Ah, now that I am about three chapters ahead again I feel that I can update. Sorry it took me so long. I was traveling for Thanksgiving and didn't have much time to write. Anywhoo, this was the last chapter that was in the preview, I think you will be... um, shocked. Enjoy.
They, Beast Boy and Terra, had been at the carnival for a few hours. There were other people there now, but they were still having a good time. They had ridden all of the rides again, except for the Ferris wheel and they hadn't gone into the house of mirrors. For some reason, probably because of the bad memories, they had decided not to go into them until night...
It was dusk already and many of the people were leaving. The carnival was already nearly empty and they decided to ride the Ferris wheel. There was no line now and they got on almost immediately. Sitting together and holding hands they rode to the top, their heads getting closer every second. Finally, at the top their lips touched, sparks flew, and they had their first kiss...
"Bravo, apprentice." Came a nasty voice from behind them. "I see you finally got your pet."
"Slade!" the two titans said together turning around.
Somehow Slade had, once again, managed to get into the wheel with them. He was sitting just across from them on the other seat. If the titans could have seen behind his mask they would have seen a wicked grin, instead they could feel it in the air as it was chilled around them.
"I am not your apprentice any more!" Terra said. "That ended the day you tried to get me to kill him!"
"Ah, but you see, once I have an apprentice I never really give them up..." Slade replied calmly, except for the bitterness in his voice.
"What about Robin?" Beast Boy asked.
"I didn't. He may not know it, or accept it, but he is still my apprentice." Slade said standing up. "Now, Terra, lets go."
"No. I won't go with you." Terra said standing up and clenching her fists.
"I'm not asking." Slade said. "Remember, I still control you."
"No you don't!" Beast Boy yelled changing into a panther and attacking Slade.
Slade jumped back and kicked Beast Boy in the side sending him through the door of the carriage. As Beast Boy fell he changed into a hawk and flew back up towards Slade and Terra. As he flew he could see Slade reaching for Terra, Slade moved as though he were trying to control her.
"What?" Slade asked. "No, something's wrong."
"Finding it difficult?" Terra taunted. "Trying to force your will on me again? Well, guess what, YOU CAN'T CONTROL ME!" Terra yelled. "So, thank you for all that you taught me but I won't be joining you again." And with that she summoned a lump of earth and jumped onto it. Beast Boy landed on it as well and morphed back into his human form.
"NO! This isn't over!" Slade yelled. "I still have a..."
Suddenly Terra stopped grasping her head in both hands. The rock beneath them buckled and suddenly fell. Terra curled into a ball as though she were in incredible pain, which she was. Slade had found a way, some of the suit had integrated into her brain and neural system.
Terra couldn't hold on much longer, soon she would loose the fight. Desperate Beast Boy morphed into a bird again and flew as fast as he could towards Slade, but as he flew he knew it was already useless. A rock flew into him and hovered between him and Slade. As he hovered he glanced back at Terra who was looking up at him, a look of pure horror and hatred on her face. She was still trying to fight but she was loosing, completely.
The rock in front of Beast Boy dissolved and Slade walked out on the rubble towards the flapping Beast Boy. "It appears that my time dead, and my revival have given me some lasting new abilities." He walked up to Beast Boy, who found himself hypnotized into place. As soon as he was directly ahead of Beast Boy, Slade grabbed him out of the air and held him his grip.
There was a scream of agony, which came from Terra's paralyzed body. She knew what Slade intended to do, finish off Beast Boy while she watched to finally throw her over the edge... she couldn't watch, but she couldn't turn away. It was the perfect torture.
Beast Boy couldn't breathe, he couldn't move and he was somehow unable to morph. Slade had control over him as well somehow. Then, suddenly he was released. Beast Boy's crumpled body fell, but as it fell it was met by lumps of earth, and not softly either. Slade had changed his mind, he was going to make Terra kill Beast Boy.
"NO!" Terra screamed. "Please stop!"
"No, Terra. I won't, I will never release my control over you."
"Fine! Fine... I submit. You win, just let Beast Boy go."
"You submit?" Slade asked looking down at Terra's feeble stance. "You submit? No, you still have fire in your eyes. You are still defiant of me."
Terra panicked, but then, because of her fear, her pain, hatred, and everything else, she completely withdrew. Her eyes glazed over and rolled up and her body went limp. Slade dropped to the ground as the rubble fell and walked over to Terra's limp body. She was still standing, but only because of his control over her.
"It shouldn't have been this easy." Slade said to himself. "It's as if her soul just left..."
"That's because it did." A voice said from behind Slade. "Her soul left her body, again. And again it was your fault."
