A\N: WARNING! I still have my Tommy bodyguard! WARNING! (Yes...that will be handy to remember after this.)
Let me tell you a story.
It starts a long, long time ago, back in the 90's and the days of Angel Grove. Back then, long before the world you know, there were warriors called Power Rangers.
Power Rangers were five highly skilled martial artists, who had been chosen by an alien named Zordon to defend the world from Rita, a space witch. At least, that was what he said. But, like all lies, there was one bit that didn't quite make sense.
The Rangers were all sixteen years old.
When Rita, driven insane by her long confinement, chose a Green Ranger herself, she also chose a sixteen-year-old, a boy named Tommy. She believed that where she had failed, perhaps a child would succeed.
She was wrong, and her error nearly cost Tommy his life.
Zordon, believing Tommy was under Rita's influence, attacked Tommy's mind, using telepathy he could barely control to destroy and rebuild it. It lasted for a few months, during which Rita began training the Rangers against monsters, so subtly the Rangers themselves never suspected. The Rangers grew stronger, brighter, five candles leading a world of light. They were beloved by not just a city and not just a nation, but by their entire planet.
And then Tommy snapped.
He had never known a mother. To him, Rita's spell had made her the only mother he had ever or would ever know. But Zordon had all but brainwashed him into thinking his mother was evil. Therefore, according to Tommy's logic, he must be evil as well. So he attacked Jason and Zordon, trying in vain to lash out at a theory that wasn't true to begin with.
Rita, witnessing this, intervened.
She, with the help of the Rangers, saved Tommy's mind. She offered him the love and compassion that he had been so desperately searching for. But by this point, Earth was under siege from Eltar, who wanted to rule this planet as well as their own, and Tommy's friends were prisoners of Zordon, who was torturing them as he had once done to Tommy.
Rita asked Tommy to help save them.
He agreed.
His Power Coin meant that he could easily slip into the Power Chamber to free his teammates. Rita had an army of monsters, however, which would respond only to her or Goldar; she had to go and offer to help Earth's forces. Tommy teleported down to the surface while she rallied her troops.
Sneaking into the Power Chamber was far from hard. After all, how difficult could it truly be for a child to know his own home? Every rock, every duracrete wall, every corner and every room were as familiar to Tommy as the back of his own hand.
It was no matter to find the same chamber where he had been tortured.
He spent the entire journey tense, waiting, but the Power Chamber seemed...empty, strange, foreign. Oh, he knew it well enough, it had once been his home. But it seemed odd, as if someone had left all the lights on and simply gone away.
He shoved it from his mind when he found the right room and opened the door.
There were his friends.
They were pale, eyes red-rimmed and voices silenced. Two of them were huddled together, seeking comfort; the rest were simply staring into space, trying to follow their shattered innocence into the next life.
Tommy fell to his knees beside Kimberly. He could hardly bring himself to, but he reached out and took her into her arms.
And, like a statue from myth, she awoke.
Tears and joy greeted him, and the two went to their friends, taking hands and placing fingertips on shoulders, releasing the spell of trauma and despair that had held them silent. They clung to each other, all weeping freely, as much for innocence lost as for the path home found.
Then, finally, Jason spoke.
"Guys, we got our asses handed to us." He said simply.
"By our friend." Trini added, disgusted.
"Our father." Kimberly corrected her, not bothering to hide the tears in her voice.
"Our father." Jason agreed. "But that's bull. All of this...it's been bull."
"Bull?" Billy asked. He was youngest, and the thought of what Jason might be suggesting frightened him the most.
Jason reached out and took his teammate's hand.
"Yeah, Bill." He said quietly. "Bull. We got played, plain and simple. By everyone. And Rita might have tried to save us, but in the end, if we want out, we've gotta get out ourselves, because these are our lives."
The Rangers' eyes turned to him, silent and attentive.
"I say we go up there," Jason said, nodding at the ceiling, "Take our powers back, and go find the army. And then..." He blew out a breath. To say this was fighting every urge he had, everything Zordon had ever told him. "Then, we tell someone. Not about us. Not how old we are. Just that we're the Rangers, and we're gonna help 'em save the world."
"But Eltar has warships!" Kimberly protested, shivering. "What if they win, Jas? We're dooming all of Earth!"
