Flashing Lights and Sounds
By Jedi-And
Disclaimer: I do not own TT, nor do I own Mr. Noel Collins or Robert Candide, but I DO own some of my own characters.
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Chapter 10: 09:45 am
Or
I Have The Strangest Case of Déjà vu And I Must Say I Have The Strangest Case of Déjà vu....
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"Alright Star, just say Ahh."
Nigel, now officially a member of the Teen Titans, checked over the ever growing Starfire in the medical bay. It had been a month since the hazing and the day were they fought Mortimer. Again. Nigel had to be called to the scene in the end, as the Titan s were again lacking a gas tanker, and after all his blood seemed to be highly flammable, with little or rather no explanation on why it acted like napalm.
Could have been worse. They may have to fight legal proceedings with the Physics Police again over the use of a fire extinguisher to start a fire.
But in the end, his blood was used all the same, and it won the battle, with some rather intriguing questions as well as their leader's failed attempt to restrain his movement in case Nigel spontaneously combusted. After this, Robin trusted him with his 'delicate' girlfriend even less. But to be fair, Tim never really gave him a chance, despite his good points.
Kory, on the other hand, felt a lot more comfortable going to see Nigel than a human doctor, because the one time Robin forced her to go to the doctor the Titans used to go see, people gawked at her all the way there and when she got into the doctor's office every journalist was waiting by the window and door to try and find out the latest. Even the doctor wasn't private about it, because he phoned all his colleagues to boast and to get advice. I suppose we can't blame him, how often did he get to examine a human/alien hybrid?
But he went too far, as after he finished he started to talk to the press. Luckily though, Savior and Raven were in the area, and they had destroyed all the evidence of her ever being there, like cameras and note pads. Though it still ended up in the paper some how. The mass media. Gotta love 'em. At least, I suppose, it was a good thing they found the information leak so Robin doesn't have to watch Nigel to make sure that he isn't using the phone if you catch my drift.
And so, for privacy's sake, Robin allowed Star to be examined by the 'glorified field medic' as he called Nigel, as long as he was present and that the doctor didn't try anything on her that might be dangerous, which was a ludicrous idea to start with, but then again, this was Robin after all. Let's not forget his Slade fugues.
"Starfire, you and your unborn are both healthy." Nigel said, as he smiled lightly and looked over her shoulder. "Strange."
"What is wrong?" She asked, starting to get a little worried all over again.
"It's nothing, but Robin has left. He usually doesn't trust me enough to leave me alone in the same room as you." Nigel said. He placed down the small torch like object and took up what seemed to be some glasses with screens in them to get a close up view of everything he was looking at to aid his diagnostic. Starfire sighed a little.
"I will try and talk with him again, but he does not understand that you can be trusted for some reason." Starfire stood up slowly from were she was sitting and brushed herself and her stomach off. Although only half way through pregnancy, the changes were still visible. She was in around month four or five and it was harder to hide as she had a bump now, which was quite in evidence, and she had started to change her eating habits even more and was eating mountains worth of food, which really put a dent in the Titans savings, line of credit from Batman or no, and also she would cry at almost anything sad. Teenage pregnancies are holiday homes for excessive emotions and hormone boosts that would kill a cow.
Unfortunately, when you are part of a group of over-emotional teens, you don't notice anything out of the ordinary until it's too late. This is even more so when they have powers linked with their emotions. Once a certain someone said Starfire was putting on a little weight under the chin and she blasted him through a wall. Beast Boy has left intensive care now and is avoiding the pregnant Tamaranean like the bubonic plague. Gauntlet has also decided to steer clear of her, along with Cyborg, who might accidentally put his foot in it and get blasted through the window and land somewhere in Gotham city.
At least some of the Titans were content. Raven has once again allowed Savior to come close to her, as it was too much effort not to do so, and so their typical dating couple thing started all over because right at this moment they were watching Man Bites Dog with Raven laying on the sofa using Noel's legs for a pillow. Nigel remained Nigel, and very secret about what he spends his spare time doing, but at this moment he was probably sharpening his claws or reading the large book on top of the tower. With the lack of female company he had little to do except read and improve his English. He remained ever hopeful that an earth woman might find him attractive, but he doubted it some how.
Robin seems to be keeping very much to himself on a little project he has been working on in his spare time. Except for missions and meal times, little is seen from their 'benevolent' leader. This worried most of the group, because whenever they did see him he shrugged off their questions by saying he was busy or what not. Fine, but some of them had seen him lugging around spare parts to some kind of machine, and the parts that he took back and fourth seemed very familiar to some of the Titans.
And then Starfire had unintentionally sneezed down a wall. At this point they figured something was up.
"Yo Robin, can I ask of a..."
"No, I'm very busy with a lead on a crime ring."
"Hey Fearless, can you help with..."
"Sorry, I have to go do something."
"Good morning Robin, how was your..."
"Ask me later Star, I'm busy."
Yes, even Starfire was ignored by her own boyfriend. She was bearing his child and she was ignored. Something was defiantly wrong. And so, under cover of night, the Titans had decided to find out what was happening. And they did not like what they had found.
"What are these pieces?" Nigel asked, kneeling down next to Savior and Starfire. Who promptly sneezed and nearly knocked them out.
"''Cuse me." She blew her nose as they walked further into the room.
"Dammit, I don't believe this. These are parts to Slade's Chronotron Destabiliser." Noel stated, marching his way through the room. This was where Robin had all his Slade stuff, the one with all the newspaper clipping on the walls and the desk in which to build things. Although it still has some of the Slade paraphernalia, some newer things covered most of the room, including the blue prints for the Chronotron Destabiliser with some minor modifications onto it. "This is bad."
"What are you doing?" They all turned sharply around to find Robin standing there, the final piece in his hand.
"Robin! I... We... I mean... Nothing! We saw no plans!" Starfire shouted, standing up straight. She was honestly trying her hardest to look inconspicuous. Of course it had the opposite effect, but at least she tried. Nigel sweatdropped, hoping to any god he could think of Robin wouldn't do something foolish. Noel just had a serious, grim look on his face.
Robin didn't do anything foolish in the end, luckily. Instead he ran forward to try and find something on the desk, but what he was looking for wasn't there, then he looked up and a look of shock came upon his face.
"Where is it?!" He leapt over the table and looked around the room, hoping for dear life for something. "What have you done with it?!" He demanded. Unfortunately the rest of the Titans had little or no clue what he meant, before he lifted the plans to show the three S's. "This!"
"We have not touched those plans." Nigel said, even as he inexplicably lied about that as he poked the plans slightly with one of his claws.
"I mean the actual device!"
"We have not moved anything Robin, please believe us." Starfire pleaded, her hands clasped.
"Robin, what the hell are..." Noel began.
"How can I? I walk in here and it's gone!" Robin yelled, ignoring Noel. Starfire looked down at her feet and was a little teary eyed at his outburst, Robin looked a little worried as she started to sniff and recoiled when he tried to comfort her.
"Great work Casanova." Noel muttered. "What a way to talk to a lady."
"What were you doing that is so important that you must be mean at her and your unborn? Does shouting at expectant women help on this planet?" Nigel asked, folding his arms.
"No, but I'd like to know the answer to your first question." Noel said. Both the men were glaring daggers at their leader, who at this rate might not be a leader for much longer if he keeps this up.
"I was... working on something." He responded, trying not to give too much away of his plan.
"With parts and plans involving a Chronotron Destabiliser?" Noel said, as he held up an orb, which seemed to be something quite vital, thought obviously spare. He was about to start yelling again when Starfire sneezed and nearly blew the door to the room off its hinges. The item they picked up must have been Metallic Chromium, as Starfire's sneezing became worse and worse, so much so they saw the rest of the Titans at the door in less than five minutes with the noise she made as Tim and Noel yelled at each other. Finally Tim noticed the others: Each of them wore a stern expression on their features, very unimpressed at the tone Robin took towards his so called 'friends'. Noel placed the sphere he had in his hand back down from where he had picked it up: some sort of tray shaped for it.
"Ok. Enough farting around. We want the truth Robin, and we want it now." Cyborg stated harshly, making his way into the room, the rest of the Titans following.
But something happened, something that none of them expected to happen. Lines from where the orb was appeared in blue, tracing across the floor and walls to form a pattern that was too intricate to make out.
"What's happening?" Raven asked, her calm exterior still apparent while the others around her lost their heads in a preverbal sense at this sudden change. Beast Boy and Gauntlet dived for the door to try and get help to find out what was happening, but he bounced off some form of force field that now covered the entrance. Everything went white for a moment.
Silence.
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"Alright Star, just say Ahh." Nigel checked over the ever-growing Starfire in the medical bay and paused. Something wasn't right.
"Have we not done this before?" He asked before Cyborg rushed into the room, closely followed by Beast Boy in the form of an owl.
"Err...What just happened?" The changeling asked, reforming back into a human shape. Nigel placed down the torch thing he had in his hand and turned to them, a confused expression on his face.
"What is the time?" He asked as Cyborg looked on the clock on his arm.
"Something must be busted. It said it's nine forty five this morning." He replied, tapping his arm slightly before continuing. "But that's impossible...unless..."
"Unless Robin was recreating the Chronotron Destabiliser to try and go back in time for some reason." Noel said. Raven and Savior strolled back in, a serious look on their faces.
"But why would Robin do such a thing? Robin would not endanger us so." Starfire said, as she tried to reassure them. Or maybe she was reassuring herself? I don't think with his recent behaviour she even believed herself on that fact.
A tap on the window drew her out of her thoughts and she walked over to open it.
"Sorry I'm late." Gauntlet said. The last missing member clambered through the window, the G on his shirt a little mucky for some reason or another, looked mostly like oil.
"Damn it Gauntlet! Why can't you do what normal people do and use the door?!" Noel shouted, gesturing to the large, open doorway.
"Because I'm not a normal person! Next question please?"
"Why is your T-shirt dirty?"
"I've been fiddling with the T-Car." He announced proudly, placing his fists on his hips and nodding his head. Unfortunately not everyone was as proud of his achievement as he was.
"MY BABY! What did you do with it?!" Cyborg yelled, as he dashed towards him quicker than Raven could teleport and shook him like a person would shake a Furby to shut it up. Although in my experience that would just make it go "WHEEEEEE! Again!" more.
"We have more important things to worry about at the moment." Raven said as she rose up between them to try and break Cyborg's death grip on Gauntlet. Rob just gasped for air whenever he got the opportunity.
"But you built that car too!" He protested, before his hold was finally broken and a sense of order was restored, even if it was unrecognisable at first glance. They all agreed on one thing though, and that was that they had gone back in time. How and why was still a mystery, but they knew Robin was behind it all. One second they had all been in the room, and the next Beast Boy was on the phone to Charm, Cyborg was watching a DVD in his room, Raven and Noel were watching Man Bites Dog, or rather Noel was as Raven was asleep at the time and we know what Gauntlet did, or rather was doing, exactly when the time had been nine forty-five.
Eventually, after searching the entire tower, they found that Robin was nowhere to be seen, and whatever the event that had happened, it meant that he was outside of the tower when it happening... and if that made any sense at all can you contact me please, I lost myself. Well whatever!
The point is that Robin was not in the tower during the day, only at night when everything got turned on its head. This was especially unsettling as he did not return on the appointed hour just before everything went to heck. They figured the loop couldn't happen if they left the orb alone, as that orb had seemed to activate something. Exactly what, they weren't sure, but it had done so all the same, and so they waited patiently, watching it in the room.
Robin did not return, and despite the fact there was another blinding light, and once again Nigel found himself checking Starfire's throat, Beast Boy on the phone to Charm, Cyborg watching a DVD, Savior and Raven spending some quality time, and Gauntlet fiddling with the T-Car.
So they tried again, and decided that to stop this, they would need to prevent whatever had been taken that Robin had been so upset about from being taken, and so they broke into Robin's research room prematurely and waited there. Unfortunately this didn't help as the machine just whirled up and vanished, locked into its predestined fate. Soon enough the appointed hour came again and the orb lit up and yet another bright light happened and faded and Nigel was once again looking down Starfire's throat. .
"Alright Star, just say Ahh." Nigel checked over the ever growing Starfire in the medical bay and paused. With an annoyed growl he placed down the equipment and walked out the medical bay to find the others.
Everything was as expected, they had gone back in time again but that wasn't the only weird thing. They turned on to the local news and they had found that it wasn't just them, but the entire city that had gone crazy. Every newspaper said that today was actually yesterday and the time on all the clocks was 9:45 am.
In other words, everything was going back in time, not just the Titans.
"I think the only thing that can stop this is if we find whatever Robin was building and destroy it." Raven said, taking the lead.
"Who said you was in charge?" Cyborg demanded, stepping forward to challenge her leadership. A cold harsh look appeared in her eyes, directed straight at Cyborg. There was a brief pause before he fell back in line. A stifled laugh came from next to her.
