Author's Note: Some specific revelations in this chapter and some dialogue may seem irrelevant and/or unexpected/unbelievable, however I do insist that I AM going places with these seemingly-pointless facts.  Not only are a lot of them used to mold character and serve as a good subplot (not to mention gives me things to do with characters when I dunno what to do with them) but also... well, you shall see.  Happy reading.  And Happy belated Halloween.  And Happy Thanksgiving.  And Happy Ramadan.  And Happy Eid.  And, what the hell, in case I forget or don't get the chance-- Happy Christmas to boot.

Chapter 9: 7:00: Crazy

7:00

"Would you cut it out already?" Beast Boy cried, annoyed. Cyborg stopped, his victory now somehow hollow.

"You're right," Cyborg said, falling back on the couch. "It's kinda... pointless, now. I mean... I beat you. Now what?"

Beast Boy sat down next to Cyborg, staring at the screen blankly. "I dunno..."

"We could watch a movie..." Cyborg offered.

"Player's broken," Beast Boy said. "And the cable's out."

"I've been meaning to fix that thing..." Cyborg muttered.

"And pay the bills..." Beast Boy said. "We could... play Super Sharp Ninja Nine..."

"I beat that game last week..." Cyborg replied.

"Yeah, me too," said Beast Boy.

The boys sat in silence a moment, looking at the screen. Suddenly, a horrible thought occurred to both of them at the same time.

"Oh God..." said Cyborg, in realization as he looked at Beast Boy.

"You mean..." Beast Boy replied, sitting up in terror.

"We have to talk!" Cyborg cried.

"No way!" Beast Boy said. "Has it come to that?"

But they just sat in silence longer.

"So... how does this conversation thing go anyway?" Beast Boy asked after a moment.

"I dunno," Cyborg said with a shrug. "I mean, we talk..."

"Yeah, but we also do other things at the same time... I can't just... focus on a conversation!" Beast Boy folded his arms, pouting.

Cyborg bit his lip. "We could... talk about Raven?"

"Again?" Beast Boy said. "I thought we settled that conversation. Dead and buried. She's fine and Robin's got the crazies."

"I think they're both crazy," Cyborg snapped.

Beast Boy raised an eyebrow at him skeptically. "Cy... have you spent any time with her all day?"

"I... uh... no... but..."

"Exactly," Beast Boy said. "I have. She's different, sure, but she's just as cool– if not cooler. And... she actually enjoys spending time with me."

"You see, that right there tells me something's not right," Cyborg said.

"Hey!" Beast Boy declared. "Is it so hard do accept that Raven might actually have fun with me?"

"OK, let me think how many contradictory statements a sentence can have before it's considered totally psychotic..." Cyborg said. "Hm... Raven... fun... with Beast Boy... that's three, right there..."

"Oh shut up," Beast Boy snapped. "You're just jealous 'cause she likes me and not you!"

Cyborg rolled his eyes. "Yes, Beast Boy. I'm jealous of you. Maybe you're right. Raven isn't the crazy one. You are!"

Beast Boy folded his arms and pouted. "I like things as they are, OK? Don't go meddling, Cyborg, because everything is great. Things are good, people are content, why can't you let sleeping dogs lie?"

"Because people aren't content!" Cyborg said. "Look at Robin! Has he come out of his room once today, other than the time he saw that kid come over? And about that kid–"

"That kid," Beast Boy interrupted. "Was a live-in patient at an insane asylum! You're gonna believe a wack job over one of your own best friends? Do you remember where that got you last time?"

"I remember," Cyborg said, calming down. "All too well. I also remember the fear in Robin's eyes when he told us what happened all those months ago. He saw something in that little head of his, Beast Boy, and whatever it was scared the hell out of him. He's got that same look, BB. I saw it when I went in there to talk to him."

