I'm slowly realizing that my description doesn't fit the story very well. Stay with me guys, you get two chapters in the next 24 hours even if it kills me.
Raven is sitting on the tower roof watching storm clouds roll over the bay. The wind whips her hair around her face, and chills her to the core. This night is much different than the night before. There is a rumble of thunder in the distance and the hero is thankful for her comfy civilian clothes as the wind picks up. She broke two fingers in the scuffle this morning and her hand is covered in plaster. She is holding the broken piece of Red X's mask. She sighs as she lifts her other hand to her head, rubbing it delicately over the stitches over her eye.
I can't believe I broke this mask. What else did I break?
She hears the door slide open and turns around. Robin looks at her, not surprised that Raven is here. He face is blank, but through their bond he can feel her swirling emotions. The transmission is dull tonight, with the medication the Cyborg gave her to suppress her powers. Her bones mend too quickly, healing them before they are set. The concussion makes it harder for her to control her emotions and therefore her powers, so they would rather be safe than sorry and give her a cocktail to dull her powers.
"You okay?" he asks as he sits down. He looks down at her hands; they are cradling the mask between them. The cast on her right arm is hot pink, courtesy of Beat Boy and Starfire. It's a shocking sight, even more so is the fact that Raven didn't argue. She may have even smiled, but Robin chalks that up to the concussion. He takes the piece of the mask from her hands, holding it in his for only the second time since the suit was stolen. Robin hands it back as he fills the silence.
"He's going to be fine if that's what you're concerned about. That mask is supposed to absorb hits, it took yours. That's why he isn't more damaged. A broken nose and a few ribs are the worst of it," Robin says.
Raven nods, relieved that she didn't have to ask and relieved that she didn't do worse.
"I don't know what got into me," she says. "The violence was uncalled for. I was seriously considering dropping him off a roof."
"Raven, he's a villain, he's exceptionally unharmed in my opinion. You didn't banish him to another dimension. Rage didn't take over. And most importantly, you caught him. Nothing about that was unprofessional."
He doesn't get it. Neither do I.
She knows that she can't give words to what she is currently thinking. Robin speaks again, his anger seeping into Raven's pores.
"We still don't know who he is. They won't let me take off his mask. They did at the hospital, but put it back on before they brought him back to the cell," Robin says, his ton bitter and fists clenched.
"Don't worry. You'll find out tomorrow during interrogation," she says as she gets up, but not before grabbing one of his hand and giving it a comforting squeeze. She gets up and walks away. Robin sighs after the door slams shut, knowing that Raven won't be happy in the morning when he tells her that she is going to interrogation with him.
Raven is already in sweatpants when she gets to her room. The rain is now pattering at her window. With a complete lack of grace and caring she falls backwards onto her bed. She lands with something sharp digging into her back.
"What the hell…" she rolls off of it quickly. In the darkness of her room, Raven can't see much. But she can see the sharp contrast of her dark sheets with a semi-circular shape of white. She reaches over and flips on a lamp.
Lying in the center of her bed is the other part of Red X's mask. Raven stands up quickly, her head pounding and spinning. She looks around her room satisfied with not seeing anything out of place, she pulls out her communicator and calls Robin.
"What?" he asks, clearly in the process of getting into bed, a toothbrush hangs out of the side of his mouth.
"Did you leave something in my room?" Raven asks, staring at the large piece of the mask on her bed. She can feel the smaller piece weighing down her pocket.
"No…" his face contorts in confusion; something that is mirrored in Raven's expression.
"Did you say Red X still had his mask on when they brought him back to jail?"
"Yes, the skull mask and everything. Even with the chunk out of it. Why are you asking?"
"Just… Concerned." Raven looks around her room again, walking around to check corners.
"Raven, what is going on?" Robin asks. He spits out a mouthful of toothpaste.
"I'm not sure. But I think you should probably come down here," she says.
The communicator screen fades to static and Raven tosses it onto her bed.
All of the corners of her room seem to be clear. Three place left to check, all the classic boogey man places. The closet, under the bed, and behind the curtains. With a flash of lightening from outside, she sees no mysterious shadows in the curtains. She looks at her bed and says out loud.
