Another chapter is written! Here's where you get to see how disturbing my mind can really be…
To Beautiful Storm Dancer- I would love to console you, but that would ruin all the fun!
Gingerstorm101- I can't tell you. Sorry!
To Chico Magnifico- thank you. I've realized recently that there isn't much breathing room at all in this story. The effects of that are beginning to get more apparent in this chapter…
To FallingDarkAngel- Thanks
To FelynxTiger- thank you. I actually have a sketch of the T Tank in my drawing pad, if I ever get a DA account I'll make sure to upload it.
To Guardian of Night- don't worry, there is much more (for now, this is only part 1). And the review did help, btw. They all do.
To YourMoosyFate- all very good questions. I cannot give answers yet, though.
I would like to give all of you a big thank you again! A big thank you for your excellent reviews and your sympathy in this trying time. I'll try and make it up to you by making this the best damn story I can.
Enjoy…
She was tied, unable to move.
Her arms and legs were bound together by thick ropes of cloth, and those in turn were fastened to a rusty metal pole in the middle of a dusty courtyard. The sun beat down from a cloudless sky, and the ground seemed to waver and twist under a shimmering mirage.
She heard a loud clicking sound, and she turned her head to see a group of anonymous soldiers exiting from a small door in the crumbling stone wall. Pulled behind them was a group of 7 people, all badly beaten and blindfolded, chained together.
She recognized them, and tried to call out, but suddenly she was gagged and couldn't make a sound. She could only slump against her bonds as she watched the faceless men line up all of the prisoners against the wall. Tears began to run from the corners of her eyes as she stood as a helpless audience. They were so damaged. The cracks in one's metal arms and legs shone in the relentless sun, and the blood sparkled off of another's green skin. This one seemed to notice she was there, and turned in her direction, trying to see through the blindfold. One of the soldiers slapped him, and he hung his head.
Another man came out of the door, and his perfect white suit gleamed. For some reason this man had thorny antlers growing out of his head, and was glaring at them all through four red eyes.
"Let them go! Please!" she called out, gag disappearing. "I'm the one you want!"
"Global security," was all the man said. He smiled, revealing a grotesque mouthful of fangs, and made a motion with a gloved hand. The faceless soldiers lined up in front of the chained prisoners and leveled their rifles.
"Give me the child," the man in the white suit growled.
She could only shake her head. Tears spattered the dusty ground and were instantly soaked up.
There was another twist of the gloved hand, and flames seemed the flicker into the air from his fingers. The soldiers put their scopes up to their black eyes.
"NO!"
There was a loud bang, and the air was tinted red. It splashed across the stones and onto her face. She couldn't wipe it away, and it burned there like acid.
"Global security," the man repeated. Somehow his suit was unsoiled. "Best for everyone if you cooperate."
She felt her stomach drop, and suddenly the man was holding an infant child in his hand. He grinned, teeth shining in the sun, and he very slowly pulled a thin, silver pistol from his coat.
"Please…" she sobbed. Blood dripped off of her chin.
He only laughed, a painfully familiar sound to her, and tensed his finger on the trigger.
"Rachael!" a faint voice seemed to call from the sky, but she couldn't take her eyes off the child.
The trigger moved, so slowly, and with a puff of smoke and a distant bang, a golden bullet exited the barrel, and she could track its movements. It was soaring closer and closer, unstoppable, and the man was laughing, and a soft crying sound echoed in her ears, and she was being shaken strongly by a firm hand. Blood boiled on her face, and her name was being called…
Raven screamed and woke up. She stared around for a second at the interior of the tank, then collapsed into her husband's shoulder, sobbing hysterically.
"Shh, shh… it was just a dream," he soothed her. "Just a nightmare."
The rest of them watched with wide, nervous eyes as Raven tried to speak, but she was so terrified she was shaking uncontrollably. Beast Boy hugged her closer, eyes closed.
"You… all of you… broken, bleeding…" she managed to gasp. "Chains… SHOT…"
Everyone glanced at each other, grim looks on their faces. While Raven's words were almost incomprehensible, her message was clear.
"And him… four red eyes… he had Emily, Garfield!" she shouted, gripping his shirt. "He shot her!"
"Who?"
"The man in the white suit! He had my father's eyes, and Emily… he just pulled a pistol out of his coat and shot her right in the forehead!"
"Relax, Rachael… it was just a dream…" Robin said softly.
"You don't understand, Richard!" Raven practically screamed, leaping to her feet. "Azarathian's dreams are more than nightmares! Sometimes they predict the future!"
"Rae… from what you've said, your dream doesn't make any sense," Cyborg said from the driver's seat. Raven wheeled to face him. "I mean… you said he had Trigon's eyes… and he doesn't. How can that be the future?"
Raven sighed and sat back down next to Beast Boy, rubbing her temples. "So where are we?" she asked, voice cracking.
Cyborg looked over his shoulder at the gps display. "Somewhere on the southern California coast."
"What happened after we teleported?"
