AN: Notes at bottom, 'cept for the usual "I do not own this" legal thing.
Oh, right. I don't own the Teen Titans.
Chapter 7: No Leaf Clover
The Titans stared at Rose for a second, before returning to their previous activities. Or in two cases, Gar returning to staring at the screen and Raven pulling a book out of nowhere and beginning to read. Jinx was the only one who continued to acknowledge her.
"Been a while, Rose, thought you forgot how to find the tower." Jinx grinned.
"Yes, because it is incredibly difficult to find a giant T-shaped building in the middle of a busy port city's bay. Damn near impossible." Rose said sarcastically, dropping her swords and gear, and wandering over to the fridge. She grumbled at the lack of beer, grabbing a soda and preceded to sit on the empty side of the couch on the other side of Raven. "If I really didn't know any better, I would've thought Vic set this place up to be found and attacked regularly."
"Knowin' Cy, it was floating in his circuits somewhere in there. Probably planted by Robin as a battle tactic. I don't try to think about it too much." Gar said with a small frown, continuing to look at the screen.
"You think?" Rose asked quickly after a sip of soda. Gar's ears went down. She smiled wide, holding her fist up for a bump from Raven, who simply looked at her from the page she was on, and shook her had softly. Rose frowned and took another sip of her soda while taking off her mask, letting her white hair flow out around her. "So, have I missed anything interesting?"
"No." The others synchronized.
Rose looked around the room suspiciously as Raven and Jinx had kept themselves glued to their books, BB to his game, Wally to BB's game and Donna to her tablet. Her eyes flicked to the crack in the window, while reduced still very much present. "Mmm...hmm...right."
"Find something interesting I take it?" Donna asked quickly, looking up from her notes. Rose had been running stealth runs in and around the city for her, trying to scrounge up the barest hints of what's going on with the underworld. Her history with said underbelly was very useful. And Rose was still looking for as many chances to prove herself to the Titans as she could find.
"Sort of. This gang popped up in the old district, keeps going from abandoned building to abandoned building. Wouldn't have given them a second thought if they didn't seem to be lugging some serious tech with them around." Rose replied, deciding to take up the full end of the U shaped couch she was one by resting her feet off the edge and laying back, putting her soda on the ground. "And when I say lug, I mean one of the bastards carried something the size of a truck engine on one shoulder, like it was nothing. So, metas, definitely, with tech that I wasn't able to identify."
"Any pictures?" Donna's face was calm but hints of excitement for having a lead entered her tones.
"No, I'm a complete noob." Rose held up a camera, casually tossing it over to Donna.
"Technically, you are." Gar said quickly with a smirk as Donna caught the camera, taking out the memory card and loading it into the tablet.
"Bite me, greeny."
"No thanks, don't like the taste of crazy." Gar said simply.
"Then why are ya-" Rose started, beginning to gesture at Raven before Jinx and Wally looked up, both rapidly shaking their heads, Wally making a throat cutting gesture at super speed repeatedly. "-Nevermind." Rose finished blandly as Gar continued to stare at his screen, Raven not looking up from her book.
Donna examined the pictures carefully, frowning to herself. She also had no idea what the tech was, it was familiar but off. It had bits of alien tech, almost Apokolips level but it was flattened out, redesigned. She further frowned at the gangs get up. They were uniformed, but not in any recognizable manner. Cheap jeans, cheap white hooded sweatshirts, but with near skull faced demonic looking masks. They had to be organized bigger than what they were trying to hide as but there was only one way to figure out. As for the tech, she decided to send an email of the pics off to Diana, hopefully get it through the league faster than using normal protocols.
"Rose, do you know if they're still at this particular building?" Donna looked up from the tablet at Rose's end of the couch.
"Far as I know, their pattern is to jump base every two to three days, and they just settled there last night." Rose replied, as she watched Beast Boy run away from a very angry set of five bears in the game.
"So if we want to make a move, today would be the best plan?" Donna frowned.
