Megan Fraud could not help but resonate the stereotypical evil laugh
that the stereotypical villain always learned to master. She walked up
the steps to her house, having already reverted back to her normal,
teen girl self. Anyone looking at her would have though that the
backpack she wore contained school books or some such teenage thing,
not diamonds and fancy watches and wads upon wads of dollar bills.
What she had collected would more than pay for that new car she'd been
wanting to get . . .
Why had she impersonated Robin when robbing a bank? It was all part of
her plan, which really wasn't that spectacular at all. There's a
certain line of thought that says the best way to keep from being
stopped is to stop whoever it is that would stop you. Not the police,
they were all bumbling imbeciles, the Teen Titans. Almost every week,
the headlines blared how Robin had heroically defused a hostage
situation or Cyborg had managed to stop a train before it ran over a
defenseless little girl. Even Starfire rescued the occasional kitten
stuck in a tree and Beast had done his share of stopping the bad guys
as well. Even with her shape-shifting abilities, Megan harbored no
illusions that the city's own group of teenaged superheroes wouldn't
at least try to get in the way when she, say, tried to rob a bank.
So she'd set their leader up for a crime that she'd committed,
reasoning that the Titans would be too busy trying to keep their own
leader out of the slammer to worry about her.
She took out her key and opened the door, closing it shut behind her.
By now, she figured, the bank holdup would be all over the news. She
turned on her television and plopped onto the couch, propping her feet
up on a nearby chair. It was no hard thing to find a news station and
when she did, her wish was granted. A middle aged female reporter
wearing way too much poorly-applied makeup was talking on a popular
news show about all the actions that were going to be taken to bring
Robin to justice.
Megan chuckled as the woman blabbed about how Robin's superhero status
didn't make him exempt from the law and all that. She imagined the
Teen Titans were having a fit right about now.
"Well Teen Titans," she said, "you ain't seen nothing yet."
***
Cyborg pushed the eject button, popping out the tape. It now had three
hours worth of coverage from the hottest new media craze, the Robin
Robberies, as they were now dubbed. Cyborg could already see the
headlines that would grace then tops of every major newspaper outlet.
BOY WONDER WANDERS ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE LAW. Or maybe TEEN TITAN
TURNS TO THEFT!
Hopefully, what Cyborg had managed to record would be of some help,
but he wasn't done. Cyborg had no doubt that there was still some
footage from the crime scene that hadn't been released to the media.
So he grabbed his laptop, plugged it into his arm which happened to
contain a wireless modem, and logged on to the World Wide Web. Given
his intimate knowledge of all things computerized, it was no hard task
to hack into the US bank's most heavily guarded files. He hoped that
they computerized all of the video and audio footage from their
surveillance cameras, otherwise, the effort it had taken to get in
would have been wasted.
Pay dirt. A few more seconds of typing and the Teen Titan had access
to any video file he wanted. He clicked the one that seemed to be the
most relevant and opened it up. A screen appeared on the left hand
side of the computer and he made a few adjustments to augment the
size. Thankfully, the graphics and media systems on his computer were
state of the state of the art. The clips played flawlessly.
It showed Robin walking in, and then a few seconds later pulling out a
handgun, he couldn't make out the model. Several muzzle flashes
indicated that Robin had fired into the air, and then he proceeded to
collect everyone's valuables as well as a great sum of money from the
bank's safe.
Anyone who wasn't extraordinarily close to Robin would be fooled.
Cyborg wasn't though, since whoever was masquerading as his friend
hadn't done it perfectly. The walk was all wrong, and Robin had never
spoken with a British accent. This pretender also had a wraparound
mask, which seemed to be tied around his head. Robin's mask on the
other hand had a natural adherence to the skin, so it didn't need
anything else to keep it attached to his head. Other than those
things, the impersonator's performance was flawless.
Cyborg downloaded the second clip, but all that had was Robin
apparently taunting the poor customers and workers and then tossing a
bomb at one of the walls, gouging an ugly hole in it which he used as
his convenient exit. Emergency workers and policemen filled the scene
with a couple of minutes, and then the clip ended.
Cyborg saved the vid clips onto his computer, and then shut it down.
Robin, having been personally trained by the world's greatest
detective, would be able to get some more information from what Cyborg
had collected.
Raven and Beast Boy meanwhile sat in a large, dark room with one
entire wall that was entirely made of television monitors, hologram
projectors, and a console to control it all. Raven was absorbed in
perpetually checking on all of the screens to make sure that no one
was coming. Not that it wouldn't happen, the news stations had pretty
much said that Robin would be hunted down at all costs, it was only a
matter of time.