"No." Zack said quietly. "Jas is right. We gotta do this. Otherwise we just let Zordon win."
Jason looked at Kimberly. "Can't force you, sis."
Kimberly considered. But then, silently, she slipped her hand into Tommy's, because in the end her love for Tommy-and the group she was a part of as well-won out over any fear she may have had.
And, together, they stood.
The Rangers were sixteen. They didn't know that every culture had a coming-of-age rite. How could they, when their own culture disdained ritual as mere superstition?
But the essence of any such rite is simple.
The child finds himself alone, often put in the situation by a parent. Danger is everywhere, and the child is left with only one weapon, if any at all.
But the child dies.
The innocence, the belief that someone else will always be there, is shattered that night. And in the place of innocence rises an adult, one who can not only cope with life, but handle it with aplomb. When the rite is over, an adult emerges from the rite, ready to be welcomed into the world of responsibility and freedom.
The Rangers were sixteen. But they had passed their rite.
And they thought the hardest battle was yet to come.
As it turned out, they were wrong. Tommy's initial feeling had been right-the Command Center was empty, save for a broken Alpha V. From what little they could get out of him, Zordon had left to fight Rita, on a planet the Rangers had never heard of. The Rangers, fearing the worst for their foe and newfound friend, took their morphers and Zords and went back to the moon.
They found an army of monsters, Goldar, Scorpina, Finster, and a letter.
The letter was written in symbols only Tommy could read, and as he read it aloud, tears began to pour down his face. Rita had left them to fight Zordon, in fulfillment of an oath she had once taken.
She told them everything. How, once, she had been a young girl named Sora, and upon taking her own rite had joined the first group of Rangers. But Zordon had ordered his Rangers to annex a planet much like Earth. Eventually, that planet was destroyed.
It had been Sora's homeworld.
Five children were saved, and Sora's team was forced to pass on the Power to them, so that they could become the public face of the Power Rangers. Sora had, initially, thought it was a good thing, but had been suspicious enough to investigate. She discovered that the children were brainwashed using Zordon's pathetic attempt at telepathy.
She became Rita, calling on the Darkest power she could, to stop Zordon.
It didn't work. Instead they had locked each other inside separate prisons, where they were left alone for a thousand years. In that time, in the place that would drive Rita to insanity, she took an oath.
There would be no more child Rangers, even at the cost of her mentor's life.
Rita had stayed to train the Rangers, and she loved them as her own children. The letter was very clear about that. Rita left messages for each of them:
To Jason, she said that she was proud of his strength and leadership, and told him to continue trying to make the world a better place, for someday he would succeed.
To Zack, she said that he was utterly insane and she understood not a thing that went on his mind, but she hoped he would never stop laughing, for that would carry him through anything he was forced to endure.
To Trini, she asked that she go to Luna, on Earth, and study magic, for a gift like hers didn't deserve to be wasted, and left a warning to guard her heart, for fear she would end up like Rita had.
To Kimberly, she said that the Pink Ranger was the daughter Rita had always wanted, a bright happy girl who loved more fully and freely than anyone Rita had met, and she asked Kimberly to never forget that, even in the worst of times, a kind word would do more than a thousand swords.
To Billy, she told him that just because he was intelligent did not mean he would be alone or afraid forever, and that if he wanted it, the world was his. He just had to take it.
And to Tommy, she said only that 'ki'o' meant 'my son'. She said he would understand.
She left a final choice for the Rangers. Go to Earth with the monsters, and lead both the Army and monsters together to defend the world. Or stay put, let Goldar lead, and go home after the battle to live normal, happy lives.
The Rangers didn't need to speak before taking the first.
The rest, of course, is history. The Rangers gathered every single army on the planet, led them in a united defense, forced the UN during the war to work together and effectively, and then, when the war ended two months later, demorphed in the famous UN meeting. As everyone watched, they explained that they were five American teenagers who had been chosen by an Eltarian, the same one who had brought the alien forces here.
They offered to work with the UN to bring Earth into the galaxy.
