Thank you to tennisgal456, XxNightfirexX, BerryDrops, kjesStar, Seraephina, Crimson Black, RavenSis, cartoonfire, TooAwesomeToRequireAName, and Somewhere In Time fo reviewing the last chapter!
And thanks to Daniella the anon. reviewer, too!
Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans.
"You thought you could run away, Troq!" the captain of the ship hissed. "You thought you had killed us, that we would never find you again? You were wrong...you will never be able to hide from us..." He beat her mercilessly, but Koriand'r refused to show any pain. What did it matter? No one would hear her. She was locked in the most thick-walled, secure, untouchable room in the entire ship. Nothing could penetrate through.
Suddenly, the alarm above her head went off, signalling a self-destruction. The captain stood stock-still in fear. Thinking only of himself, he fled the room, closing the door behind him out of habit. Now, Koriand'r really did scream. After all this...after all the pain and hardship she'd suffered, she was going to die. It wasn't fair...
Please don't let that kind man die as well, she prayed.
The alarm shut off, but there was no explosion. Instead, the tell tale rumble of take off was felt beneath her body. For the life of her, Koriand'r couldn't figure out what had just happened.
Fifteen minutes later, a black shadow appeared on the wall beside her. "Princess Koriand'r...there was never a need for panic. The Gordanians are all off the ship, and the prisoners have been freed."
"Raven of Azarath," Koriand'r cried happily. "You have no idea how happy I am to see you!"
"You're hurt," Raven said, frowning at her wounds. Quickly, the sorceress healed them to the best of her ability, apologizing for not being strong enough to finish the job. "Come. There's someone waiting for you outside."
When Dick came to, Raven was masterfully flying the spaceship through a belt of asteroids. He cried out in terror at one particularly close call, and Raven gave him an annoyed look. "Finally. It's about time you got up."
"How long have I--look out!--been...uh, asleep?"
"Ten minutes. I don't need you distracting me. Go get people out of their cells, and get some food to them. After that, let them know that we're heading to the first habitable planet in the area."
"Okay, I--whoa! Watch it, will you? This isn't a daredevil stuntfest!"
"Just go," Raven hissed. "I know what I'm doing."
"Yeah, alright. Just don't get us killed now, please?"
Out of nowhere, a stream of black energy dragged him out of the door by his ear. Note to self, he sulked, rubbing the sore side of his head, don't provoke Raven. Or any alien, for that matter. They're all stronger than you.
His first priority was to get the alien girl he'd been traveling with and make sure she was okay. On the way, he came across many different aliens in different jail cells, and managed to bash open every single lock. But he couldn't even ask the other aliens about her, whether they spoke English or not. He didn't even know her name.
Most of the aliens he freed thanked him--at least, he thought they did--and went some other way, probably in search of food. Some came with him, usually the ones that hadn't been there long, and were feeling a bit stronger. Some of their talents came in handy. One of them could control his body temperature, and he turned it up high enough to melt some of the bars on the cells. Another was all muscle, and bent the bars out with ease.
The medley of prisoners arrived at a very high-tech looking door. It had no lock, and was probably voice/DNA activated. Dick had a terrible feeling he knew who was behind it. He banged on it with all his might, pressing the only button there multiple times, but nothing worked. It took the combined efforts nearly every alien in his group to put even a dent in it. "We can't get in," Dick groaned. How was he supposed to get to her?
"You don't need to," Rave drawled, appearing out of nowhere with the Tamaranian girl in hand. "This who you were looking for?"
The girl recognized Dick at once and flew--actually flew--to embrace him. She had one lethal hug. If Dick's ribs had cracked any more they'd have been splintered.
A collective gasp echoed from the aliens around them. Actually, it sounded like a bunch of farm animals choking after they'd inhaled helium, but Dick was pretty sure there was a big deal with what they were doing right now. "Uh...it's not what it looks like...?"
Raven began to speak in that gibberish language that Dick had come to recognize as Tamaranian. They conversed for a little while, and at the end, the alien girl looked so grateful, Dick was sure Raven had been telling her about the escape. It didn't seem like Raven to glorify anything, much less his part in the whole plan, but apparently this girl knew enough to suspect that he'd done a lot more than what Raven had said.
