"Okay, okay, okay...Hey! How about this one? The pope, a monkey, and eight little Slade 'mini-me's are hanging out on the lawn of the White House, and the monkey is like--OOF! Oww..."
"I fear that I don't get it, Beast Boy."
"No, no, Star. That wasn't the joke. Raven elbowed me in the ribs." The tone was nastier probably than it was meant to be. "That really hurt..." He whined under his breath.
"Oh." Starfire put down her window halfway, allowing her thick red hair to whip around her head until she pulled it all back and held it down with her hand.
Cyborg glanced into the mirror up over the dashboard. Beast Boy was slouched with his arms crossed over his chest, fuming and crushed sideways into Raven by the stacks of crates and cardboard boxes in the right window seat and on the floor. Raven was also looking a little angry, though she at least had the available window.
Always a (somewhat) responsible driver, Cyborg turned his eyes back to the road, content that an actual fight wasn't going to break out in the backseat of his beautiful car. He swerved a little when Robin sped by him on the left with his 'R-cycle,' and a box fell off the pile in the backseat onto Beast Boy. For its small size, it was definitely heavy, which was suggested by the label, "Canned Potatoes- LARGE" and confirmed by Beast Boy's yell.
"Heh. Sorry, BB. We're almost there, don't kill anything." Cyborg said, glancing at the kid in the back. Starfire turned in her seat to take the box into her own lap and ask if Beast Boy was alright. He didn't answer her, just morphed into a swallow and darted through Starfire's open window.
"Good riddance." Raven mumbled, not really meaning it. She doubted if her two teammates heard her at all. She closed her eyes and Cyborg followed Robin, turning into a weary-looking lot and parking next to the old brick building planted in the middle of it.
"Alright, kids, glad you're here!" Said a long looking man as he walked over with big strides. "Glad to meet you, Robin." They shook hands. Robin, at just a few inches below six feet, had to look very far upwards to see the middle-aged man's face.
"So where do we put the stuff we brought?" Robin asked. Cyborg opened up the trunk of his car as Raven and Beast Boy got all the crates and boxes out of the backseat.
"You can just stack them up right here along the wall." The man gestured to a length of dull brick wall between the glass double doors and the corner of the building about ten yards away. There was an old, torn sign reading "Food Donations- nonperishable foods only. See inside for receipt."
There were already some boxes stacked up, but not many. It was early in the morning of the first day of Jump City's big food drive, so this was understandable. The Titans made quick work of stacking the boxes of canned foods they'd brought, since not many could fit into the T-car in the first place.
Robin, Cyborg, and the man went inside the building once all the boxes were piled neatly, leaving Beast Boy, Starfire, and Raven to stand around outside at a loss for what to do next. After only a few moments, a huge blue-green van pulled into the lot and a young couple struggled to unload it. Raven went over to help, for want of something to do, but Beast Boy and Starfire were content with laziness, and sat down on the rough and cracked pavement.
"Hey, Star?"
"Yes, friend?"
"Uhm. Do you mind if I take shotgun the way back?" Beast Boy picked up a pebble and chucked it away from the van, towards the fence surrounding the lot.
"Sure, Beast Boy, but why?" Starfire didn't really care why, but she also didn't really want to sit in silence after saying 'yes'. She stretched out her legs and crossed them, leaning back on her hands.
"I don't really want to sit next to Raven for another half hour." Beast Boy threw another rock, hitting the fence. Then he added, "And it's too far to fly back. Or too early in the morning for it, anyway."
Starfire's interest was piqued. "Are you and Raven in a disagreement? Nothing I can recall has been new to your relationship lately." Neither of them noticed when the van pulled out of the lot and headed back towards Jump City.
"Ugh, Star. We're not in a 'relationship'. She doesn't even like me. At all." He shrugged for no real reason. "It's not that, anyway. She's just been kind of annoying me lately for some reason."
"Oh." And nothing more was said for the time being.