"Wohpah." Noel muttered lightly before they continued onwards into the city, flying, walking or running, as they tried to find Robin and fix this real life Groundhog Day.
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"It will take us forever to find it; we can't search the whole city in one day! No, less than that actual! Twelve hours! Half a day!" Beast Boy shouted, his albatross form searching the sky.
"All we have to do is search all the large warehouses and buildings, and when the loop starts again we start from were we left off." Savior called, swinging from building to building Spiderman style to assist in possible locations. Nigel too was with this group, but he didn't say much. Instead he was doing his super jump thing to keep up, leaping from tall building to tall building in a Matrix fashion, sometimes causing a small dent in the roof when he landed. They chose to search in columns; three would search in one side, while four would look on the other side of the city and close in on each other, sharing any news they would get later.
"Hey, I see Mumbo!" Beast Boy shouted, changing into an owl to try and get a better look at him, and it was indeed the Amazing Mumbo, running full pelt down the road. "Should we get him?"
"Why bother? It's only going to be undone next time around." Noel replied, managing to shrug in mid air.
"Huh?"
"When we go back in time, we keep going back to when none of this has happened yet, so even if we take him in now, when we go back in time he will still be running down the road because that is what he was doing at ten o'clock. And even if we catch him again, well, lather, rinse, repeat." Noel said. He stopped a second, looking down. "Besides, your girlfriend is chasing him."
Beast Boy looked down and blushed a bright red. Indeed, hot on his trail was Charm, who was almost floating to move faster. They carried on looking, so perhaps we should we now check on the others.
"Are you sure you can do this Starfire?" Raven asked, flying with Starfire.
"I am fine going forward and down, it's just going up that might prove a problem." Starfire said, as she smiled lightly. The girls flew together, Raven supporting the weight of Kory as they looked. A part of Raven wanted to let go, because she was actually very heavy, but she didn't want to spend a month in traction like Beast Boy did if she angered the pregnant alien.
Cyborg was on the ground with Gauntlet searching for anything suspicious. While Cyborg was still mad, he liked Robert's detective abilities. The teen had suggested that what they were looking for might not be visible, so look out for people who look like they were trying to hide something.
Unfortunately that was making the hot dog vendor looked apprehensive, so he demanded a free hot dog with everything to make sure he was guilt free and without crime related shame. He'd do anything for something free... except pay of course. Unfortunately before they realised night had crawled up on them.
Flash.
"See anything?"
Flash
"Nothing."
Flash
"Notice anything yet?"
Flash
"Yes, falling while jumping hurts..."
Flash
"One hot dog please. Payment? How do I know you are not selling cheep-ass hot dogs?"
Flash
"Yes Charm, yes. I love you too. Bye."
Flash.
Nigel and Starfire made their way to the lounge to see everyone watching a movie, which wasn't Man Bites Dog. That had wound up Noel to quite an extent (he thought that it was a good lesson for people to watch a movie like that), so at the moment it was 'Nightmare before Christmas' by that Tim Burton fellow, whoever he might be in this realm.
"What are you doing?" She asked lightly, sitting down in a large chair with a big pillow ready.
"We are taking this loop out, to recover." Cyborg replied, chomping on a sandwich. Nigel sat and started to snack as well. They waited till the film finished and then started to move.
"I've realized something." Gauntlet started, standing up with an alarming pace as if he was mulling through something.
"That you make a better door then a window?"Noel asked incredulously, trying to think what to watch next.
"No, we can do things without being bothered by the consequences!" He replied.
Some puzzlement, and then a smile came across most of their faces at the realization of it all; however the two aliens didn't understand at all and looked at him, their head tilted. And Noel as, per usual, didn't look happy at this sudden revelation.
"What?" Nigel said.
"Well seeing as each time you go backwards in a loop we start the day again, we can do whatever we want without having to deal with the repercussions of our actions as when we start a new day we start at nine in the morning on the same day, while everything we did, say at noon, is undone. Even effects done onto us would be undone!" Robert explained. Noel smacked his face into his palm: of all the tricky concepts of life, Robert had to figure THIS one out.
But there was no change in the pair's expression.
"Think if it this way. If you went in another loop, and in this loop you threw a coin and it hit a person in the head, when the loop started over that man wouldn't know that you threw a coin at him because it never happened. Understand?"
"No."
"We can do what we want because when the loops start again, they won't have happened!"
There was a pause, before Nigel gave a scary toothy grin as he too got the picture.
"Oh let us have some fun."
"Where did we all go wrong?" Noel agonized. He wondered if he should resist or just go with it. In the end he grudgingly went with it.
What followed were many jumps through time, and many events, but I can't tell you about everything. So I'll stick with one. I could tell you about the supposed suicide attempt by Savior, who threatened that if he did not get a PA system to read his astoundingly bad poetry to the world, he would jump off the edge. Of course they did it, but he jumped anyway. Not like he could get hurt: his Shimmer instinctively protected him.
Or when Beast Boy decided it would be fun to unlock all the cages at the Zoo in protest to his furry friends being locked away. He made a note to do that when the time was right and when time had settled itself.
Starfire had gotten in the papers one day for getting stuck on a construction site after playing 'tag' with the other Titans. Small pipe and a large Starfire didn't usually go together.
There was the event were all the Titans dressed in cosplay to save the day and they drew from a hat. It was quite funny as Raven was forced to do her hair in the style of Yuna, while Beast Boy had to go as an Anime girl, sailor suit and all! At least Noel was content, he looked very good as Vash The Stampede... Nigel wasn't, he stole one of his best coats to do it.
Or perhaps when Cyborg went and got the highest score ever possible on a game that he had mastered, everything falling place as he scored over 100 million points, but of course the big flash happened and it was lost, never to be recovered again... But on with the story...
Flash.
"I have always wanted to do this." Raven said, as she made her way into an all you can eat restaurant and sat down, waiting to be served.
"Miss R-Raven, it's a p-pleasure to serve a Titan, what will y-you be having?" A nervous young waitress asked, walking over to the celebrity, her hand shaking as she went to take down the order.
"Everything."
"E-everything?" The waitress asked.
"Everything." She replied, taking off her belt. Raven, being a part of the Teen Titans, in a relationship, AND a half demon sorceress, never really allowed herself to eat too much. Apart from the fact it was a foolish idea because she was needed on the team to run around and fight bad guys and when you eat a lot you put on weight, and when you do that you become slower and more useless. She didn't want to do that, because overindulgence was classified not only as an emotion, but a sin, and since sinning was part of her 'Fathers' category of things she would not do, she did not do it...but seeing as nothing will take effect and Trigon has been locked away...
"Oh and the biggest glass of coke possible."
"That is two and a half pints Miss."
"Please."
"Y-yes Miss!" Oh this might be fun.
On the other side of town, clad in checkered trousers, a tank top sweater with a shirt underneath and a flat cap, Nigel placed a golf ball onto a tee and swung for dear life at it, knocking it quite far from the top of the building in which they stood.
"Am I doing this correctly?" He asked himself, taking out a manual and looking at it, which happened to be 'How to Learn Golf' in an ACME kind of way. "At least it's the right comic company."
Not you too... Savior and Gauntlet put you up to fourth wall breaking didn't they?
"Not really, I was feeling left out." He said, as he put the book in his back pocket and raced toward 3rd and Main to take the next shot.
Starfire, who happened to be in a store on the corner of 3rd street, was trying on all new maternity clothing, floating over to search for new things to see what worked well with what and so on and so forth.
"I didn't realise that one of the Titans was..." The store manager said. He had started talking to Star's personal assistant. Seeing as Kory was such a celebrity, the store decided it was in their best interests to keep her happy long enough for the press to get there. Unfortunately a protest of some kind down the road and everyone was there so it may take a while.
"Excuse me, I would like this zipped at the back, however I can not reach. Please assist me." The Titan asked, trying to reach around with little or no luck for the awkwardly placed zipper. With a sharp sound, it was done, and Starfire admired her new look. Her long hair was done up in a high ponytail as she styled the new fashion for celebrity mothers who want to look good. It was a high, close collar dinner dress with what looked like an oriental motif on the front. The arms were cut and the dress stopped at her knees. It was in blues and purples with a wonderfully done golden rim.
"Very nice choice Miss Starfire, it's made of a lovely material and can be worn in most of the pregnancy."
"Most of?"
"You may not be able to fit into it when you are full term of course, however we..."
"I'll take it." A boom was heard outside just as she cut off the manager's grovelling. It had been a very expensive dress, and she wanted to sell it to this very naive superhero because then it would classify as her finest sell, and for the label on it she would get a Christmas bonus for three years that was larger than most people's pay checks. But for now, they all looked outside to see a slight dent in the road works, and no sooner did the dust clear did Nigel come and land next to his ball, grabbing a four iron to get it to the next part of the city. "Having fun Scalpel?"
"Yes, but Earth games are hard to learn!" He called back, pulling the manual out from his pocket and studying it again, before replacing it and teeing off towards the town hall. Starfire turned her attentions back to the dress and how it looked.
"It makes me seem like a fal'nak balloon beast." She said lightly, re- evaluating what it looked like on her, her tone that of someone a little annoyed, or more over peeved.
"But a second ago you said..." The manager's slimy behaviour stopped when the thought of Starfire not taking the dress entered her mind.
"I know. I'll take it." She replied, walking over to the dressing rooms to change, leaving a very confused looking assistant and manager there.
Pregnant women, so much trouble at times.
At city hall, three of the Titans stood there marching in a circle, with the media on them. A well-dressed young adult stood in front of the camera before starting.
"Hello, I'm Sarah Cambell coming to you live from Jump City Hall, where today an unprecedented event has occurred. The Teen Titans, Jump City's defenders of truth and justice, are now protesting in front of us as we speak. Although only three of them are visible to us, Cyborg, Beast Boy and a newer member Gauntlet, they assure us that the others are away discussing terms with the men and women in charge of this fair city." And she would be right. Mostly. The green one, the tin man and the crooked protector stood there with placards and banners calling for reform in the system. "Live with me now is the Titan Beast Boy. Mr. Beast Boy, why are you and the others 'on strike'?"
"If you have noticed, every civil service has been paid for, except Super Heroes! The fire fighters, the ambulance workers, even the police, who seem to be now a purely optional function, get, at least, a pension and/or insurance."
"But you are heroes, you are not suppose to strike." She reassured herself.
"They say that to police officers, students, everyone. So this time..." He slammed the end of the placard down on the ground. "It's our turn."
"We need more time to learn things like the harpsichord!" Gauntlet shouted from behind.
"Some people say that you are not really working, but going out and having fun, and therefore do not get paid." She said as she replaced the microphone next to his mouth.
"Well I suppose the battle wounds are just for having fun. I suppose one of us nearly dying of blood loss is just for fun, and I suppose our home being destroyed every five minutes to save our city is 'just for fun' as well! Let me tell you something! This is totally weak!" He started to shout. Although these were partly his real feelings, it was all in good fun, and it was good to get it off his chest because no one would remember it next time around.
A boom was heard and Nigel once again hit the road area, this time getting a driver that gave a more sideways arc rather than an upward one, hitting his ball again. Beast Boy and the others watched it fly by. "Sweet shot. Anyway, what I was saying..."
In a near by art store, Noel Collins, AKA Savior, was doing something he never thought he might be able to do with the Shimmer. Making pottery, and doing terribly at it at that.
"Very good Mr Titan, are you sure you are not a natural?"
"Empty flattery won't get you anywhere." Noel looked at the mess in front of him as he started to use the Shimmer to guide the soon-to-be-pot's movement. Noel had never been very artistic, not in the practical sense at any rate, and now he had the time to try and bone up on his knowledge without worrying he would be interrupted because even if he was, it wouldn't matter. After five or ten minutes, a relative pot shape was starting to form from the pile of earthenware clay on the turntable.
(Just so you know, there are many different types of clay, the basic ones are laid out for you now. The white clay is Porcelain, very fine clay that is 100% pure and very hard and expensive to work with. The next clay is Terracotta, it's the clay that is made for roof tiles in Spanish villas and out door pots which turns orange/red when fired. The next is Earthenware and Stoneware. These are used for more general things and are the basic clays for schools and outdoor pots and sculptures. The last, and used for more study models, is Crank and has dried clay shards in it to give it strength. Why do I know this? Simple.
They forced it into my head at AVCE art and design...)
Again fate spat in Noel's face as an ever-familiar golf ball landed in the art store. Seeing as it passed through the window, through to the back and through his pot, it was a surprisingly efficient way to cause destruction, as Noel, startled, instinctively pressed his foot down on the pedal and...well, you've seen Ghost, think about it.
Covered in clay, Noel stood up. If anyone has ever used clay before, you will know that it does not go well with white or light colours, and seeing as the golf ball going forward, plus the energy put into the spinning of the pot caused the same effect as a 'Sonic Boom'. In simple terms, Savior was covered head to toe, and he didn't look good.
"Sorry Savior."
