Flashback Chapter 3: Jinxed Plans, a teen titans fanfic

HELLOOOO THERE!

It's been a while; the reason for this is at my work I have been working 50 hour weeks for the past month-ish maybe longer, I don't really know anymore my sense of time is skewed.

But at any rate that left not a whole lot of time to write so after 3 weeks I finally have chapter 3 done.

Its short I know, but these transition chapters are always tough for me and the action will start again next chapter, promise.

As far as Jinx goes, I had to do some wiki and google searches to learn anything about that character so If I get the personality wrong I apologize in advance. My Teen Titans knowledge is not the best I 'm just really good at winging it.

Also apologize for the shortness of this chapter, but the work schedule has me perpetually tired so ill make up for it in the next one.

Also put a plug in for my first real job, McDonalds, what can I say…-shrug-

I don't own Teen Titans, I wish I did, i would have more money.

I DO own Ty as a character however, please don't use him without permission, I'm a nice guy…promise ;)

Again, sorry about the shortness, Enjoy, please review.

(I will probably lengthen it later anyway)

Flashback Chapter 3: Jinxed Planning

The air shaft was a tight fit but the pink haired girl was still able to fit through it easy enough and with minimal noise. She was running this mission alone which was all well and good as her former 'teammates' were so incompetent that she may as well have done everything herself anyway.

Once a member of the H.I.V.E before it was brought down Jinx had afterward become the pseudo leader of the remaining members after its fall – but after many stints in jail and other frustrations, Jinx had left gizmo, Billy numerous, Mamoth, See-More, and Kid Wykkyd, to fend for themselves – the latter three of five still doing jail time.

In doing so early on she had joined up with what was then her boyfriend Kid Flash but that didn't last as long as she had hoped it would, while she still liked the boy she couldn't see herself ever having feelings that were more than just 'like' for him, mainly because he would flirt with anything that was female and shaped like a human.

So late one night Jinx decided that Kid Flash had pointed her onto the right path, but it was going to be up to her to find her own way now, and left the extraordinarily fast boy while he was sleeping, leaving only a note for him explaining why, and fading into the shadows towards her new life.

After that the pink haired sorceress had returned to Jump city to try and start her life anew but it had not been easy. Firstly she had to find a job where she could stay unseen by the Titans who protected the city, but managed to land a position working at a McDonalds, it wasn't much but it was getting her by. She then had managed to get a small studio apartment under the assumed name Fiona Pink, which usually got some sort of a chuckle when her pink hair was noticed.

But with the work and shelter thing taken care of Jinx found that outside of the one free meal a day she got while working, she didn't really have enough money left to buy food and was constantly hungry.

While she was trying to turn her life around and not habitually steal anything a girl could only go so long eating one and a half meals a day before something would snap, and that moment came tonight when her stomach growled for a dinner she wasn't going to have.

At least until she managed to kype a meal from the closed supermarket whose air ducts she was currently crawling through.

Finally reaching the vent she wanted Jinx pulled on a ski mask to hide her noticeably pink hair and to prevent her from being recognized in case she was seen, she was also wearing a black jumpsuit instead of her normal witch outfit – she didn't want anyone to know that she had gone back to stealing as a means of survival, besides it was just until she could get a better job, at least that's what she kept telling herself.

Justification was always an important aspect of thievery and no one was better at telling herself that she wasn't doing anything that wrong than Jinx. At least this excuse is better than stealing 'because it's shiny' she thought as she kicked the vent out and hopped down onto the floor in the middle of the frozen foods section. Rising up in front of her was a display of frozen Pizza's and on the other side of the isle was a variety of frozen dinners and other frozen food that could be heated in the microwave.

Now Jinx knew that eating all this food wasn't the healthiest thing in the world but she wasn't much of a cook either, so frozen food it was. She pulled a black fabric bag off of her back, opened it up and prepared to do some 'shopping' when she heard someone say "what was that noise?" from a few isles over.

Crap! She thought, someone had heard here break in, what kind of a food store had security guards anyway?! Jinx quickly grabbed a frozen pizza out of the display and threw it in her bag then sprinted for the door, but could hear the sound of running boots coming up behind her.

