Chapter Twenty-Eight: Checkmate

Dregon looked over his people, the Edenites, and laughed. They were under his control and no one could stop him. He had finally gotten what he wanted. He had found King Lexian and had taken him to a prisoner camp. Dregon held Lexian hostage and promised he wouldn't destroy him... as long as all of Edenoi surrendered to him.

"What are your plans?" Cyclopter asked Dregon as he stared out from his window over the people of Edenoi he had quickly put to work.

Dregon slowly turned away and paced down the path they were walking in his spaceship. Smiling, he replied to Cyclopter.

"Lexian refuses to tell me where he has hidden the Masked Rider tech. I am a greater leader than my brother... how dare he allow Kamen to have the power!? He has never been better than me! Once I find that brother of mine... it will be our last encounter. That I guarantee. Either he falls or I fall!"

Cyclopter waited patiently as Dregon finished his tangent. When Dregon realized Cyclopter did not reply, he understood he had let his emotions take the best of him, so he straightened himself out and regained his composure.

"..so, I plan on Edenoi suffering as I have suffered. I plan on Lexian being the cause of Edenoi's suffering. Under Edenoi's surface, the planet has a layer of noxious gas. I will force them to dig around their planet, slowly releasing the fumes into their atmosphere. I will continue to cause this to happen as long as he doesn't disclose to me the location of the Masked Rider powers..."

Cyclopter was shocked. "That's... rather harsh..."

"He brought it upon himself." Count Dregon said curtly as he left the room.

Rahp looked out into space. He felt defeated. He had gone out of his way to help defend the Zeo Crystal, but he and his team had failed. He rested his head against the glass and sighed deeply. He could see the glass fog up where he was breathing. He pushed away from the window and walked back to the main room.

"We are approaching the Alliance main docking bay." Risp said as she piloted the ship.

Filcar walked up to Rahp and placed an arm around him. "Don't worry, Rahp. We did the best we could."

"He's right. There's nothing more we could have done. There's no way we could take on giants..." Reon said as their medic, Priscilla, finished touching up the wrapping around his injured ankle.

"But it was still something I promised myself I would do, in honor of Zedd." Rahp said, frustrated. "If the enemies get the crystal, then Zedd sacrificed himself for nothing! We all may as well have followed Novact over to Master Vile's forces! At least then Zedd would've still had his life!"

"Hey! Hey!" Risp said from her seat. "You can dwell in the land of 'what ifs' all you want, but things are what they are. Zedd was lost to that monster and Rita does have the Zeo Crystal. So, what? We quit now? I don't think so. Rahp, you need to stand tall! You need to keep fighting! Understood?"

"Yes, ma'am!" Rahp said, saluting his senior officer. He felt bad he had allowed his emotions to cloud his judgment. He needed to keep fighting and he knew it.

Otherwise, Zedd really did lose everything for nothing... Rahp concluded in his own mind.

"Docking now." Risp announced.

Risp and her crew filed out of the ship. Looking around, they couldn't find anyone. It was an uncommon sight in the Alliance docking bay.

"That's odd... there is usually someone here waiting to receive our report." Risp said, looking around.

"I'll receive your report." A voice said from the other side of the room.

Priscilla was the first to spot who it was. She got into her fighting stance. As soon as the others caught a glimpse of their unwanted guest, they followed suit.

The Gold Ranger laughed and walked forward. "What? No welcome?"

"You're never welcome here, Tria. Go back to Triforia before it's too late." Risp warned.

The Gold Ranger pointed the Power Staff at Reon and fired. Unable to get out of the way on time due to his injured ankle, the fireball that emanated from the Power Staff hit him in the arm. He fell, grasping his arm. Priscilla sighed heavily and ran to him.

"You guys go ahead. I'll stay behind and take care of the lieutenant." She said, disappointed she was not going to participate in the battle.

The Gold Ranger laughed and ran through one of the doors. Risp, Filcar, and Rahp chased after, shooting at the ranger with their blasters.

They found themselves in the corridors of the Alliance's mechanical department. It wasn't wide enough for all three to walk shoulder to shoulder, so Filcar staggered behind his two comrades. Risp made a silent gesture with her hands, signalling for the three to split up.

As Rahp turned a corner, he heard an explosion behind him. He ran toward it to find Filcar unconscious, trapped under the debris of a wall that had been shot at. It appeared as if Filcar was the intended recipient of the blast, but had ducked quick enough to only be buried by the after effects.

He then heard blasts further down the hallway. He ran toward it to see Risp doing a backflip through the air, blasting at the Gold Ranger as she did. The Gold Ranger blocked each blast with the Power Staff easily, almost as if it was a game. Rahp pointed and fired at the ranger as well, successfully hitting his target. The Gold Ranger fell to a knee.

