Disclaimer: Teen Titans characters belong to D.C. Comics. Agni is from Hindu believes. I just demoted him a little. "Come to the Edge" is written by Guillaume Apollinaire (1880 - 1918).
WARNING: Lesbianism discussed. If not your cup of tea leave now.
Ravens and crows are like any other animals; they host the possibility of genetic abnormality and mutations. Albinism, for example, because there were white ravens and crows. Whether they were thought to be positive or negative all depends on different cultures, and it didn't really matter after all since whatever their existence meant was all artificial anyway. In her case, however, Raven of the Teen Titans was dying to tag the creature with a meaning. She had been visited and revisited and revisited by this said bird in her dream inconsistently over the past few months, and it bothered her even in her meditations on the roof of the Tower.
A white shape flashed inside Raven's closed eyes like a curtain blown into a window. That again. Things had been down right miserable inside her mind lately. With disgust she frowned and opened her eyes a slit, and saw the red marks on her skyward palms like lava cracks.
"Friend Raven!" cried an obvious voice, startling her. She instinctively curled her fingers and withdrew her arms a little into the shadow cast by her back. "Would you like to join us for supper?"
Raven didn't need to look to recognize Starfire's voice or her peculiar grammar, the voice which, after almost a year of constant oppression, still incited that prickling sensation all over her dark skin and a terrifying hunger within her ribcage. She promptly answered, "No."
"But," Starfire was reluctant to admit defeat, but proceeded cautiously, for she knew not how much was too far with Raven. "You have not dined with us last night either, and today the whole day as well."
"There are things I needed to do," The last thing Raven wanted was to have Starfire linger any moment longer for her fear to break lose and her tongue to fling hostility. It was not exactly the other girl's fault, it was just bad timing. Raven was in the midst of turning things over in her mind, and she felt her control taking a dive like a broken fuel indicator at Starfire's presence.
"Oh… . Perhaps… is it something…"
"You can't help with," Raven finished for the Tamaranian too quickly and harshly before she could stop herself. She took a couple of deep breaths and began again calmly, "Sorry Star. Please leave me, alone." It was almost a whisper when she finished, but it left no ground for arguing, and Starfire felt it. Although she didn't want to leave unaccompanied, she took Robin's advice and let Raven be. Raven remained unmoved for a while after the other girl left, but black energy was slowly gathering all over Titan Tower roof top, betraying her otherwise apparent calmness. The creak of the Tower's metal gate to the roof as it began to misshapen begged the sorceress to acknowledge her lost of control. Star believed in me… as a friend, and I treated her like shit, just because I am too scared to even try and return her feelings… but how can I! How can I risk letting any feeling go when it might just wring loose all together like a mad dog? I feel for her too much… She uncurled her fingers to see the markings. No… I can't… I shouldn't. Dammit! I don't deserve to be with the Titans, I'm just a monster cooped up, feeding and growing on itself… . Another creak. Raven, Calm down. Calm down… . She closed her eyes and forced herself to take in a deep but ragged breath. "Azarath...Metrion...Zinthos..." chanted the sorceress, but after barely an hour of that she realized she was disturbed beyond meditation. She needed something immediate. Her eye lid lifted, and her sight rested on the glistening white belt of moon light floating atop a restless sea.
She fell, like a stone, and sank like one too, down, down without any attempt to stop, toward the seafloor. It was autumn and the water was freezing cold at night, sucking the heat out of her, the agitation. And she sank, until she could feel nothing else but the stinging coldness that was beginning to numb out as well. I will drown if I don't do something now. As troubled as she felt, suicide was never a consideration, so she dragged her body ashore. Her hunching form was indistinguishable from the rocky terrain, and she stared at her sharply defined shadow in front of her where there was no lamp post or any other artificial light sources, catching her breaths. There won't be shadows if there was no light. She was the shadow, the night caped. The light that the darkness, this darkness, needs to exist… is her. She glanced at her hands, and, satisfied, levitated to reenter the Tower through its tortured roof gate, fixing it by the way.
