94. For the Queen of Strings part 5
Cyborg rushed at me with his hulking fist flying at me.
"Um….," Control Freak hid behind the medical bed and gulped: "This doesn't mean I like you or anything….but….GET THE HELL DOWN!!!"
I gritted my teeth and splashed to the floor.
SWOOOOOOOOSH!!!!!
Metal knuckles almost grazed my nose as I fell back.
The possessed Cyborg's blue eye flashed and he brought his right foot down to smash over me.
I gasped and rolled to the side.
SMASH!!!
A crater formed in the floor.
I vaulted up from my roll with a pulse of murk, teleported, materialized on the wall, and kicked off to fly over Cyborg's body.
He reached a strong hand up and gripped my leg.
I gasped.
He growled in a possessed voice and swung me like a golf club to the floor by my foot.
I held my breath and switched my torso into smoke form.
FWOOSH!!!!
My upper half warbled across the floor, and Cyborg's swing ended up going in an upwards arc towards the ceiling as I solidified my torso again, gripped Myrkblade, and slapped him hard in the metal elbow.
CLANK!!!
He released me.
I landed on the floor in a kneel.
He joined two fists together and brought them down.
I dove forward between his legs.
SMASH!!!
Another crater formed where I was.
I rolled to a stand on the other side of him and reversed kicked his rear.
WHUMP!!!
He stumbled for—WHANG!!!!—into the wall.
I spun about and twirled Myrkblade into a flickering pose. Smoke danced out under my shades for a moment….then settled back as I panted and reminded myself that this was my teammate. Possessed by the Puppet King or not, I couldn't—and wouldn't—bring myself to hurt him.
With a metal creak, Cyborg swiveled about. He was frowning. He adjusted the bow tie of his ridiculous tuxedo, narrowed a blue human eye, and cracked his knuckles.
"Dude…," Control Freak said from behind the bed. "I don't think he's here to strip."
I gave him a sideways glare.
WOOOOOSH!!!!
Cyborg came at me.
I gritted my teeth and flipped backwards, dodging a punch. I stood up and stumbled backwards in time to miss a kick and an uppercut. Cyborg threw another heavy punch which I easily ducked, twirled about, and struck up with a slash of Myrkblade. CLANK!!!! The android stumbled. I twirled Myrkblade again and struck it hard against his chest. WHAM!!!
He stumbled back. Behind him I saw a pile of metal tools and conduits and decided it was a good thing to collapse him into.
So I ran and performed a flying kick--
GRIP!!!!
He had me by the upper thigh.
My black eyes bulged.
I let out a surprised exhale as he flung me over—using my own momentum—and flung me into the pile of junk.
CRASH!!!!
"Ooooooh," Control Freak winced. "Just like where my iPod ended up."
SWIVEL!! Cyborg spun around. His blue eye flashed. He stomped towards the fat fanboy.
The obeseling bit his lip and cowered with his hands over his head. "N-No!! Don't kill me!! Not till I have the entire DS9 dvd collection!!!"
Cyborg raised his huge fist and--
WOOOSH!!!
I jumped with a silent snarl and landed on his shoulders. I wrapped my legs around his neck tightly and proceeded to pummel his metal skull repeatedly with the hilt of Myrkblade.
Bonk!! Bonk!! Bonk!!
Cyborg struggled for a second, then he reached his hands up and succinctly grabbed my ribs.
I winced.
He tossed me off of him.
I spun in the air and grabbed a laboratory viewfinder that hung from the ceiling on a track. My momentum caused the hanging metal contraption to slide down the track towards the far wall. Dangling by one hand, I kicked my legs back upon reaching the wall and slid myself back forcibly with a twirl of Myrkblade in my free hand and--
SWOOOOOSH!!! (I swung).
WHACK!!!!
Cyborg's head spun to the left.
I kicked myself off the hanging support and impacted my legs into the robot's chest first.
CLANG!!!!
He stumbled back.
I grounded myself and immediately uppercutted with the broadside of Myrkblade.
He fell back—and down like Goliath.
CLUNK!!!!
He lie still on the floor.
I stood with Myrkblade. Panting. Sweating.
Control Freak's face peered up over the bed. He gulped. "Would now be a good time for 'Klaatu Barada Nikto'??"
I stared down and took a few steps forward---
ZAAAAAAAAP!!!!!
Cyborg suddenly had a blue laser cannon firing off in my chest.
I flew off with a grunt past Control Freak.
"Whoah!!" his head turned to watch me streak by with a smirk. "Get the license plate on that shinobi, will ya?!"
CLANK!!!
I struck the wall hard. I winced.
POW!!!!
SWOOOOSH!!!!
I gasped under my shades.
One of Cyborg's arms had ejected and was sailing at me.
I twirled to the side at the last second--
SMASH!!!!
The metal appendage formed a dent in the wall. I let out a sigh of relief--
SMACK!!!!!
His second arm flew on its own into me.
I wheezed and slumped to the floor.
"Sorry, Noir. Looks like he's got the winning hand. HA!!!"
I gritted my teeth at both him and the pain. I looked up weakly as the tuxedoed Cyborg came to bat. He stood menacingly still as his detached hands 'walked up' his body on nimble figures and reattached to his forearms with separate hisses. He cracked his metal neck and—blue eye pulsing—raised his leg to kick me again.
I took a deep breath. I summoned murk and gripped the handle of my sword.
WOOOSH!!!
His leg came down.
SWISSSH-CLANK!!!!!
I jabbed the tip of my blade directly into his soul. With a pulsing wave of smoke powers alone, I was successfully holding his foot at Myrkblade's length and keeping it from squashing into me. I gritted my teeth. My arms struggled. The blade started carving a tiny dent in the metal of Cyborg's heel and--
FLASH!!!!!
I unleashed a huge pulse of Murk that drew him back.
I hardly had a breath left as I dove forward and rolled past him. I desperately sprinted towards the side of the lab. Anything to get away.
He grabbed for me.
I ducked his reach and plowed clumsily into the medical bed Control Freak was hiding behind. WHUMP!!!!
I tripped and collapsed on the other side of it.
"AACK!!" Control Freak warbled. "Not here!! Don't run to where I'm hiding!!!"
Cyborg stomped over loudly like a T-Rex.
Control Freak shrieked like a girl and jumped up on the bed.
SMASH!!!
Cyborg's foot came down where the fat boy was.
I jumped to my feet, gritted my teeth, and jabbed Myrkblade forward.
Control Freak—on the bed—flattened himself the best he could and gasped as my sword stretched uncomfortably close as it jabbed over him.
SMACK!!!!
Cyborg struck the blade aside. He lunged a fist at me from the other side of the bed.
I dodged and swung my blade down with an exhale.
Cybrog's arm withdrew and I struck the bed uncomfortably close to CF's leg.
"Whoah!!!" the fanboy fiend exclaimed.
Cyborg growled and swung at me again. I pinned his arm to the bed where Control Freak writhingly dodged.
"Stay on target!!"
Cyborg tried to headbutt me. I jumped back and slashed downward, grazing Cyborg's metal skull and showering sparks before ending the blade an inch from Control Frek's neck.
"Stay on target!!!!"
Cyborg reached two hands over to grip my neck. In so doing, his titanium body leered dangerously close to Control Freak's head. The rotund fellow gasped and his manacled arms nudged a control panel on the bed's side.
WHUURRRRRR!!!
The bed spun about ninety degrees---simultaneously knocking Cyborg and I back.
"OOF!!!"
"!!!!!!"
"Whoah!!!" Control Freak gasped and dizzily shook his head.
Cyborg got up, growled, and ran straight for the bed this time.
Control Freak panicked. "Uhhhh…," he sweatdropped, looking all around. His crusty eyes fell on the bed's control panel again. He struck a switch with two bound wrists.
Beep!!
CHTUNG!!!!
The foot of the bed shot up—succinctly uppercutting Cyborg's chest just as he approached.
CLANG!!!!
"It's not made yet!!" Control Freak exclaimed.
Cyborg stumbled back. He shook his head and glanced up just as I ran, vaulted over the bed, and flew at his possessed figure with Myrkblade slashing.
SWOOOOOSH!!! CLINK!!!
He deflected with his metal forearm.
I landed in front of him, gritted my teeth, and slashed and slashed and slashed and slashed and slashed with lightning quick precision. He deflected well for a zombified Titan, but had to back up from my constant offense. I made a desperate attempt to push him up against the far wall of computer consoles. From then I would consider my options. Whether I could knock him unconscious. Whether I could push him into the electronics and short him out. Or perhaps whether I could just distract him long enough for me and my negligent friend to make an escape.
He didn't give me much time to think. With a shoulder, he shoved through a set of my thrusts and pushed me into the center of the room.
In the meantime, Control Freak scurried over to a nearby wall. He panted and held his manacled hands out. "At least let me help you, you selfish jedi!!"
