‎

Disclaimer: I do not own the Power Rangers, they belong to their respective copyright owners and are used here without permission. No money is being made from this fic.

Authors Note: This is an alternate universe with an alternate time line.

Guardians, Lords and Masters

The dark age of magic and ignorance was coming to an end. The Dark Times as they would often be referred to in the future were a period during which many of the events taking place within the cosmos were hidden from the general population. A new race had emerged and attempted to hold itself up as a shining example for the rest of the cosmos to aspire to. A race dedicated to the pursuit of science and knowledge, that appalled the use of magic and was rumoured to have taken steps to wipe out those that failed to adhere to a more logical, rational, and scientific view.

Their public deeds were well recorded and a matter of highly vocalised record as they had moved to make all around them aware of their triumphs. But behind the cheering and support there were many that questioned the rumours and stories of other activities that had taken place. There were stories of planets disappearing and races ceasing to exist. Some galaxies had mysteriously changed shape and outspoken opposition had either vanished or completely changed their minds.

There were even some stories that this new race, the Time Lords as they preferred to be called, had had some involvement in the rise of the Age of Chaos as well as its end. There were many who suspected the Time Lords and their leaders had used the chaos as an opportunity to remove opposition and sabotage those that might oppose them in future. Their jealously guarded secrets made many wary of their true intentions and so despite the great service they had done for the universe, the Time Lord would be revered and but never truly followed.

One of the biggest things to hold the Time Lords back was the knowledge of the things they had had to do to reach their place at the top of the cosmic power struggle. They knew of the crimes they had committed, the secrets they had buried along the way. The Time Lords knew how dirty and corrupt they had been, and it caused them to believe that other races were just as calculating and underhanded. They refused to commit to cooperation out of fear that their competitors might take their interaction as an opportunity to strike against them.

And so instead of claiming the leadership they so desired at a time when it was freely given, the Time Lords instead chose to grow more and more isolated, sending out edicts that were often ignored with their influence slipping away.

====

The truth was a little more complex where the Time Lords were concerned. The Shobogan race had been one of those selected by the First Ones during the fixing of the laws of reality. They had in fact been one of the most dedicated parties to the process, urging their peers to go further and truly nail down the rules of physics to make it impossible for there to be anything but logic and order.

When the First Ones had sent their recruits back to their worlds, the Shobogans had been one of the few to make complex written records of everything they had learned during their time away. And even though they realised that they would never achieve the feats that they had managed again during their lifetime, they hoped that their descendants would once again unlock the secrets.

It took many generations and much of the knowledge was forgotten. The Shobogan had to start from almost nothing and build themselves up. In time they mastered space flight and then later unlocked part of the secrets to immortality. It was not true immortality for they were bound to eventually die, but it gave them the longevity to learn and evolve. But it was when they mastered time travel that they saw the true possibilities the First Ones had unlocked. Using time travel they were able to remove the chaotic elements of the cosmos. They waged war on beings that used magic and took steps to prevent extra-dimensional energy from seeping in. They claimed they made the universe safer. Most argued they had managed to make the universe dull.

The Shobogan manipulated history, making themselves a central part of its history. The set fixed events in time that led to their emergence as the leaders of cosmic society while recognising, but ultimately downplaying the role of others. Eventually though they adopted a position of non-interference, stating that the universe should make its own way. There were many who suspected that this stance was a ruse and that the Time Lords were really intervening in secret to keep events how they wanted them to proceed.

====

As the Time Lords and the Guardians of Oa rose to prominence and then faded into the background, two other races were engaged in a devastating war that prevented them from stepping forward as leaders. The ancestors of the Kree and the Skrull had been among those the First Ones had selected. Unlike the Shobogans and the Maltusians, they did not retain the same level of knowledge when they returned to their own people.

The Skrull had been the first to advance, building a society that elevated neighbouring worlds and encouraging the growth and evolutions of societies. The Kree on the other hand were war like and violent, unable to show the dedication needed to reach the same heights as their former allies.

And so, the Kree attacked the Skrull, seeking to take from them everything they had developed. Worse, they used their ability to convince others of their own righteousness to make the Skrull appear as the infiltrating villains seeking to conquer worlds by aiding them. The Kree turned those the Skrull had formed their alliances with against them, breaking apart the Skrull society. The Skrull retaliated by declaring war on the Kree. It was a war that would never end and robbed both races of any influence in how the universe would progress.

As the Age of Chaos ended and the universe emerged from the dark times, the races that had been chosen to guide the lower dimensions through their evolution had faded. What emerged was not the ordered and logical society that so many had wished for. The universe had emerged broken, but it had endured. And even without the guidance of those that had been expected to take up the reins of leadership, the cosmos still clung to hope.

And from the darkness, new light emerged.

====

The Guardians had frowned upon the use of magic. The Time Lords had gone even further, attempting to obliterate all traces of magic and magical creatures from the cosmos while actively hunting those that sought to use such destructive power. Despite the efforts of both races though magic could not be completely vanquished because it was a fundamental part of existence and had been woven into the fabric of reality since before the universe had formed. So, while they managed to hide magic away and pretend it did not exist, vast dimensions of untapped magical energy remained waiting for those skilled enough to break the seals and call upon the power that waited for them.

It was one of those pockets of magical energy that had caught the attention of a new alliance of interested parties. Some were scientists, others considered themselves monks and philosophers. They had identified a particular source of magical energy, unique due to the presence of spiritual and psychic energy in peaceful coexistence. It had a limited number of frequencies and wavelengths, from so far as they could tell it in some way linked to every particle of matter and all living beings.

