Disclaimer: I only own Shadow, and the plot. I do not own the Teen Titans, LOTR, of Van Helsing
Hey everyone, I plan on updating as much as possible this weekend to hopefully get as much of the story in as I can before I get loaded down with homework again. I hope you all liked the last one. Hopefully this one will be just as good as I want it to be. Please Read and Review. I want to know if you all want me to go ahead and write the sequel. Thanks
Surprisingly, everyone easily adjusted to having Terra around and quickly fell into a new routine that included her. Shadow once again found that they had much more in common than most would think and would spend time talking abou the parts of the world they had seen during their time as wanderers. Beast Boy found this to be especially interesting and would just sit there and become enthralled with their stories of who made the best pie, burger, or just plain best food. Shadow had surprisingly seen even more than she had during his time before aiding the Titans. In fact, he talked about places that Terra had heard about but had never made it to. During their more interesting days the other Titans would come and listen to the stories, it became a kind of tradition to spend at least a half hour after dinner to swap stories about little towns and good traveling experiences.
Usually most of the Titan's days would be spent with BB, Cy, Robin, and Terra playing the RPG they had become so enamored with. In fact, they had become one of the top teams in the online tournaments. A normal tournament consisted of spending about three hours going through dungeons and castles searching for new weapons, armor, and magical items. The last four hours were spent using those items to defeat other teams in battle. The four of them had become one of the top ten teams throughout the country, and today was the national championships. They ate a hearty breakfast before turning on their wireless controllers that stored their characters and they began to play. Right after Breakfast Shadow and Raven had left to, get away from the annoying game in Raven's case, and to just have some alone time in Shadow's.
They easily started to navigate their way through the first dungeon using their characters' unique skills and abilities to get some of the better items. Cyborg's barbarian warrior, which looked a lot like him when he was one, was their power hitter and the guy that moved blocks and other obstacles out of their way. BB's thief was extremely useful for opening chests and pick-pocketing other players for a few more funds, he also was able to slip into the shadows and attack people from behind if they got in the way. Terra's wizard was the healer and magical specialist of the group. She was the one they relied on to attack people from a distance and take out the people with less magical resistance. Robin's swordsman was an extremely specialized character. He had had to pay some major money for that one, but they soon found that it was worth it, because the swordsman was almost impossible to hit and could easily slip through an enemies defenses.
By the time they began to reach the harder levels and better items they found that someone was getting into these dungeons just ahead of them and getting the best stuff! The strangest thing was that whoever they were, they were incredibly picky about what they took, leaving some decent items behind for the four heroes. After about three levels with this almost constant taunting from the mysterious team they rushed through one to try and see what they were dealing with here. Just as their characters passed into the main treasure room of an Egyptian pyramid they finally saw who they were dealing with. Their mouths dropped open when they saw what classes the two people were. One was a high level assassin, which basically, was Robin and Beast Boy's characters combined into an incredibly deadly package. The other was another high-level person, but the class was the one that stunned them the most, she was a sorceress! A sorceress was the ultimate magic user, they had major healing abilities as well as the most powerful dark magic in the game.
The two stopped looting the place and turned to introduce themselves through the game's text message communication system.
RedX-Well what do we have here, looks like it's the second best team in this tournament.
FallenAngel-You know what? I believe your right. Well we would like to introduce you to the best team in this tournament, The Dark Ones, with the infamous Red X, and me the beautiful Fallen Angel.
CytheBarbarian-what makes you think you're the best? We can take you.
RocknRoller-Uh… Cy, no we can't. Didn't you hear what their name was? The Dark Ones, you know the guys that can't be beaten?
GreenSkin-C'mon, the reason they're so good is because they haven't faced us yet.
PheonixBlade-I agree with GS. We can take em.
RedX-sorry to disappoint, but that's gonna have to wait until after lunch, because treasure hunting time is up. See ya later kids.
With that the game system said the play time was suspended and saved. They would have a one hour lunch break and then they got to show those jerks who was the boss.
When the game resumed they began the round by facing off against teams that weren't important at all. After about an hour of this they had a break again while they waited for the semi-finalists to be announced. During their breaktime, they got a call from the boys at Titans East.
