Back again with chapter 18. :) Nothing much to say up here, except a thanks to all reviewers and anyone who reads this fic. :P
D-I-WaRrIa: Could be. :P Personally, I think that if the Titans aren't always fighting in a group, the story can get a little more interesting. Just my opinion. ;) By the way, hope you had a kick ass birthday:D
Disclaimer: I don't own Teen Titans.
Chapter 18: Another Barrier
Beastboy slowly came back to his senses after being unconscious for who knows how long. His eyelids lifted themselves heavily, as though he was asleep for a while, slowly taking in the first sight of his new location. At first he wasn't sure what was going on, not being familiar with the blue colored stone walls and the lingering smell of pure water in the air; his brain just wasn't functioning for the moment. It didn't take the shape shifter too long to finally figure out what had happened before, and upon doing so, he snapped back to life completely.
The Abyssal Shadow's painful eye lasers, being rendered unconscious, and feeling himself falling down some eternal pit were the first things he remembered. He pieced together everything he could remember, and then it struck him: was he dead? The details weren't clear to him, but he knew for a fact that there was no way he could have survived a fall that long, assuming he was falling down something in the first place. He quickly pinched himself, rather hard, only to find out that he was still alive and kicking. Taking a breath of relaxation, he noticed something else: he wasn't the only one who was attacked by the Shadow's lasers. Definitely Cyborg was another one and... Terra was too.
As though it was instinct, Beastboy leaped to his feet with unreal energy, and started looking around for his only true love. Cyborg was probably fine; the mechanical teen wasn't made completely of flesh and bones so if he could survive, then Cyborg could just as easily. Beastboy finally got to take a good look at where he was. He found himself in a rather open room, the size of a half a basketball court with small torches sitting on top of short pillars that provided the light. Unlike the Jungle Temple, the stone walls here were were stained a hue of deep blue. He assumed that this must be another temple since he also saw various symbols and small paintings on the walls that depicted something of religious nature. There existed a strange yet perfume-like smell of clean, fresh water in the atmosphere here, which totally gave away the hint that indeed this was the Water Temple. And where there is a temple, there is a barrier that must be broken, for the most part.
The only way out of this room was through a wooden door on the north side, which Beastboy gladly went through. He found himself in a room almost identical to the one before, except this one was longer and wider with a stronger aquatic aroma. However, upon taking a second look, Beastboy noticed two people lying not far from where he was: one was obviously Cyborg and the other was most likely Terra. Beastboy quickly ran up to blonde haired teen without any further thought.
"Terra... Terra are you alright?" The shape shifter questioned, cradling her in his arms.
After a few seconds, Terra finally came about. "Woah, what time is it?" She questioned rhetorically, cuddling up in Beastboy's arms for a short moment.
"Um, BB where are we?" Terra asked, noticing that she wasn't where she expected to be.
Beastboy shrugged, "Not sure. I woke up just a few minutes ago, but I think we should wake Cy before he gets annoyed." It wasn't necessary, however, as Cyborg had already stirred from his slumber.
Rubbing his head slightly, Cyborg was rather surprised to see himself here, "Yo, where are we?" Neither Beastboy nor Terra could give a definite answer as they too weren't exactly sure what to make of this place.
"I have a feeling that this place," Beastboy presented his thoughts, "could be another one of those temples. And I bet you that this place is the Water Temple."
Cyborg seemed to agree, "Yeah, well at least that's one thing you managed to guess." Beastboy shot him an annoyed look, but decided to let it slide. "Anyway," Cyborg continued, acting as the leader of this small group, "I think we should wait for Robin and the others to find us."
"But how are they going to find us," Terra pointed out, "if we are probably in a totally different place than they are?"
Cyborg was stumped. "Ok... but we can always try to break the barrier in here by ourselves," he finally said after a minute of thought.
"Dude, we'll get owned!" Beastboy exclaimed, "Just like the Abyssal Shadow almost killed us!"
