Sorry about the wait, school is a wild ride now that I'm back full time.
Disclaimer: I Do not own Teen Titans.
Please review, it gives me motivation and helps me improve with constructive criticism. So without further adieu, enjoy the story.
A Titans Titan: Chapter 3
The mind of a Titan
It was a six hour trip, and honestly the Titans were worried about how the league would react. Raven looked next to her, the sealed hover medical bed floating next to her with the peaceful looking teen that they had under guard. Personally Raven felt that this teen was a potential threat if left unchecked, she herself kept her hand on the lid of the med bed and pulsated a calming wave of emotions to keep him asleep until a proper cell is established.
"Yes we are approaching the watchtower.. yes, I know, I understand sir." Said Robin as he turned around to face the rest of the Titans after his conversation with Batman. "Guys we need to be on our best behavior around the league, they are our investors and possibly future coworkers. Also, this is as serious a situation as it can get. This teen is somehow related to one of the league's most dangerous opponents. "
"You got it boss." Said Cyborg.
"Yes sir." Said Beastboy as he slightly wormed around in his seat. His pointed ears folding against his head like a fearful kitten.
"Yes friend Robin." Said Starfire.
"Of course Robin." Said Raven. They settled back into that uncomfortable scilence, the touch screen moniter on the container of the floating med bed was beeping slowly with the alert that the teen they held was alive. As Robin piloted the ship the rest of the team looked out the windows to see all the stars as they passed them by in the empty vacune of space.
The ship had finally approached the watchtower, it stood tall in space. The hull a large ring around a pencil like main station, it was reflecting the light of the son making it seem like it descended from heaven. The hatch doors opened and allowed the T-Ship entery, and as the ship landed with a loud release of pressurized air as the haul closed. The Titans looked out the window, all the founding members of the Justice Leauge including Supergirl where present for their arrival.
"Welcome back Robin." Said the Dark Knight and a deep gravelly voice, and at his voice Robin flinched. Oh how Robin hated that voice, he founded the Titans to get out of Bruce's shadow and even now he is still in it. As the Titans approached they all slightly tensed at the elder team of superhero's gaze, Raven especially considering her father caused them no end of strife.
"We assembled as soon as you called, now, where is the infected subject." Said Superman as he floated of the ground a few feat away from them with Supergirl at his side. Both had uncharacteristic tense atmospheres around them, both had their eyebrows furled. Robin nodded to Cyborg who pressed a button on his wrist, after a few seconds the floating medical bed made its way over to the group. As the medical bed came to a stop the entire league felt a chorus of guilt and sympathy at the sight of a young teen who had no choice in this fate, they could see him peacefully sleeping as the sound of a heart monitor chimed to every breath he took.
"Your report says you found him in a hidden basement room in the Metahuman prison? One that was previously unknown, and that after searching for any records of his existence you found nothing. You said he was in a vat tube containing a chrysalis that hatched when you were fighting the Metahuman Plasmus? It also states that upon his escape from his vat the infected defeated Plasmus in one hit and set himself upon raiding a nearby grocery store." Asked Batman as he was typing away at the computer terminal in the landing bay. Cyborg looked at Batman in awe of his hacking into their systems like they were nothing.
"Yes sir, everything we know is listed in the report." Said Robin, his tone hollow and lifeless. The rest of the Titans looked at Robin out of the corner or their eyes in shock, this was so unlike their leader. Yes he could be moody, bossy, obsessive, and listen to his music too loud on his radio but he never sounded so empty.
"Leader Batman, is there anything that you have found that we haven't?" Asked Starfire as she floated forward, her curiosity peaked. Batman looked at her with his trademark blank expression and answered her question.
"Yes, we have found some…. things." Said Batman, his breath slightly shook. The only ones who noticed this behavior were Superman and Supergirl, both due to their super hearing. "I hacked into the traffic cams in the area where Wonderwoman and Superman were fighting Doomsday, what you two didn't notice was there was a teenager in the infection radius when you bisected Doomsday. However, what's strange is that previous to him showing up there was a flash of blue light and then he was there, so we wondered if he could be a meta with teleportation. But, when we went to get readings in the area it came up with forgin universal energy." Said Batman, he turned sideways to show them an older teen with a black and red beard, black hair, covered in a hoodie obscuring his face, and wearing cargo shorts. The entire room of people turned to see the same tattered hoodie and cargo pants in tatters upon the sleeping teens body.