The golf ball came back out at full speed and hit Nigel right between the eyes, making a small 'Pok' noise as it did so, which caused the new Titan to step back a little holding the bridge of his nose.
"As a penalty, add five shots to your score." Noel replied grimly.
"But then I will not get the large winged creature I need to complete this game!"
"You do not actually get a Eagle, it's a term."
"I do not understand."
"I'll explain it to you later. Just take the shot from there." He pointed to where the ball landed, a few feet away. "What are you trying to do anyway?" He asked, removing some of the clay from his face and hair. It will take days to wash it out completely. But as he was in the time loop it didn't matter.
"I'm trying to find all the Titans and return home while golfing." He replied simply, grinning widely at his friend, who had the best 'I am not impressed' look on his face of anyone you have or have not seen.
"Golfing for Titans?"
"Yes, indeed it sounds like a strange concept, however I feel that it will improve not only my strength, but my knowledge of the city. It's also quite entertaining! So I may as well, how you humans say, go for broke?" He pulled out a one wood and swung, much to Noel's surprise, much harder than expected, making it fly. He watched were it landed and jumped away, leaving Noel to explain why a Titan had just demolished the front of a store in the name of entertainment.
Back onto the side of town in which we had started, and seeing that a few hours had passed, we find Raven in the middle of her large feast. The restaurant had been cleared out by this time as they could not support such a large order and have everyone else ordering this that and everything, which meant not only was Raven letting herself go for once, and enjoying it, she was also all on her own to relax and take it easy.
Unfortunately she saw the flaw in her plan. When she said she wanted everything on the menu, she didn't actually look at the size of the menu, which happened to be around 8 standard sized pages long, and so she now has in front of her a week's supply of food that all the Titans would have trouble on, all to herself.
And Beast Boy thought he had the ultimate overindulgence challenge...
So there she sat, feeling bloated and looking a little too full, trying her hardest to fit it all in. Unfortunately the expression 'hollow legs' didn't apply to poor Raven, so why on earth did she try this? Simple, because she didn't have a good enough reason not to. She finished off the last of the BBQ chicken legs and sat back while rubbing her aching stomach, trying to breath through the sauce covered mouth. Lets hope she doesn't do a repeat of this woman who accidentally killed herself because she ate so much her stomach expanded and stopped her diaphragm from moving, meaning she couldn't breath.
"You realize that if you do not finish, you WILL have to pay, Titan or not." The waitresses stood there, waiting with a bottle of cola, fresh napkins and a bill and mints (just in case). So Raven had one of three choices, 1) Finish the meal and throw up, 2) stall them for time till the loop starts again, or 3) pay up. The last one wasn't really a good choice but it may happen all the same.
Like with her other half, an all too familiar sound was approaching, a kind of sound made by a falling motor shell or, in this case, golf ball. Raven was far too groggy with all the food to even utter her favourite words, besides her cheeks were too full and tired from all the chewing. And so, out of the sky and making a hole in the ceiling, the familiar golf ball came crashing down, smashing into the table and hitting the edge of some plates, which not only covered the Titan with food, but the waitresses as well. Raven wiped her face clean and leaned back. Soon enough the ever curious Nigel wandered to the hole and looked in.
"Sorry about that Raven." He commented before making his merry way around to the door. Making a grand entrance, he searched for his golf ball.
"What are you wearing?" She managed to ask, looking over to see all the tacky golfing gear he wore.
"I thought this was traditional golfing equipment on this planet." He replied, turning, before stifling a laugh and regaining his composure. "Now answer me dear lady; what, pray tell, are you wearing?"
"I think it was a pepperoni pizza." She replied plainly, picking a bit of meat of the 'Raven' emblem and swallowing it whole.
"Aha! I have found the Sphere!" He clambered up onto the table, his claws slipping slightly on some spilt jelly while he placed his one wood in a bowl of sticky toffee pudding. "Nerts." He simply said before pulling out from his bag-o-tricks a sand-wedge and prepared to swing.
"WHAT the HELL do you think you are doing?!" The manager bellowed as he stormed into the room while Nigel was in mid swing, forcing the Blacktrinian to miss and fall over face first into the 7th course.
"I was winding up for a swing!" He shouted back, pepper sauce all down his face and stylish knitwear jumper. And so, he took the shot again, this time sending it as hard as he could in a random direction. "Now look what you made me do!" He shouted, jumping off the table. "I have to find that so if you excuse me." He barged past the manager, grabbing a napkin from one of the waitresses and stormed out, leaving Raven to try and continue on.
"A friend?" The manager asked, agitated as he approached the young Titan. Raven unfortunately was feeling far too sick to move so she sat there helpless as the now angered manager walked slowly up to her like some cheep suspense movie.
"Oh joy."
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Time had passed on with that particular day, and the elusive ball had only just been found. Obviously the over powered shot had been sloppy and hit somewhere in the middle of the city, but it was rather dense wherever it was. Day had become night, but still there was nothing. Nigel had to try and find the ball and hit it hard back to the Tower or he would never live it down after all the trouble he had caused, especially with Raven and Savior.
Luckily, all his searching paid off, and he found the ball on top of a small warehouse to the south. The only problem was it had been torn in half by something or other, maybe some kind of blade. Scalpel's ears fell a little at the annoyance of it all, all day he went to find the Titans and after all that he would have to take a relief shot.
"Sorry Mumbo."
His lowered ears perked up again at the sound of a very familiar voice, cold as ice but much younger than most voices that tone. The doctor took it upon himself to look into the situation and removed the soiled jumper he wore and climbed down the building to see, using his claws to act as climbing pegs.
"I finally found it!" He said. The figure's watch bleeped lightly and he growled. "I took too long. At least the others didn't find it before I did."
"Robin!"
The figure turned.
Flash
Nigel cut himself short while looking down Star's throat. She looked at him with a puzzled look on her face as he wandered around, almost as if he was trying to get his bearings. He then pointed in a direction and paused as Beast Boy wandered in with Cyborg, holding out a maternity swim suit for Star and a pair of black and white swim shorts.
"Who wants to go to the beach?!" They shouted as more of a statement than a question.
"I know where Robin is." Nigel said softly, double checking where he had gone in his head. A shocked look came upon them at this point, then a look of confusion.
"How the hell do you just know?" Cyborg asked indignantly, removing the sunglasses from his face and stared him down.
"Simple, when I was golfing I lost the spherical object you hit and when I found it again, it was cut in two. Now that I think about it, it had slight shards of red on it. But I heard a noise, and went down and I saw a long nosed, blue skinned man being dragged over to the machine on the blue prints by Robin."
"A long nosed, blue skinned man?" Starfire asked, getting who he meant.
"Mumbo!"
So it was a race against time, because from what Nigel had told them Robin had seen him just before the loop started over, which means Robin would be thinking what they were thinking and try to reach it with all due speed, and the winner would be whoever reached it first.
Robin, surprisingly, had three advantages. He was closer because he was on the main land when the loop started while the others were on the island. The second advantage was the fact that he was on his own and was quite fast on the ground and through the air, jumping from building to building, while the others had to move as a group and some of them couldn't fly, plus with the added bonus of a pregnant Tamaranean which meant not only did they go slower but the 'get a lift with the alien' card was no longer in play. And one final thing that helped Robin no end was, of course, was one of the trademarks traits of the Blacktrinians; apart from their massive strength, appearance and inability to swim.
And that was Nigel's lack of a sense of direction.
So Robin had enough time to reach the warehouse several times over, do what he needed to do to fulfil his plan, and get out of there.
But, finally, fate and karma decided to gang up on the fearless leader and throw a preverbal spanner in the works because Robin didn't factor in that Charm, Beast Boy's ever elusive girlfriend, playing hero to try and stop the magician which in turn made him late, but luckily not too late as he burst in the door and locked it tightly, sighing with relief.
"Thank god for small favours." He muttered to himself, leaning on the door, completely oblivious to who was there with him. With a swift flick of the wrist, Mumbo produced his wand and in another equally quick movement with some cliché magician's words, the Chronotron device that Robin had built miraculously appeared in a cloud of smoke. "With that little urchin out of the way I can finally find out what this device does. It looks pretty important." He pondered slightly before a shadow appeared behind him and grab his wand.
"More important than you know!" Robin yelled, as he snatched the wand, snapped it and threw it away. Nothing happened.
"Aha! But I have a better plan! My wand is only for show for I now posses Wand-like gloves!" He flexed his fingers as if to show off the white, pristine gloves on them, their stiff movement showed that there may have been wiring of sorts laced through them. Robin wasn't impressed, and with one quick swing of his staff, he knocked the middle aged man unconscious.
"Just shut up already." He almost pleaded, before making his way over to the machine. Finally his plan would come to fruition and life will be returned to normal. He started slowly by removing the panel on the base of the machine and pulled out a new piece that looked like it slotted into the gap that was now there. All he had to do now was get back to the Tower and enter his room, and then all that was left was to activate the machine and everything will work out fine.
At least that was the plan for when he turned around he slammed straight into the rest of the Titans, who stood there, Cyborg in the front, the rest fanning out in an arrow.
"Hey there Robin, what'cha doing?" Cyborg asked, a serious expression on his features, which all the Titans mirrored.
"Just disarming the bomb." He replied simply. "It won't do us any harm." He thumbed back, keeping the cool and calm expression on his face the whole time. The Titans' expressions never changed.
"If I believed that, I don't think we would have come all this way." The larger teen stated, staring down into the blank eyes of his leader, whose eyes just stared straight back. "What's the deal?" He asked again, this time wanting an answer he could believe.
"Well if you must know." He started. "I want to go back and change something that should never have happened."
"And what might that be, if we don't know already." Beast Boy said from next to him. Luckily Starfire wasn't there yet, so Robin could speak his mind.
"Teenagers are not supposed to have babies! Especially not mine while I'm part of a super hero group!"
"And you're only realizing this now, when you could have taken several precautions to avoid this earlier? You selfish son of a bitch." Savior spat, not caring that Nigel was in earshot. Then again considering the size of his hearing devices, he would be in earshot from surprisingly far away, but back to the point.
"Say what you will." Robin replied, not surprised at his outburst. "You just wait and see what happens when Raven goes off and decides to have a baby."
Savior hissed at this remark and was about to retort, but he was cut off by a faint growl.
"Foolish human! You need a male AND a female to have offspring! Raven can't have a baby by herself!" Nigel shouted, from the back.
"I can't say I blame your outburst, after all this is technically your fault." Robin folded his arms and stared at the back of the group. "I went through your medical records. You know why the Blacktrinians have to take over everything to survive? It's because in their food there is a plant, which I couldn't read the name of. This plant has medicinal properties of regeneration and fertility. It causes your reproduction cycle to go so fast that you need to conquer other planets simply for the space." He scowled. "In other words your breakfast made sure she became pregnant, despite the medicine on this planet to stop it!"
"How dare you!" Nigel shouted, unfortunately it was in his natural tongue so no one understood him, but they could tell he was annoyed all the same as he had started to lunge at their so called leader. Luckily for Robin, Noel and Rob where there to hold him back. "What a bag of ill truths! There was none of that plant in the meal! It only grows on the home world!"
"You leave him out of this! You would blame him if the world suddenly caught on fire." Beast Boy yelled, folding his arms.
"Err... BB? His blood acts like napalm." Cyborg whispered quietly.
"... Bad example." He paused. "This is between you and Starfire! Leave Nigel and Raven out of this! If she was having a baby she would deal with it in a cool and level headed manner! Like she sorts everything out!"
Raven, just so you know, wasn't there yet: she was helping Starfire fly there, as on her own she couldn't keep up and they didn't want to teleport, who knows what effect that would have on her. Better safe than sorry.
"Yeah, who died and made you god?" Gauntlet shouted in his never serious manner. For once, Savior agreed with him. Each part of the plan was coming together, slowly, but they didn't know what Robin planned to do about it.
"I am more than a god; I'm the leader of the Titans." He spat back at them, extending his staff into a battle ready position. "And no one can interrupt my plan, not even my friends!" The others did not move.
"Dear lord, how did it ever come to this?" Savior muttered.
"Man, listen to yourself!" Cyborg stepped forward, tensing for possible battle. "You sound like Slade."
Robin's eyes widened in anger as his grip tightened.
"I told you not to compare me to him! He's an insane psycho! I'm trying to right a wrong that should never have occurred!"
"By going back in time to kill a baby?" Beast Boy jumped in. "Or don't you remember the reason he built this machine? It was to go back in time and rewrite our histories for destroying his son's pride!"
"If anything Robin, with this idea you're at least as bad as he is." Savior said, walking forward through the crowd. "You didn't even ask Starfire if she wanted the baby. How do you think she will react when she finds out that you don't like it? You think she hasn't become attached to the thing inside her?"
"If Starfire has that baby is or not is not open for discussion."
"I think it is." A woman's voice said from behind him and stood there was Starfire with Raven. Star looked like she wanted to cry, but was fighting it back with every ounce of strength she had. The others knew that this was a matter between Robin and Starfire, so they silently agreed not to interfere. Too much.