I'm…having this dream again. It was gloomy, no light. She stood on an earthen path with rocks rough enough to be felt through her boots. Mere feet in front of her stood a white raven. It was of such a pure white it was radiating softly as the only light source there. It's not supposed to be there, but where is it supposed to be? She felt anxious. I need to hold on to it, or it'll…ah! As she was thinking so, the white raven beat its wings and took off, fading into the muddy mist. Panicking, Raven took off after the bird, running. Suddenly she ended up before a cliff with wind blowing so strong she sometimes was forced to take an involuntary step. Beyond the cliff was a belt of impenetrable thick, white fog. Stop! Don't go further! She beckoned to the bird, but it flew straight into the fog, and vanishing almost instantly upon contact. Then, she heard the bird – how she knew it was the bird she couldn't reason – beckoning, summoning her to come forth. Below the cliff was bottomless pit. An absolute fear gripped her and she lowered herself to the ground against the clawing wind, and would not go near the cliff. But the wind was growing stronger and stronger, and for the first time the secretive Raven wished she hadn't her cloak, for it was catching the wind like a sail, pulling her closer and closer to the edge. Just once the sorceress turned her face to look back down the lightless pit, and realize she was already at the edge. Then a sudden gust in the current and she fell.
"AAH!" Raven awoke with a violent, whole-body jerk and felt water drops trailing down her temples, once again. She lay still in her bed, feeling frustrated and furious that she wanted to scream, and did not. What monster was that bird which haunted her light or dark, taking away her sleep, driving her mad, and destroying her inside out! … fuck sleep, it's lost.
The kettle screamed sitting on fire, prompting Raven to leave the window in the living room. She turned the heat off and poured the hot water through a ceramic filter holding herbs that rested on top of her mug, capped it, and walked back to the window. No light was on in the living room. On the other side of that sheet of glass the world was black too. The moon had set during her four-hour sleep, and only a few sparkles that were the distant street lights marked where land might separate from water. She took one hand off the warm mug and reached out to press her palm against the chilly glass. It was too early in the morning, the coldest hours of a day. She suddenly felt like a bird which, failed to understand glass, persistently fly into the uncompromising barrier, thinking it was free. Her hands phased through the glass, and drew back to warm up against her mug. When will the bird break its neck? She had thought about telling Starfire her overflowing feelings for her, several times. She was afraid. Unbridled joy, righteous fury, and boundless confidence... she was everything Raven was not, or rather, could not be. Her heart was soft, feeling, and innocent; Her own was rigid, confined, calculating. Sometimes she envied her, who never had to check and process each and every reaction each and every moment of her life. Sometimes she wondered why she fell so hopelessly in love with someone so incompatible, the exact opposite. Three weeks ago she noticed the change in the relationship between Starfire and Robin before anyone else did. Now she couldn't tell anything even if she dared to. She would only trouble and wreck her relationship with the whole team. Those feelings that died and rotted never seeing the light of day was now transformed into a pulsing cancer mound. She felt like she was walking round and around in a negative cycle, with each turn grinding and chipping her off a little at a time. Now it was only the question of which one would break her first – the cancer mound or the natal monster sealed inside her.
Something red and blue flashed where the street lights were lined up. Then again. And again. And soon Raven was looking at four police cars gliding along the coast line at high speed toward opposite directions, in teams of two. More colored lights twinkled between slim city buildings. Probably chasing a burglar. Since she wouldn't be sleeping anyway, she phased through the glass and flew off to stick her nose into the business, leaving her unfinished tea on living room table.
A group of four policemen were talking excitedly next to an open-door police vehicle when one of them noticed a shady figure suddenly approaching them from seemingly out of nowhere, and alerted his comrades. As they quickly drew their guns another one recognized the person and halted the other three, "It's Raven of the Titans."
"What's going on here?" Raven asked.
"I see we're not the only one not getting sleep tonight," the first police to recognize Raven said, "A serial arsonist just broke outta jail."
"Do you mind me helping with this?"
"Not at all! But you don't have to. It's just an arsonist," the same police answered.
"It's okay. I'm not getting sleep tonight anyway," Raven said with a slight smile, "which jail did the arsonist broke out of?"
"City Juvenile Correction Center," Another policeman said quietly, his eyes met those of his comrades, who shared his frown.
"Something's wrong?" Raven inquired, finding the reactions of the law enforcers odd.
"Yes… he appeared to have outside help. The walls to his cell collapsed inward upon outside force, but there was no signs of impact from other objects nor explosive. It was as if the entire wall collapsed on its own. And another strange thing is probably just coincidence, but today happened to be his eighteenth birthday. If he's caught he would be tried in a full court and receive full sentence this time,"
The policemen's communicator buzzed to live. They've tracked the young man down to a half torn down building – one of the many that he helped burn down. After getting the address of that building Raven took off, hovering above the cityscape.
