Darkness, there was nothing but darkness. Then something wet and slightly slimy was felt upon her face. With a moan Whitney opened up her eyes to find Dude licking her cheek as if he knew he had to wake her up. With a moan she sat up and reached for the campus mutt and mascot. "Oh, what the…" She started and then gasped, though she ended up coughing a moment as smoke filled her lungs. "Callie." She whispered once she could speak again. She set the dog down and started toward where she thought she had seen her friend, the daughter of Cinderella and Prince Charming. Dude followed her.
She was just able to climb over some rubble and land without breaking her ankle. Dude slipped in under some rubble and continued to follow the daughter of Wendy. She was just able to shove her way through another pile of debris and found Callie lying on the floor, trying to force a shelf off of her leg. "Let me help." Whitney said. Together the two girls just managed to shove the shelf off, and Whitney collapsed next to Callie.
"What…what happened?" Callie asked her friend as they both tried to catch their breaths. She flexed her leg and winced in pain. Clearly nothing was broken but she had pulled something. She figured the odds were it was a small favor judging by the destruction around them.
"I remember trying to help people get to the gym." Whitney said. Callie nodded her agreement. "Someone said the sky was falling, and I turned to look. It was dark, but I don't think it was the sky falling." She reached over and stroked Dude's side to calm her thoughts.
"It looked like metal." Callie recalled softly.
After another moment Whitney said, "We need to try to get out of here. Find some of the teachers or some of the other students and find out what we do now."
Callie nodded. "I hope whatever happened to Auradon Prep didn't happen to any of our parent's places." She said as she thought about her parents. For a fleeting moment she wished her brother were there before reminding herself he was some of the reason this was going on.
"I hope mom and Will are okay." Whitney added. She knew her brother was out there right now as the green ranger trying to put a stop to whatever was now going on that had brought about this current realm of chaos. That also meant if evil won her brother was as good as dead.
Whitney took a deep breath and stood up, then helped Callie to stand. The princess needed to lean against her friend in order to move and it was slow going. Dude was strolling beside them. He hadn't reacted and Whitney didn't know if that was good or bad. She was starting to fear they might be the only ones still left alive in the school.
A few more steps and Dude's ears seemed to perk up and he started to bark. Neither girl was sure whether that was a bark of welcoming or warning, but they hesitated as they looked in the direction Dude was barking at.
Gradually shadow began to fade into substance. The first thing they saw was not good as they saw the glowing purple eyes of one of the soldiers. It let out a roar of its own and started to advance on them.
Without thinking about it Whitney sat Callie back on the ground as she picked up a decent sized rock and looked as if she were going to throw it at the soldier, not that it would do them much good. The soldier continued toward them and despite the futility she threw the rock right at the soldier, who knocked it aside with blade. "Just leave us alone." She tried to shout at it despite her rising fear. She suddenly had the horrible feeling that if they had invaded the school then Will, Lonnie, and all of the rangers were dead. "Haven't you taken enough from us?"
Dude was barking and growling but the soldier didn't seem to care about that either as he moved closer to the two little girls. Whitney shakily stood in front of Callie as if to protect her and give her whatever small seconds of life she could.
A portion of the already half destroyed wall suddenly came crashing down. "Hey!" They heard a girl yell. "Get away from them right now!" The soldier turned to be face to face with Ruby the daughter of Rapunzel and Flynn, who had her long blonde hair twirled like a lasso around her left arm even as a long strand was in her right hand, ready to be used as a whip. The soldier turned its back to look at the girls again and Ruby used the long strand in her right hand to wrap up a large chunk of rock and toss it as hard as she could, striking the side of its head. "Don't turn your back on me." She warned.
Seemingly enraged, the soldier turned to face Ruby now. She lashed out her right hand and her hair flew out and wrapped around the soldiers ankle, then she pulled back and ended up tripping the soldier. It fell to the ground hard, but the blonde didn't hesitate as she then turned around to take the bladed arm and slam it right into the things chest, causing it to dissipate.
"That was impressive." Callie said and Whitney nodded in agreement.
Ruby came over to them and only then did they notice she was bleeding a little from her temple. "Are you two okay? Can you walk?" She asked them.