"Aw, no, man, don't do this!" Beast Boy screamed, putting his hands over his ears and shaking his head violently. "I like Raven, dude, how she is, I accept her and her quirks and... and we had fun today! Whoever I spent an hour with today wasn't evil, Cyborg! I would know! She was..." All of a sudden, Beast Boy was lost for words as he stared at something at the wall. "She was..." Suddenly, he turned to Cyborg, angry again. "That was the first time in all the years I've known her that I actually remember her laughing at any of my jokes– openly! And I don't mean that fluttery pink Raven we saw inside that mirror, I mean the real Raven. She... She was happy, Cyborg, really happy, and now you want to go and ruin that by accusing her of lying!"

"I don't want to accuse her of lying," Cyborg protested. "I don't want to accuse her of anything, at least not yet. I never meant that Raven was the problem. All I'm saying is, something isn't right. Raven's showing more emotion, Robin's showing less of himself, and something in the air just doesn't breathe right. I'm as much Raven's friend as you are, and I'd follow her to the ends of the earth if it took us that far, you know that. I doubted her once, and that was a mistake, and I told myself I never would again. I don't want to condemn her without evidence, Beast Boy, but I don't want to condemn Robin either. What do we have that tells us he's insane?"

"Raven's word!" Beast Boy cried.

"Exactly!" Cyborg grinned and pointed at Beast Boy, as if he'd finally made his point. "That's all we have to go on. And granted, it's a reliable source, what with her knowledge of brains and all, but she's been acting a little wacky herself, hasn't she? Something is wrong here, Beast Boy, and I can't figure out, for the life of me, just what the hell it is!"

"Maybe it's you!" Beast Boy declared, jumping to his feet. "You overgrown trash can!"

Rather than take this as an insult, Cyborg merely frowned. "Or..." he said. "Maybe... it's all of us."

Confused by the statement, but unwilling to show it, Beast Boy opened his mouth to fire back another defensive insult when the alarm sounded. Both boys looked around, bewildered.

"Raven again?" Cyborg asked, curiously.

"Nah," Beast Boy said. "I think this is the real deal."

Larkin paused as the echo of a siren drifted into the room and the crack under Robin's began to flash red.

Robin frowned at the door himself, then looked back to Raven impassively. "Hey," he said. "Who knows? Maybe you'll get lucky and I'll die in battle." He walked swiftly to the door, threw it open, and walked out, leaving Larkin to stare furiously behind him.

"One can only hope," he muttered, before following the teenage boy to the living room.

For a change, it was Starfire who greeted the other four and explained the situation. It seemed Mumbo Jumbo had somehow made a cat in a tree disappear and was threatening to do the same to the Jump City Bank.

Robin stared at Starfire, unblinking a moment. Finally, he sighed. "Well, this couldn't have come at a worse time," he said.

"Mm, indeed," Raven muttered, eying him intently.

He ignored her and looked to his other friends. "Come on, Titans," he said, unenthusiastic. "Let's go."

His friends watched him drag his feet over to the elevator. Raven sighed, then joined him without a word, leaving the other three Titans behind.

"I said something wrong?" Starfire asked, wide-eyed, looking from Cyborg to Beast Boy. "They are angry with me, yes?"

Beast Boy and Cyborg sighed collectively.

"Stop doing that!" Starfire cried, stamping her feet on the ground. "With the apathy and the act of exhaling dispassionately... It is unpleasing!"

The boys raised an eyebrow at Starfire curiously before joining their two friends downstairs, not saying a word to each other.

As the elevator doors closed, Starfire glowered in frustration. "What has happened to my friends? I fear they've all gone mad!"

Abby looked up at the dark tower forebodingly. Just after sunset, the tall edifice was black. Nonetheless, for little Ray's sake, she rang the doorbell again.

When silence greeted them, she turned to Ray apologetically. "I'm sorry, sweetheart," she said, kneeling to his level. "But it looks like nobody's home."

Ray seemed not to hear her as he walked up to the door and looked up at it. He turned his head over his shoulder and she shivered as he reminded her for the second time that day of The Exorcist.

"Where could they have gone?" he asked her, sounding hopeless. "You said Robin knew we were coming, didn't you?"