Risp landed, throwing a plasma grenade at the Gold Ranger. As Rahp continued firing, the Gold Ranger did a side slip to the left. As the Gold Ranger landed, Rahp saw the plasma grenade almost stick to its intended destination. What the Gold Ranger did surprised both Risp and Rahp. The Gold Ranger swung the Power Staff around and hit the plasma grenade with such a force it didn't stick. Before Risp could react, the plasma grenade landed four yards away from her, exploding almost instantly.

"Riiiisp!" Commander Rahp yelled.

The Gold Ranger laughed before sprinting toward Rahp. Rahp dropped his blaster and ran forward to meet the ranger head on. He pulled out a saber and swung at the Gold Ranger. The ranger was able to parry each attack easily, laughing as Rahp did everything he could to land a blow. Rahp then lifted the sword over his head and swung down as hard as he could. The Power Staff met the sword halfway and blocked the blow. As the sword was held still by the Power Staff, the Gold Ranger kicked Rahp in the chest. Rahp went flying and slammed into a pillar.

The Gold Ranger laughed as Rahp slid down the pillar, beginning to lose consciousness. As Rahp did, though, he reached his hand down to the blaster at his side. He pointed and fired at the Gold Ranger. The Gold Ranger went flying. Rahp smiled to himself as the Gold Ranger got up.

Rahp looked up to find the Gold Ranger hovering over him, breathing heavily. The last thing Rahp saw before everything went black was the Power Staff flying down, hitting him in the head.

Walking over to a control panel, the suited warrior input a code, deactivating the power barrier protecting the headquarters of The Alliance. Opening up communications, the Gold Ranger spoke into the console's microphone.

"Master Vile, the shields are down. Please enter."

. . .

Leopardon flew toward their base as fast as possible. They knew something had happened when they lost all contact with Burai and the rest of the United Alliance.

"Oh, no..." Gosei said from Droid 2 as he scanned the headquarters.

"What's wrong?" Dulcea asked from within Leopardon.

Orion answered from Droid 1, getting the same readings as Gosei. "All defenses have been deactivated. All communications for the base are also down."

Zordon pounded his fist into the console in anger. "Let's get inside."

As they landed, Droid 3, Droid 4, and Droid 5 detached. The pilots teleported out of their machines and looked around. Zordon looked back on the Droids, disappointed on how they performed. He had no idea he would meet up with such a foe on his first battle using the Megadroid. He knew if he were to revisit the project he had in store for the Megadroids, Project Zordina, the Droids would need to be upgraded.

As Zordon reflected on the battle, the Morphing Masters with him saw some movement on one side of the room and rushed over, ready to battle. Noticing the others running, Zordon followed after them. What they found was no threat, however: it was Priscilla and Second Lieutenant Reon Talp. He had bandages on one of his ankles, and on an arm. Priscilla explained they had been attacked by the Gold Ranger.

"We're fine, but you guys need to go. She was tearing her way through the building after we got here and had already done some damage before." She said.

"We now know why the communications went down." Delphine said.

Orion nodded. "Let's get to the main council room. Sentinel must have instructions for us."

"Right," Zordon said. "Get ready to teleport."

As he typed in the coordinates, he got an error message on his wrist tech. *No network connection* flashed across the screen.

"Looks like we're walking." Dulcea said.

They turned away and sprinted down into the hallway. On their way they had to jump over what appeared to be a wall that had been fired upon. As they did, they noticed the body of Commander Filcar under the debris. Delphine turned around to help, but Orion grabbed her by the arm, shaking his head.

"No time." He said.

As they continued forward, they entered a foyer where they saw Commander Rahp's body slumped against a pillar. Zordon shook his head as he saw that. Rahp had been dragged into this mess, just as Zedd, Filcar, and countless other archaeologists because of the Zeo Crystal.

I doubt anyone thought it would end like this. Zordon thought to himself.

As they turned a corner, they found themselves in the midst of a battle with countless members of Vile's army: lizard- and goat-men, along with several Tenga Warriors, all running around causing mayhem. Bodies of Alliance fighters were seen, almost in piles around the room. In the midst of all the chaos, a sound could be heard emanating through the air. Only one warrior could be seen in the middle of all the villains, standing his ground. The golden Dragon Shield could be seen shining as he fought.

"Power of Light: Activate!" Orion yelled. Morphing Energy surrounded him as his armor appeared.

"Saba: come forth!" Zordon proclaimed as his red saber formed in his hand. From out of the pouch Zordon carried with him, Saba himself also appeared, leaving the pocket dimension he lived in.

