Arcadia City always sounded alive, even in the dead hours of night. The clock towers breathed with gears behind glass faces, elevated rails hummed between brass-rimmed platforms, and the enormous central chronometer at Epoch Square chimed every quarter hour with a tone so deep it seemed to roll through the stones beneath the streets. On ordinary nights, Cole Beckett found the sound soothing. Tonight, however, the square was bringing him a whole new problem.

It floated above the cobblestones like a wound cut through glass, its jagged edges pulsing with time pressure. Beyond it, Cole could see a battlefield. Burning towers rose in the distance. Soldiers ran beneath torn standards. A storm of green lightning crawled through black clouds above a ruined plain.

Ty Mercado walked up beside him holding a burrito that he subsequently dropped. His tropical shirt was already soaked at the shoulders, his hair clung to his forehead, and his eyes kept darting between the fissure and Cole’s face, searching for any sign of just how bad this was.

Ty Mercado: Cole, buddy, I need you to use words that are going to make me feel better about whatever this is.

Cole did not look away from the fissure.

Cole Beckett: I don’t have those words.

Ty Mercado: Then lie to me with confidence?

The wind pouring out of the rupture intensified, sending rain sideways across the square. One of the clock towers groaned as its hands spun backward, stopped, and then began moving forward too quickly. Cole watched it happen and felt the cold settle deeper into his bones than the rain ever could.

Cole Beckett: This isn’t a normal fracture. I mean what fracture is normal, but this is something new.

Ty Mercado: You're the guy that almost turned into time itself...and this is...new?

There was something about this fissure that felt different. This wasn't like anything that had attacked Arcadia before.

A shape moved behind the battlefield image.

Cole’s fingers tightened near the Driver.

Cole Beckett: Ty, get behind me.

Ty immediately stepped behind him, then leaned around his shoulder to take a look.

Ty Mercado: You got me shaking, hermano! What's going to happen?

The fissure pulsed.

The air collapsed inward as the square warped, stretching forward and backward simultaneously. Cole grabbed Ty by the arm and tried to activate the Chrono Engine Driver, but the device sparked violently, as it hadn't been working right since the final battle against the Maestro of Axis Nova.

Cole’s eyes widened.

Cole Beckett: Oh no.

Ty Mercado: Oh no what?!

Purple light swallowed the square.

Cole felt the ground vanish beneath his feet. Ty screamed beside him, though the sound stretched backward before it reached Cole’s ears.

Then they fell.

Cole slammed shoulder first into mud hard enough to knock the breath out of him. Rain pelted his face, colder and harsher than the city storm. He rolled onto his side and immediately heard screaming, but not the panic of civilians. These were battle screams. War cries. Horses. Steel. Thunder. Fire.

Ty landed in a hay cart fifteen feet away, broke straight through the rotten boards, and vanished into the heap with a miserable groan.

Ty Mercado: Maybe the third worst landing I've ever made.

Cole forced himself upright, coughing as mud slid down his sleeve. He looked around and felt his stomach drop. They were no longer in Arcadia City. They stood at the edge of a military encampment stretching across a rain-soaked valley, where thousands of tents, siege wagons, banners, cooking fires, and wounded soldiers filled the muddy ground beneath a gray sky. Beyond the camp, a fortress city rose against the mountains, its towers marked with the ancient emblem of Avalon. Farther still, on the horizon, green lightning flashed over a blackened battlefield where monstrous silhouettes moved through smoke.

Cole knew about this place. He had read about it. Books of ancient history. Tales of long ago. He had studied enough of Avalon’s history to know exactly which past.

Ty staggered out of the hay with strands of straw stuck in his hair and a deeply offended expression.

Ty Mercado: Okay, I’m alive, but is that a good thing? Where are we?

Cole stared at the banners.

Avalon.

Magnus Foundation.

Nightrook Society.

The Zauberers.

The Church.

And among the soldiers, the name passed from mouth to mouth like a prayer.

Mercer.

Cole swallowed.

Cole Beckett: We’re in the Great War.

Ty stared at him.

Ty Mercado: THE Great War? Ay Dios Mio.

Before Cole could answer, a horn blared from the nearest watch post. Soldiers turned toward them. At first, confusion marked their faces. Then suspicion. Cole realized too late how badly they stood out. His navy hoodie, Ty’s soaked tropical shirt, the Chrono Engine Driver, the modern sneakers half-buried in medieval mud; everything about them screamed wrong era, wrong place, wrong problem.

A soldier in dented chainmail pointed a spear toward them.

Avalon Soldier: Worzol infiltrators!

Ty immediately raised both hands.

Ty Mercado: I would like to strongly object to being called whatever that was!

Second Avalon Soldier: They speak strangely!

Ty Mercado: I speak just fine, dude!

More soldiers drew weapons. Cole shifted his stance, trying to calculate how to de-escalate without transforming and making the timeline even worse. He could fight his way out, but every move here risked becoming history. Every person he knocked down might be someone’s ancestor. Every decision could ripple forward into catastrophe.

A soldier lunged.

Cole sidestepped, caught the spear shaft, and redirected the thrust just enough to send the man stumbling past him instead of breaking his arm. Another came from the left. Cole ducked beneath the swing and shoved him backward into a pile of shields. Ty, meanwhile, grabbed a wooden bucket and held it like a weapon.

Ty Mercado: Back! I have medieval Tupperware and I’m not afraid to improvise!

A third soldier charged him. Ty yelped and hurled the bucket. It struck the soldier’s helmet with a hollow thunk, and the man dropped to one knee more from surprise than pain. Ty looked at his own hands in astonishment.

Ty Mercado: I have discovered my war calling.

Cole grabbed Ty by the sleeve.

Cole Beckett: Don’t celebrate. Move.

They ran through the camp as soldiers shouted behind them. They soon found themselves surrounded.

Ty Mercado: You sure you can't transform?

Cole Beckett: We...we surrender!



Ty Mercado: I don't think they're taking prisoners today, hermano.




Episode 22: Through the Portal of Time

Back in Arcadia City, the Kishirangers arrived on motorcycles, their engines cutting through the panic like a battle cry. Trace Mercer led the formation, red light reflecting across the wet road as he leaned low over the handlebars, his longer hair whipping in the rain behind him. Ashlyn Westbrook rode close beside him, her black motorcycle throwing sheets of water behind its tires, while Roland Vander, Miles Rowan, and Lena Solis followed in tight formation. They braked together at the edge of the square, tires skidding across polished stone before the five of them dismounted and stared upward at the impossible tear in the sky.

For several moments, no one said anything.

The fissure showed them Avalon.

Not modern Avalon, but the Avalon of the Great War. Rolling green hills stretched beneath a sky choked with smoke. Fortress walls stood proud in the distance, banners snapped in violent wind, and far beyond them burned a battlefield marked by siege fires, marching armies, and the sickly emerald glow of the Worzol Dimension.

Trace stepped closer before he seemed to realize he had moved. The rain ran down his face, but his eyes were fixed on the hills beyond the fissure with a softness Ashlyn had almost never seen in him. He looked younger somehow, not in body, but in spirit. The guarded weight that had followed him since his return from captivity eased beneath the sight of a world that no longer existed, and yet there it was.

Ashlyn noticed his hand find hers before he did.

His fingers closed around hers instinctively, like a man reaching for the one thing that made the impossible bearable. Ashlyn looked down at their joined hands, then up at him. Trace remained transfixed by the fissure until the warmth of her hand registered. He blinked, realized what he had done, and turned faintly red despite the rain.

Trace Mercer: Sorry. I didn’t mean to—

Ashlyn tightened her fingers around his before he could pull away.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Don’t apologize.

That silenced him instantly.

Miles Rowan pushed wet green hair out of his eyes and stared into the fissure with a mix of awe and extreme inconvenience.

Miles Rowan: So that is definitely a time hole, right? I’m asking because I’ve only seen, like, none....ever.

Lena Solis stepped forward, holding her hand near the fissure. Yellow light flickered across her Oathlink. Her expression tightened as Zauberer instinct seemed to help her understand.

Lena Solis: The Sanctum current is being pulled through it, but it isn’t natural. It feels like something punched a tunnel through time and left the wound open.

Miles Rowan: You're getting REALLY good at the whole Good Witch of Avalon thing, I must say.

Lena Solis: ...Miles.

Miles Rowan: Well, I don't HAVE to must...but I'd like to.

Roland Vander examined the fractured edge with the calm intensity of someone mentally building and dismantling several bad possibilities at once.

Roland Vander: If that wound continues expanding, it could destabilize more than Arcadia City. A fissure this large may eventually affect the surrounding region, perhaps even Avalon.

Trace finally let go of Ashlyn’s hand, though he did so slowly, as if he regretted losing the anchor even for a moment. He stared into the ancient hills beyond the fracture.

Trace Mercer: Whatever caused this is on the other side.

Ashlyn nodded, her eyes still on him more than the fissure.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Then we go through, find the cause, and stop it before this thing grows enough to swallow Arcadia.

