A/N: Some good news; I'm not dead! Also, this story is COMPLETE. Meaning, I have all of it written, I just need to edit the bits and will be posting them in parts so that the finale isn't thirty-four pages long in one chapter. I guess that's the bad news; the ending is going to be up in chunks and will be posted as I finish editing and feel certain spots are good for a chapter ending. Some might be shorter than my usual (like this one), and it's very possible others will be longer. But what that ALSO means is that there'll be a steady stream of updates until the story is concluded! Editing doesn't really take me too long, so I can see a part going up weekly (so long as work doesn't kill me). I really hope you guys enjoy this final ride as much as I did writing it! Thanks for all your love and support!

Exhibition[ist]

[raw emotion] PART. 1

Raven didn't do jealousy. It wasn't in her limited emotional repertoire. But Garfield Logan was starting to become an exception to nearly every one of her self-imposed rules. He was an enigma, one she couldn't solve, and much like a muse inspired their artist, he appeared to inspire her feelings, too.

"Uhm, Raven? You okay?" It was Cyborg's voice that snapped her out of her train of thought.

Raven blinked, the cybernetic man's concerned visage swimming in her vision, blocking the view of what she'd been asphyxiated with moments before.

"I'm fine. Why?" she replied, tone gravelly and stoic.

"Oh, nothin'. Just, you've been glaring daggers in grass stain's direction for the past ten minutes," jibed Cyborg, shrugging.

Raven's face flushed hotly. "I-I was?"

On cue, they both looked at the currently amicable changeling, happily conversing with the media about the team's current takedown. He was laying his charm on thick with a petite, blonde reporter, and although Raven ought to have been used to Garfield's designated role as social media mogul, she couldn't help the sharp stab of envy in her gut every time the two seemed to flirt.

"I think I'm going to be sick," Raven confessed, overcome with nausea when the reporter touched Beast Boy's shoulder, squeezing the firm muscle beneath the thin, form-fitting material of his tunic.

The smaller, fair-haired woman then blinked a set of pretty, heavily mascaraed, baby blues up at him and snickered at one of his jokes with girlish delight.

"Yeah, it's unnerving. Grass stain flirting." Cyborg gagged, his expression souring, and Raven felt a small bit of validation.

It helped her remember what she was supposed to be doing before she'd noticed the man she'd developed feelings for casually hitting on another girl. A young woman whom, she noted, looked and acted absolutely nothing like her. Maybe she'd been all wrong about his intentions, and suddenly Raven was a mite grateful that she hadn't been a fool and confessed to him the other evening after all.

Not only had the timing been all wrong, but there was something different about the green shapeshifter that the empath couldn't quite place. Like a dark, clouded shadow followed in his every step and clung to him in a ghostly veil. The truth was, he'd been fogged up ever since the dinner with Steve and Rita, and every Titan knew it. For the empath, even his emotions were a lot harder to read, whereas he typically wore them on his sleeve.

Another wave of nausea hit Raven, making her break out into a cold sweat, and she looked to Victor to help take her mind off her own destructive thoughts. "Any injuries?" she mouthed, examining him with skilled hands and a healer's gaze, purposely avoiding any eye contact with the older man in the event he read her like the open book she had apparently become. Raven worked diligently while simultaneously trying to block out the vibrant shade of green from the corner of her eye — a feat far more difficult now that she was helplessly affixed to the skin changer like a magnet, always conscious of his every move.

"Nah, I'm good. Nothing mortal you can fix, anyways. Thanks, though. I did catch Robin gettin' scraped up by Cinderblock if you wanted something to do." Victor gave her an appreciative half smile before nodding in their leader's direction.

True enough, the boy wonder was doing his damndest to hide a tight grimace, one of his arms wrapped tightly around his torso where his gloved hand applied pressure to the side of his ribs. He was looking a lot paler than usual, and his skin was clammy with sweat. Mask or no, it was obvious he'd been nursing his wound for a while now.

Raven floated over to him just as Starfire moved past her to interrupt Beast Boy's interview.

"Show me where it hurts," Raven demanded of the boy wonder, trying to take her mind off what was going on behind her.

Robin mustered up a weak smile. "Nothing gets past you, does it?"

"You're one to talk, detective," she jibed, her hands finding the wound easy enough. She pried his grip away, and a fresh, steady stream of crimson oozed from the gaping cut. The dried blood around the area that clung to pieces of shredded fabric was evidence that the injury was not a more recent one. He winced, but otherwise, Robin remained the stoic, brave man she'd come to know over the years. Besides that, she'd seen him suffer far worse, and some of his more damaging scars weren't even the physical kind.

