AUTHOR'S NOTE: This doesn't take place in the same storyline as my "Forced Base" and "Fractured Heart" stories, so forget those when you're reading this. Also, about Sanza/Red X: When he's wearing the mask, he's Red X. When he's not, he's Sanza. Simple as that.
SECOND AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is a sequel to "The Life and Times of Red X", which is in my profile. Read that before you read this. Also, this fic COMPLETELY IGNORES the events of the fifth season (with the exception of "Go"). For the purposes of this fic, "Things Change" NEVER HAPPENED.
O-O-O
"Now let's just see here," said Maddy, smiling as she lifted up the cover of the long, white box that contained her big brother's Red X suit. "I-"
The box was empty... the suit was gone.
"You gotta be kidding me! He was wearing the suit under his clothes the whole-"
Then Maddy remembered the shoes that Sanza had put on just before he left... they hadn't been shoes, they had instead been closer to boots... the black boots that went with the Red X costume.
"Well, that's a drag..."
O-O-O
Sanza turned to face Sedaris, realizing that even with his Red X suit, this fight would be extremely difficult, if not impossible to win.
"I'm surprised you're attacking me. Don't you have a city to destroy?"
As Sanza spoke, he reached down into his pockets and pulled out the gloves and mask of the Red X suit. Slipping the gloves on over his hands, he took a step back, watching to see if Sedaris would make a move.
"You were going to come after me first, so I had to take preventative measures. It's nothing personal."
"Well, this is personal."
Now wearing the gloves, Sanza pointed his palms toward Sedaris and blasted him with several exploding Xs, which Sedaris easily countered by smacking them away with his hand. Several of the Xs still hit Sedaris, but the rest flew out into the cathedral, destroying several pews wherever they hit. The smoke from the explosion gave Sanza time to remove his clothes and put on his mask, and now he was Red X once more, lunging forward at Sedaris' throat with X-blades extended. Sedaris grabbed Red X by the arm, tossing him harmlessly away and continuing forward with a stomp aimed at the thief's legs.
"Not this time," said X, rolling out of the way of the stomp and standing back up again, holding a powerful electrical charge between his two hands. The red lightning coursing around his body prevented Sedaris from launching another attack, and the thief took advantage of this, leaping into the air and aiming several more X-bombs straight down at his opponent. The large explosion generated by this shrouded the altar completely in smoke and once again concealed the thief from view.
"You realize by now that your attacks don't do a damn thing to me," Sedaris replied, peering through the smoke and seeing Red X's silhouette darting back and forth across the front of the cathedral. "I'll just let him tire himself out a bit..."
As the smoke cleared, a large, glowing net flew from Red X toward Sedaris, who leapt back to avoid the net, then charged forward over it, only to be caught by a powerful electrical burst emitted by the netting as soon as Sedaris came in contact. He let out a scream and fell to one knee, while Red X leapt at him and kicked him in the head, knocking him away.
"Now you realize that I can combine two of my weapons at once," said the thief, firing several Xs in Sedaris' direction. The Xs expanded into cables and wrapped themselves around Sedaris' arms as he tried to stand. He flexed out to break the cables, only to have the cables expand on their own and form a large, circular ring around Sedaris' body. The ring then transformed into a column, from which a bright red glow began to emerge.
"What is this?" thought Sedaris, closing his eyes as the light became far too bright for him to stand. "Dammit!"
The entire column detonated in an enormous explosion, blasting a huge crater in the altar and sending Red X, who was standing some distance away, skidding backwards. He raised his forearm to his eyes to shield himself from the smoke and debris, letting out several coughs as the dust began wafting over him.
"Gotcha," X whispered, lowering his hands from his face.
"No, I've got you."
A powerful arm wrenched itself around the thief's neck from behind, lifting him into the air and choking him with an immense amount of force. As he coughed and gasped in surprise, Sedaris, who still had X in the powerful headlock, began to speak.
"That could've really hurt if I had been there... that's very impressive."
"How... how did you... I-"
"Obviously, you didn't pay attention while you were combining your weapons, but in the moments before the explosion, the outside of that column transformed from solid metal into pure light and I was able to walk right out. Energy and matter are conserved, but you're too stupid to know that... or perhaps you're just too arrogant to care."
Sedaris released the headlock and threw Red X to the ground, allowing him less than a second to catch his breath before striking him with a powerful kick to the ribs, sending him rolling several feet across the floor. He then casually walked past the thief and up onto the altar, standing just on the outside of the crater that X's explosive blast had made.
"I suppose you'd like to know why I'm doing what I'm doing... why I'm going to destroy your city and so much more. Would you like to know?"
"I'd like you... to shut up..." coughed X, slowly picking himself off of the ground while continuing to clutch his ribs. "This fight's not over..."
"Of course not, but you looked like you needed a break."
X's eyes narrowed at Sedaris, and he raised his palm again, preparing to launch another attack at his dangerous foe. Sedaris had to be stopped now... Red X knew that he was in a fight not just for his life, but the lives of everyone in the city as well.
"We fight," said Red X, his palm beginning to glow. "We fight now!"
Several more explosive Xs were launched at Sedaris, who stood his ground as the Xs detonated around him, creating another explosion and cloud of smoke but leaving the powerful man completely unharmed, and leaving Red X even more frustrated than before.