"You got it." Rose smirked, continuing to watch Gar fumble. "C'mon, man, just kill 'em."
"Give me a goddamn sec." Gar grumbled. He had lead the bears to chase him up an incline, before using a shout to knock them all the way back down. "There, bear threat, gone."
"Clever." Rose complimented. "So did you hear all of this, or do we have to go over it again?"
"I heard ya, and it's a good plan. Catch 'em now, figure out if they know anything, and hopefully avert what ever they're up to in the meantime." Gar stated in a near business tone as he saved the game, turned it off then stood up and stretched. "I guess we should get ready. Rose, you can get us there unnoticed right?"
"Duh."
"Alright, that settles it. Let's get movin, guys an' girls." Gar said before wandering his way towards his room to change into his uniform. Wally and Jinx sat up and did the same, Wally hobbling a little as he had been sitting on his foot. Raven continued to sit there, reading her book.
"...Raven, ya gonna go get ready or something? Don't you usually meditate before these things?" Rose eyed her suspiciously.
"What?" Raven looked up, blank expression on her face.
"Mission, get prepared for, leaving soon." Rose filled in flatly.
"Oh, right. Yeah. Probably should." Raven responded simply, folding her book and walking slowly back towards her room.
As soon as she was out of sight, Rose looked at Donna. "What the fuck's goin' on with her?"
Donna sighed. "Bad day."
"What, she and the greenskin get into a spat again?" Rose asked, almost jokingly. She watched Donna frown, her eyes flickering to the crack in the window, before nodding slowly. Rose titled her head. "That bad, huh?"
"How'd you figure out it?"
"You guys weren't here last summer, I was. Lacked a place of my own at the time. Anyways, they were damn near all over each other. Almost as bad as Dick and Star, without the blatant turning into the halls and running into a make out session. That was always awkward." Rose frowned then shook the memory out. "But yeah, it was obvious then. I didn't even know them that long as it was. Might help that I was trained by a clinical psychopathic father to analyze people rapidly but I feel that's aside from the point."
Donna mulled it over. "Did they fight often then?"
"Sorta. I don't think it ever lead to, well..." Rose looked at the window, "That. But they could go on for a bit. Didn't get bad until the winter. Stopped by during the holidays and they were colder than Finland's left nut to each other. Something happened, but no one pried. And then a few months ago it kinda was like it was a few minutes ago, tension, closeness, but apparent nada."
Donna's ears perked at the wording. "Apparent?"
"Yeah." Rose looked at the doors, in thought. "Something's still goin down they're just...I dunno, not acknowledging it?" She then shrugged, going back to laying on the couch. "Just an outsider's perspective, don't think too hard on it, Donna. Even amazon's have to have stress limits."
Donna nodded, standing up and putting the tablet on the side table near her chair and beginning to walk out of the room. "You're incredibly perspective, have you gone over this with anyone else?"
"Naw, I'd prefer no one figure that out yet. They don't trust me as it is, telling them 'Oh, by the way, I'm pretty sure I can figure out what you had for lunch by watching you walk' might put them more on edge. 'Sides, this way, I stay outta the drama loop." Rose said calmly.
"You can tell what we had for lunch by how we walk?" Donna quirked an eyebrow.
"Chipotle." Rose stated simply. Donna blinked, then walked out of the room quickly, causing Rose to smirk, resting her hands behind her head. "Still got it."
Gotham:
Dick had returned to the cave in the early evening, using the drive back to prepare himself. As he slowed the bike down in the cave, he looked over to see that Bruce had passed out on the control panel of the computer, cowl off and from what Dick could tell, at least seven windows open. Dick shook his head as he walked over to softly tap Bruce on the shoulder. When his hand got within an inch of him, it was stopped roughly at the wrist by Bruce, whose eyes blinked open slowly. He looked up, and noticed who it was and let go.
"Reflex." He said simply.
"I'm aware." Dick replied rubbing his wrist slightly. A pause entered the conversation, both men looking mildly uncomfortable.