From behind them, Starfire cleared her throat and spoke up sternly. "Excuse me, but I believe Beast Boy has done enough interviewing for one day. If you'd like to converse with the other Titans, we'd be happy to oblige."

Robin peered past Raven's shoulder with a raised brow. "Uh...what's Starfire doing?"

"I don't know. Now hold still," Raven replued, exasperated. Her eyes then glowed, cascaded in a bright white light as her healing aura left her fingertips and slowly knit his flesh back together. "Azarath, metrion, zinthos." Unfortunately, there was nothing she could do for the torn Robin suit.

"Star, it's fine," Beast Boy assured the alien princess, still forcing a strained smile, jaw muscles twitching. "I can handle a few questions with the press." He sounded like he was speaking through gritted teeth — with barely contained annoyance.

But Kory did not look pleased, nor was she deterred. "No. You've done enough flirting, Beast Boy," she seethed, green eyes aglow as she yanked the mic out of the reporter's hands — who let out a small, surprised yelp at the action — and incinerated it in her grip with a flaming starbolt.

"Holy shit, Star!" Garfield exclaimed in bewilderment, clutching at his hair as he watched the ashes vanish in thin air.

Kory ignored him. "No more questions. You can leave now." Smiling forcibly, she dismissed the disgruntled reporter and her crew away with a wave of her hand. They left the vicinity with a mumbled string of curses that Starfire pretended not to hear.

"Kory, what the heck?" Garfield stammered, narrowing his eyes at the taller woman and getting up in her face, unfazed by her menacing stature.

"Uh..." Robin had become too preoccupied with watching the scenario unfold to answer Raven's lingering question about pain, even forgetting to thank the empath for her work.

Meanwhile, Starfire's smile had evaporated, her mouth becoming a thin line as she glared sharply at the changeling. "You were being a clorbag. Again," she snapped with added emphasis.

Beast Boy blinked at her rapidly before engaging in his more typical hysterics. "I was what?! How was I being a clorbag?! Robin always leaves the reporters to me!"

"If I must spell it out for you, then truly you are being a clorbag!" Starfire jabbed the point of her finger accusingly into his chest.

"Why are the two of you arguing?" Robin had pushed past Raven to address the escalating situation.

"Starfire doesn't seem to like how I handle the press!" Beast Boy shouted, folding his arms over his chest, looking positively irritable.

"He was-" Starfire caught herself in the middle of her rebuttal and shot a tentative — and guilty — glance in the empath's direction before exhaling in defeat and dejectedly adding, "Never mind."

She then floated past everyone, shoulders slumped, in the direction of the tower, not glancing back once.

Robin stared after her, just as perplexed as he'd been moments earlier. He scratched at the back of his head, evidently conflicted in giving chase or letting his girlfriend take some time for herself first. "Well, that was weird."

"Hm..." Victor eyed the changeling, the ominous red light of his robotic lens lingering long enough to be unnerving. His expression was difficult to interpret, but the tension among the Titans was palpable, thick enough to cut with a knife.

Shockingly, Garfield couldn't meet his friend's inquisitive stare, like he was too ashamed to do so. That, or he was too distracted trying to gauge Raven, because it was her that he was focused on. "I just don't know what I did wrong." Beast Boy's voice was almost pleading, and the hurt look in his honest expression made Raven have a hard time swallowing. It was as if he were looking to her for the answers. As if she could somehow explain away Starfire's overreaction, or validate what everyone else already suspected.

Or maybe, he'd known exactly what it was that he'd done and was seeking some sort of forgiveness for his actions from the teammate he'd intentionally hurt. Garfield may have been oblivious to many things, but Raven had an inkling that the changeling was, at least in some form, aware of her budding feelings for him, making his behaviour even more unwarranted and atypical.

Either way, in the end, she did nothing to respond, opting instead to lift her hood over her head and hide away.

"I'm sure it's nothing serious, Gar," Robin reassured him, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder and giving his comrade a light squeeze.

Raven gulped and turned her back on the three men. "I should go check on Kory." Her voice was barely an octave higher than a whisper. She could feel his eyes boring into her — through her.

More of a reason for her to flee the scene. Opening a dark portal, the empath vanished through it, not a remnant of hers — not even a shadow — left behind…

"Is this a bad time? You look...troubled." Lillith's fair complexion appeared grainy in the screen of Raven's computer.

"What? No, I'm...I'm fine." She cleared her throat, doing her best to mimic her usual tone. "What's going on?"

Lillith didn't appear entirely convinced by the charade but pressed on anyways, probably too excited to share her news to unpack any of Raven's current dilemmas — ones she seemed to find herself in quite often as of late. "I'm calling you to tell you that I think I may have found a way to sever the connection."