"He was the one who told us to come," Abby verified. "I don't know what could have happened."

But Ray shook his head, once more looking up at the Tower. "No," she said. "There's only one thing that could pull Robin away from anything, and that's a city in danger. We have to find out where the trouble is and get to them." And with that, he marched right past her to the edge of the water.

Abby, however, simply raised a skeptical eyebrow at the kid and bit her lip. "Uh... Ray? That's, er, heroic and all, but, um, you seem to be forgetting one minor detail..."

Ray looked at her in annoyed cynicism. "Oh? And what's that?"

"You're in the body of a ten year old boy," Abby said simply. "And a weak one at that."

Ray fumed. "I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself! If you don't want to come, I don't need you!"

As Ray readied himself to fly over the water, Abby folded her arms smugly. "Right. Do you have a driver's licence? Can you tell me what you'll tell the other Titans when they ask you what the hell you're doing there? Do you have access to all hospital records? Can you make up your own alibis for where you've been for the past few hours?"

Ray blinked at her blankly, then grinned in that childlike way that said "please!" just with the look in those shattered brown eyes.

Abby laughed and raised her eyebrows at Ray, complacently. "Humph. I thought not."

"Wait..." Ray said, a thought occurring to him. "Hold that thought." He marched up to the house and thought a moment.

How can I do this... Raven thought. Gotta tap into Larkin's powers again... let's see... Raven searched her mind for Larkin's physical power center, searching for the dark powers he left behind.

 Raven thought. Raven searched her mind for Larkin's physical power center, searching for the dark powers he left behind.

And just by thinking about it, the lock broke off the door. Raven grinned. But at the back of the mind, she knew that the more she used his powers, the closer she came to unlocking the door to the full potential of Larkin's deadly powers. And she didn't know if she could control them.

"Ray!" Abby exclaimed, horrified. "You're not breaking and entering?"

"No," said Ray, grinning. "I'm just entering and taking. Stay here, I'll be right back."

Abby just folded her arms crossly.

"Hey," said Ray, rolling his eyes. "It's my house anyway. Relax, I just need to grab something." And before she could protest, he was gone into the shadows of Titans' Tower.

Mumbo cackled hysterically as he beheld the bank with the glee of a child staring at presents on Christmas Eve.

"I think it's time for you to do a disappearing act."

Mumbo turned to give a clever retort to the teen superheroes, but stopped short as he observed their stance.

The team was visibly divided, with Robin at the front as always, but Beast Boy stayed far from him towards the back, behind Raven who was watching Robin with some curious negative emotion. Meanwhile, on Robin's other side stood Cyborg proudly, behind whom stood Starfire, looking terribly perplexed. And even their stances looked half-hearted, as if each and everyone of them was preoccupied– as if this whole thing was nothing more than a nuisance distracting them from their oh-so-much-more-important lives.

Needless to say, this did not please Mumbo. He put his hands on his hips, furiously. "That's it?" he said. "That wasn't even that witty! Oh come on, you're not even trying!"

Robin looked to Cyborg and cocked an apathetic eyebrow. Cyborg merely shrugged in reply, then glared at Beast Boy as if involved in some petty child's fight, his expression just as effective as it would have been had he stuck out his tongue.

Mumbo couldn't believe his eyes. He threw his arms up in the air. "I go through all the trouble of putting on a show and who shows up to see it? Some cheap imitation of the Teen Titans who don't even have the decency to show a little malice!"

The Titans merely watched him mutely.

"Fine then!" Mumbo exclaimed. "If all you're going to do is watch the show, then by all means, watch the show while I make money disappear–"

Within a second, he was on the ground, Robins foot on his neck, threatening to press.

"Not so fast, Mumbo," he said.

"Look again, Robin," Mumbo returned, grinning.

Robin frowned, "Wha...?" he said, but before he could blink, Mumbo was gone, behind him in fact, and knocked the boy down.

