Poor Twisted Me Chapter 8

Guess what! In an effort to be more interactive with my beloved reviewers, I am holding a contest! Each chapter I will post three questions. They could be about the story or be about anything. Anyone that gets three out of three correct will get the chapter dedicated to them, and everyone that gets two out of the three will get an honorable mention. Everybody that gets none of the three will have ROCKS THROWN AT THEM!!!

This chapter's questions:

1) What show was referenced during Fenrir's resurrection?

2) From where did I get Fenrir's name?

3) How many stories have I written prior to this one?

Okay! Time to answer reviews!

ScarletAngel68- In a perfect world, that would be true. But, the Titans don't live in a perfect world. You'll just have to see what happens... Yeah, I saw a bunch of stickers like that in a magazine my friend had. Some were pretty funny. And you can't have Beast Boy as your boyfriend! He belongs to Raven, at least in this story. Don't worry; he will eventually get to go mano-a-mano with Izevm. But not for a while!

Rukato86- Yeah, having a heat stroke was kind of funny. It wasn't fun, but it was funny. Heehee. Yeah, Izevm is a slime ball. But I promise you all that before this story is over, Beast Boy will get to kick Izevm's ass.

Warprince2000- Back to the same thing again! Maybe it's because it wasn't as good as the last...

PrincessCat- YAAAAY!!! I GOT MY BROWNIE POINTS BACK!!! Hell yeah, System of a Down is awesome. My favorite song from them is "Pictures". It's hella weird, but still hella awesome. Hella hella hella.

Metallikid- Yeah, giving Orion a sandwich fetish was a fun part to throw in. Who knows, maybe I'll make Lyrim obsessed over carrots...Actually, I won't. But it would have been funny nonetheless. Yeah, my spellchecker is a little fucked up, so that extra 'd' found its way in. As for "Battery", you can't get them all to like a story. So just stick to who does like it and give them what they want. And above all else, make sure to piss all your flamers off! They don't have to like it, but you can still make them suffer for it!!!

Moezy-chan- Really? I thought it was. I had originally intended it to be one big fluff, but I had writer's block, and I ended up taking a different route. But it still worked out.

Kestrel- Yeah, we all hate those preppy IHOP waitresses. Almost as much as those preppy Denny's waitresses...God, they're all over the place...And yeah, there will hopefully be fluff in this chapter. But I still have to make the chapter fit.

Guest- God, everybody hates Izevm! Which is good, because I PROMISE ALL MY READERS THAT EVENTUALLY BEAST BOY AND IZEVM WILL FIGHT! But I'll stop there so I don't give away too much of the plot.

Voices-in-my-head0304- Yeah, the Internet sure can be a bitch sometimes. It's okay; I still love you like I do with all my reviewers. As for the names, they will all be part of the contests I will be holding. I will give the answers on the next chapter, so you will find out where I got Fenrir from in the next chapter. Izevm and Lyrim are a little harder...actually, their damn near impossible if you don't know cryptology. Which I do. Heehee.

Darkfire- Yeah! BBRae forever! By the way, my favorite color is black, so I will graciously accept your 'black' roses.

On with the story!


-Titans Tower-

Izevm continued, "...I don't know."

All the Titans groaned. Robin spoke up, "So, you're telling me that we have no way to defeat these guys?"

"Not that I know of, no."

Cyborg was about to say something when it started raining intensely. The winds outside picked up speed, causing the trees outside to bend and twist. The lights flickered, and died.

"Well this just sucks!" Beast Boy said, unable to see a foot in front of him in the pitch-black darkness. Starfire lit up the room with a starbolt, allowing the Titans and Izevm to see clearly.

A sudden pounding from the basement came. A couple seconds later, Dave, Bobbo, and Ben entered the living room.

"Damn, it can get creepy down there," Dave said. Looking around, he whistled. "Hurricane must've struck a power line. We could be powerless for quite a while."

Robin, who was unfamiliar with Beast Boy's band, was unsure of what to do. "Umm, do we know you?"

