(A/N: I don't really have much to say other than I hope you guys enjoy this chapter. It's so amazing to me that I've been able to get this far because, to be truthful, I thought I might lose interest in this before I could really get to a significant point in this.
For those of you that are getting annoyed with their 'little' side trip, don't worry, it's almost over. It'll likely end by the next chapter, so not much longer.)
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"This... thing is your friend?" it took everything Robin had in him to not shout.
The rock whale growled at him when he called him a 'thing'. Fortunately XL's hand was still on his snout, which kept him calm enough to not attack him out of rage.
"Yes and don't call him that," he told them in a manner that seemed to indicate that he was enjoining them.
"Thing?" he repeated, tilting his head to the side.
He snarled at him when he repeated that word, he did not like being called a 'thing', not in the slightest. He bared his large, elongated teeth at them, as if threatening to swallow all of them whole.
XL rested his head on his snout and closed his eyes. He started to hush him in a low, soothing voice. It seemed to calm him down, he stopped baring his teeth at them, although he still looked quite angry.
"Perhaps you shouldn't insult him any further," Slade uttered.
XL pulled away to face them, while still keeping his hand on him to keep him calm, "That goes for everyone, he understands every word we say."
He removed his hand from him, which alarmed him at first, but he calmed down when he felt a hand on the side of his lower jaw. He started to scratch him under his chin and jawline with his free hand. He started to make rhythmic sounds from that throat that sounded like he was purring.
He stopped scratching him, much to his disappointment, and swam up to be level with his snout. Then, the rock whale did something very unexpected, he opened his mouth and licked him. His large tongue brushed over his entire body, everything from head to toe.
Surprisingly, XL wasn't upsetted by this and started laughing. The brief lick didn't leave behind much saliva, mostly because they were underwater, so he simply brushed off what little was transferred.
"Old habits die hard!" he laughed as he flicked off the last of the saliva.
"Are you going to introduce us to your friend?" Ripjaws asked.
He looked back at them, he almost forgot they were there, "His name is Tlaloc, I raised him since the day he hatched." He gestured for them to come closer to them, "Don't worry, he won't hurt you as long as I'm here."
Slade was quick to comply with his word and swam over to them, he trusted him. The others were very hesitant because of his massive size and because it seemed that XL was the one who trained him, and they weren't exactly sure if they could trust a repeat offender.
Eventually, they decided to swim to them when they saw that he really was quite tame. Tame enough to allow Slade to get close to him and even let him touch the side of his face.
"You named him after the Aztec god of rain?" Robin asked.
"I'm surprised you caught that," Slade gibed.
"I was learning about South American cultures at the time and 'Tlaloc' was the first thing that came to my mind when he hatched," he explained, scratching the right side of his snout with a finger.
'I'm surprised there wasn't some kind of attack by the mother,' Beast Boy thought.
As if he could hear his thoughts, XL gave a response, "He's an orphan, he was found alone. One of my brothers discovered him and took him up to the city when no mother reclaimed her lost egg. He was the best birthday present a three-year-old could have asked for." He let out a grateful growl and nudged him with his snout, causing him to laugh.
"So you're like his Dad?" Ripjaws questioned, a little confused.
He shrugged, "In a way, I suppose."
"He must have been a real nightmare to deal with," he commented, joking slightly.
He shook his head, "No, not really. He was quite small when he hatched, smaller than me and I was two feet tall at the time."
"Looks like he went through a growth spurt since the last time you've seen him," it was Robin's turn to comment.
"He isn't at full size, he will be much bigger than this when he's older," he replied.
"How much bigger?" he was almost afraid to ask.
He pointed down at the mother rock whale, "Roughly her size."
'That's huge!' Beast Boy mentally exclaimed.
"Rock whales age just as we do," he explained, "he's an adolescent now. That's what makes them unique." He growled in satisfaction when he said that and nudged him again.
"Are there others like him?" Slade suddenly asked, his hand was near the young rock whale's mouth, near where the base of one of his two tentacles was.
He nodded, "Yes, but very little. I don't understand why, though, they are very easy to train." He then went on, mostly to himself, "They might be predators, but they are intelligent. Not even the natives can argue against that."
"You mentioned the natives earlier, but never explained who they are," Robin uttered.
"The natives are the Soronians, rather short and timid, but otherwise quite peaceful," he answered. "I wouldn't startle or anger them though or that's a lifetime of repeated sickness-" he paused when he realized something.
"What's wrong?" he questioned when he suddenly went quiet.
"I forgot to tell the other team about the natives, I told them about the pathogenic mist that they can produce, but I didn't tell them where it comes from," he responded sheepishly.
"We have to get back up to the surface!" Robin shouted in a panic.