All this time, neither Cyborg nor Terra realized what happened before they got here. They were rather shocked when memories of the battle with the Shadow came flooding back to them, noting that painful attack that probably would have killed them.
"Aw man," Cyborg said, rather depressed, "I forgot all about that. And what happened to the other three Titans?"
"Dude, I wish I knew," Beastboy replied, praying that they succeeded in their original goal.
Terra, looking down at the ground in defeat, took a few steps to the other side of the room where a closed door stood waiting. "We really don't know what could have happened to the others, but all we can do is just hope that they made it through," she said, "but now that we're here, we might as well try to get rid of the barrier in this place."
The other two Titans couldn't find anything to argue that move, so they complied. They walked in silence across the room and through the only door at the end. The group arrived at the foot of a gigantic stone staircase leading up into the higher stories of the temple. The stairs were encased by two walls and an inclined ceiling, the walls being close together which made the staircase itself rather narrow.
"Dude, do these stairs even lead somewhere?" Beastboy commented, pointing out that darkness overtook the upper part of the staircase as the torches ceased near its landing. Cyborg flipped on a light from his mechanical body, shining it upward to disintegrate the black velvet darkness that seemed to cover the stairs above. However, there were only more stairs to be seen.
Cyborg turned off his light, looking skeptical, "Um, should we go up there?" There was no alternative, with the exception of a stone door on the side of the staircase's landing that the Titans failed to recognize when they first came in. They were at a deadlock; no one was sure which path to take. Splitting up was obviously foolish as they could land themselves into traps that they wouldn't be able to get out of, or worse.
"I say that we go up the stairs," Beastboy said, "Besides, if we find nothing there we could come right back down."
Terra agreed, "Yeah I see no harm in that." Cyborg, having no other option, accepted Beastboy's plan and so the three started climbing the staircase, Cyborg providing the light. It wasn't long before the pitch black darkness overtook them, which hampered their progress as no one wanted to be the first to find out what lurked here, if anything at all.
At least fifteen minutes must have passed since the trio started their way up, and there was no end to the staircase in sight. "We must be at least a hundred feet above the ground by now..." Terra said impatiently, wondering when they would reach the top.
"Or maybe just a few yards..." Cyborg said, his face shocked. The other two look at him quizzically, but soon joined in as they realized that their mechanical friend was right. Cyborg was shining his light down the stairs now, and it revealed that they only managed to climb two yards worth of stairs.
"Man what the hell is going on?" Beastboy questioned, not believing what he was seeing, "I know that we managed more than this."
Terra, taking the time to think about a solution, put one of her ideas to work, "Cy, keep your light shining down there. Now start walking up and check your progress." The three Titans tried out what Terra suggested, and they found out that they were in fact going up, but the ground wasn't getting any further away. The stairs didn't move at all, but no matter how much the Titans walked, they seemed to stand in place.
The three didn't know what to do. Superstition got the better of the shape shifter, causing him to blurt out, "Dudes this place is cursed!"
Terra countered his claim, "It can't be, but then again how is this possible?" At the time no one could think of an explanation, so they decided to go through the door they that omitted, hoping that it would lead them somewhere.
"Well that was a total waste of time," Cyborg admitted in defeat as the Titans pushed open the stone door once they descended the never ending stairs. They found themselves in a whole different room, much unlike any in the rest of the temple.
This room's dimensions were enormous, almost too large to comprehend. It contained the same color stone walls and was lit up by some unknown light source. The Titans found themselves standing on a thin metal bridge positioned very high above the ground. Below them was water, but it was already moving by the forces of a whirlpool of unimaginable proportions that took up most of the room below. The small bridge seemed to lead diagonally across the room judging by its position. The structure of the bridge and its height had the Titans relatively worried for if it happened to collapse, it would mean instant death in the waters of the whirlpool. They hesitantly started making their way across, moving at a very sluggish pace.