"Hey Robin, this is Speedy. You have to hear what just happened to us on the game."
"What Speedy, did you actually get past the first round?" Cy and BB snickered. TE wasn't exactly the best team on this game because they couldn't work together and hadn't picked a team captain, choosing instead to do the democratic thing of voting. Which got them killed during the fights.
"No for your information the others finally picked me to be the captain, and we only just lost on the second round. But I didn't call you guys to tell you that we lost, I called you to tell you who we lost to." Now the others were interested. If the others had gotten into the last round with their four fairly high-leveled characters then anyone who beat them had to be good.
"Who did you lose to? Was it the HIVE?" the four guys in the HIVE five were almost obsessed with this game and were surprisingly decent players at it.
"No, we actually feel honored about losing to these guys. They're supposed to be some of the best, The Dark Ones." Speedy paused for dramatic effect. "Then after they absolutely clobbered us they said to let you guys know their looking forward to the final round. What did you guys do to them? They seem to have a vendetta against you guys."
"I don't know what they want, we just happened to search in the same places as them throughout the game. But they were always ahead of us with well developed taunting tactics." Cy was still bitter about those two and the way they talked in the game, you could almost see their smirks through their virtual counterparts.
"Well dudes what ever you did, prepare to pay for it, because they just slaughtered the HIVE. We'll be watching your match, Good luck." Speedy then hung up leaving the four teens to their own devices. The games announcers were showing a replay of the battle Speedy had been talking about, trying to do a play by play, but the Dark Ones seemed to want this one done with a new record on speed, within a matter of seconds the HIVE had been obliterated. The four teens turned to look at what their next match was, they were going against the Dark Ones in the final match. Then it started.
After breaking the record of longest battle against the Dark Ones the four teens were pissed, because right after that those tow had decided that they would stop playing with their prey, and in a matter of minutes they had easily cut down the three warriors and sent the wizard flying.
"Man, who are those guys! How could any one be that good? It should be impossible!" Beast Boy and the others were fuming amongst them selves about how unfair it was that those two were even allowed to play the game. Just when BB was about to pull out one of his boards that explained his crazy theories when the swooshing of the door was heard. Everyone turned to look and see who had just come in when their jaws dropped. Standing there were Shadow and Raven holding up the controllers for the game, the names imprinted on the casing of the controllers were Red X and Fallen Angel.
"It was YOU!" Cyborg couldn't believe it. This had to have spawned from them saying that Rae was probably bad at video games and that was why she never played.
"Yes Cy it was us. We so just kicked your cans while you were being watched by thousands of people. I believe that I have earned the right to gloat now and punish you for your remarks about my skill level?" Raven's voice was full of taunting and mischief.
After a few days of rubbing it in to the losers Raven went back to being herself. She had decided that just knowing she had beaten them was enough for those two. But the Titans began to have much bigger problems in the form of recurring emotional backlash. None of the Titans knew that any of the others were also waking up terrified and depressed. But it happened every night to all but one of them. Starfire was beginning to wonder why all of her friends appeared to be so tired and cranky during the day. Every night at exactly the three in the morning though they would find themselves waking up in cold sweats terrifies and angry at nothing in particular, but after about two minutes the emotions would disappear just as fast and they would feel like nothing had happened at all. Beast Boy thought that it might be some nightmare that he could never remember and would have forgotten about it the next day, but he still woke up in the morning tired and drained. Terra had the feeling that it was her guilt at having betrayed all of them haunting her sleep and was terrified that they hadn't forgiven her. She had accepted her fate at having red hair soon after three completely unsuccessful attempts at dyeing it blonde again.
Cyborg was just chalking it up to his Brother Blood problems and how angry he was at the man, who incidentally had just escaped from jail about a week ago. Robin had put it up to his frustration at not being able to track down Slade. Raven however because of her empathy knew it was coming from an outside source and not from her. She had been really worried about the other Titans because their lives were reverting back to the stressful ones of being superheroes. The big supervillains were back on the scene and the seemed to be trying to plan something big. She knew this backlash was coming from one of them, she just didn't know who.