I made a face at the villain—then gasped as Cyborg suddenly rushed forward and I had to block. I slid back a few more feet and slashed at him. The possessed android side-stepped my swing. CHH-CHIING!! My blade sliced through a series of pipes on the wall which came falling down from my severed swing.
Control Freak eyed the brand new 'staffs' on the floor, smirked, and held his wrists up again. "Come on, Shinobi! Trust me! Consider it like our Khitomer Treaty---"
SWOOOOOSH!!! I rushed at Control Freak, snarling, swinging my sword.
His crusty eyes bulged. He wet himself and raised his hands up in last second defence--
SLASH!!!!!
My blade went in between his wrists and cut the manacles off. Control Freak was free.
No sooner, I shoved him out of the way as Cyborg rushed in and pinned me to the wall. I struggled. I gritted my teeth. He pressed me harder and harder to the side of the laboratory. I gasped for my lungs…but couldn't feel them anymore. I felt like my head was about to pop--
CONG!!!!
Cyborg shook his head, let me loose, and rubbed his sore scalp.
I somersaulted out of the way, gasping for breath. I leaned limply on Myrkblade and glanced at my right.
Control Freak fatly twirled a long, severed pipe like a two-edged lightsaber and got into a fighting stance that seemed unnatural for an obese warrior. He winked at me as we stood side by side, ready to attack. "Now…you gotta admit, man. This is friggin' cool."
I blinked at him. I bore a sickly grin…
Cyborg swiveled around.
I gripped Myrkblade and got ready.
Control Freak smirked and spun his pipe nimbly.
The robot charged at us.
We both dove in. Control Freak yelling. Me with my silent warcry.
SWOOOOOSH!!!
CL-CL-CLANK!!!
WOOOSH!!!
CLANG!!!
Wood struck metal struck metal struck metal struck wood.
Myrkblade, the pipe, and Cyborg's metal arms deflected against each other in a three-fighter spiral of madness in the center of the laboratory. Control Freak and I gradually worked it so that we were on either side of Cyborg, fighting him from opposite angles. Control spun in with a twirling attack. Cyborg pushed him back. I jumped in and jabbed into the square of his back. Sparks flew and he spun around, knocking me away. Control Freak came in with a smack to the head. Cyborg grabbed his pipe and flipped his fat body over effortlessly. I eagerly dove out of the way as the obese fiend fell to the floor. I then charged, teleported, materialized in mid-air, and descended with a heavy slash that knocked Cyborg back about ten feet.
He stood dizzily under a huge light fixture.
I looked at it. I whistled at Control Freak.
The fanboy dizzily sat up and saw the fixture. He smiled. "Bring it down!!"
I smirked. I twirled Myrkblade and ran at Cyborg.
As predicted, the titanium Titan grabbed for me.
I blurred, pulsed murk, and flipped up and out of his grasp.
"She's all yours, kid!" Control Freak tossed me his pipe. "Now let's blow this thing and go home!!"
I grabbed the pipe in mid air, uprighted myself, landed on Cyborg's shoulders, and locked him in place with the pipe pressed back up against his throat. He struggled to get me off of him. I repositioned myself, held the pipe with one hand and one knee, and flung Myrkblade up with my free hand.
SWOOOOOSH!!!
SNAP!!!!
The blade sunk into the ceiling, cutting off the support to the light fixture, but not its wiring. The glaring object sailed down heavily. I took a breath, winced at the thought of what was about to happen, and leapt off my android friend.
The possessed Cyborg finally yanked the pipe off his neck, flung it to the floor, and slowly looked up with a twitching blue eye--
SMASH!!!!
ZAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP!!!!!!
Cyborg's body convulsed as the light fixture exploded over his metal cranium and shot bolts of electricity all throughout his body. I landed behind him, panting, squinting my black eyes under my shades.
The ends of his bow tie sizzled as he fell down to his knees, groaned, and collapsed face forward on the ground. Still.
I rushed over and felt his pulse just to be sure. I sighed with relief.
He was down for the count…nothing more.
"Woohoo!!" Control Freak jumped and cheered. "Man!! That was so cool!! Never before was there a greater union than the Dominion and the Cardassians!! I tell you what!!! Control Freak and Wyldecarde could clear ANY room—"
-click-
Control Freak blinked. He looked down at his hands which I had just refastened swiftly with one of Cyborg's spare handcuffs. "Awwwwwww chocobo poop."
I smirked. I turned around and looked at my blade pinned into the ceiling. I decided to leave it for then. Instead, I walked over to the communicator that had gone dead and picked it up. I thought of Robin….
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
"Nnngh!!" Robin was tossed down on his rear end next to Sandy against the cinderblock wall of the gym.
Spears pointed at them close up from six 'guards'….citizens under the Puppet King's control. The Puppet King hobbled forth in a 'march', pacing before the two captured infiltrators. The richly attired 'guests' of the ceremony stood in their frills and dresses and powdery expressions in the background of the 'ballroom' gym. They watched with concerned blue eyes, as if they were truly shocked at the sudden interruption of their controller showing off his bride to be.
The Puppet King's googly eyes settled evilly on the Boy Wonder and the goggled volunteer for a few seconds. Then he swiveled around without blinking and waved at two leftover guards besides the coach. "Take her back to her chamber. My beloved must not despair at the awkward events transpiring before her."
The guards nodded and guided a zombielike Starfire towards the coach. She gracefully stepped up into her seat and smoothed out the wrinkles in her shimmering white and blue dress. The green horse neighed and trotted off through double doors which the guards closed upon exiting.
The Puppet King turned around and stared at the two. His wooden block of a mouth bobbed open and he uttered: "I will not let you defile my beloved's evening!"
"You don't know what you're talking about," Robin spat. His eyemasks narrowed. "You're not the one here who really knows Starfire."
"Oh…but I do know her," the Puppet King said. He waved his scepter as he stumbled into a dramatic swoon. "And I love her. I love her truly." He tilted his head down into a 'glare'. "It is you who does not understand. It is you who truly neglects the woman I love!"
Sandy slipped her goggles off and glared. "Um….j-just what makes you so certain she is the Queen of Strings??"
"Simple! I woke up to her lovely voice!" the Puppet King exclaimed. He paced and spoke, "She cared for me. Almost every morning. Speaking to me of her days. The most insignificant details of an angel's life. And I couldn't help it. I fell in love." He sighed in as trademark a way as an animated, wooden puppet can sigh. "Her soft voice. Her breathy giggle. Those sparkling green eyes and that unblemished smile. The way that she does not think of herself, but instead puts the weight of the world—the universe on her shoulders. She is so cute and so simple, and yet so exotic and mysterious. And she's alone on this destitute rock of a world called Earth. A world full of ignorant warmongers and evildoers. She does not deserve this infidel culture! She deserves a destiny in the stars. Much like what her home planet once offered her."
He pointed an angry wooden hand at the two.
"It is you!! People like the Titans and so called 'do-gooders' who pin her down on this forsaken planet and force her to fight a daily battle that is unbefitting for her grace and beauty! I will not let you taint her any longer!! I shall wed her and take her far away from here. As King and Queen, she shall be free. We shall be free!"
"Starfire volunteered to join the Titans," Robin frowned. "I did not talk her into doing anything she didn't desire. I would never do that! If you're so concerned about her being manipulated…why don't you turn your damn magic spell off and let her look at you with her real eyes and say what she feels?!?!"
"I told you already," the Puppet King said firmly. "I do know my beloved. And in such, I know how she feels. She is confused. Lonely. And perplexed by this harmful macrocosm that she's forced to fight crime in! How could she love to be anywhere but with me in the stars?!"
"Starfire has always been willing to deal with the culture shock of living here after a long life of Tamaranian experiences!" Robin retorted. "We knew that! We always knew that! And yet we've given everything we could to help her! To assist her! For we're her friends. And to show how we love her, we promise to be there for her no matter what! Not whisking her away to some god-awful fate like you're so selfishly intending!!"
"Enough!" the Puppet King stomped the end of his scepter down into the gym floor. "You have no say in this matter. You were never truly her friend to begin with. My beloved deserves my attention and my attention…as she has done nothing in the past year but given me attention when all else seemed lost…"
Sandy leaned in and muttered into the Boy Wonder's ear: "Boy….someone seems smitten!"
"What was that?" the Puppet King leaned in.
"Er….n-nice mittens! Hehehehe…"
The Puppet King pointed his scepter. "Silence! You will honor this ceremony. The Queen deserves it." He raised his hands towards the ceiling. One of the many lattices with room for two more glowing spots shook and warbled. Streams of energy started to branch down towards the two captured infiltrators.
Sandy and Robin grunted and squirmed in their seats.
"Unfortunately….you are not properly attired," the Puppet King glared. "But do not fear. We will take care of that soon enough. We will give you the last suits you shall ever wear…."
Sandy grunted. "Now would….be a good…..time for….Boy Wondrous stuff…."
