The Titan's Fury, Chapter 1

Alright, here's where the story will become a lot more clear and concise on what happened. I know the prologue was confusing, but hopefully, everything will become clear soon.

I want to thank my first reviewer on this fic, Whisper Dark Rose. Don't worry, character descriptions will be in this chapter, as well as some explanations.

So, on with the show, as they say.

-=TTF1=-

Slowly, his eyes opened. The bright lights made him immediately regret that decision. He could hear a voice talking softly to him.

"Robin! You are awake! This is most joyous! How are you feeling?" asked Starfire, her voice heavy with happiness.

"Bright…" was the only hoarse whisper he could make at that time.

"We'll turn the light down," replied Raven, apparently somewhere to the left of him. After a few seconds, the lights were dimmed to a point where Robin could open his eyes. Robin, the leader of the Teen Titans, sat up on the infirmary bed. As he became vertical, his hand went up to his face. To his relief, his mask was still on. It wasn't that he didn't trust his teammates, but hanging around Bruce for so long had instilled a great amount of paranoia in him, and keeping his identity secret was the first line of defense for him.

He took the pain medication and water offered to him by Raven. He looked around the room. Raven, now to his left at the side of the bed was still wearing her typical navy blue cloak and black leotard. Her hood was down, showing her indigo hair. She studied him closely with her violet eyes. Her normally gray-ish skin was quite pale, especially after having two of her friends hurt by some weird vortex. Her right hand was enveloped in her black energy as she moved her hand up, down and around his back, performing various diagnostic spells.

At the foot of the bed was the tall Tamaranian girl, Starfire. She also wore her normal outfit of purple knee-high boots and purple mini-skirt, as well as her matching sleeveless cut-off top. She had taken off her elbow length gloves though, exposing the orange hued skin on her arms and hands. Her green eyes were wide with worry for him. She was twirling his waist length red hair in her fingers, awaiting Raven's prognosis.

And against the door, was Beast Boy. Easily the shortest member on the team, but also one of the most distinctive, what with his green skin and hair, and his pointed ears. He had changed from his normal outfit into a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt.

Robin, let out a sigh, seeing that he was surrounded by friends. He was about to say something when he heard a low moan from behind Raven. He looked over, and saw two more beds being occupied. One was a African-American, wearing a yellow t-shirt and blue jeans. While he wasn't cut, per se, he definitely was physically fit. The furthest bed held a white kid, wearing a red t-shirt and blue jeans. He was more muscular, and had an athletic build, with a messy mop of brown hair on his head. What was strange was that both occupants were strapped to the bed, and had breathing apparatus masks on.

"Who are they?" asked Robin.

"We don't know. They came out of the vortex with you and the other guy. We've strapped them down, and we're keeping them on sleeping gas for the moment. We wanted to be sure that we were all at one hundred percent before we woke them, in case they are dangerous," said Raven.

"Please, Robin… What happened when the cute Larry attempted to heal your fractured arm?" asked Starfire.

Robin sat in thought for a minute as he recalled what happened. "Well, when he healed my arm, I looked up, and there was nothing, like it was literally an empty white space. The next thing I know, A vortex opens up behind me, and some guys slam into me, and then we're all back in the tower. I can't remember what happened after that…"

"Well bro, that one dude who was here, but now isn't, he looked a lot like the Flash! But, was it really?" asked Beast Boy.

"It seems that way," came Cyborg's voice, to Robin's right. Cyborg moved the privacy curtain, and the Titans, looked on in surprise. Cyborg looked a little older, and broader. The cybernetics on his body had finally stopped shifting around. He no longer had the spots of skin on his arms or legs, but at the same time, a little more of his face was revealed. He no longer had transparent reinforced plastic showing internal circuitry and blue lights on him. Instead, he had small, but numerous lines of blue light highlighting where one piece of metal met another. Cyborg stumbled to his feet. Beast Boy rushed over and put Cyborg's arm over his shoulders to keep him from toppling over.

"My computers have finally finished recalibrating and updating. It seems that I merged with another me from another alternate dimension. I've got his memories… or he has mine… Still trying to figure out if I'm me or him, or even an 'us'. Man, having two sets of memories really bites," sighed Cyborg. "Damn… I had so many full-ride scholarships offered because of how good I was at football. And that's all gone… again."