"Thank you," Raven enunciated slowly, making it clear that she was not enjoying her job as translator.
"Thhhannnk youuu," the girl told Dick. He was taken aback. In English, her voice sounded so much friendlier. Hers must be one of those languages where everything sounded angry.
"Uh...how do you say 'no problem' back to her, Raven?" Raven just glowered at him. Dick figured that probably wasn't it, so he just smiled.
Raven sighed. "This is P..." The girl threw Raven a look. "...Koriand'r.
"Coriander? Like the vegetable?"
"It's not a vegetable, genius. It's an herb. Gulshtik Koriand'r, ene na'ma Dick." She turned to all of the other aliens, and announced (probably about nine times, in all their respective languages) that there was a hunt for food going on. "Language barriers are so fun..." She disappeared into the ground, just melted into a pool of black, like the Wicked Witch of the West.
Maybe she's where they got it from, Dick mused. He tugged on his companion's arm, urging her to find the Gordanian's stock along with everyone else.
A cry of triumph went up somewhere close to them. Dick followed the sound of that voice, pulling the girl behind him. More and more aliens were squealing, squaking, shrieking, screeching, belching, and squeaking for others to come join them. Dick turned a corner, saw what they were looking at...
...And promptly lost his appetite.
A bunch of still-moving worm-like things had been thrown in a huge box, and were now being gobbled down by the hungry aliens. Koriand'r flew to the box at once, stuffing her face. Dick was sure he was turning as green as the stubby tentacles on Today's Special.
"Come, human," one of the diners gurgled. "Feast with us!"
"Nah, I'm good, thanks."
"You will not be, soon. This is the only food on the whole ship." Another alien handed him half of a gigantic grub, which still twitched and wriggled. Some kind of pus was dripping from it, probably because it was just cut in half. Dick would've thrown up, if he's had anything inside of him to throw up.
Slowly, painfully, he took a bite out of the side. Truth be told, after he got past the sliminess, it wasn't so bad. The meal was like flavorless Jell-o. He ate the whole thing without too much of a hassle, glad he couldn't feel it moving around in his stomach...hopefully, it had stopped by now.
"You look like you're having fun." Raven suddenly appeared beside him again, smirking.
"Where do you keep coming from?" Dick asked, thoroughly annoyed.
"Someone has to fly the ship. Right now, Anthriux is on it. He's already eaten."
"If you can call it eating. This stuff is disgusting..."
"Whatever you say. I wouldn't complain, though. It's all you're going to get for a few days."
"Yeah, okay...you wouldn't complain...right...ouch!"
The planet they finally chose to land on (mostly because it was the closest to them, and they'd run out of fuel since someone decided it was a beverage) looked like something out of Raven's dreams. Most of it was barren, but a few black trees twisted up from the dry ground, indicating that there was some support for life close by.
Most of the aliens were glad to get off the ghastly ship that had imprisoned them for so long, but Koriand'r was the first. She stood there, nearly fifty feet away from the spaceship, just turning her head up to the sky and relaxing. Dick leaned onto a window of the ship as he waited for the hubbub to subside so he could leave, just watching her. She probably did need the fresh air that much, but it was a strange picture: someone as pretty as her, out alone in the middle of nowhere, just waiting for something to happen...
"Hey, Raven," Dick called. "What's Kori...Kordi...what's she doing?"
"Tamaranians get most of their energy from suns...any sun. She's storing up," Raven explained, not even paying much attention to him. Her main goal was to get everyone out of the spaceship without having to pick them up with her powers and toss them out from pure impatience.
The interior had cleared out enough for him to navigate his way to Koriand'r. She smiled at him, forgetting about her sun-ritual for a minute. The alien girl looked a lot better, with most of her injuries almost healed. Dick couldn't help but notice that a few looked pretty fresh, though...
"Hi."
"Thank you!" she chirrupped happily.
"Uh, no problem," he answered, chuckling at her antics. She frowned for a second, deep in thought, and turned back to the sun. Dick assumed that was a 'leave me alone, now' signal, and decided to explore the planet.
