Power Rangers: Element Fury

Chapters

Episode 2: Awaken the Fury Part 2
Episode 3: Fight As One
Episode 4: Your Own Shade Of Red
Episode 1: Awaken the Fury Part 1

Episode 2: Awaken the Fury Part 2

-Clover's Cave-

After their impromptu rescue by Clover, the group of teens followed her as she lead them through a tunnel. "So, where are we going again," Tempest asked.

"My home," Clover replied. "We'll be safer once we get within the protective wards."

"Protective wards," Twilight asked.

"Look, I know you kids have a lot of questions-"

"Understatement of the century," Soarin muttered.

"-but I can explain everything a whole lot better at my home. So please, save your questions till we get there."

"Just one question," Sunset pleaded.

Sighing, Clover replied "I think I know what it is. You're wondering if I ran into your friends last night."

"How did you-?"

"I've got detection spells all over Everfree in case anyone found the Gems. I overheard your conversations. ALL of them." Sighing again, she continued "Yes, I did find your friends. You can relax though, they're alive."

"I'm sensing a 'BUT' in there," Thorax stated as they came to a rock wall.

Not skipping a beat Clover tapped the rock wall with her staff, causing it to glow green before sliding over to reveal a passageway. "It'll be easier if you see it for yourselves."

They continued following her for roughly thirty minutes, before they finally came to a large metal door. Upon it was a mural, depicting two large ponies, one white and one dark blue, each with a wing and a horn, moving in a cycle with the moon and sun following them.

Seeing this Sunset gasped. "This-? How-?"

"You recognize this," Flash asked.

Sunset nodded. "It's one of the most well known pictures from Equestria. It depicts the Alicorn Princesses Celstia and Luna. Celestia, Princess of the Sun, and Luna, Princess of the Moon, as they go through the day and night cycle."

"Oh yeah," Twilight said. "You told me about this. Celestia raises the sun and Luna raises the moon." She then frowned. "Which makes no sense. Since if your world is anything like Earth then it would orbit the sun and the moon would revolve around the planet, thereby eliminating any need for a pony to need to raise or lower them as that would actually throw off the natural cycle and MMMF!"

Fortunately for the viewers, Tempest Shadow wisely put a hand over Twilight's mouth. "Sorry, I just figured nobody wanted to sit through one of her lectures on astronomy."

Sunset couldn't help but giggle, having seen a similar reaction when Princess Twilight couldn't understand how the Sun and Moon raised and lowered themselves in the Human World. "I get the feeling if she ever went to Equestria proper, she'd have a nervous breakdown due to how much this worlds Laws of Physics constantly get turned upside down and inside out." Looking back at the mural she asked "What is this doing here?"

"Oh, a little reminder of home," Clover commented as she pointed her staff at the mural, either not hearing or straight up ignoring Sunset's surprised gasp.

As the center of the mural began to glow, the twin princesses began to rotate until Luna was on one side and Celestia was on the other. The gate then opened to reveal-

"Sweet Celestia on a pogo-stick," Sunset muttered.

When Clover had said they were going to her home, most of them imagined a small cave with some shelves lined with spell books, possibly a cauldron filled with some steaming mixture. Typical stuff you'd imagine finding in the lair of a sorceress.

What they were not expecting was to see was a large three story room with hardwood floors, a series of panels on the far wall that show various locales ranging from Downtown Canterlot to the Everfree Forest, a small laboratory with beakers and test tubes of various sizes, three large bookshelves that reached to the ceiling filled with various books and scrolls that looked ancient.

Seeing their shocked looked, Clover smiled and said "Welcome to my humble abode."

"Humble," Tempest asked in disbelief. "If THIS is you being humble, I'd hate to see you when you're bragging."

Clover laughed as she walked in, removing her cloak and revealing the clothes underneath: a simple pair of blue jeans and green sneakers, and a t-shirt for the band Paramore. Her overall body type suggested that she wasn't much older than the rest of them, probably being in her late twenties. "Not exactly the clothes I'd imagine a sorceress would wear," Twilight said upon seeing it.

"Well robes and a wizard hat tend to stick out when you go for groceries."

"Fair enough."

"Plus Paramore is my favorite band."

She then casually tossed it to the side, only for it to somehow fly and hang itself on a hook on the far wall. Turning to face the group she said "Well, we're here. You are free to ask your questions." Seeing them all about to speak she quickly added "One at a time please."

Flash was the first to ask "What exactly is going on? Between our friends disappearing, the crystal tree, the gems, us getting magic, and then you showing up, we'd just like the whole story."

Clover was silent for a moment, before saying "Well, let's start at the beginning.

'The legend only goes back 1500 years. But in reality, the story actually starts about 10 years before that. As you can imagine by the mural and by Sunset's surprised gasp, I am actually from Equestria."

Sunset's eyes widened. "Wait, does that mean you're-"

"Yes, Sunset. I am indeed the same Clover the Clever from Equestria. The apprentice of Starswirl the Bearded, the mare who helped revolutionize magic and magical theory, one of the Founders of Equestria, and a whole bunch of other titles I'm probably forgetting."

Silence reigned for a few minute before Sunset let loose arguably the loudest fangirl squeal of all time, one which made everyone cover their ears and could shatter glass (which didn't happen since Clover took the precaution of enchanting all her glass items to be near indestructible.)

Massaging her ringing ears, Tempest asked "I take it that means your're a fan?"

"A fan? A FAN?! She's my icon. My idol! MY INSPIRATION!"

"Yeah, we kinda figured that when you exploded," Thorax replied.

"Ahem." Everyone looked back to Clover, who continued "Thank you.

'A few years after we founded that happy little kingdom, I discovered seven magic gems hidden away in a temple. If you're familiar with the legend you can guess what they were. Or are."

"The Elemental Gems," Thorax stated. "So they're from Equestria?"

"No they're from Wonderland," Clover replied while rolling her eyes, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "Any more questions?"

"I'm good."

"They should really call you Clover the Snarky," Soarin muttered.

"No arguments there.

'I could tell the Gems were dangerous, so I took them for safe keeping. And, admittedly to study them." She giggled. "I'm a scientist, what can I say?

'So during my research I found out that these gems weren't just full of powerful magic, but that they weren't linked to any source of Equestrian Magic. What I mean is that while they were FROM Equestria, the source of their magic was from somewhere else. Being the young, naive, and curious mare I was, I decided to follow it. As you can imagine it led me here to the Human World, in what is today the United Kingdom (Yeah, the Mirror Portal wasn't always here in America.)" She sighed. "Unfortunately, I kinda ran into some trouble, trouble being some bandits that had some not-so friendly plans for me, and sadly I couldn't magic myself out of it. Fortunately I got saved by six very friendly humans who were more than willing to lend me a hand. And that's when all our lives changed.

'Contrary to what the legend would have you believe, I wasn't the only Element Fury Power Ranger. The seven gems each bonded to one of us, and we each felt a surge of power the likes of which we'd never experienced."

"Oh trust me, we know the feeling," Twilight said.

"Yeah. It is kind of a rush," she admitted. "But back on topic, they decided to go with me to find the source of the Gem's power. Our travels eventually took us across the sea to America, where we found a temple tucked away inside of a mountain. From the scrolls and tomes they had laying around, we found out that the temple was known as the Forge of Elements, and you can put the pieces together from there."

"That temple was where the Gems were created," Sunset stated. "But why were they created and how did they end up in Equestria?"

"We'll get to the why in a moment. But as for how they ended up in Equestria, I have no idea. My best guess is that somebody had them and stumbled across the Mirror Portal, or they might've found another way into Equestria. Either way, they were there, I found them, I followed their magic to this world, and here we are.

'Anyway, we found out that the reason the Gems were created was to create a team of warriors to fight against the forces of evil, of which there were many. Seriously, this world's pretty much a magnet for the forces of evil. To do this they tapped into an energy field that stretched across the entirety of the multiverse, to different dimensions entirely. This was the Morphing Grid, and as I later learned it was the source of power for the Power Rangers. Their powers, weapons, suits, Zords; it all comes from the Grid."

"So the Power Rangers basically get their power, from the Force," Soarin asked.

BONK!

Soarin groaned, rubbing his sore head while glaring daggers at Clover, who was holding her staff that she had used to bonk Soarin on the head with. "Was that necessary?"

"No." She grinned. "But it was fun.

'Most of us were initially hesitant to do this; after all it's one thing to protect people from some jerkwad bandits, but protecting the world from monsters and demons was a whole different ballgame. But after we saw a group of monsters terrorizing a small town, we realized we couldn't just stand by and do nothing while people suffered. So we jumped in, and that was our first battle as the Element Fury Power Rangers." She smiled as nostalgia took her. "Those were good days."

Flash asked "But if there were more Rangers than just you, why does the legend only talk about you?"

Almost immediately he regretted asking that, as Clover's face changed into one of pain and loss. In barely a whisper she answered "Because not every hero gets a happy ending."

That shocked everyone present. Most of the time when they heard about the Power Rangers it was about them fighting monsters or saving the day. As far as any of them had heard from various news outlets and several blogs on the internet, not once had there ever been a story of a Ranger falling in battle. At least, not any Ranger team on Earth.

"I'm sorry," Flash said. "I didn't-"

"Didn't know that sometimes a hero's tale ends in tragedy. Yeah, been there."

"I'd ask if it was the King of Shadows," Tempest said "but I think we all know the answer to that one."

Clover nodded solemnly. "Before he showed up most of the monsters we fought were just that, monsters. Sure some of them were intelligent but they weren't really much of a threat outside of causing wanton destruction and hurting people. We defeated them time and time again.

'But then he came. He was the villain we could have never been prepared for. He was smart, calculating, ruthless, and he was powerful. He said he wanted our Gems because their power would help conquer not only this world but the universe at large. Naturally we weren't going to let that happen, so we fought back." She sighed wearily. "The first few battles ended in stalemates. Neither my team or him and his generals could really gain an edge. But as time went on he began to learn more about us, our fighting styles, our weaknesses. The battles started getting harder, we found ourselves getting pushed back against the wall. With our battles getting increasingly more destructive, we decided to draw the fight away from the majority of people and took the fight overseas. We also made sure to bring the Mirror Portal, since in the off chance he did discover it we didn't wanna risk him going to Equestria. And before you say anything Sunset, I've seen the things he can do firsthand. If Princess Celestia and Princess Luna were to fight him when he was at his full power, they would get pwned."

Sunset's jaw dropped at that. "But they have the power of the sun and the moon! And at the time, they had access to the Elements of Harmony, the most powerful artifacts in Equestria! How can he trump that?"

The moment the words left Sunset's mouth, Clover burst out into fits of hysterical laughter. Between gasping breaths she asked "You really... you honestly... Just... give me a sec." Once she got herself back together, she said "Celestia and Luna can NEVER use their full power, otherwise they'd more than likely end up destroying Equestria and every pony in it. You really think having the power of the Sun and the Moon doesn't come with some drawbacks?

'As for the Elements of Harmony? They are powerful, but they're not quite what Celestia would have you believe. I would know, I was with Starswirl when we studied them. The Elements of Harmony are capable of banishing creatures of darkness, removing dark corruption from an otherwise good pony, and for those who lose their way to the darkness it can turn that little spark in their heart into a blazing fire (like it did to you). BUT, if the target in question has no spark, IF that person in question IS pure darkness and has completely rid himself of any light and any possible chance of redemption, the Elements won't do anything to them. And if that same person happens to have magical strength equal to if not greater than the one wielding the elements? There's a chance it could backfire and the target could rebound the magic, and potentially destroy the Elements and the Tree of Harmony itself. Why do you think there's no mention of Celestia and Luna using the Elements on King Sombra? Answer; they didn't because they knew it wouldn't do jack squat. Because at that point King Sombra had completely given himself over to the darkness, essentially killing the pony he used to be."

If Sunset wasn't shocked before, she was now. "I-I'm sorry. I never knew."

"Yeah, I'm guessing Princess Celestia's teaching skills still suck." Taking a deep breath, she finished her earlier explanation. "The King of Shadows was a remorseless monster, an amoral being of pure darkness. If there was ever an embodiment for all the evil and darkness in this universe, he'd at least make the top 3. I doubt the Elements of Harmony would even chip his armor. And if he had come all those years ago and the Princesses tried anyway? If those Elements and the Tree had been destroyed, all of your Princess friend's accomplishments would get flushed down the proverbial toilet. I'm sure you can imagine what that would mean for you and everyone here."

Neither Sunset or Flash had to say anything at that; Flash because he knew it was only because of Princess Twilight that Sunset had been stopped and redeemed, and Sunset because Princess Twilight had told here about all their exploits in Equestria that required the Elements of Harmony. Needless to say, it didn't paint a good picture.

"Once we arrived in America, we made our way here to Everfree because this mountain sits on one of several magical hotspots that are dotted across the land, which combining that with our link to the Morphin Grid, helped us create the Zords. They definitely gave us an edge, and we managed to hold our ground for a few more months. But... in the end..."

Drip. Drip.

A few tears fell from her eyes, which she wiped away before she continued "We lost the Gold Ranger first. Then Silver. He took out Pink and Yellow with one attack. Green fell next. Red... He put all of his power into one last attack, point blank range. He sacrificed himself to weaken the King enough for me to land the final blow. So, somehow I managed to draw the power from all the Gems, and blasted him with the most powerful banishing spell I had. And it worked. Partially."

"Partially," Thorax asked. "Considering how much power you'd get from all seven gems, I figured you'd blast that bastard into oblivion."

"Even though I bonded to them it was for the briefest of moments, I didn't have near the experience with the six as I did with my own Water Gem. So while I could use them, I couldn't bring out their full power. But that didn't mean I didn't deal a heavy blow. The full power of the banishment spell didn't just send him to the Dark Dimension; it completely vaporized his physical form and weakened him immensely. If he were to try and cross through to your world now, his body would fall apart and he would die.

'But the legend was accurate when they said that during the fight the Silver and Gold Gems were scattered. When I cast the spell he fired a blast of dark magic that sent them flying away from me. It was the same blast that wounded me." She pulled her shirt up to reveal part of her midriff, and everyone gasped when they saw what looked like a black spider-web around her stomach, while the skin over her stomach was a mess of black and red scar tissue. "Damn thing still hurts when I bend over."

"How the hell did you manage to set up that crystal tree to protect these gems, AND crawl back here to cast your healing spell," Soarin asked in disbelief.

"Pure willpower, determination, and my friends have told me I'm too stubborn to die."

"Clearly," Tempest said in awe.

"Fortunately with my knowledge of medical magic and with our location, I had created several chamber beds that would bathe our bodies in healing magic and restore us from all but the most serious of injuries. And clearly it worked," she gestured at herself. "It wasn't perfect though. I woke up about two years ago, but as it turns out it took out a lot of my own magic so that I wouldn't die. That's kinda why even though I knew about the Fall Formal and the Battle of the Bands I didn't interfere. I didn't have enough magic to do anything substantial to help. Not that I needed to, since the Princess, your friends, and Sunset here managed to take care of it."

"My friends," Sunset exclaimed! "Oh my god. With everything that's been happening we forgot all about them." Looking at Clover she asked "Where are they? Are they okay?"

"Relax, Sunset. They're... alive."

Noticing the pause, Sunset asked "But?"

"The King of Shadows has been watching this world for the last millennium and a half. No doubt he's seen your friends aiding the Princess and you. Which means, they and you are a threat to his plans."

"HE ATTACKED THEM?!"

"Yes. But they're not really injured. Physically at least." Seeing their confused looks, she explained "Somehow that bird man was able to drain the magic from their bodies. I didn't see what happened after, because I had teleported out to try and help them. By the time I got there, the Pawns and Nevermore were gone and the five girls were completely out. No matter what I did, I couldn't wake them. I even tried a low level Mind Dive spell, but whatever magic used on them just blasted me out, giving me the mother of all splitting headaches."

Sunset looked absolutely pale. "So... they're..."

"Whatever they did to them has put them in magic induced comas. I've been looking through my library to see if there's some Earth Magic that can wake them up, but so far, nothing."

Sunset didn't say anything for a while, before she muttered "It's all my fault. If I'd never tried to steal that stupid crown-"

"You can't blame yourself for what happened," Flash said, putting a hand on her shoulder.

"HOW CAN I NOT" she screamed, tears rolling down her face. "IF I NEVER STOLE THAT STUPID CROWN AND PUT IT ON, THE GIRLS WOULD'VE NEVER HAD TO TRY AND STOP ME AND GOTTEN MAGIC IN THE PROCESS! THE SIRENS WOULD'VE NEVER COME TO CHS, AND THE RAINBOOMS WOULDN'T HAVE BEEN TARGETS OF ALL OF THIS! HOW CAN YOU SAY THIS ISN'T MY FAULT!"

Before anyone could stop her, she stomped over to the far wall that was purely stone, and slammed her fist into it. Everyone heard a sickening CRACK!, followed by Sunset holding her now broken hand and unloading a stream of curse words that made everyone in the room, sans Clover, blush.

Having seen enough of this, Clover walked over to Sunset and put a finger to her forehead, the tip glowing green. "SLEEP," she commanded.

With that, Sunset's eyes rolled into the back of her head before she fell backwards, clearly asleep. Grabbing her before she hit the floor, Clover said "Sorry, but I don't think that's helping anyone. Excuse me for a second while I take her to the medical room."

A few minutes later Clover came back, and said "She's asleep. That and a little minor healing spell should make sure the bones in her hand will be back how they should be in about an hour."

"She's taking it hard," Tempest said.

"Sunset never had a family until she became friends with the Rainbooms," Flash explained. "How would you react if something like this happened to Twilight?"

"I'd send the guy who did it to Hell on the business end of my boot."

Clover smiled at that. "Oh, you guys will get your chance."

Everybody looked at her and let out a very confused "Huh?"

Rolling her eyes Clover replied "What do you think I've been doing for the past 2 years? Restocking my library and polishing my nick-knacks?"

"I was thinking more along the lines of fixing up your body and working on restoring your magic."

"Well yes, I have been doing that, Soarin. But, I also spent the last two years working on new equipment and upgrades for the next team."

"Next team," Twilight asked in confusion, before her eyes widened. "Wait, you don't mean-?"

Clover nodded. "Those two monsters clearly are taking orders from the King of Shadows. That means he's making a comeback, and it's only a matter of time before he finds someway to restore his strength and build himself a new body. And sadly, I'm in no shape to ranger up again." She looked at all five of them with the most serious of gazes they'd ever seen. "I need you five to become the next generation of the Element Fury Power Rangers, stop the King of Shadow's monsters, and hopefully, eventually, destroy him."

There was a moment of silence before-

"I need to sit down," Twilight muttered, looking like she was about to faint.

Tempest quickly held her and said "Breathe Twi. Breathe."

"We can't be Power Rangers," Soarin exclaimed. "Aren't we supposed to fly, or have super strength, or- Oh yeah. I forgot we could do that now."

"But why us," Thorax asked. "I mean, I'm just a guy who likes insects and blogs about the Power Rangers."

"You made the Morphin Blog" Soarin asked. "Dude, I love your posts!"

"Thanks!"

"Guys?" Everyone looked at Flash, who pointed at Clover, who was smiling at their exchange.

"Believe it or not, that was pretty much our reactions when we first found out about all of this," she said smiling. "But as for the why, the Gems can only be activated by and bond to someone who embodies a trait in their personality. Fire bonds with Courage, Water bonds with Knowledge, Wind with Determination, Earth with Strength, and Lightning with Faith. Even if you guys don't know it, the Gems do. It's what made them choose you in the first place."

Everyone looked at their Gems at those statements, some in shock and others in disbelief.

Finally, one person said "I'm in."

At that, all eyes turned to Flash. "What?"

"Just like that," Tempest asked in disbelief.

Soarin laughed. "Yeah, I saw this coming. Flash is the kind of guy who would gladly help an old lady cross the street."

"One, that only happened once when I was thirteen. Two, that 'old lady' was my grandma, and she's only fifty-nine." Turning to face the group he said "Look, I can't just stand by and let people get hurt when I know I can do something to help them. That's not who I am."

The rest of them were silent, before Thorax finally said "I've always admired the Power Rangers. Ever since I was a little kid and saw the first footage of the Jungle Fury Rangers in Ocean Bluff. The way they fought those monsters, putting their lives on the line to save innocent people; it was inspiring." With one last look at his Gem he finished "I'd be honored to follow in their footsteps. To help keep this world safe."

Tempest spoke up next. "Like hell I'm letting some scumbag like the King take over our world. I'll zap that bozo back to the stone age."

Soarin smirked. "Well, this is officially number 1 on my list of Craziest Things I've Ever Done. Count me in."

All eyes then turned to Twilight, who hadn't said anything yet. She just stared at her Gem, deep in thought.

Finally, Tempest said "None of us would blame you if you decided to step out, Twi."

"I would." Twilight looked at them. "Thorax, Tempest; you two have always had my back when I was either being bullied or I needed help. And Flash, Soarin? I've only know you guys for a few hours, but part of me just knows that you two would do the same. And all of you are willing to go out and fight to protect everyone you care about." She smiled and finished "I'm not Princess Twilight, but I think we'd both agree that I'd have to be the worst friend ever to back out of this and let you guys go off on your own. I'm in."

Clover had to hold back a squeal of joy as they said that. "Well then, we'd better get you guys ready. After what you guys did to his Pawns and his monster, I doubt the King's gonna be wasting any time."

She wasn't wrong.

-The Dark Dimension-

If one were to enter the Dark Dimension, the first thing they would notice was that it seemed to always be nighttime. Spending any amount of time there would let them see that the sun never rose, bathing the world in an oppressive darkness.

The second thing they would notice was the desert. A sprawling desert of sinister looking black sand that stretched for miles, devoid of any plant life or wildlife.

The last thing they would notice, would be the gigantic castle. A large, imposing structure with high walls of black stone, towers at set intervals with Pawns posted as sentries. On the ground around the walls was a wide moat, filled with what one would guess is water, except it was a dark red and seemed to bubble and boil. Four drawbridges were stationed at each wall, each with an iron portcullis to prevent trespassers from breaching the inner grounds.

While there were several large rooms and chambers within the fortress, and more still in the lower levels, there was one room deep in the center of the castle. Inside of the room stood a large tube made of purple crystal, which held the essence of what had once been one of the most powerful beings in the universe.

What had once been the King of Shadows.

But even in this greatly reduced form, he was still someone who commanded fear from his followers.

Even those who were loyal to the core, like Nevermore.

Nevermore kept his head down as he knelt before his master's crystal tube, as his red eyes seemed to peer into his very soul. "I would have destroyed them and brought you five of the Gems, had SHE not came to their aid," he finished.

A few sparks of black lightning flashed within the King's tube for a few seconds, showing that he clearly wasn't taking the news well, before they stopped. Finally the King said "I had hoped that Clover would've perished after our final battle. After she did this to me."

"Unfortunately, she hasn't. But she's clearly weaker than she was before, which means she shouldn't be a threat to our-"

"You fool. She knows how to use the Gems. And more importantly, she has access to the Morphing Grid and the technology to create a new team. Under her tutelage, they may very well come to be a considerable threat."

"Indeed, my Lord," a new voice said.

The voice came from a humanoid creature with a slightly reptilian head, with dark gray skin and electric blue eyes. He was dressed in a dark red robe with black trim, and in his hand he held a metal staff that ended in a metal ring with a black jewel floating inside.

His name was Blast Radius, a wizard from another world. One with an unhealthy obsession with explosion spells, and a serious disregard for the lives of others save his own. But he more than made up for that with his knowledge of dark magic and science.

Even if he did tend to blow up his lab and the surrounding part of the castle.

A lot.

Almost. Every. Single. Day.

With a sinister smile, Blast Radius continued "Fortunately, the damage done to Skullossus was minor. He's healed up and he's ready for Round Two. He's waiting with two squadrons of Pawns. He's ready to go at your command."

"Excellent. And what about our other... project?"

"The spell itself is complete. We merely need the crystals to be charged by their primary power source. Which shouldn't be that hard to find considering those humans are so easy to scare."

The King was silent for a moment before he issued his command. "Send them. Strike terror into the hearts of the humans. Feed the crystals with their fear."

"And should those children interfere?"

"An ant has no quarrel with a boot. Crush them and bring me their Gems."

After their little history lesson and they made their decision to become Power Rangers, Clover had led them into another room filled with tools and various pieces of equipment. Twilight had immediately deduced this was Clover's workshop, which Clover confirmed.

Leading them to a table, Clover revealed five objects. They were mostly rectangular, with a small hatch on the one end. They all had silver, but each also had the respective ranger's color. "Our old Morphers got trashed, so meet the new and improved Element Morphers," she explained. "They're inactive now but once you pop in your Gem you'll be fully synced to the Morphing Grid and ready to go." She held up the blue one and showed two buttons on the side. "The blue button activates the communicator. Just press and say who you need to talk to, and regardless of cell service or location you'll be able to contact another ranger or the base. This green button activates the teleport function, which will immediately bring you back to base. Real handy in emergency situations or if you need to get to the base fast."

"Which considering we'll more than likely be coming here right after school's out, will be often," Flash pointed out.

"Quite. Now, onto the good stuff."

Clover then stepped over to a nearby table that the five hadn't noticed before.

It was covered in a white sheet that appeared to have something on it that the sheet was covering. Clover moved around until the table was between her and the five before removing the sheet, revealing five more objects. They were H shaped handle like objects that were a combo of black, white and one of the Ranger's colors.

Clover raised her hand as the five objects levitated off the table and began to float to the Ranger with that colour. "The E-Raisers. These were the weapons my friends and I used during our tenure as Rangers. Each one takes a distinct form based on what what the user can wield best." She smiled and said "And now they're yours'."

As the E-Raisers got closer, the five of them reached out and grabbed them before they each glowed. Flash's morphed into a red handled sword with a red streak running down the blade, which he gave a couple of practice swings.

Thorax's became a yellow battle-axe with the blades shaped like the horns of a stag beetle. The sudden weight of the weapon almost made him fall to the floor, but he quickly recovered and held it up with one hand.

Tempest's became a spear with a lightning bolt shaped blade colored dark pink, which she spun around while a trail of lightning followed.

Soarin's became a green crossbow with the head of an eagle on the end, with blades on the outside of the bow, indicating it could have some use up close.

Finally, Twilight's became an angular katar with blue blades. Looking it over she noticed a trigger by her thumb, which she assumed meant it could also fire some form of projectile.

"Aw," Soarin said to her, "you got a cute little E-Raiser."

Twilight frowned at him, but then smiled as Tempest prodded the teen with the end of her spear and zapped him, which not only made him spasm but also made his hair stand straight up in a ridiculous manner. "And you look like you got struck by lightning," she retorted with a smug grin.

"I-I will g-get you b-b-back for this."

"As time goes on and you continue using your Elements and your E-Raisers, you'll get stronger. This can mean your E-Raisers might gain additional forms, grant new attacks, and a whole bunch of other cool things. Also, when you're morphed they'll be stored in the belts of your suits. All you need to do is focus and they'll appear in your hand."

"That's cool." Thorax then asked "Hey, where are the Zords?"

Clover giggled, pointing to a shelf on the wall. Everyone turned to look, and-

"You're kidding, right," Tempest asked in disbelief.

Standing on the shelf were five robot creatures, each small enough they can fit in their hand. From right to left they were a red lion, a blue turtle, a green eagle, a yellow beetle (a stag beetle Thorax noted), and a pink wolf.

"Uh, unless the monsters' final forms are toy-sized, I don't think those Zords are big enough," Soarin said.

"They're in standby mode, genius. Contrary to what you guys might think, this mountain doesn't have enough room for them to be in their full size all the time. Plus while they're like this they'll be able to go out with you."

"So they can help us in a fight," Flash asked.

