Nightshade
Chapter One: Born Different
In the tenth year of the alleged 'mutant' problem, mutants and humans no longer shared the earth, they fought for it, and hero's who fought crime were told that all mutants were criminals, mighty hero's brought the mutants into specially designed prison cells, each designed to stop a certain type of power, however not all mutants were so willing to give up and live under wraps, keep they're abilities secret so they would blend in with the rest of the 'normal' population.
So the story begins, Andreda was born different, the start of his problems were, at two he developed a growth, a growth which turned into a tail, his skin would change color, and texture to blend in with his surroundings, his mutant gene developed faster then any one in recorded history. At the age of fifteen, his parents had enough; they abandoned him, planning to turn him over to the proper authorities, Andreda over heard they're plan, after gathering supplies, he used his newest and best ability. He teleported out of they're lives, going all over town. He went to the far edge of town, where it was covered in abandoned buildings. He settled down there, to live his loveless life totally alone. When his food ran out, he did the only thing he could…He stole what he needed to survive, food, clothing, even weapons. Andreda was a wanted mutant. It became too much and he was forced to leave his home city, he ran and soon ended up in Gotham.
Andreda lay in bed, listening to music; his home was once again an abandoned building. He had kept his stealing on a low scale, to avoid drawing to much attention to himself, in his time spent practicing with his powers he found the ability to retract his tail, to maintain a normal flesh color and to control his 'night eyes' as he called them (which caused his eyes natural lenses to glaze over with a dull yellow, acting as some sort of filter, inverting all the darkness into light.) The only thing his home lacked was wall paper and a bathroom, stealing a small solar generator he was able to power a few things at once in his home, electricity for the night was not necessary for him, because of his eyes. Every morning he would get the paper (typically off some one's lawn or out of a coin operated paper dispenser) and read about crime, and heroes. The teen titans were a big hit in his portion of town, from his window he could see the famed 'titans tower' he would watch at night as its lights were lit, the sounds of fun echoing across the cold water. Andreda would often use the computers in local cyber cafés to read anarchist files. See it was something of paranoia with him; he wanted to learn all he could about IED's and other weapons in case there was ever another mutant uprising. During especially cold and lonely nights Andreda would watch movies on his small battery operated DVD player…all the luxuries he could ever want, at his fingertips, with the exception of some one to hold him at night, friends to be with during the day. One day after stealing his early morning breakfast, the titans went wising by off to fight yet another battle. Andreda shut his eyes tightly in fear they were after him yet knowing they were not. He turned a corner into a dark ally way, as he swallowed the last of his food, like every dark ally way in Gotham, there were thugs, toting lead pipes and chains. Andreda sighed thinking to himself, "Like they have nothing better to do." They rushed him with the intent of doing God knows what to him, though Andreda was in no way weak looking or scrawny. At that moment he realized he had a choice, teleport and risk people in Gotham seeing a mutant, or try and fight without powers, he stood his ground without a thought of retreat, when suddenly a Ion blast slamming his attackers back, they were then levitated and thrown against a wall. Andreda then laid eyes on her for the first time her dark eyes seemed to peer into his soul. Robin called to the team, and out of nervousness using that brief second to his advantage he teleported away.
At his home Andreda laid in his bed, and thought about that girl, he checked the papers to find out what her name is.
"Raven" he said softly to himself. "Wow." Andreda thought back to the ally,
"Who says that…Mutants cant be hero's also, what if they used they're powers for good." Andreda continued to dwell on this thought then made his decision.
"First I'll need some clothing, a fashion Icon of sorts." So he did what any young person would do, he went to the mall, finding a long leather trench coat, heavy high ankle steel toe boots, and black jeans was no problem. He approached the lady at the counter.
"Would you unlock the dressing room for me?" he asked politely, in hopes of making his escape go unnoticed. She rolled her eyes and grabbed the key. He bid her thank you and closed himself in. Then merely teleporting out of the store, this was how he often got things without being noticed, walking into a bathroom, or changing room, or even just a corner where a camera might not be located. He went home and tried on his new clothing, he smiled to himself as he looked quite well in them.