Saba stretched his arms and retracted his claws. "Oh, my! It is worse than it sounded! Well, let's see how I can help!" As he finished his statement, he leapt into the air and landed on a Tenga. He dug his claws in and began tearing at his prey, black feathers flying everywhere.

Dulcea began twirling her batons, causing the sound meant as an emergency beacon to sound. Many Tenga Warriors began frantically running away, looking for an escape to alleviate themselves from the excruciating torture the Morphing Master was inflicting upon them. She smiled as she saw her success.

Gosei's eyes were white as he sent chunks of the building flying at the beasts who tried attacking him. He focused on his tap to the Morphing Grid as he blocked attacks coming at him from behind. He then closed his eyes and touched his right hand to the ground. As he did, he caused the floor beneath him to rise up, allowing him to stand on a platform. He looked down at the beasts trying to claw their way up to him. He smiled as he began hurling more objects at them as they were distracted with their climb.

Delphine fought her way through hordes, but soon found herself to be outnumbered. She looked around and saw Zordon and Saba slashing their way through opponents, but saw them both beginning to fatigue. Orion, too, seemed tired. After a couple of blasts from his "power up mode", he was waning fast. Burai was also having difficulties, as she saw him be thrown into a wall. Delphine shook her head, knowing it wouldn't be long until all seven of them would sucumb to Master Vile's forces.

She looked down. She knew what she had to do. It was an ancient technique, banned from use by theAquitian Elders. Not many Aquitians even knew how to perform the technique, since the old writings were locked away. Delphine, being a Morphing Master however, had access to The Alliance's vast library and had read about the old power Aquitar had once taught.

The power Delphine contemplated on using was how Aquitar came to be conquered by the beings who currently form the majority of the planet's population. Using this old power, the water dwellers had conquered the small population of beings who lived on what little bit of land there was on Aquitar. After many centuries of progress, the civilized world of Aquitar, ashamed of their ways, tried to right their wrongs and give back freedom to the land dwellers, banning the old power. The society was still in the midst of a political struggle on Aquitar, with the ground dwellers demanding more rights due to the slavery they had endured for many centuries. Delphine feared if word went out of the use of this technique, it would only spark further controversy for the politicians on Aquitar.

But I have no choice... She thought. Her eyes turned blue as she concentrated on her tap to the Morphing Grid. She directed her thoughts on the process she had read and began to focus on the enemies in the room. Morphing Energy emanated from her body and hit each monster. Pain shot through their nerves, and each monster began to stall in their ability to move. Delphine raised up her hands and begin to direct them in the direction she wished them to go.

"What's happening?" Gosei asked, finally able to shrug off the Tenga Warriors who had flown up to his perch and carried him away.

Orion shook his head in disbelief. "She's doing it. She's using the old powers..."

"What old powers?" Zordon asked, confused.

Burai joined them, one arm crossed across his torso, grasping his ribcage. He knew he had broken a few ribs in the last battle. He stared intently at Delphine as she concentrated. The monsters were all in a line now, marching oddly out of the room. Their bodies were bent in odd positions, as if they were trying to resist where their bodies were being led.

"She's blood bending..." Dulcea said, fully aware of the technique that Aquitians had once used for many centuries to put the ground dwelling population of Aquitar into bondage.

"What's that?" Burai asked.

"Aquitians can control water. There is water in the body, constantly running through our vascular network. Aquitians were once a power hungry people, and they used their ability to control water to control beings to do whatever they wanted by controlling the water in their blood, basically turning them into puppets on string. It's a ghastly practice that is no longer practiced on Aquitar." Orion said, explaining to the people around him not in the know.

Delphine began to follow the monsters into the next room. She turned, a tear coming out of one of her eerie blue eyes, and spoke to the others, saying, "Go on. Find the other Masters. I will take care of things here."

"Right!" The other five exclaimed.

Glad to not witness what Delphine was about to do, they raced toward the main council room for the Morphing Masters, with Saba not trailing too far behind. Delphine turned back and looked at the room of beings in front of her. The beings whose free will she had robbed. She saw their muscles bunched and coiled as they fought through their central and peripheral nervous systems to gain control of their body. Delphine then raised a hand and began to orchestrate her symphony of destruction: the creatures were forced to attack each other, destroying their teammates against their will. It was a scene of gore and misery Delphine would never be able to erase from her mind, let alone the sounds and pleas of agony that echoed off the walls around her. Tears poured down her face as she continued to conduct the most miserable dischord she had ever witnessed.

