Chapter 10: Fear
"Raven? What's wrong?" Robin asked the dark Titan but Raven didn't answer.
The notebook was gone!
But how?
Beast Boy didn't know anything about magic so how did he manage to open the chest?
"It's…gone," she muttered and she could feel the confused stares drill holes into her back.
"Gone?" Cyborg asked and moved closer to see for himself but Raven whipped around, passing the boys without a second glance and hurriedly stepped into the changeling's room, anger and fear evident in her tone as she called his name.
But all that greeted her was an open window, a gently breeze ventilating the room.
"Seems like we found ourselves a suspect," Cyborg said and looked out the window. "If he wanted us not to find out, he could have at least not made it so obvious," he said, shaking his head.
"What kind of spell was it?" Robin asked carefully and Raven turned to look at her leader with eyes so fearful, it scared him.
"I don't know. But knowing my father…it's something dangerous," she said in a low voice before her voice suddenly grew louder, urgent. "That's why we have to find Beast Boy as soon as possible – before he can use the notebook."
"But why haven't you just destroyed it?" Starfire asked, joining the others by the window.
Raven faced the dark sky and her expression turned solemn. "It's because…I couldn't."
With that, she floated out of the window before the others followed, Starfire lifting Cyborg and Robin using his grappling hook to aid him.
For a moment, the room was in complete silence, only the wind stirring in its surrounding. But shortly after, a small fly flew out of the partially open closet before a familiar green boy replaced it.
The changeling slowly stepped over to the window, the wind cold and stinging on his skin. His expression turned solemn as yet another sentence of his other half turned out to be true.
His team didn't believe him – they only believed what they thought they knew. And all they knew was that Beast Boy was untrusting and dangerous.
His eyes lowered to his ripped sleeve of his suit, the bite markings still visible with patches of red peeking from beneath it. And with a sinking feeling in his heart, he realized that his team was so caught up by what Beast Boy had apparently done that they completely neglected his well-being.
It was like he himself didn't matter anymore – only what he did for the team – only what his role as a Titan was.
And his grip on his belief in the good of his friends slipped – if only a little.
The Titan gave out a tired sigh, stepping out of his room as he was not in the mood for another interrogation and morphed into a rat as he scurried out of the tower.
Maybe some fresh air might lift his spirits and clear his head.
Somewhere in an abandoned street where traffic had ceased to be since several hours ago, a small Persian cat trotted through. It was light on its feet and its ears perked up at the few sounds that managed to shatter the silence of the night – leaves rustling, dogs barking, or even bells of the few shops that were still open. The cat moved into the shade of a tree before a crow moved out of it, taking off lazily into the sky.
The cold, speeding wind did nothing to stop the crow from flying as it almost effortlessly glided forward, its eyes on the lookout for any sign of unusual activity.
He had been getting bored and he wouldn't mind to have some real fun again.
Soon the bird reached its destination – Titans Tower and it dropped down onto the window ledge of the only open window. Sharp eyes peered inside and the bird entered once it realized that nobody was inside.
The bird vanished to be replaced by a cockroach and carefully it scurried out of the room, making sure to not attract too much attention.
He really didn't want to face the others yet but he was surprised it was so quiet.
Did they always sleep this early? What time was it anyways?
Pushing those interrupting thoughts aside, he focused on the task at hand and continued until he reached the mainframe computer of the Tower.
The cockroach stopped at the foot of the large machine as its lights blinked intriguingly in colors of red and blue – like it was inviting him to just test it out.
But he wouldn't just test it – he had much bigger plans in mind.
The cockroach vanished and red eyes narrowed in concentration at the large screen. And just then, blaring alarms and red light filled the room as the words. 'Intruder alert!' flashed across the large screen.
The grey figure silently cursed under his breath, angered to find out it activated once he morphed out of his animal forms. His fingers quickly moved over the virtual keyboard displayed on the table in front of him as he typed in the security code in order to deactivate it.
"Access denied!"
The titan raised a curious eyebrow, hearing that sentence coming from the speaker and half of him…was intrigued. "Come on, Cyborg! Don't tell me you forgot to keep me updated on our towers security," he mocked as if the half-robot was really present.
Seems like his friends had some real issues with him.
But it didn't matter. The others weren't present as it seemed and there was always other ways to shut this thing down.
Cyborg should really call the pest control once in a while.
The Titan morphed into an ant, crawling up on the table before disappearing into a small space where the cooling fan of the computer was located. Being surrounded by cables, circuits and sensitive hardware, the Titan morphed now into a small mouse and started gnawing on several of the cables and damaging sensitive and vital circuitry.
