*BEEP BEEP*
*BEEP BEEP*
*BEEP BEEP*
That was all that emitted from the alarm clock on a chest of drawers before a hand emerged from a seemingly formless mound on top of a queen-sized plush bed and silenced the device before it could irritate the hand's owner any longer. The hand, having accomplished it's purpose, stayed in position until a groan was heard and movement was detected from the mound. A plain-looking white duvet was carelessly tossed to the side and the newly emerged being sat on the side of it's bed rubbing it's eyes. After clearing up it's vision to a reasonable haze, the eyes groggily looked over to the newly bought alarm clock and saw the digital imprint 9:00 glazed over the front.
"Too damn early" was rasped from the figure. "No point counting sheep anymore, Garfield, the world is calling". The aptly named 'Beast Boy' smiled at the thought of counting sheep jumping over a fence as he had been a sheep at one point and he could tell everyone that it was next to impossible to jump at all in that form.
Garfield Logan was living in an apartment on the highest floor of a non-descript building with easy access to the roof useful for some of his more flight-oriented forms. It was fairly small, but made good use of what little space there was. After entering the front door, a viewer was graced with a hallway containing a bedroom and a locked door to the left, a closet and a bathroom to the right, and a wide kitchen area with a door looking towards a large river and the rest of the city twinkling beyond it. It was an incredible view by anyone's standards, but the main reason it was being occupied by a retired superhero was it had a close proximity to a very familiar tower shaped like a giant 'T'.
Standing now, Garfield moved towards the kitchen while navigating through small mounds of dirty laundry and empty pizza boxes on the ground. It was a fun game that he played twice a day, treating the foreign objects as mines and avoiding them in the most epic way possible. Just the other day, he narrowly avoided a festering pile of socks by jumping over it and landing a finish that even an olympic gymnast would envy. Looking back, he saw his room and noticed all the similarities and differences with his last place of residence. The bunkbed had gone along with the numerous bruises that had come with falling from it. Replacing it was an extremely comfortable bed that went along with the beige theme that the walls adopt. The floor was also covered in a carpet that was a welcome relief from the cold metal that surrounded Titan Tower. Yet however immaculate the walls were, the mess on the floor could never be fully ignored.
"Some habits die hard, I suppose" Garfield said towards the ever familiar mess that followed him everywhere he went. "Ha! 'Die Hard'. Need to watch those again"
There was always something that gave him that toothy smile he always wore, and the one person guaranteed to make him laugh was himself. How did nobody else think he was funny? That question nagged at him constantly, but hasn't been answered yet.
The only appliances on the kitchen counter were a coffee machine and a kettle for making tea. One was used daily, and the other was used during that rare when company graced his door. The only thing was, it was the kettle that was used frequently. Garfield used to load up on coffee whenever he had to pull an all-nighter or to get him up in the early afternoon, but now, Black Tea was the only thing he drank. A girl he lived with before had tea every day and she made a profound change in the boy's life, starting with his now-favorite drink. Yet as much as he tried, he could never drink the herbal tea that the gothic girl was used to, instead adding sugar to sweeten the flavor.
After taking the first sip, Garfield was alerted to a beeping red light. Focusing his attention on the source, he discovered that during the night, someone had called and left a voice message, being displayed by a flashing '1'. Finding no reason to ignore the message, he pressed the green triangle.
There was a silence long enough for him to take another swig of his drink, but was stopped immediately by a very sad voice saying "Garfield, it's Raven".
All other functions and motions vanished the second he heard her voice and all attention was forcefully diverted to the machine reciting the recorded message.
"I have no idea why I'm calling you, you may not even hear this, but I need to talk to someone and you're the only person left."
*Don't be so hard on yourself
Those tears are for someone else
I hear your voice on the phone
I hear you feel so alone My baby*
The mere tone of her voice gave way to several memories spanning the years they spent near each other. He remembered the first time they met. At first he thought he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and he was. He was in the middle of a street trashed by a rampaging alien surrounded by an apprentice without his master and a man who stared out from under a raised hood with a piercing red eye. There was a scuffle and everything went black as a massive raven rose from the ground with such power, he could do nothing but marvel at it with awe. From that moment, he knew there was just something about her. Just something...
