"Are we there yet?"

Lobo looked around, then frowned. "No- too soon- hey, did they paint their communicators?"

"What?"

"Nothing." He turned to the Titans, lazing around in the ops centre, and sighed as the alarm went off. "We should probably go." The Czarnian opened another hole in subspace and ushered them off, hoping not to alert the team to their existence-

"Who are you?"

Lobo flinched, looking back. A robed girl had spotted him! "Um… I'm… Pete! Pete Lorenzo, the electricity… inspector."

She glared. "Who's that beside you?"

"This is my assistant…" she was referring to Malum- "Memora! Say hello, Memora!"

"Memora" scowled. "No way," "she" whispered angrily. "I'm a Vorox Chief. I have to have some dignity."

"Do it or she'll be on to us!"

"Ugh. Fine. Hello, Raven," "she" waved, speaking in a fabricated cheery voice. "I am Memora."

The girl facepalmed. "Hello, Malum. I am not an idiot."

"What- How did you know?"

She floated over to them. "I sensed your arrival. You need to stop playing with the timestream."

Lobo winced. "But- that's a good thing, right? My client is going to-"

"Who's your client?"

"Um-"

"Lewa. I thought so. He's fine," Raven spat. "Go home. We can take care of him."

"But the Gordanians!"

"Gone. I sent them into the water."

The two's eyes widened. "Oh… but did they kill Lewa?"

"Windflyer. And he's okay."

"How far along are we, miss?" Lobo asked.

"Since he arrived? Six… ish days. Yeah."

"But we only have one day left! How is that possible?"

She sighed. "How does he 'die'?"

Lobo thought this over. "Eh- we don't know how, but new heroes always crash and burn after the first week-"

"We haven't."

"Oh. Okay." The two moved back into subspace. "Just don't tell him we were here."

"I don't plan to," Raven intoned, voice laced with venom, and then they were off.

She sat down to meditate again and exhaled. Lewa's friends were weird.

"All right… a little to the left… there! That should be good."

Windflyer sulked. Cyborg had been working to fix the rusty circuitry that had been broken against Punk Rocket, but he didn't know if it would-

"Try talkin', man!"

He hesitated, took in a breath; then exhaled and began to speak. "Hello-hi- I am Toa Lewa, Windflyer, Spirit of Air-" He grinned. "Hey! It works!"

Cyborg grinned. "Of course it should! Your technology was alien, yeah, but it was 100,000 years old. I didn't have much of a problem workin' with it. Can you move?"

Windflyer raised an elbow.

"Great, great. Welp," the robotic man moved out of his lab, "I'd best be headin' for some food. Got a hankerin' for some roast beef."

"I thought Beast-brother said you couldn't?"

"We're not going to talk about that," Cyborg grumbled.

Outside in the ops centre, things were quiet. Raven meditated, murmuring incantations by the couch. Starfire had taken Robin out for a stroll. Beast Boy was watching a movie on the monitor. After the hectics two days ago, it was nice to have some peace.

Windflyer smiled. "I think I'll take a small snack then be off for a wind-fly. The weather outside is nice."

"You think so? Man, everything's positively swelterin'."

"I used to live tree-bright. I should not have a problem."

Cyborg shrugged. "Okay with me, dude. Just-"

Their communicators beeped. Windflyer pulled his out and sighed. "Why did you put the Dragon Cops thing on this, again?"

"Liked the theme."

"I know, but-"

Robin's image appeared. "Titans! Trouble at Skippers County Federal Jail!"

Raven raised an eyebrow. "How would you know?"

"Star and I were walking past the thing on a… ehe… tour, and the whole thing just exploded-"

"The criminals contained inside are escaping!" Starfire added. "You must come the quick!"

"It's not on the Alarm System," Cyborg said.

"It only just happened. I wouldn't be surprised if the-"

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

The monitor switched on, displaying a news feed of the jail. "Breaking news! I'm Sasha Tomlinson, here for Jump at 9."

"And I'm Kent Brockhoff."

"We've just been informed that only a few minutes ago, the jail up at Skippers County… exploded! Large clouds of smoke have been seen coming from the back wall, a good chunk of it destroyed. Eyewitness reports confirm that guards are working to prevent any more damage and contain prisoners. No idea if the Teen Titans will arrive on the scene, but if their defeat of Punk Rocket on Sunday is anything to be believed, they should be here soon! We'll update you with more details as we get them."