"Stop where you are!" The Security guard yelled but as Jinx ran by a impulse item stand and scooped a few granola bars into her bag without breaking stride, she then ran between two towers of stacked tomato soup and with a little bad luck from her, both towers collapsed onto the guards as they approached burying them in cans.

Jinx slid to a stop and ran back to the pile of cans, uncovering both guards just enough to confirm that they were just unconscious and not dead then threw the soup can she was holding as hard as she could at the glass front doors shattering the right door into little glass pieces and setting off the stores alarm.

Jinx then used more of her bad luck powers as the alarm shorted out a moment later, then slipped quickly through the gaping hole in the glass and escaped into the night, with her dinner.

Cyborg drove through the nearly empty streets of jump city in the T-car with the windows down. The large SUV plodded through the streets not really expecting any trouble from bad guys but always prepared for it, and the same went for the driver of the large vehicle. Cyborg had decided to go for a drive after getting Ty settled into the guest room.

Once he returned to the common room he had found Raven was missing, most likely in her room, Beast Boy was also missing, most likely gone to bug Raven or chasing something shiny, and Starfire and Robin were off somewhere most likely in their own little world or doing detective work. It was a perfect chance for him to go for a drive.

Driving his car around was Cyborg's Zen place, it allowed him to think things through and clear his head and circuit's of all the random thoughts he'd had throughout the day.

Like what was up with Beast Boy and Raven? Having feelings that they recognized who this random time traveling boy was bad enough on its own, but the fact that Raven especially was worried enough to talk with her friends about it? That meant something was bothering her – now he knew raven pretty well and knew that it took a lot to be able to bother her so whatever it was, it was probably pretty serious and could guess that it involved the little time traveler they had found.

He thought of Raven like he would a little sister and knew her almost just as well as he would if they were related. He knew that underneath her nearly impenetrable shield of zero emotions was someone who just wanted to laugh and feel what it was like to feel without fear. He also knew that Beast Boy knew the same thing about her and tried everything he could think of to try and get Raven to come out of her shell, but he was going about all the wrong way.

Cyborg knew that in order to get raven to open up a bit one would have to appear mature – which was something he didn't know if Beast Boy was capable of – and Beast Boy also needed to do something Raven liked rather than trying endlessly to get Raven to do something that he liked to do.

Most of all Cyborg simply cared for Raven like he did all his friends, these people were his family and he was not going to let anything intrude or jeopardize their safety. Hence the reason for the room that Ty was in was securely locked with parts of the alarm system active so that he would know exactly what the little time traveler was doing – which at the moment was sleeping – but the thought of time travel actually being possible still blew Cyborg's mind a little.

Having seen the design specs for the time machine in his scan Cyborg was convinced that the boy was telling the truth about when he was from. Heck the time machine itself almost looked like something he would make given the right equipment and time, almost that is. Checking the clock he noticed that it was almost midnight and he should probably stop joyriding so he could go home and recharge. Turning right onto another road so he could turn around his headlights illuminated the broken front door of a grocery store.

Slamming on the breaks Cyborg quickly checked his batteries, he still had about four hours left, two and a half if he was in extended combat. But either way it was more than enough for him to investigate what had happened at the store. Pulling up to the front of the building he switched on all of the extra lights the car carried and jumped out of the vehicle. He hurried through to the front door and discovered one glass everywhere on the sidewalk with a can of tomato soup lying at the end of the glass trail, defiantly a robbery and probably a robbery gone wrong if the thief left a different way than they came in.

Cyborg quickly called the police using the screen on his arm and once it was confirmed they were on the way flipped the panel shut again, looked like his musings about the time traveling kid would have to wait till later. Quickly scanning the inside of the store he noted there were two unconscious guards lying on top of a pile of soup cans, and in the pile of cans Cyborg was detecting a faint hint of something that shouldn't have been there, but was something he recognized immediately.

Jinx, Cyborg was sure of it as that was the only person he knew whose magic was detectable by his sensors, and if she was back in town chances were that the rest of her 'cronies' were as well. The Hive Five back in Jump City, he realized most of the original six members were now in jail but the fact that Jinx was back and breaking into stores worried him the most, he had become close to her while he was under cover with the H.I.V.E and though he would never admit it, he had grown to like the little bad luck charm.

