Disclaimer: All the characters used in this chapter are the intellectual property of Time Warner, Inc. I own nothing.

Ascension of the Beast

Chapter XV

Unintended Consequences

Unintended consequences can be quite surprising. When we think of the concept, it is common to usually associate it with unforeseen drawbacks or perverse results, such as when Prohibition actually resulted in an explosion of organized crime or when the Peltzman effect causes people to be more complacent and take more risks where safety measures have been put into effect. There is, however, another side to the concept—sometimes actions will have unintended benefits.

When the Teen Titans defeated the Brotherhood of Evil in Paris, it did not go unnoticed by either side of the war on metahuman crime. The Brotherhood was not a minor threat by any means, and groups such as the Justice League and the Doom Patrol found themselves regarding the teenage heroes with much more respect afterward, treating them as peers rather than subordinates (even to the point of sharing their deepest secrets to keep the Titans on the same page). The Teen Titans had certainly been on the Injustice League's radar since the defeat of Slade Wilson, but the destruction of the Brotherhood of Evil caused them to tread ever more carefully when the Titans were involved (which was a reasonable reaction, as the Titans were not inhibited by the same rules which restricted the Justice League from interfering in terrestrial affairs, and were certainly strengthened by a greater degree of solidarity). The reaction of the League of Assassins, however, was perhaps the most interesting of all.

They did absolutely nothing. For years, the League, which comprised many of the best assassins and mercenaries in known existence, had constantly been plotting to bring their leader's vision for the world into fruition by any means necessary. It should be noted that Ra's al-Ghul, as far as his objectives went, was never especially evil—all he ever really wanted was to create a new order in which humans lived in harmony with the natural environment. The problem had always been in his methods, in that he was willing to kill billions of people in order to make it reality. Ra's was never an aimless psychopath like the Joker, for example, tended to be. Rather, he had always been the epitome of a well-intentioned extremist—holding to a worthy ultimate objective, but willing to do anything he had to in order to make it happen, no matter what the collateral cost might be.

When Ra's al-Ghul and the League of Assassins suddenly dropped off the radar, Bruce Wayne's initial reaction was to suspect that it was a ploy of some sort. Ra's, by his very nature, was an extremely stubborn man; once he was set in his ways, it would take something unimaginable to change his mind. But as the months turned into years and Ra's made multiple promises that he was not going to pursue his ends through his more familiar violent means anymore, Bruce ultimately had a single thought which changed his entire perspective on the matter: Ra's was a man who highly valued honor and had very deep respect for Bruce himself; while Ra's was certainly capable of using some ethically questionable tactics, and would willfully omit facts and bend the truth at times, Bruce could not identify a single instance in which Ra's had actually told him a direct lie. Nor could he identify any real motive for Ra's to lie to him—Ra's knew him well enough to know that the Batman was notoriously paranoid and untrusting. Ra's was not stupid enough to think that Bruce would believe him if he lied to him, so the entire enterprise of telling such a lie would not be worth the effort.

This, of course, still left a major unanswered question. As stubborn as Ra's was, his opinions would not change unless something very big had forced them to change. Whatever it was, it seemed that the defeat of the Brotherhood of Evil was the watershed. Whatever it was, Ra's wasn't spilling the beans. Bruce could not even be sure that most of the other members of the League of Assassins knew what had changed the Demon Head's mind about the tactics of how he intended to achieve his utopian vision. Wayne was certain that his bride had to know what it was, but, always a daddy's girl, she wouldn't tell him either.

Whatever the precise cause of Ra's al-Ghul's change of heart was, it had a massive impact on the course of Bruce Wayne's life. Bruce had first met the ecoterrorist's daughter on an odd occasion just over a half decade earlier. Ra's wished to track down the men who murdered his wife, and Bruce ultimately aided him in this mission. It was during this mission that Ra's introduced the Batman to his daughter, Talia al-Ghul. From first sight, both Bruce and Talia were absolutely smitten.