"That, and others things. Plus they've been on standby since I went into stasis, so they haven't been outside this cave in the past 1500 years."

"And believe me, we could use the fresh air."

All five pairs of eyes snapped to the shelf, to see all five of the Zords were now up and moving, peering from the shelf to look down at the rangers.

The Lion Zord added "It's kinda boring, just sitting on this shelf collecting dust."

"So, you guys are alive," Twilight asked, surprised and yet not surprised at this revelation.

The Turtle Zord shrugged, at least as well as he could with his shell, and replied "Well, about as alive as a robot could be."

The Eagle Zord spread its wings before flying down and landing on Soarin's shoulder. Fixing Soarin with its eyes, it said (in a girl's voice much to everyone's surprise) "Sorry. Just needed to stretch my wings."

"Oh, it's cool." Soarin then reached up and tapped the Zord on its head. "You know, I always thought it would be cool to have a bird as a pet."

If it were possible for a robot to glare, the Zord was. "I am a Zord, a living machine meant to fight evil and protect this world. I. AM. NOT. A. PET!"

Soarin quickly raised his hands. "Sorry! I didn't mean to ruffle your feathers."

"Don't mind her," the Beetle Zord said, Thorax having let him climb onto his arm before stopping on his shoulder. "She's just a little cranky when she wakes up."

"You would too if you were stuck in one place for over a millennia and had dust in your wings, feathers, and boosters," the Zord replied. To emphasize her point, two metal plates on her back slid apart, revealing several openings. A green light flared, before they shot out a large amount of dust.

Both the Wolf Zord and Tempest rolled their eyes. , the Zord perched on Tempest's left hand. Tempest muttered "Drama queen."

"I hear ya, sister," the Wolf Zord said, holding out her paw, which Tempest bumped with her right thumb.

Before anyone could say anything, a loud noise came from within the main room. "Looks like the King just sent out his Pawns," Clover said as she made her way to the door, the rest of the group following.

Once they got into the main room, they followed her to the wall of panels, noticing one was flashing red. She pressed a button on the console, and the image on the panel enlarged to fill the whole screen.

Seeing the image Flash said "That's the Farmer's Market in Canterlot Park, not too far from the City proper."

The market and park in question were being terrorized by a large group of Pawns, all being led by a familiar looking skeleton monster. "Looks like Bonehead's back for another round," Soarin stated.

"Let's not keep him waiting then," Thorax said.

Clover pointed towards a green platform with one hand, while her other typed in the coordinates. "That's your ticket there. Hope you guys are ready for this."

As they stepped onto the platform, Twilight couldn't stop her hands from shaking. Seeing this, Flash put a hand on her shoulder. "Are you gonna be okay out there?"

"I... I hope so," she replied, trying to stop her hands from shaking. And failing. "I'm just... maybe a little scared of the thought of fighting that monster."

"I am too." Flash smirked as he saw her surprised look. "But I'm not thinking about the monster. I'm thinking about my friends and family who are gonna get hurt if we don't stop that thing."

"And that stops you from getting scared?"

"More like it helps me realize that I can't let my fear stop me. Cause if I do everyone I love and care about is going to get hurt. Possibly worse."

Hearing their exchange, Tempest said "You can do it, Twi. I believe in you."

"We all do," Soarin added.

Thorax nodded. "I told you that you're stronger than you think. I still think that."

Hearing all this, Twilight clenched her hands into fists, as they finally stopped shaking. Looking at her friends, she said "Let's go break some bones."

That got a laugh out of the group, as they moved so Twilight could step onto the platform.

As she was about to send them she asked "You guys did put your gems in your morphers, right?"

Realizing they forgot about that, the five immediately grabbed their Gems and placed them in their morphers. Once the compartments closed up they could feel, a robotic voice said "Morph Grid Link Established. Rangers Ready."

Clover smiled, before pressing the button to send them. As the platform lit up, she said "Go Go Power Rangers!"

And with that, they were off in a flash of green light.

-Canterlot Park-

"I LOVE THE SMELL OF DESTRUCTION IN THE MORNING!"

The sound came from Skullossus, who was in the middle of a small farmer's market. The Pawns he brought with him were wreaking havoc among the humans present. Most of the people who had been there had run away in terror, though there were a few stragglers here and there. Seeing one, Skullossus smiled and created a black and red ball of flames in his claws. He then threw it like it was a baseball, right into the man's produce stand. As it exploded and the produce was either incinerated or burned, he screamed "MY CABBAGES!" before running away in terror and a bit of anger.

Skullossus cackled at that. "That never gets old." Seeing that the spot they were in was empty of humans, he added "Aw, everyone's left. Guess that's what we get for going to a park." Looking to the Pawns he said "Come on boys! Let's move this to the city!"

"HOLD IT RIGHT THERE!"

Turning around, Skullossus and his Pawns saw Flash and his friends standing there, all of them looking like they were itching for a fight. Grinning, Skullossus said "So you all came? The King figured you would, but it's still nice to see you guys again. And you!" He pointed his one claw at Flash, before raising his arm to show that the arm still held a burn shaped like Flash's hand. "I owe you some payback for what you did."

"Sorry pal," Flash said, readying his morpher. "But the bank's closed."

"On the plus side," Soarin added "we're more than willing to make sure that burnt arm doesn't hurt you anymore."

"Oh please," Skullossus replied cockily. "You're just a bunch of rookies. As I told your blue haired friend, I have 500 years of experience under my belt. You honestly think you stand a chance of taking me down?"

"I'm looking forward to finding that out," Twilight answered, everyone surprised at the confidence in her voice.

"You guys ready," Thorax asked.

Tempest replied "Oh yeah."

In unison the group cried "It's Morphin Time! Element Morpher!"

They each pushed the red button on the top of their morpher, the compartment opening to reveal their gem.

Flash yelled "Fire Fury! ENGAGE!"

The Gem began glowing before he was surrounded by a pillar of red flames. When it cleared it revealed Flash in his red ranger uniform, before the helmet appeared around his head in a final burst of flame. "A wildfire of Courage! Element Fury, Red Ranger!"

Twilight yelled "Water Fury! ENGAGE!"

The Gem began glowing before she was surrounded by a pillar of blue water. When it cleared it revealed Twilight in her blue ranger uniform, before the helmet appeared around her head in a splash of water. "An infinite ocean of Knowledge! Element Fury, Blue Ranger!"

Soarin yelled "Wind Fury! ENGAGE!"

The Gem began glowing before he was surrounded by a pillar of green wind. When it cleared it revealed Soarin in his green ranger uniform, before the helmet appeared around his head in a small cyclone. "A hurricane of Determination! Element Fury, Green Ranger!"

Thorax yelled "Earth Fury! ENGAGE!"

The Gem began glowing before he was surrounded by a pillar of yellow rocks. When it cleared it revealed Thorax in his yellow ranger uniform, before the helmet appeared around his head after being surrounded by a few rocks. "Strength of the tallest mountain! Element Fury, Yellow Ranger!"

Tempest yelled "Lightning Fury! ENGAGE!"

The Gem began glowing before she was surrounded by a pillar of pink lightning. When it cleared it revealed Tempest in her pink ranger uniform, before the helmet appeared around her head in a flash of lightning. "Faith as powerful as lightning! Element Fury, Pink Ranger!"

The suits themselves were similar in that they all had white gloves and boots, with the symbol of their elements on their chest surrounded by a white circle similar to symbol on costume worn by The Flash, while each had their respective colors on the majority of their suits. Their helmets were modeled after their Zords, with a black visor that protected their eyes.

In unison they yelled "Elemental Might! RANGERS UNITE!"

Skullossus growled. "Don't just stand there! Pawns, ATTACK!"

"Focus on the Pawns first," Flash called out as they split apart. "Then we go for Skullossus."

Nodding in the affirmative, Tempest rolled out of the way as one of the Pawns tried to stab her, before lashing out at another Pawn with a swift kick. She jumped and slugged one across the face, before jumping back and focusing on her weapon like Clover had told them. "Time to get serious. STORM SPEAR!"

With a flash of pink light her spear appeared in her hands, its tip crackling with energy. Spinning it in her hands she said "Hope you guys are ready. Here comes the storm!"

She charged into the Pawns, spinning and slashing at them, electricity arcing off her spear with every attack. Once she had them on their last legs, she raised her spear up and yelled "Take this! THUNDER STRIKE!"

Her spear sent a bolt of lightning up into the clouds, which momentarily darkened before unleashing multiple lightning bolts down on the Pawns surrounding her, turning them to ashes. "I'm all clear on my end. How about you guys?"

Thorax dodged a swing from a Pawn before slamming his fist into its chest and sending it flying. Deciding to put his new strength to good use he grabbed the next Pawn that tried to attack him, picking him up and chucking him into a group of his buddies before summoning his weapon. "QUAKE AX!"

As the familiar Ax appeared in his hand, Thorax smacked a Pawn away with the flat of the blade. He then spun around slashed away three Pawns with one strike. "Jeez. This thing has some weight, and a whole lot of power." Grinning under his helmet he said "Let's see what it can really do."

Raising the ax over his head, he brought it down on the ground and yelled "ROCK WAVE!"

As the ax slammed into the concrete, a trail of yellow colored spikes shot out in a straight line towards the Pawns, before a final giant spike shot out and scattered them like bowling pins. As they hit the ground or the nearby trees they faded into ash, as Thorax hefted the ax on his shoulder. "All clear "

Soarin flipped over a Pawn, and then promptly bounced off of the head of the next one. After he exchanged a few punches and kicks with a few of them, he grabbed a nearby metal trashcan and chucked it at a group of them, yelling "Shizuo Heiwajima, eat your heart out!"* He couldn't help but smile as the trash can nailed one of the Pawns full on in its face, causing it to fall back into its comrades. Thankful for the momentary distraction, Soarin summoned his weapon. "CYCLONE CROSSBOW!"

Bringing the green and silver crossbow to the right position, he squeezed the trigger and fired several green lasers that struck the Pawns, which promptly exploded with a blast of wind. "Sheesh. Shooting you guys is like shooting the Grunts in Halo; fish in a barrel."

One of the Pawns rushed him with its sword, but Soarin deflected it with the blades on its bow, before spinning around and slashing it.

Aiming at the group of Pawns, Soarin focused more power into the shot before yelling "TORNADO GRENADE!"

A large green laser sphere shot forward into the group of Pawns, detonating on contact and creating a small yet powerful green tornado. The Pawns were all lifted up and promptly thrown in different directions, most of them turning to ash in mid flight, the survivors turning to ash when they hit solid ground. Soarin looked around to make sure none were going to surprise him, before saying "No Pawns over here. Twilight? Flash?"

Twilight kicked away a Pawn before replying "I'm almost done. Give me a minute." Looking at the group of Pawns she held out her hand to summon her weapon. "HYDRO SLICER!"

The blue katar now in her hand, she dashed forward and slashed one of the Pawns across the chest. She then aimed at another Pawn and pressed the trigger. The blade glowed blue for a second, before shooting out what could only be described as a angled blade of water that slammed into the Pawn. "Huh. So it's also a gun. Just like in RWBY."**

After a few more exchanges of blocks, slashes, and firing off water blades at the Pawns, Twilight decided to end it. Focusing her power into the Hydro Slicer, she yelled "SLICING WAVE!"

She pulled the trigger, and an absolutely massive water blade shot out and annihilated the Pawns, the water washing way their ashes into a nearby storm drain. Smiling under her helmet, Twilight said "They're all washed up. Flash?"

Flash had already exchanged punches and kicks with the Pawns before he summoned his weapon. "PYRO SABER!"

As the sword appeared in his hand he lunged towards the Pawns, parrying their swords, slashing and slicing, before focusing power into his sword that set it ablaze with red fire. "BLAZING SLASH!"

Swinging his sword horizontally, Flash unleashed a wave of fire that incinerating the Pawns. Looking around Flash said "The Pawns are down." He then noticed something missing. "Uh, anybody got eyes on Skullossus?"

Thorax was the first to answer over their comms. "I see him! Looks like he's trying to make a break into the city!"

"We're on our way. Think you can keep him occupied til we get there?"

There was a sound of metal striking bone, before Thorax sarcastically yelled "What do you think I'm doing!?"

"Fair point. Double-time guys!"

Despite the fact that he had no visible muscle, it turns out Skullossus was surprisingly strong. Thorax found this out firsthand when he managed to stop his Quake Ax with one bony hand, despite the ax's weight and Thorax's enhanced strength. "I was kinda hoping Red would find me first, but I guess you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs."

"Sorry to disappoint," Thorax growled, pushing more of his strength into the ax. "But I prefer my eggs scrambled! WITH CHEESE!"

Thorax broke the stalemate when he jumped back, before rushing forward with a horizontal slash. Skullossus sidestepped it and slammed his fist into Thorax, sending him flying back. As he landed on the ground, Thorax was thankful that the suit managed to block the worst of the attack.

That being said, it did still feel like someone hit him in the ribs with a construction girder. "You guys might wanna be careful. Mister Skin-and-Bones here packs a punch."

"Oh I do more than just punch," he replied as he created another fireball and launched it at Thorax, only for it to be struck by a water blade and destroyed. "What?!"

"Hey ugly!"

Skullossus turned to his left, only to get slashed across the face by Twilight and her Hydro Slicer. He moved to strike her with his claw, only for Thorax to rush in and block with his ax, Twilight capitalizing on this moment by blasting the monster in the face with a water blade that sent him staggering back. "Thanks for the save, Twi."

"No problem, Thorax."

Regaining his balance Skullossus roared "That's it! You kids are dead!"

"Not today, bonehead!"

This time Skullossus turned to see Soarin standing by the trees, his crossbow aimed right at his chest. "Yo Tempest! Coming at ya!"

He pulled the trigger and fired a blast right into Skullossus's rib cage, which sent him flying through the air-

-right towards Tempest and her Storm Spear. "You really think you can take us down? You're in for a big shock!"

Spinning her spear, she promptly used it to swat the monster away, pink lightning through its body. "All your's Flash!"

Flash smirked, before charging up and firing a Blazing Slash at the flying monster. The wave of fire slammed into him, setting him ablaze as he crashed into the ground.

But to their surprise Skullossus rose back up, creating a fireball in each claw. "How about I give you a taste of my fire," he yelled as he launched the two fireballs.

Before anyone could so much as try to dodge the fireballs struck the ground in front of them, blasting the rangers off their feet and sending them flying backwards. As they landed, rather painfully, Soarin said "This guy seems stronger than last time."

"Yeah. When we fought in the Everfree he wasn't near this strong," Flash replied. "We're gonna need something- Huh?"

At that moment all of their weapons started to give off a golden glow, much to each of the ranger's amazement. "Clover, what's going on," Twilight asked.

Over the comms they heard her slap her forehead before she answered "I knew I forgot something! Your E-Raisers have the ability to combine to form a powerful super weapon that should be able to turn that monster into dog treats."

"Really," Thorax asked. "Sweet!"

"What's the weapon," Tempest asked.

"I don't know. When my team and I first combined them it was a giant sword. I have no idea what it'll do with your weapons."

"Guess we're gonna find out," Flash said. "Let's put 'em together!"

The Cyclone Crossbow shifted as the Quake Ax joined with it, the blades of the ax shifting to match the bow blades. The Hyrdo Slicer fit over the crossguard of the Pyro Saber, which promptly slid and combined with the handle of the Quake Ax. Finally, the Storm Spear's handled retracted slightly until it was only a foot in length, as it slid into the crossbow through the eagle's head as the mouth opened. As the sequence finished all five of the rangers held it; Thorax and Tempest held the right side, Soarin and Twilight the left, and Flash at the back holding the trigger. "It's a cannon," Soarin said. "A big, overpowered, beautiful cannon."

"Well let's put it to good use," Flash said as they aimed it at Skullossus. "Fury Cannon, ready!"

"Oh please," Skullossus scoffed, as he began to form a giant fireball between his claws. "Let's see you handle this!"

Flash pulled the trigger, only for nothing to happen. "Uh, Clover? I'm pulling the trigger but it's not shooting."

"I can see that. Is there a slot above the trigger?"

Taking a quick look Flash replied "Yeah. Why?"

"Tap your belt buckle. Trust me."

Flash did so with his free hand, and a red key with flame designs appeared in his hand. "Thank you, Clover."

"No problem. Now torch that monster!"

"Can do," he replied, putting the key in the slot. Almost immediately the rangers felt a surge of power go through the cannon, growing more and more powerful as it charged until it reached full power.

In unison, the rangers yelled "FIRE FURY BLAST, ENGAGE!!"

In response, Skullossus yelled "SKULL FIRE!"

As he threw the fireball, Flash pulled the trigger of the Fury Cannon, which glowed before firing a massive blast of fire energy towards Skullossus. As his fireball and the Fury Cannon's Fire Blast collided Skullossus grinned, fulling expecting his fireball to overpower it-

-only for his jaw to drop in shock as the attack smashed through his fireball like it was nothing, and soared right towards him far too fast for him to avoid. "THIS IS GONNA HURT!"

The Fire Fury Blast slammed into him full force, creating a massive explosion of fire. Once it died down he said "This is the end, no bones about it" before falling forward and exploding in a flash of black energy.

-Castle of Shadows: Dark Dimension-

Inside the King's chambers Nevermore, Blast Radius, and the King himself were looking through a circular portal, watching Skullossus fall to the Rangers. Blast Radius winced. "Ouch."

Nevermore sighed. "It seems we placed too much faith on both Skullossus, and the idea that these children would be easy pickings."

"Too true, my fine-feathered friend," Blast replied. "However, it wasn't all for nothing," he added, gesturing to the center of the room.

Drawn in the center of the room was a large black circle, filled with multiple runes and arcane symbols that very few (if any) humans would be able to read or translate. Situated around three fourths of the circle were large crystals, each roughly ten feet tall. Before Skullossus attacked, the crystals had all been dull and colorless.

But now, small amounts of black shadows moved within the crystals, similar to when someone drips food dye into a fish tank.

Smiling, Blast continued "Skullossus and the Pawns had caused enough of a panic to charge the crystals. Not enough for what we have planned, but just enough for us to activate the spell and bring him back, bigger and better than before." Turning to the King's tube he added "With our Lord's permission, of course."

"Do it," he replied. "His new size and the devastation he causes will no doubt supply us more."

Smiling, Blast Radius pointed his staff at the rune, the sclera in his eyes turning jet black with what looked like smoke of the same color seeping from them. He then blasted a beam of black magic into the rune, and yelled "SHADOW RESURRECTION!!"

The rune circle on the ground and the crystal pillars began to glow black in sync, before unleashing an absolutely massive pillar of dark magic erupted through the open skylight and into a portal that opened in the moonless sky.

Back on Earth, a portal opened in the sky before the pillar of dark magic slammed down in the spot Skullossus had just stood, and all of them could hear a loud inhuman roar.

"That can't possibly be good," Tempest stated.

"Considering how most Power Rangers battles go," Thorax replied. "I think we're... gonna need..."

As the pillar of magic ended the rangers were treated to the sight of a fully revived Skullossus, only he was now the size of a skyscraper and somehow looked even more terrifying. With a cackle that sent shivers down their spines he started walking towards the city proper and yelled "GUESS WHO'S BACK!!!?"

Finding his voice Flash said "Time to take this fight to the Zords."

With a small flash of their ranger colors the Zords appeared in front of the rangers. The Lion Zord said "We're ready when you guys are."

"Okay, so how do we get you guys big enough to fight Skeletor's lesser known cousin," Soarin asked.

The Beetle Zord replied "Just say 'Zords! Engage Battle Mode!'-"

"-and hold on for the ride of your life," the Eagle Zord finished.

"ZORDS! ENGAGE BATTLE MODE!"

The Zords began to grow, going from toy sized to the size of a three story building. The Rangers were then teleported into their cockpits, each grabbing their controls.

The Lion Zord's eyes glowed green briefly before unleashed an earth-shattering roar, and its golden mane blazed with red fire. "LION ZORD, READY!"

The Turtle Zord's eyes glowed purple, before two panels on its shell slid back, and tow large silver cannons slid out into position. "TURTLE ZORD, READY!"

The Eagle Zord's eyes glowed red, before the panels on its back slid open to reveal its thrusters, which fired up (without any dust this time.) "EAGLE ZORD, READY!"

The Beetle Zord's eyes glowed white, before a large metal plate on its shell slid back to reveal a single cannon which slid into place right over the Zord's head. "BEETLE ZORD, READY!"

The Wolf Zord's eyes glowed blue, before it opened its mouth and its fangs and its front paws sparked with pink lightning. "WOLF ZORD, READY!"

"CHARGE!"

With that all five Zords ran into the city, the Turtle and Beetle Zords being surprisingly fast despite their rather bulky designs, while unsurprisingly the Eagle Zord was at the head of the group.

Up inside the aforementioned Zord Soarin said "Jeez Aquila, you got some serious speed."

"Aquila," Tempest asked.

"Yeah, that's what I'm calling my Zord. Figured it's easier than just calling her Eagle Zord all the time." Tapping his console he asked "You don't mind, do ya?"

"You do know Aquila is simply Latin for Eagle, right" the Zord asked.

"Yes."

"And no, I don't mind."

"Well how about you guys fly high and tell us what you see," Flash said. "Keep an eye out for any bystanders who might need our help."

"Got it, Flash."

"Roger that," Aquila replied, gaining altitude until she was above the city.

And what they saw wasn't good.

Skullossus had smashed a trail of destruction through Main Street; having set an apartment building on fire with one of his fireballs, smashed through the street into the sewer and left a bus about to fall into the crater, and had smashed through a police barricade that had tried in vain to stop it with their ineffective handguns. "Oh man. It's not looking good guys. This guy's going to town."

"Transmitting data," Aquila said.

The computers in their cockpits all showed what Aquila was seeing, and the Rangers took note. Flash grimaced. "They need our help."

Twilight looked at the screen on her console. "Okay, according to this Splash has water cannons. We'll take care of the burning building."

The Turtle Zord nodded. "Splash. I like it."

"I've got built in grappling hooks and titanium cables," the Beetle Zord said. "Thorax and I can handle the bus."

"Alright then, Stag. Let's rock!"

Flash nodded. "Leo and I-"

"Actually I prefer Leonidas," the red Lion cut in.

"Leo's easier to say. We'll check on the police officers. Soarin, Tempest-!"

"We keep Skullossus occupied," Tempest finished. "You ready, Bolt?"

The Wolf Zord nodded. "This Alpha was built ready!"

"We'll regroup with you guys when we're done. Move out!"

With that the group separated, with Aquila and Bolt heading towards the monster. "Don't suppose you got any weapons, Aquila," Soarin asked.

"Big blue button on the console."

"Thank you," Soarin said as he pressed it.

On the outside, two panels slid open on each wing, revealing hidden rocket launchers. A targeting reticle appearing on the console, and the screen read [Cyclone Missiles Armed][Target Locked]. "Oh, hell yeah!"

Soarin pulled the triggers and fired four missiles that struck Skullossus and exploded, unleashing large wind blasts against him. With a growl he threw a fireball at him, but Aquila quickly dived and narrowly dodged it. Enraged, Skullossus continued chucking fireballs, but Aquila was just too fast and agile. "HA! I'd say you need your eyes checked, but you don't have any!"

Aquila groaned. "Why do I get stuck with the comic relief ranger?"

Over the comm Tempest said "Keep him occupied, Soarin. Bolt's about to get a new chew toy."

"Got it. Where you coming from?"

"Right behind him."

Bolt peered out from behind a building that was behind Skullossus. "Where should I chomp down?"

"Go for the neck. It probably won't kill him but it'll hurt like hell."

Bolt growled, barring her sparking fangs. "Agreed. One Thunder Fang coming up."

Seeing that Skullossus had his full attention on Soarin and Aquila, Tempest said "Bolt. Sic 'em."

"With pleasure!"

Bolt bounded from around the corner, charging at Skullossus's exposed back. Before he could register the oncoming threat, Bolt jumped up and tackled Skullossus, before locking her electrified jaws around his neck. The results were immediate as pink lightning surged throughout his body, making him spasm and jerk like a poorly maintained animatronic. "G-g-g-get o-o-off m-m-m-me," he yelled, trying to reach behind him to grab Bolt.

Tempest held onto the controls for dear life. "Hold on Bolt!"

She growled something back, which was translated on the screen. "Kinda hard to do when you're not built with hands."

"Fair point. Flash, Twilight, Thorax; you guys doing okay?"

Twilight and Splash had just gotten to the burning building. There were three firetrucks at the scene, but they were having trouble against the flames. "Okay Splash, let's cool 'em off." She winced. "Wow, that sounded better in my head."

"Sadly I have to agree," Splash replied.

Pulling the triggers on the controls, twin geysers of blue water erupted from Splash's cannons, spraying over the burning building and quenching the fires.

After a few minutes the last of the fires went out, the firefighters and the people looking up at Splash with awe, some even snapping pictures or taking videos with their phones. Twilight smirked at that. "Bet you we'll make the seven o'clock news."

"No doubt," Splash replied. "Shall we regroup with the others?"

"Yep."

Thorax and Stag had just arrived at the bus, finding it about to slide front first into the crater. "This city seriously needs to rethink how big they make their sewers," Thorax said. "Alright Stag, do your thing."

"Copy!"

Two panels opened on the inside of Stag's horns, revealing the grapple launchers. With careful aim Thorax fired them, nailing the hooks on the rear roof of the bus. Seeing they were secure he began retracting the line, slowly pulling the bus back to safety. Recalling the lines he said "Okay. Bus full of people safe. Remind me to check that off the list."

"We don't have a list."

"It was a figure of speech Stag."

"Oh. Sorry." Hearing a explosion he said "Sounds like they could use our help."

"Then what are we waiting for?"

A quick survey of the scene showed multiple cars that had either been stomped on, flipped over, and one had been flung into a building. Fortunately Leo's scanners had pointed out that all of the officers were either unharmed or had non-life threatening injuries. Speaking through Leo's speakers he said "Get the civilians somewhere safe. My friends and I will take care of the monster."

Suddenly Leo yelled "Flash we got incoming!"

Turning around Flash could see one of Skullossus fireballs heading right towards them. Thinking quickly, Flash moved Leo to stand in between the fireball and the officers, before pulling the trigger on one of his controls. "Lion Fire!"

Leo opened his mouth before shooting out an equally large fireball at the one fired by Skullossus. Both attacks canceled each other out and created a small explosion.

"We need to end this and fast," Flash muttered.

"On that we agree," Leo said.

As they ran off towards Skullossus, a police officer with two-toned blue hair pinched himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming. He then smiled. "Cadance is never gonna believe this."

Back with Flash he said "Tempest, Soarin we're on our way. How are things going?"

"Not that great," Tempest replied through the comm.

"We're hurting him but he just keeps shrugging it off!"

Skullossus had successfully managed to get Bolt off of his back and had thrown her against a building, stunning her. Soarin and Aquila had managed to provide covering fire, but while their missiles hurt him they didn't cause any significant damage. Once she got back off Bolt surprised Tempest by firing a beam of pink lightning from its maw, but just like Aquila's missiles it didn't really cause any damage. All it really seemed to do was make the skeletal monster angry.

Which unfortunately led to it throwing more and more fireballs.

Just as Skullossus was about to throw another fireball twin streams of water slammed into him, knocking him off balance and extinguishing his attack. Both Tempest and Soarin saw Splash with his cannons at the ready. "Sorry we're late," Twilight said.

"You're just in time," Tempest replied.

Skullossus managed to regain his balance, only to see Stag appear and aim his cannon at him. "Rock Cannon!"

The cannon fired, shooting a large boulder at high speeds into the monster's head, which exploded and forced him backwards. "OW! THAT HURT!"

"That's the idea, stupid," Thorax retorted.

Leo then appeared and launched another Lion Fire attack at the monster that struck home. But aside from a few scorch marks Skullossus stayed relatively unharmed, much to Flash's annoyance. "Seriously?"