"Jump City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, all of them gone by sunrise, all of them completely destroyed by the most horrific cataclysm in history. Wouldn't you like to know exactly how I'm going to pull that off?"
"I don't give a shit whether you wanna destroy one person or a million people, it's not gonna happen!" shouted Red X, rushing forward at Sedaris and showering him with a flurry of punches and kicks, each of them either dodged or blocked. When the thief finished his series of attack with a powerful uppercut, Sedaris avoided it by swinging back his head, watching as the thief's fist soared past him, just an inch from the tip of his nose. Then, his head came forward, slamming into Red X's forehead and knocking him flat on his back, the headbutt nearly knocking him out. "Unnnngh... damn you..."
"As soon as my drill reaches the San Andreas Fault, a pre-programmed computer sequence will activate, triggering a massive earthquake that will accelerate the natural processes of the planet by ten million years. A massive chunk of the state of California will fall into the sea. The ensuing tsunami will sweep across the Pacific Ocean, washing over Hawaii and destroying cities such as Tokyo, Sydney, and Shanghai. That is what you and the Titans have been trying to stop me from doing, right?"
The thief didn't stand this time, simply staring up at Sedaris, in shock at what he was hearing. If such a plan was pulled off... tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of people would be killed. Why anyone would want to do such a horrific thing was beyond comprehension, even for Red X, who'd dealt with people as vicious and as evil as Slade.
"Nothing like it has ever happened before... the deaths of millions of people in a single event... don't you want to know what it's like? Aren't you even the least bit curious to see how the world will react? What they'll say on the news? What they'll write in the history books? Such a disaster... a sight of incomprehensible terror... and absolute beauty."
"You're psychotic..." Red X rose to his feet again, clenching his fists and speaking with a newfound determination, determination to stop this madman at any cost. "Killing millions of innocent people just to see what the news would say about it? That's the most fucking sick thing I've ever heard!"
"You really shouldn't swear in church, Sanza."
"Fuck church, I'm kicking your ass!"
Red X ran at Sedaris again, striking him with a kick that impacted his cheek and send him back several steps, slowly descending into the crater in the center of the altar. Another kick was blocked by Sedaris' forearm, while a punch landed squarely on his jaw.
"That barely even made me flinch," said Sedaris, striking straight forward with a kick that hit Red X right in the chest and threw him off of the altar again. He then turned around and reached up, toward the massive, gold-leaf painted cross that hung from the ceiling behind the altar, measuring ten feet from top to bottom. With one mighty tug, he freed the cross from its mounting, walking toward Red X and carrying the cross like a baseball bat. "This, on the other hand..."
Sedaris swung the massive cross downward at the thief, who somersaulted out of the way and watched as the top of the cross impacted the marble at the foot of the altar, making a large crack. He swung the cross at Red X again, who leapt up onto one end and ran across the massive piece of painted wood, leaping into the air and striking Sedaris across the face with a spinning kick that knocked him off-balance. He dropped the cross and tumbled backward, falling into the center of the crater, limbs sprawled out and eyes glazed over.
Despite the fact that he could begin to feel the effects of exhaustion, Red X descended into the crater and down toward Sedaris, pointing his palm down at him and firing a metallic X across his body to keep him pinned in place.
"You're the worst kind of criminal... you're not curious, you're just evil, and I don't know whether to kill you or to call the Titans to have you put in jail."
As Red X stood over him, Sedaris showed no sign of fear... no emotion at all, looking up into the thief's eyes as he continued to speak.
"You're not scared of me? Fine, I'll just have to convince you..." X once again extended his wrist blades, kneeling down beside Sedaris and placing the tip of one of the blades at his throat. Again, Sedaris said nothing... showed no expression at all. "You don't think I won't kill you because we're in a church? Believe me, God heard exactly what you're planning, and I think He wants you dead as much as I do."
"You think I'm really helpless, don't you? You should know a lot better than that."
In an instant, Sedaris snapped the metallic bands holding him to the ground, his right arm snapping through the metal and knocking the blade away from his neck. Then, his left arm reached up, its fingers gripping tightly around X's throat. The thief let out a gasp as Sedaris lifted him into the air, then a cry of pain as he was thrown down to the ground, landing on his back and having all the wind knocked out of him.
With one cruel kick, Sedaris knocked Red X out of the crater, sending him tumbling down from the altar and coming to a stop on the aisle in the middle of the room, some fifteen feet away. At that moment, several priests rushed inside the room, only to see a good portion of the room destroyed, and a large man in sunglasses walking toward the downed body of one of the most fearsome thieves in the city. Sedaris gave them a single look, and they rushed from the room, leaving the two combatants alone to finish their battle.
But it was quite clear that the battle was already finished... Red X was hurt and exhausted, having used all of his best weapons against Sedaris but barely being able to give him little more than a scratch. He watched as the madman slowly approached him, barely able to get to one knee before his foe was right on top of him.
"I really feel sorry for you, since you're not going to get to see the amazing events that are about to befall your city... but I'm sure your mother and sister will just love the show."