Raven stood a moment more behind Starfire and Beast Boy, where they had not noticed her presence in the end of their discussion. At first she wondered how she annoyed Beast Boy, then she marveled at how Starfire's one spoken word was right on beat with her mental response to Beast Boy's confession, and then she realized she was hungry and hoped that a lunch break would not be taken too soon. She quietly walked away from her teammates and tried a door of the T-car and found it, as she expected, to be locked.
She leaned against it. She hadn't seen any other volunteers except for the man who greeted them. She tried to remember what he looked like. He was very, very tall. Possibly taller than Cyborg, and he was thin. Raven wondered how old he was. His hair wasn't white, but it was barely able to cover his scalp in dusty blonde fluff, and he didn't have too many wrinkles, but enough to make him older than 40. She couldn't for the life of her remember the colour of his cheerful-looking eyes.
She shook her head and looked around the lot for something else to keep her distracted. She noted that Beast Boy and Starfire were having a rather animated conversation, but didn't care enough to listen in. Last time she'd done that, she'd heard something she wished she hadn't.
Some birds flew overhead and landed on a nearby power line. This charity building was on the outskirts of town, close enough to see the skyscrapers and office buildings, but far enough to not hear much of the city noise. Raven briefly wished that Titan's Tower was that far from the city, or farther, but common sense took hold and she knew the city would be impossible to protect from such a distance. She sighed, wondering how long it would take before Robin and Cyborg came back outside so that they could leave. There was a large moving truck full of crates waiting at the docks for them to deliver it here, now that they'd dropped off what hadn't fit inside it.
Raven released some pent-up energy on the loose gravel littered on the pavement at her feet. She scattered it one way, then another, making simple little designs in the thin layer of dirt. After a few moments, she lowered her hood and stood up from leaning on the car. It was probably about ten in the morning, but it was early summer, and the days heated up fast. She squinted up at the bare blue sky, hoping to see clouds coming to rescue her from the sun's glare, and was disappointed.
Beast Boy and Starfire had gone off, she noticed suddenly. Raven didn't think about it much, though, because the heat was really starting to get to her. As she looked at the sky, she imagined the smooth gray skin on her face turning red and blistering into sores as if it were boiling, and finally melting away from the white bone underneath, as the skin on the rest of her body followed suit from top, down to her feet. Raven looked down at her cloth boots and bare legs. She wondered if sun screen contained holy water.
---
Starfire cheered as the ancient pinball machine lit up and blared some terrible "you're winning" music as Beast Boy played. Cyborg watched the game eagerly, probably awaiting his turn once his friend had lost. Raven just shook her head and let the door close behind her quietly. Her eyes quickly adjusted to the dim light coming from some barely working ceiling light fixtures.
The building was mostly one room, filled with racks of clothes, boxes of things, shelves of things, and an assortment of furniture and appliances. The pinball machine and two vending machines were located on the far wall, and Raven could barely see it.
"Hey, Raven, over here!"
Raven turned to the left, where she spotted Robin, who'd just called for her, and the man whose name she still didn't know. They were sitting at a folding table with a bunch of papers on the table. Raven walked over and pulled out a seat next to Robin. He was busy filling out forms.
"Raven, this is Mr. Pilkvist. He owns the building and runs all the charities and such that use it. Mr. Pilkvist, Raven." Robin pushed some forms in front of Raven. She hurriedly grabbed a pen off the table and began reading a form, hoping that Mr. Pilkvist wouldn't try to shake her hand.
"Nice to meet you, Mr. Pilkvist." She said. "What are we filling out?"
"Nice to meet you too, Raven." His smile was warm. "These are just some tax forms and then the forms you have to sign to be a volunteer here, since the place is privately owned and all that. Your friends don't seem to have adequate attention spans to fill out their own, so Robin's scrambling to do them all."
"Yeah, I left yours. Figured it would be better if you just did it yourself."
Raven nodded. The first thing to put down was her name. "Robin, are we putting down real names or--"
"Whatever you want. It doesn't really matter except in my case since my name is actually a secret." He finished a form and reached for another. "Why'd you even ask? I thought Raven was your real name."