Ben looked at Robin funny, and then snapped his fingers. "That's right, Beast hasn't introduced you yet."

Robin scratched his head. "Beast?"

"That's me," Beast Boy said, grinning. "I know, stupid. Robin, this is Dave, Bobbo, and Ben. I'm in their band."

Robin raised an eyebrow. "Since when have you been in a band?"

"Since a couple weeks ago."

"That might explain your new tattoos and all that metal sticking out of your head."

Raven interrupted them before they could argue further. "We have better things to do than argue. Since we're going to be stuck here for a while, let's all find something to do. Robin, get acquainted with these guys, because they're not going to be able to leave until the hurricane's over."

Beast Boy was suddenly struck with an idea. He watched Cyborg get up off the sofa, and decided now was a good time for revenge.

Beast Boy stuck his foot out in front of Cyborg, who didn't notice it in the darkness. You can imagine how it went from there.

Raven couldn't help but giggle as Cyborg tripped and fell, literally, flat on his face. As the hybrid looked around to see who had tripped him, he was answered with, "Hey, you pulled my earring."

Raven walked down the hall, intending to go to her room. Sure, it was the creepiest place in the entire Tower, but it was where she wanted to be most right now. However, the sheer darkness didn't make for an easy trip.

"Ow!" she yelled as she bumped into a wall. She was rubbing her head when she felt a calloused hand grab hers. She immediately recognized it as Beast Boy's.

"Need a little help?" he asked. Raven nodded and said, "Mm-hm."

So Beast Boy clasped her hand and slowly led her into the hallway, since he already knew the layout by heart anyway. Before long, Raven found herself back in the sanctity of her room.

"Thanks, Beast Boy," she said, and lightly pecked him on the cheek. Beast Boy grinned, even though Raven couldn't see it in the dim candle light of her room.


"So, you're telling me you guys got your ass kicked by a midget with a beard, a dog with leathery skin, and a creature with a sandwich fetish?" Ben said incredulously. Robin groaned. It was still true, save its gross under-exaggeration.

"Basically, yeah," Robin replied. He sighed, still not sure which was Ben and which was Dave.

"I think I'm going to work on that riddle some more," Robin said, and got up. Bobbo's head snapped up, and he asked, "What riddle?"

Robin answered, "Lyrim left us some kind of code, and I can't crack it. It makes no sense."

Bobbo lit up. "Can I see it?"

Robin raised an eyebrow, seeing as the last person he expected to figure the code out was a death-metalhead named "Bobbo".

"Sure, I guess." Robin fished the parchment out of his pocket (I don't know if he has pockets in the show, but for all intents and purposes, he does in my story) and handed it to Bobbo.

After a couple seconds of looking over it, Bobbo said, "Well, he's obviously not heavily experienced in cryptography."

"What do you mean?" Robin asked. Bobbo looked over at him and said, "He's using very simple ciphers here. He's even telling you which ones to use. The only part he made any effort to disguise was they key."

"But it said 'evil was the key'," Robin said, now thoroughly confused. Bobbo gestured for him to sit down, which he did.

"This might take a while to explain, so pay attention. The line 'A fallen emperor will begin your quest' is referring to simplest of all substitution ciphers-the Caesar Cipher. In the Caesar Cipher, you basically move the letters down a certain number of spots, with a key telling you the number of spots to move the letter down. For instance, suppose the key was 2. Then 'a' would become 'c', 'b' would become 'd', and so forth. Do you follow?"

Robin nodded. Bobbo took a breath and continued.

"To apply the Caesar Cipher to those letters he gave us, we need a key. It states that evil is the key, but we need a number between 1 and 26 as a key. Therefore, the word 'evil' is not a valid key. He is most likely using what's called the Multiplication Cipher, in which letters equal numbers, like a=1, b=2, et cetera. So, you would just convert each of the letters of 'evil' to numbers. E equals 5, V equals 22, I equals 9, and L equals 12. So, evil would be the number '522912'."