"Tell me about it…," Robin struggled to reach his utility belt. But he was quickly losing his will to fight. "If….only…."
SWOOOOOSH!!!!
A dark streak zoomed in.
THWACK!!!!
The Puppet King was knocked back into a guard.
"Ooof!!"
The crowd of possessed dancers gasped.
I skidded to a stop, my body trailing murk and calming down. I panted with Myrkblade in my gasp. I jerked to the side.
Six guards stared at me with blue eyes blinking.
I swiftly jabbed at them. Knocking one back by his blocking spear into another. I then leapt into the center and swept my leg out, tripping the last four in one strike.
WHAP!!!
THWUMP!!!!
Robin took a breath and jumped up. "That's more like it…," he grinned and whipped his metal staff out…extending it. He rushed by my side.
In the meantime, Sandy slipped her goggles on and cowered against the wall. "N-N-Not my department!!"
Robin and I stood side by side with Myrkblade and the staff.
The guards got back up.
We took our respective breaths and jumped them.
CLANK!!! CLINK!!! WHANG!!!
Wood against metal. Metal against metal. The guards may have been possessed citizens…but they were merely citizens. It didn't take very long for us to break through their defenses and knock them—safely—unconscious against the throne in the center of the gym.
"Woo!!" Robin spun his staff and struck a pose while facing the Puppet King. "Easier than I thought! Consider this wedding crashed, ya damn Muppet!"
The Puppet King was helped up by a few guests and twirled his scepter. "If you're so willing to fight, Titans…then fight all you like." He stretched the scepter to the ceiling.
The dozens of lattices glowed. Soon, the blue eyes of the guests were glowing too. Their faces turned into nightmarish frowns and they started marching at us like a scene out of the Dawn of the Dead and Great Expectations combined.
"But if you came to crash a wedding…you must crash the reception as well. Painfully, I might add."
Robin sweatdropped. "This….is not a good idea."
I slowly nodded with a weak face.
The first in line to lunge for us was Commissioner Decker. His usual badass face was contorted in a ghoulish howl as he swung at us with his richly sleeved arms.
Robin jumped back. Another arm snagged onto his cape but he spun free. Not willing to crush any innocent souls, he dashed towards the far side of the gym and motioned for me to follow.
I nodded. I blurred over towards the wall.
"Is it over??" Sandy looked up. She saw the wall of oncoming wedding zombies. "Eeek!!"
I blurred by her, yanked her up by the collar of her black jumpshirt, and ran towards the double doors with her in frightened tow.
The Puppet King watched, chuckling, amused with his wooden self.
Robin approached the doors first and shoved against them. Growling. They wouldn't budge. "Damn!! Sandy! Help me out with this thing!!"
"O-Okay!"
Robin fumbled for adequate tools to pick the lock as Sandy joined him. "Noir!!" he shouted. "Hold them off long enough for us to get through!!"
I spun around.
I saw the wall of innocent flesh approaching me.
I glanced at my wooden blade.
I bit my lip.
I sheathed it, cracked my knuckles, and got into a martial arts pose.
The body wall came.
I took a deep breath and rushed forward.
WHUMP!!!
I chopped one chest.
WHUMP!!!
I chopped another chest.
Bodies fell back harmlessly into others, knocking the advancing line down like bowling pins.
WHUMP!!
I knocked a woman into two gentlemen and another lady.
WHUMP!!
I kneed a city official back into a bunch of police officers.
The mass of bodies was picking up on my right.
I rushed over to shove them back—but paused.
My black eyes blinked.
Blake Glover hobbled towards me in his lacy, eighteenth century getup. His zombiestep was perfect…right down to the drooling.
I leaned my head to the side and smiled a sickling smile before shoving him extra hard back into the crowd…knocking down literally a dozen people at once.
WHUMP!!!
"Almost got it!!" shouted Robin as he and Sandy picked the lock.
I nodded at them.
FLASH!!
My metal left hand was suddenly encased in black telekinesis.
I gasped and looked over.
There stood Raven. In a magician's costume. Complete with the top hat and robe and tuxedo-leotard…thing.
It was the first time I had seen her and I didn't have a time to laugh hysterically (or sob miserably).
She uttered: "As the King's magician, I cannot let you escape. Watch. It's all in the wrist."
And that said, she succinctly began twisting my metal arms in ways that Cyborg had not engineered it to be twisted. I gritted my teeth and struggled in place as the dark girl pulled and pulled at my prosthetic. The wall of possessed bipeds lumbered closer. I could smell their hot, ragged breaths. Sparks of pain shot up my left arm and throttled the shivers into my being out of nowhere. I felt a wall of arctic proportions settle through my system. Arms of zombie guests reached my scarred throat. I let loose a gasp and desperately reached my right hand to my forearm. I pressed the right points in the metal disc and—SNAP!!! HISSSSS!
The metal hand popped loose. Freed, I ducked out of the grasp of the masses just when--
"THERE!!"
CHTING!!!
The double doors were unlocked.
Robin kicked them open.
WHAM!!!
He shoved Sandy through, who got the idea and scurried down the hall.
The Boy Wonder looked at me and waved. "Noir!! Come on!!!"
I wasn't about to complain. But as I started to run, more dark energy enveloped me. This time my ankles.
"!!!!!"
I spun about.
Raven's blue eyes were glowing over with gray. The 'magician' had me caught once again.
One handed, I unsheathed Myrkblade—CHIING!!!—twirled it—SW-SW-SWISH—and struck the floating arm of blackness hard with the length of my blade. CRACK!!!
It sailed straight out of the dark bubble of Raven's powers.
SWOOOSH!
And it struck her hard in the face.
CLANG!!!!
"Ooof!!" the possessed girl fell down. Her top hat rolled to the floor and she saw stars with a red welt on her nose.
I winced at that…but was nevertheless free of her manipulations. I dashed away from the last line of marching crowds as the ones I grounded began standing up and joining the molasses pursuit.
Watching from afar, the Puppet King shook his googly eyes and looked towards the dizzy magician. "Call for my steed! I will need his help in tracking those infidels down!"
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
I caught up with the sprinting Robin and Sandy.
"You made a good rescue," the Boy Wonder exclaimed. "I hope you had a good escape plan too!"
I nodded. I pointed down a right turn with my existing hand.
"The elevator?!"
We rounded the corner.
"The elevator!!"
Indeed, the double doors to the elevator were open. Inside sat Control Freak, handcuffed to the far wall and away from the buttons.
"Going down?" he grinned.
The three of us rushed in.
"Um…cl-close the doors, please," Sandy whimpered.
Robin flipped off the lock switched and the doors closed just as the shadows of our lumbering pursuers appeared around the corner.
Sandy sighed. "I don't mind community service…but so much as long as the community doesn't try to eat your brains out while dressed to celebrate Bastille Day!"
I reached my right hand to press a button for a lower floor….but Robin smacked it away.
I winced and rubbed it against my right side with a pout.
"S-Sorry…," he stuttered. He pressed the third highest button. "But since we're in the elevator…we're going up."
I raised an eyebrow.
"We need to get to the Main Room," Robin explained. The elevator shook and vibrated gently as we started to rise up the floors. "From there we can operate the lighting system."
"And then make the possessed people think that the Sun is rising!" Sandy nodded. She slipped her goofy goggles back on over her eyes while still regaining her breath. "That'll stop their end of the curse!"
"Indeed it will," Control Freak grinned. "Now do you mind freeing me from this wall support? I may be composed of 75% syrup inside of my belly…but I'm no T-1000!"
"Oh…it's you…," Robin grumbled and marched over. "I guess it's unethical to kill you or something…right?"
"Love you too, Robin."
The Boy Wonder undid the villain's handcuffs, freed him from the side of the elevator, and fastened them again.
"Now that the adrenaline is slowly fading…," Sandy gulped. "H-How'd you guys get into the elevator to begin with?"
"Yeah," Robin nodded. "I thought they weren't working because of the Puppet King's manipulation."
Control Freak smirked. "We blew our way to the fifth floor and accessed one there."
"Blew your way?" the Boy Wonder raised an eyebrow.
A rattling sound.
He and Sandy looked down at the loose metal hand of Cyborg in the form of a laser cannon.
"Oh…..," Sandy bit her lip. She looked up. "Guess you ran into an old friend, huh?"
I shrugged. I raised my arms to hand-sign….then remembered I only had one hand.
"Eeep!!" Sandy gasped and jumped back. She blushed. "Th-That's not a good thing."
I blinked through my shades then grumbled as I shook my wristless left appendage.
Robin walked over and gently gripped the disc where the prosthetic was missing. "Raven?"
I nodded.
"We'll get it back….somehow."
I chuckled breathily.
He glared up at me. "In the meantime, let me get this straight…."
I gulped.
"You beat up Cyborg…..apparently….."
I nodded.
"Started blasting through sturdy, expensive FIREWALLS throughout the Tower to get to the fifth floor…."