"We're okay." Whitney said to her. "I can walk, but Callie has to lean on me for support, she twisted her ankle or something."
"It could have been worse." Ruby said softly. "Get your friend and let's go. We have to find other survivors, maybe the head mistress or someone."
"What about Whitney's brother Will?" Callie asked for her friend. "He was out in the field, fighting that thing and that man."
"Last I saw they had just stopped that robot thing." Ruby told them. "Right now they're probably in better shape than we are." Whitney helped Callie up to lean on her and the two girls and the small dog followed Ruby where she had come from.
"How could you?" Audrey asked in horror. "All of those people?"
Paradias laughed. "All of those people will likely be dead by the time my vision comes to pass anyway." He answered her dismissively.
It was then that they realized the roaring wasn't from the recently descended and crashed ship or even from the horrified rushing of their own hearts at the destruction and chaos of the school, even from Will or Jane. It was still coming from the skies.
"Now what?" Jordan asked.
The black skies now opened and a large bluish green reptilian head emerged. It was almost more like a dragon's head but it didn't seem quite right for either a snake or a dragon. They all knew it had to be the Great Serpent thing that Paradias had said would be summoned from the dark essences of the monsters they had destroyed.
"What are we supposed to do against that?" Carlos asked in horror and shock. It was large than any zord they had, even the Clam zord that served as the basis for their ultrazord.
"We have no choice but to try the zords." Ben said to Mal. "We can hope that it's not as strong and durable as it looks."
Mal was afraid that was wishful thinking. But she knew that her boyfriend was right. "It's time to call upon our zords." She agreed.
Will now looked to Grant. "You'll pilot the Auradon Warzord with me, Amy, Melody, Aquiella, Alex and Ellie." He told their new gray ranger. "No stepping away from the action."
"I don't know if I should be relieved or not." Grant said with a deadpan expression.
From the mountains the Auradon Megazord emerged. Audrey, Evie, Jay, Carlos and Lonnie boarded their zords and inserted their iPhones into the appropriate slots.
Mal and Ben both freed their crystalized dragon and horse zord respectively. The two of them boarded their zords. Mal inserted her iPhone into the slot which transformed her dragon to look more like a Chinese dragon. Ben combined his sword with his zord.
Ally, Jordan and Jane summoned the Auradon Battlezord. Right behind that was Aziz's call for the Auradon Falconzord. The four rangers inserted their iPhones into the appropriate slots.
Will summoned the Auradon Warzord and his other team mates boarded the zord with him, inserting their iPhones into their slots.
Miranda summoned her bear zord and boarded it, placing her iPhone in the slot. She transformed her zord into the warrior mode.
"How do we want to try to handle this M?" Evie asked her purple haired chosen sister.
"Ben, you and I will combine with the Auradon Megazord for the Auradon Champion Defender Megazord." She said to her boyfriend and her original team, at least more or less since Lonnie had not started with them but had come in not too long after. "Aziz, combine with the girls to form the Auradon Falcon Battlezord." She hoped that four battle zords would be enough. If not, all they had left to try was the Ultrazord.
"We're on it Mal." Aziz told him. The arms of the Battlezord separated so that it could encompass the wings as the rest of the body folded into the zord. A new spot was made in the cockpit for Aziz, in between Ally and Jane.
As the dragon zord soared up next to the Auradon Megazord, the first zord discovered by the team leapt onto the back of the dragon. The Auradon Champion Megazord then did a loop before descending onto the back of the Horse zord to form the Auradon Champion Defender Megazord. Space opened up between Audrey and Evie to make room for Ben and Mal.
Even from their positions inside the megazords they could hear Paradias laughing. "You think that's going to be enough to stop my Great Serpent. This should be amusing." He stated.
"Can't we just step on him instead?" Grant asked the ranger team inside the warzord.
"You have no idea how tempting that thought is sometimes." Aquiella answered him but shrugged. "Still, I suspect he could easily dodge it."
"Let's worry about the giant snake then." Amy said to them. She didn't hate snakes the way she hated insects, but this one made her wonder if she should change her mind.
Blades extended from the wrists of the Auradon Warzord and they moved toward the giant serpent. They swung but the serpent was quick enough to dodge the attack. It then lunged and bit into the left blade, snapping it off the warzord.