Robin butted in, "But I thought the key had to be between 1 and 26?"

Bobbo nodded. "That's true. He's probably using what's known as the Euclidean Algorithm, where you just basically find the greatest common denominator between two numbers. This guy is most likely splitting the number down the middle and using those numbers. In this case, that would be 522 and 912."

Robin's head was spinning. This was a little too much to take in at one time. But he just nodded his head and Bobbo continued.

"So the greatest common denominator between those two numbers would be..." the last sentence trailed off as he scribbled some speedy math down on his hand with a pen.

"...Six."

"So, the key is six? Are you sure?" Robin asked. Bobbo nodded and said, "Yep. This guy, Lyrim was his name? Yeah, Lyrim obviously doesn't know much about cryptography, as I said before, since he's using the most basic stuff here. So, there are not many other paths to take."

"Moving on, you would move the letters down six spaces, since the key is six. So, it would change from 'MMUQC' to 'RRZVH'. As for the next line, we don't need a key. 'Atbash will continue but not the rest' is referring to the Atbash Cipher, which is very simple. The letters are simply put into reverse positions in the alphabet. Meaning that 'a' would become 'z', 'b' would become 'y', and so on. So, 'RRZVH' would equal...'IIAES'."

"That still leaves two lines though..." Robin said disappointedly. Bobbo nodded and said, "And these are the hardest ciphers out of the four."

"God damnit."


"Beast Boy...you can leave now..." Raven said, realizing Beast Boy had not yet left her room. Beast Boy's shoulders sunk, as if he was disappointed. Raven saw this, and interpreted it as a sign he wanted to be around her.

As Beast Boy got up from her bed, she held her hand out and said, "Wait...you can stay...if you want."

'Whoa...talk about mood swings,' Beast Boy thought to himself. But he didn't complain; hell, he got to be around Raven more.

Raven giggled slightly and poked the bolt in his eyebrow. For some reason, she liked it better than his other piercings. Beast Boy chuckled and pushed her playfully.

They continued amiably messing around until Beast Boy found is head resting lazily on Raven's lap. He suddenly had a flashback to his... meeting...with a certain brick-red emotion.

"I'm tired," Beast Boy said, yawning. Raven began playing with his hair absentmindedly, flakes of hair gel floating onto her lap. Beast Boy swatted her hand away teasingly and said, "Hey, you'll mess up my hair."

Beast Boy yawned again, but this time his eyes closed, and he began snoring. Raven couldn't help but smile.

"You're so damn cute when you're asleep," Raven said to the latent Beast Boy.


"So, I came to Jump City a couple years ago, since Metropolis is no place for an aspiring musician who tunes his guitar lower than drop-A," Dave finished.

Cyborg nodded. He had never been into metal, but somehow her felt perfectly affable with this guy, despite his intimidating look.

"My friend Ben Howe and I started our band Fallen Cherub about six months ago. At first it was me on drums, him on bass and vocals, and this other guy named Kevin Hogan on lead guitar. But then we found a better bassist, Bobbo, so Ben switched to rhythm guitar. But then Kevin got all 'born again' and left. Then Beast Boy came, and here we are now. We've made a couple songs, but mostly will still play other people's stuff."

Cyborg nodded and laughed, recalling the earring pulling incident. "Yeah, Beast Boy plays his guitar really loud. It can really get on your nerves sometimes."


Robin looked on intently as Bobbo continued scribbling down letters in a piece of paper.

"'Of or relating to a line'...God that's a really crappy line. This guy's a horrible poet," Bobbo commented as he read the next line. "He's definitely using what's called the Linear Cipher, which is kind of tricky. I'm not going to explain it, because it would take waaaaaaaaaay too long."

"How do you know all of this?" Robin asked, the question having been suppressed for a while now.

Bobbo grinned. "I majored in cryptology at Gotham U. But I ended up moving, 'cause there's no work for a cryptographer in Gotham City. Batman always did the stuff that was real heavy and the police did everything that was open. So, there was no middle ground for me."