I nodded again.
"Left Hillbilly Yoda over there alone in this elevator with a dangerous laser cannon…."
Control Freak bore a cheesy grin….literally.
"And you rushed in on the scene at the gym to rescue us, specifically disobeying my order for you to stay down in the laboratory all this time?!?!"
I sweatdropped. I smiled nervously.
A beat.
Robin stared at me. "Thank you." He said.
I gave a thumb's up with my right hand.
"If he could hand-sign right now…," Sandy folded her arms and smirked, "…I think he'd be saying 'don't mention it'."
"Or 'hey Robin', nice Titan Batch."
Sandy elbowed Control Freak.
Whump!
"OW!!"
Robin turned around and faced no one in particular as he punched his fist. "Ergghh!! Once we free the curse from everyone…I'm going to beat that little wooden stump for all the grain he has in that blockhead of his!!"
I leaned my head to the side with a curious expression.
Robin swiveled around and explained to me as if he telepathically knew of my confusion: "Starfire is the Queen of Strings."
I mouthed 'oh'.
A beat.
Robin blinked under his mask. "Th-That doesn't surprise you in the least?"
I scratched my long head of hair and shrugged.
"……well it should," he grumbled and folded his arms. "And you should want to kill him too."
I sweatdropped.
"It's okay, R-Robin," Sandy stuttered. She smiled bravely. "It's not like Starfire can't handle herself till we save her!"
"I don't care if she can handle herself or not!!" Robin rambled. "I just….just…..I'm going to kill the Puppet King!!"
Silence.
I cleared my throat.
"Someone has issues…," Control Freak smiled.
"And someone has teeth," Robin glared. "But not for long!"
The fat fiend gulped.
SHAKE!!!!
The entire elevator jolted.
We all stumbled, gasping.
A beat.
Sandy blinked under her fish-lens goggles. "Wh-Wh-What was that?!"
Control Freak sweated. "Every Turbolift. It never fails."
SHAKE!!!
The elevator jolted again. There was a sickening CLANG!! and CRACK! sound…and suddenly we were no longer moving.
"Oh what the Hell…," Robin grumbled. He pressed the numbered buttons.
Nothing.
He pressed the 'open' button.
Nothing.
"We're stuck," he gritted his teeth. With strong gloves he forced the panel beneath the buttons open. CRACK!!! Wires spilled out. He stared inside with squinting eyemasks. "Power's still on! It's not a shutdown from the computer system."
The elevator started shaking as hallow sounds like upside down footsteps clattered along the sides and top.
Sandy gulped. "I-I think something else has stopped us."
"Like what?" Control Freak frowned. "Mighty Mouse?"
SMASH!!!!
A hole smashed open next to him and a piercing, green beak of a pterodactyl poked through.
Control Freak gasped and dashed over by Sandy's side. "Please be Mighty Mouse! PLEASE BE MIGHTY MOUSE!!!"
The beat retracted. An animalistic shriek. SMASH!!! SMASH!!! Green dinosaur claws pierced through the outer shell of metal. The entire elevator car shook as the claws trailed up with an ear-grating sound of skewered metal.
Robin gritted his teeth. "The Puppet King fetched his new puppy after us."
The claws retracted. A beat. A green snake slithered down on the outside and peered in with a cock of its scaly head. The tongue darted out once…twice….then turned into a razor sharp set of teeth as a green crocodile tried climbing in.
I clenched my fleshly fists and bit my lip.
Robin, on the other hand---"RAAAUGH!!" He charged forward, whipped out his staff, and smacked the green changeling out. WHACK!!!
The crocodile fell, turned into an emerald toucan in mid air, and floated up the shaft…disappearing above the top of the car.
"Hey! Isn't that your teammate you're hitting?" Sandy exclaimed.
"Beast Boy can take it when in animal form," Robin sweat. "Besides." He looked back at us. "Undoubtedly—in a matter of seconds—he's gonna be sending us plummeting to our deaths! Do you want that?"
SHAKE!!!!
The elevator lurked.
Two of us gasped.
Metal twanging sounds could be heard echoing throughout the hollow shaft outside.
"H-He's biting through the cables above us!" Sandy gasped.
Robin nodded. "That he is."
The elevator lurched again.
Control Freak winced. "If only Keanu Reeves was here!"
I elbowed him hard.
WHUMP!!
"OW!!!"
"Noir…," breathed Robin, poised on the gaping hole.
I looked his way.
"You and Sandy try and get that door opened," the Boy Wonder pointed with one hand while whipping out a grappling hook launcher with another. "I'm gonna go up there and distract him!"
"Alone??" Sandy whimpered.
"I have to."
"Whatcha gonna do?" Control Freak scowled. "Feed him raw fish? We're a long way from Seaworld, man!"
"Just let me deal with it! You deal with the door!"
I nodded and saluted with my one arm.
Robin aimed the grappling hook up the shaft. POW!! He fired and away he went.
I turned and looked at Sandy.
She simpered. "Need a hand?"
I smirked. I rushed down on my knees beside her and the controls as the three of us reached into our pouches and satchels for the right equipment to 'hack' into the door mechanism.
Control Freak stood by the obviously closed doors. "I'll…um…keep watch in case any of Puppet King's minions come." He smirked.
"Yeah…," Sandy sweat and frowned during her work. "You do that…."
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
Robin swung up onto the top of the elevator card via the grappling cord. He panted and looked through a thinned eyemask.
A green beaver was eagerly gnawing through the cable supports of the elevator. Slowly, the metal 'string' lost more and more of its structure. The elevator heaved with each lost strand of the support.
Robin held his staff out and slowly paced across the roof of the elevator car. "Okay….Beast Boy….easy…easy…."
The green-furred rodent paused in its task and glanced sideways at Robin with beady, blue eyes a-glowing.
"No need to fight…," the Boy Wonder softly said. He held his empty hand out non-threateningly. "We can just…..ya know….work this out. You're only being controlled by a puppet that wants to elope with Starfire. You can't be anymore badass than normal—"
"RRRRRRGHHH!!!" a hulkingly huge green bear rushed over and clawed at Robin's chest.
SLASH!!!
"AAUGH!!' Robin tumbled over, three red cuts in the front of his uniform. He winced, gritted his teeth, and sat up halfway. "Then again…." WOOOSH!! He jumped up and uppercutted the green animal with his steel-tipped boot.
WHACK!!!!
The bear stumbled back.
Robin charged. "FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE!!!"
WHANG!!!!
The staff struck the changeling across the chest.
SW-SW-SWISH!!!
Robin twirled the weapon, bopping the green mammal twice in the head.
Beast Boy flew across the roof in bear form.
Robin leapt at him.
Suddenly the fur shrunk into scaly skin and a green velociraptor shrieked with claws and teeth waiting.
"Whoah!!" Robin reached a hand out, grabbed what was left of the support cable, and swung his lower body around before the green dinosaur could bite his ankles off. SNAP!!
Robin swiveled to a stop in a sideways perch.
The raptor came at him.
He whipped out a weighted bolo, held his breath, and dove into a forward-flip over the raptor. While upside down, he flung the bolo. The cords wrapped around the torso of the dinosaur and grounded him on the roof. WHUMP!!!
Robin came out, twirled his staff, and rushed over to knock the changeling unconscious.
But even as he brought his weapon down, the dinosaur shrunk into a snake that easily slithered out from under the bolo and the throw of Robin's bludgeon.
CLANK!
"Rrrrrgh!" Robin groaned in frustration.
The snake darted towards the center of the elevator, circled up the cord, and left off it and directly at Robin in the form of a kicking kangaroo.
SMACK!!!!
The Boy Wonder bounced off the edge of the elevator. He grabbed a hold of the edge and hung on at the last second. Panting.
The elevator car wobbled. A green gorilla towered above. It snarled down at the boy.
Robin gritted his teeth, planted his boots against the side of the elevator car, and tensed his legs with a cry. He vaulted up and over the gorilla. He landed on the other side of the changeling and swept a leg out.
WHUMP!!!
The gorilla fell over.
The elevator car shook.
The support cable gave a little and more strands snapped off—flying like tethered bullets and striking the sides of the shaft above and below. CLANG!! CL-CLANG!
Robin sweatdropped.
The gorilla stumbled up into a lion, growled, and pounced on the Boy Wonder.
THWUMP!!!!
The green feline pinned Robin down. The hero held a flimsy metal staff between him and the ravenous paws of the killer cat. He dodged his masked head around to avoid clawed swipes. Finally he let out a grunt and kicked at the beast with his legs.
WHUMP!!!
It struck the support cable.
More strands snapped off the fragile system.
The whole elevator car shook.
Robin jumped up to his feet, didn't give time to sweat, and rushed in for the attack.
"RAAAUGH!!!"
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
Sandy let out a nervous sound as the elevator car groaned and shook all around us.
