The Apprentice II

The Final Battle

Slade, getting up from the shot Starfire laid on him.

"Robin! Attack!" Slade yelled pointing at the titans.

Robin is now close to a piece of equipment at one end of the row of monitors. It is the same device that blasted the other four Titans off the speedboat and implanted the probes. As he speaks, he gestures toward it.

"Get out of here! Go! You don't know what those beams did to-"

"Dude..." Beastboy said.

"...we know..." Raven sighs.

"...and we don't care." Cyborg said.

"We are your friends, Robin. We are not leaving without you." Starfire spoke softly.

They tense for battle, Slade steps up.

"How very touching." Slade putting a finger on the button. "But Robin doesn't need any friends."

He presses it, bringing the rapparatus to life, red energy bolts blaze out across the space. Cyborg, who is first to succumb to the probes, as he and Starfire both collapse in torment. Beastboy, whose knees buckle next, Raven drops to the ground next to him. Across the platform to put Robin in view, watching them, and Slade just behind him.

"This is the price for your disobedience, Robin. Now do as I command. Attack!" Slade yells pointing at the titans.

With a Herculean effort, Starfire lifts her head and aims a pleading gaze at Robin. Even though her eyes are whited out by the glare of the energy surging through her body, they and the tears running down her cheeks broadcast the quartet's agony loud and clear. Robin's jaw drops open as he gasps softly, he looks off in the direction of the device,  now narrowed in pure, righteous determination.

"No." Robin dashed off.

"Robin!" A few more steps and a great leap carry the roaring apprentice over the last few yards, and he plants his hand on the rig. Now bathed in its glow, he brings his other palm around to touch it as well. The groans that escape through his tight-locked teeth betray the unendurable physical strain he has put on himself. Dissolving to a sequence of internal shots just like those that showed the entry of the probes into Starfire's body. Muscle tissue, artery, devices latching onto blood cells-they are invading his body, and a flash of white subsides to put us back in the lair and him still at the system's core. He is thrown backward as the entire rig explodes.

A long shot of him, supine near the monitors with smoke rising from his body. Slade, watching the four Titans' bloodstreams with great surprise-and, as he does, a fifth screen pops up with Robin's name on it. Groaning with the strain, this new victim hauls himself to his feet; Slade regards his control button with some trepidation now, and the orange-glowing boots advance toward him, step by labored step. Slade as he stops for a little face time.

"New deal, Slade. If I lose my friends, you lose your apprentice." Slade's eye, narrowing as Robin stood close to him. "And I know how you hate to lose."

He collapses. Slade gives this proposition a long moment's thought, his thumb ready to bring Robin's existence to a grinding halt-and then tears the controller off his wrist and tosses it away. A few sparks flash up from it, after which the probes cease their destructive work on the Boy Wonder. Not about to let the matter drop so easily, Slade raises one foot to stomp the spiky-haired head flat, before he can bring it down, though, Robin is up and grabbing at it. He smirks at Slade, whose eye goes very wide, and a smashing punch sends the evil genius flying to the other end of the platform.

"Titans! Go!" Robin charges.

The others, also back in good health, charge at Slade. Beastboy, now a tiger, is first to do damage with a clawed swipe that pierces the armor. Cyborg and Starfire move in next, starbolts and cannon going full throttle to blast Slade backward. As he tumbles, Raven casts a spell to bind his feet and sling him hard onto the platform. Only now does Robin go on the attack, delivering a flying kick that pastes a boot sole across that masked face. Slade, seen from behind, glowing cracks spread across the back of his head as the steel fractures.

Robin lands in a crouch as Slade falls to his knees, the left side of his face turned to them. The right half of his mask drops away and skids across the floor, and he now stands up with one big hand covering the exposed portion of his visage. Nothing can be seen but a fringe of unruly hair above the fingers, and his eye looks as if it might pop out of his head. He turns and runs off, dropping his hand as he does so.

He runs into view and fiddles briefly with a large piece of equipment, then turns to them. The light does not shine on the exposed side.

"Another day, Robin." Slade said as a dial on the end of this. He has slotted his fingers into holes bored for a better grip, similar to a bowling ball, and he turns it. Lines of red light emanate along the surface of the device, to show rings of light flicking on down the body of the rig. "Another day."