Unto the Last

Disclaimer: I do not own the Power Rangers or Doctor Who. They belong to the current copyright owners. This is a fan work and not for profit.

The void stretched endless and silent, an abyss beyond the reach of time and space. At the edge of all things, five figures stood watching as the final embers of existence flickered into darkness. Stars collapsed, their light swallowed by an ever-consuming shadow, and even the great Morphin Grid, the heartbeat of existence, trembled at the brink of dissolution.

Far behind them, a gothic structure loomed an eerie monument of stone and iron, its spires clawing at the empty sky. It appeared as little more than an ancient folly, a relic of a forgotten age, its high-arched windows hollow and dark, its buttresses crumbling as though time had forsaken it. But the façade was a lie, a veil draped over a marvel of advanced engineering. Beneath the cold, dead stone lay the beating heart of a space platform, an observation station woven with technology beyond mortal comprehension. Hidden within its walls were chambers of glowing interfaces, crystalline data streams, and unseen mechanisms tirelessly recording the final moments of existence. It had been built for one purpose: to watch, witness, and catalogue the end.

"It was not supposed to end this way," said the Morphin Master, his form shimmering with the fading glow of a being long ascended. He had once been part of the great tapestry, woven into the Morphin Grid itself, but now, even that infinite reservoir of powerwas unravelling.

"Yet here we are," replied the Emissary, their form shifting through hues of red, blue, and yellow, a spectral echo of those they had once represented. The Emissary's duty had always been to guide, to serve as the bridge between the Power and those who wielded it. But now, all paths led only to oblivion.

The Emissary was an old warrior, his body worn with age, his mind filled with holes where memory should have been. He had once been among the first, one of the chosen children who rose against Dark Specter in the earliest days, wielding a Power Star forged in the fire of necessity. But now, that past was distant, fractured, as though it belonged to another man. He clenched his fists ready to strike out at some unknown foe, though there was nothing left to fight.

"We have watched so many rise and fall," murmured the Monitor, his eyes reflecting the shattered remnants of the cosmos. His duty was observation... to oversee existence as it unfolded. His counterpart, the Watcher, had always focused on the details, chronicling the small victories and defeats, the moments of courage and despair that built the grand narrative of the multiverse. Yet now, their records ended.

The fourth remained silent as always. His task was not to speak or voice his opinion. He was there as the companion of the Monitor to record all that happened around them and pick up on the things the Monitor missed with his vision extended across existence. He was known only as the Watcher. Though he felt the pain of reality, as it was corrupted by some unseen virus, he remained stoically dedicated to his first task: watch and record.

The fifth among them stood apart, cloaked in a shroud of temporal distortion. A Lord of Time and Space, a traveller who had glimpsed the collapse long before it began and sought refuge in the presence of those who might understand. He alone had foreseen the end, but even he had not comprehended the full measure of what was coming.

The silence among them was vast, heavy with the weight of failure. The multiverse had been rewritten many times by the Grid, by Rangers, by forces both benevolent and malevolent. Yet never before had it been so utterly erased. This was not a battle lost; this was a story without an ending, its pages torn from the book before the final words could be written.

"There must be a cause," the Morphin Master insisted. "A force beyond even the Grid. If we can identify it—"

"We cannot act," the Monitor interrupted. "Not directly. You know the laws."

"Then perhaps we should find those who can," the Emissary suggested. Their form flickered uncertainly as if already being pulled toward the void. "If we are bound to silence, we must ensure others can speak. If we are shackled from battle, we must give others the means to fight."

"And who would you send?" asked the Watcher. "There is no one left."

The Lord of Time and Space stirred at this. "Not here. Not now. But the past remains untouched. Splinters of reality where the rot has not yet set in. If we can reach back... perhaps we can change what is to come."

"You suggest breaking the very fabric of time itself," the Monitor said, his tone unreadable.

"I suggest ensuring time still exists to be broken."

A grim understanding passed between them. To act would mean a violation of their very natures. To remain idle would mean the end of all things. They were observers, chroniclers, remnants of what had been and what could no longer be. And yet, if they did nothing, then the concept of existence would be nothing more than an echo in the void.

The Morphin Master closed his eyes, reaching out with the last vestiges of his power. Somewhere, in another time, in another place, hope remained. Unknowing. Unaware. But not yet lost.

"Then we must find them," he said. "And guide them, even if they never know we were here."

The void loomed ever closer, the storm of oblivion howling at their backs. But now, there was a chance—fragile, desperate, but a chance all the same.

The search for saviours began.

The Monitor nodded sagely. "If we can find them and if they are worthy, perhaps we can buy time to unravel this mystery. We must anchor the forces that bind reality together. Not just the primary elements, but time and space. If we can slow the tide, create the balance..."

