Greetings from the Author's desk once more (or whatever computer I managed to hijack at the moment to work on this thing), and I hope ya'll are enjoying the twists and turns of the storyline. Just so you know, the basic idea is still the same, but things have changed in my head over time. Hopefully ya'll will never notice the changes as I work them in. For those of you who don't know, I'm deployed again, and we're in the middle of the humanitarian rescue mission in the middle east. That's right, Dark's aboard the good ship USS Nashville (yeah, the same one they've been showing all over CNN) and it's been a bit difficult writing while trying to take care of everyone we're evacuating. Hopefully ya'll can forgive me for the delays there, but in my eyes, these people have to come first. It's been difficult, not a lot of sleep, not a lot of time to myself, but when I do, I'll try to keep working on this thing. Drop me an email if you want, I can pass it on to the rest of the ship if you want me too, or just if you want to say hey. my email on the ship is a bit different than the yahoo addy I have here, if you want to reach me, it's morcomjlpd13.navy.mil. Well, that's all for now, the LCU (Landing Craft) just hit our well deck, and I'm gonna go try to help where I can. C-Ya'll!
-The Dark One
Chapter 23
Dark Separations Part 4
I stood poised, ready to begin practice with my new blades, my body tensed, and my mind relaxed. Stepping forward, I moved the blades slowly, watching the dim red glow from the runes wash in its wake. With a step back, I brought the twin blades into a defensive position, following through with a high speed series of jabs and slices. With a smirk, I stepped back, paused for a moment, and made to turn my body into a furious cyclone of blades, and the alarm went off. I jumped skittishly, before realizing what the sound was. Raven rose from her position on the ground, and nonchalantly made her way back towards the tower.
"C'mon Ryk, your new toys'll have to wait a bit longer."
I sighed, picked myself up off the ground, and went to sheath the daggers, until I realized that the twin blades would make it a little difficult to just sling in my belt. After a few moments of adjusting things, I finally found a place to keep them, and made my own way to the tower.
Beast Boy paced nervously back and forth across the floor.
"Why now…why when Robin and Starfire are…" Beast Boy paused, and looked towards the door as it opened. "Rae! Ryk! Bad news guys, word has it that…"
Cyborg placed a firm hand on the changeling's shoulder, quieting him. "HIVE's at it again. Nightmare, Gizmo and Mammoth were spotted downtown in the park. They haven't destroyed anything yet, but they're calling us out, and threaten to start destroying things if we don't show up."
"Well, let's go," Raven droned, already headed for the door.
"Rae, wait. We need a plan for this one. We're going in two members short, and we know we're walking into a heck of a fight. Nightmare has already shown us that she can take all of us on at once, and the now she's got both Gizmo and Mammoth with her to back her up. I don't want anyone else taking rounds this time. C'mon, we're all taking the T-Car, that'll at least give us a few moments to get our heads together.
---------------
Nightmare stood between Gizmo and Mammoth, waiting for the Titans she knew would arrive…waiting for him to arrive.
"Aww, c'mon Nightmare…let me blast something!" Gizmo whined.
"No. No one so much as twitches until the Titans get here. This is our perfect opportunity to start to take them apart. The leader and his alien girlfriend aren't even on the planet, makes the last four that much easier to take out. Once we deal with them, we'll take Robin and Starfire out without them even knowing what hit them."
"Heh…Mammoth smash!" the single minded hulk smirked.
"Yeah…Mammoth smash…" Nightmare mocked, her voice dripping in poison.
A white car pulled up on the corner, and a lone Cyborg stepped out.
"Well well, what have we here, the electronic snotball!" Gizmo sneered.
"Where's the rest of your puny friends?" A jeering Mammoth added in.
"Hate ta disappoint you guys, but I'm all ya get tonight. Everyone else is out playin' with more volatile problems." Cyborg joked cheerfully, a twinkle in his one human eye.
Nightmare smirked, then frowned. "Kill him. He's not worth my time."