"I'm...well, I'm not sorry I snapped." Dick started.
Bruce smirked. "Figured as much."
"Besides, I have a feeling that was the desired result." Dick raised his eyebrows at his mentor.
"That is true." Bruce said calmly. Another pause entered the conversation.
"...Are...you going to...?" Dick began to ask.
"No. You know why I did it, well mostly, so I'm not apologizing for my actions." Bruce said simply. Dick's face began to scrunch up, looking as if he was getting ready to start yelling again when Bruce put up his hands. "I will, however, apologize for upsetting you as much as I did. For that, I am sorry."
Dick stared blankly at Bruce, still slightly in a pose prepped for an argument, finger slightly raised in an accusatory fashion. "I...uhm. Thank you." His stance relaxed, and he scratched the back of his head.
"I take it your talk with Clark went well?" Bruce stood up and stretched lightly, various popping noised from his back being heard. He tapped a button on his computer, and the screen went to a blank, light blue background with the Bat symbol on it.
"Yeah, he gave me a lot to go over. Told me a story that gave me an idea." Dick's eyes flickered to the now blank screen curiously.
"Did he now?" Bruce had the barest hints of amusement in his tones.
Dick sighed "Well, I figured that honestly, I'm a bit to old to be 'Robin', I've been kinda wanting to move on from it, especially after you had Jason over here. But I kept it, just as a reminder of where I came from. And you made the good point that it'd confuse the hell out of people with there being two Robins." Bruce nodded. "Then Mr. Kent told me a story about a Kryptonian hero named 'Nightwing', forced to give up his family name and fight on his own. Admittedly, I like the idea."
"Nightwing..." Bruce said in the same manner someone does when their trying to find a place for a puzzle piece. He motioned for Dick to follow him as they went across the cave towards the armory area.
"Yeah, I figured it fits, it's not too flashy and...I'm not gonna lie, sounds pretty damn cool." Dick finished.
"My ability to take that from you is dampened by the name 'Robin' being your idea." Bruce smirked.
"You didn't argue and I was twelve." Dick rebutted.
"True enough." Bruce replied. They moved past the normal armory and stopped at what looked like a bulked up shipping container. "So you really want to go through with working on your own?"
"...I would like to keep working with Star, but mostly yeah. Would miss the connections though." Dick frowned.
"Who said you would lose them?" Bruce asked calmly, pressing a button on the front of the container. The door opened and revealed what initially looked like a secondary armory, but the weaponry was different. Everything appeared to be more curved, an inbetween for the Robin and Batman gear, with a simple set of jumpsuits in the center. Everything was a plain black, no colors added.
Dick stared. "You clever bastard."
"Clark had told me about the Nightwing thing a while ago, which matched up with what you had described to me about a run in with a time traveling version of yourself. So I had Lucious run up some ideas, trying to make sure everything is something that you'd be comfortable with, focusing on what you do better than me; being light on your feet." Bruce said with a genuine smile.
"Why the lack of color?" Dick asked as he walked in, examining the gear like a kid on Christmas.
"I'd let that be up to you, it's your gear. I figured this would be enough to get you started. Any adjustments you can make yourself. For the color patterns though, I kept flipping between these." Bruce tapped at a monitor that had been placed inside the container, it flicking to life with two separate patterns, one with simple blue lines on the gear and a stylized bird motif on the suit in blue, the other the same in red.
"I like the blue more, the red just looks weird." Dick frowned, tapping at the screen.
"Automanufacturing adjustments acknowledged, please step out of the unit so adjustments can be made." A computerized voice responded.
"You really do think of everything." Dick grinned as they stepped out of the container unit, the doors hissing closed behind them and a digital counter appearing on the front of the doors as a hologram with a twelve hour countdown.
"I try." Bruce replied. "There is one string attached, though."
Dick frowned. "And that is?"
"I'd like you to settle in Bludhaven for a while." Bruce walked over to the computer and put the windows back on, revealing maps of Bludhaven and criminal traffic patterns to and from.