"Star-" Robin began.
He was cut off by a slap that echoed through the room, leaving some of the Titans to cringe at both the sound and the position of Robin's head. She had hit him so hard he nearly fell over, and was still only on his feet because his armoured toes kept him on the ground. The reaction from the usually happy and tranquil Starfire shocked everyone in a visible way, even Raven showed a look of pure surprise. None of them had ever expected her to use such force, but it wasn't too surprising as she did just hear her own boyfriend say he wanted to kill her first child.
Now I hear you ask, considering what this had led to, why couldn't she just get an abortion? Well they tried but Nigel refused. Despite their high birth-rate, Blacktrinians believe having a child is a privilege and an honour, and should not be disturbed and when they went to human doctors they said it was far too late to do anything. This leads us to where we are now. It was a real shame that they took so long trying to convince the young doctor, as if they hadn't they might have been able to continue on.
"I want to know why!" She demanded, her hand still where it was after the slap for a moment or two, before it returned to her side, shaking violently and clenched in to a fist that could very well spark a star bolt at any moment. Robin looked back at her, more surprised than the others were, and now sporting a large red mark on his face. Her angry expression looked like it could change at any moment into full-on tears.
"It's just not right Star." He said, his tone much softer, as he withdrew his staff.
"Why?" She asked, her aggressive standing also coming down a few pegs, but her never blinking eyes, usually soft and caring, were now like daggers piercing her boyfriend to the core.
"You have your whole life ahead of you, it's not right to have a baby at your age." Robin almost pleaded with her, trying to make her understand the truths behind it all, but this line of argument was not working.
"I have a feeling that isn't the only reason." Raven commented plainly, trying to force Robin into saying what he felt, not just what he knew. He growled at her intervention but nodded all the same. Some times, the truth hurts.
"It's true." He paused and, double-checking that Mumbo was unconscious and the windows were closed and covered, he took off his mask so he could look at her in the eyes. "I would be happy being Tim, teenage father, but I can't deal with being Robin, teenage father. People can't just only use it as a way to get to me, but also I think this baby might tear the Titans apart. The constant distractions, the wake up calls in the middle of the night, all the hardships that arise from having a child. So I built this to try and keep us together." He said, gesturing towards the device.
"Oh I get it now. You rebuilt this sucker in order to go back and prevent you two from having the baby in the first place, by any means possible." Cyborg stated, finally realizing what he had planned to do.
"Sugar coating the truth with noble intentions." Nigel stated, his arms folded and his back to Robin. Gauntlet, actually doing something that might turn out to be half sensible, turned the alien around to face the rest of the group and walked out front, slowly and casually like he always did;
"Well then, now that we know what's what, I vote we try and put this whole thing behind us. After all, at this point, words aren't any good."
"Stay out of it Gauntlet, please just stay out of it. This is not a situation that favors you." Noel begged to himself quietly, hoping that he would just back away now that he had said his piece. He didn't.
"We now know what he wants to do, and we know in our mind it's wrong." He continued. Robin was about to reply but he cut him off "Now before you start going on about how you were right, let me just put something to you A- Capi-tan. You said it yourself that you were taught to respect life, and, if possible, never take one." He started to move in his oh-so erratic way, his arms outstretched and upwards, as if to emphasise his point. "Yet that thing in there-" He paused as he lightly poked Starfire's stomach. "Is a living, breathing thing. Okay it isn't breathing yet, otherwise it would drown but you know what I mean! So technically, you are going against what you believe in." He finished. "Beat that!" He re-finished in his typical mannerism, looking so tempted to do the John Cena 'you can't see me' taunt. He couldn't just be serious and let it end like that.
But he did get through to him, and that was what he was trying to do. He even surprised Savior at his outburst. Fairly intellectual. If he was like that all the time they might actually get along. Maybe.
Robin seemed to be forced deep into thought. Did it strike a nerve in Fearless?
"Oh." Starfire said lightly, holding her stomach. They looked up at her, wondering if something was wrong, but there was something on her face that they hadn't seen all day. A smile. She made her way slowly towards Robin, her hands never leaving her stomach and the soft, loving smile never leaving her face. "The baby kicked, want to see?" With alarming speed, she reached out and took his hand and placed it onto her 'bump'. Robin was speechless for a moment or two.
Before he pulled his hand away with a sharp impunity that he didn't want to show. He almost had a snarl on his face as he turned from her. Starfire's face, less than five seconds ago a warm, loving smile, now wore a sharp state of shock as she realized that her boyfriend had just snatched his hand back away from her.
"Sorry, but as a leader I must be unwavering in my decision." He said. He started to walk away.
"So that's it then?" Raven asked, straightening her cloak. "Robin, the fearless leader of the Titans is just going to walk away?"
There was no response.
"I hope you realise that these actions have torn you away from the group you were so willing and desperate to protect." Nigel spat. Again with no reply. This just angered the alien more, as he kicked down the door and stormed out, his thick cape fluttering in the wind. One by one, the Titans followed him, leaving Robin alone in the world of his own devising.
"It will be better this way." He said as the last of them left. Raven stayed till last.
"It seems like so long ago that we formed this team, when I formed this team. Yet I felt that you could be the leader we needed, you had compassion and a level head, alongside training and experience. What happened to that young man I asked to lead me all those years ago?" She finally asked, before she escorted the expectant Kory out. The princess looked back quickly to see him, but all she saw was his back.
Now all that was left was to wait for the 'new future'.
But something happened to Robin, something unexplainable. The Titans had struck a nerve in him, in a way he couldn't describe. He was having doubts, second thoughts about his wonderful plan to right the universe.
You sound like Slade.
These thoughts played on Robin's mind like a man playing on a string instrument, steady but relentlessly. He wasn't like Slade. Slade was a merciless tyrant, whose every intention spawned hate and violence. But the thoughts kept playing on his mind. What made him different from any religious fanatic? Sticking to a single mindedness that only comes when you believe in something so blindly you would die for it, or perhaps even kill someone else for it.
In that sense what made him different from any terrorist? A man who wants to kill to put forward his ideas. But he wasn't killing, was he? No, of course not. Killing is when you stop someone from living by artificial means, he wasn't. He was going back in time to try and prevent an event that was never supposed to happen, so he wasn't killing. Instead he was preventing.
Then again,some devote Catholics thought that using any form of contraception was a way of killing unborn children, so perhaps he was killing? If that is so, then every time in a James Bond movie where 007's next lady love is killed is one extreme form of contraception...
But he wasn't doing this for himself. No. He was doing it for Kory and the team. If he didn't stop this, then the team would suffer. His team. The Teen Titans, protectors of the good and decent people of Jump City, and the world. Protecting people who were unable to protect themselves. A teenage father like that isn't decent. Not a good image to young children out there at all.
This was the thin line between his life and TV. But if this was a Soap Opera, then Savior would be killed next week and Raven would date Beast Boy, who secretly reveals he's gay...
Too many Soap Operas...
But what good was a superhero team with a baby on the way? "Oh excuse me while I just go feed the baby." What super villain in the world would wait for you to feed and change a young one? Well except that crazy Evil John person who robbed the bank a few years back, he would probably wait quite calmly.... now what was Robin doing? Reminiscing over old villains? Next he'll start thinking about all the damage the Lord did...
He sighed at the thought of what the Lord had done. So much death and destruction, so much pain and hate...
His thoughts drifted back over to the new Titans, Rob's ever present smile and jokes, Noel's knowledge, and even Nigel's loyalty. Even if he hated to admit it, they had given the team a new lease of life.
Perhaps it would be good to have a little life in the world?
Robin looked at his watch. It was 8:45 pm, one hour exactly before history would be changed forever. His thoughts drifted back to the villains that he had encountered. From the downright dumb, ranging though the psychotic and deadly, all the way up to the Lord, who was in a class of his own. Was he, the leader of the heroes of this town, really as bad as all these enemies?
The answer hit him like a brick. He was. If he went back in time and stopped this from happening, he would be as bad, if not worse than some of these villains. Killing a child because he didn't want it? Didn't the Lord kill a child because he didn't want it in his 'perfect world'? How can Robin do the same and not call himself either a villain or a hypocrite?
Lifting up his com link, he spoke in to it.
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"So. We're back. What did you want to tell us?" Cyborg asked as all of the Titans stood in front of the red and black costumed man. There was a pause. Not wanting to give up on their leader entirely, the Titans had gone back to the tower and waited. Luckily, their waiting had paid off.
"I was thinking." Another pause as he walked, or rather paced a little, his boots coming down hard on the cold surface of the warehouse. The Titans watched him, as he strode, each with a different expression than the last. Noel and distastefulness, Rob and boredom, Nigel and anger, Raven and calmness, Kory and sadness, Victor and hesitance and finally Gar and mockery. Each person surrounded the Teen Wonder, going in a circle using the device as the last link in the chain. With no idea how it worked, they left it alone.
"And what where you thinking about?" Raven questioned, looking straight at him.
"About the villains we faced." He turned his back on them, in thought. Was this intentional? The Blacktrinian and the Tin-man readied themselves just in case. Who knows if, or maybe when, this man, this highly trained teenager, would turn around and attack. "I was thinking about what you said." Another pause. "I'm not like Slade." He placed his gloved hands behind his back, as Kory started to look confused.
"How so?" Her innocence shining through, wanting to hear out Tim, wanting to hear out her boyfriend despite all he had done.
"I don't want to kill, and therefore I don't have too." He turned towards the group once more, with something in his hand. It was a metallic shape with what looked like a plug to slot in to a motherboard. "So I choose not to." It was the add-on to make the Chronotron Destabiliser work to how it was supposed to. "I want us to be a team again." He dropped it on the floor and crushed it with his metal clad boot. "But we may need a new room." He smiled as the others relaxed.
"Wonderful! Joyous news!" Starfire shouted as she sprinted for her boyfriend and clung on to him for dear life. The others laughed then dispersed, not wanting to be around if things got mushy.
"What made you change?" She asked, staring in to the eyes of the father of her children, now and maybe in the future. His mask was still off and so he also gazed in to her beautiful green eyes.
"I didn't, I just remembered who I was, who we where." He laughed lightly, as she wrapped her arms around his neck and smiled as they leaned closer, their lips trying to embrace despite the difficulty posed by her new size. He could feel her heart beat as he reached down to kiss her gently.
"Off! Turn off! Open Sesame! Hocus Pocus!" Rob was currently shouting at the device with the others huddled around it.
"Should I get a big stick of pain?" Nigel suggested.
"No Nigel, hitting it won't work..."
Of course the rest of the Titans could be such pigs and philistines when it came to tender moments such as the one just past. Placing on his mask, Robin then turned to the Titans who tried, with little or no success, to stop the time looper. Starfire blushed lightly as she brushed her hair behind her ear and went to help.
"How about reversing the polarity?" Gauntlet shouted, poking the Chronotron Destabiliser.
"What will THAT do?" Noel asked, standing up a little straighter.
"It always works on Star Trek..." He replied, folding his arms.
"Right, where do we get some polarity?" The resident Blacktrinian asked, more confused now than he ever was.
"I think it already has polarity." Gauntlet called, almost proudly at his achievement.
"But were must we obtain some in case of later encounters with machines with no polarity?"
"Nigel just shaddup." Savior said, starting to get a little bit of a headache.
"I vote we blow it up." Beast Boy called, having said nothing for the past five minutes.
"Won't destroying the time machine wreak havoc on the space-time continuum?"
"Not in any science fiction movie I've ever seen." Both Robert and Gar stated at the same time.
"Yes the documented evidence is even that happened in the 80's with a Delorian and a man called Marty Mcfly."
Again the resident alien showed his lack of understanding.
"Just shoot me now..." Raven was starting to get her own headache that you would need an elephant tranquilizer to cure.
"Well, how about we just press the big button labelled 'off?'" Noel asked incredulously, because by this time he had gone beyond the point of caring.
"Seems like a plan... where is it?" Cyborg asked, fiddling around its base. Robin walked over and pressed the large button labelled off on the back and sidestepped. The tragic thing was that Savior had meant it as a joke. Why on earth is there an off button on what was basically a doomsday device?
"I say we smash it!" Gauntlet shouted as he stole Nigel's glaive from him. "Give me a boost!" Nigel and Kory shrugged and the two aliens threw him in the air, only to be brought straight back down to the ground by its weight of the bladed end. And luckily, for him anyway, he landed on the device which broke his fall... and probably an arm. Noel flinched slightly.
"I vote we fix the machine to go back and stop him from ever joining." Noel sighed. "Sometimes I half wish reality would collapse."
"Well, reality didn't collapse. You lucked out big time."
Maybe the Titans breaking up over a baby would have been the most rational option?
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gahhhhh
Nigel: Forgive him; he's drained from that chapter... One draft, two re- writes and too many cokes to count.
Jedi: Thanks to all those who have reviewed so far! I owe you all!