Beast Boy awkwardly patted Cyborg on the back until Cyborg got control of himself again. "Last my counterpart remembers, was going to see my dad after he didn't show up for my game, again. Then, this box they were studying opened up a Boom Tube, and all these Parademons came through, and started taking people. The initial energy surge of the Tube opening almost killed me," said Cyborg.

"Please, I am not familiar with your Earth words. What is this tube that booms? And are the demons you speak of, are they of a parachute variety? I cannot imagine the horrors a parachute demon could unleash," shuddered Starfire.

Everyone stared at Starfire for a few minutes, before she blushed, and motioned to Cyborg to continue.

"To answer your questions Star, the other me, once he was made into Cyborg, was able to link with every single computer on Earth in a matter of moments. Including the Mother Box, the device that opened the Boom Tubes, which are extra-dimensional wormholes, and they all connected Earth to a place called Apokolips. Now that I'm back online, these upgrades that my other self gave me are letting me link to even the Justice Leagues computers. I'm uploading the Apokolips data to our computer here. But anyway, after my other self came to, he ran as far as he could, thinking that dad made him into some kind of monster… then he ran into the Justice League, apparently before they became the Justice League. Then came him. Darkseid. He's the ruler of Apokolips, and he very nearly beat us all. But before he had run from my dad, the other me had managed to integrate a Boom Tube into my systems. Batman helped me gain complete control of my systems, and he, or I or whatever, we opened all the Boom Tubes at once, and all the Parademons got sucked in, and so did I… and then, next thing I know, we were merging, and we passed out… but, I did see that the Flash was one of the ones who came out of the Boom Tube with me. His mask was off, so I was able to get an ID on him… a guy named Barry Allen. According to the Leagues computers, Barry Allen exists here as well, and seems to be able to run fast enough to manipulate time, if Einstein's Theory of Relativity is right. All I can guess is that yet another Barry Allen was running through time, and somehow, my opening the Boom Tubes interfered with that… But, the sheer amount of energy required for something like that… is astronomical. "

The other Titans sat in stunned silence as they processed this. Finally, Robin spoke, being one of the only ones who understood physics well enough to see where Cyborg was going.

"How much energy would it have taken?"

"The equivalent of a nuclear explosion," replied Cyborg. This was met by a grave silence. As one, the Titans turned their heads to the other two occupants of the infirmary.

"So… those two… we're they caught in a nuclear explosion…" started Starfire.

"Or were they the cause of one?" finished Robin. "Cyborg, I know you are going through a lot right now, but if you have access to every computer on the planet, are you able to identify those two?"

Cyborg nodded, grateful for the distraction, stood all the way up, and slowly moved over to them, getting used to his new body. He approached the African-American kid first. The tips of Cyborg's fingers morphed, the index finger into a scanner, and the middle finger into a razor, and the ring finger into a glass type material, with yet another scanner underneath it. Using his thumb and index finger, Cyborg pinched the tips of each of the kids fingers, with the finger pads against the scanner in his index finger. The middle and ring fingers extended, and carefully cut a tiny incision into the boys arm before the ring finger wiped the blood and began to analyze.

"Raven, can you get something to clean and patch him up?" asked Cyborg. Raven nodded and moved to clean and bandage the cut.

With the data gathered from the kids hand and arm, Cyborg's pinky finger morphed as well. Cyborg opened one of the kids eyes, and positioned his pinky right over it. At once, a small series of lasers ran over the irises before flashing off and Cyborg let his eyelids drop back over his eye.

Cyborg did the same to the white kid before motioning to the others to follow him out into the hallway. Once there, and the door closed, Cyborg began to report his findings.

"OK, I actually got two matches for each of them. One from the other me's memory banks, and the other from this Earths computers. The black kid is named Jason Rusch. Here, in this dimension, he is about ten years old, real studious and an egghead kind of kid. Now, for my counterparts computers, he's exactly the same, except for being seventeen. Now, there's something odd about the older Jason, but we'll get to that in a few minutes.

