Author's Note: Wow, despite my hatred for Terra, I came up with this. And another oneshot focused solely on her. Anywho, this is my first forray into the Teen Titans archive, though I do have a multi-chapter in progress. So if you like this, and the comics, then maybe you'll check that out. :)

Anyway, I hope you enjoy this, and if you do, please review or favorite. :)

THE IMAGE IS NOT OF MY CREATION, THE AWESOME JAMES-LI OF DEVIANTART MADE IT! :)

Story Note: Set right after she ditches the Titans for the first time. :)

And I do vaguely refer to Robin breaking off from Batman, which happened because he got shot by Joker and Batman thought it meant Robin was incompetent. So :)

""Vengeance, though sweet at first, becomes a bitter cup that proves to be its own executioner." -Irish Proverb.

"Yet each man kills the thing he loves, By each let this be heard, Some do it with a bitter look, Some with a flattering word, The coward does it with a kiss, The brave man with a sword!." -Ballad of Reading Gaol, Oscar Wilde.

She stared down at the whipped-cream topped pie and felt the familiar ache in her heart. A never-ceasing ache of loneliness, betrayal,and frustration, the three constants in her life. She stabbed the pie with her fork and scooped a piece into her mouth, the sweetness creating a temporary haven of happiness. She opened her eyes and reached down for another bite, becoming self-conscious and nervous when she realized someone had sat down beside her. A teenager, by the look of him, wearing a simple red hoodie, jeans, black sneakers, and dark sunglasses. Even though she was sitting at the bar and had sat next to strangers before, something about him unnerved her and set fear gnawing at her inside. She turned her focus back to her pie, trying to find a haven that never lasted long enough.

"Relax, I'm just here to talk." She tensed, feeling like a deer caught in headlights. She'd know that voice anywhere: Robin, the leader of the Teen Titans and one of the people she'd abandoned. While he could be kind enough, she also knew he could be ruthless and was a foe to fear. "I'm not angry at you for abandoning us. I'm not going to try to guilt you into returning, even though I think you should. I just-"

"I don't care what you have to say. I can't trust any of you." She'd trusted Beast Boy the most, and he he had hurt her the most. Not a mistake she would make again. But it seemed to be her curse: to aid people of the goodness of her heart only to have them turn on her once they realized she couldn't control her powers. "You're irrelevant to me." She was used to the sting of betrayal, but theirs was the worst yet. Because she'd expected them to be different, to understand, and they hadn't. They were as bad if not worse as the criminals they fought. She started to stand up to leave him and this wretched city behind, when he spoke.

"Beast Boy didn't tell us about your powers. I figured it out on my own." Relief and joy welled up in her. Beast Boy really had been her friend! But how did you repay him? By hurting him, just like you do everyone else! She hung her head. No matter what she did, she always wound up hurting people even if she didn't mean to. And they never suspected it to be her because she helped them. She was a curse. The self-loathing and frustration welled up and she projected it onto him, needing a vessel to beat on other than herself.

"You told the whole team! You humiliated me!" She projected all her emotions through a scathing whisper so that no one other than him would hear. He looked down, and she realized he was penitent. Or looked it, at least.

"I did, and I'm sorry. I know now that I should have pulled you aside and told you...but I didn't think it through. I embarrassed you, and you thought Beast Boy told me. I am sorry, Terra. I just want to ask you to come back. Raven and Starfire could help you figure out your powers, and Beast Boy...he's beating himself up over something I did. You can hate me and hold a grudge against me and I will not say a word, I won't treat you any differently, but please don't hurt them over something I did. We miss you, Terra." Tears welled in her eyes as her anger slowly drained out of her. She needed to hate them, to have that anger distract her from the pain.

"You made them see me as weak. How can they trust me again? How can they trust me to look after myself and them?" She didn't expect him to understand. He was always strong and capable, never once had he been weak and doubted. And she hated him for it.

"Terra, once they see you can fully control your powers, they will trust you. They already do." She scoffed at him, wanting to punch him in the face. Like he'd ever been looked down on, he was Robin!

"I don't want your guilt gifts. I want you to leave me alone. I don't want to be a part of your stupid team." Tears were flowing softly from her eyes, but she didn't dare draw attention to them by wiping them away. She wasn't a weak little girl, she was strong like the earth the she commanded.

"I know you can't bear the thought of looking into their eyes again, you're seeing the doubt and hurt in them and you can't face it knowing that you caused it. That all you wanted was to have them trust you and not see you as weak. I know what it's like-"

"How could you possibly know what it's like?" She hissed with venom in her voice, yet sounded calm in a way. "No one has ever doubted you. Ever scorned you. You've never had to try to make up for something." She was dangerously tempted to throttle him, embracing her logical reasoning over her turbulent emotions by a narrow margin that thinned by the seconds.

"I have, and I wish more than anything that I'd stayed and made it up to them. But I let us fight and now here I am, with no chance to change the past, only to regret it. Don't make my mistakes, Terra, please. We're your friends-"

"I don't need friends." It was true, she didn't. Friends were there to entice you into spilling your secrets and then gutting you with them. Her so-called friends had taught her to trust no one. And any mistakes I make are going to be my own. He put his hands up in a gesture of surrender, but didn't get up and leave much to her disappointment and ire.