Quickly checking his power reserves to confirm he was going to be okay he quickly ran his way down the street – the T-car would stay there until police arrived then drive itself after Cyborg – Cyborg in the mean time ran down the sidewalk with his arm screen open following the trail of magic that Jinx had left. It didn't take long, he caught up to the sorceress about five blocks away from the store, but she wasn't running, just walking kind of quickly.

That's odd Cyborg thought, usually she is running like a cat with it's tail on fire after she steals anything. He also noted that she was carrying a black bag that was quite empty except for an angular object in side. A quick scan form is optical sensor revealed it was a frozen pizza, since when did Jinx steal food? Were the former H.I.V.E members that hungry?

He also thought it odd that Jinx was stealing in the first place, last he had heard she was trying to reform her ways with Kid Flash, a teen hero who could probably drive anybody insane given the right amount of time but he didn't know what happened to her after Jinx had left with him. Something wasn't right about all of this and he intended to find out what.

" 'Ey Jinx!" Cyborg called out as he left his hiding place by a dark wall.

Jinx froze in mid stride, how had he found her so quick? More importantly was why were the titans chasing pathetic thieves like what she just did?

"Erm…hey Cy!" She waved as she turned around trying not to look to suspicious being out this late at night, in black, with a black bag over her shoulder.

"Where are your little friends?" He asked as his sonic cannon powered up but didn't deploy quite yet.

"They aren't my friends." She spat back, "They never were my friends and neither were you. So where are your friends?"

"Back at the tower but they can be here in three minutes, one instantly." He said knowing that Raven could appear here instantly if the need arose. Jinx knew it too and that struck a little fear in her, "I know you Broke into that store back there Jinx, what happened to cleaning up your act?"

Jinx didn't have an answer to that; she was embarrassed that she had gotten to the point where she even had to steal to survive, and alienated herself from Kid Flash, suddenly she wished she had never left but she knew that he wasn't right for her and she needed to find her own path.

"I…I don't know…" She choked back some tears refusing to cry, "I'm just hungry and I needed to get food but I didn't have money because of rent and then there were those guards and all I could get was a pizza." She pouted ready to burst into tears, "I only stole it because I don't even have enough money to feed myself!" she protested, "It's not like I'm not trying to be good you know!"

Cyborg was struck then by the feeling that she was telling the truth and it hurt him to see her like this, so with a warm heart there was nothing else he could do but open up his own home to her to help.

"Why don't you come stay with us at the tower?" he asked, "There's food and good shelter, I don't know what apartment you have but I'm sure the tower is better."

"What?" Jinx blinked.

"Come stay with us Jinx." Cyborg pressed with a smile, "I know Robin can be a hardball sometimes, but the rest of the gang would be happy to see you turning your life around."

Jinx couldn't believe that someone was being nice enough to her to take her into their home. At this point even though she may not have liked Robin she knew that staying in the Tower would be a dream compared to the life she was living right now, after all her apartment while comfortable, smelled of rotting cheese.

She wanted to run to Cyborg and hug him and cry but knew that would make her look like she couldn't do anything by herself – that being the whole reason for her not telling the Titans she was in town in the first place – and she wanted so badly to be able to be independent after screwing up her life so far. But over all of this was her growling stomach demanding food, which she knew there was plenty of at the Tower.

"Okay." She said meekly.

"Great!" Cyborg grinned and pressed a button on his arm, a moment later the T Car flew around a corner and raced up to where the mechanical man was standing before screeching to a halt, with no driver. "Hop in." he said as he climbed into the driver's seat with Jinx climbing into the passenger seat.

"There's one thing we have to do first before we go back though." Cyborg said and Jinx was afraid she already knew what it was, "I want you to tell the police what happened why it happened, and apologize."

Jinx was beyond exhausted as well as starving, and could do nothing more but nod her head.

Ty looked out from the windows in his room at the thriving city across the bay, he had never seen anything like it in his lifetime, cities were targets for the Echrid and generally avoided at all costs. But seeing the city like this, so vibrant so alive made him feel good inside despite the fact that he had no idea how to stop the Echrid from destroying earth.

He had tried sleeping but no sleep would come to him because he knew Robin was busy probably commandeering high powered telescopes to find the Echrid mother ship.

