Author's Notes:

Shout Outs –

The Cretin – Humble name there. Thanks.

Annab1119 – No problem. I'm glad ou like the pacing. There are a few more flashbacks coming, but we will being dipping our toes more and more into the Present Day in this and future chapters.

JOHNXgambit – You've got a point with Raven and the Kids. Before I advance too much after The End, I think I should probably revisit "Hide and Seek."

Jazzybizzle – Glad you like it. More present day goodness to come.

I'm back at work, busily grinding out plot and character development for which I will never be paid, except in the form of your reviews and favorites. I took a short break to write the one shot, Love in the Library. You might want to take a look at it if you really like this pairing. My other piece on this pairing is Raven's Wedding, but it's actually alluded to in both Behind Robin's Mask and Extreme Sanction.

This Morning

Spring had come to Jump City and with it the rich, intoxicating scents of new life. Spring every year was a challenge for Beast Boy – the instincts of all of the animals buried deep within his DNA clamored for release. Just sitting in the common room, minding his own business, he kept finding himself staring at Starfire if she happened to walk by. She had always smelled nice, but now it was . . . compelling. But Starfire was nothing compared to Raven. If Raven walked into a room, her scent grabbed his attention in a headlock, and simply would not let go. He couldn't concentrate on video games if she was in the room. His games with Cyborg went from regularly getting beat to persistent and total abject humiliation. Like today. He'd spent all week mastering Super Spider Monkey 17 and had Cyborg pinned down on the 34 level with his 16th Dan Space Samurai Ninja when Raven walked into the room. He had recognized her footsteps from across the room, past the kitchen and down the hall. He heard the doors open and could immediately tell her scent. He tried to focus on the game, keeping Cyborg at a disadvantage. Raven got up and went to brew tea. Her scent wafted over him again. It was all he could do to not turn his head and watch. He focused in on Super Spider Monkey: Cyborg had made a mistake. All he had to do was line him up and . . .

Raven crossed behind the couch again. Without thinking he whipped his head around to watch her pace across the room.

"Ha!" laughed Cyborg as he whipped his spider monkey adroitly around Beast Boy's Ninja and on to victory. "Taste the agony of defeat, Grass Stain!"

"Raven!" shouted Beast Boy, "Look what you made me do!"

"Me?" said Raven, flatly. "I wasn't anywhere near you."

"But . . ." Beast Boy said, and gave up. Nobody else on the team even had a nose. Not really. They'd never understand. But it was all her fault. He stomped out of the room in disgust.

What happened a few days later was worse. The team had been involved with the H.I.V.E. Five in a full-contact, knock-down, drag-out winner take all fight. Beast Boy, in his T-Rex form had been supporting Cyborg in an engagement with Mammoth when he had noticed Raven being menaced by two of Billy Numerous.

He transformed into his human shape and shouted "Raven!" at the top of his lungs. Then he transformed into a mongoose to race across the street to fight with Billy and his clones. In the process, he dropped Cyborg about fifteen feet onto his butt in the middle of the street. Mammoth had taken advantage of the distraction to snatch up a light pole and baseball bat Cyborg several blocks away. Cyborg had been hurt, and the HIVE gang had gotten away with the loot, vanishing into the city night. Robin had not been pleased.

"What were you thinking? Were you thinking at all?" Robin's eyes narrowed behind his mask.

"I don't know," Beast Boy shouted his hands on his head. "I don't know," he repeated more softly. "I just saw those two of Billy Numerous closing in on her –"

"Don't give me that," Robin interrupted, "Numerous is a D-list bad guy. Raven could handle eight of him on a bad day. If she was on her game, twenty or thirty of him, and you know it. What's going on with you? Your goofing around is putting the team at risk."

"I'm not goofing around!"

"I don't care what you call it. I just need your head in the game before you get someone seriously hurt. Or worse. Whatever's going on with you, fix it."

Dejected and angry, Beast Boy made his way to Cyborg's bed in the medical ward. The tall half-human lay on a specially-designed hospital bed that more accurately resembled a forklift. He was sitting up, idly surfing the web when Beast Boy quietly stood at the door. The fading sunlight cast sharp shadows across the floor.

"Dude," he said, "I'm sorry."

"C'mon in. It's okay. I know you didn't do it on purpose. But, man, what's going on with you?"

