Teen Titans Presents Robin; Torn Legacy of a Prodigal Son –
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Chapter 42: A Life Without Pain in It is Meaningless
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The metaphorical title is meant to be just that. Basing this on Gotham Knight anime with Indian teacher and a few different takes, also almost death in this to be clear. Slade saw Dick almost kill a person so…he's going to put a spin on this sort of training tactic and let death stare the kid in the face if it can. Wait and find out!
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Dick was trying to sit up, though Slade's arm had him pinned to remain. His head down into the copter seat as if the rest was history. They'd lost Bruce, a possible fellow Titan had perished and…and…he'd almost learned to inflict harm to a human body…even if it was a stunt.
"You're going to need to stay seated, just until the shot wears off." Slade muttered to his protégé. The mask back on, Dick was the only one without that and in a dust ridden uniform. "You can keep that on." He told the boy who groaned and let his hair be pushed into the side of the man's leg. "Why this…"
"How can I possibly give you a full answer, kid? However, even for an act on Cheshire you did manage to wound her…. even with the pig's blood being an interesting touch."
"You…could tell…"
"I kill EVERYTHING." Slade snorted and rolled eye at the amateur remark. "Boars, bears, gators and even dragons…. long story. You'll have to wake up soon, or else your departure won't be soft."
"Huh?"
Suddenly, the boy was shoved onto the floor, his belly down and his legs still asleep from whatever Slade had injected him with. "Give it a minute, you'll start to have feeling…right about…"
The wave was not kind as Dick felt something other than a simple migraine race through his head. In fettle positon, he was jabbed by his master's foot. "You can't be hurt unless you have a weapon…when are you going to learn to be more tactically inclined, RENEGADE!" The man shoved down his boot, the pain crushing as Dick curled up a bit more, the boot finally rising as arms together tugged the kid to where the craft was readying to land. A mountain path to a country as humid right now as the end of summer. Dick was breathing at least, puffs of breath as Slade took him to the door, ramming it back before throwing the kid off and leaving him with a stare. "Get better at managing pain; the job requires it. See you in a few days apprentice, or else the Titans won't get another respite for your actions."
The craft flew off, Dick groveling in the dirt as he shouted for Slade to come back, to not desert him in the middle of no place he knew…the palms and groves, the forest was thick as he would have to get to civilization in his socks…
No gear, no unit and it was too hot as he got up, dazed and tired and cranky! Slade wasn't doing this! He was…it was not his fault; he wasn't a killer…
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Women dressed in long sari and a few light colors that seemed reminiscent to rural India. Nanda Parbat was further north, so that explained the shift in altitude. He was stared at or ignored, the locals quite taken to a degree by his outfit and maybe even cautious since the logo of Ra's was etched into his tidy whites. Dick blushed yet realized that he was actually thirsty. He saw a vendor and remembered nothing of speaking the language, nor did he think Batman had been…he could be wrong, some meditative practices Bruce had said were picked up on his journey to "become" the Bat.
The vendor was no help to it, so Dick looked and decided to keep walking, or….or.
He looked into his pouches and smiled. He had something to barter for the water he wanted.
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Directions were also given to the nearest inn, yet the only thing he could trade there would be enough to piss of Ra's and Slade if he ever made it back or was hunted down in a few days…was that how long it could take? Maybe he actually meant a month or…
Dick felt pale, was it…it…. his punishment?
Shaking his head, he kept walking. The canister enough as he kept the cold drink and sipped in small amounts to preserve his last meal. He had to speak. Someone had to…
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The city, was big. He walked faster, the idea of being run over a scare, yet the city itself was in fact in India. The rest proved it. There were many bearded elders with interesting…. side attractions. He saw over the way a man with a mustache, possibly in his early forties just sitting, before he got up to sigh and dust off his wares before seating himself again. A market, which meant English… maybe?
"Um…Excuse me?"
Dick came before the man, the person not as he would have pictured. The boy cleared his throat and tried a bit harder…. What was the phrase…he had to know this….!
"Ah…. Kya aap…. angrejee…. bolate, hain….?" (Google translation I apologize! Feel free to correct, I love to learn!)
The man gave a sort of funny look, something sarcastic before replying, "Do you speak any Hindi, ladaka?"
"I…yes and no, rusty. Not very good."
"I see that, you look as if you fell off of a mountain."
"I…"
The man took one close look and his eyes got big. Bigger, by the emblem on the kid's chest. "Eh?? Why are you out here! You escaped the mountain fort?? You must stay out of sight. I cannot be seen –
"Please! I need to find….a phone, that's all." Dick clapped his hands together as the man, being perhaps a parent as well, maybe an empathetic person…. he had to say yes. "You promise you are not going steal from my stall?"
"I'm the sort of person who can't break the law, please…I'm in danger if I don't find a way to get home."
"I understand." The man looked around, his arm going below to pull up a sign saying "Back in five" in Hindi. "Come, I'll only let you use the long distance once. Phone lines aren't easy to keep in the countryside." Immediately, Dick thanked the man with a smile and did what he could to punch in the Titans' line, or right now the Titans' stand ins' line.
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Which was Cy and a new recruit at that very moment.