"The other one is confirmed to be Ronnie Raymond. This universes Ronnie Raymond was an average student, at best. He was going to college, where he met a man named Stein, a physicist who had created something referred to as the "Firestorm Matrix". Basically, it let him and Ronnie merge into one being called Firestorm. Firestorm became a superhero, and eventually joined the League, known as the youngest member ever. But, about a year and a half ago, Ronnie was killed in action. Because one half of the matrix was now invalid, it split Ronnie from Stein. Stein's grief and guilt led him straight to the bottom of a bottle, and eventually, about six months ago, Professor Stein committed suicide.

"This Ronnie, that is lying in bed there, is the same age as Jason, both being seventeen, so there's the first major difference. This Ronnie is a lot like me, he was a rising football star. Then there was an explosion at their high school, and authorities reported that Ronnie, Jason, and some girl who was with them at the time had blown it up. To be honest, I don't believe it. Jason had a permanent record that showed he was very dedicated to his studies and the teachers always had glowing remarks about him. The girl was Editor-In-Chief of the school paper, and Ronnie was probably going to be a pro football player.

"But coincidentally, the Jason Rusch in there had gone to an International Science Camp, where he met their universes Professor Stein and quickly became a favorite of Stein. Now, other hijacked data shows that a company called 'Zithertech', had pursued Professor Stein for his research relating to the 'God Particle' and had some special interest in a 'magnetic tube' he had developed. There's no other info on the tube, other than Jason was on the list of suspected people that Stein could have given it to. Shortly after the International Science Camp, an apparent natural gas explosion had killed Professor Stein."

All the Titans stood, with their eyes to the floor, processing what they had just learned, and how they should proceed. If what Cyborg said was true, and the correlations between these new arrivals, and the Ronnie and Jason that already existed here…

Robin, suddenly looked up. The word 'Firestorm' had set off warning bells in his head when he first heard it, but he couldn't remember why. "Cy… the Firestorm from this dimension, what were his powers?"

Cyborg looked at expectant and apprehensive faces of his teammates. He quickly looked up all info on Firestorm he could.

"According to the Leagues files, he had the ability to fly, generate intense heat, throw fireballs, was immune to fire, and could potentially become radioactive. There was a reason he was called 'The Nuclear Man'… but all that pales in comparison to his last power: transmutation," said Cyborg gravely.

Robin, Raven, and Starfire's eyes all widened. A man with that kind of power could literally unravel the very fabric of the universe!

"Transmogrification? What the hell is that?!" said Beast Boy.

The others looked at him with an 'You're an idiot' look, before Raven smacked on the backside of the head.

"Transmutation," she corrected. "It's the ability to turn any kind of material into any other kind of material. You remember the legends that alchemists could turn lead into gold?"

Beast Boy nodded, still looking confused, then brightened as comprehension dawned on him. "So those dudes in there can turn lead into gold?! DUDE! THAT IS FREAKIN'SA-WEEEET!"

"Beast Boy, think about it!" snapped Robin. "If they do have that power, and it's entirely possible they can, they could destroy the world. Easily. Can you imagine what would happen if they turned the air we breathe into say, gunpowder? Or turned water into sulfuric acid? Or buildings into bubblegum? If those guys can use transmutation, they can easily be the most powerful beings on the planet. Possibly the universe."

"What if someone like Superman tried to stop them?" asked Beast Boy, his ears drooping as he thought of the implied dangers as well.

"They could turn the concrete around them into Kryptonite, and then Superman wouldn't be so super, would he?" asked Raven in a sharp tone.

Beast Boy became unusually silent as he thought of all the things they could do if they had that power, the dire situation finally dawning on him. The five teens looked at each other, sighing as they tried to figure out what to do. Finally, Robin spoke up.

"Keep them sedated. Gradually, we'll decrease the dosage on one of them, just enough to let them to regain consciousness, and we'll interrogate them and see what we can find out about them."

The rest of the team nodded in agreement.

-=TTF1=-

Eventually, it was decided that they would awaken Ronnie Raymond first, since, according to Cyborgs records, he hadn't had any interaction with Professor Stein himself, and his grades were average at best. In his drowsy state, he might be more willing to impart information without really taking in anything that they said.