"Wow, didn't see that coming." Melody noted. "It's jaw must be very strong."
The blade on the right wrist was brought down on the serpent and it let out a screech of some sort. Then from the other end of the cloudy vortex what had to be the serpent's tail emerged and slammed into the right wrist hard, shattering that blade too. It still had not emerged fully so there was no way to know how large the thing really was.
"This doesn't bode well at all." Evie said to them.
The Auradon Warzord took several steps away from the Giant Serpent. Now the Auradon Champion Defender Megazord and the Auradon Battlebear moved toward the monster together and tried to bring their blades down on the serpent, but it dodged again and then reared back, sending a burst of points like snake fangs striking the two battle zords hard.
"I sure don't like the idea of getting that close to this thing." Ally revealed to her friends in the cockpit.
"I don't either." Aziz assured her.
"It's not much fun, trust us." Melody stated. They had already tried to do so with the Auradon Warzord and were now bladeless as a result. "Maybe we should try a bit more of a long range approach."
"I think that's a good idea." Will vouched.
"Let's do it." Aziz confirmed. Much like the falcon zord used by Tommy as the white ranger so long ago, they could unleashed rocket like bursts from the tip of the wings. The Auradon Warzord meanwhile had rocket launchers that could be raised from its shoulders. Together the two battle zords unleashed a volley of rockets at the serpent creature.
The Great Serpent moved faster than any of them thought a large snake ought to be able to, swerving to the right as the rockets shot past it. Then it unleashed the same fang like volley at the two battle zords. The Auradon Falcon Battlezord brought up its wings to try to minimize the impact of the attack but it wasn't quite enough as the two battle zords fell to the ground.
The Auradon Champion Defender Megazord moved in to check on the two zords as Miranda maneuvered the Auradon Battlebear moved in and slashed again at the giant snake. It struck with another screech only to have the tail slam into the head of the battle zord. It fell back with a crash.
"Okay, so getting in close is a bad idea. It simply dodges long range attacks." Lonnie said. "What's the next option?"
"I say we try and take it to the skies." Jordan answered. "Both our zord and your zords can do that."
"It's worth a shot." Jay said as he looked to Mal.
Mal nodded. "Let's do it." She decided.
The Auradon Warzord moved in to help the Auradon Battlebear as the Auradon Champion Defender Megazord and the Auradon Falcon Battlezord took to the skies. It caused a bit more of a distraction as the Giant Serpent had to divert its attention to keep an eye everything. Still, it seemed to think that the aerial zords were the greater threat.
"Maybe we should try another missile attack again before they descend." Grant suggested. "It's not paying as much attention, it might hit."
Will thought about it only a moment before nodding. "Get ready." He told them.
Again the Auradon Warzord's rocket cannons rose from the shoulders and unleashed a barrage of rockets at the Great Serpent. Several of them struck this time and the thing let out another screech. They did however notice that beneath the scales the thing was starting to regenerate.
"That's not good." Aquiella noted. "Even the damage we do to this thing can be brushed off with enough time."
"Then we can't give it that time." They heard Mal say over the helmet intercom. From two different sides both battle zords descended downwards. First the Auradon Falcon Battlezord came in and drove both fists into the new wounds opened up by the missiles. Then the wings slashed out at the serpent too.
As that attack ended the Auradon Champion Defender Megazord finished its descent and the fast hooves of the horse zord took over. With the sword raised the battle zord ran past the giant snake with a powerful sword slash that caused it to emit another high shriek.
They however failed to notice the tail ascend back into the sky. Then it reappeared and lashed out, slamming both of the battle zords hard. As the Auradon Warzord and the Auradon Battlebear moved to their sides the Great Serpent let out a huge screech again, this time emitting a sonic burst that struck all the zords quickly.
"Wow, no way." Carlos said as he pressed on his console rapidly. "Don't do it, hold together."
"What are you going on about?" Jay questioned, not having paid much attention as it was between him and Lonnie to create the sword the Auradon Megazord and its forms used to fight.
"We nearly lost all the zords connections to the power levels." Carlos said. "The sonic burst nearly disrupted everything."
"He's not wrong." Jane confirmed as she made a few bypasses of her own. "We nearly lost power over here too."
