2.

Teleka

Other people... There are other people in this place. I can hear them. My senses are still sharp from training under Catwoman... I need a weapon, something to use as a weapon. There was only me in this place... then he came... Speedy, but I got rid of him... And now there are more people. Six, I think, from the footsteps....

"Wait!" I cry suddenly, hardly even realizing. "Something's wrong here." For a second, my vision skews and warps, and I could swear I can see Headquarters, but then I'm back here. This place I don't recognise, with people coming after me. I still need a weapon. A bar... there's a bar lying in the corner, so I drop from the ceiling and lift it, before I jump back up and brace myself in the alcoves again.

"Wrong! No!" Not a bar... Venom's baseball bat... No, it's a bar, a metal bar. I need to find somewhere to think about this. I drop down and pad down the hallway, but all the doors are locked; all except one, so I slide into the room and close the door noiselessly, checking I'm not being followed. I'm still holding the bar, I mean, bat... No, I mean bar!

I turn around, intending to bury myself in a corner to think this through, but scream when I realize I'm not alone. Two people, one tall, one slightly shorter than me, both male. They come out of the shadows a little, and I scream louder when I see their faces. Tom and my father. "No!" I gasp again, telling myself that this can't be real, Tom's dead. But I was Cat-girl an hour ago. He was still alive when I was Cat-Girl. This is some twisted dream, that's all. For a second I freeze, the arm holding the baseball bat goes limp. Wait... baseball bat! I am still at HQ, this can't be real. This train of thought sets off alarm bells in the back of my head. Have I come to this conclusion before?

"Scarecrow!" I shout madly, spinning and rattling the door, pushing as hard as I can. But someone seems to have locked it from the outside.

"Ingrate..." I recognise the voice instantly. It's my father speaking. I don't turn, just keep trying the door. "I kept a roof over your head, put up with you, fed you, clothed you. Is this how you repay me?"

"You sold me to Selina!" I can feel that I'm crying now, but nothing matters except opening the door. "Was she just the highest bidder, or was there some kind of deal to get your freak daughter off your hands?"

"How dare you... After all I ever did for you..."

"You made my life hell! Physically, mentally... I used to dread going home! At least here, I'm accepted! I have friends and I have people who love me!"

"We loved you, sis," Tom says, taking over, but there's something horribly wrong with his voice... something gravely and croaking. Something that hardly sounds like him.

"If you'd love me you wouldn't have tried to repeat my mistakes!" I sob, still frantically pushing at the door. "Did you think you'd get to me by becoming Slade's apprentice? What was it? Wouldn't Catwoman take you?"

"Oh, of course I could never be as good as you. Turn around and see what you did to me!"

"No!" but I feel his hand on my shoulder, uncannily strong, spinning me around, I try to close my eyes but I can't. I knew he'd been crushed under the rubble when the Slade Complex had been decimated... Oh God... I did this. He looks as though he was inflated like a balloon, still bruised and gashed and broken... When I destroyed the complex, did I really do that to Tom? But I remember the baseball bat, the bar, and I remember what I shouted. Not real... not real... is it?

All this confusion is driving me mad. I lift the bat over my head and start swing at them, but it seems to moves straight through their forms. "You're not real! You're not real!" I can hear myself screaming over and over again. I squeeze my eyes shut and keep swinging until I lose my balance and fall backwards into the door. To my surprise, it opens and I fall back into the hall. I scuttle backwards a few paces before I manage to turn over and pull myself to my feet, sprinting off down the hall, getting and deeper and deeper into Headquarters and still not sure where I'm going.

Raven

Both Speedy and I recognise her scream immediately and without a word we both head off in the direction it came from. On past the place where she confronted him earlier, there's a door swinging across the hall. Inside the room, it looks as though Teleka barely moved past the door, but there are signs of a struggle. The door itself is badly dented from the inside, and lamps and furniture to either side of the doorframe are in pieces.

"That's weird," Speedy says in confusion, looking up at me. "There're only two footprints in the carpet. Teleka was alone."

"What could possibly make her react like this?" I reply slowly, picking up the shards of a glass lampshade.