"Son of a bitch..." As Sedaris reached down toward X's neck again, the thief drove his elbow forward... right into Sedaris' groin. The man let out a gasp of pain, doubling over and stumbling back, which gave Red X time to get to a standing position. "You just reminded me why I have to win this-"
Sedaris drew his hand back and smacked Red X hard across the face, knocking him on his back again and nearly causing him to pass out.
"You can keep fighting until I snap your neck for all I care," said Sedaris, still grimacing slightly but once again preparing to put the thief down for good. "You're not leaving this room alive."
Red X struggled to get up, but he could see that Sedaris would get to him before he could even get to his knees again. Clenching his teeth, he pointed both of his palms upward, closing his eyes as he got ready to give Sedaris everything he had.
"I'm not letting you hurt my family... I don't have to be standing to beat you!"
The sound of shattering windows behind Sedaris didn't distract him, but the Batcable wrapped around his arms certainly did, and he let out a loud cry as he felt himself being yanked backwards. A hail of Starbolts slammed into his body, followed by an enormous dark energy blast and a blue beam of light from a sonic energy cannon.
"Titans, go!" shouted Robin, standing at the back of the altar with Starfire, Raven, and Terra hovering in the air behind him, and Beast Boy and Cyborg at his sides, poised to attack. Sedaris turned toward them, only to feel dozens of X-bombs explode against his back. Red X now stood up, slowly walking toward Sedaris and preparing to launch another attack.
"I don't believe this..." muttered Sedaris to himself, looking behind him to see Red X, and then looking forward to see the Titans. At that moment, Beast Boy, transformed into a rhinoceros, slammed into his side and sent him flying into a nearby wall.
"That's for Raven and Terra, and there's a whole lot more where that came from!"
"A whole lot more from all of us," Terra added, lifting her arms and sending chunks of marble and concrete raining down upon Sedaris, battering his body even more and slamming him repeatedly against the hard wall just behind his back.
"You will not get away from us this time!" shouted Starfire, her green eyes aglow. She blasted Sedaris with eye lasers, firing a new blast every time he tried to walk forward. "Everyone, attack him with everything that you have!"
The wall behind Sedaris quickly crumbled as the attacks came in at an increasing rate, and soon, all that was left of the man was a large pile of rubble where the wall that he'd been backed up against had once stood. Terra immediately used her powers to clear out the rubble, only to see that Sedaris had completely disappeared... there was no trace of him anywhere in the room.
"Did we... vaporize him?" asked Starfire, a hint of worry on her face.
"I don't think so," said Robin, kicking a rock away from the rubble pile. "I think he ran off again!"
"He couldn't have gotten far," said Red X, clenching his fists and pointing toward the cathedral's entrance. "He must've slipped out that door, we have to go after him!"
As the only one who understood the true evil of Sedaris' plan and the true gravity of the danger to the city, Red X was now completely determined to stop him. He dashed out the front door into the street, with the Titans following close behind. As thunder continued to ring out, the thief looked back and forth for any sign of Sedaris... but the man was gone, having completely disappeared. Letting out a loud cry of frustration, the thief fell to one knee... partly from despair, and partly from exhaustion.
"It's all right," said Terra, placing a comforting hand on Red X's shoulder. "We're going to stop him..."
Red X stared up into the sky, then back down at the ground, his entire body trembling.
"That sick bastard... he's going to destroy the entire state... he's going to drop it into the sea... I heard him, he told me everything..."
"What did he tell you? Did he tell you where he was going?" Robin's questions were coming quickly, and a worried look could be seen on his face as well. Red X shook his head, and Robin let out an angry sigh. "But you said-"
"He told me everything except where he was going... he just said that he was going to trigger an earthquake that would rip California away from the rest of the country... he said that he was going to do it just to see what it would look like. He's sick... he's a complete psychopath, he's as evil as Slade..."
"No one's as evil as-"
"Robin, did you hear what Red X just told us?" asked Raven, her arms across her chest. "He's going to kill hundreds of millions of people out of sheer morbid curiosity. That's pretty evil to me."
"Not to mention what he almost did to Raven and Terra..." said Beast Boy quietly, bowing his head and trying to block out the horror of the previous night from his mind.
"We're going back to the Tower... I may have a lead on Sedaris' location, and if I'm correct, we'll need to get there in a hurry."
Robin began running toward the T-Car, which had been left in a nearby parking garage. The Titans all raised an eyebrow, not having been given any prior indication that Robin knew where Sedaris might be... even if it was only a hunch, they all eagerly followed him, anticipating the news. While the Titans headed toward the parking garage, Red X turned back toward the cathedral.
"Are you coming?" The thief turned at the sound of Terra's voice, and could see her standing just a few feet away, having stopped to see what Red X was doing. "The T-Car is-"
"I have to get my other clothes, I left them inside. I'll be back."
X dashed inside the sanctuary and toward the altar, where he'd left his discarded clothes. He picked them up and began to turn away, before noticing the cross still resting on the floor where Sedaris had dropped it.
"This is the second time I've been in a fight that wrecked this place," said X to himself, remembering his fight with Robin several months ago in the very same cathedral. "Lord, I hope You can forgive me this time... I sorta didn't start the fight, so..."
The thief let out a sigh, turning from the altar and walking back toward the entrance of the cathedral.
"I came here to get some answers and I almost ended up getting killed... and I still don't know what God wants me to do... there's only one thing I do know... I have to help the Titans stop Sedaris... mom and sis and everyone else in the city are counting on us..."