"It is." Raven said quietly, honestly not sure why she asked in the first place. She penned in 'Raven Roth' and continued filling out the form. It appeared to be the volunteer form, since it was asking for her race and address and such. She only left the year part of the 'DOB' blank empty. She couldn't remember the difference in years between Azarath and Earth. Finally, she signed it and moved on to another stack of forms.
"Are these the tax forms?" She asked. "Tax deduction, I mean?"
"Yeah. I should probably do those, though." Robin traded her four paper stack for his even smaller one. "Here are the rest of the volunteer forms. Just do Beast Boy's and the rest of Cyborg's."
"Alright." Raven was quick to fill out the forms and, upon finishing, realized that Cyborg and Beast Boy had already signed. She wondered if that was even legal and looked over at Robin, who was on the last tax form. "Do you want these, Mr. Pilkvist?"
"Yes, Raven. Thank you." She handed him all of the volunteer forms, careful not to touch his hand. The hairs on her neck remained standing; he'd been staring at her since she'd walked in.
"Alright. I'm finished." Robin said, the anxiety barely hidden in his voice. "Anything else?"
"No, I think you're good. All you need to do is drop off the t--" Mr. Pilkvist was cut off by a rather catchy little melody from Robin's communicator. (Beep-beep beep be-beep beep beep-be-beep.) Robin fished it out of his belt and flipped it open.
"Trouble!" Robin shouted, catching the other titans' attentions. In a flash, everyone was out of the building and in the lot. "It's just a small gang fight downtown, so ah, Raven and Beast Boy, go get the truck from the docks and bring it down here. Titans, g--"
"Neither of us can drive." Raven said.
"Alright, Cyborg and Raven, you guys go." Robin responded without much thought. He jumped up into the air as Beast Boy morphed into a hawk and flew towards the city. Starfire caught him and the three were off.
Cyborg turned to Raven. "You got your limited license two days ago." Raven only shrugged and walked to the T-car. Cyborg unlocked it and they both climbed in and drove towards the bay.
---
"You know, this band is okay." Raven said, eyes closed, head against the passenger side window. Cyborg snorted.
"What? Is something wrong with them?"
"It's Linkin Park, Raven." Cyborg chuckled.
"So?"
"Never mind." Cyborg turned up the volume a little more, and Linkin Park's "Breaking the Habit" played on. He was glad she was taking an interest in something, even if it was popular emo music. In rap form. He glanced sideways at his little gray friend. She had curled up in the passenger seat in an awkward sitting position, and was using her hood as a pillow against the window. Cyborg couldn't tell if she was sleeping, but he hoped she wasn't. They were fast approaching the docks and he didn't want to have to wake her.
Cyborg turned left and pulled into the parking lot of a warehouse. He sat for a moment, trying to remember which pier the truck would be at. He parked and took the key out of the ignition.
"Twenty-eight."
Cyborg looked at Raven in surprise. She shrugged and uncurled, stretching a little before stepping out of the car. Cyborg followed suit, locking the doors.
"It's right down there." Raven nodded toward the water away from the direction of the Tower. She rubbed her eyes and yawned. Cyborg guessed she'd actually been sleeping, or attempting to, despite the drive only being half an hour. He followed her down a small hill, and they walked along the docks bustling with midday activity.
People gave way to the two titans. Cyborg drew attention to them with his size, but Raven might've gone unnoticed without him. People didn't always see her in a crowd, partly because she was just barely over five feet tall, and partly because she didn't like to be noticed.
Cyborg and Raven found pier twenty-eight and signed off on the huge U-haul type truck without much talking. With anyone else, long silences were immensely uncomfortable for him, but as they climbed into the truck and he started driving all without a word, Cyborg realized that quiet was okay with Raven. She made him feel calmed and at peace, and he briefly wondered why she couldn't have that effect on Beast Boy.
Raven stared out the open window, squinting every once in a while against the hot, rough winds blowing by. Her stomach suddenly growled loudly. She blushed when Cyborg laughed.