Windflyer puffed his cheeks. "Well… that was a thing that just happened," he said while muffled.

"We'd better go after them," Raven said. "Come on, Beast Boy."

"But- my movie!"

"You can watch it later."

Beast Boy pouted. "How do you know if this thing has DVR?"

"It does, grass stain," Cyborg said. "Now let's go."

They quickly made their way to the jail, Raven transporting herself there using her soul self, Beast Boy taking Cyborg there as a pterodactyl, and Windflyer flying there with an extra sword, which Cyborg had provided him with after he had fixed him up. It wasn't exactly the same as his old katana, but the armour seemed to help balance the power divide just fine. The jets would do their job, anyway.

As they arrived, it was clear things did not look good. Police cars littered the road by the bridge, news crew frantically working to assess the situation. The front entrance had also been destroyed in the interim, and just as Cyborg touched down-

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMM!

"Oh, wow! If you're watching this, the bridge leading up to the prison complex has just exploded as well! Much debris was clouded everywhere. I don't know if any of us will be safe-"

"Azarath metrion ZINTHOS!"

A dark shield quickly raised itself over the response team. Sasha sighed. "Thank you, Raven," she said sarcastically. The reporter turned back to the camera. "Still no word on which supervillains have been able to escape, but first accounts tell us Madame Rouge, The Amazing Mumbo, and Kardiak may be among them. It is indeed very concerning, and I think it might be better if the Justice League-"

"Ma'am."

She turned to notice a tapping on her shoulder. "Yes?"

"We're here."

"What? Oh, you are!" Sasha tapped her watch and laughed. "Right on time, I see."

"Yeah. What's up?"

"Well, if you'd listened to the news report, you might've found-"

"The police have the declined to let us in," Starfire added.

"We wanted to see if we could solve this case ourselves."

"Don't you have a permit?" Sasha asked.

"Yes, but- they do not think we are the able… they say we are 'only teens'…"

She flared, veins bulging. "Really? Come ON!" she growled, trudging towards the police. "I'll take care of this!"

For a middle-aged woman, Sasha was quite athletic. She deftly climbed over debris, making her way towards a policeman. He smiled and straightened up. "What seems to be the problem, ma'am?"

"The Teen Titans. Are you letting them go into the jail?"

He frowned. "No. They're teenagers. It wouldn't be safe."

"Don't you remember Young Justice? They seemed to handle things pretty well!"

"They were a covert ops team, right?"

She paused. "Yeah, why?"

"Then that's it. We didn't know." The man sighed. "Look, ma'am, I know they're really eager to get into the field, but we can't risk the lives of children to overly powerful supervillains…"

"We're not children."

The policeman froze. "What?"

Robin glowered at him. "We're a team. If we can't do it, we can't do it. And right now, I think we all can."

"Who were you again?" he asked. "The Boy Wonder?"

"I prefer Teen Wonder, actually. And I'm Robin-"

"The Batman's sidekick!" The policeman's eyes widened and he opened the yellow tape around the jail. "Oh… my. I don't want to him to stab me or something. Go right ahead, kids."

The Titans moved in and turned to Sasha. "Thanks for your help," Robin said.

Sasha saluted. "Don't mention it, guys! Just put in a good word for me at the Justice League and all."

"I'll… see what I can do."

With an excited wish of good luck, the Titans were on their way, walking down the bridge.

"Alright, here's my plan," Robin told the others. "We'll-"

Crumble!

He looked down. The bridge had become unstable from the explosion, and now it was collapsing. "Oh snap-"

The Boy Wonder fell through, plummeting towards the water. The others gasped. In a flash, Starfire was upon him, taking him in her arms and carrying them to safety.

He smiled weakly. "Thanks, Star. Maybe we should fly the rest of the way."

When they reached the end of the bridge, Raven carrying them all over, Robin detailed his plan. "We'll go in and see what prisoners have escaped," he said. "Once we've got a good idea I'll call everyone back and we can make plans on how to capture them. You guys in?"

"Right!"

"Right. Titans! Go!"

The team split into three groups of two, going through different parts of the jail; Robin and Beast Boy went through the left sector, Cyborg and Starfire took the right, and Raven and Windflyer took the middle.

