Thought this would be fun. Robin & Starfire, TT universe, romance and ZOMBIES. What could possibly go wrong? Well, since I'm writing it, just about everything!
I own only the army of zombies.
"Robin, perhaps I simply have 'the jitters', but this city seems...quiet."
"You're right about that much. Three AM is usually a busy time here."
Robin and Starfire had gone to work out a simple robbery—something the local PD would usually handle, but couldn't, due to a string of murders. When they arrived, they found no cars in the street, nobody in the street side diners and McDonalds...no lights but the streetlights and stoplights.
"Perhaps if we make our way down to the robbed store we may find something," suggested Starfire.
"Right. Let's go."
They made their way down three blocks, each as deathly silent as the last, before coming up to the store. It was a Sports store. The thing that made it stand apart from the buildings around it was that the lights were on inside. They went inside.
It was a mess. There was merchandise scattered everywhere, racks overturned, and shelves broken in half. There was no one to be found.
They separated to search around the store and see if they could find anyone. Robin was lifting up a piece of a large shelf when he heard Starfire call his name.
"You find something?" he asked, jogging over.
Starfire, a terrified expression on her face, pointed at something.
At first, Robin thought it was a dead man. He was missing legs and an arm and his innards were exposed for the world to see. The thing that heralded otherwise, though, was that the person's head was moving around, with his jaw in a constant up-and-down biting motion.
"What the…?"
"Robin, what is wrong with him?"
"Uh, he should be dead, but he isn't? I don't know."
"What should we do?"
The man stopped moving. All of a sudden, he let out a horribly loud wail. He then resumed his jaw motions.
"Oh, he is in pain! Robin, we must help him!" she took a step towards the dismembered man.
Robin grabbed her arm. "Starfire, wait. There's something wrong with this entire situation. This guy should be dead. I mean, look at him!"
"But he is not dead, so we can not just leave him here so he -can- die!"
"He's missing half his organs and, judging by the pool around him, a lot of blood. Enough blood that he probably doesn't have an ounce left!"
"But he is somehow alive!"
"That's my point, Starfire: I don't think he's actually alive."
She looked confused. "What do you mean?"
Robin looked at the man again. "I don't know."
Starfire opened her mouth to speak, but there was the sound of glass breaking. The Titans looked at the front of the store, and more people were coming in through the window and the door. They were all in various states of decay and mutilation and they were moving at a slow shuffle.
Starfire took a step back. "This reminds me of one of Beast Boy's terror movies."
Robin took out his staff. "Star, I don't think this is the best time to be talking about movies."
"No, Robin, I think I understand. The movie I am thinking of was called 'Night of the Living Dead'."
"So you're saying these people are zombies. Wonderful." He assessed the situation. There were fourteen zombies and two of them. "I think we can take them."
"Is it wise to fight them in an enclosed area?"
"Going outside would probably attract more."
The zombies began to wail and moan louder than they had been before.
"And so will that! Come, Robin, we must escape from this place!" Starfire grabbed Robin's arms and flew out a side window.
As he was being hauled over the city, he noticed zombies starting to come out and mill around the streets. A few looked up and wailed at them, but there was nothing they could do.
Every second, the streets became more packed with walking corpses.
"What is going on here?" he whispered to himself.
Starfire landed on the roof of a corporate building. There was no way to go from the roof to the inside, so no zombies could get to them.
"I am sorry if I startled you, Robin. That would have been most unpleasant had we stayed."
Robin nodded. "Yeah, don't worry about it."
"We should return to the other Titans. We can not handle this alone."
Robin shook his head. "We can't leave. What happens if we do, and zombies start leaving for other cities?"
Starfire paled slightly. "But...we need help."
Robin pulled out his communicator and tried to raise Cyborg.
There was nothing but static. He tried again.
Still nothing.
"Looks like we're on our own."
"How are we going to deal with all these zombies? We can not possibly kill them all by ourselves!"
"They had to have come from somewhere. With any luck, eventually they'll go back. Maybe there's something there that can make our job easier."
Starfire considered this for a moment, and then nodded. "That is a good plan. Let us go and find a group of zombies to follow."
Grabbing Robin once more, Starfire flew off the roof of the building.
Hours of searching led to the belief that a small movie theater was the origin of the zombies. Almost all of the groups they followed stopped there for a while before moving on.
Starfire was tired from carrying Robin the entire time—he had insisted that she didn't need to, but she was too worried that he would be attacked—and Robin's arms felt like they were going to fall off.
Starfire landed on top of a medium-sized building. It probably had seven or eight stories.
"All right," said Robin, "let's rest for an hour or three."
Starfire nodded in agreement. "That sounds like a wonderful idea," she said, panting lightly.
They lay down near each other. The sun was beginning to peek over the horizon, but they didn't notice. Within minutes, they had drifted off into sleep.
