A/N: Um, hi. After a really long time. When I said updates would be fast and forthcoming. I really apologize for the lack of update; this chapter terrified me and presented an unusual level of difficulty (which I was not expecting). And I had a major writers' block. However, I do enjoy this chapter, though it's practically useless for plot development. *Dodges a few rotten tomatoes.* All poor excuses, but at least there's another chapter, right? Right?

Disclaimer: *yawns* Same as usual.

Chapter 10: Blood and Tears

Beast Boy had always been, well, the dumb one on the team. He cracked jokes at inappropriate times, had a vocabulary a few pages long (at least that was what Raven insisted), and couldn't sense a moment to save his life. What did he expect? Of course he was going to be labelled as the dumb one when he only seemed to provide comic relief. But he was smart enough to know that confronting his half-demon teammate, who threw him out the window on a daily basis when she was in a good mood, was a bad idea. A really really bad idea which could (and probably would) have painful consequences.

The top of her dark head, just barely peeping over the couch, and the occasional rustle as she turned a page, were the only indicators of her presence, at least to any normal human but he was a far cry from normal. If his green skin, fangs, and pointed ears didn't reveal as much. Raven's scent was a dead giveaway, not that he'd ever tell her, a strange but pleasant mixture of spicy incense, old parchment, and...he knew it would upset her if he admitted this, but ash. He supposed it was a part of her demonic nature which she tried so hard to deny.

In truth, Raven frustrated him beyond belief. At least she had been frustrating him to this extent ever since things had taken a turn and started going badly. Ever since that despair had filled her eyes, and fear followed her every motion. He got that she had to limit her expression, but just because her emotions affected her powers, it didn't mean she couldn't show any emotion at all! She had taken it to the extreme and decided that no emotion was the best option, and for what? So that she could act like a total robot, void of feelings?

He huffed to himself. Maybe that wasn't the whole reason. Maybe that wasn't even part of the reason for his frustration at all. Maybe it had to do with the fact that Raven didn't trust him after all these years of taking hits for one another and living together. He could feel it burning at him in his gut, the snide voice hissing in his ear, Look where your trust got you...

And he did. He trusted Raven, maybe more than he had any right to. He told her things, he confided in her, but she never reciprocated. And he knew he was probably just being selfish, after all, Raven was Raven, and he didn't have to take it so personally, but after all these years he had hoped that, maybe, just maybe, things had changed.

But they haven't, he thought bitterly, gripping the edge of the countertop. And now something horrible was coming, he could just sense it in his gut, and Raven had withdrawn and become even more secretive than when the prophecy of her birth, and the arrival of Trigon, had been forthcoming. Trigon was a full blood demon who towered higher than skyscrapers and had every power imaginable. He was, as Raven had warned them, "evil incarnate". How could things get worse than that?

But they were worse.

He opened the fridge and poured himself a glass of soymilk before Raven started wondering why he was there. Taking his full glass, he sat at the side table, sipping at it occasionally, but all his awareness was focused on Raven's presence not fifteen feet from him on the couch.

Yet, despite his frustration and anger, he wasn't here to chew her out, or make her feel low, or try to make the truth snap out of her with his accusations. He'd done enough of that once already, and the end result had been a heartbroken Raven, and a Tower half destroyed by a magic-wielding dragon. He was here to help. Somehow. He was here to get her to talk to him at whatever cost.

From this angle, he could see the side of her face and read into her body language. She seemed to be reading a book, just like usual. But there was more to it. She gripped the book tightly in her hands, more tightly than was necessary if the slightly crumpled pages were any indication. Her back was a rigid vertical line, her shoulders slightly hunched, and every motion, even the turning of a page, spoke of her stiffness. What with the enhanced gray pallor, the hollow drawn face, the haunted eyes...she looked like a ghost, wrapped in her midnight blue cloak.

So maybe he was callous and just plain stupid at times, but he wasn't unperceptive and he could tell one thing.

Raven was hurting.

He knew how he had felt when he had heard that Robin had been shot. Raven could not have been feeling much different because she was a human being. She experienced happiness, sorrow, and pain...she despaired and felt sweet relief. She was just so much better at hiding those feelings than the rest of them that they sometimes forgot that she was not made of stone or ice, that she felt everything as they would, but kept it hidden away where they could not see. He had smelled all the blood from the infirmary...seen her come out of the bathroom with those haunted eyes...she could not just be alright.