"Plenty dark in here," Cyborg muttered.

"Yes." Starfire ignited a starbolt. "Are you able to see now?"

"A bit." He messed with his cybernetic eye, trying to see if he could make things any brighter. Eventually, the man managed to trigger the night vision setting on his optics system; able to see better, he took the lead.

Starfire sighed. "I must ask you, friend Cyborg…"

"Shoot."

The girl took a deep breath, then began. "Why does it get so cold in the night? Why must some people be so rude? Why are people kind enough to offer me their protective apparel? Why are some left the homeless and alone? Why does Robin desire to… do the holding of my hand? Why? Why is it like this on Earth?"

Cyborg frowned, processing this information. "Well, first off… slow down. It isn't really that scary. Second… It's summer. Sun isn't up. People just act like that 'cause they feel angry. Can't really put it into words. That's just being generous. They… aren't as fortunate. He…" The man shrugged. "I dunno. Guess he was just trying to be nice."

"Nice." She smiled sweetly, floating around. "That is ever so kind of him. Do you not find it the strange that the customs are so weird here?"

"Nope. Lived here all my life."

"Oh. Surely things have been the better for you?"

He sighed. "Why do you think I came here?"

"For the chance to obtain new knowledge-"

She froze. "Friend Cyborg? Is something the matter?"

"I- I see something!"

"Is it a prisoner?"

He tensed for a moment, and then relaxed. "No, Star. It's just a dove."

"Doves should be flying in the sky, and not in the cell, should they not?"

Feathers littered the cell they were in, sticking to the walls and their feet. A small note had been left in the biggest pile. Cyborg picked it up and began to read.

"'Dear Bozos,' he began. 'Left this deadbeat jail since I felt it wasn't doing things for me. If you want to find out where I am, I'll just say that I'm in a new place, practicing for my newest performance. Don't try to look for me yet, I won't be ready. Loves and Kisses, the Amaz…'"

He squinted. "It turns into papyrus near the end. Can't read it."

"Papyrus? Do you joke?" Starfire took the paper.

"No, look! Hieroglyphics and all! This guy's a hoot!"

"That is… supposed to be the funny, yes?"

"He's a criminal. These sorts of things are never funny."

Windflyer looked at Raven. She hadn't said a word to him since they entered the jail. Was she mad at him? To be fair, it wasn't like she said much at all, but the lack of any intonation at all made the Toa kind of concerned.

He sighed. "So," he said, fiddling with his cape. "Sister."

Raven looked at him. "Hmm?"

"You seem… awfully quiet-talk as of late. Something up?"

"Mmmm…" She shook her head. "Mmmmn."

"Oh, come on. Can't you say anything other than that awful humming? It's freakin' me out!"

Raven glared. "No."

Windflyer perked. "Oh, hey! That's a good start! Keep at it and you might progress to a more standard coherency level-"

"Quiet."

He sulked. "Sorry. I mean- It's not that I'm angry-mad, I'm just concerned, but ever since the whole Punk Rocket incident, you've been actin'… kinda dull…"

"I'm always dull," the witch replied.

"More so than usual."

"What can I say? The Titans are boring."

"You mean to say I'm boring?"

She grimly nodded. "Eeeyup."

Windflyer sighed again, kicking at the dirt floor. "Fine by me. Thought it unusual, is all." He frowned. "Say, you said you had 'magical precognition powers,' right?"

"Yes."

"Do you know if… um… can you tell me if my heart-friends are still alive?"

"It wouldn't be right to tell you."

"You told me about the dream…"

"That wouldn't have affected anything; this might." Raven sighed. "You can get over them, can't you?"

"I will, in time, but it seems… so unfair…"

"Life's not fair. I think everyone in this team can agree to that."

"Yeah." The Toa squinted and turned to his friend. "Hey, Raven-sister, can you see anything?"

"Who's been leading you?"

"Oh... yeah." He switched to his Ruru. "I don't know how you're always one step ahead of me."

Raven glared, then smiled a bit. "I just kind of have that ability," she rasped. Then she stopped. "I see something. Stay back."

"What is it?"

The witch used her powers to see, and gasped. Then she allowed Windflyer to look as well.

"Woah. Is that… warm-blood?"

Raven nodded vigorously. "Somebody's been here."