"I seriously hope this bridge doesn't give way," Terra said, clutching on to Beastboy's arm as she slowly followed him. The bridge was only about five feet wide with railings that only rose to a height of four feet, which gave reason to question its durability and safety.
Just about when the Titans reached the midpoint of the bridge, a powerful tremor overtook the room. The three teens held on to the railings for dear life as the tremor intensified. Below them, the whirlpool's center opened up with extreme force, splashing water high into the air. A jaw full of huge fanged teeth that belonged to some kind of worm-like body protruded out to the surface. The body of the creature was covered with a layer of very rough orange skin that contained many folds in it. The body was cylindrical in shape with a rounded off area that housed the jaw, and nothing but the jaw could be noticed; no eyes were present, at least up to this point. This portion of the body was just about as big as the whirlpool itself. As the creature opened its mouth, it emitted a heart stopping roar that only encouraged the tremor to continue. The Titans only managed to get a glimpse of the jaw that was directly below them for a few seconds before the creature returned to the water with a splash.
The tremor rocked the bridge in every direction possible, but no matter how much the Titans tried to hold on, someone was bound to slip. Indeed both Beastboy and Terra, loosing grip of the now slippery railing, fell over the side with the shape shifter holding on to the lower portion of the railing with one hand. Terra had her arms wrapped around him as hard as she could, knowing that death was in store right below them.
With whatever energy Beastboy could summon, he attempted to alert Cyborg who probably didn't see them fall over, "Yo Cyborg! Gonna need a little help here!" The shape shifter's muscles were starting to get sore trying to hold up the weight of two people, and to make it worse, Cyborg didn't seem to hear his plea over the sound of the tremor.
Beastboy saw no other way then to at least try to keep Terra alive. He managed to use the remaining energy to inform her of his plan, "Terra, reach over to that railing right there and climb to the other side. I can't hold on much longer!"
The blonde teen looked at him as though he was mad. "And what about you!"
Beastboy replied as though he was in pain, which he actually was but refused to show it, "Don't worry about me, just go! Now!" Terra had no choice but to stretch her hand to grab onto the railing that Beastboy was already holding on to. She managed to climb back to safety, and immediately turned her attention to help Beastboy, but it was too late. Beastboy drained the last of his stamina helping Terra up over the railing, and so he slowly was forced to let go.
"I love you Terra," was all that Beastboy managed to say before he plummeted hundreds of feet to the unforgiving waters below.
"Beastboy!" Terra yelled out upon seeing him let go, trying to reach out to the helpless changeling though she knew it was in vain. Beastboy was already too exhausted to turn into a bird of some sort to rescue himself, and so he fell into the whirlpool's waters with a loud splash that sickened Terra to hear. She would have gladly jumped down there and summoned a boulder from the walls to save Beastboy, but by now there was no point as he was already caught in the wrath of the whirlpool.
In a desperate move, she tried to get Cyborg to help out though she knew it was no good, "Cyborg... Cyborg! Beastboy fell over into the water!" The mechanical teen's nonhuman eye almost popped out of his head as he noticed what Terra was talking about. Luckily, the two could see Beastboy floating around in the turning waters below from the bridge. Cyborg tried to think of something to do, but Terra already had something in mind. She summoned a few stones from the walls and pieced them together to get a platform going. Without any preparation, she zoomed down near the water, close enough for her to actually feel the misty spray of the waters. Beastboy was in this hell already, somewhere...
"Yo Terra, he's over there!" Cyborg yelled from the bridge, pointing to an area not far from her. She tried her best to follow Cyborg's direction, and indeed there Beastboy was. Since the water was moving rather fast, it was tough for her to keep an eye on the changeling. After a few tense moments, she got close enough to try to pull him out, but missed by a few inches.