This information hit Raven with the weight of a freight train, and all of a sudden, everything else going on became inconsequential. "You what?" Raven couldn't mask the desperation in her voice, her eyes widening as she stared at the clever, triumphant telepath in the small screen. The auburn-haired woman wore a smug little smirk, a corner of her mouth upturned in pride, pronouncing a single dimple on that side of her cheek.

"I can't believe it took me this long, truth be told. I suppose it's because I've always figured your abilities worked differently than mine, but you said you've been in Robin's mind before, too, and that got me thinking."

Raven's heart was racing, and she bit down on her bottom lip. It was a good thing she was sitting down on her bed; she wasn't too sure that her knees wouldn't give out the way she was shaking; a by-product of her frazzled nerves. With bated breath, she awaited Lillith's explanation.

"Why did you get stuck with Gar's mind but not with Robin's? Even with my own teammates, I've never had a breach like yours with any of my connections."

Raven shook her head, puzzled, and the tiny camera capture in the corner reflected her movements. "This isn't the same thing, Lillith. I explained that to you."

The powerful telepath only smiled wider. "Exactly, and we both don't quite understand it still. But what if...you made it similar?"

"Come again?" Raven blinked rapidly, dubious.

Lillith seemed to take in a deep breath before continuing, "You need to let him into your mind and he needs to let you into his. Then, you should be able to turn it off, like you did with Robin."

The idea was so simple, so blatantly obvious, that it almost sounded too good to be true. Raven felt foolish for not having thought of it sooner, once the idea took root in her head.

Of course.

Of course.

The ability to project images must have been but a hyper-focused fraction of what she'd done when she'd established a mind connection with Robin. Between the two bird Titans, it had been mutual, and thus, Raven had no trouble ending it when they no longer needed it. If she merely let Garfield into her head, too, then she could shut off all the channels, because she already knew how to do that.

Ironically, that also was part of the problem; letting Beast Boy into her mind would not only mean that he'd officially become aware of her developing and complex feelings for him, but also learn the finer details of her dark upbringing and unconventional childhood. It had been one thing with Robin; he'd already known much about her even before the mind link she'd established all those years ago. Being a detective putting a new team together, he couldn't help but look into each of his new partners, and the fact that he'd left it unspoken between them while still respecting her trauma had actually been a blessing in disguise for Raven. Garfield Logan, however, was none the wiser to some of her more morbid memories, and Raven wasn't too sure about how he might feel when he learned the entire truth...

The empath gulped, swallowing at the nervous lump in her throat. "That sounds...easy enough, I think," she half-lied.

Her friend pouted, bottom lip jutting out. "You don't sound so thrilled, Raven." Concern pulled at Lillith's youthful features, her shapely brows drawn together.

"I... I am, I just...I need to speak to him first." Raven's eyes darted about her room and she tucked her silken hair behind her ear. "Thank you, Lillith. Truly. For everything you've done. You've been a great help." She mustered up a quivering smile to the best of her abilities and then closed the laptop before she fell apart completely. Maybe later, when she was less of an emotional mess, she'd apologize for hanging up on Lillith. For now, she needed to deal with other pressing matters.

Taking a deep, shuddering breath, and allowing for her facade to slip back into a more neutral, cool exterior, she figured she'd given Starfire enough time to cool off before confronting her. Raven gathered her swimming bag — which reeked of chlorine now — and took one last lingering gander at the full-length mirror in an attempt to fix her appearance. It was late at the Tower, and she'd slipped into some of her comfier lounge-wear — a strappy tank-top, and some sweat shorts — since she hadn't really planned to interact with the other Titans after the mission. Some strands of her dark, straight hair sat askew, and she quickly ran through them with her fingers until smooth. Not that she'd ever really tell anyone, but her natural hair actually had some wave to it, and Raven often had to straighten it after it would get wet to maintain the illusion of perfectly straight hair. If the other Titans had noticed it when it had grown down the length of her back that one time around her birthday, they'd never truly made a note of it.

Satisfied with her look, and with the strap of her canvas bag flung over her shoulder, Raven then left the safety of her room to hunt down Kory, being sure to avoid any other Titans if they were around. Thankfully, she found the hallways dark, empty and quiet. Somewhere in the distance, she could swear she heard the television in the common room, but Kory's bedroom lay in the opposite direction, much to her relief.

When Raven reached Kory's door, she found it slightly ajar, and light spilled out, illuminating the otherwise dark corridor.

She glanced inside and saw the other woman sitting atop her bed, stroking Silkie's back as he lay snoozing comfortably and perfectly content in her lap, none the wiser to his mistress' emotional distress.

