Chapter Two
At the Titan Tower
The Titans entered their towering home, Robin went to the control room, Star went into the kitchen, Cyborg and Beast Boy went into Beast Boy's room to play their new video game on Beast Boy's little television, and Raven walked past Beast Boy's open door and into her own room. When she entered her room she sighed heavily and emptied the bag of things she had gotten from the mall onto her bed and threw the white and purple plastic bag away. She walked into her own bathroom and turned the shower on all hot water and replaced the dark purple inner plastic lining of the shower curtain, leaving the thick cloth part out of the tub's wall. She walked back out of the bathroom and to her bed and picked up the packet of incense sticks and picked one of the darkly colored straws and grabbed her incense holder and lighter. She locked her room door and proceeded back into the bathroom and carefully slid the stick into it's holder and lit it, holding up the lighter and as she put it down the flames nipped at the palm of her other hand but she didn't try to stop it. The smoke slowly filled the room but she left the door cracked, she used the hand that didn't have a fresh burn on it to undo her cape and drape it over the counter, she slipped the straps of her leotard off and allowed it to fall to the floor, then she unsnapped her sleeveless bra and took her underwear off and got into the shower, ignoring the throbbing pain in her hand. The water ran down her back as she washed her hair and then proceeded to wash the remainder of her body and subsequently opened some small wounds she had received in fighting that hadn't fully healed. Her blood was darker than most but still red, she looked down in the water and saw the tiny droplets disperse, then as she got out of the shower and wrapped herself in a towel she began thinking, the sight of her own blood disgusted her, not because she was afraid of blood in any way but because of it's hue, her blood wasn't like human blood, even Starfire and Beast Boy had blood that looked like any other humans', but hers looked inhuman. She felt her chest seize up and she started to slightly hyperventilate. She had to fight her emotions though; she didn't want anyone to get hurt; she reached out with her hand and took hold of the door knob pushing the door open. Then she remembered the little burn on her hand and it started throbbing again, she needed to go bandage it she decided. She went over to something that looked very much like a casket and opened it, rather than there being a dead body there was another black leotard, a few other capes, some other changes of clothes, and two night gowns. She picked up one of them and slipped it over her head, allowing the towel to drop then she slipped on a new pair of underwear and gathered up her old clothes and threw them in a hamper with her hand that wasn't burnt. She went to the door, hitting a few numbers on a keypad causing it to unlock and open. She quietly walked past Beast Boy's door, where he and Cyborg were still playing the video game, barely holding consciousness but utterly engrossed in their activity. She came to the place where the control room connected to the kitchen, she glanced into the control room, instinctively remaining aware of her surroundings as best she could, Robin was sitting in his usual spot on the couch watching a movie, and Starfire was curled up at the other end of it sleeping. Everything there was normal; they were all just normal people, except for her. She quietly walked into the kitchen, sighing lightly, but remaining unnoticed. She opened a cabinet and got out some medicine, gauze, and medical tape. She took a swap and began carefully dabbing the medicine on the wound, especially slowly, it hurt more that way but somehow in her mind she deserved pain and she wasn't even aware that she was doing it. She was so busy putting the medicine along the somewhat raw blistered area on her palm that she didn't hear Beast Boy and Cyborg telling one another goodnight and Beast Boy heading toward the kitchen to get his midnight tofu bread and tofu patty until he was near the door. She didn't want him to see her hand and start asking questions, and for that matter she didn't really want him to talk to her and start cracking jokes, she really was not in the mood. She quickly and quietly pushed the medical utensils she had back out of the way and quickly went to the far end of the island in the middle of the kitchen and sat against it, hugging her knees quietly and holding her breath, but the longer she did the more futile it became, because being this quiet only left her alone with her thoughts, and Beast Boy's incessant chatter, mimicking video game dialogue. She felt her heart seem to swell painfully as she fought back tears and then without warning a burst of her dark energy filled the room causing a wooden vase that belonged to Beast Boy to fall off its perch on the edge of a counter in front of her. Beast Boy turned to see what the thud was as Raven's tears started to brim over. She fought it and got a semblance of control of her emotions just as Beast Boy stood from kneeling down to pick up the exotic flowers he kept in the vase. As he turned he saw Raven sitting there and jumped slightly startled.
"Well that explains inanimate objects spontaneously flying around. Raven what are you doing in here and in the floor?"
"I-" Raven began, but couldn't think of a very good excuse, "I came in here to..." she began to tell him the truth about her burn but she began to cry a little, it wasn't that the burn hurt that much, it was that she wouldn't have even had the burn had she pulled away from the fire, but she couldn't figure out why she didn't want to. All she really wanted was for the fire to engulf her and allow her to return to the ashes and devastation from which her existence spawned. Not being able to speak without her crying becoming worse she just put her forehead on her knees and began trying to regain control of her tears. She held out her hand so Beast Boy could see.
He shook off the shock of seeing Raven's emotions so overt, or seeing that she had them at all for that matter and decided to try to comfort her. She might try to kill him but he had to do what was morally right, she was a girl, a teammate, a friend to one degree or another, and she was crying so it was his job.
And there was an odd nagging feeling in his chest when he saw her like this, he reached out and grasped either side of her hand without touching the burn and looked at it, "Yikes, that's a little brutal not to be a battle wound."
Raven continued crying slightly, quieting a little her voice as soft and meek as it had ever been that anyone could remember, "It was my fault, I burnt it with a lighter, and I came in here to put some gauze on it."
"Accidents happen, here I'll help you," he pulled her up off the floor and led her over to the counter and went about carefully medicating and bandaging the burn, "Why were you hiding though?"
Raven had stopped crying but still wasn't back to her normal self completely so she didn't push Beast Boy's help away, she didn't respond but just breathed deeply.
He chuckled after a minute, "I guess you wouldn't have hid if you wanted me to know, huh?"
She nodded slightly and proceeded to walk away, just as she was about to exit the kitchen she turned to him and without making eye contact and in a more normal tone said, "Thanks, and by the way, don't ever touch me when I'm crying again, something bad might happen, I might hurt you..."
"Um, you're welcome, and uh... okay?" he said in a confused tone, but she had already left, 'Hurt me? Well if you don't want my help then just say so...' and he went back to eating his midnight tofu meal.