"And what did she do the damage with?"

"The impact required to break this furniture goes beyond her fists. Something heavy, and blunt. We're not talking axe-murderer here."

"No, because this is Telly we're talking about," he replies slowly, like I'm some kind of child. I can already see the problems arising out of this situation.

"Listen, Speedy. I know you care about Teleka, but if she has to be subdued, you can't let that get in the way. This is all for her own good."

He looks at me for a brief moment, before he turns away again. "Let's just find her first. I'm hoping it won't come to that." I could argue back at this stage. I want to. But I understand. I understand why Robin sent me with him instead of after Venom. I'll be able to keep him in check with my powers, whereas if I had gone with Cyborg or Terra, it would have been more difficult. I would've needed to be subdued, and they're both my teammates. So I don't argue. I just follow him silently down the hall, tracing Teleka's claw marks.

Blue Moon

When I feel I'm far enough away from the spiders to stop, I manage to collapse against the wall and start tearing at the crawling, itchy sensation in my skin. Teleka's always shouting at me for biting my nails. I'm glad I don't listen to her now. These ragged edges get rid of that terrible feeling faster, drawing warm, soothing blood from underneath the skin. "Spiders..." I mutter, but just saying the word refreshes the tingling and I scratch the backs of my legs again. But with more blood, pain also sinks in, sheer white-hot pain.

I wince slightly and lean my head back against the wall. I can feel a slight tremor, as though someone's coming down the corridor towards me. For a second I could swear I hear my name being called, but then there's a loud roar, and a long, inhuman shadow on the wall. Ignoring the pain, I get up and run again, knowing I'm leaving droplets of blood behind me, not really caring. There's a door lying open just ahead, and I skid around the doorframe and inside. Our weapons room. I always said this should be moved to Telly's third. They're all hers anyway, but she insists she needs the room for her workshop. Oh God, I'm gabbling, and this place is a godsend... If there is something out there, it couldn't do any harm to nick her staff. Just this once. She'll forgive me... after about a month of grovelling.

That's all I lift, because it's the only one I know how to use. If I took a katana I'd end up decapitating myself. But that's still not the point. I have a knack for drivelling on and on when I'm in Barney like this. I open the door again, take one step out, and immediately run back into the room and close the door. Quicksand... The swamp again, right outside the room. Oh God, that was the hall a minute ago... Sure-fire signs you're going nuts, by me: first off, I'm talking to myself. Secondly, I exit a room and find myself in a presumably spider infested swamp, I know I'm dreaming.

I'm sure I'll come up with more of those before the day's out...

Something's knocking against the door with clicking and gurgling noises... The Spider! The big one! Well that's settled, I'm not opening that. Blue Moon knows when she's done for! I run and hide between a rack of swords, the ones Telly keeps for show, and the case of weapons Venom inherited, but rarely uses. Maybe if I curl up tight enough, and ignore it, it'll go away.

"Yeah, sure Blue. It's never worked in a horror movie yet, what makes you think it's going to work now!" I yell out loud to myself. Almost the moment I close my mouth, the door is bashed in, and two of the long legs start feeling around the room. The clicking and screeching of the spider are still too loud. I can't hear the footsteps... I mean, the legs poking around the room. But I can see the shadow of one, long and spindly, like bare bones. The other one, coming in the other direction, trying to corner me. "No!" I yell back, louder than the creature's cry, able to hear my own voice this time. Without knowing what I'm doing, I shove the rack of swords over into the aisle and bolt out, suddenly remembering what my powers are. Honestly, if start relying any more on these instincts I'll turn into Telly...

Teleka! Venom! Where the hell are they? Are they here in the swamp too? Maybe it's someone with the power to create alternate dimensions or all that crap Rae knows about. They just happened to create a place that's pretty damn terrible for an arachnaphobe like me. That's just my bloody luck, isn't it! So that'll be something to focus on. Finding the other two... Now, what way leads back to where I woke up? I'll be able to find their thirds from there.

So I start to pick my way through the swamp, and seconds later I feel it. Something on the outside of my boots, crawling... sliding down inside, crawling up my legs... I look down and they're on my veils and everything. Tiny black spiders, all over me. Billions of them. Too many... Too many...