"So we know a teen came to our universe and we don't know how or why, we don't know what his intentions are whether they be benevolent or malevolent. We know he was exposed to the virus and vanished. Though, through further investigation we found that he was taken into Cadmus and most likely experimented on. We looked through Cadmus's computers and found files saying he was experimented on because of his unusual reaction to the virus, but the nature of his reaction and subsequent experiments were wiped from the databanks." Said Wonderwoman, she stepped forward with her two cents. She wondered just like the rest of the league, what this male's intentions would be.
"But he wasn't hostile, he was quite friendly! He gave us food and helped us fight against Plasmus and Cinder Block. He did not have the "bad intentions" as you say!" Said Starfire with a passion in her voice. She floated higher into the air and throwing her arms down to her sides in a huff.
"What Starfire said was true, although he was acting quite confused. When we cornered him in the supermarket he acted like he wasn't all there, instinctual, animalistic almost. We think those experiments may have tried to alter something in his brain." Said Raven, her monotone voice. Cutting through Starfire passionate cries to the league, the league looked to each other and then to Martian Manhunter.
"J'onn, you think you could take care of this? Maybe fix his mind and see what his intentions and origins are?" Said Superman, J'onn looked at the sleeping teen with furled eyebrows and then looked curiously at the slumbering inquiry.
"No I am Unable to acsesss his mind, it is like running into a brick wall." Said the Manhunter, rubbing his forehead in slight irritation due to his inability to help aid his team. He shuffled to the back of the group of the elder members, everyone looking to him in sympathy.
"Maybe I could try? I'm a psychic from my heritage, maybe I could break through the mental blocks?" Said Raven as she floated forward, everyone looked towards Raven as she offered her service and then to each other, each member nodded their heads and turned back.
"Alright, but let's get our guest here into one of the Kryptonian cells my cousin put in for this meeting before we begin." Said Supergirl as she floated forward shaking Raven's hand and looking to Cyborg who nodded, pressing a button on his arm causing the bed to follow them.
Everyone was silent as they reached the holding cell in silent curiosity, when they reached it Superman put his hand on a scanner to open the door. They wheeled the teen inside and placed him on the soft mattress of the holding cell, they brought Raven a chair to sit on at the side of the bed and she got to work.
"Azarath Metrion Zinthos!" Said Raven as she placed her hands on the armored chest of the slumbering teen, at first nothing happened and then they say her eyebrows furl and then black lightning started to arch its way across the room. As Raven focused harder the lightning started to get more erratic, it thundered against the one way glass where the rest of the group remained behind.
"Raven we need you to stop! This cell isn't magic proof, we don't know what will happen if you continue!" Shouted Batman into the microphone as he pressed the button on the console.
"Hold on, I'm almost there! There is a crack forming in his defenses! I can reach him!" Shouted Raven as she focused even harder, then the black lightning went even wilder. It phased through the one way glass shrinking the Titans, Wonderwoman, Superman, Batman, and Martian Manhunter in the chest. At this black shadows left Raven and the victims of the lighting strike and they flew into the head of the slumbering teen.
What shocked everyone was when they all woke up they saw a huge, colorful, chaotic mess of a landscape. And standing in front of them was the same teen they saw in the pictures wearing a pink hoodie and pink cargo pants.
"Hi, you must be the Justice league! You can call me Happiness the joyful and energetic, it is so nice to meet you!" Shouted the pink clothed teen, he bounced forward shaking everyone's hand except Batman's. When Happy attempted to approach Batman he scowled at the teen causing him to back away from the caped crusader. This caused most of the group to look at him in curiosity, all except Raven who looked at him in shock.
"You're an emoticlone! Why are you here?! It should only be your whole who is here!" Said Raven, this caused the pink emoticlone to look at Raven and smile causing her to blush.