But Shadow knew who it was that was stressing out all of the Titans. It wasn't Robin, Cyborg, Beast Boy, Terra, Starfire, or Raven. It was him. He had been having nightmares for the past two months. Ever since he had helped defeat Trigon he had been receiving summons that he kept ignoring. It seems that with all of the training he had received from Azar there came some fine print. He was now supposed to become a warrior for good and give up the next fifty years of his life to destroy evil. But he had been refusing the angels' summons because he felt that he had paid his dues. He had helped stopped the apocalypse but apparently that didn't fulfill his unwritten contract. Another part of his contract was that he would never go to heaven because of the sins he would commit to save souls that wouldn't make it if he didn't fight. He had been so eager to find a way to give Raven a life all her own he hadn't realized what he would be giving up.
Because he was refusing he was receiving nightmares as a warning that they would soon force him to answer, but he had decided that he would fight all of heaven if he had to, just to stay with Raven, Robin, and the other Titans. Yet he knew that his very presence was doing more harm than good now because the dreams were so horrid and graphic about what he would do that he lost control of the barriers to his mind and flooded his friends with his emotion. He would have to leave soon before he drove them insane.
One morning, each of the Titans walked quietly into the main room to have some breakfast. This morning, there was no war over meat or tofu, there was no herbal tea, the only thing that was normal was Starfire insisting that they eat. Yet none of them ate, they were waiting for Shadow to walk in, just to know that he was still here and hadn't done any of the things they had seen in their nightmares the previous night.
Shadow walked in and knew that his time of hiding his own destiny was up. Yes, even though he always said that he didn't believe in destiny he did now. Raven had had more of a chance escaping her father on her own than he did escaping this with all of his friends at his side. He had gotten himself too involved in something far bigger than he had ever wanted to.
Just as he was about to open his mouth to announce his intentions to leave again the alarm went off signaling that Slade had finally made his move. The Titans set aside their own problems for a moment to go out and once again protect the city. Shadow breathed a sigh of relief, he would get one more chance to fight alongside the ones he cared about more than anything. He quickly ran down into the garage and strapped Gurthang to his waist and jumped into Shadewing who had no idea what was happening to everyone.
They drove to the library that sat above the temple of Scath to find that not only was Slade there, but Brother Blood, the HIVE five, and a few villains that Shadow had humiliated more than once during his time in Gotham, the Joker was the most prominent among these.
"Well Titans, it seems we have finally discovered how to break you." Slade's voice was still cold and calculating, but it had a feeling of sick and twisted joy inside.
"Yes, when Slade boy here discovered how to defeat the mighty Teen Titans I jumped at the chance. Not because I have something against you as a group, but the person we're after today, well he's a much different story. Wouldn't ya say Shadow." Joker's voice still had it's creepily happy sound to it, but it also had a huge amount of malice obviously aimed at the boy he was referring to.
"Listen, I don't know what you guys are planning, but it wont work. Titans Go!" Robin immediately took command as he had so many times before. But before the Titans could attack all of them but Shadow were trapped inside some sort of cage that held them back from the fight.
"Well it looks like it's just you and us now kid. I think that you're smart enough to realize what we're after." Slade was obviously enjoying seeing the other Titans watch helplessly as Shadow went up against Slade, Joker, Br Blood, Poison Ivy, Scarecrow, and Mr. Freeze.
"Well it would appear that way wouldn't it?" Shadow was just standing in a calm position while the villains surrounding him were getting ready for what they had seen the boy do. This was always his trademark tactic back in Gotham, stand there taunting until you had your enemies good an riled, then leap into quick and devastating action. But Slade and Blood who had never seen him fight normal villains like this were falling into his talking trap. The ones who did know about it didn't want to warn them because that would make Shadow move earlier.
The other Titans, with the exception of Robin, watched incredulously as Shadow flaunted what he thought was annoying about each of the villains he was looking at. They were once again amazed at his ability to get under a persons skin just to make fighting them all the easier. Even the villains who knew what he was trying to do found themselves chomping at the bit to get at him.
"Blood… what kind of name is that? I mean, no wonder you're so bent on controlling others to do your will, you probably never had a girlfriend because they all ran away after hearing what your last name was. I mean who would take a guy seriously if his last name is Blood? I know I sure don't." Blood's mouth appeared to be silently chanting 'shut up' over and over again. Cy couldn't help but think why he had never thought of that.