Beast Boy gave her a sideways glance. "See anything yet?"
"Not yet." Raven hadn't bothered to look up. "But-"
Whatever shed been about to say was cut off by the blaring of alarms.
Someone had breached the islands security perimeters. Both Titans'
heads swiveled towards the wall of monitors. It wasn't hard to see who
had set off the alarm. About a dozen black helicopters were rapidly
approaching, all bore government markings, and all looked quite
unfriendly. On the water, even more motorboats of various sizes sped
toward the island.
"Aw crap," Beast Boy muttered. "They're here.
The Teen Titans comm. system crackled suddenly. They were being
contacted.
"Attention Teen Titans," said a raspy voice on the other end. It was
so loud that Cyborg heard it, causing him to come running into the
room. "Robin is wanted by the government for high felony and vandalism
(I have no idea how the legal system works, so I just came up with
these charges off the top of my head). We have a warrant to search the
Island and the premises for him. Any attempts to interfere or hamper
our search in any way will be dealt with harshly and immediately."
"Tell them he's not here," Cyborg urged.
Raven shook her head. "No, we'll let them comb every inch of the
place, it'll keep them busy and buy us a lot of time to warn Robin and
figure out how to hide him until we can get this whole mess figured
out."
The implications were not lost on any of them. They were about to
break the law, several laws, and they were supposed to be the good
guys.
The government helicopter and watercraft squads neared ever close.
***
Starfire and Robin landed on the barren rooftop of an antiques store
that was just across the street from the bank. It had been hard to fly
in without attracting any attention, but under Robin's guidance,
Starfire had managed it. The scene below was a beehive of activity.
Crime scene taped cordoned off the area, while people were being
interviewed by the dozens, both by police and the media.
"Oh my," Starfire said, peeking out from behind Robin's shoulder. "I
would not have thought that it would be such a big deal to people if
you robbed one of these bank places. I mean, of course it would be
rather odd, and quite wrong, but the amount of coverage that a small
town bank robbery like this is getting . . .I don't understand. "
"Me neither Star, but one thing you have to learn about earth is that
the human media tends to over-sensationalize things, and it doesn't
help when you're a semi-celebrity superhero."
"Well what shall we do now?" Starfire asked.
"We watch. Wait a bit, and then when things have cooled down we check
out the scene for ourselves."
Robin's communicator made a beeping noise and he pulled it out of his
pocket. "Hey."
"Raven here. The authorities are practically on our front
doorstep.They want you pretty bad. And that's not all, news just came
in that an elderly woman at the scene died from heart failure just
moments ago. Cause of death: traumatization from being hit by a shard
from the wall that your evil twin blew up. She got knocked right out
of her wheelchair and even though they rushed her to the ER, she
didn't make it."
A cold sweat broke out on Robin's forehead. Starfire put a comforting
hand on his shoulder, unable to say anything. The situation had been
bad enough before without the added complication of a death.
"Robin, are you there?" The voice on the other end asked.
"Um, yeah. Listen, you didn't tell them that I-"
"Wasn't there? No, you can give us a little more credit than that."
"Good. Don't tell them anything, lie or otherwise. Don't say a thing,
and definitely don't start a conflict."
"Gotcha."
Robin could now hear sirens in the background, as well as the roar of
motorboats and the THWOP THWOP THWOP of helicopters. He turned the
communicator off.
"This is not good," Starfire said mournfully. She and Robin sat down
on a neardy upraised ledge, an advantageous spot since it made them
virtually undetectable. Star turned to Robin. "How will we pass the
time?" It would be quite a few hours before it was dark enough or the
bank deserted enough for the two teen superheroes to get any real work
done.
Robin let his head fall back against the brick wall behind him "I
dunno Star, do you know any jokes?"
"Well, I do have one about three Malfarians who wandered into space
time continuum without regulation antigrav shielding units."
Robin chuckled. "Never mind. I have a few."
"Ooh, do share"
"OK, A lady and her baby get on a bus. The bus driver looks at the
lady, and then her baby, and then screams, "AHHHH! That's the ugliest
child I've ever seen in my life!" The lady then, totally disgusted,
marches up to the back of the bus to sit down. As she was sitting
there absolutely furious, a man asks, "Are you ok, dear?" The lady
replies, "I'm so angry, that bus driver just insulted me." The man
says, "You go back up there and give that bus driver a piece of your
mind, and I'll watch your monkey." "
Starfire howled with laughter, partly because it was a funny joke on
its own merit, and partly because of the humorous inflections that
Robin had given to the voices of the bus driver, the lady, and the
other man in his joke.