Between the knowledge of his daughter's feelings and the fact that Bruce was the only man in the world who Ra's truly respected as an equal, Ra's certainly approved the match. "The world's oldest chauvinist," as Bruce often characterized him, Ra's had an obsession with gaining a male heir to his legacy; the Demon Head's problem with this being that his only progeny were two daughters. Hence, Ra's pinned all of his hopes for gaining the male heir he wanted on Talia reproducing. In Bruce he saw a man who he felt was worthy of fathering his heir; hence, he actively wanted the Dark Knight to mate with his daughter. Beginning on a mission during which Ra's and Bruce worked together to rescue Dick Grayson and Talia from a disgruntled Ebeneezer Darrk, the Demon's Head made several overtures to the Dark Knight over the years requesting that he marry his daughter.

Of course, matters were complicated by the fact that Bruce and Ra's were enemies. Talia was often torn between her loyalty to her father and her devotion to the man with whom she'd fallen in love. Bruce, always a master at figuring out what was going on in others' heads, was completely cognizant of this reality. In part to save Talia from the conflict of interest in which she would be placed, as well as to protect himself from potential vulnerabilities she might cause, Bruce went against his own affections for the woman, continuously turning down her father's pleas. For as long as the Dark Knight and the Demon's Head were enemies, Bruce Wayne and Talia al-Ghul could not be wed.

But now things were very different. When the League of Assassins ceased its terrorist activities, Ra's al-Ghul ceased, for all intents and purposes, to be Bruce Wayne's enemy. Their war was over, and though Bruce could still not fully trust his father-in-law-to-be, it was nevertheless now possible for their houses to be joined in such a manner.

The actual wedding ceremony was a public event. Bruce Wayne the attractive billionaire was at the top of the social pecking order in Gotham and was, prior to this day, easily the most sought after eligible bachelor in the country, so it was only natural that the public would want in at some point. Then again, although Bruce had been the most desired bachelor in America, he paled in comparison to his bride, whose beauty stole the day. That's not necessarily surprising, however, as Talia had always been very richly imbued with the gifts of great beauty, great intelligence, great business sense, and great skill in battle. That foursome really made it impossible for the Dark Knight not to fall for her; she was his equal in every way. That's not to say it was always good—their lovers' quarrels took on dimensions unknown to any normal relationships.

The reception would be an entirely different matter. Bruce calculated that, although someone would have to be certifiably insane to attack this particular event, the reception would be more vulnerable than the ceremony. Neither the Batman nor his bride had any shortage of adversaries whose sanity was questionable—in fact, there had just six months prior been a major escape from Arkham Asylum and several of its residents were still at large—so it made sense to be careful. The reception would only be open to a number of superheroes, their spouses and dates, and the father of the bride and his manservant (who were conspicuously absent anyway, which was to be expected as Ra's had completely divested himself from his activities—legitimate and otherwise—in the United States). This was primarily to prevent harm from coming to civilians should some villain be demented enough to attack a venue full of some of the most skilled and powerful fighters in the world. As an extra measure of control, the couple decided upon Wayne Manor itself as the venue for the reception.

Still, with his ever-alluring bride by his side and all of the security matters at some point on his mind, even at the beginning of his own wedding reception, Bruce could not help but ponder upon what exactly changed the Demon Head's mind. His uncharacteristic inability to figure it out was really beginning to annoy him.

"...in the end, it was either going to be her or Selina, and, between the two of them, Talia was the only one who was okay with playing second fiddle to Bruce's...er...nocturnal activities," Zatanna Zatara was explaining the reason behind Bruce Wayne's choice of Talia al-Ghul as his bride to a somewhat distracted Raven. The nature of the relationship between the magician and the demi-demoness had changed markedly over the years. Initially Zatanna distrusted Raven as she had sensed her demonic heritage—it didn't really help things that Raven was attempting to hide that particular element of her ancestry from the Justice League. Due to Zatanna's distrust of Raven, the Justice League as a whole refused to trust her for a long time, but it actually ended up being Beast Boy, Cyborg and Starfire who changed that.

Two years prior to the present festivities, there had been a sudden burst in supervillain activities. The Justice League was swamped to the point where Batman had to call upon Dick for help. Of course, the Justice League didn't trust Raven, so she was left to her own devices. Not long after Robin had to depart to aide Batman, Superman's body was possessed and the Justice League ended up having to call upon the Titans to help him regain his body. Among the Jump City group, Beast Boy, Cyborg and Starfire all volunteered to help; although other Titan groups also sent help, to the effect that there were somewhere between ten and fifteen Titans on that particular case. After that event, Superman befriended all of the Titans who helped him.