XL covered his ears when his loud voice hit his ears and inadvertently flinched. Tlaloc snarled at him and hit him with the mouth of his tentacle, then forced him against the rocky wall behind him and pinned him with his tentacle. He roared and opened his large maw, revealing his massive, lethal teeth in all of their glory.
Robin closed his eyes and looked away as he neared closer to him. He held his breath as he waited for him to devour him.
"Tlaloc! No!" XL shouted. He swam over to them like a mako shark and got in between Robin and his open mouth.
He complied with his wishes and let him go, closing his maw. He backed away from them, but still stayed near them in case he felt he would be needed.
"I'm sorry about him, he's very protective. Are you alright?" he asked.
He took in a couple of breaths of relief before he gave an answer, "Yes, I'm fine and don't worry, I understand that he's just protective of you, but I don't understand why."
"Why he's protective of me or why he attacked you?" he inquired for clarification, although he thought he already knew the answer.
"Why he attacked me," he replied with a slight smile.
"You raised your voice, they're naturally sensitive to tense voices," he explained. He swam up to Tlaloc and patted him on the side of his face, "Don't worry, he doesn't mean any harm."
Robin came up to him as well and placed a hand on his snout, just like XL did earlier, "I'm sorry I raised my voice and I'm sorry it startled you."
He opened his mouth slightly, just wide enough to slip his tongue out. He licked his hand and retracted his tongue back into his mouth, closing it afterwards.
XL explained the action to him, "He says he forgives you."
"Okay, well," he paused for a second to clear his throat, "we should probably get going. We still have to find the battery and get back up to the surface as quickly as possible."
"We have to hurry, I could change back any minute now," Ripjaws spoke.
"Well, I can't really think of-" XL then paused and looked up at Tlaloc and his eyes widened slightly when he came up with an idea. "Actually, we are almost done."
"How so?" Slade inquired, although he had an idea of what he might say.
He smiled in a slightly knowing manner and looked upward. The others followed his eyes and theirs landed on Tlaloc.
'I knew it,' his 'father' thought.
Ripjaws paled at the idea, mostly because of his history with a protective mother rock whale when he was ten. "I'm not sure that's a good idea," it was obvious that he was nervous, but his voice was so deep it was hard to hear.
"Why not? You just said that you could change back soon and we all know what would happen if that does happen," he pointed out.
He tried to argue against that, but he couldn't. He did say that and, unfortunately, he knew that the Ultimatrix was about to time out.
XL then looked at Robin, "You were quick to say that we needed to get up to the surface, which is true, and the quickest way to do so is with him," he pointed his thumb up at his friend.
"You don't have to convince me," he uttered, "I know."
He turned to the rest of his team, "What do you say?"
"I think you know my answer," Slade replied, causing his 'son' to smile.
'Yeah, I know,' he thought.
Ripjaws sighed, "Alright, fine."
"In that case," he swam up a few feet and grabbed onto the fin on Tlaloc's head, "grab on."
They followed his lead and grabbed onto his fin as well. Since Beast Boy didn't have hands in his current form, Ripjaws had to hold him so he wouldn't be left behind.
"Hold on tight," he told his team. He tapped Tlaloc with his toe, "Let's go."
He took off quickly like a missile, but not quick enough to mistakenly throw them off. The mother rock whale watched as they left and waved at them with a tentacle.
Within a very short period of time they arrived at a building similar to the ones they discovered earlier. This one was in relatively good condition and one-third percent larger than the others from earlier.
Right in front of the building was more of the death coral they saw earlier, but it was in the shape of only one body instead of a cluster of numerous. When XL saw it his reaction was different from his earlier one. Earlier he was distraught, now he grimaced and bore a very bitter expression.
He swam up to the coral rock and stomped on the face of the body. The face shattered into pieces that resembled gravel rocks.
All but Slade and Tlaloc were shocked that he would deliberately deface the face of a dead person. Based on his expression and actions it seemed likely that he knew who the dead person was and didn't like them for one reason or another.
"What are you doing?" Robin asked, trying to not shout and struggling to keep his voice level so as to not upset Tlaloc.
"I recognize him," he replied, his voice almost stripped entirely of emotion, the only obvious emotion in his voice was a rumbling anger in the back of his throat, as if he was growling at the petrified remains.
"Who is it?" he asked again, carefully.
"He's a spree killer and he was once engaged to my cousin," he answered, his voice the same.
"Spree killer?" Ripjaws repeated, his voice a little fearful.
"My cousin broke off the engagement when she gave birth to a stillborn child and an autopsy showed signs of being poisoned with a rare type of kelp that the Soronians used in executions," he explained. "She blamed him and he started to kill her friends, he was finally caught when he tried to kill her father, my uncle, who's an expert in martial arts."
"Do you think he actually poisoned her?" Robin questioned.
His answer was immediate, "Yes. I'm the one who told her about my suspicions because I thought it was odd that she got sick every time she was with him."