Miles gave a strained smile.

Miles Rowan: Yes. Let's do that. Jump into a historical disaster. That's the Great War, mind you! The thing we're still dealing with today!, all because of this Grail!

Roland Vander: You brought it with you?

Miles Rowan: I could not help it! It's muscle memory!

Lena looked toward Trace.

Lena Solis: Are you sure you’re ready for this?

Trace’s answer came after a long breath.

Trace Mercer: No. But I know that place.

Roland looked at him.

Roland Vander: Then you lead us.

Trace’s jaw tightened, but he nodded. The five Kishirangers stood together beneath the storm, modern warriors staring into the age that had forged the first shape of their legacy. Then Trace took one step forward and jumped into the fissure. Ashlyn followed immediately, then Roland, Miles, and Lena, each disappearing into the purple-blue crack as the time wound pulsed brighter over Arcadia City.

The passage through the fissure was nothing like ordinary travel. It was pressure and memory, like being dragged beneath the surface of a river. Then they fell onto a hillside outside Avalon.

They landed in tall wet grass under a gray morning sky, far enough from the main road that no soldiers immediately spotted them. The air was cold and clean in a way the present never felt, carrying the scent of rain, horse leather, woodsmoke, damp earth, and distant iron. The hills rolled down toward a fortified city in the valley below, where enormous stone walls wrapped around towers and banners that snapped in the wind. Beyond those walls, fields stretched toward the dark line of a distant battlefield where smoke climbed into the sky in thick black columns.

Trace stood slowly, mud clinging to his boots. His expression changed with every second he looked across the land. The hard edge of the modern world fell from his face, and for once he did not look like a displaced relic trying to understand a future that kept asking him to adapt. He looked like a man who had found his way back to the language of his own soul.

Ashlyn stood beside him and watched that realization settle over him.

Ashlyn Westbrook: This is really it.

Trace nodded.

Trace Mercer: Avalon. My Avalon.

Lena stared toward the city, her eyes wide.

Lena Solis: The Ehrvolt energy here is unreal. It’s everywhere. The ground feels alive.

Miles looked down at his own clothes, then at the distant road where several riders passed in chainmail and cloaks.

Miles Rowan: Not to ruin the majesty of the moment, but we are dressed like we are not dressed for this. We're really standing out.

Roland glanced at his own modern suit, which had survived the trip remarkably well and still looked absurdly pristine considering he had just fallen through time.

Roland Vander: He is correct. We need period appropriate clothing immediately if we intend to avoid unwanted attention.

Trace looked toward a cluster of abandoned supply shelters near the tree line.

Trace Mercer: Scouts used those during rain rotations. If this is where I think it is, there may be spare cloaks, tunics, and travel gear inside.

Miles gave him a look.

Miles Rowan: You remember all that stuff?

Trace started walking.

Trace Mercer: I was responsible for keeping people alive. I remember.

The shelters were exactly where Trace remembered, built from rough timber sealed against the weather. Inside, they found old but usable clothing, woolen tunics, leather belts, cloaks, boots, spare trousers, travel wraps, and simple armor pieces meant for messengers and lesser retainers rather than knights. Trace immediately took charge, sorting through the supplies with a familiarity that made the others realize just how much of his life had been spent in conditions like this. He gave Roland a blue-gray cloak and a plain leather jerkin to dull the obvious richness of his presence.

Trace was adjusting his belt when he heard a frustrated sound from behind a hanging canvas divider.

Ashlyn Westbrook: How do I put this thing on?

Trace turned without thinking.

Trace Mercer: The inner lace goes beneath the side—

He stopped dead.



Ashlyn stood behind the half-open divider in the middle of changing, her modern outfit folded beside her and the borrowed clothes not yet pulled into place. His eyes widened, his face went red, and he stepped backward directly into a bucket.

The bucket rolled.

Trace’s foot went with it.

He fell backward into a stack of wooden shields with a crash loud enough to startle birds from the trees outside.

Ashlyn yanked the canvas shut.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Trace! Trace? Trace, are you alright?!

Trace lay buried under three shields, one cloak, and his own humiliation.

Trace Mercer: I saw nothing!

Miles Rowan: You absolutely saw something because you fell like you got smote.

Lena covered her mouth with both hands, failing miserably not to laugh.

Lena Solis: Are you alive?

Trace stared upward at the shelter roof.

Trace Mercer: I really need to pay more attention. I'm a little...out of it.

Miles Rowan: Homecomings can be like that.

Roland, from the doorway, looked as though he was trying very hard to be dignified about the entire situation and losing by degrees.

Roland Vander: Perhaps everyone should face a wall until she's changed.

Ashlyn’s voice came through the divider, mortified and irritated in equal measure.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Sorry everyone, I'm working on it!

Trace slowly sat up, one shield sliding off his chest.

Trace Mercer: I am going outside.

Miles grinned.



By the time they finished changing, they looked convincing enough to pass at a distance. Trace wore red-brown traveling armor with a weathered cloak. This wasn't a disguise to him. They descended toward the city carefully, avoiding the main road when possible. As they walked, Trace’s expression grew more serious. The closer they came to Avalon’s walls, the more frequently they saw signs of war. Refugees moved in groups beneath guard. Wounded soldiers were carried toward the inner gates. Messengers rode hard along the roads, while priests, healers, and supply workers moved between camps with practiced urgency. This was not the polished legend of the Great War that had been written about in books. It was the living disaster that legend had grown around.

Ashlyn walked close to Trace.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Your younger self is somewhere here, isn’t he?

Trace nodded without looking at her.

Trace Mercer: If this is time I think it is, yes. He would be alone. The rest of the team had been betrayed and slain. He would be working to hold the alliance together before the final battle.

Ashlyn Westbrook: That must feel strange.

Trace’s mouth twitched faintly.

Trace Mercer: Most things lately have been quite strange. This certainly ranks highly.

Ashlyn laughed despite the tension.

Lena, walking behind them, suddenly slowed.

Lena Solis: Wait. If young Trace is here, then Jeanne Ark is here too.

Ashlyn stopped walking for half a breath.

The name hit her like a bell.

Trace glanced at her, concern softening his face.

Trace Mercer: She may be.

Ashlyn looked toward Avalon’s gates.

Jeanne Ark. The ancestor she had only recently learned belonged to her bloodline. The woman whose legend stood behind so much of what Ashlyn was becoming without her ever knowing it. The possibility that she might be walking somewhere beyond those walls, breathing the same air and carrying the same war, made Ashlyn’s chest tighten with something she could not easily name.

Ashlyn Westbrook: I don’t know if I want to see her or if I’m terrified of seeing her.

Trace’s voice was gentle.

Trace Mercer: That's understandable.

They entered Avalon City near midday, blending into a stream of travelers, soldiers, merchants, refugees, and camp workers moving through the western gate. The city was vast and alive, less polished than modern Avalon but richer in texture and noise. Smiths hammered armor in open workshops. Children carried water between stone houses. Market stalls sold bread, dried fish, wax tablets, knife belts, charms, and small carved symbols meant to ward off Worzol corruption. Above it all rose the royal citadel, golden banners snapping from its towers beneath the watch of a clouded sky.

The crowd drew them toward a broad square before the citadel steps, where hundreds of people had gathered to hear the conclusion of a royal address. At the top of the steps stood King Aurelius Arcturus, even more resolute than the heroic statues in modern Avalon made him look, and no less commanding. He wore a heavy crown, a dark blue cloak lined in gold, and armor that had clearly seen battle rather than ceremony. His face was marked by exhaustion, but his voice carried across the square with a strength that made even the restless crowd quiet.

Behind him stood two figures.

Trace Mercer.

Young, resolute, and unmistakable in his Kishi Red armor.

And beside him, Jeanne Ark.



Ashlyn stopped so abruptly that Lena nearly bumped into her. The sight of Jeanne at Young Trace’s side did something to her. Jeanne looked neither distant nor unreachable now. She looked human. Strong, yes. Radiant in presence, yes. But human, with worry in her eyes as she watched the crowd with the full knowledge that inspiration came with the burden of being believed.

King Aurelius lifted one hand, bringing the crowd to silence.

King Aurelius Arcturus: We have lost villages, fields, and good souls to the armies of Vantrex. We have buried sons and daughters beneath banners that should have flown over weddings, harvests, and homecomings. I will not stand before you and pretend the road ahead is gentle, because every person in this square has earned the truth. The Worzol Dimension marches against our world with hunger in its heart, and if we stand divided, it will devour us one death at a time.

The square remained silent.

King Aurelius Arcturus: Yet look around you. Avalon does not stand alone. Magnus has sent its best. The Zauberer have joined us. The Church has brought faith into the mud and blood where faith is needed most. We do not gather because we are the same. We gather because the darkness believes our differences will make us weak, and by God, by crown, by spell, by steel, and by every promise ever made to the children who will inherit this world, we shall prove it wrong!

