Teen Titans – Interview Series
A Teen Titans FanFiction
Interviewer: Hello, readers. I must say that after reading a few other fics of interviews, I missed doing these! So, I decided to do another.
Here with me today, of course, the best way to start a series of interviews, filled with rantings and ramblings, starting out in both my last interview series, and 'To The Fans'! Of course, it's Raven! … Now, Raven, remember, just act like this is a real face-to-face interview, and things should go smoothly… Now…
Raven: Why are you listening to Linkin Park? It's distracting.
Interviewer: … Why? Do you dislike Linkin Park?
Raven: … Actually, the lyrics are depressing. So keep it playing.
Interviewer: Okay…
Next question, now, we'll start from the beginning of your highly obsessed-over cartoon series, Teen Titans. The first issue I want to ask you about is the episode Deep Six, featuring Aqualad. It features an ego battle between Beast Boy and Aqualad, and something very, might I say, out of character for you. Almost any time around him, you went all… Googley eyed? Hearts flying above your head? Is this true, or was it a writer slip-up?
Raven: What? Do you think I'd go all… lovey dovey over a fishman in blue tights? They did it for publicity, obviously. Next question.
Interviewer: Ouch… That had to hurt. Heheh… Oh, Right.
What's your real name?
Raven: It's Raven. What else would it be?
Interviewer: Well, according to your comic book counterpart's official 'identity', your name is 'Rachel Roth'.
Raven: What…? Rachel? That's seriously not right. … Did you say comic book counterpart?
Interviewer: Yes? Why?
Raven: … Is Terra in it?
Interviewer: … Uh… I'm going to go out on a limb and say that… Beast Boy reads comic books?
Raven: What? I don't know if he does or not. I'm not the peeking type.
Interviewer: Oh. … Peeking? Did you peek at what he was reading?
Raven: No. Why would I?
(Note to self: Try not to show inner bias towards BB/Rae when sitting in front of her face.)
Interviewer: Nevermind, that was unjust. Now, next question…
The next big boom is in Season 2, and is kinda related to the last question, in fact. Terra. I saw the hate you had towards her, but… I also saw a bit of jealousy there. Writing error, or no?
Raven: They wrote me as jealous? I already told you, emotions don't control me. I control them. That's why my powers aren't turning over ever car in Jump City right now.
Interviewer: Oh. Well, now… like any popular TV Show, there are those that pair up characters of the show. Robin and Starfire, Robin and you, You and Beast Boy, him and Terra, all those… All those are the most popular in the fanbase. Any comments towards any of the pairings listed?
Raven: … Okay, I have to start by saying the idea of me and Robin is ridiculous.
Interviewer: Why? You and him had an arguably intimate set of discussions in Season Four, and also he was the one-
Raven: Season 4?
Interviewer: Oh, right, cartoon character, not fellow role-playing fan… Hmm… uh… birthday?
Raven: 16th?
Interviewer: Yes.
Raven: Oh, that. Right, well, it wasn't anything. I had been in his mind before, which was really the only connection we had. There's nothing. Oh… wait… Was there any hugs between and him in… uh… Season… 5?
Interviewer: 4, and yes, there were.
Raven: Oh. When I was wearing white, by chance?
Interviewer: Yeah- I mean, Yes.
Raven: … Oh. Well, about that… It was a… ahem… 'Gratitude' hug. … Like, it wasn't anything. I mean, I feel sorry for the people these… well… people that want me and Robin together… know in real life. I mean, if a girl is really excited because the guy got her tickets to a sold-out Avril Lavigne concert and hugs him, he'll think she's in love with him. I mean, Sheesh…
Interviewer: Ouch… Rob/Rae shippers… No love in Raven's city for you.
Raven: What?
Interviewer: Nothing… Now, what about BB/You?
Raven: Unrealistic.
Interviewer: I hate to poke… but… then why do you constantly match his stale humor with your flat-toned sarcasm?
Raven: I don't. Whatever gave you that idea?
Interviewer: … The show.
Raven: That must have been wrong too, just like that Aqualad thing.
Interviewer: Raven… we can't blame it all on the show, you know. It made you, after all.
Raven: Wrong. I was born on Azarath, to my mother. I wasn't born by a ton of Beverly Hills writers and producers that wanted to make money and have fun.