"At the very least Splash managed to make sure he can't make anymore fireballs," Twilight said.

"The dude could still destroy a building with a few punches," Soarin stated.

"And none of our Zords can take him down," Tempest replied

"Not on their own," Thorax said. "But their not on their own. They're a team, just like we are."

Flash smiled. "And no team fights alone. Isn't that right, Leo?"

"Correct," Leo replied. "And I say it's high time we all send this skeleton back to the King of Shadows in pieces. Give the command, Rangers! Activate Element Fury Megazord!"

"ACTIVATE ELEMENT FURY MEGAZORD!"

The eyes of the Zords all flashed, as the five of them were enveloped in an aura of their respective colours. Suddenly, Leo unleashed a mighty roar before the five leaped into the air. One by one, the Zords began to transform.

Leo's front legs disconnected from the main body, revealing two connectors. The legs then shrunk down to their mini size before flying into a compartment on its head. The rest of his body shifted upright, its head and mane turning ninety degrees as its back legs folded in half.

Aquila's wings also disconnected, shrunk down and flew into a compartment on her head. She and Bolt then flew up next to Leo before their rear ends connected to the connectors the front legs had detached from, Aquila becoming the Megazord's right arm and Bolt becoming its left arm, their heads serving as the hands.

Splash's shell came off before shrinking down and flying into the compartment on its head, while Stag's horns folded inwards to form a triangle shape. After that, Splash's body folded inwards to the middle behind its head. The two Zords then folded forwards, Stag becoming the Megazord's right leg and Splash becoming the left leg with their heads acting as the feet, while Leo flew down as its folded up legs linked to the top of them.

Finally, a compartment on the top of the Lion's mane opened up before a large humanoid head folded out, its eyes glowing blue as it came online.

Inside the Megazord the Rangers and their consoles appeared in a large cockpit. Each console was lined up from left to right; Flash was in the center, while Thorax and Soarin were on his right while Twilight and Tempest were on his left.

In unison the five Rangers cried "ELEMENT FURY MEGAZORD! READY!"

Back at their base, Clover was beside herself with joy at seeing them form the Megazord. "THEY DID IT! THEY DID IT! WOOOOO!!!!!!" Sitting back down she looked at Skullossus and imagined she wasn't just looking at him, but also the King of Shadows. "YOU GUYS ARE SO SCREWED NOW!"***

Skullossus growled at the Element Fury Megazord as it charged at him. "Bring as many toys as you want! I will end all of you!"

"You'll die trying," Flash responded. "Take him down!"

When the Element Fury Megazord was close enough it ducked under Skullossus's swing before throwing a punch with its right hand, followed by a kick with its left leg. Both attacks hit home and knocked Skullossus back. Regaining his balance Skullossus swiped at them with his claws, only for the giant robot to sidestep and deliver a powerful hay-maker right into the monster's jaw, sending it flying and landing on the street. "That was a lucky shot," he grumbled as he got back up.

"What about this one," Twilight asked.

"What are you-URK!" Skullossus replied only to be cut off when the Element Fury Megazord kicked him in the face, sending him flying a good distance away. He did get up, but he was shaking and clearly injured this time.

"Looks like the bonehead's on his last legs," Soarin said.

"Then I guess it's time we put him down for good," Tempest replied.

"ELEMENT FURY MEGAZORD! FINAL STRIKE!"

The sections of the Megazord suddenly began to glow their respective colours, making Skullossus begin to worry. "Oh that definitely cannot be good!"

Suddenly the Megazord started rushing forwards before all five rangers called out "ELEMENTAL STAMPEDE!" The Megazord then exploded into its individual Zords, which were each surrounded by their own elemental aura. As they flew past Skullossus, time seemed to slow down as each Zords struck it one by one. First he was burnt with fire, then cut with wind, smashed with rocks, drenched with water before finally being zapped by lightning.

Once the last attack ended, time seemed to resume normal speed and in a flash the Zord recombined back into the Megazord. Said robot skidded to a stop behind Skullossus, who started sparking. "Looks like this is the end for me," he wheezed before falling forward and exploding.

The Rangers cheered at seeing this, at their first full battle as Power Rangers ending in a victory. Flash smirked. "Elements Together, Rangers Forever."

Later that day Sunset stood in the medical room, her eyes puffy and red from the hundreds of tears she had shed since she woke up.

In front of her were the healing chambers that Clover had told them had saved her life, only now inside of five of them were her comatose friends. Just as Clover had said they seemed to be in a very deep sleep, but nothing Sunset did or said could wake them up. The only sign they were even alive was that their breath fogged up part of the transparent crystal above their faces.

She felt a hand on her shoulder, looking to see Clover. Behind her were the rest of the rangers, still in uniform but with their helmets off. Smiling Clover said "We'll find a way to wake them up."

"And when we find Nevermore and the King, we're gonna make them pay for what they did to them," Flash added. "That's a promise."

Sunset sniffled, before finally giving a small smile. "Thanks guys."

"In the meantime," Twilight said "we could still use some help using our magic. Maybe you could give us some pointers after school?"

Chuckling, she replied "I think I might be able to help with that."

"That's gonna have to wait until tomorrow," Tempest said. "Because in case you guys forgot, we actually have to go TO school tomorrow. And after the day we've had, I think we've all earned a good night's sleep."

"A lot of this still feels like a dream," Soarin stated. "I mean, when I woke up this morning i wasn't expecting to get drafted into being a ranger."

"I don't think any of us were," Thorax added. "But I'm not complaining."

"Still, Tempest is right," Clover said. "You five just got done with your first battle as Rangers. And considering the king'll more than likely see you guys as a significant threat from now on, these fights are just gonna keep getting tougher. Go home and get some rest. Like Tempest said, you've earned it."

The six of them left the cave via the teleporter, with Sunset going last so she could say one last goodbye to her comatose friends.

Once they were gone, Clover sighed wistfully. "They're just like we were when we first started out," she whispered, a single tear falling from her eye. "I just hope they get the happy ending that we never did."

Author's Note

*Many of you who haven't watched the anime Durarara!! probably don't know who that is. So here's a helpful video!

** Volumes 1-5 are on Youtube. Feel free to look it up if you want.
***

:pinkiehappy: What? It's true!

This chapter currently holds the top spot for LONGEST CHAPTER I'VE EVER WRITTEN!! 12,673 words. Then again this is the opening two episodes, so I have to set up the plot elements, get the rangers their powers, introduce the Zords and Megazord, et cetera. Oh, and don't forget the exposition.

Fortunately, the next couple of chapters should be relatively shorter, as I don't need to write out the majority of the morphing or Zord/Megazord sequences, since you guys have already read it the first time. I'll save it for new Zords/Megazords later down the line. (I'd say spoilers but given the usual Power Rangers formula, you probably expected it.)

I'd like to say thanks yet again to https://www.fimfiction.net/user/284583/Banshee531 for giving me the idea for the E-Raisers, some aspects of the Zords, and several scenes and sequences throughout this chapter.

Speaking of which, the E-Raisers are based off of the Bayards from Dreamworks Voltron Legendary Defender, which I sadly haven't been able to watch outside of scattered Youtube vids because I don't have a Netflix account.

If you're wondering why I made the Zords alive and with personalities, that's because they'll be playing some pivotal roles in the development of our rangers down the road, in more ways than one.

As I said in the opening description, the Ranger suits and Zords are designed by me. To my knowledge they are not based off of any previous Sentai or Ranger team.

Quick heads up, the next chapter's going to be awhile because I want to do a chapter or two for my other story: https://www.fimfiction.net/story/420567/equestria-girls-spider-man-book-1-amazing Feel free to check it out if you want!

That's all for now. Until next time, Equestrian Defender, out!

Episode 3: Fight As One

-Monday, March 23rd, 2019-
-Canterlot High School-

Sadly the team wasn't able to meet up for training on Sunday, as Soarin had to help his Uncle move into their new apartment, which Flash decided to help with. Not only that, but Twilight and Tempest needed to fill out some paperwork at the school while Thorax was... doing something at home (he never said.)

But they did all meet up at Sugarcube Corner, minus Sunset because she had another job interview, to just hang out and get to know each other a little more. While it was only for a few hours, they did manage to learn a few things about each other.

Surprisingly, the human Twilight didn't sing or dance like her Equestrian counterpart. Instead she played the violin and preferred classical music over pop, though she did also enjoy rock and roll (which she said was mostly because she hung out with Tempest so much.) Also, she hated tea but loved coffee. Her dream was to use her knowledge of science and engineering to create a clean and renewable energy source, one that could eventually replace fossil fuels.

Flash already knew a lot about Soarin, being best friends since they were kids. But the rest of the group found out that he lived with his Uncle Jetstream since he was seven (though he didn't say why, since that was kind of personal.) He also enjoyed cooking, comic books, video games, and riding his motorcycle. Honestly he didn't have a dream as of yet, but he wasn't bothered by it. He figured he'd probably find his calling sometime in the future.

Oh, and he loved making jokes. And puns. Especially puns. Leading to this moment.

"Don't doubt me guys," Soarin said with a smirk. "I know for a fact that I'm very, pun-ny."

Everyone groaned, with Tempest actually slamming her head onto their table. "Goddamnit Soarin."

Thorax was a fairly open book. Aside from running the Morphin Blog and having a fondness for insects (especially beetles, fittingly enough) he was a huge fan of anime (something he had in common with Soarin) and had what he jokingly called an "addiction to anything and everything sugary and sweet" (which explained why along with his school stuff, his backpack was also filled with candy.) He also liked to write stories in his free time, leading to his dream of wanting to be an author or screenwriter.

Tempest... was a bit more tight-lipped about anything involving her past or home life (though they did notice that she looked at Twilight when it was her turn) but she was nice enough to tell a few basic things about herself. Her favorite music was rock and roll, she didn't like bullies (especially snobby rich @$$holes like Suri Polomare) and she liked art (especially graffiti.)

Flash had told his new friends that his mother, Storm Sentry, was a lieutenant on the police force (something he and Twilight had in common, as both had a family member in law enforcement) and about his ten year old little brother, First Base. He also told them about his father, Fire Brigade, who had been a captain for the Canterlot City Fire Department before he contracted his leukemia. He liked multiple forms of music (though he leaned more towards rock, much like Tempest) and played the guitar in his free time. He did used to be part of a band, but they broke up a couple months ago. His dream was to either be a cop like his mother, or a firefighter like his father, which everyone thought was pretty cool. Soarin joked and said protecting and saving people must run in his family, which Flash admitted was pretty true.

After the exciting events on Saturday*, naturally the Power Rangers and the monster attacks would be the talk of the entire school. Everyone was asking the usual questions of:

"Who were these new Rangers?"

"Where did they come from?"

"What did the monsters want with Canterlot?"

"Who did the monsters take orders from?"

And many more questions that would more than likely never be answered.

It almost took all the attention away from the fact that the five Rainbooms were missing.

Almost.

Which led to the very, very uncomfortable meeting Sunset and Flash were currently having with Principal Celestia and Vice-Principal Luna.

"I appreciate you two coming to talk to us," Celestia said, taking a seat at her desk.

"No problem," Flash replied. Sunset didn't say anything, knowing what was coming.

"Let's get straight to the point," Luna stated. "We got a phone call from the parents/guardians of Rainbow Dash, Rarity Belle, Fluttershy Breeze, Pinkamena Diane Pie, and Jacqueline Apple."

"Who's Jacqueline Apple," Flash asked.

"That's Applejack," Sunset replied. "Jacqueline Apple is her real name. But she hates it so she took Applejack as her nickname."

"Got it. Sorry Vice Principal Luna, you were saying?"

"Apparently, their children haven't been seen or heard from since Friday afternoon, after they were all told that they would be having a sleepover at the Breeze's house."

"Something that I'm guessing you know about, Sunset," Celestia interjected. "Seeing as how Fluttershy's parents said that you waited all night for them, only for them to never show. The next morning, you promised that you'd look for them and find out what happened to them."

She nodded, remembering that promise. "Yeah, I remember."

"Well, seeing as how they're not here for class today, we're assuming that either you didn't find anything-"

"-or you did, and whatever happened to the Rainbooms involves magic," Luna finished. "Which would probably be why you haven't told their parents, or notified the proper authorities."

"And before you ask, Flash, the reason you're here is because Rainbow Dash's parents saw you and four other teenagers (coincidentally being our four new students joining our school today) and all of you left Canterlot Mall and headed off in the direction of the Everfree Forest," Celestia explained. "Which means you more than likely know what she knows."

Both Flash and Sunset had known this was going to happen, especially considering that Sunset's friends all had very supportive and loving families (Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash's parents, Pinkie Pie's big sister Maud Pie, Rarity's Aunt Gem, and Applejack's grandmother, Granny Smith.) But they didn't think telling them the whole truth would be a good idea, since the more people who knew about their secret meant more chances for the wrong people to know. In this case the wrong people would be the press, the police, or the Ranger's own families. Flash knew for a fact that if his mother found out he was the Red Ranger she'd ground him, take his morpher, and more than likely blow the whistle on all the others. And then everything would snowball from there.

So after they swapped numbers and set up a private encrypted chatroom (courtesy of Twilight) they all came up with and memorized a cover story that would hopefully be enough to get the adults to back off, if only until they could actually get the Rainbooms awake again. "We found out that the Rainbooms had went into the Everfree Forest to help Fluttershy release some rabbits the animal shelter were caring for back into the wild," Sunset said, beginning their cover story. "We managed to find where they released the rabbits, and even found Fluttershy's phone."

"But aside from a few footprints from their shoes, there was no other clue to what happened to them," Flash continued. "No blood, no signs of any struggle, no evidence of any sort of foul play. For all intents and purposes, they just up and disappeared."

"So we searched around the area to see if they might've still been there, but we didn't find them." Sunset mentally prayed they'd buy this next part. "And then we were attacked by the same kinds of monsters that attacked the farmer's market yesterday."

Both Celestia's and Luna's eyes widened at that. "You kids were attacked?!"

"Yes," Flash replied. "They just came out of the woodwork and chased us out of the forest. But no one was hurt, and we didn't tell the cops because we figured they'd write it off as a prank call."

Luna couldn't fault the logic in that. "So, they showed up in the same area where your friends were?"

Sunset and Flash nodded. "By the time we got out of the forest and back to Canterlot, we found out that the same monsters attacked and got destroyed by a new team of Power Rangers. And we didn't tell any of the Rainbooms' families because we thought there might be a chance that they might show up yesterday or today." Sunset sighed. "But... they didn't."

Flash looked at the two women and said "I don't want to jump to conclusions, but the fact is those monsters jumped us in the same area where the Rainbooms disappeared while we were looking for them. And while they did attack us, they seemed more like they wanted to disable and capture us as oppose to kill us. I think it's highly likely that-"

Celestia held up her hand. "That's enough, Flash." She sighed. "Are you sure that's all you two know about what happened?"

Flash nodded, and Sunset gave a low "Yes."

If either of the two adults were suspicious of the two of them, they didn't show it. With nothing else to say, Celestia said "You two are excused. Oh, and if you would, could you two please show our new students around the school?"

"You think they bought that," Sunset asked Flash once they were out of the office and a few feet down the hall, hopefully out of earshot.

Flash nodded. "They should've. We didn't lay it on too thick, we kept eye contact, and we did everything we could to make it sound believable. Not only that, but we have an airtight alibi since we technically did come back into the city after the fight was over."

"Yeah, I guess."

Flash noticed her tone of voice. "You know we had to do that, Sunset."

"I know. I just... I kinda figured after what happened at the Fall Formal I wasn't going to be lying again anytime soon."

"I get that. But I seriously doubt they would be okay with five teenagers going out and saving the world in colorful costumes while piloting giant robots. And neither would the police. Or our families."

"Especially your incredibly overprotective mother. I highly doubt one of the best cops in Canterlot would be okay with her son being a vigilante."

Flash groaned, facepalming. "Don't remind me. She worries about me and First Base enough as it is. If she ever found out I was fighting monsters while simultaneously breaking many, many laws? She'd probably have a full on panic attack that would make her heart explode."

Eventually they reached the hall where Twilight, Soarin, Thorax and Tempest were. Twilight and Thorax was looking at something on Twilight's laptop, Soarin was reading a volume of some manga, and Tempest had her earbuds in and was tapping her foot to whatever song she was listening to. "So," Flash told the group as they arrived. "It looks like Sunset and I will be your tour guides for the day."

Nobody seemed surprised by that. Putting her laptop away, Twilight asked "Did the Principals buy our story?"

"It looks like it," Sunset replied. "But be sure to remember the cover story in case they call you in to confirm it."

"Jeez, you make it sound like we're being interrogated by the police," Soarin joked.

Tempest chuckled while she stashed away her earbuds. "Considering how you drive that motorcycle of yours? I have no problem believing you've spent time in handcuffs."

"I will neither confirm nor deny that statement."

Flash couldn't stop the small laugh from escaping his lips. "Anyway, let's get this tour started. First stop, our lockers."

As they walked, Thorax looked in his backpack and asked "You okay in there, Stag?"

Hiding under his spare hoodie, Stag poked his head up and said "I'm good."

"Be thankful you're not squashed between a math textbook and someone's gym shorts," Aquila said, her voice coming from Soarin's backpack.

"Guys, keep it down," Twilight whispered. "The last thing we need is someone wondering why voices are coming from our backpacks."

"Sorry."

"Remind me again why you guys are keeping your shrunken down Zords in your backpacks," Sunset asked.

"Because they've spent the last 1500 years in a dusty old cave," Tempest replied, sticking a hand in her backpack and petting Bolt (more like tapping her Zord on the head with her finger, but it's the thought that counts.) "Figured they could use some fresh air."

"Problem is that we don't exactly blend in, so unless we're all alone without non-team members, we can't exactly walk around in public," Splash said, from Twilight's backpack.

"So this is the next best thing," Leo finished from Flash's backpack. "Plus, being stuck between a chemistry textbook and a bag of... Sweet and Spicy Chili Doritos is far better than staying in a cave gathering dust."

Soarin smirked and asked "So, you finally got over your addiction to Nacho Cheese?"

Flash rolled his eyes. "Nah. I just got hooked on another flavor." Once they reached the lockers, Flash noticed something. "Uh, Sunset?"

Sunset sighed when she saw her locker, marked with a message of DIE SHE-DEMON! scrawled in permanent marker. "You know, you'd think after I saved the school and possibly the world from the Sirens, EVERYONE would've let this thing go by now."

Tempest shrugged. "Some people can hold grudges that last forever. Trust me on that one."

She didn't answer, instead choosing to open her locker and pulling out what she needed for her next few classes, she asked "So, are we heading back to 'that place' after school?"

Everyone nodded. "Yeah, we're hoping to at least get some basic training for our elements before the next monster attack," Twilight replied. She then promptly facepalmed and added "And now that I said that, I've probably just jinxed us and our next monster attack is probably going to be sometime today."

"Let's hope we can at least cover the basics before the King sends one over to our dimension," Thorax said. He then looked and asked "Hey, am I the only one who noticed all of our lockers are next to each other?"

It was true. From right to left was Flash's locker, followed by Twilight's, Soarin's, Thorax's, and Tempest's lockers all side by side. Sunset's was in the same row, but there was an empty locker in between her's and Tempest's. "Huh. Weird coincidence," Soarin commented.

Or is it? Sunset mused with a smile.

-The Dark Dimension-
-Inside the Castle of Shadows-

"My disappointment at this turn of events, cannot be overstated."

Nevermore and Blast Radius both shuddered at their King's words, knowing that despite how calm his voice sounder, their King was anything but. If the sparks of black and purple lightning were anything to go by, he was annoyed at best, and angry at worst.

"I understand, my Lord," Nevermore stated.

"The longer those five meddlesome brats are allowed to live whilst the Gems are bonded to them, the more powerful they will become. It's possible that with enough time they could grow powerful enough to become a legitimate threat to us."

"Well, for Nevermore and I, perhaps," Blast Radius quickly said. "But surely you, my Lord, would forever be beyond their abilities."

"I probably would be, Blast Radius, if I happened to have a BODY, as well as the full extent of my powers. But as I am now, if the Rangers were to get into this room and shatter this tube, my energy and consciousness would be scattered so far across this dimension that I may never be able to pull myself together again." A few more sparks flashed in his tube, and he continued "Did Skullossus at least manage to generate enough fear to justify using the Shadow Resurrection?"

Both Blast Radius and Nevermore nodded. "He has generated a substantial amount of fear, my Lord," Nevermore stated. "Enough for us to replace the Pawns we lost and be able to perform another Shadow Resurrection."

"However, if we are to create for you a new body," Blast Radius explained "then we are going to need more. Far more."

A sigh sounded from the tube, and the King said "I assumed as much. Do we have another monster ready to send out?"

"They're getting prepped as we speak," Blast Radius answered. "And they've been given clear instructions: Cause fear among the humans first and foremost, and to destroy the Rangers when they try to interfere and bring us back the Gems."

"And while they're doing that, I shall be scouring the city for any signs of the Gem of Steel and the Gem of Light, incognito," Nevermore added.

Very well. Who are you sending?

Blast Radius smiled. "Let's just say his love for causing fear among the humans is second only to his love of sharp objects."

-Clover's Cave: Medical Room-
-After School that day-

Clover looked at the healing chambers, running multiple scanning spells on the five Rainbooms to try and figure out how to lift the spell that was keeping them comatose.

It wasn't going anywhere. No matter what counter-spell or method she tried, the spell that Nevermore had placed on the Rainbooms persisted. In some cases, it rejected her counter-spells rather violently, creating shockwaves that sent her across the room (which was why she was now wearing a protective vest and a football helmet.) She sighed and said "I'm going to have to look through my books again." There was a sudden knock on the door, to which she said "It's open."

The door slid open to reveal Sunset Shimmer, who blinked when she saw Clover. "Is... now a bad time?"

She shook her head, taking off her helmet and letting her green hair fall out. "No. This is just because the last counter-spell I tried on them bounced back, and I would like to keep my ribs and spine intact."

Sunset nodded in understanding. "Well, the Rangers are here and ready for training."

"I'll be right out," she replied, slipping out of the vest. She saw that Sunset hadn't exited the room and asked "Something on your mind, Sunset?"

She nodded and asked "How's it been going with them?"

"The Rainbooms?" Seeing Sunset nod, Clover replied "Well, the healing chambers are keeping their bodies stable for now courtesy of the built in stasis spells. They managed to keep my alive all this time while I healed, and negated my need for food, water, or... bathroom breaks."

"TMI."

"Sorry." Clover sighed. "The problem though is that whatever Nevermore use on them is either immune to or completely rebuffing all of my attempts. I've tried almost every counter-spell I can think of and it did absolutely nothing, and trying to connect to their minds in any way only serves to give me a splitting headache." She groaned and said "I'm running out of ideas, and sadly I'm no closer to figuring out this puzzle since when I started."

Sunset looked at the Rainbooms, worry evident on her face. "Have you ever seen a spell like this before?"

Clover thought about it for a second, and replied "Similar spells, yes. But most of them were to put a patient in a controlled coma before surgery. Not to put them into a sleep-like state for what I presume to be forever."

She thought about it for a second, before saying "Maybe I should write to Twilight."

"You mean Princess Twilight?"

It was there for just a moment, but Clover could swear she saw a slight blush on Sunset's cheeks. "Yeah. That Twilight. I figure she might be able to find a book in the archives or something about this."

Clover nodded. "Couldn't hurt to try. Because frankly, outside of leaving them in there and hoping the spell wears off (which I don't think is likely since it was cast by villains,) I'm about out of ideas." Running a hand through her hair she said "In the meantime, I've got five highly energetic teenagers to teach magic to."

As she left, Sunset reached into her backpack and pulled out the magic journal Princess Twilight gave her. "I just hope she's not at another political summit again." Pulling out a pen she began to write Dear Princess Twilight...

-Downtown Canterlot-

In an alleyway behind an abandoned building all was quiet, until a black portal appeared and scattered a bunch of discarded newspapers and old garbage.

From the portal emerged two monsters. One was Nevermore, still in his monster form. The other was a rather, peculiar looking monster.

For starters he was a head taller than Nevermore and with a body that seemed to be made completely out of rusty blades, with a few protruding out of his shoulders, arms, legs, and back. The only part of his body that wasn't silver or rusty-brown was his glowing yellow eyes. He flexed his four fingered hands and said "Okay, what do I cut up first?"

Nevermore rolled his eyes and replied "Anything. As long as there's humans around so we can harvest their fear, Razor. In the meantime..."

His body seemed to turn into black liquid, before reshaping into a more human looking form.

The result was a pale-skinned man with long, shaggy black hair and sickly yellow eyes. He clothes were almost entirely black; his boots, jeans, and t-shirt were all jet black, along with his trenchcoat. There was some gold on the front of his coat, along with a gold necklace around his neck with a large black stone. He pulled out a pair of sunglasses and put them over his eyes, and said "I have Gems to find. Have fun."

Razor laughed before one of his fingers elongated into a three foot long blade, which he promptly slashed horizontally down a trash can. It stood still for a moment before both sides fell apart, the blade having cut through the (thankfully empty) trash can like it was made of butter. "Oh, you know I'm gonna have fun!"

Flash shook his head, shaking off the fuzziness he was feeling. "Please tell me we're done now."

Clover nodded. "Yeah. You can go sit down now."

Flash sat down in a chair next to the other Rangers, all of them feeling a bit dizzy or disoriented. Why?

Well, the five Rangers and Clover were discussing their training regimen when Thorax pointed something out. He had been looking through his blog when he noticed that in the past, several teams of Rangers had dealt with either one of their members or almost all of their members being mind controlled or had their minds screwed with, either by a monster or the Big Bad themselves. Some prominent examples included the Mighty Morphin Green Ranger, the White Dinothunder Ranger, and the Jungle Fury Spirit Rangers; all of whom had fought the then-current teams of Power Rangers and had done a good job of kicking their asses. Soarin even pointed out that it wasn't just the Power Rangers. Superheroes in comics or characters in manga were always getting mind-controlled or possessed, usually forced to do horrible crimes and/or fighting their own friends.

And considering what happened during the Fall Formal (where the majority of the school save for Princess Twilight and the Rainbooms were mind controlled by the transformed Sunset Shimmer) and the Battle of the Bands (where the singing by the Siren Sisters made everyone except the Rainbooms (again) so angry they were about ready to tear each other apart) Thorax thought that maybe it might be a good idea for Clover to put some spells/enchantments/wards to make sure that none of their future enemies could mess with their heads.**

Everyone agreed, with Flash being the most supportive of this since he was subjected to having his brain messed with during both events, and he was understandably NOT eager to repeat the experiences. Not only that but outside of sparring with each other or fighting evil clones of themselves (hey, it could happen) they really did not want to fight each other.

And thus they spent the last half hour having Clover put protective spells and wards on them that would protect them from multiple forms of mind magic; be it a monster taking control of their minds, having their emotional states altered to make them angry, sad, depressed, or enraged (which thankfully included the Siren's Songs) having their minds swapped with a monster's, having their memories erased***, et cetera.

Having gotten her bearings back, Twilight asked "So, you're sure these wards will work?"

Clover nodded. "I've cast these spells plenty of times before back in Equestria. They always worked then, and unless one of the monsters has telepathic abilities on par or even stronger than Professor X or the Martian Manhunter, you'll be fine."

"Well, I don't think we're gonna be crossing over with Marvel or DC anytime soon," Soarin replied, standing up and stretching. "But did you really have to cast a ward on us that would make sure a demon or evil spirit wouldn't possess our souls?"

"Like Thorax and Flash said, better safe than sorry. And considering the King of Shadows has had a millennium and a half to find the meanest monsters in The Dark Dimension to build up his army, there's no telling what kind of freaks and freaky abilities he's got to throw at us."