"And you Ivy, do you really think that all guys go gaga over you? Because most men I've talked to just think you're a skank. I mean look at yourself, do you have any respect for yourself dressing like that?" Ivy unconsciously blushed and looked down at her attire, did she really look like a skank?
"Freeze Freeze Freeze… you have got to be one of the coolest guys I know, no seriously you are so cool that the air around to freezes and turns to ice. No wonder you can't find a new girl, they probably get frostbite when they kiss you." Robin winced, Shadow was mad, he had to go for the one thing that drove Freeze up the wall, his wife. Freeze's face had turned a true shade of purple from his contained rage.
"Scarecrow, puhlease, why would anyone put the word 'scare' in your name? Wait, I think I know why, you're one of those people that can be referred to as scaredy cats, because I seem to recall, the last time I saw you I made you pee your pants." The other villains looked at Scarecrow with questioning looks, but he just looked down at the ground in shame.
"Slade, it must be humiliating for someone of your intellectual caliber to be working with a clown, but then again you always were full of surprises. Tell me, are you secretly a clown lover? Do you have a clown come and perform at your birthday parties? What aren't you going to say that you secretly have clown heads on your underwear?" Slade seemed to be absolutely fuming about that obviously ridiculous assumption. This was exactly what Shadow wanted, rage blinded super villains were easier to take down than calm ones.
"Ah… Joker, isn't this just like old times? You, me, standing across from each other? Wait no it isn't, because back then you were trying to stubbornly get the Bat to laugh. Yes that's why you are so fixated on him isn't it. You're going to have to face it, the man doesn't have a sense of humor, not that you're very funny. I mean squirting flowers, electric buzzers, lame, where's the 'A' material? But enough about that, I'm going to ask you something I've always wanted to." Shadow knew he had the other villain's attentions. "Tell me, have you ever danced with a demon in the pale moonlight? Cause I have." With that Shadow jumped into an offensive tactic while the villains were trying to discern any meaning of his question. Shadow immediately headed towards Freeze to get the man's ice gun out of the picture so that he would always have a sure footing.
Shadow practically vanished and reappeared right in front of the man and used one of the X blades on the back of his hand to slash the gun into two pieces. Then he slipped under the taller man's legs and came up behind him making Scarecrow punch Freeze. Then Shadow used the leverage he gained from Freeze's shoulders to jump out of the way of some of Ivy's vines. The vines then grabbed the first thing that had gotten in their way, Freeze trapping him for a moment, but then he started to feel hot and saw that there was a glowing red X on his right shoulder acting as a heater and thawing out his suit. Scarecrow threw one of his fear toxin gas bombs at Shadow who just stood there not even trying to cover up his mouth. It wasn't until then that the Titans had fully registered that he had worn a full-face mask since they had freed Terra. It was just black though, except for the two blank white eyes. They decided that it must be filtering the air before he breathed it in.
Scarecrow didn't notice this though and decided that his toxin must have affected the boy and jumped in to attack, but Shadow had been counting on this and teleported right before the man tackled him. Scarecrow instead of hitting the ground was hit by one of Joker's cards that cut through his mask and let the toxin seep into his lungs. He then began to see nightmares of shadowy creatures and giant bat-like demons. Shadow then jumped towards Ivy and pinned her to her own vines with X's that had electricity flowing through them causing her to loose control of her plants.
Just then Shadow was trapped in a giant energy field. 'So that was what the other three were doing.' Shadow had barely thought this when he noticed that he couldn't use the X suit. Every time he tried to teleport or even just extend the blades he found that the suit wasn't responding. "Do you like the HIVE's newest class project? I had them build a generator that could counter the one inside of that glorious suit of yours. It took some time but they finally got it right, and you are now at our mercy, because the field will only allow certain genetic signatures in or out of it. So now you're going to have to fight us without your precious suit." Blood was about to go off ranting about his own genius again when the other two slapped the back of his head. The three of them slowly walked into the dome of energy surrounding Shadow.
