Forget Me Not 3
*~`3´~*
Robin or rather Richard now that he officially quit the Titans walks slowly toward to the small run down apartment where he has been staying when he isn't near Raven's grave. With her gone he feels like he has lost a part of himself. A part that he can't live without. He stops on impulse when he nears the library. One of Raven's favorite places he thinks. He finds himself walking up the stone steps and going inside. Richard wanders around the stacks of books. He thinks that Raven must have been in heaven when she was in here. Richard stops gazing at the mythical section, an area that he knows Raven often frequented when she was here.
"Can I help you with anything?"
Richard freezes at the sound of the voice behind him. At first he can't bring himself to turn around. That dream he had...could it possibly be? He turns around quickly. The girl doesn't have short cropped indigo hair. Its long and so blond its almost white. Nor does she have a red gem on her third eye chakra. Her eyes are the same color though and she is so very pale. He wonders could it possibly somehow be... "...Raven?"
"I get that reaction a lot. My name is Ragen."
"Ragen?" Richard snaps out of his shock as he sees her name tag only one letter different from Raven he notices. "I'm sorry, you just look so much like Raven."
"I've heard that everyday for the last three weeks."
Its been three weeks to the day since he had the nightmare about Raven being buried alive. "I'm sorry...its just a shock."
"Did you know her?"
"Yeah. This was one of the places she liked to hang out. I thought I would stop by on my way home and look around."
"If you need any help let me know. I'll be at the front desk."
Richard watches the girl walk away in shock. He practically staggers to a nearby chair as he mind reels with just how similar the girl looks and sounds to Raven. Working in a library is something he thinks that Raven would have been doing if she weren't a Titan. Three weeks he thinks again. She had said three weeks. Not a month which is how long it has been since Raven died. Could Ragen possibly somehow, someway really be Raven who very possibly hadn't really be dead after all. He had never really believed it. Not after paramedics had dragged him from her body that night in the alley. She had been taken away not by them but the county coroner her still form draped in a sheet until his arrival. On impulse he gets up and takes a random book from the shelf and heads back to the front desk. He stands there watching a few moments as Ragen checks out books to another patron.
"Ready to check out?"
"Yes."
"Do you have your card?"
Richard realizes he doesn't have one, at least not under his civilian name. "I need to sign up for one."
"No problem. Are you new to the city?"
"No. I just haven't checked out books here before."
"What about you?"
"I don't remember...its complicated. I would rather not talk about it." Ragen gets out a form and a pen. "I just need some information then I can issue you a card."
Richard quickly fills in the information on the form and signs his name. He watches as Ragen takes it and enters the information into the computer.
Ragen scans a plastic card with a bar code reader then she scans the book. "You're all set. Your book is due back in two weeks."
"Thank you."
"Have a nice day."
"You too." Richard's mind is still reeling as he exits the library. Ragen doesn't remember if she is new to the city and people have been commenting on how much she looks like Raven for three weeks. Three weeks ago was when he had the dream Raven was buried alive. It all makes his head ache as he tries to process it. The grave hadn't been disturbed, but Raven has powers she could have used to get out if she really had been buried alive. He really shouldn't jump to conclusions until he knows more, but he feels strongly that he shouldn't pass this off as a coincidence.
*~`'´~*
Richard spent the last several hours wandering around the city in thought. It is almost dark when he finally returns home. He looks up while unlocking the door as someone comes up the stairs and stops at the apartment next door. He does a double take when he realizes who it is. "Ragen?"
Ragen looks over at the guy. It takes her several moments but she finally remembers his name. "Richard...right?"
"Yeah. I saw you at the library earlier today."
"The library...yeah. I remember now. You'll have to forgive me, things get a little fuzzy in my head since..." Ragen shakes her head quickly changing the subject. "...so you live in this dump too?"
"Its a place to sleep at night."
"You must hibernate at night or something to get any sleep in this place."
Richard finds himself taken aback by the comment that is some much like something Raven might have said. "Actually I don't really get much sleep. Insomnia. Maybe a place to get off the streets at night is a better way to put it."
"That's about all its good for." She looks up at Richard. "Cut out the caffeine laden coffee and invest in earplugs and thick earmuffs. That might help you get over the insomnia and sleep at night around here."
"How do you know I drink caffeine laden coffee?"
Ragen points to the large coffee cup in his hand.
Richard looks down. He barely remembers stopping at a coffee shop to get it. "Right."
"I don't remember seeing you here before. Did you just move in?"
"A few nights ago."
Ragen points up to smoke detector on the wall in the hallway. "You might want to invest in your own smoke detector and light bulbs. The superintendent rarely fixes anything in this place."
"Thanks for the tips." He watches as Ragen leans heavily against the wall and holds her hand to her head. "Are you okay? Should I call a doctor?"
"No. I'll be fine. I just need to lay down for awhile."
Richard notices how much paler she suddenly looks. "Are you sure?"
"It will pass. It always does." Ragen quickly opens her door.
"Maybe you shouldn't be alone."
"I'm okay really." She slips into her apartment and locks the door before he can say anything else.
Richard stands there in the doorway wondering what is wrong and if he should get Ragen some help.
"Don't bother. It will just upset her."
He turns around to look at a scantly clad young woman coming out of the apartment across the hall.
