happen, I would do everything I could to make sure we survive this."

He stopped her by putting a firm hand on her shoulder. "Just stop, Jennifer."

"Stop what?" she cried out. "I'm here with you, and if we die we'll die together. I don't know what's going to happen, but I'm not afraid to die if I'm with you."

"What's it like to be from the future, Jen? What's it like to know every single horrible event that happened in the past could be stopped and you can't do anything? I've never asked you, because I never wanted to know."

"It's not my job..."

"Not your job to save people?" He turned away again.

"It's not my job to change the past. I have to live with that. My job is to make sure that others, like Ransik, don't."

"Then why do you keep coming back here, Jen? Why are you here?"

She threw a pillow across the room. "I'm here because this is what I was born to do, Wesley. Can't you just be happy with that? I am a Power Ranger, I follow orders, I do what my commander says I have to do to keep the timeline. I'm here because it was meant to be. Why can't you just be happy with that?"

Wes turned and caught her lips with his own. "I can't take this any more, Jen. I can't face having you leave again. Each time you come back to me it's a little harder to say goodbye."

He turned and grabbed his keys, closing the door behind him and walking off toward his motorcycle.

Jen stood in stunned silence, her fingers lingering over the place where his lips met hers. The skin felt broken into a thousand pieces.

The BioLab auditorium was even more silent the moment everyone took their seats for the final deliberations. Tommy stood up and moved toward the front of the room.

"News arrived today that KO-35 was attacked last night. The colony has suffered extensive damage, but reports speculate that as many as fifteen hundred people have managed to escape the carnage in underground passages. That is more than half of the population. Sad as it is, this is the best news we've received this week."

Andros clutched his sister's hand tightly, glanced over at Zhane and felt himself begin to slowly unravel.

"Triforia has been scouted by a ship in the area and has been confirmed as uninhabitable. Aquitar has also been marked as a casualty. Eltar's current state is unknown, but is also being considered a loss. Mirinoi has been spared currently, but we don't know if or when an attack will arise there."

"On the up side, we now know a time frame for an attack on Earth. A select few stations here on Earth that know about the attack have put a ball-park figure at thirty-six hours from now. The time dilation field around the main cruiser will envelop Earth at exactly seven AM Pacific time tomorrow. At this time we will all be suspended in a single moment. To the world outside it will seem as though the event of the attack will happen in less than actual time. As was seen with the prior attacks on several worlds, the ship arrived, and was gone before the planets nearby realized what was happening."

"Tommy isn't exactly sure how to describe this all to you," Billy said quickly, "So I've prepared a little simulation for you all." Billy started a video as he spoke.

"Basically, the ship warps in from outside our basic understanding of time, from a place in the future or whatnot, and causes a massive shift in the time around it. This causes a ripple effect around the warp zone, the planet seems to stand still, allowing massive amounts of destruction in a moment's time. Think of a rock hitting water, when the rock hits the water it does damage to the surface layer immediately, but it takes several moments for the ripples to dissipate long enough for us to see where the rock struck the surface. Imagine if you could freeze time at the exact moment the rock hits the water. By the time everyone realized what was happening, the rock would already have done damage, everything else is aftershock."

Kira raised her hand, "Could you tell me how this is relevant at this point in time. I get the fact that we're screwed, I don't need a physics lesson."
Billy nodded, realizing how frustrated everyone was getting. "The point is, we might be able to do this in a way that causes minimal damage if we focus the attack on a single point." He started his simulation again. "One rock in a pond is much better than say- five or six rocks at once..."

"So what you're saying is that we need to have our army attract the hostiles to a single point on Earth and hope we can take them out before the time field catches up with us and they move on before we realize what hit us," Taylor said quickly without pause.

"Exactly. The ship will be most vulnerable just as it starts it's attack. The moment when the rock hits the pond and we are trapped in the time field is when we have to move. If we can stop them within this window, we just might be able to survive this attack."

"They tried that on Eltar," Gavriel said impatiently. "They tried to stop the field from causing dilation, but it didn't work. The enemy soldiers kept them at bay long enough to beat the window. They accelerated their speed and were gone before my people knew what hit them."

"For God's sake people, shut the hell up!" Hunter yelled. "I have a huge headache right now and your not making it any better." He stood up and leaned against the chair ahead of him. "What's the plan and how do we make it work?"

"He's right. We're wasting time," Blake agreed. "Arguing about how we're going to die isn't helpful."

"Jason," Tommy said, stepping down and letting his friend take the stage.

"I have a plan, and I know how we can stop what happened on Eltar from happening here."

Gavriel smirked. "I'm sure you do."

"We have our powers, maybe it's time to use them. Master Mao said we needed to start thinking about a different kind of power. The source of our Ranger powers still resides inside us, if we can tap that power, we can stop them."

"Stop them how?" Shane asked, "We have a short window to work with here, and from what I know of the morphing grid, most of our powers stopped working years ago."

"We can call on them one last time, with Zordon's help. We can bring them all together to create an energy anomaly that should be strong enough to stop the time dilation field and destroy the enemy ship."

