Memory Lane
Hello, all. This is my first fic set in the Legendverse. However, it's not my first fic, or even my first Titan fic. So, any mistakes, anything I should fix, please tell me.
The Legendverse is different from the show itself in the fact that it has three original characters (Noel "Savior" Collins; Robert "Gauntlet" Candide; Nigel "Scalpel" Hasting), Terra never teamed up with Slade (thus never becoming a statue), Robin is Tim Drake but still has a relationship with Starfire, and... well, that's about it, right? Oh, and Jump City is located in Florida instead of California.
Thank LegendMaker for improving this chapter significantly and possibly the rest of the story. Not to mention having created the Legendverse in the first place. Moving on...
Finally, when something's typed like this, that indicates thought. Something like this is the author being stupid, and this represents Manik speaking/thinking, because of his Draconic nature, and Manik resides in Nik.
Davopolis, Eyarth, Castle Black...
Most tales in this universe begin in Jump City. Instead, this story shall start off in a different dimension, on Eyarth, in the city Davopolis, and in the recently created Castle Black. Where two paragons of darkness are fighting.
"MOTHER FUCKER!" a shout rang out.
Two forces were clashing. The battlefield was rubble but the two competitors ignored everything but the other. As any good fight goes.
The two forces locked together and exploded with black energy. They pushed against each other with all their might. They both looked human, but they were exerting tremendous force. The black energy roared around them, creating a mini-tornado.
"I was spawned from darkness, like yourself," one spat back.
The two began transforming in the black energy. The energy then slowly died down.
They stood there, waiting.
"Now that our human counterparts finally relinquished their pathetic control, we can truly fight. Eh, Taokii?" one asked.
He was a dragon in appearance, but he stood on two legs on and used his arms like a human's. His wings were folded in.
"Hopefully like we had the first time. It was only a few years after time began, as you should recall, Manik," Taokii replied.
He looked semi-draconic, he had a crown of horns on his head and his right arm sported a sword. His wings were folded in as well.
Manik formed a sword from black energy while Taokii simply raised up his left arm and extended the sword to four feet. They circled each other a few feet then Taokii rushed in and slashed at Manik. Manik narrowly dodged it by scooting back, then he slammed the side of Taokii's head with his claw, knocking him down.
"You always were impatient, Imperknight," Manik said.
Taokii merely grunted in reply and lanced his foot out. It crunched Manik's right leg, bending the knee backwards. Manik raised an eyebrow, then his shadow leaped up around the knee and fixed it. He raised his claw that held the sword up. The sword reformed into a spear of energy which then threw itself and pierced Taokii's side.
Taokii hacked up some blood, but merely got back up.
"Nik!" a voice from behind a pillar shouted out.
Manik turned around and was slammed in the back by Taokii.
"You always were easily distracted, Draak Rei," Taokii replied.
"DISGRACEFUL!" a voice roared.
Then out from behind a pillar, a lion covered in armor that allowed complete freedom of movement came barreling down on Taokii. It leapt through the air and blasted him with intense fire. It was at that point a kid in light armor leapt off the lion and came down, thwacking Taokii with a bo-staff. He then kneeled down, swung the staff low, tripped Taokii and then stabbed him with the bayonet on the end of the staff all in a manner of five seconds.
"Bayonette! Leo Knight! This is MY FIGHT!" Manik shouted.
"I'm going to help you, dad! PERIOD!" Bayonette shot back.
Manik roared and picked both of them up with his tail. He then threw them lightly (as a restriction by Nik) into the wall, knocking them unconscious.
If you do that to allies, I'd hate to see what you do to enemies.
Shut up, Nik.
As you wish, asshole.
Manik turned back to Taokii and ripped him off the ground. He then shoved his claw through Taokii's chest and pulled out a black orb. His darkness. His heart. Taokii coughed up more blood.
"Damn it, I lost again," he spat.
Manik threw him aside and blasted him through the head again. Taokii fell to the darkness of reincarnation in another world. A world to which Manik would follow. The Darkness was all absorbed by Manik as he turned back into Nik. He wore a tattered white shirt with a hood and grey jeans (which happened to be made of incredibly tougher material than denim).