*When we were young
And truth was paramount
We were older then
And we lived a life without any doubt*
He remembered the time when Raven shut herself into her room more than usual. He was unsure of what exactly happened, but the culmination of events ended in tears as a cruel and heartless Malchior broke Raven's heart. Garfield had no idea what he was doing at the time, standing outside the door to a girl who never laughed at his jokes giving her advice even though he had never had the same experience. He found out that she really did care, she just couldn't show it.
He remembered when Raven destroyed the world because she couldn't rely on others. It was only through the combined effort of friends and enemies that everything returned to the way it was. Raven believed that there was no hope for the future, but Garfield showed her that all that was needed was some faith in friends and a little luck.
The recall was stalled by more from the sobbing girl. "It happened again, Garfield. I let someone in too close and they hurt me. Why are things so complicated? Why can't things be like they were?" He silently agrees with her. Things are always simpler in the past.
*Those memories
They seem so long ago
What's become of them
When you feel like me, I want you to know*
The memories resume and jump to the day the Titans broke up. The motivations were mostly political in nature, but there was also an invisible time limit on how long they could keep doing the same thing. People only need protecting for so long, and the residents of Jump City were perfect examples. It was a melancholy day and the tower was stripped bare.
The T car and all of it's related components were transferred to STAR labs by Cyborg to "Be with what family I have left". The numerous alien food ingredients and enough clothing to fill a dozen walk-in closets were to accompany Starfire back to Tamaran. The masses of dumbells and training equipment were shipped off to an unknown area in Gotham City by a newly designated 'Nightwing' on his never-ending quest to clean up his hometown with the Dark Knight. Garfield, with no family or friends outside of the Doom Patrol and the Teen Titans, stayed in Jump City to overcome the loss of his parents and take control of his inner Beast. As for Raven, as she was no longer bound by the prophecy that had previously controlled her life, she took refuge in an ancient bookstore in a forgotten part of town to try to grasp her emotions more freely.
The years had certainly changed everything. Cyborg had created new technology that effectively replaced prostetic limbs to extremeties that were almost indistinguishable from the flesh it was replacing. Victor Stone, as he was known now, was the new face of STAR labs, the figurehead of a company that far surpassed any achievement it had made and that is now the maker of practically everything that moves. Nightwing hung up his mask after two years of fighting crime and joined Starfire in the way she always wanted him to, though he never dropped his rash nature. Starfire became the Warrior-Queen that Tamaran so desperately needed and together with Nighwing brought a reign of wealth and prosperity that was never known before.
"I just can't help myself sometimes. All I feel is loneliness and I just take whoever will have me. The worst part is the same things happen every time, yet I fall for it every time and I just get burned. It has to be punishment for being a demon. It's my fault. It's all my fault". The tears can be heard from the answering machine with such power that it pangs the man just listening to it.
From what little information Garfield could gather, Raven had a far less exciting time, yet possibly even more eventful. She attended Jump City University and took courses in literature, philosophy and psychology. From what he could understand, she got her degree a year sooner then most people did, and for good reason. Raven wasn't most people. After her schooling ended, she focused on finding that special someone that makes one complete. She had fallen into the same cycle it seemed. She would go out to casual bars and nightclubs, latch onto anyone who even smiled at her and ended up as the damaged end of a one-night-stand. It had gotten so bad that she lost count of how many foreign ceilings she had woken up to. There were a few relationships that lasted longer than a few hours, but the ones that did often ended up with Raven bruised and bloodied from an angry outburst or with the men in jail for petty crimes they were always committed.
It pained Garfield that the strong and willful girl he knew could so easily be tossed around like an unreliable phone and it enraged him to think that there were even men who could hurt women and get away with it. Any anger he did have was quelled instantly by the still sobbing voice of a woman he cared about. All he wanted to do was to hold her in his arms and never let her go. To have her wake up and feel safe and secure. To be around someone who doesn't see her as an object to be disposed of. Those were the only thoughts he had yet were silenced once again by the last words recorded from a missed conversation.
"I'm sorry I called, I shouldn't trouble you with this. You should just delete this, there's no reason to keep this message, it was just a relief to hear your voice again, even if it just says to call back. I don't think I will. Goodbye Garfield." An automated voice mentioned the time of the call, but Garfield wasn't close enough to hear it.
