Legacy of the Tamaranian
Chapter Six

The T-Ship hovered in space, slowly making its way through the Tamaran star system. Starfire did not like what she saw on her planet. A crater where the capital had once stood, and a maelstrom of radioactivity across the surface of the planet. It would be hard to land on Tamaran, but Star said that it wasn't something they'd have to worry about yet.

"Why are you directing us to these other planets first?" Robin asked. He thought he knew, as his mentor Batman had taught him a lot of psychology in their time as partners in crime-fighting. He assumed that as long as Kori didn't set foot on her planet, she could more easily cope with it being gone. Out of site out of mind. But she explained it a different way.

"The ancients of my people had developed technologies, machines that despite their small size harnessed an immense amount of power. They were called the Catalysts, and given names to correspond to what they did.

"The Red Catalyst on the icy world of Holoth controls fire. Its wielder becomes what we would call a pyrokinetic back on Earth.

"The Green Catalyst of the lush world of Verden manipulates plants to grow as the user wills.

"The Crimson Catalyst on Oela, the abandoned city world of the ancients allows the wielder to manipulate large amounts of earth with great precision. I was hoping I could give this one to Collin to perhaps make his rock-moving powers more effective."

(At this, Collin perked up, but it wasn't in delight. Robin couldn't tell, but it seemed more like concern, or confusion… or even guilt.)

"The Prism Catalyst on the dessert world Olowa manipulates light and shadow," Kori continued.

"The Dark Catalyst on the perpetually-eclipsed nighttime world of Coris has the unique and dreadful ability to alter reality itself, and is reserved for the direst emergencies.

"And finally, the key to our so-called Ultimate power lies in the temple of X'hal on Tamaran itself, but even I do not know what it is capable of."

Robin thought a moment. "Where should we head first?"

"If I remember the procedures passed down by my family correctly, we must gather all the others before opening the door on Tamaran in the sacred temple. Tim, you are my leader, and I will let you decide where we go first."

"Well," Robin sighed. "I've had my fill of pyrokinesis for one week," he said, the battle against Hotstreak and Flare fresh in his mind It hadn't even been 48 hours since it had ended. "I say we go after the Green one first."

"That would be most agreeable," Star said with her trademark cheeriness. Ever the optimist, despite losing her entire species. She certainly didn't deserve what had been her lot in life.

oooo

"Look, 'Ravager'," Raven said harshly, "I don't know who you are and why you have targeted me..."

"Not just you, dear Raven," came the sickeningly familiar voice, "I mean all of you. Everyone responsible for my father's death will pay."

"Your father?" Raven gasped to herself. Slade. He had children? The thought had never occurred to her. In fact, in any other circumstance, she would have found the idea ridiculous and made some sarcastic remark. But she betrayed none of it here and now. She had to control her emotions, and not trigger those of her enemy.

"I considered challenging the lot of you at once," continued the blue-armored madman. "But it occurred to me that if you defeated my father, I was no match for you together. So I decided to pick you off one by one. Get her." As he gave the last command, Ravager stepped back, and Thunder and Lighting landed in front of him, the smaller of the two still dripping water.

"Heyah!" yelled Thunder as he charged forward. He smashed at Raven multiple times as she dodged the blows and countered with a blast of dark energy. A bolt of lightining flashed towards her and she rolled away. Suddenly, Thunder was back on her, smashing at her with his massive fists, and hitting mostly concrete. And Raven finally noticed the control collars on their necks.

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!" she yelled, sending a small wave of darkness at the metal ring on Thunder's neck, but it deflected off as if her magic was nothing… Then she got kicked in the face by Lightning, who started electrifying her with a steady stream in a very Palpatine-esque manner.

"Burn, child!" Ravager called out over his slave's attack.

"Get off of me!" she yelled. But he kept on zapping her, and Thunder raised his hands up as if to smash them down, but waited as if to let his brother continue his torture. Raven tried to consume their anger and calm them, but they had none. There was nothing—no emotion. And that made Raven rather angry. "What have you done to them?"

And in a twisted version of an answer she'd heard before, in an eerily similar voice, "Nothing they'd really want me to. Don't blame them for this, child." The condescending tone became almost as infuriating as what was happening to Thunder and Lightning, and Raven snapped.

