A/N
Author: Im not dead yet -looks around cautiously while rubbing the bandages on his head- You all wanted an update so I just hope people like this chapter… Now on with the chapter!
Chapter 7 Terra's betrayal part 1
In a bunker below Jump city, a lone figure stood before four screens that were showing a battle between a robot army and the Teen Titans in their own home. The figure watched calmly and calculatingly as his robots got the drop on each Titan while they went about their daily business. However, the army he had sent was destroyed, even with the surprise attack and the Titans being down one member.
The figure's single eye gazed at each individual Titan and finally came to a stop on his former apprentice, Robin. He had held Robin's friends' lives hostage through nanites, but his plan had failed and now he had found a new apprentice in Terra, who felt betrayed by the Titans. Holding up a remote, he pressed a few buttons and one of the screens pulled up Terra's stats.
Terra was a very powerful apprentice; she may not have been as good as Robin at hand to hand combat, but her geomancer powers more than compensated for that. She had a problem with her powers though, she couldn't control them but he was more than happy to give her the control she wanted.
Even with Terra as his apprentice, he felt like he didn't hold all the aces. Pressing a few more buttons another screen changed to show a white haired boy standing out of some rubble. Another screen switched to a video he had "persuaded" Gizmo to give him of the same boy fighting Robin. The fight was short, and the white-haired boy lost but the boy had held back against the Boy Wonder, intentionally or unintentionally. Either way, the boy had power, that much was certain, but he needed training.
Another screen changed to show a raven haired teen working at the register of a store. A close-up of the boy was put next to a close-up of the white haired hero. "Facial recognition complete..." The cold robotic voice of his computer cut through the quiet of the room. "Daniel Fenton is Shade."
'He could pose a problem for my plans and he will be harder to get under my control unlike Terra. It's a shame to have to destroy such a promising individual, but if I'm going to destroy the Titans, it can't be helped.'
"Terra!" A blonde walked in and kneeled behind him. Unlike her video counterpart who was dressed in a t-shirt and shorts, she now wore blue armor and bandaging. "To prove your loyalty one last time… I want you to destroy Shade."
The last three weeks had been quite uneventful for Danny, other than his training with Vlad. He was now barely able to create a single clone, but it diminished his power greatly and the clone would be very unstable and would fall apart. Vlad told him he needed to focus better, but his mind was always a torrent of emotions and thoughts.
A duplicate of Danny appeared for a moment and took a step before falling apart in pile of ectoplasm then re-merging with the original, who fell to one knee breathing heavily.
"Well that was better than the last five times you tried, Daniel." Vlad said in an irritated tone as he floated near Danny. "At least you didn't grow a second head again." After a moment of silence Vlad sighed. "What's wrong Daniel? Why are you having such a hard time concentrating? You haven't gotten any better since our last training session."
After a moment of silence Danny stood up. When he looked at Vlad, his eyes were trying to hide the sadness and sorrow, but it still showed through the determined look that he was trying to muster. "Don't call me Daniel! I told you, I'm Shade in my ghost form. And it's nothing. I just haven't been sleeping well… Let's just give this another try."
Danny heaved a sigh as he left work. He was starting to get worried about the Titans. A week ago he had heard their tower had been attacked and there was a rumor circulating around that Terra, their new member, was a traitor and behind the attack. The Titans had not been to the store since the attack.
Danny had seen the Titans on the news, and Terra was not with them. They wouldn't comment on her absence. The Titans' expressions would also darken at the mention of her name; especially Beastboy, who he had heard had a crush on her.
Danny was brought from his thoughts of Terra and the Titans when he realized how empty the street was, and found this to be quite odd considering it was only eight in the evening. A figure stepped out of an alleyway in front of him. He almost didn't recognize who it was until the blonde turned to face him, her single blue eye peering from behind the hair that partially covered her face.
"Terra…" The word broke the deafening silence that had taken over the city.
"Hello, Danny, or should I refer to you as Shade… or maybe Phantom?" The words caught Danny off guard. He almost started to deny it, but realized it was pointless, seeing as how she knew his past. Two white circles appeared at his midsection, one going up, the other down, changing him into his ghost form.
"What do you want Terra?" Danny asked in a calm tone, though on the inside he was starting to panic.
Terra smiled the same smile that had made Danny feel uneasy around her the first time he had met her. "My master sent me to destroy you. Unless you will join us, of course."
