Teen Titans - Dangerous Dance

Hidden Dangers-

Disclaimer: See page 1

A/N: Hello! I finally got past my brief writers block with reading a fic from Weiß Kreuz. I hadn't really thought that much about the fic when I uploaded the first chapter, so I will be changing the rating slightly. It will now be PG-13. Anyway, I hope you enjoy the rest of this fic. Thanks for reading!

Robin turned around to face Starfire, the mansion was crowded to the brim with people having ball dresses and high class tuxes on. Chandeliers hung in rows of about fifty or so, each spaced a good ten feet apart. The marble stairs to the upper level of the house had giant white ribbons draped on the banisters. The ceiling had fancy blue streamers hanging everywhere that didn't already have something there. Robin could also make out a kind of plastic coating the marble floor. No doubt to either protect it from the hundreds of feet that it would receive punishment from, or to give the floor some other surface that it would not be slippery—as to not have everyone fall on their rear end when they started to dance.

It wasn't even the hundreds of people that amazed Robin. It was the hundred or so rooms clearly visible on the second floor, and the other at least thirty leading out of the dance hall on the floor he currently was on. It wasn't just a mansion with so many rooms either, each room had its own unique door, indicating that the room that the door led into must be equally unique.

Not seeing Cyborg, Beast Boy, or Raven in his immediate sight, Robin held his right hand out to Starfire politely, his palm facing the ceiling.

"Would you like to dance?" Robin asked. Now, Robin had only danced twice in his life, although he would only admit to once. It wasn't that Robin disliked dancing or that he simply didn't know how to dance. It was the fact that he usually never really liked his dance partners very much, therefore making it seem like dancing was a punishment to him somehow. However, on this rare occasion, he actually got the chance to dance with the exact person he wanted to.

Starfire hesitated, a little startled by his question, but then smiled and nodded taking his hand to indicate her acceptance.

Robin closed gently around it and turned towards the dance floor, walking in short strides-so that he wouldn't be dragging Starfire roughly behind him. He stopped a little way into the dance floor and turned around again. He let go of Starfire's hand briefly to gently grasp her right hand with his own left hand. Then hesitantly, he allowed Starfire to put her left hand on his shoulder before cautiously putting his right hand on her side, as if afraid that if he touched her in a certain way, he would burn his hand. Starfire waited patiently for Robin to get himself under control.

Then finally, he started the dance step, allowing Starfire time to look down and learn while still stepping out her part of the dance. When Starfire was finally comfortable, she looked up--still silently counting the beats and thinking out the moves—as she looked at the unmasked Robin. He looked so relaxed this way. His eyes spoke of happiness and days when he had little cares to weigh down his young heart, days when he was allowed to be an innocent child. Starfire supposed that was why he wore his mask; so that he wouldn't have to face the cruel world with his own eyes...so that he could pretend it was all in his mind, all a horrible nightmare that decided to last a lifetime. She could understand this, because she sometimes felt the same way. It was then, however, that she had always started thinking about the other Teen Titans and their undying friendship to her and each other. Whatever happened. If no one else was ever there for her...she knew they always would be.

"Having fun?" Robin said grabbing Starfire, startled, out of her thoughts. Then regaining her composure she smiled.

"Yes, Robin, I am," Starfire answered.

"Good, I'm glad," He said looking away to the view over her shoulder.

Starfire blushed slightly as she felt Robin's hand move from her side to the lower part of her back. Robin allowed his gaze to drift back to Starfire as she recomposed her face.

"Have you seen Cyborg or the other two at all?" Robin finally asked.

An embarrassed wave of red flushed over Starfire's face. She hadn't even thought about the mission since she stepped onto the dance floor with Robin. Robin's expression turned into a confused half-smile.

"What?" He asked with his soft brown eyes twinkling at Starfire.

Starfire shook her head, "Nothing. Err...no, I haven't seen Raven, Beast Boy, or Cyborg."

Robin nodded thoughtfully, mindlessly continuing to dance. "Well, I'm sure if they found the target, they would tell us."

Starfire nodded, a smile showing white teeth found its way onto her face. Robin found himself staring at her for a moment without realizing it. Then occupied himself with looking over her shoulder at the crowd of people, trying to concentrate on finding at least one of the people they were looking for—Teen Titan or criminal.

Robin brought two drinks back to a set of chairs. One which Starfire now occupied and one which he intended on sitting in. Cyborg jogged up with a wide grin on his face.

"Hey, what's up, man?" He asked, giddy with excitement.

"You sound happy, what's going on?" Robin asked, hiding the relief in his voice at seeing his friend for the first time since he had left him at the limos.

"Ah, you know. Dance stuff. I already got five lovely ladies to accept my dance proposals out of six. Not bad, huh?" Cyborg said, bouncing on his toes.

"Not bad at all," Robin agreed. Then his voice took a suddenly more serious tone, "Have you seen Beast Boy and Raven?"

Cyborg's head bobbed up and down very fast, "Yeah. The last I saw of them, they were dancing—well, if you could call that dancing. The way they were moving looked like Raven was a block of solid ice and Beast boy was a stream of water if you know what I mean. Anyway, as I said, they're over there in the far right corner. But I wouldn't disturb them right now...Beast Boy's been drooling over Raven since she stepped out of the limo two hours ago." He chuckled lightly at the thought. Then returned his attention to Starfire and Robin. "What about the mission? Anything happen yet?"

Robin shook his head as Starfire's face flushed again. She knew that she hadn't been paying attention to anything other than Robin--the way his feet stepped so accurately, the way his arm had slowly and silently crept to almost the other side of her waist, his brown twinkling eyes looking at her from time to time, and the way he seemed so relaxed in her company. It had made her completely unaware of the things happening around her even after he had reminded her that they had a job to do. Thankfully, neither Robin nor Cyborg noticed Starfire's sudden change of coloring.