It was, to his eyes, more than worry and fear. The way she had hunched over, her frame curled over itself, like nestling a wound at her center, spoke of a deep pain, not physical, but emotional, mental...something which he could barely touch, let alone soothe away.

But he could try. And he wouldn't be Beast Boy if he didn't risk life (well, maybe he was exaggerating with that one) and limb to try. And giving up was not an option.

"So..." he began casually, disappointed when she did not react to his voice, "I thought you might want to know that Robin's up and walking, though Cyborg's acting like a fussy mom-" he smirked at this "-and says he's not cleared to leave the medbay for another day...Star's backing him up, so that's pretty much guaranteed, but in a day or two, everything will be back to normal."

"If you say so," she droned. Her monotone even sounded normal, but she squeezed the book more tightly for a brief instant. He wanted to smack himself as he realized his word choice.

Stupid, Beast Boy! How can everything go back to normal after she's seen Robin half-dead? After we've almost lost him?

He waited for her to ask him why he was bothering to tell her this now, but she didn't. Trying to get rid of me, Raven? You'll have to try harder than that.

She was trying to get rid of him. Here without her powers running, without her empathy, she had nothing. She was in the dark, blindly bumping into objects and trying to read his emotions through visual cues and his reactions. She was decent enough at it, because she had unconsciously tied certain emotions with certain actions as a child, but at the same time, there would always be a hint of uncertainty and doubt, and less prominent emotions would remain concealed to her. Because of this she didn't have a sense of his motives. She would never read his mind without his permission, but emotions indicated much about future actions. Maybe Beast Boy was just being plain old Beast Boy, bothering her at inopportune moments...or maybe he was looking for something more.

Beast Boy looked around them ignorantly, though he'd already known the answer to this question before he'd stepped into the room. "Where's Cyborg?"

"He's doing the smart thing and leaving me alone," came her curt reply. "Which is what you should do if you want your head to remain attached to you shoulders." He ignored the empty threat and looked at her in surprise.

"Well, why don't you just go to your room then?" he demanded, his voice quavering into a higher pitch. "I'm not stopping you!" An almost imperceptible shiver ran down her spine, but her voice remained controlled as she retaliated with "You don't own the living room, Beast Boy."

Well, at least he knew something else. Part of the problem, part of whatever had Raven terrified out of her mind and kept the fear scent swirling about her, came from her room. He made a note to look into that later. Then he took a deep breath and went for the direct approach, leaning forward slightly, though they were almost fifteen feet apart.

"Are you okay?" It came out in a garbled rush, but he knew she understood. The knots of her shoulderbones coiled more tightly, preparing herself, he realized, for the attack.

"Perfectly fine," she replied, flipping another page.

"You're lying."

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are," he retorted, mimicking her tone. He could not prevent some of his anger from coloring that statement. "Robin almost died. We were all scared out of our minds and blaming ourselves, and you want to act like you're just perfectly fine."

"Well, things are back to normal now, so it doesn't matter what was," she said caustically and he winced. He should have known that one dumb comment would come back to bite him in the butt.

"What was, or what is, Raven?" he asked, leaning back. She did not even stir, but her shoulders shifted slightly, and her mouth thinned. "I've been here for about five minutes and we're already fighting again." He hesitated, and sighed through his nose. "That's not what I wanted. I just wanted...to talk."

"You always want to talk about things that don't exist."

"Don't act like that!" he exploded, pounding his fist upon the table with a sickening crack! He was both surprised and slightly pleased to see that the action startled her, if only for a flicker of a moment. "Don't act like it's nothing, now or ever again! I saw what you looked like back there," he hissed in between clenched teeth, his outflung arm and accusing finger pointed in the direction of the bathroom. "I saw you! That was not nothing!"

"What do you want me to do then?" she demanded, snapping her book shut, and glaring at him levelly. "Shall I come weep on your shoulder? Maybe I should start tearing my hair out?" He dropped his eyes to the table, his fingers spasmodically clenching and unclenching. "What do you want?"

His anger left him, like hot metal cooling on the snow. His eyes flicked up to hers, once, twice, then grew unfocused, looking elsewhere.