Interviewer: I'm sorry to enforce this… But you're a piece of fiction, dear. This is a sort of a novel, and just like in the cartoon, you're a character.
Raven: I can't believe this… Mr… Whoever you are… If they made a cartoon about you, would that mean you weren't real?
Interviewer: Well, when I go in the major cities in California, I don't see a giant T sitting in the middle of the bay, so I'll have to say that's not the same thing. If I already exist, and they made a cartoon about me, it still means I exist. You, however… you didn't exist, they made a cartoon with you in it, and you still don't exist outside the cartoon. And outside people's imaginations. And now that I say that… I have a pretty interactive imagination…
Raven: You're not in control here.
Interviewer: I'm writing you, aren't I?
Raven: Hm… Okay… Let's see… Time to quiz you.
Interviewer: Ok, what?
Raven: What's Robin's real eye color?
Interviewer: Well, when I was researching on TV dot com for what height Robin is, I found them saying this eyes are blue.
Raven: Damn it… What's Starfire's real name?
Interviewer: Koriand'r. Got that from the comics.
Raven: … Gah… What's… Wait… How tall is Robin?
Interviewer: I didn't find that in the topic. People were being morons and ignoring the question.
Raven: … 5 feet 5 and a half inches. Beast Boy is 5 foot 3 and 3 quarter inches tall. I'm 5 feet 6. Starfire is 5 foot 8. Cyborg is 6 feet 3 and 1 eighteenth inches.
Interviewer: … Whoa… Ok… How did you know that?
Raven: Fiction, hm? There's a street they named after one of us in southern California. Huntington Beach, I presume. It's named either 'Raven Ln', 'Starfire Ln', or 'Beast Boy Ln'. Go look it up readers.
Interviewer: … I'm not even going to bother, since the idea of a cartoon character having a REAL street named after them is ridiculous. This was my interview, but now I'll stop and submit it to the site. More to come… if…
Raven: The others aren't coming.
Interviewer: Why aren't the others coming on?
Raven: We have better things to do then be interviewed by a cartoon fan with his head up his-
…
…
…
"What's going on?" a voice shouted in desperation, in a thick blackness. Beside him, but unknown to him, stood Raven. The lights in the interviewing room cut back on. As he looked to his left and spotted Raven, he shouted out like a man seeing a real ghost.
"You? You're not real!!!" he shouted, backing away in shock.
"I told you," Raven muttered, glaring at him.
"How? Why? What am I doing-… This is a dream. I probably went to bed early, and dreamt this up… It must have been while I was watching Heroes… that would make sense… dream about the Teen Titans…" he mumbled, turning around, as Raven raised a brow, "Haha… Linkin Park… I stopped listening to that ages ago. It must have been that friend on Xbox Live asking me if I liked the band, then playing some music over his low-quality microphone… Yeah…"
"Uh, Hello? I'm still here," Raven muttered, "Now are we going to continue this interview or not?"
Suddenly, the door nearby opened, and in walked a man that was much older, better dressed, and had a bunch of papers in his left hand.
"Uh, sorry I'm late," he muttered, apparently being the real interviewer, but he turned to see the teenage guy standing there dumbfounded and stared at him in confusion, "Who is this?"
"You're the interviewer?" Raven asked, glancing from the young teen back to the real interviewer.
TEEN TITANS
Leaving Reality
A Teen Titans One-Shot
"Get lost, kid! I know you want to see the Titans, but it's not gonna happen, alright? Now… just… go home!" the security guard shouted over the pounding rain, as they pushed the teen out the entrance, locked the doors back, and walked back in. As the teen rushed to another storefront with a canvas and some wet café chairs that were very empty, he rushed in and sat down. He looked around at the high-rises, shivering from the cold rain, as people passed by on the street and cars swerved around.
The closest he had ever been to a city was Greensboro, the city he was from. And Charlotte to vision his cousins, but nothing like this. It felt surreal, just like any first time in the big city.
But as he turned back to the front entrance of that place, he was still left with a profound sense of a separation from reality.
Raven. A living, breathing, existent Raven, in that building he just got booted from. He was in Jump City. He was a part of it. And it wasn't a flat landscape like Paper Mario. The people passing by were as real as back where he lived. The cars driving by were real. Everything was 3D, moving, breathing, existing. But yet, he felt like he could reach out and touch the people walking by, and his hand would go through them, just like a simulation. He did just that, dripping wet, looking miserable, and reached out into the crowd.