"I think we've had enough of that," said Cyborg, aiming his cannon at him. Mumbo merely grinned and threw a playing card at him, which lodged itself in the half-robot's arm, causing sparks to fly. "Damn!" Cyborg exclaimed, pulling the card out.

"Hehehe!" Mumbo cried as he ran towards the bank, only to be tackled by a green tiger.

"Cyborg's circuits are screwed up enough without your help," Beast Boy snapped, pinning the man to the ground. Mumbo gave a mighty kick and the small-framed superhero went flying, transforming into a pterodactyl midair and giving a loud screech to show his annoyance.

There was a blast of green at Mumbo's feet and he jumped and spun around to meet the red-haired heroine, smiling at him with glaring green eyes, another star bolt kindled in her hand. He sneered at her and reached into his cloak to pull out another trick.

"Have enough in there for all of us?"

Mumbo spun around to meet Robin. Suddenly, he noticed Beast Boy and Cyborg had joined him, surrounding him in a tight circle. Furiously, he glared at each in turn, a truly evil grin spreading across his face.

"Mumbo always saves his best tricks for the grand finale..."

They all prepared for the worst, each Titan in battle position as he reached into his cloak... and pulled out a pair of dice.

"Huh?" Beast Boy said, voicing what they were all thinking. With the Titans caught off guard by pesky confusion, Mumbo threw the dice. A pair of ones. Snake eyes. The dice emitted a cloud of gray smoke and then, suddenly, Starfire shrieked.

Scales. Cold scales in darkness cutting into her arms, her midriff, her shoulders... something was squeezing her.

Within the blink of an eye a giant anaconda had wrapped itself around all four of them.

"Raven!" Beast Boy called out, painfully, running out of breath. "Raven, where are you?!"

"Um... Ray?" Abby asked after a while of driving around the city. "Where exactly are we going?"

"Left," Ray said.

"Excuse me?"

"Turn left. At this next intersection."

Abby glanced at Ray in her rearview mirror. "How do you know..."

"Robin and Larkin's mental signals," said Ray, frowning. "They're... near here. A little out of range. Left, go left."

"Downtown?"

"Downtown."

Larkin floated above the roof of the building, observing the strangely passive fight. Neither side had seemed very enthusiastic about the battle, using no unique moves or strategies... until the snake had arrived.

"Damn..." Larkin muttered to himself. He'd been hoping that he could stay out of the fight. But if he did not intervene, they would all die.

But is that such a bad thing? Larkin was stunned at the thought. Why was he taking so much care in keeping them alive? The answer was simple. To use them, of course. They were the perfect tools to achieve his own ends. They could get him anything he asked for. Money, power, revenge... it was so simple. If he lost one of them, the team would suffer as a whole. It was best to keep them all alive.

Yes, that was best.

Of course, it had nothing to do with the agonizing way Beast Boy's face was screwed up in pain, his neck slowly acquiring a new accessory as the serpent wound itself around them tighter. Soon, his head would be gone and he would be crushed before he could have the chance to suffocate.

Starfire's eyes, the vengeful fire gone from them now, wide in pure terror as she struggled against the reptilian grip. She let out a bloodcurdling scream as the snake bit into her shoulder. She began to bleed.

Larkin turned away.

They must be kept alive. For the greater purpose.

As the fog dissipated, Mumbo began giggling madly, dancing around on the spot. Finally, he turned to the bank, rubbing his hands gleefully. He got ready to work his magic when...

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

"Huh?" But as Mumbo turned around, to his great surprised, there was a sharp stabbing pain in his nose. Blood gushed everywhere and his face and head began to throb like the thunderclouds of the Migraine from Hell. This was only the beginning. He fell over backwards, stunned not only from the pain, but from the trauma of such an unexpected phenomena.

Instantly, the snake disappeared and the Titans ran to detain the fallen Mumbo Jumbo.

Meanwhile, Raven rubbed her knuckles, frowning. "Ow," she said. "That hurt more than it should have."