'Alright, just take it easy...' Terra told herself, repositioning her makeshift platform of stone so that she could reach down again. This time luck was on her side as she caught on to Beastboy's hand, trying her best of pull him out of harm's way. It wasn't too easy as Beastboy seemed to be unconscious, making the job much harder from her perspective.
Finally, after a battle that seemed to never end, Terra was able to pull Beastboy, almost losing him again, onto the platform. She took a quick breath of relief and started levitating the platform back to the bridge, praying dearly that Beastboy was going to be alright. Upon arriving close to the bridge, she let Cyborg transfer Beastboy to the floor of the bridge, herself hopping off the platform soon after.
"How is he? Will he be ok?" Terra persistently questioned Cyborg while he ran some tests on Beastboy.
"I'll find out as soon as you stop asking!" Cyborg said in annoyance after a while of incessant interrogation. Terra stopped her questioning and resorted to instead holding onto Beastboy's hand.
The tremor had long since subsided and it didn't take too long for Cyborg to finish up his work. "He's fine, breathing and everything. Just give him a moment to wake up." The mechanical teen said, trying to sound rather important. Terra was easily overjoyed by this news.
The two decided to stay on the bridge, even though they really wanted just to get off the damn thing, for a few more minutes for Beastboy to wake up, not wanting new trouble to arise with a Titan down.
"Are you sure we should just go ahead and bust this barrier?" Terra asked Cyborg.
Cyborg half chuckled, "Well it was your idea from the time we got here."
"Oh yeah..." Terra mentally slapped herself for forgetting that this was mostly her plan.
Beastboy finally started to come about at the sound of their voices. "Dudes..." Was all he could say, surprised to see himself still alive, "What happened?"
Cyborg decided to lighten the mood, "Oh nothing, except that your girlfriend just saved your ass!" Both Beastboy and Terra flashed Cyborg annoyed looks, though Beastboy was slightly embarrassed.
"Shut up tin man," Beastboy finally said, trying to calm a laughing Cyborg, "Can we go now?"
"Yeah sure, whatever man," Cyborg said, standing up but still unable to suppress fits of laughter.
"I think he finally cracked," Terra whispered to Beastboy as the three finished crossing the bridge.
Beastboy replied with amusement, "Dude he cracked a long time ago." This caused both Beastboy and Terra to start laughing at Cyborg's expense. He suspected the jokes were about him anyway, so the mechanical teen just gave them nasty looks.
When the Titans passed through the door on the other side of the bridge, they found themselves in a small cubical room about thirty feet in each dimension. In the center stood a small wooden elevator that appeared to go upward. Having nothing else to do here, the three Titans crammed themselves into the elevator, which seemed to go up without any further command.
"Elevators that go by themselves... this place has to be possessed," Beastboy concluded, still suspicious of this whole temple.
Other than Beastboy's crazed theories, the Titans were once again in a relatively small room that contained only one wooden door. Instinctively, the trio opened the door but stopped right there. Cyborg, who was the one up front, stood looking down. The other two Titans, curious as to why Cyborg didn't proceed, looked over his shoulder. It was then that they noticed why. Apparently, the door led to the same room with the whirlpool, except this time they were even higher above the waters. There was another door on the other side, but there seemed to be no clearcut way reach it, with the exception of a tightrope that connected the two sides.
"Aw great, first crappy bridges and now this," Cyborg complained, claiming that he wasn't going to cross that rope.
Terra simply rolled her eyes, "Big whoop, I'll just summon a rock or two for us to get across." Cyborg agreed to that. Without any further talk, Terra summoned a relatively large rock from the stone walls and set it up to serve as a platform. The three hopped on and Terra used her powers to command the stone to hover to the other side. Before she could reach her destination, however, Cyborg called for her to stop.
"Um, anything wrong?" She questioned Cyborg, bewildered as to what the mechanical teen had to say.
Cyborg was investigating the actual tightrope as they hovered over it. "Yo take a look at this," he said, Beastboy and Terra peeking over the stone, "There are cuts in this rope. Look over at this part."