The building had all its windows blown open by either flame as it burned or water from the fire trucks, but it was still difficult to see where someone might be hiding. Its neighboring buildings were dragged into its tragedy, and were both abandoned as well due to excess amount of fire damage. The three of them stood there, lightless in each of their windows, like three tombstones. Without the moon, the interior became almost pitch black, and even Raven couldn't see much of the open-sky third story with its roof torn off. Police cars surrounded the building from back to front like wolves at a reindeer, but policemen were hesitant to move in. From above, Raven saw them all shielding behind their car doors, guns drawn. She landed and spoke to the inspector. Apparently a shot was fired at the policemen earlier, but they didn't know how many people or how many guns were there. She offered to check the building out for them, and the inspector gave her a communicator to carry. She levitated against the adjacent building to the highest floor of the ruins, and phased through the walls from there.
It was dark and difficult to see anything. Perfect. Raven glided along the dark walls without a sound, phasing through them instead of using existing openings. The top floor was cleared. She dropped through the floor, careful to look around the space before landing into it. Second floor was clear too. "He must be on the ground floor," the inspector buzzed, "We'll take it from here, thanks for your help, Raven." Doesn't want me to take his credit away, huh? Nonetheless, she decided to drop to the first floor anyway. She was at the far corner from the front entrance, so she anticipated the chance of dropping right on top of the hiding arsonist, but she didn't expect to actually hit the jack pot. Really, the jack pot.
The one time she didn't check before landing, a large and powerful hand reached out from the shadow next to her and grabbed her left hand that held the communicator. Raven swung her right fist around, only for it to be caught by her captor's other hand. "Slade!" She struggled to free herself, "What are you…Arrgh!"
"My, my… Don't we meet often?" Slade must have been smirking behind his mask. He clenched his hand tighter, crushing the police communicator in Raven's hand. "Might as well come along, hmm? I have something to show you and you alone."
When the police flooded through the ground floor they found no arsonist or superhero, except the crushed communicator. "Must've thought the inspector rude and let the arsonist escape on purpose," they said.
In the cellar of the ruined building, which was all cleared out, the ground and the walls and the ceiling were all scribbled with curving pictures and characters of foreign language, like a cult room for some deviant practice. Across the room there was a search flashlight pointed upward, serving as the only light source. In the middle of the room a dark-haired teenage boy in prison uniform lay on his back like he just fainted from a violent punch. His clothes were drenched. What is this?
"A binding spell diagram," Slade said, earning a shocked look from his captive, whose wrists were clamped behind her back in his hand. "And something else. I want you to meet your friend here on the floor, who we'll soon release."
"'We'?" Raven asked weakly. She had received a powerful punch in her abdomen from Slade that knocked most of the wind out of her, and broke her chant earlier when she tried to fight back. Now she simply played along, keenly waiting for a chance to escape. Scanning the dim room once again, she saw a figure wearing dirty trench coat sitting in the corner to her right. The figure turned to look at them. He was wearing an animalistic, totem-like mask that resembled some sort of fanged creature. A cougar? The rest of him was covered in his coat and its hood. The man stood up, and towered over Slade by a whole foot. He was slim, and wore leather gloves. "Who is he? You were the ones that helped this arsonist escape prison, weren't you?" she asked.
"His identity does not matter to you." said Slade, "And yes, we took this young man out, though he did not exactly ask us to. Shall we begin?" Slade finished motioning his head toward the unconscious boy on the floor. The masked man nodded, and walked pass them to the edge of the round diagram on the floor, and knelt down with his back to Raven, mumbling.
"What are you trying to do?" Raven asked, but received no answer. The masked man continued to mutter incomprehensible sounds, and made minute maneuvers barely an inch above the ground diagram with his hands. The round diagram began to glow dimly and hum, and its inner circular components began to spin. The spinning brought on increasing rotation of the entire drawing, and it then brought to life the other round drawings on the walls and the ceiling it was touching. Raven had never seen sorcery like that, although she was a sorceress herself. The boy began to stir, and once he was conscious he panicked at his situation. His fingers twitched at failed attempt to move and get back up, and he made a few choking sound before he could manage an understandable sentence.
"What are you trying to do!" the boy screamed like a drowning person fighting to get a mouthful of air.
"What you have been yourself trying to do through all your past arsons, Agni," said Slade.
"Release him!" Raven yelled.
"That," said Slade calmly, "is what we're doing."