He looked around at his adopted son, Logan Vinyette. His helmet had been shattered, leaving the face of the young black boy revealed. He then looked over to the man he considered a brother. Leon Pridion. It was for them that he was about to do what he was about to do.
Unfortunately for Nik, he couldn't remember what that was.
Gargarin Cathedral, Jump City, Florida...
The same man we saw earlier in Davopolis was standing on a ledge of a building, musing on his life.
I do not know where I am. I just remember tossing Taokii aside and then... I was here. Something happened inbetween that time. I just know it.
He sat there, wondering what it was.
Manik! What happened?
Hell if I know. I never remember what happens after I beat Taokii. I just remember waking up in a new realm, and that darkness has considerably less sway overall. And I'm occasionally in a new person. Damn that's annoying.
Yeah, you had to scare the hell out of me with nightmares for most of my life until I realised your presence, dirt bag.
Shadow Walker Humans are such-
You're going to end that statement right there.
Cats.
Nik waited there a while until something creeped up the building, completely flat. It was wolf-like in appearance, but it was entirely black and had white eyes. It touched his shadow and Nik nodded, having understood a silent communication. He leapt up into the air. For a split-second, you could see him in front of the moon, before he was swirled in black and disappeared.
Titans Tower, Jump City, Florida...
It had been just last night that Nik had come into the world under unknown circumstances. It was a fairly decent morning. That was... until Robin came out of the shower.
"Tim?" Nigel asked.
Scalpel, to all new Legendverse readers, would quite easily scare small children. In short, he looked rather metallic, with ears longer than Beastboy's, metal claws fused onto his three digit hands (two fingers and a thumb), and blue pupils that had a... glow to them.
"Yes, Nigel?" Tim asked, seemingly irritated.
"Your hair... is pink," Nigel stated, still in semi-surprise.
"Why yes. Yes it is. Care to explain?" Tim asked.
"I honestly haven't a clue," Nigel answered.
"Well, I used the shampoo. That you bought. On your last grocery trip. Only you ever touched it, to my knowledge," Tim said.
"It sounds more like something Gauntlet would do," Noel said, from behind a newspaper.
Noel, to the casual observer, was just an ordinary teenager. With really red hair.
"Yes, I did hand it to him to put in the showers," Nigel said, offhandedly.
"And for that... you can go with him to the monthly lawsuit settling meeting," Tim said.
"But... what for?" Nigel asked.
"One: you handed something to Robert that he could and would tamper with, ie. My shampoo. Two: you know damn well Robert would fail miserably at the meetings, meaning he needs someone to level him out," Tim said.
"Don't worry much about it, Scalpel. It's definitely not fun. But it's not boring so long as you can simply imagine your own world in your head," Noel said, having put the newspaper down. Nigel still looked unhappy.
"I might have use for those assassination plans for Robert that you most likely came up with," Nigel said, picking up his plate and getting up.
"You? Actually threatening someone for agitating you?" Garfield Logan aka Beastboy asked.
"It'd be an empty threat, and you know it. Just the knowledge that I had said plans, even if I had no intention of even looking at them, might get him to at least act like he's paying attention," Nigel said, from the kitchen.
"And what makes you think I'd have plans to assassinate Gauntlet?" Noel asked, an eyebrow raised.
"You're Noel," Garfield said.
"...rigghht. Keep forgetting that." Noel rolled his eyes, but simply continued reading an article in the paper. Albeit briefly.
"Hey Tim? You might wanna' take a look at this," he said.
Tim quickly read the article.
Apparently, a string of killings had occured the previous night. But the odd thing about them was that nearly all the victims had a criminal record and had two holes, about an inch-wide, piercing through the general radius of their heart and brain.
"So now we have a psychotic meta on the loose," Tim said, shaking his head.
"And he sounds a bit like Emmanuel," Noel thought to himself.
