"Now... Now you really don't have to do this." Robert stammered out as Rarity, in full fashionista mode, measured him up for clothing. To be honest, he was always uncomfortable about shopping for new clothes, or shopping in general really. In and out the store as quickly as possible it was for him. It wasn't something he could really explain or put his finger on, maybe it was because shopping required him to be around people and he wasn't that much of a people person as you might have figured out. Whatever the case, he was grateful Syd and Z always went out and did the shopping for him, knowing he wasn't likely to go out and do it himself. At this, he felt guilty for one of the first times in his life. He'd always been so rude to the both of them, and it never really bothered him before, and why it was bothering him now he wasn't quite sure.

"Hey, Rob, you caught this guy yet?"

"Actually yes, I'm bringing him in right now in a confinement card."

"Well, no need to get sarcastic with me. Need a hand? Me and Syd are nearby. Just got back from... Ugh, shopping. Syd here pretty much spent all her monthly allowance in one go."

"Funny thing, you shopping, coming from a former clothing thief. The kind I was supposed to catch."

"See, this is why I don't really like you. You go off all alone, with this lone wolf attitude, and are constantly disrespecting your teammates. Keep this up, and you might just get kicked off the team. You're not the first Green Ranger to get bumped back to a lower squad."

"BAH! I can handle myself Z. Didn't I prove that when that moron... Oh, I don't remember his name... Used to work for Broodwing and had a giant robot escaped custody and I caught him by myself?"

"Suit yourself."

Robert felt even more guilt hit him when he remembered his last conversation with Z, essentially blowing her off. God above, it couldn't be that "Magic of Friendship" thing he overheard Sunset mention while he was on the Animarium, could it?

"No, that's not it..." Robert mused to himself. "No, no, no, that's just plain ludicrous. Bloody ludicrous. Never really was friends with any of the team, aside from Bridge. They were all at least a decade younger than me, so I never really... clicked. It was always the older people I got along with better, like Kat and Cruger, despite how many arguments I got into with him and received enough repremands to fill a lorry. I don't know why Cruger kept me around instead of throwing me out on my arse like I should rightly should have been."

"No, I insist darling!" Rarity refuted as tape measures all around levitated themselves in the air, Robert being unfazed by all of this, as he'd seen magic before in NewTech City. "You really look rather horrid in just a pair of pants, which reek of sweat by the way, and generally look like you've been living off the street or in a jungle somewhere."

"Well, she's not far off..." Robert mused to himself with a noticeable chuckle. As soon as Rarity finished measuring him, she smiled.

"Okay, I think I've got the perfect clothes for you. Now, you go over to my husband and-"

"Wait, wait wait." Robert piped up. "How do you know what I want?"

"I just do darling. I have a sense about these sort of things, about what best suits the customer, and besides, there's that old human phrase never look a gift horse in the mouth right?"

"True enough." Robert admitted, forced to concede Rarity's point. "But nothing too flashy or over the top okay? I don't want to look like Elton John, or God above, Liberace." Robert said with a shudder. Despite Rarity being confused by the names, she got the general point.

"Welllll.... The customer is always right I suppose." She replied and gave him a smile all the while sending a mental thought to her husband which said "If he's dangerous, then I must be Nightmare Moon!" and went over to her supply closet of fabrics, threads and stitching equipment and set to work as Zephyr led him over to another chair.

"Oh my my, we have got some work to do don't we? That hair, far too long. I agree with Rarity, you do look like you've been living out in a jungle for weeks on end. That hairstyle, absolutely frightening." The green pony said with a shudder before he took out his haircutting equipment, a trimmer and a pair of scissors and began to cut off sections of Robert's now very long locks. "Celestia above, this may be my most difficult challenge yet! But never fear, I always prevail in the end!"

Fluttershy smiled to herself. Before she and her good friend Rainbow Dash knocked some sense into him some years back, her brother could never succeed at anything and always thought himself a failure, and left any work given to him to others to do. It was quite a pleasant change really, and an even more pleasant one when Zephyr began to become less obnoxious just to make himself look more like a gentle stallion just for Rarity. At first, it was just a mask, but then he BECAME the mask and became a nicer stallion in the process. He'd even apologized to Rainbow for hitting on her all those years and apologized for his parents for becoming the thing that just would not leave and being an overall problem for them to deal with.

"You know, you really need to think up a new phrasing for that expression 'round me. Not such a wunderbare pony around me, she is." Robert commented in an offhand manner, rubbing his cheek where Celestia had slapped him.

"Nonsense, she's a kind pony to everypony!"