"I'm not looking under there."
She backs away, towards the door. She avoids the desk, where her mirror sits; she can practically see her emotions' reflections in it. The concussion isn't helping their continuous nonsense. Raven takes a deep breath, calming herself. She doesn't know how the mask got there, but she will find out.
Raven takes another step back and a hand slinks around her waist, another around her mouth.
"I'm glad you didn't check under the bed. Though I would be glad to see you on top of it."
Raven tenses up, the all too familiar sleazy delivery gives him away, even without his voice modifier. It has an odd quality to it that Raven attributes to his broken nose.
"It's good to see you too, Sunshine. I would let you talk but we can't have you screaming just yet," Red X says.
Raven almost laughs at the insinuation, but she can't quite judge his emotional state as she normally does during their encounters.
There is a knock at the door.
"Raven, open up," Robin says from the other side. Red X tightens his grip around Raven's waist. He whispers in her ear.
"Tell him you figured it out. It was just something from Starfire."
"It's okay, there was something on my bed. I was concerned but I saw a note from Starfire," Raven forces a small chuckle.
"What was it?" Robin asks, she can hear the concern.
"Flowers," Raven says quickly, ignoring the chuckle in her ear.
"Oh. Okay then. I'll see you in the morning." Robin says. His footsteps fade.
X hasn't replaced his hand over Raven's mouth, but his grip on her hasn't loosened.
"Good job. I didn't think you could lie that well," he says.
Red X lets her go, Raven immediately takes a step forward and spins around. The thief stands in front of her, wearing something much akin to her pajamas, dark sweatpants and a t-shirt. The mask he has on is much like Robin's. He has a large white bandage over his nose.
"How did you get out of jail? How did you get here? What are you doing here?" All of the questions fly out of Raven's mouth before she can stop them.
If she had the ability to take them back she would. Instead, she smacks her good hand over her mouth. He smiles, all teeth and full lips. Raven mentally shakes herself, knowing that he can see her staring.
"Curiosity killed the cat you know," his smile morphs seamlessly into a smirk.
Raven takes a step back, feeling that tonight is one of the nights when Red X breaks things.
Right now I think he might break me, she thinks with a small shiver.
He takes a large step forward, bringing him less than an inch away from Raven. She can feel the exchange of body heat between the small space and some tangled emotions, though she can't determine what they are.
He towers over her, in his head he smiles, having never gotten to appreciate this fact in battle. The thought that has seen more of her than anyone other than her teammates flashes through his mind.
She doesn't look scared, even though an escaped thief that she recent kicked the shit out of is standing in her bedroom. He smiles for real when he realized that she probably still could, though her arm is in a cast and she has stitches in her head.
"Nice stitches," he remarks, in almost the same way he had said when she was bleeding earlier.
"Yeah. Thanks for that," Raven replies, looking up at him with a glare.
With that Red X actually laughs. Raven's eyebrows quirk at the sound, it isn't as grating without the mask. His voice in general isn't half bad, she thinks, mentally kicking herself.
"Why are you here?" Raven asks again, not breaking eye contact.
"I wanted to give you a reward, that being the other part of my mask, and to make sure my favorite titan wasn't seriously injured," he answers smoothly.
Though he is wearing a mask, he feels uncomfortable without his regular one that is currently sitting in pieces on Raven's bed. He isn't sure if it's the way Raven is staring at him or something else. She looks away before responding. When she does it surprises him.
"I'm tired, you know this the second night in a row you've kept me up," Raven looks up at him again, and surprises him once more. "Are you all right?"
"Uh... yeah. I'm good?" he says, taking a step back. "I just broke out of jail after you single handedly kicked my ass, but I came back to see you. My mental stability may be a more off than usual, but I blame you for that."
"And why is that?" Raven asks.
"I'm still trying to figure that part out, Sunshine," he says with a sigh, reaching around Raven's waist once again.
Raven is pulled closer to him, she puts up her good hand instinctively, pressing it against his chest. She can't position her head to glare at him, so she growls instead, out of confusion and anger.
"Get some sleep Raven," he says quietly, pressing a light kiss to the stitches on her forehead before teleporting away.