The crowd erupted.

Ashlyn barely heard the cheers.

She was watching Young Trace.

He smiled at something King Aurelius said quietly after the speech ended, and the expression was so familiar and so different at once that it made her ache. The man beside her, the Trace she knew, watched the same moment with a complicated softness. He did not look jealous of his younger self. He did not look afraid. He looked as though he were standing outside a memory and finally seeing why someone else might have believed in him.

Ashlyn glanced at him.

Ashlyn Westbrook: You were good at this.

Trace kept his eyes on the steps.

Trace Mercer: I just stood there. I was just a rallying point.

Ashlyn Westbrook: No. You were more than that.

He did not answer, but she saw the words reach him.

Miles, who had been scanning the crowd with the instincts of a former thief, suddenly tilted his head.

Miles Rowan: I hate to interrupt the historical feelings, but I hear a fight.

Lena frowned.

Lena Solis: Where?

Miles pointed toward a side street leading away from the square.

Miles Rowan: That way. Shouting and running.

They pushed through the crowd and followed the noise into a narrower street where several soldiers had cornered two very out of place men near an overturned produce cart. Cole Beckett stood with his hands raised. Ty Mercado stood beside him, holding a turnip defensively.

Ty Mercado: I am warning you, I'm deadly with a vegetable.

An Avalon soldier leveled his spear.

Avalon Soldier: Sorcerers from the Worzol ranks!

Cole’s eyes flicked toward the Chrono Engine around his waist, then toward the soldiers. He clearly did not want to transform. Trace understood immediately. The clothes, the confusion, the restraint, the way Cole kept trying not to hurt anyone. Future. They had to be from the future.

Trace stepped forward before the others could stop him, lowering his hood and deepening his voice just enough to disguise himself from anyone who might have heard Young Trace speak at the square.

Trace Mercer: Hold your steel. I’ll test them.

The soldiers looked him over. In this era, confidence carried weight, and Trace wore the posture of a battlefield commander whether he meant to or not.

Avalon Soldier: Who are you?

Trace did not hesitate.

Trace Mercer: A soldier who knows evil when he sees it, and these two are too confused to be spies.

Cole looked at him sharply.

Trace quickly lunged.

Cole reacted instantly, dodging the first swing and blocking the second with his hands. Their movements looked violent to the soldiers, but Trace spoke as they grappled against a wall.



Trace Mercer: Future?

Cole’s eyes narrowed.

Cole Beckett: Yes. You?

Trace Mercer: Same. Sort of. Keep up.

Cole Beckett: I was about to say that to you.

Trace almost smiled.

Then the duel became spectacular.

Trace forced Cole backward into the street, and Cole responded with a burst of speedy footwork that made him seem to appear half a step ahead of himself. Trace adapted immediately, making each strike wide enough to look painful but controlled enough to avoid forcing Cole into a real defense. Ty dove out of the way as they crashed past him, still clutching the turnip.

Ty Mercado: I don't even like turnips!

Miles appeared beside him.

Miles Rowan: Here, let me help you up.

Ty looked at him.

Miles looked at Ty.

Something immediate and terrible passed between them.

Ty Mercado: Thanks. Finally a friendly face from the past.

Miles Rowan: I get the feeling we're from the same place. Love the tropical shirt by the way.

Ty Mercado: We’re going to get along.

Miles Rowan: Obviously.

Meanwhile, Trace and Cole leapt over the overturned cart, exchanged three fast blows, and landed in the center of the street. Trace let Cole drive him back just enough to impress the watching soldiers, then twisted, locked Cole’s arm, and slammed him harmlessly against a wooden post in a move that looked like a decisive victory.

Cole gave a dramatic grunt.

Cole Beckett: That was rude.

Trace Mercer: Sell it better.

Cole let his knees bend slightly.

Cole Beckett: Agony. Betrayal. My pride is in ruins.

Trace turned toward the gathered soldiers.

Trace Mercer: Enough. These men are not Worzol spies. They are strange, yes, but courage often comes in unfamiliar forms. This one fights with restraint when he could have maimed you, and that one defended himself with a turnip rather than a blade, which is either mercy or madness.

The soldiers murmured.

Ty raised the turnip slightly.

Ty Mercado: It can be both.

Trace ignored him with heroic effort.

Trace Mercer: They are warriors from a far-off land, drawn here by the same darkness we all seek to crush. If they have come to help us break Vantrex, then I say we welcome every blade, fist, and questionable vegetable willing to stand against him.

That landed exactly as Trace intended. Soldiers cheered. Someone clapped Cole on the back. Someone else raised Ty’s hand, turnip and all. Ty looked deeply confused.

Trace turned toward Ashlyn across the street, clearly meaning to signal that the deception had worked.

Then he froze.

Jeanne Ark stood beside Ashlyn.

Close enough to touch.

Trace’s eyes widened in absolute panic.

For one instant, Ashlyn saw the ancient warrior who had faced monsters, curses, and armies become a man terrified, and it befuddled her.

He turned and walked away very quickly.

Almost ran.

Ashlyn stared after him.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Trace?

Jeanne turned toward her, eyes narrowing slightly.

Jeanne Ark: Forgive me. Did you see where that soldier went? I thought I heard a familiar voice.

Ashlyn’s entire body went stiff.

Lena stepped in immediately, smiling with desperate brightness.

Lena Solis: He went that way.

She pointed confidently in the opposite direction.

Jeanne looked that way, then back at Lena.

Jeanne Ark: My thanks.

Ashlyn could barely breathe.

Jeanne’s gaze lingered on her for one moment longer than expected. A flicker of curiosity, on her face, before she walked away.

Ashlyn exhaled hard.

Ashlyn Westbrook: I almost died.

Lena nodded solemnly.

Lena Solis: Historically, emotionally, and possibly genealogically.

They regrouped at a crowded inn near the edge of the market district, choosing a back room where the noise of soldiers, travelers, and merchants would cover their conversation. The inn smelled of stew, wet wool, woodsmoke, and spilled ale. Trace returned through the rear entrance. Ashlyn gave him a look that promised questions later. He avoided it with skill.

Cole and Ty were now in proper attire for the time period and sat across from the Kishirangers at a rough wooden table. Ty had already acquired bread, stew, and a suspicious cup of something that Miles told him not to drink unless he wanted to see God sooner than later.

Cole studied the group carefully.

Cole Beckett: So you’re from the future too.

Trace nodded.

Trace Mercer: Like I said, sort of. They are definitely from your time, while I took the long way around to get back to the time I'm originally from.

Cole’s gaze flicked over him.

Cole Beckett: You’re Trace Mercer.

Trace hesitated.

Trace Mercer: Yes.

Cole looked toward the street, where the younger Trace’s banners still flew in the distance.

Cole Beckett: Yeah not the right one for this time though.

Miles Rowan: Great observation.

Ty leaned toward Miles.

Ty Mercado: Is this normal for you guys?

Miles considered that.

Miles Rowan: Lots of things have become normal, but not time travel. This one is new.

Ty Mercado: That's great, hermano. Glad I'm not the only one panicking.

Roland sat upright, hands folded.

Roland Vander: We came through a fissure in Arcadia City. It appears to have been opened deliberately, and unless we find the source, it may expand enough to destroy the city.

Cole’s expression hardened.

Cole Beckett: I saw a symbol while inside the fissure before it fully pulled us in. I believe I recognized it. Axis Nova.

Lena frowned.

Lena Solis: Those guys? That strange company that tried to do business with Worzol?

Cole leaned forward.

Cole Beckett: Axis Nova is an organization from further ahead in the timeline. They want control over all time and space. They rewrite causality until history itself serves them. Kamen Rider Tempo and I defeated the Maestro of Axis Nova and wiped out the timeline he was trying to force into existence. At least, that’s what I thought happened.

Ashlyn’s eyes narrowed.

Ashlyn Westbrook: But someone escaped?

Cole nodded.

Cole Beckett: Praetor Null. I don’t know his name because I met him. I know it because the fissure showed me fragments, and to make a long story short, I once almost became time itself, so some things are still rattling in my head. He survived the collapse of an erased timeline and dragged himself backward through broken history. If he’s here, then he’s trying to make sure the future that defeated him never happens.

Miles Rowan: Did you just say you almost became time itself?

Trace looked down at the table, jaw tightening.

Trace Mercer: He's going to change history by helping Vantrex win the Great War.

The room went quiet.

Even Ty stopped eating.

Cole looked at Trace.

Cole Beckett: If Vantrex wins, what happens?

Trace’s answer came quietly.

Trace Mercer: The world ends, swallowed by the Worzol Dimension.

Miles Rowan: I did hear right that he almost became time? Right? Anyone?