"Wanna stop and get lunch?" He asked, and when she grimaced in reply, he added, "Or we can drop this thing off and get something with the others, if they're done." At that moment, Raven received a call on her communicator. Flipping it open and almost dropping it in the process, she found Robin on the screen.
"What do you need, Robin?"
"We finished here, but then we got two more calls that we're going to go and take care of."
"Okay." Raven wasn't sure why he was even telling her all this.
"Basically, I just wanted to let you guys know that when you've finished up with the food drive, go ahead back to the tower and we'll meet you guys there later this afternoon. Maybe we'll all have a late lunch."
"Right."
"Or not. I'm out. Later." And with that, he ended the link. Raven shut her communicator and put it away. She leaned back into the seat and shut her eyes.
"I hate this truck." Raven said suddenly.
"What do you want me do about it?" Cyborg joked, getting off the exit ramp a little too fast. Raven thought for a moment that it would tip, but it seemed to be fine after a few seconds.
"I don't know. Can't you fix the air conditioner?"
"While driving?"
Raven shrugged. Cyborg laughed. Raven smiled to herself. She liked to hear people laugh.
"Don't worry about it. We're almost-- Nope, we're here." Cyborg said, pulling into the dusty old lot once again. He parked alongside a half-filled truck twice as big as the one he was driving. He and Raven got out and walked around to the back. Raven walked over to Mr. Pilkvist while Cyborg opened up the back of the truck.
"Oh, I'm so glad there're two of you." Was Mr. Pilkvist's greeting. "None of the people came that were supposed to, except for the useless guy who drives this monstrosity."
"Okay. Should Cyborg and I load it from this truck?"
"Yes, please, if it's not too much to ask. We're going to need the truck you've brought to transport everything from the drive across town to here."
"It's no problem at all. We'll go ahead and get started." Raven smiled at Mr. Pilkvist in as much a friendly manner as she could manage and went back over to Cyborg. "We've got to move everything from here to the other truck."
"That shouldn't be too hard." Cyborg replied. He pulled three crates out of the truck. Raven bit her lip.
"I can't really use my powers for this kind of thing. I lose control too easily with all the focus required not to break the things inside the crates and everything..." She shuffled her feet.
"It's fine, Rae. It'll take a little longer, but it's no big deal." He grinned at her and went into the bigger truck to add his crates to a stack. Raven looked up at the truck packed to the top with stacks of crates. She climbed up the ramp and levitated to pull a crate off the top. It was a very heavy one, and she wished she'd picked a different crate. One marked "empty", perhaps.
She lowered herself to the ground and nearly bumped into Cyborg as she went up the ramp to the larger truck. He took her crate with one hand and ruffled her short hair with the other. She growled.
"Heh. Sorry, Rae. Here, why don't you just take boxes from there and put 'em on the floor of this truck instead of going all up this ramp here. I'll just stack them up."
"Okay." Raven turned from him and went back the other truck. She flew up a few feet to get a new crate, this one a little smaller, and carried it down the ramp, then to the bigger truck. She placed it on the edge, next to the ramp.
The sun beat down on the titans as they worked. Cyborg wasn't having too bad a time, though. His mechanical body kept his body temperature comfortably cooled, and the lifting and stacking of boxes wasn't bothering him much. Raven, however, had not only broken a sweat, but vowed to start listening to Robin when he told her she needed physical training along with meditation and exercises of her powers.
After two hours, the truck was completely empty, and Raven finally decided a break was a good idea. She sat on the ramp of the bigger truck and used a bit of her cloak to wipe her face. She'd considered taking the heavy cloak off, but her self-consciousness was stronger than the heat, and she kept it on. It was the only thing keeping her outfit from being totally indecent.
The ramp vibrated when Cyborg stepped onto it. He walked down to the end where Raven was sitting in the dirt and plopped down next to her.
"So...we're totally done." He said after a moment's quiet.
"Mhm."
"I'm starving."
"Okay." Raven stood up, ready to go home. She put her hood down and looked around the parking lot, and became a little distressed. "Cyborg, we left the T-car at the docks. And it looks like Robin got his R-cycle back."
