Control Freak was feeling good. His little plan had gone off without a hitch so far, and he was pretty excited that nothing had blown up in his face thus far. Surveying the incapacitated Titans before him, a Cheshire grin formed on his face.
"Please, please, hold your applause," he said mockingly, fully aware that none of the Titans could move their arms, let alone clap their hands. "There's plenty of me to go around."
"You can say that again," Robin said, simply unable to resist firing such a good shot.
Anger flamed in the fat man's eyes, but only for a moment. Instead, he laughed off the Titan's remark. "Funny man, Robin!" he cackled, wagging a finger at the boy. "You know, you always were my favorite."
"I'm flattered," Robin said, rolling his eyes. "So, what's your evil scheme this time around?"
"Ooo, let me guess!" Cyborg said, grinning. "You're going to make us watch your homemade version of the original Star Wars trilogy, right?"
The villain's jaw dropped, a look of indignation stapled to his face. "Hey!" he cried out, furiously. "No! Not cool! I worked really hard on those costumes! I mean, do you know how many pounds of dog hair I had to dig out of the dumpster behind the grooming place to make that Chewbacca getup?"
Cy's well-timed remark prompted a few chuckles from the captive Titans. Control Freak had always been high-strung, and the moment anyone bad-mouthed a legendary sci-fi epic, he practically turned into the Incredible Hulk. Even Robin smirked, remembering how he had enticed him into a fistfight simply by stating that he considered Jean-Luc Picard the better Enterprise captain. The look on Freak's face had been priceless – both before and after getting stomped by the Titans.
"Well, if this is how you're planning on tormenting us, we just all might die laughing!" Bumblebee said, grinning.
"SHUT UP! I can't see you, I can't hear you, la-la-la-la-la!" Control Freak's voice was reminiscent of a toddler who just had his favorite toy taken away.
Before the heckling could continue, another voice broke out over the commotion: "That is quite enough from all of YOU!" The surprise of another individual in the building brought the Titans to a silence.
Robin's brow furrowed as he heard the refined, British accent reverberate off the walls of the warehouse. Only one villain he knew talked like that…
"Mad Mod," he said, watching as the aging villain calmly strolled out onto the stage and into the spotlight. Forever stuck in the 60's, Mod looked like what might have happened when the Beatles met LSD. His hipster glasses and his salad-bowl cut mop top couldn't hide the fact that he was far behind the times and, more often than not, way out of his league. Robin made a mental note that this was the first time in quite a while that the British villain had even made an appearance, let alone perpetrate and evil scheme.
"Good to see you here, Robin," Mod said, smiling weakly. "I see you still have the wonders of youth at your disposal."
"And you've got a date with an early bird special," the Titan retorted. "You know, I never would have suspected a guy like you ever teaming up with a complete klutz of a villain like Control Freak. And here I thought you British people had class…"
Although the normally pale face of Control Freak burned like the midday sun over Mercury, the old gentlemen simply smiled. "In this world, you take whatever you can get," he said. "Besides, this new plan our good friend Control Freak has whipped up was so incredibly interesting, I just couldn't help myself."
The villain's remark piqued even Robin's curiosity. "What kind of plan are you guys running here?" he demanded, his eyes narrowing into slits.
Freak grinned, and let loose with a hearty, booming laugh that practically shook the building. "Oh, you'll know soon enough, mon fruer," he said, adding in a little bit of mock French a'la Gambit. "You'll know soon enough…"
"So, you got a lock yet on the Titans' location?" Aqualad said, impatiently as Beast Boy continued pounding on the sides of the Tower's computer console. The two had been stuck at Titan Tower for some time as BB tried his best to gain access to the Titans' supercomputer. Since, the only two people who had access to it were currently indisposed, the three had found themselves locked out of the system.
"Just shut up and let me think!" the shape shifter muttered, punching keys in a random order as the monitor repeatedly blurted out "ACCESS DENIED!"
"So I can safely assume that you're still experiencing technical difficulties?" Lad asked, smirking.
"You're going to be experiencing some physical difficulties if you don't shut your trap!" Beast Boy shot back. Computers had never been the Titan's strong suit. In fact, the last time he fiddled with a computer he uploaded a virus into Cyborg's mainframe. As he crawled under the table, the boy chuckled to himself, remembering just how much Cyborg loved waffles during that episode (Author's note: no pun intended). Still, that incident had led to Robin revoking BB's access to the computer…something he was regretting now.
