Raven was falling again. The same desolate hellish land lay untouched around her. The quiet was a death like hush and was unsettling to say the least. The air seemed to be absent because every time she tried to breathe her heart raced erratically as if panicking at the lack of atmosphere. Somewhere in her mind it occurred to her that this was a dream and when she hit the ground she'd wake up like last time. Though some trepidation stayed with her as she vaguely wondered where or if she'd teleport. That same feeling of longing for something, anything under her feet made her twist and reach clawing desperately for something, anything to slow her descent. Suddenly she hit the ground and looked about herself. She was in a cemetery; a high wall of dirt alive and squirming with thousands of writhing maggots and a dark lid stared back at her. A casket! Raven began writhing against the sickeningly slippery silk of the casket as the lid closed trapping her inside. She banged her fists on the lid and a painful glow lit up the area. Flames licked her body and shot searing, stabbing, shooting pain through her. Raven continued to pound on the casket's lid with her hands frantically trying to save herself from being incinerated alive. A heat passed through her and fire consumed her vision.
She sat up and abruptly; her head whacked into something. "No!" Raven cried out with a parched throat. She beat her fists as hard as she could on the surface. Raven let out several breaths as the dimly lit aircraft bay came into view. She must've been crying in her sleep again as her throat was sore and her eyes burned. Wiping some sweat off her brow, she fully fixed herself in her comfy plush seat. The stark orange of the ship, rows of bright LED lights and the clear domed glass above her that bore a glare from the lights reflecting off of it made her breathe out in relief. She'd teleported to her pod of the T-ship and not the coffin about to be incinerated as she'd disturbingly dreamt. Raven rubbed her head and felt to make sure there was no lump. Her wrists and hands ached; bruises were already beginning to form. Too upset for movement and feeling her dark energy crackling around her arms and fingertips, she bent her head down onto the ship's controls and breathed deep. A few more tears slipped out as she got herself back under control. The crackling sensation in her limbs faded into pins-and-needles and then to soft pricks…under control for the moment. Her body protested as she stiffly tried to uncurl her body from the position she had been. The aircraft bay struck her as eerie so she concentrated and teleported back to her room. The sun was beginning to rise, so she carefully hobbled over to the window and pulled the curtain shut. There was a little sliver of light that speared into the room near the bed, just enough to hopefully keep her grounded should another nightmare arise. Almost an hour of tossing and turning ensued before Raven finally fell asleep.
The indulgence didn't last long however as a knock came at her door. Raven let out a sound like a mama grizzly bear and jerked the covers away. A hard pulse of cold assaulted her and she shivered as she made her way to the door, stopping only to grab her cloak and pin it in place. Her face screwed up as she put weight on her bad ankle. Dismayed at it not healing fully while she was asleep, Raven limped slowly across the room to her door. She pulled her hood up and opened her door a crack only to be faced with a mask. "Hey Raven, you doing okay?"
"Fine. What do you want?"
"We're headed out to run some errands. I- well, we were wondering if you needed or wanted anything?"
"No." Raven closed the door and let a small smile onto her face. She'd have the tower all to herself and could relax. Ever since her surge of anger yesterday, the prospect of having some complete alone time was appealing. Her friends still annoyed her. Their lives were so easy compared to hers! Raven unclasped her cloak and let it drop as she fell into bed again and closed her eyes. The sounds of the garage opening and bridge to the city extending out gave her a measure of comfort at her time alone.
She only managed to get another forty minutes of sleep before she woke with a start hastily surveying the area around her. Raven ground her teeth together. Rearranging her room hadn't seemed to help anything. It was hopeless! Raven let out a loud yawn and stretching slowly, got out of bed. Or at least she tried to, but she found herself on the carpet. Now she was tripping over nothing. Enough was enough, she had to meditate to heal her ankle. Already the torment was swirling inside her and there was a weight on her chest. Going over to the thermostat, she lowered the temperature and made a circle of candles. Raven was too tired to recite a full incantation and perform a spell circle. Instead she settled on doing a technique that she hadn't done since she was a child on Azarath. She brought her largest candle, a chubby one that smelled like sugar cookies that Beast Boy had given her last Christmas, and focused on the flame dancing around as she controlled her breathing. It jumped and wiggled with her gentle breaths. A sigh escaped her at the memory of her home dimension.