"I think I'll try out my little outfit." He didn't plan on going off and fighting crime, he had no knowledge of fighting, other than what his powers enabled him to do, such as run up walls, jump distances and move quickly, the mutation had left his muscles mutated also, they never got weak though they could on occasion get tired, Andreda knew he needed proper training if he ever wanted to fight but to have a teacher he needed money. To him money was no object, he would merely teleport inside a bank vault, or any where that housed money, borrow the money he needed to pay for his tutor. He left his house and began his walk to the bank, but on the way he got an idea, he quickly ran back towards his house, he heard a loud boom and then teleported across the bay to the top of titans tower, where looking down he could see them training. Robin was apparently recording his combat session, talking to a camera. After awhile of watching Robin turned off the camera, and walked inside. Andreda quietly dropped down and commandeered the tape before Robin returned to find that he hadn't been recording with a tape at all.
Andreda jumped off the roof of the tower aiming for a flag pole down toward the bottom, his head instantly began to throb with a screeching pain that disenabled him from acting, as he fell helplessly his tail latched onto an antenna sticking out the side of the building. As he recovered images of countless things flew through his mind when he had finally recovered he jumped and landed perfectly on the spherical ball on the top of the pole, he looked back at the only window he had passed on the way down, the curtains were drawn, he thought little of it at first, and continued his way home. He dove from the top of a building and flew through the air narrowly missing a wall but instead going through, or rather around it by teleportation, he had practiced that, to hopefully elude suspicion about him being a teleporter if it looked like he walked through walls instead.
He wasted no time in an attempt to learn something along the lines of fighting; he placed the tape in his (stolen) camera and rewound it to the beginning. What he found was a long, well documented series on kung fu, and added to his text files on combat techniques he now had, enough to possibly survive in combat with other than his powers. But he wanted more, but that idea would wait. He studied hard, practiced for hours upon hours a day until it was second nature or in his case third nature because his abilities were already second nature to him. After weeks of this grueling training, Andreda climbed a tall building equipped with home made IED's, pipe bomb type devices that could be employed like grenades, and binoculars, he scouted the city in the near pitch blackness, leaning out over the city blending in with the gargoyles placed on the gothic architectural style buildings. His first night was unsuccessful, but in a lust for action he descended to the streets and prowled the ally's actually looking for trouble, wanting to test himself against any one really, he didn't care who he just wanted to test his steadily growing skill.
It wasn't long, street gangs roamed quite freely, especially at night. It didn't take long, with Robins training, his own abilities, he had confidence when out of the shadows came six men wielding various weapons.
"You on our turf!" barked the lead thug, in no proper English. Andreda made no reply; he just continued to walk head long into them. Like cavalry the two sides, rather the one side and Andreda rushed forward, in the darkness they couldn't tell that he had teleported and he re appeared behind them, kicking one of them to the ground and running up walls, jumping back and forth, they fell into disarray. The advent of Andreda's tail was like a fifth limb, he was able to use it just as well as a punching fist, or kicking foot Andreda was content with his victory and teleported away, leaving two of them standing. He smiled to himself, he knew it was only small time crooks, but still victory was victory. He had intended to rest when he got home…but something caught his eye, looking out his window, or lack of, he saw a very pleasant purple light, glowing slightly; a floating figure sat gazing out the window. Andreda pulled up a chair and just…stared, stared blankly at this figure, though she was far away he could see certain loneliness about her, a fixed gaze out over the city…Andreda knew she had friends, and a home that was structurally sound, what he wondered did she have to be lonely about, thinking about what made her lonely made him lonely, but he knew…that he was a mutant like it or not (and he did like it) he was still a mutant. He went to bed but had dreams about her, she talked to him, they sat on a blanket in the park. The odd thing about his dreams were simply that they were both happy, yet still he knew he could never do anything other than look he couldn't touch. She was a heroin he was, by law a criminal (his petty theft aside).
