I present to you another installment of this story. :P This chapter is pretty much all fighting, hope that's ok. ;) Anyways, a thanks to all of my reviewers!
D-I-WaRrIa: Thanks! And yeah, you've guessed it: all action in this one. ;) Can't wait for you to update your stories as well. :D
teentitantruefriend: Lol thanks! I'm glad that you enjoy reading this story. :)
Disclaimer: I don't own Teen Titans.
Chapter 17: One Down
There was nothing but cold, dead silence in the room. It was as though all life was put on pause, except for the six teenagers and the vile apparition.
The Titans weren't sure what the Shadow had in mind for them, but they decided to take it easy and try to find out a weakness that they could go after. However, prepared as they were, the Abyssal Shadow made no movement whatsoever; it just hovered there, eyes glued on the Titans. They stood for what the Titans felt was an eternity before finally Robin decided it was time to try and take this thing down.
"Alright, enough waiting. Titans, attack that thing!" Robin yelled out as he and the rest of the Titans charged at the waiting ghost. Starfire threw a rain of bolts, Raven magicked a few tiles out of the platform's floor and also sent them flying, and Terra summoned a chuck of the stone wall surrounding the platform, each throwing the objects forcefully at their target. However, everything the three Titans threw just passed right through the Shadow's semitransparent body. Still, the Shadow did not attack back, leaving the three to move back and prepare another attack. Meanwhile, Robin snuck up behind the Shadow and swung his staff hard, but it never even made contact with the ghostly body as the black armor, which was somehow being worn by the Shadow, blocked it. Apparently, the Shadow couldn't be physically harmed by distance nor close combat attacks.
Beastboy also gave it a shot and charged at his target in the form of a small tiger, but like the rest of the failed attempts, the shape shifter easily passed through the Shadow's body, narrowly missing hitting his head on the ghost's armor. "Dude, how are we supposed to take him down if we can't even touch him?" Beastboy questioned as the Titans regrouped, Cyborg not even bothering to waste power by attacking.
"I really have no idea..." Cyborg finally said.
The Abyssal Shadow seemed to snap back to life. "Already? I didn't even feel a thing..." The Shadow said in its hoarse voice, "But you have been here long enough, time to meet your fate!" Without warning, the ghost ran up to the Titans in lightning speed, slamming his battle axe into the ground which forced the Titans to split up. Robin, Starfire, and Raven were to one side of the Shadow, and Beastboy, Terra, and Cyborg were to the opposite.
"Six against one, how fair... Let's see you handle this!" The Shadow hollered as he returned to a bubble of shadow and split in two, reforming itself afterwards.
"Now see if you can take two of me!" Both clones hollered, each going to one of the groups.
It turned out that even though the real Abyssal Shadow was now two entities, both clones had the exact same power and strength as the original, which made it much harder to fight. Both ghosts were putting up quite a good fight, probably the best the Titans had ever encountered.
"Man, this is getting annoying real fast!" Cyborg said out in frustration, unable to cause any physical damage to the Shadow. Beastboy was trying his best to block off the spirit's attacks while Terra and Cyborg attacked it by the use of projectiles. It was all in vain, however, as the three started to get tired and the Shadow was still untouched.
"You'll have to do better than that," The Shadow clone said, swinging his axe in a way that he managed to hit all three Titans, sending them to the floor. He hovered over and look directly at the weakened teens, his eyes starting to turn a shade of light blue.
None of them knew what the spirit was planning on doing. "What are you trying to do, scare us to death?" Terra joked rhetorically, herself not knowing what was coming. Without any further warning, two powerful silver beams shot out of the Shadow's eyes, making direct contact on the Titans. The beams were a mixture of electricity and fire, and when they hit the Titans, all three felt immense pain and screamed out.
Neither Robin nor any of the other Titans could do anything to help, as the other clone was blocking their every move. As the Shadow clone's beams intensified, the pain became too much for the Titans to bear, causing them to go unconscious. The spirit laughed at the fallen Titans, hovering over to the other side to help out its other clone.
