Teen Titans: Nomad

S5: Trust

Opening shot: a pan past a dark rock formation that fills the screen, so that a barren desert landscape comes into view under a cloudless red sky at sunset. Hard breathing is heard for an instant before the beefy, black-clad, armored figure of Wildebeest races into view.

Shots from different angles show him running to beat the band, after which the camera pans quickly back the way he came and stops on a slender female shape in pursuit. It is in silhouette, marked only by glints of light at the edges, but these are enough to pick out the details of Madame Rouge.

Wildebeest darts ahead, surprisingly agile for a four-hundred-pounder, and slides down a short slope to try and get ahead. Ducking behind a large rock, he stops to catch his breath and brings up something in one hand. Close-up: it is the communicator Robin gave him at the end of "Winner Take All." He flips it open, then turns to peek furtively out around the edge of his hiding place; cut to his perspective, no Rouge anywhere in sight, then back to him. The rubber-limbed villainess oozes up behind him at a leisurely pace, but once he gets sight of her, he is off and running all over again.

Rouge's shadow extends toward his back, marking her rapid catch-up, and only a last-second dodge keeps her lengthened arms off him. Cut to an overhead view of the desert canyons in this area, panning toward a broad mesa with a path spiraling up its slopes, then to its summit. Wildebeest dashes into view, stops at the edge to take in the brain-spraining drop, and finally voices a howl of unadulterated desperation and terror. The camera cuts to a spot well down the height, pointing up at him for a very long shot, and pulls back as the noise dies away.

Close-up of his hands, the now-closed communicator still clutched in one of them. It beeps to mark an incoming message, and he opens the device again; on the next line, cut to a long shot behind him and zoom in.

Robin: Robin to Wildebeest. Do you read me? Come in. Over.

Wildebeest turns to give the camera and the approaching whatever-it-is a very frightened look, and the flash of a strike whites out the screen. This clears to give another lower-altitude view of the peak, over which the communicator plunges toward a river far below.

Robin: Answer me!

Rouge's arm flashes down into view toward it; she delivered the blow that knocked it out of the honorary Titan's hand.

Robin: Wildebeest!

Before she can get her fingers around the communicator, it says hello to the stony riverbank and flies apart at the seams. Fade to black.
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Opening shot: an overhead view of a city at sunrise, Paris, as indicated by the Eiffel Tower in the foreground. Pull back a frame more of the urban center, then cut to a close-up of a chessboard behind which Monsieur Mallah is seated. The camera is positioned at the pieces' level; he reaches into view to capture a white pawn with the black queen. Tilt up to his face, showing the world map from the end of Part Two of "Homecoming" behind him. This game is taking place in the new hideout seen in that final sequence.

Mallah: We have captured one of their pawns.

Pull back. His opponent is the Brain, and a teapot is set nearby with one steaming cup.

Brain: Wildebeest is just the first of many.

Mallah moves a white piece to its side of the board.

Brain: The young Titans' days are numbered.