"Well our whole's new ability makes him magically resistant, and he was immune to the Manhunter's telepathy. However, when you forced your magic and telepathy to break through his mental fortitudes it caused your magic to mix with his science and seep into his mind, splitting him into us!" Said the now named emoticlone as he bounced from one foot to the other. On his face was a face splitting grin, his eyes shined bright with the light of a thousand suns and his clothing reflected that part of himself.
"We were here to see if your whole would be a threat, now due to unintended side-effects we are trapped in here." Said Batman, scowling slightly at the overly colorful landscape. At Batman's response superman floated forward and stood in front of happiness and placed a strong hand on his shoulder and looked him in the eyes.
"What Batman was trying to say was how do we get out of here?" At Superman's words happy paused, tilting his bushy face and head. He reached into his un-damaged hoodie and pulled out a crystal, held it up in front of his face and smirked.
"This is the key, when you gather all of the emoticlone together we will merge into this. This process will make us whole again and provide you a key to the gate to get past his reinforced defenses." Said Happiness, he handed it over into Superman's hands, the crystal glowing with unknown radience and energy.
"Where are we supposed to find this "Gate" you are talking about?" Asked Cyborg as he stepped forward, offering a handshake, and smiling at the energy this guy possesses.
"Well we have to pass the Arches, when we pass through the Arches we will be in a new part of our domains. I have to warn you though, some of the things you will see will not be pretty." Said Happy with a suddenly dark and serious tone, causing the hero's to look at happy in worry, all of a sudden happys cheery attitude returned and he bounced over to Superman. He reached his hand out and touched the crystal resting in Superman's palms, he dissipated into pink light that was absorbed into the crystal giving it a wispy pink in the center of the crystal contrasting the clearness of the rest of it.
"Now who is supposed to guide us dude?!" Panicked Beastboy, lightly pulling at both of his ears in anxiety. At this the crystal in Superman's palm floated out of it, giggling, and started of in a random direction. At this everyone turned to Beastboy as he withered a little under ther arched eyebrows and upturned lips.
As they walked forward they say a orange arch in their path, they all looked at eachother and nodded, first the leauge passed through and then he Titans. Raven, the last one to pass through, looked at the arch and cringed at what she guessed was behind it before she entered.
"By Hera!" Shouted Wonder Woman as they walked into the other side, as far as the group's eyes could see was a dusky winter covered landscape. Both Cyborg and Beastboy ran forward and plucked what looked like a cookie from a bush and took a bite, and fell backwards onto floating pillow-like clouds awaiting them.
"This is paradise!" Said both Cyborg and Beastboy with tears in their eyes, everyone looked at them in amusement as they looked around to see cookie bushes, rivers of chocolate milk, winter landscape, dusk timing, floating pillow clouds, it was all so bizarre. The whole group gained a shocked exspression as they were scooped up by floating pillow clouds of their own, the clouds floating them to a small cabin in the distance. A fire going in the fireplace, it looked even older when their pillows floated them to the cabin, it looked homey and lived in and as they approached and the door opened. Their clouds floated them through and what they saw shocked them.
"O my X'hal!" Said Starfire, everyone's clouds floated into the beautifully decorated cabin containing an orange colored emoticlone of the boy they were helping.
"Oh great you're here..welcome *YAWN!* to my domain." Said the orange emoticlone, he placed down his tablet and looked towards them. His eyes half lidded and droopy, his cloths baggy, and he was covered by a weighted blanket. His own cloud floating him near the fire of the cabin keeping him warmer.
"Which one are you." asked the Martian Manhunter, turning to catch a plate of floating Chocos and and milk. Everyone looked at him in suprise as multiple snack foods started to float towards each of their sides. Tea and cakes for Raven, Pudding of happiness for Starfire, Waffles for Beastboy and Cyborg, Caramel apple for Superman, Juiced fruit for Batman, Milk Chocolate for Robin, and some Bougatsa for Wonderwoman.