"Huh…who is thi –
~CY! ~
Cyborg nearly dropped the line as Kid Flash gawked at the luck as he prodded Aqualad in the shoulder. "We are way ahead a ya!"
"Robin?? Dick, are you…where are you man?? I'm seeing a line I –
~In India, Slade dropped me here and said to get used to …. doesn't matter. The only person I found here right now said he'll let me stay the night and a wise man on the mountain I was dropped might be able to help. He said a woman was a dark cloak was seen in town. Has Raven been –
KF guffawed out of habit. "Dude, she got the memo and we put a tracer on –
~ DON'T. ~ Dick suddenly warned. ~ Slade, the nanos he altered are still inside me, and there is a way he has access to everything I'm up to. You need to let her know. I'm going to find her, but don't tell anyone yet…I have...to make…~
"Robin? Robin! Are –
The line went dead as the minutes didn't drop, yet the man from behind was on another burner. "Mister Deathstroke. He came like you told us. Going to ship him up the mountain as planned." The man nodded to his accomplice and the rest was set as an unconscious boy wonder should have never tried to be so nice about fibbing his head off.
He was still a bit rusty in the lie department. Slade was whittling away that old habit yet as the boy was dragged into a car and forced to lie still once more…
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Slade's trooper had knocked the kid out long enough to leave him a few feet from the small village where a powerful teacher lived and breathed. A lot of people even in his home area called the man a sorcerer, yet Dick was the first to learn that this person might have the power to alter his later fate…
Dragging himself to the first door he saw, a bruise on his head now swollen a bit, the stupid faker had…ugh! Why was he so trusting?? What happened to the more assertive and reckless idiot that had run around roof –
The door opened crack as Dick just tried to remember some of the language, and yet again that idea was useless for once.
"Who is this? A scrawny thing you are…Ah, a guest…go away."
"Wait! I'm…I'm in trouble. Do you have a phone… so I can call –
"Will that solve your problem? Did it do any good to act upon the same action instead of to think of other ways to better your predicament?"
Dick gawked at the man. "He got to you too…The kid shook his head. "Deathstroke, am I right?"
"Sadly, we are both victim to this madness, so I will not tell you if I believe the man whose wish was to be granted." Dick blinked up at the man. "You…you won't help him? You, then you must be someone who knows…Batman!"
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"There was a teacher and witch in a few villages over who had been taught to overcome pain. I too learned from the same masters as she, yet she…was no equal. A perhaps tortured spirit."
"Sla…Deathstroke told me to overcome pain for my job, so you know what he wants to do…right…who he told you I was."
"You are a boy becoming a man and finding your place amid the chaos, and right now is my mid-day meal. Would you like to join me?" Dick nodded on instinct, his stomach also agreeing that it was well past breakfast. "Very good, come inside. You may change as well. That suit will not do in this climate."
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The hot tea was good here, that was what Dick's brain believed…. besides the suspicion that Slade had given the man clothes to give to his pupil…that was a Slade thing to do…
"You drink it well, are you familiar with our customs?"
"A little. The person I learned from when I was young had traveled…that Witch…did she ever…." Dick swallowed the drink and felt at peace. "Did she have an American student? I heard that my teacher learned from a blind woman –
The man went still. "Who was this, man?"
"A hero, and my family." Dick told the yogi, his head nodding back to the teen as if to recall the day of her death. "She died, protecting that American…no, he protected her until she was certain he had learned everything she could bare to teach."
Dick went still as well, the cup nearly empty. "Bruce…. he did…. he was here…" Dick didn't notice it before yet tears had begun to taint his drink. He was…. weeping?
"Besides being deserted by a mysterious helper, you won't cry anywhere else if it cannot heal you in some way. Go ahead, don't hold anything back. The man sat and ate and sipped his drink, while the boy wept and bawled into a cup that could never heal his spirit in the smallest of ways again.
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"She knew pain was a way to be and to feel, and it was only one part of a person. She could…still possess us whenever we spoke her words, and for that your family should be grateful to know her student, her only and very last."
"He…" Dick wiped away the rest of the mess his crying had left behind, the cloth handed to him enough to be used for his mucus as well. "I can teach you a way, a less dangerous way to overcome pain if you really think it will save you for the man who has entered both of our visions." The yogi spoke to the child as he got up slowly. "I will not offer you this advice if you would rather tire of this life and go far away. I may ask if you should stay longer to learn this lesson, the mysterious "Deathstroke" will have to be patient."
"What…. Oh, my name is Richard." Dick said with a gulp. "I'm sorry, you've been very kind. The last person was a liar; a stall owner hired by the man who…"
"Say nothing else and come with me." The guru told the boy. "You do wish to learn this secret? Your face is terrible in hiding the truth."
Dick chuckled, admitting this to be true. "I have eyes that tell everything in them, I'm told that a lot." The kid laughed sheepishly and followed the elder to a room that looked to be for meditation only. "You'll learn the basics first before you can walk into the rest of my teachings. Her, teachings." He corrected. "Chaos and order exist to be one, without them to guide us, we are empty and without meaning or purpose. However, you believe evil must be, I believe it exists in other forms. For this exercise you will sit and empty you mind – when an image of your pain arises, you are to allow it to stay."
"How?"
"By not being afraid to embrace it, to understand it instead, and this side will be the key to understanding the pain you must overcome."
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