Robin nodded. Bobbo scribbled a bunch of numbers and letters down and said, "Okay...if he's still using the key 6, then it would come out to...J-J-Z-E-C. Okay, one to go."

Robin read off the paper for him. "'And a French cryptographer will prove your mind...'"

Bobbo blinked. "Vinigre Cipher. Made by the French cryptographer John Vinigre."

"How do we solve it?" Robin asked.

"Like the Linear Cipher- too long to explain. We need a key that's a word- I'll assume it's evil. Okay let's see here..." Bobbo's voice trailed off, and he once again began writing furiously. All of it meant nothing to Robin.

"Wait...something must be wrong..." he said. "Maybe I used the wrong keyword...maybe I did the algorithm wrong..."

"What?" Robin said, worried. If all that work didn't solve it, they were pretty much shit out of luck.

"I got 'forty' as an answer..." Bobbo said, unsure of him self. Robin sighed in relief. Forty could still mean something.

"Maybe forty is longitude or latitude," Robin said, encouraged. Bobbo shook his head. "Forty longitude is a very long way away, Robin. So is forty degrees latitude. Unless..."

Robin looked up. "What?"

Bobbo explained, "There's a place in the middle of the forest outside of Jump City that some arsonist burned the word 'forty' in a long time ago. For some reason, the trees didn't grow back. So the word 'forty' has always been there, and the name stuck."

Robin snapped his fingers. "That's it."

Bobbo looked concerned. "You sure you should go after this guy? He did kick your ass last time. How do you know he won't do it again?"

Robin frowned. "I'll have to talk to Izevm about that one. Maybe if we can separate Fenrir and Lyrim, we can pick them off one by one. But Fenrir can be resurrected, so I don't know how we're going to do this. But we have to go after them now, or they'll destroy Jump City. Again."

Bobbo made an intriguing look. "Maybe Ben can help you out. He wanted to be in the military ever since I knew him, and he's always been fascinated by strategizing."

Robin grinned. "So you have a cryptologist, an aspiring military strategist, and a superhero all in one band?"

Bobbo grinned back. "Yeah, plus the fact that Dave majored in psychology at Jump City High."

Robin laughed. He decided maybe Ben could help him out, but he didn't know where he was. Bobbo saw his confusion, and said, "Ben's over talking with Starfire in the living room."

Robin instinctively tensed up, but assured himself Starfire would never cheat on him. He got up, and slapped Bobbo a high-five. "Thanks a bunch. You've been so much help."

Bobbo grinned. "You're not too bad yourself."


"Beast Boy...wake up," Raven said, the green shape shifter having slept on her lap for a couple minutes. She lightly nudged his head lightly, careful not to hurt him by accident.

He stirred and awoke, yawning. "Good morning, Ms. Anderson," he said, still in his dream. Raven pushed him lightly and said, "It's me, stupid."

Beast Boy rubbed his eyes and said, "Oh...I knew that."

"Sure you did."

Beast Boy reached over to Raven and pecked her on the cheek. Raven smiled and pressed her lips to his. Beast Boy kissed her back and snaked his arms around he waist, pulling her once again as close to him as possible. They had no idea how long they kissed; but all they know is that when Robin yelled out "Team meeting!" they really felt like hurting him. The two aficionados parted, not wanting to leave each other's company.

Upon reaching the living room where team meetings were usually held, Beast Boy found his friends seated next to the Titans as well.

Robin sat in the center of the couch, with Ben seated next to him.

"What's this all about?" Raven asked dully, masking her adoration from minutes ago. She sat down next to Beast Boy at the end of the couch.

Robin grinned, and said, "Ben's going to tell us how we can defeat Lyrim."

Izevm walked in, looking as if he had came from nowhere. "Impossible. Lyrim alone can kill you all, as can Fenrir. The two of them would run circles around all us," he said, slightly irritated. "Not to mention that Orion is still bound to Lyrim."