"Not when it comes to humans, it seems." Robert put in, trying to be as polite as possible. "Or haven't you been noticing the town's general reaction to me?"

"Ah... Oh, yes... That." Zephyr admitted with a blush, even as he continued cutting and shaving off Robert's beard and hair. "I did kinda notice that. Ponies are naturally afraid of what they don't understand. Griffins, head to the hills. Zebras, run into one's home, shut out the lights and lock the doors. You get the idea."

"I believe the correct term is xenophobic, am I right?" Robert commented, and it was noticeable that everypony in the room had a look of shame about them. It was about then two Alicorns, one Robert recognized by her face and mane style even if she was wearing a golden tiara with a red gem set in it and wearing a yellow and red dress with the setting sun on it, and the second Alicorn Robert didn't know but she had dark blue and violet hair along with lavender fur and wings and wore what looked to be the attire of a librarian, glasses and all. It was rather cute to be honest. However, that entire ensemble was ruined by the look on her face, one of a mix of disgust and fear that Robert knew all too well. It was the exact same Princess Dick-With-Wings-And-Horn wore. Sunset summed up the situation best with one single word.

"...Awkward..."

Canterlot Royal Guard Barracks: Training Grounds

Shining Armor swung his sword and chopped a dummy in half, splitting it straight down the middle in a complete bifurcation. To be honest, smashing up training dummies was the only thing that made sense nowadays, what with how weird everything had gotten over the past few weeks. Firstly, a human appearing after over 2,000 years, and then Celestia restraining that human and nearly killing him. It then only got weirder from there. The human, as it turned out, seemed to have no knowledge that this was a future version of his home planet and was a law enforcement officer for some organization known as SPD, and a Power Ranger to boot. Oddest of all, Shining actually found himself liking the human, which was really strange as he'd only met him for a few minutes at max.

What's wrong with me? I should, by all rights hate the guy, if Celestia's history of humans is correct, they did nothing but rape and murder ponies, but then again, history is generally written by the victors, so no telling who's right or wrong in this case, and Celestia is clearly biased. I've never seen her like this. She's always been so kind and wise to everypony. But then again... everypony has skeletons in their closet. And Robert might just have a few of his own. I just don't know enough about the guy to be sure. But... As my father always said "Innocent until proven guilty, son. Innocent until proven guilty." Shining mused as he made a wide swing with his sword and decapitated two dummies.

Suddenly, he felt footfalls behind him. Shining whirled around and pointed his sword in the direction of the sound, but nopony was there.

"Alright, if this is a joke, it's not funny!" Shining shouted to whoever was around. No answer came.

Then, the footfalls started up again from behind him and Shining turned to face their user. In front of him was a dark grey armored figure, with a green gem in the center of his chest armor and gold detailing on his shoulder pauldrons and belt, and had a visor on his helmet with two golden bull like horns on either side of the helmet itself along with a red flowing cape attached to his armor. Weirdly enough, Shining could see right through the man, if that's what he really was under the armor.

"Having trouble figuring out what's right and what's wrong? I was like you once." The figure said.

"Discord, if this is one of your jokes, I'm not laughing!" Shining shouted, and half-expected for the King of Chaos to appear and begin laughing his head off. For some reason, Shining was a major target of his pranks, Discord's reasoning being him always being so stuffy and needing to lighten up.

"No, you misunderstand. I am not a trick nor an illusion of that chaos spirit. I am as real as you are. My name is the Magna Defender, a protector of the innocent just like you. Or I was. Sit down for a minute, and hear my story." The newly named Magna Defender said, and for whatever reason, Shining found himself sitting down on a nearby box.

"Okay, that's better. Now, it all began thousands upon thousands of years ago. I was a warrior of justice, defending those who could not defend themselves. I was arrogant, believing nothing could stop me. And it was true, nothing could. Together, me and my Torozord were the perfect team. Life was like an adventure to me." The Defender began, and Shining somehow, in some mysterious way had the whole world change around him. He saw the Defender battling many foes, and enjoying himself all the while as he either used his sword to cut them down or a strange rifle weapon to blast them. From various monsters that were indescribable in description to Shining to giant beasts that ravaged cities, the Defender fought them all, in both his normal form and combined together riding atop the Torozord, a giant grey bull with golden horns and hooves and a small green gem in the center of it's forehead.