Raven was getting a dreadful feeling about what was going on. She could feel a nameless pressure emitting from the working diagrams, and it was growing. But was it the diagram or the strange sorcerer? The boy's face was beginning to twist as in great pain, he made beast-like noises, and tears dropped down the sides of his face. I don't know what they're trying to do, but I've seen enough. The boy's gonna die! Although she would most likely not finish her chant before Slade knocked her wind out again, she tried anyway, as quietly as possible. Just before the last phrase, however, Slade suddenly released her, and shove her forward while the masked man ran past her. Without the sorcerer the spell diagrams were still spinning in increasing speed. She turned around to see Slade struck a lighter. "I'll let you two young ones get to know each other better, alone," he said, and tossed the lighter toward the drenched and still struggling boy. In that instant she realized the boy was not wet with water, but oil. "Azarath-Metrion-Zinthos!" Her black energy froze the falling lighter in time, but the pause had let Slade and the masked man escape. A hand shot up and grabbed the lighter. The boy had somehow lifted himself from the ground on an elbow, gripping the lighter with his other hand, and his eyes were twinkling furious colors as if they were glass balls with fire in them.
"Release me!" the boy hissed. The flame of the lighter licked his hand, and instantly turned him into a human torch. His hand dropped and he rolled around in the circular diagram, screaming, as his life quickly burnt out. Suddenly just as Raven thought the boy dead the fire feeding off him turned around and got sucked back into his charred body with loud hissing sound. The strange feeling of pressure she felt before came back multiplied, and she felt for a split second an instinctive urge to run. Some kind of creature is getting loose. Agni…..it's the demon of fire. So he has a monster inside him too… no wonder Slade called us friends. I see now. He was an experiment, and I'm probably next. The dead boy's body burst back into a ball of flames, growing in size and pulsing and roaring. Within seconds the fireball filled the basement cellar, destroying the binding spell diagram and forcing a stumbling retreat from Raven up the cellar trap door. From the trap door she could see shadowy cracks appearing between swirling fire, like cracks on an egg. The demon's about to break out. She imagined how it would be like, what could happen, to the city, to her four friends... to 'her', if Agni was to run loose. She remembered how her team had had to fight a fire element before, and how nothing in their abilities could weaken the creature. Now she was alone.
And she would be alone. No one would come. If no one found out about what was going on no one would come. And she would be alone, concealed, and whatever action she should take, concealed. Less than a handful of people on Earth know of the heritage Raven had brought with her from Azarath, and she had no intension on letting that number grow. I don't want to risk hurting or losing my only friends, especially Starfire. She wrapped the ruined building with her black energy, forming a dome shaped barrier. She then rewrapped a few more times, one layer within another. There. Now nothing could get out, and nothing could get in. She didn't have to worry anymore, and almost as soon as she thought that she felt a horrifying uncontrolled surge of emotion and berserk power welling up from within. It was then she finally realized how much she was destroying herself from the inside out by ignorantly and stubbornly hammering down all these loose feelings without ever sparing a look at them. The inevitable quality inspection time had to roll around sooner or later, and each bad nail taken care of. Yanked back up. The lump of cancer cells was being dissected, and upon the first cut, out sprang like from Pandora's Box jealousy, shame, guilt, self-hatred, anger, and frustration. "C'mon, demon. Let's see who's a bigger monster," From two converging black stripes on the fireball rolled open two pale yellow orbs that were met by four blood red eyes.
The eastern sky was turning pale velvet, and the sun was due within three-quarter hours. As the Titans leader Robin was up and getting ready for his morning workout by finishing his breakfast. He walked into the living room, downing his orange juice. It was going to be a beautiful day. He noticed Raven's deserted mug on the living room table, and thought it odd for the girl who always cleaned up her trail. He had just picked up the mug when he saw a spot far into the city light up orange. He nearly dropped the mug when a blazing, horned giant with charred lava plates confining parts of it to a stable shape rose up above the buildings. A huge, black, bird-like giant with long mane rose up after it to force it down, seizing the flame giant by its throat with its clawed wing. Before submerging into the cityscape, the black giant cast a backward glance to the Titan tower, and he saw its four red eyes.
Robin dashed up the hallway, and banged on a certain metallic door, like a hound with its tail on fire. "Raven! Raven! Are you in there? Raven!" There was no response. The alarm rang throughout Titan Tower, snatching the rest of the three Titans out of their respective dreams.
"Hey, where's Rae?" Beast Boy asked when they were all assembled in the living room.
"She's out," Robin replied, earning three confused and unconvinced look from the Titans, "She'll meet up with us later outside. For now we must move out without her. Star and Beast Boy stay close to the rest of the team. We have a new enemy, and we don't know what it can do. I want us to stay close and nobody going in alone. Titans, GO!" Secretly, Robin prayed and hoped Raven had heard the Titan signal beep, and would get a grip of herself before the rest of the team got to the scene.
