A Hero

Disclaimer: Fan FICTION...enough said

A/N: My brother recently got back into Power Rangers, and after watching some certain episodes with him, this idea stuck to me. I felt it fit the Memorial Day theme, so I decided to upload it, sorta like a birthday present for my brother...that he'll never see *-* So, Happy Birthday, Drew! And Happy Memorial Day for everybody else!

For a land of ruins betwixt the dual summits of Twin Peak Mountain far out in the Great Desert that neighbored the small city of Angel Grove, California, it was unusually populous today. Individuals dressed in every color of the rainbow gathered at the cliffs, a crowd of Ranger Offspring and Allies below them. They were milling about, socializing, as if they were at some sort of party or function, waiting for the host to begin. In truth, they were waiting...waiting for their final arrival.

Beep beep!

With that warning, an open-topped blue jeep descended from the cloudless sky, swooping low enough for its riders to leap down before jetting off to reunite with its friend, the sentient red sports car, at the base of the mountain.

"Hey guys!" cried the ever-energetic, always-enthusiastic blue-clad prodigy "Sorry I'm late, had to make a pit-stop in a far-away galaxy."

From behind him, a young girl stepped out. She was dressed in a wide-sleeved, billowing white robe that flapped in the breeze. A head of electric blue hair stood in a halo of spikes, a braided rattail stretched between her shoulder blades. She stood no taller than four-feet and stared up at her greeters with shocking white irises.

"Uh...want to introduce us to your friend, Justin?" Adam asked, smiling kindly at the kid.

"Oh, this is Halo. She's an Eltarian Voyager with a mission on Earth," Zordon's last chosen one answered brightly. "She works with Robot Justin on Eltar to even out the team. Storm Blaster picked up his call when we were making a detour from the Karova Galaxy and we swung by to give her a lift to Earth." Justin held her by the shoulders in front of him, where she barely reached his belt, like a parent would while introducing their shy child to their friends. He seemed completely at ease with the fact that she was the partner of his robot-preteen-self whom he had only met a few days ago.

Jason stepped forward to greet her, being the first leader and spokesman of Earth's Power Rangers. "We welcome you to Earth, Halo of Eltar."

Her reply came in a just-audible whisper, "Thank you, Red Ranger."

Tommy came up from behind and clapped his best friend on the shoulder. "Now that we're all here, why don't we get this show on the road then, huh?" he suggested, trying to turn the much unwanted attention from Halo, who looked like she would be squirming if she wasn't too shy to do so.

Jason nodded in agreement. "Right." He turned and made his way to the raised jutting that they have been using as a stage. "It's time."

Somehow, his two words managed to reach every person's ears. The crowd immediately fell into place, lining up in rows of teams, from oldest to newest, and in color-coordinated columns. Down below, the silence told them that the activities have also ceased. The ROs were arranged similarly to their parents, in rows by teams and age, with the respective Allies on each end.

Halo stayed clinging to Justin.

Jason cleared his throat and spoke, his voice ringing out as if amplified by a non-existent microphone.

"Rangers, Allies, friends, we are gathered here in honor and respect of a wise galactic sage, the finest commander of all time, and a hero whom without we would not be alive today: Zordon of Eltar..."

"...we know that he will forever live in all that is good. His legacy will continue through us, through our children, and the infinite generations to come. Zordon died to save me, to save you, and to save the universe. But Zordon did not leave us defenseless. Teams and teams of superheroes will rise to meet the challenge whenever the time shall come. That said, may the Power protect us for all eternity."

"May the Power protect us all," everyone one else chorused.

They were still for a moment, then, as if a spell was broken, the heavy atmosphere lifted and the light mood from earlier returned to the Rangers.

Once more, it had become a party.

Halo made her way through the thick throngs of people who were picnicking at the bottom of the mountain. She caught snippets of conversations that happened above her head as she searched for the target of her mission.

"...and the monkeys followed him the whole time!"

"Well, he is the Red Ape..."