To those of you who don't know, Emmanuel was an alternate universe's Savior. Instead of white paint, he had been splashed with yellow pain and the mutation that had granted his powers had altered. He apparently developed a second conscious which was righteous to the point of delusional, as it seized control and went out killing anyone who spited him or were sinful. By his definition. Which was zealously insane.
The Titan alarm blared. Robin's eye twitched behind the mask. Learn of new trouble in this city, and said trouble seemed to knock on their door a moment later. It was annoying, in more than a few ways, as Robin strode over and hit a few keys.
The screen pulled up to reveal Dr. Light. Ah, not trouble. Robin relaxed a bit.
"Titans, let's go! Arthur's trying to cause trouble again!" Robin said, as he and the Titans left the room to head into the city.
For once, Robin had forgotten to switch the viewscreen off. Not that there was much to see except Dr. Light trying to be competent again.
Another figure came out of seemingly nowhere on the viewscreen and engaged Arthur in combat. The figure was Nik. Robin had already taken off, along with most of the Titans.
Except one.
A few moments later, Robert Candide came downstairs, yawning.
He was a fairly average teen with blonde hair, normal pants, and a white shirt with a 'G' on it. The only odd thing was the ring on his finger: it had a rather large jewel on it.
He looked around to see no one around and the screen showing the current battle between (Pride) Nik and Dr. Light.
"Aw, spam it. Well, it's only Dr. Light... and that guy's probably on our side if he's fighting him," Robert shrugged.
Still, duty was duty. And he totally had to see Tim's current hairstyle, he thought with a snicker. So, he quickly activated his namesake, the Gauntlet. The metal of the ring quickly extended up to his elbow and the jewel enlargened and placed itself in the center, as Gauntlet took off for the location as well.
Somewhere, Jump City, Florida...
Dr. Light was still developing a machine (well technically his computers were developing it, while he occasionally looked at boring records that all said the same thing), but that kind of behavior can, and had lead, to stupidity-inducing boredom. Rather than just sit around, Light decided, in the meantime, to go out and fight a bit for practice. He expected the Titans to come and possibly get a new record for taking him down.
He didn't expect some adult to emerge from his shadow and throw a blast of the same material at him.
"What the... HEY!" Light yelled, as he countered the blast with one of his own.
"Who the hell are you supposed to be?" Pride asked.
"You insipid being! I am Dr. Light, ruler of light itself," Dr. Light answered, thrashing a light tendril at him.
Pride produced a large black shield from his shadow that cancelled out the tendril.
"Well, I'm Pride. King of darkness," Pride replied.
Dr. Light snickered.
"Well I guess this is regicide, then." Dr. Light said, and then shot a large blast of light energy at his opponent.
Pride raised up another shield of shadow which took the damage. Growling, Light focused his blast, as Pride walked forward, still blocking the attack. Pride began focusing harder in return, and Dr. Light's shadow rose up, forming an exact copy of the not-so-good-doctor, except, well, shadowy. He was like a 3-D silhouette.
Dr. Light was faintly aware of a presence behind him before Dark Dr. Light (It's Oooooooxymoron!) cuffed him in the back of the head. Hard.
Yelling, Dr. Light turned one hand behind him and blasted the shadow back to its place, attached to his feet. Now he was really mad.
"You should've stayed in whatever you crawled out of. As cliched as it is, light triumphs over darkness!" Dr. Light roared, as he began sucking in light from the nearby area, ...causing darkness to fall.
Pride looked around, amused.
"You take away light, and darkness remains," Pride said, as he absorbed all the nearby darkness, leaving more in its wake, "You take away darkness and more remains."
"...Oh poopy." Dr. Light said.
He then blasted Dr. Light into a building and threw another assault of dark blasts as a followup.
"Light is temporary. Darkness. IS ETERNAL!" Pride roared, as he pulled up the darkness like it was a tangible thing and hurled it towards Dr. Light.
A giant form wrapped around the photokinetic, and the light returned, as Dr. Light was actually struck with an idea. He had shot out all the light he had absorbed back into its proper place. When the light returned to its normal position, Pride suddenly was expelled of a good portion of the darkness he absorbed, due to the explosion of light.
