Lover's Walk III: Love is a Many-Splendid Thing
SR: A crucial part of the final scene. Once again, to see how the scene originally appeared, e-mail me.
The Lord looked at Raven. He chuckled slightly.
"My my, what's this! The girl has shown up to save the guy! Something is wrong here! Isn't it supposed to be the other way around? Aren't you supposed to be in danger, so the foolish man under my boot here can show up and save you and thereby get you to spread your legs for him?"
Raven threw a brick at the Lord. He snapped his head to the side, dodging it.
"More where those came from." Raven said, levitating more bricks.
"Can you get me with them before I crush Savior's skull? Try. Really. I'd like to see what happens."
"Do it Raven. Forget about me." Savior groaned.
"Oh, THAT old cliché!" the Lord laughed, and sliced the Shimmer again. Raven winced at Savior's agonized scream.
Something was wrong with the Lord's face. His hair kept it mostly hidden, as did the shadows, but when she got a look, something struck her as wrong about it. She couldn't quite put her finger on it: it looked normal enough. No scars, no weird colours, nothing really except those strangely dark eyes.
"Well, I'm waiting Raven. Throw away."
Raven hesitated.
"You're not going to, are you? I figured. Despite your little rejection this morning, you DO feel something. How touching." The Lord chuckled. Raven gaped. How did he know?
"I have talents, my dear. Talents I will use to cleanse society. You two insist on getting in my way, though. Guess I'll have to deal with you…" The Lord was saying.
Then his sword, incased in dark energy, suddenly yanked out of the ground and swung at him. It took him by surprise, but he still managed to dodge it.
But it was just the opening Savior needed, as he lashed out with another Shimmer strand and whacked the Lord away. The Shimmer then pushed Savior across the roof. He ended up near the ledge, trying to recover from the torture the Lord had put him through.
Raven kept swinging the sword at the Lord, as he ducked and dodged. He did a back flip and then threw some knives at her, and she was forced to let go of the sword to dodge. The Lord reached up and caught it.
"Think I missed?"
Raven's eyes went wide, and she looked down to see if she had suffered an injury she hadn't felt…
She hadn't. Instead she found a tear at her waist and a small bit of wreckage on the ground that had once been her com-link. He'd thrown a dagger right through it, timed it so well she'd actually leapt into it without being aware.
"Now my darling, I was having a little conversation with your friend over there that you interrupted. So why don't I do go over there instead and peel back a few layers of your ice queen front and see what we find, shall we?"
Anger filled Raven, and she fought to keep it under control as she began throwing bricks at the Lord. His sword and talons slashed out, cutting through the baked mud-rocks as he ran at her, getting close despite her barrage.
Just as he swung at her, she sank into the shadows at her feet. The Lord's sword slashed through the air.
"Going behind me, eh?" he said, and turned around.
Then Raven materialized out the same shadows she had just disappeared into.
"Think again."
The Lord turned around as Raven smashed him with a telekinetic bolt, sending him flying through a brick chimney. By now the rain had become a heavy downpour, and she felt water soaking through her hood and dripping down her back.
"Azarath…" Raven muttered as she ripped a door off a stairwell. It floated at the Lord as he pulled himself out of the wreckage. But she didn't throw it into him, no. Instead she lowered it and the door skimmed along the ground towards him.
Just in time for him to walk onto it.
"Metrion!" Raven yelled, and the door suddenly flew upward, throwing the Lord into the air. "ZINTHOS!"
The door zipped out from under the Lord, turned sideways, and then smashed him like a swatter smashing a fly, the wood breaking as the Lord went flying through the air and bounced along the rooftop.
Raven floated over, looking at the man as he got up.
"Nice." He said, holding out his arm.
The skin on it suddenly ripped off as parts emerged and began to shift around, and then Raven realized that the Lord was not wearing a bladed glove. He, just like Victor, had cybernetic parts. Parts that were shifting into a…
Fire suddenly exploded at her. Flamethrower. She flew down and behind another stairwell as fire burned behind her. Looking over the edge, she levitated a dumpster from the alleyway beneath her and threw it over her head. She heard a curse and loud crashing as the dumpster hit something. She emerged from her cover to see the Lord frantically pulling something on his arm. She must have damaged something. Good. She melted into the shadows again.
