War of any kind is greatly devastating as it is, but it is at its most horrible and fearsome when it is between different cultures. People in general have always shown at least mistrust to those that are radically different from themselves, be it because they have not see that color of skin, the mannerism or even because they cannot communicate between one another due to language barriers, so when two culture collide between one another in war the result is even more frightening amongst its participants for they face enemies unlike anything they have seen before. At least on Civil Wars though they fight amongst brothers and sisters, soldiers know what to expect, but what about fighting someone from another universe?
Though many years had passed after the defeat of Dark Khan bringing peace and stability to the cosmos, all had not gone completely well in the realm of Earth and after the reality shattering events of the Deadly Alliance and the return of the Dragon King, the Apocalypse was imminent for the war torn universe of the Elder Gods' realms. Perseverant and all knowing as they are however, they had long foresaw the devastating effects that constant combat between super beings would have on the fabrics of reality, every burning ki coming from all the participants of the Mortal Kombat tournaments at the same time would have disastrous side effects and that is why the fire being known as Blaze was created. Whoever would destroy him would absorb the powers from all the combatants into themselves, leaving only one new God instead of dozen minor ones either discarding or outright killing those who had failed to achieve their goal.
However as things often happen in universe of the Elder Gods, something went completely wrong. Though their chosen one, Taven, was capable of defeating Blaze the power of the Mortal Kombat participants was not stolen and bestowed upon him as everyone expected but rather pushed every other warrior into a different realm, dimension or even universe. Though the Elder Gods' domains were safe once more since a great number of the combatants had been banished from their realms, the fighters still possessed the tremendous powers that come from participating in Mortal Kombat. One can only imagine what sort of consequence sprinkling beings of such sadistic and violent nature through the cosmos will have, but in the end it wasn't the Elder Gods' problem anymore and they were content to leave their supposed charges to someone else.
Like irresponsible parents leaving their spoiled offsprings unattended, chaos was sure to come wherever a Kombatant came to be.
There is no justice anymore, only MOOOOORTAAAAAAAAL KOOOOOOOOMBAAAAAAAAAT!!!!!
Snow!? In the middle of summer?
Law enforcing agencies were left aghast at the crime scene before them. Several crooks lay on the ground beaten senseless by an alley, most of them were frozen solid, their features still left in the agonizing painful expressions they had as they were getting the crap beaten out of them, the walls of the surrounding buildings as well as the ground covered by a layer of ice. Police were tipped off by this strange scenery not by someone calling 911, or much less by crashes and screams of pain as the street brawl took place, but rather by a sudden patch of the city's temperature lowering rapidly before snow fell.
It was quite a treat to the police however; all kinds of murders, robberies and rapes had been reported in the vicinity of the alley but no matter how many patrol cars protected the area, authorities could never find any unsavory looking individuals to arrest. So to find the gang that had been committing all those atrocious crimes piled up beaten senseless and turned into ice cubes for the police to pick up was quite refreshing, talk about someone making their job easier for them.
"Well I guess we can close this case, I'm gonna have to send a Christmas card to those kids at the tower from now on. Didn't think they'd had the guts to go around stopping murderers since they're always chasing all those masked lunatics like themselves."
The police chief idly commented surveying the scene to a detective both wearing heavy jackets due to the low temperature of the scene and shivering quite a bit, but even then the veteran looking detective couldn't simply pass this one up. There was something wrong here.
"I dunno Chief. Something tells me that the Titans didn't have anything to do with this."
"What? Do we know of any other superpowered people that beat up entire gangs and turn them in like this to us?" Countered the Chief.
"No…not that I'm aware of. But I mean, look at this mess, our archives don't have any incidents that resemble this. The husslers all shown signs of have gotten in a bare fisted fight, swollen cheeks, black eyes, the works. But look at this.." The detective said picking something up from the floor with a pincer to not spoil the evidence and showed it to his boss, it was a broken tooth.