Slade whipped around and found a man wearing white robes standing ten feet away from him. The man was holding Beast Boy, who had changed back into his human form. The robes were made up of three parts, a cape with a hood, similar to Raven's, a cloak, and a tightly fitting outfit that looked similar to Robin's (without the cape and mask).
"Who are you?" Slade asked, his eye narrowing.
"I am your worst nightmare." The man replied. "I will not allow you to harm these children for your evil purpose. Not even these new powers you seem to have acquired are yours. You prey off of those around you, taking the power they have and making it yours. You care nothing of those around you but only for yourself and your purpose." The man paused and gently placed Beast Boy on the ground. "I personally may not be aloud to stop you but I can prevent you from harming those who can."
Standing straight again the man extended his hand over Beast Boy's resting body, and specifically over his head. With a slight clench Beast Boy's body illuminated with a light blue-green glow. Slowly Beast Boy rose to a standing position and opened his eyes. Then the man released him and Beast Boy looked around confused.
"What happened?"
"You are safe now, child." The man said. "But stay back, no matter what happens."
"Who are you?" Beast Boy asked.
"I cannot answer that question." The man said. "Not now, at least, but soon all the titans will know."
In a flash of light the man moved towards Slade. He was just a blur but somehow Slade seemed prepared. Slade blocked the man's initial attack, and three of his secondary attacks. They jumped back from another and seemed ready to get at it again but the man shifted his weight and swung his right arm in front of his body. At the center point, directly ahead of his face, a light appeared as he continued his swing, and the light grew into a thin, long sward. As the sward reached the hilt two pairs of wings appeared, one angelic, the other demonic.
The man grabbed the sward from the air and jumped at Slade, bearing the sward, ready to slice trough Slade's mortal body. Suddenly, just as the man got close enough Slade jumped back and Terra moved into the blade. There was a sickening sound as the blade cut straight through her and Beast Boy yelled in anguish. The blade had gone through and blood dripped from the edge, yet the man didn't seemed phased at all.
"So, this is how you save those who you help?" Slade mocked.
"No, this was just an empty shell. Terra's soul left long before the blade hit her, your doing I might add." The man said and placed his left hand on Terra's back. Beast Boy nearly ran forward but he felt as though he couldn't move again, not the way Slade had stopped him, but similar. Fear, misery, terror, anguish...
"Slade, this ends now." The man said. "Till we meet again." The man inhaled and then uttered a single word. 'Absolution'.
The sward lit up, as did the air all around them. The light grew and congealed around and within the sward. An insignia appeared within a circle around the tip of the sward but was quickly consumed by a sphere of light. The man pulled the sward and the sphere shot towards Slade. There was a loud crack as though hundreds of lightening strikes were happening all around them and Slade disappeared within the sphere.
As the sphere disappeared up into the air the man slashed his sward through the air, sweeping the blood off of it. Then he sheathed the sward into a sheath that had, till now, been hidden.
"You... you killed her." Beast Boy found his voice as he ran to Terra's dead body.
"No," the man replied. "As I said before she was already dead before. She had never really been with you, but instead her soul was attached to this shell of a body."
"What does that mean?" Beast Boy yelled.
"It means that she wasn't really Terra," Raven said from the air. She had finally reached the spot where the fighting had taken place. "It was something else."
"Raven, at last." The man said. "My time is short, if I am to do this I need to do it quickly."
"What do you need me to do?" Raven asked.
"You'll know." The man said.
He placed his hands, arm level, over Terra's lifeless body and the insignia reappeared on the ground. Suddenly Raven felt a warm, burning excitement just below where her ribcages met. She placed her left hand there and felt something fill it. When she removed her hand she found the book laying in it. Curiously she opened the book and looked at its appealingly blank pages.
"Terra, daughter of earth," the insignia had grown so that it completely surrounded Terra's body. "Rise from your resting place and return to your mortal body. I bring life back from the death."
Suddenly the pages in the book began to move themselves rapidly, as though they were being blown by a brisk wind. They landed on a page that had text and images within it. Raven couldn't read most of it but she did recognize the word 'Terra'. Then two cards appeared from the back and flew over to the man. He caught them and held one out. The card was labeled 'The Death', then as he released the card it flew flat and hovered over Terra's body. It began to lower and as it did so her body began to be consumed by the ground. Finally when she was completely gone beneath the ground he held out the second card and the two titans could see that it was labeled 'The Life'.
"I need one more card." The man said.