O-O-O
Back at Titans Tower, Robin was discussing his theory with the others, displaying a map of the city on the large screen in the main room.
"Sedaris plans to use a massive drill to control the fault line beneath the city... and what kind of structure would have a massive drill?"
"A massive hardware store?" replied Beast Boy, immediately drawing a look of annoyance from Raven.
"An oil platform," said Terra, sparing Beast Boy any further embarrassment while simultaneously progressing the conversation forward.
"That's right," replied Robin, pulling up a diagram of every single nearby offshore oil rig and its position along the coast. "Sedaris must be using one of the oil platforms outside the city... and there's only one platform close enough to the fault line that Sedaris would be able to use."
Another diagram appeared on screen, displaying a massive oil rig and its structural information, its every nuance and measurement displayed for the Titans to see.
"The Valentine Platform, a mile-high, with two-thirds of its height contained underwater. It's the world's largest oil platform, capable of boring dozens of miles into the earth... and it's the only platform with a drill that could activate the fault. Sedaris is on the Valentine Platform, and we need to get there right now and stop him."
Red X stared up at the screen, slightly annoyed that Robin hadn't been able to find out this information sooner... at least before the group was led on a wild goose chase to a bunker that nearly cost he and the Titans their lives.
"I could've figured that out," quipped the thief, slumping into the couch where he was seated and pointing at the screen.
"Then why didn't you?" Raven replied, narrowing her eyes as she looked down at X. "Don't open your mouth unless you're planning to say something intelligent."
Red X rolled his eyes, while Robin continued to talk to the group, obviously caring little about what the thief had just said.
"The lives of a lot of people are depending on us stopping Sedaris as soon as possible. We may have just a few hours before he activates the earthquake, so we're heading out immediately. I think the incident in the cathedral today showed exactly what Sedaris is made of... individually, he may be able to beat us, but every single time we've fought him together, he hasn't even stayed to fight. That's his weakness... he's constantly trying to get us alone, and whenever he has to fight us all, he runs like a coward."
The Titans nodded in agreement, while Red X leaned back on the couch, his eyes staring up at the ceiling.
"He ain't gonna be able to run anymore!" said Cyborg, smiling and pumping his fist. "He's no match for the Teen Titans!"
"We shall stop Sedaris and bring safety back to our city... with all of us working together, Sedaris cannot prevail!" The optimism on Starfire's face was evident... though she had been fearful of Sedaris before, the strength of her friends comforted her, and she knew that the next time she fought Sedaris, she would be fighting him alongside the rest of the Teen Titans.
"Remember, Sedaris is strong, but he's just one man... he's just a criminal, and we're going to bring him down like every other criminal we've faced!" Robin's words of encouragement brought an affirmative cheer from Beast Boy and Cyborg, and even Terra, who had been apprehensive ever since the incident in the bunker, managed to crack a smile. "This is it, team... Titans, go!"
The Titans dispersed from the room, heading toward the elevator and the roof, where the T-Plane had been prepared and was ready to go. Red X was last to leave, standing up from the couch and walking toward the elevator. Again Terra lagged behind to make sure that he was coming... and she noticed immediately that he was nowhere near as excited as the others.
"Sanza... you're not hurt, are you?"
The thief shook his head and walked past Terra, standing in front of the elevator and waiting for it to come back down. She stood alongside him, a look of concern on her face as he leaned into the closed elevator door and let out a sigh.
"I prayed and I prayed, and all I got for an answer was Sedaris trying to kill me. He came out of nowhere, Terra... I almost get the feeling that God doesn't want me to be a hero..."
"So... you think he wants you to be a thief? Sanza, I still remember what you told me yesterday... that all I needed to do was to be myself..."
The elevator door opened, and Terra climbed in, with Red X entering the elevator close behind her. The door slid shut, and the elevator began its ascent up the shaft, with the thief still deep in thought.
"Be myself... but God is a part of me... right? Then again, there's no way that He'd just want me to let Sedaris destroy everything, so... wait a minute, I'm Red X. I'm out for myself... What's in my best interests? Being a hero, or being a thief?"
Maybe he was both... or maybe he was neither of them at all. His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the elevator door sliding open, and the sight of Robin, Starfire, Raven, Beast Boy, and Cyborg, standing out in the hallway and waiting for the two stragglers.
"We need to go right now," said Robin, slightly annoyed with Red X and Terra's tardiness. While Terra apologized and joined Beast Boy at his side, X stepped out of the elevator and didn't even look at Robin, casually strolling out into the hallway without seemingly a care in the world. "What was keeping-"
"Cut me some slack, kid, I've already fought Sedaris once today, I was taking a little nap. You got a problem with that or something?"
O-O-O
Deep below the ocean, near the bottom of the oil platform and inside a large room lit only by a dim blue light, sat several dozen capsules, each of them about the size of a bathtub, and each of them filled with a clear, slightly bubbling liquid substance. Sedaris stood in front of the capsules, looking out over them with a smile on his face.
"Quantum computers... when connected, they contain more processing power than every other computer ever created, multiplied a quintillion times... the pinnacle of Frederick Dullahan's work, now at my command..."