As Zordon and the others raced forward, they were surprised to find their trek uninterrupted by henchman. It seemed as if all of Vile's troops had confined The Alliance troops to a certain area. This made Zordon even more concerned.

What are they doing that is so important that they had to cut off the rest of the troops from the council room? What is Vile planning?

As they approached the council room and entered, they saw what the big deal was about. Master Vile, the Gold Ranger, and Rito stood in the center of the room, their weapons pointed at Gerlit, Ivicar, Sentinel Knight, and Magnus in his Defender Armor. They all had wounds on them, signifying they had been battling for a while. The Morphing Masters looked exhausted.

Rito turned to face Zordon and the other Masters. "Ah! Nice of you guys to join us!"

Master Vile chuckled as he began to speak. "Now is my revenge going to be complete! Welcome, Morphing Masters! I've been waiting for you! I'm impressed most of you made it up here. I was expecting more than one of you to fail along the way!"

As he said this, Delphine appeared with the other five Masters and Saba. Her face was pale and she made no eye contact with anyone, ashamed at what she had just done.

"Oh, my! You Masters sure do live up to your title!" Vile said, surprised to see them all together. "Oh, well, it's not like it matters. The end result... will be the same!"

Panting, Sentinel Knight addressed his foe. "What... do you mean... Vile? What... end result?"

"This!" Vile said, producing a dark colored, spherical crystal in his hand.

"Impossible!" Orion exclaimed as he eyed the object.

"That was supposed to have been destroyed!" Ivicar said, fury dancing in his eyes. It was an odd expression to see on the face of the man who normally was calm under pressure.

"Yes! I do have it! Haha! Checkmate, Morphing Masters! Hahaha! Checkmate!" Vile yelled.

"What is it?" Burai asked, confused.

"The Orb of Doom..." Zordon and Saba both said simultaneously.

When Zordon had first been brought into the council and assigned to help retrieve the Zeo Crystal and Zedd's unit from Master Vile on Solaris 8, Orion had briefed him on the origins of the Zeo Crystal. Although they did not understand all of the physics behind the phenomenon, it appeared as if occasionally the Morphing Grid, a force permeating throughout the entirety of the universe, would have a section of it harden and crystallize. It was unknown if the process was an instantaneous event, or something which happened over time. It was also unknown what would be the catalyst for such an event. While they had traveled to Solaris 8, Orion had forwarded to Zordon all of Master Michael's research into what was called the Crystallization Hypothesis. Apparently, many centuries ago, during the war surrounding the Corona Aurora, another event had been occurring, connected to the jewels on the Corona Aurora's origin.

The jewels of the Corona Aurora were the result of a fragment of the Morphing Grid crystallizing. What had occurred was that an empire had stumbled across the aforementioned Morphing Grid fragment and had polished it, smoothing it out into an orb they used to power their destructive army. The power source had come to be known as the Orb of Doom, because while the orb was in use by this empire it spelled certain doom to whoever fought against it. The shavings and leftover scraps of the process of smoothing the fragment of the Grid were discarded, because the empire had no idea the power those fragments contained, although a small portion compared to the lion's share the empire had taken for themselves. Another kingdom had discovered the fragments and had fashioned it onto their king's crown. He called himself a god and named his power source the Crown of the Gods, or in other words, the Corona Aurora. His kingdom, powered by the Corona Aurora, then had a face off against the empire who had the Orb of Doom. Those events eventually caused the formation of the Morphing Masters, with among the first of them being known as the Venerated Ones.

Fascinated with that bit of fringe science he did not know had existed, Zordon had spent the time he was not on assignment studying with Saba about the Crystallization Hypothesis. He had already begun his application to be a fellow on Michael's secret research team before the United Alliance was turned on its head by The Queen's plans.

Not satisfied by only knowing its name, but seeing the situation was dire, Burai decided not to push the issue. He had already become accustomed to not being let in on important information of the many years he had been a member of The Top. So, he did what he did best: he prepared for further orders from the Morphing Masters. He unsheathed the Dragon Dagger from its black case he kept on his belt and stood, ready to fight.

"Yes, that is correct, Master Zordon! The Orb of Doom! Now, prepare yourselves for the beginning of the end!" As Master Vile concentrated on the orb, it began to glow.

Orion shook his head. "I'm not going to let this happen... Power up Mode!" He yelled as he turned into a big sphere of Morphing Energy.

While he charged forward, Rito saw what was about to happen. He saw how Orion was beginning to shoot forward to unleash a lethal attack on Master Vile. A lethal attack on the man who he called father.

"Oh, no you don't!" He yelled as he jumped in front of Master Vile, taking the full force of the attack. Performing a backflip, Orion landed next to Sentinel Knight.