After that, Superman began to make frequent visits to all of the Titan teams. One day he helped the Jump City team apprehend a very disheartened Dr. Light, who'd just gotten out of jail after previously having to face thirty Titans. The Man of Steel was impressed by how afraid the villain was of Raven in particular and, after Beast Boy told several stories about her exploits, began to form a friendship with the empath herself. Superman ended up convincing Wonder Woman to join him in visiting the Jump City Titans a week later, and the Themysciran ended up bonding with the Azarathian over their common ground of having both been products of pacifistic societies with matriarchal and relatively egalitarian social structures. Wonder Woman thereafter ended up defending her new friend to Zatanna, who was otherwise the princess's best friend, and working to convince her to give the empath a chance.

At the same time, the Doom Patrol requested the help of Beast Boy and Raven on a mission that had to do with a paranormally empowered villain; Mento also called John Constantine in for help. During that mission, Raven ended up winning Constantine's respect (which says a lot, considering his own history with demons), and Constantine ended up joining the chorus of voices trying to convince Zatanna to give the Titan a chance. With her best female friend and her long-time on again/off again lover both putting pressure on her, Zatanna eventually relented; when she finally did give Raven a chance, the two hit it off surprisingly well. Indeed, as soon as Zatanna got over the fact that Raven was half demon, they became friends.

The friendship aside, Raven was only half listening to Zatanna at the moment. By no means did the Azarathian have any lack of respect for the Justice League reservist who was now basically trying to talk her ear off, but Raven was never one for small talk. Besides, her attention was presently set upon someone a little more... green. Gar was on the other side of the ballroom, immersed in conversation with Clark Kent and Lois Lane-Kent. Apparently, the changeling was cracking jokes, as the Kryptonian was almost blue from laughing. 'I wish I knew what the hell he finds so funny about Gar's jokes,' Raven thought. 'Have I just not been getting it all these years, or is it just that Superman happens to share Gar's horrid sense of humor?' Regardless, her divided attention in no way meant she was ignoring what Zatanna was saying.

"Not that it really matters anymore," the magician added to what she had been saying. "Ever since the crackdown, Gotham has been relatively safe. I think the last time Bruce set foot in the Batcave was like three weeks ago." The most recent escapes from Arkham ended up being the straw that borke the camel's back, as far as the State of New Jersey was concerned. Within 24 hours after the incident, an entire National Guard battalion was on the asylum's premises, and within a week the state had exercised its eminent domain powers to statize the facility outright. Problematic staff were promptly terminated and state employees installed in their stead. It wasn't as if all had turned good, though—although the majority of the escaping residents had been caught within the first 48 hours, the list of patients who were still at large was quite disheartening: the Joker, Harleen Quinzel, Pamela Isley, Victor Fries, and Lyle Bolton, none of whom having been heard of since. Still, everyone in the Batman's periphery was sure that it would only be a matter of time before these stragglers were rounded up, and recent reforms had cleaned up most of the corruption in the GCPD and left the department more than capable of handling normal crime.

"It also helps that the blushing bride's father decided to relocate himself and all of his assets to Cairo a few months ago," the magician added. "Pretty much as soon as Bruce agreed to marry Talia, Ra's decided he was done with his activities in the US."

"That seems odd," Raven contributed her first actual comment in the 'conversation' since it had begun. "I mean, since when do villains—especially terrorists like him—give up so easily?"

"Ra's al-Ghul may have been the Batman's biggest foe," Zatanna noted, "but there's apparently not a man in the world who Ra's respects more. The guy's actually obsessed with the idea that Bruce should father his grandchildren; so of course he was elated when Bruce finally agreed to marry Talia."

"Why's he so worried about grandchildren?" Raven inquired. "I mean, I get it that normal parents want their bloodline to live on, but obsessing over it seems to be a little much."

"In Ra's al-Ghul's case, it's rooted in sexism," Zatanna noted. "The guy wants a male heir to his legacy, but he only produced daughters. He thinks Bruce is the only man alive who is worthy of being the father to his male heir. Even though Talia is probably pretty close to an even match for both Bruce and Ra's in intellect and combat skills—and her sister Nyssa pretty close to a match for her—Ra's still refuses to believe a woman could ever be suited for the role. It's like the guy refuses to see what's right in front of him, and even worse, Talia's a major daddy's girl in spite of the general lack of respect he has for her gender."