"That," she managed between guffaws, "was the most humorous tale I
have ever heard."
"Um, I don't think it was that good."
"Do you have any more?"
Robin smiled. "Well, there's the one about the boy who writes to
Santa."
And so they spent the better part of four hours telling each other
jokes and stories, partly to relieve some of the tension that had
arisen because of the recent events. Below on the streets, the ruckus
was settling down. Bit by bit.
"Who do you think is impersonating you?" Starfire finally asked,
shifting her leg to ease a cramp that had suddenly come up.
"We haven't run across any baddies who have those kind of abilities.
Maybe Gizmo, but its not his style. I think the real question is why.
And I don't have an answer to either one." The Boy Wonder paused for a
moment. "Look, they're leaving."
Starfire peeked over the edge. Sure enough, all the media vans were
leaving. It was almost hard to make them out, given how dark it had
become. Some of the police also seemed to be packing up.
Robin's mouth quirked up into a half-smile. "OK Star, fly me down. The
rooftop should be good since the bank has a skylight. I'll take it
from there."
"I understand." Starfire hopped to her feet and wrapped her arms
around Robin's waist, making sure she had a good hold on him, and then
lifting off.
***
I hope you're right about this," Cyborg said, referring to Raven's
insisting that they not put up any resistance. The police forces had
just reached the island, and the boats were unloading a seemingly
endless line of armored troopers. It looked like they were about to
start a war or something
"So do I." Raven drew her cloak around herself and put her hood over
her head.
Beast Boy was bus checking all the different screens. "They're
surrounding our HQ," he reported. Apparently, these boats were the
latest in government technology, because after they unloaded their
passengers, they seemed to morph, with huge , monster wheels popping
out of the side among other changes. They were now something between a
tank and a Monster Truck, with all the lethality and menace of the
first and all of the appearance and attitude of the latter.
All of the sudden, a loud crash broke the tense silence. It was coming
from downstairs, and all three Titans whirled around. Raven's eyes
narrowed into slits. "They're here."
"Well," said Cyborg, "lets go greet our guests."
that the stereotypical villain always learned to master. She walked up
the steps to her house, having already reverted back to her normal,
teen girl self. Anyone looking at her would have though that the
backpack she wore contained school books or some such teenage thing,
not diamonds and fancy watches and wads upon wads of dollar bills.
What she had collected would more than pay for that new car she'd been
wanting to get . . .
Why had she impersonated Robin when robbing a bank? It was all part of
her plan, which really wasn't that spectacular at all. There's a
certain line of thought that says the best way to keep from being
stopped is to stop whoever it is that would stop you. Not the police,
they were all bumbling imbeciles, the Teen Titans. Almost every week,
the headlines blared how Robin had heroically defused a hostage
situation or Cyborg had managed to stop a train before it ran over a
defenseless little girl. Even Starfire rescued the occasional kitten
stuck in a tree and Beast had done his share of stopping the bad guys
as well. Even with her shape-shifting abilities, Megan harbored no
illusions that the city's own group of teenaged superheroes wouldn't
at least try to get in the way when she, say, tried to rob a bank.
So she'd set their leader up for a crime that she'd committed,
reasoning that the Titans would be too busy trying to keep their own
leader out of the slammer to worry about her.
She took out her key and opened the door, closing it shut behind her.
By now, she figured, the bank holdup would be all over the news. She
turned on her television and plopped onto the couch, propping her feet
up on a nearby chair. It was no hard thing to find a news station and
when she did, her wish was granted. A middle aged female reporter
wearing way too much poorly-applied makeup was talking on a popular
news show about all the actions that were going to be taken to bring
Robin to justice.
Megan chuckled as the woman blabbed about how Robin's superhero status
didn't make him exempt from the law and all that. She imagined the
Teen Titans were having a fit right about now.
"Well Teen Titans," she said, "you ain't seen nothing yet."
***
Cyborg pushed the eject button, popping out the tape. It now had three
hours worth of coverage from the hottest new media craze, the Robin
Robberies, as they were now dubbed. Cyborg could already see the
headlines that would grace then tops of every major newspaper outlet.
BOY WONDER WANDERS ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE LAW. Or maybe TEEN TITAN
TURNS TO THEFT!