Later that night, the seven of them moved through the woods east of Avalon under cover of darkness. Lena could feel the energy leading them, while Cole used his Chrono Engine to try and assist in tracing a path to a person who should not be in this time. All of them were giving off a signature, and this one was a major difference. Cole called it a paradox. Trace led them along old scout paths he remembered from campaigns long past, avoiding patrols with unsettling ease. For all his confusion in the modern world, here he moved with calm familiarity. Ashlyn watched him become more himself with every mile and felt both happy for him and afraid of what that meant.

The trail led them to a hidden encampment beyond a ridge where Dreadlings and human collaborators gathered beneath black banners marked with Worzol symbols. The human traitors wore scavenged armor and painted their faces with green ash, while Dreadlings crouched around fire pits, snarling and scraping claws against stone. At the center of the camp stood Praetor Null.

His armor was not medieval, not Worzol, and not modern. It was angular and black, marked by pale lines that glowed like cracks in dead starlight. The Axis Nova symbol burned across his chest, and around him time behaved incorrectly. Sparks froze midair. Flames reversed into wood and then burned forward again. Shadows arrived before bodies moved. His helmet was shaped like a broken crown, and behind him floated fragments of circular machinery like pieces of a clock that had forgotten what time meant.

He addressed the camp with a voice that omit before he spoke.



Praetor Null: I have seen the future you were denied. I have seen worlds chained to order, empires perfected by Axis Nova, and time itself made obedient beneath the will of those strong enough to command it. Then I saw that future murdered by rebels, Riders, and the diseased chaos they call freedom.

Cole’s fists tightened.

Praetor Null raised one hand.

Praetor Null: I survived the erasure. I crawled through the collapse of my own history and found the first wound. Here. This war. This fragile alliance. This age of heroes that becomes the root of every rebellion yet to come. Vantrex shall have his victory, Axis Nova shall have its correction, and together we will build a paradise of chaos!

Trace’s eyes narrowed.

Trace Mercer: He caused the fissure.

Cole nodded grimly.

Cole Beckett: Not just one. He probably ripped through multiple time periods to get here.

Roland looked toward the camp.

Roland Vander: Then we definitely have to stop him to erase those fissures.

Miles Rowan: So we hit him now.

Ty looked from Miles to the heavily guarded camp.

Ty Mercado: Just so I understand, the plan is seven people attacking that monster army and that big dude in the middle?

Trace drew Oathrender.

Trace Mercer: Yes.

Ty nodded slowly.

Ty Mercado: Clear. I Hate it, but clear.

Cole Beckett: It's going to be six. You stand back, Ty. We don't have Clockwork Runner with us.

Ty Mercado: I can't let you do this alone!

Ashlyn Westbrook: He's not alone.

The Kishirangers stepped forward together. Their Oathlinks ignited in muted light.

Trace Mercer: Oath forged.

Roland Vander: Knowledge guarded.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Courage sworn.

Miles Rowan: Wild heart awakened.

Lena Solis: Truth shone.

Together, they raised their arms.

All Five: Kishiranger, arise!

Colored light erupted across the ridge. Red, black, blue, green, and yellow armor formed beneath the medieval night. Cole gripped the Chrono Engine Driver as sparks burst across its face. For several seconds, the device resisted him, damaged by the time displacement and Praetor Null’s interference. Cole clenched his teeth, forcing his own temporal pressure into alignment.

Cole Beckett: Come on. You dragged me here. Now work.

The Driver clicked.

Steam burst from the side vents.

Golden clockwork light spun around his waist.

Cole’s eyes sharpened.

Cole Beckett: Calibrate. Lock. Ignite. RIDE THE PRESSURE! HENSHIN!

The Chrono Engine lit up.

The transformation was violent. Steam erupted around him in a circle, forming a glowing ring of light. Plates of bronze and black metal clamped onto his limbs like shackles, twisting into segmented armor. Gear teeth spun across his chest as the red gauge on his belt slammed into place.



Ty stared at them.

Ty Mercado: I am both inspired and wildly underdressed.

Then the heroes charged the camp.

The first impact scattered Dreadlings like leaves in a storm. Red Kishiranger cut through the front line with Oathrender. Black Kishiranger moved beside him with Gravebrand, the black blade carving through corrupted armor in arcs. Blue Kishiranger drove forward behind Shield Vanguard, protecting their flank as enemy arrows and Worzol blasts slammed uselessly against his barrier. Green Kishiranger moved through the chaos in flickers of afterimage, Gungnir striking from all angles. Yellow Kishiranger brought Aymr down with enough force to crack the earth, sending waves of Sanctum energy through the camp. Gauge fought differently from all of them, using timed bursts of acceleration, pressure vents, and counters to appear where enemies least expected him.

Praetor Null watched them approach without fear.

Praetor Null: Cursed Paradox, I see you followed me, and brought some friends.

When Trace and Cole reached him together, the villain finally moved.

His first strike hit both of them at once.

Trace blocked with Oathrender, Gauge crossed his arms defensively, and the force still drove them backward across the dirt. Praetor Null followed without seeming to hurry, his blade forming out of nowhere.

Praetor Null: Red Kishiranger. Kamen Rider Gauge. Two errors standing side by side.

Gauge lunged.

Praetor Null parried and fought him off with ease.

Cole Beckett: Careful, he's ready causality.

Trace Mercer: He's what?

Cole Beckett: He's got a feeling of what we're going to do before we do it. Trust me!

Trace attacked from the opposite side, but Praetor Null twisted through the strike and slammed a gauntlet into Trace’s chest hard enough to crack sparks from the armor. Ashlyn immediately intercepted the follow-up, Gravebrand colliding with Praetor Null’s blade in a burst of black and violet light.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Stay away from him.

Praetor Null tilted his head.

Praetor Null: Attachment. The driving force of history. It's a mistake.

Ashlyn Westbrook: It's my mistake to make.

Before the fight could press further, a grotesque Worzol lieutenant lumbered from the back of the camp. It was massive, hunched, and covered in layered bone growths, with four arms ending in jagged hooks and a mouth split too wide across its face. Green fire burned inside its ribcage. It roared and charged directly toward Lena and Roland, forcing the team to turn their attention as it began tearing through both heroes and its own allied humans without care.



Praetor Null looked toward the distant battlefield where Vantrex’s main army gathered.

Praetor Null: The final battle nears. I have no need to waste this night finishing you.

Gauge tried to pursue, but Praetor Null stepped backward into a fracture of violet darkness.

Cole Beckett: Null!

The villain’s voice lingered after his body vanished.

Praetor Null: On the battlefield, Rider. The future dies there.

The fracture closed.

The Worzol lieutenant attacked again, forcing the heroes into formation. Trace and Ashlyn exchanged one glance and moved together.

Trace Mercer: Final Vow!

Ashlyn Westbrook: Twin Judgment!

Their red and black energy spiraled together into a devastating blast that struck the lieutenant square in the chest. At the same moment, Gauge’s Driver vented steam and golden light wrapped around his leg as he launched himself upward.

Cole Beckett: Steam Spiral Kick!

Gauge came down through the center of the Twin Judgment blast, his kick drilling into the weakened monster with clockwork force. The Worzol lieutenant screamed as the combined attack tore through it, and the creature exploded in a wave of green fire that lit the encampment like dawn.

For a moment, the battlefield fell quiet.

Then hoofbeats thundered from the ridge.

A white horse emerged from the trees, carrying Jeanne Ark beneath a rain-dark cloak, her banner strapped across her back. She reined in hard at the sight of the five armored Kishirangers standing among the ruins of the Worzol camp.

Her face went pale.

Ashlyn froze.

Trace’s entire body went rigid.

Jeanne looked from Red to Black to Blue to Green to Yellow, disbelief and pain colliding in her eyes.

Jeanne Ark: The Kishirangers?

The words were barely above a whisper.

She dismounted slowly, staring at them as if ghosts had stepped out of fire.

Jeanne Ark: Trace, what is going on? The other four are dead. Slain by the traitor who shattered the oath.

She looked toward the black armor.

Her voice became cold.

Jeanne Ark: Mordred Vander.

Roland went still.

Miles looked sharply toward him.

Ashlyn turned.

Trace said nothing.

The rain fell harder around them as the name echoed through the broken camp, and somewhere in the distance, the armies of Vantrex began to march toward the final battle.

To Be Continued...

Last edited by Machismo (5/31/2026 4:12 am)

Episode 24: Great War and Beyond

The final battle of the Great War began beneath a sky that looked as if heaven itself had been wounded.

Dawn had not truly broken over Avalon. The sun existed somewhere beyond the clouds, pale and hidden, while the horizon burned with the reflected light of siege fire, spellcraft, and the unnatural radiance spilling from the open gate that Vantrex had forced into the heart of the battlefield. The land before the gate had become a churned wasteland of broken shields, fallen banners, shattered siege engines, and smoking craters where magic and steel had already spent themselves in impossible quantities. Armies that had sworn for generations never to stand beside one another now fought shoulder to shoulder under the desperate command of the last alliance. Zauberer mages formed circles of blue flame around exhausted archers. Magnus knights moved through shadow and struck at the flanks of towering Worzol beasts. Priests from the early Church raised hymns over the clash of iron, and warriors of Avalon held the center with blood on their armor and faith in their teeth.

