Chapter 15

Gunshots resounded down the narrow hallway as Cyborg and Jinx fled desperately.

"C'mon, man, just let me blast them...just a little?"

"Fzzt-Click. No! Stick to the plan, my eager automaton. Give a rousing chase but do not return fire. We do not want them to aware of any supernatural abilities you-"

Cyborg flicked off the communicator. Clenching his teeth, he snarled softly. "Soon as I get my hands round that li'l freak's neck, I swear he'll be smear on some wall."

Jinx, however, was far more worried about the bullets. Zing! A few, scant strands of pink hair drifted down. "Umm, Cy? C-Could we, I dunno, worry about our targeted hides?"

Glancing minutely at the petite girl, he lumbered up behind her, effectively blocking all projectiles.

Clink! Clank!

Grunting, he bore the shocks against his metal exterior. "I'll feel that in th' morning."

Jinx simply kept running, frowning worriedly. "What I wouldn't give for some Ceylon tea right about now." A sudden smile. "Ooh, and a nice, hot biscuit with butter and jam." As suddenly at it came, the smile left. A solid wall of metal rose up before them, signaling the abrupt dead end. "Errr...Cy?"

Stomping hard, Cyborg came to ansliding halt just before slamming into the now stationary Jinx. He stared at the wall. It stared back. "Oh, you're !&$ kiddin'!"

"Fzzt-Click. Go peacefully. Click-Fzzt"

Glancing at each other, then at the rapidly approaching guards, they sighed, and lifted their hands in the air. "Smear," Cyborg growled.

---

The lone, plush hallway high above the commotion on the lower levels sat silent during graveyard shift, whatever few workers tucked away in their rooms, minding their only little projects and tasks. Far down the corridor, a light flickered, casting a shadow for a bare moment. Nothing stirred.

THWUMP!

Beast Boy muttered something around the sudden face-full of carpet, his limbs splayed about comically, as Raven stepped out of her meditative stance. The teleport was a complete success.

"Shut up," hissed the dark girl, glancing around. Grabbing her partner, she deftly hoisted him to his feet. "Will you keep quiet for a few scant seconds?"

Childishly, the changeling stuck his tongue out at her. "Eh, no one's around anyway."

"Fzzt-Click. Can you idiots stop babbling and get going? We do not have all night. Click-Fzzt."

Raven noticeably scowled. "You heard him." Moving down the corridor, she glanced here and there, noting the small plaques that titled the room. "Figures we'd be picked as research partners in some God-forsaken tower."

Rubbing his hair, Beast Boy chuckled. "Am I really that bad?"

"Worse."

"All right then." The smile on his face did not leave. "Ya know, Rae, I get the feeling we'll be stuck together a lot more often if we keep doing this kinda thing."

Lifting a brow, Raven simply kept walking, not even bothering to turn. "I'm not even going to ask for the reasoning behind that logic."

Crossing his arms behind his head, the animorph simply chuckled. "I think that, deep down, you can't be without my overwhelming charisma and great jokes." The blue cloak waved dispassionately in front of him. "I brighten you're day. Admit it."

"Don't hold your breath." A pause. "No, actually, please do."

"Well, aren't we little Miss Grumpy Cloak today, eh? You gotta learn how to smile, lighten up, enjoy life while it l-"

Raven interrupted him with a sharp growl. "There is nothing about my life to enjoy, Beast Boy." Turning on him, the blue girl nearly snarled, her teeth clenched. "And you're constant meddling is only putting yourself...and every living thing in horrendous peril."

Cocking his head, Beast Boy simply stared at her. "You don't give yourself much credit, Raven." His eyes hardened into emerald shards. "And I'm gonna get that past you one day."

Raven nearly snarled again, this time at the determination set as if chiseled onto his face. Instead, her face softened slightly, as if patronizing a child. "And you shall keep failing." Turning around abruptly, she nearly ran into a door. Trying the doorknob, she found it securely locked. "Well?" She motioned a hand at the door.

Beast Boy sighed, before morphing into a spider. The emerald arachnid skittered under the door with agile speed, moments before the door opened from the inside. "Let's get to infiltratin', then."