"Sir..." A short man in a camouflage had entered the room and was now standing right behind Sedaris, waiting to deliver him an urgent message. "The Titans... they're headed this way. Their plane is in the sky..."
Sedaris' eyes went wide under his sunglasses... he hadn't anticipated that the Titans would be able to locate him, and began to wonder if perhaps he'd told Red just a bit too much... and if now, his arrogance would be his downfall.
"Do not allow them to get down here... don't even allow them to enter the structure. As soon as they exit their plane and onto the platform, I want you and the other men to kill them. Do NOT let them in here, do you understand?"
Sedaris' words were coming at a slightly elevated pace, and there was a hint of nervousness in his voice... for the first time since he'd taken command of the oil platform, he seemed to be losing his cool.
"Yes sir," replied the man, turning away from Sedaris and dashing out of the room to alert the other soldiers. As he left, Sedaris glanced toward the adjacent room, where an elevator led directly down to the bottom of the platform, and to the controls of the computer programmed to activate the earthquake.
"Even if they do get here... they'll never make it in time to stop the inevitable... Dark Calamity will go forward without a hitch... and I will be witness to the most incredible disaster the world has ever seen."
O-O-O
Aboard their plane, the Titans and Red X could see the Valentine Platform looming in the distance, its massive spire jutting 1,700 feet into the air. Far below the waves lay the bulk of the structure... and most likely, somewhere inside, was Sedaris and the massive computer that was programmed to trigger a terrifying earthquake.
"This place will be very heavily guarded, so stay on your toes... no matter what, all seven of us are sticking together."
Robin's instructions brought a solemn nod from Beast Boy, who wasn't about to let either Raven or Terra out of his sight. The latter glanced nervously out the window, her eyes darting back and forth between the top of the platform and the ocean below.
"I'm not letting you get the best of me or my friends again, Sedaris..." thought Terra, her face pressed against the window, her hand resting on her chin. "I'm just glad that all of this is about to be over..."
"Yeah, it'll be nice to have a day or two without having to worry about the city getting ripped up," replied Cyborg. "Then again, as soon as we kick Sedaris' butt, we'll probably have another villain show up and try to take out the city. It never fails."
"Which is why I hate playing the hero," said Red X as the plane came in for a landing on top of the platform. "Way, way too much work."
"But what about being a thief? That is quite a bit of work..." said Starfire, glancing at Red X. "You must first break into a structure... then you must take out the guards and find the object that you intend to steal. Then, if we show up, you have to fight us. That is quite a bit of work."
"That's not work, that's fun," Red X replied. "And I don't ever have to worry about what'll happen to mom and sis if I screw up..."
The plane descended and came to a stop, and the six Titans and Red X climbed out, glancing over at the side of the huge platform and at a set of metallic stairs that winded around the structure, descending downward.
"That's where we need to go," said Robin, pointing toward the stairs. "Let's-"
Almost immediately, the group could see dozens of guards emerging from every direction, walking out of doors or out from around large structures mounted on top of the platform. More than a hundred in all, and quite possibly closer to two hundred, the men, all wearing identical camouflage jumpsuits, came at the Titans with weapons in hand. Terra and Raven, who had seen a similar sight during their ambush in the bunker, immediately went into battle stances, while Robin extended his recently-repaired bo staff and began twirling it rapidly around his body.
"Sedaris was expecting us," said Cyborg, readying his sonic cannon.
"No shit, Sherlock," replied Red X, his eyes narrowing as he watched the guards draw nearer and nearer. "This should be interesting..."
Starfire was the first of the Titans to attack, tossing several Starbolts into the rapidly approaching crowd of guards and knocking a section of the first row well back into the ranks. Some of the guards opened fire, but Raven's energy shield blocked the bullets and gave Cyborg a chance to strike.
"This ain't gonna be pretty, but it sure is gonna be fun!" shouted Cyborg, launching several metallic cables into the crowd and using them to pick up some of the guards and toss them from the platform and into the water below. With every guard that Cyborg tossed away, another came forward to take his place, and he soon found himself overwhelmed by the men as they got closer and closer. "A little help here would be nice!"
Help came in the form of Beast Boy, who as a t-rex was able to keep nearly two dozen of the men away at a time, biting at them with his jaws while using his tail to beat them back into the crowd. Robin and Red X stood back to back, fending off the men with a combination of fisticuffs and weapon swings, while Raven kept her shield up to guard her friends from gunfire.
"Need a rock, need a rock, need a rock..." Terra had been backed into the edge of the platform, and was trying to use her powers to lift up earth from the ocean floor, with little success. Nearly a dozen men stood in front of her, their guns lowered toward Terra's face. "C'mon, how long does it take a rock to move two-thirds of a mile?"
Seeing Terra in trouble, Beast Boy transformed into a falcon and attempted to fly to Terra's aid, only to have a bullet nip him in the wing and send him plummeting back toward the metallic platform floor, landing on his face and detransforming with a painful groan.
"Beast Boy!" shouted Terra, her eyes widening just as several bullets came whizzing her way. She crouched down and closed her eyes, only to have the bullets turn black and fall to the ground, having been stopped by Raven's telekinesis just in time. "Don't worry about me, help Beast Boy!"