"Same here." Amy said to them. "That sonic burst seemed to have very nearly fried all of our circuits. If it does that again, we might not be able to compensate for it."
"We need to find a way to end this quickly." Miranda said, though her own voice showed how unlikely that prospect was.
The Giant Serpent reared back its head again and this time a stream of energy formed in its mouth and moments later unleashed a huge burst of energy at the four battle zords. It struck hard and heavy and the four battle zords crashed to the ground hard.
"Report!" Mal called out.
"Not good M." Evie said to her. "We've lost a lot of power from that blow. Main power is down."
"Switching to backups." Carlos added.
"I've switched to backups as well, but it's already down a quarter." Miranda said to Mal.
"We've got less than ten percent main power, we're going to have to switch to backups to even have a chance." Jane reported.
"We're at a quarter main power." Amy said to her twin sister. "We can take maybe two more hits like that before we lose all power ourselves."
"That makes you guys better off than the rest of us." Jordan reminded the rose ranger.
"What do we do Mal?" Audrey asked their leader.
Mal closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She could only think of two ideas, none of them good. One idea would leave the zords drained for who knew how long, unable to help in any future fight. The other was surprisingly even worse because it would leave them with no zords what so ever. She let out a small sigh, deciding on the slightly easier route. "Let's give it all we've got." She declared.
The Giant Serpent unleashed yet another of the massive energy beams at the same time that Aquiella summoned the Clam zord. It showed up in just enough time to take the brunt of the attack, its armored hull and lack of prior damage able to take the attack better. "Let's form the Auradon Ultrazord."
The clam zord opened its mouth and the four battle zords jumped or flew into it. The Auradon Falcon Battlezord and the Auradon Champion Defender Megazord split into its base forms as it required the falcon, dragon and horse to take their own places in the formation. And in the center of the clam each of the rangers and knights appeared in the chamber, ready to go.
"I hope this works Mal." Amy said softly. She didn't need to be a twin to know the options that Mal had gone through. They all knew it, but of course Amy had felt it from her sister.
"I hope it does too Amy." Mal replied softly.
"It's better than blowing up the zords Mal." Audrey tried to assure her. She, like the rest of the rangers, had formed a certain attachment to their zords, even the Auradon Warzord despite it having spent more time in the enemies' hands then theirs.
The Auradon Ultrazord move in on the Great Serpent. The giant snake proceeded to unleash a fang attack at it but the giant fortress like zord took that hit without a problem. "Lock on and fire." The team announced. The clam shell opened up just enough for all of the zord's to unload their increased fire power on the Giant Serpent. With a shriek its head hit the ground hard and it seemed not to stir.
"Did we do it?" Jay asked.
"The body is still there." Jane pointed out. In their experience if a body remained there was a chance the monster wasn't dead. But with except for perhaps Paragon they had never seen a creature this ancient, even Sermaya couldn't reach that point. She reminded them as much. "But we've never faced such an ancient creature before."
"Indeed you haven't white ranger." Paradias agreed. He didn't seem to be fazed at all about Giant Serpent's seeming defeat, which only reinforced in Jane's mind that it was not dead. "In fact it's now time for you all to see the full extent of the Great Serpent." With that he disappeared.
"Um, that seems anticlimactic." Jordan noted. "What are we missing here?"
It was Amy who first felt something, something she couldn't quite put her finger on. She glanced in fear to the giant snake and understood why. "Look!" She called out. They saw on the skull of the giant snake wriggling before pulling outward and taking the shape of Paradias as if he were trapped within the snake's skin.
"That's kind of gross." Audrey said.
Paradias laughed, but it echoed from that of the Great Serpent. "The true power isn't the serpent itself, but rather the power that I command from within." The eyes opened and the formerly black pupils of the snake were now his one green and one yellow eye. "And now this game of yours is over." Two new heads burst through, making it more like a hydra. The all three of them unleashed the same massive beam of energy and struck the Auradon Ultrazord. Even the armor of the ultrazord couldn't stand up to that firepower and there several large explosions.
The rangers were all hurtled toward the ground, landing roughly. They all shakily stood up. They looked up in horror as massive explosions were seen on the hull of the clam zord and from within as the zords were severely damaged.
