Thunderstorms in Jump City aren't out of the ordinary, but this one was particularly intense. Horizontal lightning struck across the sky and left an imprint of downtown's skyline in Raven's eyes as she watched through her window. She was not afraid of the storm but instead concerned as to why she was unable to sleep. Any time she woke up in the past was due to something troubling in the Tower or with herself. No visions came to her and she couldn't feel any unwanted presence in their home. Still, she hoped that maybe a walk through the halls would let her doze off again.
Despite the torrential downpour, the moonbeams were strong enough to push through the rain and illuminate the outer halls. Raven felt exposed as the light shone in and she made a compulsive reach toward her cloak before realizing it had been left behind. She continued forward without it, each step reminding her of just how substantial the Tower actually was. Turning the corner revealed a harsh cutoff from the moon's light, casting dark shadows through the inner halls that bled into a void. In some sense, Raven felt more comfortable as she deserted the moonlight that reflected from her skin. Though she didn't necessarily enjoy the darkness, it was more painless than being the center of attention.
Quiet steps as she roamed barefoot down the hall, mulling over whether she'd check the floor above or below next. Going up would bring her to Starfire and Robin's floor where Starfire's Tamaranian heritage and ability to fly made her more comfortable near the roof and where Robin originally claimed that being on the highest floor would give him a better vantage point of the city than the floor just below it. Although, the rest of the team had always made jokes that it was a poor excuse to be closer to the alien that kissed him at their first meeting.
A distant sound pulled Raven out of her thoughts. It sounded as though it came from just up the hall. Peering around the corner, she saw a figure creeping toward her. There were no distinguishing features she could identify until a stray gleam of light bounced off their head and revealed a flash of unrecognizable gold hair.
"Stop!" she warned before encasing the intruder in her dark energy and binding them to the wall. Though a stranger in appearance, the intruder called out to her with distinct familiarity.
"Can't a guy go pee in peace?"
"Beast Boy?"
He fell to the floor as she released him. With cautious steps, Raven approached. She had noticed blonde hair – there was no mistaking that – but when the boy in front of her met her eyes, Raven realized they were the same green that she had seen for the past three years. Beast Boy stared back at her after rising to his feet only to catch his friend expressing something that he had never seen from her before – shock.
"It's actually you," she breathed and he countered her with his trademark sarcasm.
"Geez, Rae. You're acting like you're not looking at a handsome green heartthrob."
"I'm … not."
"Well, there's no need to be rude about it. I know I look good," he joked, but he became more unsettled as Raven barely shook her head and softly spoke his name once more. His gaze dropped toward his hands on impulse and where he once retained green skin was now replaced with just mundane, fair, normal skin – similar to when he was a kid. He began to mutter to himself as he bolted for his room, leaving Raven in the hall. Rushing through his door, he came to a clumsy stop in front of the mirror that hung over his dresser and stood there dumbfounded.
"Okay. No big deal," he struggled to convince himself. "Just focus and … change." Nothing happened. He pushed himself repeatedly. "Cat. Snake. Hawk." Tears began to well in his eyes as he braced himself on the dresser.
What's going to happen to me, he thought. If he had no powers, could he really be a part of the team? He didn't quite have the skills to hold his own without abilities. He was useless.
"Beast Boy, it's okay."
"No, it's not," he said, stepping toward Raven who appeared in the doorway. "What am I going to do?"
"Tell Robin."
"I can't do that! I don't have any powers; he'll make me leave!"
"He's our friend," she responded, placing a reassuring hand on his shoulder. "He won't throw you out of our home. He'll find another way. Come on. He needs to know."
Robin was never sluggish when he awoke. When he heard a knock at his door, he collected himself and made his way to answer within seconds, leaving his weapons behind. Villains didn't knock.
"Raven, what-" he started. "Beast Boy … what happened?"
"We have a problem," she replied, as Beast Boy seemed to be highly interested in the floor.