Emerging behind him, she began lifting the dumpster again…
And then the Lord suddenly did a quick flip and was in her face as his mechanical arm lanced up and twin blades sprouted on each side of her face. She gasped and dropped the dumpster as a third blade poked up against her chin.
"How long can it take you to get something to throw? A second? Half of one maybe? This blade can be in your brain in 1/8 of a second. So in other words, checkmate." The Lord said. The blade lifted, ever so slightly, just cutting into the outer layers of skin under Raven's chin.
Raven suddenly felt fear and tried to claw it back down. But it was hard, in the grip of a lunatic who had a blade ready to shoot into her brain. How had he known what she was doing? Was he physic?
"In a way." The Lord said. Raven started as much as she could with a knife at her throat. He had heard what she was thinking. He must have some kind of telepathic talent.
Telepath….
"Oh yes. If you're thinking of calling your teammates via your mind, I'll know. And you'll be dead before you can even say one word." The Lord said. "My, you are a pretty one, aren't you, in the dusky sense?"
"Let me go. You hurt me, my teammates won't stop…"
"I care not. They are foolish children, predictable and easy to best. But YOU…you have a certain air of knowledge about you…interesting…" the Lord was saying. "Care to play Twenty Questions? Your little friend back there seemed quite adamant on how he felt. Why be so cruel and reject him the way you did, you little ice queen?"
"You…I…you can't…" Raven stammered. She felt the blade push in a bit more. For once in her life she had no idea what to do. Even Killjoy hadn't put her in such a situation.
"Ah. Despite your demon blood, you're only too human. I guess you have to hear it from me. You do have feelings for him. I can see them clear as day. And I can also see how hard you're trying to keep them concealed, even from yourself…poor little girl, cursed by her birthright to be so confused!" the Lord mocked.
"Shut up!" Raven hissed, greatly angered that this lunatic dared to pick her brain and throw her…feelings…back at her like they were something to be mocked.
"Ah ah, don't be getting mad now girl. It's not like anyone made you do this little act of lying. You did it to yourself. You're so good at it you're not even aware of it. Pretty disciplined, if you ask me. But doomed to failure in the end. Even before I showed up, you were starting to crack. You can't help it. Behind that façade of competence and world-weariness is still the heart of a human, a heart that has grown so very weary of being alone. Humans are pack animals, they crave companionship, even as their need to survival insists on taking everything for themselves. You humans. Such paradoxes. You put so much effort into telling yourself that nothing is there, yet the deepest part of you would like nothing more to be touched…"
"But…I…I can't…"
"It's not a matter of practicality. You humans never were the best at those things. It's a matter of desire, and no matter how hard you try and keep yourself together in case you cause something to break…such damaging nonsense. That's why I have to clean up this world…it's time for practicality, not people who keep telling the world and themselves they don't want to be touched when they so dearly DO want to be touched…"
"Who are you to decide how people should feel?"
"I'm apart from them I don't really care if I get touched or not."
"I guess you won't mind this much then."
And then three Shimmer strands spun out of the ground below the Lord and Raven and seized his arm, yanking it down even as another strand whipped out and around him, smashing him in the face. Raven flew backwards, grabbing the dumpster again and slamming it into the Lord. He fell and she dropped the heavy metal container on him.
Savior landed next to Raven.
"I reached out and touched you. You ok?" Savior said, directing the first sentence at the Lord and the second to Raven.
"Fine." Raven lied, trying to keep her voice calm and level over the physic violation she had just suffered and not quite succeeding.
The dumpster flipped over as the Lord pushed it off himself. He was smiling as he got up.
"Ah, the loving couple, reunited again!"
"Shut up. You're going down now, 'Lord'." Savior said.