Starfire was the first to notice what happened to her friends. "Robin, look!" Robin quickly took a glance at the other side of the platform and noticed what Starfire was talking about. This gave him another reason to make sure the Shadow was defeated in the most painful way, even if it couldn't feel pain. Still, one of the Shadow's clones was keeping them fighting. As the other entity hovered over, the two merged together and formed the original Abyssal Shadow.
"I just took out three of your little friends, now what are you going to do about it?" The Shadow laughed at the helpless Titans as it moved in for another attack. Instead of trying to hit the Titans, the Shadow powered up its axe with a misty purple spell that made the thing glow radiantly in the form of a gradient from a light green to a deep emerald green. With all the might it could summon from its mystical body, the Shadow slammed the axe into the platform, causing the entire column of stone on which the battle was taking place on to vibrate and slowly start to split in two. The Titans were too shocked to notice that the other three Titans had started to slowly slide over the platform.
"I guess that your other friends wanted to take a dive," the Shadow said menacingly, watching the group of three start to fall over down into the abyss.
It all happened in slow motion from Robin's perspective. One by one, Beastboy, Terra, and Cyborg slipped over the edge and started the long downwards fall into the unknown darkness that loomed below. Robin, nor any of the other two Titans, could do anything to stop them as the rumbling of the platform and the Shadow's careful guard quashed any means of getting across to save them.
Tears formed in Starfire's eyes as she realized that she may never see her friends again. "How could we just let our friends die!" She questioned in anger aloud, much to the Shadow's pleasure.
"Because you are all failures," the Shadow answered, "You came all this way for nothing."
After hearing this bit, Raven completely lost it. "Shut up! Shut the hell up and leave us alone!" She started throwing all kinds of random magic at the Abyssal Shadow, most of not even leaving a scratch. However, the Shadow seemed to take note of Raven's anger and started to defend his black plate armor for an unknown reason.
"He really seems to treasure his armor," Starfire pointed out, still amazed by Raven's fury.
Robin finally came up with a plan. Obviously, the armor covering the Shadow must serve some purpose, and if the Shadow actually defended it, then the Titans' best bet would be to attack his armor. Starfire, with the help of Robin, managed to cool Raven down and the two opposing enemies settled down for a moment.
"Are you ok Raven?" Robin asked the dark witch, who replied with a simple "yeah." The Boy Wonder took this opportunity to quickly mention his theory about attacking the Shadow's armor. Having nothing to lose, Raven and Starfire agreed.
By now the Abyssal Shadow had completely recovered from Raven's fury and stood ready to attack. "That was a nice display, but I'm afraid that you'll have to be better than that!"
"Oh we will..." Robin muttered as the three Titans attacked without warning. Robin threw as much explosive disks as he could hold and Starfire threw yet another barrage of bolts with the aid of her eye lasers. Raven summoned blocks of stone and metal from the walls and along with the others attacks, threw them aiming for the Shadow's black armor. The Shadow, seeing all this coming at him, unsuccessfully tried to block the incoming attacks. Just as planned, most of the thrown objects hit the Shadow's armor, causing the Shadow to be thrown straight into the platform, his armor shattering into many glittering black slivers.
"What have you done!" The Abyssal Shadow yelled out, black energy overtaking him. He started morphing into various geometric shapes all in a few seconds worth of time. He screamed out an eerie yell and the cluster of purple shadow exploded into many smaller ones, each falling into the abyss.
Silence fell over the room, with the exception of the crackling sound of the few remaining torches that were still lit. The Titans were rather confused as the past few events happened almost instantly. The bridge that was previously unseen reattached itself as it slowly elevated itself to be level with the slightly slanted platform. A wall of stone moved away at the point where the bridge was leading, revealing two new wooden doors.
"That's it? It's over?" Raven questioned, still looking around.
Their moment of victory was cut short as they noticed that three of their friends weren't present. "What about Cyborg and Beastboy and Terra? Where are they now?" Starfire asked tearfully, hoping that they were still alive down somewhere in the abyss.
Robin was very silent, not knowing the state of the three Titans' conditions, "I... don't know. Doesn't look like they had a very good chance of surviving the fall, where ever it leads to..."