"I'm getting to it." Raven turned away toward Terra and back in the direction of the fallen green changeling, who was being repeatedly stomped by the surrounding guards. "Azarath, metreon, zinthos!"
A huge burst of energy blasted into the guards around Beast Boy, knocking them into the air and sending several flying off the edge of the platform.
"There's too many!" cried Red X, no longer able to keep the soldiers away with his martial arts skills. Nearby, Robin was having his own problems, unable to keep forty men away with his bo staff. As the two struggled, Starfire, who was flying overhead, gasped at their plight and launched a flurry of Starbolts down at the area, hitting not just the soldiers, but Robin and Red X as well.
"Sorry!" shouted Starfire, her hands flying to her lips. "They are in such close proximity to you that I-"
"It's fine, Star," replied Robin, rubbing his slightly-singed shoulder and looking around at the group of unconscious men surrounding him. "You took care of the guards, so... Starfire, behind you!"
Starfire couldn't turn in time to avoid being tackled by a dozen men at once, who pressed her into the ground and began raining punches and stomps down on her head and back. As Robin rushed to Starfire's aid, Red X looked toward the edge of the platform to see that Terra was still in trouble.
"No rocks up here..." thought Red X, slowly walking toward the soldiers who had Terra trapped. "Guess I'll need to give her a hand..."
As the soldiers once again raised their guns toward Terra's head, she began looking nervously between them and the water, still waiting on the rocks from the ocean floor to rise to the surface.
"I don't think they're coming," said one of the men, a smirk on his face. "You'd better just get ready to die, girl."
Out of the water came several stones, each one flying into the foreheads of one of the soldiers and knocking them out. By the time Red X had gotten over to help, Terra had already defeated her attackers, and bore a proud smile on her face.
"You know that once we get inside, your powers are pretty much useless, right?" quipped the thief, causing Terra to give a casual shrug.
"I guess I'll just have to use my fists then," replied Terra, trying to be as optimistic as she could. "He's right, though..."
"Who knows, maybe we'll find some rocks once we get inside. If we don't, just know that I've got your back."
Red X turned away from Terra and was immediately confronted by six more soldiers, their guns drawn. He took a step back, and Terra's rocks zoomed past him, hitting the soldiers in the head and knocking them out as well. The rocks then returned to Terra and began spinning rapidly around her body, held in artificial orbit by Terra's amazing powers.
"Then again, nothing says I can't take these rocks inside with me, right?"
The six rocks were immediately shot to pieces as several more soldiers charged at Terra and X, reloading their rifles as they ran. Terra gasped and stepped back, while Red X ran past her, his palms held out in front of his body.
"I'll handle these guys," said the thief, blasting the ground in front of the men with several exploding Xs and sending them flying off the side of the platform, splashing down into the ocean below. "Now, what did you say about those rocks again?"
The Titans had been successful in keeping the soldiers at bay, but as they continued to fight, the soldiers they'd managed to knock out earlier were waking up and rushing back into the fray, providing a constant stream of opponents that quickly began to wear down the group's strength. Only a couple dozen men had been knocked off the platform entirely, and all the rest were still a threat... and still under orders to exterminate the intruders at all costs. The six Titans and X gathered in a circle at the center of the platform and watched as the soldiers slowly began closing in on them.
"Every time we knock a few of them down, more come at us... and by the time we've dealt with that group, we're dealing with even more of them again," said Robin, his bo staff still held out in his hands. "Cyborg, when you knocked those guys off-"
"They're alive, we're only about fifty feet above the water... they'll survive the plunge. You're not getting the same idea I'm getting, are you?"
"Exactly the same," said Robin, a smile appearing on his face. He charged at the soldiers and swung his staff completely around, taking down nearly a dozen of them and keeping the others at bay. Starfire and Raven lifted off into the air again and concentrated their blasts toward the edges of the platform, knocking several more of the men off the sides and sending them into the ocean.
Terra had managed to gather a few more small rocks from the bottom of the ocean, and was using them to clear a path for herself into the middle of the crowd of soldiers, with Beast Boy and Cyborg following close behind her. Red X stayed at the rear of the group, kicking or punching anyone that got too close.
"You guys have a plan?" asked Red X, just as one of the men attempted to pick him up by the leg. "Because I'm really busting my butt over here..."
"I've got a great plan," said Terra, turning to Beast Boy. "Change into a really big dinosaur with a really long tail... brontosaurus should do."
"Got it," said Beast Boy, immediately transforming into the long-necked dinosaur and swatting away some of the soldiers with his tail. A large group of the men began attempting to climb up his legs and onto his back, which was exactly what Terra wanted. She turned to Cyborg.
"Cyborg, can you get on Beast Boy's back and wait until he's got guys all over him? As many as can possibly fit..."
"Uh, sure, I guess..." Cyborg ran up Beast Boy's tail, knocking away any of the men who were standing in front of him. He stood at the center of Beast Boy's back and watched as the soldiers slowly overtook his friend, swarming up his legs and climbing onto his neck and tail. "There's like five dozen guys up here! Terra, are you sure you know what you're... Terra?"
Terra had completely disappeared, and it could only be assumed that she'd been overwhelmed by the large crowd of soldiers. Red X was gone as well, while Robin had run up to help Beast Boy, thinking that his green friend was in trouble.