With a howl of both bestial fury and mechanical jets, Mammoth and Gizmo both launched themselves at were the lone Titan stood. As they rushed him, Cyborg took a half step back, and formed his body into a defensive pose. Mammoth reached him first, and the two locked hands, fighting for control.
Gizmo flitted about the two, his twin laser cannons already charged, waiting for a clear shot.
Nightmare stood in the background, watching, but letting her empathy cover the area around her, searching for the other three Titans. She did not believe Cyborg from the moment he stepped out of his car. Try as she might, though, she could not detect any of the rest of the team.
On the edge of the park, up atop a decently sized building, Beast Boy and I crouched behind a ridiculously bright billboard. A drop of sweat ran down my forehead as I shielded both my own and Beast Boy's mind from Nightmare's silent search. On the far side of the park, hidden as well as we were, I knew Raven was hiding behind a shield of her obsidian telekinesis, concealing her own presence from the empath.
In the park, Mammoth got the upper hand in the power struggle, and flipped Cyborg around several times in the air. The metallic Titan twisted in the air, letting his opponent complete the spin for him, and landed with but one knee hitting the dirt.
"Sucker," was all he said.
The steroid packing HIVE student's eyes popped wide as Cyborg's arm, now free from the lock, popped open into his sonic cannon. With an ear-popping scream, the cannon discharged, sending Mammoth flying to where he crashed at Nightmare's feet.
Gizmo took the moment of advantage, and dove in on where Cyborg stood, guns blazing. Cyborg was quick on his feet however, and turned the cannon towards the genius midget.
"Booyah."
-ZZZZZZAAAAAAPP!-
His cannon discharged once again, straight into Gizmo's snickering face. With a scream, the mini terrorist went to join Mammoth in the heap.
Nightmare rolled her eyes, and with a slow grace, unhooked her pair of axes from her back, and brought them around to a fighting pose.
Cyborg waited, his eyes glistening with anticipation, his cannon shifting back to an arm.
With nothing more than the whisper of her feet on the ground, Nightmare leapt over her fallen teammates, and charged the one man army.
Cyborg held his ground.
Nightmare sneered, and brought her axes back for a deadly blow.
Both of Cyborg's arms took traits of his sonic cannons, yet he never moved.
Nightmare's eyes shone of victory as she raised both of her axes above her head, a warcry on her lips. She reached the spot where Cyborg stood in a blur, bringing her axes down in a screaming arc, where they were both stopped cold by an obsidian burst of telekinesis only inches from the smiling android's head
"Do I have to say it again?"
Nightmare struggled to pull her hands free from the binding power.
"Yeah, I think I do."
The winged demon's eyes widened as Cyborg's twin guns hummed to a crescendo.
"Boo-yah."
With that, the Titanium Titan cut loose two full blasts of sonic energy, connecting solidly into Nightmare's chest, and throwing her backwards, where she tumbled overtop of a green Rhino that just happened to be standing behind her. After several very ungraceful bouts with the ground, Nightmare came to a rest with her other two teammates in the center of the park.
"Who's da man!" Cyborg crowed out.
All three HIVE members rolled slowly back to their feet, their collective ears ringing from the sonic blasts they had endured.
The android became serious once again, while Raven and Beast Boy fell in beside him.
"Attack pattern echo!" Nightmare cried out. Mammoth stomped a heavy foot into the ground, creating the front of the formation. Spindly spider legs sprouted from Gizmo's back as he fell in behind Mammoth, and Nightmare took up her place just to the left of them.
"Titans, GO!" Cyborg barked out
"Go!" Nightmare shouted, and the two teams rushed towards each other.
-FLASH!-
In a blur of silver, I stepped in between the Nightmare and the rest of the Titans, bringing her to a skidding stop.
"Not today, babe. You get to fight me this time."
Mammoth's massive strength crashed against Cyborg's mechanical brawn while Beast Boy and Raven had their hands full of a very trigger happy Gizmo, and I stood face to face with Nightmare.