"We can't give up... but we can't really do anything right now," Raven said, looking over the edge of the stone platform, "It's too dark to fly down there and check it out, and we don't know what is really on the bottom." The dark witch sighed in defeat as she retreated to the other two Titans.
"Well, what now?" Robin asked, not sure as to go ahead through the doors or try something else.
Starfire refused to speak, still looking very depressed. Raven, seeing this, replied, "I guess we have no choice but to go ahead to the next room." The three were very hesitant, but they knew that standing around was going to do nothing, so the Titans slowly proceeded to the bridge.
Robin sighed as they arrived at the doors. "I... I just hope that they are alright..." He finally said after a moment of thought. There was nothing to do but to push the doors open, but just as Robin placed his hands on the left door's handle, the whole place rumbled a second time, but much more violently then previously.
"Now what?" Raven questioned impatiently.
The abyss, which was pitch black just a few moments ago, now let through a barrage of blue beams, lighting up the room in a hue of deep navy. "I'm not done with you yet!" The same horrific voice filled the entire place, causing the three Titans to brace themselves for anything. One large shadow to rival Raven's powers zoomed out of the abyss, this time rendered in a deep emerald green color. The shadow slammed into the center of the platform and morphed itself once again into the Abyssal Shadow. He looked just like before, with the exception of a silver headband, encrusted with a green gem in the center, that was now worn. "Now you will pay for defeating me the first time!"
"And we'll make you pay for taking away our friends!" Robin said aloud.
"Yes, where are they you vile thing!" Starfire blasted out, surprising the other two Titans.
The Shadow simply laughed, "Wouldn't you like to know? Where ever they are, I know that for a fact that they won't be interfering with our fight now."
The three Titans didn't need any orders as they unleashed their attacks without another warning. A group of bolts, disks, and magicked items flew at the Shadow, who lifted his hand and caused the projectiles to drop from the air. "Can't wait to try out these new powers," the Shadow hinted, pointing out that he could now do far more powerful magical attacks.
"No matter what magic you can do, we'll still take you down!" Robin yelled, almost mocking the Shadow, "Titans, split up!" Upon the Boy Wonder's order, the three Titans went their separate ways until they formed a triangle around the Shadow.
"I see your logic, but that won't work against me," the Shadow said, casting a barrier around himself.
Robin was the first to attacks, charging up to the Shadow while chucking handfuls of disks of each variety. The disks didn't cause any initial damage as the barrier blocked their effects, but the Shadow was distracted which gave Robin enough time to to jump at his target. The Boy Wonder swung his staff without mercy at the shadow, making contact with its body. Unlike the previous form of the Shadow, the staff actually caused the Shadow to recoil in physical pain.
"Barriers are nice, but they can't block everything..." the Shadow muttered, recovering from the blow. As a counterattack, the Shadow cast a spell that formed a circular ball of electricity, and swung it telepathically with its hand like a mace. The Titans jumped, ducked, or did whatever they could to avoid getting hit. The Shadow started spinning himself on the spot, causing the ball to travel faster and faster around the platform. Occasionally it made contact with the platform itself, shattering a piece of it into small bits of rock. Whenever they could, the Titans threw a projectile, whether it be a bolt or disk, at the rotating Shadow hoping to hit it, but none of their attempts were successful.
Finally, after a long time of dodging the Shadow's electric ball, Raven managed to hit the Shadow's head with a magicked piece of the broken platform. Upon contact, the Shadow terminated its attack and yelled out in pain. "Lucky shot, now take this!" The Shadow powered up another smaller ball of energy and threw it at Raven with blazing speeds. The dark witch was unable to block it and was sent flying into the wall. Again, the Shadow shot another energy ball that caused an explosion when it hit an undefended Raven. "And now try this..." However, the Abyssal Shadow couldn't finish his speech, nor attack, as Starfire rammed him with a large green bolt.
"Raven, are you undamaged!" Starfire hollered to a recovering Raven. The dark witch replied in the affirmative, and flew over back to the platform.
"Now what was a cheap shot," the Shadow said, hovering stably once again, "but you forget that you can't kill me, no matter what! I'm invincible!"
