[IC] Teen Titans: New Beginnings

[rocketrobie2]

Ted hadn't been able to work up the nerve to make a break for it which he cursed himself out for as he began to hear the tell tale signs of something amiss up above. He heard the whooshing of flight and the other jet up above along with the landing thud and talking. He wasn't a betting man but Ted was fairly certain that the titans had arrived on scene.

"Fiddlesticks."

This was absolutely what he wanted, being put on the map and getting a popularity boost by going toe to toe with some supers but he was beginning to second guess himself now. Not only was he outmatched, he was outgunned and his mind was starting to go blank as the realization that he may not make it out of here a free man began to sink in. Maybe turning himself over would be his best bet? It would probably save him a lot of bruising. *No*, he'd gotten this far, might as well go out with a bang.

As he tried to think of what that bang would be, Ted caught a glimpse of what confirmed his theory. The air suddenly got cold in the hideaway room as part of the Teen Titans member Wraith floated in. Like a bat out of hell, Ted sprinted towards the upper deck. Quickly he turned the setting on his Airgun pretty high, loaded up his grappling hook and made his way for the stairs where the guards would no doubt be stationed.

Upon coming to the stairs Ted did a quick assessment of who was in his way to the top. A few security guards were stationed there but luckily they seemed somewhat distracted at the moment as they spoke with someone. Not looking a gift horse in the mouth, Ted quickly brought his Airgun up and fired at his ship, getting its location from the small whiffs of smoke still escaping from the nozzles. As soon as he heard the satisfying clunk of metal on metal Ted began to zip himself up the stairway, barreling through the guards. Now was his big moment to let everyone know who he was and though he still wasn't sure he could get away with it, especially now considering how close in proximity all the titans were, Ted wracked his brain to think of something to say.

"Scarlet Scarab did this! I am he!" Ted yelled as he sped by, mounting his ship quickly and all but jumping for the controls as he tried to speed away from the crime scene after tossing the jewel into his bed.

[Metronome]

"Loud and clear, thank you, Robin," Wraith responded politely to the message. The others were here, good. "I searched most of the decks below. Everything seems to be clear." Maybe they were too late, or maybe he just hadn't been thorough enough.

He phased through another wall and paused in the hallway to fiddle with his comm device. A loud cladder caused him to look up. A man dressed in red was hauling ass away from him. That must be their villain!

"I found him. He's heading up top," Wraith's words sounded no more urgent than if he was discussing the weather. He picked up and flew after the man. The villain climbed into what appeared to be a floating door and vanished. Wraith paused. An invisible ship, perhaps?

He took a chance and became incorporeal, flying towards where the man had disappeared. He phased through a wall and into what looked like a tiny flying craft of some sort. He was a bit startled, but quickly got over it.

"Mr. Scarlett Scarab," He addressed the villain politely as he approached him from behind. "I believe surrender would be wise." He passed to radio the team. "He's in an invisible aircraft of some sort. I'm inside with eyes on him now."

[Mistress Dizzy]

With Wraith's directions, Mirage started to head for the top of the boat. Once she got there, she didn't see anything. "Hmm... there's got to be a way." Then she had a brilliant idea. Reaching for the staff lashed around her waist, she pulled it and set it standing upward, with the octopus facing the sky.

With an effort of will and a summoning of the magical runes etched all over it, Mirage started to summon a stream of water from the seas outside the ship. The runes lit a soft, glowing blue as she did so. The water spiraled up and on until it was obediently waiting in a large sphere in front of her. There were some small lake creatures and some algae in it; maybe she'd pulled too deep. Oh well.

"Up!" Mirage commanded. The orb of water shot upward like a rocket, whistling through the empty air until- SPLASH!

It hit something. Mirage watched closely as the ship took form briefly, a void in the water as it started to come down. "Gotcha!" She pinged the spot on her communicator. The flyers would have to do the rest. "Found the ship!"

[Tackytaff]

---

Cassie felt oddly in control of the situation, despite the chaos of security still running around and the thick smoke that made it nearly impossible to tell who exactly was on the ship. After all, there were five Titans on call. No sooner had her cockiness come into existance before smacking her in the face.