"So what? Didn't expect to find a couple of those in a scrap?"
"Not where the Titans are involved, no. Robin has brought some crooks to us badly beaten before but never like this. Broken teeth, shattered collar bones, collapsed knee caps…I don't think some of these guys will be able to walk again Chief. Besides there's the ice, we don't have any reports of any Titan capable of doing that."
The police chief didn't seem to be all that impressed by the detective's research, he merely shrugged idly and continued drinking his coffee trying to keep himself warm. "Robin may be just a kid detective, but he was trained by none other than Batman himself and reports are always coming from Gotham city of Bats hospitalizing scumbags all the time, maybe he's starting to finally grow up, which shows since he's going for murderers now. Plus, he doesn't work alone; don't they have that emo angsty teenager sorceress with them? Could be that she just learn a new spell." The Chief explained calmly showing the detective other possibilities for his theory, as he glanced back to the face of his subordinate and noticing by his features that he was still not convinced he sighed. "But, if it really means that much to you I'll ask 'em about it. If it turns out you're right it'd be best if we let 'em know they have competition, last thing this city needs is two guilds of super heroes duking it out in the streets."
Meanwhile in the Titan Tower .
Being the first one to wake up, Robin was the unlucky recipient to get the message from the police agency. The boy wonder furrowed his eyebrows and checked the panel for official reports from the local authorities scanning the message asking if they were involved in the apprehension of the group of iced gangbangers. Before responding however, Robin made sure to turn to the news to hear of any other details, the chief of police had neglected to be specific on what had happened causing even more discomfort and curiosity on the Titan leader. As he tuned in to the morning news and heard the anchor's report, he was left even more puzzled.
A group of frozen beaten crooks found unconscious on the streets? Robin's initial thought was that of Red X, but not only had the professional thief shun the path of a hero, he also knew that he wasn't capable of using ice to apprehend criminals, not to mention that if he somehow managed to reprogram the suit in some manner to do this he wouldn't use it to solidify gang bangers.
Also the part of the city in which the fight took place was one that normally only Cyborg and he patrolled, being the most senior members. Starfire's and Beastboy's infantile nature left them as a liability when tracking down criminals of such magnitude, though relatively weak in comparison to the world threats they have to deal with. the two oddly colored members of their group were considered incapable of handling sensitive cases like murder and rape; they would have to wait until they were older. Since Cyborg hadn't reported going on a solo mission to apprehend that gang that only left Raven, it could have been possible that she had gone into another one of her uncontrollable rages and decided to take it out on street scum.
"Raven, can I talk to you for a second?" Robin confronted the sorceress once they were all coming down to the mess hall for breakfast. Since Raven always secluded herself from the group and went to drink tea by herself, talking her in private wasn't difficult, prying Beast Boy or Starfire unnoticed would have been more challenging.
"What is it?" Hissed the girl with her usual morbid demeanor, her expression that of utter boredom as she sipped her tea trying to tone down Cyborg's and Beast Boy's argument over who gets to make breakfast. Robin's look however told her that this seemed to be quite serious causing her to arch a thin eye brow in concern, showing the slightest amount of worry at getting scolded by her leader.
"Were you out patrolling by yourself last night by any chance?"
"No..I was in my room meditating, you'd know if I went out by myself by my report on the security system…what's all this about?"
Robin went and sat in front of the sorceress, handing her some pictures of the scene he had printed. The sorceress frowned as she scanned over the pained visages of the beaten crooks encased in ice and asked "What exactly am I looking at?"
"The police chief mailed me this morning about a group of gang bangers found beaten senseless and frozen solid by in alley in the southern sector of the city. Now you know Beast Boy and Starfire are specifically told not to go there, but you can patrol in the city as you please and since neither Cyborg nor I had to do anything with it I thought maybe you would know something."
