Teen Titans- Renegade's Last Resort; Finding Pandora = Hope

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Chapter 19: Entering; Terminator

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This is messed up and I mean that fir the suspense side! People almost die, cussing issues and Slade does something bad ass and another thing…? After!

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The time was after hours. Ten pm and standing. The rooms were on guard. Mercy was going to get her cat nap in while Lex made sure to stay full up and tend to his secret weapon.

On his screen in the lab, a silly little wager was bound to go off as Slade's masked face didn't show, but an enemy's. An ally's.

~ Evening, Mr. Luthor.~

Waller, Amanda. She ran a portion of Project X at Cadmus, taking her underground war hounding to Belle Reve for now. The prison made for metal, like Slade Wilson.

"Mrs. Waller, you caught me. What in the world though could keep you up this late, I suppose?" Lex slid in slyly, his main object of attention just needed one more tweak. He had a second.

~ Your still in possession of something that's no secret. I hear that Slade's gotten ahold of the element. You know that there were multiple keys held under orders by my associates. If they get out there-

"I've not heard of a thing from anyone so far. Just fixing up my machinery while the night is still young. If anyone gets as far as the second story, I'll have to call his help…" Shuddered the con man.

~ If he shows, you had better not be the reason why. Our last encounter wasn't a picnic.~ She sniffed at the cue balled mogul. ~ As allies in the fight for peace, more metas will need to be addressed. If you are on our side, make sure that anything in your city is guaranteed as a short-term concern. No need to have my crew out to take care of your superman problem ourselves.~

He was let go as her voice didn't have a very positive drive. They had….trouble getting along in the past. After all, Waller was a JLA and Batman problem. She'd left Black gate and now ran the facility at Belle Reve that worked metas to the bone.

The true suit would need power, as there was only one source, he'd ever hand to someone like Slade. "Livewire's death was a standard mercenary threat to me, Wilson. If you think I'd give you the opportunity to off my other accomplices, think again."

He rubbed his chin, wondering if the firmer bat boy would show up. Slade seemed so overjoyed to show off his new things. Why not do the same here in swell old Metropolis?

/

Slade's mornings were dark, dreary below the world he'd crafted. Right now however, the light would shine in as the curtain drawn back for his blinded apprentice.

"I think it's just about time for a test run of our new replicas. I want you, to take them to this location."

Slade let the screens show Metropolitan life in a city miles away. Dick gawked at the fact that only two heroes were in the T – car headed to the city of Superman and the Daily Planet. Knowing their history, Slade wasn't well liked by the man of steel, and Bruce had to still be snooping about.

"What about you? Are you going too, sir?" Dick dismissed how he'd get a flipping new mark for asking. Slade only huffed and leaned into his fist, eyeing the kid before rising from his control chair at the dais.

"You won't be alone, dear child. I have my orders in your ear as always. You might even be pleased to know that some of your useful equipment has been upgraded as a reward for nearly facing me properly this week. Your aim is more than improved. It aims to kill…"

Still as a statue, once again Dick did not have enough to add. "You're going to be the next big sensation. Only I can tell that Robin isn't remembered the way you think. Simply a damsel to the bat. A boyfriend for that alien princess –

"We never –

"It is in the past, who he was. I have what I'm after."

"Sir."

Slade kept walking up to the boy, his hands to his sides while he was observing how Richard reacted to his presence. "Look there, apprentice." He directed his pointer finger gloved to the screen behind the boy. Dick bared a look as his eyes had gone wide.

"Who…is with …"

"Your two Titans are in Metropolitan airspace, but I don't see the other two. I have drones masked everywhere to get a clear shot. Could it be, that they haven't figured out where we are right now?"

Dick swallowed, turning to Slade as hks heated intensity lit the angst back up. However, an image of his beaten body on the floor of the old haunt had Dick hiccup a gasp. Slade straightened himself, seeing the reaction was as he'd feared it.

"You're truly that afraid. We can't have that. When you return from your mission, Richard." Slade licked his lips he finished.

"I'll show you how we'll overcome that unwanted phobia of your master. It's unneeded."

