The Waiting Wolf
"ADONIS?" Beast Boy yelled. "I was just about to beat you in Megafight Ultrathon III and we have to go fight ADONIS in some stupid warehouse? Man..." An idea struck him and he leaned forward, looking over the dashboard for the video output jacks.
"First of all, B, you weren't about to beat me." Cyborg glanced at Beast Boy but focused most of his conversation on driving the T-Car. "Second, there's no way we're going to finish Megafight while I'm driving so quit tearing up the dashboard. And third, who would you rather be fighting? Trigon? Slade?"
"No, 'course not, it's just - it's just lame! We've got better things to do -"
"No we don't, especially not some video game." Cyborg stuck out an arm and pushed Beast Boy back in his seat as he braked to a quick stop. "We're here." He unbuckled his seat belt and looked over at Beast Boy again. "You know, this guy almost wiped you out the last time we fought him. Why aren't you taking this more seriously?"
"Wiped ME out? No way." Beast Boy got out of the car and the two Titans met up with the others in front of a dark downtown warehouse, Robin zooming out of nowhere on his R-Cycle and Raven and Starfire appearing from overhead. "It was dumb luck and that goop we got hit with. It wasn't him." He looked doubtfully at the silent building. "Are we sure this is the right place? It doesn't seem -"
As if on cue, a massive explosion lit up the inside of the warehouse and a dull boom shook the ground beneath the assembled Titans.
Beast Boy sighed. "I guess it is."
Robin took charge. "Cyborg, get us in there. Starfire and Raven, ready to attack. Beast Boy, distract him. I'm going to take a shot at deactivating his suit. Maybe we can finish this up quickly."
"One door, coming up!" A shot from one of Cyborg's sonic cannon made a hole in the side of the warehouse big enough even for the T-Car.
"Titans, go!"
Despite the occasional explosions, the warehouse was dark, the high, dirt-encrusted windows letting in almost no moonlight.
Robin said I have to distract him, thought Beast Boy, But first I have to find him. He morphed into a wolf, remembering the last time he fought Adonis. Brute strength didn't work, but maybe agility and cleverness would.
A green flash and Starfire's "I believe I have found the Adonis!" got Beast Boy running deeper into the darkness. His wolf's vision worked well enough for him to dodge the huge shipping crates and iron shelves that were scattered everywhere. As he got closer he saw Raven and Starfire keeping Adonis occupied with starbolts and telekinetically-flung tires. Beast Boy morphed back to human again and yelled, "Hey, Alame-o, nice outfit! I was about to win a video game and you wrecked it! What are you looking for? Did you get someone to ship you a personality?"
Adonis spun to face him and Beast Boy gulped; Adonis was wild-eyed and stumbling. He looked almost feral, not in control of himself. He took a step toward Beast Boy and snarled, "Where's the stuff?"
Keep distracting him, Beast Boy thought. "What stuff? Your brain? No idea!"
"The stuff! Give me that green stuff! I was powerful! I didn't need the suit! What did you do with the stuff?"
The green goop, Beast Boy thought, it made us both powerful and it almost killed me. Why is he looking for it here? Behind Adonis he could see Robin, moving through the shadows. If Robin could get one clear shot at the controls on Adonis' suit...
"Hey, maybe I used it all!" Beast Boy danced around, waving his skinny arms, willing Adonis not to look behind him. Raven and Starfire covered Robin, and Beast Boy guessed that Cyborg was nearby, waiting for his own shot at the enemy. "I'm strong enough to kick your butt, even in that stupid suit!"
Adonis howled and charged. Beast Boy morphed into a wolf and dodged back and forth, not giving ground, hoping Robin could catch up and get to Adonis' cybernetics.
He really is out of control. Avoiding Adonis' slaps and punches was almost ridiculously easy. Maybe he's addicted. Maybe he'll shut down if he can't get to the...
Adonis roared his frustration and grabbed a wooden packing crate, flinging it at Beast Boy. His wolf-self sidestepped it and it shattered against some steel shelves behind him. Robin, hurry up, I'm getting tired -
A ragged wooden shard spun out of the debris and hit Beast Boy, burying itself in his leg. He let out a yelp and fell, sliding across the concrete floor, directly toward Adonis.
Beast Boy tried scrambling to his feet but his right back leg collapsed under him. He hit the floor just as a rush of noise from overhead signaled an incoming shot from Cyborg's sonic cannon. He vaguely heard Robin yelling, "This ends NOW!" and the whine of Starfire's green bolts. He blinked, wondering why everything was going black, then realized that Raven was beside him and had put up a shield of darkness to protect him both. She looked at him closely and exhaled sharply in relief. "I thought... never mind. You got hit. A chunk of wood, it's like an arrow in your leg. Don't move." He followed her glance and saw a few inches of splintered wood sticking out of his leg, above what would usually be his knee. My flank? My thigh? Who cares? I've got to get that out, it HURTS... Blood oozed, trickling to the floor, where it glowed against the black light of Raven's shield.