"Yeah," Tempest admitted. "I wouldn't put it past him to have some sort of body-snatching monster."

"So now that that's over, how about we get to training," Flash asked, getting back to his feet.

Clover nodded. "First things first, have you guy tried to use your magic ever since your battle with Skullossus?"

They all shook their heads, with Soarin saying "Last thing I wanted was to have the apartment we just moved into torn apart by a tornado."

"That was probably the smartest move you could've made." Clover said. "While Elemental Magic isn't necessarily the most powerful magic there is, you're still dealing with the forces of nature. If you guys tried a spell and you lost control, the results could be disastrous. Fortunately, that's what this training is for. So, let's get started-"

She was then cut off by the monster alarms going off. "Right after you guys deal with this monster."

They rushed to the computers to see what was going on, and to their surprise the scanners were picking up two alerts. One was a monster made out of blades (AKA Razor, not that they knew his name) and a group of Pawns tearing through the downtown area.

But the other one was a bit confusing, since all they saw was a pale-skinned guy mostly dressed in black walking through a different section of downtown. He wasn't attacking anyone or anything, but he did seem to be looking for something. "Um, unless that guy is a vampire or a werewolf, I don't think he's a monster," Soarin pointed out.

"Looks can be deceiving," Flash replied. "The Sirens look human enough, but give them enough magical power and they reveal their true monster forms."

"And from what you said, they were a pain in the ass before that happened," Tempest stated. "Still, why would they send this guy out when they've already got Mister Blades going to town?"

"That's easy," Thorax explained. "'Mister Blades' and the Pawns are causing havoc that will no doubt draw our attention, while the other guy who looks like a human can go out and about and hunt for the Gem of Steel and the Gem of Light."

"Probably a good thing," Twilight mentioned. "According to this, the human looking monster apparently has a low magical signature. Probably wouldn't last long in a fight."

"Let's not take any chances though," Flash cut in. "Weak or not, if he finds the Steel or Light Gems then the King of Shadows can use it to his advantage. And that's the last thing anybody wants."

Clover nodded. "Flash is right. I think the best course of action would be for you to split into two teams; one goes to deal with the blade monster while the other deals with the one searching for the Gems."

"We'd probably only need one of us to deal with the human monster," Flash stated. "I'll take him."

"Are you sure that's a good idea," Thorax asked.

Twilight nodded. "Yeah. Maybe one of us should go with you?"

Flash shook his head. "Not a good idea. With all those Pawns and that monster tearing up Downtown, more Rangers should be there dealing with them rather than joining me in destroying or driving off the weaker monster."

They couldn't really argue with that, so they all headed towards the teleport platform.

-Downtown-

Razor and the Pawns marched through the town, sending the citizens running away for safety. While the Pawns didn't have any facial expressions to be seen, Razor was having an absolute blast. "This is the most fun I've had in centuries!"

To prove his point, he extended one of his claws, which began to glow. He then swiped it downwards, unleashing a crescent wave of energy that cleanly sliced a (thankfully) empty car in half, right before it exploded which made even more humans cry out in terror. He let loose an evil cackle before looking at the Pawns and he yelled "Come on boys! Make these humans scream! Make them feel terror! The more fear they feel, the more fuel for the King!"

Meanwhile behind a dumpster, all the Rangers except for Flash were listening in on what he was saying. Twilight in particular was relaying the conversation to Flash to keep him looped in, as well as Clover and Sunset back at the cave. "'The more fear they feel, the more fuel for the King'," Twilight echoed. "Clover, what does he mean by that?"

"I've got a theory about that, but it's nothing good," Clover replied. "In the meantime, take that monster down!"

Tempest cracked her knuckles. "Now this is the kind of after-school activity I could really get into."

Thorax peeked over the top of the dumpster and stated "Coast is clear save for the monsters."

"Then let's go," Soarin replied, jumping out from behind the dumpster and running forward, much to the other's surprise.

Which for Tempest quickly turned to annoyance as she dashed out after him. "HEY! Leeroy Jenkins, wait up!"

"Keep up, slowpoke!"

"GRRR!"

Twilight and Thorax followed the two, Thorax asking "You think those two are gonna be able to get along?"

"They managed to do it before," Twilight replied. "But didn't all the Ranger teams have to work on being, you know, teams?"

It was at that moment they arrived to Razor and the Pawns. "Hold that thought," Thorax said.

Because at that moment Soarin yelled at the monster "HEY RUSTBUCKET!"

Razor turned towards Soarin, seeing all four of the Rangers standing there ready to fight. He focused on Soarin and replied "Well, if it isn't the Power Rangers. You saved me the trouble of having to- HEY! WHO YOU CALLING RUSTBUCKET!"

"You, stupid," Tempest replied, enjoying the growl from the monster.

Frustrated, the monster extended his claws and yelled "It's Razor!"

He brought his claws down on a car beside him, slicing it into multiple pieces, widening the eyes of the four of them. "Definitely gonna want to avoid those," Twilight stated.

"I think we figured that out, Twi," Thorax muttered, pulling up the sleeve of his hoodie to reveal his morpher. "Ready?"

The other three replied "Ready!" and readied their own morphers.

"Water Fury!"

"Wind Fury!"

"Earth Fury!"

"Lightning Fury!"

"ENGAGE!"

Now fully morphed, the Power Rangers drew their E-Raisers, ready to fight.

Razor growled, pointing one of his elongated claws at them. "GET THEM!"

The Pawns charged forward, as did the Rangers, and the fight was on!

Meanwhile, Flash was following the human looking monster, doing his best to stay out of his line of sight. If he noticed Flash following him, he didn't show it. So far the monster had been looking around several construction sites, a steel mill on the far side of town, before coming closer to the downtown area near a construction site where a company was building a skyscraper. The building itself was half-finished, with all the workers having gone home for the day, so there was no one around.

Which was why no one stopped him when he hopped over the fence and into the site. Flash waited a few minutes before opting to take the stealthier option of climbing the fence.

Landing as quietly as he could on the other side, he looked and saw that his quarry... was gone. "Huh? Where'd he go?"

"Closer than you think."

Flash whirled around, and was immediately sent flying by a backhanded blow from the humanoid monster. As he collided with a support beam and felt whole spasms of pain go up his spine, he groaned "Well, if there was any doubt you weren't a monster, it's gone now."

The monster man laughed. "Ah, the Red Ranger. So good to see you again."

Confused, Flash asked "Have we met?"

"Perhaps this will jog your memory."

The monster man then reached into his shadow, his hand literally sinking into it like it wasn't there, and pulled out a very familiar black and gold katana. "Oh, crap. Nevermore?"

"Of course," Nevermore laughed out before dashing forward with his sword raised, preparing to slice Flash in half vertically.

Fortunately he was just fast enough to summon his Pyro Saber and block the strike, the two swords creating sparks where they hit. Flash grunted due to Nevermore's strength, but he managed to say "So, how exactly did you manage to hide your true power? What we got on our sensors was a lot weaker than what you're capable of."

"Oh, your sensors found me? And here I thought I was keeping my power suppressed."

Breaking the blade lock, Flash went on the offensive and tried to strike him, only for Nevermore to block the attack without any issue. "Come now. I have several millennia of sword training and combat experience. You on the other hand, have only had that sword for... 2 days, I'm guessing?"

Flash growled as he pushed back against Nevermore's attack. "You know, Skullossus said the same thing about having 'centuries' of combat experience. And guess what? We still beat him."

Nevermore laughed. "Despite his proclamations, Skullossus was one of our weakest monsters. I, on the other hand?"

Before Flash could blink, Nevermore broke the blade lock and lashed out with a kick that struck him in the chest and sent him flying across the site again. He quickly got back to his feet, just in time to see Nevermore's body glow back before transforming into his traditional monster form. "I am the King of Shadow's top lieutenant, the Right Hand of the Dark Lord himself. You are but a small candle's flame compared to my power."

Flash chuckled, readying his morpher. "Well, even a small candle's flame can dispel the darkness. Fire Fury! Engage!"

Now morphed, Flash stood at the ready with his Pyro Saber. "It doesn't matter how strong you are, Birdbrain. We will defeat your monsters. We will defeat you. We'll fix whatever you did to the Rainbooms. And then we're going to dethrone that King of your's once and for all."

Smirking, Nevermore readied his own sword. "Bold words. Let's see you back them up."

And with that, the two of them began their duel.

Soarin blasted another Pawn away with the Cyclone Crossbow, the foot soldier fading away once it hit the ground. Another Pawn tried to get him from behind, but he pulled off a similar spin like he did in the Everfree Forest, kicking up a miniature tornado. Think I'll call that one my Tornado Spin he thought. He was jarred out of his thoughts as the Pawn was sent flying into a group of his cohorts, knocking them over. Before they could get back up he fired off a Tornado Grenade and sent them all flying and fading away. With no more Pawns around him he said "Hey Tempest! That's ten for me!"

Tempest twirled his Storm Spear before impaling a Pawn and firing a lightning bolt through it and striking another one. Both faded away as she saw four more Pawns all rushing at her at the same time. She felt the lightning inside of her, pink sparks appearing around her body as the Pawns seemed to be slowing down to the point they moved in slow-motion. Taking advantage of this she pressed her attack and unleashed a series of lightning fast slashes with her weapon, and feeling immense satisfaction as she watched the Pawns fall apart in slo-mo. "Sorry boys. You're too slow." Looking at Soarin she added "Thirteen for me, Airhead."

"Huh. You didn't strike me as having lightning fast reflexes."

Every Ranger that heard that groaned. "Can the chatter, and the jokes, please," Twilight said as she fired off a Water Blade through a Pawn before spinning and slashing an arm off of another. The Pawn surprisingly didn't react to it, only to notice its stump and that its sword was now on the ground. Fortunately Twilight sliced its head off before it could reach down to grab it. Hearing a scream, she turned to see a group of Pawns about to attack a woman and her baby on the other side of a fountain. Without any hesitation she jumped over the fountain, and the water inside of the fountain's pool raised itself up into the air to create a platform for Twilight, which she jumped off of like it was a solid surface. While in midair she fired off several Water Blades, destroying all of the Pawns except one. The last Pawn quickly met its end when Twilight landed on it, stabbing right through it with the Hydro Slicer. Once she landed she looked to the mother and asked "Are you okay?"

The woman nodded. "Y-yes. Thank you, miss."

Twilight smiled behind her helmet. "That's great. You two get somewhere safe." Once they ran off Twilight said "Thorax, you almost done with your Pawns?"

"Working on it!"

Thorax cleaved through three Pawns with a single swing of his Quake Ax, grabbing the sword from one of the fading ones and throwing it, impaling another Pawn to a nearby wall. He then looked around and saw that he was surrounded by roughly six Pawns all charging him from multiple angles. Instead of panicking or trying to dodge, Thorax instead leaped up into the air, raising his fist up before letting himself fall down. As his feet touched the ground he slammed his fist down, sending a shockwave that cracked the ground and sent all six Pawns up into the air. He then quickly spun around and swung his Quake Ax, either cutting or knocking the Pawns away. The ones he cut immediately faded into nothingness, while the ones he knocked away ended up fading too (either because Thorax's strength was too much for them to handle, or because they hit something that broke them.) "And now I'm done." Looking around he asked "Did anybody see where the walking razor blade went?"

Everyone looked around and saw the aforementioned monster had decided to make himself scarce."Oh come on," Tempest grumbled. "Is this just their M.O.? Use the Pawns to keep us distracted while they run off to go destroy something?"

"Maybe he's just scared after we turned that bonehead Skullossus into dog treats," Soarin suggested. "Clover, Sunset, you guys wanna help us find that guy so we can send him to the recycling center?"

"Please," Twilight added.

"Already started tracking him after you guys morphed," Sunset replied. "The walking-tetanus factory is heading towards the Seven/Eleven right next to Spark Plug's Auto Shop."

Everyone paled at the implications of that. "If he were to start a fire at that gas station-" Thorax began.

"Let's make sure he doesn't get that far," Tempest stated.

As they ran off towards the Seven/Eleven, Soarin hit the communicator on his morpher. "Flash, where are you? We could really use your help."

"I'm a little busy at the moment!"

Flash had been under the initial assumption that being morphed would give him the strength, speed, and power to take down Nevermore relatively quickly. He had been proven wrong in those regards, and had been dueling with Nevermore for the past five minutes unable to land a single blow. Every strike of his sword was deflected or sidestepped, and the one time he tried using a Blazing Slash Nevermore simply destroyed it with is sword. He tried shooting a jet of flame at him, but the bird monster simply tanked it with only a few singed feathers.

The most frustrating part was that Flash knew Nevermore was holding back his true power, probably just to toy with him. Locking blades with him again, he asked "Are you even taking this seriously?"

Nevermore smirked. "No. Admittedly while you've shown some promise and a hint of skill, you're hardly worth me using more than five percent of my true power."

Flash grit his teeth, growling as he felt his anger rising. He broke the blade lock and slashed at his opponent, and to his and Nevermore's surprise crimson flames suddenly coated the Pyro Saber.

And even more surprising was Flash's attack breaking through Nevermore's defense and slashing right across the left side of his face, eliciting a roar of pain and several curses from the crow monster. Flash looked at his now flaming sword and said "Huh. That's new." Looking at Nevermore clutching the side of his face he asked "So, am I still not worth the effort?"

A low growl emanated from Nevermore before he removed his hands from his face, allowing Flash to see the damage. The entire left side of his face was seriously burned, with the left eye pretty much nothing but ash. "You are going pay for that, you insufferable child."

As he said that his katana began to glow black, the blade extending from its original length to almost six feet.

Flash reiterated his earlier statement. "Oh, crap." Hope the other Rangers are having better luck than I am.

Razor grinned evilly as he saw his target in the distance. "What better way to spread some fear than with a blazing fire followed by a nice big boom," he said aloud.

He took a step forward, only to be struck by a bolt of pink lightning, making him stop and spasm.

The bolt was courtesy of Tempest Shadow, who quickly put herself between Razor an the gas station. "Sorry Rusty, but we're not letting you go any further."

Razor growled and moved to strike her, only to be blasted by a shot from Soarin, followed up by a Water Blade from Twilight. "GRR! Anyone else wanna take a shot at me?!"

He felt a tap on his shoulder, and he turned around to see Thorax holding his Quake Ax poised to swing. "Batter up!"

He swung for home, slamming his ax into Razor's side and sending him flying into the side of a garbage truck. The force of the swing was actually hard enough that he smashed through the side of it and collided with the other side. Soarin whistled and said "It's a home run! The crowd goes wild as Thorax Beetles scores one for the home team!"

Tempest facepalmed at that. "Okay, seriously Soarin. Do you ever shut up?"

"Only when I'm sleeping," he replied.

"Well if you need a nap-"

Thorax looked at the garbage truck as it suddenly rocked and said "Guys, maybe wait until after we take out the walking pile of rust before we-"

The words died in his throat as Razor's elongated claws tore through the side of the truck, quickly followed by the other one. With a horrendous sound of tearing metal the monster forced his way out of the garbage truck, glaring hatefully at the Rangers. "I! AM NOT! RUSTY!"

"Really," Twilight asked. "Because I'm seeing some pretty obvious signs of rust on your armor."

That was the wrong thing to say, as Razor let loose a roar of rage, elongating his claws and yelling "AIR CLAWS!" before unleashing multiple energy waves that cut through the concrete sidewalk, the road, and several cars. The Rangers all got hit and sent flying, their suits protecting them and making sure they didn't get cut in half. Landing most ungracefully on the ground, they struggled back to their feet to keep fighting. "Okay, this guy is clearly a lot stronger than we thought," Tempest groaned out.

Thorax nodded. "We could really use some help right now."

"Not help," Twilight said. "We need Flash. We were only able to beat Skullossus because all five of us were there."

"Hate to be the bearer of bad news," Soarin answered, firing his Cyclone Crossbow and nailing Razor in the chest "but that human monster Flash was tailing turned out to be Nevermore, who he's currently sword-fighting with." He ducked, dodging another energy wave, and added "I seriously doubt Birdbrain's just going to let him run and come help us."

"A sentiment I unfortunately have to agree with, old bud," Flash replied on their communicators. "Especially cause I kinda burned half of his face extra crispy and- AH!"

There was the sound of something very heavy slamming onto the ground. "What was that," Tempest asked.

The hook of a crane. He lead me to a half-finished skyscraper a few blocks away from you guys. I could probably get to you guys in about five minutes if I could get this guy off my back.

Soarin snapped his fingers and said "Flash, remember when Smokescreen and his goonies cornered us behind the Cloudsdale Arcade?"

"Yeah. We barely got away from those morons. Though to be fair I did kind piss them off when I kicked Smokescreen in the- Soarin, you're a genius!"

"Thanks man. I try."

"You guys try and hold out for a few more minutes. I'll be there as soon as I can."

Another Air Claw slice through the mailbox beside Thorax, who replied "Make it sooner. Please."

CLANG!

"Believe me, I'm trying."

Flash broke the blade lock, sidestepping a thrust from Nevermore while attempting to strike his back, but Never once again countered his attack. Honestly, he was surprised that the monster was still able to put up such a good fight despite his new lack of depth perception.

It didn't help that the blade of his katana was now able to extend itself; the few times Flash put some distance between himself and Nevermore to try and launch a Blazing Slash, Nevermore would swipe at him and his sword would glow black and then grow to absolutely insane lengths (the record so far that Flash had noticed was at least ten and a half feet) and would cut through just about anything. Solid steel girders, a dump truck, and the cable holding a crane's hook.

The problem with trying to get in close to attack him was that since Nevermore decided to up his game, he was now fighting faster and stronger than he had been earlier, and Flash was struggling to try and match him. I really hope this works.\

Flash ducked under an attempted thrust and began a series of strikes and attacks, Nevermore blocking each and every one. Sparks flew form their blades whenever they clashed, until finally they locked blades again while glaring at each other. Nevermore growled "Surely, you realize you can't beat me."

Grunting with the effort, Flash replied "Maybe. But you never know. We humans are full of surprises."

"Like what?"

He smirked, thankful the helmet concealed it. "Like this!"

And before Nevermore could understand what was happening, Flash brought his knee up...

...right into Nevermore's crotch.

Now Flash wasn't an expert in monster anatomy, but he reasoned that since Nevermore and the other monsters he'd seen had been relatively humanoid, then they would have something in that area.

And if the incredibly pained look in Nevermore's eyes was any indication, he was right.

Taking advantage of that, Flash headbutted the monster and making him stumble backwards into a pile of sandbags. "Sorry to cut this short, Birdbrain, but my friends need me." Flash then fired a Blazing Slash that struck him full on in the chest, creating a small explosion and a bunch of smoke.

Not waiting to see if Nevermore survived that (honestly he wouldn't be surprised by that) Flash ran and leapt over the fence and booked it towards where the other Rangers were fighting Razor. "How you guys holding up," he asked on his communicator.

"Not that great," Tempest replied.

"Rustbucket's gone completely crazy!"

SLICE! "QUIT CALLING ME THAT!"

The past few minutes for the Rangers had not gone well. Their attempts to attack with their individual weapons had done little to no damage aside from scratching Razor's armor. This in turn made Razor angrier, elongating his claws and launching Air Claws everywhere, most of them missing the Rangers but striking just about everything else (fortunately their weren't any civilians around, so nobody except for the Rangers got hurt.)

Soarin fired another shot from his Cyclone Crossbow and asked "Where'd this idiot learn to shoot? The Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy?****"

"Don't jinx it," Twilight admonished.

Thorax, who had managed to sneak up behind Razor, struck him across the back with the Quake Ax. But while it knocked him forward, it still didn't break through his armor. "Well, his back armor's as strong as his front armor."

Razor whirled around and yelled "I could've told you that, moron!" before slashing Thorax across the chest and sending him flying into a car.

Before he could follow up on that, Tempest used her Storm Spear to pole vault and kick Razor in the face. She then started slashing and stabbing at the monster, trying to find a gap or hole in his armor that could serve as a weakspot. But sadly it was to no avail, and Razor endured her onslaught for roughly a minute before unleashing a spread of four Air Claws that struck her point blank, sending her flying through a window into a building. "I'm okay," she called.

"You won't be for long," Razor responded, his elongated claws glowing bright silver. "Let's see what happens when I chop up that building while you're inside of it!"

"BLAZING SLASH!"

A crescent wave of fire slammed into his side, setting him partially on fire. He growled and turned in the direction it came from, seeing Flash standing there. "You're done hurting my friends, monster."

Razor laughed as the fire started to burn out. "Your friends couldn't scratch me. What makes you think you can?"

Flash smirked behind his helmet. "Not me, tinhead." The other Rangers lined up on either side of him, all readying their weapons. "Us. Five Rangers, fighting as one."

He scoffed at that, his elongated claws glowing bright blue. "Like one more's gonna change anything. AIR CLAWS!"

As Razor launched the slicing energy waves, the Rangers launched their own attacks to counter them. "BLAZING SLASH!"

"SLICING WAVE!"

"TORNADO GRENADE!"

"ROCK WAVE!"

"THUNDER STRIKE!"

All of the attacks collided, cancelling each other out with several bright flashes. "If that's all the five of you got, then this'll be-" Razor began, only to balk once the flashes died down and saw the Rangers holding a fully formed Fury Cannon that was aimed right at him.

"No," Flash admitted. "But this is!"

Before he could fire off another Air Claw, the Rangers yelled "FIRE FURY BLAST, ENGAGE!"

The Fury Cannon launched the massive blast of fire, striking Razor head on. While his armor had been able to withstand the Rangers' individual attacks, the full power of the Fury Cannon was too much to handle, partially melting his armor as the attack drilled into him before exploding.

Once it died down, Razor weakly growled "That was a lucky shot." before falling forward and exploding into black energy like Skullossus had.

Blast Radius sighed as he watched Razor die. "Well, today's certainly turning out to be a bummer," he muttered. "Nevermore's been injured and we lost another monster."

"Let's hope we can at least salvage this moment," the King of Shadows said from his tube. "Resurrect him. "

He nodded, pointing his staff at the rune circle as his eyes became black smoke again. "SHADOW RESURRECTION!"

Back in the real world, the Rangers witnessed the beam of shadow magic that remade Razor and grew him into a giant. "OH, IT'S GOOD TO BE BACK," he yelled.

Soarin looked at Flash and said "I think it's time for some heavy metal."

"Amen to that," Flash replied. "Leo?"

The Zords appeared in front of the Rangers. "You rang," Leo asked.

"As a matter-of-fact, we did," Twilight stated, pointing at the giant Razor. "It's time we take that guy to the scrapyard."

"Then what are we waiting for," Bolt happily said, wagging her tail. "LET'S GO!"

"ZORDS! ENGAGE BATTLE MODE! ACTIVATE ELEMENT FURY MEGAZORD!"

Razor growled when he saw the fully formed Element Fury Megazord standing across from him. "You think that wannabe Gundam of yours' can hurt me," he asked before he charged at them with his claws extended. "Think again!"

"Wrong franchise, moron," Soarin replied from his console. "And as for us hurting you, how about you try this?"

The Megazord reared its right fist, before throwing it forward and smashing Razor in the side of the face with a perfect right hook. "OW!" He snarled before swiping at the Megazord, sparks flying as his claws glanced across the lion head on the chest.

Inside the Rangers were all jostled around as the whole Megazord shook from the impact. "Jeez, this guy's a lot tougher than the last guy," Tempest noted.

"Noticed," Thorax replied, holding onto his controls.

Razor roared, grabbing onto the Megazord's shoulder while using his free hand to continue slashing at the head and chest.

"This guy's not giving us an inch," Soarin said, trying in vain to get a punch in with the right arm.

"And we're too close to him to use the Elemental Stampede," Twilight stated.

Flash looked at his console before finding something useful. "Then let's get some distance."

He pushed a big red button and yelled "LION FIRE!"

On the outside of the Megazord, the mouth of the Lion Zord opened and a fire began to glow in its maw. Confused, Razor asked "What's that supposed to-"

Before he could finish a stream of fire shot out, striking him point blank and sending him flying, crashing down on the street.

"HA! Bullseye!" Looking at Twilight he asked "We far enough away now?"

She nodded. "Yep."

"Then let's finish it!"

As Razor got back to his feet, he saw the Megazord segments glowing and charging at him. "Oh, come on!"

"ELEMENTAL STAMPEDE!"

The five Element-enhanced Zords slammed into Razor, reforming into the Megazord behind him. Defeated, he started sparking before falling forward, saying "Looks like I'm heading to that recycling plant in the sky" before hitting the ground and exploding.

Flash sighed as he leaned back in his chair. "Elements Together, Rangers Forever."

Nevermore growled as he looked at his reflection in the mirror.

Specifically at the bandages covering the burnt half of his face.

The spot where that damned Red Ranger had struck him.

The mere memory of it was enough to make him draw his katana in a fit of rage and slash it through the nearest object, which happened to be one of the black pillars in the room, cutting through it like it was butter.

"You know, you keep cutting through those pillars and you're going to make the 2nd floor the 1st floor."

He turned to see Blast Radius standing there, having just come into the room. Taking a deep breath he replied "Sorry. I'm merely... venting my anger."

"At having half of your face burnt or at getting kneed in your cajones?"

Nevermore grit his teeth. "At the fact that I was humiliated, by a rank amateur with a sword."

"Well, maybe next time you won't underestimate your opponent."

"He got lucky," he growled, tightening his grip on his sword so much Blast Radius was surprised his hand wasn't bleeding. "He won't be next time."

"So," Clover said "what did we learn today?"

It was after their fight with Razor and now the Rangers were back in the cave, resting and digesting what had happened.

"The monsters are a lot stronger than we thought they were," Twilight guessed.

"Some of the monsters can hide how strong they really are," Tempest added.

Thorax chimed in with "And shapeshift."

Clover nodded. "All good points. But not what I was looking for."

"We're stronger when we're together, rather than when we're alone," Flash said.

"Bingo. You guys may be strong on your own. But together, as a team, you guys can take down anything."

Everyone nodded at that. "Still, you managed to do some damage to Nevermore by yourself, Flash," Soarin stated. "That was pretty cool."

"Yeah. Except if I hadn't took your advice and kept trying to fight him, he'd probably have killed me," Flash replied somberly. "As we are right now, Nevermore's too strong for any of us to take on 1 on 1. Hell, he didn't even use his full power on me, so I'm not even sure all five of us could take him down."

"Well, that's why you got me to train you guys," Clover said. "And now that the monster threat's been taken care of, we can finally get started on your first lesson."

Everyone's reactions were to either groan, sigh, roll their eyes, or a combination of the three. "Can't we do it tomorrow," Tempest asked exasperatedly.

Clover smirked. "Nope. No time like the present."

They all sighed, knowing she wasn't going to let it go.

Meanwhile in the Medical Room, Sunset had just gotten her reply from Princess Twilight via the Magic Journal.

She hadn't been able to find a specific book on sleeping spells or curses that could help the Rainbooms, but she did know a pony who specialized in that branch of magic and was more than willing to lend her aid. But she'd have to come over to the Human World to see what had happened to them so she'd be able to tell what had been done to them. If she can help then I say bring her over.

Okay then. It'll probably be a few days, her schedule's kind of packed.

Really? Who is this mare again?

Oh, I forgot to tell you! It's Princess Luna.

Sunset's eyes widened. Princess Luna? She's your specialist?

Yeah. Not only does she have several centuries of magical knowledge, but she also specializes in Mind Magic, Dream Magic, and Curses. Plus, she's been wanting to meet you for a while.

Sunset smirked. Gee, a former villain now reformed wants to meet another former villain now reformed. I wonder why she'd want to do that?

Ha ha. Very funny.

I try. See you soon.

See you.

There were a few footsteps, and Sunset turned to see Clover walking in. "So, how's the training going," she asked.