Dick froze up as Slade let him be. The screens showed the blue print of the safe wgere the shard was supposed to be. It wasn't the safe, yet a secret laboratory inside Lex Corp.

"Lex is a fan of killer robots, so am I. You'll see to it that the shard is erased , along with our competition. Got it?"

"The shard, how do I…" Shaking his head, he tried again to ask, "How do I destroy the one thing, if it can't be well, destroyed at all?"

"In parts, it can. If it isn't 'active, then it can be." Slade hummed as Dick nodded. "When di you send me there."

"Oh, we don't have much time." Snapping his fingers, a bot brought the orb of magic beyond scientific feats. "Like a djinn granting good fortune to its master, you only have to imagine where you want to go. I'll permit it, this time."

The orb was directed at Richard as he imagined Clark, the Daily Planet's logo and a few sky scrapers.

The light that engulfed the boy teleported those thoughts as he felt the wind grapple at his shoulder length mop of dark hair. Dick pushed it back as he looked out, to see that day's own light had not yet coated the sky. He'd been here hours before as the hours in Kansas felt off compared to Gotham.

Here, he saw Lex's logo and checked to see if any parts were floating around. No. The marvel of the century. It could do just about anything.

He wanted it, to fight Slade. Once it was time, once he was over this stupid block to attack back, he'd-

~ Apprentice, come in. Answer me if you're present.~

"Sir. It…it worked." Dick gasped, not knowing how but he was impressed and Slade could tell. ~ Not a bad way to travel. U thought it would save on mileage. How is your view of the destination? Anything worth noting?~

"There, it's about ten - thirty at night. The streets are pretty safe. I'm going to find a back entrance to the main building."

Slade didn't say much as his eyes on the other obstacle were of a Titan sized dilemma. Oh, yet the wonder boy Kent wouldn't come flying by to throw Lex a few words of encouragement?

If Waller or anything else went wrong…

Slade chuckled, changing screens as he didn't let Dick try his amusement on as a distraction. The kid was where he had to be. The shard was fully weaponized, was what he DIDN'T yet know.

Slade checked in on a breach elsewhere, finding it to be of his decoy warehouses. He could go have some fun. Maybe put another robot in the fight that could die. Not the new addition, that was for a certain lesson not yet earned .

" My apprentice has to learn. That some obstacles are easily avoided. Others, inevitable as the choices we make to surpass what one might expect of us. Our own selves triumph only when those blocks are banished, disregarded."

He turbed to where the warehouse was being investigated. The muffled sounds of a youthful voice from the other entrance and shuffling metal across the floor intensified Slade's mood to distract himself as much as possible. "Crystal, was it? You never made it back to your caretaker . You've left him as vulnerable as he has you from Cadmus."

She vane in, collared, gagged and held by the termination bots. "Those creations cane from something that you helped to build, my dear. With whatever strength, I wouldn't fight it." He lectured, getting up to see into her eyes. To realize that this was a different girl.

"Who, are you?"

She was given room to talk as her eyes glared back. "From the stars, my people hath traveled to find the pieces of the millionth bound hearts of this universe. Your world STOLE such a device, and now –

"You?"

So, that was it. Sentient. The keeper of the keys, was a key maker herself. Only that meant that there were two or more blue eyed twin girls about. Copies, similar to the no male dominated Themyscera. "If you give me what I've brought you here for, I'll hear you out-

"Fraudulent! You are as evil as all the rest!"

"Question, if I may…can you die?"

She blinked up, a crystal set of eyes as contorted as his robots waited until her body was calm enough to suck it dry. The shard inside of them was removed as her power only waned, it did not completely vanish. Slade hummed as he tilted up the head of his catch of this very dark night. "You, cannot be killed. But I know one way to keep you from replicating. Key."

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The key was reverted and stored as her sentient body was closed tightly within a case designed like the orb. It could sort of in a sense, duplicate matter, which included the box it came from. Yet the key looked as a flat long disk with no lock. It was a marvel as the orb in his hands started to shift, morphing into something framed like konpeito. A star rock candy. Sugar, and yet the doll from before was just a body. It had also vanished with this new tool.

