1. :inside:
Things change.
I change.
Are things better or worse? I don't know. I will never know, will I? I miss them sometimes, but it is a distant part of me that misses them. My life as one of them is over, gone, the memory of those days filled with shame, despair, horror. He changed me--Jean changed me. Mother changed me. Windfire changed me. Blackfire changed me. Raven changed me, Cyborg changed me, Beastboy changed me.
Robin changed me.
The woman rocked slowly back and forth in her rocking chair. In old age, she was not haggard or ugly--her green eyes were tranquil but sad, her hair pale as snow. The sound of her rocking filled the room, echoing among the empty boxes, the scattered quilts, the photo albums filled with happier days.
She made a despairing noise in her throat. No longer. Not since her sister had come back, come back and changed everything. The city that was once a city of happiness and peace was destroyed, destroyed by one person, into a wreckage.
"Why?"
The woman looked across the room. A girl floated there in midair, her eyes glowing purple, black hair falling straight down her back.
"Blackfire," the woman said calmly. "After all these years."
"Shut your trap, Windfire," Blackfire said suddenly. "Why did Starfire come back? Why did you choose to grow old?"
Windfire turned her face to Blackfire's, and held the purple gaze for a brief instant. Her eyes glowed teal blue, power radiating from her body. "I tire of this life," she said simply into the stillness. "You would not understand, Blackfire; to you things are here and now. To me, there is more to life than what I do now. Once I am gone, I shall be among the stars as the beliefs of our people, and I will see all ends and outcomes. Physical existance is the price."
"What did you do to her, you fool?" Blackfire breathed. "She destroyed me. She is not my sister."
"Me?" Windfire drew herself up, and suddenly aqua energy eminated from her as she seemed to shoot through the air, stopping an inch from Blackfire. Her eyes were bitter now. "She is your sister, Blackfire," she spat at her. "You made her like this, made her like she was. You and Jean. You took a girl with a broken heart and turned her away from all she could have been!"
Blackfire recoiled as if slapped. "I planned my revenge," she whispered, her voice quivering with fury. Her eyes burned within her face. "Against Starfire. Darkstar...she is not my sister, not the sister who put me in jail, left me to rot." Her voice was fueled with quiet intensity, anger smoldering in her eyes. "Darkstar would kill me if she found me now. She nearly did. I want revenge against my sister, and my sister no longer exists."
"Didn't you take your revenge?" Windfire snarled. "Destroying her happiness, her life, her personality, was not enough for you?"
"You don't understand, old woman," Blackfire spat out. "Don't you dare make me out to be the villian I never was. She nearly killed me--you can't blame this on me."
"I can and I will," Windfire said, intense.
Electricity crackled in the room, and there was absolute silence. The hatred in both gazes was almost a visible presence, tainting the room, ringing with echoes of bonds of sisterhood gone sour. Anger, resentment, guilt, grief, trust betrayed, never regained. Years of broken bonds, walls built of lies, and hearts long immune to forgiveness did not stregthen the sister's bond; nothing could, now.
"Someday," Windfire said, her eyes glistening with unshed tears.
"Someday," Blackfire agreed in a low voice, her eyes dry but her heart screaming.