"Something's happening there, it's become a training ground for criminals. Everything from the various mafia groups to meta-humans trying to get a start. I need someone ground level, to try and dig in and figure out what's going on." Bruce turned to Dick, frowning slightly. "And I don't trust anyone else to do this, Dick."
Dick stared at the screen, thinking it over, wide eyed a little. "But...the Titans..." Dick started.
"Are in good hands." Bruce said smoothly. "Beast Boy somehow does an excellent job as a leader. Would've almost never seen it coming."
"He's smarter than he'll admit." Dick replied, sighing. "I don't know how to break it to Kori."
"She knows." Bruce added, causing Dick to look up at him quickly. Bruce sighed. "Kori and I had a...discussion after you left the cave. I mentioned to her my plans and she, after much internal deliberation, left it up to you. You can talk to her yourself if you want."
"I think I might, I...I need to think this over Bruce." Dick said wearily.
"That's fine, take as much time as you need." Bruce nodded. Dick walked up to the mansion, head swimming with what he had to consider.
Jump City:
Jump City is a fairly large, old trading city. It's full of many wonderful, historical sights and sections. Unfortunately this was not one of them. The area was run down, half of it slated to be demolished for either expanded warehouses and storage for the docks a few blocks over or cheap apartments. The building that the Titans were currently perched across from was one such example. Old, five story apartment building, surprising that it had lasted into the twentieth century let alone the twenty-first. It made a decent hiding place though, in between two larger buildings, creating narrow alleys on either side, it's back blocked off by another large building.
A green mouse scurried away from the building, shifting to a cat then a pigeon, fluttering up to the remainder of the group before shifting back into the familiar form of Beast Boy.
"It's got a fairly open interior, and it looks like they're not planning to settle. No equipment, a few cots and some canned foods still boxed up. What ever the tech is, they ain't using it." BB said, looking over at the building, brows furrowed in thought.
"They have the entrances covered too, 'cept one from the alley to our right." Kid Flash had dashed up the side of the building a second ago.
"They have a choke point at the front, and no one to come in from the back." Wonder Girl thought out loud.
"Or from the upstairs windows." Ravager added, slight grin on her face along with a look of cold calculation.
"Anything on numbers?" Beast Boy looked at Raven.
Raven's face contorted with concentration. "It's weird...I can tell where people are because they leave an imprint but something's making it fuzzy. Harder to pinpoint. I have to guess somewhere between eight and ten, though."
"I don't like the feel of what they're using to block themselves out." Jinx said, her usual pre-fight grin absent. "What ever it is, it...shouldn't be here."
"Well that's always comforting." Beast Boy said with a slight frown. He finally sighed as he finished his plan up in his head. "The best I got is this; Wonder Girl, fly Ravager over, and drop her near the alley door, and her and Flash will bust in from down there. Then you and Jinx start working your way down from the top and Raven and I will go in from the third floor windows. It doesn't have to be all at once, the more random it is, the more it should throw 'em off. Hopefully."
Everyone nodded.
"Alright, Titans, well. Go." Beast Boy resisted the temptation to shout, stealth op and all. As everyone departed, it just left him and Raven on the roof.
"...Are you okay with working with me on this?" Beast Boy asked nervously.
"Of course. You think you'll be able to keep up?" Raven smirked slightly.
"Oh, oh. It's on." BB grinned quickly, then face went back down. "...And hey...about earlier..."
"We'll talk about this afterward, okay?" Raven said quickly.
"...Okay." Beast Boy agreed. 'Better not cloud things up before a mission. Things go wrong that way.' He thought.
Gotham:
Dick's plan to talk to Star when he got to the room got thrown out of whack a little when she had pounced him. Apparently, she had missed him greatly in his few hours of running off...