"It seems you can't handle a sudden flash of light too well, hmmmm...?" Dr. Light asked. He then proceeded to throw several blasts at Pride
Nothing the king of darkness couldn't handle though, and he quickly grew bored... until a fairly large group of teens showed up. The Titans had arrived.
And their first action was to stand and look at the odd sight. Dr. Light was throwing light blasts, while Pride was simply having his shadow leap up and take the damage.
"...the Lord?" Savior asked, briefly thinking that an old, deadly enemy had escaped death's grasp once more. He had transformed in the meantime, and now wore white clothing and had hair equivalent to a Super Saya-jin from Dragon Ball Z. For those of you unfamiliar with Savior.
"...No." Raven said. It wasn't their old enemy... but that didn't make him any less dangerous.
Pride finally turned to the group and raised an eyebrow.
"What is this, Halloween? Shouldn't you kids be in school?" he asked.
"Kids? We're over nineteen each, at least," Cyborg replied.
"Excuse me for my grevious error. How shall I atone?" Pride asked, sarcastically.
"Apparently not from around here, and a smart ass," Savior said.
"Hey! Didn't your parents ever teach you to respect your elders?" Pride semi-snapped. He had a reason to ask the question. He was 30, nearing 31.
"We taught ourselves respect is something to earn, not expect." Savior retorted.
"Touche' if I ever heard one," Pride muttered.
"Who are you, anyways?" Tim asked.
He suddenly regretted having drawn attention to himself.
"Woah! Since when was pink such a hot color on guys! You're primarily masculine in an alternate universe, aren't you?" Pride asked, noticing the pink hair. (This statement is a direct reference to Bob & George.)
Why he hadn't reacted to Starfire's orange skin, Beastboy's green hair and skin, Cyborg's half-metal body, Savior's hair (SSJ!), Raven's gray skin, or Terra being the human equivalent of a stick is unknown.
"Most likely because Asta thinks it'd only be funny to pick on me," Robin muttered.
RESPECT THE FOURTH WALL AND KEEP IT UNKNOWN!
"Who are you?" Robin demanded again.
"Wait just a second," Pride said.
He turned around back to Dr. Light, focused on his shadow, and a large pillar shot up from it, square into his back. A loud CRACK was heard as he fell to his knees and onto his stomach. The Titans all visibly winced.
"Call me Pride," the semi-hero said.
Before anyone could do anything else, he had disappeared.
"...Great." Savior said, and went to check to make sure Pride hadn't killed Light by snapping his spine. Light was mostly intact as it turned out, as Robin handcuffed him and disabled his suit as the police arrived to cart him back to jail for the 17,000th time.
"I can assume we will have to be aware to his presence, am I correct?" Starfire asked.
"Exactly. Be on alert for him, too!" Beastboy said, turning into a cheetah and bounding off for the car, "SHOTGUN!"
"You better turn back human before you get yo' furry butt in my car!" Cyborg ordered.
"That was exceptional shadow manipulation, especially against Light." Raven commented to Savior as she walked up to him.
"Perhaps. But if he wants to cause trouble, well, Pride goeth before a fall." Savior replied, as he stepped close to Raven. Raven swiftly teleported herself and Savior back to the Tower while everyone else drove or flew.
Gargarin Cathedral...
Nik sat on the topmost platform of the Cathedral, trying to remember something. He then made a motion and slight sound that indicated he remembered. He pulled his shadow up and formed a circle with an inscription inside of it.
"Klatu berata nikto... no more stupid sci-fi movie marathons with Leon. How'd it go? Oh yeah, it was: Melchizedek links to Merlin. Merlin links to Lin-Fo. Wiseman, I pray thee, please help me," he chanted.
The circle swirled a bit before showing the face of a sorceror, who had a Chinese look to him. His pointed hat was red and it too had various inscriptions on it.
"Nik Gatrite. State your business. I obviously gave you the instructions to contact me in the various dimensions and probably stated it only be for emergencies," Lin-Fo said, sternly.