Suddenly, a man passing by put something in his hand, stared at him, and smiled.
As the man walked off, he whispered, "You're welcome," and disappeared into the crowd of city-goers. He brought his hand back towards him, and in his hand was a 100-dollar bill, and a 50-dollar bill.
He stared, looked around, and right before deciding to call a taxi, he spotted Raven leaving the place.
He jumped up in a hurry, nearly knocking the white chair over, and quickly dashed up to her.
"Please, please, I need your help," he begged her, as she looked at him with little acknowledgement of his dilemma, and simply tried to get some words out, but couldn't in time before he said more.
"I don't know how I got here, I'm from some other reality, please, I need your help!" he said louder and louder, as finally she replied.
"I… I have to go," she said in her usual monotone, which was much more hard-hitting and depressing than he ever could have heard on a TV screen.
As suddenly all he had in front of him was a whoosh of air, he looked back down the street to see her swooped off into the sky. As bystanders looked up, and a camera flash or two went off, he looked at where she was flying off in exasperation.
Then, through the hazy rain, he spotted it. He was looking down the same street from the flying SaikoTek scene in the beginning of the Tokyo movie.
He simply stared, the sun coming out from the clouds behind… the T itself, towering over the bay. The reflections of all the glass and metal on the front of the tower was stunning from this far away, especially when the sun came out and suddenly started shining on it.
He looked at it in complete awe, soaking wet, as others walked on past. Another camera flash came next, presumably tourists taking pictures of the beautiful site, and suddenly he heard a male voice talking next to him. It was a college-age teen, looking up at the tower too.
"So, you're not from around here? Heh… I could tell because the way you looked at the tower. It's been there for 5 years, and- See all these people?" he began, pointing around, as the teen listened, "They're used to it. But every time I see that giant T shine… it's like nothing else. It's like they're meant to watch over us, y'know? Like Angels… only… less religious and more… here."
"So, Tom DeLores, nice to meet you," he said friendlily, holding out his hand for a handshake. The teen shook his hand, and muttered back.
"John Randall. And yeah… it's… my first time… here…" he muttered, as Tom smirked.
"So… got a hotel to stay at?" he asked, as John shook his head.
"No… I'm… uh… well… broke and homeless. My friend took me here from… New York… and yeah, he ditched me here, and I paid for the flight… so now I'm broke," he explained, trying to make up some story, since saying he was from another reality entirely where this city didn't exist… wouldn't be too credible. And if it didn't work on someone like Raven… well, honestly… he didn't know anymore. Raven was a lot more understandable as a cartoon character.
"Well… not to be… weird, or anything… but, if you need a place to crash, I've got a perfectly good guest room until you get back on your feet…" he muttered, as John smirked.
"That would be great," he replied, as they both walked off.
As he got situated in the new guest bedroom, he looked out the window to see an amazing sight only seeable in big cities. All those little bitty 1 or 2-story buildings that his town was mostly made up of… had nothing to compare to this. He was used to looking out from the 1-story window of his parent's house and seeing the land and the streets in his neighborhood. In the 2nd-story he was used to seeing if his friends were out playing football down the street, or checking to see if a car was coming by.
But he was way high, overlooking several high-rises below. It felt surreal, and made him happy he got over his fear of heights at around 10… well, to where he could stand there in that room without feeling weak-kneed.
He walked over to the bed, and relaxed, taking a deep elated breath. He leaned up, his back sore for some reason, and noticed a TV sitting there, off. He got up, looked over, and turned it on. It was on a news channel, completely unfamiliar with him. Across the state he lived in, TV stations were different, of course, so this wasn't an unfamiliar situation… just an unfamiliar news station.
"And, now we give you silence…" the newsman said, as total silence was held for several minutes, causing John to stare in confusion.
"The 5 killed in Gotham City, 2 of them police, has devastated the country, but it is only so hard-hitting because of… who was supposed to be a real hero, … Batman," the newsman began dramatically, causing John to stare wide-eyed at the TV screen, "apparently killed those men, and is now officially on the run from police."
John, back in his reality, had just re-watched a few Joker clips from the latest movie days ago on You-Tube, mainly because of the fact the actor playing the Joker, Heath Ledger, had died. He also had seen the movie in theatres, and now he was sitting down on a bed in a city that formerly didn't exist, where 5 citizens protecting that city were formerly cartoon characters, and watching a news station that described events that he formerly watched in a Hollywood movie.