Slade wondered if Dick was going to enjoy trying out his new upgraded suit and gloves or boots. They were a thank you for sticking it out this long.

If the boy was as mean and nasty to the teenagers and bat as before, he'd think up the perfect reward should the kid finally stop being reluctant to stand up straight in his presence.

"Wayne made him stoic, but I…" Slade put away the orb as he pulled off the mask to wipe his face of the off feeling of regret. Was the caning what had set the boy into that much shock?

~ Sir, they're here. What is my next move?~

If only he'd be that close. Slade sighed a long, wanting breath as he went to see about those "intruders."

To that, he'd try to get back in time to aid his little swallow on the rooftop.

/

To fix any confirmation on the plot.

THE Pandora element can be opened but to fully gather its power and "advance" it up a level like a real program, it first has to have a key. Turns out, Crystal is a type of extraterrestrial being from a similar or same dimension as the element, so Slade knows why Lex wanted her and he goes after her – but to his surprise, she's got a lot of copies all over. So Lex maybe also has a key, thus this is why he's starting a little competition with Slade who has made robots with the first-tier level energy. The robots are indestructible as Bruce found, yet they can't be sure that Clark won't beat it.

Remember that the Titans are goings back and forth between Jump, Gotham, Central and now Metropolis is where Bb and Cy are with Roy. Starfire, Raven and Slade are still in Gotham.

Slade is teaching Dick to come back out of a traumatic shell that he sent the boy into. When in part two of 03 ep, in this case the Titans failed to find Dick who was still able to crack Slade's mask yet didn't get out the same way. Instead, Slade got angry and beat him until he couldn't fight or even move to think straight. The caning was from a bo staff, but now Slade is trying to get Dick to wake up to the fact that he can't curl into a ball or shut down whenever something from Slade becomes alarming.

Similarly, Bruce triggers the same as Dick runs back to Slade out of a fear that Bruce doesn't want to use caution in keeping his friends alive. He actually wanted them to stay off the case. If they didn't fight, Slade wouldn't make the treat to get them even more ill by the side effects of the nanos. The one reason why they are alive is because Bruce poured in with Silas at Star labs the technology to nullify the "cancers" Slade expects to so his work for him.

Jason is refused the job as "sidekick" so this may prompt him to pull a Grayson and run off in his own Robin suit or other outfit.

Selina is in danger of losing her lives if Slade sees her as an enemy. Right now, she's no threat as long as she does not go and does not turn coats over. Or belly up.

So, what goes next? Are we all caught up? Good!

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Bruce wasn't supposed to be here. He wanted to be there when Dick had his big steal. Now, he was tagging up up with Clark for old times sake to stop the boy from going through with something highly unethical.

At the same end, he'd been denied aid by anyone but Raven and Starfire who had stayed in Gotham to investigate a topic he'd had to square them in on the details of another location that needed surveying. On the inside.

Alfred and Jason took turns at the bat computer monitor since the migraines were a side effect of Al's recovery process.

"Al, lemme take care of tonight's watch." Yawned the teen as Alfred groaned and put more ice to his balding noggin. "You'll have classes early tomorrow. I won't be sending you to school as if sleep doesn't matter at all under my watch, Master Jason."

"They need us, but your head can only take so much." Jason argued as Alfred did need to lie down. "Once more, and then the monitors will automatically scan to notify us as the night comes closer to midnight. Then, to bed." He replied, sternly.

"Gee, I hope that the concussion you got isn't giving ya a different personality. Sure, got it, Al. But lemme check on…"

He blushed by how cute the pair were.

This , somehow now felt wrong as he covered his face and watched a smirk lift onto Al's lips. "I see, then you're not prepared to do as Master Bruce requests?"

Jason growled and ignored how Kori was so less clad in her attire. He saw Raven wearing a damn leotard and it turned him the –

"Your nose, Master Jason??"

( Nose bleeding. Jason the perv Robin.)

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In a Gotham city warehouse that acted as a decoy for evil Uncle Slade?

Raven checked around by her power for any hands, workers. The machinery had been turned off. It looked like less dangerous than she'd pictured it.

