The whir of an electric door announced its action as it opened, and on the other side stood six young adults. Kori's boss stood on a floating platform as he watched them slowly enter the conference room with an observant eye. Each one looked around in awe and amazement at the size of the room, but even more to all of the technological devices that surrounded them - especially Raven Roth.
Kori ushered them to sit at the table in the middle of the room and wait for her boss to arrive. She moved to the far end and began shuffling through papers as the others looked around and at each other. Garfield and Terra were enjoying some idle conversation, Victor was looking around until his eyes locked onto Raven (sitting a few seats away), who was, in turn, looking at the electronics with a look in her eyes that matched Victor's, the difference being the subject of their scrutiny.
"Is your boss coming out or what?" Richard asked, rather impatientally, drumming his fingers on the table. He began to ask Kori again, but the sound of footsteps stopped him from asking.
Each of them looked towards the shadows; it was from here that the heavy sound of rubber against metal originated in rhythmic beats. They came closer and closer until a man with slicked-back, silver hair emerged from the shadows. He wore all black, but his most striking feature was the dark eyepatch on his right eye.
"Sorry to keep you waiting. My name is Mr. Wilson," he said in a patient, drawling tone, as he moved towards Kori. "You all know why you're here, I presume?"
"Yeah, but what I'm wondering - Why didn't you just request the services of the military? I'm sure there top officers would serve your purposes just as well... Not that I'm objecting to being busted out, but it doesn't seem to make sense," Victor explained, looking questioningly troubled.
"According to your record, you were once in the military, Mr. Stone, so you should know that those officers have to follow a specific code of orders. This type of mission requires more cunning than planning, since you'll be going up against an enemy that is as smart - if not smarter - than us." Mr. Wilson responded smoothly. Victor nodded in agreement.
"Now that we know that, I wanna know why we're here." Garfield said.
"You're here because you were chosen by my best agent"- he motioned to Kori - "to help recover our base on Mars, which was experimenting on DNA - crossing dinosaur and human DNA, to be more specific," he explained. He turned down the lights with a remote.
He pressed another button, and a large screen slowly lowered. Mr. Wilson pressed a red button on the table and a more in-depth movie than the one they each saw when they were recruited began.
"As I said earlier, our team of scientists was working on ways of crossing human DNA and dinosaur DNA to create a unique hybrid that has unlimited capabilities - not just physically, but mentally as well." He stopped as the video showed footage of scientists breeding the half-dinosauric, half-humanoid creatures in seperate tubes.
The video then moved to one scientist doing his routine check. He looked up to see that several of the tubes were broken, but before he could do anything, a greenish-blue blur ran in front of the camera and tackled him. Mr. Wilson and the others turned their heads as the beast disembowled the scientist. Blood flew everywhere, marring the sleek capsule glass as well as the camcorder's lens. Although their heads were turned, they could hear the horrific screams of pain and agony that echoed throughout the video before scratching into nothing but static.
"However, as you just saw, they were... unable to maintain control." Mr. Wilson stated evenly before taking a deep breath.
"Okay, all in favor of getting the hell out of here, say 'I'!" Garfield exclaimed as he scrambled to get up.
"I understand that you would be a little scared by what you just saw."
"A little! A LITTLE!" Garfield practically screamed. "That dude just got mauled for doing nothing! What're they gonna do to us when they figure out we're trying to do something?"
"Look, you came here already knowing what to expect (more or less), and if you help us out, whatever Kori promised you will be granted. Plus an extra ten million each," Mr. Wilson added in a no-nonsense tone that made Garfield suddenly want very much to sit back down.
For the first time since the six had entered, a smile peeled across Mr. Wilson's lips.
"Good."
-
Kori stepped in and informed Mr. Wilson of each one of them as well as their backrounds as they themselves read the files explaining what they would have to do, which had been handed out after the video clip.
"Well, after reviewing each of your abilities, I have assigned you all psuedonyms. Fake names," he clarified to Gar as he began to speak. Logan closed his mouth and leaned back down. "In this agency, we each have code names which we go by so as not to give away our identies, should any of us be overheard or found by the public. Richard Grayson, you will now be referred to as Robin. Victor Stone, your name will be Cyborg. Raven Roth, we'll keep it to Raven, since your name itself is a code name. Garfield Logan, you are now Beast Boy, and Terra Markov, being a terrain expert, we'll keep your to Terra as well. I want you to all become accustomed to these names and call each other by them. If I hear any non-assigned names from here until the end of this mission, the one speaking the name will be punished. Severely."
Each one took a moment and looked at each other, associating the new names with the faces. They then turned back to finish hearing what they needed to know.
"You may know her as Kori," he pointed, "but you will call her Starfire. You will refer to me as Slade."
"I was thinking Cyclops." Beast Boy joked. Terra smacked him upside the head.
"So when do we leave?" Robin asked. He wanted to get it over with.
"Considering what you're up against, you're going to need to trust each other and learn what needs to be learned."
"Meaning?" Robin asked.
"Meaning that you all will spend one month here training," Slade clarified, hiding his irritation.
"Wouldn't the best thing be to go straight to Mars? I mean, what about the rest of the people there?" Terra asked.
"We confirmed a week ago that all of the scientists that are - well, more accurately, were there are now dead. The only beings that you'll encounter there now are the experimental beings, called dinosapians by the scientists," Slade explained before walking away. Almost as an afterthought, he added, over his shoulder, "Oh, your training begins... now."
He disappeared into the shadowed hallway again.
"If you all will follow me." Starfire said briskly...
They all did as ordered and followed behind her.
-
They walked past the receptionist who had greeted them earlier, and moved to an elevator. They all got in, and it took them several floors down. When it opened, they saw a long hallway, with ten doors on each side, a hallway in the middle of them, and one, large sliding door at the end.
"This is where you all will train and stay for the next month. Your rooms have been prepared, on the left is the mess hall, on the right is the bathroom, and at the end down there is the holo-room or training room where you will be spending most of the day. Which is what you all should be doing now. First go to your rooms, change into your uniforms, and join me when you're done."
Five of the six wandered into the foyer. Robin turned to Starfire with a cocksure smirk.
"So formal. So sophistocated. So-"
She swatted him, but she was smiling.
He raised an eyebrow after recovering. "Ooh. Fiesty. This promises to be quite the interesting month... Miss Starfire."
She tilted her head as if curious, and said, "Oh, does it? Yes, I suppose it will be quite intriguing to watch your little friends crush you like a bug."
Robin smirked.
"Touche."