It felt so unreal. It felt so… live. As the more and more he watched, the more and more he hoped it was a dream, but at the same time… he hoped it wasn't.
As he sat back, and next was breaking news of a robbery in downtown Jump City, thwarted by none other than the Teen Titans themselves. Later that night, as Tom informed him that he was going to sleep, 60 Minutes came on. That interview with the real reporter, that he somehow got placed in by mistake, was on now.
The last Interview that had interested him was one by Katie Couric asking John McCain and Barrack Obama about their favorite books and favorite Presidents… but this took it to new levels.
It wasn't a well-known candidate for the soon-to-be-vacated presidency, nor was it a popular celebrity, nor was it anyone in the midst of a grueling investigation, nor was it like any 60 Minutes he had ever seen before. This time, as the darkness outside became apparent, and the interviewer thanked Raven for being there with them, the city lights began to shine.
As John got up to close the curtains, he stared first down towards the Atlantic Ocean, near the coast, at an island.
An island with a giant T, with the lights on in the living room area. He thought how lucky he really was… he had seen the inside of that thing. Not in person, but in a cartoon. It was close enough.
As that fact sunk in, he lay down, and went to sleep…
Hoping it was all a dream.
He awoke the next morning, as an alarm clock was going off at 9 AM. He got up, expecting to find relief. To find he was in his bedroom, socked out, dreaming about a fanfiction. He had thought to himself before he drifted into slept, "If this is a dream, I'll make an awesome fanfic about it."
But he awoke, in the same room, the same place. He jumped up after looking around, and opened the curtains. The same window overlooking the same inexistent city sitting next to the same shiny T-shaped Tower.
He turned around, eyes bugged out, and this realization set in. This wasn't a farfetched dream. He was really in their reality, living in and breathing air that didn't exist for him 24 hours ago.
Then, his fascination went away, as he came up with an idea.
He grabbed a new set of clothes from the dresser, and rushed out the door.
As the elevator dinged and hit the first floor, he stepped out into to front doors. On his left were a crowd of women talking, and behind them was a man leaning on the wall calm and secluded.
On his right were a security guard and a man asking him for directions. He walked past them all, and stepped outside through the glass doors. The doorman was nearby talking on the cellphone, which is why he did it himself.
As he stepped outside, immediately tons of pedestrians were walking past him, on their way to whereever they were going. He walked around with the crowd, looking at different shops. Where he looked for a Kodak store, he found something else. Korat, which looked just like a Kodak store, only it had different lettering. He made his way across the street, and entered the store.
He walked up to the counter, as another customer just left with a bag of film.
"Uh, Hello… I'm looking for a digital camera that I can get for under 45 dollars… Can you help me out?" he asked, calculating 45 dollars from what he would be paying plus tax.
"Well, uh… Yep, here you go," the man at the counter said, looking under the counter and getting a box out.
"39.95, takes up to 20 pictures, and a disc and help manual is included in the package," he said, talking fast because of how many tourists would roll in here ands buy cameras.
"Sure," he muttered, and got out a 50-dollar bill. He gave it to the man, and the man got him his change and handed him the box. "Have a nice day," the man said, scooting the box over the counter to him.
He picked it up, and walked out of the store. "Ok… this way, if I ever get back… nobody calls me crazy," he muttered to himself, standing in front of the store's window, opening up the box.
He got the camera out, the CD, and the manual. He dropped the manual back in, however, and walked through the crowd, standing next to a parked black 2-door sedan and aiming for the high-rises.
He took a picture, as the camera made the lens-snap sound through its speakers. On the small built-in screen, it shows the skyscrapers and everything.
Next, he grabbed everything and winged it under his arm, except for his camera, which he held in his other hand.
He walked through the crowd to the corner, and got to the side of the street again, this time near a parked silver full-size truck. This time, he snapped 3 different shots of the street… and the Teen Titans tower, down near the bay. At least, if he ever did get back to his own reality, he would have proof… if not for anyone he told, proof to himself that he was still sane.
Suddenly, to his side, came an African-American guy, and whispered with a very raspy voice, "Hey."
This caught his attention, and he turned around to see him standing there.