At the very heart of that storm, young Trace Mercer fought beside Kamen Rider Magnus and Kamen Rider Ash.

The younger Trace still carried the same fire in his movements, the same relentless refusal to yield ground. His red cloak had been torn nearly in half, his sword arm shook with exhaustion, and dark smoke clung to the edges of his armor, yet he kept pressing toward Vantrex with raw courage. Magnus and Ash fought on either side of him, their Rider armor catching the terrible light of the gate as Vantrex dragged the Rune Lens toward the threshold that would let the Worzol Dimension swallow the world.

Trace Mercer, the Trace from the future, watched that battlefield only for a moment before he tore his eyes away and fixed them on the black valley below.

Praetor Null had brought an army.

The Dreadlings poured over the broken ridges west of the final battlefield in a vast, crawling wave of jagged armor, bone masks, hooked blades, and green-black fire. They moved with terrible discipline now, no longer scattered raiders or warped remnants, but a true incursion force marching under the will of a man who should not exist. Praetor Null stood at their head, the mark of Axis Nova burning on his chest. He had found the one moment where a single interruption could break all of history, and he was driving everything he had toward it.

The Kishirangers stood between him and the final battle.

Trace lowered his sword and felt Ashlyn step into place beside him. Ray, Miles, and Lena formed the line without being asked, their Oathlinks already humming against their waists. Jeanne Ark stood slightly ahead of Cole Beckett, her banner-spear planted into the mud as her eyes followed the thousands of monsters advancing through the smoke. Kamen Rider Gauge turned the Chrono Engine Driver with a sharp twist, steam venting from the side of his armor as his orange lenses narrowed toward Praetor Null.

Ty Mercado stood behind them, mud on his face, a borrowed sword in his hand, and the expression of a man who had no idea what he was doing, but he was going to give it his all.

Ty Mercado: I just want everyone to know that when I said I wanted to see old Avalon someday, I meant like a guided tour of the ruins.

Cole Beckett: We tried that once. You complained when the tour guide didn't have snacks.

Ty Mercado: She tried to placate me with raisins...raisins, Cole.

Jeanne glanced back at them with the strangest mixture of confusion and fondness.

Jeanne Ark: Are all warriors from your era like this?

Cole Beckett: Just be happy Tick and Tock didn't get dragged with us.

Trace kept his eyes forward. The Dreadlings were close enough now that he could see the light in their mouths, could hear their layered shrieks rattling through the ground. His heart was not calm, but it had become steady. The past was raging behind him, the future was waiting somewhere beyond a fissure, and standing beside him was the woman who had become the one truth time could not devour.

Ashlyn’s fingers brushed against his.

He looked at her.

She looked at him.

No speeches passed between them. Their Oathlinks spoke for them in the rising glow that ran from red to black, from black to red, a pulse of power so complete that the air between them shimmered.

Roland noticed first. He turned his head slightly, his blue visor catching the light.

Lena noticed next and immediately set her jaw as if she were trying very hard not to smile in the middle of the end of the world.

Miles stared at their wrists, then at their hands, then at the approaching army.

Miles Rowan: Is this a bad time to point out-

Lena Solis: Yes.

Miles Rowan: Understood. It can wait.

Praetor Null raised his blade, and the Dreadlings charged.

Trace lifted his Oathlink.

Trace Mercer: Kishirangers, charge!

The team answered as one. Their Oathlinks flared, and the five symbols of Avalon ignited in the air before them. Red, blue, black, green, and yellow light, followed by the steam and temporal pressure of Kamen Rider Gauge.

Jeanne did not transform. She simply lifted her banner-spear and charged ahead, fearlessly.

The armies collided.

The first impact threw mud, fire, and broken weapons into the sky. Trace met the foremost Dreadling with a slash that cut through its shield and breastplate at the same time, then drove his shoulder into another hard enough to send it crashing backward through three more. Ashlyn moved beside him in a black arc, her blade sliding through the gaps in armor with surgical precision before she spun under Trace’s follow-up strike and severed the arm of a Dreadling captain reaching for his flank. Their movements joined without hesitation, each attack creating space for the other, each step drawing power from the Oathlink bond that blazed between them.

Roland took the left flank with disciplined brutality. His shield flashed blue as he forced a path through a wedge formation of spear-bearing Dreadlings, blocking five thrusts in quick succession before driving a kick into the lead monster’s chest and using the recoil to pivot into a sweep that split the entire rank open. Lena guarded his rear with golden force, Aymr striking like judgment as she smashed one Dreadling into the ground and used the rebound to hammer another through a ruined barricade. Miles moved in bursts of green, Gungnir spinning in his hands as he vaulted over a line of crawlers, landed on the shoulders of a siege beast, and drove the spear through the glowing sigil at the back of its skull.

Cole charged straight through the center.

Kamen Rider Gauge: Boiler Breaker!

Steam exploded from Gauge’s armor as he punched through a wall of Dreadlings, the Chrono Engine building pressure with each strike. He ducked beneath a cleaver, caught a second blade against his forearm, and drove his knee into the attacker’s ribs before twisting the Driver again. A pulse of compressed temporal force blew outward, freezing a dozen Dreadlings for the span of a heartbeat. Jeanne used that heartbeat with terrifying efficiency. She swept in behind him, banner-spear glowing, and struck every frozen enemy in a single circular motion. When time snapped back around them, the monsters collapsed all at once.

Jeanne Ark: Your machines are strange, Cole Beckett, but I confess they are excellent in battle.

Kamen Rider Gauge: I wish I could quote that for my shop sign, but who would believe me?

Praetor Null entered the fight like a blade dropped from the sky.

He struck between Trace and Ashlyn with enough force to split the earth, and only their linked reflexes saved them. Trace crossed his sword low while Ashlyn crossed hers high, their weapons catching Null’s descending strike between them. Black and red energy erupted from their Oathlinks, but Null leaned into the clash and forced both of them back several steps.



Praetor Null: You don't belong here, Blazing Oath!

Trace Mercer: I’ve been told that a lot lately! I don't care!

Null twisted his blade, and a burst of energy ripped through the air. Trace rolled through it, came up with a slash toward Null’s side, and found the attack blocked by a black shield that unfolded from Null’s gauntlet. Ashlyn attacked from behind, but Null’s shadow split from his body and met her blade with a mirror weapon of its own. The shadow had no face, no voice, only the cruel outline of something erased from time and dragged back wearing hatred as a skin.

Ashlyn planted her heel, drove her sword through the shadow’s blade, and forced it to buckle.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Trace, low!

Trace dropped without looking.

Ashlyn’s strike passed over his shoulder and cut through the shadow’s neck as Trace swept Null’s legs from under him. Null caught himself on one hand, spun in the air, and kicked Trace square in the chest, sending him backward into a broken wagon. Ashlyn leapt after Null, black energy spiraling down her blade, but Null caught her by the wrist and slammed her into the earth with enough force to crack stone.

Trace was already up before Null could finish the motion.

The red Kishiranger struck him with a shoulder charge that carried them both across the mud and into the remains of a Dreadling siege tower. Wood splintered around them. Null rammed his elbow into Trace’s helmet once, twice, and then drove a blade of black light toward the crest on his chest. Ashlyn’s chain snapped around Null’s wrist before the strike could land. She pulled with both hands, dragging his arm wide, and Trace answered with a rising slash that carved sparks from Null’s armor.

The Oathlinks flared again.

This time the glow was so intense that even the Dreadlings staggered away from it.

Cole turned while fighting, one gauntlet locked around a Dreadling’s throat.

Kamen Rider Gauge: Okay, that’s new.

Ty ducked behind a broken shield as a Dreadling axe flew over his head.

Ty Mercado: I really shouldn't be out here!

Miles landed beside him and skewered the monster trying to climb over the shield.

Miles Rowan: You're doing doing great! You're not dead yet! You've exceeded expectations!

Ty Mercado: That is the kind of blind confidence I can hide behind.

Roland Vander: What is happening over there? The light, it's so bright!

Lena Solis: That's love! THAT'S LOVE!

Trace and Ashlyn stood together as the light between their Oathlinks became a single blazing chain of red and black. Their armor answered the bond, crests glowing, gold trim igniting with power that ran down into their weapons. Praetor Null stepped back for the first time, and through the black visor of his helmet, something like recognition moved.

Praetor Null: You two...can't be doing this!

Ashlyn Westbrook: You keep talking like love has rules.

Trace turned his sword, the red light wrapping around the blade in a spiral. Ashlyn lifted hers beside it, black fire rolling along the edge.

Trace Mercer: It doesn’t.

They moved together.

The Final Vow Twin Judgment had always been powerful, but in that ruined valley of the Great War, with young Trace fighting for the world behind them and future Trace fighting for the love that waited, the attack became something greater than a technique. Trace and Ashlyn crossed their blades, as Roland, Lena, and Miles lent their energy to the attack.