"Nonononononononono...." I murmur, over and over and over again, frozen in the one place while they just keep coming. Then that same hissing and clicking noise behind me. Like a slightly smaller version of the monster spider, there's this eight-limbed, utterly petrifying, hairy, black... thing, coming towards me. And I bolt again, shedding the spiders as I go in any and every direction to get away.

Starfire
I do not fully understand this Scarecrow creature Robin speaks of. I thought a scarecrow was a jovial rag doll the farmers of this planet place in field to prevent the crows from eating their crops, hence their name. But it seems this Scarecrow is very much alive. However, I do not believe that is the point of this exercise. Blue Moon seems terribly afraid of something that we cannot see.
Robin, who narrowly avoided the sword that fell from the rack Blue Moon knocked over, tells me to stay behind him as he tries to approach again. I try not to giggle as I realize it must look like one person with eight limbs. But Blue Moon spins towards us and freezes. Robin stops and take aim with the dart gun, which he assured me cannot hurt her for more than an instant, but she runs away again. Although, I too would run away if I saw my friend pointing such a mean-looking device in my direction.
"She is gone..." I sigh, disappointed. "Were we wrong to try and help one who flies so swiftly?"
"No. We'll catch up to her. We can't let her stay under the gases for too much longer."
"And this... Scarecrow, you are certain it is not the kind employed by farmers to scare the crows?"
"I'm certain. It just has the same name."
"Oh I see! Similar to you and the little bird we found at Christmas?"
"Uh... something like that Starfire. Yeah."
"And... Blue Moon is not the same as the figure of speech Beast Boy explained to me? She does not symbolise a rare event? They merely share the same name, correct?"
"You're getting better at this Earth thing, Starfire." He looks up at me with a smile and I feel the heat in my face that means I am 'blushing', I believe. Raven had to explain that concept to me. I look away quickly, feeling 'embarrassed.'
"We must find Blue Moon..." I say quickly, walking down the corridor in the last direction I saw Blue Moon run in. "I believe this was her direction. Back the way she came..."
"Back to the source of the gas. I wonder if Beast Boy has found anything yet."
"No such luck dude!" I jump and fire a bolt at the source of the voice in surprise, before I realize it's only Beast Boy, hanging from a vent in the ceiling.
"Oh Beast Boy, you are unharmed? I am sorry!" He looks a little dazed and singed, but he is quickly well again.
"Star! Jumpy much! I just thought I'd drop in and tell you I haven't found anything yet, since you were wondering. But you should hear some of the screams... They really carry! Do you know how complex ventilation systems are? But it stinks. I'm telling you, dude, I always pull the short straw! It's unfair! I mean how am I supposed to-?" Robin reaches up and closes the cover on the vent and begins to the walk down the hallway. "Dude! That's cold!"
Venom
Just keep walking... Just keep walking... Don't think about it... Don't look back... There's nothing to see... They were never there... They're not there now. In fact, they're probably looking for me, wondering where I am. At least if I bump into them I know they're not dead. And that I didn't... Oh God, I'm gonna be sick! No! Don't think about it. It wasn't real...
That's all that runs through my head. The same train of thought going round and round. I'll drive myself insane if I'm not careful. For all I know I'm already insane... No, there has to be a reasonable explanation. There is always a reasonable explanation. I need to think this through, and then the answer will be obvious, just like always. I'm the calm one. Teleka's the impulsive one. Blue's the mad one. But I'm the calm one. I'm supposed to be calm, and levelheaded and laid-back and always be able to explain it. If I meet one of the girls, I'm going to have a nice, sensible explanation before Telly kills something and Blue goes insane. And I'll calm them down, without going on and on like this.
The door of my room's open, sunlight from inside spilling into the hall. It looks kind of inviting so I decide that might be a good place to stop instead of taking a chance and going back to the living room. I step inside and collapse on the window seat in the warm sunlight, starting to feel a little better as I organize the facts and try to sort this out.
"How could you?" A cold voice comes softly out of the shadows on the other side of the room. I can't see who it is, but the voice sounds familiar. Dangerous, but familiar...
"Who's there?" I manage warily, afraid in case the same thing should happen as before, ending with me, as before, terrified.