Clover smiled. "Pretty good. They're going through some basic exercises right now, summoning small amounts of their elements. I'm letting them practice that for now." Seeing the journal she asked "Did Princess Twilight find something?"

"Yeah. A specialist she thinks can help. But we're gonna need a cloak or something to hide her when she gets here."

"Why?"

"Because I'd really not have to explain why there's suddenly two Vice-Principal Luna's on campus."

Author's Note

*Yeah, bit of an oopsie on my part from Chapter 2. I said that the events of the first two chapters occurred on a Saturday, but THEN I had Tempest and the group say they had school TOMORROW. Even though at the time, tomorrow would be Sunday, and while some schools do have school on Sunday, most American schools don't. So, oops.
So, bit of a minor retcon on my part.
**This has always been a plot line that I've never particularly enjoyed in any season of Power Rangers. Mind Control, emotional manipulation (Thank you, Sirens.) and body swapping. I don't know whether it's because it's happened in multiple episodes across multiple seasons and it's gotten kinda stale, or because I just really don't like it when a villain is easily able to mess with the minds of our heroes. It would make sense if the Ranger team doesn't have a mentor figure who's experienced in this stuff, but you'd think that Zordon or one of the other mentors would think to use items or enchantments to make sure a monster or the Big Bad wouldn't be able to screw with the Ranger's heads. Fortunately, that won't be happening here.
***Take that, Forgotten Friendship!
****Apply now and learn how to hit everything EXCEPT your target.

After a... Holy Cow! It's been over a year since I last wrote for this story. I'm not kidding, I published Chapter 1 on March 21st, 2019 and Chapter 2 a month later on April 1st, 2019 (and it was a serious chapter and not an April Fool's joke.) I am so sorry to all of you who have been patiently waiting for this story to continue. I am so sorry for making you wait this long.

Anyway, technically a sorta-filler episode having the Rangers bond and fight a monster. We'll get to more plot and character stuff next episode. Promise.

Also, if you didn't happen to read it on the preview page, we got a TVtropes page now, courtesy of SuperSonicHeroes. Thanks man.
SuperSonicHeroes!
Go check it out if you want.

Until then, Equestrian Defender, out!

Episode 4: Your Own Shade Of Red

-Friday, April 3rd, 2019-
-Sentry Household-

After a grueling all-nighter at the precinct, Storm Sentry had went to bed that night utterly exhausted. She honestly wasn't expecting the morning to be anything exciting.

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM!"

Clearly, she underestimated her sons.

When she woke up that morning she came out to the kitchen to see Flash putting the finishing touches on a plate of blueberry pancakes (her favorite), placing down three strips of bacon that were right in the sweet spot between juicy and extra crispy, just how she liked it. First Base was there too, finishing up mixing her coffee (though with the amount of creamer and sugar she liked in it, it may as well have been milk.)

And all this because, as she just now realized, today was in fact her 36th birthday (a fact that she was too embarrassed to admit she forgot.)

So instead, she pulled both of her boys into a bear-hug and said "Thanks boys. This is just what I need after the night I had."

First Base smiled and replied "Well, you always go out of your way to make our birthdays feel special. So we wanted to return the favor."

"Plus this is one of the few days you're actually here before we leave for school," Flash added, setting up plates for First Base and himself. "And we kinda miss getting to have breakfast with you. You want one or two pancakes, little bro?"

"Two please."

As she sat down she couldn't help but smile. "What did I ever do to get such amazing and thoughtful sons?"

Hearing that, First Base gave his mother arguably the most devious grin imaginable. "What did you do to get us? Well Mom, when a mommy and a daddy love each other very much they-"

"BASE," Storm exclaimed, her face red as a tomato while First Base was laughing hysterically.

Flash simply rolled his eyes as he filled his own plate. "Of all the things you had to inherit from Dad, why did it have to be his sense of humor?"

"Hey, one of us had to get it."

-The Dark Dimension-
-The Castle of Shadows: Pawn Creation Chambers-

In the deepest levels of the Castle of Shadows was a large chamber, roughly the size of a football field. Within it were what appeared to be several statues that looked like the Pawns but without armor, roughly one hundred of them in a ten by ten formation and seemingly sculpted out of jet black stone.

Standing in the back of the room by a small mountain of the same black stone was a monster. It was roughly eight feet tall and seemed to be made purely out of stone. It's body was a patchwork of different brown and grey rocks, with large spines on its shoulders and back in a burnt orange color. Its head was also burn brown and shaped like a prism, ending in a sharp point at the top. But the slightly disturbing part was that the monster had no face; on all four sides of its head there were no eyes, mouth, not even a nose. It was all just smooth stone, save for seven glowing dots on its face shaped like an 'H.'[1]

"Ah, Golem!"

The monster, now known as Golem, looked to see Blast Radius walking into the chambers. He smiled and said "You've been busy."

Golem responded with a serious of noises that sound like rocks clicking and scraping together, which to anyone else would probably sound like some form of Morse Code.

Apparently Blast Radius knew it by heart though, since he replied "And the King appreciates your time and effort." Golem sent another series of clicks and scrapes his way, to which Blast Radius rolled his eyes. "Stop complaining. You don't even need sleep."

Golem didn't reply, simply turning back to his latest statue and chipping away a few extra bits on its face. Once it was finished to his standards, he lifted up the statue before placing it down with the nearest group.

Nevermore walked into the room, the left half of his face still covered by bandages. "Blast Radius," he said, looking at the mad wizard. "I have new orders from the King."

Blast Radius looked surprised at that. "Huh. I figured he'd want you to get your eye and your face fixed first."

Nevermore sighed. "He does. That's why he wants you to go for this one."

His eyes widened at that. "Me? I'm not exactly a combat specialist."

"He's aware of that. That's why you'll be taking a monster with you. And..." He growled in anger before continuing "She will be accompanying you."

If it were possible, his eyes widened even further. "Please tell me we're not talking about who I think we're talking about."

"We are, unfortunately."

"Not to question the King (seeing as how I dearly value my continued existence) but he is aware that she-"

"-is one of the most treacherous, untrustworthy, conniving, backstabbing monsters in the entirety of the Dark Dimension? The same monster who would sooner cut the tendons in your legs and muscles and leave you to die so that she could save herself," Nevermore finished, rolling his eyes. "I'm sure he's aware of it."

Golem let loose a series of clicks and beeps, getting both Nevermore and Blast Radius's attention. "I'm not sure you going would be a good idea," Nevermore replied, understanding Golem's language. "Don't get me wrong, you are strong enough to go toe-to-toe with those meddling kids. It's just that if they destroy you, we'll have nobody to make the Pawns."

"Actually, that won't be a problem," Blast Radius quickly said, a smile on his face. "And besides, having my own personal bodyguard would definitely be a good thing."

-Canterlot High School-
-Lunch Time-

"Jeez, Thorax, your blog's blowing up like crazy," Soarin noted, looking at his phone while his other hand held half a sandwich.

Thorax nodded, swallowing a bite of his salad. "Yeah. Ever since the Element Fury Power Rangers showed up, I've been getting all sorts of attention. Cell phone and camera footage, theories on who they are and where they came from, and a whole bunch of comments concerning us and our Zords."

Looking at her phone, Tempest raised an eyebrow. "Some lady on here just commented that my suit's weird. Said that it's a darker shade of pink than all of the past Pink Rangers."

As they looked through some of the pictures on the blog, they realized that was true. Most of the Pink Rangers of past teams were a mostly consistent shade of pink that wasn't too light, but wasn't too dark. The Element Fury Pink Ranger's outfit, the one Tempest wore, was a darker shade compared to them that bordered on a solid shade of magenta.

Soarin shrugged. "I think it looks cool."

"Definitely helps you stand out from the ones who came before," Thorax added encouragingly.

Tempest smirked. "I like it. Fits me a lot better than the bubblegum pink that's worn by almost every other Pink Ranger."

As they talked about that, Flash was actually scrolling through the blog and looking through some of the posts.

Almost all of the comments were comparing him to the other Red Rangers from previous Ranger teams.

And many of them were not flattering AT ALL.

What a rookie.

Kid looks like a total noob.

Carter Grayson would've had this monster taken down in ten seconds flat.

He's no Wes Collins, that's for sure.

Kid should just give up. He'll never be as good as the other Red Rangers.

Flash sighed. I've only been a Ranger for two weeks and morphed twice. Give me a break.

Seeing the look on his face, Twilight asked "Something wrong, Flash?"

"Nothing," Flash said quickly, putting away his phone.

The look on her face clearly said she didn't believe him, but she didn't say anything.

-The Dark Dimension-
-Castle of Shadows: Throne Room-

Nevermore sighed as he leaned against the wall of the throne room, listening to the King address Blast Radius, Golem, and the new monster in the room.

The new monster was roughly a head taller than most of the Rangers, not quite as tall as Nevermore but not as short as Blast Radius. Surprisingly out of all the monster she looked closest to a human. The only things really setting her apart from a human were her blood red skin, her glowing green eyes with black sclera, and her knee-length jet black hair that was tied back in a ponytail and seemed to defy gravity, floating behind her like a tail. Hanging from around her neck was a metal mask shaped like a snake, right down to having two large fangs around the mouth part.

She wore a black bodysuit that covered everything except for her hands and feet. She had red armor over her chest, arms, and her legs; all divided into sections that wouldn't hamper her mobility.

And strapped to her forearms, around her midriff, and her thighs were knives. Lots and lots of knives, ranging from simple throwing knives to much larger combat knives.

And those were only the ones she let everyone see.

Her name was Serpentra; not only because of her mask, but also because she tended to be as treacherous as an actual snake. Nobody in the entirety of the Castle trusted her, not even the King. The only real reason she was even in the King's employ was because her skills were very useful and she knew better than to try and betray the King.

"So, are all of you clear on your mission," the King asked.

Serpentra nodded. "Yes, your Majesty," she replied. "It will be done."

"Your will shall be done, my Lord," Blast Radius added.

Golem bowed his head, sending him a series of clicks and scrapes that gave the affirmative.

"Good. Oh, and Serpentra?"

"Yes?"

"While losing our monster won't be much of a loss, I want to be perfectly clear. If you sabotage Blast Radius and Golem, or leave them to die at the hands of the Rangers, you will be signing your own death warrant."

He spoke in the same cold and even tone he always spoke in, but Serpentra wasn't stupid. She could practically see the malice and rage in his words, the promise of a slow and painful death if she did violate that rule. "I promise you, betraying them is the furthest thing from my mind. And I would have to be the biggest idiot in the Dark Dimension to even think about trying to betray you."

It was hard to read the King Of Shadows, seeing as how he didn't have a face. Or any distinguishing features save for the red eyes within the tube. However, it seemed her answer was satisfactory, because he replied "Good answer. However, you still aren't exactly what we'd call trustworthy. And I'd be a fool to send you out there with one of my lieutenants without taking some precautions. So... Nevermore, if you would?"

Before Serpentra could ask what was going on, Nevermore (who had been slowly walking up behind her while they were talking) grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her towards the King's tube. "What the hell are you-?"

The words died in her mouth the moment Nevermore forced her to hold her palm against the tube. She felt the energy, HIS dark energy against her palm, felt every bit of rage, malice, and hatred that made up his body that was barely contained within the tube. She watched transfixed as something phased through the surface of the tube, what appeared to be a snake made out of purple and black energy. With surprising speed it coiled itself around her forearm and sunk its fangs into her wrist, causing her to scream out as searing pain coursed through her body. The energy snake in the meantime began to work its way into the skin of her arm, eventually taking the form of a purple snake tattoo. Finding her voice through the pain, she panted "What... the hell...was that?!"

"An insurance policy. That mark I just gave you binds you to my will. If you try to betray me or do something I don't approve of, THIS happens."

Before Serpentra could blink the snake tattoo began to glow, and suddenly black lightning coursed through her body, bringing her to her knees and forcing horrendous screams of pain from her mouth. Nevermore smirked while Blast Radius winced, glad it wasn't him going through that.

It only lasted for a few seconds, but eventually it stopped. Gasping for breath, Serpentra glared at the King and asked between gasps "What... the hell... was that?"

"That, my dear, was a little thing I call an Agony Matrix. With a single thought, I activate all of the pain receptors in your body. And that mind-numbing pain you just felt? That was on the lowest setting. If I were to unleash it on its highest setting?"

He let the threat hang in the air, but Serpentra knew what he was implying. If she stepped out of line, if she sabotaged the King's plans, the Agony Matrix would more than likely cause her mind to shatter beyond any hope of repair.

Or possibly make her head explode. She couldn't choose which one was worse. "I... I understand, your Majesty."

"Wonderful. Now all of you, go. And do not fail me."

-Clover's Cave: Main Room-
-After School That Day-

Twilight stared intently at the softball-sized sphere of water she had summoned, floating roughly an inch above the palm of his hand. The goal of today's training was control, so she had raised the ball of water from a small bowl Clover had gave her and had kept it in place, doing her best to keep it together while not letting it lose it's shape. She'd been holding it for roughly five minutes so far. Seeing this, Clover said "Nice job, Twilight. Remember, stay focused and keep your emotions steady."

"You realize you're talking to a teenager, right," she snarked, never taking her eyes off of the water-ball.

Clover giggled. "And they say I'M the snarky one."

A few feet away, Soarin was doing a similar exercise but with a miniature tornado in the palm of his hand. Unlike Twilight's ball of water, however, Soarin's was wild and erratic, doing its best to escape from his hand. "Focus on the wind, Soarin," Clover said. "Ignore all of outside distractions."

"Trying my best here, Clover," he replied through gritted teeth, reasserting his control over the tornado. "But my stomach's constantly telling me I need a cheeseburger."

"Didn't you have lunch today?"

"I can eat a quintuple burger with extra fries and drink two chocolate milkshakes, and still have enough room for an ice cream sundae."

At that, Clover actually smirked. "I'm not surprised. Your predecessor had a big appetite too. Seems to be a thing with Wind mages."

Thorax was levitating a handful of marble-sized rocks over the palm of his hand, having them move around and occasionally group together into bigger shapes; sometimes it was a sphere, sometimes a cylinder, a pyramid, et cetera. His control was actually pretty good, she noted. "Not bad, Thorax. Keep up the good work."

"Thank you."

Tempest was holding her hands out in front of her, her fingers bent and each fingertip roughly a foot away from each other. Strands of pink lightning would shoot out from between them; first it was between her thumbs, then her forefingers, middle, ring, pinkies, back to her thumbs, then skip to her middle, and she kept it going for a while before the lightning started moving between the wrong fingertips, making her take a break. "Jeez. This stuff's harder to control than I thought it would be," she muttered, flexing her fingers.

Clover nodded. "It's easy enough to shoot it out from your hands in a big stream or a shockwave. But with better control and refinement, you'll be able to use it a lot more efficiently and a lot more creatively."

Tempest smirked. "Awesome."

Looking around Clover asked "Hey, where's Flash?"

"He said he'd be a little late," Soarin replied, finally seeming to get the hang of the cyclone in his hand.

Puzzled, Thorax asked "How come?"

"He said he's grabbing a birthday present for his mom."

Tempest rolled her eyes. "Bet you ten bucks we get a call from him saying he's either getting attacked by monsters or he finds a group of them doing something evil."

Soarin smirked. "I'll take those odds."

Twilight sighed before looking at Splash, who was standing with the rest of their Zords except Leo on the nearby table. "What do you think the odds are, Splash?"

Splash shrugged. "Well, the King seems to send a monster out at least once a week. And we haven't fought one since Monday of last week. So logically speaking, we'd either be fighting them today or tomorrow."

"Good point." Putting the water back in the bowl, she pulled out her Hydro Slicer and said "Guess I better get some practice in with this."

Flash exited the store, his mom's birthday present paid for and tucked away in his jacket pocket. "There we go. Hopefully she'll love this."

There was a slight unzipping sound from his backpack, just enough for Leo to poke his head out (fortunately still hidden by the hood of Flash's jacket) and he said "You humans really love to give gifts to each other."

"Well, it helps show we care about each other," Flash replied. "Besides, despite how busy she was with her police work, both here and back at Cloudsdale, she still did everything she could to be part of me and Base's lives. Even after Dad passed away, she still made sure to be there for every one of the gigs my band did, and every one of Base's baseball games."

"Wow."

"Yeah. She's may not be from Krypton or wear a cape, but she's definitely a Super-Mom."

"I can't really comment on that seeing as how I and the Zords are machines, ergo, we have no biological parents."

Flash paused for a moment, before saying "You guys are a lot more than just machines. Besides, someone had to build and create you guys. Wouldn't they technically count?"

Leo seemed to ponder that for a moment before he replied "Honestly, we- Flash, I'm picking up dark magic!"

Surprised, he asked "You guys can do that?"

"Yes, we can if it's close by. And there's a big surge of it up ahead."

Flash took off running, taking note of the buildings that were up ahead. "We got a Burger King, an office building, and the Canterlot Museum of Natural History. Which one, bud?"

"Whichever one's straight ahead!"

Seeing the familiar twin horse statues out front, he said "Museum it is."

As he raced up to the building, he tapped the blue button on his morpher. "Guys, Leo picked up dark magic at the-"

Whatever he was about to say was cut off as several loud, ear-piercing screams were heard. He quickly pulled up the hood of his jacket as he rushed in, weaving around a few people who were running away.

And as he got into the main atrium, he saw the reason for the screams.

A monster was terrorizing a bunch of children, presumably part of an elementary school group on a field trip, in the Paleontology exhibit. The monster itself stood at around eight foot tall and was made out of purple rocks with pink lava flowing between the gaps of the rocks. It's body was water drop shaped, being round at the bottom and a pointed cone at the top. It had large round rocks for shoulders and a head that was round with spikes coming out the top that gave it a mohawk appearance. It mouth was hidden behind a metal mouth-mask and its eyes were bright pink. Its left arm was a normal looking arm, though it too was covered in purple rocks and pink lava, but its right arm was very different. Before the elbow it looked normal but after it, the arm became a large round tube with three short claw like nubs. [2]

The creature raised his right arm, revealing a metal sphere flew out and hovered a few inches above the end. The tube began to spin, creating a buzzing sound as pink energy flew out of the tube and surrounded it. "Okay, kiddies! Time for Magma Sphera[2] to teach you kids how to HAVE A BALL," it said, before launching it at the screaming children.

"FIRE FURY, ENGAGE!"

There was a flash of red light as Flash morphed, the Pyro Saber in hand and blocking the orb. Gritting his teeth as he pushed against it, he turned his head to the children and their teacher and yelled "GET SOMEWHERE SAFE! GO!"

As they took off running, Magma Sphera groaned "Come on! I was gathering a whole bunch of fear from those kids!"

Taking note of that in the back of his head, Flash replied "Sorry to disappoint. But on the plus side..."

He ducked under the orb, letting it slam into the wall behind him before throwing his free hand out at him. "I've got something with a little more heat!"

He focused and formed a fireball, but before he could launch it Magma Sphera pulled his right arm back and the orb shot out of the wall and clocked Flash on the back of the head, breaking his concentration and causing the fireball to fizzle out. Blinking the stars out of his eyes, he turned back to the monster and saw him focusing more pink energy into the orb, causing its glow to intensify. "Let's see you try this on for size. BLAST ORB!"

With a BANG! similar to a cannon blast, the orb shot forward at remarkable speed. Flash brought up the Pyro Saber to block, but that proved to be a mistake as the moment the orb touch the sword it unleashed a shockwave of pink energy that sent Flash flying down the hall. He flew far, past the exhibits showing skeletons of a Mastodon, a Pterodactyl, a Triceratops, a Saber-Toothed Tiger, before finally landing and skidding to a stop beneath a Tyrannosaurus Rex.[3] His suit glowed red for a moment before disappearing, the monster's attack forcing him to de-morph. Groaning, he lifted himself up as he heard Twilight's voice coming from his morpher. "Flash, what's going on? You said Leo had sensed Dark Magic and then-"

"We got a monster attack at the Canterlot Museum of Natural History. The monster in question hit me hard enough to de-morph me," Flash replied. Seeing the monster walking towards him, he added "Could really use the cavalry right now."

Clover's voice came on next. "Your friends are on their way, Flash. And your morpher's gonna need a few minutes to reboot and reestablish the link to the Morphin Grid before you can morph again."

"Wonderful," Flash replied sarcastically, getting to his feet and seeing Magma Sphera charging up its orb again. "Uh, question: how long is a few minutes?"

"Not sure. On the plus side, your friends will be there right about... now!"

There were four flashes of green light behind Magma Sphera, and suddenly he was blasted by several green lasers. This was followed up by several streaks of pink lightning, a water blade, and finally getting sent flying by a blow from the Quake Ax, revealing the other Rangers morphed and ready to fight. "Stay away from our friend, ugly," Tempest growled.

Having regained its bearings, Magma Sphera growled "Great. Like one Ranger wasn't bad enough."

"Hey, we're a package deal," Soarin replied. "You mess with one of us, you mess with all of us."

With that the four Rangers charged into battle, while Flash quickly ducked into a side hallway so as not to get caught in the crossfire. "Well, this day just keeps getting worse and worse. Charge headfirst into a battle, get de-morphed, and now I can't help my friends fight a monster."

He would've probably sunk deeper into self-loathing, if he hadn't noticed a group of Pawns heading down the side hall to another exhibit. "Huh. I wonder what they're up to?"

-Meanwhile, in the Ancient Cultures Exhibit-

Serpentra smiled, looking at a large diamond sitting in a glass display case. "Well, hello there. Aren't you just magnificent?"

"Yeah," Blast Radius said, snapping her out of her reverie. "Magnificent, but definitely not what we came here for."

The two of them and Golem had teleported into an an ancient cultures exhibit, specifically looking through the artifacts for specific items that the King of Shadows wanted. Fortunately, Blast Radius's staff also doubled as a magic detector, so they wouldn't have too much trouble telling the difference between an artifact with actual magic and just a very expensive yet completely useless hunk of gold and/or diamond.

Serpentra rolled her eyes. "I know that. And I know what the King wants." Turning back to the display case she added "But that doesn't mean I can't take a little something for myself."

"How about you wait until after we get everything the King wants? The Rangers are busy fighting Magma down the hall, so we need to make this quick."

"Fine, fine. Have you found what he's looking for yet?"

Following the light from his staff he answered "I believe I have. This way."

Serpentra followed him towards a table full of weapons, armor, and jewelry from Medieval Europe. Blast Radius waved his staff and a single item was coated in orange magic before rising up from the table and hovering in the air. The item in question was a necklace with four large stones dangling from a solid gold chain: one stark white, one a dark and bloody crimson, one a jet black, and the last one a sickly pale green color. "Hmm..." Seprentra said as she gingerly took the necklace in her hand. "Have to admit, the King has good taste. I can feel the magic held within the jewels. "

Blast Radius nodded, taking the necklace in his hand. "Indeed. This was one of his most powerful artifacts; the Necklace of Destruction."

"Oooh. Sounds sinister."

"No it doesn't."

Both of them whirled around to see Flash standing a few feet away, leaning against a pillar in the room, with a bored expression on his face. "Actually it sounds really generic," he added with a smirk.

Serpentra rolled her eyes before looking at Blast Radius. "Blast Radius, who is this kid?"

"That kid, Serpentra, is the Element Fury Red Ranger," he replied. "Though I'm a bit surprised he's not morphed."

"Huh. Magma Sphera's attack must've done something to his morpher."

Flash gritted his teeth, knowing that they were right and that sadly his morpher still needed about two more minutes to reboot. But all the same he replied "Yeah. But..."

In a flash of red light the Pyro Saber appeared in his hands before he settled into a combat stance. "I don't need to be able to morph to fight. Just ask the Pawns I took care of outside."

The two monsters looked behind him to see that indeed, the bodies of roughly ten Pawns were fading away into dust, a few of the more intact ones showing melted armor and burning gray flesh.

Serpentra almost seemed impressed by that, before making a motion with her arms and a set of knives slid down from under the armor over her forearms. She held up her hands and the set of knives folded out like a fan. With a smile she said "Well then, Red Boy. Let's see if you can survive THIS!!!"

She flung her arms forward with lightning fast reflexes, launching the knives at him. Flash managed to deflect a good chunk of them, but sadly a few of them managed to slip through his guard. None of them stabbed him or seriously injured him, though it dead leave some tears on the sleeves and sides of his jacket. The last one actually missed his face by about a millimetre; any further to the left and he might've lost his right eye.

Serpentra smirked. "Not bad. Good reflexes, though they could use some work."

Flash growled. "This was my favorite jacket. You're going to pay for this, snake lady!"

At that, Serpentra smiled. "Snake lady? How appropriate."

She grabbed her snake mask and placed it upon her face, the mask and her body beginning to give off a sinister green glow. "Let me ssshow you jusssst how SSSSSNAKE-LIKE I CAN BE!!!!"

She began to change, and Flash's eyes widened in fear. "Oh, you've gotta be kidding me!"

-Back with the other Rangers-

To say the battle between the Rangers and Magma Sphera was not going in the Rangers' favor would be an understatement.

Twilight dodged another strike from Magma Sphera's orb, which immediately zoomed away and slammed into Tempest, who was attempting to strike the monster from behind. Soarin tried to blast it with his Cyclone Crossbow, but the lasers harmlessly bounced off his skin. "Seriously," Soarin grumbled. "What the hell's this guy made out of?"

"Pure evil," Thorax guessed, using his Quake Ax to deflect Magma Sphera's orb again. "But what's really annoying is that heat-seeking beach ball of his!"

"It's not a ball, it's an orb," Magma Sphera yelled, pulling the orb back to his right arm and charging it with energy before aiming it at Soarin. "BLAST ORB!"

The orb shot out with the familiar cannon blast, but rather than try to block it Soarin focused some of his wind magic to his feet and leaped into the air, the height of his jump taking him less than a foot away from the ceiling. The blast barely missed him, though he could feel the energy wave just tickling the bottom of his feet. Magma Sphera immediately pulled his orb back, coating it in energy. Seeing an opening, Soarin aimed and fired a Tornado Grenade at the monster's head, hitting home. But to their shock, Magma Sphera tanked the attack head on without taking so much as a scratch. "Oh, come on!"

Tempest started charging her Storm Spear. "Let's see if he can tank this. THUNDER STRIKE!"

The lightning bolt came down on Magma Sphera, but again his skin deflected it and sent it towards Twilight. She dodged it and fired a few shots from her Hydro Slicer, but they still didn't do anything. Thorax threw his Quake Ax, but this time Magma Sphera pulled his orb back and knocked the ax away. Recalling it to his hand Thorax asked "Clover, is Flash's morpher ready yet?"

"About 30 seconds," she replied. "Do you guys have eyes on him?"

Ducking under another strike from the orb, Twilight answered "He said he saw some Pawns heading down the hall. He figured this guy might've just been a distraction."

"AND UNFORTUNATELY I WAS RIGHT!"

All four Rangers turned to see Flash running into the exhibit, a look of abject terror on his face.

They saw the reason for his terror a second later, when the largest snake any of them had ever seen slithered in pursuit of Flash. It was easily as thick around as a fire truck, and scales as red as blood. It locked its emerald green eyes on Flash before flicking out its forked tongue, almost looking like it was licking its lips.

"HOLY- That is one big snake," Soarin commented.

Before any of them could say anything else, the snake flicked its tongue out and wrapped it around Flash's ankle. With one swift motion, it lifted Flash up, throwing him up in the air and opening its mouth wide.

"Oh no," Twilight muttered in horror, realizing what was about to happen.

Just before Flash fell into the snake's maw, he heard his morpher beep and say "Morphin Grid Link Reestablished."

Slamming his finger onto the red button he yelled "FIRE FURY-!"

The rest of his Morphing Call was drowned out by the snake snapping its jaws shut, before swallowing him with a loud GULP! All of the Rangers were in shock at this, seeing their friend get swallowed whole like a mouse.

