Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Titans. Nor the Deftones team and their song "Passenger".
A thick curtain of mist hung over the empty streets. There was no sound to breach the cold silence. The fog seemed to choke down any voice, any heartbeat… even the sick yellow streetlights seemed blurred, dimmed and weary in their own nature. No life treaded the almost frozen gray asphalt. It felt as if time itself stood still. The heavy air pressed on your already dry lungs, like an unseen murderer, leeching life and vitality.
The shape of a man slowly drew itself in the gray mass, displacing the cloudy matter as he passed through it in a lazy pace, the sound of his steps muffled by the vile atmosphere. As he passed each light pole, the ill shades of yellow light collided with the deepest black of his sweatshirt, making his features visible, moving in a fluid and ghostly manner like he was one with the fog. He kept his head lowered, under tendrils of messy ebony hair coming out from underneath the black hood, his absent gaze fallen on the sickening gray asphalt. With his hands in his pockets, he kept on walking on the empty alley, raising his head just as he passed underneath a buzzing streetlight, his hood falling off his head. His unraveled pale face looked almost like a glimpse of a phantasmal visage for a brief moment, before the light bolt burned out with a soft crack. As the only sound that had buffered the dead silence ceased its resonance, the dark figure let out a choker sigh, pulling his hood back up, not aware of the hidden amethyst gaze that drank into every movement of his thin body from a darkened and misty window, long and slender fingers pressed against the cold surface. He seemed so familiar, the shape of his body, that elastic way of movement, the way he walked with his head lowered…
…a dark shade in the back of an alley…
…a figure leaping from a rooftop to the other…
…the sound of metallic hits in unleashed fury…
…"Robin, there's nothing you can do about it, she's dead, she's gone, she's not coming back!"…
…"Raven!"…
With a gasp she woke up from her reverie, leaning her forehead on the cold window, exhaling as she watched the dark shape dissolve into the mist, sauntering absently.
His solitary pace had led him into the heart of the city, which looked nothing more than abandoned, the blocks rising tall and dirty gray like massive constructs craning their necks over the darkened and still streets. His steps stopped in front of an old looking staircase with broken light firm, a few more red lights forming the name that read "Scarlet Rise". Strange humming and echoes could be slightly heard from underneath, the rhythm making the ground reflect the beat under the dark haired man's feet. He climbed down to the bottom of the stairs, where a massive man covered in tattoos waited, behind a wire fence, with his gaze locked on him. Tobin rolled up his sleeve, revealing a drawing on his inner forearm, with the shape of a wide opened eye and flaming lashes prolonging it. The tall man nodded and opened the gate. Robin passed it and started walking along a long corridor, with the beats of a song getting louder as he approached a leather covered door, which got opened just as he reached it. A bald man looked at him from behind the door, nodded and let him in, the music now beaming and red flashes of light almost blinding him. Once inside, he looked around to find a seat: couples scattered on sofas in moments of mortal arousal, men and skimpy clad women chaotically dancing in the whole club. He took an empty sear at the bar and ordered a drink, going back at vicariously watching all the commotion around him with a tedious stare, pulling his hood down. As his eyes searched the crowd, he saw so many manifestations of human depravation, how everyone unleashed their worst parts; they resembled demons at the edge of madness, shouting and screaming at the top of their lungs, in the rhythm of the song. He turned back at the bar to finish his drink when his eyes was distracted by a swift movement of a violet shade at the entrance, but as he turned his body towards it, he saw nothing more than the chaotic movement under screaming crimson rays and flashes. He bought another drink, trying to get caught in the song that was playing, when he thought he saw the purple flash again somewhere. Startled, he turned around to look for the distraction that kept getting to him. Again the same mass of red. The song was turning into a horrible loud humming sound, alongside the shouting that now sounded like screeching, making him grow dizzy. Again a piece of violet swished through the crowd, driving him insane. He knew he was being watched, he could feel it. That violet shade, whatever it was, was persuading him. He kept turning so he could catch it with the guard down. Then, for a second every sound and movement stopped, brief moment in which a female voice whispered:
"…Robin..."
He knew that voice. He could've sworn he had heard it before. A monotone yet deep voice, soft yet penetrating. He knew… he thought… the voice…
But the hellish ruckus once again drummed onto his head, as he grasped it in pain. With jaws clenched, he paid the bartender and ran for the exit, almost knocking over everyone in his path.
Once got out, the cold air clawed at his burning cheeks, as he panted, slightly bent on the edge of the sidewalk.
Violet. Black. Blue. All those phrases that invaded his mind, the voices, the people. The memories…
…"No don't go, you'll both get yourselves killed"…
Metallic blue.
…"Dude, it's a trap, I don't trust him"…
Green.
…"Robin, there's no one here… there never was"…
Dark.
"ROBIN!"
Red.
Red falling into red.
Hot crimson liquid spilling on the gray asphalt.
Gray. And black.
A coffin lowered under the ray. Red spilling into gray. Never to come to the surface again.
…"Robin, there's nothing you can do about it, she's dead, she's gone, she's not coming back!"…
A scream.
Blue.
Black silk.
A pale form grasping the black silk, clenching it into her fists, gasping underneath his body.
He looks down into her eyes.
Violent.
The dark room empty.
