Night of the Bandit (Titans)

Hotwire drove through the portal, out from the alley and down the street. He saw a man hopping out of the truck. As in hopping out of it. He had a couple sacks in his hand. As if that weren't weird enough, Yang contacted him from, what his readings could tell, on top of the building across from the crash. She said his body temperature was at most 50 degrees. Nobody could live with that kind of temperature unless they were meta-human. Which, to be frank, totally made sense.

Then the man did something even stranger. He climbed into midair. Well, rather, he climbed an invisible something. That something shimmered into sight. A horse, with wood planks on its legs. The man looked like a wild west cowboy, or at least as much as somebody could with a eerie purple glow. And that face... it was like...

Oh no.

"You know I hate to say this... and you know how much I hate to be the one to admit this. But we have a ghost." Hotwire said as the horse began to gallop off.


"Titans, move in!" He yelled revving his cycle and zooming off after the man.

Yang was hardly convinced by that. "Really. So we live in Jump City where I can tank a truck to the mouth, you can take down skynet, and we have people who can drink electricity and turn into any material, and this instantly means he's a ghost? I think that's a bit far fetched..." She watched her team zoom off without her though. "Of course...cuz #%!$ me right?" She muttered and swung off the roof, watching for the target. He did leave a pretty huge temperature distortion behind him, making a clear trail for her to follow with her thermal vision. "Hey Hotwire, do you think that-" Halfway through her sentence, Rot phazed through a building and rode straight through and out the other side. "...Once again, Not ruling out metahuman. He could just be trying to appear as a ghost to throw people off his trail."

Meta waited at the portal until Jenny picked up his lighter form, then they both flew off into the portal. Meta felt a little uncomfortable being held in her arms like that, it made him feel vulnerable. But it wasn't just that, while he wasn't a lone wolf or anything, he didn't feel comfortable with his team-mates inconveniencing themselves for him. Not that his insecurities showed, he looked as serious as he could while being carried like a bride.

Meta saw the man jump out of the van, so what did we have to deal with here? Intangibility and... climbing on the air? He'd heard of one other hero who could do that by the name of Kicker, but the Titans had Jenny on the team, her powers of flight should be more than enough to deal with a Kicker rip-off. But as it turns out, things weren't so simple, he was in fact climbing a horse which seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. The horse galloped off, Harmon gave the order to follow the horse, Meta looked up at Jenny If you need to drop me to go faster, don't hesitate

When yang said it was a bit far fetched to say that the villain was a ghost she actually laughed a bit. "Sorry for laughing but I dunno Yang I wouldn't believe it either if I had just came back from being dead for a good month or two there recently, or that one of my best friends was a chaos lord, and one of my ex boyfriends was half dragon, basically what I'm saying is I think at this rate anything is possible. She then saw the guy leave the van she thought to herself about hot to land hits on him but then was cut off by what Meta said.

"I'm fine you're light in your current form, besides it'd set the team back since we'd have to wait for you to run and catch up if I dropped you here." she said picking up speed flying above the villain. She made sure she was always close by to him but not too close and was ready to raise a shield if needed. Though one thing couldn't wait any longer she had to do it. "When there's something strange up in jump city, who you gonna call... Teen Titans!"

Right through a wall. HE WENT RIGHT THROUGH THE WALL. At this point, Hotwire didn't care if it was a ghost, meta-human, or lone ranger impersonator who was just having a bad day. He wanted this thing CAUGHT. "Energy. Metamorphi. Whatever that thing is just went through a the building half a block before us. We're going to have to detour to get back to it. See if you can use your birds eye view and keep on him." Hotwire said.

Yang quickly interrupted him. "He leaves a big temperature distortion. I've still got him. Focus on catching up Jenn." She climbed on top of a building and mashed some keys into her gauntlets. "I've got a waypoint set up on your communicators to track his distortion paths. Just follow that and you'll be fine." She jumped back off the building and swung through the crane of a construction site. "Hey Hotwire, you wanna use your namesake to drop some crap on him? Obstacles? Minor annoyances? Anything?"

Metamorphi did not comment on the 'whether or not he is a ghost' banter, when he was at the base he was perfectly sociable, but in the field he was completely serious and didn't engage in conversations like this. He spoke into his communicator Stay focused The Ghostmanthing went through a wall, so he had a big tactical advantage over them, Hotwire ordered them to watch from above to try and get an eye back on him in case he tried to outsmart them, but Yang communicated that she could track him from his temperature. Metamorphi couldn't really do anything in this situation, so he just awaited further orders.