Magma Sphera actually laughed and said "Wow! Didn't think you'd go that route, Serpentra."

She laughed and said "Me neither. He ssssure wassss a sssspicy one." She then looked at the other Rangers and added "And it lookssss like there'ssss- URP!"

She winced in pain, before looking down at the small bulge in her stomach where Flash was, noticing that it was starting to glow a brighter red than her scales. She coughed, smoke coming out of her mouth and through her nostrils as she did. She gagged once, twice, then three times before finally she retched and a fully morphed Flash (whose hands were covered in red flames) was thrown up onto the floor, covered in a foul smelling green liquid. As he got up to his feet Serpentra's body glowed as she reverted back to her previous form, a little smoke still coming out of her mouth as she removed her mask and coughed.

Soarin looked at Flash and said "Guess you were a little too spicy for-"

Flash stopped him with a raised finger. "Not. Another. WORD!"

"You okay, Flash," Tempest asked.

"I just got swallowed whole and then puked up by a monster snake-lady that turned into a giant snake. I'm just peachy," he replied sarcastically.

At that moment Blast Radius walked into the room, Golem carrying a large wooden crate on one shoulder. "Serpentra! Magma! I got what we're after. Let's go!"

"Oh, no you don't," Flash yelled, launching a Blazing Slash at him.

However, Golem simply stepped in front of the attack and tanked it, the fire barely leaving a scorch mark across Golem's pure stone body.

Seeing this, Blast Radius smirked. "Well, Fire-Types always were weak against Rock-Types."[4]

Before any of the Rangers could move, he aimed his staff at them and uttered "Tsalb!" fired off a sphere of red energy. It struck down in front of the rangers and exploded in a violent fireball that sent everyone flying backwards. Flash and Twilight landed on their backs, Thorax and Tempest ended up landing on their fronts, Soarin ended up unluckily crashing against a wall and falling headfirst into an open trashcan. Each of their suits flashed their respective colors before they all de-morphed, all of them groaning in pain.

Serpentra laughed, but then coughed up some more black smoke. "D-(cough) damn it! (cough, cough) That S.O.B. seared my (cough, cough, cough) throat," she rasped out between coughs.

"I'll whip something up for you when we get back," Blast Radius promised, pointing his staff and opening up a portal. "Now let's go!"

Once they passed through the portal, the Rangers all heard police sirens outside the building. Flash sighed, before hitting the comm button on his morpher. "Hey Clover. Think you could do us a favor and teleport us back to base before the cops come in?"

"Done. Standby for teleport."

"Thank you."

As the green light surrounded them, Flash sighed. Some Red Ranger I am.

-The Dark Dimension-
-Castle of Darkness: Throne Room-

If it were possible, the King sounded pleased. "Excellent work."

They were going through the artifacts that they'd stolen from the museum, sorting them out for various projects that Blast Radius was working on. "The Necklace of Destruction," Blast Radius said, holding the item in question up for the tube to see. "As you ordered, my lord."

"Fantastic. And it still has all the stones."

Serpentra just rolled her eyes, grabbing a jug of water and downing it in one go, breathing out a cloud of steam and wincing in pain. "I swear, the next time I see that red ba- (COUGH!) I'm going to snake up, wrap my coils around his scrawny neck, and-"

Whatever she was going to say next was lost as she devolved into a coughing fit, before grabbing another jug and downing the water in that. Once she was done she glared at Blast Radius, pointed at her throat and asked "I thought you said you'd fix this?"

"Patience, my venomous friend. Once we're done sorting the loot to where it needs to go, I'll make you a nice potion that will soothe your throat and heal the damage," he calmly replied.

Behind her, Nevermore smirked and handed her something. "In the meantime, try these."

Serpentra looked at what Nevermore put in her hand, which turned out to be a small packet of cherry flavored Cough Drops. She glared at him and muttered "I hate you. SO. MUCH."

"I bask in your hate, and laugh at your pain."

"If the two of you are done acting like children," the King said, sounding annoyed. "Nevermore, send Magma Sphera back out there to gather more fear. He managed to get a good amount from those children, but we're going to need a lot more for future plans."

Nevermore nodded and bowed. "At once, my Lord."

"Blast Radius, once you take care of Serpentra's throat problem, get to work on the Pawn conversions."

"As you wish. I know the perfect potion to fix that." He looked at Serpentra and said "Give me about ten minutes."

Once he left, the King said "As for you, Serpentra, I have a special assignment for you."

"It's not (Cough!) gonna involve dealing with teenagers again, is it," she asked. "Cause I've (Cough! Cough!) had enough of those Rangers for a while."

"Yes and no. You will be having to deal with teenagers again, but assuming you don't screw up you shouldn't have to be fighting the Rangers again for quite a while."

"Why do I have a bad feeling about where this is (Cough!) going?"

-Clover's Cave-

Soarin winced as he moved the bag of ice to a different spot on his head. "Well... that sucked."

Tempest nodded her head in agreement, having ditched her jacket and placed an ice pack on her right shoulder. "Understatement. That monster pretty much bulldozed us."

"That monster was a lot more difficult than the last two," Thorax stated, handing Twilight an ice pack while he himself was holding one on his chest. "Aside from the fact that he had that annoying beach ball of his, his hide was tough enough to No-Sell multiple attacks from the Hydro Slicer and Cyclone Crossbow."

"I was there, dude," Soarin replied. "I noticed. That Tornado Grenade should've at least knocked him back some, but he tanked it like it was nothing."

Twilight was furiously tapping away on her laptop, looking through both security cam footage and the footage from the Rangers' own helmets to try to figure out what the monster's weakness was. "His orb moves too fast for us to really be able to strike it, and if we try to attack him he just has the orb attack us. He seems to somehow be able to see or sense around him, since every time one of us tries to attack him from behind or from an angle out of his field of view he sics his orb on us..."

Sunset and Clover were looking at Twilight as she was doing that, before Sunset looked at Clover and asked "Were you like that when you were the Blue Ranger?"

Clover giggled. "Yeah. But back then we didn't have computers. Had to do everything with a feather quill, an ink well, and parchment. A LOT of parchment." Looking around at the Rangers she asked "I take it Flash is still in the shower?"

Everyone nodded. "Still trying to get the stench of that Snake Lady's stomach acid out of his hair," Soarin replied. "And probably mourning the loss of his favorite jacket."

"Torn up by Serpentra's knife collection and then half melted away by her stomach acid," Tempest said sadly, looking at her own jacket. "What a way to go."

"And considering that jacket was the last gift from his dearly departed father," Soarin added. "Yeah, that snake lady better hope she never runs into Flash again, cause he's liable to incinerate her."

Twilight looked up from her computer and asked "Has anyone noticed that Flash has been kind of... off?" Seeing everyone's puzzled look she continued "It just seems like there's something on his mind, something that's been bothering him."

Soarin nodded. "Yeah, I did notice actually. He's been quiet ever since lunch. Not even a chuckle at any of my jokes."

Rolling her eyes Tempest said "While that second part isn't that surprising since your terrible puns barely count as comedy-"

"HEY!"

"-I will admit he has been unusually quiet."

"I think I might know why," Thorax said, looking at something on his phone that he immediately showed to everyone.

Everyone's reactions were varying shades of disappointment. "Okay, seriously," Tempest asked. "Thorax, I thought you moderated the comments?"

"I made sure to enforce the rules that commentators can't harass other commentators, post any sort of death threats or put NSFW content on my blog. But unfortunately, beyond that I can't really control what they say about the Rangers. Believe me, if that were the case, NOBODY would be allowed to say ANYTHING about the Operation Overdrive Rangers."[5]

"Fair point."

"Still, I can see why it would bother him," Thorax said. "While all of the Rangers are important regardless of their color, with a few exceptions the Red Rangers are generally considered some of the greatest of all time. That kind of legacy would be hard to live up to."

Soarin nodded. "And considering he got one-shot by a monster, got his jacket torn up by a snake lady who then proceeded to swallow him whole, and the get one shot AGAIN by that explosion-slinging wizard monster, I think it's safe to assume he's probably not feeling that great right now."

"Ain't that the truth?"

Everyone turned to see Flash standing there, dressed in a red t-shirt and a pair of blue jeans. "Thanks for the clothes, Clover," he said.

"You're welcome," she replied. "I'll try and see if I can do something with your jacket."

"You mean what's left of it," he muttered.

Everyone else looked at each other questioningly before Twilight finally asked "So... how are you doing?"

Flash sat down and sighed. "I spent most of today getting my ass kicked and being humiliated. My jacket's totally ruined, and I doubt any magic Clover has will be able to fix it. Frankly the only good thing to happen today is that my mom's gift wasn't damaged. Gonna need a new box for it, though."

"Don't forget that you also saved a bunch of kids from getting knocked around by that monster's heat-seeking beach ball," Thorax added. "I'd definitely call that a good thing."

"I'm not denying that. Trust me, I'd be a terrible excuse of a Power Ranger if I ever considered saving people to not be important." He looked down at his morpher and said "It's just... I figured being a Power Ranger wouldn't be as easy as they make it look on TV. Something I'm sure we can all attest to." They all nodded at that. "Well, it's even harder for me. Like Thorax said, all of the Rangers are important, but the Red Rangers tend to be the MVPs. They're the ones who tend to leave the biggest impact from each team, for better or worse. And honestly... I'm just not sure I'm cut out for the job. I'm not like any of the previous Red Rangers. And frankly, I don't know if I can ever be as good a Red Ranger as any of them were."

There was a few minutes of silence before Twilight looked up from her laptop and said "You're right. You're not like any of the previous Red Rangers." She then smiled and continued "But I'd say that's a good thing."

"As awesome as Carter Grayson, Wes Collins, and those other Red Rangers were," Soarin said "they're not you. They're not Flash Sentry."

"Clover told us that our Gems all chose us for a reason," Thorax added. "Clearly it deemed you worthy of being the Red Ranger of this team."

Tempest put a hand on his shoulder and said "You don't need to be as good as the past Red Rangers. You just need to be the best Red Ranger that YOU, Flash Sentry, can be."

Leo hopped up onto Flash's lap. "So stop beating yourself up. Everyone make's mistakes, especially when they're just starting out. Heck, your predecessor, the first Element Fury Red Ranger, screwed up plenty of times when HE first started out. You know what he did when that happened?"

"What did he do," Flash asked.

"He got back up, promised his team he'd get better, and kept moving forward. And when people gave him flack for his failures or because they didn't like him, he didn't care. The only opinions he cared about were his own and those of his team members. The words of all the naysayers were nothing more than background noise to him."

Flash looked at Leo, then back at everyone else. Finally he asked "You guys really want me to lead this team?"

Everyone nodded. "You're the Element Fury Red Ranger. That means you are our Red Ranger," Twilight replied. "We wouldn't want anyone else for the job."

"And keep in mind, you're not the only rookie here," Soarin added, motioning to everyone. "We're all rookies at this, pal. You're not alone in that department."

He was quiet for a moment, before he smiled. "Thanks guys. After the day I've had, I needed that."

"Anytime, pal," Thorax replied.

"And trust me, I'm going to be better. Starting with coming up with a plan to take out this monster." Looking over at Twilight, he asked "Any idea on how to do that?"

Twilight made the "so-so" gesture with her hand. "Sort of. I did find a glaring weakness in Magma Sphera's attack strategy."

"Good. What is it?"

"Well, depending on how he attacks, his orb can only attack so many times before he has to pull it back to recharge it. With his regular attacks he can strike 3 times before he has to pull back and recharge. With his Blast Orb, he can only fire that one time."

Flash grinned. "So, we have a window that we can exploit."

"Technically, yes."

"Technically?"

"See, the recharge time for his orb never seems to be longer than five seconds max. The orb also moves fast enough to keep up with all of us, and it seems to act like a third eye that has 360 degrees of vision, since while it was above his head he was able to see us anytime we tried to sneak up on him from behind. And sadly none of our weapons are strong enough to blast or cut through his orb, or himself for that matter."

"And sadly, five seconds won't be enough for us to put together the Fury Cannon, charge it, and blast the guy to smithereens," Flash figured. "Well, we could try combining our elemental attacks together. When you and I combined our fire and water elements, we actually managed to stun Nevermore. Granted it didn't actually hurt him, but it did still stun him and buy us a few seconds. Plus when we're morphed we have a lot more power than when we're not."

Twilight drummed her fingers on her laptop in thought. "That... could work. But part of me thinks that we need something with a bit more, oomph."

At that moment the monster alarms started going off, and Clover said "Looks like Magma Sphera's back for Round 2. And this time he's got some Pawns with him."

Seeing the screen, Flash noted "Looks like they're near Canterlot Mall."

"The place is bound to have a whole bunch of kids who just got out of school for the day," Thorax stated.

Flash nodded. "Then let's not waste any time. Let's move!"

As they got on the teleport platform, Soarin looked to Flash and asked "You ready for this?"

Flash smirked. "You know it. IT'S MORPHIN TIME! FIRE FURY!"

"WATER FURY!"

"WIND FURY!"

"EARTH FURY!"

"LIGHTNING FURY!"

"ENGAGE!"

-Outside Canterlot Mall-

"Onward Pawns," Magma Sphera ordered as they advanced on the mall, the people outside rushing inside and many of them calling the police.

Just as one of the Pawns were about to grab the door handled there were five flashes of green light, and suddenly the Pawn found itself being sent flying away via a kick to the face, courtesy of the Element Fury Red Ranger.

All of the Rangers looked at Magma Sphera and his Pawns, summoning their weapons. Flash leveled the Pyro Saber at them and said "Mall's closed, jerk. You want those people, you gotta go through us."

"Or to be more accurate," Tempest said, her Storm Spear crackling with pink lightning "WE go through YOU!"

As one, they all cried "Elemental Might! RANGERS UNITE!"

Magma Sphera growled. "CHARGE!!!!"

The group dispersed to deal with the Pawns, but before they really got into the fight Flash said "Thorax! Put up a barrier in front of the doors. Better safe than sorry!"

"On it," Thorax replied, slamming both palms on the ground. Said ground raised a solid wall in front of the doors, several feet thick and several feet high. Summoning the Quake Ax back, Thorax said "That should do it. Now then..." He turned to the Pawns around him. "Who dies first?"

Soarin dodged and weaved around a few of the Pawns before ending up next to Thorax. "Think maybe you can get these guys airborne," he asked.

Thorax nodded, charging his Earth Magic into his right fist. As he slammed his fist down he yelled "Pawns going up!"

The magic he unleashed created a shockwave that functioned like a miniature earthquake, one that sent all the Pawns around the two Rangers airborne. Soarin himself wasn't hit because he jumped into the air a moment before Thorax's fist hit the ground. As the Pawns were all knocked into the air, Soarin moved quickly, aiming his Cyclone Crossbow and yelling "Pawns going down!" before taking his shots, nailing twelve of them. The thirteenth and final one began to fall back to the ground, and was bisected in midair by Thorax's Quake Ax.

Floating gently to the ground, Soarin smirked and held out his fist to Thorax. "Nice job, dude."

Thorax smiled, fist-bumping him. "You too, man."

Tempest weaved in and out of the group of Pawns she was fighting; nimbly dodging their own attacks while striking at them with her Storm Spear as it crackled with pink lightning, stunning any Pawn unfortunate enough to be touched by it. Once she got most of them stunned she raised her Storm Spear skyward, before bringing it down in a spinning fashion. As she spun she unleashed a stream of lightning from her spear, essentially turning herself into an electricity spewing sprinkler that decimated the Pawns around her. "That should be all the Pawns," she said, looking around and seeing no more of the unliving soldiers. "Flash, Twilight, you guys got the monster?"

"Sort of," Twilight replied.

Flash and Twilight had been fighting Magma Sphera for the past few minutes, doing their best to avoid his orb and try and deal some sort of damage to him when he was recharging.

Sadly, that was easier said than done. Even with that window of opportunity his recharge gave them, none of their attacks seemed to do anything except annoy the monster, who was quickly losing his composure and firing his Blast Orb as often as he could. "Come on! There has to be some way to hurt this guy," Flash grumbled.

Twilight fired a Water Blade at his back, but just like the last few times it didn't leave a scratch. "Think we should try that plan of ours," she asked.

"Plan all you want, it won't change a thing," Magma Sphera yelled, shooting his orb out. "BLAST ORB!"

The two Rangers both leapt out of the way, narrowly avoiding the energy shockwave. They then charged up their weapons with their specials, their weapons glowing red and blue. They waited until he was recharging his orb before unleashing their attacks, both of them yelling out "ELEMENT COMBO! BOILING SLICE WAVE!"

The attacks combined into a massive wave of boiling water that shot forward and slammed into Magma Sphera, unleashing a massive cloud of steam and causing the monster to scream out in pain. "Ouch," Flash said. "I almost feel bad for him." He looked at Twilight and added "I don't, though."

"Let's just hope that actually did some damage to him," Twilight replied, looking at the disappearing steam cloud warily.

Soarin, Thorax and Tempest ran up, all of their weapons ready. "We heard someone screaming," Soarin said. "Take it that was the monster?"

Flash nodded as the steam cloud finally cleared up, revealing Magma Sphera, seemingly not taking any damage. "We poured everything we have into that attack," Twilight exclaimed in disbelief! "How is he not hurt?!"

He was about to answer when he noticed something. Among the rocks and lava that made up his chest, there was a patch that was a different color, the lava and rocks being much darker shades compared to the rest. As he looked on the ground he noticed a bunch of pink rocks and some rapidly cooling pink lava, roughly the size of the hole on Magma Sphera's chest. "I think it-"

He was cut off by Magma Sphera letting out a roar that was filled with rage and pain. He pointed at the Rangers and screamed "THAT'S IT! I'M THROUGH PLAYING AROUND!" He raised his right arm and the orb up into the air, the orb getting filled with so much pink energy that the whole area was bathed in a pink glow. "I'M GOING THE BLOW ALL OF YOU PUNKS TO KINGDOM C-"[6]

Before he could finish that sentence Flash had shot forward, fire surrounding his Pyro Saber as he charged forward. "BURNING STRIKE!"

He slashed his fiery sword across the exposed spot, and couldn't help but smile when he heard Magma Sphera scream in pain and the pink glow suddenly died down. Flash smirked and said "Aw. Did that hurt?"

"I AM GONNA MURDER YOU!"

He attempted to knock him away with his arm, but Flash jumped back out of the way. He looked to the Rangers and said "He does have a weakspot. The steam wave knocked off part of his armor. Aim for the patch on his chest!"

Seeing the patch, Twilight said "We could probably nail that with the Fury Cannon, but we still need to do something about the orb."

Flash smirked. "Call me crazy, but I have an idea. Twilight, Thorax, you're with me! Guys, keep him occupied!"

Taking his cue, Soarin started unleashing a barrage of lasers from his Cyclone Crossbow. Tempest followed suit, fired lightning bolt after lightning bolt towards his weak spot, which made him try and attack them with his orb.

His attention focused on them, he never noticed the other three Rangers sneaking up on his right side. "Care to clue us in on the plan," Thorax asked.

Flash nodded. "His right arm is what charges his orb. So if we take that out or immobilize it, he can't recharge it."

"And, how do we do that?"

"Well Thorax, what happens when you superheat rock?"

Both Thorax and Twilight understood what he was implying. Thorax nodded and placed his palm on the ground. "Can't get a boulder, but I got a nice amount of decent sized stones that should do the job."

"That actually works better. Easier to melt a whole bunch of smaller rocks than to melt a giant boulder," Flash noted. "Twilight, once we get this stuff on his arm, dump as much water as you can on it."

"Got it. Give me the signal when you're ready."

"Then let's do it!"

Thorax focused his magic, pulling a large amount of rocks out of the ground. Keeping his focus, he shot them forward and had them cover Magma Sphera's right arm, making sure some of them covered the opening where his hand was. Confused, Magma asked "What the-? Hey, get this stuff off of me!"

"All you, Flash!"

Focusing the fire on his saber until it glowed white hot, Flash said "To quote one of my favorite video game characters, BURN, BABY!"

He aimed his sword and unleashed a stream of white hot fire onto the rocks, keeping them there until the rocks began to melt into lava. Once they started that, he cut off the flames and yelled "Twilight!"

Water shot out from her open palm like a fire hose, soaking the lava covering Magma Sphera's arm and creating a lot of steam. "You're all washed up, pal," she muttered.

Once she cut off the stream and the steam cleared, they saw his arm was completely covered in cooling rock. The orb, now out of energy and unable to be recharged, fell to the ground as a useless paperweight. "NO," he cried. "YOU JERKS! NOW I CAN'T RECHARGE MY ORB!"

"That's the least of your problems, pal," Soarin said.

"You got that right," Flash replied. "Let's end this guys. Form the Fury Cannon!"

Once their weapons were combined, they aimed it right at the weak spot. Realizing what was about to happen the monster said "Oh, this is gonna suck!"

"FIRE FURY BLAST, ENGAGE!"

The blast from the Cannon shot right into the weak spot, burning him from the inside out and creating an explosion. Once it died down, Magma weakly growled "You Rangers always have to win, don't you?" before falling down and exploding into black energy.

Blast Radius winced as he saw Magma Sphera explode. "Sheesh, deep fried from the inside out. What a way to go."

"At the very least his two excursions into the Human World managed to get us a decent amount of fear," the King said.

Readying his staff, Radius asked "Shall I keep that going?"

"Make it so."

"SHADOW RESURRECTION!"

"YOU RANGERS ARE GOING TO GET IT NOW," a resurrected and giant-sized Magma Sphera roared.

"So are you, pal," Flash said. "Let's do it, guys!"

"ZORDS! ENGAGE BATTLE MODE! ACTIVATE ELEMENT FURY MEGAZORD!!"

The moment the Megazord was formed they got hit in the head by Magma Sphera's orb, knocking them back and knocking the Rangers around in the cockpit. "Oh, come on," Tempest groaned. "Why did that have to get giant sized with him?"

"Because sadly, our jobs can never be THAT easy," Soarin replied.

Flash growled, slamming the red button down on his console. "LION FIRE!"

The Lion Zord opened its mouth and fired a stream of fire at Magma Sphera, but before it could reach him he shot a Blast Orb forward. The orb smashed through the flamethrower and struck the Megazord full on and exploding, sending it falling backwards and jostling the Rangers even more. "I am really, really starting to hate this guy," Thorax grumbled.

"I think we all do at this point," Twilight said. Looking over at Flash she continued "We can't get close enough to hit him, and I don't think the Elemental Stampede's going to-"

Whatever she was going to say was cut off by the Monster coming forward and repeatedly stomping his foot down on the Megazord, hard. "YOU RANGERS ARE PATHETIC! YOU'RE JUST A BUNCH OF CHILDREN THINKING YOU CAN TAKE ON THE WORLD!"

Ignoring that, Flash said "I've got an idea. Soarin, Tempest, when I say go, grab his foot!"

"Got it," they both yelled.

"YOU SHOULD'VE JUST GIVEN UP WHEN YOU HAD THE CHANCE," Magma SPhera said, raising his foot and bringing it down.

"NOW!"

The Megazord's arms shot up, grabbing his foot and holding it in place. "HUH?! HEY, LET GO OF MY FOOT!"

"Can do," Flash replied. "Guys, give this guy a push!"

They did so, pushing him back and throwing him off balance, eventually falling backwards on the street. "OW!"

Once they got the Megazord back on its feet, Flash said "Hate to break it to you, Magma, but we're Power Rangers. Giving up is never an option!"

The moment he said that, a lion's roar was heard and his console began glowing red. "Whoa, what's going on with your console," Soarin asked.

"I have no idea," Flash replied. "Leo, what's up?"

"Something spectacular," Leo replied.

A panel opened up on the console, revealing a slot that needed something inserted in it. Looking at it, Twilight said "It looks like your E-Raiser could fit in there."

Pulling out his E-Raiser, Flash replied "Let's find out."

He plugged the E-Raiser into the slot and turned it counter-clockwise, and the whole Lion Zord began to glow red. "Leo, please tell me this is going somewhere good."

"It is. I just need the command. Activate Blazefire Saber!"

"ACTIVATE BLAZEFIRE SABER!"

Outside, the red energy turned into a fireball that hovered in front of the Megazord. It then slammed both fists into it, before separating and revealing the sword.

The sword itself was shaped like a cutlass, roughly as long as the Megazord's arm with a gold hilt and hand guard. The blade itself was bright red, with gold flames decorating the sides.

Seeing this, Magma growled and said "A SWORD. REALLY?"

"Let's hope this gives us the edge we need to take this guy down," Soarin said, half-joking and half-serious.

"You just had to ruin it, didn't you," Tempest groaned.

"Can the chatter, you two," Flash said. "We've got a monster to destroy."

Magma Sphera growled as the Megazord approached, charging up his orb. "IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT KIND OF TOYS YOU HAVE! I'LL DESTROY YOU ALL THE SAME!"

Seeing him charging up a Blast Orb, Flash had an idea. "Soarin, bring the sword down on the orb when it's close enough."

"You sure," he asked.

"Do you trust me?"

Soarin grinned behind the helmet. "Always."

"BLAST ORB," Magma Sphere yelled, shooting it at them like a bullet.

Once it was close enough, Soarin raised the Blazefire Saber and brought it down, striking the orb-

-and to the surprise of everyone, it cut the orb in half like a knife through butter.

Even Flash was surprised. "I wasn't even sure that was going to work," he said. "But I'm glad it did."

Magma Sphera looked at it in horror. "OH NO."

Readying the sword, Flash said "Let's see what else this thing can do."

The monster tried to back away, but the Megazord was already on him. They slashed him across the chest, chunks of his rocky armor flying off as they did. They nailed him with three more strikes, knocking out chunks of his armor until most of his chest was laid bare. "NO! PLEASE! HAVE MERCY!"

"You tried to attack a bunch of defenseless kids, and you're asking US for mercy," Flash asked. "You guys think he deserves mercy?"

"Nope," Twilight replied.

Soarin shook his head. "Nuh-uh."

"Heck no," Thorax added.

"Let's finish this guy," Tempest said.

"Then we have a unanimous decision," Flash stated. "Let's end this."

The Megazord raised the Blazefire Saber skyward as it began to glow, red flames surrounding it as the temperature rose exponentially.

Seeing this, Magma Sphera's eyes widened. "UH OH."

"BLAZEFIRE SABER! INFERNO SLASH!!!!"

The Megazord brought down the Blazefire Saber down on the monster, unleashing a massive wave of fire that decimated Magma Sphera. He started sparking and screamed "IT BURNS! IT BURNSSSS!!!!" before falling forward and exploding.

Flash smirked as the Megazord raised the sword up to the sky in a salute. "Elements Together, Rangers Forever!"

-Clover's Cave-

"So, what exactly was that sword," Flash asked.

"Remember when I said that as time goes on you guys will start unlocking things like new attacks, new weapon forms, et cetera," she asked. Once they nodded she continued "That also extends to the Zords and the Megazord. Each of your Zords has a weapon or ability that can be accessed with your E-Raiser once your Zord deems you ready for it."

Looking at Leo perched on Flash's shoulder, Soarin asked "So you thought he was ready for that?"

Leo nodded. "When Flash realized that he was worthy of being the Red Ranger for this team, he gained the Blazefire Saber. You guys helped him with that, so technically you all deserve praise for this one."

"Yeah, thanks guys," Flash said.

"What're friends for," Twilight replied, smiling.

Soarin looked at Aquila and asked "So, what's your weapon gonna be?"

"Just like with the E-Raisers and the combined weapon, it's different for each Ranger," Aquila replied. "When his predecessor awakened Leo's weapon, it was actually a shield. Your predecessor got a giant paper fan for the Megazord. So for all we know, it could be anything."

"Guess we'll just have to wait and see," Thorax stated.