The Titans weren't moved. There was a way to defeat this creature, just like they got rid of his first form. Raven did notice that the headband the Shadow was wearing was rather strange. What good would it do anyway if he's a ghost?
"Take this!" The Shadow powered up an energy ball, slightly larger than his previous two, and chucked it at the Titans, who dodged it without a problem.
Yes, there must be something up with that headband, Raven continued to think while easily dodging any attacks. There was one similarity: all of the Shadow's attacks were green, just like the gem in his headband! There was obviously a connection. If they managed to remove the headband, then possibly the Shadow would lose his ability to preform magic attacks, giving the Titans an easy target. Might as well try it.
"Robin, Starfire! Get rid of his headband!" Raven yelled out, giving her theory a test run.
The other two complied, changing their focus of attack. Starfire was the first to fire some bolts at the headband, but the Shadow blocked them. He countered with a bolt of his own, which hit Starfire in the face as she failed to defend herself. The Tamaranian was sent hard into the ground after the bolt collided with her.
"Star! Are you alright!" Robin asked with concern, but Starfire motioned that she was fine, letting a few drops of blood fall to the floor from a cut across a cheek she received as a result. This made Robin yet more motivated to remove the Shadow off the face of this planet.
"I've had it with you..." Robin silently muttered, looking at the Shadow with a look of pure hatred. The Boy Wonder started to charge at the Shadow, but instead of directly attacking, Robin leaped right over his target and brought his staff down hard. The Abyssal Shadow nimbly dodged the attack, but was then hit by Raven's incoming magic, sending him across the platform.
Starfire, now ready to beat the snot out of the Shadow, fired a few bolts into the air, causing them to fly up and then down with more force. The Shadow tried his best to avoid getting hit, but as soon as he dodged one bolt, he was smacked with another. After the barrage of bolts was cleared, both Robin and Raven ran up from opposite sides, hitting the Shadow with whatever they had.
As an end result, the Shadow was thrown with such force into the platform that the impact managed to cause his headband to slip off and slide across into Robin's waiting hands.
"What are you doing! Return that band at once!" the Shadow yelled out in desperation, but to no avail.
"Let's see how strong you are without this thing," Robin said, tossing the headband into the air and breaking it to pieces with a swing of his staff. Small bits of silver and emerald fell to the floor, much to the Shadow's horror. As soon as the headband broke, a powerful force overtook the Shadow, twisting it in every direction possible. The Shadow started screaming out in obvious pain, parts of him starting to disintegrate.
"You may have defeated me, but there are much more powerful guardians in the other temples," the Shadow said with whatever strength it had left, "And I was indeed the weakest of them all. You won't get very far, trust me on that!" The Shadow's words faded after a moment, leaving the Titans standing alone on the battle torn platform.
"Well, I guess that does it," Robin said, watching the last bits of the Shadow disappear forever.
"Yes, but we still don't know what happened to the rest of our friends," Starfire said, looking at the ground in tears. Robin went over to comfort her.
Raven thought for a moment, "Maybe they aren't dead as I know we are thinking. This abyss has to lead somewhere, and I doubt it's a solid stone floor. Even if did, Terra would be able to summon a boulder or something and save the three of them."
Robin agreed, "Hmm, I never really thought about it that way. But until we know for sure, we unfortunately can't guarantee that they are safe. Might as well go get rid of that barrier now..." Raven and Starfire nodded, leaving the three to proceed to the wooden doors.
Upon pushing them open, the Titans found themselves in a long hallway lined with torches that lit the way. Seeing no other option, the Titans proceeded down this plain hallway until they arrived at another set of wooden doors. Unlike the doors before them, there was a symbol of a leaf carved into these two doors.
"I guess this is the place," Robin said, pushing these doors open.
He was right. The Titans found themselves in a whole different room. It was unlike any they had seen so far in this temple. The room itself was in the shape of a cube, the walls made of stone were colored a very deep green, bringing out the nature in the temple. A green carpet filled the floor of the room, but the most prominent feature was the large, cylindrical beam of emerald light that was traveling vertically from the floor to the roof. In the center of this beam was levitated a large, olive colored gem shaped like an enormous diamond.