Indeed, the rope was partially cut in several places, which meant that if they crossed the rope themselves, then it would most likely snap and send them flying down to the waters below.
"And those aren't by accident," Beastboy said, "They were made by a knife..." The partial cuts in the rope weren't from normal wear and tear as Beastboy mentioned, but instead they were those of a knife. This was a trap.
"Someone's been here..." Terra finished, causing the three to turn and look towards the door that they were supposed to have reached. When they first saw the door, it was closed, but now it was slightly ajar with a pair of orange colored eyes peeking out at them. The eyes vanished as soon as the Titans had a good look at them, but a figure could be seen running down the hallway on the other side as the door was now completely open. After that experience, chills ran down the Titans as they knew that there was someone besides them lurking in the temple... trying to murder them.
"I really don't like this place anymore..." Terra said, moving closer to Beastboy for protection. The three Titans wished that they could stay on the safety of the platform, but they had a job to finish. Terra reluctantly flew the stone platform the rest of the way to the door, letting the group jump off.
Cyborg turned around, himself looking rather frightened, "Alright ya'll, stay close together and keep a sharp eye out for anything suspicious." Terra and Beastboy needed no further convincing, the two taking hold of each other's hand and shifting closer. The group then started making their way down the same hallway that the mysterious figure dashed down. It was rather eerie now that another thing, a person probably, was roaming the confines of the temple along with the Titans. All beauty of the temple was quickly discarded and instead replaced with hatred towards this whole place. It was like an armed murderer running around in a house full of defenseless people. Though Cyborg had his sonic cannon out and ready to fire, he wasn't too sure about its success considering the many various lifeforms on this planet.
After passing to the next room once they reached the end of the hallway, the Titans found themselves in a room that branched into two other hallways. Above each hallway entrance was a symbol. The hallway on the left had an inverted triangle shaded a navy color while the hallway on the right had an upright triangle shaded light blue. From this perspective, both hallways looked identical yet they went in opposite directions.
"Guess we have no choice but to split up now," Cyborg announced, rather wishing he didn't have to. There was the option of simply picking one hallway to follow as a group, but if that hallway was a dead-end, then they would waste valuable time. Also, Cyborg couldn't contain power in his battery cells forever, and he already used up a substantial amount. "Alright, so BB and Terra, you take the hallway on the right and I'll the the left one. Be careful." And with that, the Titans went their assigned ways.
Cyborg was walking down a rather plain hallway, nothing but torches and the occasional dripping of water filled the place. This hallway was taking the mechanical teen downwards in a spiral. He eventually reached a door which he promptly entered, not knowing that there was no way back now. As soon as Cyborg closed the door behind him, steel bars dropped down to block entry through the door. There was another door on the other side, but bars had already blocked it as well. This room seemed to be a set up, but nothing was happening. The room itself was the size of a basketball court, the doors being on the shorter sides opposite to each other. The floor was covered by a blue carpet and small torches lined the walls, providing a pleasant light. Cyborg was getting confused since he assumed that something big was supposed to happen, yet the room stayed in its serene state.
'Alright, what's going down here?' Cyborg asked in his mind, starting to make his way across the room. Just as he got halfway, most of the torches were extinguished by some breeze that blew by out of nowhere, throwing the room into semi-darkness. Cyborg retreated from the center of the room, positioning himself near the door through which he came in. Small quantities of water started dripping from the walls, pooling in the center as though they had a mind of their own. Eventually enough water clustered itself, taking on a jellylike property. A form started emerging out of the mess of water, shaping itself like a human. It let out a howl and its turquoise color turned to jet black. A pair of orange eyes, similar to those the Titans saw before, formed somewhere where a normal person's eyes would be. The final height of the figure resulted in six feet. Additionally, a sword formed itself from the water and turned to steel. The figure, grabbing the sword, poised itself for battle.