There was distinctive coughing from the stairs behind behind her post, prompting Cassie to investigate and find another member of the crew struggling up the stairs. She was kneeling over the man when a bullet shot between them, leaving both more than slightly dazed as a man in red sped past them on a grappling hook.

"Shit" Cassie muttered before jumping into action, she ran off the edge of the yacht to join the assailant in the sky. "Any idea on direction Wraith?"

Almost in response a massive jet of water surged upwards, knocking Cassie out of the sky. Underwater, Cassie waited for the worst of the waves to subside before breaking the surface again; ready to begin a very long and deserved grudge on Kassandra, until she saw the faint outline of an aircraft dripping water.

"Nice aim Mirage" Was all she said as she sped off in pursuit again. The water that had revealed the ship so briefly was already dripping away and it was impossible to determine any distinctive parts available to sabotage, but neither stopped Cassie from barreling headfirst into the aircraft, lodging her fist and forearm past the cloaked outer surface. She made a conscious effort not to look down. It was one thing to fly herself after practicing for years, clinging to the side of an aircraft piloted by whatever kind of criminal was much less appealing. "I'm just outside Wraith, going to see if I can find the engines. Stay safe."

[Master Crim]

-Robin-
-^{Dick Grayson}-

Robin was making his way to the cabin on the main deck where a few of the security had already began ushering people out and securing the area. This cabin of the ship was a large bar and dining area lined with windows, giving it a more open feel to the enclosure. There were a door with a sign showing stairs descending, denoting that they went to the lower deck. The security had already secured the door and were waiting for a sign of the intruder in red. Just as he began to approach the stairs he heard Wraith's call-out.

"I found him. He's heading up top."

"Team, get ready, and careful-" Before Robin could finish he heard a ruckus from out on the main deck, and rushed to find out what was going on. Robin emerged from the dining area just in time to see a red blur shoot past Wonder Girl, as she was aiding a crew member, and disappear into a doorway of a ship as it closed. That explains the reading on the jet Robin though as Wraith took off and Wonder Girl Sprung into action. What followed was a miscommunication on the stage of pursuit that Robin would have to address later, now they needed to focus on the mission. "Mirage, good job revealing the ship to establish a ping on it," Robin started into his next set of orders while calling in the jet for pursuit. "I want you to follow from the water and wait for us to drop the ship from stealth, once it is; identify the intake for the engines and flood them. This will be the safest and quickest way to disable it so it can't get away." The T-Jet had circled back around, and Robin used his grapple to get aboard. Just as he sat down at the controls, Wonder Girl had confirmed she made contact with the ship. "Wraith, see if you can get to the controls; top priority is opening the door he grappled to for Wonder Girl to get inside. Wonder Girl, once inside try to over power this Scarlet Scarab while Wraith then tries to drop the cloaking." Now in pursuit of the awkwardly flying Wonder Girl who was clinging to the still invisible ship. "Starfire, let the coastguard know that there is no fire before aiding Wonder Girl and Wraith." Robin activated the grapple cables and began analyzing the invisible ship based on the glimpse he got from Mirage's water pocket, and how Wonder Girl was climbing around on it. With the press of a button on the control stick the grapple shot forwards. There was the distinct sound of metal on metal, scraping, but the cable failed to tension and the grapple slid off the unseen surface. Dammit.