"Hey, you," Raven called out, peeking in from the crack of her open door.

The other Titan raised her melancholy green gaze towards her friend and replied solemnly, "Hello."

Taking it as her queue to come inside, the empath floated in, giving a quick once over of the princess' room. Aside from a few more recent photos of her and Robin together taped around her vanity mirror, and a few new toys and trinkets likely from their dates and adventures, not much else had changed since the last time Raven had been in there. "Are you...okay?" the empath queried, taking a spot next to the alien woman on the bed, and placing her swimming bag at her feet.

"Are you?" Starfire clipped back, sharp enough to leave her fiend bristling from the accusation in her tone.

When Raven didn't answer, Starfire sighed, her eerie jade eyes a faded glow in her brightly lit room. "I am sorry. Perhaps I was too forward today. It's just...I know that he feels something for you, and that you feel something for him, and I recall the events with Robin and Kitten and how that had made me feel-"

"Kory, slow down. It's okay." Raven touched her shoulder in comfort, purposely ignoring how Kory had somehow discerned Garfield's own emotional turmoil in regard to the demoness. "I'm not upset. Not with you, and not with Gar," she explained calmly.

Starfire shook her head, tendrils of long, flame-red curls moving with her. "It doesn't make sense. Why push you away? Why try to hurt you? Beast Boy is not supposed to be cruel."

Raven shrugged passively, even though she wanted nothing more than to parrot her friend's sentiment. But she was already used to consoling herself most of her own life, so it was never a stretch to do the same for her friends. "Gar's always been...a flirt. That's nothing new, really. He'll take attention from anywhere he can get it. I don't think he was trying to hurt anyone."

"Then why?"

"I don't know. Maybe because he's so busy trying to cover up his own hurt, that he just...drowns himself in everything else to avoid dealing with it…"

Starfire quieted down, and the two girls shared a moment of silence, thinking on the mystery that was their green shapeshifting friend.

Then, in a smaller voice, Kory asked, "Do you think that maybe something has happened with Steve again?"

Raven leaned forward and ran her pale fingers along her bare knees, carefully considering everything. It was clear that Beast Boy been acting strange ever since the dinner; all the Titans knew it, but so far, none of them had really approached the elephant in the room just yet. Garfield was behaving somehow colder — uncharacteristic of his usual sunny disposition — and like he was trying to keep everyone at arm's length by pretending to be a husk of his old, chipper self. It wasn't working very well at all. Once upon a time, maybe he'd have had Raven fooled, but with the dynamic of their relationship shifting, she found herself paying more and more attention to him. So much so, that she was about as sensitive to his emotional spectrum as a river was to a subtle wave.

Now that Raven also knew how to sever their connection, she was realizing the real reason she'd been less than enthused when Lillith had spoken to her about a prospective solution — that, not only would it likely offend the changeling, but, maybe, it would also mean they'd have one less reason to spend time together.

Like it was a death sentence for their blossoming relationship. Like, without it, they'd have nothing in common any more, and they'd go back to being teammates and friends in the loosest sense of the term.

More frightening still, perhaps, was that Raven was looking for any excuse, any reason, not to go through with it.

She couldn't break his heart even more. And, after everything with Malchior, she was even less inclined to break her own.

"I don't know, Kory. But I mean to find out…"

Raven found Beast Boy soaking in a metal tub full of ice water in the infirmary.

It was really, really late now and all the other Titans were likely in bed, save for perhaps Robin. She'd only just parted ways with Kory herself after their rejuvenating swim, pool water still clinging to chunks of her hair and dripping down her long, pale legs. Raven's towel was still draped over her arm and her bare feet felt good against the carpeted plush of the floor. It was pure coincidence that she'd had to walk by the infirmary on her way to the bathrooms where she'd planned to wring out the rest of her clothes and hair, but her own morbid curiosity had gotten the better of her.

She'd heard him first before she'd bothered to pry; the sound of moving water and ice as he shifted uncomfortably inside the metal tub. He hadn't noticed her presence when she'd wandered in, having thrown his head back and closing his eyes, his features pinched into a permanent grimace.

"You're wounded." Immediately, Raven was at his side, kneeling on the floor next to him to assess the damage, and not caring for where she threw her things in the meantime. The clattering noise they made when they hit the tiled floor seemed to echo throughout the room, but Raven was overcome with concern when she got a good look at the injuries Beast Boy had sustained. Bruises, cuts, all of varying sizes, discolored his emerald skin in wide, ugly, purple and red gashes.

