"Time is not frozen. It's caged." – Mira
Scene: Phantom Atlas – Jump Room
The launch bay groaned to life with quiet turbulence. Echoes bounced against steel walls like ghosts refusing to leave.
Zara stood before them, her eyes flicking between their morphers and faces. "Remember," she said, her voice calm but iron-clad. "This timeline was locked at the moment of implosion. You'll see civilians—frozen. Rangers—mid-movement. Weapons—mid-fire. But nothing is real unless it moves."
Thorne cracked his knuckles. "So if it moves… we slice."
"Correct," she nodded. "But Null Red won't attack immediately. Cipher's patterns are calculated. He'll test you first."
Mira frowned. "Test how?"
Zara locked eyes with Rin.
"Emotionally."
Rin didn't flinch. He rarely did. His white and black armor shimmered faintly under the flickering lights. He held his helmet under one arm, jaw locked and unreadable.
Kael noticed.
"You alright?" Kael asked under his breath.
Rin gave a slow nod. "I just don't like ghosts."
Ayla piped up, bouncing a bit on her heels. "Good thing we're walking into a graveyard then."
Mira muttered, "Fantastic."
Scene: Arrival in Timeline ZK-09 – The Still City
They stepped through the breach.
The world was… frozen.
An entire metropolis stuck mid-battle.
Buildings cracked mid-collapse. Fires hovered mid-flare. Civilians, rangers, monsters—all suspended in time like mannequins in a museum of ruin.
Thorne waved a hand through a frozen energy blast. "Feels wrong."
Mira scanned the area. "Time's fractured at a molecular level. It's like the timeline was paused during a crash… and never resumed."
Kael knelt beside a mid-scream Yellow Ranger, hand raised defensively in stone-like paralysis.
"She was trying to protect someone."
Rin stood off to the side, staring at a figure in the distance—high on a shattered rooftop.
White cape. Red suit. Head turned ever so slightly.
Kael followed Rin's gaze. "That him?"
Rin nodded once. "He's not hiding. He's waiting."
Ayla tilted her head. "So… is it polite to knock or just break in?"
Suddenly—movement.
Time rippled.
Half a dozen corrupted Ranger figures unfroze from the scenery. Their suits distorted, colors flickering wildly—pieces of armor missing or pulsing erratically.
"Nulls," Mira said.
"Formation," Kael ordered.
"Rin, with me. Ayla, support left. Mira, Thorne, hold right."
"Morph."
In synchronized motion, six morphers sparked with unstable light.
"Red Fracture Ranger!"
"Blue Fracture Ranger!"
"Black Fracture Ranger!"
"Yellow Fracture Ranger!"
"White Fracture Ranger!"
"Fracture Protocol—ENGAGE!"
Their suits slammed into place with a flicker of static distortion—each one echoing with fractured energy from across timelines.
The Nulls charged.
Kael met the front line, blade drawn. Sparks flew.
Thorne drove a shadow-infused punch straight through a corrupted Ranger's chestplate, sending it scattering into digital dust.
Ayla flipped into a spinning kick, unleashing a swarm of illusionary doubles to confuse a Null Pink Ranger who fought like a rabid blur.
Mira slid behind cover, launching scanning drones and electromagnetic pulses.
But Rin?
He didn't move.
He just stood, staring straight at the red figure atop the roof—Null Red.
"I know you," Rin murmured.
"You were the first. The template."
Null Red moved.
He stepped forward, arms at his side.
Then he dropped from the rooftop.
And landed.
A crater cracked beneath him.
Silence.
Null Red's helmet was jagged—like someone had forcibly reattached shattered glass.
He spoke in a voice stitched with pain and clarity.
"I remember you, White Ranger."
"You hesitated once. It cost your team everything."
Rin didn't blink.
"That hesitation saved two timelines."
"Not this one."
Then Null Red snapped his fingers—
And time resumed.
Suddenly, civilians screamed, energy blasts resumed mid-motion, Rangers cried out.
Chaos reawakened.
Kael roared, "RIN—NOW!"
Rin launched forward, colliding with Null Red in a burst of white static. Blades clashed. Sparks flew. Their movements were sharp, practiced—like mirrored twins battling over memory itself.
"He's mine," Rin growled.
"You think you're different from me?" Null Red rasped.
"We're both born of loss. Both abandoned by time."
"Difference is," Rin said coldly, pressing his blade to the crack in Null Red's visor,
"I never gave up being human."
Rin's blade glowed bright—then split the air with a white slash.
Null Red shattered.
But he didn't vanish.
His suit crumbled—revealing a teenage boy beneath. Wounded. Hollow-eyed.
Kael knelt beside him as time began freezing again.
"Who did this to you?" he asked.
The boy looked at him weakly. "Elios…"
Everyone froze.
Even Rin.
Kael whispered, "He's… alive?"
Mira stepped forward. "Or fragmented."
Zara's voice crackled in through comms.
"Bring him back. Cipher just lost a piece of his control.
This changes everything."
Kael nodded, lifting the fallen boy into his arms.
"Then let's give Cipher something to be afraid of."
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