Ah My Goddess Fan Fiction / Ranma 1/2 Fan Fiction ❯ The Raven 03: Apocalypse ❯ Suiting Up ( Chapter 5 )

Disclaimer: I claim no ownership rights to any of the works of Rumiko Takahashi or Kosuke Fujishima, and certainly not anything owned by Warner Bros.

/oOo\

Belldandy ignored her father's secretary as she all but ran past him and through the door into Kami-sama's office, only to slam to a stop as soon as she burst into the room. She stared around her, even the burning resentment at being pulled away from her family that she'd been fighting (she was a Goddess 1st Class, how could she be angry with her father?!) guttering out in her shock at the office's transformation. Her father liked to redecorate on a regular basis, possibly even for every guest, so it had been different almost every time she'd visited — but it had never looked like this!

All the furniture had vanished, the walls' often-cozy coloring replaced by pure faintly glowing white. Though now it was actually a single wall, the room reshaped into an immense round dome, and that single wall's purity was broken by the black shapes of sigils and circles and Asgardian hieroglyphic writing. Glancing down at the floor, the earth-haired goddess found it to be the same as the dome, glowing white covered in black patterns. And like the diagrams on the dome, beyond sensing the mystical energy charging everything she couldn't make heads or tails of what any of the symbols and circles were for, it was all simply too complex and interrelated, each circle and line of code tying into multiple others.

“Daughter, thank you for coming so quickly, I know it was not easy for you.”

She looked up again to find the two people standing off to one side of the room that she'd missed in her shock — Kami-sama (in a white business suit this time) and the Daimakaicho of Niflheim (the latter currently an adult, rather than the disturbingly evil/cute child form she enjoyed so much when she wasn't around Raven, and actually dressed modestly for the first time Belldandy could remember). The goddess quickly strode over to the pair. Fighting to hold her voice to its normal serene tone, she asked, “Father, why am I here? I know that you know best where I may serve, but I cannot help but feel that at such a time I should be with my family.”

“I know, child, you cannot be what you are and not feel as you do. I understand your anger. But I am afraid that you are needed here, for several purposes. Here.” He motioned toward a section of the floor.

Belldandy stepped over and examined the circle he had indicated, frowning slightly as she tried to puzzle out its purpose. It had a four foot radius, enough space for a single person, and her eyes traced the various symbols and hieroglyphs. That was the symbol for air, and that for water, and that for the Earth, and ... she gasped as she realized what she was seeing — a circle designed to freeze every living thing on Earth in stasis. Or at least, everything in the air and in or ... she double-checked the patterns around the glyph for water and yes, everything both in and on water. And it was all tied to her in her persona as the Norn of the Present. But she didn't have the control to gather that kind of raw power, not when she was simultaneously connecting to so many living things, so that meant ... Again she looked around and found the other two circles she'd expected, one for her father and one for Hild, both designed to feed her the power she needed.

“But father, this makes no sense,” she protested as she returned to studying the circle intended for her. “Why would you wish to put so much of life in stasis at such a time —” Then she located the trigger, and paled as fresh shock swept through her. The circle was keyed to activate when the Devourer claimed the Earth as his own. “Father, are you truly so certain Raven will fail?” she whispered, beginning to shake as images of her family flashed through her mind.

Kami-sama stepped over to her and laid a gentle hand on her shoulder. “There are degrees of failure, daughter,” he said softly, “and once this is over, if she survives Raven can do without the guilt of the deaths of all the many thousands that will be caught in flight or travel on the seas if Trigon comes.”

Belldandy considered her father's words, and looked around with fresh eyes at all the other diagrams and heiroglyphs that had nothing to do with the three circles she had just studied. Finally, she nodded. “You are right, Father, Raven should not have that added to the burdens she already carries.” She stepped into her circle, and with a soaring burst of wordless song the lines and symbols lit up, shining a soft blue. “I am ready.”

The other two stepped into their own circles, without a sound fresh glowing pure white and black intermingled with the blue light of Belldandy's circle, and the three braced themselves, and waited.

/oOo\

The door to Raven's sanctum slid open, and even with the tension filling the teens they still looked around curiously at the bookshelves full of books and `knickknacks' (except for Starfire, of course, thanks to the many times she had meditated with her friend she was familiar with Raven's bedroom). Not that they were tempted to touch anything, especially Cyborg and Beast Boy — those two had learned their lesson after touching one of Raven's mirrors and getting an impromptu personal tour of her fractured mind.

Still cuddled in the hovering Starfire's arms, Raven weakly motioned toward an ornately carved wooden box on a shelf close to her bed, ignoring the unnaturally dim morning light visible through her window. “There,” she whispered.

Starfire floated over to the shelf, and Raven reached out and laid a shaking hand on top of the box's lid. “Malfermu!” she chanted, fighting to keep her voice steady in spite of the tremors running through her body, and felt the box click open beneath her hand. She pushed open the lid and tried to scoop up the rings stored inside, the black crystal rings she'd found in Trigon's temple that Skuld had returned to her just that morning, and snarled in frustration when her shaking hand scattered the rings across the floor. Her fractured Anger flashed through her for, rattling her shelves before she managed to force it back. When she was certain she was again in control, she whispered, “Robin, pick those up, pass them out. They're safe.”

Robin hastily stooped to gather up the rings, and handed them out to his teammates.

Beast Boy held his up and examined it. “Dudette, I don't do jewelry,” he said dubiously. “And this really isn't the time.”

Raven surprised everyone (including herself) by giggling, and for just a moment felt her father's call ease off before surging back. She whispered, “The rings are magical, they'll protect you from my father's influence. Don't wear them, they may not take pummeling well, or survive one of Starfire's blasts. Keeping them in a pocket will work.”