"So, you like the tower, huh? I can get you inside for 100 bucks…" he muttered, but right as John was about to reply with a no, he continued, seeing his expression, "Listen, man, I'll let you give me the 100 after we look, and the Titans are across town fighting villains, so it's worth it."
John finally decided to accept, and the man muttered with that raspy voice, "Great, let's go."
After a long and awkward walk to the docks of Jump City, as dock machinery could be heard squealing and clacking nearby. There was a speedboat waiting there, which made John a bit uneasy, because honestly… He couldn't swim.
They got in the boat, and the man revved up the motor. Off they went, John feeling a bit uneasy.
Knowing what he knew from the cartoon, the Teen Titans had an 'intruder alert' system that he saw in several episodes, the 'Homecoming' one from Season 5, to list one of them.
As they finally got to the island, there was a hole in a nearby fence that was blatantly visible that far offshore.
"That's where we're going," he muttered, and parked the boat a bit up the shore.
They climbed out, John taking a stunned look around. The giant shadow of the T Tower was shading that entire side of the island. It looked so huge up-close and personal.
They walked along the shore, and the man climbed through the hole first. Next, John came through, looking back at the city in awe. It looked so big, even this far away.
"C'mon," the man whispered, and John turned and followed him and they quietly ran across the grassy hill leading up to the Tower.
They both slowly snuck up the hill, but suddenly a clanking sound could be heard, like they stepped on a piece of metal. The man in front of him looked down at his foot, and John looked too. The guy had stepped on something that was like an oval domed-shaped object about the size of a water sprinkler. Suddenly, it starting buzzing, and lifted from the ground.
"It's their training course! Get down!" the man said loudly, and pushed both him and John down on their bellies, flat on the grass.
Suddenly, a camera flash happened right above them. Then for a brief second, it paused. John began to rise up, but the man pushed him back down, and whispered, "Wait."
Next thing John knew, the thing spun around with a loud buzz, shooting out laser bullets all around them. It then turned off, and with a squeak descended back to ground level.
"Let's go," the man whispered to him, and they both stood up and began going again, John dusting the grass off his jeans.
They got up to a solid steel door near the corner of the tower, and the African-American man put his finger over a security system there, which was a number code.
"It's the only security override in this entire place… and it's the only keypad without a finger-print analyzer…" he muttered, and pressed the code.
It went in this order: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1.
With a beep, a female robotic voice said 'Security off, door opening.'.
With a surprisingly smooth slide, almost like a screen door, the door opened.
They both rushed in, John looking around more.
After a few minutes of walking down narrow concrete halls, they reached a door with a light shining under it.
John's heart was pounding, anxiousness overwhelming him. He gulped, and retained a firm grip on his 40-dollar camera.
The guy in front gripped the door handle, and whispered, excitement in his voice, "Ready?"
John simply nodded, and the man opened the door swiftly.
As they walked up, the overheard light from another room shone across the metal floors they were stepping on.
John walked past the guy and through the doorway, onto the steel floor, and looked left.
As soon as he did, he gasped, eyes wide, and whispered, "Whoa."
His heart was now racing. He walked through the doorway, rubbing his left hand along the doorway's tan-colored walls.
"It's… just like… in the toon," he whispered, as suddenly the African American guy ran past him in a big hurry, looking panicky.
"Jesus, Jesus… The lights are on! That means they took the T-Ship to get the bad guy!" he shouted, as John was trying hard to focus on him and not the green couch next to him… and the awe the entire room inspired.
"What's… What's so bad about that?" John asked.
The man gritted his teeth, looking outside, about to answer, but suddenly alarms went off. But the man didn't budge, looking outside, staring.
As the red flashes went on, John was about to ask what was wrong, but looked to his left out the huge glass windows. The T-Ship, headlights and all, with those 5 cockpits housing the Titans, were heading right towards them.
Suddenly a video screen popped up on the window, causing the guy to jump and John to take a step back with chills.
It was Cyborg, with an annoyed tone. "Yo! Who's in my hou-…"
But he paused, peering a bit at the screen.
"You again! Yo, I'm tired of you giving people tours of my house when we're not here! When we get there, you guys are in for some serious pain!" Cyborg shouted, priming his cannon.
Overheard from the background, as the African American ran right past John with little more than word, and down the staircase, was Robin.
As John hid behind the corner, he heard Robin saying, "They're civilians, Cyborg, we can't do any harm to them."
