Chapter Two
Cyborg looked at the key that lay in the middle of his palm. It seemed so small, but he hoped that Raven would see the meaning behind it.
It was one of the two keys to the T-car, and he was giving it to Raven, the one person who had hated the car to begin with, and then had helped rebuild it...out of friendship. She was not one for friendship.
The key itself was nothing special, and the only thing on surface value that Raven might like was the black background with the midnight blue flames licking up the sides. She might not like it for what if represented (though he doubted that she would miss the meaning) but she might like its face value.
He sighed at such a small gift, and felt slightly guilty. Both Robin and Starfire had combined money and had gotten Raven a gold bracelet with her favorite verse from Edgar Allen Poe's The Raven engraved on it.
The sixteenth verse in fact. The one where the speaker was calling out to the Raven asking which demon had sent him. Cyborg hadn't been fond of it, but Raven was often found muttering it under her breath.
Once when they were working on the T- car together, she had insisted on taping all of Edgar Allen Poe's poems and then listening to them, reciting them, just as she has recited them to make the tape. She had drilled The Raven into his mind, and Demon in My View.
He had asked her why she loved the poems so much and why he was making him listen to them. She had turned her lavender gaze on him and her eyes were unreadable. Not hard, yet not soft. Not angry, yet not happy. Not hating, yet not loving. It was just was as she always was.
"Because I am what he writes about," she whispered to herself, and then she looked up at him. "If you know these, you know how I feel. Doesn't Demon in my View related to me all to well?" He nodded, remembering her father that was in her mind.
"Quoth the Raven Nevermore," she whispered, and the conversation was closed, for he was teaching her how to weld.
Cyborg slipped the key into a small black box and closed his hand around it. He still felt guilty about not buying her anything good. She already drove the car... once in a while, when he was forcing her to learn how to drive it. She preferred moving in the form of a shadow raven. Flying through the sky and shielding the people below from the harsh sun.
He walked down the hall, towards 'the room' as he called it. But then he heard a soft muttering. He pressed his ear to enhance the sound.
"Azarath Metrion Zinthos," was being chanted with deep breathing was gently coming behind it. He knew that it was Raven for the voice was deeper than Starfire who had started to meditate along with the half demon in her spare time.
What is she doing in her room? He wondered, and went to knock on the door. His fist boomed as it hit the door, and he regretted having doing so. He didn't like disturbing Raven. It was dangerous, for him and her.
"Starfire, for the last time," Raven said from behind the door, but she stopped just as she opened up the door and saw Cyborg standing there presenting a small box.
Raven had been expecting Starfire to come and plead with her to let her meditate with her, or to ask is Raven liked her gift, yet another time. In fact she would have expected anyone over Cyborg, even Beast Boy who had forgotten about her birthday.
"What?" she said, her voice cracking, and her eyes emptying. She didn't let them wander to the box that her friend was carrying.
"Did I say happy birthday yet?" Cyborg said, smiling. Raven smiled weakly in return, and looked up at his red eye.
"You did," she said simply. She let her eyes wander now down to the little box. Cyborg saw them fall, and he placed it in her hand.
Slowly she opened it, and saw the key lying on the white background of the box. Raven felt her eyes widen, and she stroked the key with her middle and index finger. She closed her eyes, and kept the picture of the key in her mind.
"Is this to" but she was cut off by Cyborg's sharp nod. He smiled down at her and shrugged.
"You helped build her," he muttered, and rubbed the back of his neck. "So now you have to drive her." Raven shuddered at his words, and he laughed at her, told her that they would go on a drive later, he needed to eat, and she was obviously busy.
"I like it better than the bracelet," she said to herself, and he heard.