He was relieved when the blaring alarms suddenly turned off after he had bitten through a red and a black cable.
Deciding that he had done enough damage, the mouse turned once again into an ant and crawled out of the system before morphing back into human form.
He gave one last glance at the computer and he felt excitement running through him, seeing that the screen once again turned to normal like it was when he had first entered. Now the real fun could begin!
With steady strides, the changeling walked towards the first room – Robin's room.
But his pleased expression turned to surprise when he saw that out of the opening door…Sladebots started charging.
The dark changeling ducked out of the way of a fist before morphing into a Rhino and knocking the robot into another approaching one, the force strong enough to send both of them slamming against the wall. Unfortunately 2 others jumped him while one tried to pull him by the tail.
How embarrassing!
The rhino vanished to be replaced by an outrageous elephant before it slammed one of the bots away with a swipe of its trunk and simply crushed the other one with the same trunk, breaking it in half.
The elephant vanished and the Sladebot lost the grip on the tail as a grey dove flew into the air before taking a dive as a falcon, its talons engraving a scratch on the face before a T-Rex crushed its head as it tried to get up from the floor due to the hit.
"Why do you have to send your trash to come and fetch me? Let's talk face to face," the changeling said before evading another robot and countering with a simple uppercut, making it land on the pile of the other losers.
A smirk played on his face as the thought of a scared Slade filled his mind. But then again, who wouldn't when faced with a dark being summoned by one of Trigon's spells?
"Don't tell me big, bad Slade is scared of little, old me?" he said, folding his hands like a little child would do when begging for a lollipop.
Hearing another android approaching, the shape-shifter merely side-stepped a few times as the robot tried to aim a hit at him.
He felt triumph fill him from head to toe, seeing that this was apparently the last one of Slade's minions before blocking an incoming punch with his palm. "I'm flattered."
The boy vanished to become a snake, wrapping around the arm as it coiled ever tightly before the arm completely broke off because of the pressure. He let his jaws close around the other arm before the android toppled over. It didn't take long until the other arm was gone too and the snake was replaced by the dark boy once again.
He let his foot rest on the android's face before he decided to be serious. "Let's cut the small talk. Why are you here? Let me guess: It's probably because of that trigger – or is it maybe…Trigon's spell you're looking for?" he said, purposefully stretching the last part.
How he wished he could see Slade's face – or at least the surprise in his eye!
The pressure on the robot's head increased slightly, cracking sounds coming from beneath the changeling's foot as a few blue sparks shot from the head. The changeling leaned closer to the minion. "Too bad you came for nothing. That notebook can't be destroyed. Seems like Raven has some secrets you don't even know," he sneered, being sure he had left a lasting impression on the masked villain. "Until next time, Slade," he spoke with confidence before his foot closed the gap between it and the floor, making metal scraps appear under it.
Finally he could finish what he started!
Another morning brought sunshine to Jump City and a certain blonde-haired girl sat in her seat, the glaring sunshine heating up her back as her back faced the window. Occasionally, she would steal glances at the clock as her anxiety grew.
It was unusual for them to be late.
And just as she glanced away from the clock, there was a knocking sound and Terra's eyes widened when seeing who it was that apologized to the teacher before sitting in her seat.
Luckily, the teacher had to make a run to the principal and Terra immediately turned to Amber, her eyes taking in her black eye and her hand that was bandaged. "What happened?" she asked, the worry obvious in her otherwise composed voice.
Amber's usual smile and cheery attitude vanished as she glanced away before she murmured her answer. "Dionne…got hit by a car."
"What? How?" Terra honestly didn't expect that.
"I…don't know. Something pushed us from behind and I managed to land on the sidewalk but since Dionne was a bit ahead of me…she…landed on the street and she was about to get up but-"she trailed off and bit her lip.
"And what about you? Your eye-"
"When I turned around to see who it was…someone hit me and decided to just crush my hand while he was at it," she mumbled as her voice started cracking.
"Couldn't you see who it was?" Terra asked with a raised eyebrow.
Now Amber looked away, closing her eyes for a minute and Terra was getting anxious, sensing that she hid something.
"Who was it?"
Amber looked at her with fearful eyes. "He had his foot on my face but I could hear him say: 'Make sure she will remember'".
Terra noticed the troubled expression on her face but she said something that made Terra's heart almost skip a beat.
"I heard his voice. It was…that green guy that kept looking for you."