Afterburn: Part I
Arc 1: Illusions
Chapter I: The Dawn of Doom
By: mrbeans
Beta read by: El Queso de Maliscioso
Hello everyone and welcome to my new major fic series. I've been working on this chapter for months now and I'm so glad it's finally ready to release. This takes place post-series about a month or 2 after. It also assumes that "Things Change" never happened.
Without further ado, I present Afterburn: Part I
Malchior stood atop the ruined remains of a building, looking out at the cold red sunrise. He looked to his side, where his boss stood.
"Everything is going acording to plan" said Malchior.
"Indeed it is" said his master "But there is one last piece of the puzzle to assemble. The other Titans must be eliminated before we can truly consider ourselves to be victorious. You know what to do."
The dragon smiled and flew down from the building, off to his library to find the perfect seed to plant.
The mysterious master looked out across the horizon. "Look out Titans, your counterparts stood no chance against me and neither do you."
-
A dimension away the Titans were persuing Dr. Light, who apparently had a hard time with learning that he could never win.
"I shall be victorious!" said Light "Sooner or later you will see the light!" he shot a blast of energy at Raven, who simply deflected it with an energy shield.
Robin activated his staff and lunged at Dr. Light. The goateed villain pulled out a sword made of light and cut through the staff with ease. He swung at Robin several times but he dodged every attempt..
Cyborg flew through the air and power punched Dr. Light in the side. This sent him flying into a nearby wall. Somehow, however, he was able to get up.
Starfire, seeing that her friends could use some help, tried firing a barrage of starbolts at the villain, but he deflected them with a shield of light energy.
Light pulled out a large bazooka cannon and took aim at Raven. Seeing this, Beast Boy leapt forward, morphed into a crocodile and landed atop Dr. Light, knocking the cannon from his hands. The villain reached for something on his belt but was stopped by Raven who surrounded him in black energy.
The police, seeing it was their turn to do something; rushed in, cuffed Dr. Light, and put him into a prison bound van.
"All right! Bad guy caught, time for PIZZA" exclaimed Cyborg
"Glorious" called Starfire exuberantly. "This time we must get a pizza with mustard!"
"Dudes!" said Beast Boy "I was promised a tofu pizza when I won the 'drink-the-most-root-beer' contest!"
"Not if I get there first" said Cyborg, with a grin.
The two launched off for the pizza shop while Starfire, Raven and Robin walked, experiencing a rare moment of perfect mental synchronization, as all three rolled their eyes.
Raven had some time with her thoughts as she walked behind Robin and Starfire who were 'busy'.
Raven gazed up ahead at Cyborg and BB. "Why him?" she thought, continuing to look at the green shapeshifter.
Her serenity, however, was shattered as they reached the pizza shop.
"I won!" exclaimed Beast Boy
Cyborg sat in a huff. "Cheetahs are cheating" he said angrily
"You didn't say they were" said BB, attempting to rub his victory in the half robot's face.
The team entered the shop and sat down at their usual table on the balcony. The pizzas were brought shortly thereafter, as they were well known and such were there pizza preferences. One was tofu, another Canadian bacon and pineapple.
"Hey Raven" said Beast Boy picking up a piece of tofu pizza and holding it in front of Rae's face "You know you wanna try some" he drawled, waggling his eyebrows.
Raven took the piece of pizza and held it ,inverted, at arm's length. She stared at it a minute before plucking a piece of tofu off and eating it. Her eyes widened "It's...good" she said, surprised.
"Really?" asked BB, completely flabbergasted
"No" replied Raven in a blunt monotone.
In response to this, Beast Boy put on the face everyone makes when they have been comicly fooled.
After this little exchange, the Titans continued to eat their pizza in silence. The rest of the meal was basically uneventful.
"Raven..." said a voice in Raven's head as she picked up some of the other pizza.
"What the? Who are you?" asked Raven, quite shocked, but showing nothing of the sort on her face.
"That is not important, you must check the Aleirian Book..." the voice died away.
"Wait!" yelled Raven in her head "Why the Aleirian Book? What do I look for?" But the voice was gone. Raven put her attention on conuming her pizza as fast as possible, without looking suspiscious, so she could get back to the tower.
Finally finishing their meal, the Titans paid for their food and made their way back to the tower.
Each team member began to head for their rooms. Raven, being in the greatest hurry, rushed to hers. Upon arrival, she sealed the door behind her, bolting to the book shelf.
She searched through every book she could get her hands on, until she found the one she was looking for.
It was an old leather bound book, the words 'Aleirian Chronicles' pressed in black swooping script. Before Raven could open it, it burst from her grip and did so on its own, flipping to a particular page.
She gazed at the page. It read as so:
In the ninth dimension on Urnan lives a legend of a terrible power, said to live deep in the mountains.
This power, is said to be a mythical dragon. This dragon, whose name has never been discovered, was said to have created a gem of disastrous, destructive power.
It supposedly, if used, opens a portal to the endless void that consumes all around it and throws them into eternal blackness. A spell is said to be the only means of reversing it's destruction. To cast this magic one must only say, "Orion Calzar Elcoume."
Beware, the actual effects have never been tested.
The validity of this curse and it's bane rest ,for now, in legend.
Raven closed the book, attempting to absorb what she had read. She placed the book under her bed and went to sleep, only to fall into twisted dreams of portals and dark spells. These nightmares of course were nothing compared to the horrors that would soon come into play.
---
The next day reeked of false hope, the skys were sunny, but a storm was moving in and promising rain. Beast Boy and Cyborg naturally had been drawn into another meat vs. tofu battle.
"No way man!" yelled Cyborg "You're the only one who likes that stuff!"
"It's better than meat!" parried Beast Boy.
"Friends" said Starfire, attempting to stop the boys from fighting "Can we not simply cook both?"
"NO!" yelled BB and Cyborg simultaneously.
During all of this, Robin was sitting at the computer, attempting to find a criminal. To his secret pleasure, he soon got his wish, as the alarm sounded.
"Titans, GO!" yelled Robin, shouting his trademark battle cry.
The team rushed off to the city as it began to rain. Sheets of water gushed onto the T-car making navigation extremely difficult even with the car's advancements.
"Can't you go any faster?" asked Robin, becoming worried that they'd miss the villain.
"I'm going as fast as I can, but I can hardly see in this rain!" shouted Cyborg, nearly swerving his visibility was so low.
"Dude!" yelled Beast Boy as a shape appeared ahead of them.
Cyborg jammed the wheel to the side and the car screached to a halt just before colliding with the person.
Robin quickly exited the car to help but stopped at what he saw. The other Titans joined him and, except for Cyborg who didn't recognize the figure instantly, froze and gasped in near unison.
"Hey Robin, what gives?" asked Cyborg. Suddenly realizing who laid before them, he also froze.
Leaning against the car, at the brink of unconciousness was Slade. He was dressed differently, though. In place of Black on his costume was blue and in place of copper was white.
He leaned up and looked directly at Raven.
"You" He said weakly "You must help me"
With his energy drained he collapsed onto the ground.
"So now what?" asked Beast Boy, eyeing the form with a mixture of confusion and apprehension.
Robin sat there for a moment, struggling with his own concience. After a moment, he spoke "We bring him back to the tower"
My first Major fic. I tried to be as detailed as I could be. Read and Review.
-mrbeans