On The Wings Of Icarus, Chapter Two: And So It Begins...
AN: I am taking creative license and giving the characters some first and last names. I have not seen all of the episodes of Teen Titans and therefore, do not know if they reveal their true identities in the show. If it is wrong and you know their real names, then please tell me so I can go back and fix it. Thank you for your cooperation and patience.
And without further ado, here is Chapter 2 of On The Wings Of Icarus!
It had been over three years since Robin died. The Teen Titans had tried to stay together, but without Robin...things just kind of fell apart. That isn't to say that they had stopped fighting crime, they just did it by themselves now. The rest of the Titans occasionally ran into one another, but for the most part, everyone had gone their separate ways. What they couldn't figure out, was why Slade had stopped his criminal activities. The man had simply disappeared and fallen off the grid. There were no attacks against Jump City that could be attributed to him. It was like the man had given up being a criminal master-mind now that Robin was gone. They were of course grateful that Slade wasn't attacking Jump, but it worried them, having not heard of his whereabouts or his activities for the past several years.
What none of the other Titans knew, was that Slade was very much alive and very busy. He had been procuring certain things from his contacts for the last three years for his latest project. And it looked like it was very close to completion.
All he had to do now was turn it on and send something through. He had spent many agonizing days, without sleep, just to see this through. He couldn't fail. To do so, would mean that he would never see Robin again.
That wasn't an option.
As Slade began his preparations for the machine, he recounted the last several years. His obsession with Robin had grown to all new proportions. Everything he did nowadays was a testament to the young teen whose life had been cut short way before it's time. Which was the main reason for the gigantic machine in his underground lair.
The pet project he had been spending time on was a time machine. It had taken him an embarrassingly long amount of time to actually turn the fantasy concept into reality. The machine was made out of titanium alloy, with built in nanomachines in order to monitor the devices progress. He was going to be in the thing and it wasn't like he could step out and press a switch and hop back in before the machine did it's job. That's what the nanomachines were there for.
Right now, he was monitoring the machines energy output. He knew it would be a lot, hence why he had built his device in an old underground bunker. Whomever had built it had made sure that anything they did down there would not be caught up above by a scanner or a monitor. It had been the perfect spot. And now, as he watched the machines progress on his computer screen, he hoped that everything would work out alright.
It had to. He was counting on it. He had to see Robin again. He had too. His mind, his very sanity, depended upon it.
Back then, he hadn't realized just how much Robin meant to him. Sure, he taunted the boy, tried to kill his friends, and made the boy his apprentice at one time, but he had always felt like something was...missing.
Without Robin around, Slade finally figured out what it was.
Richard "Robin" Grayson made him feel alive in ways he had thought were long dead. The boy's fiery temper and passion for a good fight had made him stand out like a beacon that Slade couldn't possibly resist.
He needed Robin in his life. He realized that now. And he was going to make Robin apart of his life whether the boy wanted to be there or not.
Hence the time machine.
Noting that things appeared to be working correctly, Slade started up the machine, silently praying that this one didn't blow up on him like the last one had. (It had taken him months to get everything assembled again!)
Slade double-checked his belongings. He was taking everything with him. Especially his most prized possession: Robin's black and white mask.
He pulled out the mask and traced the edges with his finger. "Soon...Robin...very soon..." he whispered to the empty room.
Hearing the computer beep, Slade put the mask back in his pack and set it down on the floor before going over to the computer.
All of the programs had a green light next to them, indicating that things were moving along smoothly.
For the first time in three years, Slade allowed a smile to grace his mask-less face.
It was time.
Slade picked up a small piece of metal from the ground and placed it in the time machine's pod and closed the door.
He started the machine via his computer console and watched in fascination as the pod began to spin at a dizzying rate. The pod then began to glow a whitish-gold and it was so bright that Slade had to cover his eyes lest he be blinded.
When the light died down several minutes later, Slade went over to the pod and peered inside. The jagged piece of metal was nowhere to be found.
Slade's smile widened.
(Teen Titan Tower, Jump City, 3:07 a.m. Same Time)
Cyborg was bored. It seemed to happen a lot more nowadays then it had whenever...whenever Robin had been alive.
Cyborg still couldn't believe that the little acrobat who had survived practically everything thrown at him was gone.