"Starfire, I've completely lost sight of Terra..." Raven continued blasting down at the men below, watching as a slowly-growing crowd of them began to gather underneath her and her Tamaranian friend. "And Red X is gone too..."
"I fear they may have been crushed! We must look for them!"
Beast Boy was disappearing as well, his massive dinosaur body overrun by guards, and feeling as if he was about to detransform... while Cyborg was frantically punching at the men who had come to knock him off of the green dinosaur's back, occasionally blasting a few of them away with his laser.
"Beast Boy, I think I know what Terra wanted me to do," shouted Cyborg, "but you're gonna have to cover your ears!"
"Uh... dude, that's kinda impossible right now..." thought Beast Boy, who even if he could move, would've been unable to bring his stumpy legs up to the level of his head. "This is gonna hurt, isn't it?"
Cyborg lifted his arm and began to activate one of his weapons, only to be tackled from behind and knocked off of Beast Boy's back, falling into a huge crowd of men and disappearing instantly.
"CYBORG!" shouted Robin, watching what had just occurred and being unable to do anything about it, still frantically fending off soldiers with his bo staff. "I'm not losing anyone today..."
Robin reached down to his utility belt and pulled out a large canister of tear gas, which he threw to the ground, sending up a large cloud of noxious smoke that quickly sifted over the surrounding area, incapacitating all of the soldiers who'd climbed onto Beast Boy, as well as Beast Boy himself, who detransformed and fell to the ground, his eyes burning severely. Robin himself took the brunt of the gas, collapsing to the ground in the choking fog and clenching up into a fetal position, knowing that he'd be unable to see or fight for at least a minute.
"I just hope that bought Cyborg and the others some time... that was a desperate move..."
Terra, who had been trapped beneath a crush of soldiers and had been unable to coordinate the rest of her plan, now watched as the cloud of tear gas came toward her. Suddenly, she found her vision completely cut off as something sticky was placed over her eyes.
"Hey, what gives?" shouted Terra, reaching up to her face only to have her hands quickly yanked down and pulled to her sides.
"You can thank me later," replied Red X, keeping his own eyes firmly closed beneath his mask and crouching down next to Terra, who now had a sticky X pasted over the top of her face. "That stuff really hurts... believe me, I know..."
"I just hope that whatever you put on my eyes doesn't hurt even worse when it comes off..." whispered Terra. "Dammit, my plan... I just hope Beast Boy and Cyborg are okay..."
As the soldiers who had been affected by the tear gas began to sputter and cough, falling to the ground and rubbing their burning eyes, the other soldiers ran toward the edges of the platform, a few of them fleeing down the stairs to the safety of the inside of the structure.
"Damn, Robin!" shouted Cyborg, holding his hand over his stinging eyes while holding his other arm high into the air. "I know you had to get those guys off me and Beast Boy, but did you have to throw down tear gas?"
"Just... just do what you have to do, Cyborg!" shouted Robin painfully. "Activate your concussion blast!"
"That's exactly what I was gonna do," said Cyborg, managing a quick smile. "Everybody hunker down!"
A few of the soldiers, realizing that they were about to be hit by something that was extremely powerful, stood up and fought off the pain of the tear gas to charge at Cyborg. Just before any of the soldiers reached him, Cyborg activated the concussion blast, triggering an enormous shockwave that blasted dozens of men off the roof in an instant and sent all the others flying into the air. Beast Boy transformed into a gorilla and held on tightly to a wall, while Raven used an energy shield to keep her and Starfire from feeling the effects of the blast.
"Robin!" shouted Starfire as she watched the Boy Wonder be thrown off the roof, only to see him deploy his Birdcable and latch it onto the grated steel floor at the last moment, keeping him anchored to the platform. Red X and Terra went flying as well, both of them screaming loudly as they flew back toward the edge.
"I've got you!" shouted Red X, reaching out and gripping Terra's wrist in his left hand, while using his right to fire a grappling hook that latched onto the platform in a similar fashion to Robin's Birdcable. The two of them dangled from the side of the platform, while Robin was helped up by Starfire, who set him down next to Raven near a large metallic crane.
"Robin... your eyes, the gas has damaged them..." said Starfire, attempting to peek under Robin's mask. "Just let me check them, and-"
"They still sting a bit, but they'll be fine," replied Robin, looking over at Beast Boy and Cyborg as they walked over to join their three teammates. "Great work, Cyborg..."
"You really coulda warned us a little better about dropping that gas, though," said Beast Boy, rubbing his aching eyes.
"He had no choice, you and Cyborg were about to be crushed, and we had no idea where Terra and Red X were," said Raven, taking a quick look around the platform. "Speaking of them..."
Red X and Terra lifted themselves onto the side of the platform, Terra having just peeled the X off of her eyes, where an X-shaped mark could still be seen. They walked over to the center of the platform and met up with the rest of the group. All of them showed signs of exhaustion, if only slight... they'd battled through more than two hundred well-trained soldiers, and had come out with a hard-fought victory.
But the victory was clouded by one fact... the fighting wasn't nearly over yet. They'd merely reached the top of the platform, and had nearly 3,600 feet to go to reach Sedaris.