"I'm Sloth the Hedonist and Relaxed one, whatever you want to call me really. All you need to do to keep me content is to just give me some entertainment and I'll be happy." Said the sleepy orange emoticlone, everyone nodded as they dug into their snacks, and they thanked the emoticlone afterwards. "You all need to learn how to relax sometimes, I know your lives were far from easy, from Beastboy to Superman. You all need to learn how to step back, realize some things can't be fixed or controlled and take a much needed break, especially you Bruce." Said the orange emoticlone as he pointed to Batman, this caused the leagues eyes to widen. However, this caused Batman and Robins eyes to glow rat the emotion.
"How do you know that information!?" Asked both Robin and Batman.
Both of them looked ready to pounce on the emotion. Everyone looked shocked at the revelation of Batman's identity except Starfire, the emotion looked mildly irritated waving his hand causing sleeping masks to appear around both Robin's and Batman's mouths, and super weighted blankets to hold them down on their clouds.
"The next aspect will explain everything, now let me see the crystal." Said the orange aspect, Superman's cloud floated forwards and he presented the crystal in his palm, as the orange aspect turned into orange energy and lazily made its way into the crystal, mixing with the pink as the scenery disappeared and left the, in front of a yellow Arch.
"That was interesting." Said a shocked Superman who looked at the crystal in his palm. Batman looked at the, in his opinion over glorified rock, with great suspicion. They all walked towards the Arch wondering what would be on the other side, and boy they were surprised.
On he other side was a large library, as the looked around they looked up and saw the height of the shelves went on forever but they were only partially filled up with books, more books appearing by the second. The crystal from Superman's hands shot up and forward with the group running and flying to catch up, and what they found in the center of the library was interesting.
"Hello newcomers I'll be there in a minute!"
At the shout they all turned to see a inconcebible amount of yellow emoticlones in yellow lab coats, and long cache pants. All were waiting in line at the base of an evelated platform containing a laboritory. Each clone carried varias things like a book, plant, blueprints, recipes, anything worth reserching and studying scientifically at least one clone heald in their hands.
"Let me guess, your his knowledge?" Asked Raven in a feintly curious monotone, this caused the clones in a line to part and let the group through to the elevated platform. Upon the top contained one single yellow emoticlone, the only one wearing glasses to discern himself from the others, looking into a book and marking mathematics on a whiteboard.
"Yes my dear, my name is Knowledge the Creative and Intelligent. How might I be of assistance? Have you come for information?" Asked the newly introduced aspect of the teen. Before anyone could say anything Batman and Robin burst in front of the group and Batman grabbed the yellow teen by the collar of his lab coat and hoisted him eye to eye with himself.
"How do you know who I am!?" Asked Batman, as he screamed into his face with his Feiffer bat glare some spit his the emoticlone's face. This caused the aspects face to scrunch up, and reach up and wipe the spit from his face.
"Who told you I knew your identities?" Said knowledge.
"The orange one before you." Said Batman.
"Of course, Sloth always gets in the way of my brilliance. Fine." Said knowledge, he thought how he would go about this and just decided to rip it off like a bandied. "I know who all of you are." Said the emoticlone, pointing at each member of the group.
"Diana King of Themyscira, daughter of Zeus and the queen of the Amazon's Hapolita. Formed from the clay of the island and born of divine birth."
"J'onn J'onzz, Martian, founding member of the Justice leauge, uncle to Ms. Martian, and Choco lover."
"Klark Kent, last son of Krypton, cousin to Supergirl Kara Kent, founding member of Justice League, weakness kryptonite."
"Dick Grayson-Wayne, lost both parents to a performance accident in the circus, adopted by Bruce Wayne and trained to be Robin by Batman."
"Victor Stone, Academic athlete with a former scholarship, nearly died in a lab accident at star labs, you were saved by a mother box but became a cyborg as a result."
"Garfield Mark Logan, famous biologist parents who died in a boating accident, caught Sakuya from an infected monkey at four, was cured by your parents but gained green skin with pointed ears as a side effect along with a connection to The Red from the serum."
"Princess Koriand'r of Tamaran, sister to the villian Blackfire, sold into slavery to the Gordans by your defeated Homeworld as a spoil of war to do heavy labor."
"Rachel Roth, daughter of Trigon the Terrible and Arella Roth, insanely powerful sorceress, taught by the Goddess-Queen Azar of Azarath, most powerful person in the room." At the final words given by knowledge he pushed Batman back with a schooling display of strength, betraying his scrawny body, releasing his shirt collar from his grasp and landing back on his own two feet.