His death had hit them all hard. Especially Starfire and Raven. Starfire had had a huge crush on the Boy Wonder and his death had nearly torn the younger girl to shreds with grief. The last Cyborg had heard of her, she was in Gotham calling herself Poison Ivy. He hadn't spoken to her in a while, so he had no idea if she was still there or not. Or even what she was up to.
Raven had said that she and Robin used to converse via telepathy a lot on and off missions and his lack of mind link had left her feeling terribly empty inside. Cyborg knew Raven was in Jump City somewhere, but had no idea where she was presently. All he knew was that she had a new codename (Steel Magnolia) and a new outfit. Other than that, well he couldn't be sure what she was up to either.
Beast Boy hadn't taken the news well, (hell, none of them had), and the last Cyborg had heard of the little green guy, he was in a circus show, performing as the One Man Freak-show. He was making quite a bit of money changing into different animals too. He had heard a rumor that the JLA had made use of BB's gift several times already. He didn't know if he believed the little green boy, as BB was known to exaggerate his stories frequently. But then again...Beast Boy had grown up after Robin's death, so maybe he hadn't been lying about his involvement after all.
Cy hadn't heard anything from him in a long time either.
Suddenly a loud beeping sound came from his arm, and Cyborg pulled up the appendage in surprise.
He blinked, stunned, at the sudden readings he was getting.
He typed in a few commands on his cybernetic arm and found out where there coming from. There was apparently some sort of energy interference coming from the lower half of Jump City, near the place where...where Robin had died.
Cyborg swallowed thickly as unwanted memories made themselves known. He shook his head and concentrated on what the energy readings could be. They were unlike anything Cyborg had ever seen before. And he'd seen a lot weird stuff. The readings themselves were off the charts, indicating something major was going down. But what could it be? There was nothing down in that part of Jump except an old abandoned bunker that nobody had touched in decades, and a lot full of rusted out vehicles that nobody had ever claimed.
He took his eyes off the energy charts a second to grab his communicator emblazoned with a capital "T". He still held onto his, as had the others, as occasionally they needed assistance with a foe or other.
He wasn't usually this cautious, but something was telling him that having everyone there when he checked out the mysterious source of the energy was a good plan. A plan that Robin would've approved of, Cyborg thought with a tiny smile.
He flipped open his communicator and waited impatiently for Raven or Steel to pick up.
"What?" came the familiar monotone voice of his little sister.
"Just got some strange readings near...near the place Robin...where Robin was when we...well the readings are off the charts. Something is going on down there. Wanna check it out with me?" Cyborg asked, fumbling through his explanation.
Steel hesitated briefly and Ryan (Cyborg) could clearly see the pain and sadness she was desperately trying to hide behind her I-don't-have-emotions facade.
When she opened her eyes, Ryan knew she was coming before she even acquiesced.
"Yeah, I guess I'll come. Got nothing better to do anyway." Ryan grinned at the familiar line.
"Alright, I'll meet ya there. Do you think you can get a hold of Starfire for me? She's too far out of range for me to get into contact with her. I'll contact Beast Boy and see if he wants to meet us there."
Steel said nothing about the blatant lie Ryan spewed about Starfire being out of range. She merely nodded and hoped her conversation with the Tamaranean didn't go horribly wrong like the last one had.
Cyborg let loose a breath of quiet relief as Steel's face faded off the communicator. He did not want to talk to Starfire. If that had been her on the comm instead of Raven, then the conversation would've taken a very different and possibly violent turn.
Pressing the button for BB's comm unit, Ryan again waited impatiently for the other boy to pick up.
"Hello?" Beast Boy's tired face came on the comm. When he saw who was calling him, his tiredness seemingly evaporated.
"Hey Cy! What's up?" Beast Boy asked, smiling.
"I don't know yet, but I got some strange readings I think we should take a look at." Ryan replied.
"Oh yeah? What kind of strange readings?" Beast Boy was suddenly all business, his attitude just as serious.
Cyborg sighed lowly. Ever since Robin died, Beast Boy's joking nature and easy going attitude had all but been extinguished. It was if the younger boy finally understood that the job they had was dangerous. After that, everything changed.
"Like I said, I don't know, but Raven is gonna meet us at the site, and hopefully Star will be there as well."