"Ragen neglected to warn you that the walls are paper thin around here."
"Is she really okay?"
"That happens sometimes since she was found in the cemetery three weeks ago. She is always fine after some rest."
"Cemetery?"
The girl lowers her voice. "No one really knows what happened. Someone heard her screaming and found her there and some shadowy figure running off into the night. Near that Titan girls grave.
"Did you know her from before that?"
"No one I have talked to has seen her around before. People would have remembered someone that looked so much like Raven if they had seen her around before that. She moved in here after she got out of the hospital has been working at the library. I shouldn't be saying this...its too creepy to think about let alone talk about but some people think that she is really Raven back from the grave somehow."
Richard stares blankly at the girl for a few moments as he processes all she just said.
"Its ridiculous right?"
"Yeah..."
"I've got to get to work. Oh and the best way to get some sleep around here is to get a nighttime job. Its quiet around here during the day."
"Thanks." Richard watches the girl leave and goes inside his own apartment. He looks toward the wall that separates his apartment from Ragen's. She was found in the cemetery near Raven's grave three weeks ago. More and more evidence seems to be mounting in his mind that Ragen has to be Raven. It all fits together too well to be some coincidence. But why the drastic change in her hair and what happened to the charaka stone? He turns to his laptop to look up any news stories online posted about what happened in the cemetery the night Ragen was found. Richard quickly scans what little information there is to be found online about Ragen's sudden appearance. Everything he was told by the girl across the hall is there in the articles. He puzzles over the account by the person that found Ragen. It doesn't mention a shadowy figure. Instead it mentions a shadow with four glowing yellow eyes that was attacking the girl. From what else he can glean from the article Ragen had been found just in time and recovered in the hospital. Richard glances back toward the door as some rowdy guys, drunk by the sounds stomp up the stairs. As they whoop it up on their way down the hall he is about to turn back to the laptop when he hears something else. The girl across the hall had said the walls were paper thin. He approaches the wall separating his apartment from Ragen's. Its faint but he clearly hears the sounds of distress coming from next door. Richard quickly leaves his apartment and walks next door to hers. He knocks on the door but there is no answer. He is about to call out when latch pops open. Richard glances around before he enters Ragen's apartment. He quickly locates her laying on the sofa-thrashing so violently she is about to fall off it. He kneels beside her gently shaking her shoulder trying to get her to wake up only to quickly realize she is having some sort of seizure. He lifts her up from the sofa and lays her down on the floor. He doesn't try to restrain her jerking but does hold her head still.
After sometime Ragen opens her eyes. She is shocked to find Richard hovering above her. She looks up at him quizzically but her mind hasn't cleared enough to voice any questions.
"I heard you from my apartment. I thought something might be wrong after the way you looked when you came inside."
"Was I that loud?"
"Not really but I hear the walls are pretty thin."
"I knew I was forgetting something."
"Maybe I should go call a doctor."
"I'm fine. Really. It happens. There is nothing any doctor can do to stop it. How did you get in?"
"The door popped open after I knocked."
"I told you the super never fixes anything around here." Ragen struggles to sit up.
"Are you sure you're OK? I would feel better if you let me take you to the hospital at least to get checked out."
"No more hospitals." Ragen climbs back up on the sofa with Richard's help. "I hated it there. They acted like I was some sort of freak of nature or something. Doctors kept wanting to run tests like they were trying to find out what I was. She looks over at Richard. "That was when the Raven comments started, because I couldn't remember anything. They brought in some...I don't know robot guy or something to see if maybe I really was her, even though she had been dead a week at the time."
Richard looks at her in shock. That could only have been Cyborg. He knew about Ragen the whole time and kept it a secret. Even after that nightmare about Raven being buried alive. "What did he say?"
"I don't know. Things get fuzzy in my mind. I wasn't breathing when I was found and hadn't been for awhile apparently. It messed up my brain."
"Oxygen deprivation?"
"Something like that."
Richard's mind is screaming at him that this is Raven it has to be. In the moonlight that streams through the window he can see her hair isn't really so blond it looks white, it really is white. That description of the shadow that attacked her...its eyes...something about its eyes sounds so familiar. Trigon he suddenly thinks. For whatever reason her father is reaching out from wherever he was banished trying to get to Raven. Richard looks down at Ragen who is looking up at him. "If you won't let me take you to the hospital will you at least let me fix the door?"
Ragen cringes at the sound of the drunk group down the hall. "I can live with that."
raven lynn morrigan worked at a library while she was in college and she says that 'stacks' is library slang for shelves of books. Near as she could tell from what I was describing to her, she says mythical type books would show up in the 001-100 section of that dewy decimal thing just in case anyone is wondering. She wonders why Raven in the story would have an interest in subjects like UFOs and Bigfoot. I don't know it was the best I could come up with at the time I wrote it.
Is Ragen somehow really Raven? Robin seems to think so but only my cousin, raven lynn morrigan and I know for sure. We aren't telling you will just have to stay tuned to the story to find out. I got permission from raven lynn morrigan to combine this revamped story with an idea I've toyed with writing for a couple of years. Unlike the other group of stories (excluding The Girl in the Magical Mask which isn't apart of that group) I feel I've mostly just edited to this point, this story is an actual joint writing venture between the two of us.