"Ok now this is just plain weird," Cyborg commented out loud, a bit amazed by the way this figure created itself out of simple water.
The figure spoke up, "If you wish to ever see the sunlight again, then you'll have to take me down. Otherwise you'll be trapped here till you rot!"
Cyborg was unmoved, "Um, whatever man but I really am not in the mood for it." The figure charged up to Cyborg without any further talk and slashed its sword mercilessly. Cyborg ducked to avoid getting hit and instead swept the figure off its feet with a blast from his sonic cannon. The figure stood back up and didn't even seem remotely injured. Instead it tried to hit Cyborg by repeatedly by slashing its sword in every direction.
Cyborg was now constantly on the defensive, and he was getting frustrated with the lack of progress. No matter what he tried, he just couldn't sink a good hit against his foe. On the other hand, this entity was putting up quite a fight. The figure tried a slash then followed by a stab, which connected with Cyborg's chest but wasn't strong enough to pierce the metal. This only caused the mechanical teen to fill up with pure rage against the poor entity.
"Oh you did not just scratch my tech did you!" Cyborg yelled out, looking at his slightly dented chest plate. The figure got slightly frightened but still tried its best to get rid of its target. However, Cyborg seemed to have enough of this petty brawl, so he blasted his sonic cannon right through the area where he presumed the figure's vital organs must be. Instead of dieing, the figure split it two after the initial hit, reforming as two smaller clones.
Both clones laughed aloud. "Sorry, we're not exactly... human," the figures said in unison, both running up to Cyborg with smaller swords than the original. However, their current height, which was about a foot less, was a major disadvantage as now Cyborg towered over them with ease.
"Chew on this!" Cyborg exclaimed, firing his cannon at the heads of both figures, which once again cloned into more smaller entities. There were now four figures running around Cyborg like little children. The mechanical teen simply rolled his eyes and fired one last round of his sonic cannon at the tiny figures, vaporizing them for good. "Ok, that was almost too easy..." he said to himself.
Upon the defeat of the watery figure, the bars lifted themselves off of both doors, allowing access further into the temple. Cyborg didn't waste any time in proceeding to the next room.
(Other hallway)
Beastboy and Terra's trek down the spiraling hallway was uneventful. However, their luck changed once they passed into the room beyond the hallway. This room was about as big as a football field and filled with tons of traps ranging from electric fences to various pits. Directly in front of the two Titans was a deep pit, about fifteen feet wide, that went along the perimeter of the room. The pit was filled with water that contained some kind of strange fish, which the two presumed to be deadly. The only way across this pit was via a small wooden bridge. Not taking any chances, Terra summoned a boulder for them to use to cross the pit without risking the bridge collapsing on them.
"Oh great," Beastboy sighed as they landed across the pit. They were now facing an electric fence that extended from one wall to the opposite, completely eliminating the possibility of going around it. The fence also reached the ceiling of this room, which meant that flying over wasn't an option anymore. However, there were a few shallow tunnels under the fence that would allow a fairly thin person to squeeze through. Beastboy would have no problem going through this obstacle considering that he could morph into a snake and slither through the tunnel. Terra, however, would need to go through without any aid. Also, destroying the fence was too risky as it could fall onto the two Titans and electrocute them to death.
Beastboy, as planned, morphed into a snake and slipped through the dug out tunnel with ease. "I think you could fit through there, it's not that bad," the changeling said after he returned to his human form, knowing that this was no time to fool around.
"I just hope you're right," Terra said, taking one more deep breath and slowly sliding into the tunnel. She was about three fourths of the way through when the fence emitted a loud, electric hum. Both Titans looked up only to see a horizontal line of high voltage sluggishly descending the fence as though it was cleaning it. Terra went wide-eyed anime style, panic taking over her, "BB get me outta here!"
