The New Teen Titans Get Bug-Bombed Chapter One: It's a Gas Gas Gas Evan Andrews 2024
This is a fan fiction.
All characters depicted in it belong to and are trademarked and copyrighted by DC Comics and/or its subsidiaries. I am not related to the company and make no claim of ownership over the characters. I've given up trying to figure out where my stories fit into the DC continuity anymore.
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Nightwing's companions stood to either side of the Titans' team leader, staring down the stairs into the unlit basement
I don't know how to break it to you, Dick, but I hate spiders and bugs," Gar, Beast Boy, confessed.
"You?" Dick, Nightwing, asked.
"Yeah, don't rub it in," Gar replied.
"So who are we chasing, if you don't mind me asking?" Roy, Arsenal, asked.
"Some plumber..." Dick started.
"Plumber?" Gar was confused. "As in pipes and drains?"
"'Plumber' as in our villain works from sewers and the city's underground water system," Roy clarified.
"Oh," the green teen said. "Go on."
"Yeah, so, this guy's been coming up from below ground, breaking, entering, and burglarizing," Dick said.
"Below ground, where most people'd never think to put an alarm system," Roy said.
"And you didn't call the whole crew because...?"
Yeah, leave it to Gar to question every little decision Dick made.
"Well, he's called Bug Bomb..." Dick started.
"Weird name," Gar said
"Would you let me finish already, Gar? He has this bug fixation..." Dick said.
"Ewww!"
"And if he gets in a fix, he uses a chemical fog to cover his escape," Dick continued.
"Thence Bug Bomb," Roy said.
"Right. So, do you really think we need a whole team of superheroes to take down a bug-addled maniac with a spray can?" Dick fixed the shape changer with a stare.
"I suppose not," Gar admitted.
And they had never been more wrong.
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Underground, the super trio followed a painfully obvious (at least to Dick's detective's eyes) trail from Bug Bomb's most recent burglary deep under New York into sewers most people never even knew existed.
"Nightwing," Gar said, switching to hero names now they were on the hunt, "This place stinks."
"So part-change into something with a dull sense of smell," Roy suggested.
Gar grumbled, but he must have taken Roy's advice because he stopped complaining about the smell.
Finally they rounded a corner and came upon their prey. Bug Bomb was just standing there in the middle of the sewer, his legs spread and set and his arms raised to head height on either side. His costume was black and shiny, even in the bad light down here, not latex but some other iridescent fabric, and his cowl, also black, was like Batman's, just with antennae instead of ears.
"Jeepers." Gar said, "There's a man who's gone around the bend a few too many times."
"Shut up, Wesley," Roy suggested, but not unkindly.
So, you thought to follow me to my hive, did you, you dratted do-gooders?!" Bug Bomb screeched.
"Why do they always have to talk like that?" Roy said. "There must be some course villains take where they teach them how to do that."
"He reads too many comic books," Gar suggested.
"Probably," Dick said, but Bug Bomb wasn't done with his rant.
"You think you three can take me?! Is that it?!" he cried.
"Well, yeah. `Cause we're the good guys; it's what we do," Gar said.
"Beast Boy..." Dick said.
"What? He's a looney in a bug suit. Let's get him."
With no other warning, the green-skinned teen hero suddenly charged.
"Crap," Dick swore. "Come on Arsenal. Old age and experience to the rescue."
"Again," Roy sighed. "And who're you calling old, gramps?"
The three heroes rushed the older man in a wedge formation. Gar had claimed point, so Dick took position on the shapeshifter's left and Roy on his right. As they got in range, though, Bug Bomb reached for aerosol cans that hung off his utility belt.
"Oh sure," Gar taunted, "Do your worst. Go for it, Bugs. I dare you! Tag me!"
"Just what I was planning," the villain cackled.
Suddenly bugs, insects of all sorts and species, fell from the ceiling and swarmed over the three heroes.
"Tag!" Bug Bomb laughed.
"Oh fuck!" Gar cried, slapping at himself as he freaked out. "So! Many! Bugs! I HATE these things!"
"When we get out of this," Roy said as he slapped at the tiny creatures crawling all over his skintight red costume, "You and I are going to have a talk about rushing into obvious traps, greenie! Ouch! One of them stung me!"
`That's what you get for sporting bare arms,' Dick thought, though he kept that to himself.
The horde of tiny creatures covered Dick's body, and they now had started flying into his face. Inevitably, some of them got inside his costume and started stinging him as well.
The dark brooding vigilante only grunted at the pain, but his friends were decidedly more vocal.
"Ouch! Fuck! That hurts!" Gar cried.
"Fuck!" Roy hollered. He was taking more stings than either of his two buddies.
All thoughts of grabbing Bug Bomb evaporated as the heroes slapped at themselves, trying desperately to kill the stinging vermin and put an end to their torment. It took Dick's powers of introspection and observation, however, to realize that with each sting, his reactions were getting slower and his coordination more uncertain. Finally, the young hero's senses start to dim as he slid towards unconsciousness.
"Nightwing!".
"I know, Arsenal. Fight it as long as you can. He has to run out of bugs eventually."
"Really, Bats Junior?" Bug Bomb snickered. "I thought you were the smart one. Didn't the old man in the Bat Cave ever teach you how many insects there are on the Earth? There are trillions in the Big Apple alone! Maybe more."
The buggy villain raised his hands again and in triumph cried, "And they're all my allies! All my servants! All my slaves!"
With a maniacal grin, he pointed at the heroes as they succumbed and said, "Just as you will be!"
Gar fell to his knees.
"Nigh..." he croaked before falling flat on his face. The bugs then swarmed over him.
"'Wing, we're down a man," Roy said
"Yeah, I noticed."
The former Boy Wonder was a mass of welts under his skintight costume.
"I... I'm not sure I can keep this up!" the red-head archer admitted.
"Try, buddy! Fight it!"
But Roy collapsed to the floor a moment later, his red baseball cap rolling to the side revealing the hero's mop of ginger hair.
"Roy!" Dick cried. (So, much for that secret identity.)
And then a sting in the back of Dick's neck proved to be one straw too many. And he dropped, oblivious to what was going on around him.
The carpet of creepy-crawlies parted as Bug Bomb stepped up, and the deranged villain looked gleefully down at his vanquished enemies.
Smiling as bugs raced up his jet black costume, the villain looked into the air and said, "Exactly what I thought, my queen. I'll bring them to the nursery straight away."
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WHAT GRUESOME FATE DOES THE FIENDISH BUG BOMB HAVE IN STORE FOR OUR BOYS? WHAT IS THIS NURSERY? AND WHO THE BLAZES WAS BUG BOMB TALKING TO?! Join us next week, same Titan Time same Titan Channel, for "Nightwing Gets Buzzed" or "A Hero's Honeytrap"!