Disclaimer: All characters belong to their respective owners and not me with some exceptions. Only this story is mine, nothing else. Please read and review. Helpful reviews welcome, really bad flames shall be ignored and/or deleted. Enjoy
Mistress of Arms
By Demonabyss
Chapter 1: Through the Looking glass
It was quiet that night. The only sounds were that of the wind and the light breathing of the girl in the room. The room itself was a plain room that held several beds as it was an orphanage and thus couldn't afford single rooms for anyone. The air was cold and it was late, meaning everyone with the exception of the girl sitting upright in her bed was asleep and snuggled in. The one still awake was a thin girl, somewhat pale, with long blonde hair and bright blue eyes, or at least normally they were bright. At the moment they were clouded over in depression and worry.
The blonde looked down at her hands, clenching and unclenching them, knowing full well what they were capable of, especially her right one. When that white creature had attacked a few days ago, she had heard it … no them, she had heard them all call out to her. They had pleaded, bargained, coerced, and downright threatened her in order to get her to use their power, but she had steadfastly refused, keeping them all on a very short leash. She knew full well the consequences of unrestrained power, several times over in fact. However, the power they offered was both new and disturbingly familiar at the same time. She had used a fraction of it before and that had been enough to convince her to not use it carelessly. The blonde still had nightmares from that very first time, hence why she was wide awake at the moment.
The voices were silent now, but when that creature had appeared, they had been very vocal. Shouting to annihilate the monster, protect the people, to run away and lead the monster away. Another focused on her former friends, telling her to make peace with them. She had vehemently shut them all out and ran away just after Beast Boy had seen her. Once she had gotten a good distance away the voice had quieted though she knew they were still there. They were always there, just waiting for a chance to goad her into doing what they wanted. During the day at school and at night they normally left her alone. However, whenever her mind drifted to the past, that's when they would speak up, using her past as a reason to use their or her depending on who you asked power. Hence she avoided thinking about her past like the plague. Right now she dug through her backpack and brought out a small 64 gigabyte flash drive. She wished there was a safe place to view this thing but at the moment there wasn't.
The blonde sighed as she searched her broken memories for the answer of where this thing came from. She remembered everything up to the point of where she was turned to stone. After that it was some hazy memories of a dark and cold place, then a warm and wet place with bright lights and someone talking to her. That about when the voices appeared in her mind. At first she had no clue what they were as everything from that time was really fuzzy and diluted. All she knew was that they argued a lot about her and what she should do. Then she remembered seeing someone get killed and then a massive amount of anger. After that she blacked out and the next thing she knew she was at Jump city limits with nothing but the few clothes on her back and this flash drive with a note attached to it saying to view this in total secrecy clutched in her hand. The small thing held answers she knew, but there had been no safe place to look at what it contained. The only computer access she had been either at school or in the public library, both places that were not safe to view such things without someone seeing. Especially now with Beast boy hounding her to be what she once was, even when she had no clue what she had truly been.
Even worse was the fact that her powers had been drastically altered. Her connection to the earth was changed, deepened in a way she didn't understand. Her original powers were still there but they were now being tempered and restrained by something else, her new powers if you were to call them that. She sometimes considered them separate entities, other times they were extensions of her self, but they were always there now. Even worse was that along with these new powers, came a huge truckload of memories that weren't hers. True she had been slowly assimilating them at night in her dreams but it was a slow and aggravating process. Even worse was the fact that the memories weren't in any order or pattern that she could tell. All the memories had a few things in common though. They were all the memories of the previous owners of her new powers. What's more, the earliest memories from any set of them all started with the original user waking up after surgery after losing a limb or being in an accident. The memories were disjointed but she was able to gather some information from them, but not as much as she would've liked. It just confused her to no end. At the moment, the blonde haired girl once known as Terra had no clue what she was supposed to do.