Trace Mercer: Final Vow!

Ashlyn Westbrook: Twin Judgment!

The powerful blast tore through the battlefield like a red-and-black sunrise. It struck Praetor Null square in the chest, lifted him from the ground, and drove him backward through his own front line. Dreadlings disintegrated in the wake of the attack, their forms unraveling into ash before they could scream. The blast carried Null across the valley and slammed him into the ridge that overlooked the path to the final battle. For one long moment, the entire Dreadling army faltered.

Then the ridge exploded.

A pillar of red-black light climbed into the sky, drowning the green fire, drowning the gate’s glow, drowning even the screams from the final battle beyond. When it faded, Praetor Null was gone, and only a crater remained where he had stood.

The Dreadlings broke.

Ray, Lena, Miles, Jeanne, Gauge, and the allied soldiers who had followed them pressed the advantage with everything they had left, as they sent the Worzol hordes retreating.

Trace stood breathing hard, the glow of his Oathlink slowly dimming.

Ashlyn stepped close to him, her shoulder brushing his.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Did we get him?

Trace watched the crater, his sword still raised.

Trace Mercer: I want to say yes.

The air above the crater split open with a thin line of green-black light.

Praetor Null’s voice emerged from it, distorted and distant.

Praetor Null: You have delayed me. You have protected your precious fixed point. You have convinced yourselves that history favors you because you know how the story ends.

Cole turned sharply.

Kamen Rider Gauge: Come out here and let me finish my job! I have a Rider Kick with your name all over it, Axis Nova trash!

Praetor Null: This isn't over! I will make everyone pay!

Trace and Cole changed at him, but he disappeared just before they could get to him.

Silence followed, broken only by the retreating screams of the Dreadlings and the thunder of the final battle in the distance.

Then, beyond the ridge, the gate collapsed.

The world shook.

A column of light rose from the battlefield where young Trace, Kamen Rider Magnus, and Kamen Rider Ash had stopped Vantrex from carrying the Rune Lens through the gate. The terrible wound in reality folded inward, shrinking from a sky-splitting maw into a single point of screaming green fire, and then that point vanished. Across the plains, exhausted armies lifted their voices in ragged disbelief. The Worzol advance had been halted. Vantrex had been beaten back. The Great War had reached the moment history remembered as victory.

Trace did not celebrate.

He knew what came next.

The Kishirangers reached the overlook just as the gathered leaders formed a circle around young Trace. Kamen Rider Magnus and Kamen Rider Ash stood nearby, battered and silent, their armor damaged from the final clash. The Rune Lens had been sealed away from the gate, but the Worzol Curse had already begun to spread from the collapsed threshold. It moved like living shadow across the ground, searching for a vessel strong enough to contain it before it burst outward and poisoned the world.

Young Trace stepped forward before either Rider could move.

Even from a distance, future Trace could see the argument begin. Magnus reached for him. Ash turned sharply, shoulders tense, clearly refusing the sacrifice before it could be spoken. Young Trace looked between them, then toward the exhausted armies behind him, and made the decision without waiting for permission from anyone.

Ashlyn took future Trace’s hand.

He gripped it as if the world might tilt under his feet.

The curse rose around the younger man in black coils. Priests and mages shouted in alarm, but young Trace plunged his sword into the earth and took the darkness into himself. The force of it bent him backward, his red cloak snapping in the wind, every muscle in his body locking as the curse tried to devour him from within. Magnus and Ash rushed forward, but the sealing circle ignited beneath their feet, preventing anyone else from entering. Young Trace screamed once, as if the pain had to escape the body or tear it apart.

Ashlyn’s fingers tightened around future Trace’s hand.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Trace...

He could not answer her at first.

The sealing chamber was prepared quickly. Stones marked with Avalon’s oldest vows rose from beneath the earth, called by the combined magic of the alliance. A sarcophagus of white stone and gold binding opened at the center of the circle, its interior glowing with suspended light. Young Trace staggered toward it under his own power. He refused to be carried. He refused to be pitied. He reached the edge of the stone resting place and finally turned back toward the world he had saved.

His eyes moved across the crowd.

They settled, impossibly, on the place where future Trace and Ashlyn stood hidden in the distance.

Perhaps he saw them. Perhaps time itself had bent gently for one mercy after all the pain it had demanded.

Future Trace’s breath caught.

Young Trace lifted his hand.

Future Trace felt Ashlyn trembling beside him and realized that he was trembling too.

The stasis light began to climb around Young Trace.

Future Trace turned to Ashlyn. All the things he had avoided saying, all the careful walls he had built around his own heart, all the fear that loving her would endanger her more than distance ever could, fell apart beneath the sight of his younger self choosing fifteen hundred years of silence so that the world could continue.

He took her other hand and faced her fully.

Trace Mercer: I’m on my journey to you.

Ashlyn’s eyes filled, but her smile came through the tears.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Then I’ll be there when you arrive, and you'll never be alone again.

Trace kissed Ashlyn with the full weight of the years he had survived and the future he had chosen, and she answered him as if every moment that had led them here had finally found its shape. Behind them, the younger Trace was lowered into the stasis that would hold him for fifteen hundred years, but in front of him stood the proof that the road had an end, that the curse did not get the last word, that the boy entering the long sleep would wake into a world where he was known, loved, challenged, followed, and finally home.

The team stared.

Lena’s mouth opened slightly.

Miles pointed, lowered his hand, then pointed again as if the gesture needed a second attempt.

Roland turned away, staring at the ground.

Jeanne Ark looked between them with soft, dawning delight.

Cole crossed his arms.

Ty leaned toward him.

Ty Mercado: Do we tell them we already knew?

Cole Beckett: What? No. Why?

Miles finally found words.

Miles Rowan: Are we allowed to clap? Are we happy? I need leadership here.

Lena wiped at her eyes with the back of her glove and immediately glared at him for noticing.

Lena Solis: We are happy. It's about time.

Roland Vander kept his gaze on the ground.

Roland Vander: ...Happy.

Trace and Ashlyn parted, though neither let go of the other’s hand. The stasis sarcophagus closed around young Trace in the distance, and as the sealing light settled over the stone, a final red glimmer passed through the battlefield. Future Trace felt it in his chest, not as pain, but as recognition. The loop had held. The man he had been had entered the long dark. The man he had become stood beneath the same sky with Ashlyn’s hand in his.

Victory should have brought rest.

Instead, armed riders arrived before the last echoes of the sealing rite faded.

Avalon’s royal guard surrounded the team with respectful caution, their spears lowered.

Royal Guard Captain: By order of King Arcturus, the warriors who held the western road are to come before the throne.

Ty looked down at the mud on his shirt.

Cole Beckett: That sounds like it could cause a major paradox...unless I'm right about my theory.

Ty Mercado: You brought that up last night. What theory?

Trace looked toward the distant battlefield, then toward the sealed resting place of his younger self. Ashlyn squeezed his hand once before letting it go, though the warmth remained.

Trace Mercer: Let's go.

The royal court of Avalon had no time to become ceremonial after the battle, but even wounded and exhausted, it remained magnificent. The throne room was filled with commanders, healers, mages, priests, and soldiers who had survived the final day and did not yet know what to do with survival. Blue banners hung from the high arches, their golden lions dimmed by smoke drifting in through shattered windows. King Arcturus stood before his throne rather than sitting upon it, his armor still marked by battle.



He turned when Trace entered.

For a moment, the king’s expression changed so completely that the entire room seemed to quiet around it.

The king descended the steps.

King Arcturus: Trace?

Trace bowed his head.

Trace Mercer: Your Majesty.

King Arcturus: You returned to us in the hour of ending, bearing companions I have never seen. Jeanne Ark once mentioned something like this in a vision, and it seems like all her visions do, that it came to pass. You are the young man who just sacrificed his life for our Kingdom, and for this world. You're from the future.

Trace almost smiled.

Trace Mercer: The future is messy and loud. It's bright and crazy, but it brought these brave heroes with me, so I could ensure the last stand would remain a victory.

The king’s eyes softened.

King Arcturus: Then I am pleased to know this future has you in it.

Ashlyn watched the exchange carefully, her mind catching on the warmth beneath the king’s words. Roland noticed too, though he said nothing. Jeanne, standing beside the throne with her banner resting at her shoulder, looked at Arcturus with quiet knowledge,=.

The king raised his voice to the court.

King Arcturus: These warriors held the western road against and invading evil. Had they failed, the gate would have fallen into chaos at the final hour. The Great War would not have ended in victory. Unfortunately, this act must remain hidden in history, but Avalon will not allow such service to go unrewarded.

A royal attendant carried forward a velvet-lined case.

Inside it rested five Zircons, each cut in a different shape, each burning with a muted inner light that matched one of the Kishirangers. Red, blue, black, green, and yellow gleamed beneath the throne room torches like captured stars.

Arcturus lifted the red Zircon first.