A moment ago there had been laughter, but now there was only a taut slience...and a strange rushing sound that whispered softly in the background. "Mommy? Daddy? What's wrong?"

"Can't restart the motor, Marie," he muttered softly, so softly Garfield barely heard.

"It's okay, Gar, everything's going to be okay," she forced her voice into a light happiness, like this was another of their games. "I know you can do it, you did it once before. Just right up there to that branch."

"I can't!"

"You can, Gar." A lilt of desperation he had noticed, even as a child, filled her words. "Just right up there to that branch. Be a little birdie for your mommy." She looked over her shoulder to something he could not see, her large eyes fixed on his. "Please, Gar. Please."

The rushing sound grew louder and louder, and morphed into a hungry roar, like that of some predator. And he didn't understand what was happening, everything was swirl of confusion, colors, sounds, voices. Why did he have to go? He did not even know how!

He did not understand.

"Garfield Mark Logan," came his voice and Garfield flinched at the anger and loudness. "You turn into a bird and do as your mother says, this instant!" He had never raised his voice before, never, and unwanted tears filled Garfield's eyes, and spilled over. "Daddy?" The roar became deafening, and then he saw the steep drop, the foaming water falling over the sides many, many feet down, and there was only the water which surrounded him, the panic which filled him, the instinct which seized him.

Death. He didn't think, he just acted. His parents frightened faces filled his vision, pleading, begging. "Go, Garfield!"

And he went.

Like a coward, he went.

Those scars had never left him. They never would. Raven was no different. "I want you to be honest with yourself...and with me," he said carefully, lowering his voice. "You may think you have to keep everything locked up, but you don't have to, Raven."

"Why does it matter?"

"Is it a good thing to keep things contained?" he asked, a playful expression forming on his face, his eyes widening slightly. Her eyebrows furrowed, suspicious of his sudden change of mood. "Maybe you'll just explode one of these days! Just up and KA BOOM!" He threw his hands into the air for dramatic effect. Her eyelid didn't even twitch.

"You're an idiot."

"Fine," he huffed childishly, crossing his arms. "I'm an idiot. Big deal, like you haven't called me that and a hundred other names already-"

"Did you want me to apologize for that?" she cut in acerbically. "I thought you heard enough of that from Timid-"

He held up both his palms in a pleading gesture. "No, I don't!" He hurried to explain before she could cut him off. "That's not why I mentioned it, I just-" he pushed his hand through his wild hair, searching for words. "I don't care what you call me, or what you do, but I'm not going anywhere until you open up, Raven!" Her face became stony. "You still have feelings, you still have emotions," he pressed on. "You lock them away but someday you're going to have to show them!"

She didn't speak, apparently confining herself to silence. Beast Boy sighed and buried his face in his palms, dragging at the delicate skin underneath his eyes with his fingertips. Why did this have to be so hard and why did he have to be so plain...stupid? He peeked at her between his fingers, inhaled her scent, his face twisting in revulsion at the blood, fear and pain. Then he rose and sat on the other end of the couch, maintaining his distance. For once the remote was in reach, so he turned the TV on and flipped through the channels as if he was somewhat interested.

"Do you want to watch something?" he asked courteously.

"No," she replied curtly.

"Do you mind if I watch something?" he asked lightly, testing the waters.

"You can rot your brains for all I care," came the scathing response.

He flinched, his ears drooping slightly. He had expected such a reply, after all, he received ones like it on a daily basis, but the coldness which filled every tone of her voice hurt him like he'd never thought possible.

"What's wrong?" he asked plaintitively. He kept his voice soft and waited for the rebuttal which was surely forthcoming. She ignored him. "Rae...?"

"I'm not going to ask you again not to call me that," she cut in snappishly without looking up from the pages.

"But you said-" he began teasingly, intending to remind her of her slip-up from a few days earlier and maybe bring back their normal banter-

"Stop it."

He hesitated. It could be unwise to continue pressing her, especially considering the way that she was always on edge of late, but enough was enough. She couldn't just keep things to herself and think to tackle the problems all alone. It was destroying her.

She heard a shifting noise, and was more aware of his presence as he scooted closer, his eyes tender, kind and understanding. She kept her gaze firmly fixed on her book, but her aching eyes did not move to read the lines which were branded in her memory.

His arm came around her, and she stiffened.