"Child, you need to make peace with your friends. They can help you find what you seek," a gentle yet regal voice spoke in her mind. Terra knew this voice, the gentlest and least vocal of the ones she kept hearing. It or rather her name was Queen of Hearts. She was the kindest and acted as a semi-mother to Terra, speaking often of making peace with others. She was also the one who Terra listened to the most since she didn't try to force the girl to do anything. Her former owner from what she gathered from the memories that went with her was a young lady named Kei Kuruma, who had been trained as a child to be a weapon. Most of her memories were not pleasant and dealt with a lot of loneliness, anger, and self doubt. All things Terra could relate to easily.
However, a deeper and much darker voice spoke. This one was the most vocal and the most disturbing at times and quite frankly scared the poor girl. He focused on destruction of her enemies and everything else for that matter. His name was Jabberwock. "Foolish girl. You betrayed them and nearly killed them! Do you honestly believe they would accept you back? Beast Boy abandoned you when you needed him to understand. Did he not also make it clear that he blamed you for all that had happened?" the voice said harshly. Jabberwock tended to be cruel if not truthful whether Terra liked it or not. The monster had belonged to a young man named Ryo Takatsuki. A survivor and strategist who had been trained by his adopted mom and dad to be calm under pressure. His memories were mostly pleasant but there were a couple where there was little more to them then blind homicidal rage. Terra guessed these were the times he had lock control of Jabberwock and to be frank they scared the hell out of her.
"Indeed Milady," a third voice chimed in. This one was also regal and held an air of a soldier or warrior. Nearly as vocal as Jabberwock, this one focused on duty and protection of others. Though more respectful, he was pushy and commanding that sometimes annoyed Terra to no end. His name was White Knight or just Knight. "While they were your allies for a brief time they have proven to be unreliable and an unreliable ally can be far more dangerous then a reliable enemy," Knight spoke calmly yet authoritatively. This one had belonged to vengeful and angry young man named Hayato Shingu. His memories showed him to be a real pain in the ass most of the time but he did have a heart. His memories consisted mostly of rage or angry confusion. These were also things Terra could identify with after her little episode with Slade.
The fourth and final voice made him self known then. This one was less pushy then Knight and held the feeling of an explorer rather then a warrior. He was vocal about facing her fears and then moving on to see the rest of the world. White Rabbit was his name. "If you stay here they'll find you eventually just like Beast Boy did and it won't be pretty. You should just face them and leave. We need to find out what's on that drive and we can't do that safely with them hounding you," he explained calmly though with a stern tone to his voice. White Rabbit had belonged to a nervous and kind hearted young man named Takeshi Tomoe. Terra had seen him as one who wanted to do the right thing and yet was so scared of what would happen to him and those around him. A lot of the time he had simply wanted to be left alone and yet wasn't. Again, something Terra could understand after being chased out of so many towns in her life.
'Quiet, all of you! I'll figure this out myself!' she yelled in her own mind, quieting the voices. She really needed to find a solution or else everything would be lost. If the Titans found her, what would they do? Would they accept her and help? Would they try to press gang her back into the group? Would they hate her and throw her into jail? The truth was she had no way to predict how they would react to her presence and with Beast Boy now hounding her to be the girl she had pretended to be, she wasn't sure how she'd react. The longer she stayed in Jump City, the greater the chances of the Titans, Slade, or someone else finding her. 'I need to leave, but not as Terra or Tara,' she thought as she started to pack what few things she had. She then looked at her hand, a thought coming to mind as she remembered the … changes that her new abilities had done before. 'I wonder is it possible?' she thought as she stood up in her baggy night clothes and turned to look at herself in the mirror of a nearby vanity. 'All right wake up, I need to ask you guys something,' she spoke up in her mind, addressing the voices of her powers.
"What is your wish Milady?" Knight responded for all of them.
Terra looked down at her hands before looking back at the vanity again. 'I know you guys can change my body into those battle modes or whatever. What I want to know is can you do more?' she asked curiously.
