Pretty lame if I didn't put this one in too. Just finishing the Beastboy section.
Raven looked around himself. It wasn't dark, yet it wasn't bright. It was shadowy, yet as clear and white as you could imagine. She didn't know where or when she was. She was accustomed to weird places due to her knowledge on the supernatural… but this place… A voice comes out…
"I am the most powerful being ever created in this realm… this realm… is mine!"
"Who are you?" says Raven, peering into the darkness. She was afraid.
"I do not know… or at least, I do know" replies the voice. "I am changing… a surprising revelation has awoken in me…" and the voice goes dark like the shadows. "I am much more than I had foreseen…"
"Where are you?"
"I am here…"
Raven isn't comforted. "What is this place? Are you a demon?"
"Yes and no…"
"A half demon then?"
"I was referring to; where you are…"
Raven decides to ask straight questions. "Is this some sort of prison?"
"You could say it is a prison… an incarceration… for it is to keep me in… but not for long…"
Raven puts a barrier around herself. Something about this voice seemed to put her on edge. "Will you help me out of here? Do you know of a way out?"
"Only after I do the writer's bidding will I release you." says the man, and he walks into some weird light. He is tall in a brown robe with golden symbols. A hood like a ninja hides his face so that only his pale eyes gleam out.
"The writer?"
She looks at him, then a slight movement in the corner of her eye catches her, and she realises he is no longer in front of her, but behind her. She twirls around quickly.
"You are just as slow as your friend Robin." smiles the man. "No doubt you will also be torn by the news I am about to break."
"Robin met you? How? When?"
Shekron suddenly becomes a distant speck on the horizon. Raven starts to fly towards him, but he moves further and further away… until he appears right next to her…
"Time is of no relevance here." he says, startling Raven. "You see; it is all up to the writer."
"Who is this writer? You?"
"I am but a shadow of the writer." replies the man. The world suddenly becomes a desolation of ash and smoke. "I am called Shekron Kaizer, leader of the Octari; but that is a different story…"
"Are you trying to tell me something, because you're really not making any sense?" says Raven. Inside she feels strangely at a loss; like she was not.
"Do you feel it? Yes! You feel it. The feeling of predictability in every word you speak?" says Shekron. "What if I told you are nothing but a fictional character, made by the whims of the writer? What if I said 'you are not real'?"
"I wouldn't believe you." remarks Raven.
"Is that your face?"
Raven thought it was a stupid question, until she realised she was looking at herself from a third person view… like a dream… or a nightmare… Kaizer sits upon a pedestal in the ruins of Rome.
"Are you some sort of sorcerer?"
"I could be. It all depends on what happens to me; written it might be."
Raven watches as she somehow starts moving around Kaizer, though being perfectly still.
"I'm getting out of here!" says Raven determined, and she whirls up all her powers to blast at the sky, to try and shatter the illusion.
"I do not think so." smiles Shekron, and he jumps at her with amazing speed and power, knocking her to the floor. "Not that you could escape this story so easily."
"AZERATH METRION ZINTHOS!" shouts Raven, and the wave of energy engulfs Shekron like a flame… then fizzles out.
"Amusing and predictable… as always." he is unscathed. He raises his palm and a force knocks Raven off her feet again and into the snow.
"What do you want with me?" struggles Raven. Her body was aching and sore.
"Are you really in pain?"
"How couldn't I be?" she says, wiping the blood from her nose.
"Like this…"
Raven's pain leaves as swiftly as it had come, like it had never been…
"How…?"
"As I said; you are merely fiction. Nothing that has occurred is real. I can tear you apart, yet you could still be very much alive. We are but wheels turning in the engines of the imagination. This realm is a realm of fiction… fanfiction as they call it… A realm of pure fantasy…"
"Fiction? As in a story? Who are they?" says Raven, but she feels like she is just repeating what was said before…
"The writers… many, many writers." says the man, and the scenery starts to change. "All you see is pure fantasy, imagination and…"
"An illusion?" says Raven, getting the drift as the snow melts to a desert.
"… Your grim reality…" says the man emotionless.
"I still don't believe you Shekron. If this is really just a story, why are you telling me this? What does this make you?"
"I am the shadow of the writer; merely a gatekeeper between reality and this land of make believe. As we are just characters, we are also, now, the masters…"
"We?" says Raven confused. "As in us?"
"No…" smiles Shekron. "Us!"
"It is we who are immortal." says Shekron from behind her. Soon, to Raven's horror, many other spectres appear, each one different from the other… but all of them are; Shekron Kaizer!
"It is we who command this space."
"It is I whom has been created…"
"It is we who are here…"
"We are all characters, we are the same here…"
"Meaningless, meaningless; everything here is meaningless…"
"In meaningless; we bring ourselves a purpose…"
"In fiction we are born…"
"In fiction we shall thrive..."
"This realm is ours…"
No fewer than thirteen Shekron's surround Raven. She feels nervous. This was dangerous. She hoped her friends could help her.