Raven didn't respond right away as she was accustomed to do, even when under pressure from the Titan leader. Tea after all came first for the young sorceress and she wet her lips on the beverage delicately before sipping, her eyes half closed. Just as Robin was about to lose his patience Raven decided it was time to answer.
"If you think that my powers are getting out of control again then you're wrong. Ever since that little incident with the personality issues I've secured the door to my room so I can't get out unless I have control of my mind."
"So it wasn't you."
Raven shook her head "No, but I may know something that could relate to that incident."
This made Robin arch his eyebrow and the young teen wonder was all ears once Raven start relating her sources.
"A couple of days ago I felt a universe very far away from here in the brink of death. Every time a universe dies or is about to there's an incredible feeling that flows across the cosmos, it's hard for any magician to not get this imminent sense of dread that comes from such a tremendous loss of life." Raven explained calmly as she sat and slowly drank her tea "This universe however gave a very different feeling, usually whenever a universe is about to collapse whether it is a natural or inflicted death, there is always a tremendous explosion that makes a magician's heart skip a beat. It can be from their sun imploding or an intensified battle by the inhabitants. But this one felt as if there were only just a few people fighting before it shattered." The sorceress took a pause to sip from her tea before finishing. "No technologically advanced armies, no great natural disasters, no catastrophic acts of deities. Just a bunch of meat heads trading blows."
Though this somehow was relevant to what Robin had just heard, universes at risk, intergalactic battles, super powered hooligans duking it out and a strange street brawl in the shady part of town, he didn't seem to know exactly what it had to do with this situation in particular.
"So--"
"So" Raven followed up before Robin could ask her how did the two relate "Just as the universe was about to collapse I felt a dozen or so people get violently shot out from their reality, most likely to avoid the escalation of their fighting break the fabric of the universe."
This was starting to sound more like something that Robin could believe, which Raven could see from the skeptical look on his face and decided to clean up her story. "You have to understand however that it was easy for me to sense these people's presence because of their immense power. An all out brawl from a multitude of people each capable of destroying worlds with their bare hands is ought to be felt across galaxies."
Robin was no fool and after Raven's explanation he finally deduced where she was going with this. "You're saying that the people who got shot out could have possibly landed here?"
"Precisely." Raven nodded taking another sip of her tea
"When exactly did you feel all this?"
"A few days ago."
"I don't understand, what are the possibilities of such a thing happening? World destroyers getting sent specifically to our reality?"
"Normally the chances are slim, but perhaps this universe was parallel to ours. Or perhaps it just happened to be aligned with this one at the precise moment their universe was about to explode. Either way, given the low probabilities of this scenario even if that was to be the reason behind those brawls, the fighters sent our way couldn't be that many, maybe one or two."
"Or maybe they just dumped all their problems into our hands." Robin countered.
"Unlikely, but there is that possibility. Our universe has the nasty habit of being other realities garbage disposal."
This troubled Robin greatly who started going over the photographs of the incident sent his way, the terrified and beaten faces of the hooligans frozen solid were more to shake him. Although there was the chance Raven's story might be a nice tid bit of information, the death of a universe avoided by sending fighting machines to other worlds along with this odd street scrap were too near each other to be a coincidence. Robin couldn't take that chance.
"It doesn't make any sense though. If fighters of that magnitude were sent our way, why would any of them lower themselves to pick fights with street rats rather than start terrorizing cities?"
"Who knows? Perhaps they don't have that many high aspirations, or maybe they weren't the smartest of people. You have to be pretty dumb to not realize you're fighting is causing your universe to collapse all around yourself."
A pause as Raven finished her tea.
"Either that, or they don't care who they engage in combat."
"You're gonna pay for what you did to us! You little psycho bitch!!!"