"Fine with me, I don't need it to fight, it just comes in handy." Shadow slowly pulled out Gurthang. He could only hope that he didn't kill these guys. Blood ran towards him with his red energy glowing on his hands. They had cut through Cyborg's impressive armor, why not some ancient artifact that the boy would carry around with him at times? Shadow smirked under his mask and hood, this was going to be a little to easy. Blood's downward slash stopped short when it met the slightly flickering edges of the blade. Blood was stunned, he felt through his mind control abilities, a presence inside the sword. It actually had a mind of its own! Then Shadow flipped Blood over and threw him to the ground but was smashed in the stomach by Slade's Bo Staff. Just as he began to recover from that hit he felt the Joker slam his buzzer onto his back. Shadow screamed inpain as Blood slashed across his face, cutting off the mask.
As Shadow rose to his feet to look at the villains the Titans saw a mark kind of like a tattoo on his face. It was a red X just like the one that goes across the right eye on the Red X skull mask! The creepiest thing about it that even the villains hesitated from was the fact that it was glowing red along with his eyes.
"That is it! Did you honestly think that all of the suit xinothium energy came from the ore itself! I was mutated when I revived Terra because of the adverse effects that the Xinothium had on her! Now, I'm gonna rip each of you limb from limb!" Shadow then started to slowly walk towards the villains only to be hit from behind by one of Freeze's ice blasts. As he got up from that the other three villains came in and started to beat the absolute crap out of him. Blood kept slashing the suit he was wearing to pieces, but he never did more than a small cut along the boy's skin. Slade kept pounding him mercilessly with the staff, causing cuts and bruises to appear all over Shadow's body. Joker was having the absolute time of his life. No one ever tried to psycho analyze him. So he was just pressing the buzzer against any open part of Shadow's skin or suit he could get to.
Shadow rolled across the ground and didn't get up this time, all the strength had been drained from his body, he could barely move his mouth. He coughed and blood spurted out. Just as the villains were about to make sure he never rose again the Justice League's Javelin flew overhead and the League members came to aid the Titans. Slade upon seeing this said that there was no way that Shadow would bother them again and that they had done what they were supposed to. So the villains all went their separate ways to celebrate their different ways. But Freeze, Ivy, and Scarecrow weren't very jucky and were caught by Flash and GL. As soon as the Titans were free they ran to try and reach Shadow, but even though the energy field was gone they were stopped by something.
Raven noticed what this energy holding them back was and used her demonic heritage to push her way through. She was fighting off a holy influence to get to the person she loved. Just as she was about to reach him an actual angel appeared in front of her.
"Stand back demon child, this boy made the choice to fight evil for the good influences in the world. He cannot remain here any longer, he must fulfill his term of service." The Angel said in an indifferent tone.
"You mean he actually made that promise? And he never told anyone?" the others present were confused about what was going on, but Raven seemed to know about what the guy was talking about.
"He made the choice to give you life daughter of evil. I don't know why he thought you were worth it. I guess the saying is right among humans, they really can't choose who they fall in live with." The angel was sneering at her. He obviously thought that she should have ended with her father.
Just then a black blade with the pale edges flickering angrily pressed up against the angel's throat. "That's enough Draziel, This girl has done more for the side of good than you ever will. I've given up the fighting-cough-and I will go to the high council, but I never said I wouldn't kill you. So I suggest that you learn to show respect to your betters. She won't demand that you respect her, but that doesn't mean that I can't do that for her." Shadow's voice had a grim edge to it as he pressed the cursed blade up against the angel's windpipe, threatening to finish the job.
"Very well Turumbar, I will wait for you over there. You have only a few moments to say good bye to the thing you hold most precious." The angel seemed to still get a kick out of revealing how Shadow felt about Raven. Shadow slowly turned to Raven and she saw that he was still coughing up blood.
"Was he telling the truth?" Raven was not going to play any games with this. She had to know two things, did he actually love her, and did he really make the oath that made him bound to being a sacred warrior until they held his oath fulfilled. The last one that she could remember hearing about was Gabriel Van Helsing, and he had been the warrior for almost a thousand years before they released him.
"Yes, about both things. I have fallen in love with you, and I did make the oath, but I only thought to stop Trigon then. I thought that stopping the end of the world would be enough, but apparently since I only helped I have to still serve them until they feel that I have fulfilled my oath." Shadow didn't want to beat around the bush either, he was almost eager to get away from it all and may ask for an extension if Raven reacted to his feelings about her in the way that he knew she would.