"Well, where is this place at?"
Ryan hesitated. "It's near the place where...where Robin died." Cyborg finished softly.
Beast Boy's face suddenly turned unreadable.
"I see." he said, his voice not revealing anything. Ryan winced.
"Will we see you there?" Ryan asked after a painful moment of silence.
Beast Boy didn't reply for a few seconds, before he hesitantly nodded.
Ryan allowed himself a small grateful smile. "Thanks BB. Talk to you later."
"Bye Cy." Beast Boy replied just as quietly.
(Meanwhile, with Raven now called Steel Magnolia.)
Raven sighed as she pressed the button to call Starfire. She mentally prepared herself for the upcoming conversation. She didn't know how Star would react to the news that they were headed back to the scene of Robin's demise.
After Robin's death, Starfire had become emotionally unstable. If someone even dared mentioned Robin's name, she would either fly into a fury the likes of which the remnants of the Titans had never seen before, or find a quiet dark corner and sob for a while.
Raven would take the sobbing over the catastrophic anger any day.
Raven glanced down at the communicator in her hand and realized that Starfire was staring back at her, completely silent.
She blinked, surprised. How long had Starfire been staring at her? Shaking her head, Raven began to talk.
"I just received a call from Cyborg. He said he's got something that we should see."
No response. Starfire was just staring at her.
The redhead blinked. "And what exactly does Cyborg want us to see?" the unbalanced female asked quietly.
Raven stared at her for a few seconds, trying to determine the other girl's emotional state, to no avail. Star's face was completely unreadable, something that had never happened before.
Raven proceeded cautiously.
"I don't know." she lied. "He said he received some strange readings and he thinks that we all should be there to check it out. He said that he has never seen these readings before."
"And he requires my help?" the redhead asked, her green eyes gleaming.
Raven nodded. "Beast Boy is also going to be there." she added.
Star's face turned contemplative. "I suppose I should go if you all are. Where are these readings coming from?"
Raven flinched imperceptibly. Here goes nothing...
"They are located in Jump City. It's near..." Raven stopped and took a deep breath. "It's near where Robin died." she finished quietly.
Dead silence. Raven was almost afraid to look up. She gathered her courage however, and looked up at the other girl.
Star's face had gone deathly white, and her emerald eyes had gone as wide as saucers.
Her mouth hung open in a small "o" shape, and it looked as if she tried to speak, but no words made it past her suddenly clogged throat.
"Do you you think...is it possible...could Robin be...alive?" Star asked, not daring to get her hopes up.
Raven again hesitated. The purple haired teen knew deep in her heart that if Robin was alive, then he would have already made contact with someone by now.
"I don't know. It is a possibility that we can't ignore though." Raven didn't mention how unlikely said possibility was. One look at Starfire's face told her the suggestion wouldn't be welcomed in the slightest.
"Then I shall see you there friend Raven. Let me just...take care of my precious plants and I'll be along shortly." Ivy said, and cut the comm off before Steel had a chance to reply.
Raven blinked down at the device in her hands, a little confused. That...had gone way better than she was hoping for.
'Well,' Raven thought as she rose into the air and floated out her window, 'It looks as if the Old Team is going to be together again.'
She sighed, and felt tears spring to her eyes. "I wish you were here too Robin." she sniffed before wiping the tears away.
She floated toward the abandoned part of Jump, determined to find out what those readings that Cyborg picked up were. Who knows? Maybe Starfire was right and Robin was alive. In any case, she would know the answer soon enough.
(Abandoned Bunker, 3:16 a.m. Same Time)
Slade tested a few more objects before he was satisfied with the results of the time machine.
Spencer then picked up his pack full of his essential belongings and placed it in the pod.
He again went over to the console and pressed Enter, and again went through the dizzying spins of the pod and potentially blinding lights.
And yet again, Spencer's test of the machine had ran smoothly.
Now, the only thing left for him to do was enter the device himself.
He did so with the widest grin on his face yet.
Now safely ensconced within the womb of the machine, Spencer ordered the computer to begin assimilation.
"Computer, activate Project Icarus." Slade had already done the math, and computed the results into the computer console. If everything worked out, (and with his previous results speaking for themselves), then Slade should arrive sometime before he had made Robin his apprentice.