"Your powers?" Robin asked. Raven shook her head in response. "Okay, head back to bed. I'll call a meeting in the morning. There's no need to alert the others right now. And Beast Boy-" he waited until his friend looked up and tried to give a convincing smile. "Everything's going to be alright."
"Yeah… right."
As Beast Boy and Raven made their way back to the floor below, Raven found herself gaining tension in her shoulders.
"Beast Boy, can you calm down? You're stressing me out."
"I didn't even say anything!"
"You didn't need to." After a few more moments in the elevator, the doors opened and allowed the two to step out. Raven spoke again. "I'm sorry. I know this is upsetting for you. I can feel your mind racing. If you'd like, I can help you relax."
"Oh? What did you have in mind?"
"If you're going to be immature, I'll take back my offer."
"No, wait!" he stammered. "You know I get joke-y to deal with things!"
"Well at least you haven't lost your sense of humor," she deadpanned. "Now, go."
Beast Boy took the lead back to his room while Raven followed from a modest distance. Even a few extra feet granted her with a moment to breathe. Only after passing through the doorway did Beast Boy speak again.
"I have to admit it's kind of strange having you alone in my room."
"I never thought I'd be here either. Now lie down and get comfortable."
"Right. Okay." He flipped back the covers and nestled into his bed. However, Raven couldn't help but notice that Beast Boy lay flat on his back and rigid as a board, analyzing her every move with just his eyes.
"What are you doing? I said to get comfortable."
"I am."
"Don't be weird. Just relax and close your eyes." Beast Boy did as she told him and he felt her hands gingerly find their places over his head and heart. His breathing slowed and they remained in place for a few minutes before Beast Boy figured that he just couldn't be helped.
"Hey Rae, I don't think it's working," he told her. Yet his eyes struggled to open as they were met with the bright light of morning sun. Raven was gone. "Whoa… what? It didn't even feel like I was asleep! It's like magic! Wait. Duh – because it is." He felt like a fool talking to himself but it almost made the morning feel like it was normal and if he wanted the morning to continue having some sense of normalcy, he'd keep his routine. That meant grabbing the cleanest uniform from the pile and heading to the Ops Center.
Beast Boy hesitated outside, hearing the voices of his teammates through the door. He knew he had to face them, but he remembered the way Robin had pitied him the night before and he wasn't sure how'd he handle it if the rest of the team acted the same way.
Screw it, he thought and proceeded into the room. The Titans were preoccupied with generous amounts of information that were displayed on the projector screen. The only one to acknowledge him was Raven, giving a slight nod to greet his entry.
"What's going on?" he started as he made his way further into the room. Robin spun the chair around to face him as Starfire and Cyborg attempted to hide their awe toward his new and unimproved appearance.
"Beast Boy, you're just in time. We think we might have an idea as to how to bring your powers back."
"You know, I've been thinking and I don't think you should call me that anymore."
"Beast Boy?" Starfire kindly pressed.
"It doesn't seem right," he answered. "At least, not until I get my powers back. Just use my real name." There was a moment of silence as the Titans looked to one another.
"Are you absolutely sure you want your powers back?" Raven drifted toward him.
"Yeah, of course."
"Think about it, man," Cyborg jumped in. "This is your chance to have a normal life."
"I can't believe it. You guys are already trying to get rid of me!" he cried, belligerent. Raven placed a hand on his shoulder and Starfire shook her head, eyes wide, hands clasped together.
"Absolutely not," clarified Robin, standing, "but think long term. Haven't you ever thought about what you might miss? A sense of peace outside of crime fighting, a house, a family. None of us get to have that chance but now you do."
"I am thinking long term. All of you are my family and I'm not giving that up. Now tell me the plan."
"Very well." Robin sat back down. "We've been reading deeper into your files and –"
"My private files?"
"You didn't seem to have any qualms when you hacked into mine," said Raven.
"Enough. Yes, your private files. Cyborg had the idea that we might be able to recreate what happened. If we can find the virus and the antidote, it might just bring your powers back."