"We should?" Lucas groaned. "That's promising."

"Does anyone else have a better plan?"

Gavriel shook his head. "He's right. The power of the morphers might just give you the advantage that Eltar didn't have. I was wrong to doubt you. My father was right to trust this world's inhabitants with our prized technology."

"Right," Eric said quietly. "I guess this would be a good time to mention that Zordon is awake for those who don't already know."

"He's working on connecting to the grid now," Justin chimed in. "He's got a good amount of power built up right now from Eric's Q-morpher. That should last him long enough to help us out."

"Before he dies," Alyssa said, cementing the fears of everyone in the room.

"Yes," Gavriel said quietly. "His last battle. This will consume the last of his energy. But he would have wanted this."

"What about Demetria?" TJ asked, "What will happen to her?"

"My sister will survive," Gavriel told them assuredly. "She has returned to her human form with the help of Wesley's powers."

Cassie turned toward him. "Your sister?"

"One of two," he told her unflinchingly. "The other was lost long ago to a dark destiny. Her name was changed, her mind destroyed, but we never forgot her. She was not as lucky as the one in this room. The transformation back to her normal state took her life." As he spoke he stared hard at Karone. "Astronema knew her well."

Karone turned away, burying her head in Zhane's shoulder, trying not to travel back to those horrid times when she had been a slave to her own body.

"You all knew her as Divatox, the twin sister of our beloved Demetria"

Carlos closed his eyes as everything began to set in. "Divatox hated Demetria above everyone else. I always wondered why."

"Now you know. The day of truths has come."

"If we have thirty six hours left before game time, I think we need to get some things straight," Adam said, turning the conversation back in on itself. "We need to make sure all our bases are operational, that our teams are coordinated, and that we have all the supplies we need to do this."

"You are exactly right, Adam," Andrew Hartford called from his desk in San Angeles. "Each and every one of you will be given a heart monitor and a communication device similar to those already given to the Lightspeed team by Angela Fairweather. I want you all to make sure they are synced and ready to go. Secondly, each of you will be given a sector of Angel Grove to defend until the time is right for us to create the vortex. Remember, the key point is to stay alive. You are more important than the citizens, try to remember that. Without you, more than a few people are going to die tomorrow. Thirdly, keep in close contact with your teammates. Under no circumstances are you to separate yourselves. If anyone is injured, stay with them and make sure they get to city center by crunch time or the plan is a bust, do you understand me?"

Each of them nodded.

"I've wired each of the devices to connect visually back to each of us," Hayley reminded them from Reefside. "If one of the teams gets into trouble we will attempt to send backup."

"What about Princess Shayla?" Merrick said quietly, barely audibly. "What about her role in all this?"

"Shayla was an unintended casualty of the war raging on Eltar. I'm afraid she was there when the first bombs exploded. I couldn't find her body, Merrick. I'm sorry, I hear she was your lover." Gavriel stood up and walked to Merrick's side. "Eltar will remember her sacrifice when it is reborn."

"That's not good enough. I saw her here before she died. I saw her with my own two eyes."

Gavriel shook his head. "That's impossible."

"Don't tell me that's impossible. I saw her..."

"We all did," Cole promised. "She was there one minute and gone the next."

"In that case, she must have channeled herself just long enough to come to you before she died. You must have meant a great deal to her, Merrick. Teleportation is a rare gift, one used only in the most extenuating of circumstances."

"She can't be dead," Merrick told him. "I won't accept that. I won't..."

"I would know if my cousin still lived, wolf," he promised. "Please forgive me."

Cole took Merrick's shoulder and Alyssa wrapped her arms around his waist. "Mer..."

He brushed them away and pushed his way out the door and out into the streets of Silver Hills. Each step of the way a dark shadow followed him, the shape of a wolf with glowing silver eyes.

"I'm scared dad," Mack said without holding anything back. He was sitting in his room at the hotel, eating an apple in silence.

"I know, Mack. I know." Andrew smiled at his son. "Promise me you'll look out for your team."

Mack nodded. "I could do no less, but, Dad, I'm no superhero, I don't have an indestructible body. I know what it's like to die, and I don't want to die."

"I gave you the only gift I had to give, Mack. I hope that you finally learn how to use it," Andrew said quietly. "Strength is a mindset, Mackenzie. Don't forget that."

He stared up at the ceiling. "Dad?" he asked, not sure if he knew what he was asking. "I never asked you if you were in love. I want to know what it feels like before..."

Andrew shrugged. "I was in love once, with your mother."

"I don't have a mother," Mack said blankly.

"Sure you do," Andrew said with a grin. "I met her in college, Linear Algebra. She was light haired, like you. Her name was Raine. She died that summer in a car accident while on her way home to Virgina."

"What was she like?" Mack asked, sitting back and staring at the dots on the ceiling, counting them, ten-by-ten.

"She was beautiful and kind, I loved her very much. She gave me you, even though she'll never know."

"You do realize how creepy that is, right?" Mack told him blankly.