"Ah, and perhaps in shared adversity, you will be able to win your little goth there, right? That IS what you're thinking under your intent to stop me, Savior. Don't bother lying, I can see you clear as day. Selfish even in the attempt to be selfless. How very human. Annoyingly unpractical."
"Don't listen to him Savior. He's just a lunatic. Let's bring him down." Raven said, as she levitated some more bricks and anything else she could find on the nearby roofs to throw.
"And now YOU'RE trying to convince Savior AND yourself that all I said about your innermost feelings are lies. You people are pathetic. One's so desperate to make a connection, and the other is so desperate to make sure that connection never happens. Well my children, I will just say this."
The Lord's arm shifted again, as a missile popped up and armed itself.
"If you two want to use me as a stepping stone to your separate goals, you better step HARD."
Savior and Raven split apart as the missile flew at them, blowing the roof apart. Raven threw her projectiles at the Lord, and Savior grabbed a hunk of rubble from the wrecked roof and threw it at him as well. Both missed and the three ended up on another roof.
"Keep trying! Until you recognize the greatest practicality of all in life, you won't win!" the Lord yelled, charging at the two.
Raven ripped up the ground under the Lord's feet, and then Savior lashed him with a Shimmer-strand. The Lord flew backwards, and the Shimmer wrapped around him and slammed him into the ground before the Lord's sword slashed out and cut through it. Savior screamed and collapsed next to Raven.
"Noel!" Raven said, kneeling next to him. She had felt his pain, standing next to him.
"Forget it it goes away get the Lord!" Savior managed to hiss from between clenched teeth.
"Nice tricks you have there." The Lord was saying as he got up, his arm shifting around again. "So do I. Let's see who runs out first!"
The Lord aimed at Raven and fired, and she barely got a piece of rubble in front of her before a dozen metal crossbow bolts slammed into it. Growling, she broke the rubble apart and threw the crossbow bolts back. The Lord dodged them, but one impaled itself into his left shin. He looked down in annoyance and then pulled it out, tossing it aside.
"Should have kept looking down!" Savior said, as a Shimmer strand exploded from beneath the Lord and slammed into his chin. The Lord stumbled back, and the Shimmer erupted from the ground as Savior pulled it out and swung it around, forming a large ball-bludgeon that he slammed the Lord with, sending him flying to another roof.
Raven and Savior headed over there, while Raven looked around. The rooftops really didn't offer much in the way of weaponry. The only real desirable weapon she could see was a nearby water tower, and it weighed too much for her to lift.
"You are actually providing a challenge. Not bad." The Lord said.
The two attacked, Raven grabbing whatever she could and throwing it, and Savior being as careful as he could with the Shimmer, lashing and swiping at the Lord. But the Lord was quicker, and another claw slash put Savior down again before the Lord leapt over to Raven and slashed at her. She dodged and retaliated in a way she guessed he wouldn't expect, swinging at his face. She hadn't wanted to engage in hand-to-hand combat, but in this case it might work to her advantage…
She felt her nails catch on something and tear as the Lord recoiled slightly.
This corner of his face was now torn and ragged, and he felt it. Strangely though, it wasn't bleeding. No wonder his face looked odd. It was some kind of mask.
"Not bad goth." He said, and slashed at her. Raven dodged aside and the blade took a large slice out of her cloak.
And then she walked right into his backhand. She cried out as she fell to the ground, even as the Lord's talons slipped away into his metallic arm and new parts emerged.
"You may be good, but me…" the Lord said, as his arm completed it's transformation and sparked. "I'm electricity."
Raven rolled away as the Lord drove the taser into the ground where Raven had been. She tried to get up, but the Lord stepped on her cloak and halted her flight. Frantically she tried to grab something and get the Lord away but he was already closing in with the taser…
Until Savior lashed out and half-slammed half-grabbed with the Shimmer, throwing the Lord across the rooftop. He tried to follow it up with another attack, but the Lord swung at him with his sword and he was forced to withdraw the Shimmer before it got cut.