"I don't know."

It didn't take too many more miss-steps like that before Beast Boy pulled Robin aside. "Um, Robin, will you meet me on the roof?"

Robin nodded, and the two of them went to the roof of Titan Tower. The sea breeze blew steadily against Beast Boy's face as he looked out over the bay toward the large suspension bridge.

"Dude," he said, "I think I'm going to have to take a leave of absence."

"I see," said Robin. "I think that's a good idea. The team will miss you."

"Not likely."

"Beast Boy, you're the soul of the team. You and Cyborg keep us grounded."

"Well, right now I'm just keeping you 'ground up.'"

Robin asked, "So, how long do you think you'll need."

"I'm not sure," the boy said. "Don't expect to hear from me for, say, at least a year."

"That long, eh?"

"I think so," replied Beast Boy. "I don't know what's wrong with me, so I don't know how long it will take me to fix it."

He turned away, then looked back, eyes as wide as the day the two had met. "I can come back, right?"

"Of course," said Robin. "You'll always be a Titan."

"Thanks."

He turned away and stepped to the edge of the Tower.

"Not going to say good-bye to the others?"

"I think that would just make it worse. I'll be in touch."

Beast Boy shifted into the form of a large bird and flew away to the northeast.

The common room was the largest, most open space in the Titan Tower. With floor to ceiling windows facing the bay, the room was dominated by a semi-circular couch. The rest of the room had a food preparation area on along one wall and tables along the other one. Various computer workstations and assorted communications gear could also be found around the upper layer of the room. Raven's face was unmoved when Robin told them. But four computer consoles shattered.

"How could he just leave like that," she thought. "Without even saying 'good-bye to everyone . . . to me?'"

"Is he at least gonna write?" asked Cyborg

"I kinda got the impression that where he's going, there's no email," Robin answered.

"I do not understand, please," said Starfire. "Why has friend Beast Boy left us? Where has he gone? Who will pick the scary movies? Who will tell the jokes? Who will argue with Cyborg about the morning tofu?"

"Well Star," Robin tried, "He wasn't fitting in anymore, and was very unhappy. Worse, he was so distracted he was putting the team in danger. He's gone to try to get his head together. I don't know where he went, or when he is coming back, but he did want me to promise he'd have a home here when he got back. Just as soon as he figures out who he is."

"And did you make the coming-home promise?" sniffed Starfire.

"Of course I did."

That night, Raven turned and walked down the darkened corridors of the Tower, toward the elevator. She'd not be disturbed at this hour unless there was an alert. "They gave all of this to me freely, without being asked and asking for nothing in return. How have I repaid them? Sarcasm, distance, closed doors, lies and deceit. I even threw Beast Boy out of the thirtieth floor window of Titan Tower."

She got into the elevator and descended.

"It's time to make a change," she thought. "And not just because I owe them more than I've been willing to give. I was a thing for so long. And a dangerous thing at that. Then I was a hero. I've done some good, and I want to be able to feel proud of that. I told Trigon that my friends had raised me. And so they have. They've raised me from a dangerous thing to a real person, actual, and almost whole."

The elevator doors opened. She move to the stairs and descended again. "I want to feel proud of my accomplishments," she thought. "I want to feel love for my friends. I want to feel fear on stormy nights and warm comfort at Christmastime."

"It's time to feel.

She stood outside the door to the Fail Safe room. Another gift, her friends had built this room for her in an effort to keep her safe from Trigon. Cyborg had boasted that nothing alive could penetrate the room, and Starfire had claimed that the sigils would keep everything else out. It might have worked, if she'd stayed inside. But now she would put it to a different purpose. What was designed to keep something out, would now keep something else in. She laid her hand on the access panel, which chirped in recognition. The heavy doors slid open.

"I should have told someone about this. I'm probably about to do something stupid."

She walked to the center of the room and sat down on the floor. The doors hissed closed. She started to bend her legs into the lotus position, the stopped.

"No – I'm not going to meditate. That's for holding on. It's time to let go."

She bent her legs and wrapped her arms around her knees.

"Now what? What to feel?"

She sat there silently for several minutes.

"Well, when you don't know what else to do, return to the beginning."

"Mother . . ." she said softly, and she bowed her head on her arms. Raven wept.