He then reached down and grabbed onto one of the hands. He then tore the hand right off the wrist and started to make his way to the building without saying a word.
"What are you doing?" Once again it took everything in Robin to not yell and upset Tlaloc or XL.
"The only way to get into one of these buildings is to have your DNA scanned so that the security system knows you're a Tyro Yagon. My DNA is scrambled because of my bond to Angelos, our best option is to use alternative methods," he held up the hand he took for all to see.
Not surprisingly, Robin, Ripjaws and Beast Boy were in absolute shock at how he was able to nonchalantly take the hand from the corpse without a second thought. Slade, also not surprisingly, was completely unfazed by his actions and his hatred, he knows hatred better than most and knows people with a hatred for him that rivals his for them. Tlaloc, meanwhile, looked at the rocky limb as if it was a toy.
He placed the hand against a small black screen next to closed double-doors that were roughly the size of doors on a house. The doors opened and tossed the hand away as if it was nothing but a scrap of trash, which was most likely how he viewed the single body part, if not the entire body.
Tlaloc went over to where he threw the hand and took in his front teeth. He shook his head around vehemently like a dog would with a chew toy.
He started to enter through the doors and turned to look at them, "Coming?"
Slade was the first to follow once again and started to swim inside. He watched as his 'father' swam in and looked over at the rest of their team. He saw their expression and rolled his head in annoyance.
"You can't seriously feel sympathy for a heartless killer, can you? If you do, go to law school or study psychiatry," he hissed.
They eventually went into the building and he followed them inside, the doors closed behind them. They discovered that they were in a room no bigger than a medium-sized bedroom. XL pressed a button and all the water drained from the room within seconds.
As soon as all the water was gone, Robin and Slade took off their helmets and set them on the ground. Ripjaws transformed back into Ben and he sighed in relief. Beast Boy changed back into his normal form and XL covered his ears before he could talk, he knew what he was going to say within seconds of regaining his ability of speech.
He started to hum along to a song that was playing in his head in order to block out his voice. The song he was humming was "Blow Me Away" by Breaking Benjamin.
They fall in line
One at a time
Ready to play
(I can't see them anyway)
No time to lose
We've got to move
Steady your hand
(I am losing sight again)
Fire your guns
It's time to run
Blow me away
(I will stay, unless I may)
After the fall
We'll shake it off
Show me the way
Only the strongest will survive
Lead me to heaven, when we die
I am the shadow on the wall
I'll be the one to save us all…
Beast Boy's mouth was moving and it looked like he was shouting at everyone and everything, with him being the focus of his outbursts. He was just glad he couldn't hear any of it, his hearing maybe powerful, but his mind and senses could only focus on one thing at a time.
He removed his hands from his ears when he finally calmed down. He pretended to know what he so stressed out by telling him, "Get over it." He said it very calmly and with a slight smile on his face as he began to walk towards the massive door that separates them from the inside of the facility.
"Get over it?!" he snapped. "Do you have any-"
He suddenly whistled and a pounding sound came from the outside. He squeaked and jumped in reaction to that, Ben and Robin also flinched, but that was all.
He winked at him, almost mockingly, "Watch yourself." He turned his attention back to the door with a proud smirk on his face.
He dragged his hand across a touch screen, similar to the one on the outside, and the door retracted upwards, revealing a dark hallway. Lights soon came on and illuminated the once dark hall. The walls, floor, and ceiling of the hall were completely white and the lights almost gave it a glow.
From what they could see, there was nothing in the hallway, it was completely clean and barren. Which meant that they would have to go deeper into the interior if they hoped to find anything, let alone the battery they were looking for.
"Well? That battery will never be found standing here," the ghost of the smirk was still on his lips.
He began to walk down the brightly lit hall with his team following closely behind as he led them further inside. He started to hum along to the lyrics again, suddenly feeling like a real leader.
...There's nothing left
So save your breath
Lying in wait
(Caught inside this tidal wave)
Your cover's blown
Nowhere to go
Only your fate
(Lonely I will walk alone)
Fire your guns
It's time to run
Blow me away
(I will stay, unless I may)
After the fall
We'll shake it off
Show me the way
Only the strongest will survive
Lead me to heaven, when we die
I am the shadow on the wall
I'll be the one to save us all
Wanted it back
(Don't fight me now!)
Don't make me beg
Blow me away
Only the strongest will survive
Lead me to heaven, when we die
I am the shadow on the wall
I'll be the one to save us all!
Save us all!
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(A/N: I know this is a little short, but I'm still happy with the finished result. I hope you guys agree with me.
I didn't use the other team in this chapter because they're pretty much done. Once the underwater team reunites with the above water team, that's it, the teams and this "side trip" is over. Don't worry, both teams will be reunited in the next chapter because I need to move on with this, I think some of you probably agree with that.)