*Splash*
*Splash*
*Splash*
The sound of heavy footsteps running through puddles echoed in the alleyway as a figure moved frantically. His pants were quick and erratic as he looked behind himself to see nothing there. 'Must've lost 'em,' he thought. The man turned around quickly to see what looked like a brick wall rapidly approaching. He squinted his eyes and held his right arm out in front of him.
"अन्यतः व्रजति!"(*) he called out; as he said it, a black portal opened from within the brick wall.
He ran through the portal and ended up on one of the many high rise rooftops of Jump City. The pitter-patter of rain permeated the air, but the man didn't care. He smiled in relief as he wiped the sweat from his brow.
"Heh," he chuckled. The man in question had a hood covering his face, a red trench coat, and brown pants. He was also carrying a rucksack that rested over one shoulder and ended at his right hip. "Probably should've been more specific on that one. Nice save, Jesse."
The man, Jesse, fell to the ground in a sitting position and began to rummage through his rucksack; after a few seconds, he took out a brown, rustic-looking codex. The codex itself looked very much as if it was handmade by one person in a short amount of time, with the wooden covers being thick and on the verge of rotting, and the metallic binding looking rusted beyond belief.
"Alright, where are you? Where are you?" Jesse mumbled to himself as he quickly skimmed the pages of the ancient book. After skimming through a sizable chunk, he tapped his finger on the vellum paper.
"Aha! Ok, radar incantation type 1: chant this or any other variation and the soul of self will locate whomever the caster wishes. Requires complete concentration," Jesse read. He closed the book and looked at his surroundings; the black of night surrounded him, only being broken up by the eerie shine of the moon above him.
"Good enough," he said. He squeezed his eyes shut and huffed out a breath.
'Help me, Jake. Help me get through this,' he thought to himself.
"बृन्ग फ़ोर्थ् तो मे थे गेम! बृन्ग मे थे दौघ्तेर ओफ़् त्रिगोन," (**) he began. "व्हेरे इस शे? व्हेरे इस शे? चोमे फ़ोर्थ्! Fइन्द् हेर!" (***)
As he continued the chant, Jesse opened his now a milky white eyes as a black spiritual construct emerged from him in the form of a crow and took to the skies. Jesse's soul self swooped down and all around the many twists and turns of Jump City, sensing no familiar energy from the many citizens. It swooped back into the skies and caught a rather unusual sight: a tower in the shape of a giant 'T'.
The soul self wasted no time zipping over to the Tower as fast as it conceivably could. It stopped and watched through the Tower's windows; it spotted a young girl of about 17 years of age sitting on a couch and reading a book while four others were doing other miscellaneous things.
Back on the rooftop, Jesse smiled as he felt a massive rush of spiritual energy coursing through him. "Found you," he whispered, his voice containing a mild echo. He promptly blacked out as his soul self returned.
In the main lobby of the Tower, Raven Roth's eyes fluttered opened and she found herself witness to all four of her friends and teammates (one of whom she hopes can be more, not that she'd admit it) crowding around her.
"Mama?" Beast Boy exclaimed, shaking her. "You're alive!"
Raven quickly pushed Beast Boy off and stood up. "Yes, I'm obviously alive," she droned, monotone. "And what did I say about calling me that?"
"Only in the bedroom?" Beast Boy replied, an awkward grin on his face. The violet-haired girl growled and the changeling quickly revised his sentence. "Alright, never! Never!"
"Good boy," she said, smirking.
"Raven, what happened?" Robin asked, his usual hard edged voice now tinged with concern.
"Yeah! It's like one minute you're reading, the next you're on the ground having some kind of seizure," Cyborg added.
"I was on the ground?" Raven said, flabbergasted. "I-I don't remember."
Starfire flew up in Raven's face, examining her closely. "You are not afflicted by any sort of ailment, are you?" the alien girl asked, grabbing and poking Raven's face.
"Starfire, let go of my face," Raven said, annoyed. Starfire obeyed her request. The violet haired girl "I'm fine, I just need to go meditate now. Don't disturb me."
"Raven-"
"I said don't!" the empath hissed.
Beast Boy scoffed at Raven floating away. "That's what she always does."
"Beast Boy-" Robin warned before he was interrupted.
"Why can't she just talk to us, dude? We're her friends, aren't we?"
Cyborg put his hand on his friend's shoulder. "You know she has trouble with things like that, Beastie. She'll come around when she comes around."
"Cyborg is right," Starfire agreed. "Should Raven find herself in the trouble, there is all the guarantee that she will come to us."
"In the meantime," Robin began, "I have some profiles that need cataloguing."
The changeling and the half-machine rolled their eyes. "Suuuure ya do," Beast Boy teased.
"I'm serious!" Robin replied. "Come on Starfire." He quickly grabbed the Tamaranean's hand and sprinted off, his face reddening.
"Cy?"
"Yeah, buddy?" Cyborg said.
"Rae-Rae's not just fine is she?" Beast Boy asked, his voice small.
"Not for a second."
The door slid open and quickly closed as Raven entered her room, a gothic, horror tinged place to the average person's eye; for Raven, it felt just like home.
'What was that? Why was I convulsing on the ground?' she thought to herself. 'Most importantly: what was that strange energy I felt?'
She floated over to the center of her room, which was right next to her bed, where the candles were prepared to be lit. As Raven went to sit down, however, she did a double take and looked at the wall.
She furrowed her eyebrows in confusion as she read the one word that was practically engraved on the wall:
HELLO.
AN: This is my first entry on the Teen Titans fandom, and I haven't watched the show in a few years, so I wanna know if this sounds too OOC or too out of the show's ordinary.
BTW, Jesse really is a character in the comics. Who? You'll find out soon enough.
All the passages with an asterisk are Sanskrit.
(*) Go elsewhere!
(**) Bring me the Gem! Bring forth the daughter of Trigon!
(***) Where is she? Where is she? Come forth! Find her!