Andrew sighed. "We all do what we can in life, Mack. We do what we need to keep love alive. Don't forget that." Andrew stared back at his son's face. "Mack, I love you."

"I love you too," Mack said as he turned off the monitor and walked back outside toward Rose and Will who were sitting by the courtyard fountain with their luggage, ready for the inevitable drive to Angel Grove and an uncertain fate.

"What are you thinking?" Blake asked Tori as he sat in the back of the SUV between his brother and her. He held her hand tightly, impulsively.

"You really want to ask that question?" Tori asked, trying to smile but failing half way.

"Right," he said, letting the conversation drop. "What about you, bro?"

Hunter sighed. "Probably the same thing you're thinking, Blake." He ruffled Blake's hair. "I was hoping this wouldn't happen. I was hoping we'd all just ride off into the sunset or something cliché like that. Should have known."

Dustin turned around from the front seat next to Shane. "I'm thinking I need a shower," he said with a wrinkle of his nose. "I feel all yucky inside."

Cam smiled from where he was reading a book in the second row of the SUV next to Conner and Ethan. "I don't think water will wash that away, but let me know if it does."

Conner nodded from where he sat talking to Krista. She kept insisting that she could drive up and meet them, but every time she suggested it, he would shoot her down. "I want you someplace safer than Angel Grove. Stay there, please baby." Krista's voice would raise, and he would calmly tell her he loved her and change the subject. Ethan could tell he just wanted to hear her voice. He needed to know that she would be there for him on the other side.

Ethan shrugged, feeling the need to pull out his PSP for a moment, just so he could finish his last level of Final Fantasy 7 Dirge of Cerberus before the world ended. He sat on his hands, trying not to feel like he was losing control of himself. The flashes of his first morph kept coming back, recollections of power and strength. He felt none of that now.

Tori blasted a tiny spray of water at Dustin from the back and he turned around, blowing her hair into a tiny tornado. She smiled up at him. It felt good to use her power for something fun, if only for one last time.

Shane looked calmly at the road ahead, watching for crazy California drivers that would stop at nothing to beat him to the destination. Even a long line of black SUVs wouldn't stop them from getting antsy. He felt his mind wandering back to Skyla, the weight of her body in his arms, the knowledge that he hadn't saved her still wore him thin, each night he kissed a woman he thought of her and how different she'd made him feel. Like his soul was on fire. He'd never replaced that feeling, and he wondered for a moment what it would be like to join her in death. He wondered if that would be so terrible after all.

Chip sat outside the room, waiting patiently for Nick to open the door and let him in. When the door finally opened, it was Xander who stood there. He was holding a bright flowering bush in his hand.

"What are you doing on the porch?" he asked with a grin.

"I was trying to be polite," Chip said with a smile. "Guess that was fruitless, considering you and Vee..."

"Ah, yeah, guess I should have knocked first," he said with a wink.

Xander handed him the bush and went through the door. Chip followed without a thought. Nick and Madison were sitting on opposite sides of the table with Vida in between them.

Daggeron handed Chip a plate of spaghetti and sat down on the couch. "I appreciate you trying to do the right thing," the older man told him. "But I think we've got things handled, finally."

Madison looked over at him and then down at her lap hastily. It looked to him as though she was trying to suppress the sudden urge to laugh uncontrollably.

"We've all decided to put our best foot forward and try not to let other issues influence us right now."

"Right, that's good," Chip said as he dug into the noodles. He missed the atmosphere of the Rockporium, when they'd used to sit together and laugh about stupid things. That time had ended all too abruptly, leaving him in a world he neither wanted nor understood.

Xander flopped down beside him, calling his mother in Australia with the most serious look Chip had ever seen written on his face. The Xander he knew was suddenly a changed man, a man who seemed like he was coming to grips with his mortality, and what scared him most was that he knew the feeling. Exactly.

Ryan caught Kelsey's chin as she brought it down, pulling her lips against his in one fluid motion that made her dizzy. She closed her ethereal blue eyes and for a moment the only feeling in the world was the feeling of his body against hers.

"Don't be afraid of the future," he told her, touching her bare skin, running his fingers down her neck.

Kelsey nodded, realizing that he was right. She couldn't do anything to change what was coming to them. She had to face it. In a movement her hands were on his bare back, feeling the muscles and skin and she lifted his shirt over his shoulders.

Kelsey let him press her further against their bed of clouds, caress her body and mind. For all her worries, he was remedy. He was life when all things around her were dead and wilting.

"I want to love you forever," he told her with absolution. "You are all I will ever need to feel powerful."

Kelsey smiled, and nudged his chin. "I want that to be enough."

Ryan nodded. They had to go like soldiers to war. Born with a solemn duty, the could never back down.

"Somewhere out there a child will wake up for his last morning tomorrow."

"Don't think about that, Kels," he told her.

"How do you not think about it?"

"If we succeed, the world will forget these days. They will blame them on some freak accident, it will be just another tragedy written in the pages of history. It will be remembered only by a name that means nothing in the end." He kissed her forehead. "People don't want to believe in evil, Kelsey."