Here's 25, damn, quarter century already!
Something's changed; I originally started writing this because I felt like writing, then I guess I kind of…fell off…mentally. I took a backseat in my own life, disassociation, which is bad for the mind.
But now I'm writing because I like to, it relaxes me and I generally feel better while doing it. But I've been feeling a lot better recently anyway.
Enough of my angst, you want some stories from the world of the Titans (well, the AU world, at least)
Go!
Last time:
Upon arriving in Metropolis, Charly begins to get the feeling something's not quite right. After that he spent the night with Terra in her hotel room (after a brief and disturbing midnight meeting with Beast Boy) and answered her wakeup call in the morning by accident.
The story was sold and printed that very morning, thus Charly vowed vengeance on the journalist who apparently 'took personal interest' in the story, one Clark Kent.
We join him after he stormed out of breakfast to have a 'talk' with the writer.
Chapter 25:
Charly slammed his feet down on the sidewalk as he walked, each step closer to the Daily Planet building made the burning anger and humiliation just that little bit more unbearable.
'I can't believe some nobody reporter would just print that shit!' Rage was pacing inside his mind, he really was angry now. Despite his namesake he rarely cursed. (Two years ago he invented new words during his spout, having used all the real ones, but he had good reason.)
'Let's not rip him apart the moment we step in the door, please.' Charly pleaded in thought, he actually wanted to talk to this Kent guy before resorting to violence.
He walked on, glaring at the windows of the great building he was headed for. He kept going until he heard footsteps rushing up behind him, he turned just in time to see the whole team skid to a stop and give him a sheepish grin.
'You guys spend too much time together.' He jibed, putting his hands in his pockets.
He studied them for a moment before asking his burning question.
'Why are you coming with me? To protect the reporter?' He let his eyebrow raise just enough to be noticeable; he'd perfected it to quite an art form now.
Robin gave him a plaintive look, 'We trust you more than that. We're just here to…watch.' He ended, his face breaking into a wide grin.
The grin was mimicked by each member of the team, including Terra, who had been clued in between Charly's exit and the Titan's own.
Charly merely shrugged and set off again to the newspaper building, the team in tow, a couple of members of which were trying very hard not to laugh.
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'Yeah, I'm looking for Clark Kent?' Charly said to the receptionist who, unlike everyone else in the city, seemed nonplussed by the Teen Titans standing in front of her desk.
'I'll call that up to him.' She picked up the phone next to her and punched a number. There was an audible click and she was off again, 'Clark? Yeah, Spitfire of the Titans is here to see you, I think it's about the article. Ok.' She placed the handset back down and gestured to the elevators. 'Go on up, sixth floor.'
'Thanks.' Charly tried charming smile No.3, which gained him a small smile in return. 'Never fails.' He said smugly as they headed to the elevator.
The doors slid closed and they discovered the elevators were incredibly slow, unfortunately this allowed Charly the time to notice Beast Boy occasionally glancing at Raven, and her very small smiles whenever she caught him.
The events of the night before came flooding back and he slapped his forehead.
'How could I forget?' He yelled at himself, causing every person in the elevator to stare at him, he turned to Beast Boy, 'You! You think I'd forgotten?' He gestured to the green boy then to his sister.
Beast Boy tried to step backwards but was stopped by something large and metallic. It was Cyborg, but it may as well have been the elevator wall.
'We haven't done anything I swear!' The quivering changeling defended, covering his head from attack. 'It's the same as you and Terra, harmless. Please don't melt me!' He was overreacting more than Charly thought he would.
'Wait, maybe he's only pretending to be pathetic so…' He was cut off by Raven, who steeped between him and Beast Boy, hand raised, crackling with energy. 'Thought so, wily bast…' The elevator doors slid open, revealing the very richly furbished sixth floor of the Daily Planet building.
Charly stepped out and wandered over to a door that had 'C. Kent' written on it, knocked politely and waited for the 'Come on in' from a rather familiar voice.
He stepped through the door and spotted the reporter behind a desk, pouring over some story or another, occasionally adjusting the glasses perched on his nose.
'Typical nerd.' Bravery piped up.
Charly cleared his throat, causing Clark to lift his eyes and peer at him. There was something very familiar about this man.
'What can I do for you, Spitfire?' He asked, pushing his glasses back up his nose.
'I'm here about the story you printed this morning, somehow, about us.' He gestured at the rest of the team, who had entered.
He noticed a few of them were smiling and intercepted an almost imperceptible nod from Robin, which was returned almost instantly by Mr. Kent.
'Have you guys met before?' He asked them all, thoroughly confused.
'Once.' Clark stood, coming round the desk and offering a hand to Charly.
He clutched it and winced as the journalist gripped his own with almost superhuman strength. Similar to a Starfire hug but for the hand.
'What about the article then?' Clark leaned on his desk, looking very relaxed.
This annoyed Charly, he was used to scaring people when he was angry, this was a new experience for him.
'I wanted to inform you of how angry I am that you've decided to invade our privacy.' He replied calmly, not sure of where to take this, any normal person would be begging for forgiveness by now.
'Duly noted, I must say it's an interesting story none the less, even we didn't know until the call came this morning.' He checked his nails as he spoke, obviously being overly nonchalant.
'Wait, we?' Charly was beginning to think this might have been a bad idea.
