Disclaimer: I Don't Own Teen Titans, If I Did, Neil Gaiman Would Write It. Bitchin'
The finish line was closing in, Vic could see nothing but the white tape. A brief flash of Rene floated through his mind. Time for that later, now he had to run. Another quick flash, his parents up in the stands. They had actually came, a first, and probably the last. They had been on him about going to the labs, trying to spur his interest into abandoning sports for a scinece career. He shook his head and focused on the task at hand. Five steps, now four. Pushing his legs as hard as he ever had, two steps, one. The tape hit his chest and he breathed a sigh of exhaustion. He had won, and had smoked the competition too. He slowed his pace to a slight jog. Jogging to his teams bench, he sat down and leaned against the wall behind him.
"That was awesome Vic." Ron said, sitting next to him.
"I know man, I know." Vic said with a smile. He glanced upward into the stands, and saw his parents watching the field. He sighed and thought he should at least go up there and acknowledge they held up their part of the bargain. He got up and walked over to the entrance to the stands, when Rene jumped over the railing and landed on him.
"That was amazing baby." She said as she kissed him on the lips. He smiled and kissed her back.
"Baby, I got to go see my parents, but I promise I'll be right back, and we can talk all about how awesome I am." She giggled, and climbed off of him. He kissed her and they both walked up into the audience, she stopped at her row and waved at him as she sat down. He chuckled and walked up the rest of the steps to his parents.
"I see you guys actually came." He said as he sat next to them.
"I don't see the appeal in these activities, but I am a man of my word." Silas Stone said as he looked over to his son. "Even though I see no point in athletics, I can't help but feel a fatherly pride at your success." Vic gave him a half smile.
"Will you come with us to the labs this evening then?" His mother, Eleanor, asked.
"I promised I'd come right? I'll see you there." Silas smiled and nodded, and he and his wife got up to leave. Vic shook his head and walked down the few rows to where his girlfriend was sitting.
After having spent the afternoon being dragged around the mall by Rene, and being used as a human shopping cart. Vic hopped on the bus that would take him to S.T.A.R. Labs. The forty minute ride nearly put him to sleep, when the driver announced the stop. Vic got up and shuffled off the bus with several other people and then fished into his pocket for his ID card to get in. He flashed the card to the security guards and proceeded to walk into the building. Some of the most sophisticated labs in the world right here in Jump City's facility, and he needed no guards, no chaperones. Very rarely had being a test subject come in handy like this. He strolled down the hall and walked into his parent's lab. They were busy tinkering with a large metallic structure in the center of the room. An assistant in a protective medical mask was tapping at a keyboard as he walked past. Vic looked over to him, and he waved. Vic shrugged and continued over to his parents.
"What's this supposed to be?" He asked as he stepped up to the structure.
"A portal to another dimension. At least, hopefully it should be." His mother said as she closed a small metallic flap on the inside of the machine. Silas was standing off to the side, examining the cables that connected the machine to the wall at the back of the room.
"There's no hopefully, it will work." He called out. Eleanor smiled and nodded.
"You arrived just in time Victor. You get to see use turn it on. She stepped out of the machine just as several long glass rods started to glow a iridescent green. She looked over her shoulder as a large hole of the green light opened up. Form within, a large creature shoved it's claw though and crushed her. Vic stood there speechless as the monster swiped at him. He flew backwards and into a panel of lights. The creature pushed the majority of it's upper body out of the portal and clawed at Vic's body again. Vic screamed at the pain, and slowly his vision faded to black….
Searing light burned into his eyes, and the smell of medical antiseptic filled Victor's nostrils as he awoke. He opened his eyes and saw his father standing over him, tears in his eyes.
"What… what happened?" Vic asked as he looked up at his father.
"The creature destroyed most of your body before I was able to close the portal and send it back to it's dimension. Your mother was…" He choked. Victor knew what that meant, it meant that his mother had died.
"I couldn't save her, but I could save you. You were still alive, and there was no way to get you to a medical facility quick enough. The was no other choice but to do what I had to."
"What did you do?" Vic asked, suddenly worried.
"I did what I had to, I did all I could in order to save you."
"What did you do!" Vic yelled, as he started to raise his arm to his face.
"I saved your life!" His father yelled back as Vic look at the thing that had moved when he wanted his arm to. It looked like an arm made of metal. Like some sci-fi nightmare come true.
"WHAT IS THIS?" He screamed as he realized the thing was his arm. His father had tears running own his face,
"The only thing we could do was to fit you with experimental cybernetics. Over 80 of your body had to be rebuilt or supported by them."
"You turned me into a monster!" Vic yelled as the realization hit that he was more machine than human. The shock took hold of him and his vision started to blur. Then back to black.