Raven grew irritated with herself, she had beaten off the demon of demons and saved the entire universe! And yet her mind wouldn't let her forget, wouldn't let her stop fighting, and more importantly wouldn't let her rest. She longed for her mother. Raven hadn't wanted her mother so much as she wanted her now; a hot lump rose in her throat. Tears threatened to stream down her face. Even in the peaceful golden glow of the candlelight, Raven struggled not to cry. It sounded stupid, but Raven wanted nothing more than her mother to hug her and tell her that everything would be okay. She just wanted someone to reassure her. She missed those few nights that she'd gotten to see her mother when she was younger. Arella would read to her and tell her stories until she fell asleep. Now that was sleep that Raven needed right now; she craved it with an almost inhuman longing that made her sick to think that she could never have that again. And she likely never would as long as she lived. Raven was used to being on her own, used to solving her own problems and used to managing her problems alone. Now for the perhaps the first time in her life, she longed for help. Her mind was muddled; she couldn't trust the coherent thoughts that she could manage to form because in her exhausted mind it wasn't likely anything that would be any help.
She stood up suddenly and bolted out of her room. The gust of wind putting out the candles. One more minute in there was stretching her sanity. Raven was hungry. Lately she had been eating a lot of sweets. And now she had a craving for pizza. The team constantly ate pizza and Raven had begun to get tired of it, preferring instead to stick to fruit or some soup. Lately though, it seemed as though they never had pizza around and of course now was when she wanted it. Raven couldn't wait for delivery, and she was in no mood to leave the tower to get some. Luckily, there was some stashed away in the freezer. It probably belonged to Cyborg or Robin judging by the toppings, but she knew they wouldn't mind. Even if they did, she didn't care. Raven had never been a big fan of frozen pizza and she never ate a frozen pizza before that she actually enjoyed. At the moment though, the cheese tasted heavenly, the crust was browned to a delicious crisp and the meat was perfectly seasoned and juicy. Raven devoured the whole thing and began searching for something sweet to go with it. Another thing she didn't ordinarily do, but sugar just seemed to taste so yummy lately. She settled on some sugar cookies, another thing she tended to dislike and put down four of them. With the vigor that the food afforded her, Raven sat down for a meditation session, but first, she had to heal her sore ankle from yesterday.
Even after another few hours of meditating and a half-hearted attempt at exercising to wear herself out, Raven still doubted she'd be able to get a relaxing sleep. So instead she hooked up a spare TV in her room and put on some sort of nature documentary. The narrating was boring and so close to monotone that it couldn't even hold Raven's interest. Before she knew what was happening, she had drifted off for a late afternoon nap.
Raven was in the tower, it was dark and sparsely lit. She almost swore she was awake and had teleported again, but the problem was that the hallways and walls were tilted and met at odd angles. Nope definitely a dream…or was it? Perhaps her powers were acting up again. Raven had been a little dizzy lately, and her vision was beginning to suffer as a result. She began walking descending into the dark shadows and warped architecture. Red eyes popped up next to her and then suddenly two more joined them. A roar shook the tower around her and Raven collapsed to her knees. Trigon stood in front of her, a giant looming menacingly above. "No! No! This can't be true! I destroyed you!" She exclaimed. Raven flew up to him, got ready to yell out her mantra to send him back to the hellish dimension from whence he came, but as soon as she looked into his blood red eyes and tried to speak her voice was gone! She stared into the face of hellish horror and though she moved her mouth, it was as if her voice was been snatched from her throat. Raven was thrown back into the shadows. She readied another attack and stood to face him, but he was gone. Her eyes snapped shut, trying to will the visions away. The landscape was still tilted and confusing like something out of Alice in Wonderland. Black swirling fabric was twirling around her, reminding her of the various cults and sadists that worshipped her father. Trigon was there twirling in a torrent of black fabric. Worse yet, her friends were unconscious and suspended nearby. Raven used her magic to free her friends sending them all dropping to the ground. She flew straight at her father and grabbing his horrid horns, yelled "Azarath Metrion Zinthos!"
Except nothing came out. Her voice was again gone. Her friends were yelling. Yelling for her help! "I'm coming!" She cried frantically, her voice ringing out clear as a bell. Then why couldn't she send Trigon back from whence he came? Why was this happening?! She was floating now; floating in some random storage room in the tower, the water was flying up out of the sinks and random objects were floating around half cloaked in onyx shadows. The room began to melt, slipping and dripping away to reveal her friends being sawed and hellfire dancing and leaping around a red landscape. Trigon brought a fist on top of her sending her down into the fires. She recovered in the air and flew towards him. Dozens of fire demons were on her tail as she tried to scream her spell at the top of her lungs "AZARATH METRION ZINTHOS!" The result was the same though as nothing came out. She was punched and fiery steel like arms wrapped around her body and it sent flying backwards into blackness.