"You're saying that like you feel sorry for her," Raven quipped. Zatanna was Bruce's closest friend, so of course she would try to be supportive of him at this point in time, but there are certain things one cannot hide from an empath. The magician was not outwardly expressing it at all, but Raven could sense a kernel of jealousy in Zatanna's unexpressed emotions.

"Well, there's certainly no shortage of things to envy about her," Zatanna knew what Raven was thinking. "And I will freely admit that I have had more-than-platonic feelings for Bruce before. But honestly, Bruce and I decided a long time ago that our respective stations in each other's lives were that of intimate friends and nothing more. He's too dedicated to his work for him and I to have ever worked as a couple." In fact, Bruce had particularly used the rationale that he didn't want to hurt Zatanna in his reasoning for not wanting to pursue a relationship with her. Either way, it presently wasn't something Zatanna was particularly concerned with—she no longer had romantic feelings for the Dark Knight and, although she was still sexually attracted to him, there was no shortage of men who were attracted to the beautiful magician. Though, that isn't to say she was particularly happy with the single life—now in her early thirties, Zatanna was beginning to become conscious of the incessant ticking of her biological clock. The experience of mentoring Misty Kilgore had opened Zatanna's eyes to the fact that she would probably make a good mother and, honestly, she wanted to have that kind of bond again.

'Awfully strange that she would jump to thinking that I was jealous of Bruce and Talia,' the magician thought, before noticing Raven's distraction. 'Hmm. Why does she keep staring at that Logan kid? Either he's pissed her off again, or...' Zatanna suddenly made the realization in mid-thought. "Hey, W, could you do me a favor?" she telepathically asked the Themysciran princess who happened to be right behind herself and the Azarathian at the moment. Raven had a rather noticeable grimace on her face at the moment, as Gar was no longer joking around with the Kents, but had instead wandered into a one-on-one conversation with Bette Kane.

"I guess that would depend on what the favor would be," Wonder Woman replied. Although they had grown extremely close as friends, it wasn't particularly often that Zatanna would ask her for help with non-professional things. In fact, the last time she had asked for Diana's help in a social matter was when she wanted to take Barbara Gordon out for a night on the town after the magician had a premonitory nightmare about what was going to happen to the then-Batgirl. It was essentially unheard of for Zee to use telepathy to ask for such help.

"Could you read Beast Boy's, Flamebird's, and Raven's emotions for me?" Zatanna was an exceptionally talented magician, whose Homo magi ancestry gave her a large range of psychic powers. Although the mistress of Shadowcrest could read minds—which seemed to be an excessively invasive procedure for such a trivial matter—she was not an empath. The most powerful Amazon, however, was. "Particularly, I'm curious about what Beast Boy and Flamebird are feeling for each other, and what Raven is feeling for both of the others."

"Best I can tell from Bette and Gar is that they have a strong platonic bond, but no romantic feelings for each other. Raven, on the other hand, is feeling overwhelming levels of jealousy toward Bette and romantic longing toward Gar." At that moment Beast Boy noticed Raven's stare and Diana was able to get another perspective of his emotional state. "I know you like things to be interesting, so you're going to love this. Gar is also feeling romantic longing for Raven. But I'm going to guess that Raven's grimaced stare is making him think she's angry at him for something, because he started feeling a touch of apprehension when he noticed Raven staring." Wonder Woman herself had to work hard to suppress a laugh at the spectacle of hidden emotions she'd just witnessed—it was like something from a romantic comedy.

"Oh, to be young, dumb and in love," Zatanna didn't quite look the part, but the fact that her 32nd birthday was now just a few weeks away gave her enough age to credibly make such a comment. "I suppose I owe Raven a favor," the felt guilty for her part in the Justice League turning Raven away five years earlier, "wanna help set these kids right?"

"Hmm...I don't have anything better to do at the moment, I guess. What are we going to do?"

"Just follow my lead," the magician said, concluding her telepathic conversation with the Amazon. "So, Rae, how are things going between you and Beast Boy?" Zatanna turned her attention back to Raven. "I heard you two were living together."