"Oh, check it out, he's going for the insanity plea now, Tel."

"Blue? Teleka? Is that you? Are you okay?" I ask. At least they're speaking normally now, not screaming like earlier. Something shuffles in the darkness, and a pair of green eyes, shining with tears come into the light as Teleka looks up.

"We are. But you asked the wrong girls," she rasps, glaring at me like an enemy. Before, her eyes were glazed and glassy, as though she were looking through me, or at something inside her eyes as she so often did. Now though, they were fiery, burning into me, already making me feel guilty when I wasn't sure what I'd done.

"What is it? What happened?"

"Don't pull that crap, mate. You know full well what happened," Blue chimes in, still in the darkness. "You did."

Teleka growls like a feral animal and bounds over the bed. "Why? Why hurt her? Why do this? She'll never get over this. Never! And neither will you, if I have anything to do with it! I hope it haunts you. And when you sleep, I hope you wake screaming about it, and when you die, I hope you go to hell for it! But above all, I hope you die in pain! And I hope I'm the one to do it!" she shouts, pinning me back against the window with a katana poised and ready to cut my throat.

"What have I done?!" I shout back, trying to push her off.

"Better get off Telly. You'll probably be next!" I hear Blue Moon shout, just as dangerous and angry. I'm afraid now. No, scratch that. I'm petrified. I try to look Teleka in the eye, force her to tell me, but it burns like a physical pain. I look away from her.

"No. Don't do that. Don't turn. Don't look the other way. Come and see your work," Teleka growls, softer now, but even more lethal. She swings the sword, just missing my throat but cutting away the curtain, allowing more light into the room, illuminating Blue Moon and someone else, lying limp against her. And suddenly I don't want to take another step in that direction. In fact, the third floor window feels like a better option, but Teleka's having none of it. She hangs on to the window frame, dangling above me with those burning eyes. I see her let go and jump out of the way as she falls. "Show him, Blue. If she's up to it." She stays behind me, crouched like a huntress, herding me to that patch of light, where Blue Moon moves slightly to give me a better view. Raven. She's quivering, paler than ever, clinging to Blue like a scared child.

"No, please Blue. Don't let him..." she murmurs, clutching tighter at the veils. I've never heard that voice. Timid and scared, five octaves above her normal tone. What have I done...?

"It's okay, Rae. He's not going to touch you, love. It's okay. We just want to let him see what he's done," Blue Moon replies softly, stroking her hair like a worried mother. "Just close your eyes, mate. You don't even have to look at him. Just turn over..."

Slowly... weakly, Raven rolls over with Blue's help, and I can feel even Teleka soften where she still stands behind me, tears dousing the fire in her eyes. I can barely force myself to look, but Teleka, ever helpful, keeps my eyes open with her powers. Three deep gashes, stitched and bandaged, lie across Raven's throat. More across her stomach... Her cloak lies in a pile in the corner, and her sleeves are ripped, even her legs are bruised and bandaged have deep gouges in them. I can see tears seep from between her eyelids, down her bruised, red cheeks. "Enough, Blue, enough..." she whispers again, turning back to her for comfort, reaching out to grab on to the front of her robes and finding herself in a tight warm hug.

"No... n-no... I couldn't have, that wasn't me, and I can't believe it. It's not real, like the bodies in the living room, they weren't real, and this isn't real. It's not! I know it's not!"

"Believe it." Teleka says, whispering from right beside my ear. "Corridor. Now. I don't want her to hear this. She's been through enough." I follow her out the doorway, unable to look back to where Raven is now sobbing against Blue, who's glare I can feel on my back as I walk out.

Teleka's waiting behind the door, slamming it with the end of her sword as soon as I enter the hallway. She jumps down from the table she's balanced on, pinning me to the ground, forcing me to meet her eyes and the tip of the katana. All she has to do now is force it down, and I'm dead.

"Teleka, I'm serious, I don't remember doing anything."