*Don't cry, you're not alone
Don't cry tonight, my baby
Don't cry, you'll always be loved
Don't cry tonight, my baby*
Garfield stood outside of a worn, padlocked door reinforced with a titanium deadbolt with a time release. He turned the knob and didn't set a time as it hadn't been needed for over 6 months. The door opened releasing stale air and a sight to tremble in fear at. This particular room was devoid of furniture, with the exception of a pile of rags in the corner, and covered in solid metal from floor to ceiling. The metal was far from the solid and sterile look it had when it was first installed. Large scratches were gouged out from every angle, and to the untrained eye, it would seem as if a family of bears on steroids tried to claw it's way out. The eyes that gazed on the spectacle before him were far from untrained and could see that every gouge, dent, and scrape had an underlying meaning: He had finally embraced his primal side. Garfield walked into the middle of the room, sat cross-legged, and did something he had never done before, he meditated and thought of all the people in the world that he knew.
*Today I dreamed
Of friends I had before
And I wonder why
The ones who care don't call anymore
My feelings hurt
But you know I overcome the pain
And I'm stronger now
There can't be a fire unless there's a flame*
He thought of his parents, who saved his life after he was infected by a deadly virus, only to have the extra time given to them ripped away by a natural force. He thought of his life of crime, forced to steal just to survive. He thought of his last remaining family, who took care of him only to get his inheritance. He thought of the Doom Patrol, how he saved the world time and again only to get no acknowledgement from his own leader. He thought of Terra, who made him feel funny and appreciated, only to get betrayed after pouring his heart out. Even one of these experiences is enough to make a mortal man lose hope in everything, but Garfield had only himself to rely on. Nobody saw past the constant failures to make people laugh. Nobody saw past carefree lifestyle he lived and saw through to a vulnerable child who had been through too much. Nobody saw past the green skin. Nobody saw past the monster he could become. The only redeeming person was Raven. She trusted him when no one else did. She gave sage advice that always seemed to be perfect and relevant to the situation. Her words had stayed with him even now, running alongside him whenever he was cold and lost.
*Limousines and Sycophants
Don't leave me now
'Cause I'm afraid what you've done to me
Is now the wolf, in my bed, in my head
The challenges
We took were hard enough
They get harder now
Even when we think that we've had enough
Don't feel alone
'Cause it's I, who understands
I'm your sedative
Take a piece of me whenever you can*
All thought processes stopped. All memories were put on hold. Garfield's eyes glazed over as his body lifted, turned towards the door, and moved forward with only one purpose. He left the apartment, went up those familiar stairs and took flight. The enjoyment recieved from flying was ignored and all effort was made to get to the darkest part of town as fast as possible. He neared his destination and became man once more. He walked up to a door that looked like the rest of them, but Garfield could hear the evaporating water of herbal tea, feel the dust that only ancient texts carry, taste the salty moisture of heavy tears, and smell the lavender always present in the ever clean and silky hair of the one he needed to see. He knew he was in the right place.
Garfield knocked four times on the solid oak door.
Time stood still on the inside of the door.
Softened footsteps were barely heard coming closer.
A chain was withdrawn.
A knob was turned.
The door opened.
Green and Purple orbs met and fell into each other. Before a sound could be muttered, Garfield moved forward, embracing the lost girl, and whispered "Don't cry, you're not alone".
Any restraint Raven had on her sadness disappeared along with her reserved nature and let loose a river that now had a direction to flow towards. She finally felt complete.
*Don't cry tonight
You'll still be loved*
FIN
Disclaimer: I neither own the characters in this fiction or the song used. This is a work of fiction for the authors enjoyment and possibly anyone else willing to sit through this overly descriptive story.
The song lyrics used in this is from 'Don't Cry' by Seal, a very beautiful and particularly nostalgic song for me. This is the first fiction I've ever done, and I did it for me, but input will be accepted, positive and negative if any at all.
All this stuff is at the bottom because it looks better in my eyes to start from scratch. And I didn't flesh out the rest of the team because it's not about them, is it?
Amenson out.