I gritted my teeth, sweated, and picked more and more at the wires in the wall console with my one hand while Sandy assisted with her own two limbs.
"Th-Think we're close to opening the doors?" the volunteer uttered.
Sparks flew.
Speakers above us crackled and suddenly there was an emanation of previously-mute elevator music.
We froze for a moment, groaned, and went on with the task at hand.
"Need a different tool?"
I nodded. I withdrew my hand and pointed to a pouch on the far right of her utility belt.
She dropped one of the tools she was handling and reached into her pouch with the free hand.
The elevator lurched from the combat taking place above…
We struggled to remain on task. Sandy handed the instrument to me and we went back to work.
In the meantime, the shaking elevator caused the dropped tool to roll over and collide with Control Freak's boot. "Hmmmmm," he bore a grinch grin, bent over, and picked it up.
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
SLASH!!!!
A huge, lumbering sloth threw a paw full of claws at the Boy Wonder.
Robin ducked and backflipped into a fighting pose.
The sloth crept forward.
Robin grunted and sprung with a jab of his staff.
POKE!!!!
The Sloth let out a groan as it got a black eye. It shook its head painfully.
Robin winced. "D'oh! Beast Boy, I-I'm sorry—"
WHAM!!!!
A green ram slammed its horns into Robin's chest.
The hero grunted and flew straight into the cable supports to the elevator.
WHANG!!!!
The car shook and swayed beneath him.
He collapsed to the ground, wheezed, and got up on his knees.
"Guess I should save the apologies for later."
The ram morphed into a bull, ground its hooves into the roof, and came charging.
Robin spun up to his feet and twirled with his staff vertically blocking.
CLANG!!!
The bull struck the metal bludgeon head-on and kept pushing.
Robin's metal-laced boots scraped against the roof. He was pushed towards the edge. The huge yawning esophagus of the Tower's central elevator shaft stretched beneath him. He gritted his teeth and backflipped. The Boy Wonder flew off the elevator car, contacted the far wall of the shaft with his feet, and bounced back. He flipped over the bull, landed, spun, and struck the animal hard against the butt with his rod.
WHUMP!!!
The ox howled, spun around, and turned into a snarling triceratops.
Robin's eyemask bulged.
LURCH!!!!
He gasped as the humongous weight of the dinosaur brought the precariously hanging elevator to the limit of its strain. More strands snapped and peeled off of the main cable support. Metal echoes and reverberations warbled down the shaft. The car wobbled offensively.
Off-balance, the Boy Wonder was helpless to dash away as the triceratops charged forward and rammed him across the rooftop with his trifold horns.
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
More sparks flew from the console.
The doors opened slightly. A centimeter's width apart. Inside was a cool and inviting hallway.
"There!" Sandy gasped. "Now maybe you can teleport us all through—"
Another spark flew.
WHURRR!!!
CLUNK!!!
The doors shut.
I sweatdropped. "Uhm….," Sandy bit her lip, sweating. "J-Just keep jiggling it like you were. We h-had something there."
LURCH!!!
We all winced. "If anything…we had sanity…"
Unknown to us, Control Freak was busily—happily—picking at the lock to his handcuffs in the corner with the dropped tool….
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
The elevator lurched again.
The support cable started to snap more and more. Strands flew off. Wires snapped.
Robin was pinned to the door-side wall by the green dinosaur's horned head. He struggled to get free. The weighted animal caused the elevator to constantly wobble and strain. Loud groaning sounds filled the shaft.
Robin gasped. With his hands free, he repeatedly bonked the soft forehead of the dinosaur between the horns. "Turn into something lighter!! Lighter!!!"
Smack! Smack! Smack! Smack!
The dinosaur shook its lumbering head, groaned, and morphed into an emerald octopus.
With his body no longer sandwiched, Robin breathed easily. "Whew. Thanks, Beast Boy. Maybe you're not half as possessed as you loo—"
WHUMP!!!!
"MMMMFFFFF!!!!"
Robin struggled as he suddenly had a face full of octopus. Green tentacles wrapped around the back of his head as the soft body pressed forward to envelope and suffocate the boy.
"Mmmmfmmfpphhhff!!" Robin struggled. He desperately swung the rod around and—two handed—whapped where his nose would normally have been but instead made contact with a full hide of mollusk.
Whap!! Whap!! Whap!!
The Boy Wonder eventually stumbled down hard onto the rooftop with the tentacles gripping him.
WHUMP!!!
He snaked an arm out desperately, felt around the wall of the shaft, and fingered a cable strung to one of the shaft's floodlights. He yanked it out. CRUNCH!!! Sparks flew from the end of it, which he lightly grazed against the mollusk's green skin.
Z-ZAP!!!!
The octopus shrieked—if or if not that's possible—and eagerly slithered off of Robin with its squishy hide smoking.
Robin sat up and shook his head. He groaned and rubbed his cheek—spotted with red marks from the suction cups.
The octopus writhed for a few seconds before turning into a huge, raging tyrannosaurus rex. "RRRRRRRRRRRGHHHH!!!!!!!"
Again, the elevator lurched and wobbled under the weight of a huge green dinosaur. The cable began to split and shatter.
Robin gritted his teeth. He jumped to his feet, ran between the dinosaur's leg, and swung his staff up into the beast's groin. "QUIT IT!!!!"
The blue eyes of the dinosaur bulged and the creature howled. It fell over—causing the elevator to lurch like mad. CREEEEAK!!!
Robin gasped and leaned on the gradually breaking cord for support. "Why does something tell me that that was a bad idea…??"
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
I gritted my teeth. I focused. I sweated…
"H-Hurry!" Sandy trembled. "Gravity's flirting with us more and more!!"
Sparks flying and---
SWOOOOSH!!!
The doors flung themselves wide open.
Sandy gasped happily. "Praise God!"
Sparks….
The doors whirred together.
Sandy's goggled eyes bulged. "Qu-Quick!!" she squeaked. "God is leaving!!"
I gritted my teeth, blurred forward, and whipped out Myrkblade at the last second.
CHHHHING!!
CLANK!!!!
I had Myrkblade stretched horizontally and pinning the walls open down the center. The doors struggled and strained to close in on my doorstop-of-a-blade. I summoned murk with my one hand and pulsed it into my blade, desperately reinforcing it with my powers. It was a struggle, a struggle I couldn't win forever.
I looked over at Sandy through sweat-stained shades and motioned towards the hallway beyond the doors with my head.
She swallowed and nodded. "R-Right." She got up and headed my way---
Cl-Click!
"Huh??" Sandy gasped and looked at her wrist. It was suddenly handcuffed to a metal fixture in the elevator wall. "H-Hey!!" She struggled to get loose, but to no avail.
LURCH!!!
The elevator car shook and teetered downwards. The floor of the hallway was now one foot higher than the floor of the elevator interior. I gritted my teeth and sweated while straining to keep the door open. I looked desperately at Sandy. Sandy looked desperately at me. Together, we both looked at--
"Thanks for holding the door open, Jeeves," Control Freak smirked. He tossed the tool into my straining chest as he effortlessly walked past me and down the length of the hallway with his free wrists. "I've enjoyed this little tour. But it's a little too much excitement to me. Next time I get a vacation from prison, I'm going to Risa. Sniff you jerks later!" He left around the corner. A beat. He peered around it at us again. "Oh, and incase you all bleed to death instead of a quick end…meditate on this. Natasha Yar died because she was a moron of a security woman. Live long and glut!"
And he was gone.
Sandy looked at me.
I looked helplessly at her.
LURCH!!!
I scrunched down to my knees. It became harder and harder to keep forcing the doors apart.
"I"ll be going down with the rest of this thing in any minute," she gulped. "You go catch Control Freak, sir. We can't let him get away!"
I vehemently shook my head.
"Do it!" she exclaimed. "Your life's more valuable than mine!" And with that said, she bravely lifted her lower body and kicked me hard in the chest.
WHUMP!!!
Even the tiniest of jolts would have loosened me. I fell out onto the hallway floor with my blade spilling by my side.
SCHLUMP!!!
The doors slammed shut on their own.
I gritted my teeth, dove in, and swung Myrkblade.
SWOOOOSH-CLANK!!!!
I tried forcing…prying…spreading the two doors apart with my sword. I strained and I strained. No use. I jumped back, panted, and wiped the sweat from my brow with one forearm.
Sandy…..
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
"RRRGH!!!" Robin swung his gloved fist into the leathery side of a green rhino.
WHUMP!!!!
The beast stumbled back, ricocheted off the cable support.
CLANK!!!!
A dozen strands snapped off. The elevator lurched violently. About to collapse.
In the meantime, the green rhino literally fell over the edge of the elevator car's roof. Its horn dug into the side of the metal shaft. The changeling morphed into a toucan, which then flapped its wings madly and tried to yank its beak out of the wall.
Robin gathered his breath. He heard a desperate, struggling sound from beneath him in the elevator car.
"Sandy??" he breathed.