As the two began to talk, John stepped out a bit to look around some more, but revealed too much of his face. Raven had switched to her video connection, and her eyes widened a bit.
"You again?" she asked, as suddenly John turned his gaze from the yellow-wooden counters that he saw them sit at in so many episodes, to the screen, in shock.
As John took off and ran, the T-Ship got very close, enough to make the headlights light to whole room up like a spotlight would light up a house with criminals in it.
"Hold it!" Raven called out over the video's speakers, as John hurried down to the staircase. As he rounded the corner to the next set of stairs, the T-Ship hovered down and turned away to land.
One of the emotions racing through John now was how that man had ran off, even though he didn't get the 100. He was hoping to catch up with him, and not be left alone on the island without the boat to get back to shore.
As he was 2 sets of stairs away, staring at his feet going down the next one, he looked up to see Cyborg standing there looking at him.
He stumbled in surprise, fell back, and landed at Cyborg's feet. Cyborg muttered, "You're his new customer, huh?"
He jerked to his left as Raven ran up next, staring at him. "Tell Robin we found him." Raven told Cyborg, as he brought up his arm panel.
Cyborg began, "Robin, we-", but as John got up and jolted past both Raven and Cyborg, Raven grabbing at him but missing, Cyborg shouted, "-Hey!"
As John got to the last few steps, suddenly, the bar beside him peeled out and bent in front of him, held by Raven's energies. He simply hopped over it, posting himself up on his arm. He heard Raven sigh behind him, and then them giving pursuit.
He got out the door, and swiftly hit the 'close' button. The lady's voice said 'Door closed'.
As he ran down the hill, and to his right, the landed T-Ship was there, and Robin staring into the communicator asking 'Cyborg?' before spotting him.
He looked down at the fence-line and the hole in it, and spotted the boat nearby, the guy waiting on him.
Raven had used her powers to manually slide open the door, and the two gave chase again.
He looked behind him, as the guy in the boat shouted, "Run, you can make it!"
Behind him, Robin was running out by the door, about to help give chase. Raven was close behind him, running, and Cyborg a bit behind her. Starfire, about the size of a pencil's tip from his point of view, has rose up in the air to look.
As a hawk's cry could be heard, presumably Beast Boy morphing into a hawk, he reached the hole in the fence, and hurried through, a few feet from the boat. Raven ducked straight under, now even closer behind him, and Cyborg close behind, but stopped, as he couldn't fit through the hole.
Raven grabbed downwards to try to grab him again, but as she was too far away still, she jumped down on the wooden docks that he was trying to run to the boat on.
She cast her hand out, causing 4 or 5 planks in front of John to curl up to block his way. As she was a split second from grabbing him, John jumped into the water, his arms landing and grabbing to the backside of the boat. He climbed in, his inability to swim scaring him every moment of the jump, as he knew that if he didn't grab onto the boat, he would be drowning.
Now, Raven jumped off the docks and levitated over the water, staring right at the boat.
"Where's the 100?!" the man shouted. John quickly jumped in and handed him the 100-dollar bill from his pants pocket.
"Thanks, c'ya later," he said with a smirk, and pushed John overboard.
"No, I can't swim!" John shouted, but it made no difference. The man sped off laughing, as Raven looked down at where John landed.
Once she realized he really couldn't swim, she dove under to try to get him.
As John held his breath, freaking out on the inside, flailing trying to swim back up, but ultimately failing no matter how hard he moved his limbs. Suddenly, he saw a person diving down right over him, and someone's arm grabbed his upper waist, and then another wrapped around his chest. As someone pulled him up, he could already tell by the person's arms it was a girl, and could already assume who it was since if it was Starfire, the grip would be a lot tighter.
He could have been thinking about how cool it was, or that Raven was the one saving him. What did he think instead? Well, he just stared up, focused on the surface, waiting for the second he hit it so he could breath again.
"Over here!" Raven shouted, as Cyborg stood there on the docks staring, and Robin ducked under the hole in the fence to walk in.
Beast Boy was running down the hill behind him, that unmistakable voice shouted, "Did we catch them?"
As Starfire smoothly glided over the bushes to the left of the fence and landed nearby, Raven climbed up and helped drag John up on the docks.
As John was gasping for breath, soaking wet, but still gripping his camera, the Titans looked over him.