"Boy! No!" Vile yelled.

The Gold Ranger got into a fighting stance, ready to retaliate. As the evil Ranger did so, electricity crackled around Rito while blood dripped from his eyes. Rito turned around slowly and smiled a proud smile, glad he was able to, at least once, be a big time component for his father's plans.

"Don't worry... Pops... Just activate the Orb... and I'll... be back soon..." And with that, Rito fell to the ground and exploded, destroyed protecting his father.

"Noooo! Rito! Argh! You will pay for this!" Vile said, horrified at the fact he had to witness his favorite child destroyed before him.

Encouraged by Orion's act, the other Masters prepared for what they believed would be their final stand.

"Let's do this!" Dulcea yelled.

They all began to rush forward. As they did, Master Vile ran as far back as he could, to give himself time to charge the Orb of Doom. The crystal had one power which he knew how to activate: the reversal of time on the planet on which the orb found itself. Concentrating, Vile attempted to get the process activated. He knew he had to do it just right. If not... the same fate Corsair faced would not only befall the planet on which the Morphing Master headquarters were, but also to him and his army.

The Gold Ranger fought with diligence, trying to stop the Morphing Masters from approaching Master Vile. The Gold Ranger shot at the ground, creating a large chasm to further separate the Masters from Vile. Dulcea attempted to make the jump but fell short, barely holding on by her fingertips.

"Almost there... too bad!" The Gold Ranger shouted, shooting the crag Dulcea was holding onto. It broke and Dulcea fell deep into the pit.

"Noo!" Delphine yelled.

Delphine attempted to blood bend the Gold Ranger, but she did not have enough energy to complete the task.

Zordon looked at Saba and nodded. "Ready?"

"As always, old friend!" Saba declared.

With his saber in hand, Zordon took a few steps back, then sprinted as fast as he could toward Saba. As he did, he could feel the Morphing Energy begin to sweep through the room from the Orb of Doom. Vile's spell was beginning to work. As he approached Saba, he jumped at him. Saba then grabbed Zordon and flung him as hard as he could, hoping to use the momentum Zordon had already created to propel him far enough to get to the other side of the chasm.

Zordon flew through the air. The Gold Ranger shot blasts at him, narrowly missing. As the fireballs sailed past him, Zordon kept his eyes focused on one thing: the Orb of Doom.

Zordon made it over the chasm and even over the Gold Ranger. He landed on one knee right next to Master Vile.

"Too late, Zordon! It starts now!" Vile said.

"Not on my watch." Zordon declared, jumping on top of the Orb of Doom.

As he did, the Morphing Energy that was meant to reverse time flowed not into the planet, but into Zordon himself. The Morphing Masters watched as Zordon opened his mouth to scream in pain, but instead purple light shot out. Immediately following that, more Morphing Energy in the form of purple light, signifying the purple spectrum of the Morphing Grid, blasted out of Zordon's eyes. Something the Future: Omega Ranger could not quite identify, but believed it to be Time Magic, flowed out of Zordon as well. Everyone in the room shielded their eyes as the room erupted in a purple blast. Then, as soon as it had happened, it stopped. Everyone looked at where Zordon had been, but all they saw was Master Vile and the Orb of Doom. Zordon had saved them from being destroyed.

. . .

Zordon found himself surrounded by blue light. It was extremely disorienting. As he spun around in the light, feeling as if he were in a tunnel, he thought he saw something... strange. They looked to be silhouettes of beings standing on the other side of the blue light. They seemed to be staring at him. The best he knew how to describe them would be calling them "amorphous". Then, suddenly, he could not see them anymore. He saw a shining light instead. He reached a hand out for it and found himself flying through the air into a dimly lit place. He landed with a thud on the ground.

"Ugh!" He exclaimed as he hit the ground.

Zordon slowly picked himself up and looked around. He looked around and found the place he was in to be lit by several torches. The walls and floors seemed to be made of cobblestone. He took a few steps forward and found himself to no longer have a ceiling directly over his head. Instead, he saw the room he was in stretched on upward for what seemed like miles.

"Welcome, Zordon. I have been expecting you." Zordon heard some say. He drew out his red saber and got into his battle stance, ready to fight.

He heard laughing. "Oh, Zordon. That will not be necessary. I am a friend."

Zordon looked directly in front of him to see a person in a ranger-like helmet step out of the shadows. He wore a long robe with and interesting arrow symbol running down the center. The helmet was a turquoise like color, with what looked like lightning bolts on each side of the helmet.

"Who are you?" Zordon said.

The ranger bowed his head as he answered. "I am The Guardian. Welcome to an area outside of time and space. Welcome to... The Hall."