Beast Boy threw his arm around her shoulders and stared at her in awe. "Wow, Rae, I mean, I've seen you do some pretty impressive stuff, but the way you treated hand-to-hand combat was like it was beneath you!"

Raven gave him a lopsided smile, still rubbing her sore knuckles. "I can see why now. That bitch broke my hand."

"That bitch broke my face!" wailed Mumbo from the ground, trying to jump at Raven but being successfully restrained by Cyborg and Robin, looking over their shoulders warily at the dark girl. She merely gave them a proud smile and shrugged.

Suddenly, she found herself finding it difficult to breathe and feared the bite of the giant South American snake and breathed in to scream– when she was nearly choked to death by a mass of red hair!

"Oh Raven, I knew you would come to our rescue!" Starfire exclaimed. "You are truly the daughter of the benevolent Zorba!"

"I assume that's like a God on your planet?" Raven said, as the boys went to restrain Mumbo further until the police arrived. Starfire looked stunned.

"He is a hero, known for his resistance without violence..." she muttered. "He once stopped a galactic war by refusing to eat until it ended. Revered by both sides, neither of which wished to see him harmed, his protest was a success."

"Huh," said Raven. "Well, I hate to burst your bubble, but I'm no Ghandi."

"He is a similar figure in Earth society, I have read of him," said Starfire, sounding ecstatic that she understood an Earth reference. "But you misunderstand. Zorba is also known for ending the tyranny of Emperor Larg of the Crobis system simply by slapping him across the face. Just as you demonstrated."

Raven smiled. "Well, I guess I'm the daughter of Zorba then," she said. Starfire grinned happily. Raven tilted her head, as if considering something. Finally, her smile broadened and she embraced her friend.

Surprised for only a moment, Starfire closed her eyes and returned the embrace.

"Are we there yet?"

"No."

"... Are we there yet?"

"No."

"Oh... ... ... Are we there yet?"

"NO!" Abby turned around full in her seat as they stopped at a stop light to see an innocent-looking Ray grinning back up at her. "Ray– Raven– would you please shut up I am trying to drive here!"

"Oh I'm sorry, Abby," Ray said, his voice nothing but sugarcoated sarcasm. "I didn't know I was distracting you so! I was just trying to be a kid, you know, like you told me to."

Abby began to grind her teeth. "Yeah," she said. "But you're more mature than the whole 'are we there yet' thing. So please, sit tight, we'll get there... wherever there is."

Ray leaned back in his seat and folded his little arms.

Abby frowned at him. "What are you grinning at?" she asked.

Ray merely shrugged, still grinning. "The light's been green for twenty seconds now."

It was then that Abby became aware of the honking cars. Giving out a frustrated growl like a wolf on steroids, she turned back to the wheel. "Alright, alright, I'm moving already!" she yelled out the window. She gave Ray a dirty look in her rearview mirror. "And you refused to tell me this because...?"

Ray just shrugged again. "I was wondering how long it would take you to notice."

Robin looked over at the girls, embracing, like friends as the police arrived. His mind was reeling.

"What's wrong, Rob?"

Robin jumped at Cyborg's voice, but did not look at him. "He could have let us die... why did he save us?"

Cyborg hesitated a moment. "Rob...?"

But Robin shook it off and turned to his friend. "Don't worry about me, Cyborg," Robin said. "I'm just rambling."

"Right..." said Cyborg slowly. But before he could ask Robin any questions, the police wanted him to answer some.

Cyborg distracted with the police, Robin shirked his duties as chief of relations with the J.C.P.D and joined his other friends. But he hesitated a moment, observing them from afar curiously.

Beast Boy's arm was around Raven comfortably, and for once she didn't look upset about it. She was chatting amiably with Starfire, who suddenly seized Raven's hand and started jumping up and down excitedly. Rather than roll her eyes at this obscene display of emotion, Raven just grinned and tossed her head back and laughed, her hood coming down to reveal her eyes sparkling in the light of the street lamps.

She was... They were...

"Happy..." Robin murmured. He took a deep breath, mustering his mettle and approached them.