Just an envelope on the circular bed.
Violet.
He took in a desperate breath, from the lack of air that pushed against his chest. The shock had shaken him so bad he felt light headed and ready to pass out. He looked at his palms that had sweat running down them. He felt the cold pinching at his hands and face like a thousand needles. He looked ahead, trying to regain his breath. The black sky had a hue of red, it seemed bitter and coagulated. It was over now. All that… was gone.
The silence seemed to atrophiate his senses, his eyes lost in a blank stare. His body uncontrollably started shaking, waking him up. The dead silence betrayed the sound of soft steps behind him. He felt eyes bore into his nape. He turned and saw a woman, dressed completely in black, as she shifted her gaze towards the ground.
Violet.
He let out an inaudible gasp as he looker at her petite and nervous form. All the memories came flushing back at him. Her black uniform, the occasional swish of a blue cloak around the corner, violet locks of hair on black silk…
She approached him with slow steps and stopped to his side, not looking at him, only ahead, just like he had done himself.
"..Ra…" he started.
"Aren't you cold?" she interrupted him. Before he could react, she continued.
"Maybe I could give you a ride home."
He stared at her unrelenting gaze that didn't leave the buildings on the other side of the street. He did the same, and turned his head back forward and nodded silently.
She started walking with no sign of acknowledgement and he could do nothing more than follow her slender form. He walked two steps behind her, silently. An awkward feeling reigned over him. He had so much to saw, so many things to ask, yet nothing was coming out. He didn't know how to make his thoughts take audible form, how to overpower the pain that crept into his mind and erupted in his heart. He felt choker once again, the same pressure on his lungs he had felt before he had arrived at "Scarlet Rise". He wanted to scream, to squirm, to ask her so many, to shout out loud the last 6 years. He had a seismic war going on inside him, but staying locked beneath his still form. He was startled out of his thoughts by a monotone voice calling his name
"Robin." He looked at her standing a few paces behind him. "The car is here."
"Oh" he managed to murmur, letting out a small sound, as dry as his throat was.
They both climbed in the car. Without taking her eyes off the road, she asked: "Where should I take you?"
Robin started out the window.
"Far. Don't care where… just far away."
She paused, thinking. With a quick breath, she rolled the key and the engine roared back to life. She drove through the dead city without a destination, without an aim, at high speed as a ghost rider into the misty night.
They stood silent, both with absent gazes stuck on the world outside, lost in their thoughts.
"Ro…"
"Why did you never come back?" He turned his head towards Raven, but she didn't return the gesture.
"You never came looking for me." She replied coldly.
With a small groan, Robin turned back to look outside the window.
"Where have you been in all those years?"
"Home. And back again. When I came back, you were already disbanded, each gone on with his own story without a trace. I chose to do the same. I couldn't' find any of you, so I moved to Gotham."
"Gotham…" he echoed her. "You just gave up on us like that." He continued with a tinge of frustration and disappointment in his voice.
"I only seconded you." She said frowning with sadness.
He was about to answer but closed his eyes, shook his head before lowering it in his hands.
"What about…us?" he asked, turning back at her, almost pleading her to look at him.
She swallowed hard. Clearing her throat and discarding any emotion from her voice she answered as emotionless as she could:
"What about us? It was a nice dream. Just as everything from our Titan times. Just a nice dream. Gone."
Tears welled up in her eyes. Robin continued to stare at her, now feeling like he was being ripped apart.
"But…"
"Don't talk. You'll ruin it." She said, on the brink of tears. "We've always went from mistake to mistake. Always managed to hurt each other without really meaning to. We ruined each other with each passing day. We gave each other death. A sweet death."
Her last phrase echoed like poison in his head.
"Do you know what 6 years were… without a word from you?" he barely managed to say without his voice quivering.
"…Let them go." She simply stated, a tear escaping and rolling down her cheek.
The scenery had switched to the coast serpentines, clouded by the same mist as the city.
Robin looked at her and without a word, bent close to her.
"I can't let it go". She accelerated.
"I never did". She swallowed.
"And never will". She closed her eyes.
He bent and closed the distance between them, pressing his lips against her wet cheek. He retreated to look at her. Suddenly, she popped her eyes open. With a quick movement, she turned to face him. Time stopped as amethyst met dirty blue. All the history repeated as their bond was reestablished.
…first step on Earth…
…a green-gloved hand offered to lift her…
…blue light healing his badly bruised and beaten body…
…a black bird engulfing him and taking him to safety…
…her falling off the block…
…fire…
…two bodies connected…
"Let it go". He heard as a whisper in his mind.
The front of the car breaking the safety fence.
Hot tires rolling off the ground towards nothing.
Two birds falling through the mist with their wings clipped.
Metal colliding against grey earth.
Glass breaking into thousand of shards.
Black.
Dark.
Gone.
Right. So I had to post it again because I had forgotten to write disclaimers (and thus I would've got my butt kicked) and I also found some typos and mistakes I couldn't stand seeing. Thanks to beloved-raven and MidnightTitan for their reviews, I'm sorry I saddened you guys
Old notes: This is my first and probably last story I post, it was just an idea I've been having for some months and I couldn't get rid of it. Flames allowed but not really cared about. Grammar ain't the best but eh... I tried.
Enjoy :D
Venge