"How do you know all that?..." asked a shell shocked Robin, knowledge adjusted his lab coat and looked the group in the eye, snapping his fingers. At the sound of a snap a clone of knowledge ran forward with a huge book with a cover that read DC Multiverse: Explained. He took it from the clone and dismissed them, handing the book over to the group who began to read.
"From my own universe you are all forms of superhero entertainment, almost everyone recognizes Superman, Batman, Wonderwoman, Flash, and hell even Aquaman after that one movie!" Said knowledge as he sat on a stool of the lab table. They all looked up from the book and back to knowledge in shock, Superman taking the book and handing it back to the aspect. Knowledge took the book and placed it under his arm.
"How did you get here?"
Asked Superman, deciding to ask before Batman began to attempt a whole interrogation. Knowledge anjusted his glasses and stroked his beard in thought, then looked back at the group. He saw the adults of the group were in shock while the Teen Titans were pretty much emotionally catatonic.
"The most I could come up with was a higher power was messing with me, as I was walking home I said it would be cool to have powers like Doomsday and BOOM! I was in an alleyway getting exposed to the Doomsday virus."
Said the worried emoticlone, he walked off of the platform towards Superman and placed his hand upon the crystal in his palm.
"Maybe we can find out together?" Said knowledge with a simultaneous grimace of sorry and smile of hope.
"Maybe we can." Said Superman, this one intrigued Clark. He honestly thought this kid was endearing, seeing as he had the steel balls to stand up to Batman and look him in the eyes as he held him by the neck. No one who stood up to Batman left unscathed, and yet he was holding his own. However, he also scared him. The boy having superintelligence and the adaptive abilities of Doomsday didn't bode well for the man of steel, he was worried what the boy would do with this information. So on that note himself and Batman could agree.
"I'm the last one before the darkest one, all I want to ask is if you can go easy on the next one? Him and I are great friends, you know what they say 'Krankzinnigheid ligt dicht bij begaafdheid.'" Said knowledge.
At this many cocked their eyebrows, lost in their thoughts about what were to face them when they would cross the other arch. When everyone cleared their thoughts and turned to look at the emoticlone he was already a yellow mist vanishing into the stone.
"Yo dudes, what did he mean?"
Asked Beast Boy, he shivered from the look the yellow emiticolene gave the group. Every animal instinct was telling him to bolt, and then he looked towards Raven. He could tell from the expression on her face as the black aura faded from around her she was distressed, the look on her face was a wrinkled brow and a stressed look in her eyes. What he didn't know was that Raven was using all her attention to keep her emotions in check.
'How did he know?!'
Raven had wondered in her head in panic, still frozen from her profile being said, all her emotions were going wild. Especially timid. So using all her concentration she suppressed her emotions and entered her sense of artificial serenity again. Everyone looked from each other and began to look into the distance to see a pure black arch, dark as the void and sucking all light into it. As everyone walked forwards the cristal started to glow and they could see the pink wisps of the crystal trying to be pulled towards that void, only for it to move as far away from the nearing arch as possible in the bounds of the crystal.
"What's going on with the crystal?" Asked Wonder Woman, she walked towards Superman, wasn't the pink one happiness? Yes she remembers! It was happiness! She reached over to Clark's hand and plucked the crystal out of it.
"I know what he said! I know what the yellow one said! He said 'Craziness is close to Genius' but why did he say craziness?" Said Diana, she observed the stone and looked up to see most of the gathered people in awe.
"How do you know Dutch?" asked Superman, he floated over and took back the crystal. Diana looked back into Clark's eyes and hers twinkled, a small smirk played across her lips.
"I stayed in the Netherlands after world war 2 for a while, I picked up a few things. What?" Wonder Woman looked at the surprised look of everyone but Batman and Robin. "I have hobbies outside the league." Said Wonder Woman, she looked at everyone and went over the arch shaped hole in existence that was this arch.