"Good luck with that. Patience has never been Soarin's strong suit," Flash quipped.

Tempest smirked. "Never could've imagined that."

"Ha, ha. Very funny," Soarin sarcastically replied.

Looking at his watch, Flash said "I gotta get going. Mom actually managed to get home tonight and I want to give her her present."

"Oh, before you go," Clover said, handing Flash a box. "Got a little gift for you."

Puzzled, Flash opened it up to reveal- "My jacket! You fixed it?"

Clover smirked. "And improved it a bit. Take a look."

He unfolded the jacket to get a good look at it, and was surprised by what he found.

The sleeves and back had been the ones to suffer the most damage from the stomach acid, but Clover had managed to fix it up good as new. No evidence of acid burn, no material missing, and not even a scratch.

But what really surprised him was that on the back of it was a new design, a red lion that was surrounded by stylized flame. "How did you do all of this? This thing was pretty much rags when I brought it too you."

"I can use magic to teleport across the country and freeze Nevermore in place for a few seconds, and yet me repairing your jacket is hard for you to believe?"

"Good point," he replied. "Thank you so much."

"No problem. You gonna put it on, or did I just put all that effort into it for nothing?"

Flash obliged, sliding the jacket on, noting that it fit just as well as it did before. Looking to his friends he asked "How do I look?"

"Like the Element Fury Red Ranger," Twilight replied, the others echoing her sentiments.

Flash smiled. "No other Red Ranger I'd rather be. Now, where's my mom's present?"

Soarin handed him the box. "Out of curiosity, what'd you get her?"

"Well, my dad always got her these glass figurines my mom liked to collect for her birthday. So, I figured I'd keep the tradition going." Looking at his watch he said "Gotta go. See you guys tomorrow!"

Once he teleported out of there, Twilight asked "Hey Clover, did you figure out what they stole from the museum?"

"Flash mentioned the Necklace of Destruction, but I'm trying to find out what else is missing." Clover sighed. "Unfortunately, I'm not that great a hacker."

Tempest and Thorax snorted while Soarin laughed. Twilight herself smiled and walked over to Clover's computers. "Give me five minutes."

-The Castle Of Shadows: Pawn Creation Chambers-

Blast Radius looked at the Pawns who were moving a bunch of machines around three large chunks of black stone. Golem himself was carefully pulling artifacts out of the crate, eventually finding three large crystals: one light yellow, one dark blue, and one dark red. He clicked and beeped over at Blast Radius, who smiled. "Good. Once the machines are ready, we can begin the conversion process. The Rangers won't know what hit them!"

"Let's hope so, Radius."

Nevermore walked into the room, the burnt half of his face now cover in a mask made of smooth black metal. Except for his new eye, which was now a glowing red ruby. "Thanks for the new eye," Nevermore stated.

"No problem, my friend. You like the new feature?"

He smirked, before looking over at the far wall and focusing.

And a bright red laser shot out of his artificial eye, cutting through the stone like it was butter. He cut off the laser and smirked "I like it a lot."

"Good. How's Serpentra liking her new job?"

Nevermore's smirk turned into a full on grin. "I'm fairly certain that if it weren't for the Agony Matrix, she'd more than likely try and kill him. Not that she could."

-Crystal Prep Academy-

"Now class, we have a new student joining us today."

A girl around 16 years old walked into the room, drawing the attention of most of the class. She was wearing the girls uniform for Crystal Prep, and had jet black hair tied in a ponytail that reached her waist, and vibrant green eyes with pupils that were eerily similar to a snake's. "Would you like to tell the class your name," the teacher asked.

She smiled and said "It's nice to meet everyone. My name is Viper Scales."

She took her seat beside some girl (something like Lemon Zest, not that she cared) and began to take notes on the lesson.

Internally however, she was furious. That King better hope I never get this Agony Matrix removed, otherwise I'm going to find the biggest sledgehammer I can find and smash his tube with it!

-Sentry Household-
His mother had loved the figurine, though she did the whole "You didn't have to get me this" thing that parents did. He told her that she deserved it and she put it on the shelf with her other figurines. The glass lion looked pretty good sitting on that shelf.

That night, he was finishing up with his homework when he noticed Leo looking out the window. "Something on your mind, pal?"

Leo looked at him and shrugged. "Kinda. It's just, when you asked me about who created me and the other Zords, it just got me wondering."

"You don't know who built you guys?"

He shook his head. "The earliest thing we all remember was a voice telling us that our duty were to protect our world alongside whoever wielded our gems. The second earliest thing we remember was meeting Clover and the original Element Fury Power Rangers. Other than that, it's a total blank." He looked back out at the night sky and said "It does have me wondering who exactly built us. And why."

Flash looked up at the night sky with him for a few moments, before saying "Tell you what. Once we find the other Gems and get the other Rangers together, and deal with the King of Shadows once and for all, the other Rangers and I help you guys find the answer to those questions."

Leo looked at him in surprise. "You'd really do that for us?"

"You guys are just as important to this team as any of us are," Flash replied, gently petting him on the head. "Plus, everyone deserves to know where you came from. Even you guys."

He seemed touched by that, and replied "Thanks, Flash."

"No problem, pal."

Author's Note

[1] I've based part of Golem's design off of Regirock from Pokemon. Jury's still out if there will be evil monsters based off of Regice, Registeel, and Regigigas.
[2] Props to Banshee531 for the awesome design. By his own admission the monster's a fusion of Magmortar from Pokemon, and Heatblast from Ben 10 (the original, not the terrible remake.) I came up with the name.
Though come to think of it, since it's not the same colors as an actual Magmortar, would that mean this thing's a Shiny? Or since it looks radically different from a normal Magmortar, does that mean it's a Regional Variant?
[3] Hmm... why does this sound so, familiar?

Yeah, I can't figure it out either. :raritywink:
[4] Yeah, if you guys haven't figured it out yet, I'm kind of a Pokemon nerd.
[5] While I still argue that it's a better season than Samurai and Megaforce, I will admit that Operation Overdrive is still pretty bad. Not the absolute worst, but still...
[6] And cue the obvious joke:

And finally, it's done! Chapter 4 is up and this story is back on track.

I promise I will try and get these chapters out in a much more orderly manner. Once a month at the lasted, possibly a little later if I have an problems in real life (which is part of the reason that it still took so long after my blog post.)

On that topic, this episode that not only gives us some insight into Flash Sentry's home life, but also gives him some character development (which isn't hard since after the first four Equestria Girls specials he basically faded to the background. Thanks a lot, Hasbro.)

Hopefully the next chapter will be out a lot sooner. Until then, Equestrian Defender, out!

Episode 1: Awaken the Fury Part 1

1500 years ago, a great evil had fallen upon the Earth.

He was known as the King of Shadows, a dark sorcerer who wished to rule over all life on this world. To do this, he sought the power of the Elemental Gems; seven stones that each granted the wielder power over one of the elemental forces of nature: Fire, Water, Wind, Earth, Lightning, Steel, and Light. With all seven stones he would be near unstoppable.

He would have succeeded, had one brave young woman not stood against him.

She was known as Clover the Clever, a shy girl who loved books but had a strong affinity for magic and an even stronger heart. Where the King of Shadows drew his magical power from the dark forces of fear, anger, and hatred; she drew her magical power from her courage, knowledge, determination, strength, faith, will, and hope.

The Gems sensed these traits within her and bonded with her spirit, giving her the power to command their elements and transforming her into the first Element Fury Power Ranger.

For years Clover battled against the King of Shadows; their skirmishes carved out lakes and rivers, rose mountains up from the ground, and created storms so powerful they tore the land asunder.

Eventually she emerged victorious and sealed the King of Shadows away in the Dark Dimension, an alternate universe that served as a prison for monsters and beings of evil.

But it was not a perfect victory, as one might think in a tale such as this.

During the final battle the Silver Gem of Steel and the Gold Gem of Light had been lost, scattered across the land. And Clover herself had been mortally wounded, thus she had to place herself in a healing slumber that could last for an untold amount of years.

But before she did she placed the last five of the Gems inside of a crystal tree, casting a spell on them so that only those who were w a orthy could free them and use their power in the event that the King of Shadows would ever return.

In the present day five teenagers go about their lives, not realizing that soon their lives will be changed in ways they could never imagine...

-Canterlot City, Northern California-
-Present Day: March 21st, 2019-

It was a beautiful spring day in Canterlot City, California. The heavy clouds and snow were gone, allowing the people to see the blue skies and feel the warm sunshine. People young and old were now enjoying the weather; some were getting their gardens ready, some were playing outdoor sports, and others were browsing through the mall hoping to get the newest spring fashions.

Flash Sentry was doing none of those things.

At the moment he was working on the underside of a truck, his truck to be exact, while grumbling to himself about the fact that he had been stupid enough to buy a part for said truck from a store owned by the Flim and Flam brothers. "When am I gonna learn that any business run by those two may as well have a neon sign that reads: THIS IS A SCAM! TAKE YOUR MONEY AND RUN!"

"Probably about the same time you get rid of this truck."

Rolling out from under his truck, he looked up to see a boy around his age with slightly darker blue hair and green eyes. He was wearing a green aviator's jacket and a pair of cargo pants with black boots. What really stood out about him was his goofy grin, one that could rival Pinkie Pie's in being able to make others smile.

Like Flash was right now. "Soarin! Long time no see."

Flash and Soarin had been childhood friends growing up in Cloudsdale, having been next door neighbors and attending the same schools. The two of them had been practically inseparable.

That had changed a year ago when Flash's father had passed away due to Leukemia. After that happened Flash's mother decided to move their family to Canterlot. Flash and Soarin said their goodbyes, but promised they'd always be friends no matter what.

Helping him up, Soarin replied "Yeah. Too long if you ask me." Looking at the truck he said "I see you got your dad's old truck up and running."

The truck in question was a 1992 Ford Ranger, colored red. It was an old truck that Flash's father had bought a long time ago at a garage sale, which he and Flash had spent a lot of time working on to restore and bring to life.

Now it was the only thing Flash had left of his father.

Flash sighed as he looked over the truck. "Well it was. But I made the mistake of buying an oil filter from the Flim and Flam brothers. Gonna need a new one of those." Turning to Soarin he then asked "So, what exactly are you doing here? Not that I'm complaining."

Soarin smirked. "Well, my Uncle quit his old job. And he just so happened to notice a job opening in the Canterlot Times. So..." Soarin shrugged. "Looks like I'm going to Canterlot High come Monday."

"Awesome! Can't wait to show you around the school."

"I eagerly await the tour." Suddenly a loud growl came from his stomach. "But in the meantime, how about you show me a place we can get some lunch?"

Flash rolled his eyes, remembering Soarin's near-infinite appetite. "Let's head to the mall. There's this nice cafe called Sugarcube Corner. Best milkshakes in all of Canterlot."

"Cool. So, you got another car stashed somewhere?"

"No, but I do have the motorcycle I got for my birthday" he finished, picking up his helmet. "She's a bit of an oldie, but she'll get me from Point A to Point B." Smiling he added "While going from zero-to-sixty in about five seconds flat."

Soarin couldn't help but smile as he picked up his own motorcycle helmet. "I suppose great minds think alike." As they walked outside he asked "So, I've been hearing about some weird stuff happening around the school. What's been going on?"

Flash chuckled. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Try me."

"Well, it started in my freshman year when I met this girl named Sunset Shimmer..."

-Canterlot Mall: Mrs. Bibliography's Book Trade-

"I'd like to buy these books, please."

The request came from a girl of about fifteen with indigo hair that had two stripes, pink and mulberry, tied back in a ponytail while some of her bangs covered her forehead. She wore thick glasses, behind which were purple eyes. She was wearing a blue blouse, purple jeans and black sneakers.

And on the counter in front of her were about fifteen large books relating to topics of science that the owner frankly had never heard of. Why a kid her age would want books like that would forever be a mystery to the store owner.

Though she wouldn't complain since Twilight Sparkle was her number one customer.

So after the sale was made, Twilight exited the store holding three bags filled with books.

Three bags filled with heavy books. REALLY heavy books.

"Need a hand there, Twi?"

Turning to face the speaker, she saw a member of her small group of friends, Thorax Beetles.

Thorax's appearance had always been a point of mockery from some of the other students at Crystal Prep Academy. Not only because his clothes had more than likely come from secondhand stores (evident by the holes in many of his pairs of jeans and some of his hoodies) but also because his eyes lacked any visible pupils or sclera. His eyes were just pure fields of metallic purple. As such he used to wear dark sunglasses all the time to hide them.

At least, until Twilight and her other friend stood up for him and became his first, and sadly only, friends. Which was a shame because he was actually a very nice guy once you got to know him. Granted he had an unusual fascination with bugs but hey, everyone has a hobby.

Anyway, he was dressed in his usual faded and slightly torn clothes; a regular pair of blue jeans, a faded yellow hoodie, and brown sneakers that had clearly seen far better days.

Taking two of the bags from her and lifting them up with little effort, Thorax asked "So, what are all these books for?"

Twilight smiled and replied "That energy project I'm working on. I'm still trying to figure out the source of those weird energy readings around Canterlot High School."

Back in September Twilight was working on a simple research project that involved measuring electromagnetic fields in the city. What it was for he'd never know but Twilight was the kind of a girl who would take a part a TV and put it back together just because she was bored, so he rolled with it.

According to her equipment there was some strange unknown energy surges appearing around the area of Canterlot High School last year in September and October. Naturally with her scientific curiosity piqued, she jumped right in hoping to figure out what it was...

...and hit dead end after dead end. Theory after theory, hypothesis after hypothesis, she still couldn't figure out what the energy was. It wasn't electromagnetic, it wasn't from fossil fuels, it definitely wasn't nuclear (which would have gotten the government involved and no doubt quite a few black vans would have been posted around the school), and it didn't match up with any other energy source known to mankind. It was mind-boggling, but it only made Twilight more determined to find out what it was.

"You know, you could just wait until Monday when we start classes at CHS and ask the students there if they saw anything weird, right" Thorax deadpanned.

"I know that. But YOU know that I'm not exactly a social butterfly."

Thorax did know that. Outside of her two friends and her family, Twilight didn't really socialize much. Most of this was attributed to the fact that very few of the students in Crystal Prep Academy wanted to talk to her, either because they saw her as a nerd to be ignored or because they were too busy trying to be "the best" by the incredibly (read: unbearably) high standards of one Headmistress Abacus Cinch.

It made him very thankful that their little group of three would be going to Canterlot High School come Monday.

His mind was brought back to the present conversation about weird energy when Twilight said "It doesn't match up with anything on record."

A thought then occurred to Thorax. "What about the energy the Power Rangers use? I mean with their weapons and giant robots, they gotta be releasing some sort of energy, right?"

Twilight shook her head. "Already thought of it and checked. It doesn't match with any of the previous Ranger teams."

"How-"

"Don't ask. Plus we only see the Power Rangers if a city or the planet itself is being invaded by aliens, monsters, demons, or evil sentient robots. Since none of those have been showing up, why would a team of Power Rangers be here?"

Thorax couldn't fault the logic at that. "A fair point." He then smiled and asked "You ever wonder what it'd be like to be one?"

Thinking about it for a few seconds, Twilight answered "I'm no superhero. I mean, I'm just a girl who builds machines using some parts I salvage from a junkyard and some custom parts I buy with my own allowance (and some money I borrowed from my older brother and Cadance.) And even if I wanted to, I'm nowhere near strong enough to be a Power Ranger."

"You're a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for" Thorax replied. "And it's not about having a strong body, it's about having a strong spirit. How many times have the Power Rangers faced near impossible odds?"

"Almost every day they're on active duty."

"And how many times did they give up?"

A smile crept across her face. "Never."

"Exactly." Smiling, he added "Besides, with that big brain of your's you'd probably figure out a hundred different ways to beat a monster in less than a minute."

Twilight giggled. "Thanks."

As they rounded the corner, Thorax asked "So where's our other friend?"

"Knowing her, she's probably up to her ears in some form of trouble."

-Meanwhile in an alley a block away from the mall-

"Look girly, we don't want any trouble. Just hand over any money or valuables you might have, and we'll let you go nice and easy."

The threat came from a group of about five thugs of various size and muscle. Who were they threatening?

A girl around sixteen with magenta hair styled in a slight mohawk, who was wearing a black leather jacket over a pink t-shirt, black jeans and black combat boots. She rolled her blue-green eyes, the right eye having a single scar, and replied "Better idea. You losers hand over what you stole from my friend, and I don't put you in the hospital."

All five of the thugs laughed at that. Their leader said "Real funny, sweetheart. Got a name?"

The girl smirked, but at that moment her cell phone rang. She sighed. "Give me a second, will you?"

Answering it she said "Hello. Oh, hey Twilight. Yes, I'm on my way. I got a little held up at the moment. URGH! You sound just like Cadance. Look, I'll be there in five, ten minutes tops. Yes, I will buy the first round. Don't I always? Ok. See you soon. Bye." Groaning, she pinched her nose with her free hand as she pocketed her phone. "Sometimes I swear she's supposed to be my ACTUAL little sister." Looking back at the thugs, many of whom had either sweatdropped at the exchange or were now just confused, she asked "Where were we?"

"Your name?"

"Oh, right. The name's Tempest Shadow. I'm the girl who's gonna kick all your asses."

The leader chuckled before motioning to the two guys behind Tempest. "Victor. Monty. Get her."

The two guys in question made their moves, reaching out to grab her arms-

-only for Tempest to spin around and lash out with a quick kick to Victor's chest, sending him into the nearby trashcan. She then spun on her heel and delivered a strong haymaker to Monty's jaw, sending him spinning to the ground.

Turning to the remaining three, she made a "come hither" gesture with a cocky grin and asked "Anyone else?"

Her answer were two of the thugs rushing her at the same time. She quickly side-stepped one, striking him in the leg, chest, and head in quick succession. She then dodged the incoming strikes of the other thug, before ducking and slamming him in the jaw with a right uppercut that sent him falling to the ground. Neither of them got back up, clearly in too much pain.

Leaving their leader, who sighed and muttered "You just can't find good help these days."

He then reached into his pocket, pulling out and opening up a switchblade. Pointing it at Tempest he said "Maybe I'll get your other eye. Then they'll match."

Tempest glared at him, focusing on his knife as she slipped into a combat stance she picked up from Twilight's older brother, who happened to be a cop. The leader charged at her, looking to stab her in her eye. She pivoted on one foot to get out of his line of sight. She then grabbed his wrist and twisted it hard, forcing him to release the knife. She finished it by grabbing the base of his neck, pulling with all her might and slamming him down onto the cold asphalt, hard. Once he stopped struggling she said "Do yourselves a favor. Rethink your life choices and try and be a better person. Otherwise, next time I see you I won't be so nice." She then reached into the man's coat pockets and finally pulled out a silver charm bracelet. Releasing the man and taking a step back, she added "Now get lost before I call the cops."

As she walked off she pulled out her phone and dialed a number. Putting it to her ear she said "Hey Coco. You free at the moment? Good. Meet me at the mall outside of Sugarcube Corner."

"THANK YOU SO MUCH!"

Tempest couldn't help but smile as the blue-haired girl in front of her hugged her. "It's no big deal, Coco."

Releasing her, Coco Pommel replied "But it is a big deal! This charm bracelet was a gift from my grandmother. If you hadn't gotten it back-"

"Well I did. Now there's nothing to worry about." She smiled and ruffled Coco's hair. "And if Suri gives you any trouble while I'm at CHS, be sure to tell her that we still keep in contact with each other. And remind her of what happened the last time she was a bitch to you."

Coco winced. "Yeah. I don't think any of us are going to forget that anytime soon. But did you really have to give her a black eye?"

"Considering the things she said about you, Twilight, Thorax, and me? She's lucky she ONLY got a black eye."

As they parted ways, Tempest walked into Sugarcube Corner and immediately saw Twilight and Thorax sitting at one of the booths. Sliding into the seat next to Twilight she asked "So, what'd I miss?"

"Twilight trying to buy an entire bookstore. Again."

"Real funny, Thorax" Twilight replied. "So, where were you?"

"Getting back Coco's charm bracelet from some thugs" Tempest casually replied. "They weren't much of a challenge."

"You know, sometimes I'm worried that you're going to get yourself hurt doing that" Thorax said.

"And what was I supposed to do? Let those two-bit cons get away with something near and dear to our friend?"

"No. But would it have hurt you to tell me? A little backup never hurt."

Tempest shrugged. "Sorry, I didn't feel like waiting."

Rolling her eyes, Twilight slid Tempest a chocolate milkshake. "Seriously though, when are you going to cut the whole lone wolf act?"

Ignoring her Tempest asked "So, any luck on that weird energy thing you're working on?"

Mentally she rolled her eyes. Great way to dodge the question Tempest. "Still going nowhere. I swear it's like it's mocking me."

"Well, who knows? Maybe the answers might come walking through that door."

Ring!

"I'm surprised you still have your driver's license with the way you drive" Flash told Soarin as they walked into Sugarcube Corner.

Soarin rolled his eyes. "I wasn't that bad."

"The fact that you went about 20 over the speed limit in certain areas, along with the fact that you took those corners like a maniac the whole ride, would suggest otherwise."

Walking up to the counter, Flash said "Hey Mrs. Cake."

"Hello Flash. What can I get ya?"

"The usual. And anything this guy wants" he added, jerking a thumb in Soarin's direction.

Looking over the menu board, Soarin said "I'll take the quintuple burger with extra fries, and two large chocolate milkshakes."

If Mrs. Cake was shocked by his order, she didn't show it and simply wrote it down. "Coming right up." She smiled and added "You know, you're the first person to order the quintuple burger in about a month. Most people don't have the appetite."

Soarin smirked. "I'm not most people." As Mrs. Cake walked to get the food prepared, he turned to Flash and asked "What's you're usual?"

"Double Cheeseburger with bacon, fries, and a strawberry milkshake."

As they waited for their food, Soarin says "So... Magic, huh?"

Flash shrugged. "Yeah. I thought it was crazy, too. But CHS has pretty much turned into Grand Central for the weird and magical."

"Magical?"

Both boys turned to see-

"Twilight?"

Seeing the look of confusion on her face made Flash realize that this wasn't the same Twilight Sparkle he had met at the Fall Formal. That and the fact that she was wearing glasses, a completely different outfit, had her hair tied back in a ponytail, and Sunset and the Rainbooms were nowhere to be found.

This obviously meant that the Twilight standing in front of him was the Twilight from THIS universe, and as so they'd never met before.

His mind was dragged back to the present when she asked "Have we met?"

Flash chuckled awkwardly and replied "No. I... kinda mistook you for someone else."

She raised an eyebrow at his statement, clearly not believing him, but she shrugged it off. "Nevermind that. You go to CHS, right?" Seeing him nod, she continued "Okay. For the past few months I kept picking up these strange energy signatures that seem to originate from your school. Has anything weird or unusual happened at your school?"

Unsure of how to respond Flash turned to Soarin, only to see him already diving into his really big burger and pile of french fries, an empty milkshake glass beside him. Sighing, Flash turned back to Twilight and said "It's a long story. And you'd probably think I'm crazy."

"We live in a world where every other week a city somewhere gets attacked by evil forces that are stopped by superheroes wearing red, blue, yellow, green or black, pink, and some other color spandex, who happen to pilot giant robots. I'm pretty sure whatever you can tell me wouldn't be that crazy."

Flash couldn't help but laugh at that. Thank you, Power Rangers, for making stuff like this seem less ridiculous by comparison. "Okay then. You wanna sit down or-?"

Twilight gestured to the booth where Thorax and Tempest were sitting and asked "Can we talk over there?"

"I guess. Let me grab Soarin."

And I'm really hoping Sunset won't kill me for this.

Sunset Shimmer sighed as she looked at her phone, seeing and hearing the call she was trying to make to Rarity go to voicemail. She quickly dialed in Rainbow Dash's number. "Come on, Rainbow. You're my only hope."

Sadly she got the standard 3 rings and then her voicemail. "Hey this is Rainbow Dash. Sorry I can't answer your call, I'm probably doing something awesome! I'll call back when I can. Bye!"

Hanging up her phone she swore under her breath before heading towards Sugarcube Corner. "Where the hell are you guys?"

Walking into Sugarcube Corner, she immediately overheard a familiar sounding voice ask "But how does the magic work?"

Twilight? But I thought she was at that Summit in Griffinstone?

Turning towards the voice, she saw five people sitting at a booth. One of them was Flash Sentry, one of them was a girl who did look like Twilight Sparkle but with glasses and a different wardrobe (Oh. That must be her human counterpart.) and a girl and two boys she didn't recognize.

Flash shrugged and replied "I honestly don't know. I'm as new to the whole magic thing as you guys are."

"Still, kinda weird to hear that there's another dimension full of magic and that your counterpart there is a princess."

"Yeah well, I'm just really, really hoping Sunset doesn't get too mad at me for telling you guys this."

The one girl, who Sunset noticed had a scar over her right eye, saw her and asked "She wouldn't happen to have green eyes and red and gold hair, would she?"

"Yeah."

One of the boys, who she noticed had odd looking purple eyes, added "Wears a leather jacket with a red stripe on each arm?"

"How would you...? She's right behind me, isn't she?" All four of them nodded and he turned around, smiling very awkwardly and with a hint of fear in his eyes. "H-hey Sunset."

But to his surprise, Sunset Shimmer didn't look angry. She simply facepalmed and said "Hey Flash. I thought we agreed not to speak about the magic to anyone outside of school?"

Before he could reply, the Twilight look-alike replied "Well to be fair, the four of us are starting school at Canterlot High School on Monday. So we'd probably learn about the magic sooner or later."

The remaining boy with darker blue hair added "Plus, Flash told us your were pretty awesome in the Battle of the Bands."

"Really," she asked Flash. Seeing him nod she said "Okay, you're off the hook for that one."

Seeing the exhausted look on her face, the purple-eyed boy asked "You okay? You look like you haven't slept."

Sitting down next to him, Sunset replied "That's because I haven't- uh... I'm sorry, what's your name?"

"Thorax." Pointing to the magenta haired girl he said "That would be Tempest Shadow-"

"Sup."

"-you've already met a version of Twilight Sparkle, so I'm sure you know her name-"

"It's still nice to meet you," Twilight added.

"-and this is our more recent friend, Soarin Skies."

"Well, more recent for you guys," Flash said. "But Soarin and I have been best friends since we were kids." Looking at Sunset, he asked "But back on topic; how come you haven't gotten any sleep?"

"Because Friday after school, Fluttershy asked for help taking some rabbits from the animal shelter and releasing them back into the wild. I couldn't because I had a job interview, but Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, and Rarity did. When they were done and my interview was over, we were all supposed to meet up at Fluttershy's house for a slumber party." She sighed. "I waited all night with Fluttershy's parents, but they never showed up."

"And they're still not back yet" Tempest asked, a look of concern on her face.

Sunset nodded solemnly. "I've called each of them three times since this morning but all I keep getting are their voicemails. And before you ask, yes, I already talked to their parents. They haven't seen them since yesterday. I'm worried that something might've-"

"Can I see your phone for a second?"

Everyone looked at Twilight, who had pulled a blue laptop out of her bag along with an AUX cord. Confused, Sunset asked "Why?"

"If your calls are still going through, then it means their phones still have some charge. Phone please."

Handing it to her, Sunset asked "What does that have to-?"

"One of the benefits of being a genius," she said as she plugged the cord into Sunset's phone "is that I have plenty of experience with computers. Enough experience to create a program that can trace cell phone calls via satellite."

"Don't the police, FBI, CIA, et cetera have programs like that?"

"Yes. But my program can do it in half the time and can trace them anywhere in the country. Sunset, if you would?"

Hitting Fluttershy's number on speed dial, Sunset asked "Will it work?"

"I've tested it on Thorax's and Tempest's phones. It works."