Not very far from where the first street brawl took place, a similar turn of events was taking place as several hoodlum ruffians surrounded a single individual. Armed to the teeth with crowbars, chains, lead pipes, brass knuckles and even wooden clubs, the punks numbering at least twenty in number closed in to their next victim, a cornered young woman who pressed her back onto a fence so as to not get completely circled. It looked like a typical deplorable street event, a gang of men intent on taking on a single unarmed female by force and do unspeakable things to her, but there was something odd about this particular woman as she seemed to be a punk or street member herself, albeit a very oddly dressed one, even for a gang banger. The woman stood shy of six feet of height and was wearing a full bodied black suit along with a blue tunic strapped across her torso, blue gloves and boots covered her extremities and half her face was covered by a bandit mask exposing only her cold blue eyes and violently spiked blue hair to the viewer. The despite the predicament in which she found herself in, the woman didn't cower or begged for mercy, but rather one could almost see her smiling under that bandit mask as she motioned all the gangsters to come closer with an outstretched hand.
"Come and get it boys, your ass whooping is getting cold."
As the woman cackled in a taunting fashion and the gang bangers lost their composure charging her with frenzied rage, their weapons high in the air and eyes full of violence, the spunky young girl breathed out cold breath from under her mask and rather than stay put went to met them head on.
Charging towards them she meet the first interloper with a kick to his knee shattering the joint and causing the gang banger to reel back in agonizing pain as he fell on top of his fellows. Undaunted the other nineteen hooligans circled around their buddy to start bringing down the pain on the girl, but as many as they were only four of them could attack at the same time causing their superior numbers to act as a liability. Whether the young woman actually planned this or simply had great courage to try and take them all by herself was not very clear, although she undoubtedly knew what she was doing in a fight. The first lead pipe and club swings coming down to her head where blocked with her forearms which she used to deflect the blows ignoring the pain of metal and wood colliding with her flesh and bone, as they swung their weapons again to go for a second blow, the woman twirled around and thrust her index fingers deep inside the armpits of one thug actually going to break flesh and puncture a major blood artery, then going to dodge and take advantage of the chaos caused by one of thugs squirting blood from the armpits to twirl around again and elbow smash another in the neck to collapse his wind pipe, the man stumbling forward holding his neck as he gurgled out foam gasping for air.
Another pair came to replace the fallen ones but as they charged in they met the bodies of their injured comrades tossed at them as the girl twirled around again smacking the lead pipe swing at her aside with her open palm and thrust her fingers onto another's eyes to blind him, immediately twisting her body to one side to land a tornado kick onto another attacker's groin. Five of them fallen in less that ten seconds, the next four came in to swing at her with brass knuckles and feet, the woman curling up to take the blows on her forearms and shins, with the woman grasping at one of the men's arm that was not fast enough to draw it back and punching him in the elbow to snap it at the joint. Screaming in horror as he felt his limb bend in a way its not supposed to, the thug tried to pull away only to put himself back to back with the girl, a situation she used to her advantage thrusting her hips back to send him flying over her head, the flailing feet of the injured hooligan hitting his partner's chin behind him before he collided with another one.
Seeing their situation to be particularly grim a bold gangster went to grapple with the girl who was currently ripping them all to shreds, the scrapper ducking his torso low grabbing hold of the woman's waist to immobilize her and leave her for his fellows to deal with. It was a risky move, and he knew that he was going to take a few hits, but he never imagined that it would only take just one devastating downward elbow smash from the girl onto his body to completely shatter his collar bone and leave his arms useless. Lowering his limp arms to his sides the thug got pulled up by his purple mohawk by the woman who heard an object coming rapidly to the side of her head, ducking and letting the lead pipe coming to hit her at the side to instead smack the other guy's face sending him reeling sideways. Crouched low she spun around again to throw a reverse punch to the lead pipe wielding attacker hitting him right in the kidneys, causing him to hold his stomach move to one side and lose his lunch on the concrete. Twenty seconds after the fight and fifteen of the twenty attackers had been either incapacitated or knocked unconscious and the final five set of gangsters came in to deal with the woman.
