Atlas moves in with us, of course.
Not in the apartment. I'm not entirely sure that he won't fall through the floor … if he can even make it past the stairs. Fortunately the basement is rather large and we manage to sneak him into it without anyone noticing.
Of course this being Jump City, anyone who had noticed might have just decided it was none of their business and kept their mouths shut.
It's good to have my friend back, but every time I look at him I think of my other friends … the ones that I betrayed. The one that I killed …
Arella …
No. I can't think of her now.
I can help the others. I can't help Arella. She's gone. I destroyed her along with Azarath.
"How will we find the others?" Tara asks me when she gets home from school.
"By looking."
It won't be easy. Malchior's own magic is currently stronger than my own. It would be suicide to approach him now. No, only Mae-Eye's power added to Atlas's and mine would be enough to subdue him so that I might reverse his curse.
Of course that meant first we would have to find Mae.
Her own magic is potent … and it's very nature lends itself to concealment and illusion. Finding a witch who does not want to be found is not an easy thing. Not if I restricted myself to magic …
Fortunately, I'm not an idiot.
Atlas was built for power and strength, but that doesn't mean he doesn't have some impressive data gathering powers. In the past he had used his ability to link to the Internet to challenge Cyborg (among others) to video game contests. Now he's using it to look for Mae.
In a way, I'm proud of him. I had cursed him, darkened his cybernetic soul, but he had prevented himself from doing real harm. It was only when Cyborg had managed to defeat him in a game that he struck out against him in the real world. He kept his curse under control until he found someone capable of stopping him.
"Trig," he says after hours of searching.
"Yes? You found Mae?"
"No. Not yet. It's just-" He pauses. "I have someone I need to find."
"Someone other than our friends?" I'm trying not to be angry or impatient. If anyone deserves my forbearance, it's Atlas.
"Yeah." He turns and looks at me. "Spike. He was a kid when I got here. He took care of me. Designed weapons that made me even stronger than I was before. And I treated him … badly. He finally walked away from me after he had enough. I owe him, Trig. I have to make it right."
"It was my fault-"
"Yes. It was. Some of it. Some of it's mine. You fixed what you did. Now I have to fix what I did."
"We will, Atlas. We'll fix that too. I promise I'll help you find Spike."
"Thanks, Trig." He can't smile the way a human can, but you can tell if you know him well enough. I'm glad that I still can.
It takes another hour after that for Atlas to find Mae-Eye. Or at least give us a general idea.
If you want to look for a witch, you just look for children. More specifically, you look for children that have disappeared. Mae lives on the psychic energy of her … victims. She needs a constant supply to maintain her powers.
Even with the Titans, there are parts of Jump City that are not safe to travel at night. There are places where a witch can hide … a place where a witch can hunt.
"You're going to need bait," Tara says when I tell her that Atlas and I have found a place to search.
"No! I won't risk your safety!"
She blushes at that. "You need me in this, Trey. If she doesn't want to be found, it could take you weeks- or even longer- to find her. She needs an incentive to show up- and a super powered teenager is her favorite kind of snack."
"The operative word is 'snack', young lady. If something goes wrong-"
"Then you and Atlas will just have to make sure that nothing goes wrong, Trey." She gives me that smug, self-confident look of hers. "Look, I'm not totally helpless. You know that."
"Tara, you don't have to do this for me. I could never ask you to do this."
"You're not asking. I'm volunteering. Look, Trey … Atlas told me about Mae. And the others. And what you did to them." She goes quiet for a moment. "I did bad things, Trey. I regret that. But I chose to do them. Slade coerced me … but I chose to work with him. Mae-Eye … she didn't choose what happened to her. If I can help her … if I can help her, then maybe I'm making up for some of the bad things that I did. At least a little bit. I need to do this, Trey. Please."
I'm an idiot.
Tara is walking the deserted streets of Mae's hunting ground. Alone.
Because I let her talk me into it.