Raven took a particularly bad blow and her concentration faltered, weakening, in turn, the multiple barriers she had placed, allowing Agni to break a hole in the roof of the domes. Oh shit! Was all Raven could think of. She quickly captured Agni again before he could escape further beyond her imprisonment, and subconsciously glanced toward the Titan Tower sheepishly, hoping no one had noticed. A little later the Titan beeper went off. She, a part of her buried deep inside this titan of darkness that she was, like a lone little white star in a lightless universe, heard it. That remaining glint of conscious, however, had no power over her body now, and could only sit with her knees drawn to her chin, and weeped like a child. No doubt her friends would be there soon. The only thing that kept her from running amok and threatening the city was the battle she was engaged in. She couldn't even bring herself to fix the hole Agni made, and she did not want to think about what would happen if she couldn't go revert back to normal.
"Looks like Raven's already here somewhere," Cyborg said, looking at the silent black dome covering a ruined building with Robin and Starfire. The building appeared to be at a complete stand still. Nothing could be seen through the window frames – the window frames that were still visible themselves anyway. Thick clouds of steam were trapped inside the dome, and water drops gathered all over its surface. The water would evaporate again without starting to drip down. Steam was rising from the top of the dome as well. There was enough steam for five trains at full speed. "What the Hell is going on in there?" he knocked on the foot of the dome with his metallic fist, and it was apparent that no entry was allowed.
"Hopefully Beast Boy will tell us," Robin said, noting at a newly formed crack and some soundlessly falling rubble behind the black screen. Not only vision, but sound, too, was prevented from leaving that barrier. A green hawk circled around the smoke tower once and descended, morphing back to normal Beast Boy without waiting to touch ground.
"It's totally crazy in there!" was Beast Boy's best description of what he saw, and since it was very uninformative Robin made the changeling take them both back up so he could get a look himself. Beast Boy turned into a pterodactyl and took to the air with Robin's arms in his claws. From the hole on the top Robin could see the interior of the building completely obliterated from top floor all the way down, leaving only the four walls standing. He could also see the different layers of energy shields Raven had put up, outside and inside the building, which was what kept anyone from seeing the actual battle. To call it a battle was not quite fitting. No wonder Beast Boy was lost at words, for all Robin could see through pillars of smoke were two currents of energy, one black, one yellow, whirling above, beneath, and around each other, each trying to overpower the other, in one big container. He could feel heat emitting off from the hole.
"Get closer," Robin said to the green pterodactyl, "see if we can get in through the hole." Before they could get to the edge of the hole, however, it was evident that the heat was too intense for human flesh. Beast Boy set down the Titan leader on the roof of an adjacent building, which was one story taller than the ruins. From the top of this building they could see dim orange light glowing at the mouth of the black dome like an active volcano. They were immediately joined by Starfire and Cyborg, and Robin explained what he saw to the duo. The only way they could get to Raven was to have her dispel the magic barrier, but doing that would let the fire giant loose, and perhaps Raven's rampant energy too.
"Perhaps I should try," Starfire said, "The Tamaranian climate has always been rougher than those of Earth's. Perhaps I can stand the heat."
"It's too dangerous for you go in there alone," Robin said, "We have no idea what we're dealing with." Besides, I doubt Raven would want anyone to see her like… whatever state she's in now.
"Friend Raven is in there alone," Starfire said, a look of determination and worry on her face, "If I am the only one that can help I will help her."
Robin was still reluctant to let Starfire take the risk, but he had to refrain from letting prejudgment make his decision for him. Be sensible, it's that or do nothing and God knows what'll happen next. Raven might be killed alone. "Alright, Star," he said, "But be careful. If you can't win just run away, and grab Raven with you." Starfire nodded with a smile, and flew off toward the gleaming mouth of the dark dome.
Starfire approached the skyward opening cautiously, pausing mere feet above it and looked down inside. It was hotter than the hottest day she had ever experienced on Earth, but not unbearable. She looked back up to her team mates, and gave an O.K. gesture before diving downward. The opening suddenly sealed up right before Starfire reached it, forcing her to brake in mid air and landing on top of the dome. A low, compounded, and distressed voice rang out, "Stay back!"
"Friend Raven?" Starfire asked uncertainly.