"But as the old story always goes, I met a girl, Syrian was her species, and fell in love. She taught me to be wiser, and less arrogant. I no longer took life for granted as I once did. In a way I suppose, I became even better than I was before. It wasn't long before we had a child together, Zika we called him and I was forced to grow up and mature. It was good for the first few years of his life, me training him to become my successor." The Defender said, as he showed Shining a series of images, from a dog like creature giving birth to a mixture of a human and a wolf to that very same child growing older, and training alongside his father in a similar, but different set of armor. They sparred, matching each other's moves perfecting, and Zika threw tiny kunai knives at trees to improve his aim.

"But that's when Scorpius and his forces invaded my homeworld." The Defender stated grimly, his voice taking on a sadder tone. Shining suddenly had a very bad feeling about where this story was going. He found himself in the middle of a battle field, a tan, black and yellow spider like creature leading forces of evil into battle, but the Magna Defender was there, rifle in hand, ready to defend his homeworld.

"I fought them off bravely, but Scorpius, the crafty and clever bastard he was, used my son, MY SON as a shield to prevent me from attacking any further. Scorpius... He... He killed him right in front of me!" And then Shining saw it, Zika rushing forwards to protect his father, and getting cut down by powerful blasts of yellow lightning much to the Magna Defender's horror, and then, a shark like creature, along with another similar looking one only different in facial color threw the dead body of the Magna Defender's wife in front of him, as if to rub salt in the wound.

"I became fantically obsessed with revenge against the creature. I fought every general he had and eventually on the jungle planet Mirinoi, I found his most loyal of generals, Treacheron." There was a series of images, from the Defender blowing up any of Scorpius's bases he could find, to viciously, without mercy cutting down powerful looking foes. Then, Shining saw on a jungle planet, the Magna Defender fighting a white armored being with a blue face and a samurai motif, in a vicious battle to the death before Treacheron carved an abyss into the ground and let the Defender fall in.

"We fought an epic battle, but I was gravely wounded and sent tumbling into an abyss where I lingered for the next 3,000 years." The Defender continued. "Can you only imagine the hell I spent trapped in that abyss, knowing I could never get out?"

Shining couldn't, and the Magna Defender knew it.

"But then, by pure chance, another man fell into the abyss with me, and I merged with his spirit to fight in the present day on the roaming space colony of Terra Venture." Here, Shining saw a giant tower that was topped off by a bubble with a city inside it with multiple limbs stretching out with various landscapes inside domes, floating through the cold cruel blackness of space, all the while being pursued by a black and gold scorpion like ship. "Mike, he was called and the brother of the current Red Ranger. Despite our common foe in Scorpius, I wouldn't help the Rangers because of my obsession. I was even willing to put innocent lives in danger, how far I had fallen." The Defender said sadly and then, when the Scorpion Stinger sprung a leak, it stopped above Terra Venture's mountain dome to draw power away from it. "It all came to a head when I created a volcano to destroy Terra Venture and Scorpius's ship along with it, not even thinking about the innocent lives that would have been lost. But something miraculous happened then. I realized how far I had fallen, and set out to correct my mistakes. I had a vision as I climbed up the fiery pits of Hell itself, much like Frodo Baggins did in the human book "The Return of the King". I saw my son, telling me he believed in me and that there was still some good left in my heart." Here, Shining saw the Defender, his chest gem cracked, crawling up a firey mountainside but no matter how hard it got, he never gave up, whispering "Yes, Zika... I believe" over and over again like a mantra. No matter how hard it got, he wouldn't give up.

"And you know what, I believed in it as well. I sacrificed myself to stop the madness of my own making, and in the process gave the Red Ranger his brother back." The Defender continued as Shining saw the Magna Defender turn himself into a ball of blue light and jump into the volcano, even with his Torozord trying to stop him. "It was my redemption day."

"But the story of the Magna Defender doesn't end there. When Mike was searching for his destiny and all of the Rangers except his brother were captured by a monster, I appeared before him, just like I appeared before you now and passed on my powers. He would be the Magna Defender and carry on my legacy. And carry it on he did. He fought many brave battles, but eventually, he was forced to sacrifice them to help Terra Venture escape the area in space known as the Lost Galaxy." There, Shining saw Mike's various battles from him going into his first battle as the Magna Defender and defeating Skelecron, to him and the Space Rangers fighting the Psycho Rangers which were five bat armored like warriors in twisted copies of the Ranger suits with nothing but darkness in their hearts and then he saw a series of images of Mike, unmorphed leading trapped slaves of the vile space pirate Captain Mutiny to freedom on a desolate, but wealth ridden planet, to finally Mike in the Defender Torozord holding open a space portal for Terra Venture to escape through with the end result being the Torozord's destruction.

"But my powers will never fade. And now, I pass them on to you. You will carry on the work we began."