By Jedi-And
Disclaimer: I do not own TT, nor do I own Mr. Noel Collins or Robert Candide, but I DO own some of my own characters.
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Chapter 10: 09:45 am
Or
I Have The Strangest Case of Déjà vu And I Must Say I Have The Strangest Case of Déjà vu....
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"Alright Star, just say Ahh."
Nigel, now officially a member of the Teen Titans, checked over the ever growing Starfire in the medical bay. It had been a month since the hazing and the day were they fought Mortimer. Again. Nigel had to be called to the scene in the end, as the Titan s were again lacking a gas tanker, and after all his blood seemed to be highly flammable, with little or rather no explanation on why it acted like napalm.
Could have been worse. They may have to fight legal proceedings with the Physics Police again over the use of a fire extinguisher to start a fire.
But in the end, his blood was used all the same, and it won the battle, with some rather intriguing questions as well as their leader's failed attempt to restrain his movement in case Nigel spontaneously combusted. After this, Robin trusted him with his 'delicate' girlfriend even less. But to be fair, Tim never really gave him a chance, despite his good points.
Kory, on the other hand, felt a lot more comfortable going to see Nigel than a human doctor, because the one time Robin forced her to go to the doctor the Titans used to go see, people gawked at her all the way there and when she got into the doctor's office every journalist was waiting by the window and door to try and find out the latest. Even the doctor wasn't private about it, because he phoned all his colleagues to boast and to get advice. I suppose we can't blame him, how often did he get to examine a human/alien hybrid?
But he went too far, as after he finished he started to talk to the press. Luckily though, Savior and Raven were in the area, and they had destroyed all the evidence of her ever being there, like cameras and note pads. Though it still ended up in the paper some how. The mass media. Gotta love 'em. At least, I suppose, it was a good thing they found the information leak so Robin doesn't have to watch Nigel to make sure that he isn't using the phone if you catch my drift.
And so, for privacy's sake, Robin allowed Star to be examined by the 'glorified field medic' as he called Nigel, as long as he was present and that the doctor didn't try anything on her that might be dangerous, which was a ludicrous idea to start with, but then again, this was Robin after all. Let's not forget his Slade fugues.
"Starfire, you and your unborn are both healthy." Nigel said, as he smiled lightly and looked over her shoulder. "Strange."
"What is wrong?" She asked, starting to get a little worried all over again.
"It's nothing, but Robin has left. He usually doesn't trust me enough to leave me alone in the same room as you." Nigel said. He placed down the small torch like object and took up what seemed to be some glasses with screens in them to get a close up view of everything he was looking at to aid his diagnostic. Starfire sighed a little.
"I will try and talk with him again, but he does not understand that you can be trusted for some reason." Starfire stood up slowly from were she was sitting and brushed herself and her stomach off. Although only half way through pregnancy, the changes were still visible. She was in around month four or five and it was harder to hide as she had a bump now, which was quite in evidence, and she had started to change her eating habits even more and was eating mountains worth of food, which really put a dent in the Titans savings, line of credit from Batman or no, and also she would cry at almost anything sad. Teenage pregnancies are holiday homes for excessive emotions and hormone boosts that would kill a cow.
Unfortunately, when you are part of a group of over-emotional teens, you don't notice anything out of the ordinary until it's too late. This is even more so when they have powers linked with their emotions. Once a certain someone said Starfire was putting on a little weight under the chin and she blasted him through a wall. Beast Boy has left intensive care now and is avoiding the pregnant Tamaranean like the bubonic plague. Gauntlet has also decided to steer clear of her, along with Cyborg, who might accidentally put his foot in it and get blasted through the window and land somewhere in Gotham city.
At least some of the Titans were content. Raven has once again allowed Savior to come close to her, as it was too much effort not to do so, and so their typical dating couple thing started all over because right at this moment they were watching Man Bites Dog with Raven laying on the sofa using Noel's legs for a pillow. Nigel remained Nigel, and very secret about what he spends his spare time doing, but at this moment he was probably sharpening his claws or reading the large book on top of the tower. With the lack of female company he had little to do except read and improve his English. He remained ever hopeful that an earth woman might find him attractive, but he doubted it some how.
Robin seems to be keeping very much to himself on a little project he has been working on in his spare time. Except for missions and meal times, little is seen from their 'benevolent' leader. This worried most of the group, because whenever they did see him he shrugged off their questions by saying he was busy or what not. Fine, but some of them had seen him lugging around spare parts to some kind of machine, and the parts that he took back and fourth seemed very familiar to some of the Titans.
And then Starfire had unintentionally sneezed down a wall. At this point they figured something was up.
"Yo Robin, can I ask of a..."
"No, I'm very busy with a lead on a crime ring."
"Hey Fearless, can you help with..."
"Sorry, I have to go do something."
"Good morning Robin, how was your..."
"Ask me later Star, I'm busy."
Yes, even Starfire was ignored by her own boyfriend. She was bearing his child and she was ignored. Something was defiantly wrong. And so, under cover of night, the Titans had decided to find out what was happening. And they did not like what they had found.
"What are these pieces?" Nigel asked, kneeling down next to Savior and Starfire. Who promptly sneezed and nearly knocked them out.
"''Cuse me." She blew her nose as they walked further into the room.
"Dammit, I don't believe this. These are parts to Slade's Chronotron Destabiliser." Noel stated, marching his way through the room. This was where Robin had all his Slade stuff, the one with all the newspaper clipping on the walls and the desk in which to build things. Although it still has some of the Slade paraphernalia, some newer things covered most of the room, including the blue prints for the Chronotron Destabiliser with some minor modifications onto it. "This is bad."
"What are you doing?" They all turned sharply around to find Robin standing there, the final piece in his hand.
"Robin! I... We... I mean... Nothing! We saw no plans!" Starfire shouted, standing up straight. She was honestly trying her hardest to look inconspicuous. Of course it had the opposite effect, but at least she tried. Nigel sweatdropped, hoping to any god he could think of Robin wouldn't do something foolish. Noel just had a serious, grim look on his face.
Robin didn't do anything foolish in the end, luckily. Instead he ran forward to try and find something on the desk, but what he was looking for wasn't there, then he looked up and a look of shock came upon his face.
"Where is it?!" He leapt over the table and looked around the room, hoping for dear life for something. "What have you done with it?!" He demanded. Unfortunately the rest of the Titans had little or no clue what he meant, before he lifted the plans to show the three S's. "This!"
"We have not touched those plans." Nigel said, even as he inexplicably lied about that as he poked the plans slightly with one of his claws.
"I mean the actual device!"
"We have not moved anything Robin, please believe us." Starfire pleaded, her hands clasped.
"Robin, what the hell are..." Noel began.
"How can I? I walk in here and it's gone!" Robin yelled, ignoring Noel. Starfire looked down at her feet and was a little teary eyed at his outburst, Robin looked a little worried as she started to sniff and recoiled when he tried to comfort her.
"Great work Casanova." Noel muttered. "What a way to talk to a lady."
"What were you doing that is so important that you must be mean at her and your unborn? Does shouting at expectant women help on this planet?" Nigel asked, folding his arms.
"No, but I'd like to know the answer to your first question." Noel said. Both the men were glaring daggers at their leader, who at this rate might not be a leader for much longer if he keeps this up.
"I was... working on something." He responded, trying not to give too much away of his plan.
"With parts and plans involving a Chronotron Destabiliser?" Noel said, as he held up an orb, which seemed to be something quite vital, thought obviously spare. He was about to start yelling again when Starfire sneezed and nearly blew the door to the room off its hinges. The item they picked up must have been Metallic Chromium, as Starfire's sneezing became worse and worse, so much so they saw the rest of the Titans at the door in less than five minutes with the noise she made as Tim and Noel yelled at each other. Finally Tim noticed the others: Each of them wore a stern expression on their features, very unimpressed at the tone Robin took towards his so called 'friends'. Noel placed the sphere he had in his hand back down from where he had picked it up: some sort of tray shaped for it.
"Ok. Enough farting around. We want the truth Robin, and we want it now." Cyborg stated harshly, making his way into the room, the rest of the Titans following.
But something happened, something that none of them expected to happen. Lines from where the orb was appeared in blue, tracing across the floor and walls to form a pattern that was too intricate to make out.
"What's happening?" Raven asked, her calm exterior still apparent while the others around her lost their heads in a preverbal sense at this sudden change. Beast Boy and Gauntlet dived for the door to try and get help to find out what was happening, but he bounced off some form of force field that now covered the entrance. Everything went white for a moment.
Silence.
-------------------------------
"Alright Star, just say Ahh." Nigel checked over the ever-growing Starfire in the medical bay and paused. Something wasn't right.
"Have we not done this before?" He asked before Cyborg rushed into the room, closely followed by Beast Boy in the form of an owl.
"Err...What just happened?" The changeling asked, reforming back into a human shape. Nigel placed down the torch thing he had in his hand and turned to them, a confused expression on his face.
"What is the time?" He asked as Cyborg looked on the clock on his arm.
"Something must be busted. It said it's nine forty five this morning." He replied, tapping his arm slightly before continuing. "But that's impossible...unless..."
"Unless Robin was recreating the Chronotron Destabiliser to try and go back in time for some reason." Noel said. Raven and Savior strolled back in, a serious look on their faces.
"But why would Robin do such a thing? Robin would not endanger us so." Starfire said, as she tried to reassure them. Or maybe she was reassuring herself? I don't think with his recent behaviour she even believed herself on that fact.
A tap on the window drew her out of her thoughts and she walked over to open it.
"Sorry I'm late." Gauntlet said. The last missing member clambered through the window, the G on his shirt a little mucky for some reason or another, looked mostly like oil.
"Damn it Gauntlet! Why can't you do what normal people do and use the door?!" Noel shouted, gesturing to the large, open doorway.
"Because I'm not a normal person! Next question please?"
"Why is your T-shirt dirty?"
"I've been fiddling with the T-Car." He announced proudly, placing his fists on his hips and nodding his head. Unfortunately not everyone was as proud of his achievement as he was.
"MY BABY! What did you do with it?!" Cyborg yelled, as he dashed towards him quicker than Raven could teleport and shook him like a person would shake a Furby to shut it up. Although in my experience that would just make it go "WHEEEEEE! Again!" more.
"We have more important things to worry about at the moment." Raven said as she rose up between them to try and break Cyborg's death grip on Gauntlet. Rob just gasped for air whenever he got the opportunity.
"But you built that car too!" He protested, before his hold was finally broken and a sense of order was restored, even if it was unrecognisable at first glance. They all agreed on one thing though, and that was that they had gone back in time. How and why was still a mystery, but they knew Robin was behind it all. One second they had all been in the room, and the next Beast Boy was on the phone to Charm, Cyborg was watching a DVD in his room, Raven and Noel were watching Man Bites Dog, or rather Noel was as Raven was asleep at the time and we know what Gauntlet did, or rather was doing, exactly when the time had been nine forty-five.
Eventually, after searching the entire tower, they found that Robin was nowhere to be seen, and whatever the event that had happened, it meant that he was outside of the tower when it happening... and if that made any sense at all can you contact me please, I lost myself. Well whatever!
The point is that Robin was not in the tower during the day, only at night when everything got turned on its head. This was especially unsettling as he did not return on the appointed hour just before everything went to heck. They figured the loop couldn't happen if they left the orb alone, as that orb had seemed to activate something. Exactly what, they weren't sure, but it had done so all the same, and so they waited patiently, watching it in the room.
Robin did not return, and despite the fact there was another blinding light, and once again Nigel found himself checking Starfire's throat, Beast Boy on the phone to Charm, Cyborg watching a DVD, Savior and Raven spending some quality time, and Gauntlet fiddling with the T-Car.
So they tried again, and decided that to stop this, they would need to prevent whatever had been taken that Robin had been so upset about from being taken, and so they broke into Robin's research room prematurely and waited there. Unfortunately this didn't help as the machine just whirled up and vanished, locked into its predestined fate. Soon enough the appointed hour came again and the orb lit up and yet another bright light happened and faded and Nigel was once again looking down Starfire's throat. .
"Alright Star, just say Ahh." Nigel checked over the ever growing Starfire in the medical bay and paused. With an annoyed growl he placed down the equipment and walked out the medical bay to find the others.
Everything was as expected, they had gone back in time again but that wasn't the only weird thing. They turned on to the local news and they had found that it wasn't just them, but the entire city that had gone crazy. Every newspaper said that today was actually yesterday and the time on all the clocks was 9:45 am.
In other words, everything was going back in time, not just the Titans.
"I think the only thing that can stop this is if we find whatever Robin was building and destroy it." Raven said, taking the lead.
"Who said you was in charge?" Cyborg demanded, stepping forward to challenge her leadership. A cold harsh look appeared in her eyes, directed straight at Cyborg. There was a brief pause before he fell back in line. A stifled laugh came from next to her.
