Disclaimer: I do not own the Teen Titans. I only own my characters. TITANSTITANSTITANSTITANSTITANSTITANSTITANSTITANS
The room was disheveled, in a homey sort of way. There were a few old, but, judging by the amount of people crammed onto them, still comfortable couches and chairs grouped in the corner. A kitchen lay off to one side, as did a screening room, where a number of people gathered. A couple persons also just meandered leisurely through the room, looking bored, while others walked a little faster, apparently on the way to, or in the process of, doing something they considered important.
But the actual individuals were a feast for the eyes. There was a little girl, no more than eight, who had the ears, eyes, tail, occasional fur, whiskers, and teeth of a tiger cub. She was, at the moment, pouncing on a rubber dingle ball on a string. The string was being tugged by a grinning man in his early twenties. He wore only shorts and sandals; almost all of the rest of his visible skin was covered by tattoos. In the kitchen, a lizard-boy teen was dumping a glass of water upon the head of a rather enraged sixteen-year-old girl. As the water dripped down her glowering face and onto her shirt, her skin began to scale over. Her eyes enlarged, the irises becoming entirely black while the boy laughed in the girl's face. A smug look replaced the girl's angry one, and she began to sing a wordless melody. The boy's expression changed from one of mocking to one of dazed wonder. He stopped, completely under the girl's control. She smirked, then tackled him, yelling something incoherent and pummeling him, rudely waking him from the trace her siren's song had put him in.
A young man with pure white hair was having a conversation a girl about his age with hair the color of fire. The odd thing about these two was, as they took turns listening to each other, sparks of electricity would leap from the man's hand to the girl's, and small flames from her to him. Others within the room had something remarkable about them as well, but before they could be described, something began to appear on the floor.
A silver circle was first, then a triad, then the appearance of a rune. A boy of about twelve or so years was the first to notice as he glanced up from his sketch pad.
"Heads up!" he called. "Kali's comin'!" Dozens of pairs of eyes flicked toward the floor. A few people had to scramble out of the way as one final symbol drew itself on the floor and the brightness of the marks intensified. There was a flash, and when the light faded, Kali Logan stood where the symbols had been.
The room inhabitants only gazed at the newcomer for a moment before returning to their previous activities. Kali's spells were commonplace in The Haven. The teenager stepped away from the site of her transportation spell and headed toward the large set of doors at on end of the large room. But before she got even halfway, a girl a few years her junior jogged up to her.
"Listen, I'm sorry I called you a witch yesterday," Tielar, also known as Helldawn, said apologetically. "It was rude. I know you hate it." Kali shrugged.
"'S ok. I overreacted." She grinned. "You know how my temper is." Tielar beamed back at Kali and sighed in relief.
"Yeah. Well, gotta go. Sorry again!" And with that the girl trotted back to her group of friends. Kali shook her head. Although Tielar wielded the deadly ability to unmake, she was as juvenile as any other twelve-year-old when not acting as Helldawn.
As Kali exited the previous room and entered into another, she was met by two impatient faces.
"Kaaaaaaaaaaliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!" whined Dylanne, one of Kali's best friends, "you're late!"
"And Vanth wouldn't start the choosing until everyone got here!" Finn complained, looking like a pouty four-year-old.
"Well, sorry! Grandpa wanted me to read to him for a while, and my spells aren't exactly speedy, you know!" the besieged teen justified. She grinned suddenly and grabbed Finn in a headlock and began to give him a fierce noogie. "That's what Cronos here is on the team for! To give me more time!"
"Well, at least you're here now!" Dylanne replied, yanking Finn loose of Kali's hold and latching on to her friend's arm. "Let's go!" she cried, tugging Kali toward a woman who had just entered to room. Kali, unable to find a smart retort, found herself glancing over Dylanne's fashion choices.
"Why in the world is it that, when you're Delusion, you wear all black, but when you're just Dylanne, you're such a pink freak?" she asked, attempting to yank out of the vice-like grip that was on her arm.
"It's not all black," Dylanne replied airily.
"Really?" Kali snorted, eyeing the pink newsie cap her friend wore with distaste. She like purple. Dark purple.
"Yes. There's a red bit on my hat, now come on!"
Dylanne and Finn marched Kali up to The Haven's administrator, Vanth, a mage just as Kali was, only without the demon DNA.
"She's here now; can we start?" the ever-eager beaver Finn wanted to know. "Can we? Huh?" Vanth rolled her eyes, but nevertheless replied with a nod of the head. "Yes!" Finn leaped into the air with extreme exuberance, then raced off to announce over the P.A. system that Kali was finally here and that the choosing would start soon.
"I could've done that myself," Vanth muttered. "That boy has too much energy and time on his hands. Literally." Kali nodded sympathetically.
"I know. He drives me crazy, too. At least you're on a team by yourself." Vanth shrugged.
"It can be both a blessing and a curse at times," she replied as the three of them (Vanth, Kali, and Dylanne) re-entered the room Kali had left only minutes ago. "Now shoo, you two."
Dylanne and Kali raced over to the ever-increasing group of people waiting for Vanth to choose the groups the go to New York. When at last everyone had packed themselves into the room, Vanth announced,
"Ok, now that everyone's here, we can begin. As I'm sure you all know, our records of "the Good Guys and the Bad Guys" desperately need to be updated.
"I will be selecting two groups to go to The Sanctuary in New York, which you all know is run by Mar'i and R'in Grayson. You may ask, 'Why don't we just do this over e-mail?' Well, the answer is that the government, as, yet again, you all know, does not like the transformed, to put it kindly. If they were to discover the existence of our refuges and refugees, the results would be disastrous. And I am positive they would be able to detect the signals those at The Sanctuary would send us, thus revealing both our locations.
"Oh, all right, I can see you all are getting restless, so I'll get on with it." Vanth drew signs in the air, magical shimmers following her fingers as they formed the charm. A whirling blur of magic appeared in the center of the diamond shape Vanth had drawn.
"And the groups are…"
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Woo! Cliffhanger this time! I hope you like this chapter. The way I worded some things seemed a little awkward to me, but then again, it's almost midnight. If you notice them too, feel free to tell me, and I'll try to fix them. If I get enough reviews, I'll stop replying to them in reviews of my own and put a little section in at the beginning of my next chapter where I'll respond to them (the reviews). Constructive criticism is welcomed! Peace and Oreos to you all, my wonderful readers. Onyx