He would find it of course just past Pluto and then he was sure that the whole team would want to know more about what they were and want to know more about him as well.

He had forgotten entirely his cover story that his mother had thought up for him and desperately wished he could remember it, Raven as his mom had come up with the perfect explanation of 'who he was' but a whole lot of good that would do him if he couldn't remember what it was.

He sighed as he walked back to the guest bed and plopped down onto it but it didn't feel right, he had grown up sleeping on the ground for almost all of his life and sleeping in something that was so plush and soft just didn't feel right, he wasn't comfortable. So jumping back out of bed with a huff of frustration Ty grabbed the blanket and walked over to the clear floor near the doorway to his room and got comfortable on his back on the floor with the blanket over him thinking, that's better.

But even comfortably on the hard floor sleep wouldn't come to him easy and he ended up lying there half asleep for a long time before he heard some sort of noise in the hall outside his door. Opening his tired eyes he tuned an ear to the happenings outside his room, trying to determine what was going on or being said.

The footsteps sounded like Cyborg's, heavy thuds that he could hear through the structure of the floor itself. The other person was much lighter than Cyborg was, maybe a female, he couldn't really tell because metal floors didn't resonate sound the same way as the earth did, but whomever was with Cyborg was defiantly smaller than he was by a long shot.

"I still can't believe you paid for the broken window, I would have done that myself you know." He heard a female voice say.

"You don't have the money to pay for that Jinx we both know that." Cyborg said, a voice that deep could have only been Cyborg, wait, did he say Jinx?

Ty shot upright and rolled too the door popping up on his feet and pressing one ear against the door so he could hear what was going on better.

"I know…But it would have made me feel better if you had let me just pay for it you know? There's not much I'm proud of in my life." The female voice said and in that instant Ty could tell it was Jinx, it had to be her, the one who betrayed them when her mind was taken over by the Echrid hive – leading to the death of not only Cyborg but his father as well…his father – Ty wanted to scream, he wanted to kill her, he would not sit here and let the girl who killed both his uncle and dad be on the same planet as he was.

The special runes on his armor designed to quell the enormous power that his anger generated suddenly lit up in bright red with steam coming out of the runes on his chest plate and shoulder pads. He hit the button to open the door but nothing happened, he hit it again but still nothing happened.

Pausing for a moment Ty closed his eyes and forced himself to calm down until a few of his anger management runes stopped glowing before he opened his eyes again. Jinx was here yes but that didn't mean she was an evil person. After all he remembered from when he was younger she was very nice to him and things only went bad after the Echrid took over her mind. As a matter of fact the Echrid seemed to be the cause of everything that had gone wrong in his short life.

In his heart he felt his anger burning anew, only now against the Echrid and knew he had to find some way to destroy the mother ship that protected the Echrid's hive mind, if he could just damage or destroy that the Echrid drones would cease to function correctly and most likely destroy each other.

But how?

Then, an idea popped into his head, an idea that was so insane it just might work, he didn't think there was any way to actually defeat the Echrid in a head to head battle, the race of insects was too numerous and too strong to be beaten that way, but what if the Echrid never existed?

The Flashback drive was strong enough to make a time travel worm whole for himself but would require much more power in order to time warp something as big as the Echrid mother ship – of course he could provide the power the drive needed using his own life force easily enough but doing something foolish like that would probably kill him, there had to be something else that could provide enough power to the drive for it to warp the Echrid out of this timeline forever.

There was a sudden knock on his door that made him blink out of his thoughts and stare at the door for a moment blankly, only when the knock came again did he walk over to the door and press the button to open it, and this time the door slid open.

Robin was standing with his arms crossed, Starfire next to him.

"We have found the ship that will bring doom do us all." Starfire said before Robin could speak.

"Thanks Star." Robin said as Starfire smiled slightly to him, "The Acrid ship was right where you said it was."

"Echrid." Ty corrected.

"Right, anyway it was where you said it would be, so now what do we do?" Robin looked the kid over.

"Like I said before, in my time everything that could be tried was tried against the Echrid and nothing worked, but I think I have an idea that will, and the time machine on my back is the key to it all." He grinned.

"Alright what have you got?" Robin said with Starfire adding, "Yes tell us how to defeat the Ecklids!"