Raven got up gingerly to watch the landscape around her shift as she was bathed in colored light. She looked up to see the large circular stained glass window of a church. It was hauntingly familiar somehow…Raven recognized it as the church that she had brought Robin to after she'd released him from her time freezing spell on her fateful birthday. Her stomach sunk at the realization. Her friends stood around her. Raven watched horrified as one by one they disappeared and Robin was suddenly in his grasp. She was angry, but moreover frustrated. Why wasn't her spell working on him. Why did it work every other time but not with him? "Raven!" Robin yelled. "Help me!" Trigon grinned at her helplessness. She flew towards Trigon trying to speak her spell, but her voice was mute. He batted her down as swiftly as if she was no more than a harmless housefly. She felt herself jolt as she hit into several pews. Her eyes glowed black and she rallied to face the demon once more.
"I'm taking you down!" Raven shouted. Trigon let out tremendous roar shaking the ground and sending the walls crumbling down. The stained glass above her collapsed and rained down sharp gemstone like pieces of vivid color, cutting her body. The glass caused burning sensations to spring up all over as the warmth of fresh blood snaked down across her.
"You'll never defeat me dear daughter!"
"I'll destroy you! Azarath Metrion Zinthos!" Raven's threat came out okay, but the spell once again was silent and there was no effect. Robin made an odd gurgling sound. He was on fire. She was on fire. The whole area was on fire. Raven screamed out at the pain.
"AHHHH!" She yelled wrenching herself away from the burning. Steam shot out at her and turned her gray skin red. Raven looked down to inspect the burning in her palm and hand. That was a nice burn. Raven grimaced and shook her hand out to cool it down. She would have to teleport right next to the tower's industrial sized hot water heater. At least it was just a steam burn, it could've been far worse. With her throbbing tomato red hand, Raven made her way to the med bay for some gauze and burn ointment.
Along the way, she heard the garage open and the loud voices of her team crescendo. Raven finished applying the ointment and wrapped her hand in a bandage. The burning sensation was still prominent. She pinned on her cloak and realized that she couldn't get back to her room without passing the common room. That likely meant running into her friends. Raven wasn't exactly in the mood to see them, but what else could she do? She still lacked the energy to teleport and wanted to save her magic for fighting.
Starfire was attempting to bake a cake and was busily stirring something in a bowl as she scanned the directions on the box. Raven's stomach growled at that. She knew there was a problem when she was craving something that Starfire made. Even though it appeared that she was following the recipe, the alien princess had a tendency to try to "enhance" her cooking with other things laying around the tower. And the things laying around the tower weren't always good. Raven wrinkled her nose in distain remembering the blue furry fungi-like substance that used to grow in their fridge. Robin was busily unloading the bags and meticulously putting things away. Beast Boy was flipping through a cookbook and it seemed to Raven that he was pulling out everything mere moments after Robin had put it away. Cyborg turned his head. "Hey Raven!" He called. "How were things while we were gone?"
"Quiet." She replied dryly.
"Aw come on Raven!" Beast Boy said sliding up to her and grinning. "You know you missed me."
"Hardly." His smile dropped from his face immediately.
Raven walked over to the counter and began pouring herself a glass of water. Robin was looking at her funny. The white bandage wrapped around her hand was in sharp contrast to her black attire. She quickly moved her hand back under her cloak and out of sight. "Yo Rae! Dinner will be up soon." Cyborg said as she left with her water. Raven didn't acknowledge him and made her exit.
"Raven do you not wish to stay? You can help me prepare the cake of confetti!" Star smiled holding up the whisk.
"No."
"Funfetti Star." Robin corrected. "Are you sure Raven? You haven't been feeling sick lately have you?"
"No."
"Then stay!" Beast boy argued.
"I said NO!" She yelled in a raspy voice and the stools by the counter cracked apart with her dark energy. Raven walked quickly out of the common room and down the hallway. Outside her room, there was a small box of chamomile tea with a note.
Thought you could use this.
-Cyborg
She smiled tiredly and picked up the box to bring into her room. There was a lot to do tonight: avoid her friends for the evening, come up with an explanation for what had happened in the kitchen, mediate, try to do something soothing and moreover, try to heal her new injury. Seemed like she was doing that a lot lately…