Anyone to whom this may look familiar… you are right. Run To You has been up before.
What happened to it?
Well, someone has it in for me; whether it is just someone who seems to take pleasure in reporting me, or if it is just my misfortune to have been caught by the site admins twice for posting up illicit song lyrics… My RobinxRaven one-shot song-fic Underneath Your Clothes met the same fate…
So this was a song-fic to Bryan Adams' Run To You. Here is the same fic without the lyrics… and two extra chapters. When I first posted this up, my co-writer Narroch06 came up with an idea for a "sister-fic" to accompany it. That "sister-fic" is the second chapter which is also up – Python Pathos. Before we could get around to putting it up on its own… Run To You got deleted from the site. So poor Narroch06 had to endure more of my ranting, expletive-riddled emails… BUT actually it was probably a blessing in disguise.
Because what was Run To You is now Love Over Gold! A three-parter co-written RobinxStarfirexSlade fic! What do we mean by RobinxStarfirexSlade? You'll just have to read on to find out. Anyone who read this before should read it again; because Narroch06 added stuff to it, so it is better now…
Each of the three chapters focuses on one of the characters in the "triangle"; and so, we give you;
Run to You – Robin
"I love you" was what she had said.
And he believed that. Simple words, profound meaning. Deeper than anything he wanted to be involved with. He just wasn't sure if he loved her back. He didn't know if he was capable of returning the love she was offering so freely and abundantly to him.
Which made him feel worse about the whole thing. Because she deserved it; she deserved to be loved. To be loved by someone who loved her equally as much as she loved that person.
But he didn't.
He simply couldn't.
He could not love anyone that much.
Had he changed that much? Was he even capable of loving at all? Was what he felt… simply lust?
For her? For him?
It made him ache; with pain, and with guilt. He could not stand to lie to her, yet the truth was even larger and more treacherous. He could not bear to see the shattered look on her face, to audibly hear the break in her heart.
He knew it could not go on, yet he could not bear to finish it.
He could not bear for her to know.
Only a few minutes ago… well, no, he had lost track of time now, but—
Well, she had turned those stunning green eyes on him, and she had tenderly clasped his hands, and she had tried to enter into his soul. She had begged entry as those words had left her soft lips.
"I love you, Robin…"
And she had promised that her love would never die.
What had he said in reply?
He had lied to her.
"I love you too, Star…"
He had fucking lied to her.
Hadn't he?
What she doesn't know can't hurt her, he had reasoned. I won't hurt her.
But he was hurting her more by lying. It was a slower pain, one that would eventually nibble away at them in tiny shearing pieces. He knew that; he did not deny that. But he lied anyway. To her. To himself. He preferred the slow decay to the quick and soul-shattering truth.
It was a whole lot easier to lie.
Because she didn't know.
She didn't know that he couldn't love her…
…because he loved someone else.
He loved her too much to want to hurt her.
But not enough to tell her the truth.
The truth? The truth was that he was afraid to tell her the truth. He was truly frightened by what he had gotten himself into; a trap in which he had ensnared himself. He even built it himself and it terrified him that there was no way out, that he had forgotten to construct an escape route into the self imposed cage. And yet he was perhaps not as terrified as he should have been.
Because it was something he needed. Not every night, just…
When it got too much, he would go to him. It was weakness; he knew that Slade loved to see it. He cursed himself for it, and yet he would go anyway.
Because Starfire just couldn't satisfy him.
(Yes, that was it…)
And that was something that he just couldn't tell her.
He needed it tonight. He lay there on her bed and all he could think was that he needed it tonight. Even…
"I love you", she had said. Starfire. She had opened her heart and her soul and had said that to him and had goddamn meant it. She had said that it would never die, that she would always love him, and he had lied and said it in return. That he loved her, and would always love her no matter what.
She had rewarded him then. She always did. She rewarded him for just being alive. She rewarded him because she loved him incomprehensibly. She was different; unlike anyone else he had ever met. She loved him for qualities he wasn't even sure he had. She loved him even though…
Maybe it was because she was alien to this planet.
Maybe it was because she was blind.
Maybe it was because she was stupid.
Naiveté. It didn't come into this equation. Robin scorned her secretly for not working it out, and yet he always dreaded the day when she would. He despised her incessant always-believing-the-best-of-everyone, and yet knew it was only because of that that she had not figured him out.
Because it did not take a genius.
The excuses. The lies he so clearly spun her. The obvious lack of interest whenever she became intimate with him.
Like now.
In the dark, entangled in her sheets. Both naked and sweaty. She was moaning under her breath, on top of him, copulating against him…
…And he wasn't even looking at her.
Even during that, his mind was elsewhere. Planning his escape tonight. He knew how to work her. When this was over, she would be tired. She would want to sleep, and would curl up in his arms. He would lie there for a while, waiting until he knew that she was definitely deeply asleep, and then would slip out of her grasp and grab his clothes and dress and be gone.
He would be long out of the Tower by the time she awoke, noticing his absence. Perhaps even in Slade's arms by the time she would sit up, gasping his name and feeling the lack of his presence at her side.