"We need to move on," said Robin, scanning the platform to check if any of Sedaris' men remained. The few that had been able to stay on the platform after Cyborg's shockwave had immediately fled down into the structure, probably warning their boss of the Titans' victory. "Let's go."
O-O-O
The Titans and Red X descended a metallic staircase that went around the entire perimeter of the structure, sloping downward until it ended at a single door, a door that led into the oil rig itself. Inside was a single hallway that was flanked by several rooms, rooms that the Titans didn't even bother to check... they already knew where Sedaris was. Down at the bottom, two-thirds of a mile below the surface of the ocean... with his finger on the button of a machine capable of killing millions of people.
Most of the guards had been defeated, but the group still had cause to be worried... they had no way of knowing when Sedaris would be able to activate the earthquake. Once again, they were in a race against time.
The hallway ended at an elevator, as well as paths that led to the left and the right. Immediately, Robin opened the elevator and led the group inside.
"Will it take us to the bottom?" asked Starfire, observing the panel of buttons. Robin shook his head, a grim look on his face.
"It's not programmed to go down to the bottom of the platform... it'll take us a couple dozen stories below the surface of the water... once we emerge, we'll still have a lot of ground to cover."
"At least it's a start," said Beast Boy. "Let's get movin'."
The elevator began to descend, a slow journey that delivered the Titans and Red X below the water and down several hundred feet, finally stopping at its destination. The door opened, and the Titans emerged into an enormous open room which they could tell had been recently emptied. The ceiling of the room was made of a material that allowed the group to see right through it, though in the darkness outside, they could see very little of the water above. The room was lit only by dim yellow lights built into the walls, just inches above the floor.
"This room must be beautiful in the daytime," said Terra, staring up at the pitch-black plexiglass ceiling of the football-field sized room. "You can see all the fish, and all the waves..."
"This room gives me the creeps," said Cyborg, walking at a quick pace toward the small metallic door that he could see at the other end. "I got a feeling that we need to get out as soon as we can..."
"Cyborg's right, we've gotta get to Sedaris and stop him from activating that earthquake. Let's not take any more time in here than we have to," said Robin, breaking out into a run and dashing across the floor of the room, closely followed by Starfire, Raven, Beast Boy, and Cyborg. Terra lagged a bit behind, while Red X, as usual, went at his own pace, barely past the center of the room when the Titans reached the exit door.
"Something's not right..." thought the thief as he came to a near-complete stop. "I can hear something moving in here..."
The sound of metallic thumping below the floor of the room, the echo emanating and reverberating off the lights mounted in the walls... could it be Sedaris' drill making the noises, or something far more sinister?
"This door is locked," said Robin, turning to Red X and shouting in an annoyed tone. "Get over here, we need you to get this door open!"
Robin could do it himself, of course, but the thief was much faster... and time was of the essence.
"I can get it," said Cyborg, repeatedly ramming his fist into the door but being unable to make it budge. "Then again..."
Red X began walking toward the Titans and the room's exit, still carrying an eerie sense of foreboding about the room that the group was in. The sound was getting louder and louder, and was now primarily coming from the walls of the room, right next to the lights.
"Can you guys hear that?" shouted Red X, pointing toward the walls. "There's something moving in here!"
"I hear it too," said Starfire, taking a brief look around the room and keeping her arms close to her sides. "There is... something... please, hurry and open this door so that we may-"
Suddenly, Starfire let out a shriek. Something was gathering just underneath her, and she floated down to confirm what it was... the Titans themselves already had a confirmation. It was water... the room was flooding.
"X, get over here and open the door!" shouted Robin, but the thief had already beaten him to the punch, placing his hand over the door's control panel and sending an electrical burst to its circuits.
"Nothin' doin', they've shut this door off completely and I can't get it working again!"
"Keep trying!" shouted Robin, who could now see that the water had filled the room to the level of his ankles, and was still rapidly pouring in. "We're in serious trouble..."
Just above the lights, massive panels had slid open, causing huge amounts of water to flood the room from the outside, filling the entire huge space at the rate of nearly an inch every few seconds. Starfire, Raven, and Beast Boy could float in the air, but if the entire room flooded, it would do them no good, and the panels were grated, letting water enter the room but allowing nothing to escape.
Red X and the Teen Titans were about to drown.
O-O-O
The room had filled up nearly halfway, and while the group of heroes hadn't drowned yet, they were struggling to stay afloat, and still struggling to escape before the chamber filled entirely. Watching the whole scene play out, Sedaris let out a small chuckle as he continued to watch the room fill, waiting for the moment when they would be trapped completely, and encased in water, with death following shortly after.
"Sir... you can't fill that room up, the difference in pressure will collapse the entire platform... if you don't stop pouring in water now-"
Sedaris reached over and pressed a small, flashing blue button, triggering the grates built in the bottom of the room to slam shut, and ceasing the rapid flow of water into the chamber.
"I suppose it doesn't matter... Nicholas Jarvin left me one final weapon, and while I may not be able to drown the Titans, I can still assure them a watery grave."
O-O-O
And with yet another cliffhanger, this chapter comes to a close. Only one more chapter to go... can you feel the anticipation? I can, and it's almost too much for me to bear! What will happen to the Teen Titans? What will happen to Sanza? Will Sedaris be able to complete his evil plan? The exciting conclusion awaits!