"Don't touch me," she stated coldly.

His arm shifted and unexpectedly he reached over with his free hand and removed the book from her lap, flipping it shut and placing it off to the side.

Her head jerked up, anger burning in her eyes, an expanse of thick thunderclouds roiling in her mind. To her surprise, his gaze was fixed upon her hands, the corners of his mouth curled downwards in a frown.

"Raven, you're bleeding." She looked down, the blood dark, almost black, trickling from her fingers down onto the leather from the unhealed cuts in her hands. She looked at the blood numbly, surprised at her own lack of reaction. How did she feel about this? She scoured her own mind for her emotions. Disinterest. Distaste at the scent of blood again following her everywhere she went. Indifference. "I don't care." She tried to draw on a flicker of her powers to heal herself but Robin's healing had drained her and left her a powerless shell.

Beast Boy sighed softly, rose, and disappeared. Good. He was gone and would stop bothering her. She winced as her head throbbed suddenly, and lifted a hand to her temple. After a moment, to her astonishment, Beast Boy returned with a rag and a bowl of water. "Here." His hands gripped her wrists delicately, and pulled her palms towards him.

"Stop it." Red crept across her cheeks, but she didn't even have the energy to fight him, or throw him across the room like he deserved. Her hands quivered uncontrollably, but the light insistent pressure of his fingers seemed to lend her strength.

He wiped the blood off of her hands gently. Unexpectedly she felt the cloth across the side of her face, stroking away the blood stains across her scalp. Her eyes jolted upwards in surprise.

And her gaze met his, which was exactly what he had wanted.

Her heart skipped a beat as she stared into the depths of his emerald eyes, lit with that energy and sincerity. No words were said; no words were needed. His eyes said it all. Here he was again. Begging her. Begging her to expose her heart, her mind, her soul. Begging her to trust him.

"Stop it." she murmured again. She pushed his wrist away from her roughly, ignoring the twinges of pain from her hands. "Don't touch me."

She maintained her distance from him as best as she could, visibly leaning away from him. He did not react in any way but continued gazing at her and with a force of will she tore her eyes from his and focused her gaze on the ceiling.

"Leave me alone," she said robotically. He didn't say a word, just gazed at her, compassion shimmering in those forest-green orbs. He cared for her so much, she could feel it swelling through him, and overwhelming her, even through her faint empathy.

"Raven, let's talk about this," he murmured softly, with a trace of pleading.

"No." She kept her voice low and controlled, but something smashed with a tinkle nearby, a result of her returning powers, no doubt. He drew even closer to her, and she no longer compensated by leaning away from him, but pointedly stared elsewhere, as if by ignoring him he would suddenly cease to exist.

"I don't want to talk." Again the smashing sound and music of falling glass on the floor. She felt like Pinocchio, trying to lie her way out of the webs of deceit, and watching her nose grow longer and longer until it exposed her.

"I don't want to see you like this," he continued tenderly, trying to make eye contact with her. "I know you say that there's nothing to talk about it, but that's not true, is it."

A painful knot rose in her throat. Everything which she had been keeping hidden, the stress, the pain, the fact that her friends' demise was inevitable swirled upwards, unwanted and uncalled for. "It is true," she insisted, her voice bland and emotionless. She swallowed, harder and harder. Why wouldn't that stupid lump vanish? Why couldn't he just vanish? Couldn't he see that she didn't want to talk?

"You don't have to be alone." His gloved hand fell on her own. "And I know that you don't want to be alone, Rae. So please, please," he begged with a note of desperation, and she looked at him, his shining eyes fixed on her, "just talk to me."

"I'm not alone," she muttered, but her voice cracked horribly. She felt a dampness gathering at the corners of her eyes and she rubbed it away quickly with the heel of her hand. She was not going to cry, she didn't need to cry, she didn't cry. "I know that I'm not alone." It even sounded false to her. Every breath hurt quivering there in her throat, raw and painful, and they came faster and faster, her voice thick with dangerous emotion.

She expected him to continue pushing her until the answers came out but he didn't.

"Raven," he murmured gently, and compassionately. Her name balanced on its point for a moment in the stillness, a stillness so deep as if the whole world was holding its breath. "It's okay."