Raven sighed softly as she stepped into the dark room, glancing about. A lone window in the far wall to her left cast the only light, leaving a patch of shattered moonlight on the floor. Lines of computers and servers lined the walls, steadily humming and clicking in the still, dead night. Occasionally, a computer's light would blink, casting a pale, green hue over everything. On the right far wall, a single door stood blaringly obvious. Reinforced metal wrapped around a lead core, a massive handle, and, to finish it off in grand stainless steel splendor, a digital pad and voice identification unit. The blue girl sighed once more. "Wonderful."

Beast Boy stared at the door. "Sooooo, um, how-" He glanced over to Raven, whom was no longer there. "Uh, Rae?"

"I told you not to call me 'Rae'," a voice hissed...from the floor. A pale hand grabbed his ankle and yanked him down into a black pit that was not there a moment ago.

After a few moments of utter stygian dark and silence, they were on the other side of the door. And once again, Beast Boy was on his face in the carpet. "I hate you."

"Harsh words," Raven uttered boredly. "Too bad I don't believe it." A soft, soft smile suddenly graced her face. "Honestly, you should try to lie better."

"Yeah, well..." Beast Boy trailed off. "Nevermind. So, what're we looking for again?"

"That." The dark girl lifted a finger to point at a lone, large computer console and a chair. There was nothing else in the room. "Kinda spartan. Probably not too much creativity flowing around here."

Beast Boy was all ready tapping away at the holographic keyboard. "When's virus boy showin' up?"

The screen suddenly flickered to life. Subtraho's pale face grinned out at them. "Not to be cliché, but..."

Raven sighed, then pointed a finger at the image. "Just...get to work, will you?"

The image flickered again, before disappearing, leaving only scrolling OS text.

---

"And then I'm gonna tear his arm off and shove it where the sun don't shine. Next, I'll use his big head for a soup bowl after tearing it off and hollowing it out like a pumpkin. Oooh, and maybe I'll-"

"Cyborg! I'm gonna get sick." Jinx pouted cutely from the opposite cell wall, her arms and neck bound in glowing restraints. "Let's talk about something more friendly, hm?"

The android slumped against the wall dejectedly, similarly bound, but with thicker chains. Very thick chains. Fettered into a wall of solid titanium. "S-sorry. Ngh..." He tried for the last time to yank on the chains. The simply clinked and rattled at his attempt. "Y'know, if this doesn't work out, then we're screwed...several times over."

Jinx simply smiled her classic, Cheshire cat grin. "It'll work."

Cyborg simply frowned deeper. "Y'know, for a girl whose lived her entire life in some sort of prison, you're awfully cheery."

The grin faltered for a moment. It turned into something pained and stressed before popping back into a sincere smile. "Silly robot, depression's for the hopeless. I'm not hopeless." She ran a hand through her hair. "Doesn't matter if you're chained to a wall, chained to a lifestyle, or chained to a job, we're all living in wrought iron cages, aren't we?" Shrugging slightly, she smiled arrogantly. "So, might as well make the best of it. A pox on those poor saps runnin' around, depressed in their free world. I'll choose to be happy in a caged one." A soft, warm smile now.

"But," sighed Cyborg. "Doesn't...doesn't it hurt? All the crap you've pulled through? I know it hurts me."

Jinx's smile turned into a chuckle, her round, usually joyful eyes creased in a type of relaxed concern. "It hurts like crazy, Vic. Like crazy."

Cyborg glanced up, trying his own smile. "Doesn't it though?" he whispered.

They simply stared at each other for a long, long time.

---

Clink! Vwhurrr! Chunk!

Creeeak!

"'Ewo? Cy? 'Inx?" Poking a furry, vulpine head into the chamber, he blinked his small, black eyes, trying to get them to adjust to the light. "Aw, c'mon. Say some'ing!"

Cyborg groaned, blinking against the thin strip of light falling across his human eye. "Yo..." Yawning, he stretched softly, before turning his attention to the still dozing Jinx. She was stretched out somewhat, her small chest rising and falling with every breath. "Jinx, girl, wake up."