"I looked for our targets, but found nothing. Either it was all a bluff and they're not here...or we just haven't seen them yet. It could be that they aren't anywhere near the dance floor too," Robin hesitated, "But if they are somewhere else, I wouldn't know where to begin looking."

Cyborg nodded, "The lady who owns this place said that there were three- hundred twenty-seven rooms total in this mansion."

Robin hissed with displeasure, "That would take hours for us to just walk through every hallway in this mansion, not to mention search every enormous room in the house. We'll just have to hope they don't do anything in one of the rooms."

Cyborg nodded, "That's all we can do. That and keep an eye out for them."

"Yeah," Robin said, rising from his chair. Starfire, seeing him rise, did the same. Robin held out and bent arm to Starfire, indicating that she should take it. In response she wrapped her hand gently around Robin's arm for the second time that night.

"Where are you going?" Cyborg asked, wondering what could be grabbing Robin's attention away from the mission at this moment.

"I have a dance to finish," he said, leaning his head slightly towards Starfire then walking away with her on his arm.

Cyborg rolled his eyes, then sighed, watching them walk back into the crowd of people. Just as he turned towards the back of the house, he could vaguely see Raven and Beast Boy exiting the house to the garden outside. He silently wondered how the decision to leave the inside of the mansion had come about, but he didn't bother to catch up to them in order to find out. He looked at the drink in his hand and sighed, draining the remaining liquid in it. He silently put it on a nearby table that was already stacked with dirty dishes and started walking towards the back door of the mansion as well.

When he finally reached the door, he could see that it was well lit with garden lamps and small lanterns hanging from a few of the trees. Although he couldn't see any sign of Beast Boy or Raven, he could see many other couples on benches, standing together, or just strolling around the enormous garden. He sighed and shrugged before starting to walk forward. It was not long before he found himself pleasantly lost in an endless maze of bushes, flowers, trees, and even cacti. It was as if every square-acre of the garden had its own theme. One acre was herbs of many sorts—all of which gave the entire garden a soothing fragrance in the warm night air. There was no wind at all, which made everything still and peaceful except for the light chattering of an occasional nearby couple. For the first time in a very long time, he was completely calm and his worries drifted away into the clear night sky, like a ghost departing from its haunting habits to take its place peacefully in the afterlife.

It was around nine when the candles from the chandeliers were the only existing light in the dance hall. The orchestra had slowed their songs, making it more and more difficult to find a fitting dance that still kept Starfire and Robin from getting more than four inches closer to each other than normal. Within ten minutes of this, however, Robin gave up completely, seeing the whole thing as childish and cautiously put both of his hands around Starfire's waist. This put him about three inches apart from her—making him hold her in a sort of hug-like fashion. He silently hoped that she wouldn't take offense to this, but made no visual or verbal indication of this.

On the contrary, Starfire blushed slightly at his closeness, then gently put her arms around his neck and shoulders. With this accomplished, she leaned forward slightly and rested her head on his shoulder. This startled Robin at first, but he quickly adjusted to it. Even so, this didn't stop him from becoming tensely aware that Starfire's head was inches away from his own. Sure, she had been this close before. When she was angry perhaps and wanted to prove a point, or when she was overjoyed at something. But never quite this way. Her closeness made him nervous as he found his mind wondering over various decisions he wasn't even aware he was making. Somehow, he had decided that this was beyond the role of any friendship. That to him, just maybe, Starfire meant a bit more than he ever realized. His eyes closed involuntarily as he became aware of her soothing lavender scent. It flooded his brain like a kind of fog, making it hard to think...hard to breathe.

He suddenly became dimly aware that someone was calling his name. Someone pushed away from him slightly. He opened his eyes groggily, feeling as if it had been an eternity since he had done so. The image of Starfire's worried expression made its way to his brain. His senses protested, begging him to somehow get back to the same way he had been a moment earlier.

"...Robin?" Starfire repeated. Her hands were gripping his shoulders tightly. Then seeing his eyes open, her hands relaxed slightly, becoming gentler. "Are you alright?"

Robin blinked, releasing Starfire with one of his hands and rubbing it incoherently across his face. "Yeah, yeah...I'm fine."

Starfire hesitated, then nodded with a nervous smile as Robin released her waist with his opposite hand as well, allowing her complete freedom. His eyes smiled back at her as he struggled to piece together exactly what had just happened. A yearning feeling possessed his heart and simply refused to let go. He wanted to do something, anything to show Starfire his feelings for her...feelings that without realizing it, had been growing for some time now. Nerves took over his body at the thought of doing more than hugging the girl he now found that he loved very much.

A muffled ringing sound suddenly came from his pocket and his attention was drawn away from Starfire for a moment. It took a moment for him to remember that they had made a new com for this mission--making it look like any normal cellular phone, so that if they had to contact each other, they would both look like nothing more than a workaholic to everyone around them. Robin clicked the "answer" button on the com and held it up to his ear.

"Yeah," he said in a way that reminded Starfire of when normal adult men would get an important call from their office about a customer. She could hear Raven's voice come over the com.

"I just spotted our target. Haget, Sigg, and Cole just entered the garden."

"Alright," Robin replied, "We'll be right th—" But his sentence was cut off by an expanding, blinding white light that clawed its way through the entire mansion, eventually reaching outside of the enormous house as well. A deafening roar sounded throughout the entire house and everything around it, followed by something knocking him off his feet with great force. His vision blacked out completely and he vaguely felt himself fall, unable to find a way to stop it. Everything seemed to fade around him and he remembered no more...