"More? What do you mean?" White Rabbit asked confused.
'I mean, can you alter my body's height, weight, build, skin, hair, and eye color, things like that? Could you make me a different person?' she asked her powers. She waited as they seemed to convene with each other in the back of her mind. She truly hoped this would work because if it didn't it would be that much harder for her to move around.
The White Rabbit tentatively answered his mistress. "In theory we should be able to mold your body into whatever form you wish. What is it you wish to become?" he asked curiously. Terra replied with a mental image of who she wished to be. It was a complete picture of a person she had never seen before and was almost completely different from her original form making it the perfect thing to hide herself. "I see. We will attempt to reshape your body to this form. This may feel odd and you may want to lie down and take off your clothes for this," the entity suggested. Terra did so laying on her bed under the covers just in case anyone was looking though she doubted it at this time of night. She didn't have to wait long as the changes occurred. They weren't painful by any means but felt strange nonetheless.
First her body overall started to lengthen. Bones and muscles all grew longer, still remaining the same size, making her taller about Starfire's height. For a moment she looked even thinner then before but that immediately changed as she felt her body start to thicken for lack of a better description. Her arms and legs rippled as the muscles were enhanced and enlarged as well as her figure. She now looked like how she would have given proper nutrition throughout her travels instead of relying on survival tactics to get food and if she hadn't been running for her life a majority of the time. Her body was well built and more endowed then before, looking more athletic and definitely someone who spent a lot of time doing exercise, be it running, climbing, or fighting. Next thing to change was her skin. Terra could feel it tingle as it darkened into a nice tan, making her less pale and looking more like what she should have had she not spent so much time in caves hiding. Next was her hair. It started to change from straight and golden blonde to being more wild, spiky and changing into pure white. Last was her face and eyes. This change was the strangest one, even more so then her skin. It wasn't as drastic a change but it was enough that she didn't look like Terra anymore. Her face became less child-like and thin and more mature looking, like an older version of her self. Last but not least were her eyes. Gone were the sapphire orbs and in their place were animalistic amethysts. The change was complete and thus the new Terra got up to inspect herself as she got dressed.
While her clothes were a little more … snug now then before, they fit well enough as they were her baggy clothes. Once she was dressed in a black tank top and baggy red sweat pants, she inspected her new body. Gone was the stick figure girl and in her place was an exotic looking young lady. Now she'd be able to move about without anyone finding her. Terra stretched her new form, getting a feel for it as she looked herself up and down. Smooth, hairless, tan skin covered her body with her only hair being on her head and crotch. Upon closer inspection of her hands she noticed that she had no fingerprints, they had been erased. She grinned at the thought. 'Nice touch, so to speak,' she thought to herself as she absently rubbed her fingers together, feeling the new sensitivity and smoothness. After she was done checking herself out, she continued to pack whatever she could and slip out of the orphanage before anyone noticed her.
Terra made her way outside with ease, having broken into and out of a number of places in her short time, even without her original powers. While she didn't have any of her new abilities fully activated, they did enhance her enough for her to make her way through the city with ease. She was now wearing an old dark blue jacket, leather gloves, some worn sneakers, and her backpack full of things she'd need. She felt free for a moment, freer then she had ever been in a real long time. As Terra moved through the city, heading for the outskirts, she failed to notice someone watching her as she ran and jumped across the rooftops. It was a man in an armored uniform. He spoke into a radio transceiver, "Target sighted, heading east. Appearance has been drastically altered, most likely by Arms."
A female voice replied, "Do not engage. We still have no data on what would happen if she tried to use all four of those Arms at the same time or even how they are reacting to each other all being in the same body. Follow and observe but I repeat, do not engage." The transmitter went silent as the spy continued to watch the now exotic looking girl gracefully leap across the rooftops.
AN: This is an experimental story. I have no clue as to where I'll be heading with this but the idea wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote it down. Review and tell me what you think.