"OFF OF ME! AZARATH METRION ZINTHOS!"she bellowed. An enormous burst of dark emphatic power rang out from her body, and her eyes and chakra glowed in unison. The dark power grabbed the duo of elemental teens and hurled them both into the drink of Jump City Bay. She stopped the assault just short of unleashing her Soul Self, as she had on Doctor Light two years earlier, and she was glad of it, as the two hadn't done anything deserving of such a horrible punishment.

"Most impressive, but I bet that was rather tiring." Ravager said, drawing a sword from a scabbard on his back. "Can you press the attack? I'm good for another good hour as it stands." Even with a blue cowl covering the top half of his face, his smile was decidedly wicked. He ran at Raven full force, and indeed, it was as he said. She was out of emotional power. And he was fast.

But there were some who were faster. "Patada del fuego!" yelled two high-pitched voices. Mas and Menos did a spinning drill kick into the back of Raven's assailant causing him to stagger forward. Suddenly, Beast Boy also arrived, leaping out of the water as a pink dolphin and walloping Ravager as a pink gorilla. And Ravager reeled long enough for Raven to regain her footing and knock the sword from his hand with a well-placed kick.

The three new comers assumed positions to the left and right of Raven. The Titans, standing together as always. "Nobody messes with the Titans, and nobody plays divide and conquer with this team, jerk!" Beast boy yelled.

"How did you know!" Ravager exclaimed. "I disabled her communicator!"

"You forget that I'm an empath." Raven said with a smirk. "Your father wouldn't have."

"Estas muerto! Asi te decimos Mas y Menos!" the Speed Force brothers said.

"Father?" BB asked Raven quietly.

"GRANT!"a new voice boomed in. But it was all too familiar—even more so than the Ravager. It was Slade himself.

"Father?" gasped the Ravager.

"Wait… That guy is Slade's SON?" Gar realized.

"Father, I thought you were dead!"

"Grant, my son. I was. And if I were still among the dead, I'd be rolling in my grave. You let these Titans humiliate you, and three of them aren't even there. You underestimated them, as I did. But you have no excuse. I was betrayed, you just lost in a fair fight…"

"Where are you, father?" Ravager asked.

Suddenly, the trademark black and brown helmet phased through the asphalt of the street the battle was happening on, and slowly did the rest of Slade as well. The same evil look in his eye, and the same Mark of Scath on his forehead.

"You will come with me. I serve a new master now. And I wish to introduce you to him…"

A burst of fire consumed both Slade and his son, and the two vanished without a trace, leaving the Titans confused and befuddled.

"Pink suits you in battle," Raven said at length, getting and annoyed look from Gar. "Where's Impulse?"

"He took off to Steel City right after you left, and I don't know when he'll be back."

"Good. That means he's doing his job."

"Has done his job," Bart said, suddenly standing beside Raven, where he wasn't standing a second ago.

"What did I miss?"

"Well, apparently Slade has a son now, and the son is as psycho as the father." Beast Boy said.

"That's bad news, I take it. Who is Slade?"

The two Jump City Titans facevaulted. "I'll explain when we get back to the tower," Raven said. And they went.

Oooo

The landing on Verden was smooth enough, and soon the five heroes who bore the name of those who had spawned the Greek gods were on their way to the ancient Tamaranian temple that concealed the first Catalyst.

"How much farther?" Robin asked as the quintet came over the top of a hill in the dense jungles of Verden.

"If my instruments are right, about half a mile." Cyborg said.

"You want me to clear out some of the jungle for you?" Ragnarok asked.

Robin took a drink of water. "We'll see. If the path gets much harder than this, you might have to."

"Right," Collin said, sounding a bit annoyed.

"Tim," Kori said as she got close enough to Robin to have some privacy, "Friend Collin only wishes to help, and he does not appreciate your distrust of him."

Robin stopped and looked her in the eyes. "I'm sure he doesn't, Star. But I can't take chances. He almost caused an earthquake back on earth when we were fighting the fire metas, and even if he means well, he could screw up an injure one of us. He treats his powers too much like a cheat code and this job too much like a game."