"Wait wait wait! You have your own satellite" Soarin asked.

Flashing Soarin an "Are you kidding?" look, she replied "My older brother's a cop and my sister-in-law's the Dean of Students at Crystal Prep. You really think I have enough money to buy my own satellite?"

"You mean to tell me you hacked a satellite" Flash asked. "Isn't that illegal?"

"Only if you get caught."

Everyone barring Tempest and Thorax, who were used to this, was wide-eyed at that statement. In unison, not that they knew it, Flash and Sunset thought Princess Twilight she is NOT.

After a few seconds, Twilight said "Got it."

"You found them" Sunset asked.

"Their cell phones, at least. They are in... the Everfree Forest."

Soarin looked worried about that. "You mean the forest that's had all sorts of legends and rumors about it?"

Tempest chuckled. "You're not seriously scared of some old wives' tales, are you?"

"I'm not scared," Soarin said unconvincingly. "I'm just... wondering why they'd choose that forest of all places to leave a bunch of bunnies."

"We can ask them that when we find them" Flash said. "If you guys are going, that is."

"I'll go" Thorax replied, picking up his keys. "I've got a van that should fit most of us, and a First-Aid Kit." Seeing everyone's looks he added "Better to have it and not need it then need it and not have it."

"You don't have to worry about me and Soarin. We've got our own rides." Flash looked at the rest of them. "Anyone else?"

"Considering we might have five people in need of medical attention, you'll need every set of hands you can get" Tempest said. "I'm coming too."

"Since I'm the one with the location and I don't let ANYONE touch my laptop, I'll come too" Twilight said.

"I've done crazier stuff than go into a reportedly cursed/haunted forest." Downing the rest of his milkshake, Soarin said "Let's do this!"

As they walked out of the mall, Sunset said "I can't thank you guys enough."

"Well," Twilight said as she climbed into the backseats of the van "maybe you can answer some of my questions about the magic on the way."

Thinking about it, Sunset replied "I can try. How many questions do you have?"

In the shotgun seat, Tempest sighed before pulling out a pair of earbuds and picking a song on her phone.*Here we go.

Thorax's thoughts were similar, though he merely settled for rolling his eyes. She's gone full on nerd.

-Unknown Location-

"My Lord, the five girls have been dealt with."

The statement came from a humanoid creature with a face similar to a crow, with large wings with jet black feathers. He was clad in midnight black armor with gold plates on his shoulders and forearms, and a large black and gold katana at his side.

He was speaking to a large tube made of purple crystal that seemed to be filled with jet black smoke. Something within the smoke shifted, and a pair of dark red eyes looked at him. In a slithery whisper, the smoke replied "Good. And how close are we to finding the Gems?"**

"I sent Skullossus and a squadron of Pawns into the Everfree Forest."

"Why such a small force?"

"I believed it would be all that was necessary. After all, as far as we know the Gems have not bonded to anyone, so Skullossus is merely Gem hunting."

The voice was silent, before it finally replied "Very well. Go back to Skullossus and supervise. With those five girls out of the way we shouldn't have too much to worry about. But if the Gems are found and bond to new wielders... Well, I supposed that's why I have you, Nevermore."

Bowing his head, Nevermore replied "I will not fail you, my Lord."

-Outside the Everfree Forest-

"So, this is the Everfree Forest." Soarin shivered. "Anybody else getting the creeps just from looking at this place?"

One wouldn't blame him for posing that question upon having seen the sheer size of the forest and feeling its presence. The trees were so close together that they almost seemed to form a wall save for a trail through it, their canopies so thick that they served to prevent nearly all the sunlight from reaching the ground.

But what really sold the creepy factor was the silence. The entirety of the forest was so quiet, so smothered by an oppressive silence that it could never NOT be creepy.

Thorax tucked his First-Aid Kit into his backpack and replied "Sheesh. Just throw in some thick fog, inhuman monsters, some horrifying hallucinations and you'd have a setting for one of the Silent Hill games."

Tempest rolled her eyes. "Come on, nerd. Let's find these girls and get out of here."

Twilight checked her laptop. "Okay, I'm cross-checking their position with the maps of this place. I'll let you guys know where we need to go."

Seeing Sunset with her phone, Flash asked "Still no answer?"

She shook her head. "Still nothing."

"Figured it wouldn't be that easy. Guys?" Once he had everyone's attention he continued "This place is huge and the last thing we want is someone getting lost. So stay close and make sure your cell phones are on."

Soarin smirked and gave him a mock salute "Aye aye, Captain!"

Smartass. "Let's move."

As they set off down the trail, Soarin couldn't stop the nervous twitching in his hands. Noticing this, Sunset asked "You okay?"

"Not really." He looked around at the trees, almost expecting something to jump out at them. "It's too quiet."

"I hear you" Thorax replied. "You'd think you'd hear some birds or squirrels."

"Not what I mean. I grew up in Cloudsdale. I'm used to honking cars, screeching tires, the yelling of street vendors and sign spinners. This whole place may as well be The Twilight Zone. No offense, Twi."

"None taken," she replied. "At least you didn't make a reference to Stephanie Meyer's god-awful vampire books."

"Considering how much she butchered vampire mythology, I don't even think they deserved to be called vampires."

"Amen. Those books sucked, figuratively and literally," Tempest quipped, getting a chuckle out of the group.

"So, where did you guys go to school before CHS" Flash asked.

"Well, Twilight, Thorax and I went to Crystal Prep Academy," Tempest replied. "But... we kinda got expelled."

"No, you and Twilight got expelled," Thorax cut in. "I asked for a transfer request. I don't think Cinch cared that much."

Flash, Soarin, and Sunset looked at Twilight in shock. "YOU GOT EXPELLED?!"

"Why is that such a shock? Wait, let me guess, Princess Twilight never got expelled."

"From what she told me, she's the kind of girl who would follow the rules to a 'T.'" Sunset shook her head. "How did you get expelled?"

Sighing, she replied "It was stupid. The girl's soccer team pulled a bunch of pranks on the three of us, and Cinch did absolutely nothing to stop them. She said, and I quote 'I'd rather not risk the success and reputation of this school over some juvenile tomfoolery.' Well after they put paint bombs in our lockers, took photos of our paint-splattered faces, and posted them on MyStable, I snapped. So after their Gym Class one day, I hacked into the school's system and input a code that would switch the water in all of their showers to cold." She winced. "But... I input the wrong code and turned the sprinklers on. I tried to stop it, but I made it worse and... I sorta, kinda-"

"She flooded the whole school" Tempest and Thorax said in unison.

There was a moment of silence, before Flash, Sunset, and Soarin all burst out laughing. Twilight rolled her eyes and after a few seconds asked "You three done?"

Regaining their composure, they nodded. Flash asked "So Cinch found out and you got expelled?"

"No, I confessed to it. She wanted to sue me for all the damages, but Shining managed to talk her down. I ended up spending most of February doing community service, after which I got expelled."

Continuing their trek, Sunset asked "So what about you, Tempest?"

Tempest looked away and muttered "I don't want to talk about it."

"Come on, Tempest" Twilight said. "They got to hear my story, now tell yours."

Rolling her eyes, she complied. "Fine. You guys ever heard of Suri Polomare?"

"Wasn't she that girl who stole some of Rarity's designs for that fashion contest" Flash asked Sunset.

Sunset nodded. "Eeyup. A rich, snobbish, self-entitled brat. Like Diamond Tiara times one thousand."

"Well one of our friends, Coco Pommel, got a job at a store owned by her family. More specifically, Suri was the manager. So she hired Coco as her assistant. And... Coco's not exactly what one would call assertive."

"Fluttershy's like that too. Though she's gotten better since she and her friends got back together."

"Well considering Crystal Prep's policy on friendship, that wasn't happening unless she joined one of the sports teams" Thorax replied.

"Anyway," Tempest continued "she kept telling us about how awful Suri was to her everyday. So, being the kind and caring friend I was, I decided to have a little talk with Suri. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of telling her what Coco told me. She told me she'd be 'nicer' to Coco."

"Let me guess, she fired her."

"And spread a bunch of rumors about her so no clothing stores or boutiques would ever hire her. And just to really get me mad, she posted rumors about Thorax, Twilight, and... me."

Noticing the pause, Flash said "The rumors about you weren't rumors, were they?"

She fixed all of them with a glare. "I'm not, nor will I ever, go into detail about them. So don't ask. But yes, some of the things she said about me were true. I saw it online..." She clenched her fists so hard that Soarin, Flash and Sunset were surprised that her nails didn't draw blood."It's just... the idea that this bitch could post that stuff, say stuff like that online for the whole world to see and ruining our lives, just to make herself feel better? Just to spite me. The next day in school, we called her out on what she did, and she freaking gloated about it!" Growling, she slammed her fist into a nearby tree. Taking a few deep breaths, she finished "All I saw was red. And the next thing I know Suri Polomare's on the ground in front of me, with a black eye courtesy of my fist. Her parents called the school, one thing leads to another and I get expelled."

"You left out the part where you grabbed her by the front of her dress and threatened to break every bone in her body if she didn't take those posts down and post the real truth," Twilight added.

"Which she did" Thorax stated.

Seeing the shocked looks on their faces, Tempest shrugged. "You didn't see what she posted, or heard what she said. If you did and it was about people you care about, you'd slug her in the face too."

Sunset smirked. "I would've done the same thing. Was it worth it?"

"Given the fact that she deserved/needed to be knocked off her high horse? No offense, Sunset."

"None taken. I'm a Pony, not a horse."

"Either way when it comes to knocking Suri down a peg, I'd do it again in a heartbeat."

They came to a fork in the trail; one path went eastward, the other westward.

Looking at her laptop, Twilight said "We're gonna wanna take the west trail."

Pulling out his phone and bringing up a map, Flash said "That trail goes towards Clover Canyon."

"Clover Canyon" Thorax asked. "Isn't there an old legend about that place?"

"Yeah, some story about a sorceress who defeated an evil monster" Tempest said dismissively. "Honestly, I never paid attention to most of those fairy tales."

Sunset tuned them out when she noticed something on a tree on the edge of the trail; a bright pink streamer tied on one of the branches. Recognizing it she said "This is one of Pinkie's streamers she uses for her parties."

"There's another one on that tree" Thorax pointed out.

"Smart thinking," Flash stated. "She left a trail so they wouldn't lose their way."

Twilight looked at her laptop. "And that's where we're going."

As they walked off of the path and into the woods to follow the trail of streamers, they never noticed a cloaked figure peer out from behind a large tree. "And so it begins."

"This is just about where the signal came from," Twilight said, closing her laptop and sliding it into her backpack.

Her program had brought them to a small grassy clearing, surrounded by trees on three sides and one side giving a good view of the canyon a few yards away. The only evidence that there had been anyone here recently was a large pet carrying crate that had a few half eaten carrots and an empty bowl of water.

But Sunset's friends were nowhere to be found.

Looking around, Sunset immediately noticed a yellow small phone with a pink butterfly on the back. "It's Fluttershy's phone. She was here!"

"Okay," Tempest replied. "They were here. But where are they now?"

Flash looked around the clearing, before saying "There's no blood or any signs of a struggle. Nothing looks out of the ordinary."

That's when Soarin noticed something on a patch of bare ground. "Hey, you guys said that Rainbow Dash was into sports, right?"

Sunset nodded. "Yeah. Why?"

Soarin smirked before saying "There's a pair of shoe-prints here, belonging to a pair of Nikes."

Everyone gathered around them, with Sunset saying "Yeah. Those are definitely Rainbows." She then pointed to a different set of shoe-prints and added "And that's definitely from Rarity's shoes."

"How can you tell," Tempest asked.

"Because I don't know anyone else on this planet who would go hiking in the woods while wearing high heels."

Studying the prints, Flash said "Looks like they're heading deeper into the forest."

A buzzing came from Twilight's backpack, which she immediately opened and pulled out her laptop. After a few keystrokes she said "I think I know why." Looking in the direction the footprints were heading, she explained "I'm picking up a massive energy signature from that direction. One that's very similar to the ones I picked up from the Fall Formal and the Battle of the Bands."

Almost the second after she finished that sentence, Sunset's body began glowing a light red before she suddenly grew pony ears and a pony tail that matched her hair. Everyone was a bit surprised at this, save for Flash who'd seen it before. Once the shock wore off Sunset confirmed "Yeah. Definitely Equestrian magic."

Tempest asked "You think they decided to check out what it was?"

"Knowing them, more than likely."

"Then I guess that's where we're going," Flash said.

As they continued down the path, Thorax whispered "You ever get the feeling you're being watched?"

Just about everyone whispered back "Yes."

Soarin asked "You guys know how to defend yourselves, right?"

Twilight was the first to reply. "My big brother made me take some self-defense classes."

"I can vouch for that, since she and I took the same classes," Thorax added.

Tempest smirked. "I can handle myself."

"You know I can handle myself in a fight, Soarin" Flash stated. "Remember in seventh grade when we fought off Smokescreen and his friends?"

Soarin laughed. "Good times."

Eventually the team came to a large cave, Sunset's magical aura glowing brighter the closer she got to it. "Whatever's causing it is definitely in there."

Seeing how dark it was inside the cave Soarin asked "Don't suppose anybody bothered to bring a flashlight?"

Tempest rolled her eyes. "Why would we need one when we have the glowing pony girl?"

Seeing how bright Sunset's aura was glowing, Soarin nodded. "Fair point."

As Sunset lead the way into the cave, Thorax noticed something. "That's odd."

Hearing him, Soarin asked "What is?"

"Well, most caves usually have jagged or rough floors and walls." Running his hand across the walls, he continued "But both the floors and walls are perfectly smooth. Almost as if this was built instead of carved out by erosion like most caves."

"Considering magic's involved, I'd say that's very possible."

After a while the cave opened up into a large chamber, big enough to put a two story house in.

But in the center of the chamber was something that immediately drew their eyes, as well as defied their imaginations.

In the center of the chamber grew a large tree, roughly the size of a full grown oak, that seemed to be made out of pure white crystals. While there was no sunlight it still glowed, shining like a beacon through the darkness.

"Okay, that's not normal."

Tempest facepalmed before looking at Soarin. "Thank you, Captain Obvious. Your services are unnecessary, but appreciated."

"What? I'm just saying-"

"Hey guys?"

All of them turned to see Flash at the trunk, looking at something in the center of it. Once they joined him they got a good look at what caught his attention.

Set within slots on the tree were five gemstones of different shapes and colors: a red flame, a blue drop of water, a green cyclone, a yellow boulder with a crack going through it, and a pink bolt of lightning. Each gem was small enough they could fit in the palm of their hands.

"Any idea what these are, Sunset" Flash asked.

She shook her head. "Nope. I've never seen heard or read anything about gemstones like these. The tree does kinda resemble the fabled Tree of Harmony, but that's back in Equestria."

"Well I get the feeling that these gems are what drew the Rainbooms here."

"But they're not here," Thorax noted. "So, maybe they couldn't get the gems free?"

"I wonder why," Tempest asked aloud. "It doesn't look like there's anything protecting it."

"Looks can be deceiving. I've read enough Daring Do books to know that the things that you think aren't booby-trapped, are usually booby-trapped," Twilight stated.

Soarin chuckled before turning to Tempest. "She said traps."

BONK!

Rubbing his sore head, Soarin looked at Tempest and asked "What was that for?"

"For being stupid."

As that little comedic exchange was going on, Sunset looked on the tree and noticed something etched in just below the stones. Leaning closer she recognized it as Old Equestrian. "Looks like someone wrote something on the tree. In Old Equestrian."

"Old Equestrian," Twilight asked. "You mean from your world?"

"Yeah. But from a looong time ago. Not a lot of ponies read it or use it outside of translating ancient tomes." Looking carefully at the etching she read "Only those with pure hearts and courage, knowledge, determination, strength, and faith can release the power of the Gems."

The moment she finished reading the five gems glowed brightly before shooting out of their slots towards the other five members of the group. The red gem flew into Flash's hand, the blue gem to Twilight's, the green gem to Soarin's, the yellow gem to Thorax's, and finally the pink gem into Tempest's hand. The moment the gems made contact, they felt a surge of power run through them.

As Sunset watched this she saw the magical aura she had begin to fade, her pony ears and tail disappearing as well. Looking to the tree she saw that it was fading away as well. So the tree was just made to protect the gems, which were the source of the magic the whole time. Does that mean the magic... is now inside of them?

Once they stopped glowing Soarin asked "What just happened?"

"I... I honestly have no idea," Sunset replied. "Magic gems flying out of a tree and into the hands of my friends is a new experience. Even for me."

Twilight flexed her free hand, looking at the blue gem in her hand. "What was that power surge? I feel... different."

"I feel like I just drank three espressos in one sitting" Tempest added, flexing her fingers.

"I feel like I could go three rounds with All Might***," Thorax said.

"Not to put a damper on things," Flash said, getting everyone's attention "but we still have five missing girls we need to find."

Looking around Soarin stated "There's no other ways into or out of this cave. We haven't seen any sign of them in here or by the entrance. So whatever happened to them, it must've happened either before they made it to the cave, or after they left."

"Well, we're not going to get answers standing in a dark cave. Let's get out of here."

A few minutes later the group was exiting the cave, Twilight saying "Maybe we should check the clearing again. We might've missed something."

Flash shrugged. "It's worth a shot. But..."

His words died in his throat, as a cold shiver ran up his spine. "Guys? You feel that?"

Soarin shivered. "Please tell me that's just the wind."

Tempest shook her head. "As much as we want it to be-"

"-it's not" Twilight finished.

The moment she finished talking someone, or something, let out a sinister, bone-chilling laugh.

Tensing up at the noise, everyone looked around trying to find the speaker. "Okay, tell me I'm not the only one who heard that," Thorax said.

"No. You weren't," Flash muttered. "But where...?"

"Right here!"

Everyone turned their heads to look at the trees to try and find the speaker, only to see something drop down from the branches and land a few feet in front of them. Once it landed it stood up to its full height, revealing its form.

It's horrifying, nightmarish form.

It looked like a skeleton that was roughly seven feet tall, but with metal gray bones and two angled horns on its head. From within its empty eye sockets a red glow shone, and its fingertips ended in sharp bone claws. Around its waist was what looked like a tattered loincloth, not that it mattered since it didn't have anything to hide.

What really unnerved them was that despite the fact it had no facial muscles or lips, it seemed to be sadistically grinning at them. It opened its mouth and said "Greetings. My name is Skullossus. And thank you so much for getting those gems out of that tree. Now, if you could just hand them over right now, we can avoid any... unpleasantness." He flexed his claws at the last word, ensuring that his point got across.

Being closest to Sunset, Twilight whispered "Don't suppose you can just make him disappear?"

"Like I told you in the van, I have no idea how magic works in this world. And besides, even if I did I can't just make him disappear. I can teleport him somewhere but I can't-"

Skullossus cleared his throat (despite not having any vocal cords) and said "You two ladies do know I can hear you, right?"

"How can you do that when you don't have ears," Twilight asked.

"Not important," he replied, before snapping his fingers. "PAWNS!"

Seemingly from the shadows themselves, about ten humanoid creatures emerged. Each of them stood about six feet tall and wore plates of pitch black armor on their arms and chests, as well as helmets with visors. The flesh that shown was pale gray and seemed to be stretched over their bones. A bright red glow came from the slits in their visors, and each one carried a short sword roughly the length of their forearms.

And unfortunately for our heroes, they were surrounded. "Any ideas," Soarin asked.

"Can't go forward, and if we go back in the cave we'll be trapped," Twilight stated.

"Guess that leaves one option," Sunset said clenching her fists. "We fight."

Tempest smiled, settling into a combat stance. "Music to my ears."

The Pawns and Skullossus charged at them, but the group scattered and the fight was on.

One Pawn rushed Tempest but she lashed out with a kick into its exposed stomach, sending it flying to the ground. Another Pawn slashed at her with its sword, but she sidestepped it and struck him in its exposed neck with a chop, followed by a kick to his head. Seeing the first Pawn she knocked down start to get up she quickly stomped on its head, slamming it into the ground. "Huh. These guys aren't so tou-"

The words died in her throat as they both got up, apparently not even injured or winded. "You've gotta be kidding me."

As they both charged at her with their swords she felt another surge of power, this time stronger than before. Looking at her hands she saw pink sparks arcing off her fingertips, moving faster and faster. With nothing else to go on she threw her hands out at the Pawns-

-and watched in awe as streams of pink lightning shot out and nailed them in the chest, making their bodies spasm like cartoon characters. Once she stopped the Pawns fell to the ground, fading away into black dust.

Looking at her handiwork Tempest said "Okay. That was pretty cool." Pulling out her Gem, she saw the pink lightning bolt was glowing. "This just got interesting."

Twilight was not faring well. Most of the self-defense classes she took focused mainly on grappling or disarming her opponent, giving her time to run away and find help. The problem was that the two Pawns she was fighting weren't human and didn't seem to feel pain. Meaning that she was just delaying the inevitable.

But then she saw the blue gem in her hand glow, and suddenly she felt the air around her moisten, as if it were about to rain. Acting on instinct, she moved like she was pushing the Pawns away-

-and somehow summoned a massive stream of water, which slammed into the two Pawns and knocked them into the nearby trees. As they faded away Twilight was in shock, her mind trying to figure out what the Gem did to her. "Well, that was a thing."

Soarin dodged a swipe from one of the Pawns attacking him, then jumped out of the reach of the other Pawn. He looked at his Gem and said "Don't suppose you got anything for me?" Feeling the familiar surge and seeing his gem glow green, he smiled. "Okay. Now what?"

As a Pawn tried to strike him he spun out of the way, but he didn't stop. He began to rapidly spin like a top, summoning a green tornado that yanked the Pawns up and sent them flying away. As he stopped spinning he grinned. "That was fun."

Thorax had also awakened the power from his Gem, his arms now coated in glowing yellow stone and his strength greatly increased. The Pawns' swords broke on contact with is arms, and with two quick punches the Pawns were nothing more than dust. "Another one bites the dust," he said, quoting one of his favorite bands.

Sunset unfortunately had no magic at the moment, as she still hadn't figured out how to call upon it at will. Sadly that left her with the karate lessons she took when she was dating Flash, and that was proving to be mostly ineffective.

As one of the Pawns tried to stab her a green blur slammed into its side, revealing Soarin who had nailed it with a high speed kick. "Magic is officially awesome!"

The other Pawn tried to rush him but got grabbed by Thorax, who lifted him up and slammed him headfirst into the ground, dispersing him into dust. "Down boy."

The final Pawn tried to get back up, only to get splashed by a large amount of water courtesy of Twilight. Turning to face her, Twilight said "Metal, water, and electricity; not a good combo."

Pink lightning struck the Pawn, frying it until it joined its brethren as dust. "That's the last one."

Soarin stated "I see everyone else who got a gem got some benefits."

"Hey, where's Flash" Twilight asked.

Flash dodged another swipe from Skullossus' claws. "You move pretty fast for a guy without muscles," he quipped.

"I've got five hundred years under my belt, fleshbag," he replied.

Dodging two more swipes, Flash felt the power surge and saw the red glow. As Skullossus tried to slash him again, he sidestepped and grabbed his wrist. Smoke started to rise from where Flash had grabbed him, and Skullossus screamed in pain. "ARGH! IT BURNS!"

"That's just the warm-up!"

Flash released him before knocking him back with a kick. On instinct he threw his hands out, and twin streams of red fire shot out and slammed into Skullossus with the force of a freight train, and sent him flying through multiple trees until he smashing into the ground.

Looking at his glowing hands, Flash couldn't help but smile. "So... THIS is what it's like to have magic."

"FLASH!"

Turning he saw the rest of the group run up to meet him. Seeing the destruction and some of the scorched trees, Soarin asked "You too?"

"Yeah. I got some serious firepower. You guys?"

"Wind."

Showing his rocky arms Thorax said "Earth. Twilight's got water, and Tempest has lightning."

"Well, this is an unfortunate turn of events."

All six of them turned to see another monster drop from the sky, a large humanoid bird with black wings, holding a black and gold katana in his right hand. "Oh joy, another one," Tempest grumbled. "And who are you supposed to be?"

The monster smiled. "I am Nevermore. And it seems you five have bonded to the Gems. That's unfortunate for you."

Flash asked "Why's that?"

"Because in order for my lord to use the full power of those gems, I'll have to destroy you five."

It was then that they noticed his katana was glowing.

"MOVE!"

Nevermore brought his katana down in an overhead slashing motion, unleashing a crescent wave of black energy towards the group. They all dodged out of the way but they all saw it continue on its path, carving out a trench in the ground. Tempest threw her hand forward and shot a stream of lightning at Nevermore, but he simply blocked it with his sword. Thorax was more surprising, grabbing a nearby boulder and chucking it at Nevermore like it was a pillow. But it was all for naught as with one swing of his sword the boulder was sliced clean in half. Soarin shot a cyclone out of his palm, but Nevermore walked through it like it was nothing. Twilight and Flash decided to hit him simultaneously, blasting him with a condensed stream of water and fire. Their combined attack struck Nevermore head on, eliciting a cry of pain from him, and creating a large steam cloud that obscured him from view. "Did that work" Soarin asked hopefully.

"I doubt it," Sunset replied. "He's obviously stronger than the Pawns and Bonehead."

"More than you can imagine."

Out of the steam cloud Nevermore walked, not a single scratch or scorch mark on his armor. Laughing he said "You five may have accessed the Gems' power, but you've only just started using them. You've got a long way to go before you could so much as scratch me."

As he slowly walked towards them Tempest asked "Any ideas?"

Almost as if answering her call a blast of green energy slammed into Nevermore, freezing him in place. "That should hold you for a bit."

Everyone turned to see a cloaked figure, obviously a woman judging by their voice, standing behind them with a staff in her hand. She looked at them and said "Sorry about this but we need to get out of here before my stasis spell wears off."

Before anyone could say anything she slammed her staff on the ground, and all anyone could see was bright green light.

And then they were gone, not a trace of them to be found.

Nevermore finally managed to break free of the spell, cursing under his breath. "I'll have to inform the king at once."

"Owwwwww."

Turning towards the trees he saw a stumbling, dazed Skullossus walking towards him. "Did anyone get the number of that truck that hit me?"

Sighing, Nevermore focused his magic. "Come on, Skullossus. The King'll need to hear this at once."

And with that the two of them disappeared into the shadows.

Inside a cave there was a flash of green light before the cloaked woman appeared, Flash and his friends appearing shortly thereafter.

Looking around Flash asked "What just happened? Where are we?"

Getting the shakiness out of her legs Sunset answered "Our mystery lady teleported us out of there. As for where we are, ask her."

A giggle escaped the cloaked woman, who said "You're welcome, by the way."

Tempest grumbled "Why does it feel like I'm gonna hurl?"

"First time teleporting? That's usually one of the side effects. Don't worry, it get's easier the more you do it."

Thorax finally asked "Okay, who are you? What is going on? Why did we just get attacked by a skeleton and some living chest pieces, followed by a monster named after one of the works of Edgar Allen Poe?"

"All in due time, my friend. And as for who I am?"

The woman then pulled her hood down, revealing a pale skinned woman in her twenties with dark green hair and eyes. She smiled and said "My name is Clover the Clever. And I need your help."

Author's Note

** Is it just me, or does this design sound kinda familiar?

:raritywink:
***If you get that reference, fifty bonus points!

FINALLY!

I started this story shortly after I watched the first episode of Beast Morphers. It's taken me hours upon hours of my time, liter upon liter of Coke-Cola, and so much sugar that I need to go to a doctor to see if I have diabetes.

All this, for a first chapter of my story that is 10,118 words. FOR THE FIRST CHAPTER! That's a new record!

The Rangers will get their suits, weapons and Zords next chapter. So stay tuned for the next episode of Power Rangers: Element Fury!