That was probably what he would do tonight.
He heard her moan his name and retreated further into himself. He was so distant at these times; he could almost completely separate himself from his body. It had taken a while to master but now he switched off as soon as she touched him. Such superficial perception made it easier for him to contemplate his betrayal of her. To continue with it. It was easier to take what she was offering and pretend he liked it than to refuse it and have to explain why he didn't want it.
Because she would not understand. And he had wanted it once.
A very long time ago.
He hated to cheat on her.
But he hated the thought of not cheating on her even more.
Was she simply too good for him? After being raised by the Dark Knight, was a "heart-of-gold" too sickeningly bright for him? Bruce certainly didn't have heart of gold. He was good, yes, but not a "good" good person. He could be horrible sometimes; Robin knew. He had seen his mentor's nasty side. There was a darkness in and around him that was far more than his cape…
Was that why he had been drawn to Slade instead? Darkness? Why Slade then? Why not Raven?
It was another thing he could not explain.
Other things…
She came before he did – not unusual in their relationship (though perhaps odd in anyone else's), because he simply did not pay attention – and collapsed against his chest, giggling weakly. Her long red hair was matted and tangled with sweat – where he had made an effort and half-heartedly ran his fingers through it – and was all over his chest.
He shifted uncomfortably, irritated by it tickling him, and by her lying on him.
She kissed his chin and he resisted the urge to push her away. It was not because he found her repulsive in any way – it was because he felt so overwhelmingly guilty. He hated these nights of passion with her simply because they made him feel bad. He would lie awake long after she had drifted off to sleep in his arms, and contemplate how much it felt – to him, at least – as though he was raping her. Not in the literal sense, but in the sense of taking advantage of her.
Because he was getting a pretty good deal out of all this, the guilt aside.
She giggled softly again, whispering something in Tamaranean. He breathed in deeply and looked up at the ceiling.
"You are still hard," she whispered in his ear in English. "I can feel you inside me…"
Erotic talking. It had no effect on him unless it was him whispering it in his ear.
"Mm." He shifted again, taking his weight on his elbows. He hated it when this happened. This required a lot more effort from him.
Effort he didn't have the energy or will to give.
She started moving against him again, building a rhythm to ease the tightness in him, and he sighed and worked with it.
His eyes were empty; his mind was full.
Not of her.
Of him.
There was no real feeling in his moan. He had given up trying to moan her name, because it sounded so fake and hollow in his own ears. She cried out as he spilled into her, and he took out his anguish on her by snapping at her to shut up. She blinked at him and he sighed and looked away.
Knowing that her love for him was so genuine made it all the more difficult for him. He hated himself for doing this to her; for being so underhanded, for taking advantage of her naiveté and sneaking around behind her back. Behind all of their backs.
He sneaked away at night to sleep with his sworn arch-enemy.
He still hated the man, and by day worked unrelentlessly to stop him.
Yes, by day they were enemies; by night they were lovers. The line between their love and hate was thin, blurred, and at some points disappeared altogether. The seemingly distinct opposites were really nothing more than different ends of the spectrum, still undeniable connected at the core.
Perhaps it was because of the close proximity of such hate that Slade was not a kind lover; he was cruel and rough, hurting Robin deliberately to assert his power over him. Robin knew that Slade did not even love him, not really.
Not the way Starfire did.
And yet he continued the throw Starfire's love aside for Slade's lust.
Why?
Because Starfire would love him unconditionally. No matter what he did, no matter what he said. He did not have to prove anything; he did not have to earn it. She was turning him into a spoiled honey bear; one that simply had to reach out for another scoop. No longer did he have to track the scent for days, or climb trees, or fight off the stings for a taste. He had lost the need to hunt, but not the recollection of how thrilling it was.
And that wasn't what he wanted.
He had made up his mind about that a long time ago.
(Yes, that was what it was…)
Of course.
TT
Clasping the buckle of his yellow belt in almost-darkness, Robin looked over his shoulder at Starfire as she lay asleep, curled up on her side beneath the soft pink bedsheets of her circular bed.
He looked away, feeling bad.
He took his hands from his belt, feeling bad.
He neatened up his hair, feeling bad.
He crept out of her bedroom, feeling terrible.
But that was what Batman had taught him.
"Never be affected by your emotions. They cloud your judgment."
So he ignored it and continued with his stealthy escape. Go to the garage. Get his bike.
Go to Slade before he changed his mind. While the feeling was still right.
While he still had it in him.
Why did he love Slade more?
Because he had to. Because Slade would not accept anything less.
As for Starfire…
…Robin loved her too much to let Slade hurt her.
Far too much.
Like?
Although it does make sense without the lyrics, the words of the song are up on my bio page (can't get in trouble for that; there are no rules against having song lyrics in your bio!) if you want to read them. You will see where some of the lines in the fic were inspired from.
BTW, the next two chapters – Python Pathos and Full Circle (latter not yet posted up) – are much less vague that the above; this was the original stand-alone one-shot, you must understand.
Well, be a sweetie, leave a review; and read on to Python Pathos…