About an hour later, he was still awake, somehow, staring at the ceiling in thought as she was curled up next to/around him. It was a lot to take in admittedly. Bruce was willing to give him his start, and independence. Sort of. He would work his own way, with his own methods, but still in a way reported to Bruce. At the same time, he understood why; everything he had read up on Bludhaven in the past and recently since he's been in town indicated that it needed a good clean sweep. Dick wished he could bring the Titans in but he didn't think it would be fair. Raven and Gar had really settled in Jump, to the point that he wasn't sure they'd be entirely willing to leave, even to help. Cyborg was, in more ways than one, attached to the Tower. Starfire...well he wasn't sure. She wouldn't want to leave her friends, but he sure as hell knew she wouldn't want to leave him either.
"You are still awake?" Kori said softly, eyes still closed.
"No."
"You are a terrible liar, Boyfriend-Richard." Her eyes were still closed, but a smile formed on her face.
"Only when I want to be." Dick smiled as well.
"The decision is a most difficult one, is it not?" Kori asked solemnly.
"I know the right choice, but it's the hardest one to go with." Dick sighed.
"I believe that is how it always works." Kori replied sadly.
"And you'll support whatever I go with?"
Kori sat up, allowing the sheets to fall off her naked form, and leaning on his so they were face to face. "I will support you with whatever you do, Richard Grayson. Just remember that no matter what, you are 'the stuck with me'"
Dick did his best to keep his eyes on her, and failed momentarily to look down at her chest pressed into his then back up. "I think I'll be able to live with that." He pushed his head up to kiss her deeply, before catching her off guard to flip her onto her back, earning a pleasing yelp.
Jump City:
Beast Boy crashed through the window from the left side of the building and looked around the room. It was an odd apartment building, each floor seemed to be one unit to itself, almost completely open. There was hardly any lights in the place, almost perfectly dark. Which would be a problem if he really needed to see. He smelled the air, catching hints of mold, asbestos, various forms pest droppings and little else. 'Odd,' he thought 'should be able to smell the members of the gang.'
Raven had a similar feeling when she had phased through the wall. The fuzzy feeling had hung in the air. It was like...being blinded by radio static, her sense both overwhelmed and deadened at the same time. She looked across the room to see Beast Boy having a similar expression of confusion. They walked over to each other.
"This really is too damn weird. Do you think they already jumped sites?"
Beast Boy asked, eyeing the hardly lit room with suspicion.
"Don't think so. If they had they would've not left some sort of filter up to block my senses." Raven responded. She saw a slight shift in movement behind Beast Boy, her eyes flickering to it.
Luckily, Beast Boy's hearing had caught the sound of the person moving behind him and turned in just enough time to catch a black baseball bat coming towards his head. Admittedly, it hurt like hell to catch but he wasn't going to show it beyond a twitch.
"Fuck!" The man said. He was tall, about equal with Beast Boy, above average build, that BB could see, and was wearing a white hooded sweatshirt, and a silver colored mask that seemed to have some form of demonic face on it. It was kind of generic but at the same time gave Beast Boy an unconscious feeling of discomfort. Hard to place what was wrong, but something was wrong.
Raven sent a quick blast of energy at the goon, and he was thrown back, but only in a manner that seemed like he had been lightly shoved instead of thrown. Raven was about to send another but was almost caught off guard by another man, a bit shorter, but same style mask and white hoodie. She redirected it and ended up blasting him directly in the face, which created a wave of energy in the room, throwing everyone back and down.
Raven looked at Beast Boy, who was trying to sit up before the goon who had attacked him, "So I think I know the source of the odd feeling." she said flatly.
"Sources." BB corrected, to which Raven nodded.
"Hope the others notice."
Jinx had noticed on her first goon, and between her and Wonder Girl were able to easily take them out, well sort of. Jinx decided to cheat by weakening the floor in the center of the room, and simply lured her sparring partner there. The man yelped as he fell though, groaning when he hit the floor below. Wonder Girl had lifted one of her assailants and thrown him into the new hole while holding the other in a headlock. She reached for and tried to yank the mask off, but was stopped by a burning sensation. She yelped and removed her hand, causing the goon to chuckle. Wonder Girl then punched the mask, hard, causing a minor ripple of energy but the goon went limp. Not dead, thankfully just unconscious. She let go of the head lock, and after he had dropped in the air enough, grabbed the back of his hoodie and thrown him into the hole on top of the other two.