"Alright, hate us. I can't change your feelings. Just know our door is always open, Terra." He could take their door and beat them up with it, no way would she ever go back to them. They'd all probably laughed at her behind her back. "And promise me you'll never join Slade, no matter what he offered you." She froze. He said offered instead of offers. How did he know about her chat with the villain? But her pride overtook her curiosity quickly. Did he really think she'd join a villain? How dare he-

"You have the nerve to ask me to promise you something? They say you have courage, but that sounds more like arrogant stupidity to me." A cover for her inner thoughts, yet he seemed to see right through it.

"He ran away and you followed him while something kept us busy. I know because he did the same thing to me. He likes power, Terra, and you have it. He will do and say anything to get that power. If you care about anyone even a little, you will never join him." During his little speech, she realized two things: 1. She didn't care about anyone but herself because they all hated her for trying to be good, and 2. He had been apprenticed to Slade. Lightbulbs lit up in her brain. How dare the hypocrite try to tell her not to be evil, when he'd clearly been evil himself. He'd probably learned everything he knew from Slade.

"You hypocrite. You're warning me about not being evil?" She let out a small laugh, finally finding a joy that she'd previously only ever found in pie. "You're worse than Slade. You think your hero cape and costume hides what you were?" He looked like he'd been slapped across the face, and she relished in the fact that she could make someone as tough as him react that way. The feeling of power and control over another was a feeling she found herself liking. A lot. She knew it was wrong, but people were going to hate her whether she was good or bad, and at least this way she got some enjoyment out of it.

"You're right. I was his apprentice, I followed his orders and no matter how much I tell myself it was just the adrenaline, some part of me enjoyed them. I thought before that I was always going to be a hero, but my apprenticeship to Slade made me realize how easy it is for us to cross that thin line between good and evil, how blurred it is. We can justify anything we do in order to stop from feeling shame and guilt. It's a flaw you and I both share, we hate to be embarrassed, hate to be looked down upon. Slade will use that against you. It might seem worth it, that with him you'll get the respect you've always craved. But I promise you it isn't. He will never see you as an equal, you will always be a means to an end for him." To Terra's hate-filled ears, it sounded as if he were vilifying her already, as if deep down inside he thought she was going to be evil and this was her last chance. But she wasn't a helpless little girl, she didn't need saving, not from anyone and not from herself.

She simply didn't care. In her heart, she had given in to the complete and utter hate-driven rage that she had fought against for so long. It was a battle she was weary of fighting and had finally surrendered in. She didn't care about her so-called friends, didn't care that she was turning into the exact thing she'd once feared of being. All she cared about was vengeance. Vengeance for every time she'd felt ashamed of her powers, every time she'd cried with her ears and mind filled with their hate-filled shouts even after she had just helped them. She wanted everyone to get down on their knees and beg for a mercy she would not give, to suffer tenfold what she herself suffered. Even that would not satiate her, but it was a starting point.

"You're right, Robin, that line is blurred, easy to cross. The only thing that makes you so-called heroes 'better' than me is that you justify everything you do and everyone you hurt by saying you're fighting for the greater good. There is no greater good. These people are pathetic, filled with hate when they see one flaw." Tears flowed freely from her eyes, but she didn't care. "I'm going to show them what we all are, deep down inside. We might never admit it, but we all have it. Even you, you 'great hero' you, admitted that you got a rush off hurting others. There aren't villains and heroes, just people. And there are no great redeemers that can save us."

She laughed, a cold sound born of having the last laugh against her enemy. "You seem so sure I'm going to be 'evil', and I know how much you hate to be wrong. So fine, I am 'evil'. But I don't care. Being 'good' brought me nothing but pain. But being evil...I can finally show you arrogant pricks what you really are. And I'm going to make you suffer and bleed until you're so broken you're begging for death. That's the promise I make to you, Robin. Give the Titans my best." She snarled the last two sentences. Her family and friends had failed to teach her love, but from them she'd finally learned how to fully hate.

"You're angry and you're bitter, I understand. You might even lose your way for a while. But you're not evil, Terra. Not now and not ever." She scoffed at his words. He thought he knew her so well, when in fact he didn't know her at all.

"Get. Out." She growled, feeling her power awaken and the ground begin to shake. Respectfully and calmly, he inclined his head to her as if she were a friend. As if I would ever be their friend again. Once he left, she calmed down and stared at her pie, thoughts and emotions bouncing around inside her. He had rattled her to a level she hadn't known before, but she knew who could give her foundation and power: Slade. Slade was everything she wanted to be. Upon realizing this, she let out another laugh meant only for her. Robin thought she still had a shred of heart in her, but he was so incredibly wrong. He personally had caused whatever heart she had to shatter like glass and had replaced it with a stone-cold one.

Author's Note: There it is. I personally feel it was a little bad, but eh, what's life without a little risk of complete failure? And I don't feel this is AU, mainly because Robin obviously didn't trust her when she returned, though he did grow to trust her again.

I hope you enjoyed, please review/favorite if you did. Have a good day. :)