"STAY BACK!" came Raven's dire warning. In the midst of fighting, through the boiling and waving air, at least one of her four eyes had caught a glimpse of red and purple, and closed the gap in time. She was standing in a furnace of Agni's power. Hours of stand off had taken visible deduction in both of their energies, but after breaking out of her barrier Agni had apparently gained power while she had not. Why? He was not free for more than a few seconds, and nothing had happened during those few seconds. What has caused him to rekindle?
On the roof of Raven's confinement, Starfire summoned up two hand-full of neon green star bolt and drove them down against the black energy. The two forcers neutralized each other, allowing Starfire to open an entrance with her bare hands, and she was inside.
Agni roared, stretching his short, lizard-like jaws, blew up the flames on his body, and struck. Raven stretched out her feathered claws to catch the other monster's full body lunch. The force of impact knocked her backwards against the melting interior of the suffering building, singing her. He had both his claws around her throat, and hers around his. Steam was coming off where they made contact with each other, and further distorting the interior's visibility. Was it her suffocating brain that had begun to hallucinate or had the fire demon just grew more powerful while strangling her? The red in her four eyes had begun to fade, and one of the two pairs had begun to close. Will I die? Suddenly Agni let go of her, reared back and howled. A tiny, red-and-purple figure swirled around the flaming giant, and hovered in mid-air right between the two giant creatures. It seemed Starfire had somehow got through her barrier and got her out of a tight one. Agni's tiny eyes found his new enemy and his burning fist quickly followed. Starfire crossed her arms, ready to defend. A huge, black wing swung around and shielded the alien, and she looked up, locking eyes with Raven's demon. Suddenly the dark demon's body stretched toward all direction, and became a translucent black wall between Starfire and Agni. Immediately the temperature on this side of the wall dropped to an understandable degree, and the loud hum of the fire demon's burning quieted. Agni on the other side was quite angered at that turn of the event, and launched a series of fierce, but fruitless, assaults at the wall. Before Starfire, from the field of energy, Raven emerged as if rising from the river of the dead. Her cape was gone, and the rest of her clothes singed with holes in them. Her purple hair was unusually long, and her eyes were still red, with an extra pair, squinting, as if trying to hide their existence. "I don't know how you got in, but you're leaving," the demonic Raven said with the same low and composite voice.
"I am not," said Starfire defiantly.
"Do you want to die?" Raven asked.
Starfire was confused at the question, and her face showed it. "No… . Do you?"
Raven did not answer, instead she said, "Come back to the basement here when this is all over and find the glyph in blood. Now get out before I hurt you. There's nothing for you to do here." Starfire may be ignorant about many things, most of which Earthen, but she was certainly not stupid. She didn't know exactly how, but she felt that the other girl had already given up on something. To live, perhaps. When she saw that Raven was about to turn and disappear back into the black wall, she pounced without further thoughts, grabbed the other girl firmly by her waist, and flew upward through the steam clouds to find where she came in. Raven was surprisingly cold to the touch – in her arms and on her shoulder where the wild sorceress' hands were clamped, trying to pry herself free. So cold it provoked goose bumps all over Starfire's body despite the humming heat around them. They reached the thinnest, the top, part of the domed barrier, and Starfire liberated one hand to charge it with star bolt. She pressed it against the shield, neutralizing it, but before she could open it her hand was seized by Raven's, who, with a forceful jerk, managed to break free of Starfire's weakened hold, levitating in mid air. "Is that how you got in?" Raven asked. Starfire nodded. The irony of it, that Starfire should be able to neutralize and pry open my entire barrier with her bare hands. "I'm going back, and you're not," said Raven, "I think I know how to put out that oversize match. Wait till I get a hold on Agni, then break out to tell the others what's happening. They need to know," She turned back and shot toward her energy wall. It was waning and disappearing. Agni launched his final attack, knocking the energy wall to nothingness with his horned skull. Heat and noise of combustion instantaneously surged and flooded the dome, raising it to almost unbearable degree for Starfire. Black energy streamed out of Raven's body, and stretched into the shape of a humongous bird. It slapped its entire self against Agni tactlessly, creating a loud hiss and sending steams pouring out from them, blocking them from the sight of Starfire. The bird wrapped its wings around the fire demon, and morphed into a soft membrane, entrapping the demon within it. Air. It was air. How can I not see the simplest of rules? Fire needs air, just as darkness needs light. I'll smother you! Agni roared, and ripped and pummeled at his prison with his hands. He realized what Raven was trying to do, and what it would cost him. He lost his nerves at that recognition, and blasted all he had against Raven's energy net, trying to kill her before she kill him. His body grew paler and paler as the heat and energy inside Raven's confinement built up, until what she was containing looked more like a mini sun than anything else. Smoke began to rise from Raven's hands as if the black energy she commanded was being tainted by Agni's fiery energy. My power is running out. I can't hold him much longer. I'm nearing my end….