Suddenly, a sword, black with gold trimmings, two bull like horns jutting out from it and a green gem in its center appeared in Shining's hands to replace his own and two bracers appeared on Shining's wrists.

"My armor, along with the Torozord is now yours. Use them well, and use them wisely. This is your destiny now." The Magna Defender said before vanishing away, leaving no trace as if he was ever there.

Ponyville: Carousel Boutique

"Crikey Moses, I just seem to keep on meeting more and more ponies who want my head on a stake, don't I?" Robert commented in a mock cheerful tone of voice even as Zephyr continued his work. Rarity meanwhile, had stopped working on Robert's outfit and sighed to herself. This was going to be ugly, she could tell already. Sunset meanwhile was preparing her magic to step in if needed and her horn glowed with a light green aura. Twilight as well was charging up her magic, though for a very different reason altogether.

"What are you doing here?" Twilight growled out. Robert's eyes widened. He knew that voice, but kept calm. No sense in getting mad and things going right to shit for him.

"Getting my hair cut and a new outfit, can't think of any other reason why I'd be here." Robert said lightly.

"I can..." Twilight snarled. "You just want to rape Rarity, skin her husband alive and do a bunch of other horrible things."

"Listen, I can tell by your attire you're a librarian, so that must mean you're a smart mare and so go ahead and use that brain of yours and think about it, if I wanted to do that, I could have done it already, and besides, I'm not nearly stupid enough to take on someone who could fry me with her magic, not counting the two others in the room." Robert refuted.

"How do I know you don't have magic yourself?" Twilight asked sarcastically and Robert then decided to drop all pretenses of politeness.

"Newsflash, if you're really Celestia's little pet poodle you'd know humans don't have a drop of magic in their entire body. So I couldn't possibly use what I don't have, now could I?" Robert remarked, deliberately leaving out the part about the Chi energy he had stored in his body to unleash his animal spirit. Twilight was really furious now, she'd been insulted on her intelligence multiple times by this man who shouldn't be even alive right now, or at the very least locked in the deepest dungeon she could find. It was only thanks to Sunset holding her back that she didn't go absolutely ballistic on Robert right now.

"Funny, you being the Princess of Friendship and all, thought you'd be more... Oh, I don't know, friendly." Robert remarked dryly. Twilight then turned on her heels and walked right out the door with a huff having had enough of being insulted leaving a very awkward silence indeed with only Robert breaking it.

"...Well, I'd say we got off on the right hoof quite well don't you think?" He asked cheerily.

Sunset could only facepalm and look skywards.

Canterlot Royal Guard Barracks: Training Grounds

Shining, still stunned by the powers he'd been given, thought over his new situation. He'd been given a great responsibility to care for powers that had been passed down over thousands of years and use them to fight for justice. But the problem was, how could he balance his time leading the Crystal Guard (Which Shining noted he still hadn't been sent back to, by the way) and spending his time with his wife with defending Equus as a Power Ranger? Of course, the choice would have to be made later, as Shining soon found out when an explosion came from the other side of the city.

"Guess I'll have to think on this later."

Shining flicked one of his bracers and a key popped out and he plugged it into the other after throwing his newfound sword into the air, knowing to do so by the knowledge he'd gained from the power transfer and shouted out two words that had not been heard in thousands of years.

"Magna Power!"

(To Be Continued...)

Author's Notes:

Okay, so now Shining's become the Magna Defender and the official sixth Ranger of the team... Which means Robert will be the last to get his powers, but trust me it'll be awesome when he finally does. Now what that means, is unlike Zen-Aku and Galaxy Swirls, he will appear to help the Rangers in every battle if he can or his Princely duties don't get in his way. (Boy, how's he going to break this to Cadence eh?) Also, Robert gets his first official introduction to Twilight Sparkle, and handles the greeting in his own way... That is, like a jackass. (Thanks to HawkerHurricane for the suggestion of Robert calling her Celestia's little pet poodle) Seriously, if he handled the meeting better he might actually have another powerful ally and loyal friend. Originally, I was going to have Spike here as well, but I couldn't figure out how to fit him in and give him any sort of role for this chapter. Also, you may have noticed the Lost Galaxy Theme in pace of the GaoRanger one. I decided to put that in for obvious reasons, and chapter six's opening them has been changed to the Dino Charge one. Anyways, next time, the Magna Defender makes his debut and Vapor's backstory... finally revealed!

(Edit: Added a few extra lines to the Magna Defender's story and showed images of his and Mike's tales to Shining along with cutting all but the lines of the flashback to the first chapter on Villain's advice.