"The question is… who?" He froze. "Wait… there're letters on the wall…" He squinted again, gasped. "'I WIN. –K.' Is that- who do you think it is?"

"Dunno. Just ignore it and move on."

Robin and Beast Boy went through the most damaged sector, so they had to endure the most noise. Klaxons and sirens blared all over the prison, guards running to plug defensive holes. Beast Boy had been pumped up to fight crime before, but seeing the situation and remembering the fiasco at the concert hall he deflated a bit.

Robin noticed and looked at him concernedly. "Um… Beast Boy? Are you alright?"

Beast Boy huffed. "You tell me, dude."

The Boy Wonder frowned. He didn't seem all right. "No… you're not. Anything I should know about?"

A guard shot past them. Beast Boy shook his head.

"I'll understand if it's concerning me. I seem to… have that effect on people."

Beast Boy sighed. "I know, dude, but…"

"This is about the Punk Rocket thing, right? Look… you messed up. We know that. But you also helped us big time (and probably saved Cyborg from being disabled.) There's really no need to stay angry…"

He froze. "Oh. The joke we played later on…"

"That was a joke?"

"Yeah. Cyborg figured it was a good way to get back at you."

The boy growled. "Are you kidding me? I thought you guys were just being rude!"

"That and we really didn't want to lose our hearing over the boom box again."

"Oh. Right." Beast Boy narrowed his eyebrows. "That was Cyborg who did that, right? I'm gonna have to get back at him."

Robin shrugged, picking up a dirty pen then throwing it away. "Be my guest. We only did it because we thought he deserved the help."

"Is that permission?" Beast Boy grinned. "Dude, all right!" He froze, sobering. "Say… you ever done this kind of prison break thing before?"

"Loads. Arkham Asylum doesn't clear out itself."

"You guys went right into Arkham? But that's… like… the scariest place in Gotham! How did you manage?"

"I trained with Batman. Nothing is scary anymore."

"What about with Young Justice?"

Robin smiled on remembering his former team. "Batman told us where to go. No problems there."

"You're not with Batman anymore…"

"I still remember his tricks. Stay calm, stay alert, and keep an empty mind. Which reminds me," he said, breathing deeply, "we should've found something by now."

"But… everything's gone!"

"Yeah… but I can't help shaking the feeling that something is out there in the darkness-"

"Go, go, go!"

Klaxons blared, three guards running past them through debris. They wore dark beige uniforms with a small badge on the chest- they must have been looking after the cells. On their right shoulder, each kept a number emblazed in rectangular felt- one was 1, one was 3, and one was 8.

"Code red!" Guard 1 yelled. "Cellblock Nine! Move out!"

They moved towards a small opening, the guard bringing up the rear. As the two watched, they ran towards it then began to walk, weapons held high.

"Main yard secure," the guard called.

Suddenly, something very large was thrown in front of them, rolling around and growling. The guard's eyes widened.

"There he is!" Guard 3 shouted. The three advanced.

Guard 8 frowned. "Wait… He'll free the criminals!" They quickly stopped and lowered their weapons.

Guard 1 ignored this. "Fire!"

As the being smashed a hole in a nearby wall, he took some debris and threw it at the guards. They put up shields and were thankfully unharmed. Now that he was uncovered, the monster could be seen in greater detail. He was large; at least ten feet tall even, had very blocky features, and appeared to be composed almost entirely out of concrete. Beast Boy paled.

"Cinderblock!" he whispered.

"You know him?"

"You kidding me? I fought him! This guy was a huge problem for the Doom Patrol, and now that he's free-"

"He'll cause more trouble." Robin nodded. "Come on. Let's go get the others."

"So, let me get this straight- there's a giant stone man outside this cell?"

Beast Boy shrugged. "Yeah, pretty much."

They had met up with the other Titans in an abandoned cellblock and were relating what they had found. Cyborg and Starfire had not seen much but a dove and a note. Raven and Windflyer had found something "dark-gruesome" on the wall, but Windflyer did not want to tell them as he found it too violent. That meant Robin and Beast Boy had found the most- if there were any reward to be gained in this competiton, they would've won it by far.

"Did you attempt to engage him in the battle?"

"No." Robin shook his head. "He… We decided to wait until everyone was together. Looks like the guy's pretty powerful."