"C'mon, let's dance once more," I smirked, pulling my new blades, and turning them so I held them in a reverse grip. The red runes glowed menacingly.
"New toys?" she mused. "Let's see if I can break them AGAIN!" On the last word, she brought both her axes around on a screaming course parallel to the ground. In a silver flash, a single blade was brought up, the dual blades stoppingboth of her axes, while the other ended millimeters from her throat.
Nightmare sweatdropped.
"You know, I could finish this right here, right now, and I would be done with you."
Nightmare swallowed hard.
"Good thing I don't kill people any more, isn't it?"
I held the girl at the tip of my blade, and with the tilt of my head, signaled to her to call off her teammates.
"You're jumpy tonight Nightmare," I growled. "Take your clan and go home. If you value your freedom, I wouldn't come back to my city."
The girl tried to pull her axes free away, but the razor sharp cutting edge of my new blade had eaten into the blade of her axes, and with the twist I had put on them, held them fast.
"Nuh uh…these are mine now,"
"…"
"…"
"wwWWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!"
Gizmo went flying by over our heads, chased by hundreds of thousands of razor edged grass blades that had been plucked from the earth, and sharpened with Raven's telekinetic power.
"Go home Nightmare, crawl back into whatever dark hole you found your way out of, and stay away from my city."
-WHUD-
Mammoth landed in a horribly contorted position, face first next to us. Cyborg stepped up, and popped his cannon.
"We're arresting the whole lot," the android smiled.
"No, we're letting them go home."
-SMASH-
A green pterodactyl dropped a sparking Gizmo atop a groaning Mammoth, and snapped back into elf form, landing on Cyborg's other side.
"And why are we letting them go?" Raven monotoned.
"I want them to leave, and leave us alone. This is no longer their playground, and they are well aware of that."
Nightmare scowled, and threw a kick at me. My reactions were instant, and with a twist of my body, my leg captured her own. My knees bent, and I crouched down, twisting her hip, and spinning her face first into the dirt. My foot stamped down hard on her hand, stopping it from reaching out for her fallen weapons. A gasp of pain escaped her lips, and my face fell to a scowl as I forced my way into her head.
"It's time to go Nightmare. We won this round."
"I'm not done yet…"
"Yes you are. Leave my city, run like you lives depended on it, for your freedom surely does."
Mammoth's hand managed to grab on to a too close Beast Boy, who merely stared down at the steroid buff, and transformed into a T-Rex. A roar echoed across the park, and a toothy grin swung down to stare into a suddenly very scared pair of eyes. Mammoth released his now insignificant grip on the dinosaur's leg, sweatdropped, and waved innocently.
The T-Rex seemingly forgot to transform back, and stood there in his green power, staring down its three opponents.
"Can I step on 'em?" Beast Boy's voice came from the T-Rex's mouth. "I bet they pop like grapes."
Gizmo's eyes bugged out, and he paled of all color. "Nightmare…" he begged, "Can we please go home now? Robin's not here to hold…to hold 'em…back."
'Run and hide, little children. One day you'll be able to walk under the sun…but not today.' My voice rang through their heads, and with a sweating nod, Nightmare signaled for her and her allies to retreat.
High fives were offered between the guys of the remaining Titans, while Raven sat quietly, already back inside the T-Car.
"Dude, we so kicked their butts!"
"Man, did you see the look on her face when Raven caught her little axe thingies! It was priceless!
"I think Gizmo will be spitting grass blades for the next month the way Rae pounded him!"
I chuckled and watched as Gizmo's jet trail vanished into the distance.
Cyborg and Beast Boy finally settled down, and turned a serious face towards me.
"Dude!" Cyborg exclaimed. "Why did you let them go? We could have had all three of them right there!"
I shrugged. "Sometimes, one must release the tail in order to cut off the head of the viper."
They looked at me, and I smiled back, sliding one of Robin's Bird Trackers from my pocket. It beeped, and a red light traced its way in a roundabout way through the city.