"Wohpah." Noel muttered lightly before they continued onwards into the city, flying, walking or running, as they tried to find Robin and fix this real life Groundhog Day.
------------------------------------
"It will take us forever to find it; we can't search the whole city in one day! No, less than that actual! Twelve hours! Half a day!" Beast Boy shouted, his albatross form searching the sky.
"All we have to do is search all the large warehouses and buildings, and when the loop starts again we start from were we left off." Savior called, swinging from building to building Spiderman style to assist in possible locations. Nigel too was with this group, but he didn't say much. Instead he was doing his super jump thing to keep up, leaping from tall building to tall building in a Matrix fashion, sometimes causing a small dent in the roof when he landed. They chose to search in columns; three would search in one side, while four would look on the other side of the city and close in on each other, sharing any news they would get later.
"Hey, I see Mumbo!" Beast Boy shouted, changing into an owl to try and get a better look at him, and it was indeed the Amazing Mumbo, running full pelt down the road. "Should we get him?"
"Why bother? It's only going to be undone next time around." Noel replied, managing to shrug in mid air.
"Huh?"
"When we go back in time, we keep going back to when none of this has happened yet, so even if we take him in now, when we go back in time he will still be running down the road because that is what he was doing at ten o'clock. And even if we catch him again, well, lather, rinse, repeat." Noel said. He stopped a second, looking down. "Besides, your girlfriend is chasing him."
Beast Boy looked down and blushed a bright red. Indeed, hot on his trail was Charm, who was almost floating to move faster. They carried on looking, so perhaps we should we now check on the others.
"Are you sure you can do this Starfire?" Raven asked, flying with Starfire.
"I am fine going forward and down, it's just going up that might prove a problem." Starfire said, as she smiled lightly. The girls flew together, Raven supporting the weight of Kory as they looked. A part of Raven wanted to let go, because she was actually very heavy, but she didn't want to spend a month in traction like Beast Boy did if she angered the pregnant alien.
Cyborg was on the ground with Gauntlet searching for anything suspicious. While Cyborg was still mad, he liked Robert's detective abilities. The teen had suggested that what they were looking for might not be visible, so look out for people who look like they were trying to hide something.
Unfortunately that was making the hot dog vendor looked apprehensive, so he demanded a free hot dog with everything to make sure he was guilt free and without crime related shame. He'd do anything for something free... except pay of course. Unfortunately before they realised night had crawled up on them.
Flash.
"See anything?"
Flash
"Nothing."
Flash
"Notice anything yet?"
Flash
"Yes, falling while jumping hurts..."
Flash
"One hot dog please. Payment? How do I know you are not selling cheep-ass hot dogs?"
Flash
"Yes Charm, yes. I love you too. Bye."
Flash.
Nigel and Starfire made their way to the lounge to see everyone watching a movie, which wasn't Man Bites Dog. That had wound up Noel to quite an extent (he thought that it was a good lesson for people to watch a movie like that), so at the moment it was 'Nightmare before Christmas' by that Tim Burton fellow, whoever he might be in this realm.
"What are you doing?" She asked lightly, sitting down in a large chair with a big pillow ready.
"We are taking this loop out, to recover." Cyborg replied, chomping on a sandwich. Nigel sat and started to snack as well. They waited till the film finished and then started to move.
"I've realized something." Gauntlet started, standing up with an alarming pace as if he was mulling through something.
"That you make a better door then a window?"Noel asked incredulously, trying to think what to watch next.
"No, we can do things without being bothered by the consequences!" He replied.
Some puzzlement, and then a smile came across most of their faces at the realization of it all; however the two aliens didn't understand at all and looked at him, their head tilted. And Noel as, per usual, didn't look happy at this sudden revelation.
"What?" Nigel said.
"Well seeing as each time you go backwards in a loop we start the day again, we can do whatever we want without having to deal with the repercussions of our actions as when we start a new day we start at nine in the morning on the same day, while everything we did, say at noon, is undone. Even effects done onto us would be undone!" Robert explained. Noel smacked his face into his palm: of all the tricky concepts of life, Robert had to figure THIS one out.
But there was no change in the pair's expression.
"Think if it this way. If you went in another loop, and in this loop you threw a coin and it hit a person in the head, when the loop started over that man wouldn't know that you threw a coin at him because it never happened. Understand?"
"No."
"We can do what we want because when the loops start again, they won't have happened!"
There was a pause, before Nigel gave a scary toothy grin as he too got the picture.
"Oh let us have some fun."
"Where did we all go wrong?" Noel agonized. He wondered if he should resist or just go with it. In the end he grudgingly went with it.
What followed were many jumps through time, and many events, but I can't tell you about everything. So I'll stick with one. I could tell you about the supposed suicide attempt by Savior, who threatened that if he did not get a PA system to read his astoundingly bad poetry to the world, he would jump off the edge. Of course they did it, but he jumped anyway. Not like he could get hurt: his Shimmer instinctively protected him.
Or when Beast Boy decided it would be fun to unlock all the cages at the Zoo in protest to his furry friends being locked away. He made a note to do that when the time was right and when time had settled itself.
Starfire had gotten in the papers one day for getting stuck on a construction site after playing 'tag' with the other Titans. Small pipe and a large Starfire didn't usually go together.
There was the event were all the Titans dressed in cosplay to save the day and they drew from a hat. It was quite funny as Raven was forced to do her hair in the style of Yuna, while Beast Boy had to go as an Anime girl, sailor suit and all! At least Noel was content, he looked very good as Vash The Stampede... Nigel wasn't, he stole one of his best coats to do it.
Or perhaps when Cyborg went and got the highest score ever possible on a game that he had mastered, everything falling place as he scored over 100 million points, but of course the big flash happened and it was lost, never to be recovered again... But on with the story...
Flash.
"I have always wanted to do this." Raven said, as she made her way into an all you can eat restaurant and sat down, waiting to be served.
"Miss R-Raven, it's a p-pleasure to serve a Titan, what will y-you be having?" A nervous young waitress asked, walking over to the celebrity, her hand shaking as she went to take down the order.
"Everything."
"E-everything?" The waitress asked.
"Everything." She replied, taking off her belt. Raven, being a part of the Teen Titans, in a relationship, AND a half demon sorceress, never really allowed herself to eat too much. Apart from the fact it was a foolish idea because she was needed on the team to run around and fight bad guys and when you eat a lot you put on weight, and when you do that you become slower and more useless. She didn't want to do that, because overindulgence was classified not only as an emotion, but a sin, and since sinning was part of her 'Fathers' category of things she would not do, she did not do it...but seeing as nothing will take effect and Trigon has been locked away...
"Oh and the biggest glass of coke possible."
"That is two and a half pints Miss."
"Please."
"Y-yes Miss!" Oh this might be fun.
On the other side of town, clad in checkered trousers, a tank top sweater with a shirt underneath and a flat cap, Nigel placed a golf ball onto a tee and swung for dear life at it, knocking it quite far from the top of the building in which they stood.
"Am I doing this correctly?" He asked himself, taking out a manual and looking at it, which happened to be 'How to Learn Golf' in an ACME kind of way. "At least it's the right comic company."
Not you too... Savior and Gauntlet put you up to fourth wall breaking didn't they?
"Not really, I was feeling left out." He said, as he put the book in his back pocket and raced toward 3rd and Main to take the next shot.
Starfire, who happened to be in a store on the corner of 3rd street, was trying on all new maternity clothing, floating over to search for new things to see what worked well with what and so on and so forth.
"I didn't realise that one of the Titans was..." The store manager said. He had started talking to Star's personal assistant. Seeing as Kory was such a celebrity, the store decided it was in their best interests to keep her happy long enough for the press to get there. Unfortunately a protest of some kind down the road and everyone was there so it may take a while.
"Excuse me, I would like this zipped at the back, however I can not reach. Please assist me." The Titan asked, trying to reach around with little or no luck for the awkwardly placed zipper. With a sharp sound, it was done, and Starfire admired her new look. Her long hair was done up in a high ponytail as she styled the new fashion for celebrity mothers who want to look good. It was a high, close collar dinner dress with what looked like an oriental motif on the front. The arms were cut and the dress stopped at her knees. It was in blues and purples with a wonderfully done golden rim.
"Very nice choice Miss Starfire, it's made of a lovely material and can be worn in most of the pregnancy."
"Most of?"
"You may not be able to fit into it when you are full term of course, however we..."
"I'll take it." A boom was heard outside just as she cut off the manager's grovelling. It had been a very expensive dress, and she wanted to sell it to this very naive superhero because then it would classify as her finest sell, and for the label on it she would get a Christmas bonus for three years that was larger than most people's pay checks. But for now, they all looked outside to see a slight dent in the road works, and no sooner did the dust clear did Nigel come and land next to his ball, grabbing a four iron to get it to the next part of the city. "Having fun Scalpel?"
"Yes, but Earth games are hard to learn!" He called back, pulling the manual out from his pocket and studying it again, before replacing it and teeing off towards the town hall. Starfire turned her attentions back to the dress and how it looked.
"It makes me seem like a fal'nak balloon beast." She said lightly, re- evaluating what it looked like on her, her tone that of someone a little annoyed, or more over peeved.
"But a second ago you said..." The manager's slimy behaviour stopped when the thought of Starfire not taking the dress entered her mind.
"I know. I'll take it." She replied, walking over to the dressing rooms to change, leaving a very confused looking assistant and manager there.
Pregnant women, so much trouble at times.
At city hall, three of the Titans stood there marching in a circle, with the media on them. A well-dressed young adult stood in front of the camera before starting.
"Hello, I'm Sarah Cambell coming to you live from Jump City Hall, where today an unprecedented event has occurred. The Teen Titans, Jump City's defenders of truth and justice, are now protesting in front of us as we speak. Although only three of them are visible to us, Cyborg, Beast Boy and a newer member Gauntlet, they assure us that the others are away discussing terms with the men and women in charge of this fair city." And she would be right. Mostly. The green one, the tin man and the crooked protector stood there with placards and banners calling for reform in the system. "Live with me now is the Titan Beast Boy. Mr. Beast Boy, why are you and the others 'on strike'?"
"If you have noticed, every civil service has been paid for, except Super Heroes! The fire fighters, the ambulance workers, even the police, who seem to be now a purely optional function, get, at least, a pension and/or insurance."
"But you are heroes, you are not suppose to strike." She reassured herself.
"They say that to police officers, students, everyone. So this time..." He slammed the end of the placard down on the ground. "It's our turn."
"We need more time to learn things like the harpsichord!" Gauntlet shouted from behind.
"Some people say that you are not really working, but going out and having fun, and therefore do not get paid." She said as she replaced the microphone next to his mouth.
"Well I suppose the battle wounds are just for having fun. I suppose one of us nearly dying of blood loss is just for fun, and I suppose our home being destroyed every five minutes to save our city is 'just for fun' as well! Let me tell you something! This is totally weak!" He started to shout. Although these were partly his real feelings, it was all in good fun, and it was good to get it off his chest because no one would remember it next time around.
A boom was heard and Nigel once again hit the road area, this time getting a driver that gave a more sideways arc rather than an upward one, hitting his ball again. Beast Boy and the others watched it fly by. "Sweet shot. Anyway, what I was saying..."
In a near by art store, Noel Collins, AKA Savior, was doing something he never thought he might be able to do with the Shimmer. Making pottery, and doing terribly at it at that.
"Very good Mr Titan, are you sure you are not a natural?"
"Empty flattery won't get you anywhere." Noel looked at the mess in front of him as he started to use the Shimmer to guide the soon-to-be-pot's movement. Noel had never been very artistic, not in the practical sense at any rate, and now he had the time to try and bone up on his knowledge without worrying he would be interrupted because even if he was, it wouldn't matter. After five or ten minutes, a relative pot shape was starting to form from the pile of earthenware clay on the turntable.
(Just so you know, there are many different types of clay, the basic ones are laid out for you now. The white clay is Porcelain, very fine clay that is 100% pure and very hard and expensive to work with. The next clay is Terracotta, it's the clay that is made for roof tiles in Spanish villas and out door pots which turns orange/red when fired. The next is Earthenware and Stoneware. These are used for more general things and are the basic clays for schools and outdoor pots and sculptures. The last, and used for more study models, is Crank and has dried clay shards in it to give it strength. Why do I know this? Simple.
They forced it into my head at AVCE art and design...)
Again fate spat in Noel's face as an ever-familiar golf ball landed in the art store. Seeing as it passed through the window, through to the back and through his pot, it was a surprisingly efficient way to cause destruction, as Noel, startled, instinctively pressed his foot down on the pedal and...well, you've seen Ghost, think about it.
Covered in clay, Noel stood up. If anyone has ever used clay before, you will know that it does not go well with white or light colours, and seeing as the golf ball going forward, plus the energy put into the spinning of the pot caused the same effect as a 'Sonic Boom'. In simple terms, Savior was covered head to toe, and he didn't look good.
"Sorry Savior."