"She remembers what you did," she whispers, somehow scarier now than when she was screaming at me.

"What did I do, Teleka? Please! Just tell me..." I beg. A hard scowl twists her face and she drops the sword to the ground with a clatter and leans over, growling in my ear.

"Those wounds... You made them... Can't you remember why?"

"No! Just tell me!"

"Because she wouldn't let you rape her..." she says slowly... softy... in utter calm, drawing back to fix me with that glare again.

"No." It's more of a statement than an exclamation this time. I know I wouldn't do that. But Teleka simply nods, satisfied that her work is done.

"Believe it," she tells me again, her voice still the snarl, the deep rumble in her throat like a panther, but now she sounds more sad than angry. She lifts her sword and walks back into the room, leaving me lying there.

"No," I say again, hiding my face in my hands. I'd never do that to Raven... But what if I did? Why would they lie about something like that? Could it have been me? If I could go insane enough to see Teleka and Blue as screaming corpses in the living room, could I be insane enough to r-... God, I can't even say it... No! I can't, I didn't! I know I didn't!

Suddenly the whole world twists into a thick mist, sliding sideways, forcing me to open my eyes to shake off the dizziness. But the door of my room is open, the same shaft of light that invited me in falling over my face. There are no sobs inside the room. The drapes aren't slashed and there's noone in the shadows... It's official. I'm crazy. There is no reasonable explanation. For the first time in my life, I can't explain it all away, blind the situation with logic, or ignore it.

Terra

Cyborg and I don't have much to go on, except the odd spot of poison on the ground. I haven't known Venom as long as the others. He's quiet, and mysterious, but he's always calm. It's only when he's angry, or fighting, that the toxin would escape him. He must be in a hell of a state. Cyborg's passed on everything he knows about the Scarecrow, an ex-psychiatrist turned sociopath named Jonathan Crane who used his knowledge of the human psyche and a kind of 'fear gas' to make the victims worst fears seem real. We've been discussing that as we follow the trail. Teleka's will be her history and Blue Moon suffers arachnophobia, but Venom has never revealed anything that might constitute fear. He's the calm one when everyone else is afraid. That seems to be his position on the team...

"No." A tiny cry further down the hall, grabs our attention. Cyborg and I share a glance before running off in that direction. Venom, standing from the floor, walks into his room, looking ahead as though checking for something. He walks to the window and pulls at the curtain to one side of the window, running his hand over the surface across the top. It almost looks like he's checking for a seam or a tear, before he jumps down from the window seat and walks to the side of the bed that's in shadow, reaching into the darkness as though he expects to hit something, but there's nothing. "Thank God..." he whispers. "I'd rather be insane than have really done that..."

Cyborg has his dart gun locked on him, but Venom looks up and spots us. "Cy, Terra! Where's Raven? Is she okay?"

"Uh... last time I checked..." I reply, slightly confused by his question. Cy fires the shot to put him asleep. Venom looks at the dart in his shoulder for a second and pulls it out.

"Y-you... You're part of it! You're not real! You're in my head... Why shoot me? No!" he says, all in one breath, his eyes widening. He pushes past and takes off down the corridor and downstairs. I turn to Cy, not sure what to think. He only shrugs, just as puzzled as I am.

"Why isn't he asleep, Cy?" I ask simply.

"Best I can figure is that he's immune to toxins. As his blood's full of it, it kind of makes sense that his body would be used to it." He shrugs and I nod in reply.

"Uh-huh. And plan B is?"

"Uh..."

"Is there a plan B?"

"Uh... no."

"Oh... okay then... We need one."

"Yeah, I kinda figured... I think we should try and knock him out the old-fashioned way," he says after a minute, the end of his cannon arm folding out.

"Wasn't the whole point of this not to hurt the Triquetra? In case they hurt us, because the Scarecrow has driven them mad. You do remember that, don't you?"

"You have a better plan B?" he asks sheepishly. I walk into the room to our left and lift a guitar from just inside the door. It's strange I never knew Venom played. But I can only hope he forgive me if something happens to this. So I hold it up like and offensive weapon and walk back to Cy.

"And on with plan B!"