The card appeared and flew to him. As he placed it next to 'The Life' Beast Boy and Raven could see that it was called 'The Earth'. Suddenly the ground around them became liquid-like and began to move rapidly. The spot where Terra had been rose up and the two titans were shocked to see it form a flower. As the flower bloomed they saw Terra's body, clothed in a light brown robe, laying in the center. She suddenly inhaled and began to move. After a second she opened her eyes and looked at the man.
"Kind of a flashy way of bringing me back, don't you think?" she asked.
"Well, it is what the universe wanted." The man replied. "And now that I have repaid my debt I can begin to regain what I lost. But I fear there will be much more for me to do. This was only the beginning, and I will still be needed yet. But for now my time is short, and is nearly up. It is not my time yet, and I must release my hold and allow the universe to return to its own ways." That said two pairs of wings lifted up from beneath his cape, one angelic and one demonic. They encircled him and when they released once again he was laying on the ground, as Timothy.
---
Somewhere off in the distance Slade had already begun to plot how to get his revenge. As he had been hit by the massive attack he had glimpsed Timothy's 'true nature' and it filled him with a greed and lust for power that surpassed even what he had had before.
Slade had already found one of the crystalline objects that three other villains had used, he knew what their capabilities were. Shortly after he understood what it was he decided to assault the titans once again but discovered that Terra was alive again as well. Seeking to once again control his second titan apprentice he attacked her instead, and at first it seemed to be working.
Of course then that little boy had to show up... it was he who held all the true power. The crystals were just extensions, or outlets... with them he would be able to use and eventually gain the power that the child had but with only one crystal in his possession even he was no match for the boy. For now he would plot his next move, and that would most certainly be to gather more of the crystals.
---
As they made their way back to the tower, Terra flying on a lump of earth with Beast Boy and Raven flying of her own accord and carrying the sleeping Timothy, they talked about what had happened.
"So, let me get this straight," Beast Boy said, only for the seventh time, "That body, the one I had been talking to for a few days, wasn't actually you?"
"That's right." Terra said.
"But then..."
"It was a shell, a dead lump of flesh and bone that Timothy reanimated." She told him, again. "The Terra that you had been talking to was the remains of my mind within the body."
"But..."
Terra sighed. "Look, I wasn't supposed to tell you this but shortly after I was covered in molten rock, but shortly before I died, a man in glowing white robes and angelic wings came to me. He said that he could save my life but I would have to leave with him for a year or so. I chose to go and he took me to another universe, I can't recall the name right now. There I rested until another Terra from another universe was saved from Slade's grasp. My resting soul was placed in her body and there I continued to rest until I awoke, just before she had to return to her own universe. I stayed in that universe, awake and curious, until just an hour ago when the emperor of the world came and told me that it was time for me to return to my home. A few seconds later I found myself here, being born from a flower sculpture, the same man helping me out of the ground..."
"Oh... but..." Beast Boy tried again.
"Yes?" Terra asked, looking over at Beast Boy and sweeping her hair out of her face as she did so.
"Nothing... never mind." Beast Boy said, blush running across his face. "I am just glad to finally have you back."
"And I am glad to be back." Terra said, leaning into Beast Boy.
They kissed and Raven looked away. "I would say get a room, but since we are a mile off the ground I'll let it pass."
The couple turned to look at her, blushing, and they all laughed. Timothy stirred and his eyes opened. He looked around, looked at the Titans, and then looked down... Suddenly he grasped Raven tightly, apparently frightened from the height. Raven cradled him in her arms and told him it would be alright.
"No way, am I actually seeing this?" Terra asked. "Raven, being motherly?"
"Yeah," Beast Boy said. "She has been ever since we found Timothy."
"Really?" Terra asked and laughed. "Never thought I'd see the day."
---
Back at the tower the others were, somewhat, worried. They had known that Terra and Beast Boy were going to be gone but the sudden disappearance of Raven and Timothy didn't bode well. Robin opened his communicator and called Raven, "Raven, where are you?"
"I'm heading back to the tower with Terra, Beast Boy and Timothy. There was a little trouble but we were able to handle it." Raven replied.
"Oh, ok." Robin said, visibly relieved. "What happened?"
"Oh, not much, Slade attacked Terra and Beast Boy trying to take control of his old apprentice again, which he managed. Then he fought with someone and Terra was killed... but don't worry, she was revived again."
"What?" Robin said shocked.
"We'll explain it when we get there." Raven said. "Raven out."
"Well, that was strange." Cyborg said.
"Yes, Raven does not seem herself at the moment." Starfire agreed.
Robin looked at his still open communicator. He hadn't been able to get a visual, just audio, so he hadn't been able to actually see anything. He didn't know what was going on, just that she hadn't sounded like herself... at all. Something was up, and he didn't like being out of the loop.