---

Gotham City

Away from the small crisis that was unfolding in the downtown area of south Jump City, in a tall office building emblazoned with SIONIS INDUSTRIES in Gotham, a scene of its own was beginning to decline as well. In a large office that overlooked a good portion of the business district, a man reeled and fell to the ground from the fist Roman Sionis catching him in the jaw. "YOU IDIOT!" Sionis yelled at the man as he lay clutching his face. "You can't tell me you are this fucking stupid!?" He kicked the man in the ribs once before walking to his desk and opening one of the drawer pulling out a bottle and glass. he poured a generous amount and taking large sips as the man on the floor tried to regain himself.
"How was I supposed to know-" the man on the floor paused to get to his feet before continuing. "-to know that the titan's would find-" the glass flew by the man nearly hitting him, shattering as it hit the floor.
"DID YOU EVEN BOTHER TO VET YOU PEOPLE?!" Sionis sat heavily into his chair and shoved a file of papers off the desk at the man. "Three of them were former employees of Lex Corp!, and who do you think let the word out?" The man just stood unsure of how to respond. "By now the Titan's are tracking back the origins of the shipments and will be looking into what we have worked so hard to keep in the dark in Jump City." The man started to stammer a little trying to find a way to turn this situation around, but was hushed by a wave Sionis's hand to dismiss him. "Get out of here before I change my mind on letting you walk away from this." The man left and Sionis's secretary approached and began to clean up the papers on the floor while Sionis produces another glass and poured another generous amount. "Naomi," he paused looking at her as she gathered the papers from the floor and put them on the desk. "Get me a call with Wilson." Naomi stood a moment scrolling through her touch pad.
"I will see if I can get him on the line, but I can not guarantee he will be willing to-"
"Tell him the lot is still his, and I will pay in advance to get him on his feet if he wants to come back, I just need a small favor that will benefit us both." Sionis said not caring about Naomi's concerns of contacting Wilson.
"Right away, sir."

[Bright_Ops]

Jump City National was the second largest bank and second oldest bank in Jump City, losing both first titles to the local branch of the Bank of America. A clean, clearly designed with the ideas of wealth and comfort in mind and decorated with artworks that were so awful that the almost universal response to anyone finding out how much a given piece of the 'art' was worth was generally something along the lines of "They paid how much for this thing?!"

It was also in the process of having a section of its vault industrially cleaned.

Asura, the manager who had opened the doors that morning, had his otherwise well planned and organized list of objectives for the day thrown out the window when a well dressed man had stepped through the front doors, politely told reception that he was with the government and needed to talk with either himself or the other possible morning manager Robert as soon as possible.

It meeting itself had reveled some distressing news. The man (named Jacob Wilson) was an Agent for the FBI that was there to investigate a recent shipment of money that had been transported out of Gotham City and arrived at Jump City the night before; The Joker had quietly taken over some warehouse in Gotham and had tainted a large sum of physical cash with one of his chemical creations before slipping them into shipments that were leaving the city by both legal and illegal methods. Batman had caught wind of it, Joker was arrested and now the FBI was now discreetly investigating ever known shipment of cash that had left Gotham within the correct time period to remove the tainted money before it reached circulation and started a panic; The truck that had arrived the night before was on the list.

After confirming Agent Wilson's credentials, calling his boss to let her known what was going on and being sworn to secrecy with the clear professional warning that if the public learned of this threat needlessly that there would be hell to pay, the two had quickly located where the the vault the cash from Gotham had been stored the night before (and thank god it hadn't been put into the ATM's yet) and two professional looking men with breathing masks, safety goggles and gloves came into the vault with devices and scanned everything in the vault that had shared the same air as the Gotham pile before packing the Gotham cash and what cash had been close enough that contamination was a serious risk into air tight bags and removed them from the building to be destroyed off site.

While having almost a million dollars walk out the door was painful, Asura was prepared to write it off as 'dead' money since money that killed people would be far worse for his career. Once the money was gone, Agent Wilson had summoned a clean up crew in order to give the section of the vault that it had been stored in a proper industrial clean for health and safety reasons at government expensive. The official story was that a former patron of the bank had left an unknown organic substance in one of the safety deposit boxes at an unknown time in the past and time had caused it to rot to the point that it was now a health hazard and required a section of the vault to be professionally cleaned immediately. An embarrassing story to tell those performing business at the bank, but apart from being a funny anecdote nothing to worry about.

It was as the cleaning crew was leaving and Agent Wilson was thanking him for his cooperation when Asura brought up something he had discovered. "Forgive me for not mentioning this sooner, but I decided to check our shipping manifest for any other deliveries from Gotham that left during... well...." Shaking his head a little as he recovered without having to say anything more, he continued "There is a shipment arriving via plane that's going to be arriving in the airport this afternoon."

Agent Wilson, a African-American man in his late thirties to early forties with a bald head that was clearly shaved gazed at Asura with stern, brown eyes before offering a sigh and a muttered curse before returning to professionalism. "Other teams failing to do their jobs correctly aside, here's what we're going to do. We're going to call the airport and security company that transports your goods to quietly explain that we suspect that a dangerous, illegal chemical was smuggled aboard that flight. When it lands, we're going to have the airport put the plane somewhere isolated so that me and my team can go in, check the cargo and get this taken care of without alerting or alarming the public. Shall we?" He finished as he gestured back towards Asura's office.