He knelt and pried a roof panel open with his staff. He peered in. "What happened?! Where is everybody?!"
Sandy struggled with the handcuffs pinning her to the metalwork. "I-I'm stuck!!! Control Freak got away!!"
Robin bit his lip.
LURCH!!!
"Eeek!!"
Robin spun and looked up silently.
The cable was about to snap.
He took a breath and snaked down into the elevator car.
He landed besides Sandy, pushed her chest back, and said: "Hold still."
She did her best, trembling.
Robin raised his hand….focused….and karate chopped the thin, metal chain.
SNAP!!!
Sandy exhaled. She was free. "Thanks, Robin. Noir…h-he…"
Robin gripped her wrist, pulled out a grappling hook, and rushed towards the hole Beast Boy had smashed through the elevator car's side.
"Don't panic," he said.
Sandy panicked. "What are we—"
Robin hugged Sandy close and dove the two of them out, plummeting down the depths of the elevator shaft.
SWOOOOOOSH!!!!
Sandy would have shrieked if she had a breath available.
Robin concentrated, staring fixedly at the spraypainted floor numbers whirring up past them.
Meanwhile…
SNAP!!!!!
The cord to the elevator above them finally snapped and a green toucan fluttered away.
WOOOOOOSH!!!!
The elevator hurtled down after them.
Robin gripped tight to his grappling hook launcher.
The bottom of the shaft gradually appeared.
The Boy Wonder hooked the arm with the grappling hook around Sandy's chest. With his other arm loose, he whipped out an explosive birdarang. He flung it with a grunt down at the second to the last door.
SW-SW-SW-SW-SW-SWISH-CLANK!!!! It embedded into the doors. Beep-Beep-Beep-BOOOOOOM!!!
The resulting explosion blew a hole into the doors.
Robin twisted their two bodies around in mid air, aimed at the wall, and fired his grappling hook.
POW!!!—SWOOOOOSH-CLUNK!!
The hook dug into the wall.
The cord dangled between it and the falling couple.
The elevator throttled downwards after them.
A fountain of sparks rained, catching up with their bodies.
Robin pressed a button down hard on the launcher.
The cord stopped dangling. It grew tight between them and the hook.
YANK!!!!
Their bodies dangled, swung back, and then forward right at the blasted door frame.
Robin grunted and let go of Sandy.
"Yaaak!!" She tumbled safely onto the hallway floor.
Robin bounced back, hanging.
The elevator scraped its way down to where the hook was. Robin swung forward.
SMACK!!!
The hook was knocked off the wall by the chaotic elevator car. Robin half-fell/flew towards the doorframe, his arms flailing.
"OOF!!!"
He hung off the side. Struggling. Wincing.
SWOOOOOSH!!!
The elevator came down on him.
Sandy gasped, dove forward, and grabbed Robin's wrists with her hands.
Robin planted his feets into the shaft wall and—using Sandy like a weight—pulled himself up and into the hallway.
Sandy yanked him safely out of the shaft---
WOOOOOSH!!!!
CRUNCH!!!!!!!!!
The elevator crashed loudly and explosively beyond the doorframe.
Dust rose, fell, and silenced into oblivion.
Robin and Sandy panted where they lay apart from each other on the cold hallway floor of the lower Tower level. The Boy Wonder gradually sat up and shook his dark head.
"Next time…we're taking the stairs."
Sandy wheezed and nodded.
"Come on…," he stood and helped Sandy dizzily up to her feet. "I've got an idea."
"Wh-What idea is that?"
"Did Noir get off on the level where I fought Beast Boy?"
"Y-Yeah. I sorta kicked him off…," she blushed.
Robin looked at her strangely for a moment but shook it off. "Okay….well, I think we can still do the Main Room Light Control thing."
"How?"
"Gotta make a pit stop first," Robin tugged her along the way with him. "Come on!"
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
I walked through a dark hallway…one armed…alone.
And yet, I smiled brilliantly when I heard--
"I'm depending on you, Noir!" Robin's voice said through my communicator. "Secure the Main Room and input the master authorization code. Since you'll be using a central computer station, you should be able to override the Puppet King's commands. First of all, I want you to unlock all of the firewalls in the hallways. Especially all doors blockading the stairwells!"
I punched a morse code into the button system of the communicator.
Robin responded: "YES, Sandy is fine! Yeah, love you too, Noir!"
I smirked.
"Just go to the Main Room, do that one little thing, then wait for us. Okay? We'll um………be joining you shortly."
I raised an eyebrow.
"Robin out."
I nodded and replied a short morse code message of affirmation before switching the communicator off. As I reached the darker shadows of the hallways, I whipped my shades off, smoothed my hair back beyond my bandanna, and cloaked my body into stealth mode….
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
The Main Room had a soft pink glow to it. I remembered barely the Lieutenant telling Robin over the communications that there was a light seen shining from the Main Room of the Tower. Perhaps I was about to find out why. It soon struck me that there was an entire City of people worrying over the mission of Robin, Sandy, and I. We had to do this very carefully…or else the Puppet King's ludicrous plan would be acted out and the Fusion Reactor would go off and…
I winced as I invisibly sneaked into the Main Room. I thought about the lives at stake. My friends who were possessed and inevitably beaten by their own kind trying to 'save' them'…and then the stains of cheese puffs on the Puppet King's lips. And I felt suddenly angry.
I clenched my fists….remembering that I only had one at the time.
I gulped and pressed on.
The Main Room was……..sashayed all over the place with white sheets and off-pink curtains. I blinked from under my shades and stood still to observe it all. For the femininity of the Tower had jumped by about three hundred and fifty percent.
I felt depressed.
I wandered stealthily through the forest of white linen and shimmering satin, trying my best not to touch or graze the material with my invisible limbs…thus giving myself away.
I soon became aware of three bodies forming shadows in the center of the room. Translucent figures of two women converged on yet another female in the center of the room. They seemed to be…fitting a dress-shaped shadow on her.
I blushed. This was the 'bride's room'.
"You look absolutely marvelous…," droned a random citizen, most likely mind controlled to become a hand maiden.
"The groom shall be so very pleased." The other hummed, just as stale and eerily emotionless at the first.
"I must not be too vain," Starfire's unmistakable voice uttered in zombie beauty. "It is the Puppet King who shall make me Queen and thus make me happy. Not myself."
I wanted to wretch. Instead, I snaked my cloaked way around the perimeter of the Main Room till I found--
I gasped happily, smiled, and rushed over.
The computer console rested in front of me…
"Shall you assist me with the attiring of my corset?" Starfire's voice asked the handmaidens.
I tried to ignore that…
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
The ceremony in the gym had more or less returned to normal. The possessed dancers gathered once again and performed a gentle waltz throughout the richly dressed interior.
But the Puppet King—sitting on his throne—seemed hardly at ease. He leaned against his scepter and tapped his free fingers against his wooden face.
Silence, save for music filtering out from the speakers of the place.
Suddenly, a green songbird fluttered down. Its wings morphed arms and its beak turned into the face of a elf. Beast Boy stood up, eyes a bright blue. He seemed bruised in a few places.
The Puppet King sat up straight. "Did you extinguish them as asked?"
Beast Boy slowly shook his possessed head. "They got away. But they were disbanded."
"I see….," the Puppet King slurred. His googly eyes shook. The dances swayed behind them. "Where has Robin gone?"
"I believe he and the strange girl are presently on the first level of the building. Heading into the garage and supply station."
"A dead end…," Puppet King tilted his head forward. "Unless they were attempting to escape. And if that be the case, they'd surely know that the Tower's defenses would obliterate them if they so much as showed themselves." A beat. He stood up. "Send my finest guards to seal them off."
The green elf nodded. "Aye, sir." He turned to go.
"Wait!"
Beast Boy stopped and looked at his 'master'.
The Puppet King stepped forward. "Let me accompany you. Cyborg is incapacitated and Raven is on an errand for the Queen. I'll be relying on you despite your shortcomings."
The green elf slowly nodded. "Anything I can do to please you, Master."
The Puppet King's eyes shook. "First….I'll need a saddle…."
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
I typed slowly at the computer, trying not to make a noise that could possibly alert the 'Queen' Starfire and the two 'handmaidens'. I hacked my way into the master programs of the Tower. I stared at the screen with naked black eyes. Once the window for the hallway security system stabbed into my optics, I performed a flurry of a keystroke and switched the firewalls off.
I took a deep breath of relief.
And then the reflection of a black top hat appeared in the monitor's reflection.
I glanced at it.
My lips parted---
FLASH!!!!!
Black energy encased my shoulders and flung me back.
SWOOOOSH!!!
I shredded through layers of white silk and linen. I couldn't help it. As I crashed, my stealth mode shattered and I lay visibly bruised and dizzy on the floor.
Two soft feet settled before me. Raven in a billowing magician's coat glared down. I saw my metal left hand tied to the bet around her leotarded waste.
