Chapter 6: Geese-a-laying
On the sixth day of Christmas,
my true love sent to me
Six geese a-laying,
Five golden rings,
Four calling birds,
Three French hens,
Two turtle doves,
And a partridge in a pear tree
Raven stepped down the stairs quietly. It was early. The sun wouldn't be rising for a few minutes or so. She had decided to look for Ebony while the others were still sleeping.
The little bird had grown on her and she wanted it back.
She started over by the windows in case Ebony had been trying to get outside. The frosted windows held dust, and nothing more. She wiped a hand over the glass to look outside.
It was the first snowfall. A world of fresh white snow was about Titan Island. No doubt they would be spending the day out in the snow. At least there she could pelt the guys with snowballs and not be suspicious.
Raven moved toward the television next carefully stepping over the game controllers. Her breath came out in puffs. Cyborg wasn't up yet to activate the tower and start the heat. She didn't mind, the cold didn't really bother her half-demon body.
She peered behind the television and around the couch. There still wasn't any hint of a bird. No feathers, peck marks or 'gifts from above'.
"Where are you?" She mumbled out after a while of fruitless searching.
"Talking to yourself?" Came a voice in reply. Raven froze recognizing the voice. Biting her lip she turned around to face the stairs, and Robin.
"I was just, looking for something." Raven added casually trying to get a good look at her leader still bathed in the early morning shadows.
"I see, pretty early to be up." He moved further into the living room where Raven could see him. Surprisingly Robin was dressed in baggy black sweat pants and a white shirt.
"I wanted to find it before anyone got up," Raven mumbled averting her gaze.
"What, you didn't think I slept in spandex did ya?" Robin added noticing Raven's surprise.
"I suppose not," She responded.
A silence fell for a second before Raven turned noticing a change. The sun had begun to rise. Robin yawned moving closer to take a seat on the couch. Reluctantly Raven took a seat on the couch. She made sure to leave a good amount of space between her and him.
"I noticed it was the first snow, in the holiday spirit I'm going to let the team off for a snow day."
"Good of you," Raven said absentmindedly. She had been watching the sun make a slow ascent filling the tower with light.
"Then tomorrow there's a Christmas parade I know Starfire will want to see." She heard him move on the couch.
Guards pulling back up she turned back to him. He had been leaning in closer seemingly examining her.
"You seem side-tracked, what's up?" He could see her and she couldn't see him. Raven suddenly hated his mask, the one-way mirror.
"Is that a feather?" Raven asked suddenly noticing a black bit stuck to his shirt.
Robin looked down and pulled the small black feather off. "Yea, the real reason I'm up is there's quite a commotion going up a few floors. Some bird got in the tower and Beast Boy was awaken by it pecking on him. So of course he had to get Cyborg to chase it down. I heard the noise and woke up. One second out the door and I end up in a mess of arms, legs and feathers."
Raven swallowed hard. She needed an excuse to get away and save the bird. And how did it get in Beast Boy's room?
"It's actually quite funny, they haven't caught it yet." Robin raved on smiling now.
"I think I'll go save this bird, wouldn't want them two barging into my room using this bird as an excuse." Her lie came out smoothly.
Robin laughed. "Have fun, make sure to be down around noon, it's when we'll be organizing snowball fight teams."
Raven got up but turned back to him smirking. "Boys against girls?"
"Of course."
With that she turned heading up to save her bird.
"Boys against girls!" Beast Boy called wildly when everyone was piled at the titan front door. Everyone was wearing winter clothes instead of their costumes for the outdoors. It was a strange but welcomed change.
"We shall be victorious, yes?" Starfire bounced around happily next to Raven. Raven had just went over the rules with Starfire. Anything went, as long as they only threw snowballs and didn't use their powers.
Raven nodded to the girl already planning the boys demise. Two of them had practically scared her bird to death when she had finally rescued it, and the other was a one-way mirror.
"Ladies first, we'll give you five minutes." Cyborg grinned holding open the door.
"Hurray!" Starfire shouted first out the door. Raven made sure to give the three a death glare before following into the snow draft.
"Does this location look suitable?" Starfire finally stopped after the distance from the front door was sufficient.
"Yup, get ready." She grabbed some snow as Starfire did the same. The two smoothed them into balls and Raven used her power to levitate them.
"But did you not say we could not use our powers?" Starfire questioned as she watched the glowing black snow.
"Well we have to get them good first, then we'll play fair." Raven put out smoothing another snow ball. Starfire nodded as if she agreed and continued making snow balls.
When they heard the boys approaching Raven had near thirty snowballs floating about. She moved them over out of sight behind a tree.
Starfire giggled pointing to the boys who were grinning madly. Cyborg had his arms full of snowballs while the other two were armed with a few each.