"There's nothing going on," Raven replied in straight monotone. "When the team disbanded, I didn't have anywhere to go or any money to get a place of my own. Being a good friend, he took me in. While we've certainly gotten closer, that's all we are." Her facial expression noticeably saddened at the last sentence.

"No money?" the magician was honestly surprised. "I was in Japan a few years ago and I saw your face all over the place in gum advertisements. I would have thought they'd have paid you royalties for that."

"They did, but it's kind of an embarrassing topic," the Azarathian replied. "Suffice it to say, it was a learning experience. I'm never going to lend my image for product endorsements again without the advice of an attorney and an agent. I'm also never going to lend my image for foreign product endorsements without considering there's often a big difference between the value of currencies."

"Why?" this tangent had piqued Zatanna's curiosity. "How much did they pay you?"

"They used my image for ten months and the monthly total of royalties they paid me was about a hundred thousand yen, overall," Raven said; Zatanna visibly winced at the demi-demoness's reply. "So, yeah...a grand total of one million yen, which converted to about ten thousand dollars. I didn't actually recognize my mistake until the morning we left Tokyo. I saved the ten grand for a while, but then Jump City started cutting our budget and I ended up having to spend it all."

"I wouldn't feel too embarrassed about that, Raven," Wonder Woman chimed in. "Like yourself, I am an implant in man's world. I'm not too familiar with Azarath—I only really know what you've told me—but would I be correct to guess that it's a communal society?"

"Yeah," Raven answered. "I mean, not like in a totally egalitarian way—Azarath has a theocratic system of government and a system of stratification where there's a clerical nobility, albeit the status of nobility only confers responsibility to the people and not rewards. But, yeah, basically the economic system of Azarath is organized on communitarian lines. Why?"

"Themyscira is very similar in that regard," Diana noted. "I heard that Azarath has a matriarchal social orientation and a pacifist moral system. Is that correct?" Raven nodded. "I wouldn't blame you for being taken. I've been in that situation too. To suddenly go from a society based on love and peace to one based on power and greed is a big leap that requires a lot of adjustment. I can certainly sympathize with you, Raven, it takes time to adjust. And it certainly didn't help that being a Titan and living on income from the city kind of insulated you from the reality for a while."

"But it was nice of Beast Boy to help you out," Zatanna added. "John has been a pretty close friend of Steve's for a while, and I visited Dayton Manor with him once—holy shit was that place luxurious! I heard you guys were moving there now?"

"Yeah," Raven replied. "Actually, we moved into Dayton Manor a few days ago. It doesn't quite feel like home yet, though. If it weren't for Gar and Vernon, I'd probably starve to death in that place. I still can't find the kitchen."

The two older women laughed. It was a funny situation, but they both knew she wasn't kidding—in addition to Zatanna having visited the estate with John Constantine, Diana had been there for Donna Troy's wedding (Gar, incidentally, won big favor points with Diana for how kind he was in providing a venue and basically serving as Donna and Terry's wedding planner...even if that marriage was now ending in divorce). The place fell somewhere in between the Forbidden City and the Louvre Palace in its shear size—when they had it built, Steve and Rita were certainly showing off. When you're the fifth-richest man in the world, 'showing off' in building a home will tend to result in something monumental, like the neoclassical palace that was Dayton Manor.

"Do you like it, otherwise?" Zatanna asked, hoping Raven would give her some ammunition. She would not be disappointed.

"Yeah," Raven replied, as a serene look took over her face. "I especially love the library. Gar was so kind, on the first day he and Vernon helped me find space for all of the books I already owned, and on the second day he brought me into the City and bought me a truck-full of whatever other books I wanted," she said as her lips began to curl into a slight smile and her hips began to sway slightly to the side.

"Timda ti!" Zatanna responded. "You love him and you know it. I don't have to be an empath to see that."

"And I am an empath," Diana added, backing the magician up.

"What does it matter if I do?" Raven tacitly admitted her feelings. There was no point in trying to lie about it, these two women could see through it. "I'm not his type."