Unfortunately, so did everyone else, and it wouldn't do to separate. Raven was stressed beyond belief that she had to babysit so many fully-grown intelligent beings, and nobody else actally felt like helping. Dick felt weird ordering around a bunch of creatures that could beat him up in a second, but he did it anyway.
"Hey, you guys! Hey! STOP MOVING!"
Not everyone could understand him, but they figured he wanted their attention. Raven sighed and looked like she was about to thank him, but decided it went against her whole 'I'm indifferent to everything' persona.
In what seemed like twenty different languages, including English, Raven explained the situation. They were trapped on an unknown, possibly hostile planet, with no source of food, water, or fuel. Some of their party had been wounded by the Gordanians, a good many had been just about dying from starvation before the meal they'd just had, and no one was very strong.
About this time, some of the ex-prisoners had started to talk amongst themselves again, so Raven split them up into two groups. Anyone who could speak even a little bit of English was handed over to Dick, who accepted the leadership position very reluctantly. As it turned out, more than fifty percent of the population wasin his group, nearly quiet, and waiting to hear what he had to say.
"Where did you guys learn this language? You live in a completely different galaxy!" Dick exclaimed.
"Some of us have lived on your planet before. You may not have known," suggested one alien, who could possibly have passed for human...if his tail had been cut off.
"Yes. I know my mother was actually part of a 'freak show' two hundred Earth years ago," another reminisced, the scales on her body rippling with indignation. "Humans were rather unkind to her."
Dick considered that point. "...Well then, it's a good thing freak shows are looked down on in today's society--okay! So, while everyone else looks for something edible on this planet, we're searching for any kind of fuel to get us outta here and back to our own planets."
"I apologize for drinking our store," mumbled one of the more muscular aliens who'd helped Dick free the prisoners.
"That's okay, we'll find something new. Uh...any ideas?"
"You could just wait for the trees to decompose," Raven offered, evidently free of her food-scroungers. "It probably won't take very long."
Dick would've rolled his eyes at her, if he wasn't afraid she would roll them out of his head. "Any other suggestions?"
"Sha-la!"
"Hey!" A tiny, snow-white alien was tugging at Raven's cloak, curiousity sparking in it's pink eyes.
"Hey! Sha-la!" it mimicked, not letting go.
"Cute. Now, if you speak English, get in front where you can see us properly, and don't ever touch me again," Raven growled.
"Again! Sha-la!" And it tugged at her cloak some more. Dick couldn't help laughing, along with a couple other aliens, but Raven had had enough. She conjured up a handful of her black energy to blast at the little creature. "Sha-la this, you little--"
"Raven, don't! I don't think this one's ours..." Dick had only just noticed a moving cloud of white and pink in the horizon. Hundreds of thousands of those little creatures were running to their spot. "If you annihilate this one, we'll have to fight all of them..."
At the word 'fight,' the prisoners slouched away, clearly in no condition for combat. Dick didn't see another choice except to run, but where would they hide all these aliens? It was the little creature's planet, after all. They probably knew everything about it...and there wasn't much of a place to hide, anyway.
The crowd kept coming, coming...and it stopped about twenty feet in front of them.
"This can't be good," Raven whispered.
"Good! Sha-la!" they all echoed.
"I think they like you. Maybe we should sacrifice you...for the good of everyone else," Dick murmured back.
"Shut up."
"Shut up! Sha-la!"
Most of the aliens were getting increasingly annoyed. Dick and Raven had to do something...and soon, before a conflict erupted. "Listen, inhabitants of...whatever this planet is!" Dick started, sure they would interrupt with their 'Sha-la!'ing if Raven said anything. "We...uh, come in peace!"
Raven slapped her forehead, mumbling about how corny that was. As one, the whole crowd slapped their foreheads with stubby, hand-less arms and said, "Corny! Sha-la!"
"Don't do anything! Or at least, pretend to listen! Maybe they'll follow you," Dick hissed at her. "Um...we need fuel for our rocket...thing, and food for our passengers...do you, uh, know where we could find some?"
None of them responded.
"Food! Gas!" Raven tried.
"Gas! Sha-la!" Suddenly, the whole place reeked. Really, really bad.