…

"...what were you thinking giving Chip and Max that much sugar?!"

"I was thinking Kelsey would handle them, being a Yellow and all!"

"Are you kidding?! Kelsey's natural high is worse than both their sugar rushes with Dustin thrown in!"

…

"...When Cole told me they had brought home a liger cub from that trip, I thought he meant Alyssa was pregnant, but no, they really brought home a liger cub..."

…

"...Chad still goes crazy whenever he's reminded his fellow Blues can manipulate water, and Carter keeps trying to recruit Tori and Madison into the firefighting squad..."

…

"...and Krista's been hunting Conner down since."

"He's hopeless..."

…

"...and just when I was about it get my cell phone back, he drops it in the toilet!"

"I hope you didn't pick it back up...you didn't...did you?!"

"It was still ringing, and I was waiting for an important call."

"Ewww!..."

…

"Hello Halo."

The girl's gaze snapped up at the sound of her name.

"Phantom," she greeted in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

"My goddaughter, Gwen, is celebrating her birthday soon. Cassie demanded that I show up this time, so I just came a little earlier to pay respects to Zordon with the other Rangers."

"Yeah, Zordon..." Halo murmured, her eyes drifting once more in search of her goal.

The Phantom Ranger nodded. "Yes, the Astro Rangers are ridden with guilt that they were unable to save Zordon." Halo nodded absently. "Andros takes it especially hard, seeing as he was the one to make the final strike. Every year, he sits out on that rock, away from the others, brooding in self-asserted shame." Halo's ears perked and her eyes followed to where he pointed. "No one can get him out of his 'funk', as Rocky puts it."

Halo nodded. "Please excuse me, Phantom," she said softly, already heading towards the outlier.

Her senior smirked in amusement, which went unnoticed. "You are excused."

Halo bowed her retreat and took off.

Phantom watched her go, shaking his head lightly before turning to engage Kendrix in a long-standing discussion of the pros and cons of ghost-life. Perhaps I spoke too soon. Good luck, Halo.

Andros looked up when he felt the presence approach him. He was surprised to see the Eltarian child coming over and sitting down beside him. Admittedly, no one had reached out to him since Trini had tried during the Rangers' first gathering here, when he and the Astros had just returned to Earth from helping reconstruct KO-35. After that failed session – Trini's first and only – Ashley and the others were usually successful in warding off anyone else. It was unanimously, and silently, agreed by the Rangers that it was best just to let Andros find his own peace.

"Halo," Andros nodded, deciding to acknowledge her so not to be rude to the visitor.

"Andros," she returned in the same tone. After a short silence, she spoke. "You're upset, aren't you?"

Andros, knowing it was a rhetorical question, as the answer was quite obvious, did not bother to reply.

"You have no reason to be."

Andros turned to look at her, raising an eyebrow. "I was the one who killed Zordon," he murmured. "Is that not reason enough?"

"You didn't kill Zordon."

"Yes, I did. I was the one who brought my Spiral Saber down and smashed his energy tube."

"You didn't kill Zordon," Halo repeated.

"He's gone now, Halo," Andros said sadly, "because I wasn't able to find another way to defeat Dark Specter's forces."

"You didn't kill Zordon."

"Yes, I did! I'm not proud of it, but I did."

Halo shook her head. "How could you have killed Zordon, if Zordon isn't dead?"

That caught Andros off guard. Lots of different people have said lots of different things to him to try to relieve him of his guilt, to try to tell him it wasn't his fault. But this, this was new.

"How could he not be?" Andros asked. "The energy tube was destroyed, I destroyed it, and the good energy from that tube was what ended the conquest of the United Alliances of Evil."

Halo nodded. "Yes, you did destroy his energy tube," she agreed, "but you didn't destroy him. Zordon's not dead, Andros!"

This time, the zebra-blond Astro Ranger could only stare at her.