But she didn't. Instead of slapping him or rejecting him she did something that he had never even let himself dream about. She kissed him. It was just a short kiss but it was enough to send what she felt about him to his brain. "I can't believe that you actually fell in love with me. Because I fell in love with you Shadow, but now when we finally tell each other we're about to be separated again. Just promise me that you'll come back, just promise me that whether I go to heaven or hell that you'll follow when you're done." Raven was actually breaking down in front of everyone she knew. Tears were streaming down her face as she buried her head into Shadow's chest.
"I will, don't worry I will." Shadow then slowly stopped hugging her, which neither of them knew when he had started doing that, and walked back to wear Draziel was waiting for him. After one last look at his friends he disappeared in the pillar of light that surrounded him. Raven then sank to her knees and broke down completely, her tears and sobs choking out the silence that had engulfed the now nighttime sky. The other Titans and Batman just stood there silently grieving for hours until Cyborg and Batman finally decided it was time to go back to the tower.
The team would stay together for years. Well, everyone except Starfire, who was called back to Tameran after the first year. But when they finally went their separate ways, it was because they had to, the league had deemed them to old to be Titans any more, but let them work together as a 'sub-team' in the league. But after a while they drifted apart and went their separate ways, but stayed in touch with everyone. One subject that was taboo in Raven's presence was that after that day she stopped ageing. She of course noticed this and slowly felt out of place among her friends and took to exploring the world.
Robin became Nightwing and protected Bludhaven. He chose that city because he and Shadow had always talked about going there after the Titans and protecting the citizens of that city. He kept in touch with the others and always hoped to one day have a reunion with all of the original team. Cyborg went back to the tower and now trains the younger generations of Titans. He still enjoys being the big brother figure to younger ones. BB and Terra eventually got married and help Cy train younger heroes. They seem to rather enjoy being more of a handful than any of the teens are. Batman eventually retired and grew distant from all of the batfamily's kids and Tim Drake never got to know the one that Barbara and Richard would not shut up about.
Shadow walked up to the high council. He was still bleeding from his battle earlier but he wanted to waste no time in getting this over with.
"Blane Grayson, you made a vow one that you will keep. But now we must warn you about something, you are immortal and will never age a day. We will hold your oath fulfilled after fifty years. Your tasks will traverse history itself, because you were a vital part of this world's history before you were even born. Your brother made that suit based on a legend he heard about a patriarchal line of warriors known as the Red X, but in reality, he made the suit that they wore, because each one of those warriors was you. We will send you to the vital points of history you were involved in. Then you must do what you feel is right in those situations. You will be allowed to return to your own timeline when fifty years has passed there. But you will still look seventeen years old when they will be almost fifty."
Shadow walked out of the room with his mind in turmoil. He only had to do this for fifty years instead of the hundreds that it normally took, but he wouldn't age, and his family would. Raven wouldn't want to be with a boy. Being a hero really had taken everything away from him. He hated being the hero, when he got back to his own time he would resurrect Red X not Shadow. He would never help other people again because it had burnt him to many times. Look out world because Shadow really did die in that fight with Slade.
Gotham was quiet and no one noticed the blinding flash of light in a dark alley. Out of the portal stepped a young boy dressed in the infamous Red X suit that many learned about in history books now. The boy smirked it was time to take Gotham by storm again.
"Sorry dad, but I can't be a hero anymore. I'm just going to rile things up a bit and find my place in this new world." The teen then began walking around to get his bearings in this new high tech version of Gotham. He would have to find out about the new security systems and how to get past them. But the Red X suit was at least centuries ahead of its time. He could handle anything this new Gotham could throw at him.
So what do you think? I ended this a little quicker than I had originally intended but I think that it will make the sequel better. I hope you enjoyed this one and I'll explain just what happened to Shadow to change his views on the world in the sequel. I used lines from Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker and a variation of a line from the first Batman movie that the Joker used because the Joker used the actual line on Shadow and Shadow thought it would be funny because he had actually danced with Raven one night a long time before. So he said demon instead of devil. Please Review and I'll try to get the sequel started as soon as possible. Thanks for reading.