He stopped as he felt another universe meet its end, lost to a dark place his consciousness could not pierce. He had been granted the task of watching over creation by The One's surviving child. It was that unfathomable power that allowed him to weather the storm that had already washed away so many immortals. But he was a part of the fabric of the material realm and as it grew more and more fragile... so did he.

"We must act immediately," the Monitor decided, turning to the Watcher. "We will send forth the means to slow the decimation. You will follow and observe those that claim them. When you confirm that the selection has been made, you will return with them."

"I am a Watcher," the Watcher protested. "My task is to observe and record... never interfere. You gave me that name and the rules by which I function."

"And now I am giving you a new purpose," the Monitor replied. "Your purpose was originally mine and one that I cannot escape. Which, I now realise is the reason you were created to serve me. My purpose is absolute, the restrictions on me serve as definite red lines I cannot cross. You, however, are free to ignore those restrictions now so long as you choose to do so."

There was an uneasy silence as the complex instructions that prevented the Watcher from acting beyond its function were removed.

"There is a tradition, started long ago that a creation such as you would be created without a purpose and be left to discover your place throughout your lifetime. Circumstances forced me to rob you of that freedom, and I am deeply sorry. But now I give you the chance you were previously denied. Go forth and learn your place as you seek out those that will save us."

He turned so that he was facing the Morphin Master and the Emissary, who stood in deep discussion. The Morphin Master held before him a series of metallic objects that the Emissary touched to infuse with power. As a being outside normal time and space, he was capable of following the pattern left by the Power, identifying those that were best suited for the powers they created. But, the corruption of the Morphin Grid made the possibility of journeying to those worthy of his gifts impossible. Instead, all he could do was send them out and pray that they would find their avatars. He would rely upon the Watcher to observe what happened when they arrived and to recruit those who claimed them. Somehow the older being was better equipped to handle the journey.

"We need to find a way to increase the protections," the Time Lord warned. "The storm is eroding our shields."

Right now, he was the weakest of them. Time Lords had once been among the most powerful species, but the storm that ate away at time and space robbed them of their access to the Vortex. Without the ability to travel through time, they were little more than mortals with whatever experience they had gained during their lifetime. At least if nothing else he could understand the technology posing as magic, pretending to be technology that kept the citadel in its current location.

He looked off to a side monitor, peering closely at the report.

"You should know that your guest has finally stabilised. In a few hours - if we are still here - we should be able to find a way to communicate with him."

"His... health... has not improved?"

The Time Lord shook his head. "There is a reason why Time Lords created ships to travel through the Vortex. Doing so without that sort of protection... imagine being pulled at the speed of light through a dust storm without your magical shields."

The Monitor frowned as he tried to imagine such an event, failing because he knew it would be impossible for him to be that vulnerable. Still, with effort, he could imagine what such a situation would do to a weaker mortal form.

"How he came to be with us is a mystery even I cannot solve," he said. "His arrival and the warning it gave us to locate this citadel and seek answers was most fortunate."

"Not to mention that your friend, the Morphin Master and his pet Emissary have all but stripped him of his belongings to create their morphers," the Time Lord pointed out.

"The ability to take the energy of the Morphin Grid and transform it into the tools needed to battle the darkness is second nature to the Morphin Masters, after so long within its confines," the Monitor allowed. "And the Emissaries mastered the art of crafting Power Morphers long before they taught the techniques to the Morphin Masters. But the Grid is corrupted; anything forged from that darkness will be tainted. They needed something untarnished for this plan to stand a chance."

The Time Lord nodded, his face grimacing as he observed the medical chamber. "It is just a shame that he will pay an even greater price for bringing such a gift."

"We're ready," the Morphin Master announced, revealing a set of devices. "Each of these is designed to seek out a being capable of anchoring one of the prime elements and channelling its energy. With each element we secure, we'll learn more about whatever is causing all this."

"And those wielding those powers will be able to stop whatever is causing it," the Emissary added.

"Do these morphers have a name?" the Time Lord asked, uncomfortable around the obvious magic.

"In times long forgotten the Emissaries reunited with the Morphin Masters and taught them the art of making Power Morphers," the Emissary replied. "The first set created were rightly referred to as the Alpha Morphers. And now, as we reach the end, it is only right that these new creations will be known as the Omega Morphers."

The Morphin Master pointed his staff, opening a portal into the Grid. He frowned as he beheld the storm beyond the barrier.

"We will not be able to control where or when these morphers end up," he stated. "Some might not remain in this universe."

"We're not in a universe," the Time Lord grumbled, fiddling with the dimensional array. "That's the only reason our shields are still holding, but if you don't close that portal we won't be here much longer."

The Morphin Master nodded and with a sweep of his hand sent the Omega Morphers off to find their new avatars. The Emissary gave a nod and stepped through. Although he could not control where they ended up, he would do his best to convince those who found them to use their new powers so that when the Watcher located them they would be ready to serve.

To be continued.