Several phone calls later (Including one call that Agent Wilson made to his team to update them on the situation), Agent Wilson was about to head off with his team to wait for the arrival of the plane at the airport when Asura asked "Should we contact the Titans to help with this?"

There was a thoughtful pause before Agent Wilson nodded his head. "This is an FBI operation and I cannot ask even super powered teenagers to assist in the process of searching and destruction of tainted goods, but I would be remiss if I didn't suggest you contacting them to suggest that they patrol that area. We do not need some criminal organization or wannabee super villain hearing that there is a pile of cash at the airport and risk them endangering the population by potentially letting Joker infected cash entering the money flow. If you would be so kind, I have to report the failure of one of our other teams to catch this before the plane took off to my superiors. Good day."

And with that final polite but professional goodbye, Agent Wilson finally went out the front door of the Jump City National, walked to the stock standard black 4wd car that his team had been parked and waiting for him in for pick up and slid inside. It was only after the engine was turned on and the car was driving away that 'Jacob' muttered to the crew "And this, Gentlemen, is why I'm getting paid more then the rest of you. When we get back to base, we've got a few hours of downtime before part two of this starts so we're going to be putting off the celebratory drinks for a bit longer."

[rocketrobie2]

The jig was up.

Ted was kicking himself as he saw Wraith materialize from the hull of his ship and heard the tearing of metal from somewhere on the skimmer. The skimmer had already started moving from his interaction with the controls but not nearly fast enough to outrun whoever was outside. Though he was screaming on the inside, Ted swivelled his seat to face Wraith as his mind raced for a way out of this.

"I can agree with you there. One schmuck like me against a super like you isn't a bet I would wanna make." Ted said truthfully as he locked his finger over his lap.

This whole thing was a mistake, I should have stuck to shoplifting! You don't need to deal with superpowers or come up with failsafes for shop-! Ted's mind raced before his eyes landed on a vestigial button on his gauntlet, one that was simply a foundation for future suit modifications. A plan started to form in Ted's head, a long shot for sure but given how close the cold hand of the Titans was getting it was the best shot he had. In a quick fluid movement he began to press the button in a random pattern though doing his best to make the presses look deliberate.

"'Cept today I'm feeling lucky. I've got a bomb on that boat, a little bit of insurance just in case something like this happened. My first press of this button armed the thing and if I don't press along in the correct pattern the whole district goes. Now you can try scanning for it, hell I'd like you too, nothing like testing some sensor cloaking technology in the field. If you want to actually want to keep Jump City from being home to the Grand Canyon two I suggest you and your friends leave me and my ship be and start looking for that bomb." Ted said with a small grin as on the inside he panicked hard.

"That being said you can always choose to not believe and yank me out of my seat right here and now but do you really want to make that bet? Roll the dice on a hunch? As a sign of good faith I'll even let you take the diamond back. No hard feelings Casper ol' pal?" Ted explained, continuing to push away at the button.

[Metronome]

The alien shifted a bit as the ship was rocked by Supergirl. He listened to the villain's monolog without any display of emotion. If he was surprised, he sure didn't show it. Wraith lifted his arm and radioed the team again.

"The villain has informed me of a possible bomb threat on the boat. Please see to it that the area is clear of civilians."

Wraith wasn't particularly gullible. He had a feeling that Earth technology hadn't advanced far enough for the villain to single handedly install a bomb of the magnitude implied on the ship within the time frame allowed. But, just to be sure...

An inky black force field formed around the red clad man, and before he could object, he was being pulled downward, through the hull of the aircraft, and flung back onto the deck of the ship. The bubble protected him from major injury, although he'd certainly be a little shaken up.

Wraith wasn't far behind him. The black bodied alien stepped down softly onto the deck beside the fiend and released him. "I don't know much about you," He said, soft and calm, "But I have to assume you aren't suicidal. You will remain here while the ship is searched." It didn't sound like a suggestion.