Atlas and I are shadowing her using the bookstore's delivery truck. It's a tight fit for my robot friend, but he manages it by hiding out in the back. That leaves me driving.
As you might imagine, that is not one of my greatest skills. My home world had not been too dissimilar from Earth, but when you can teleport learning how to drive traditional transportation. I knew just enough to be dangerous.
That meant I wasn't particularly good at being incognito.
"We're either going to need a larger truck or you're going to have to enroll in Driver's Ed," Atlas tells me after half an hour. "I can hear the brakes crying every time you hit them."
"This is harder than it looks."
"Do you think Mae will be able to detect us?"
"Not likely. As a robot, you're not going to trigger her empathic senses. I've cast a spell of concealment on myself."
"And Tara is such a tempting morsel she won't be looking out for oddly behaving vehicles."
I grind my teeth. "She is not a morsel."
"You care about her, don't you?"
"Yes I do. She was the first friend I made when I returned to myself. We helped each other get a new start."
"You're not—?"
"Atlas, she's young enough to be my daughter."
"Ah, so that's it."
"What does that mean?"
"I remember Arella was pregnant, Trig. And I've met the Titans. All the Titans. Raven, she's your girl isn't she?"
"She's Arella's daughter. She would never claim me as her father."
"And that's why Tara's so important to you. She's the daughter that you think Raven will never be."
"She's more than that. Tara's made mistakes. She wants to do the right thing. She's young enough that she has time to do that."
"And you think it's too late for you? That helping her- helping us- will be the closest you can come to doing the right thing."
"Atlas, this isn't the time."
"It's always the time- Hold it."
"What's wrong?"
"My sensors just blipped."
"What?"
"There's something out there. They'd do the same thing when Mae would use her magic."
I look out the window of the truck.
Tara is standing stock still. There's this silly look on her face. I'd seen that look before when Mae-Eye had used her abilities to calm down an enemy or prevent a crowd from panicking.
But we couldn't see her.
"Where is she? Why can't we see her?" Atlas asked.
"Her magic conceals her from adults. I can try to break the spell, but that will cause our concealment to break as well." I pause. "Atlas, we may have to use force to subdue her."
"I understand, Trig." His optics flash quickly. "I've seen her, Trig. Seen what she's become. I can't believe that I didn't remember her- I should have-"
"There was nothing you could have done, Atlas. The curse wiped your memory. Neither you or Mae would have been able to free each other. This isn't your fault. It's mine."
"Trig-"
"Never mind, Atlas." I'd left my staff beside me in the cab. I take hold of it. "Noctis Lux Anima!"
Mae's magic has always been strongest in deception, illusion. Deflection was her strength; but when our magics clashed directly against each other, mine's the stronger- even now.
There's a flash, and when it clears Mae-Eye is standing in front of Tara. Atlas had seen her before. I … hadn't.
"Mae," I whisper in shock.
She's been corrupted by the curse. She's fed on the life force of the Light only knows how many children. It's warped her body, twisted her mind, and blackened her soul. "No! Tara dearie, protect your mother!"
Tara whirls, her hands glowing as the pavement rips free from the ground.
Atlas kicks his way out of the delivery truck. "Trig, I'll keep Tara from hurting you. You deal with Mae."
"All right. Be careful."
"Don't worry. I always win." Atlas launches himself towards Tara. It's all the attention I can spare him. In my weakened state, Mae is still a threat.
She stares at me. "You … look familiar." She violently shakes her head.
"We used to be friends, Mae."
"I don't have friends!" She aims with her magic ladle and fires a blast at me.
I deflect it with my father's staff. "Not that easy, Mae. Noctis Lux Anima!"
Fire bursts out of my staff, encircling us both. The circle will keep Mae from teleporting away. The bad news is it will do the same to me.
"I don't need my magic! I can tear you apart with my bare hands!"
There'd been a time when she might actually have been able to do that … she's always been able to become a giant just as large as Atlas, and she can convert the energy she draws from others into physical strength for herself. In her prime, she was just as skilled as she was powerful and was able to give Atlas a run for his money in hand to hand combat.