"Dude…you didn't…"
"He did…"
"Yeah, I did. I planted one of Rob's Bird Bugs on Mammoth before he took off. He'll be the last to notice, and by the time he does, we'll know where their hiding out."
"And if we're lucky," Beast Boy cut in, "The whole HIVE Academy!"
I nodded. "That's the plan. They'll all head back to the Academy before to much longer, and my plan is to be ready for them when they do."
Inside the car, Raven stared out the window, watching the stars. Something bothered her, but she refused to show it.
The ride back to the tower had been a quiet one as we all contemplated our next move. Beast Boy was all for tracking the HIVE kids, and taking them on the moment they walked back into the academy, while Cyborg wanted to contact Robin to get his opinion of it first. I sat in the back, half listening to the argument, and half watching Raven. Her face was different. I couldn't figure it out, but somehow, it was different…troubled, maybe worried, but still well hidden.
Once we had reached the tower, Cyborg rushed his way to the his computer to enter the tracking data, and to call Robin, Beast Boy attacked the fridge, looking for some kind of tofu slop to satisfy himself with, and Raven tried to settle behind her book, but kept glancing out the window. I snagged my laptop from where it sat on a counter, sprawled out on the ground, and logged into the World of Warcraft, playing as my rogue for a while. Beast Boy hopped his way over the couch, and landed next to a reading Raven. She made a face at the stench of tofu, but returned to her book in silence.
"Raven," the changeling asked. "What's eatin' ya?"
"Nothing," she droned. "Leave me alone."
He pointed out the window at the stars. "It's something to do with those?"
She grimaced and looked away.
"You some kind of astrology freak now?"
Slowly, almost compromisingly, she shook her head. "You wouldn't understand."
The little elf sat back, and took a bite out of his goop. "Yeah, whatever you say."
His foot turned into that of a monkey, and wrapped itself around the remote, and started clicking through the channels on the TV. I looked up from my game for a moment, made a mental note of Raven's actions, watched the changing channels for a moment, and dropped back into gamer mode.
------------
Nightmare nursed her wounded wrist sitting in her room at the academy. What had gone so horribly wrong tonight? Last time they had gone up against the entire team, and had stomped all over them, this time…it was like two completely different teams. Somehow, they had figured out how to fight against her team, and had humiliated all of them, then dishonored the fight itself by voluntarily letting them go.
And it wasn't all of them that let them go…
…it was him…
What was his motivation? Why did he let them go? He had to know that they wouldn't leave the city until they had what they wanted…and Nightmare only wanted one thing. Ryk.
Still, what was his motiva…ti…on.
Nightmare gasped, as the realization came to her. The only reason he could have behind letting them go, beyond some miraculous grant of mercy, was that he was tracking them…but who? How?
She immediately stripped of her clothing, and searched it carefully, looking for any kind of device that could be hidden on them, after finding nothing, she carefully dug through her locks of hair, again in vain. Putting her clothing back on, she dashed from her room, and down to Gizmo's, and began pounding on the door.
"What's with the racket jerk-wad," he spat sleepily, cracking the door open. Nightmare pushed him back, slammed the door open, and stormed in.
"The Titans are tracking us," she stated. "At least I think they are. Get your stuff out, we're going through it…NOW!"
Gizmo blinked several times, yawned, and was rewarded with a resounding slap across his face.
-POW-
The mini-terrorist tumbled end over end, landed on his backside, and sat bolt upright
"What the freakin' heck?"
"Check. Your. Gear. NOW!"
"Alright, alright, hold your freakin' horses." He grumbled, but obeyed, pulling his gear out of its locker, and laying it out on the floor. Parts, pieces, and equipment was strewn haphazardly across the floor as Nightmare inspected the boy's fighting outfit while he searched for anything out of place in his robotics.
The winged girl growled, tossed the clothing aside, and stormed towards the door.
"I'm going to go check Mammoth. Keep looking," she ordered.