Robin frowned at Izevm's pessimism. "That's what you think."

"I don't think. I know."

Robin sighed. "Sit down anyway."

Izevm made no reply, only sat down next to Raven. Beast Boy's upper lip curled slightly in a sign of disgust, but that was the only sign of antipathy he let show. Raven, however, made no effort to shield her discomfiture. She unsubtly edged towards Beast Boy and rested her head on his shoulder, trying to send a message to Izevm.

The umbrager ignored this and focused his attention on Robin.

Robin cleared his throat and said, "Okay, Ben here is going to explain to us how we might be able to defeat Lyrim and Fenrir."

Ben nodded and began, "Alright. From the sound of it, Lyrim and Fenrir use each other to individually pick off each one of you. Never all at once. So, they rely heavily on teamwork. You defeated Fenrir before, when he was by himself. So if we can manage to get rid of either one, we can pick of the other one much more easily."

"However, Fenrir's resurrection abilities still pose a problem. I figured that instead of killing him, we incapacitate him. Beast Boy, you can change into a snake and poison him, for example. Paralyze him, poison him, knock him out, it doesn't matter. As long as he is unable to harm anything, it'll do."

"But the biggest problem if Orion. From what I've been told, he has hella strong powers."

Raven smirked. Now she knew where Beast Boy had picked up the expression 'hella' from.

Ben took a deep breath, and seeing as there were no interruptions, he pressed on. "I also understand he has a strong passion...for...sandwiches...weird. Anyway, since Lyrim is the one who gives him sandwiches, if we can dispose of him, Orion will go away. Then we can focus on destroying him."

Izevm interrupted, "Impossible. Lyrim controls Orion. Simply separating him from Orion won't do jack shit."

Ben raised an eyebrow at Izevm's pomposity. "Well, Mr. I-Know-Everything-So Everybody-Suck-My-Balls, I was about to get into that. I realize that you think that Lyrim controls Orion. I also realize that Lyrim needs Orion."

Izevm snorted. "Ridiculous. Lyrim doesn't need anything. He merely summoned Orion because he was flaunting his powers."

"Is that so? Tell me, why did Lyrim choose to flaunt his powers by summoning something so powerful? I understand that Orion could destroy the world if he or his master wishes it. Then why hasn't he done it yet?"

Izevm was about to say something, but Ben cut him off. "I'll tell you why. Lyrim can't completely control Orion. Sure, he can make him destroy towns, but Orion acts of his own will, following Lyrim's orders only when there's an incentive for him. Most of the time it's more sandwiches. And I don't know if you realize it, but Orion has no feelings. Not in the sense that he has no conscience; I mean that he is only driven by primal instincts, following the age-old philosophy of 'kill or be killed'. So if Lyrim does anything that Orion doesn't like, Lyrim is fucked, because Orion will kill him without a second thought. If Lyrim gets separated from Orion, why will he care? Unless there's an incentive, he doesn't give a shit about Lyrim."

Izevm considered it, and knew he was right. But he still wouldn't admit his spuriousness.

Ben continued, "However, we can't put all of this together at once. If we try to separate Fenrir from Lyrim while they are together, you'll soon find out of there is a God or not. So, we set a trap."

Izevm objected to this. "How do you know Lyrim is not the one setting the trap?"

Ben cracked his knuckles and replied, "I considered that. I ran a bunch of scenarios through my head, and decided the best way to spring a trap without getting trapped ourselves. I also made a backup plan, if he predicted our trap. What we do is..."


Haha!!!! Cliffhanger!!!! Okay, remember to at least try the trivia, cuz if you get none right you get rocks thrown at you!!!

Next Chapter: Ben finishes telling the Titans the plan, and they set out. Izevm acts like an ass some more, but that's okay, since everybody hates him now anyway. The apocalyptic showdown between the Titans and Lyrim, Fenrir, and Orion begins!

This is Mud signing out.