So, over the course of a week, they gradually lightened Ronnie's dosage of sleeping gas. They kept Jason's turned up high enough that he would be drowsy even if a fight broke out and knocked his mask off. To be on the safe side, they wheeled Jason's bed into a reinforced room, with Raven carefully levitating the equipment.

Once Jason was locked away, the machines wirelessly linked to Cyborg to let him know of any abnormalities, the Titans gathered around Ronnie's bed. For the past hour, his heart rate and brain wave activity had been slowly increasing, indicating that he was close to consciousness.

The Titans did not loosen any of the straps on the bed, but did tilt it into a sitting position. Using her dark energy, Raven removed the mask enough to let some fresh air get into Ronnie's system. Slowly, Ronnie's eyelids fluttered, before shutting tightly and then relaxing before he began to slowly open them.

"…Where… where am I?" he asked groggily.

"You're in a place called Titan's Tower. The headquarters of the Teen Titans. We have some questions for you on how you and the other kid ended up here," replied Robin, his tone frosty.

After a couple seconds, Ronnie's eyes seemed to clear a little bit, and he visibly tensed. Seeing this, Cyborg sent out a wireless signal for the mask to slightly increase the dosage of sleeping gas. Within moments, Ronnie's eyes slid out of focus again.

"How did you and Jason end up here, Ronnie?" asked Robin.

"Dunno… One minute, was fighting… another guy… I think his name was Pohzar… the next, we got sucked into some… swirly thing…"

"Who is Professor Stein?"

"I don't… know him… He's someone… that… Jason knew…"

"There were reports of you, Jason and a girl blowing up your high school, care to explain about that?" asked Robin harshly.

"…Not us... Mercenaries… after tube… that gave… us… our powers…"

"Tube? What tube?"

"Something… Stein gave… to Jason. Don't know… what happened to it."

At this point, the Titans were too shocked by what they were finding out to notice Ronnie's speech getting better, and his eyes coming into focus again. Ronnie, however decided to still act like he was drowsy while examining how he was bound.

Robin gathered the Titans in a huddle a couple feet away as they discussed what else they might try to learn from him. As they had their backs turned, Ronnie subtly tried pulling at the wrist and ankle restraints, only to find that they would not budge. As the Titans turned back around to talk to him again, Robin spoke.

"Alright Ronnie, here's what's going to happen now…"

"Actually… I have more… to say," replied Ronnie.

Robin looked suspicious immediately. "What's that?"

Ronnie smirked, and yelled out, "Firestorm!"

In a flash of heat and fire that made the Titans cover their eyes and faces, Ronnie had transformed. The stretcher bed he was strapped to was incinerated, and Ronnie stood, ready to fight. He was now in a red costume with loose fitting sleeves and pant legs. His forearms, and calves seemed to be made of a purple fire that didn't burn anything… yet. His chest had a large white circle on the left side, with three intersecting white lines, separated from each other at forty-five degree angles. On each of these white lines was a red circle. His eyes burned with a white hot fire, and instead of having hair, he now had a plume of purple fire.

The Titans stared in shock as Ronnie's gloved hands started to smoke.

"Now I have some questions for you," said Ronnie.

-=TTF1=-

And that's the end of chapter one. Now, I just want to go ahead and list some of the elements that were in the prologue, and make reading recommendations off of those.

The part of Thomas Wayne being Bat-man and killing the Reverse Flash can be found in the "Flashpoint" trade paperback. I definitely recommend reading this. If you ever wanted to know what a world with Aquaman and Wonder Woman being the bad guys was like, or a world without Superman, pick this up.

Then there was a portion of a man running alongside Barry Allen in the time stream, whose body was pure scarlet. That is the Flash from "Kingdom Come", a book in which society had decided that Superman and the Justice League were too soft on crime, and Magog became the number one 'hero'. As an eventual result, all super-humans start fighting against each other and mankind. READ THIS.

The flashes of the different Superman, Wonder Woman and Darkseid and the Cyborg in this story all come from the New 52's Justice League book. The first volume is out, it's called "Justice League: Origins". Again, highly recommend reading it.

All reviews are welcome and appreciated. If you're a comic fan, or a Harry Potter fan, please also check out some of my other works.