'The League, we didn't know about you two,' He gestured at Terra and the very confused Charly, 'Or and definitely not those two.' He gestured towards Beast Boy and Raven.
'The…the League?' Charly had lost all of his nerve and it finally dawned on him where he had seen Clark Kent before. 'Oh crap, I rushed out on breakfast to threaten Superman? Oh man, I'm sorry Sir, I meant no offence.' He tried to back up but was stopped by the super-hand that was suddenly on his shoulder.
Superman was looking at him very sternly, as though about to give him a damn good thrashing, until his face broke into a wide smile.
'Nonsense, I thought it was brave of you to even complain about a story that annoyed you.' He let go of the terrified teen and moved back to the chair. 'There a few people in the League who wouldn't do that. Flash for example.'
'Hey!' A voice came from a small black box on the desk.
'They were listening to that?' Charly tried to drown out the laughing coming from both the box and his own team mates.
'Are you kidding? I though Bruce was actually going to laugh! I wish I could have seen your face when you realised.' Flash's voice yelled from the communication device.
'It was everything you could have hoped.' Cyborg gasped out between fits of uncontrollable laughter.
'You guys suck!' Charly raged, storming out, slamming the door behind him.
Robin was the first to stop laughing, looking concerned.
'Should we have done that to him today? I mean, we need him to be at least present if not civil at the parade later.' He asked everyone, which stopped them laughing.
'He'll shake it off, he always does, that's one of the things I love about him.' Terra explained.
'Me too.' Beast Boy piped in, '…Without the love part…I…Damn!' His attempt to save his throwaway comment had failed, causing a snort of laughter to erupt from the communicator, probably from the Flash.
He floundered for a while until Cyborg put his hand over the green teen's mouth (well, around his whole head) to shut him up.
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'Charly!' Terra ran up behind the British boy, who was now shuffling along with nowhere to go after his brief outburst.
'Hey.' He greeted her, throwing his cigarette to the ground, he knew she hated him smoking, though she had never mentioned it. He had picked up the habit on his travels and found that because of his powers his body was immune to all the harmful effects, so he kept going and became addicted.
'I'm sorry.' She started, lacing her fingers into his.
'For what? That? Nah, I'm over it.' He smiled a little for the first time that day.
'I told them you would be, but Robin's stressing about the parade later and whether you're going to even show up, let alone be polite and friendly.' She said quickly and probably in one breath.
'I've got to, I said I would.' They walked on for a while, Charly began humming an old folk song from his country of origin and they took in the sights and sounds of the enormous city.
'Fancy hopping to a rooftop somewhere? I'm getting bored of the ground.' Charly asked, pointing to a nearby building.
'Sure.' Terra pulled him into a side alley and lifted the two of them on a piece of concrete, floating over to the roof, where they sat on the edge and watched the people below.
'It looks almost unreal.' Terra's voice was filled with awe.
'Is all that we see and seem but a dream within a dream?' Charly quoted, almost to himself. 'Poe.' He explained in one word when he spotted the questioning look he had gotten.
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'…and here comes the one we've been waiting for, Jenny. The Teen Titans, here as a favour to Superman who couldn't be here today, all looking fabulous in the afternoon sun.' The man sat in what was apparently a commentary box above the festivities and addressed his colleague.
'That's right Steve, they're in what seems to be more flashy versions of their regular uniforms. Spitfire's heart apparently isn't into this though, he's simply standing at the back of the float with his arms crossed.' Jenny noted.
That he was, partly refusing to be friendly on the grounds that…well, he wasn't. Though mostly it was because he knew he looked fantastic when he was being moody.
'I don't know Jenny, we've come to expect that from the newest Titan and personally I think he looks wonderful the way he is.'
'I've always wondered about you, Steve.'
'That's right, Jenny.'
Robin walked over to where Charly was standing, surveying the crowd. This was not easy, as walking on a moving vehicle never is.
'Are you going to, say, move at all? Wave or something.' He gestured to the other Titans, all of whom (even Raven) seemed to be smiling whilst waving to people in the mass of civilians.
'Fine, but only because my legs have gone to sleep and I need to move them.' He grinned and stepped forward, raising his hand.
'Ah, there we go, Spitfire has finally decided, after some words from Robin, to be friendly.' Jenny was a little over-excited, it must be said.
'I admit even I was getting tired of watching him just stand there. He looks better when he's moving anyway.' Steve added.
'You're slightly in love with him, aren't you Steve?'
'You could say that, Jenny.'
'Alright, so this isn't so bad.' Charly thought.
'Of course not, you love being the centre of attention.' Wisdom was being a little too snippy today.
Just as he was about to retort, Charly felt that telltale pull on his mind again, much stronger than before.
'Robin! Something's wrong.' He shouted to the leader, glancing around.
'What is it?' Robin asked.
At that moment a large explosion rocked the surrounding area, a building began to collapse, thankfully not near any civilians but someone might have been nearby.
Hundreds of what looked like robots began to swarm through the crowd, over floats and through side streets. They weren't Slade-bots though, they looked too primitive and lo-tech for that.
'I'd hazard a guess that it's that.' Charly pointed towards the swarm of robots before grabbing his jacket which he had placed over the back of the float.
'I knew this was going too smoothly.' He sighed, jumping to street level and taking formation behind the others.
That was 25.
Thanks for reading it, dudes and dudettes.
This has been your host in the world inside my head.
Reamis, out.