"Aww, chill, Rae. It's fine." He stood up next to her and put a massive hand on her little shoulder. "There was a Pepsi machine inside. I've got some cash. Let's go get something to drink and then we'll walk back." Her let go of Raven and walked to the building. She followed, but only because the building was cool inside and there was a drink to be had.
Raven followed Cyborg to the back of the building. The hairs on her neck stood up, but she didn't see Mr. Pilkvist anywhere. In fact, neither of the titans had seen him since they started working. Raven shrugged it off, and thought about what she wanted to drink that would come out of a dusty old machine.
"Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, Sunkist, and Aquafina. The flavoured kind." Cyborg said, as if having read Raven's mind. He pushed a dollar into the machine and Raven hit the Diet Pepsi button. She' have chosen the water, but flavoured water was too weird for her.
"Diet? Rae, you're such a girl." Cyborg rolled his eyes. He pushed in another dollar and another, buying two Sunkists. Raven read the nutrition facts on her can of soda. Zero calories, zero fat, some sodium, and none of the other stuff. She shrugged and popped it open.
"There's no way I can fly us back, Cyborg. I'm too worn out." She sipped her drink, cringing at the carbonation. Sometimes, she almost wished she were like Starfire. Starfire could eat whatever she wanted and not worry about anything like taste and whatnot.
"That's alright, Rae. I'll call Robin and see if somebody can't bring the T-car out here." He pushed a button on his arm and Robin's face popped up a moment later. His helmet was on, and he appeared to be racing down a city street on his R-cycle.
"What do you need, Cy?"
"What's going on?" Cyborg frowned and took a drink of Sunkist.
"There were more gangs ready to fight today than we realized. The cops are actually," Robin swerved harshly to avoid something and made an awkward motion like he'd thrown something. "The cops are actually helping us out for once. Where are you guys?"
"Well, we're back at the charity center without a ride. Raven's too tired to get us anyplace far off, so...yeah."
"If she can't use her powers much anyway, don't worry about you guys getting here. You'll have to find your own way back, though. Sorry." Robin made that awkward motion again. "Look, go on back to the tower until Raven's rested up and come help us out if this is still going down. I kind of need to go."
"Alright, Rob. See you." And with that, Robin cut the transmission. "Guess we're walking, Rae."
"Goody." Raven wiped her face with her hand, feeling rather greasy and gross due to the sweat. "Huh. I'd rather hitchhike."
"Yep.'Cause that's what superheroes do. We hitchhike." Cyborg ruffled her hair again.
"So you two are done?" Even Raven jumped. She and Cyborg turned around to see Mr. Pilkvist.
"Er... yeah. Yeah, we are." Cyborg said, grinning.
"That's great. Very good." Mr. Pilkvist smiled at them as if he were very proud of them. Raven resisted raising an eyebrow.
"Yeah, we're just going to walk back to the city." Raven said, itching to leave.
"Walk? All the way back?" Mr. Pilkvist frowned. "Well, I'm driving that truck back in a few moments, and I can take you two back. Maybe I can drop you off at a restaurant or something?"
"Wow, thanks. That would be great, if it's not too much trouble, acourse." Cyborg eagerly replied. Raven inwardly cringed, but kept her facial expression pleasantly neutral.
"It's no trouble at all! In fact, there's a nice inexpensive little place that's right near the bay. I can drop you all off pretty close to there."
"Oh, good. Lunch would definitely be nice. What d'you say, Rae?"
Rave shrugged. "Sounds good to me."
"It's a deal. Let's go!" Mr. Pilkvist said. Raven and Cyborg followed him out of the building. Cyborg tossed his first can of soda into a nearby trash bin.
---
I've decided that to preserve my sanity, this is where the chapter needs to end. It's nearly forty-one hundred words without this note. The next chapter is complete, but I won't post it until chapter three is finished (and I'll post that when I finish four, and so on.)
Thanks for reading,
--Emerald
PS: If you've got any feedback (criticism, encouragement, even threats if I haven't updated in a while, etc) it's all welcome. If you've got nothing to say, well, I hope you did enjoy my story here. :)