Of course, all good things must end. Robin woke to a zombie getting ready to rip his throat out with her teeth. Thinking fast, he took a bird-a-rang and shoved it through her eye. He pulled out his staff to see Starfire fighting off a group of five zombies. She was trying to take off, but every time she did, a zombie pulled her back down.
Robin charged into the fray, bashing a skull open right off the bat. At his second kill, he heard a loud scream from Starfire.
The top half of a zombie had his teeth sunk into her leg.
With rage threatening to burst out of his every pore, he smashed the last standing zombie and then crushed the skull of the half-zombie with his foot.
Starfire collapsed and clutched the bleeding wound. Robin ran to her.
"Starfire! Starfire, are you—stupid question. Can you fly?"
She looked at him like he was crazy.
He repeated his question. "Can you fly?"
Somewhat unsteadily, she lifted off the ground, and then nodded in affirmation.
"Okay, go on top of that building right there," he pointed to a larger building, "and I'll be there in a bit. I'll get you help."
She nodded. "Robin?"
"What?"
She hugged him. "Be safe." She flew up to the other building before he could respond.
"Yeah, I'll be safe. As safe as you can be in a movie theater, anyways."
As Robin entered theater 3, he made a mental note that zombies make horrible security guards.
He ascended to the back of the room quietly and checked the rows before him. Just zombies again. He wasn't going to risk a confrontation with more than he could handle. Without being noticed, he slipped back out into the hall.
When he arrived at theater four, he knew he had found whoever was in charge. The doors were padlocked.
This posed no trouble for Robin, as he easily picked the lock. Upon entering, he noticed that there was a large pile of bodies in the corner, and most of the seats had been removed. There was a single man in there, and he was working on something at a table.
Robin sneaked up behind him and swept his legs out from under him, after which he pinned him to the floor.
The man was, needless to say, startled. "Wh-what?"
"Did you make the zombies?" Robin asked, getting right to the point.
"Why would I—no, that's a horrible thing to do!"
Pressure was applied to the man's right arm, threatening to break it.
"Ah, ow! Ow! Yes, yes I made them!"
"Is there a cure?"
There was no response for a moment, before the man began to laugh. "A cure? Oh, that's good! What are you, a comedian?"
Robin heard zombies coming.
With a whack to the side of the head, he knocked the man unconscious. He turned around and saw that the zombies had stopped. They made no move to attack him.
Robin looked down. Dropping a few of his explosive disks, he ran for the emergency exit.
Theater number four exploded behind him.
He turned the corner, heading for the building Starfire was on, only to run into something very large and metallic. This happened to be Cyborg's chest.
He stared at his African-American friend in utter disbelief for a moment.
"Robin? Hey, guys, I found Robin!" he shouted. He looked at Robin. "Where's Starfire, do you know?"
"She's on top of that building over there. Quick, we have to get to her!" He took off running.
Cyborg caught up to him quickly. "What's with this place? There were zombies everywhere, and then they all just stopped doing anything!"
"No time! Starfire's been bitten!"
The mechanical man tripped over himself. "Why didn't you say so?!" he picked Robin up and increased his speed.
Starfire was white as a sheet and sweating. Robin stared at her unconscious form, lying in the bed of the medical room, helplessly.
Cyborg had said that they needed to find a cure for her, fast. The virus was slower than he thought it would be, which may have had something to do with the death of its creator. That happened six hours ago. Cyborg said they had ten, maybe.
Robin thought to what Beast Boy had told him. His signal did get through, Cyborg just couldn't speak back. When he checked the location of the communicator and it didn't show up on the map, they knew something was wrong.
Good thing, too, or else Starfire might...
he didn't want to think about it.
Cyborg entered the room. Robin immediately asked, "Did you find it?"
Cyborg shook his head. "No, but the computer is working on it while I'm gone. I just needed to tell that, worst comes to worst, we might not make it in time, and..."
"...Yeah. I know." Robin was glad for his mask; he figured he was about to cry.
'"Get some sleep. You've been up for who-knows-how-long." he looked him over. "You look like you need it, too."
"No, I'm fine."'
"Robin. Get some sleep. Just a few hours."
"Cyborg, I don't need to sleep."
"Yes, you do. You're human too."
He huffed. "Fine. Just an hour." Robin stormed off to his room, set an alarm to go off in an hour, and lay down on his bed. He was asleep before his head hit the pillow.
Robin jolted awake, but not to his alarm. Someone was in his room. No light filtered in through the window; he must have been asleep for a few hours.
When his eyes adjusted, he saw Starfire's face—her tanned, happy face.
"Koriand'r?" he whispered, not believing it was her. He put a hand on her cheek, to make sure he wasn't dreaming.
She nodded. Tears threatened to spill over. Robin was given a kiss and pulled into a joyous hug.
Yeah, that sucked. Oh well. I had it most of the way written and I figured I may as well finish it. Hope you enjoyed, please review.