Beast Boy braced himself to change and Raven put a hand on his shoulder and looked into his eyes. "DON'T MORPH. You'll make it worse. If you try to change now the wood will tear you up. We'll get you back to the Tower. Until then, stay a wolf."
He nodded, feeling the cold of shock creeping over him. Raven was still staring at him and he was happy to keep looking at her. The fight with Adonis was still going on but it seemed far away. He felt a little dizzy. Raven. She had nice eyes. Too bad he was a wolf at the moment, he -
His leg twitched and a wave of nausea roiled through him as the wood moved against muscle. Her hand tightened on his shoulder. "Does it hurt badly?"
Beast Boy nodded again. Raven's eyes softened a little and she said, "I can't heal you with that wood in your leg, but I can make it stop hurting for a while. You're not going to like it when we move you, anyway." Her other hand touched his forehead, and his last thought was This close to her, and I'm a wolf? This stin- and then everything really did go black.
When Beast Boy came to his senses again Raven was still there, his leg still hurt like hell (though someone had cut away the excess wood and his leg was bandaged and immobile), and he was still a wolf.
I didn't change shape, he thought. I didn't know I could pass out and keep the same form. How did I do that? I wonder if Raven... He moved his head a little and saw he was back in Titans Tower, in the medical center. Raven was sitting across the room, head bent, hood on, meditating, he guessed. He tried to say something and it came out as a whine before he remembered he wasn't human at the moment. Raven started, then looked at him. She drew back her hood and went to kneel beside him where he lay on a gurney.
"Are you back?" He nodded. "Still hurts?" He nodded again. Raven looked off into space for a moment, trying to remember everything so she could fill him in. "After you got hit Cyborg ... lost his temper. He got Adonis and his suit and set fire to the warehouse accidentally with a couple of missile shots. We're lucky the whole downtown didn't go up." She straightened and paced a little, a few steps away from him. "I brought you back here, while everyone else is cleaning up the fire. When Robin gets back he'll get that wood out of your leg, and I'll heal you while he cleans out the wound. I could try to heal you now, but all I can do is encourage the process. I can't take out arrows or wood chunks or whatever that is. Your leg could get infected or I could make things worse." She knelt beside the gurney again. "I can make it stop hurting, though, let you rest until Robin comes back. Do you want me to?"
Beast Boy shook his head, then whined a little, looking at his paws, then the rest of himself, then at her.
Raven understood the question immediately. "You stayed a wolf the whole time, yes." She glanced at him, then away, and then, to Beast Boy's astonishment, blushed. "Remember when I was studying ... with Malchior?"
She won't even mention that creep's name usually, Beast Boy thought. No wonder she's blushing.
"At one point I morphed you ... into a rat. It's like flipping a switch in your head. When I helped you to sleep I just kind of - locked the switch? It's not permanent," she continued quickly, "and now that you're awake you can change again, but you shouldn't." Raven fiddled with the clasp on her cloak, obviously wanting to put her hood up. "I don't like... doing what he taught me. That kind of magic, and on my friends... I'm sorry. I couldn't think of anything else to do."
From now on I am only morphing into things that can talk, thought Beast Boy. He barked once for her attention and when she looked at him he tried to shrug.
"Thanks." Raven drew up her hood, then lowered it and looked at Beast Boy intently. He stared back, wondering what was the matter. Dude! Do I have spinach in my fangs? Finally she took a deep breath and shook her head. "You really, really scared me."
What?
"When you first got hit and I saw you, it looked like you'd gotten stabbed in the chest, or in the heart. And then you fell, and you started to bleed, and I thought ... I thought that was it." Raven blinked and impatiently wiped her eyes. "And I thought ... how stupid, to be fighting someone like Adonis, and have something like that happen, but there you were on the floor and you weren't moving." Her voice broke a little and she tried to glare at him through her tears, then turned away. "And if you weren't morphed I could count on you to say something dumb at this point and make me angry, and I wouldn't be making an idiot of myself."
Oh, man, what do I-? Embarrassed, Beast Boy stared at her, wishing he could say something, anything - then he grinned as only a wolf can, and took a huge gulp of air. And as Raven looked back at him he let out a enormous BURRRRRRPPPPPPPPPPPPPP.
Startled, Raven almost laughed. "You pinhead," she said, smiling crookedly with tear tracks on her face, "If you can do that, you're going to be fine. I should have put a bandage around your muzzle." She reached out a shaking hand and touched him - running her hand gently over the fur between his ears - before turning away, pulling up her hood and her cloak around her, and all but running to her chair on the other side of the room.
Beast Boy turned to watch her, bemused, still feeling her hand on his head. Sighing, he stretched out, listening to the low buzz of her meditation chant, trying to follow it. Maybe it was because he couldn't talk anyway, but it seemed easier to follow the chant as a wolf, and it seemed to ease the horrible ache in his leg. He watched Raven and drifted, floating alongside the pain, thinking about that jerk Malchior, what kind of animal would be best to squish him into a dragon pancake...
He had just decided on rhino (stab first, then squash) when the communicator light over the medical panel came on. Robin's voice sounded tinny and strained over the speaker. "Raven."