Holding up the ring between the thumb and forefinger of one massive, robotic hand, Cyborg said, “Good thing, I don't think it'll fit on my finger.” He lifted his other hand and a panel popped open, revealing a small compartment. A moment later the ring was in the compartment and the panel snapped closed. “Will that do?”

Raven forced her eyes to focus on her Black teammate, shifting to mage sight, and jerked a nod at the sight of the new aura tainted with her father's power that now surrounded the teenager. “It's working.”

Robin and Beast Boy stuck their rings in pockets on their belts. Starfire's costume tight, purple miniskirt didn't come with pockets, but she solved that problem by shoving one hand under her equally purple sleeveless, midriff-baring top to push the ring down between her breasts. The alien princess turned around first where she floated in the air for privacy (not that she'd ever really understood the concept, but a few interesting events early on had at least taught her the rules even if she thought the whole fuss was silly), but she didn't put Raven down and the half-demon both got a close-up eye-full of the entire process and had a cheek pressed against one generous orange-toned breast. From their grins when Starfire turned back around, the boys found the resulting furious blush from Raven's hairline down her face and neck to disappear under her costume absolutely hilarious and her equally furious scowl didn't phase them in the least.

Then the proximity alarm siren sounded, wiping away the grins like they'd never been, and the light set in the wall by the bed exploded as panic flashed through Raven.

Robin called out, “Starfire —”

“I am gone now!” she interrupted, and flew past the three boys and out the still-open door, as fast as the need to maneuver around corners and down stairs allowed. Before Raven had a chance to fight Fear back under control, Starfire flew into a room in the subbasement, and the last of Panic's hold vanished as Ravens's eyes widened in shock, her head swiveling to take in as much of the room as possible as Starfire circled the room to kill their momentum.

Except for a single view screen on one wall, the black floor, walls and ceiling were covered with white symbols, most of which she didn't recognize. But from those symbols she did recognize and the logic of the pattern, she realized that the focus of everything in the room was the circle in the center of the floor. The circle they were now hovering over.

Starfire tilted and without touching the floor lowered Raven down to lie in the middle of the circle. “Friend Raven, rest here. You will be safe while we deal with this destroyer of worlds.”

“Safe? And how will this keep me safe?” Raven demanded.

“You will see,” Starfire replied, and twisted to fly from the room.

As soon as the princess was clear the door closed. It, too, was covered with sigils, and as soon as it clicked shut Robin's voice rang out over a hidden speaker: “Rondo aktivigu!”

Nothing appeared to change but Raven gasped, going limp as she abruptly found herself alone in her head and body, the call from her father that she had been fighting since the sky went dark gone like it had never been.

The view screen lit up, showing Robin from the waist up, a control room in the background Raven didn't recognize with Cyborg and Beast Boy behind him on both sides. A moment later the door behind them slid open and Starfire flew through. Robin asked, “Do you like our surprise? When we learned about Trigon I contacted the Batman. He made some calls of his own, and this is the result — so long as you're in this room, Trigon can't touch you. Now let's see what's coming.”

Her teammates vanished from the screen to reveal an underwater scene, from what Raven guessed was one of the cameras set up on the bottom of the bay surrounding Titan's Tower. The water was murky, but not so much that she couldn't recognize the figure shambling straight toward her — the blue-and-black costume over chain mail, the one-eyed full face mask, split vertically between orange and black. Slade was back. She supposed she shouldn't be surprised that her father had granted him the ability to survive without air, but did have to wonder why he was walking instead of flying. He had when he'd shown up on her birthday, after all, when she'd tried to run away. At least he was alone. Then he was past the camera, and the view changed to show the edge of the island. A few moments later Slade's head broke through the water. He shambled up onto the shore, strode forward several yards toward the tower, and stopped. He waited, standing in the same bent and slump-shouldered posture he'd had since his return from the dead.

Second after second ticked by, until finally Robin's voice again came over the hidden speaker: “Let's go see what the man has to say.”

“Do not worry, friend Raven, Slade shall not touch you so long as we breathe!”

Raven's breath hitched at her friend's words. “Wait!” she called out, but no one answered. She weakly pushed herself up and twisted to sit in a lotus position, still recovering from the physical assault of her father's call, and stared at the screen. In less than a minute her friends came into view, lining up between Slade and the tower. Raven whispered, “That's what I'm afraid of.”

/\

“Let's go see what the man has to say,” Robin said, then allowed himself to be pushed to one side by the ever-excitable Tamaranean princess. As she delivered her own words of encouragement into the microphone, he glanced over at several video screens that he hadn't considered sharing with Raven even for a moment: news feeds from around the world showing or reporting various heroes being attacked by the same flame creatures — including from Metropolis, and Las Vegas. That took care of Superman and Zatanna, and there'd been reporters in space and at a certain remote tower in Salem Robin was sure that he'd be seeing reports of attacks on the Justice League Watchtower and Dr. Fate's sanctum, and London, and more.

There would be no help coming, they were on their own.

Still, there was nothing to say, and he forced himself to project the same confident air he always had during the team's adventures as he led his friends up to the tower's main entrance. Maybe, just maybe, someone would be able to shake loose from their attackers and find some way to bounce themselves hundreds — thousands — of miles to come to the rescue. Or maybe Slade had underestimated the teenagers, devoted so much of his resources to holding off adult heroes that the Titans would be able to handle what was left.

In front of the others, Robin allowed a grimace to cross his face. Yeah, right, like Slade would make a mistake that obvious. Still, we'll be able to hold him off for awhile, hopefully long enough for him to make a mistake. Then they were approaching the outside door, and he again put on the confident we-can-handle-anything air that he had always used to inspire his teammates and unnerve their foes. Showtime.