He awoke to the ceiling of his room. He had a splitting headache, especially after that horrible nightmare. He rubbed his head, feeling the cool touch of metal on the right side of his head, and could only hear metal rubbing metal on the left. He looked at his hands and his eyes widened in realization, it was no dream. He got up and ran to the mirror and looked at himself. Part of his face, and a bit of both arms were still flesh, or flesh simulate. He thought to himself. He opened the door and walked down the stairs of his house, looking around, he noticed a large machine that now dominated the living room.
"Your power charger." A voice said from behind him. He turned to see his father standing there.
"You have a small amount of power that will never end, to sustain life functions, but the majority of your implants will cease function if you do not keep your batteries charged." Vic just stared at his father.
"If you feel up to it, you can go to school today. In your closet are some pants and a sweat shirt large enough to cover your implants. As well as some gloves for you hands."
Vic shouldered past him and back towards his room. Donning the pants and jacket he grabbed his book bag and walked out into the main house. His father was checking something and the large computers screens.
"Bye." he said coldly as he left the house and started toward the school. He brought hood of the jacket up to hide his head as he walked into the school about thirty minutes after leaving his house.
"Hey Vic!" he heard Rene yell form the other side of the hall. She ran up to him to kiss him, but he stopped her.
"Not right now babe." He said as he walked past her and towards his first class of the day.
Sitting down, he began to notice the stares he was receiving from his class mates. He shrugged them off and just stared at the blackboard until the bell rang. The teacher walked in and began to talk, then noticed Vic's hood.
"Mr. Stone, please take down your hood."
"No thank you." He said as he looked way from eh teacher.
"Now, or I'll have to contact the administration. He could feel Rene's eyes on him as he reached for the hood. He slowly moved it back, and then felt a stabbing pain as he heard Rene shriek. The metal encasing his cranial implants glistened in the fluorescent light. Horrified murmurs rippled through the class,
"And now, hell starts" He said as he prepared himself for the coming day.
He was waling home when Ron ran up to him.
"Hey Vic, I got an idea." Victor stared at him, Ron's eyes looking into his, then flicking quickly to his one red eye.
"How about you come with me, I got plans at the UN building. Something big and loud." Vic looked at Ron as his eyes began to glow with a mischievous glint. Vic knew his friend had radical tendencies, but trying to use him as a tool in his new act of terrorism. Vic had other ideas.
"No man, I got to go home a charge my batteries." Vic hated saying that, making him feel that he was becoming more like someone's game boy, than a human being.
"Alright man, call me by ten if you decide otherwise. " Ron walked off, glancing a Vic from the corner of his eyes. Vic rushed home,
"Dad, does this body come with weapons?"
After a quick explanation of what Vic had heard, and decided to do. His dad decided to show him some of the military capabilities they had designed the cybernetics for. Nothing lethal, but effective against Ron, and whoever was going to be working with him. He quickly changed back into his large oversized clothes and began to walk toward the UN building in the distance. As he neared, he could hear gunshots coming from the building. He ran towards them as he saw Ron's group of militant radical's exchanging fire with the police. Using some of his new sensors,. He scanned for Ron, and found him at the top of the building. Hoping he wouldn't crash and die, he activated the boosters in his feet. They shot him skyward and onto the first roof of the buildings lobby. He jumped with the boosters again and he was up on the second tier. Five more times and he was on the roof, face to face with Ron.
"I knew you wouldn't be able to stop yourself from having some fun. Here, set these bombs up over there at the eastern corner."
"Ron, I'm not going to let you do this. Removing his jacket, he activated the rockets on his shoulders. Though filled with a non-lethal gas, they'd give him enough time to get the detonating devise away from Ron, and to take him down and drag him to the police.
"I always knew you would get in my way eventually, that's why I had that portal thing in your parents lab sabotaged. I figured either they died, and you go to some foster house, or it'd take you out too. I guess I'll have to do that myself." Victor couldn't believe his ears. It was Ron's fault he was the way he is. He saw red, even when Ron pulled out his gun and leveled it at Vic's head, all he could think was to fire the rockets and charge him, one punch to the stomach and he'd be down for the count. Ron fired two shots, simultaneous with the launching of the rockets. The rockets exploded and Vic rushed him and punched him as hard as he could. He felt Ron go limp, and dropped him onto the roof. He looked at his body, instinctively searching for any bullet wounds. Finding that the bullets had deflected off of him. He picked up Ron's limp body and proceeded to jump tier to tier back down to the street.
He dropped Ron off with the police, and began to walk back to his house. Taking a detour downtown, he grabbed another large sweatshirt from an outside rack. To deep into thought to worrying about paying for it. As he walked, several explosions sounded. For some reason unknown to him, he rushed toward them, and straight into a battle.