Hopefully, what Cyborg had managed to record would be of some help,
but he wasn't done. Cyborg had no doubt that there was still some
footage from the crime scene that hadn't been released to the media.
So he grabbed his laptop, plugged it into his arm which happened to
contain a wireless modem, and logged on to the World Wide Web. Given
his intimate knowledge of all things computerized, it was no hard task
to hack into the US bank's most heavily guarded files. He hoped that
they computerized all of the video and audio footage from their
surveillance cameras, otherwise, the effort it had taken to get in
would have been wasted.
Pay dirt. A few more seconds of typing and the Teen Titan had access
to any video file he wanted. He clicked the one that seemed to be the
most relevant and opened it up. A screen appeared on the left hand
side of the computer and he made a few adjustments to augment the
size. Thankfully, the graphics and media systems on his computer were
state of the state of the art. The clips played flawlessly.
It showed Robin walking in, and then a few seconds later pulling out a
handgun, he couldn't make out the model. Several muzzle flashes
indicated that Robin had fired into the air, and then he proceeded to
collect everyone's valuables as well as a great sum of money from the
bank's safe.
Anyone who wasn't extraordinarily close to Robin would be fooled.
Cyborg wasn't though, since whoever was masquerading as his friend
hadn't done it perfectly. The walk was all wrong, and Robin had never
spoken with a British accent. This pretender also had a wraparound
mask, which seemed to be tied around his head. Robin's mask on the
other hand had a natural adherence to the skin, so it didn't need
anything else to keep it attached to his head. Other than those
things, the impersonator's performance was flawless.
Cyborg downloaded the second clip, but all that had was Robin
apparently taunting the poor customers and workers and then tossing a
bomb at one of the walls, gouging an ugly hole in it which he used as
his convenient exit. Emergency workers and policemen filled the scene
with a couple of minutes, and then the clip ended.
Cyborg saved the vid clips onto his computer, and then shut it down.
Robin, having been personally trained by the world's greatest
detective, would be able to get some more information from what Cyborg
had collected.
Raven and Beast Boy meanwhile sat in a large, dark room with one
entire wall that was entirely made of television monitors, hologram
projectors, and a console to control it all. Raven was absorbed in
perpetually checking on all of the screens to make sure that no one
was coming. Not that it wouldn't happen, the news stations had pretty
much said that Robin would be hunted down at all costs, it was only a
matter of time.
Beast Boy gave her a sideways glance. "See anything yet?"
"Not yet." Raven hadn't bothered to look up. "But-"
Whatever shed been about to say was cut off by the blaring of alarms.
Someone had breached the islands security perimeters. Both Titans'
heads swiveled towards the wall of monitors. It wasn't hard to see who
had set off the alarm. About a dozen black helicopters were rapidly
approaching, all bore government markings, and all looked quite
unfriendly. On the water, even more motorboats of various sizes sped
toward the island.
"Aw crap," Beast Boy muttered. "They're here.
The Teen Titans comm. system crackled suddenly. They were being
contacted.
"Attention Teen Titans," said a raspy voice on the other end. It was
so loud that Cyborg heard it, causing him to come running into the
room. "Robin is wanted by the government for high felony and vandalism
(I have no idea how the legal system works, so I just came up with
these charges off the top of my head). We have a warrant to search the
Island and the premises for him. Any attempts to interfere or hamper
our search in any way will be dealt with harshly and immediately."
"Tell them he's not here," Cyborg urged.
Raven shook her head. "No, we'll let them comb every inch of the
place, it'll keep them busy and buy us a lot of time to warn Robin and
figure out how to hide him until we can get this whole mess figured
out."
The implications were not lost on any of them. They were about to
break the law, several laws, and they were supposed to be the good
guys.
The government helicopter and watercraft squads neared ever close.
***
Starfire and Robin landed on the barren rooftop of an antiques store
that was just across the street from the bank. It had been hard to fly
in without attracting any attention, but under Robin's guidance,
Starfire had managed it. The scene below was a beehive of activity.
Crime scene taped cordoned off the area, while people were being
interviewed by the dozens, both by police and the media.
"Oh my," Starfire said, peeking out from behind Robin's shoulder. "I
would not have thought that it would be such a big deal to people if
you robbed one of these bank places. I mean, of course it would be
rather odd, and quite wrong, but the amount of coverage that a small
town bank robbery like this is getting . . .I don't understand. "
"Me neither Star, but one thing you have to learn about earth is that
the human media tends to over-sensationalize things, and it doesn't
help when you're a semi-celebrity superhero."
