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"Why did he do it?" Robin wondered aloud to himself, not realizing Beast Boy standing behind him in the kitchen.
"Why did who do what?" The changeling asked, opening up one of the cabinets to grab a mug. Robin sighed, taking a seat at the table and resting his head in his hands.
"Slade. He helped us lay Trigon to a permanent rest, worked with us the entire time, and then he just suddenly turns around on us. I don't understand. I was just beginning to really feel proud of myself for having converted him, too…That's partially why I snapped on you when you acted on your instinct in the Amazon," Robin replied.
"Some people just don't change, man. I mean, seriously. Some people are always going to be good, and some people are always going to be after nothing less than pain and suffering for others. It's a war that'll never end, good versus evil," Beast Boy said wisely.
"It's seriously going to have to be explained to me just exactly when and how you became so sage and all," Robin said, shaking his head and allowing a smile to grace his features.
"It definitely had something to do with me getting together with Raven," Beast Boy said with a laugh. He began to pour himself some milk (Raven had convinced him to consume dairy, because he needed it and dairy products are harmless to produce) when Drake walked in.
"Larry's done, and he made his way out of Raven," He informed the two casually. They both nodded, now thinking on the imminent battle.
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"Are we really prepared for this?" Raven asked herself, staring in the bathroom mirror at her chakra gem. She sighed, momentarily closing her eyes. Opening them, she saw Sophia's silhouette framed in the door.
"Anything profound?" The former emotion asked, leaning on the doorframe. Raven shook her head.
"Not really. Just worry. I hope we're able to truly fight and win. I mean, he has a full army, as well as what, three Gems? Including a lesser Murder gem? Not to mention the other emotions…all gone, except you and Sam. The Horsemen are MIA, which is definitely bad. So…" Raven trailed off.
"Good always prevails over evil," She said simply, quoting herself, before smiling and leaving Raven to her thoughts.
Or so we hope, She thought.
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"Talk about a makeover… Wait, what?" Cyborg cried as he checked himself out in the bathroom mirror. All of a sudden, his tech had returned to its natural color. He wired his sonic cannon and saw that it was, indeed, sonic once more. "Why? What the hell happened?" He cried. Rushing to his room, he looked to the red cloaked mannequin. Nothing was different. The same cold gaze emanated from its eyes, and it hadn't moved.
Cyborg growled. For some reason, he had just lost the last bit of connection that he had felt with Angella. Now all he had left was her cloak. It was then that he noticed Sophia in his doorway.
"The power has left you," She stated the obvious. Then she smiled. "I thought that might happen," She added. Cyborg looked at her, surprised, confused, slightly angered.
"And you didn't tell me? Why? Why did I lose it? What happened?" He began to fling questions at the girl. She held up a hand to silence him.
"That was not Angella's power you absorbed, Victor. That was the…residue, I suppose, of the Murder powers. Your circuits recognized that power as a threat that could overtake you, and expunged it from your systems. In short, your cybernetics were looking out for you," She said with a smile.
"So… Angella might be dead then?" Cyborg asked, downcast.
"I will not lie to you. There is a chance that you may have completely destroyed her. But there is no time to berate yourself. We have work to do. We have Angella's legacy to uphold. Come on," She told him. With that, the pair exited the room.
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"Alright, we've got a lock on Slade's new position," Robin said, pointing up to the holographic map on the common room screen. A red area indicated their target. "The plan is simple. Slade suspects nothing. He doesn't know about the fake Gem, nor about the tampering we've done with the real one. We have the element of surprise, and we're going to use it," He explained with a smile.
Drake stood up. "Wait a sec, Robin. Slade's a tough son of a bitch to surprise. He may not know what's going on, but he'll adapt quickly. We'll have to act quickly, before he can figure out what's happening, because once he does he'll just pull some other trick," He said.
"We have Wally," Jinx countered with an amused smirk. Said speedster gave a thumbs up and his usual grin. Then the alarm sounded. Robin flew over to the computer, typing and looking at the screen in horror.
"We've got a breach in Raven's room!" He cried before hauling ass towards the door. He was about to open the door when Kid Flash zoomed ahead, blocking him.
"Are you seriously that stupid? It's a distraction, a trap, man. Don't go for Raven's room. Go to the storage area where the Gems are," He advised, opening the door. Robin nodded.
"Good thinking, Wally," He said, running out the door. The others followed close behind as fast as they could.
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"Oh. Shit." Drake stated when they had gotten to the storage room. The place had been ripped apart by a supremely powerful force. Wires sparked, and ceiling bits littered the floor.
"The Gems!" Starfire gasped. In truth, however, it was not the Gems she was exclaiming about. Rather, it was the lack of said items that caused her to be alarmed.
"I repeat, with feeling: Oh. Shit." Drake said dryly. Robin punched the wall, managing to deal damage only to his gloved hand.
"He's got the Gems. All of them. That's game," He said, hanging his head. He had failed. He was supposed to be the leader of the very embodiment of justice, and he had allowed evil to acquire the most powerful weapons possible.
