My body fell onto the hard ice with a crack, my left arm fractured beneath me. Letting out a slight scream, I checked Raven. Her body continued to be racked with spasms. The ground around us was filled with black static, the escape of her power. It looked like poison ivy, beautiful, but deadly to touch. One touch, and I could potentially die, then again, fighting this thing would probably do the same.
Looking at the Kolossas, I knew that above all else, I had to get Raven to safety. Looking around, as the creature did the same, probably trying to find me, I saw nothing for at least four hundred meters that she could be hidden by. As I glanced at her, her grimace turning even more gut-wrenching, I knew what I had to do.
"Raven, I trust your power." I spoke to her, as I placed her on the ground, running in a direction away from her, the Kolossas spotting me and beginning to swing his sword. It was large, twenty meters tall and five meters wide, and as it crashed down onto the ground in front of me, I leapt onto it, running up the back edge of the black blade, pulling out an exploding disk to throw at the eye that made up its grotesque face.
As I angled my body towards the eye, shooting a grappling hook at one of its horns, and threw the disk, watching as it sailed through the air, towards the patterned eye of XANA. It nailed the eye, causing an explosion, and as I took the line of my grappling hook and hooked it on my belt, I threw another at the eye on its sword, and a similar explosion occurred there.
I held on with my right arm for dear life, feeling the throbbing pain that took my entire arm, causing small spasms like Raven's. I knew she was in agonizing pain, and I needed to finish this quickly to get her the help she needed, otherwise, I could very well lose her.
In my moment of thought, I was caught off guard. Something hit me in the side with approximately 40 gs of power, and knocked me flying to my left. Before I had a chance to react or brace myself, I was knocked from my other side, and sent tumbling across the ice field. When my body finally came to a stop, I felt it, that overwhelming pain. It charged through my body, from my throbbing head, to my broken ankle. It seared my muscles, and made it feel as if someone had rubbed my skin raw and poured lemon juice on me. My face in the ice, I could see the hard surface beginning to have a red hue to it, and I could taste the coppery liquid quickly filling my mouth.
I used my right arm to slowly and agonizingly push myself up, and as I did so, I could feel something snap in my right wrist.
"Dammit!" I screamed, before falling back to the ground.
My body had reached its limit, and I had no one to help me. Beast Boy and Cyborg would be here eventually, but not soon enough. There was not much more I could do, and being in a virtual world like this, if there was an afterlife, I could never go there. I would turn to a few bits of code, and that is it.
I lay there, my face in the ice, waiting for the Kolossas to strike down again, if I time things right, then maybe I will be able to kill this thing. The steps of the beast pounded the ground like punches from some kind of god. He was slow, and that was the biggest advantage I had, despite my injuries, I could still do this, because of its low speed.
After about thirty seconds more of the earth-pounding steps, it was upon me again. This time, it began to bring its foot down, and I took my chance. Rolling out of the way just before it brought its foot completely down, I shot one of my grappling hooks at the handle of its sword. Then, I held on for all I was worth, feeling the agonizing burning coursing though my limber body.
As I neared the top of the handle, I pulled out every disk I had, and began to throw them. Six I threw at the eye on its grotesque face, and six on its darkened and beautiful sword. As the explosions went off, I grabbed more from my belt, using all of the force I could when flicking my wrist. Each one landing perfectly on the eye, with an explosion to boot.
My face did a slight grin, I knew I had not won, but I was so close to the end here. I wonder what it would be like to die here, since I am virtual is there any chance of reaching the afterlife? I wonder if Cyborg would suffer the same fate as I will here, is artificial intelligence less important than actual hard-wired brain stems?
As it walked closer to me, I checked my belt. Everything, even my micro explosives, were gone. My staff had snapped on my landing, and its broken pieces lay on the ground behind me. I stood,my legs rubbery beneath me, as the Kolossas walking towards me. If it took me out, it might miss Raven, although I doubted it. Her powers would give her away eventually. Though, they will probably be able to protect her in the end.
I forced myself to stand, for a bit longer, feeling the blood running into my boots and soaking my socks. Soon it was upon me, crashing its sword down with such a ferocity, that I almost thought it was Slade in disguise. The world went quiet as it slashed downwards, the blade having an eerie black glow, as it sliced downward into my body.
The pain was carved into my body, pulsing in my arms and legs, grating into my flesh, and saturating my entire body in the most unimaginable agony I have ever felt. My bones snapped, some of them quickly like a twig, and some of them slowly like a living branch, each second being more unbearable than the last. Clenching my jaw and turning my body rigid was the only reaction left.
I had no conception of time any longer, and as my body tumbled and twisted, leaving cuts and punctures all over my skin, I felt the all familiar pulse of dizziness in my head. My hearing was numbed and fuzzy, I could hear faint noises, but I had no idea what they were. It is like when you blink, you see silhouettes of what was in front of you just before you blinked, only this was what I could hear. Everything was so close, and yet, so far away.
Opening my eyes, I saw the white landscape and red all around me. A deep crimson red that had a mind of its own, it had been a part of, but now it was nothing. Just a mark on this landscape, a mark of death, my death. Raven lay not twenty feet away, a black orb of energy surrounding her body. I took all of this in in an instant, before the burning started. All I could see was red, my eyes filled with my life's blood, before that very blood drained down my face. My mask was no longer there to protect my eyes, it was somewhere away from my body, my only true mark of identity, gone, and I would not get it back before the end.
My head was light, and my body was soaked. I could feel it, I was almost gone, only my calmed heart rate sustained me now, otherwise, I would have been long dead.
I was losing consciousness, for the last time.
"Why do you insist on staying in a place like this? Don't you know you aren't alone?" Raven's haunting voice came from somewhere to my left, in an automated like fashion.
My breaths turned to static and my blood to red coding. I was dying, if such a word existed here. I could hear the screech of a bird, and then silence. A voice rang out, and it was Raven's, yet not.
"All you need to do is close the door to this world, and open the next one." After that, I heard and thought nothing. I was only aware of the time passing in the blackness of my own mind.
The boy named Robin lay in a bleeding heap on the ground, to an untrained eye, he appeared dead, but I knew better. He had nearly died here, which in actuality, is not death. His data would be saved to the hard-drive here, becoming a ghost of coding that would appear every now and then. His mask was thrown aside, about ten feet from his person actually, it was the last piece of his equipment to go. His black titanium cape was shredded, almost unrecognizable, and a yellow belt with pockets for storing weapons was cut in half at my feet.
Raven had fared far worse. Her outfit had been damaged by her black fires, her cape filled with burned holes and the jewels of her belt were cracked, to the point of shattering. The worst though, were the electrical and chemical burns running up her body. In fighting the Kolossas after Robin passed out, she used an enormous amount of power, practically turning the Ice Sector into an ocean. Now, we stood on a lone patch of ice I had made to stay, while for many clicks around us, was nothing but water. It was not supposed to be possible to even melt the ice, but I had underestimated her power greatly.
Raven was complex, and now I knew we had an even greater threat than originally perceived. Despite this, her intentions were pure enough, although naive. She had only been able to fight when Robin went out, so at least that much was cleared up.
"If it hadn't been for that idiot..." I shook my head at the thought of the agent. He had been tricked, and it was a pity, he was rather clever, actually is rather clever. His consciousness is still here, saved into my memory.
I suppose I had the four Titans to use, and the six Lyoko warriors, despite only coming to a sum of ten, it might be just enough to fix the damage already done. Looking at the two figures, I slowly began the process of de-virualization, as Jeremie could never bring these teens into the physical world on his own.