King Arcturus: These are Oathlink Zircons, refined from sanctified stones beneath Avalon and tempered in the vows of those willing to defend more than their own age. They will strengthen your transformations and grant your armor a greater channel for the power you already carry.

Roland stepped forward first when the blue Zircon was offered, then Ashlyn, Miles, and Lena. Trace waited until last. When Arcturus held the red Zircon before him, the king paused.

King Arcturus: I offered you such a stone once before.

Trace accepted the Zircon slowly.

Trace Mercer: I remember.

King Arcturus: You refused it.

Trace Mercer: I did.

King Arcturus: May I ask why?

Trace looked back at his team. Roland stood steady and silent. Ashlyn watched him with the faint smile of someone who already knew his answer. Miles tried to look noble and almost succeeded. Lena folded her arms, but her expression was gentle.

Trace turned back to Arcturus.

Trace Mercer: Because it wasn’t something I wanted unless the whole team was there together.

The king’s pride showed for only a second, but in that second it was unmistakable.

King Arcturus: Then you chose well.

The Zircon settled into Trace’s Oathlink with a clean flash of red light. Across the line, the others did the same, and the five devices answered one another with a soft harmonic chime that rose into the vaulted ceiling.

Cole, still in partial armor with his helmet dismissed, stared at the glow with a fascinated look.

Cole Beckett: That is incredibly beautiful technology.

Ty Mercado: Don’t lick it.

Cole Beckett: Right. It's not. I'm not making that mistake again, hermano.

Jeanne laughed softly despite the exhaustion in her face.

Jeanne Ark: I will miss them when they go.

That word settled heavily in the room.

Go.

The fissure had not appeared.

The team had completed the battle they believed they had been pulled into the past to fight, yet the way home remained closed. Trace looked toward Cole.

Trace Mercer: Why are we still here?

Cole’s humor faded as he stepped toward the center of the room, eyes narrowed in thought.

Cole Beckett: Causality. If my theory is right. This is all because causality.

Roland Vander: Please explain.

Cole pointed loosely toward the battlefield beyond the broken windows.

Cole Beckett: We keep thinking of this like we changed something by being here, but what if we were always here? Think about it. Why wasn’t Jeanne Ark at the final battle in the old stories? Because she was with us. Why did the western road hold when every map said it should have collapsed? Because we held it.

Cole continued, pacing now.

Cole Beckett: If the fissure hasn’t opened, then the loop isn’t done. There are still things that need to happen because they already happened. We didn’t come here to alter history. We came here to fulfill it.

Miles Rowan: You know I had a dream like that last night.

Lena Solis: What do you mean?

Miles Rowan: I keep dreaming about this guy, and he was wondering what we were doing in the past. Said his name was Nacht.

Cole Beckett: I'm sorry, what did you just say? Nacht?

The doors to the throne room burst open before anyone could answer.

A wounded scout stumbled inside, one hand pressed against a bleeding cut at his side. Two guards caught him before he fell, but he forced himself upright long enough to speak.

Avalon Scout: My king, the black-armored one lives. He was seen beyond the western ravine. He rides with what remains of his monsters toward the sealed resting place.

Trace’s blood went cold.

Ashlyn Westbrook: He’s going after your younger self.

The scout nodded, pale and shaking.

Avalon Scout: He means to kill Lord Trace in his slumber.

Praetor Null’s final threat returned like a blade sliding between Trace’s ribs.

King Arcturus turned to his guards.

King Arcturus: Muster every rider still able to hold a spear.

Trace raised a hand.

Trace Mercer: No. By the time an army forms, he’ll already be there.

Roland stepped forward.

Roland Vander: Then we go now.

Miles spun Gungnir once and caught it tight.

Miles Rowan: New power, old enemy, fate of the timeline at stake. I understand the assignment.

Lena gripped Aymr, the yellow Zircon shining at her waist.

Lena Solis: Finally.

Ashlyn stood beside Trace.

Ashlyn Westbrook: He doesn’t touch you. Either version.

Trace looked at her, and this time he did smile.

Trace Mercer: Together.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Together.

Cole checked the Chrono Engine Driver at his waist and grimaced.

Cole Beckett: I should mention one small thing before we rush into the fight.

Cole Beckett: I don’t have my cores. Valve, Ignition, Voltage, all of them are back in the future because I didn’t expect to fall into medieval causality loop. That means we only get one shot at this.

Trace nodded to him.

Trace Mercer: Can you still fight?

Cole snapped the Driver into place.

Cole Beckett: For my new friends, and the future that has Aria waiting for me? You bet I can fight. Always.

The sealed resting place lay beneath a hill of white stone overlooking the battlefield, already guarded by a ring of Avalon knights and mages who were in no condition to repel what came for them. Praetor Null arrived with the remains of his Dreadling elite under a moon veiled by smoke. His armor was cracked from the Final Vow Twin Judgment, his left arm hung stiffly, and the Axis Nova mark on his chest burned through the damage with a poisonous green light.

He cut through the first line of defenders with contemptuous precision.

The Kishirangers reached the hill before the second line fell.

Their Oathlinks rose together, connecting to their Oathbucklers.

Trace Mercer: Kishirangers, transform!

The Zircons blazed.

Sir Mercer: Burning Oath!

Ashlyn Westbrook: Darkness Conquered!

Roland Vander: Shield of Justice!

Lena Solis: Magic and Might!

Miles Rowan: Knight of the Wind!

The bucklers flashed.

All Five: Kishiranger, arise!

This time the transformation came with a deeper sound, like cathedral bells struck beneath the earth. The familiar armor formed first, but the Zircons ignited at the heart of each Oathlink and sent new light racing through the suits. Gold trim sharpened. Crests brightened. Subtle white-gold channels opened across the armor, carrying Sanctum power through the chest, shoulders, gauntlets, and boots. Their capes lengthened slightly and flickered at the edges with colored sparks, while the emblems on their chests glowed with living force. Red stood out with regal fur lining his collar.



Trace lowered his sword as power settled across his armor.

Ashlyn’s black armor gleamed with faint violet-red highlights, her blade humming with Oathlink resonance.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Now we end this.

Praetor Null turned from the entrance to the resting place.

Praetor Null: I will have the future I desire one way or the other!

Trace stepped forward.

Trace Mercer: Your time is up.

Cole Beckett: I believe...that's my line. Calibrate. Lock. Ignite. RIDE THE PRESSURE! HENSHIN!

The final battle with Praetor Null began at the door of the long slumber.

Null attacked with everything his broken body had left. Blades unfolded from his armor in jagged arcs, striking every direction, and the Dreadlings around him surged in coordinated waves to force openings in the team’s defense. Roland met the first wave with a charged up Vanguard. His shield trailing a luminous afterimage as he pushed back three enemies and redirected a fourth into Miles’s spear. Miles drove Gungnir through the creature and released a burst of green energy that pinned an entire line of Dreadlings against a stone wall. Lena raised Aymr and brought it down in a golden shockwave that shattered their armor before Jeanne Ark charged through the opening with her banner-spear and finished the line.

Gauge vented steam into Null’s shadow step, disrupting and attempted time-skip just enough for Ashlyn to intercept the strike meant for Trace’s back. He used compressed pressure bursts to knock Dreadlings off balance, then let Ty trip one with a fallen spear and a panicked shout.

Ty Mercado: I contributed! Nobody saw how scared I was!

Kamen Rider Gauge: Everyone saw, but yes, you contributed!

Null drove Trace backward toward the resting chamber doors, blade locked against blade.

Praetor Null: I will kill the sleeping boy, and every oath you cherish will unravel screaming.

Trace pushed back, the red Zircon burning brighter.

Trace Mercer: You keep mistaking pain for weakness.

Ashlyn appeared at Null’s side, her sword cutting across his damaged chest.

Ashlyn Westbrook: That’s why you keep losing.

Null staggered, and the team closed around him. Roland struck low. Lena struck high. Miles hurled Gungnir through a gap in Null’s guard, forcing him to twist directly into Trace’s slash. Ashlyn followed with a burst strike that pinned Null in place, and Gauge slammed a pressure-charged kick into the Axis Nova mark on his chest.

The mark cracked.

Null screamed.

Trace lifted his sword, and the team’s Zircons answered. Red, blue, black, green, and yellow light gathered into a single royal crest above them. Gauge stepped into the formation as well.

Kamen Rider Gauge: I don’t have cores, but I’ve got pressure.

Trace Mercer: Gauge, with us!

They struck together.

The Burst attack hit Praetor Null in a flood of color and steam, carrying him away from the resting place and into the open field below the hill. His armor ruptured under the force. The Axis Nova mark shattered. Green-black energy burst from him in violent streams as his body lifted from the ground and detonated in a massive explosion that lit the entire hill.

For a moment, everyone believed it was over.

Then the green fire rose.