Spencer watched as the world outside the pod began to blur. He closed his eyes as the whitish-gold lights from before appeared and seared his closed irises.
He screamed in sudden agony as his body tore itself apart. The process was brutal. The time machine's design tore objects apart at the molecular level and put them back together again at the end of the cycle when it dropped the completed objects at the dumping site.
Slade screamed until he no longer had a voice. 'The...pain...is worth...it...' he thought as his mind conjured up images of Robin. 'I will...see...you very s-soon...my...little...bird...' Spencer thought before his entire world turned dark and he knew no more.
(Outside and near the old bunker, 3:58 a.m.)
Cyborg looked around at the grungy surroundings through the windshield of his T-Car.
The place looked virtually the same since...they had last been here.
It didn't look as if anything was out of the ordinary.
His arm beeped again. Cyborg looked down at it and whistled sharply. The energy readings had just spiked massively!
"Alright," he said, getting out of the car, "let's find out who's doing this." Ryan took his time exploring the place, making sure that he didn't go too far away from his car. The others would be here soon and he didn't want them to have to search for him too. He would glance down periodically at the charts on his cybernetic arm to make sure that the readings were there and the information he was receiving was accurate. It was. Good. At least his equipment was still in good shape since his last fight.
He quickly noticed a pattern in the readings. While the readings were abnormally high to start with, they would occasionally spike off the charts more than they had been seemingly every five to ten minutes or so.
He jumped and spun around, his arm transforming into his gun in mid spin as he heard a soft rustling noise behind him.
Raven was floating in the air a little ways behind him and looked unconcerned with the fact that he was pointing his weapon at her face.
"Has anyone else arrived?" she asked as she descended toward the ground, her long ponytail trailing elegantly behind her.
Cyborg shook head in the negative. "Nah, it's just us for now."
"Have you located where the signal is coming from yet?"
Ryan shook his head. "Was waiting for the rest of you. Thought it'd be a good idea to wait and see what we're up against first."
The purple haired girl raised a delicate eyebrow but didn't comment.
A sudden piercing call, that from a falcon or hawk, rang in the dark skies above the two Titans, and they looked up to see a dark green bird coming toward them.
Raven allowed herself a small, barely there, smile. It really had been too long since she had last seen Garfield.
When the green bird landed on the ground, it transformed into their friend, Beast Boy, who looked around his surroundings with a small frown before focusing on his old friends.
"Star's not here yet?" BB asked, pointedly not looking in the direction where they had discovered Robin's body. He clenched his fists as the images assaulted his brain, despite his control.
They had found Robin face up on the split and cracked concrete just inside the lot of rusted and beat up old vehicles. His mask was gone, and Robin had appeared as if he was only sleeping. The four or five bullet holes in his chest and abdomen proved otherwise. Robin had bled out before they got there. Whoever had shot him had been taken down by an unknown force. They had never found out who had killed Robin's killers; Cyborg thought it was one of the Titans, mainly Speedy. The hot tempered bowmen had become really good friends with their acrobatic leader and he had taken the news of Robin's passing especially hard. Starfire and Raven hadn't cared at the time. They were satisfied that Robin's killers hadn't got away. But Beast Boy knew it was Slade who had done the killing. He didn't know how and he didn't know why, but something was telling him that Slade was responsible for the mercenaries' deaths. However, he never told the Team his suspicions.
He came back to himself when he felt a small tug on his arm. He blinked and looked up at Raven, who had tears gathering in her eyes. They didn't fall, and Beast Boy felt like a selfish bastard for wishing that they wouldn't.
"I know." was all she whispered and BB grunted, but didn't pull his arm out of her hand.
They all glanced up and looked around when they heard a loud snapping sound.
Everybody powered up, not knowing if the newcomer was Starfire or the person responsible for the weird energy signal.
They all blinked in shock when a moment later, Starfire, or rather Poison Ivy, came through the darkness, riding atop a giant blood red rose with wicked thorns protruding from the massive stem. Her fiery red headed mane flew behind her like a flame wreathed halo, and her green eyes were blazing.
"Uh..." was the intelligent response Beast Boy in regards to Starfire's new entrance.
Raven and Cyborg were of the same mind, but didn't let out a verbal response.
"Wow Star! Nice Ride!" BB said in a parody of his usual cheerfulness.