"I am I'm just trying to have some fun while I work." She said to meta as she listened to Yang and Hotwire's orders. She then thought for a moment 'To follow Yang's orders or not to and follow Hotwire's orders...." She then thought a few more moments but then spoke to Meta. "Hey I'm gonna drop you so you can follow the trail while I try and get a higher view."

She then flew down and placed Meta where Hotwire asked her to then flew back into the air getting a higher view and following the man and pulled out her communicator and started to take a video of the birds eye view broad casting it to the others so they could look at the same view if they wanted to.

Hotwire looked down at his computer, interfaced with his cycle. "I'll see what I can do..." He said checking a map of the city. The signature of the man was heading in a straight line. Pulling a few quick turns, he found himself at the intersection two roads, with the cowboy fast approaching. With a swish of his arm, a street light bent over into the mans path.

"Like that for instance."

But the man just rode straight through it.

"Doesn't look like there's much I can do. I'll try to catch up again and see if my cycles energy weaponry can do any damage. Energy, you get up close to him. We need to bottleneck him, control where he can and can't go." He explained zooming off again after him.

"Metamorphi. As Energy just said, you're in a prime position to corner him. Use whatever you can to set a trap for him, and we should be able to move him to where you are."

Yang scratched her chin from her position on top of a building. "I don't think that's going to work Hotwire." She said, blocking out the other Titans' comms. The two may be co leaders but no one seemed to listen to her. Not like Hotwire anyway. "I think our best bet would be to have Energy try to bait him into fighting her. If we can't slow him down with obstacles, maybe he has an ego that can get in the way or something?" Before Hotwire could get a chance to reply, the target made a turn and was running down a nearby street. "In fact...gimme a sec." She said, hopping off the roof and cocking back a shock shot in her gauntlet. Maybe something electrical would get on his nerves? "I'm gonna have to ask you to pull over!" She called out, firing it straight down into him and his horse, ready to swing away if something went awry.

As they received their orders, Jenny informed Meta that she would set him down so he can try and follow the heat signature trail, he nodded to show he understood and let himself be let down. He stepped down on the ground and nodded to Jenny Good luck Harmon then contacted him, telling him to try and set a trap, Meta spoke into the communicator, simply saying one word Roger to confirm that he heard and understood what he was to do.

He wasn't completely sure what exactly he could do to stop this man, seeing how he could just faze through objects, but he had to do something. Just as he was trying to figure out what he could do as a plan, the man took an unexpected turn and was now going down the street opposite the one Meta was in. Meta cursed under his breath and turned his body to paper, running after the horseman even though he was much slower than the horse. He knew he'd never catch up, but he needed to at least stay in the same general area so he could intercept him at some other point. Hopefully Yang's attack worked.

Jenny sighed as she watched it all from the skies not hearing yang's word since she only talked to hotwire it appeared she was left out of the action for now. Sure it would possibly change soon but jenny always felt weird when she wasn't in the main fight. "So guys is there even a plan on trying to slow him down or are we just randomly attacking him. I mean I'm fine just flying over head but since that guy can phase through things I don't think any sort of trap will get him since we don't know what kind of trap would catch a guy like that." Jenny said expressing her concerns and sharing her thoughts with the others.

Hotwire rolled this around in his head. Yang was right. Then she shot one of her shock shells at the horseman... it went right through him... again.

"Okay. We'll try to play his emotions, but that means we need to catch up with him" He said as he pulled up along side him on his cycle.

Yang tried ice. Nothing. Fire. Nothing. This was just stupid! Everything is stupid! She grappled herself off a street lamp and landed on the back of Hotwire's bike. "So um...Thats everything I've got. I literally have nothing now." She sighed, checking her shots. Definitely nothing else new to try.

Metamorphi didn't like this, his was a smart and tactical mind, but against an opponent that no traps would work against and no weaknesses are known, there is very little he could do to help in this situation. For now he focused on keeping up with the ghost, the horse may be much faster than Meta, but Meta could track his route with his communicator and take short cuts to keep up with him. He kept up with the conversation going on on the comms so he could keep up with any plans being formed.