"I hope this is an answer enough for you." Danny shot an ecto-blast knocking Terra off her feet as she screamed in outrage. Taking his chance, Danny went invisible and started flying away. His escape attempt was stopped by a large rock and earthen wall that rose in front of him. Turning around, he found Terra wearing a pair of blue goggles and staring right at his invisible form. Realizing he was not going to be able to avoid this conflict, he let himself become visible and his hands started glowing green. "I guess you'll have to try and destroy me Terra."
Robin had just destroyed one of Slade's robots as three more appeared before him. He and the other Titans had received a call to the coal mines just outside Jump city and were met by a large amount of Slade's robots.
'Why is Slade attacking this mine? It's been empty for years.' Robin swung his staff around decapitating two robots before jumping into the air and planting his foot into the chest of the third. 'Where is Terra; she is now his apprentice.' Throwing an explosive disc, he destroyed a robot that had been sneaking up on Cyborg, who was busy fighting 3 others. After clearing the area of robots, the thought struck Robin: "Titans, we've got to get back to Jump; this was just a diversion!"
"Good, Robin, but you won't make it in time." The voice of Slade echoed through the mine, and more Robots started gathering around the Titans as they prepared to fight their way out.
"It will be my pleasure." Terra responded, and she sent stones and rock straight at Danny who went intangible in response.
'What just happened?' Danny felt like he had just been punched several times as the rocks went through his intangible form. 'It must have been that yellow glow around those rocks, it's interfering with my intangibility.' Danny became tangible, still reeling from the hits he took, but he flew at Terra anyway, dodging the next rain of stones she sent at him. When he got closer to her, a wall of stone appeared in front of him. He flew upward, going over the wall, and was knocked down by a boulder to the side.
Terra was on a floating rock above the wall she had created, grinning as Danny collided with the ground. She sent two more boulders and half of the one she was standing on straight at Danny, who sent three green blasts destroying the boulders before they could reach him. He continued unleashing blast after blast at Terra, who was now on the defensive and busy dodging his blasts.
"What's wrong, Danny; is the little boy who failed to protect his friends and family still weak?" Terra's word struck a chord in Danny, and he started unleashing more blasts, but they became more erratic. Terra took the opportunity of Danny's anger and caused the ground underneath him to explode, knocking him upward where she quickly brought a grapefruit sized rock to hit him squarely in the chest.
The blow had not only winded Danny, but he felt like she may have either cracked his ribs or broke a few, neither of which he was sure of. All he knew was the pain he felt as he was sent back downward and hit the ground. Getting back up was hard for Danny, as he tried to catch his breath and ignore the excruciating pain he felt.
Terra smiled a chillingly cold smile when she saw victory within her grasp. She brought a rock the size of a small car up in the air and sent it at Danny.
Danny responded with an ecto-blast that destroyed the rock, causing Terra to turn away from him and shield her face for only a few seconds. Seconds he used to close the distance between himself and her, and by the time Terra saw him, the once confident look she had been wearing was gone and replaced with a slight look of fear. Through the pain he had been trying to ignore, he unleashed his ghostly wail at nearly point blank range. The wail lasted for only a second and was very weak, and left Danny coughing and hacking as the pain in his diaphragm heightened greatly.
The wail may have been very weak, but to Terra it felt like she had been hit by a wall. She was knocked off her floating rock, but she stopped her decent by catching herself with another rock. Seeing Danny was no longer defending himself, she sent a rain of rocks at him.
Danny went intangible but only lasted for a moment, as a rock went through his side and disrupted his power, making him tangible once more. CRACK! A stone collided with his head and he started falling towards the street below. Terra opened a rift in the ground, allowing him to drop into the sewer then closed it afterwards. "Master, I have carried out my orders."
"Good, Terra, now return." Slade's voice replied through the ear piece she wore.
Danny, now in his human form, was fading in and out of consciousness as he lay on the wet ground of the sewer. His mind was hazy from the head impact, and his chest and sides which were still a blaze of pain which was now beginning to dull. He had been staring at the fissure in the ceiling for a few moments when he felt a chill run down his spine and he could see a puff of his breath. 'Oh great, my ghost sense went off! Maybe its Skulker, finally coming to turn me into the pelt on his wall.' Danny tried to sit up but a jolt of pain stopped his attempt and he settled for closing his eyes, waiting for the whirring of an ecto-gun or an ectoblast being sent at him. What he didn't expect was being licked a couple of times.