"My name is Poison Ivy. I am not Starfire anymore. She was too innocent. Too naïve." Poison Ivy said as she glided down toward the ground.
Raven, BB, and Cyborg exchanged looks.
"Okay...Star—Poison Ivy—what do you all say we check out these readings and figure out what's going on?" Cyborg said.
"Let's not waste anymore time then." Ivy said and Ryan blinked, before quickly taking point.
"Right. Keep your eyes open guys. I have no idea what could be causing the readings I'm getting."
Cyborg said.
They all nodded before trailing after their robotic friend. They walked for several minutes in silence, Ryan conveniently bypassed the part of the car lot where they had Robin. Nobody mentioned his shortcut.
Ryan looked down at his arm, and began to type several commands into the interface. A small red blip popped up on the screen and Cyborg grinned.
Good, they weren't that far away from whatever was going on.
"I've got a solid location on the signal. It's about fifty feet from here. Spread out and pair off. Let's find this thing and shut it down." Cyborg said after they had been walking for a short while.
Everyone nodded. Beast Boy went with Steel Magnolia, and Poison Ivy accompanied Cyborg.
"What do you think we'll find?" Starfire asked quietly.
Cyborg shrugged. "Honestly? I have no idea. The signal is a mess. I'm surprised I even managed to pick up anything."
Starfire remained quiet and didn't utter another word.
Cyborg pretended not to notice the sudden oppressive silence that hang between them.
Ryan looked down at his arm. "Not too much further ahead of us...wait a second. This can't be right."
Starfire looked up and questioned him.
"The signal...it's coming from underground. But that can't be right. There's nothing there except...except..." Cyborg's face suddenly brightened.
"What is it?" Ivy asked curiously.
"There's an old abandoned bunker down there that was evacuated a long time ago when Jump and the rest of the cities were at war with each other. That's where the signal is coming from I bet."
Starfire nodded and contacted the others. Before too long they were all together at the site. Or rather on top of it.
"Any idea on how to get down there without blasting the place apart and letting anyone know that we're on our way?" Cyborg asked, looking at the rest of his friends.
Everybody shrugged. "I can go in a smaller form and scout around." Beast Boy said and changed into a small mouse.
Cyborg nodded to the little green rodent and BB disappeared into a small hole in the ground.
"Well," Ryan said as he looked around their grungy surroundings, "It looks like all we can do now is wait."
Meanwhile, Garfield, or Beast Boy as he was more commonly known as, flitted through the darkened tunnel he found himself in.
Thoughts raced through his mind as he ran.
Being here felt...strange. Not wrong, but somehow...different. It was almost as if someone or something was urging them to be there. Like he said, it felt strange.
But what was really weird about the strange feeling, was the fact that Garfield welcomed it.
Anything to get rid of those horrible images of Robin...lying there so still...
BB shook his head. 'Concentrate!' he scolded himself.
So Beast Boy entertained thoughts of what was down here in the super secret bunker.
Was it an alien invasion of some kind? Was it Terra? Had she somehow regained her powers? (He hadn't seen her since before Robin died, so he had no clue where she was or what she was doing.)
Or...or was it Slade who was doing all this weird energy stuff?
Quite suddenly, he could smell something...burning. Squeaking in surprise, BB quickly ran through the tunnel. What he hadn't expected was for the ground to rush out from under him like it had, and he dropped straight down into a...well a gigantic room.
Quickly transforming back into his human body, Garfield surveyed his surroundings after he landed. The room he was in was long and rectangular. The walls appeared to be made out of metal, as was the floor. But that's not what caught the green boy's eyes.
It was the humongous machine sitting in the center of the room.
"Whoa..." he whispered as he stepped toward the contraption.
He sniffed the air as he drew closer, and wrinkled his nose. Ugh. It smelled horrible in the room. And he confirmed that the mysterious machine was the cause of it.
But...what exactly was this thing? Who had built it and why?
"Cyborg, you're gonna wanna see this." BB said into this communicator.
End chapter 2. I know it seems like an odd place to drop off at, but it's ten pages long, and well...I wanted to get this out to you guys as soon as possible. So here you are! Hopefully this chapter explains things a little more and the characters are kept in character. I am currently hard at work on Chapter 3, so be on the lookout!