"Well what shall we do now?" Starfire asked.
"We watch. Wait a bit, and then when things have cooled down we check
out the scene for ourselves."
Robin's communicator made a beeping noise and he pulled it out of his
pocket. "Hey."
"Raven here. The authorities are practically on our front
doorstep.They want you pretty bad. And that's not all, news just came
in that an elderly woman at the scene died from heart failure just
moments ago. Cause of death: traumatization from being hit by a shard
from the wall that your evil twin blew up. She got knocked right out
of her wheelchair and even though they rushed her to the ER, she
didn't make it."
A cold sweat broke out on Robin's forehead. Starfire put a comforting
hand on his shoulder, unable to say anything. The situation had been
bad enough before without the added complication of a death.
"Robin, are you there?" The voice on the other end asked.
"Um, yeah. Listen, you didn't tell them that I-"
"Wasn't there? No, you can give us a little more credit than that."
"Good. Don't tell them anything, lie or otherwise. Don't say a thing,
and definitely don't start a conflict."
"Gotcha."
Robin could now hear sirens in the background, as well as the roar of
motorboats and the THWOP THWOP THWOP of helicopters. He turned the
communicator off.
"This is not good," Starfire said mournfully. She and Robin sat down
on a neardy upraised ledge, an advantageous spot since it made them
virtually undetectable. Star turned to Robin. "How will we pass the
time?" It would be quite a few hours before it was dark enough or the
bank deserted enough for the two teen superheroes to get any real work
done.
Robin let his head fall back against the brick wall behind him "I
dunno Star, do you know any jokes?"
"Well, I do have one about three Malfarians who wandered into space
time continuum without regulation antigrav shielding units."
Robin chuckled. "Never mind. I have a few."
"Ooh, do share"
"OK, A lady and her baby get on a bus. The bus driver looks at the
lady, and then her baby, and then screams, "AHHHH! That's the ugliest
child I've ever seen in my life!" The lady then, totally disgusted,
marches up to the back of the bus to sit down. As she was sitting
there absolutely furious, a man asks, "Are you ok, dear?" The lady
replies, "I'm so angry, that bus driver just insulted me." The man
says, "You go back up there and give that bus driver a piece of your
mind, and I'll watch your monkey." "
Starfire howled with laughter, partly because it was a funny joke on
its own merit, and partly because of the humorous inflections that
Robin had given to the voices of the bus driver, the lady, and the
other man in his joke.
"That," she managed between guffaws, "was the most humorous tale I
have ever heard."
"Um, I don't think it was that good."
"Do you have any more?"
Robin smiled. "Well, there's the one about the boy who writes to
Santa."
And so they spent the better part of four hours telling each other
jokes and stories, partly to relieve some of the tension that had
arisen because of the recent events. Below on the streets, the ruckus
was settling down. Bit by bit.
"Who do you think is impersonating you?" Starfire finally asked,
shifting her leg to ease a cramp that had suddenly come up.
"We haven't run across any baddies who have those kind of abilities.
Maybe Gizmo, but its not his style. I think the real question is why.
And I don't have an answer to either one." The Boy Wonder paused for a
moment. "Look, they're leaving."
Starfire peeked over the edge. Sure enough, all the media vans were
leaving. It was almost hard to make them out, given how dark it had
become. Some of the police also seemed to be packing up.
Robin's mouth quirked up into a half-smile. "OK Star, fly me down. The
rooftop should be good since the bank has a skylight. I'll take it
from there."
"I understand." Starfire hopped to her feet and wrapped her arms
around Robin's waist, making sure she had a good hold on him, and then
lifting off.
***
I hope you're right about this," Cyborg said, referring to Raven's
insisting that they not put up any resistance. The police forces had
just reached the island, and the boats were unloading a seemingly
endless line of armored troopers. It looked like they were about to
start a war or something
"So do I." Raven drew her cloak around herself and put her hood over
her head.
Beast Boy was bus checking all the different screens. "They're
surrounding our HQ," he reported. Apparently, these boats were the
latest in government technology, because after they unloaded their
passengers, they seemed to morph, with huge , monster wheels popping
out of the side among other changes. They were now something between a
tank and a Monster Truck, with all the lethality and menace of the
first and all of the appearance and attitude of the latter.
All of the sudden, a loud crash broke the tense silence. It was coming
from downstairs, and all three Titans whirled around. Raven's eyes
narrowed into slits. "They're here."
"Well," said Cyborg, "lets go greet our guests."