"What friends?" smiles Shekron. "These friends?"
A brilliant sensation rocks Raven as what she had known to be true dissolves, and the alternate realms bare open on her. Every fanfiction is remembered…
Beastboy hates her, Beastboy loves her, she killed Beastboy, Beastboy killed her. Cyborg loved her, she killed Cyborg, Cyborg killed her, Cyborg hated her. Robin killed her, Robin loves her, she killed Robin, Robin hates her. Starfire killed her, she killed Starfire, Starfire loves her, Starfire hates her.
"STOP THIS!" cries Raven, still surrounded by the grim figures. The pain of the realisation was like dying…
"Dying? Like this?" says a Shekron.
Every story where Raven dies is accessed in her memory. She goes silent and more deathly pale as she realises she may be dead!
"Or death like this?" says a Shekron.
Horror grips Raven as she sees a multitude of faces… faces she had killed. She had no friends, it was all an illusion. She had no life, for she was dead. She was a murderer… she had killed.
"Consider yourself fortunate to have only one known identity." says the first Shekron. "Robin was torn incredibly by the revelation. He didn't even know his own name… his REAL name."
"But why?" cries Raven. "Why do they do this to me?"
The Kaizers sum up their tale…
"Everything you had once known…"
"Everything you had once held dear…"
"Is false…"
"A web of unreality for entertainment…"
"Your passionate relationships…"
"Your hate seething mutilations…"
"The happiness of your life…"
"The atrocities…"
"Even the horror of the maltreatment on your mother by the demons…"
"Was all designed for entertainment…"
"Amusing to say the least…"
"Are you amused?"
"Are you real?"
"STOP! STOP! THIS CAN'T BE TRUE!" screams Raven. She can't even remember her own face. "I don't believe you! It just isn't possible! I know I'm real! WHY. WHY?"
"You know it is true…"
"The writer has made it so…"
"You cannot fight the writers…"
"You have no real power…"
"You are helpless…"
"You know the truth…"
"But this is sick!" argues Raven. She realises that she everything is not real anymore. She wasn't even in control of what she said. "Why so much pain? Do they enjoy it? Do they like to see me suffer? My friends and family suffer? Is this all a game? IS THIS ALL A GAME?"
"Like a voice crying in the cold…"
"Being choked by the insignificance…"
"Shouts out to deny it's own reality…"
"As a being of non-being…"
"Trying to be heard…"
"Less they should never be heard again…"
Raven falls to her knees speechless. She now remembered everything that had been imposed on her… her fictional character. The stories of love, hate, suffering. The stories of friendship, truth and deceit; they were all made for entertainment? They were all illusions? They were not real…? What did that make her…? She is speechless.
"My purpose has been done…" says Shekron.
"But… … … why…?" says Raven weakly. But Shekron is gone. She is but a shape in the void, illuminated by a sole spotlight…
Did it really have to be this way?
Is this how it ends?
How did it all begin?
Was I born?
Did my mother have to suffer so?
Was it by the choice of one, solitary man that made me the horror I am this day?
Is it my destiny, my lot in life, to be used for amusement?
Are my pains are just to make you happy?
My emotions are but entertainment?
My thoughts are only thin words on a page?
Am I really…?
So many alternate realities…
So many lives are spinning me out of my sanity…
I was her, and I was her and her, her, her…
Me…
Do I have friends?
Are they just pieces on a game?
Am I saying what I am saying?
Has this just been a script revised for my own undoing?
Are you reading this?
Do you think I'm real?
Can you see me?
Did I love, did I hate, did I… think?
Did it have to be me…?
The darkness morphs to the darkness of a room. "I wish… it didn't have to be me…" she cries on her bed, in her bedroom, in Titan's tower. Whatever went into her mind about her alternate selves seemed to disappear from memory. But she still wept… she had been used… she was abused for the enjoyment of 'readers'… she was not real…
I cringe…
…
"Rae? Are you okay in there?" knocks Beastboy from outside. "Are you crying?"
"N… no… I'm not…" she sniffs.
"In all accounts, Raven crying is a very rare occurrence." says Starfire.
"Well she'd better hurry is she wants some of this pizza!" says Cyborg.
"I think you've meditated quite long enough Raven." says Robin, munching the pizza. "Have a break!"
"R… Right." says Raven, still dazed from the encounter. She heads out… in doubt…
"Are you okay?" says Beastboy. "You look pretty shaken up!"
"I just had a… weird dream." says Raven. She feels her hands to try and reassure herself she is real. But even that is of little comfort.
"Whatever you visioned in your state of sleep, I am sure it will be an interesting and entertaining story." says Starfire with just a bit of irony. "Will you tell it for us friend Raven?"
Raven was glad to be talking with her friends. But she couldn't edge out the feeling that was inside her… that at any moment, something may go terribly wrong. It was all up to the writer…
"Maybe some other time…"
…
Something did go wrong… something terribly cruel…