Drake shook his head in amazement, looking at Robin. When the Boy Wonder shot him a death glare of annoyance, he laughed.
"Wow. I can't believe this. You're just going to just give up? What, all out of genius ideas? Gonna just leave the world in Slade's hands without a fight?" Drake said with a smirk. Robin's lips curled into a snarl. Reverse psychology for the win, Drake thought.
"Not if I can help it!" Robin growled. Then his face softened. "But that's the thing…there's no way to help it," He said. Drake rolled his eyes.
"Wrong. For one thing, he doesn't have ALL the Gems. We've still got little miss Murder here," He said, putting his arm around Raven's shoulder. This earned him a smack from both Raven and Beast Boy. "For another, as long as we aren't dead, we still have a shot," Drake finished with a nod.
Robin closed his eyes. "You know, for being a sarcastic jackass, you sure are optimistic," He said. Drake grinned.
"I know," The thief replied.
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"Death! War? Pestilence!!" Conquest called as he rode, combing the heavens for his comrades. In the distance, he saw an unfamiliar orange horse galloping towards him. "What's this?" He asked himself, coming to a halt.
As the horse approached, he saw an orange cloak billowing in the wind, belonging to the rider. The horse soon reached Conquest, coming to a rest about three feet to his right. The rider jumped off.
"None of the above, but I'm better than nothing. I'm Carrie, a.k.a Rude," She told him, scratching her nose as she did so. Conquest's eyebrows shot up.
"You're…one of Raven's emotions! How did you end up here?" He almost stuttered. Carrie shrugged.
"Angella. She went psycho on us once we realized that she was connected the Gem of Murder. I guess it unlocked something in her, because she went from being the former Rage to killing most of us emotions, claiming she was Murder," She said. Conquest's mouth was now gathering flies. Or at least it would have been, if there were flies in heaven.
"Most? Who's left?" He asked.
"Sam and Sophia. Sam you already met. I hear you're looking for the Horsemen?" She told him. He nodded. "No luck?" She asked. He shook his head.
"It's quite worrying. The Horsemen shouldn't be this hard to find…" Conquest said, frowning.
"I can sense things. Maybe I can locate them," Carrie said, closing her eyes. When she opened them, they were white. And suddenly, a black raven erupted around her and flew into the air. After a couple minutes, the bird disappeared, leaving the emotion on her hands and knees, breathing heavily.
"Shit," She gasped out. Conquest bent down to give her a hand up, pulling the girl to her feet.
"Well? Where are they?" He asked after she had a chance to recover. She closed her eyes and shook her head.
"Not good. They've been sealed inside the Gems, Conquest. You're the only free Horseman remaining," She told him, causing a look of fear to spread across his face. Then a cocky grin crossed her face.
"What are you so happy about?" Conquest asked, amazed.
"There's only one way to free the Horsemen. I can gather the other 'dead' emotions. Once I've got them, we're gonna have to get into the castle and whoop some ass," She told him. He smiled.
"Alright. Gather them and meet me in front of the gates," He told her. She nodded and took off.
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Angella sighed. "What the hell am I, some fairy-tale princess? Locked up in some damned tower, waiting for someone to get my ass out of here. If I had my powers… Fuckin' gem," She muttered to herself. She looked around her cell again. There had to be some way to escape. She was freaking Raven, in a sense. No way some demons kept her locked up.
She tried kicking the door, to no avail. Punching didn't work, either. She spent hours trying to break it down before giving up with a sigh.
It was only an hour later when she grinned, having come up with one last-ditch effort. "If my powers don't work…I'll have to use someone else's," She said. With that, she closed her eyes and focused. Images flashed through her head: Beast Boy blowing down Mad Mod's robots as a dinosaur when it grabbed Raven, utterly destroying Adonis when he tried to hurt her, The Beast as it fought Slade and Trigon's demons. And just as she had last time, she slid down into the shadows of the room.
And after a minute or two, she reemerged. But this time, it was different. She had went into her Beast form. With a roar, she ran at the door, slashing. With one swift move, the door fell down, cut into two clean pieces. Angella exploded out of the room, brutalizing the guards and rushing down the hallway leading into the main area of the castle. With a snarl, she burst down the stairs and into the courtyard. And promptly stopped dead.
Oh, shit, She thought. Facing her were roughly 100 Bloods.
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"Alright, Slade's in Japan, in a very remote area just outside of Tokyo. We've got our game plan. The Gems are weakened now. They're still powerful, but he'll have a far harder time using them. Wally, your role is to get those things away from him. The rest of us will keep the Bloods and demons off your back," Robin said, looking at Kid Flash. He nodded.
"Raven, can you teleport us that far?" Beast Boy asked. Raven frowned.
"Not alone, but if I can get Sophia, Sam, Syrnium and Jinx to support me, I think so," She said. The changeling nodded. Everyone looked to Robin, who blinked.
"What?" He asked, clearly bewildered.
"What's keeping you?" Cyborg asked.
"Huh? Oh," He said, rolling his eyes. "Titans, Go!"
"Much better," Raven commented.