"Starfire, shine your bolt please over your that monitor."

"As you wish." Starfire let her green light Illuminate the room. Her eyes as well took a minute as the entire room was cleared of parts. All that remained was an unused packing plant. "It's no cover." Raven put a hand to her temple as the image of below her ended up showing tunnels. "This, is a dec –

The floor began to his and crackles of board began to click like gears as the women moved from the spot. The floor was shifting in a stair – like upheaval as the steps of one, didn't need an announcement.

"You've certainly come a long way from your city. I fear, there is nothing here to keep on searching for, Titans."

He had his hands behind his back as three of his murder bots and five if his regular Slade bots leaped out to show off their creation. Their duty, as Raven clenched her fists. "This has to stop. AZARATH METRION ZINTHOS!!"

He was craving a battle, and Raven would make the perfect candidate to go less easily on than he had the robots or his new apprentice. "If you're looking for the boy, he's long gone. I'm all you have to look in the face. Shall we?"

"Let us fight!"

"STAR!" Raven didn't trust whatever he was planning as the murder bot shot out an electrical field from its hands, making Starfire scream before she could even hope to strangle her enemies. She collapsed to her knees as two of the termination bots got ready to fire. Raven yelled out as her power was to max. The ripped bits of machinery went pulverizing the Slade bots as they twitched in dying remarks. Yet the other robots, and Slade, just dusted off the soot to stand taller.

The bots had faces like his , yet not anything less than the Slade bots. Too much like androids, they pounced at Raven while two held down the aliases princess while she blasted and made barely a dent.

More marched out from the gaping floor as the women were smothered. Only when Kori got mad did her power pull any punches. The shot at Slade only got the floor as he got out his arm to show them something on it.

"I don't have the control today. I put it in a safe place. Somewhere only it can be activated from here. Not on my usual person. If you attack me, the nanobots will easily activate, killing you before you can complete your mission." He hissed to the women. "Stand down from this set up. You must have guessed it being a decoy, I wouldn't show you all of my chess pieces at once?"

"WE do not care! Those monstrosities must be exterminated before any more lives are to be lost!"

"You've been using those robots to kill citizens in Gotham. The evidence was done to attract attention. Not to hide anything. Why?"

"It's credible of its own right, empath. You should know my work by now never stays underground for long. You're looking for hope, yet hope won't come to those that can't kill to receive their philosopher's stone."

He directed the robots to strike as Raven threw up a dark force field for she and Kori. "Get ….away, find the gap and –

The door to the floor moved again as it narrowed, leaving the man to pull out a strange glowing energy from one filament. He placed it inside the monitor of the warehouse that held no clues. His head tilted as words in an unfamiliar language tumbled out almost playfully.

"BAKUHATSU."

Raven understood from her long journey to escape her fate. Starfire however, questioned the words, as Raven dragged them both away from the building before….

It exploded.

/

Slade grinned as the filament was recovered while the gap closed , leaving the boy's still alive, the termination ones to find him elsewhere throughout the tunnels.

Raven coughed as she and Kori had been salted by leaping into the water below, outside of the building Slade had blown sky high blue flames were strange as the explosive mess wasn't natural.

"Did…he did not just –

"He wished for it to explode, and it did."

RRaen groaned as Kori swam to her and lifted them both up. The man was gone, yet a strange sound had the girls look to a speedboat in the water. More than one.

"This is the Gotham City Police! Put your hands up and remain where you are in the water."

Gordon put down his mega phone and nodded to the others, including Bullock. "Where is the bat? What's this-

"The culprit, got away." Raven frowned as the women were taken up onto the twin boats and given towels. "Sorry, procedure. You've been at this…all night? Did you get a look at –

"It is a man from our city who is indeed a criminal." Kori coughed. "He now has a new weapon. It did this….and we could not stop him from running away in the after – the – math…"

"What she means is, we might know where he's gone but he has allies he's' built." Raven seethed. "And….they are, indestructible robots."

"Robots that are very, the evil." Kori corrected, earning grunts from the officers. "Contact the boss, we have to make sure none of these robots are lethal to the public. "How many did you face?"