"Well, this is the barrier alright," Raven said.
"True, but how do we destroy it?" Starfire questioned, seeing no obvious way of shutting this thing down.
Robin was puzzled, "Beats me... I think we should have asked Karthor before we left..."
"We got nothing to lose, so why not trying hitting that diamond thing?" Raven suggested, not expecting much.
"Worth a try," Robin armed an explosive disk and backed away with the rest of the Titans. He threw the disk at the gem and it exploded. No real change happened except the beam in which the gem was surrounded flickered for a few seconds.
Starfire, always managing to come up with ideas in situations like these, said, "How about we all attack it? That way maybe the beam will stop and the gem will be destroyed."
Raven and Robin needed no further convincing. The Boy Wonder counted down from ten, and upon his signal, all the of the Titans threw something at the gem. As all the objects collided, the beam seemed to stop altogether. As a result, a small tremor overtook the room as the gem, now left hovering by itself, exploded into tiny bits of green slivers. Raven casted a shield over the Titans as the bits of crystal flew all over the room.
"Is it... gone?" Starfire asked, looking over at the now empty holes in which the light traveled. Tiny crystal slivers filled the floor of the room from the gem's explosion, signaling that the barrier must have been broken.
"Looks like it," Raven replied. However, just as she finished her statement, a small rumble echoed through the cubical room as a column of stone rose from the hole on the ground. It stopped moving up in a few moments, going up about five feet off the ground. On its top was placed a small emerald jewel shaped like a sphere. The Titans carefully approached it.
"Should we take it?" Starfire questioned, looking down at the innocent jewel.
"I don't think so. It's probably a trap like in the movies, and we don't want anymore trouble," Robin said. Starfire reluctantly agreed. "I guess our job in this place is done. Raven could you get us out of here?"
"With pleasure," Raven wrapped the group of three in a black shadow and warped out of the temple.
(Outside the Jungle Temple)
Bright daylight greeted the Titans as they arrived outside on the steps of the Jungle Temple. Everything in the jungle outside seemed to have come back to life after the barrier was supposedly broken. Trees that were previously dead now were revitalized with life. The leaves, which were previously a brownish color, now turned green. Also, various sounds of animals started to fill the air, which confirmed that the Titans' job at this temple was done.
"Everything looks alright, but I still can't get the fate of the other Titans out of my mind," Robin commented.
This seemed to bring the three Titans' moods back down. "I should have helped them, but that Shadow kept getting in my way..." Raven said with guilt, angered by the fact that she could do nothing to find out the whereabouts of the other Titans right now.
"It wasn't your fault Raven; the Shadow had this planned the whole time: separate us then try to take all of us down one by one." Robin replied, trying to make Raven feel better.
Raven sighed, "I guess, but I'll ask Karthor or Smilax if either of them know something about that abyss."
"Good idea, but for now, let's get back to Emporia so we can plan our next move from there," Robin said, leading the group back along the path that they came, not knowing what became of the rest of the Titans...
(Back at Emporia Castle, throne room)
From behind the throne, a voice rang out, "How are those kids doing?"
"From what I heard: not too bad." A mage wearing a long brown cloak replied, kneeling in front of the throne which was turned away, facing the opposite wall of the room.
"Good, very good. It's only a matter of time until they complete their quest, and help me complete a task of my own."
The mage replied with uncertainty, "But, are you sure your plan is going to work? I mean, many things can go wrong."
"Yes, I intend on finishing it, too." The voice replied back, "And if I do it in secrecy, then none of Emporia will know what really happened."
"I see, but I recommend that you should be careful; many people are already very suspicious of what's going on over here. Besides, we don't want the people to revolt or something that may blow our identity," the mage said.
"True, but regardless we're still proceeding as I planned. You are dismissed," the voice rang out again, in a more commanding tone.
"Thank you for your time. Good day, King Smilax," the mage bowed and promptly left the room.
So there you have it. :) Hope you enjoyed it! The next chapter is coming soon.