"I ran the numbers. There's roughly a ninety-four percent chance your powers will return as they were. You carry the meta-human gene and your body is already adjusted to the virus. There's basically no way for it to fail."
"The only things we can't find are any kind of information on the virus you contracted or the antidote that cured you," Robin continued.
"That's because they don't exist anymore. I'm sorry but your plan already failed." The team stared at him in silence, hoping he'd elaborate. He did. "The disease was called Sakutia. It was only found in the Congo in a rare species of monkey. They didn't used to be rare, but the disease caused them to go extinct. I got sick from one of the last ones and my parents found the cure. They're the ones who discovered the antidote but they died before they could publish their research."
"So…" Cyborg thought aloud.
"There's no way for me to get my powers back. Not unless we have a time machine."
"I know there's a prototype at S.T.A.R. Labs but I'm not sure if it's safe. They started drafting the idea after –" Cyborg's words faded out as Robin and Raven glanced at one another. In that moment, Raven conceived an idea that Robin all but vocally approved. She sighed. "– unless you want to look like me," Cyborg finished.
"I think I can do it," Raven spoke. "I've already reached back far enough to drag Cyborg out of the Stone Age and, while you all wouldn't recall, I've frozen time for an extended period. Since then, I've been testing the constraints of time manipulation and I'm certain I can get us where we need to be."
"I'm sorry. You what now?" Cyborg hollered. "Messing with time is a dangerous thing!"
"Not when it's a single time-stream. Has anything seemed odd to you?"
"Uh, no," he answered as though questioning everything around him.
"That's because whatever future decisions we're going to make in the past have already brought us to where we stand now."
"The what now?"
"Like when we faced Warp," Starfire chimed.
"Precisely."
"Hang on a second," Garfield interjected. "You can time travel? Why haven't you gone back to stop all those times Cyborg beat my high scores or to stop Starfire from reciting Tamaranian poetry?"
"Because I don't use my powers for idiotic reasons. Besides, it's risky for one person to be identified twice at the same moment in time. I've only turned back the clock on physical objects."
"Oh yeah? Prove it," Garfield jeered.
"Remember the penny you found in the park before Trigon came to Earth?"
"Yeah, I gave it to you for good luck."
Following the events of Trigon, Raven had gone back to the abandoned library and scoured for the lost coin. It was simple, but having it near her was comforting. After all, she did come out of the disaster alive as did the rest of the world.
Raven faced her palm upward, conjured the penny from her room, and curled her fingers into a fist. She then unveiled an empty hand. "And now you can give it to me again."
"Dude, no way! I knew it popped out of nowhere!" he cried with excitement, grabbing her hand and inspecting every angle. She tore it from his grasp.
"It's not a party trick. At that moment, you've found the penny and the sky turned black."
"Is it possible that Trigon will return and be victorious? If he is all knowing, how can we be certain that he will not change his plan to conquer the Earth?"
"There are fixed points, Starfire – points in time that no one can change. Trigon's defeat is one of them. He may still return in the future, but trust me when I say that he does not want to relive the past."
"Okay then," Robin declared. "New plan. Starfire will take Raven and Gar shopping for time-appropriate clothing. Cyborg, I need your holographic rings and then I'm putting you on supply duty."
"The holographic rings are my toy! Why can't you go shopping for supplies?"
"I have to stay here and coordinate the mission. I've also been undercover more times than you."
"Which means…"
"Which means I know how to make their appearances match their personalities without their identities being given away. This isn't like when you went undercover as Stone. They need to look human and Garfield's parents can't be able to recognize him."
"Whatever. Just don't change a lot. The rings have their limitations. If you alter the appearance too much, they'll look strange and inhuman to the naked eye."
"Got it. Thanks." Robin began expelling frantic code into the computer as Starfire grabbed both of her friends' hands.
"I am joyous that we may travel to the mall of shopping together. It will hold such fun for us." She began to drag them into the halls.
"Yeah," Raven muttered, "fun."