"Raven!" Starfire had found her way through the dense steam clouds to where the sorceress was having her life burnt up along with her last bits of energy.
"I told you to leave me!" rage and fear boosted up inside Raven when she realized Starfire was still inside her barrier. She could not bear the other girl seeing her self like she was – that unbalanced, monstrous, and insecure part of her she inherited against her own choice.
"I will not leave a friend in battle alone!" Starfire retorted.
I don't want to be just your friend. "I don't want to be your friend! Get outta here!" Starfire, Raven saw, was visibly shaken by her last comment, and she felt immediately sorry.
"… Why?" Starfire asked quietly, "Have I done something to anger you?"
"No," Raven answered crisply, desperately wishing Starfire would just shut up and do as she was asked. Agni was pressuring intensely against her hold.
"Or have I hurt you somewhere?"
"…no," Raven was having difficulty lying now and she felt like she had just dug a grave for herself.
"Perhaps it is something I say…"
"NO, Star! It's just me!" Raven cried out with distress. The strain of Agni inside her grip and Starfire's interrogations combined finally short-circuited Raven's sensible section of mind, "I'm too bloody in love with you and I don't want you to be awkward with me if you know so stay away!" Oh, no… what did I just do? The brilliance of the now amorphous blob of white light that was the fire demon Agni suddenly grew exponentially as he finally burnt out and exploded with a long howl, shattering her confinement.
Outside, the male Titans gazed on almost with joint heart attacks, as the steam built up denser and denser inside the black dome until it looked like a thunderstorm could erupt any moment within it. The energy barrier suddenly began to fade, came back full, faded again, and went up in the air and vanished all together. The steam poured out of its container looking solid like cream, and rolled and filled in nearby streets as if it was a live creature with a mind to consume all. At the same time a blinding white light flashed from within the steam clouds accompanied by a scorching heat wave. The light and heat died as quickly as they came, and Robin found himself blinking several times to regain his vision as a white circle shrank in front of his eyes. "Are both of you alright?" he asked, looking around. Beast Boy was crouching on the floor with his hands on his head, mumbling something about singed hair. Cyborg was kneeling on one knee, a hand on his stomach as if he was having a running cram. "Cy?"
"I think the heat burned some fuses, but I'm not sure yet which ones," Cyborg said. Things seemed to have calmed down where the black dome once stood, and the steam clouds were running out.
"Why don't you stay here, Cy? Beast Boy and I will go look for Star and Raven," Robin said. Cyborg looked like he wanted to protest for a minute, but instead just grumpily gave them a wave of his hand.
Robin and Beast Boy stepped past uneven ground with patches of charcoal and graphite black. The whole place looked like it was made of a molten, unmoving, and unidentifiable material. They walked lightly as a pair of cats out on a hunt, wary of what they were stepping on. The walls of the ruins were melted, curved, and caving in at the top. Upon Beast Boy's pulling on his cape, Robin turned and saw behind them what roughly resembled a four-tip star bit of wall that maintained some of its original texture and light colors, stretching from edge to edge of the wall. Through one of the holes in it that were the windows Robin could see Cybog's head and shoulder peeping out from the edge of the roof of the adjacent building. He waved at him once before returning to their expedition. The sun had yet to surface, and the pre-dawn, hazy light made it difficult to see down the basement, though the moistures had been evaporated. "Star?" Robin asked the gloomy void below, "Raven?"
Raven felt cold and every single cell in her body was resonating pain. What's going on? She opened her eyes and grudgingly made out the shape of a ceiling-less, misshapen, dark room in which she lay. The lightless walls of the room seemed to stretch up dozens of feet, framing in their middle a murky pond of blue-purple space. I can't move. Then she noticed the darkest darks at the base of the walls were slowly closing in, eating away all recognizable shapes, and inching toward that small pool of weaken light like a living amoeba monster. She was frightened, but couldn't get herself to move a finger, less to say escape. The darkness touched her fingers and feet, and it felt burningly cold. She closed her eyes in anticipating fear. Through her eyelids she saw something glow. Her eyes fluttered open and caught in the closest distant ever since she first saw the creature a raven of the brightest white standing on top of her chest. The bird radiated as before, keeping the darkness at bay. Stay…. The white raven tilted its head and stared at Raven sideways. I finally got this close to you. Suddenly the white raven turned its head face to face with Raven, opened its beak, and Starfire's voice boomed out, "Raven!" The sorceress opened her eyes for real this time, and saw the same ceiling-less cellar and the same misty morning framed over it. The walls and its enclosed space now looked shorter and more concrete. There was no white bird. She felt warm and when she tried to move she triggered a tearing pain throughout her whole body – even frowning hurt. "Please, you mustn't move," Starfire begged with shaky voice.