"You good?" Jinx asked, looking at Wonder Girl's red hand.
"Just not used to it." Wonder Girl replied, also examining her own hand. "What ever those masks are, they're well designed."
Jinx nodded, then looked down the hole, gesturing with her arm, grinning. "Shall we?"
"I'm actually going to check the ground floor, have a bad feeling." Wonder Girl said, walking towards a window.
"Suit yourself." Jinx said cheerfully, jumping down the hole she had made, landing on one of the goons trying to stand up. Wonder Girl leapt out of the window, hitting the ally with a dull thunk, denting the pavement a little before diving into one of the ground floor windows and rolling to a stop. Sure enough, Ravager was being hassled by two goons, one of which was armed with a sword of his own, and being able to keep up with her, at least while she was distracted. Kid Flash was fighting an apparent meta-goon, he was large but faster than he should've been using his strength to brush off Flash's punches and his speed to try and catch him, which he almost did a few times.
Wonder Girl decided to give Ravager a hand, because it frankly looked like Flash was playing with his goon, leading him into something. She unhooked her lasso, and wrapped it around the non-sword wielding goon, yanking him over to her, causing him to yelp in surprise.
Ravager gave a quick, almost imperceptible curt nod at her before pulling out her second sword and went full offensive. The goon didn't have as much luck after that, though actually got a few more nicks on her, almost getting at her throat. She caught him with a stab in the shoulder, gaining a yelp before she used her other sword to brush his away and moving in to crack him upside the head with the hilt to knock him out. He slumped a little, still being held up by the sword in his shoulder, to which Ravager simply kicked him off, onto the ground with a thud. She twirled the blades to get the blood off then put them up. Noticing that Wonder Girl and Kid Flash had their goons under control, she went towards the stairs and up.
She found Gar and Raven on the second floor, their fight having moved them down through a hole and into another 7 guys which they were having a tad bit of trouble with. Well, sort of. Raven had fell back on her martial training, using bursts of energy to push people back, where Beast Boy had settled on his sasquatch form, allowing him to hold off at least two and kick a third onto the ground. Ravager watched as the goon slid onto the ground, stopping in front of her. She saw his eyes behind the mask open from their apparent grimace of pain and have a shocked look when seeing her looming over, smiling.
"Mind if I join the party?" She asked before kicking him unconscious and leaping into the fray, jumping at a goon who had tried to grab Raven from behind.
"What took you so long?" Raven growled as she placed her palm on one of the goons and flung him back with a large burst of black energy.
"Got lost, you wouldn't believe the twists in this place." Ravager grinned as she decked a goon in the side of the head, gaining his head moving only a little and causing her to pull her hand back in pain. "Motherfucker, that hurt!" She then connected her knee to his crotch, causing him to drop like a sack of bricks. "These masks are weird."
"No shit." Raven added, jabbing her foot on a goon's and catching him in the shoulder with a burst of energy, giving a small cracking noise as his ankle gave out. She lifted her foot, letting him fall over, cursing at her in pain. One of the goons left standing ran for the stairs, going up.
"I got 'em." Beast Boy said as he shift back, running after the goon in his normal form. It was a two flight set, like the rest in the building, and he decided he'd just run it normal, as these guys hadn't shown themselves to be anything beyond brawlers with creepy masks. He caught up with the goon at the top of the stairs, towards the entrance to the next floor. As he almost had the leap on him, the guy turned, giving a solid punch that almost connected. 'Okay, maybe there is some skill here.' BB thought. He dropped into a loose boxing form and jabbed out at the goon, which was quickly deflected and responded with a quick uppercut, catching Beast Boy on his chin as he tried to back up. Unfortunately, there was no where to back up to and BB felt himself lift in the air as the punch connected, momentarily dazed. He regained enough sense to notice he was falling down the stairs, brain rapidly flipping between animal choices that'd take a fall well.