Opening his eyes, he was surprised to see a little green dog looking at him, before it yapped happily. "Cujo? What are you doing here?" Danny slowly petted Cujo who, in turn, started licking his hand and then his face. "Alright Cujo, down boy owww…" Cujo immediately stopped licking him and looked at his master, concerned that he was hurting. Cujo then took on his much larger size and laid down, pulling on Danny's arm. Taking the hint, he slowly put his arm around Cujo and heaved himself onto Cujo's back, ignoring as much pain as he could.
Cujo stood up slowly, careful of his injured rider, and, turning them both invisible and intangible, went through the nearest wall and up to the streets by running through apartment buildings.
The Titans arrived at the scene of Danny and Terra's fight to find the police and crime scene investigators already searching the rubble for clues.
"I'm glad you got here, Titans. And the coal mines?" the detective and chief of the meta-human unit asked as he approached them.
"It was just a diversion. As soon as we figured that out, we hurried as fast as we could to get back to the city, but Slade had this planned out well." answered Robin, as the rest of the Titans scanned the battle scarred landscape.
"Yes, Slade had whatever he was doing planned out well. Phone calls and alerts came in about Terra attacking an unknown victim, but all responders were attacked by Slade's infernal robots."
"Was anybody injured?" Robin asked, his voice even, but his masked anger leaking into his words.
"Thankfully no, but we suspect that whoever was attacked may be injured or worse, thanks to this." The detective held up a bag that contained a rock with a jagged edge. It was coated in a red substance that looked blood except for the splotches of glowing green in it.
Robin gritted his teeth but kept his cool, while the rest of the Titans looked extremely worried. "You wouldn't mind the Titans helping you in searching the area?"
"Not at all; we really need the help with all the fissures in the ground and the rubble created by Terra."
Robin nodded to the detective before telling his team what to do. The Titans started helping with the search, moving rocks quickly and efficiently, and doing their best not to let their worry for who had been attacked cause them to make mistakes.
They worked for an hour until… "Robin! Everybody! Over here!" Everyone hustled over to Beastboy who had just moved a rather large rock. Cyborg shined his shoulder light onto the ground, where there was a drop of the same strange blood the detective had shown them.
Robin examined the blood before looking at the others. "This is a gravitational blood splatter, indicating that whoever was attacked was either standing here or was above here." Looking around, Robin noticed that among all the fissures and rubble in the area, the ground ten feet away was bulging upward as if it had been forcefully closed. "Raven, pull that ground open." Raven did so quickly, revealing a hole leading into the sewer.
Cyborg shined his shoulder light into the sewer, while Starfire held the green energy that formed her starbolts, illuminating the area as much as possible. Robin nodded to Raven, who created a black disk underneath them and lifted all of them down into the hole.
Once inside the sewer, they found themselves in a dead-ended corridor with running water blocking the other end. Beneath the hole they used to get down, they found a little more blood and the imprint of where someone had been laying on the ground. With whoever was attacked missing, the only clue left was a single glowing strand of white hair that which, after a few moments, turned black…
End Part One of Terra's Betrayal
A/N
Author: Sorry people for the long wait and I'm probably going to get a lot of people not liking this chapter… I'm probably going to redo it because I am not happy with it.
CJ: -bangs Crim over the head with a huge thesaurus, then hands it to him- Here, maybe you'll have less trouble writing the next chapter. And maybe -pauses to take a deep breath- I'LL SEE THAT CHAPTER BEFORE TWO YEARS ARE PAST! –huffs and crosses her arms, tapping her foot and alternating between glaring at Crim and staring pointedly at a keyboard and computer-
Author: And this is my new "friend" who helped beta this chapter and the person who "convinced" me to update… I'm just glad she left the baseball bat and chainsaw at home this time.
CJ: -sound of an engine revving, then she pulls something from behind her back- ... -coughs slightly, and motions with chainsaw towards the computer-
Author: -pales slightly and starts typing hurriedly- Now leave a review and tell me what your thoughts are. -The sound of the chainsaw gets louder.- AAAAAHHHHHH! -runs away-
CJ: -coughs slightly again- well, that's that. Hopefully now the author will get the next chapter out quicker... -revs chainsaw once more for emphasis then chases after author-