"You think we can take him on?" Windflyer asked.

"Hey, we're Teen Titans. We can take anything on."

Windflyer grimaced. By Robin's description, Cinderblock was pretty powerful- and if Punk Rocket was the bar for the difficulty of villains here, he pretty much cracked it in half. He soon nodded, though; not much use in thinking over it too much. "I guess… I'll trust you on that, fire-spitter."

Robin smiled, froze. "He's coming. Positions, everyone."

The guards all glared at Cinderblock and shot with their guns. Many struck the edges of the hole he had created, while others connected with his back. Some did not even hit him at all. On feeling the shots, Cinderblock turned to the guards, revealing a blocky-featured face and piercing red eyes, roared loudly, and rose a foot. Guard 1 winced. "Aww… crap-"

He brought it down.

WHUMMMM!

The ground shook. A long fissure appeared in between him and the guards, debris and dust being thrown into their faces. Unable to aim properly any more, they dropped their weapons and fled. Cinderblock harrumphed and trudged into the jail cell.

It was dark and quiet. Cinderblock was confused. Wasn't there supposed to be something here? The masked man had told him he would find a reward, something "beyond his wildest dreams" (Cinderblock didn't bother to make sense of that; it didn't.) Maybe if he slammed on the ground a few times, it would come out and he could snatch it up and take it back to-

"You know, Cinderblock, normally the bad guys break out of jail."

Was that… the… changing man? From the Doom Patrol? Cinderblock was angry now. He HATED the Doom Patrol! Reward or not, he was going to crush the guy's skull into tiny little pieces-

"And I can think of six good reasons why you don't want to break in."

Something pierced the shadows, jumping in front of him and crouching. And that was the robin! Batman's sidekick! He hadn't heard much of Batman, but if Clayface had told him right the man was very fast and very dangerous-

"One!"

Another thing swooped him, smiling at him, and landed besides the robin. It was a girl, but Cinderblock didn't know whom. She looked very pretty with her orange skin and red hair, though. "Two!" she yelled.

Then the changing man, as a tiger, lunged in and changed back into a man. How did he do that? Cinderblock wanted to tell him that his head and arms were still a tiger, but he quickly changed them as well. The man sighed internally. "Three!"

After a moment, something else was upon him, flying down in a robe. She looked like a witch, pale and mysterious. Witch Hazel? No… she couldn't be. She had some jewels that glowed black. Maybe she could help him get some Halloween candy, though. "Four," she chanted.

A robot jumped in next. Cinderblock frowned at the sight… robots? Did they exist? He didn't look too much like a robot, since his face was still real, but everything else about him was metal. He was probably a nerd, going about in a costume. "Five!" Yeah. Cinderblock was definitely going to punch his face in.

Finally…

Cinderblock did not know what to do.

He was a robot as well, but at the same time he looked like an Alien, from the movie. Robots and Aliens couldn't coexist. He literally defied logic… Oh well. At least he had a cool mask and costume. Cinderblock didn't know. He dropped in and did a backflip, landing on his feet. "Six!" he shouted.

They all stood before him now. Cinderblock knew they wanted to hurt him, but he waited. Masked man told him something important about them.

"No matter how you do the math, it all adds up to you going down," One said. Cinderblock was confused. He wasn't going to go 'down'. He couldn't. And he couldn't do math either. He growled at this second defiance of logic.

"So, are you going to go quietly…"

Five grinned. "Or is this gonna get loud?"

No. It was not going to get loud. They were too dumb to exist. Cinderblock didn't want to deal with their weird outfits and mental gymnastics any longer. Plus, Three was from the Doom Patrol… and he HATED the Doom Patrol! That was it; they were going DOWN!

He roared and barreled straight towards them. Robin stood his ground for a moment, before smiling grimly. "Titans! Go!"

Then they were off. Raven, Starfire, and Lewa took to the air, Beast Boy morphing a hawk to follow them, while Robin and Cyborg stayed on the ground. Rushing towards the villain, the Teen Titans yelled in glee. They had arrived.

END OF PART TWO

And that's Part Two! Part Three begins adapting the series proper.

1. That first scene takes place in the future. I'm not sure how long.

2. Did you like my character interaction back there? (It sucks. I know.)

Read on for Divide and Conquer!