But that was before my curse took her.
She's grown fat from the energy that she's stolen. Fat and slow. Oh, to be sure she's strong enough to tear me apart if she gets her hands on me, but having strength is useless if she can't lay a hand on me.
Time becomes a blur.
She reaches out with one meaty hand or tries to smash my head in with her giant ladle with the other. Either thing would mean my death if she connects- but she doesn't.
I duck when I can. Block when I must. I'm not trying to hurt her. I'm just trying to keep her from hurting me.
She's strong, but her power isn't infinite. The more that she uses, the faster she uses it, the faster she weakens. Once she's weak enough that she won't be able to escape, I can remove the curse.
Out of the corner of my eye, over the circle of flame, I see Atlas fighting Tara. She's hurling dirt and stone at him, he's trying to get close enough to subdue her without risk of hurting her. I know he can take her out without doing any permanent damage, but he just has to get close enough.
Even mesmerized, she's still a formidable foe.
"Who are you?" Mae hisses. "Why do you make my head hurt?"
"I used to be your friend, Mae." Dodge. Deflect. Sweep. "And I'm hoping that we will be again once you're yourself again."
"Myself? What do you mean?"
She actually stops fighting.
I smack the ladle out of her hand.
She falls to the ground. She glares hatred at me. "I'll kill you!"
"Can't say that I wouldn't deserve that, but I'm afraid I can't allow that! Noctis Lux Anima!"
Mae screams as the dark fire erupts out of her skin. Her flesh doesn't char, but it must feel like she's burning alive. It's almost enough to blister my skin.
It's stronger than the flames that had corrupted Atlas. It's fed on the life force that Mae herself consumed. And it almost feels like it knows what I'm trying to do.
But I'm stronger too. I tamed the fires that had darkened Atlas. I had done it once. I knew that I could do it again- no matter how strong the curse is, I knew that I could break it because I had done it before.
And I had to do it again.
"Noctis! Lux! Anima! Noctis. Lux. Anima. NOTIS! LUX! ANIMA- MAE-EYE BE FREE!"
And finally the dark flames die.
Mae-Eye collapses, her form shrinking down, growing thinner. She looks up at me with three eyes that weep. "Trigon … why didn't you kill me instead, Trigon … how can you make me live with what I've done? How can I live with what I've done?!"
And she buries her face in her hands.
I fall to my knees. I'm exhausted. I want nothing more than to pass out. I close my eyes ….
"Trigon … we have a problem."
I open my eyes and glance over at Atlas.
He's holding an unconscious Tara in one hand. Gently, but to the casual observer- to one who didn't know Atlas- it would not have been a reassuring sight.
The Titans.
All of them.
Robin stands with his staff in his hands. His face is an impassive mask as he studies the situation.
Beast Boy has turned into some giant reptilian animal. (I learn later that it's called a Tyrannosaurus Rex.) He looks ready to charge Atlas at any moment. His eyes are focused on Tara as though she's all he sees.
Cyborg is also looking at Atlas. He has his sonic blaster leveled at my robot friend. "Let her go or I'll play Rock 'Em Sock 'Em upside your head, Atlas!"
Starfire surprises me.
Her hands are lit with power, but she's not looking ready to combat. She's staring at the sobbing Mae-Eye with so much empathy that it looks as though she going to start crying soon. "X'hal, what did you do to her?"
I look at her friends as long as possible because I don't want to look into Raven's eyes. I don't want to watch that fine mind of hers- that brilliant intellect she inherited from her mother- work out who and what I am.
"Look at me," she finally commands. "Damn you, look at me!"
I do so.
She drops her hood. "He … he called you Trigon. That's impossible. Trigon's dead. Trigon's gone. You can't be Trigon."
"I'm sorry, Raven. I'm sorry for so many things, but I am Trigon. I'm your father ..."
And with that, I pass out.