"Come for your other hand, outsider?" she remarked with blue eyes glowing. "Or are you a peeping tom?"
I gulped, sat up, and waved. 'Hi Raven' I nervously mouthed with a smile.
"You are defiling the King's beloved by being here. I think it is due time I make you disappear."
And she flicked her wrists--
I winced.
FLASH!!!
Black energy encased me.
I gasped for breath.
And I was thrown across the prettied-up room.
SWOOOOOSH!!
-T-T-T-T-T-T-T-
On the bottom floor of the Tower, seven 'guards' rushed down a hallway with glowing blue eyes and threatening spears. They stood in front of the door to the Titan garage.
"Hold back…," the appointed leader of the possessed company commanded. "The two infiltrators are just inside. We must collectively assault them."
"Aye. For the Queen of Strings!"
"For the Queen of Strings!!"
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
Inside the garage, Sandy heard the chant outside. She turned her head and sweatdropped with an apprehensive blink of her goggled eyes.
"W-We have company…"
"Good," Robin walked past the T-Car and held out a small, red remote. "I love to show off my wheels." He clicked the remote.
Chirp-Chirp!
The R-Cycle lit up.
Sandy walked over and leaned apprehensively against a pillar in the garage. "Um…..wh-what are we doing exactly?"
The Boy Wonder walked over to the Cycle. "I thought I hinted to that earlier." He put on a helmet and tossed another one to Sandy.
She nervously caught it.
Robin smirked. "We're taking the stairs."
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
"Okay…prepare yourselves, men," the possessed citizen guard spoke. He stepped up towards the door to the garage. He shouted. "Come out of there at once, infidels!! The Puppet King requests of us to break down this door if we have to!"
SMASH!!!!
VROOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!
The R-Cycle burst through the door, smashing it to bits. Robin gripped the handles and grinned evilly while Sandy clung to him from behind. The wheels spun and burned rubber as the vehicle righted itself and the Boy Wonder zoomed it forward. Some guards were knocked unconscious. Others dove desperately out of the way as Robin laid on the horn-HONNNNNK!!!-and throttled down the hallway like it was a compacted, underground interstate.
VROOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!!!!
Recovering guards shouted and tossed their spears at the two's rear.
Sandy flinched.
Robin swerved to avoid the bludgeons.
CLANK!!! CL-CLANK!!!
The spears struck the walls and clattered to the floor.
Robin reached a corner and swerved hard on the bike.
SCREEEECH!!!
He planted his feet to the ground, pivoted the bike some, and forced it down the new turn and towards a distant stairwell.
"Ha ha ha ha ha!!!" Robin couldn't help it. "I'm some showoff, huh?!?!"
Sandy gulped. "Yeah…my bladder can feel it."
"Hold your breath!!"
Robin aimed for the stairwell. He switched the R-Cycle's one floodlight and—VROOOOOM!!!!! The two drove up the bumpity stairs of the passageway, ascending to the next floor…and the next…and the next….
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
WHAM!!!!
I slammed into a potted plant, my one arm flailing.
I winced and hobbled up to my feet.
I glanced up—panting—as magician Raven floated down in front of me. Her eyes were a chaotic gray-blue. Her fingertips flickered with wisps of black magic.
"You do not know when to quit," she uttered. "No wonder Raven has respect for you."
I raised an eyebrow.
She aimed her wrists at me again. "Forgive me if this is painful. I must strip you of your skin now. It is the easiest way to make you bleed to death."
I bit my lip. I looked in the general direction of the Main Room's windows beyond the shadowed forms of Starfire and the two citizens.
Raven may have been badass as a possessed magician, but she still wasn't Raven. Her only purpose at that time and place was to eliminate me. As long as I distracted her from Starfire and the computer consoles…then I could wait for Robin's and Sandy's arrival and we could all settle together with our combined strengths.
So in a blink, I whipped my shades back on, gripped Myrkblade, and dove/tore a way through the sheets of drowning linen just in time to avoid a launch of Raven's obsidian energy.
I shredded my way through the curtains and suddenly tripped into the center of the room.
WHUMP!!!
"!!!!!"
I stumbled up to my feet, wincing, and glanced up. I blinked.
Two dazed 'handmaidens' looked my way. So did Starfire…with her underwear visibly showing.
She stoically blinked her glowing blue eyes. "Is this not an intrusion?"
I blushed furiously and covered my shaded eyes, wincing.
Bad idea. The magician came back.
FLASH!!!!
I was knocked clear out of the center of the 'chamber' and towards the windows of the Main Room. At least it was 'some' progress.
Though I'd never forgive myself….
"Leave the Queen's presence!" possessed Raven snarled. "NOW!!!"
I was only happy to obliged. I gripped Myrkblade with one hand, got up to my feet, blurred, and leapt through the windows--
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SMASH!!!!!!
I sailed out into the dark night, but not without twirling about and stabbing the solid wall of the Tower with Myrkblade.
CLANK!!!
I dangled as shards of glass fell and littered the distant ground below me.
The waves crashed against the bluffs. The searchlights swarmed all around from the security outposts of the surrounding baysides. The sounds of helicopters and police sirens swarmed into my ears.
I gulped.
FLASH!!!!
Black energy streamed out and towards my dangling body. I took a breath, summoned murk, and vaulted myself up with an outward pulse that sent me flipping skyward and landing more or less nimbly on the rooftop of the Tower.
I regained my breath.
FWOOOOSH!!!
I sensed a shadow against the stars behind me.
I spun around.
The dark blue magician hovered against a backdrop of golden searchlights and blinking helicopters. Not to mention moonlight and celestial obscurity.
"Do you wish to see the secrets behind magic?" she uttered. Her wrists aimed at me. "Death shall be waiting with the answers for you."
I took a deep breath. I clenched my fingers around the hilt of Myrkblade.
I had only one honest and true option….
I turned and ran with my tail between my blurred legs.
She grunted and flicked her wrists. Talons of dark black energy soared after me, scooping up huge clumps of rooftop.
CRUNNNNNNNNCH!!!!
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VROOOOOOOM!!!
The R-Cycle reached the end of that particular stairwell and evened out into a hallway of the third floor.
The motorcycle vibrated loudly, filling the cold metal hallways with echoing, engine madness. Robin turned the vehicle about and throttled down the hallway towards a stairwell that would lead them higher up the Tower.
Sandy exclaimed: "Look out!! Twelve O'Clock!!"
"I see 'em!" Robin shouted through his helmet.
Two possessed guards with spears ran to a stop in the hallway and lifted their weapons overhead.
Robin used his freehand to whip out a birdarang and fling it ahead while driving.
SW-SW-SW-SW-SW-SW-SWISH!!!
CLANK!!!!
The spear of one guard was knocked out of his grasp. He gripped his hand and winced. The second guard flung his weapon.
Sandy clenched her goggled eyes shut.
Robin shifted his weight back. "HA!!!" He pulled the bike into a wheelie. VROOOOOOOOOM!!! The uplifted chassis deflected the spear. DINK!!! Coasting on the rear wheel alone, Robin drifted by the second guard and lifted his left leg just in time to uppercut him unconscious. WHACK!!!
The man fell down and--
WHUMP!! SCREEECH!!! Robin's front tire came back down and he gunned it. VROOOOOOM!!!
The two screeched around a corner and rocketed towards a stairwell in sight.
"Almost there!" Sandy exclaimed, smiling again for once.
Just then, the automatic doors on the side wall flung open and a dazed, one-armed Cyborg crawled out.
Sandy gasped.
Robin gritted his teeth and swung hard to the side.
SCREEEEEECH!!!
There was barely a foot left to clear between Cyborg's metal skull and the far wall of the hallway, but Robin cleared it. As he zoomed along, though, Cyborg's human eye glowed an angry bright blue and he stretched his remaining arm as a laser cannon and fired.
ZAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP!!!!!!
As Robin reached a turn, he swerved the motorcycle so hard that it skidded sideways and pivoted towards the incoming laser at a sixty-degree angle, effectively—and barely—managing to have the two infiltrators duck the blue laser blast that smashed apart a wall beyond them as the Boy Wonder kicked the throttle and the two soared up the stairwell. Wheels bumpitying up stairs as they ascended in such gloriously ghetto fashion.
"So much for b-banisters…," Sandy murmured.
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RIPP!!!!
FLASH!!!!
An A/C unit tore off the rooftop in a black bubble and soared at me.
I flipped its flinging flight. I landed, skidded along the Tower's rooftop, and twirled Myrkblade with one hand just in time haphazardly 'bat' the A/C unit away on its second incoming dive.
CLANK!!!!
Raven floated around me, flexing her arms and ripping up a t.v. antenna this time.
I spun, panting.
The metal skeleton flew at me.
I flung myself down onto the floor, back first.
SCRAAAAPE!!!!
The sharp branches of the antenna trailed the floor around me, barely missing my limbs.