While Beast Boy and Starfire kept laughing, Raven fell unusually silent, her expression turning grave.

"Robin," she said, forcing a smile. "Have you too come to congratulate me on my punching skills?"

"Yes," said Robin, glad for the excuse to speak. "That was very... unpredictable of you."

Raven eyed him warily a moment, and then seemed to smile knowingly. Strangely, Robin found the expression forcing his own lips to turn upwards, though he was unsure why. Something seemed to be different about the person before him.

"I believe that's a very accurate way of describing it." Raven said, her smile quickly turning into a smirk.

"Hey Robin!" Beast Boy cried. "How 'bout taking your team out for pizza? I'd say we deserve it!"

"Funny," said Robin, nonchalantly, "that half an hour ago we should all be in terrible moods, obviously bickering among ourselves, neither of us in a mood for a fight... And yet now, when we realized that apathy could be our downfall, we're much more appreciative of what we have. Wouldn't you agree, Raven?"

The girl merely smiled at Robin mysteriously. "It would seem so, Robin. But has our attitudes changed so much as to have eliminated our friendly conflicts completely?"

Robin eyed her uncertainly. "I'll get back to you on that."

"Well!" said Cyborg, coming up from behind them, the police already driving away with Mumbo in tow. "A good fight always gets that adrenalin rushing, doesn't it? I believe I heard Beast Boy mention pizza?"

"You better believe it, man," Beast Boy declared giving his friend a grin and a pat on the back. "Robin's treating!"

"I am not!" Robin protested, but to no avail as neither Beast Boy nor Cyborg were paying much heed.

"Sounds good to me," said Cyborg. "One condition, though. NO tofu!"

"Aw, man, that's the best part!" Beast Boy insisted.

Robin shook his head with a content smile. "Crazy..." he mumbled.

They squabbled about it all the way to the pizza parlor.

"Alright, smart one, now what?" Abby asked, coming to another intersection. She tapped her fingers on the wheel a moment and licked her lips. She rolled her eyes. "Ray, I'm talking to you," she said. When he did not reply, she sighed. "Look, I'm sorry for snapping at you earlier, and I'm sorry for putting you off track with that shopping trip, and I'm... Hell, what else do you want me to apologize for? But this is your life we're saving, so give up the silent treatment and–"

She cut herself off when she turned around and noticed Ray wasn't there. Or rather, his mind wasn't.

Suddenly, it became very cold inside the small Altima. Abby looked around, somehow strangely worried, then turned back to her ten-year-old companion. "Ray... Ray? Ray, wake up. Please?"

"Please..."

The word startled Abby out of her skin because it was not Ray who said it, though his lips moved. She turned and noticed frost forming on the windows. She rubbed her arms. "Ray, we have to go..."

"Go." The word was a direct order, but Abby did not know who was delivering it.

"Ray, I don't know..."

"No!" It was a shout now, and Abby didn't like it.

"Ray, stop it!" Abby screamed back.

"Pit."

"I won't let you scare me," Abby said, shaking her head, her eyes wide.

It was then that the boy turned, his eyes staring straight at her. They were empty, and somehow small in their tiny sockets, lonely. "You scare me," he whispered.

Abby frowned, then gasped in realization."

"You're... I read about this," she said, nodding her head up and down. "It's... Latin, Echo and Narcissus, or Echo and Pan... you're..."

"Or...?"

Abby grinned. "Abby," she said.

"Be," said the boy.

Abby nodded up and down. "Listen to me Ray. I'm not very good at this game. There was this book, about how an echo can return a totally different meaning... You're trying to talk to me. But Ray, I don't know what to say!"

"Say..." Ray whispered. "Say, say..."

Abby sighed. "Hang in there kid, I'll find them for you. Just, sit tight, alright?"

"Right!" Ray said adamantly.

Abby blinked. "I sure hope that was a hint," she said, before turning back to the wheel, turning on her blinker, and turning right. "Damn, this is crazy."

"Crazy..."