"When we arrived here you were unconscious," Starfire explained. "Victor preformed a medical analysis and concluded that you were not hurt, so we set up our defenses and waited. Just before you woke up you were screaming and thrashing about in your sleep."
"I'm sorry guys…" Raven began, but Bumblebee stopped her.
"Don't be. You got us out of there just in time."
"Did we lose the army?"
"For now."
(…)
Brother Blood breathed in the salty coastal air and sighed. He was free of his wretched cell, but not truly free. The soldiers provided for him were wearing a sort of device that cancelled out his persuasive control, and they kept their guns on him at all times. He was merely a superpowered figurehead for the government, who had promised him freedom in return for destroying the Teen Titans. He highly doubted that they would keep their promise, but if there was even the slightest chance, what choice did he have? And eliminating the Titans wasn't so bad either. They had air-dropped him and his hired army about twenty miles away from their targets, in fear that Cyborg's advanced sensors would pick them up if they were any closer, and had left them to walk the rest of the way.
He shook his head and closed his human eye, focusing on the displays on his cybernetic one. Being half robot was indeed hard to get used to, but it had its advantages. One of which was that he didn't have to carry around a holographic map like his army did; it was all in his head. Not that he would have needed a map anyway; one look and he would have had it memorized.
The coordinates displayed over his vision showed that the Titans were camped out approximately twelve miles away, on a remote rocky beach.
He sniffed the air again and flinched as he walked. Despite his name, he had always despised the smell of blood and flesh, and it was heavy on the wind. They would have never found the location of the former superheroes without the beast wrapped in chains behind him, but he regretted ever agreeing to take it with him. It was so… unnatural, and it couldn't be controlled. There was a group of twenty men assigned to hold the chains, and twenty more with electric ropes, but even that was barely enough. It was a monster, plain and simple, and it revolted him. Its rancid meat smell, its savage growls… disgusting. He preferred machines to creatures every time.
He checked his display again. Still twelve miles.
Slow progress, but they were getting closer.
(…)
They had decided to set up some makeshift tent resembling structures outside the tank under the shade of the rocks for the sake of Jinx's claustrophobia, which was driving her near insane. Raven was assigned to lay in one of the tents on the most comfortable surface they had and try to get some real sleep, but she was doing rather poorly in that respect. She was so terrified of having another dream like the first that all she could do was lay there shaking, staring wide-eyed at the ceiling. Her composure was completely shattered.
Beast Boy peered discretely around the corner of the tent flap to see Raven's eyes still open and turned back to his friends.
"We have to do something," he pleaded with them. "She's broken… I've never seen her so vulnerable."
Cyborg laid a hand on his shoulder. "She'll be okay, man, she's just scared."
"Do you hear what you're saying?" Beast Boy asked. "Rae doesn't get scared! She's always strong enough to take anything head on, and now she can't… it's not like her!"
Starfire bit her lip. "She is not normal, Garfield. Our species are similar in the use of our powers, so I'm assuming other aspects are as well. When Tamaraneans are with child, our powers cease to work and we may become moody and sullen, which is not natural to our race. I fear Rachael may be experiencing the same thing."
"Being pregnant is causing her to act in ways she normally wouldn't," Robin elaborated. "Energy she normally might put into controlling her fear is now being directed towards Emily."
Beast Boy's shoulders sagged and he sunk to the ground with a drawn-out sigh.
"I'm not sure what to do anymore," he confessed to them. "Both me and Rae are falling apart. With her in such a weak state and me being me, I don't think we can last much longer."
Cyborg laid a heavy hand on his shoulder, forcing the changeling to look into his eyes.
"You can, dude. And you have us, remember? We'll make it through this."
Beast Boy nodded, but the clouds of doubt remained heavy upon him.
(…)
Nine miles. Walking was so slow!
Blood rolled his human eye and turned around to face his army, which was almost out of sight behind him. He spat on the ground and teleported back to them.
"WHAT IS TAKING SO LONG?" he shouted into a soldier's ear, causing him to jump and scream. Brother Blood fumed, arms folded and metal shoulders hunched.
"I… I… um…" the soldier stuttered. The troops surrounding him were beginning to shy away slowly.
"Spit. It. Out." Brother Blood hissed. "Now."
"Well… the weapon… it sort of…"
Blood raised an eyebrow.
"It ate three of our men, sir, and now it's in a rage. We can barely keep it controlled."
"What?"
"The energy whips won't contain it for long."
"Fine. Bring me to it."
The soldier reluctantly led him around some of their vans to the weapon was. Blind, animalistic insanity was apparent in its eyes, and bubbling foam spilled from its scarred lips. The mighty twists of its head sent the men holding the chains sliding across the ground in a shouting pile.
Brother Blood made a face and held out his hand. A pulsing red light sparkled on his fingertips, and the wild movements ceased.
The soldiers watched in awe as Brother Blood lowered his hand and walked back to the head of the army.
"Now hurry up, please, or I will have to let it eat another one of you."