The boy nodded, now fervently searching his things.
Mammoth proved to be a bit more difficult to wake, but after finally kicking his door in, and dragging him out of bed, the massive HIVE operative groggily pried his eyes open.
"Whut?" he grumbled.
"Your gear from the fight, where is it?"
"Ova dere."
Nightmare tossed him aside, and stormed her way over to a pile of discarded clothes. It took here a mere moment to search it, and come up with what she was looking for. A tiny beacon, the shape of the boy wonder's signature bird, blinked steadily on the back of his collar.
"rrrrrRRRRAAAAHHH! Dammit! That cheap sunova--"
-------------
I sat in the tower, and blinked once as the light finally winked out on my computer screen. I smirked, marked the place, and rolled off to head to bed.
"So that's where you're hiding, huh…"
Cyborg sat in front of his computer, talking to Robin's image on screen.
"So you found the HIVE's Academy!"
"Yeah, Ryk did, he managed to tag one of the kids before they took off."
"What's the plan?"
"Well, Ryk and Beast Boy want to storm the place, but Raven's saying to hold off till you get back. Personally, I want to blitz in there and wipe 'em out, but we all figured I should talk to you before we make any final calls."
"Good idea, but honestly, what do you think? Think you can handle things?"
"Pfft, the way we handled Nightmare and her crew today? It'd be a walk in the park."
"Well…ok, but be careful, and don't rush in without a plan."
"Roger…Cyborg out."
The screen winked out, and once Cyborg was sure the transmission was over, leapt to his feet, and pumped his arm in the air
"Booyah! We are so gonna kick HIVE tail!"
-------------
I sighed, sitting once again on the window ledge in my room. The emotions that Cyborg was giving off were far to much to be ignored, and I knew this fight was not going to be an easy one.
A blue cloak drifted into view, and I figured someone else had picked up on the emotions blasting through the tower.
"So we're going after them, aren't we," Raven hummed.
I nodded quietly as she perched herself on the sill next to me.
"Why are you still up?"
I shrugged, "I don't plan on sleeping tonight. I was enjoying the stars and the night air for a moment longer, but I have some meditation to prep me for tomorrow to tend to." My hand dropped gently on her shoulder, and though she never acknowledged it, she didn't resist either. "You need to get some sleep, though. Catch up on your meditation in the morning, but I can feel it on you. There's been a lot on your shoulders since Robin left, I know, but tonight, you need to let go, rest, and be ready for tomorrow."
She nodded quietly, but didn't leave my sill as I slid off backwards, and into my room. Instead, she followed me in, and lowered herself into a bean bag I had sitting off to the side. I eyed her warily, dropped to my knees, and released my mind, exploding through the city, visiting the parks, the rich side and poor districts alike, but kept a part back, swirling about the goth girl that had curled up in my room.
Eventually, I felt Raven drop off to sleep, and the last of my mind blasted out into the darkness, shooting a straight line through town, and pulling the other strands of my mind along with it. Skyscrapers blurred past, and the buildings got shorter, until I rocketed to the edge of the city's limits, and to a lonely cave…and a golden girl glow.
"Hello Terra," my voice rang out into the darkness.
"Hi Ryk," her quiet voice answered. "What's new?"
The river of my mind converged, and took on my form. I stepped slowly towards the ghost of a titan, and let her fall once more into my arms.
"I have good news."
-----------
Morning broke, and I opened my eyes with the sunrise. A faint golden glow faded from my body, and I turned to see Raven watching me. She sat in her traditional lotus, but instead of having her eyes closed as she meditated, she watched. I, too, noticed the gold glow, but shrugged it off.
"And where were you last night?" she hummed.
"Just…trying to give an old ghost new life."
She shook her head. "We still can't help her, you know."
I smirked. "You haven't read it yet then."
"Read what?"
I smiled.
Raven's eyes widened.
Cyborg's voice blared over the intercom. "Rise and shine kiddies! It's HIVE stomping day!"
End Chapter 23