Just those words and her resolve shattered . She fell limply into his waiting embrace without thought or even regret. Her body shook with uncontrollable tremors. Beast Boy's arms winded around her, holding her carefully, and drawing her into him. He had never meant to elicit such a response and his heart ached for the dark empath. "I can't do it anymore," she whispered into his shirt brokenly, her voice cracking like the squeaking line of an old record playing. Her voice was muffled against his chest. "You, and Cyborg, and now Robin." The couch shook in reaction to the turmoil of her returning powers then stilled. "It won't be long before one of you-" She didn't finish the thought.

"That won't happen."

Somehow her arms had found their way loosely around his waist, but it was he who was holding her there, her anchor, steadfast and solid. She took a choppy breath and then another and another, pushing down the raw emotion.

"Just let it out," he said quietly. His heartbeat pulsed against her ear with a soothing rhythm, strangely reassuring. Her shuddering breath filled the quiet as she, unsuccessfully, tried to stem the stream of unwanted tears.

So she let it all go. Everything. Her shoulders shook with silent sobs as she cried, and the flow of tears dampened the front of his uniform.

When her sobs had died down, after a long while, maybe even an eternity, he spoke.

"Do you want to tell me what this is all about?" he asked, his voice floating over her head, and thrumming from his chest to her ear. She stirred there and burrowed her face deeper into him. Her breath see-sawed erratically and burned in her chest.

"I can't," she said hoarsely. "You wouldn't believe me even if I did."

"Try me," he offered.

She shook her head against him, her hair brushing the silkiness of his uniform with a rustling sound.

"It's my problem. I have to carry it," she spoke defeatedly with a deep sadness unnatural to her voice.

"It's never your problem," he replied. "We're a team, remember?"

She didn't answer. Who knew how much longer the team would remain intact? Starfire was heartbroken, Robin half mad with his obsession, Cyborg, who had always been a good mediator, had given up on them once. Maybe if things continued as they were, he would quit them entirely and move on to the Titans' East. Beast Boy was struggling again with the Beast and his instincts. They were all on knife-edge, about to slip off and fall at any moment.

There was a long pause, a comfortable silence which stretched on and on, which she did not feel compelled to fill. Weariness and fatigue filled her. She felt incredibly tired with him holding her close like this. His welcome warmth had spread through her, tingling through her limbs. He did not speak, but his hand stroked her hair, and she didn't care that he was touching her, or that he had invaded her personal space. None of that mattered.

Gradually her hiccuping breath eased and she stopped resisting the lulls of sleep. She knew that she was curled up against him, feet tucked underneath her, her head pressed against his side. It occurred to her that if Cyborg or Starfire walked in at this moment they would never let her live it down, but she didn't move. It was strangely comfortable and comforting to be held like this, in a way that she could never remember being held before, not even by her own mother. The monks had never offered such physical contact either. It was always distance, distance, distance, emotionally and physically, so that she wouldn't hurt others. So that she would keep her control.

"Raven," he spoke gently. "We can't keep avoiding this."

Her heart constricted and she tensed in his arms. Was he talking about her dealings with the Devil...or something else, perhaps the reason why her heart fluttered whenever he smiled at her, and a warmth filled her whenever she stared into the depths of his eyes. She shoved those feelings down hard, back into the depths where they belonged. She couldn't feel like this, not about him, and not now!

Beast Boy didn't move, he just held her, rhythmically stroking her hair and humming quietly to himself or to her, she couldn't tell. "We can talk tomorrow," he offered.

"Hmmm mmmm," she agreed without thought, achingly tired, and she felt hollow now that the torrent of emotion was spent. Yet somehow...she felt strangely...

Free.

She relaxed against him and fell into a deep sleep, a sleep without dreams.

A/N: Ok, there it is. The (hopefully) much anticipated chapter. Lots of BBXRae fluff...hopefully, good fluff, or maybe not fluff at all?

Also a quick explanation: Raven isn't completely drained of power (as this chapter indicated), but she lacks the energy to control her powers and therefore is unable to heal herself. However, the things she's feeling as Beast Boy is pressing her are, to say the least, extremely powerful, which is the only reason her powers react at all. I hope that makes sense...

What is the Devil planning next? Will Raven reveal all to Beast Boy? All to come in the next chapter (which hopefully will come out very soon). You know what to do! Leave me a review! ;)