The golf ball came back out at full speed and hit Nigel right between the eyes, making a small 'Pok' noise as it did so, which caused the new Titan to step back a little holding the bridge of his nose.
"As a penalty, add five shots to your score." Noel replied grimly.
"But then I will not get the large winged creature I need to complete this game!"
"You do not actually get a Eagle, it's a term."
"I do not understand."
"I'll explain it to you later. Just take the shot from there." He pointed to where the ball landed, a few feet away. "What are you trying to do anyway?" He asked, removing some of the clay from his face and hair. It will take days to wash it out completely. But as he was in the time loop it didn't matter.
"I'm trying to find all the Titans and return home while golfing." He replied simply, grinning widely at his friend, who had the best 'I am not impressed' look on his face of anyone you have or have not seen.
"Golfing for Titans?"
"Yes, indeed it sounds like a strange concept, however I feel that it will improve not only my strength, but my knowledge of the city. It's also quite entertaining! So I may as well, how you humans say, go for broke?" He pulled out a one wood and swung, much to Noel's surprise, much harder than expected, making it fly. He watched were it landed and jumped away, leaving Noel to explain why a Titan had just demolished the front of a store in the name of entertainment.
Back onto the side of town in which we had started, and seeing that a few hours had passed, we find Raven in the middle of her large feast. The restaurant had been cleared out by this time as they could not support such a large order and have everyone else ordering this that and everything, which meant not only was Raven letting herself go for once, and enjoying it, she was also all on her own to relax and take it easy.
Unfortunately she saw the flaw in her plan. When she said she wanted everything on the menu, she didn't actually look at the size of the menu, which happened to be around 8 standard sized pages long, and so she now has in front of her a week's supply of food that all the Titans would have trouble on, all to herself.
And Beast Boy thought he had the ultimate overindulgence challenge...
So there she sat, feeling bloated and looking a little too full, trying her hardest to fit it all in. Unfortunately the expression 'hollow legs' didn't apply to poor Raven, so why on earth did she try this? Simple, because she didn't have a good enough reason not to. She finished off the last of the BBQ chicken legs and sat back while rubbing her aching stomach, trying to breath through the sauce covered mouth. Lets hope she doesn't do a repeat of this woman who accidentally killed herself because she ate so much her stomach expanded and stopped her diaphragm from moving, meaning she couldn't breath.
"You realize that if you do not finish, you WILL have to pay, Titan or not." The waitresses stood there, waiting with a bottle of cola, fresh napkins and a bill and mints (just in case). So Raven had one of three choices, 1) Finish the meal and throw up, 2) stall them for time till the loop starts again, or 3) pay up. The last one wasn't really a good choice but it may happen all the same.
Like with her other half, an all too familiar sound was approaching, a kind of sound made by a falling motor shell or, in this case, golf ball. Raven was far too groggy with all the food to even utter her favourite words, besides her cheeks were too full and tired from all the chewing. And so, out of the sky and making a hole in the ceiling, the familiar golf ball came crashing down, smashing into the table and hitting the edge of some plates, which not only covered the Titan with food, but the waitresses as well. Raven wiped her face clean and leaned back. Soon enough the ever curious Nigel wandered to the hole and looked in.
"Sorry about that Raven." He commented before making his merry way around to the door. Making a grand entrance, he searched for his golf ball.
"What are you wearing?" She managed to ask, looking over to see all the tacky golfing gear he wore.
"I thought this was traditional golfing equipment on this planet." He replied, turning, before stifling a laugh and regaining his composure. "Now answer me dear lady; what, pray tell, are you wearing?"
"I think it was a pepperoni pizza." She replied plainly, picking a bit of meat of the 'Raven' emblem and swallowing it whole.
"Aha! I have found the Sphere!" He clambered up onto the table, his claws slipping slightly on some spilt jelly while he placed his one wood in a bowl of sticky toffee pudding. "Nerts." He simply said before pulling out from his bag-o-tricks a sand-wedge and prepared to swing.
"WHAT the HELL do you think you are doing?!" The manager bellowed as he stormed into the room while Nigel was in mid swing, forcing the Blacktrinian to miss and fall over face first into the 7th course.
"I was winding up for a swing!" He shouted back, pepper sauce all down his face and stylish knitwear jumper. And so, he took the shot again, this time sending it as hard as he could in a random direction. "Now look what you made me do!" He shouted, jumping off the table. "I have to find that so if you excuse me." He barged past the manager, grabbing a napkin from one of the waitresses and stormed out, leaving Raven to try and continue on.
"A friend?" The manager asked, agitated as he approached the young Titan. Raven unfortunately was feeling far too sick to move so she sat there helpless as the now angered manager walked slowly up to her like some cheep suspense movie.
"Oh joy."
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Time had passed on with that particular day, and the elusive ball had only just been found. Obviously the over powered shot had been sloppy and hit somewhere in the middle of the city, but it was rather dense wherever it was. Day had become night, but still there was nothing. Nigel had to try and find the ball and hit it hard back to the Tower or he would never live it down after all the trouble he had caused, especially with Raven and Savior.
Luckily, all his searching paid off, and he found the ball on top of a small warehouse to the south. The only problem was it had been torn in half by something or other, maybe some kind of blade. Scalpel's ears fell a little at the annoyance of it all, all day he went to find the Titans and after all that he would have to take a relief shot.
"Sorry Mumbo."
His lowered ears perked up again at the sound of a very familiar voice, cold as ice but much younger than most voices that tone. The doctor took it upon himself to look into the situation and removed the soiled jumper he wore and climbed down the building to see, using his claws to act as climbing pegs.
"I finally found it!" He said. The figure's watch bleeped lightly and he growled. "I took too long. At least the others didn't find it before I did."
"Robin!"
The figure turned.
Flash
Nigel cut himself short while looking down Star's throat. She looked at him with a puzzled look on her face as he wandered around, almost as if he was trying to get his bearings. He then pointed in a direction and paused as Beast Boy wandered in with Cyborg, holding out a maternity swim suit for Star and a pair of black and white swim shorts.
"Who wants to go to the beach?!" They shouted as more of a statement than a question.
"I know where Robin is." Nigel said softly, double checking where he had gone in his head. A shocked look came upon them at this point, then a look of confusion.
"How the hell do you just know?" Cyborg asked indignantly, removing the sunglasses from his face and stared him down.
"Simple, when I was golfing I lost the spherical object you hit and when I found it again, it was cut in two. Now that I think about it, it had slight shards of red on it. But I heard a noise, and went down and I saw a long nosed, blue skinned man being dragged over to the machine on the blue prints by Robin."
"A long nosed, blue skinned man?" Starfire asked, getting who he meant.
"Mumbo!"
So it was a race against time, because from what Nigel had told them Robin had seen him just before the loop started over, which means Robin would be thinking what they were thinking and try to reach it with all due speed, and the winner would be whoever reached it first.
Robin, surprisingly, had three advantages. He was closer because he was on the main land when the loop started while the others were on the island. The second advantage was the fact that he was on his own and was quite fast on the ground and through the air, jumping from building to building, while the others had to move as a group and some of them couldn't fly, plus with the added bonus of a pregnant Tamaranean which meant not only did they go slower but the 'get a lift with the alien' card was no longer in play. And one final thing that helped Robin no end was, of course, was one of the trademarks traits of the Blacktrinians; apart from their massive strength, appearance and inability to swim.
And that was Nigel's lack of a sense of direction.
So Robin had enough time to reach the warehouse several times over, do what he needed to do to fulfil his plan, and get out of there.
But, finally, fate and karma decided to gang up on the fearless leader and throw a preverbal spanner in the works because Robin didn't factor in that Charm, Beast Boy's ever elusive girlfriend, playing hero to try and stop the magician which in turn made him late, but luckily not too late as he burst in the door and locked it tightly, sighing with relief.
"Thank god for small favours." He muttered to himself, leaning on the door, completely oblivious to who was there with him. With a swift flick of the wrist, Mumbo produced his wand and in another equally quick movement with some cliché magician's words, the Chronotron device that Robin had built miraculously appeared in a cloud of smoke. "With that little urchin out of the way I can finally find out what this device does. It looks pretty important." He pondered slightly before a shadow appeared behind him and grab his wand.
"More important than you know!" Robin yelled, as he snatched the wand, snapped it and threw it away. Nothing happened.
"Aha! But I have a better plan! My wand is only for show for I now posses Wand-like gloves!" He flexed his fingers as if to show off the white, pristine gloves on them, their stiff movement showed that there may have been wiring of sorts laced through them. Robin wasn't impressed, and with one quick swing of his staff, he knocked the middle aged man unconscious.
"Just shut up already." He almost pleaded, before making his way over to the machine. Finally his plan would come to fruition and life will be returned to normal. He started slowly by removing the panel on the base of the machine and pulled out a new piece that looked like it slotted into the gap that was now there. All he had to do now was get back to the Tower and enter his room, and then all that was left was to activate the machine and everything will work out fine.
At least that was the plan for when he turned around he slammed straight into the rest of the Titans, who stood there, Cyborg in the front, the rest fanning out in an arrow.
"Hey there Robin, what'cha doing?" Cyborg asked, a serious expression on his features, which all the Titans mirrored.
"Just disarming the bomb." He replied simply. "It won't do us any harm." He thumbed back, keeping the cool and calm expression on his face the whole time. The Titans' expressions never changed.
"If I believed that, I don't think we would have come all this way." The larger teen stated, staring down into the blank eyes of his leader, whose eyes just stared straight back. "What's the deal?" He asked again, this time wanting an answer he could believe.
"Well if you must know." He started. "I want to go back and change something that should never have happened."
"And what might that be, if we don't know already." Beast Boy said from next to him. Luckily Starfire wasn't there yet, so Robin could speak his mind.
"Teenagers are not supposed to have babies! Especially not mine while I'm part of a super hero group!"
"And you're only realizing this now, when you could have taken several precautions to avoid this earlier? You selfish son of a bitch." Savior spat, not caring that Nigel was in earshot. Then again considering the size of his hearing devices, he would be in earshot from surprisingly far away, but back to the point.
"Say what you will." Robin replied, not surprised at his outburst. "You just wait and see what happens when Raven goes off and decides to have a baby."
Savior hissed at this remark and was about to retort, but he was cut off by a faint growl.
"Foolish human! You need a male AND a female to have offspring! Raven can't have a baby by herself!" Nigel shouted, from the back.
"I can't say I blame your outburst, after all this is technically your fault." Robin folded his arms and stared at the back of the group. "I went through your medical records. You know why the Blacktrinians have to take over everything to survive? It's because in their food there is a plant, which I couldn't read the name of. This plant has medicinal properties of regeneration and fertility. It causes your reproduction cycle to go so fast that you need to conquer other planets simply for the space." He scowled. "In other words your breakfast made sure she became pregnant, despite the medicine on this planet to stop it!"
"How dare you!" Nigel shouted, unfortunately it was in his natural tongue so no one understood him, but they could tell he was annoyed all the same as he had started to lunge at their so called leader. Luckily for Robin, Noel and Rob where there to hold him back. "What a bag of ill truths! There was none of that plant in the meal! It only grows on the home world!"
"You leave him out of this! You would blame him if the world suddenly caught on fire." Beast Boy yelled, folding his arms.
"Err... BB? His blood acts like napalm." Cyborg whispered quietly.
"... Bad example." He paused. "This is between you and Starfire! Leave Nigel and Raven out of this! If she was having a baby she would deal with it in a cool and level headed manner! Like she sorts everything out!"
Raven, just so you know, wasn't there yet: she was helping Starfire fly there, as on her own she couldn't keep up and they didn't want to teleport, who knows what effect that would have on her. Better safe than sorry.
"Yeah, who died and made you god?" Gauntlet shouted in his never serious manner. For once, Savior agreed with him. Each part of the plan was coming together, slowly, but they didn't know what Robin planned to do about it.
"I am more than a god; I'm the leader of the Titans." He spat back at them, extending his staff into a battle ready position. "And no one can interrupt my plan, not even my friends!" The others did not move.
"Dear lord, how did it ever come to this?" Savior muttered.
"Man, listen to yourself!" Cyborg stepped forward, tensing for possible battle. "You sound like Slade."
Robin's eyes widened in anger as his grip tightened.
"I told you not to compare me to him! He's an insane psycho! I'm trying to right a wrong that should never have occurred!"
"By going back in time to kill a baby?" Beast Boy jumped in. "Or don't you remember the reason he built this machine? It was to go back in time and rewrite our histories for destroying his son's pride!"
"If anything Robin, with this idea you're at least as bad as he is." Savior said, walking forward through the crowd. "You didn't even ask Starfire if she wanted the baby. How do you think she will react when she finds out that you don't like it? You think she hasn't become attached to the thing inside her?"
"If Starfire has that baby is or not is not open for discussion."
"I think it is." A woman's voice said from behind him and stood there was Starfire with Raven. Star looked like she wanted to cry, but was fighting it back with every ounce of strength she had. The others knew that this was a matter between Robin and Starfire, so they silently agreed not to interfere. Too much.