Beastboy didn't want her to rush the rest of the way since one wrong move would surely kill her, so he instead tried to calm her down, "Just take it easy, that thing still is kinda far," he said, managing to calm the blonde teen down somewhat. With a little help from Beastboy, she was almost completely out, but the line of electricity was about a foot away from her by now. Seeing this, Beastboy took a risk and pulled her out the rest of the way very quickly, praying that he succeeded. Indeed he did, with little time to spare as the line completed its descend a second after Terra climbed out.
"Ok, that's the last time I'm going through any cheap tunnels," Terra commented, hugging Beastboy to show her thanks.
"Yeah, but I think there's more where that came from," Beastboy said, looking ahead. Unfortunately, he was right as the next, and final, obstacle they faced was probably more difficult than the previous. The two approached another pit, this one containing multiple spikes of steel on the bottom. Over the pit hung another electric fence, which disallowed flying over this pit. Spanning the pit was a lone wooden plank, which needed to be used in order to cross successfully. There was only about five feet of space between the plank and fence, which would require careful crossing.
"Alright, I'll go first and make sure this plank is safe to cross," Beastboy said, refusing to risk Terra crossing a potentially unsafe piece of wood. The shape shifter had to be extra careful to fit in the allocated space, therefore his progress was slow, as also the plank was rather wobbly and only two feet wide. With much effort and patience, he made it to the other side. "Looks safe, just be careful when you start out," Beastboy said, finding this obstacle rather easy compared to the other two. Terra, following Beastboy's suggestions, also managed to cross, but at a much faster pace.
"Now that wasn't so bad, was it?" Beastboy teased, noting Terra's I'm-never-doing-this-kind-of-thing-ever-again look. She playfully punched his shoulder as a response. With the help of a summoned boulder, the two Titans completed crossing the other end of the pit that went around the room. They passed through the door that now faced them and found themselves in a small room that only had one thing worth noticing.
The room was probably the smallest in the temple. It was cubical and on the northern wall was a framed painting depicting a staircase, much like the one in the beginning of the temple. On the opposite side of where they came in stood another door.
"So... what's up with this painting?" Beastboy asked, not really sure that the painting was intentionally supposed to be here.
"Beats me, probably just a trick or something," Terra said, not noticing anything special about it. "I think we should just go through that..." She was cut off, however, as the door that Terra was planning on going through opened, revealing Cyborg standing on the other side.
Both parties were rather surprised. "Yo, I didn't know that both hallways led to the same room," Cyborg said, "I bet yours was probably 'easy' to get through."
"Dude, you don't wanna know..." Beastboy said, recalling the room with all the traps, "Anyway, we found this painting on the wall here. Look familiar?"
Cyborg took a moment to analyze it. "Oh yeah, it's that same staircase that we tried to get up when we first came here!" The mechanical teen found this rather suspicious. "I think that this is kinda strange ya'll," he added.
The Titans agreed, but there was nothing secret about it; no hidden switches nor anything else for that matter. Beastboy was eager just to leave this room and go check out the rest of the temple, thinking that this room was just pointless. "Alright, I seriously had enough standing around. Let's just go somewhere else," With that, Beastboy waved his hands in defeat, but one of his hands hit the painting and threw it off the wall. He soon stopped after he realized what was behind it. It appeared that the painting was covering up a hole in the wall that was about three feet wide and four feet high. In that hole was a lone, unlit candle.
"Um, should I light this damn thing?" Cyborg asked rhetorically, knowing that this candle was probably unlit for a reason. He used his sonic cannon to spark a small flame on the candle, causing it to light up. As soon as he did that, a loud, blood boiling roar could be heard all over the temple, and the painting, which showed the darkness covering up the stairs, changed to show a new landing on top.
The Titans noted the changed painting which still was knocked down on the floor, knowing that the barrier, as well as possibly a new foe, was not far away...
So there you have chapter 18. :P Anyways, I hope you enjoyed this chapter; stick around for more. :)