"No." Audrey gasped, holding onto Jay's arm. It was as much the shock of seeing their zords defeat as the immense fall they had taken.
Amy threw herself against Mal, pressing her head against her side. The purple haired girl could feel her sister crying softly.
Ellie took one step forward before falling to her knees. Alex was by her side, hands on her arms.
"This is impossible." Carlos said in shock. He could barely feel Jane's hand on his own arm.
Ruby had encountered two more soldiers as she tried to lead the two little girl's to safety though she had also thoroughly taken them out. She hated the fact though that aside from the two little girls and the campus mascot they had not found any signs of life. Either they were secluded off from the survivors or…she shook her head, she didn't want to think they were the only ones still alive.
She took some consolation that they could hear the fight going on outside. Clearly Mal and the others were alive. It had taken her awhile to figure it out, but between this incident and the previous incident where the talking turtles had shown up she had come to the truth; Mal and her friends were the Power Rangers of Auradon. She also knew if that hadn't been revealed to the public there was a good reason, so she kept the secret.
She finally heard voices. She recognized them vaguely as Doug and the head mistress and she started to work her way to them.
"We're losing it." Doug said to Fairy Godmother. He seemed fine at least. "I don't know how much longer we can keep power going here."
"What happens…if we lose power here in the command center?" Fairy Godmother asked. It sounded like she was injured though it was hard to tell for sure, or how badly.
"Then the other's connection to the grid will be severely weakened." Doug answered grimly. "They could lose their powers, and at the worst time imaginable." He then let out a gasp. "Oh no, the zords."
"Are they…" Fairy Godmother started to ask.
"Not destroyed completely, but it will take days to repair them. If we survive this." Doug reported.
"Can we call…" She started to ask before there were several large explosions that made Ruby flinch and the two girls gasp. Then she heard Fairy Godmother call out, "Doug!"
"I'm alright." He replied. "My arm's burnt. But it could be worse. That's it though. We have no power in the command center."
Ruby finally found a weak point and used her hair to bring the rubble down. "Doug! Headmistress!" She called out. She saw Doug cradling a burnt up right arm. Fairy Godmother was leaning against a wall, clearly she had broken at least one rib on her right side. "What happened?"
"We can't call for help." Doug finished answering Fairy Godmother's question "And with the power gone, I don't know how much longer they can all hold on."
Fairy Godmother looked to Ruby and the two girls. "Welcome to what used to be the Power Ranger's command center." She let out a small cough, and a bit of blood. "When Paradias crashed his ship into the school, he aimed it well enough to damage most of the command center. Doug has been fighting to keep the circuits stable."
"It gave us some time, but now Paradias has decimated all of our zords." He said to them as he came to support Fairy Godmother. He knew it was time for them to leave, whatever the risks. "With power down we can't even contact the Earth Rangers for help."
"Have you seen anyone else?" Fairy Godmother asked Ruby.
The really long blonde haired girl shook her head. "No. Either they've found themselves on the opposite end of the school or…" She again didn't want to finish that sentence. Fairy Godmother nodded in understanding. "What do we do now?" She asked.
"We try to find out way out of here, and hope somehow there is something worth leaving here for." Fairy Godmother said grimly.
"We're not out of this fight yet." Mal said, trying to sound encouraging. She wasn't feeling it though. "Let's try the Auradon Launcher." They all took their positions but when they tried to summon it, not only did it seem to fizzle out, but they were all startled as they were forced to power down.
"Not now." Lonnie said, near panic. They reached for their iPhones and tried to transform, but couldn't do it. Ben couldn't summon his shield, though for what it was worth he could still summon the Praeleanthor sword. The trident responded but the gem did not. The magic wand responded but the gem did not.
"Paradias's ship must have hit the command center, probably damaged it extensively." Jane suddenly realized. "We've lost our connection to the morphing grid." She remembered the same thing happening when Kat had told her about Goldar and Rito using an explosive device to destroy that command center and try to steal the zeo crystals. Likewise Lonnie remembered Cassie saying the same thing when Divatox destroyed the Power Chamber.
"I told you all that your time was near." Paradias gloated cruelly. "Your time is just about up. Auradon will soon be mine." He laughed as he looked down at the defenseless teenagers below him.