"Star-" Robin began.
He was cut off by a slap that echoed through the room, leaving some of the Titans to cringe at both the sound and the position of Robin's head. She had hit him so hard he nearly fell over, and was still only on his feet because his armoured toes kept him on the ground. The reaction from the usually happy and tranquil Starfire shocked everyone in a visible way, even Raven showed a look of pure surprise. None of them had ever expected her to use such force, but it wasn't too surprising as she did just hear her own boyfriend say he wanted to kill her first child.
Now I hear you ask, considering what this had led to, why couldn't she just get an abortion? Well they tried but Nigel refused. Despite their high birth-rate, Blacktrinians believe having a child is a privilege and an honour, and should not be disturbed and when they went to human doctors they said it was far too late to do anything. This leads us to where we are now. It was a real shame that they took so long trying to convince the young doctor, as if they hadn't they might have been able to continue on.
"I want to know why!" She demanded, her hand still where it was after the slap for a moment or two, before it returned to her side, shaking violently and clenched in to a fist that could very well spark a star bolt at any moment. Robin looked back at her, more surprised than the others were, and now sporting a large red mark on his face. Her angry expression looked like it could change at any moment into full-on tears.
"It's just not right Star." He said, his tone much softer, as he withdrew his staff.
"Why?" She asked, her aggressive standing also coming down a few pegs, but her never blinking eyes, usually soft and caring, were now like daggers piercing her boyfriend to the core.
"You have your whole life ahead of you, it's not right to have a baby at your age." Robin almost pleaded with her, trying to make her understand the truths behind it all, but this line of argument was not working.
"I have a feeling that isn't the only reason." Raven commented plainly, trying to force Robin into saying what he felt, not just what he knew. He growled at her intervention but nodded all the same. Some times, the truth hurts.
"It's true." He paused and, double-checking that Mumbo was unconscious and the windows were closed and covered, he took off his mask so he could look at her in the eyes. "I would be happy being Tim, teenage father, but I can't deal with being Robin, teenage father. People can't just only use it as a way to get to me, but also I think this baby might tear the Titans apart. The constant distractions, the wake up calls in the middle of the night, all the hardships that arise from having a child. So I built this to try and keep us together." He said, gesturing towards the device.
"Oh I get it now. You rebuilt this sucker in order to go back and prevent you two from having the baby in the first place, by any means possible." Cyborg stated, finally realizing what he had planned to do.
"Sugar coating the truth with noble intentions." Nigel stated, his arms folded and his back to Robin. Gauntlet, actually doing something that might turn out to be half sensible, turned the alien around to face the rest of the group and walked out front, slowly and casually like he always did;
"Well then, now that we know what's what, I vote we try and put this whole thing behind us. After all, at this point, words aren't any good."
"Stay out of it Gauntlet, please just stay out of it. This is not a situation that favors you." Noel begged to himself quietly, hoping that he would just back away now that he had said his piece. He didn't.
"We now know what he wants to do, and we know in our mind it's wrong." He continued. Robin was about to reply but he cut him off "Now before you start going on about how you were right, let me just put something to you A- Capi-tan. You said it yourself that you were taught to respect life, and, if possible, never take one." He started to move in his oh-so erratic way, his arms outstretched and upwards, as if to emphasise his point. "Yet that thing in there-" He paused as he lightly poked Starfire's stomach. "Is a living, breathing thing. Okay it isn't breathing yet, otherwise it would drown but you know what I mean! So technically, you are going against what you believe in." He finished. "Beat that!" He re-finished in his typical mannerism, looking so tempted to do the John Cena 'you can't see me' taunt. He couldn't just be serious and let it end like that.
But he did get through to him, and that was what he was trying to do. He even surprised Savior at his outburst. Fairly intellectual. If he was like that all the time they might actually get along. Maybe.
Robin seemed to be forced deep into thought. Did it strike a nerve in Fearless?
"Oh." Starfire said lightly, holding her stomach. They looked up at her, wondering if something was wrong, but there was something on her face that they hadn't seen all day. A smile. She made her way slowly towards Robin, her hands never leaving her stomach and the soft, loving smile never leaving her face. "The baby kicked, want to see?" With alarming speed, she reached out and took his hand and placed it onto her 'bump'. Robin was speechless for a moment or two.
Before he pulled his hand away with a sharp impunity that he didn't want to show. He almost had a snarl on his face as he turned from her. Starfire's face, less than five seconds ago a warm, loving smile, now wore a sharp state of shock as she realized that her boyfriend had just snatched his hand back away from her.
"Sorry, but as a leader I must be unwavering in my decision." He said. He started to walk away.
"So that's it then?" Raven asked, straightening her cloak. "Robin, the fearless leader of the Titans is just going to walk away?"
There was no response.
"I hope you realise that these actions have torn you away from the group you were so willing and desperate to protect." Nigel spat. Again with no reply. This just angered the alien more, as he kicked down the door and stormed out, his thick cape fluttering in the wind. One by one, the Titans followed him, leaving Robin alone in the world of his own devising.
"It will be better this way." He said as the last of them left. Raven stayed till last.
"It seems like so long ago that we formed this team, when I formed this team. Yet I felt that you could be the leader we needed, you had compassion and a level head, alongside training and experience. What happened to that young man I asked to lead me all those years ago?" She finally asked, before she escorted the expectant Kory out. The princess looked back quickly to see him, but all she saw was his back.
Now all that was left was to wait for the 'new future'.
But something happened to Robin, something unexplainable. The Titans had struck a nerve in him, in a way he couldn't describe. He was having doubts, second thoughts about his wonderful plan to right the universe.
You sound like Slade.
These thoughts played on Robin's mind like a man playing on a string instrument, steady but relentlessly. He wasn't like Slade. Slade was a merciless tyrant, whose every intention spawned hate and violence. But the thoughts kept playing on his mind. What made him different from any religious fanatic? Sticking to a single mindedness that only comes when you believe in something so blindly you would die for it, or perhaps even kill someone else for it.
In that sense what made him different from any terrorist? A man who wants to kill to put forward his ideas. But he wasn't killing, was he? No, of course not. Killing is when you stop someone from living by artificial means, he wasn't. He was going back in time to try and prevent an event that was never supposed to happen, so he wasn't killing. Instead he was preventing.
Then again,some devote Catholics thought that using any form of contraception was a way of killing unborn children, so perhaps he was killing? If that is so, then every time in a James Bond movie where 007's next lady love is killed is one extreme form of contraception...
But he wasn't doing this for himself. No. He was doing it for Kory and the team. If he didn't stop this, then the team would suffer. His team. The Teen Titans, protectors of the good and decent people of Jump City, and the world. Protecting people who were unable to protect themselves. A teenage father like that isn't decent. Not a good image to young children out there at all.
This was the thin line between his life and TV. But if this was a Soap Opera, then Savior would be killed next week and Raven would date Beast Boy, who secretly reveals he's gay...
Too many Soap Operas...
But what good was a superhero team with a baby on the way? "Oh excuse me while I just go feed the baby." What super villain in the world would wait for you to feed and change a young one? Well except that crazy Evil John person who robbed the bank a few years back, he would probably wait quite calmly.... now what was Robin doing? Reminiscing over old villains? Next he'll start thinking about all the damage the Lord did...
He sighed at the thought of what the Lord had done. So much death and destruction, so much pain and hate...
His thoughts drifted back over to the new Titans, Rob's ever present smile and jokes, Noel's knowledge, and even Nigel's loyalty. Even if he hated to admit it, they had given the team a new lease of life.
Perhaps it would be good to have a little life in the world?
Robin looked at his watch. It was 8:45 pm, one hour exactly before history would be changed forever. His thoughts drifted back to the villains that he had encountered. From the downright dumb, ranging though the psychotic and deadly, all the way up to the Lord, who was in a class of his own. Was he, the leader of the heroes of this town, really as bad as all these enemies?
The answer hit him like a brick. He was. If he went back in time and stopped this from happening, he would be as bad, if not worse than some of these villains. Killing a child because he didn't want it? Didn't the Lord kill a child because he didn't want it in his 'perfect world'? How can Robin do the same and not call himself either a villain or a hypocrite?
Lifting up his com link, he spoke in to it.
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"So. We're back. What did you want to tell us?" Cyborg asked as all of the Titans stood in front of the red and black costumed man. There was a pause. Not wanting to give up on their leader entirely, the Titans had gone back to the tower and waited. Luckily, their waiting had paid off.
"I was thinking." Another pause as he walked, or rather paced a little, his boots coming down hard on the cold surface of the warehouse. The Titans watched him, as he strode, each with a different expression than the last. Noel and distastefulness, Rob and boredom, Nigel and anger, Raven and calmness, Kory and sadness, Victor and hesitance and finally Gar and mockery. Each person surrounded the Teen Wonder, going in a circle using the device as the last link in the chain. With no idea how it worked, they left it alone.
"And what where you thinking about?" Raven questioned, looking straight at him.
"About the villains we faced." He turned his back on them, in thought. Was this intentional? The Blacktrinian and the Tin-man readied themselves just in case. Who knows if, or maybe when, this man, this highly trained teenager, would turn around and attack. "I was thinking about what you said." Another pause. "I'm not like Slade." He placed his gloved hands behind his back, as Kory started to look confused.
"How so?" Her innocence shining through, wanting to hear out Tim, wanting to hear out her boyfriend despite all he had done.
"I don't want to kill, and therefore I don't have too." He turned towards the group once more, with something in his hand. It was a metallic shape with what looked like a plug to slot in to a motherboard. "So I choose not to." It was the add-on to make the Chronotron Destabiliser work to how it was supposed to. "I want us to be a team again." He dropped it on the floor and crushed it with his metal clad boot. "But we may need a new room." He smiled as the others relaxed.
"Wonderful! Joyous news!" Starfire shouted as she sprinted for her boyfriend and clung on to him for dear life. The others laughed then dispersed, not wanting to be around if things got mushy.
"What made you change?" She asked, staring in to the eyes of the father of her children, now and maybe in the future. His mask was still off and so he also gazed in to her beautiful green eyes.
"I didn't, I just remembered who I was, who we where." He laughed lightly, as she wrapped her arms around his neck and smiled as they leaned closer, their lips trying to embrace despite the difficulty posed by her new size. He could feel her heart beat as he reached down to kiss her gently.
"Off! Turn off! Open Sesame! Hocus Pocus!" Rob was currently shouting at the device with the others huddled around it.
"Should I get a big stick of pain?" Nigel suggested.
"No Nigel, hitting it won't work..."
Of course the rest of the Titans could be such pigs and philistines when it came to tender moments such as the one just past. Placing on his mask, Robin then turned to the Titans who tried, with little or no success, to stop the time looper. Starfire blushed lightly as she brushed her hair behind her ear and went to help.
"How about reversing the polarity?" Gauntlet shouted, poking the Chronotron Destabiliser.
"What will THAT do?" Noel asked, standing up a little straighter.
"It always works on Star Trek..." He replied, folding his arms.
"Right, where do we get some polarity?" The resident Blacktrinian asked, more confused now than he ever was.
"I think it already has polarity." Gauntlet called, almost proudly at his achievement.
"But were must we obtain some in case of later encounters with machines with no polarity?"
"Nigel just shaddup." Savior said, starting to get a little bit of a headache.
"I vote we blow it up." Beast Boy called, having said nothing for the past five minutes.
"Won't destroying the time machine wreak havoc on the space-time continuum?"
"Not in any science fiction movie I've ever seen." Both Robert and Gar stated at the same time.
"Yes the documented evidence is even that happened in the 80's with a Delorian and a man called Marty Mcfly."
Again the resident alien showed his lack of understanding.
"Just shoot me now..." Raven was starting to get her own headache that you would need an elephant tranquilizer to cure.
"Well, how about we just press the big button labelled 'off?'" Noel asked incredulously, because by this time he had gone beyond the point of caring.
"Seems like a plan... where is it?" Cyborg asked, fiddling around its base. Robin walked over and pressed the large button labelled off on the back and sidestepped. The tragic thing was that Savior had meant it as a joke. Why on earth is there an off button on what was basically a doomsday device?
"I say we smash it!" Gauntlet shouted as he stole Nigel's glaive from him. "Give me a boost!" Nigel and Kory shrugged and the two aliens threw him in the air, only to be brought straight back down to the ground by its weight of the bladed end. And luckily, for him anyway, he landed on the device which broke his fall... and probably an arm. Noel flinched slightly.
"I vote we fix the machine to go back and stop him from ever joining." Noel sighed. "Sometimes I half wish reality would collapse."
"Well, reality didn't collapse. You lucked out big time."
Maybe the Titans breaking up over a baby would have been the most rational option?
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gahhhhh
Nigel: Forgive him; he's drained from that chapter... One draft, two re- writes and too many cokes to count.
Jedi: Thanks to all those who have reviewed so far! I owe you all!