Like if they hadn't learned anything from their previous experience they all swung at her at the same time meeting nothing but air as she weaved around it although an unfortunate one's strike collided with the girl's elbow cracking his knuckles. Pulling back and holding his cracked hand, the thug watched as how the fifth member filled in for him and they all swung once more hitting the punk girl's forearm's and back for weak body shots, the woman then pressing to one side letting the chain swung at her hit another member to then smack one with a back hand followed up with a punch to the side of his jaw knocking some of his teeth flying of. Yet another attack to her exposed rear and the woman turned once again to grab at the wrist from the incoming knife trying to shank her in the side, to slip under his arms and twist it behind his back, pressing tightly onto the vein on his wrist to send pain through his limb and force him to let go off the shiv. Not wanting to hit his homie, the other one attempted to move side ways and smack the woman from behind, but at that point the girl decided to switch from skill to raw strength heaving the hooligan she trapped over her head and tossed him forward. The last remaining one evaded the flying body of his team mate only to look back again at the girl and feel both her hands strike at the side of his head simultaneously, the world turned silent by a deafening ring to him then as his ear drums shattered, fluid running down his earlobes and collapsed on the ground holding his head.
"No way man…no way in hell! She ain't human!! I'm getting the hell out of here!" The last gangster, the one who had his knuckles cracked cowered staring in disbelief as how the bodies of his crew littered the streets and turned to make a run for it.
He didn't get very far, just as he had taken a few steps towards the main streets he gave out a gasped scream as his body temperature dropped violently and was encased in a block of ice, his eyes still wide with the shock of being immobilized.
The culprit for this was none other than the spiky haired girl herself, her palm facing the fleeing thug showing that the blast of ice which froze the man came from her. Lowering her arm she scanned the area for any reaming threat, finding only unconscious or groaning members of the gang struggling to move or merely not bleed to death, her icy cold blue eyes narrowed finding the last gang member still staring up at her from the floor holding his injured arm.
"Who…what are you?"
"I'm the coolest ninja you'll ever meet, chum" Responded the girl with blue hair pointing to herself with her thumb "The name's Frost, and you'll do well to remember me."
The thug didn't seem too thrilled by Frost's arrogant behavior and attempted a last bravado even in his incapacitated condition "This ain't over you bitch! We gonna go outside the family, get some heavy hitters and then--"
"And then! You'll get you're ass handed to ya in a platter again!" Frost finished his sentence for him, walking closer and looking down "See, thing is that I coulda turned you all to popsicles like your home boy over there the second you charged at me, but I ain't gonna waste my freezing abilities on scum like you." She hissed out blowing cold air from her blue bandit mask down to the man "I was just toying with you suckers."
The gang member didn't feel particularly brave anymore now that he was staring directly into Frost's violent eyes and kept quiet, something told him that if he pissed her off anymore he could very well die. Frost seeing the fear in his face chuckled and pressed her foot onto his face causing him to grunt in disgust "Now that you know your place, lick all the blood off my boots."
The thug however, still had his pride and spat out "Go fuck yourself you ska-NOO!! AGGH!!" Only to be interrupted by Frost's foot coming down repeatedly on his face, stomping him flat on the pavement causing his skull to bounce due to the blows until he lay unconscious, lips and nose bloodied and broken.
Hearing the struggle, another half beaten to death thug tried to move away only to find Frost pinning him to the ground by stepping on his chest. "So how about it boy, still got some fight left in ya?"
The thug shook his head in fear, it looked like the guy who had gotten his knee broken by the girl at the very beginning of the fight. "No ma'am"
Frost snickered and went to put her bloodied boot on this one's face, just like she had done to the previous thug "The clean it off."
"Yes ma'am" The panicked gangster stuttered, staring at the boot's sole, sticking his tongue out and starting to lick.
With a haughty evil look about her, Frost placed her hands on her hips feeling quite proud of herself. Looks like this new world she was in was ripe for her konquest.