Then his head hit a concrete stair with a crack, and everything went black.
Metropolis:
Vic was getting tired of everyone calling him randomly today. He actually told Dick to call him back after dinner, which caught his friend by surprise but he did so.
"So...why are you hung up on this?" Cyborg asked, staring at the computer screen in his room that had Dick in a window over various others that had blueprints open.
"...You don't think I'd be abandoning the team?" Dick asked, blinking.
"Dick, we're all getting older, the fact that any of us haven't been picked up by the League is damn surprising. I'm just surprised ya haven't gone off on your own yet already." Cy said as he continued to do his usual conversation fidget of adjusting one of his hands with a screwdriver.
"Well, Star's been a boost for that and honestly? I like being on a team, I like having a family to lean on." Dick admitted.
"And I think we'll always be Titans, we'll always be a family. But you of all of us aren't going to grow continuing to lead the team. You know you've been wanting to go off solo, well if Star's with ya, solo-ish, for a while now. Hell, you've been doing that while part of the team. And if Batman, the freakin' Batman says you're the only one he trusts for this, you should take him up on it. That's a great deal coming from him. You know that more than anyone." Vic said the last part while pointing the screwdriver at Dick.
Dick sighed. "I know...and I know this is what I want to do, it's just..."
"A big step. That shit's always scary, man." Vic completed.
"Yeah."
There was a small lull in the conversation. Cy looked at the screen at Dick for a moment, before smirking. "So if that hickey means anything, I'm guessin' Kori's gonna be with you over there?"
Dick's hand rapidly snapped to cover a spot on his neck.
"I'll take that as a yes. You think she'll be okay with that? I mean, Bludhaven's not Gotham, as far as I've heard, there's not really a nice part of the city." Vic had a look of concern.
"It'll be rough I think...but we'll hopefully be doing enough good that it'll off balance the crazy shit we're going to have to delve into." Dick said tentatively, hand not leaving the spot on his neck.
"Alright, if you say so. Just, keep an eye on her-" He was cut off as his communicator went off, he noticed Dick's did too, flashing the emergency red symbol. He flipped it open to look at the text, frowning. "Aw fuck."
Dick stared at his, looking at the same message. "Fuck indeed."
Jump City:
Raven was the first to sense what had happened, but as always Flash was the first on the scene. He saw BB's crumbled green form slumped into a wall, and followed the blood trail up, seeing the goon who had thrown the punch. The goon, for his part, was equal parts smug and shocked that he got that hit. This faded as soon as Kid Flash was on him. The bastard literally didn't see what hit him before he hit the ground, knocked out.
Jinx had finished clearing the floors above and came running at Flash. "I felt something happen, what was-" She stopped as she looked past him, down the stairwell at Beast Boy. It looked like that he had hit a step half way down then just had tumbled, cuts covered him, a shoulder looked dislocated, and the way he had hit seemed to indicate he had to have a few broken bones. She winced, noticing what looked to be a tooth on a step.
"Gar!" Raven had phased through into the stairwell, and was over him in a second, rolling him on his back. She instantly started to heal him, the white energy fizzed a little, her having drained herself during the fight. She shook her hand in frustration, not bothering to stop herself from tearing up as she kept trying to focus.
The rest of the team gathered around, looking between each other and BB. Wally cautiously put his hand on Raven's shoulder, who had momentarily given up on trying to do a full healing, but still hovered over. "Raven, can you get enough energy to teleport him back to the tower?" There was no response. "Raven, you're the one who can get there fastest, and get him set up in the infirmary before any...other damage occurs." Wally did not want to directly breach the subject of internal bleeding but he knew it was there. Raven still didn't move.
Donna leaned down, putting her hand on Raven's other shoulder. "Raven?"