Raven was kneeled next to him, so her face was the largest in his view. Next was Cyborg towering over him, then Robin to the right of Cyborg. Starfire was floating overhead, swooping down and to Robin's direction. And Beast Boy just ran up, staring down at John, between Robin and Cyborg.
Then John leaned his head all the way back, and closed his eyes, exhausted by the whole ordeal.
"Talk about character inserts…" John muttered, still breathing deeply, but letting out a little laugh.
He was laying on the same bed that Robin did in Haunted, only no restraints.
Outside were the other team members.
"He is the same boy that was seen after your interview?" Starfire asked Raven curiously, as she nodded.
"Yep… He was saying that he was from another reality and needed to get back. I just thought he was… well… you know. Mentally ill," she replied.
"Yeah… I checked his camera, looks like if he really was from another reality, he sure wanted to document ours," Cyborg added.
"So… who wants to talk to him first?" Robin asked, peering inside, obviously a bit peeved at this happening right after their last fight.
As John was still laughing a bit, Raven walked in.
"Okay, let's make this short and easy… You said you were from another reality," she began with a very serious monotone, and he nodded, "Alright, and you need to get back. Can you describe this reality to me, at all?"
"Uh…" he began, trying not to be distracted by her awfully blatant monotone. It really did make her sound like everything she did was uninteresting and unemotional. Then again, that's a monotone.
"It's… well, a place where… this… place… is actually a cartoon," he began.
She looked to the side for a second and muttered, "That explains the interview…"
"And… uh… I can list… cities…" he began again.
"Okay, I'll let you know if one of them doesn't exist here, or something…" she said, a hint of exhaustion in her voice, as she sat down and sat back.
"Los Angeles… Seattle… Fresno… San Francisco…" he began, but suddenly Raven leaned forward and stopped him.
"Hold it. That's one right there. So… San Francisco… what state?" she asked.
"California," he simply responded, and she nodded.
"A city called San Francisco in California, and there's a… 'cartoon' about us. That should narrow it down… Anything else specific?" she continued.
"Uh… a guy with the last name of Bush just left office… and… there's a war in a country called Iraq… and there's… uh… a video game named… Halo 3. And another named… Call of Duty 4… and… uh…" he continued, but she stopped him again.
"That's good. Okay… here we go… I sure do hope you get there safely," Raven began, but John rose up, with a 'Huh?'
"I'm sending you back there," she began.
"Where's my camera?" he asked.
She rolled her eyes, turned around, and muttered sarcastically, "Sure, why not show off us real cartoon characters to all your friends?"
She walked out, but suddenly stopped. Next thing he could see, and object levitated into her hand, flying sideways.
"Here it is." She said, walking back in. She handed it to him, and he paused for a moment.
"Uh… Thanks…" he muttered. His inner guyness couldn't hold out for long, as he briefly checked her out.
But he got an idea, as she closed her eyes and focused on sending him back.
He turned on the camera, and sneakily held it up and focused it on her entire figure.
He closed his eyes tight, and took the picture, and muttered with a smirk, "Better than fanart."
"Azarath…" she began, as he stared, with one thought as she began that classic chant.
"You know… after all this… now I think… this is freaking awesome…" he thought, smirking a bit wider, and looking back at the hallway where the others were.
"Metrion," she continued, as he reached his arm out behind him, and took another picture, with him lying there and Raven beside him chanting.
He bought the camera back to himself, and held it tight to himself. Then he decided to take a souvenir. He reached over to grab a nearby decoration, but fell out of the bed, camera with him.
He grabbed Raven's cape, which was lying on the floor, in reaction, as he fell, as she completed the phrase.
"Zinthos."
Suddenly, with a flash, he was back. But not in his hometown of Greensboro, South Carolina. He was in San Francisco, on Angel Island.
He looked around, being able to picture the tower and everything, right there. He spotted the Golden Gate Bridge, and then Alcatraz. He was back, to his reality. And a huge wave of relief washed over him.
But it all returned as he jumped and spin around as he heard a voice next to him.
A monotonic voice.
"You grabbed me, didn't you?" she asked him agitatedly.
His eyes widened, realizing his mistake.
As she peered at him, and muttered one thing.
"You idiot…"
Author's Notes:
Ironically, this all is based on a dream I had a few nights ago! xD
Please review : - )