Nik held his temper. Lin-Fo was an immortal who'd been around around since a few centuries after Earth came into existence, however it did. He apparently gained incredibly magic with the immortality and created a good percentage of known magic as well. In short: he's virtually omnipotent.
"I need to know where I am, who those kids I met up with were, and what I'm supposed to do here. I figured I was done already," Nik said.
"You are on Earth in Dimension DC-LM, as it's been dubbed. Here, events have swung differently than in its sibling universes. There have been different heroes in existence. The Teen Titans. Surely you recognised Robin," Lin-Fo began.
"Oh yeah. He was with Batman in that one movie I saw with Logan. Right, right, right... wait, he has his own TEAM?" Nik demanded.
"Yes. I'll mentally upload all their greatest exploits and their basic information that they would want you to know," Lin-Fo said.
Nik was suddenly hit with a mental brick. He closed his eyes and kneeled to the ground in pain, then got back up, holding a curse. That had been a LOT of information (In story terms, he'd been given information of the events from the story Black and White all the way to The Cutting Edge) that slammed into him. Well, all the information any of the Titans would ever willingly tell.
"...DAMN I WISH YOU HAD WARNED ME WHAT WAS GONNA' HAPPEN!" Nik exploded.
Lin-Fo chuckled, "I always get that reaction, or something close enough."
"They really did all that?" Nik questioned, wiping the blood from his nose and muttering curses.
"Yes. But if you don't believe me, here," Lin-Fo said.
A black orb appeared in Nik's hands.
"What's this thing, a paperweight?" Nik asked.
Here I'm tempted to do a rip-off from Dead Man's Chest, but I'll take the canonical and less non-sensical route...
"It's a Nightmare orb. When the user activates it, it causes all the people in the room to suddenly be enveloped in darkness, and mentally break them down to strike them with their greatest nightmares," Lin-Fo explained.
"You put a lotta thought into this one," Nik said.
"If you consider a decade a lot of time, then yes, I did put a lot of thought and magic into that," Lin-Fo replied.
"But, hey, what am I supposed to do here?" Nik asked.
"You discovered it once. I'll let you do so again," Lin-Fo answered, the window closing up.
"Bastard," Nik muttered, rubbing his head, "now I need a Tylenol."
Titans Tower...
Gauntlet finally ran back in, having chased the Titans all the way back to the fight scene, then discovered they weren't there, then ran all the way back. Of course, the Old Ones artifact he currently wore really helped too. But still, that had to have been annoying.
"Rob, pack some necessities for a week-long trip. We'll be going to the super heroes' lawsuit meeting," Nigel said.
"I thought that was yearly! And why me?" Rob demanded.
"It is yearly. However, there are lesser meetings that occur after major incidents or a series of bigger than minor events," Tim said.
"Why me, though?" Rob repeated.
Tim glared. Rob then looked up. He held back a laugh.
"How do you know that was me? It could have been Gar or Cy easily!" Rob exclaimed, clearly guilty.
"I can read it on your forehead 'I did it!', 'I did it!'. Plus, Gar informs Terra about all his pranks. She said he didn't do it. She's a poor liar. Cyborg doesn't touch my shampoo as he only requires a monthly cleaning and he has his own personal bathroom. The thought wouldn't have crossed his mind. Finally, Nigel handed the bottle to YOU. Not anyone else. You. Which is why he's going with you," Tim stated.
Things had clearly been too normal for too long now, for before Robert could go pack, Nik materialized through Tim's shadow.
"Hello, Titans," he said.
Everyone damn near jumped and then aimed their weapons/powers directly at him.
"No no no. I'm here in peace. I might be interested in teaming up," Nik said.
That did not lower the weapons/powers.
"You wanna give us..." Robin began.
"But first. I need to administer a little test," he said, dropping the ball he held, unnoticed.
Darkness exploded around them, swirling through their consciousness, and taking them to a whole different plane of existence.
BADUM! BADUM! BADUM!