"They poured up from the floor, bit it's a hidden door, tunnels. Below the city."

Raven turbed to Gordon. "No weapon or my magic had any affect. The only thing I would think is to shut them down manually."

"It's gotta be done. Tony? Alert the chief of the tunnels in the area and that Gotham's underground is active again-

"The again??" Kori gasped. "Why has again been the usage, if I may ask."

"Right. Gotham has a criminal underworld and the sewers connect multiple escape routes since the city's founding. We think your master builder ( joke) is actually hiding in one if those tunnels and has modified every or some locations as means of his escape in advance. Promise is, if we send our officers in, they may not come back out. A lot of times, most criminals are repetitive, but this?" James rolled up his sleeves and crossed his arms, seeming conflicted as they paddled to shore. "This is something only a crime lord would likely think about , and we need a detective with the technology to lead the search."

"What about this, reduction you spoke of?" Kori wondered as Raven could not stop her. Her energy was too weak as she leaned into the side of the boat and felt fuzzy around the edges.

"A few of the main trouble makers in this city went quiet the time you and the kid Renegade, showed up. And death has followed the trail. First Livewire from another city. A meta we think who was in cahoots with others going by the name of Rat Catcher. Her body was found at another location ad if she'd been tortured, grizzly enough for ya?"

"I…The robots held the back because their creator wished not to harm us. He was testing the us, and I believe that this copy of the original factory is still in your city!"

"We checked and it ain't." Bullock chewed his gum to quit smoking a few days ago. It helped his blood pressure, yet his mood was unchanged. "The last place anything was reported on was not even in our airspace. You'd better be searching outside a Gotham. This case, ain't over but yous' now got no case fer it."

"What….do you mean?" Raven sat up groggily.

"What it means' is, lil' lady…is that you're better checking New Jersey. Gotham is clean of any mecha – bot factories a clean sweep is being done, and so far. It ain't looking like he duped only yous."

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The factory. Slade grinned as he pulled up his mask with a toothy grin. "The factory…" He cackled while the bots followed him down a longer tunnel back to base. "Did the bat think I'd stay in this hell hole under his thumb? Well, he's going to need to look farther south."

The man removed a latch as to their ear, the factory was a top floor model. He saw out at the church across the way and protesters still stooping to stop the construction in their city of Haven.

Blud would be spilled, yet not eternal, as Slade put his hands behind his back and looked over his palace. One where his apprentice could return to train, undetected. And, uninterrupted.

"Blud is thicker, yet we'll be staying for quite some time to clot the overflow. Right, my apprentice. Renegade?"

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In the state of recovery as Dick skipped over to a way inside the building, Mercy was active as an android with a battle systems upgrade. Her tech was so that none could tell the truth, just as Dick took out his staff and let the tip flicker before shattering her optic processors.

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~ Right, my Renegade?~ Made him sick, yet he kept walking.

/

Oohhh, so Dick is down to kill now??? Wow. And Slade killer robot factor is in Blud – Haven! By the water was a trick! Selina is really bad in this through her denial. Bruce will not be happy and I'll end up bringing her back. It won't be pretty. Slade never used the probes, yet he said he "hid" them somehow off his person. In any place where if he's injured or attacked, the things go off like a bomb. Instead, he used a filament of the element and wished for "bakuhatsu," an explosion in Japanese to test the new product. The fact he's advanced the orb by way of the now molded key, he is getting way to far ahead in his attack plan.

Dick is doing the dirty work of destroying Lex's shard so that Slade's enemies don't retrieve it. He wants to be the only whole with this unstoppable super weapon. Now, I have used similar robots to symbolize his means of being over powered and in control. The cloaking bots or the future bots in series of doubts and in M rated very first apprentice fic with robots being unstoppable and changing faces to look like anyone else. Same for the sci fi. I love deception tactics. Much a turn on.

So for Lex and his toys? He has no idea that Slade has one key, but he has Crystal. The second one, who is actually not from their earth but a protector of the energy that earth stole from her dimension or planet. Do these beings have another role? Find out!

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