Suddenly, he heard Aqualad called out is name, loudly. Jerking up, he slammed the back of his head against the hard steel table. "OWW! Jeez!" he squealed, cradling his head. Through the pain, he heard his name being called again. Quickly, he scampered down from under the table, and stared up at the hero. "What?" he asked quickly, a tinge of panic in his voice.
"How's it comin'?" Lad said, grinning.
Beast Boy growled. Played again. "Well, things were going just fine until some annoying butt monkey started calling my name!" he said, angrily.
"You don't say," Aqualad said, surveying the room. "Hmm, wonder who that could have been?"
"Me, too," the boy said, glaring at his reluctant superhero partner.
Looking back up at the screen, the constant flashing of the ACCESS DENIED message irritated Beast Boy to no end. "Stupid piece of junk!" he shouted as he gave the device a swift kick. Suddenly, the message disappeared, and a map of Titan City popped up in its' place. Somehow, the Titan had just managed to bypass the security system!
"It's working…" he said cheerfully, pointing up at the monitor.
"Hey, go figure," Aqualad said, stunned. "I thought that trick only worked in the movies."
"Not when you're Beast Boy, leader of the Teen Titans!" BB said, triumphantly.
"Acting leader," Lad reminded him.
"Whatever," the shape shifter said. "I told you I'd get this thing up one way or the other!"
"Yeah you did," the aquatic hero said. "And it only took you half an hour. If you hurry up and initiate that scan, we just might be able to find their bodies."
"Ha-ha, very funny," BB said, the smile fading from his face. Although the three of them were only joking, none of them wanted that scenario to play out.
'If anything were to happen to them…' the green hero shook his head, purging that thought from his mind. 'No! That's not gonna happen! I've got to stay positive!'
Quickly, the Titan ran a trace on any and all communicator signals with in the city limits. As long as any of them were on and still had power, they would appear on the map. As the sequence counted down, Beast Boy was hoping that they could at least gain a clue about their friends' whereabouts from this data. But, as the scan finished, the three were in for an unpleasant surprise.
"What the…" BB stammered. He quickly rubbed his eyes, and looked at the screen again. Indeed, his eyes had not played a trick on him.
"They're all gathered at one central location!" Aqualad exclaimed. Tremm simply shook his head, visibly confused. "Looks like they're being held in an old building up on the north side of town. Good place for a villain's hangout. Those industrial buildings have been empty for quite some time."
"Industrial buildings?" Beast Boy echoed. Taking a closer look, he made a startling discovery. "Hey, I know exactly where that is! We were there a couple months back!"
"Does that have to do with that incident with Raven?" Lad asked, still wondering why the Titans would have to chase down one of their own.
"Rather not talk about it," BB said, quietly. Now Aqualad knew something was up. Time to push forward.
"Why not?' he asked. "What happened out there?"
Beast Boy sighed. "Look," he said, exasperated, "the reason I don't want to talk about it is because I don't know much about what happened. All I know is that we busted down the wall of that old warehouse and found Control Freak there with Raven."
The Titan paused, wringing his hand together. "Rae was strapped down on some table, half-naked and nearly unconscious," he said. "I swear, I had never seen her so…helpless…in my life."
"What did he do to her?" Aqualad asked, not sure if he wanted to know the answer.
"Beats me," BB said, shaking his head. "The only person outside of Raven and Control Freak who knew what happened was Robin, and he and Rae have been keeping everything all hush-hush since."
As he finished, the Titan's eyes hardened back up. "That's all in the past now," he said, his jaw set. "Right now, we have a rescue mission to embark on."
Aqualad and Tremm nodded in agreement. "Ready when you are," Lad said.
"Okay, now we know where the Titans are, but we don't know what to expect, so let's not go in all guns blazing and stuff," Beast boy said, doing his best to sound more like Robin…as in trying to sound like he knew exactly what he was doing. "We'll scope the place out, see who's behind this, and signal for backup if the danger's too high. Does that sound like a plan?"
"Like Robin himself would have put it," Lad said, smiling.
"Good, that's what I was aiming for," BB said, relieved. "Now, let's go take our friends back!"
Standing tall and proud, the green hero stuck out his chin in pride. Glancing over at Aqualad and Tremm, he grinned. "I've always wanted to say this…" he said.
Narrowing his own eyes into slits, it was time for Beast's Boy's finest hour to begin.
"TITANS, GO!"