She stirred.

Turning his attention back to Sneak, he rubbed his flesh forehead. "Well? We getting' sprung 'r what?"

Nodding enthusiastically, the little fox glanced out the door for a moment. "Uh-huh. Dere was a li'l problem gettin' th' key, but we 'ad no problems wi' the mechanical lock." Pulling out a ceramic key card half the size of his body, he gently drifted towards Cyborg and shoved it into a small slot on his neck brace. It instantly fell off. "Itsa nifty master ca'd. And-"

"Just go get Jinx, man."

Sitting up, the small girl rubbed her eyes as the chains slid off. Blinking, she stretched languishly. "Mmm, so, what are our orders?"

Sneak was off staring at a chain.

"Sneak!"

"Wha? Oh, wight. Ahem. 'Stay there.'" The little fox smiled.

Cyborg and Jinx groaned and slumped against the walls.

---

Subtraho lay floating in the matrixes and codes of the computer mainframe. And yet, it was a different Subtraho. Tall, tan, nearly twenty five in age. He sat typing away at an invisible console, his muscular arms blurring over the invisible keys. "Hmm." A complicated code flashed by. Glancing it over with practiced eyes, the living virus smirked, before touching it. "Finally, I was wondering where you hid yourself." The code passed on. He didn't bother to watch it go.

---

Bzzzt!

A guard started suddenly from his seat as his computer monitor began to scramble. Lines upon lines of code scrolled past the screen, a flashing green-black block.

"Oh...crap..." Tapping something into his communicator, he grunted. "This ain't gonna go well."

Slam!

The door behind him nearly broke off of its hinges as a man stepped angrily into the room. Dressed in a dark, suit and sporting an eye-patch, the man exuded an aura of strength and tenacity. Combed white hair pulled back into a small ponytail and scars splayed across his hands simply added to this aura. "Situation?" he asked slowly, his teeth clenched in anger.

The guard instantly stood. "Oh, um, Mister Wilson, sir! I didn't expect you to, um, come down y-yourself."

Wilson instantly stepped and backhanded the guard...hard. He slammed into the wall behind him. "Ugh-ERK!"

Slade grabbed him by the neck, before letting him fall down. "Next time, I expect an answer, not some rambling idiot babbling away." He straightened his suit and movedtowards the computer. "A hacker, hmmm?" He touched a few keys. "A skilled one. But let's see if we can't..."

Tak! Takkitty-Tak!

Blip!

"Ah!" Wilson bent over the chair to better look at the screen. "Wonderful code style, this hacker has. But so very, straightforward."

The guard stumbled upwards, backing out of the room slowly, before slipping out the door, his eyes wide. "I'm quitting. I'm quitting. I'm quitting." He ran down the hall, mumbling the mantra over and over."

---

Strings of code. Hundreds and thousands and millions of strands of text. Overlapping, squirming, restoring.

Subtraho suddenly grewvery afraid. "N-no." Suddenly, his fingers begin to quiver, shake, and dissolve, electron by electron. "No!" Grabbing a passing code, he flew off, further from the mainframe. "Cyborg. Come in Cyborg!"

"Snkkt-Yo."

"Run! Run like the bloody wind!"

"But-"

"I don't hear footsteps!"

"All right. All right.-Snkkt"

---

Wilson chuckled softly, pulling out a brown-black mask. "Show time." He pulled it on slowly, languorously, as if slipping into a glove. "Intermission has run on far...too...long."

Heyo. It be the author. Hmm, not that long of a wait, was it? Was it?

Yes, I realize I've left you going with the Starfire/Nightwing scenario. That's in the next chapter. Wanna find out? Send me lots an' lots of reviews. Even flames. I eat flames for breakfast.

Anywho, I made Jinx super adorable in the chapter. Why? Cause it was fun and cuz I'm a total Jinx fanboy. Gotta make her cute. And maybe give her a better hairstyle. AHEM!

Next chappie: Expect the expected...maybe.

-Raz