"They did not just do what I think they did," Dick muttered, plugging his nose. "Don't ever talk again, Raven."
She glared at him. "Fuel."
"Fuel! Sha-la!" The creatures started to waddle away, and Dick and Raven exchanged looks.
"Uh, okay...a couple of people, come with me! We're going to go see what's going on with these guys...and everyone else can help the other group, I guess," Dick finished lamely. Very few of them volunteered to come with, wary of another gas attack, but those who did looked like they could hold off at least a hundred of these little guys at a time.
Dick, Raven, and five others followed the cries of 'Sha-la!' to what looked like a gigantic air duct. In groups of three, they all hopped in, which took quite a while. Dick took a deep breath and jumped in after them.
He fell into a bottomless black void, like a gigantic tube slide that never ended. He couldn't even hear anything but his own screaming, and hoped he wouldn't crash and break at the very bottom.
The creatures had thought of that, however, and the softest cushion in the universe, made up of some kind of lightweight fur, was waiting at the bottom to break his fall. Dick rolled off immediately, just as Raven came floating down on a hoverboard of black.
"You scream like a girl," she greeted, examining the high-tech cave they'd fallen into.
Dick was beyond impressed. Who knew that such little, annoying creatures could build a spaceship that sleek, have an operations center that looked like it worked on voice codes alone, and keep the entire place spotless?
One of them (it was impossible to tell which, they all looked the same) hopped in front of a huge screen. "Sha-la!" it cried. The screen came to life, with moving pictures and background music that sounded a lot like a symphony.
"Fuel!" Raven stressed.
"Fuel! Sha-la!" Fifteen of the creatures broke away, coming back while balancing three barrels of--what Dick hoped was--gasoline for them to use on their spaceship. "Sha-la!"
"Oh...that was fast. Thanks," Raven stuttered.
"Thanks! Sha-la!"
"Let's get out of here...please..." begged one alien, covering her ears.
"Fine." Raven enveloped them all in a bubble of black, rising them and the barrels through the tube that they'd come down in. They left behind frantic cries of 'Sha-la! Sha-la!' But not for long.
Apparently, these things could jump. They poured out of the air duct, capturing Raven. "Stay! Sha-la! Stay here! Sha-la!"
She blasted the ones that were holding her away, suspending herself in the air with her powers. "Okay! We'll stay here...for tonight." She gave Dick a meaningful glance. "We'll need food, though."
"Food! Sha-la!" A few of them jumped back down to retrieve the needed items. Apparently, their whole civilization was down there. The room they'd seen was probably just the space station. There might be whole cities...which meant there were a lot more of these that could panic like they'd just done and hold Raven hostage. As much as she insulted him, and whatever he'd said before, Dick didn't like the thought of leavig her behind...that much.
The five aliens started to talk at once, wondering what she was playing at. "Listen! Listen!" Dick calmed them. "We get food, we don't upset these things, and we leave in the morning with no problems. I think everyone here needs a good night's sleep and a full stomach, right?"
"I suppose so..." they muttered.
"Good. Now, we've gotta find everyone else and let them know what's going on...good luck..."
The day on this planet lasted about as much as an Earth day. By nightfall, the whole party had been reunited and fed. The natives of the planet waited with them, forcing Raven into silence, lest something she said was repeated and irritated everyone else.
Koriand'r came and sat by Dick, who was exhausted, but not unhappy for the company. "Hi."
She smiled, beckoning to him. Dick leaned closer confusedly, though not close to the point of complaining.
Without warning, Koriand'r attached her lips to his, kissing him furiously. Dick was far too surprised to do anything but widen his eyes and wonder why everyone had made such a huge deal out of her hugging him, but couldn't care less that she was trying to make out right in front of them.
She separated a few seconds later, when realization suddenly hit Dick. He hadn't done anything. Was that why she stopped? Because he'd acted like he had never kissed a girl in his life? That he was bad at kissing? Still in a daze, Dick leaned in to set her straight, but Koriand'r frowned confusedly at him.
"There is no need for that...I have already learned everything."
That was a really long filler. I'm sorry! But hey, they kissed, right?...