"Based on the evidence of the pink wisps in the crystal trying to get away, I can safely say that whatever it is, it is making happiness very uncomfortable. However, what could make that overabundance of energy afraid?" Said Batman as he moved the crystal back and forth towards and from the arch, explaining his theory.
"We still need to go through the arch, it is what is needed to finally make him whole." Said Raven as she floated towards the Dark Knight, taking the crystal gently into her hands and floating towards the arch. The pink wisps in the crystal trying with all its might to get as far away from the arch as possible, however she simply walked through the arch.
"Your friend is very brave." Said the Martian Manhunter as he floated forwards through the abyss colored arch after her. The league sweatdropped, they didn't know whether the girl was brave, had insanely strong will, or just never got afraid. However, the Titans grimaced knowing that Raven had the second option when it came to keeping her powers in check, as to not destroying everything from her emotions.
"Alright Titans! Follow Raven and Manhunter!" Said Robin as he cautiously walked forwards and into the archway followed by a still grounded Starfire, and to the back to back of a scared beast boy and cyborg.
"Well it's either stay here or face what's on the other side." Said Superman, he wondered why he felt his solar energy start to get siphoned off. He knew when he looked at that arch that it was sucking all the energy and happiness from him slowly, but against his better judgment just flew through.
"We need to help the young lad, even if what we find is horrible we need to help him. Superman and I caused this when we bisected Doomsday, we need to rectify our mistake." Said Wonder Woman, she thought of how careless she was and hoped the league could find a way to alert civilians of dangerous areas. At the last thought she strolled through the portal, leaving behind a paranoid bat.
"Nobody lives forever." Said Batman as he collected himself, not showing his emotion, and bravely stepped through the portal. The last thing to enter was his fluttering cape as the arch crumbled behind them.
The first thing Raven saw was an endless destroyed landscape, its skies were grey and filled with smog, trees broken and uprooted, mountains were in rubble, and the rivers thick with green sludge. In the sky were machines that made no sense from a functional standpoint, however there were tubes from the sky connected to geysers in the ground pumping black sludge from the ground.
"By Hera/By X'hal." Said Starfire and Wonder Woman in unison.
Everyone saw the ravaged landscape and wondered what kind of emoticlone inhabited this place. Everyone grouped up and cautiously walked forwards on their journey, their destination? One of the geysers, they saw it build up and release a stream of black sludge into the pipe, and at the base connecting the guiser to the tube leaked some of the liquid from the gaps.
"What is that stuff?" Asked Beast Boy in anxiety, he slightly walked forwards and the sludge acted. It sprung forwards landing onto his chest, and Beastboy freaked out running in circles. However, all of a sudden he stood stark still and began to twitch in place. Everyone acted, however Martian Manhunter arrived first and laid a hand on his shoulder to see what was happening to his mind.
The Manhunter then realized that he had messed up royally, he froze stock still. Inside his mind he felt so irrationally guilty, he had thoughts swarm his head, negative and horrible thoughts he knew weren't his own but he almost believed them. He felt an anxious pressure build up and then…. he and Beastboy vomited up a stream of black goo, releasing the building pressures.
"Oh my gods, I have never felt so horrible." Said The Manhunter.
"Are you *hack* ok Mr. Manhunter?" Asked Beastboy, both men holding onto the other man's shoulder to support their trembling.
"I'll be fine."
"It's ok dude, I can't really tell, we both look a little green anyways." Said Beastboy with a small smile on his face, he sucked in a sharp breath from the pain of his dry throat, coughing as he did so. Honestly Beastboy was scared, he felt those thoughts and it brought back some of his own bad memories. Using humor was always his coping mechanism, and now he needed to cope.
"What was that stuff J'onn?" Asked Bruce as he walked towards him, resting his hand on his shoulder and squeezing. The Manhunter turned to see the compassionate eyes of his concerned teammate, and he took a deep breath to answer.
"Intrusive thoughts, horrible, negative thoughts. I don't know why they are happening to this boy but we need to find the fragment of his psyche and get out of here." Said J'onn.
Superman floated forwards, concern clear on his face. He looked at everyone else and saw they grouped together as far away from the goop as possible.