Author's Notes
This chapter was difficult for me to write, as I had some serious writer's block going into it. I felt this was a good opportunity for a lot of exposition, though. One theme that continues from earlier in the story is that the defeat of the Brotherhood of Evil ultimately marks a watershed within my continuity where the Titans stopped being just a group of kids and became a very serious threat to organizations like the Injustice League. Not so much of a threat to the League of Assassins, but something about the event nevertheless changed Ra's al-Ghul's perception of his strategies toward achieving his ultimate goal. What that is, you can guess for now, but it'll be revealed in time. I also figured it was nice to spend some time at the beginning of the chapter inside the mind of Batman, even though he's a somewhat minor character to this story.

This was another one of those chapters where I wanted to write it as one but ended up splitting it into multiple chapters because of its length. I'm not sure whether this is going to be a two chapter arc or if there are going to be more—I'm kinda flying by the seat of my pants at this point.

Also, some more words on the application of the ACD rule in this series. One of the exceptions is that I'm going to be extremely hesitant to have children dying in the story. This is partly because I find it pretty annoying that every time a Titan had a child in the comics, the kid always seemed to end up dying in early youth/infancy (Robert Long, Lian Harper, Cerdian Garth-son, etc.). For that matter, it also bugs me that the same things seems to always happen with children of Justice Leaguers too (Arthur Curry, Jr., Damian Wayne, etc.). But ACD will still apply even to children, it's just that the child mortality rate will be significantly lower than in the comics.

I'd also like to note that, although I've already confirmed that I'm planning to include Mar'i Grayson in this series (mainly in the sequels, of course) and it does seem like the universe in this story is beginning to tend toward running out of villains, I do not plan on going in the direction of something like Kingdom Come with this. That said, I'm taking all kinds of ideas from all kinds of directions, and there's certainly a lot of ideas that I'm borrowing from Kingdom Come, among others, but I don't really want to go for the superheroes vs. superheroes vs. humanity thing. That said, I do plan on carrying the sequels a long way into the future (to the point where by the later sequels, the children of the Titans will be adults).

Also, just for fun (I've already got most of my mind made up as to where this will go, but I still might pick up reviewers' requests if I feel like I can fit them into the story), which characters would you like to see reproducing, and in what pairings?

wolf 1492- Thank you. I hope the story continues to be enjoyable in the future.

Guest- Clinical is definitely what I was shooting for. I wanted to show Raven returning to her normal, very rational personality.

Annatheavidreader- Dang! I was hoping the spoiler about Dick and Kori's time on Tamaran would slip by without being noticed, but I guess I did leave it there for two and two to be put together. I'd say not to expect character deaths until either the final or penultimate act of this fic (then again, I'm not really writing with much of an act structure anyway, so it'd be hard to really quantify that), but it could still happen at any time, if a moment comes up in the story where it feels right. Everyone's been safe so far because there hasn't really been any fighting before this chapter, but that'll be changing soon enough. Anyway, you've been waiting for Batman's wedding for a while; I hope this chapter doesn't disappoint.

Hairul The Nightrage Beast- As far as killing off one of the core five Titans goes, even though ACD is in effect, I will say that there's a good 75% chance that all five will still be alive at the beginning of the first sequel to this story. I have already decided upon one of the five who is going to die in that sequel, but I'm not saying who or how until it happens.

shugokage- Thanks. That chapter was certainly easier for me to write than this one, though. lol

JasonVUK- Sorry about that.

LiumD- I didn't mean to imply that Cyborg will be dying any time soon. He might, but I presently have no plan on killing him off during the course of this fic.

re: MBTI types- A lot of you seemed to have trouble with this aspect of the previous chapter, and I admit I probably should have included some explanations. INTJ, ISTJ, ENFP, etc. are all Myers-Briggs types. Basically, what the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator does is types personalities on the basis of four binary dichotomies relative to attitudes (Introversion vs. Extraversion), perceiving functions (Sensing vs. iNtuition), judging functions (Thinking vs. Feeling), and lifestyle (Judging vs. Perceiving). More information about the MBTI system and the sixteen MBTI types can be found on Wikipedia and on websites like typelogic and personalitypage, among others (I can't link you there because fanfiction won't let me). I've read a few books on the subject largely because I've found the typological classifications of personalities to be very interesting. Sorry about that. That was one of my more selfish chapters.