One morning he awoke early, after hearing what sounded like gunshots, he hurried out of bed and began teleporting from one rooftop to another arriving just in time to look deep in the eyes of Raven, he stopped, still on all fours staring, his tail swaying. His moment was interrupted by more gunshots this time from the local authorities that had gathered at the scene, the roof tiles cracked and splintered as aggravating dust shot up in his eyes. Andreda looked up at her, she hovered just out of reach the cries of nearby people yelling "mutant, mutant!" A rage built up inside of him, he sprung into the air and rolled off to the side, landing on the shoulders of one of the officers, one of the spectators threw an empty glass bottle at him, Andreda caught it with his tail and smashed it over another officers head.
"Titans Go!" sounded off Robin as the titans sprung into action.
Andreda hung upside down on a street lamp as bullets ricochet off of buildings and other near by objects. Andreda's skin changed midnight black as he dodged the first of the titan's attacks. Andreda saw a glowing green star bolt come flying toward him, at the last second he teleported out of its way giving the illusion he had been hit. Moments after the smoke had cleared he reappeared behind them, using beast boy as a spring board to launch himself backwards in as he premeditated it, star bolts and ion blasts hit the ground where he had been standing he sprung off of a near by spectator knocking him into more people, which started a fight amongst the population in that area, a chain reaction which caused a call to be placed to the riot police.
Andreda flew forward driving his shoulder into the back of Robin, knocking him forward but not down. An Ion blast smashed into Andreda's back, he responded with a front flip directly into beast boy who had changed into a bull. Andreda flew across the field of battle, enough was enough they knew he was mutant there was nothing left to hide. He rolled to his knees and teleported, into the air, coming down and landing on Cyborgs shoulders (which hindered him little), Andreda teleported just as a misplaced star bolt hit Cyborg in the face Andreda landed his teleport behind Starfire smashing her upside the head with the heel of his hand. Raven continued hurdling projectiles, but noticed that she was not a part of the battle no matter how many times she tried to engage him, the mysterious mutant creature continued to ignore her. She decided to trap him in her telekinetic force field, but getting him in it was nearly impossible, he never stopped moving, so she did the next best thing. She fenced him in with the underground rebar used to construct the road. Her plan worked and he became fenced in, she continued to keep the rebar under her control, which acted as a telekinetic cage. Raven assumed that if his powers were controlled by the mind then she could keep him contained by using her powers that were controlled by the mind as well as emotion.
The titans closed in around him, Andreda closed his eyes and sat down. They were just about to grab him, when he teleported.
"Where did he go?" Asked beast boy.
"Down." Answered Robin.
Indeed Andreda had used his only escape, Raven didn't cover the ground so he was able to teleport down into the sewers. It wasn't long before Robin, Beast boy and Cyborg had dropped down after him, Raven and Starfire flew above the street incase he made the decision to go above ground. Cyborgs flashlight opened up out of his shoulder as the three of them walked down the dark tunnel. Robin pulled out his communicator.
"There's no sign of him, we're coming back up." Cyborg ran a quick scan.
"He's defiantly down here, I'll use my inferred vision to look for a heat signature."
They walked a little further until Cyborg got a heat signature, before they could react Andreda lunged at them engaging the three of them in combat, throwing them into confusion causing them to hit each other, in the midst of this Andreda escaped and began running down the street for home, teleporting shortly after.
This battle enraged the titans. They had scored only two hits on they're suspect, a humiliating defeat. At the tower Robin ran a scan for any free mutants. No matches were found in any of the surrounding cities, this frustrated him even more.
Raven sat in her room reading a novel. Andreda watched her through a spotter's scope from his window. He was so fascinated with her, he found her simply beautiful. He read the title of her book, wanting to find something that might give him a clue into her personality. He looked very closely, the title read 'Raven: rise of a warrior' interesting titled book for some one bearing the same name. But, he decided that in the morning he would go to the library and get a copy and maybe clue into her life. He continued to watch her, he felt very weird staring at her through a scope like a stalker, but Andreda was lonely, and she seemed to be also. Andreda went to bed and relaxed for a while, police sirens going on and on, until he faded into sleep.