"Well As far as I know there isn't any way to defeat them outright, there are too many of them and they are too strong. So I had the thought of instead of defeating them, why not just move them instead?" Ty said thinking himself a genius.

"What do you mean move them?" Robin had no idea what Ty was talking about.

"Err…move them in the timeline, we can use the time warp drive on my back to make a 'weapon'." Ty Air quoted, "That can warp the Echrid mother ship far enough into the future that it puts the ship on earth just before the sun goes super nova." Ty Grinned.

"That's a good idea, but do you have any idea how far in the future that is?" Robin questioned, the kid's idea was good but it was a long shot.

"Eh-heh…no." Ty admitted, "I'm thinking something along the lines of ten billion years-ish but the problem isn't getting there, the problem is getting enough power to the time machine to make it warp the whole Echrid mother ship that far into the future, not to mention getting the time machine inside the ship itself."

"Why does it have to be inside the Echlid ship?" Starfire asked, "Can we not just attach it to the outside?"

"I wish, the time machine is the most stable when it is located at the point of the highest mass of an object, so like with me, its on my back because my upper body is the largest part of myself, with the ship we will need to get it inside for a time warp to be stable." He explained, he remembered Cyborg telling him about how it worked before he died but anything deeper than what he was explaining now he would not know.

"Right." Robin Glanced at the clock and noticed that it was indeed almost two in the morning, "I think that is a great idea Ty but it is late and we should all get some sleep and brainstorm how to turn your time machine into a weapon in the morning."

Before Ty could object to the lack of time before the Echrid arrived the door was shut again but not locked this time as Starfire and Robin left him to sleep. But how was he supposed to sleep when he knew the Echrid were on their way to ruin his future once more – no this time would be different, this time he would transport the Echrid all the way to just before the sun went super nova, which would annihilate the Echrid once and for all.

He sighed knowing that tonight there would be no more troubleshooting on how to defeat the Echrid tonight before laying back down on the floor with a huff, pulling the blanket up again before drifting into a dreamless sleep.

The next morning found the Titans minus Beast Boy and Ty – both of whom were probably still asleep – as well as Jinx, sitting in the common room discussing the Echrid. Robin stood by one of the large windows to the left of the massive T.V. with Cyborg standing in front of the screen, Starfire and Jinx both sat on the couch, Jinx on the far end. Raven meanwhile sat at the table sipping at her steaming tea cup.

Robin had been mad with Cyborg about not telling him the night before but to Cy's credit, Robin also had been too busy confirming that the Echrid existed in the first place so no one could have found him to tell him anyway. Jinx also was very honest about how Cyborg had found her and the events that happened the night before, Robin also knew she was trying to turn her life around so for now, she could stay.

Besides there was that pesky issue of the world ending and all, so it made more sense for Robin to relate Ty's plan from the night before to the team to see if there was any other ideas.

"Really? No one has any other ideas?" Robin asked after about three minutes of silence once he finished, "I have a hard time believing that none of us can come up with something better."

"Well if a time traveler claims that with the right power he can transport a giant ship ten billion years into the future, I tend to believe the time traveler." Raven said flatly.

"Raven's right." Cyborg added, "I mean the kid says that he came from thirteen years in the future and told us about something that hasn't happened until last night. Besides I'd love the chance to look at an honest to goodness time machine, even if were making a weapon out of it."

The door to the common room by the kitchen suddenly slid open and a Tired looking Ty and Beast Boy walked in talking about video games. Starfire looked at the two boys as they came into the room and noticed how they looked almost exactly alike with the exception of Ty's normal ears and skin color – which while grey was still lighter than Raven's skin. It amazed her how humans could look so alike to each other when in Tamaran the only way her people looked alike was if the other person was related to them-

"Grunthark!" Starfire exclaimed when the realization hit her, causing everyone in the room to stop what they were doing and stare at her, "Err…It is day of holies for my people and he have to say grunthark at least once today in…in front of people I care about." She lied.

"Right…" Robin said before looking to Beast Boy and Ty, "Where have you two been?"

"Sleeping." Beast Boy answered, "Ty and I both woke up around the same time or something, we met up in the hallway, did you know this dude has never played a video game?"