Raven finally looked up at her, tears running down in streams, sobbing softly.
"Raven, you need to pull yourself together enough to get him home and get help, okay?" Donna said as softly as she could.
Raven looked back down, breathing in unsteadily than back out. She repeated this for about a minute, before nodding, and in a blink, Raven and Beast Boy disappeared in a black bubble.
Rose sighed. "I should've done better intel."
"We didn't know that someone would get a lucky shot, Rose. It happens." Wally said, sighing.
"We need to get them rounded up for the police." Donna said, her jaw seeming set as she looked at the area around them.
"I'll get 'em. Donna, go ahead and head back to the Tower, take Rose with you, I'll send a message to Cy, Rob and Star." Wally said strictly.
Donna looked as if she was going to argue for a second, but sighed. "Okay. We'll see you back at the tower."
Jinx and Wally watched as they left. Jinx looked over at Wally, worried expression "You going to be okay?"
"Yeah it's just...never a thing I like seeing, ya know?" Wally said, almost distantly.
"Yeah..." Jinx said softly. They soon got to work gathering the goons to the ground floor, making sure they were all bound up for the police when they got there, leaving as soon as they could to get back to the tower.
When they got there, Rose was waiting in the common room, sitting on the couch, maskless and staring at the blank TV screen. She was in a thinking position, hunched over with her chin resting on her hands.
"How's he doing?" Wally asked as they stepped out of the elevator.
"Stable, but still beat all to hell. Raven's been doing bursts of healing the second she gets an ounce of power back, but then drains herself dry. She's not moving from his side, but Donna's been keeping an eye on her, taking her some tea now." Rose stated looking down slightly.
"It's not your fault, Rose." Jinx said softly.
"It's not that, it's just...she really, really loves the green bastard." Rose said simply. "And I really hope she doesn't lose him."
In the infirmary, Donna arrived, carrying a tea set tray and setting it on a side table next to Raven, who ignored it as she continued to watch Gar's slow breaths. The quiet in the room was only broken by the heart beat monitor.
Donna breathed in and out for a second and asked the question that she had been holding in all evening since she got back to the tower.
"So, how long have you two actually been dating?" Donna's question was soft but clear.
Raven sighed. "Off and on for about three years now."
AN: And that's chapter 7. Y'all are lucky, by the way. The original plan was to end this chapter right after BB's fall and the NEXT chapter reveal the length of Raven and Gar's relationship. On that note; I'm not too confident I completely hid that from everyone, hell I feel like there were a lot of moments were I felt like I had a megaphone going "This is using the secret dating trope!" over and over. What I do hope I caught y'all off guard was the amount of time that has been going on. Hell, if I have at least one person who reads that go "Well...shit." I'm happy. Ish. Anyways I have another mini-chapter to put up after this but I'm going to wait a day or so, let everyone who's been following this read this chapter than post it. Kinda important I thinks.
And review responses, all two of 'em;
ChaosIsBeauty23: (never realized how many vowels are in the word "beauty" in quick succession. Seems excessive.) ^^ thank you. On the word count, really I don't know how it keeps happening like that, think it's just because I'm chatty naturally. On the leaning towards the comics; it's funny, because I never got into the Titans comics, and my only real exposure beyond the 'toon has been Gar and Raven's brief cameos in 52 and wiki articles. Everything else, I just wing it. Try to follow the buffet approach.
LurkingShadowWillow: As far as the freakout over the fight; excellent. Intended effect had. As far as the cursing making everything funnier; it's like dialog pepper, add enough and everything's better. Too much and it kinda ruins the dish.
Alrighty, as stated last chapter, song for the chapter title comes from Metallica's S&M album.
Next Chapter is: Well, 7.5 is going to be called "Bits" because it's not really a full chapter. Chapter 8 is...well I'll post it in the next one, haven't found a song that fits the mood I want yet.
As always thank y'all for reading, please review and keep being awesome! Peace!