Immediately once it had passed, I jumped up to my feet, spun Myrkblade, and jabbed backwards.
CLUNK!!!
I smirked.
Just as I thought, the antenna was making a return trip and I had just impaled it. With a pulse of Destruction, the thing shattered to shrapnel. SMASH!!!!
Raven the magician gritted her teeth. She then flew up and let out a long, feminine growl as she waved both hands around. Her eyes pulsed blue and gray.
I raised an eyebrow over my shades.
Suddenly, the ground beneath me shook. A black shadow exploded beneath me, and a huge slab of concrete roofing shot apart.
"!!!!!"
I was flung like a rag doll towards the edge of the rooftop.
I held my breath, teleported closer to the edge in mid-air, and barely grabbed onto the side.
I panted…then realized I was staring point blank at one of the defense cannons of the Tower.
WHUUUUUR-CLINK!!!
It's double-barrel eyes stared at me.
I stared back.
Blink.
POW!!!!!!
Laser fire exploded where my body had been half a second before. I was in the process of vaulting/flipping back up in the air towards the center of the rooftop. Searchlights and twinkling stars silhouetted me on the reentry. I landed in a crouch that too closely resembled a split. I wheezed—though I had seriously meant to whimper.
SWOOOSH!!!
Raven floated down in front of me, cape billowing.
"You are a most annoying audience….," the 'magician' grumbled.
I looked at her painfully. I took a breath. I hoisted Myrkblade above me in a blink of an eye and threw it like a javelin.
Raven had no cognitive ability to 'gasp'.
SLASH!!!!
The blade ripped through her black magician's cape and threw her back, pinning her snugly against the concrete protrusion of the top most stairwell doorframe.
I clenched my fleshly fist, blurred at her, planted my feet against the wall on either side of her legs, grabbed my metal hand from her belt, and vaulted myself off with a backflip. I landed three yards away, satisfied with my fetching.
I smiled.
Suddenly, my metal hand came to life in my right hand's grasp. The middle finger presented itself to my face.
I did a double-take.
WOOOSH-GRIP!!!!
I wheezed and struggled for air as the loose limb was suddenly possessed by black energy and strangling me by remote.
Raven—pinned to the wall—had an evil look on her face as she manipulated my metal hand and forced it to squeeze the air out of my scarred throat.
"If you have a problem with the royal performance….I suggest you take it up with the theatre."
I wheezed and struggled, gripping the metal fingers that were gripping me with my right hand. I fell to my knees, rolled my black eyes, and summoned up murk. I teleported through my own hand's grip, materialized on my feet, kicked it up like a hackey-sack, then smacked it with Myrkblade like a golf club.
SWOOOOSH-BONK!!!!
It struck Raven hard in the forehead.
"…….ow." She hung limply from the wall. Unconscious.
I took an exasperated breath and slumped to the rooftop floor.
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VROOOOOM!!!!
Robin's R-Cycle exited the stairwell so quickly, the motorcycle literally flew into the hallway before landing on squealing tires and zooming ahead.
"W-We're almost there!" Sandy joyfully exclaimed.
"Y-Yeah!" Robin nodded with his helmet. "The Main Room should be just up ahead—"
ZAAAAAAAP!!!
A bolt of quivering electricity flew at them.
"YAAAK!!!"
"Hang on!!!"
Robin swerved to the side. The electricity bounced off the chassis, barely avoiding the limbs of the two teens.
The cycle came to a stop.
The panting duo looked in shock.
Out from the shadows of the hallway emerged a snarling green panther with blue eyes. And riding him—saddle and all—was the Puppet King. His scepter was sparking in his grasp. A taser of biblical proportions.
"This is as far as you go. If you wish to be with my Queen. You must duel for her."
"Oh for the love of Saved by the Bell," Robin grumbled. "Can't you leave us alone?!"
"NO!!" the Puppet King's midgety wooden body shook. "You leave US alone!! This marriage does not concern you!!"
Robin gritted his teeth. "Like Hell it does…"
The Puppet King whipped the reins and the panther trotted closer. "Why is that?"
"Because nobody….manhandles….Starfire….."
"Um…R-Robin?" Sandy murmured. "You're not gonna lose it are you---"
VROOOOOOOOM!!!!!
"AAAAIIIEEEE!!!!"
Robin zoomed full-throttle at the Puppet King.
The Puppet King whipped the reins and charged his electrical scepter. The panther hissed and ran at full fury.
Robin whipped out his metal rod and held it like a jouster.
The Puppet King held out his scepter.
Sandy hid her helmeted face in Robin's back.
The panther's eyes glowed a bright blue.
Warbling engine met pounding paws and---
"YAAAAH!!!" Robin's staff swung. SWOOOSH!!!!
"RRRRGHH!!!" The Puppet King's scepter shocked. ZAAAAAP!!!!
Electricity exploded in the center of the converging duelists.
Robin skidded to the side and the two teenagers ducked the electricity.
The King's panther leapt, bounced off the wall, and re-footed itself in the center of the hallway, snarling.
Robin swung the R-Cycle around in the thin hallway. VROOOOOM!!! Teeth gritting, he revved the engine once…twice…and throttled back towards the King.
The panther went into full gallop.
Metal rod twirled.
Scepter flashed.
Sandy's gasp echoed against the hallway walls and as the two combatants converged--
CLANK!!!!
Robin smacked the Puppet King hard across the head. His wooden cranium spun a few times as his panther steed came to a stop and he had to stop it with his own puppet hands.
Robin swung the R-Cycle to a stop, smirking. "Hey Pinocchio?! Need some aspirin for your kicked ass?!?!"
The googled eyes glared. "Your ignorance ends NOW!!!" He charged the scepter up full blast.
Sandy murmured. "You're getting him maaaaaad."
Robin's eyemask narrowed. "That's the whole point."
The panther roared and the King was in full gallop.
"Starfire…here we come…," Robin murmured. VROOOOOOM!!!
The two came at each other from a length.
The R-Cycle's headlight glinted off the floors and walls.
The fangs of the panther showed.
The Puppet King raised his scepter, flared with anger, and stretched it outward. "YAAAAAH!!!!"
ZAAAAAAAAAAAAAP!!!!!!!!
A blue wave of electrical fury burned through the hallway.
"Grab the scepter!!" Robin shouted and flipped open the safety cap of the cycle's nitro switch.
"What?!?!?!"
"You'll see!! Just do it!!"
He flipped the red switch.
POWWWWWW!!!!!
A rocket erupted in the back of the R-Cycle.
VROOOOOOOM!!!
Robin blurred the two of them ahead.
The wave of blue electricity came.
He held his breath and jerked the handles to the side.
The R-Cycle literally ran up the wall, onto the ceiling, and down the other wall—agilely avoiding the blue stream.
The Puppet King gasped.
"I challenge YOU!!" Robin swiped his rod—CLANK!!!—off the King's blockhead. "Wooden bastard!!!"
"AUGH!!!" the King fell off his feline steed. His scepter flew.
Sandy gasped and reached her hands out.
She caught it.
"Yes!!" she beamed.
"Hang on!!" Robin throttled towards the double doors leading into the Main Room.
The Puppet King dizzily sat up on his stumpy behind and stretched a wooden limb out, shouting: "No!!! The Queen's room!!"
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SMASH!!!!!
The R-Cycle burst through the double-doors and came to a stop in front of the walls of linen and off-pink silk.
Robin planted his feet on the floor on either side of the motorcycle, whipped off his helmet, caught his breath, and uttered: "Starfire!! We came to lift the curse!!" A beat. "Starfire??"
Flanked by two handmaidens, the redheaded bride spun around. She wore a flowing, expensive wedding gown of satin and silk ivory. Flowers hemmed the dress and neckline. A veil stretched behind her head and ran alongside the red strands of Tamaranian hair.
Blue eyes traced with green eyed Robin strangely from afar.
Robin was breathless….but he couldn't figure if it was from her beauty or from fear for--
"Star….," he murmured. "Star….c-can you hear me?"
The zombie bride blinked. "I am sorry…," she calmly uttered. She raised two glowing hands of green. "But I cannot allow you to ruin this wedding."
Robin's eyemask bulged.
Sandy dropped the scepter.
And the starbolts flew. FLASH!!! FLASH!!!
FLASH!!!!
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Downstairs….
In the familiar, darkened evidence room….
An automatic door flung open. A fat figure entered. He flicked on a light.
-Click-
Electric blightness flooded the interior.
Control Freak whistled. He grinned like a fat kid in a tiny candy store as he walked down the aisles of captured villain stuff.
"I could spend a day in here!! A Romulan New Year, even!"
After a short stroll—however—he stumbled upon what he was there for.
"Ah!! At last!"
He bravely smashed a glass display open with his fist. He reached inside and pulled out a Klingon, red and black remote control. He cradled it to his face like a baby and cooed: "I told you I'd get back to you…didn't I?"