While Robin caught Beast Boy and Ty up with the conversation Raven analyzed Starfire empathicly. If Beast Boy was a nuclear blast of emotions then Starfire was a planet blowing up when it came to how easy she could read the alien girl, and it was obvious that she was lying about the grunthark comment. Even Robin had to have caught the vibe coming from her, Starfire had realized something just after Beast Boy and Ty walked in and it surprised her, but to what end Raven could not tell.

"So you guys can help?" Ty said as his spirits rose, "I mean my plan is a long shot but it is the best idea I got."

"Well none of us have any better ideas." Robin said, "So looks like this is our best shot."

"So what do we do now?" Jinx asked from the far end of the couch.

"Well I suppose I could get started on the ti-" Cyborg never had a chance to finish his sentence as small armor clad boy with green hair charged the now glowing runes on his armor and rushed at Jinx, timeline be damned Ty was not going watch that pink haired witch become possessed and kill his uncle and father again.

Jinx saw him coming and tried to duck behind Cyborg but Ty was too fast and tackled her at hip level making both super heroes roll away from each other. Rolling back onto his feet Ty suddenly found himself encased in a bubble of black magic, Raven had felt the change in emotions from him and decided to stop him before he did anything stupid.

"Let me go!" Ty Protested from within the bubble.

"Not until you explain why you just tried to attack someone right in front of us." Raven said.

"Seriously man what the heck? We offer to help you and you repay us by attacking one of our friends?" Robin asked as he walked over so he stood in front of Ty, sounding more than a little annoyed.

"I cant tell you it will screw up the timeline!" Ty tried to counter, "But she can't be here it will lead to the deaths of two of you!"

"You mean coming back in time to stop an apocalypse isn't screwing up the timeline enough already?" Cyborg chipped in, shooting down Ty's argument.

"Enough!" Ty said even more enraged, "I don't have time for this and I wont let her kill Cyborg and my father again!"

Instantly some of the runs on his armor changed color to bright red and in an instant the bubble Raven had around the child shattered and Ty spun around holding an orb of violet energy in his hand, ready to release it. But he was met instead with the business end of Cyborg's charged and ready sonic cannon and the end of Robin's staff at his throat.

"Calm down kid." Cyborg said, "No one is going to die here today."

"That's right, now what aren't you telling us? Obviously there's something that happens in the future that we need to know so start talking!" Robin added.

Beast Boy and Raven stood watching the tense situation; Raven was having a hard time believing that her shield had been broken so easily by the boy, whereas Beast Boy stood ready to morph into a tiger and rip the child apart should he try to harm Raven.

How had he broken my shield so easily? Raven thought, only the incredibly strong could break her shield, either that or someone who know as much about demon magic as she did – maybe all of this was a ploy by her father to exact revenge on her and her friends, but then if it was Trgons doing she would have been able to sense it in the boy, sure she sensed some familiarity from him but nothing threatening, certainly nothing of her fathers power.

"I can't!" Ty shot back, "I've already told you all more than I probably should have because I need help stopping the Echrid form destroying the world again, I can't pollute the timeline further."

"Why not?" Raven asked, "Already you have changed the future hopefully for good, so why not just tell us who you really are?"

"Seriously, I just want to know why future boy here tried to attack me!" Jinx said from behind Cyborg.

Tyler growled a moment before clenching his fist which snuffed out the power he had ready, and lowered his hand. After Tyler stood down Cyborg and Robin follows suite as Robin pressed again, "So who are you?"

"I'm…" Tyler stuttered, arg why couldn't he just have remembered his cover story, look at me I'm a 'warrior from the future' freeking lame excuse is what it was. He thought, the Titans were pressing him for his real identity and he had a feeling that if he didn't give it to them that they would most likely try to come up with their own plan to stop the Echrid that wouldn't work instead of using his – though the chance of his succeeding was marginal at best.

"Fine you win, you win! But if I cease to exsist because I screwed up the timeline too much don't be surprised." Ty said angrily.

Here goes nothing. He thought, before saying

"My full name is Tyler Logan, In the future, I'm Raven's son."

AN: Oooo Clifhanger!

I will get the next chapter up faster I promise, I should be having more time to write again soon as manditory overtime will be over soon as well, yay!

Please review, thanks :)