(…)
Raven slowly sat up, wiping cold sweat from her forehead. It was obvious that she wasn't going to sleep like everyone wanted her to. And her pendant was beginning to burn against her skin.
She coughed and rubbed her eyes. What was wrong with her? Her emotions were running so high that her jewel couldn't contain them all, and she felt sick; her head was spinning and waves of nausea were washing over her in sickening regularity.
Maybe she couldn't sleep, but what about meditation? Perhaps she could figure out what was going on with her senses.
While unable to levitate, she assumed the position and attempted to find her center. Instead, all she could feel was an aura, white, and swirling blackness beyond. She frowned. The white aura was Emily, but where was Nevermore? What was going on?
She was suddenly overcome with a startlingly realistic vision.
Raven was standing in the middle of a grey forest, surrounded by monochrome trees in every direction. She spun around, trying to catch her breath and orient herself, but the air remained thin, and everything was spinning.
"Rachael."
She whirled to see that the nearest tree had taken on the face of Beast Boy, the bark twisting his normally handsome face into something painful and distorted. The other trees were forming into the likenesses of everyone else, and then random people she had never seen before.
"Why did I love you, Rachael?" moaned the tree with Beast Boy's face upon it. "You have only brought me pain."
At the whispered end of those words, the tree burst into flames.
She screamed and jumped back as the whole forest caught, face after face crumbling to charcoal in towers of heat. One by one they fell to ash, until she was surrounded by drifts of the residue, blowing into her eyes on the bitter wind.
Raven gasped for breath and soared back to the real world. She stared at the ground, disoriented and sick. The thoughts of the ash and blood rose the surface of her clouded mind, and she threw up onto the dirt beside her. The acid burned in her throat.
She leaned back and stared at the ceiling, panting.
"What is wrong with me?" she asked the canvas. There was no answer.
(…)
The sun was past its highest point, and was just beginning to slide back towards the Earth. Brother Blood checked the coordinates once again. Five miles.
"Weapon check," he called back to his men.
"Still calm enough," replied one of his higher-ranking officers. "Though I think it's getting restless."
"Not to worry, we are close."
Brother Blood turned back to the rocks he was hiking over. He didn't need any sensors at all to tell he was near the Titans; he could feel the rebellion, the "spirit", rolling off of Cyborg like oil. He smiled grimly. That problem would soon be remedied. Cyborg was his.
(…)
Jinx found her husband sitting on top of the ledge that hung over the T Tank, keeping watch for any threats. He turned, saw her, and invited her to sit beside him.
"What's up?" he asked, wrapping an arm around her.
"I'm worried, Wally," she admitted. "I'm worried Rachael is cracking under the strain, I'm worried Garfield is going to lose it once Rachael does, and I'm worried that we're not going to make it out of this."
"We will, Jenny, don't worry," Flash assured her.
Jinx smirked. "You're a terrible liar."
Flash's smile faded slowly, and he looked out into the sunset again.
Jinx felt her husband's lean body tense, and she instinctively went on her guard. "What is it?"
"There's something on the horizon…" he said softly. "I can't tell what it is, but it's big and it's moving slowly."
"What is it?" Jinx muttered to herself as she spotted the object too. It was meant to be a rhetorical question, but Flash answered her anyway.
"An army."
Jinx grit her teeth in anger as Flash suddenly leapt off the cliff, down into the midst on the camp below. Cyborg shouted as the man landed beside them, eyes wide.
"There's an army coming this way!" he said breathlessly.
"That's what it is? I saw something on the scanners but I just assumed it was a herd of something, there's no air support."
"Herds of animals don't move in formation," Flash said grimly. "Or drive vans."
Bumblebee swore, and Beast Boy turned pale, which was actually and sickly pea-green color. Robin and Starfire frowned.
"Should we run?" Starfire asked.
"I don't think we'll be able to get away without another chase," Flash said. "They're too close, and they'll see us leaving."
"And Rae's in no condition to teleport us," Beast Boy added.
"Well, they know we're here," Cyborg said, walking over to the T Tank. "Why not send them a greeting?"
He tapped a button, and a missile shot out of the roof of the car.
(…)
Brother Blood stopped his men as he noticed a bright dot on the horizon, getting larger. He quickly zoomed in with his electronic eye to reveal that it was a missile, colored in Cyborg's signature electric blue and grey scheme.
"A missile, sir?" one of his men asked. Blood nodded, zooming back out.
"They know we're here."
"Should we take evasive action? Launch a counterstrike?" another man asked.
"No," Blood said. "That missile is designed by Cyborg, evasive actions and counter missiles won't do any good."
"Then what do we do?"
Blood smiled and spread his hands out beside him, taking a deep breath through his thin nose.
"We're going to jump the last few miles."
There was a flash of red, and the entire army teleported.
Holy snap!
What's going to happen now? Is Raven going insane? What's this weapon Brother Blood is preparing to use? How will Cyborg react to seeing his old nemesis? Will the Titans make it out of this alive?
Review to satisfy that gnawing curiosity now, and then live with the rest until Chapter 8. It'll be a blast!