"I'm not dead yet…?" Raven's voice wormed out weakly from her cracked lips.
"No, but you are hurt. Please remain still. I shall go find the others,"
The others… I wonder if they're okay? When Agni blew up Raven retrieved her energy from the dome, and used up whatever she had left and more to contradict the force of his explosion, shielding Starfire and, coincidently, the rest of the Titans behind her. She didn't know that, of course, and feared for their survival through the blast. Her front side was badly burnt and in worse areas her skin was melted away, exposing various hues of glistening pinks. There was almost no clothing left on her, and whatever was left was sticking onto her melted skin. "Star… can you stay?" Starfire bit her lower lip, and nodded with tears in her emerald eyes. She knelt down next to the shorter girl, and hesitantly but gently brushed strands of hair out of Raven's face, fearing to cause her more agony. She felt like apologizing, but she wasn't sure what she wanted to apologize for, so she just knelt there in clogged silence for ten, fifteen seconds.
"I wish I can help ease your pain," Starfire said quietly.
"It's nothing you can help with," Raven said matter-of-factly, and smile a little, "but words of encouragement are always welcome." It was then Robin's voice came down from above, and she saw the silhouette of his spiky head against the brightening piece of sky.
"Robin!" Starfire cried out, and the Titan leader hastily jumped down upon her summon, followed by Beast Boy. He cringed upon seeing Raven's condition, and before he said anything the maimed sorceress promptly stated,
"I won't die."
"Glad to hear it," said Robin with relief, "let's get you to a hospital. Star?"
Starfire carefully and tenderly picked up Raven in her arms, while the latter tried not to frown too much due to the pain, and took off to the nearest hospital with Beast Boy guiding in the form of a swallow.
Several days later Raven was visited by Starfire in the hospital she stayed in. The alien girl wore street clothes, trying not to attract too much attention, according to her, and carried a book in her hand. Raven lay in raised hospital bed, still sporting bandages, but otherwise had recovered in most parts. "That doctor just told me I can leave tomorrow," the sorceress said to her visitor.
"The others shall be overjoyed to have your company once again. You have recovered swiftly," said Starfire with a wide smile, "and your power…?"
Raven pointed a finger at a mug on a night table next to her bed, and levitated it a few inches off the table top. "That's it for now, but it's been coming back steadily though slowly," she said. Starfire had brought over a chair and seated herself next to her friend. Although Raven's condition had improved enough for her to hold a book with her own hands, she still allowed herself the luxury of being read to. "So what've we got today?"
"Poems by authors from countries near and far," replied the alien, opening to a marked page, "This one is by a man from a place called France:
He said, "Come to the Edge."
I said, "I can't, I'm afraid."
He said, "Come to the Edge."
I said, "I can't, I'll fall off."
He said, finally, "Come to the Edge."
And I came to the Edge.
And he pushed me.
And I flew.
Author's notes: This is my first time writing AND finishing a fan fiction, as well as my first Teen Titan and shoujoai fan fiction. Originally, it was meant to be a short one-shot, inspired upon having the poem "Come to the Edge" (different version, by Christopher Logue, if you're interested) read to me in a graduation ceremony (not mine). What happened was I had already signed up for a summer workshop which left me no time or energy to write this continuously. It ended up taking me 3 weeks. I wanted to apply the poem to Raven's efforts in dealing, understanding, and mastering herself (her falling for Starfire being part of it), which by the end of this fic had just began to happen. The animated version is the only version I know of, and not well either, for I never saw all of the episodes, so I'm pretty sure there would be things that seem odd or wrong to educated Titan fans, and it's okay to let me know, but don't think I'll definitely revise the story if it requires too much of a make over. What's done is done! I, however, always look to improve in the future, so let me know what you think of the plot, consistency, dialogue usage, wording…etc, and, most importantly, what you understood and what you couldn't get. I realized I kept trying to encrypt a lot of stuff. Don't bother flaming. I'm fire proof.