"So, I assume if we don't touch the goo of black we'll be fine?" Asked Starfire. Manhunter turned to look at her and weakly nodded, everyone warely looked around as they moved in group formation. Each step was in sync with the other, some jerked as the black viscous sludge slightly jumped for them.
"Raven let me see the crystal." Said Batman, Raven walked over and placed it in his palm. Everyone gathered around Batman as he started to slowly move his arm, the pink wisps staying stationary until it hit north east. "Just as I thought."
He said.
"What do you mean just as you thought?" Asked Raven.
"The pink wisps in the crystal are moving away from the direction of the south east, I believe that is where we need to go." Replied Batman as they started north eastward. For many miles they walked, until they stumbled on a twisted mockery of a garden sanctuary. Bushes of crooked black roses and a broken path leading through the depressing yet beautiful garden.
"I see you have come for me."
At the voice everyone turned around to see the last emoticlone, he stood in the middle of a fountain. Under him was a huge pool of the black sludge, all of it pouring out of every orifice on his face and being collected in the pool. He stepped down, stopping the flow of the black sludge and walked towards them.
He wore nothing but black, his hair and even his eyes were as dark as the void, and when they stared into his eyes they felt their moods start to darken. It felt as though their thoughts were not their own, a chaotic swirl of negative thoughts they wanted so desperately to be rid from their minds.
"What are you?" Asked Robin.
"I am the shadow, I am all he hates about himself, all he hides, I am the thoughts that plague his mind from the moment he awakens to the moment he falls asleep. I am his instinctual urges from his rage, his hatred, and his lust. I plague him with things not true about himself, and watch as he squirms knowing he knows it's not true and believing it anyways. I watch as I isolate him from others, and as he slowly implodes into himself like a glorious star into a black hole."
Said the emoticlone as he walked towards Raven, out of the palm of his hand grew a pure black rose covered in glowing white dots. The flower looked like a starry night sky one would see stargazing in a country field away from the city, he opened his palm toward her and she plucked the flower out of his hand and held it in her own. A pink blush spreads across Ravens cheeks, and she pulls the flower under her cloak and into her mindscape for safe keeping.
"Thank you." She mumbled from under her hood. This caused the emoticlone to smile, he then turned back to the whole group.
"Why do you plague this boy?" Asked the Manhunter. This caused the emoticlone to turn the green Martian, the Martians red eyes glaring daggers into the very being of the emoticlone.
"Because he was born with me, from a young age I was with him. Through death, depression, and pain I was there watching him. I have no reason for what I do as I just am, however he does see less of me when he's around others. Maybe it settles his restless mind, maybe it placates me, I haven't a clue."
The emoticlone finished with his monologue, turning back to see the whole group with sad looks on their faces. The emoticlone sighed, walking towards Raven again. He reached forwards and touched the crystal laying in her beautiful pale hands.
"For all he hates me, for as much as he wants to be rid of me, I will always be here. I can't say I'm sorry for what I do to him, but I can sympathize with his plight." Said the shadow, his form turning into the thick, toxic, tar like sludge and seeping into the crystal.
At this everyone was silent, and then a loud rumbling occurred as the earth around them crumbled away leaving them in a white void. In front of them was a gate and in front of the gate was white quartz statue with an empty slot on its forehead shaped like a crystal.
"All that's left is the way home." Said Cyborg.
He walked forwards and gently took the crystal out of Raven's hands and slotted it into the statue. Amazingly in front of them he crystal sunk into the statue, and like clay it began to mound itself into the shape of their charge. It's face took on a grey skin tone and his shirt and cargo shorts manifested, it opened its eyes just as the gate opened. The light from the gate swallowed everyone, and before everyone knew what happened they were back in the real world.
"Oooh, my head." Said the boy on the bed, he slowly sat up as his form shrunk. All the extra height, muscle, fat, and alterations mostly disappeared. Leaving a pale grey skinned teen with black hair, and a pair of brown x shaped eye pupils with black Sclera sitting in the place of a beast.
"Welcome back" said Raven with a ghost of a smile. The noise Raven made caused him to look at her and smack his hand onto his face.
"So all that happened?" Said Jacob.
"I'm afraid so." Said Raven.
"Well shit." Said Jacob.