"Andros, I'm an Eltarian Voyager who came to Earth with a mission: to save your restless soul. So please, listen to what I have to say, and take it seriously." Halo paused for Andros to comment. He said nothing, but kept his attention on her, waiting for her to proceed. Satisfied, she continued, "As an Astro Ranger, you know your Ranger history, right? You know of Zordon and Rita Repulsa's battles thousands of years ago? And how she trapped him in an interdimentional time warp while he trapped her in a space dumpster?"

"Yes. Anyone who knows anything about the Power Rangers knows the story. But how--?"

"The energy tube was Zordon's means of communicating with our dimension from the time warp," Halo interrupted. "It wasn't the time warp itself."

She paused again, to see if he was picking up on any of this. Andros' brow was furrowed, deep in thought. He seemed to be starting to get what she was going at.

Halo tried again. "Your destruction of Zordon's energy tube is no different than if I blew up your communicator...or if Xander drops Shane's mobile phone in the toilet," she recalled that last part from something she had heard earlier.

If she had been talking to anyone but Andros, they might have laughed, but the humor was completely lost to this Red Ranger.

"Killing the communication device doesn't kill the communicator, Andros."

"You mean to say..."

"Zordon's as alive as he's always been. Except now, we just can't contact him anymore. He's not dead though, and that's all that really matters. I mean, with the technology and geniuses we have, I'm sure someone in the universe would develop a means to reach him again. Until then, we'll just have to look after ourselves and be patient."

"Zordon's not dead?" Andros whispered in astonishment.

"Nope! He's as alive as you and me."

"Zordon's not dead!"

He seemed stuck on that.

"No, he's not."

Suddenly, Andros was on his feet, beaming.

"ZORDON'S NOT DEAD!!!" he yelled so loud, it echoed. He plucked Halo up and hugged her tight. "Thank you, Halo. Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"Uh...you're welcome?" she managed to spit out breathlessly as he squeezed the living daylights out of her.

"Oh, sorry!" he smiled sheepishly as he set her gently back on her feet. He sighed in relief. "You have no idea how much you've helped me. I mean it, Halo. Thank you."

Halo smiled back. "Just doing my job."

"I-I-I just can't believe it. Zordon's not dead?"

"You better believe it. Zordon's not dead."

"Huh. Wow!" Andros sputtered in breathless at the incredulity of it all, his gaze drifting over to the others. "So what have we been mourning all these years?"

"That's what I'd like to know. Zordon was never destroyed, just cut off from our dimension."

Andros grinned at Halo. "Well I guess we should go spread the good news, huh?"

"Better late than never."

"Let's not make it any later than we already have."

"Lead the way then."

With one last grateful beam, Andros sprinted to the swarm of multicolored defenders.

Halo stayed where she was, watching the re-spirited, re-energized Karovan return to the state her idol once was: confident and fired up.

Not a minute later, Phantom appeared by her side.

"That was your mission, wasn't it?"

Halo nodded affirmative.

"Is it true, or did you make it up for the sake of relieving his burden?"

"It's what I truly believe."

Phantom let out a laugh. He had always envied her ability to escape the question. "That's all that counts, isn't it?"

Halo nodded again.

The two Eltarian Voyagers stood at the edge of the cliff, watching the Earth's saviors rejoice the phenomenal news.

"You did a good thing." Phantom slung his arm massive over his junior's thin shoulders and tousled her hair. The natural spikes did not droop at the pressure, but rather, bent like springs. "I'm proud of you, kid. You just became their hero."

She looked up at him, a mischievous glint in her eyes. "I'm sorry, you must be mistaken. My name is Halo. Hiro is my brother."

Phantom laughed again, and the tousle became a noogie. Halo squealed as she tried to duck out it, laughing when she was thrown over his shoulder as they made their way to join the horde of heroes in their celebration.

Halo's pride swelled at the knowledge that not only had she given them this joy, but that in their hearts, she was one of them: a hero.

Tell me what you think. I'd also be happy to discuss my Zordon theory with anyone who wants to. Please review, even if to say it sucks.