"I'm fine, really." He winced through a smile, in pain even moving his arm over the ledge of the tub, the curved muscles of his biceps shaking with the effort.

She huffed, annoyed, blowing a piece of her hair that had slid before her face. "You're not fine. You haven't been fine this whole time. Why didn't you say anything?" Raven couldn't keep herself composed and it conveyed through her tone and facial expressions. She had no patience for formalities at this point, and her own insecurities would need to take a back seat for the time being. Her teammate — Beast Boy — was hurt.

"I didn't want to worry any of you. Besides, nothing a cold bath can't fix. I've been through worse and healed on my own just fine."

It was true that his strange genetic disposition also meant he was able to heal a lot quicker than any normal human, but Raven couldn't help and be cross with him judging by the severity of his cuts, strings of his blood floating to the watery surface like an ominous, crimson cloud.

She folded her arms over her chest and narrowed her eyes at him. "You say that a lot." Raven was grateful for the thick pieces of ice that prevented her from seeing anything below the surface of the tub, other than a foggy, green blur where his naked body lay. Being distracted b the changeling's impressively lean physique was the last thing she needed in the moment, especially if he was going to take her seriously. Still, it was curious how much damage he'd endured while going through a whole interview without so much as a limp. For the most part, she could have sworn his uniform had been intact, too. Then again, Raven been rather preoccupied with the task of looking everywhere but at him. Her face burned hotly at this realization, a pang of guilt sweeping through her upon noting her own lack of professionalism. Maybe this was partly why Robin had been so against inter-team romantic relationships before he'd started dating Starfire.

"I can take care of myself, Rae." There was a bit of underlying testiness to Beast Boy's voice, and he wouldn't meet her eyes, the muscles of his shoulders tightened like a coiled spring. Beast Boy stared down at the water, drumming his fingers gently along the icy surface of ice water. Due to his high metabolism — and the heat of his impressive core temperature — steam rose from his skin and the tub where the cold water chilled him. Small rivulets of water cascaded down his back from the matted, wet hairs at the nape of his neck, trailing a path between his shoulder blades until they reunited with the bathwater.

Raven reached out to touch him, her fingers shaking in the air. Her voice was soft and caring when she said, "Cinderblock gave you a thrashing. There could still be pieces of glass in some of those wounds from the skyscraper he threw you into. Wounds that, if left unattended, could become infected." He was cold and wet to the touch, but he didn't reject her gentle caress when she followed the edges of a more brutal gash on his back.

"You don't need to heal me every single time someone hurts me, Raven. Sometimes, there are things that even you can't fix." His tone was as chilling as the ice he lay beneath.

"This isn't about the injuries, is it?" she pushed, knowing very well that she was testing his boundaries. "This is about Steve, and whatever the hell he said to you at the dinner." Her fingers gripped the cold edge of the steel tub, squeezing until her knuckles paled as she stared him down intensely. Beast Boy stopped moving, the muscles in his jaw clenching visibly.

Look at me. Look at me, please! Raven wanted to scream, but she fought the innate urge.

Seeing Garfield tense up and pull into himself further, Raven then reeled her emotions in, realizing she'd touched on a sore spot in her desperation to reach out to him. "Talk to me, Gar," she pleaded. "You have to let me in if we're ever going to overcome this." Her thoughts, yet again, strayed to Lillith's words.

You need to let him into your mind and he needs to let you into his.

If he couldn't even talk to her, how would he ever trust her enough to let her play in his darkest memories?

Garfield suddenly slapped the surface of the water, splashing himself in the process and taking Raven out of her thoughts. "There's nothing to talk about!" he cried, his voice a low growl, but one laced with an undefinable pain. "And even if there was, there isn't a thing you, or anyone, could do about it. I just...I need to think. I need to be alone…" Garfield cradled his face in his hands, his whole body shaking, whether from the cold or something else, Raven didn't know.

What she did know was when she wasn't wanted — no matter how much it stung. Taking in a sharp breath through her nose, nostrils flaring, she bit back anything else she wanted to say to him — to scream at him — and stood to her full height with one last lingering stare in his direction. Her eyes were like a violet storm, hazy and prickled with burning tears she refused to shed. Every bone and muscle in her body — every sinew and every nerve — told her to abandon all her pride and hold him. To envelop his quivering, naked, hurt form in the warmth of her arms and chest. It was a shame she was born and raised a coward.

Still Beast Boy refused to look at her, and she could tell he wore a masked cringe from beneath his palms, shuddering in the water as he fought with his own inner demons. Reluctantly — and with a lot of anguish herself — Raven turned on her heels and left him in the room…

A/N: Thanks for reading and stay tuned for the SECOND PART of this finale!