"Ready to loose?" Beast Boy yelled pointing his thumb at the ground.
Raven rolled her eyes. "Bring it on." She hissed. Starfire snickered beside her. From where they were the floating barrage of snow was just to their left.
Beast Boy threw the first and Robin followed. The two girls ducked the first few. Unfortunately Cyborg then ran closer, aiming carefully and throwing a bunch. Robin and Beast Boy followed behind scooping up more snow.
Cyborg's got both the girls first, wetting their hair and resulting in the two falling over into the snow bank.
Sputtering Raven got up first. The three boys were almost hovering over them now. Her temper had flared a moment.
"Shall we now?" Starfire asked brushing white snow from her damp red hair.
Raven grinned and moved the snowballs into their view.
"Oh my-" Beast Boy sputtered and stepped back.
"RUN!" Cyborg yelled turning and retreating. Robin and Beast Boy tripped over each other in their haste to get away.
"Cheaters!" Robin called back just as the three thought they were safe.
Raven threw the snow lumps at the boys. All three yelped for mercy as the snow hit and knocked them down half burying them.
"Have we won?" Starfire asked watching the pile. Raven gave a glance, various arms and legs were twitching from under the pile of snow.
Well she certainly felt better.
"I'd say so." She spared her best friend a rare smile as the two made their way to the fallen team.
"Che-aters," Cyborg called after he sputtered out snow.
"We were only, how Raven said 'getting you good'," Starfire smiled innocently watching the three frozen boys climb out of the snow.
"Surrender?" Raven asked threateningly raising another snowball.
The three panicked quickly waving their arms in surrenderance.
"I'm having none of that, I think I'll try something less dangerous, like sledding over cracked ice," Beast Boy grumbled brushed snow from his green jacket.
"Raven?" Starfire tugged at Ravens dark purple sweater.
"Hmm?" She answered absentmindedly. Raven was still relishing in the sight of three sore losers brushing ice from their selves.
"What are those?" She pointed off to the right. Raven followed her arm and almost choked.
She had heard the song, but for a second she had thought maybe...
No, they had found a way; near the shore of Titan Island was a flock of six geese. All sitting in sand where the snow had not reached.
"They're geese," Raven responded automatically moving past the girl. She didn't even really need to think about what they were.
Raven covered the ground quickly, conscious of four pairs of eyes on her now. One of which had put these geese there. The notion flared her temper as her snow shoes met wet sand.
She scanned the laying geese for one specific goose.
Finding it near the middle she carefully passed through the herd. The one with a purple ribbon on it's neck never moved as she approached.
When she got to it she noticed it was asleep. In fact they all were. Wind rustled it's white feathers, but that was the only movement.
Carefully she untied the bow and slipped the paper out.
Raven,
Got geese?
-An Admirer
Raven growled lowly under her breath. Mockery.
She wished she had hit the boys with more snow.
Evening her breath she turned back to head back to her team mates. A legimate lie sprung to her mind as she slipped the bow and paper into her sweat pants pocket.
"A gift, from the city you think?" Robin asked unsure. Raven nodded to the group firmly.
"Can we keep them?" Beast Boy asked in between turning into a goose. He nudged the white ones, none of which deemed him important enough to bother with.
"Dude I am not cleaning up after geese, Beast Boy and Silky are enough pets," Cyborg added and proceeded to run from an angry green goose.
"I have to agree, although they are quite," Starfire paused searching for a word. "Charming, it may be best to give them to someone."
"There might be a pet store in the city who would come and pick them up," Robin scratched his head unsure.
Raven nodded before swiftly turning and heading toward the tower, she needed some tea and a plan...
The rest of the day he watched Raven in a fury about the tower. She slammed cabinets harder, her remarks were more snide than usual and three of Starfire's newly bought Christmas bulbs had already shattered into oblivion.
All the time he remembered earlier down at the beach. She had dismissed the geese all together passing off a ridiculous lie to them all. He saw the skeptical glances the others passed. It was only a few more days before the others started questioning her, as he would.
He smiled passing by the angry goddess. She never gave him a look as she heatedly stormed up the stairs.
When she was gone he headed to his room to arrange for the next gift. She would just love it.
Yay! All of the encouraging reviews make me oh so happy, I have the best readers/reviewers! Glad to see I can actually write a mystery-ish story (my first attempt).
I plan on updating every other day so I should be finished in... -counts- 14 days?
And I have decided...there will be only ONE ending. It just works better that way, and it was my original plan (not to mention reviewers and my sis convinced me).
Finally the gifts get tough. Muwhahah! Review on your way out. Thanks!
-Dragonslayer527
p.s. XD is a smiley, its like the only one that will upload on FF.
p.s.s. About BB's small fortune: well his parents died, so they had to leave him something right?