"Why didn't you just pick him up and throw him away?" Savior asked
"I find it difficult to pick up organic things. If I'm not super-careful I could accidentally pull harder on one part and remove it…" Raven replied
"What? The first thing you did when you met me was pick me up with your power!"
"And you didn't notice how very hard it was for me to do that."
"Well, I say you pick him up anyway and throw him, god damn the risk."
"No. I could kill him by accident. And that's not what we do."
"Good point. But damn, I can't get close. His damn blades keep getting me." Savior said. "Maybe we should try and get the others."
"No, god knows how much damage he could do while we retreated. We have to do this ourselves." Raven said.
"But how?"
"I don't know, but together we must have a way!" Raven said.
"Together…together? Wait a second…" Savior said. "I have an idea. You say you have trouble using your power on organics, right? All organic things?"
"Depends."
"Well…how about this?" Savior said, as the Shimmer emerged from his right hand.
Raven looked at it, and then she understood.
"Give me your hand!" Raven said, holding hers out. Savior's hand intertwined with hers. "Together." Savior said as the Lord got up.
"How practical." Raven replied.
And then the Shimmer shot out of Savior's other hand, no longer white but encased in glowing black energy, flying at the Lord as he raised his sword and slashed…
And was repelled by the black barrier. The Shimmer flew around the sword and whacked the Lord across the face. He swung at it again, but it dodged and rammed itself into his gut, and then snapped up and whacked him across the face, sending him flying backwards a few feet. He stood his ground and continued to swing, but every slash he made was blocked as the Shimmer slammed and struck him from all angles.
"Bastard!" he cursed, grabbing the strand and slamming his taser into it.
"The Shimmer doesn't conduct electricity, you fool!" Savior yelled, and the Lord looked up at him as the Shimmer twisted out of his grasp and LASHED the Lord across the face so hard he was thrown off his feet.
A torn and tattered pink…something…landed near him. Savior and Raven looked at it, and then each other.
A low chuckling came from the Lord, which became mad laughter.
"You know, it's kind of funny…" the Lord said as he got up.
Savior and Raven gaped at him, horrified. It sort of reminded Savior of the movie horror villain Freddy Krueger, except Freddy had been burned. The Lord appeared to have been slashed, over and over again, his face totally torn apart by knives, until all that was left was two eyes peering out of a giant mass of scar tissue.
"Look at you two. Black and white. What a fitting combination, because that's how you see the world. Except your perception is so screwed up you're seeing the black as white and vice versa."
"We know how the world is. You're the one who has lost the reality of it."
"Oh no…I know the reality of it quite well child, and I know this…this world, this society…it has to be cleansed…"
The Lord snatched up his sword.
"OR IT'LL KEEP MAKING PEOPLE LIKE ME!"
The Lord charged.
Right into a Shimmer-ram. Savior and Raven had had enough as together they smashed, lashed, and slashed the Lord over and over again with a half dozen tendrils, trying to slow his rage-fueled forward charge, finally driving him back before they smacked him into the air, knocking him around in mid-air for several seconds before the Shimmer grabbed him and slammed him into the roof so hard the whole building rattled.
"Consider yourself stepped on." Raven said, as Savior lifted the limp vigilante up and trussed him up with Shimmer-restraints. "Nice work Noel. We do work well together."
"Just in combat?" Savior asked.
Raven wondered what she could say. If she replied in the negative she didn't like what would happen, but if she told him the truth…if she let herself feel…
A low chuckling interrupted her thoughts.
"The loving couple." The Lord laughed, and raised his metal arm, still converted into the taser.
"Till death do you part."
And then the taser arm suddenly launched itself, breaking off from the Lord's arm and rocketing towards the two.
Towards Raven.
Savior gasped and tried to snap another strand out of the Shimmer even as Raven raised her hand…
Too late.
The taser slammed into Raven's chest, knocking her hand out of Savior's a moment before the jolt threw her backwards, smoking.
"RAVEN!" Savior yelled. He let the Lord go and ran over to his fallen teammate.
