Chapter Three

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I pulled out an emergency contact that Batman had given to everyone on the team so that we could notify each other if there was danger somewhere. I pressed a button on it and entered my code. It beeped once and went quiet.

"Sure hope this thing works," I muttered. Then I waited, I sat down on the edge of the park fountain, and I waited. Then I waited some more. And a little more. It had been nearly and hour, when I finally sat up giving a huff and decided to give up and try later. I had nearly left the park when a voice behind me spoke.

"Who are you and why do you have Shazams transmitter?"

I spun around, "BATMAN!! You're finally here I've been waiting for an hour!"

"Answer the question," he demanded.

"Well," I sighed, "I'm Billy Batson....and I am Shazam. Wooooh..." I said fading out awkwardly doing jazz hands. I could feel Batman narrowing his gaze at me.

"Shazam is not a child. If it is you then how do you explain your appearance. Have you been cursed?" Batman walked closer to me and sort of inspected my face. I was short and Batman was a big guy and he practically engulfed me in his shadow that was created from the moon.

"I've always looked this way," I explained. Batman looked at me quizzically, and I smirked, enjoying that I had hidden my identity from this great detective. But it didn't look like he believed me at all, so it's about time I used my last option. "You might want to step back.....SHAZAM!!" I yelled, the usual bolt striking down and revealing a 13 year old Shazam with my street clothes still on.

Batman stared at me for a second then said, "say something only Shazam and I would know."

"That's literally impossible man!! I mean nobody knows a thing about you....?"

"Exactly," he said, "now explain."

I nodded, glad he finally understood, and I explained what had happened dating back a year and a half ago. I left out the foster home part though, I didn't really want the league to know my sob story all the much.

"So what now?" He said.

"I was hoping that you would've had the answer to that. I don't think I'll ever switch back to how I was before, even if I want to. But I still have my powers and I can still be a part of the league!"

"No," he said. My heart stopped for a second and my breath caught in my throat. "However," he continued, "there is a team that you can join. Follow me." I followed Batman into an open area in the park and realized then that he had hidden an entire freaking jet there. "Woah!! That's so cool!" I said, then blushing scarlet because I had acted like a child in front of Batman.

"Get in," he said.

••••••••••••

We had already been flying through the air for 20 minutes in complete silence when I decided to finally pop the question, "where are we going?"

"To your new team," he said, as if it explained anything. He glanced over at me, saw my confused face and decided to explain a little more; "there's a team of super humans, aliens, assassins and all the sorts of people you would find on the Justice league. Only difference is is that they're all around you're age. You're going to join them. They're called the Teen Titans."

I stared at Batman wide eyed, "um, first of all, that's a dumb name. Second, did you say aliens?! And third, what if I don't want to join them?!" I questioned. I hadn't heard of this team, which kind of hurt since I had been a valued member of the Justice League up till now, and thought I had been informed of everything that the team knew.

Batman scowled at me, "do you want to join the team?" He said it in a begrudgingly way, which made me worried about what would happen if I did turn down the offer.

"Yes I would like to join the team of teenage delinquents," I muttered.

"Good," said Batman, "now go to sleep, we won't get there till morning." Batman didn't even have to suggest it, I was already groggy and only a few minutes later I was fast asleep.

••••••••••••

"Wake up," Batman said gruffly. I woke up shocked and it took me a few moments to remember what had happened. It was still hard to take in all of it. The sun had already rose and I guessed it to be around mid-morning, maybe a little later. The jet had landed on a wide stretch of cement and faced out towards the ocean. I stared out at it, I had never seen the ocean before, at least not as Billy Batson.

"You have drool on your face," smirked Batman as he hopped out of the jet. I got out my side, growling while still half asleep and trying to fix my appearance a little, wiping off the drool and all. I walked around the jet, meeting up with Batman. Before me was the strangest building I had ever seen; it was shaped as a giant "T". Rolling grassy hills surrounded and a little bit of forest, but I could hear the faint noises of a small city somewhere nearby.

"Well that doesn't call any attention to them. Nothing like saying, 'hey bad guys! You can't find us but we'll give you a hint! Our building is a giant version of the first letter in our team name!'" I joked about the building as we walked up to the front.

Batman almost smirked, but just said, "the building has ways of going unnoticed by people it doesn't want to be noticed by." I don't know what the hell that means, and I'm not even sure that I want to find out.

We walked up to the ugly building and Batman entered a code on a keypad by the side of the large front door. It slid open moments after and the two of us entered. It was all quite anti-climatic honestly, I was expecting a little more Pazazz from the funky building, but the room was very simple, and on top of that it seemed completely deserted.

"So when you said team did you mean just me?" I asked Batman sarcastically. He glared at me, "it's a big building," he said.

We had entered into a front entrance of a room that seemed to mostly be made of metal. There was a hallway down the front centre, and several large metal doors. There were two staircases, one to my direct left and the other to my right. Batman directed my to one of the doors to the left of the room and pressed a button. There was a ding and the doors to an elevator opened. We stepped inside and Batman pressed the button for the top floor.

Riding the elevator was probably one of the most bizarre things I had ever done in my life. I mean, here I was just riding slowly up an elevator in uncomfortable silence, listening to elevator music while standing next to Gotham's favourite vigilante, and there was the fact that he was wearing leggings.

After a long time of silence, Batman decided to say something, "here at the teen titans you will no longer be Shazam, you will be Billy Batson. You can think of a new name or whatever you want, but you are to keep the fact that you were on the Justice league a secret. Is that clear?" I nodded, honestly he didn't give me much of a choice. "Also, I checked your history and I know about the foster homes," I glared at him for that, "you'll be provided with living accommodations here just like all the others." It might actually be kind of interesting to have a place as nice as this to stay. I gave my agreements and we continued in silence.

After the longest and most awkward ride of my life, the elevator dinged and the green display showed that we were at the top floor. The doors opened, and on the other side was a lounge area filled with a few kids around my age or older. They all looked like weirdos honestly.

We stepped out and Batman spoke up first, "Teen Titans, this is your newest member Billy, he'll be living here with you and will be training and going on assigned missions as well. He has a bit of experience so hopefully he should be fine," he side while pointedly looking at me. "Someone, all of you, help him get comfortable, you're going to be spending a lot of time together."

And with that the big bat left, leaving me to stand awkwardly in the middle of the room.

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