Kori sighed. He has been playing Cyborg in Robot Samurai a lot recently, and his mind was on the games of the Gamestation. Still, she understood his position. He did not want anyone, especially herself, to get hurt on this trip, and he still didn't trust the new Titan Ragnarok. Perhaps part of him was made incapable of trusting by Terra's betrayal. Or perhaps he sensed something in him that Starfire did not sense herself. Lacking anything else to say, the two and three walked on in silence for a while longer.

"We're here." Cyborg said suddenly.

"So we were closer than we thought?" Speedy said stepping up beside him and then gaping.

"Not exactly." There was a huge canyon in front of them, and on the other side was a towering stone structure that resembled the grand hall on Tamaran where Starfire had once been set to marry Glergelslech—or whatever his name was. "The canyon is about half a mile wide according to my laser measurements, and that means that structure over there is HUGE."

"I can fly across," Starfire said, "but I can only carry one or two of you at a time. Who shall be first?"

"Wait a snorkel-breathing minute here!" Collin said. "I can handle this. I can make a bridge, right?"

"You sure you can handle such a strain on your powers?" Cyborg asked.

"I'm certain. But to be safe, you should back up a bit. If the ground starts shaking I might shake one of you off into the pit. Which would be a problem for any of us but K..Starfire."

"It is OK, Friend Collin," Starfire said, "You may call me Kori."

Ragnarok smiled awkwardly. "Thanks." He walked over to the edge of the canyon. At the far end there was a waterfall that created a river in the bottom below, and it was much deeper than it was wide. Even the Boy Wonder himself couldn't survive such a fall.

Collin stretched out his hand, and suddenly rock and earth exploded out from both ends of the canyon, gradually getting longer and longer until the two met approximately in the middle. Then Collin crossed his hands and separated them quickly as if trying to make the bridge fall apart. But rather than doing that, the columns of rock smoothed out, and strips of metal jumped out of them as if to line the bridge and strengthen it. It was crude, but effective.

"You can manipulate metal too?" Speedy asked.

"To a degree. It isn't like rock and dirt, that breaks easily.. It's hard and malleable, and I have to get the earth to push it. I don't think I can move metal unless rock or earth is touching it."

Kori walked with Robin over to inspect the bridge. "It is not the straightest bridge I've seen," she said.

Robin nodded. "Are you sure this is safe, Collin?"

"Nope," he said. "I'll cross first and use my power to iron out any faults. I can count on you to catch me if I fall, can't I Star… Kori?"

"Of course," Starfire said cheerfully.

A vein throbbed in Robin's forehead. "What is wrong, Tim?" Kori asked.

"Nothing," he lied. "I'm just…"

"Don't be jealous," Starfire said, and she kissed Robin lips. Just a peck, but it sent Robin through the roof nonetheless. He just stared at her, as did Cyborg and Speedy. And she returned the stare. She hadn't... expected that to happen... but it just felt right... and now she...

"AAAAHHH!" Collin screamed while Kori's back was turned.

Oh darn you Tim, he's going to die now because you distracted me! It will be all my fault and... But when she turned, Collin stood about fifty feet out, snickering at them.

"Gotcha!" he said. He began to laugh, and Cyborg and Speedy shared his mirth.

"Why you, FLOGNARD!" Starfire yelled, and began to chase him down. The others followed her yelling at her to stop, while Collin took off in a dead run towards the temple. Caution be condemned, if the bridge were to fall, it would fall…

oooo

Meanwhile on another planet in the system, a cloaked figure stood in the world's perpetual twilight. Coris, they called it. That did not matter. All that mattered to this person was getting the Dark Catalyst... and then using it to kill Collin Roberts. The young man in the Tamaranian armor had to die. He would pay for what he had done, and the price would be his life…

Oohh! The plot thickens! But you'll have to continue to tune in again, Same Bat-Time, same Bat-Channel to see what happens next. Who is this cloaked figure? Why does he want to kill Collin? And why did Dick Grayson not wear pants when he was Robin? All these questions may or may not be answered in the next chapter... but they'll all but one be answered in the course of this fic!