Oh god. She's not breathing. That taser must have had enough Amp's to stop her heart…
"Oh boy…"
Savior looked up at the Lord as his arm flew back to him and reattached. He pulled his sword from the ground.
"Forget about her. Worry about ME!" the Lord yelled, and charged.
And as the Lord charged at Savior, kneeling by Raven's dead body, suddenly Savior saw through the eyes that the Lord always looked through, the eyes of a killing rage.
Without a sound, he thrust out his arm, the Shimmer lashing out at a speed he had never been able to muster before, two strands slamming into the katana blade of the Lord and snapping it in half before the main part slammed into the Lord, carrying him backwards and away from the two.
The water tower nearly exploded as the Shimmer rammed the Lord into it and then through it. The Lord's body smashed out the other end and fell through the air, falling off the other end of the building and landing on a car, crushing it with a mighty crash.
The Shimmer withdrew from the tower and twenty feet formed into a blade that slashed through the wood supports of the tower, before the blade re-formed into a battering ram and slammed into the tower.
The Lord's eyes blinked open, as the tower toppled off the roof and down towards him.
"You found it, my boy." The Lord said. "Life's greatest practicality. Survival of the fittest."
And then the tower came crashing down on the Lord, and all was lost in a roar of water and wood.
The rage was gone almost as soon as it arrived, as Savior turned back to Raven.
"No."
Lacing his hands together, Savior placed them on her chest and began performing CPR (his mother had made him take medical courses, thank god). He followed it to the letter, doing five thrusts before pulling back Raven's hood, checking her windpipe, and then giving her the breath of life. Back to the chest, then the breath, over and over.
"Come on Raven. It's not your time yet. Come back to us. Come back to ME." Savior said as he continued the CPR.
The rain had broken, and the clouds were parting as Savior worked frantically over Raven, refusing to stop. She wasn't dead. He refused to let that happen.
The moon came out, shining silver over the roof, as Savior completed another set of thrusts and then went to the breath of life…
And then Raven's eyes snapped opened as she gasped, drawing in air for herself. Savior began pulling himself back up…
Only Raven followed, no longer needing him to breath for her…just needing him, as she pressed her lips to his.
Noel hesitated, and then returned her kiss as he reached down and took the side of her face. She did likewise, and for a few moments it was just them…
Until Raven's eyes, closed in bliss, suddenly snapped open again, and she pushed Noel away.
"No…I can't…" she said.
"Raven…what…did I do something wrong?" Noel said as he got up, even as Raven did as well.
"Oh Noel…I can't…I'm so sorry, but I just can't…" Raven said.
"Raven…" Noel said, reaching out to her.
"Don't touch me!" she snapped, drawing away. Drawing away from Noel like that hurt her far more then anything the Lord had done, but she had to do it.
"Raven…"
"Noel, if you really care…about me…then stay away. Forget me. I can't love you. I can't." Raven said. She pulled her hood back up to hide her face.
"Raven…I don't care about who you are or anything…I'll…I'll…" Noel said.
"No. I'm sorry Noel. Forgive me." Raven said, and then she was gone, vanishing into the shadows at her feet.
Noel was once again left on the roof, and he lowered his arm and head as the moonlight shone on.
The rest of the Titans showed up moments later. Robin and Starfire had been too far away to hear the explosions, but Cyborg had with his enhanced ears, and he had contacted the Titans. But without the com-links that the Lord had destroyed, pinpointing Savior and Raven's location had kept them away until it was too late to do any good. The Titans had found Savior at the destroyed water tower, pulling wreckage away.
"What happened?" Robin asked.
Savior gave them as quick a description as he could as he continued to pull the tower wreckage apart, trying to find the Lord's body. Cyborg, Starfire, and Beast Boy joined in.
It didn't take them long.
But there was nothing to find except a crushed car.
No body.
"What happened to Raven?" Robin asked.
"She had to go somewhere." Savior replied dully.
"Is she hurt?"
In a way no one can help her with, Robin. "Nothing serious."