They called it the Morphin Grid due to the amazing transformations it could cause. Unlike other forms of magic, the Morphin Grid was considered to be alive, the individual energies that filled the dimension taking on the forms of living beings. And so instead of fearing it, they chose to study it, to understand it and to master its gifts. They became known as the Morphin Masters.

Inadvertently, the Morphin Masters became the leaders that others had tried to be. They didn't preach how the population should live but led by their own examples of duty. Their teachings brought in students seeking to learn their ways. They built colleges where ideas could be exchanged and temples where the spiritual side of the Morphin Grid and its living entities could be carefully considered.

Their lives passed with learning and insight, growing beyond the limitations of the universe. They created new and advanced technologies guided by the Morphin Grid as the psychic energy within unified their consciousness. They created new technology, weapons, protections, and machines that could use the power of the Morphin Grid to heal. Through experimentation that lasted millions of years they gained an understanding of dimensional engineering and developed their own ways to move beyond the boundaries of a single plane in a single universe, first using technology and later the power of the Morphin Grid itself.

Eventually they reached the point in their studies where they felt that there was little more that they could uncover about the Morphin Grid from the outside. To unlock its greater secrets, they needed to venture beyond their dimension and into the Morphin Grid itself. And so, they gathered at the Transdimensional Gateway they had constructed for the purposes of exploration and after locating a point of entry, left their reality behind, vowing they would return to share their knowledge.

The machinery they used to leave shut down following their departure and nobody seemed capable of reactivating it. It remained silent for a long time as it awaited instructions from the other side. The Master Arch as some chose to name it was eventually abandoned as the Morphin Masters were believed gone forever.

More time passed and the universe continued to grow and evolve. The Morphin Masters became beings of legend. Much of their knowledge and teachings had been gathered in the years following their disappearance and was hoarded in places where scholars studied to try and recovered the wisdom that had seemingly left alongside the Morphin Masters. Their creations were either added to personal collections and hidden away in places others could not steal them or handed out to warriors to fight in the names of the Morphin Masters and what society felt were their beliefs.

As the centuries progressed more and more of the discoveries made by the Morphin Masters were forgotten. The weapons and protective garments they had created to aid them in their exploration of the universe remained as strong as they day they were created, but the art of making more had been lost. It was possible to duplicate the material, but the properties that had enhanced those items beyond the mundane were lost.

And so those left behind did the only thing they could: they hoarded everything they could find out of fear that somebody else might do the same. Those with the greatest resources located the best items available and made their own forms of armour using a mix of the clothing available to them. They held themselves up as champions following in the ways of the Morphin Masters, claiming the title of Grid Rangers. Meanwhile governments fortunate enough to secure a supply of weapons and clothing created their own Grid Troopers: small armies protected by Morphin Master technology. Although some chose to place their faith in a smaller number of individuals with more armament than a typical soldier. They called them: Grid Warriors.

As for the families that the Morphin Masters had left behind: they were widely ignored and treated as outcasts by a cosmos that no longer recognised their worth. Displaced from their homes as those seeking relics of the Morphin Masters gathered anything they could, the descendants set out on their own journey. As they spread out among the stars, they created new places where knowledge and understanding could be found by those seeking it for the right reasons. They also took it upon themselves to secure and hide some of the Morphin Masters' greatest and most dangerous discoveries.

Through history those descendants spread out, hiding their heritage to preserve the secrets they kept on behalf of their ancestors. They would be responsible for the founding of organisations that would one day spread across the cosmos bringing hope in the growing darkness. And members of their tribe would gain fame as heroic warriors in the fight against evil who would go on to train some of the universe's greatest warriors. Others would use their name, but when the records were reviewed long after the original Morphin Masters departed, their descendants would be the ones spoken about as legends.

====

Finally, the First Ones split the universe, creating multiple universes and a massive scar where they universes had once been joined together. Over countless millions of years the wound had shrunk as gravity had drawn the broken space inward. It was then that the First Ones had returned to fill what was left of the void they had formed. With a cosmic sleight of hand, they merged a swirling mass of gas and dust, igniting the gases to form a new solar body around which they rested thirteen planetary bodies. In a short amount of time, perhaps accelerated by the will of the First Ones, the planets formed out of the dust, bringing forth the beginnings of the Sol System with a planet that would one name become known as Earth sitting upon the centre of the almost completely healed tear in space and time.

The Earth was the key to the new structure of the multiple universes. Through the Earth it was possible to shift between universes. Although a small and unassuming world, which had been devastated in its early life by a collision with another planet, the Earth was one of the central hubs around which existence thrived. From the moment it had formed it had drawn the attention of those that could sense the truth of its potential. At the moment of the collision, it had been elevated from a mere curiosity into an enigma. And as the first of many races appeared, ready to treat the Earth as a cosmic dumping ground, there were some who knew that one day this place would have a pivotal role in the fate of all existence.

Long ago, before the universe descended and then emerged from a period of anarchy and chaos, the First Ones had places barriers between the higher dimensions and their final realm. It had been done so that the lower realm had time to grow and evolve before being confronted by those that lurked in the less physically restrictive planes. Now though the seals were starting to break down and the battles that raged in the upper planes of existence would soon find their way to the mortal realm as some of the higher dimensions once again gained access to the planes below.

Now the war between Good and Evil would start anew even as the fight between Chaos and Order stressed the universe to its breaking point. The First Ones had completed their task, their creations would record the results. And then they would have their answer... if they could remember the question.

End of Part

<post_date>2021-04-02 15:13:19</post_date><post_modified>2022-11-15 14:09:26</post_modified>