Soon, Operation Lightspeed became the official ambassadors of Earth, both to the aliens in the stars and the Demon people in the Middle East, where they, led by Trini, negotiated peace and the first Demon Ranger, an adopted Demon boy named Ryan. When Andros of KO-35 came to Earth requesting help, the Rangers left the planet in the care of Ryan's team while they saved not only Earth, but Karone from Dark Spector.
Zordon died then. The Rangers did not mourn.
After that, teams sprung up on their own. Operation Lightspeed became the Silver Guardians, a group of both foot soldiers and Rangers under the UN's control, guiding new teams into the old guard.
And how do I know this?
Because I'm Trini.
Yes, that's me, Trini Kwan, mother to Kira and Conner Kwan, my heart's delights and the most destructive children I've ever met. Jason's the best father to them I could wish for. Tommy's adoptive son, Ethan, plays with them every day, and I see the makings of a great Ranger team in them. They seem to be missing a Ranger, but I have a feeling the new boy who just started working at Haley's cafe, Trent, might do the trick.
But Rita's ghost has been haunting my mind lately. We never did find out what happened to her, you see. Andros was alone when he destroyed Zordon's tube, and too far removed from Earth's doings to know that Zordon was not a person to be obeyed.
We could never find the system Alpha V mentioned, either. Once I watched Star Wars, I realized why-the Moons of Iego are where angels live. In other words, it doesn't exist.
Just one more lie from Zordon.
We all learned some degree of magic, the Rangers and I. Tommy and I are the most skilled at it, and our children watched in awe as babies when we dangled bubbles of water or light before them, but all the Rangers know enough to be able to teleport up to Rita's palace once every year.
At first we did it more often. I still do. It's a comforting place, and Rita's 'henchmen' left it to us, saying we could either have fun destroying it in our Zords or not, but they were sick of waiting for a Queen who would never come home. I think it was the first time any of us saw tears in either of their eyes, despite the gruff words. Eventually it became our new command center, since we only ventured in Zordon's lair when absolutely necessary. But now we only go up once a year to remember, and occasionally to bring the youngest Rangers here, to tell them the story.
It's where we left the letter.
So, holding that, sitting in Rita's chamber, a place we all never went in unless Tommy or I hunted down a spellbook, I wrote this. I found Rita's mind, her point of view, and wrote for her.
Why did I stop here? Why not continue? After all, I have enough power and skill to discover where Rita is and what happened to her.
And I have.
We all came to terms with it, of course. And as a mother myself, I understand why she did what she chose to do. For my own children, I would suffer far worse. But you are a Ranger, and young, and I may be the old Dragon Lady now who teaches you the secrets of morphing and puts up with no lip at all, but I was once in your shoes.
To you, there is no ending.
Perhaps, to you, Rita won. She turned to help us, saw us not only doing well but thriving on Earth, and decided to let us live full, honest lives without any interference. Then she and her husband, Zedd, went off on a romantic trip, her duties ended. Certainly the appearance of our brother, Thrax, would support you...save that he is much, much older than that. So old, in fact, that Rita may as well not have had him. She can barely remember the time when he left with his father, as the tradition of her people demands.
Perhaps, to you, Rita is simply lost. After all, with so much Dark energy flooding her, she would revert to Light for a long time, and perhaps if she had been struck hard enough during the battle, she would not remember anything else. Perhaps she is even the Mystic Mother who united the Earth Witches-after all, no one knows what Rita really looked like but the Rangers.
Perhaps, to you, Rita is working behind the scenes. After all, her allegiance to Dark Spector was in the form of a spy. She was best at subtlety. Perhaps the Ranger's successes were all manufactured. I know several cadets who will think that plausible.
To me, there is only one truth: Rita died. Stained with the blood and dust of battle, she took Zordon's power eternally, giving her life to do so.
But truth is a many-faceted thing.
So, where is she? What is she doing now? Well, that's up to you. The Rangers and I, we're adults now, with lives and jobs. We love doing what we do, and we love helping people. And we've earned the right-after the First Alien War, as it's been dubbed, although I fervently hope there will never be a second, the Rangers had a lot to face. The betrayal Zordon enacted was so personal and vile that it took most of us years to get over it. Tommy had to be dragged to a therapist three years later when he tried to commit suicide.
But in the end, we're okay.
And that was the whole point.
Finis.