"Hey!" Beast Boy said, as he sniffed the ground nearby. "I found a blood trail."
The amount of water in the vicinity had washed away the first part of the trail mostly, but it was much clearer later: a huge amount of blood in a line that led to an open sewer.
"He got away?" Starfire said, looking into the open manhole.
"No way. At this rate…" Cyborg said, gesturing to the blood trail. "If he's not already dead he will be very soon. No one could survive losing so much blood."
"So we won then guys?" Beast Boy said, happy that Savior and Raven had dealt with the lunatic that had been stalking the streets.
"Yeah. We won. Hooray." Savior said quietly, and then snapped out a Shimmer strand and swung off.
The Titans let him go.
Though, in the end, only Starfire knew why he left.
Savior swung through the city streets, finally ending up at an arena. He had swung in through an open trapdoor on the roof, made his way through the upper levels, and finally sat down on one of the high light fixtures he had pulled himself up to to avoid security. A roaring crowd thundered below him. Apparently there was a concert about to start.
The band was coming out. Noel didn't really notice them.
"Raven…"
"Please welcome, NICKELBACK!" some announcer was saying. The crowd roared again, but to Noel they sounded like they were a thousand miles away.
Oblivious to the hurting Titan watching them, Nickelback started playing.
(As you might have guessed, this is where Nickelback sang, their song "Someday")
(Nickelback sings)Raven had returned to the Titans when she had composed herself. She had scanned the sewers but sensed no pain. That was good enough for the Titans, and they headed home.
She didn't ask where Noel was.
Noel was watching Nickelback play and thinking of what could have been.
(Nickelback sings)
Raven left her teammates and headed for her room. She was almost to the door when she spotted something that Starfire had missed: Noel's valentine.
(Nickelback sings)
Noel wondered why fate had been so cruel to make him lose his heart for such a woman. Why was love so painful?
(Nickelback sings)
The band went into a guitar solo.
Noel felt like Chad was playing for him.
Back in Titans Tower, Gar and Victor had started yet another video game war, and Starfire had gone off somewhere. Nervously, Robin grabbed the gifts he had gotten and went looking for her.
He found her on the roof, looking at the moon.
"Hey Star…"
"Hello Robin! How nice a night to come out of such a brutal storm!" Starfire said.
"Look…I know this wasn't exactly the best night, running around in the rain while Raven and Noel fought for their lives, but in any case, I just wanted to say…well, Happy Valentine's Day." Robin said, and gave Starfire the card he had ultimately picked out after hours of seaching.
Starfire took it, looking it over. Robin was about to give her another gift, but he didn't get the chance.
"OH TIM!" she squealed, leaping into his arms.
Raven watched from the shadows, sadly, as Starfire leapt into Robin's arms and immediately kissed him. She turned away as he returned it.
If only…
Raven walked to the other end of the Tower, leaving the embracing couple to themselves.
The wind made her cloak flutter as she looked at Noel's valentine, so carefully made and written.
(Nickelback sings)Raven looked at it for a second longer, and then, closing her eyes, she began to tear it up.
She couldn't. Nothing. No reminders, no hints of possibilities, nothing.
She could not love.
This was her cross to bear.
But even as the pieces of the Valentine fluttered out into the night, she couldn't help crying.
(Nickelback sings)
Noel looked sullenly at the band as they rocked, the fans cheered, and Raven filled his mind.
"Someday." He whispered. "I'll find a way, Raven. I'll give you a new destiny."
But until he found that day, Noel didn't know what he was going to do.
Except ache.
(Nickelback finishes up song)
The pieces of the Valentine floated out, drifting all over the city, floating bits of crimson and lace, as the darkness swallowed them bit by bit.
And back on the rooftop, Noel's poem, the paper having been soaked and the ink run, and having dried out, floated up in a slight breeze. It too floated into the shadows.
Which spoke.
"Ah, love. Such a many-splendid thing."
Laughter flowed from the shadows, and then they were silent and empty again.
The darkness never died.
Next: ABERRATION!