Null’s laughter rolled across the battlefield as the energy gathered into a colossal shape. His broken body expanded into a towering giant of black armor, warped horns, and burning fractures, large enough to blot out the moon. The remaining Dreadlings dissolved into him, feeding the monstrous form as he slammed one hand into the earth and cracked the hill from base to crown. The impact sent the tomb falling beneath the surface.

Miles took one step back.

Miles Rowan: And that explains why we found Trace sleeping like a baby under the ground! We do have an answer for this, right?

Lena looked toward the castle, then toward the ancient battlefield.

Lena Solis: The Stahlritter.

Roland’s visor lifted toward the distant war machines housed in Avalon’s sacred hangars, the legendary knight constructs that existed in this era as living weapons of the alliance.

Roland Vander: They are available in this time period.

Cole laughed once, exhausted and delighted.

Cole Beckett: Close the loop!

Trace raised his Oathlink toward Avalon.

Trace Mercer: Stahlritter, answer our oath!

Across the battlefield, ancient stone hangars split open beneath the castle ridge. Five colossal Stahlritter emerged into the moonlight, each bearing the colors and heraldry that would one day become legend: Krieger in red, Hector in blue, Drakken in black, Kestrel in green, and Spiegel in yellow. They moved like knights awakened from prayer, their eyes igniting as the Kishirangers were drawn into their cockpits by pillars of light.

Null roared and swung a massive blade of green fire toward the sleeping hill.

The Stahlritter intercepted him before it could land.

Krieger caught the blade with both hands. Hector and Drakken struck from either side, driving their weapons into Null’s arms. Kestrel swept low with a spear thrust that took out one knee, and Spiegel raised a golden barrier over the resting place as the shockwave rolled outward. Gauge stood below, taking in the fight.

Kamen Rider Gauge: I feel as helpless as you do, Ty!

Ty Mercado: HEY!

The five Stahlritter rose into formation.

Trace Mercer: Combine! Voll Stahlritter!




The machines separated into streams of light and armor, joining in a majestic sequence of steel, gold, and roaring power. Krieger formed the core, Hector and Kestrel locked into the arms, Drakken and Spiegel formed the legs and stabilizers, and the combined crest of Avalon blazed across the chest as Voll Stahlritter stood over the battlefield. The giant knight drew its massive blade, and the ground beneath it cracked under the weight of its oath.

Praetor Null lunged with a scream that resonated for miles.

Voll Stahlritter met him head-on.



Their clash shook the final night of the Great War. Null hammered the giant knight with fire, but Voll Stahlritter advanced through it, step by step, the Kishirangers’ voices joining in the cockpit as their Oathlinks synchronized. Trace felt Ashlyn’s presence beside his own in the control stream, steady and fierce. He felt Roland’s discipline, Miles’s courage, Lena’s bright defiance. He felt the team as a single living vow.

All Five: GRAND CROSS!!!

Voll Stahlritter fired a concentrated blast to the very core of Praetor Null. His giant form froze, cracked, and erupted in a pillar of green light that bent inward upon itself until the Axis Nova energy collapsed into nothing. The explosion that followed roared across the empty field, but Hector’s barrier held over the sleeping chamber, and when the smoke cleared, no trace of Praetor Null remained.

This time, the silence held.

Later, after the wounded were gathered and the dead were honored as much as time allowed, the team stood once more within Avalon’s throne room. The fissure still had not appeared. The loop was nearly complete, and every event had begun to settle into place like stones in an ancient road.

Trace looked at the Grail in Miles’s hands.

Trace Mercer: Miles. The Grail.

Miles held it tighter on instinct.

Miles Rowan: Yes, I still have it. No, I did not drop it. I only almost dropped it twice, and both times I made a quick save. No idea why I thought to bring the world ending game changer.

Trace stepped closer.

Trace Mercer: The Grail was created after my slumber began. I believe that's what the legend said. It was made to act a barrier to keep the dimensions separate. But we brought it here. We brought it to the past.

Cole’s eyes widened.

Cole Beckett: You mean...it exists...because you brought it here, and will leave it here to be found later? Closed loop.

Ashlyn looked from the Grail to Trace.

Ashlyn Westbrook: We place it where we find it fifteen hundred years later.

Roland Vander nodded slowly.

Roland Vander: Ensuring the Worzol Dimension never obtains it.

Lena exhaled.

Lena Solis: We were part of the legend the whole time.

Jeanne Ark smiled at them.

Jeanne Ark: Trace, you have brought together a most wonderful team, and I could not be happier for you. You have truly come into your own, as a worthy leader of Kishiranger.
 
Trace Mercer: All of us are important, together. One team. One mission. An oath that will not be broken. We are in this together.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Together. Jeanne, you brought together so many in this era. I vow to do to the same in the future. I've seen what can happen when we're all working together. I'm convinced it's the way to go.

Jeanne Ark: Wonderful.

They carried the Grail beneath the throne room to a hidden chamber of white stone, gold seals, and ancient protective scripture. King Arcturus came with them, as did Jeanne, Cole, and Ty. Trace placed the Grail into the stasis cradle with his own hands. The moment it settled into place, the seals ignited one by one, accepting the artifact.

The chamber closed around it.

History became whole.

When they returned to the throne room, the fissure waited for them.

It shimmered in the air before the throne, bright and impossible, its edges glowing with the familiar light of home. Beyond it, Trace could feel the pull of the future era, the future that had seemed so far away while Avalon’s ancient stones held him in the world that made him.

King Arcturus stood before him.

For a moment, no one spoke.

Then the king placed one hand on Trace’s shoulder.

King Arcturus: Whatever road waits for you, walk it as you have walked this one.

Trace bowed his head, but the gesture carried more than respect.

Trace Mercer: Thank you, Your Majesty.

Arcturus’s hand tightened slightly.

King Arcturus: Thank you, Trace.

Jeanne embraced Ashlyn first, then Lena, then Miles with enough force to make him wheeze. She clasped Roland’s arm solemnly and bowed to Cole with formal respect before turning to Ty.

Jeanne Ark: Ty Mercado, you brought joy and laughter to my heart. It's a shame you have to leave.

Ty placed a hand over his heart.

Ty Mercado: Aww, thank yo- wait what?! I COULD stay!

Cole shook his head.

Cole Beckett: I really don't think so.

Jeanne laughed, then faced Trace.

Jeanne Ark: Go home, Sir Trace. The world you saved is waiting for you.

Trace looked toward the fissure.

Ashlyn stood beside him. Her hand found his, and this time she took it openly, without hesitation, without hiding from the team, the king, Jeanne, or history itself. The others stepped through first: Roland with a final nod, Lena with one last look around the castle, Miles carrying the relief of a man no longer carrying the grail, Ty waving dramatically, and Cole nodding with respect.

Ashlyn lingered with Trace at the threshold.

Ashlyn Westbrook: Part of you must want to stay.

Trace looked across the throne room, at the banners of Avalon, at Jeanne, at King Arcturus, at the stones of the home he had lost before he ever understood how deeply he loved it. Then he looked at Ashlyn, and the answer came easily.

Trace Mercer: I am going home.

Her smile softened.

They stepped through the fissure hand in hand.

The light closed behind them.

For a long while, the throne room remained silent.

Jeanne Ark stood beside King Arcturus as the last shimmer faded from the air. She looked at the place where Trace had vanished, then at the king whose face held grief, pride, and wonder in equal measure.

Jeanne Ark: You had another chance to tell him, and you let it go.

King Arcturus: He didn't need that pressure weighing on him. He's going where he belongs. This is a secret that can stay a secret, for his sake.

Jeanne Ark: You should be very proud of your son.

King Arcturus: I am. Trace has exceeded all of my hopes. He is a true hero.

Beyond the throne room windows, Avalon’s bells began to ring for the end of the Great War. The sound rolled over the wounded city, over the sealed resting place, over the hidden chamber where the Grail waited for the future, and over the first fragile morning of a world that had survived because heroes from its tomorrow had fought for its yesterday.

The legend was complete.

And somewhere fifteen hundred years away, the future was waiting to welcome them home.




In the Worzol Dimension of present day, Vantrex sat upon his throne, clenching his fist.

Vantrex: Axis Nova failed. This time remains. We will not be aligning with them any further.

Malvora: Your powers have returned to full strength, my lord. The Kishiranger and humanity can not stand against you now.

Vantrex: To conquer alone is one thing, but I wish for their world to know the chaos of the Worzol Dimension. After all, that's why it chose me. That's why it made me what I am. It is my purpose. To answer the will of chaos within the Worzol Dimesion.

Vire the Swift: Well, I may have just the thing that could help us!

Vire the Swift appeared in the chambers from a portal carrying a large tomb behind him.

Vantrex: What has my General brought before me?

Vire the Swift: A little present from the past. Those fissures that opened up. They made traveling quite easy for me. I took a peek, and even brought back a souvenir. You wanted a fourth general, and I bring to you a better candidate than Mordred. Your ultimate trophy in fact. I bring you the corpse of-

To Be Continued...

Last edited by Machismo (Yesterday 5:05 pm)