Author's Note: Ach... seems like forever since I last updated! Well, here is the next chapter.

Teen Titans are property of DC Comics and Cartoon Network


Chapter 2: Give It Up

Several days passed, but try as Robin might, he could not get Raven to continue their early morning conversation.

In a fit of desperation he demanded a mandatory training session down at the gym, where the collected team was assembled. Cyborg was exercising on his heavy lifting apparatus, and Beast Boy was sprinting as a cheetah on his specialized running machine. Starfire flew around the massive gym, leaving an incandescent green trail as she pummeled through training robots with surges of green starbolts. Robin grunted as he settled his weight back on the bench press and took in deep, calming breaths as sweat dripped from his forehead. Raven meditated in the distant corner of the gym, floating serenely above the floor and chanting under her breath.

"Ok, guys. Whose turn is it for training?" Robin asked in a conversational tone as he rubbed his neck with a towel.

"Mine! Mine!" Beast Boy yelled as he morphed out of his cheetah form. Unfortunately, he did not take into regard the treadmill under his feet and suddenly he crashed into the wall behind the rapidly-whirring machine. Cyborg sniggered, but lumbered over to give the green elf a hand.

"Actually… I believe that it is Raven's turn to spar with you," Starfire spoke, green eyes traveling to the cloaked figure at the end of the room.

Robin raised an eyebrow, gently wrapping cloth strips around his hands and wrists. The fighting gi that he had kept from his recent training session was now a little wrinkled and damp from the perspiration, but he was still alert. For some reason he anticipated this sparring session. It wasn't to show off his abilities and lecture the group on the importance of fighting without powers, but rather the fact that perhaps Raven was the only one who could give him a run for his money in pure, hand-to-hand combat.

"Raven?" Robin questioned, throwing his towel off to one corner of the fighting ring that was constructed onto the floor of the gym. His bare toes pressed down on the spongy material of the bright blue mats underneath his feet.

Raven looked up from her meditation, then sighed and drifted over, a hand snaking out of her cloak to undo the clasp. She had come prepared for the sparring session, Robin noticed in surprise. Raven let the dark blue fabric of her cloak pool onto the floor beside her as she padded barefoot onto the mats, her customary leotard replaced by a pair of track pants and a white t-shirt. Robin toed the mat experimentally, then stood straight and gave Raven a small nod. Raven returned the stiff bow with a nod of her own, then took in a deep breath and relaxed.

Silence reigned in the training room and Robin relished it as he quietly crouched into a fighting pose, the starched gi snapping at his refined movements. Raven was already in a cautious pose, both hands up and loose. Robin knew that Raven's martial arts expertise was founded in predominately defensive arts, so he settled with a quicker technique.

"What're you guys waiting for? Let's get this match started!" Beast Boy yelled, pumping up a fist as he clambered back up onto his running machine.

His call carried Robin's jump-spinning hook kick into a greater momentum, but Raven easily blocked the blurred kick and countered by ducking and executing a spinning kick the second Robin hit the ground. Robin landed and immediately performed a back-handspring, narrowly avoiding Raven's leg in the process. He landed once more and immediately ran back into the fight, his punches and kicks being deftly blocked, avoided, or even gently pushed away by Raven's careful movements. Robin reared back, changing tactics and fighting styles at the same time. Swaying a little in time to a rhythm that only he could hear, Robin dove back into the fray with a variety of spinning kicks and punches. Raven felt a fist fly up to her jaw and she flipped back, her flexible joints allowing her to turn that into a back-flip. She continued to flip several times, avoiding a string of devastating spinning kicks that would have otherwise taken her head clean off her shoulders.

Starfire, Cyborg, and Beast Boy momentarily paused in their own exercises to gaze upon the rare spectacle of a not-so-one-sided fight between the Boy Wonder and seemingly frail sorceress. Even after a few minutes of continuous fighting, neither was close to winning. Robin was bowled over by a heavy roundhouse kick to the stomach, and Raven felt herself teeter a little bit from a punch to the gut. Absently flicking the corner of her lips with a thumb, she forced her knees to buckle as she dropped under a surprisingly slow kick and shot right back up, her right palm connecting with Robin's chin. Stumbling back a few steps, Robin recovered, his teeth grit and eyemask narrowed. Raven mentally cursed at herself when she saw the rather angered state the Boy Wonder was reduced to, but she couldn't end the training session now. Crimson red flickered in her eyes as she then did the unexpected.

She rushed at him.

Robin frowned and held his ground, executing a kick to shove her back.

Raven side stepped to avoid the blow and countered with a spinning hook kick.

Robin caught her leg, grasped her ankle, and pulled her leg down, attempting an uppercut on Raven's unbalanced figure.

Raven grunted and swung herself out of the way, working on Robin's grip on her leg to keep her moderately balanced as she swung around his fist.

Using that momentum, she then launched her other foot in the air, the instep connecting to Robin's ear.

The heavy blow almost made Robin drop down for the count, but he struggled to his feet in three seconds and wearily brought his arms up to launch a melee of punches.

Raven blocked every one of them, finally seeing an opening. Robin had grabbed one of her blocking arms, but she used Robin's pull as a spring board to flip around him and avoid a blow to the chest.

She landed and turned sharply, breaking his hold on her and causing him to turn as well. A well-placed palm to the sternum had him shocked, but only for a moment. Suddenly he grabbed the hand, twisted her wrist, and flipped her to the ground, her arm bent at a slightly awkward angle behind her as he straddled her stomach. His breaths whistling through gritted teeth, he reared his arm back for a punch to the sternum.

Something glistened in Raven's eyes, something so foreign and unreal that Robin himself blinked, his arm still reared back. But something even more unreal took hold of his brain for a crucial second, something primal that he had always been warned to never accept when under duress. But it took hold of him, warping those blue eyes that stared at him to make him believe that she was taunting him, goading him on. Robin let out a loose growl.

"Rrrrgh!"

"Robin, don't!" Cyborg barked suddenly.

Robin's punch nearly blew a crater through the blue mats. Cyborg and Beast Boy hurried over to see the extent of the damage, while Starfire gently picked up Raven's cloak and fingered the material, a slightly panicked expression on her face. But the familiar sight of a black raven appearing through the gym floor alleviated her stress as a somewhat winded Raven emerged from her soul self. Her breaths coming out in awkward pants, she took her cloak from Starfire's outstretched hands and threw it around herself, hoping to disappear from within the liquid blue fabric.

Robin panted, his anger pooling through his arm and onto the mats in a crimson stream, the blood causing him to blink. It was only then that he felt the cold titanium arms lift him to his feet and force him to turn around, forcing him to face an almost livid blue eye, its cybernetic twin emotionless as always.

"Dude… I know that we've gotta be prepared… but…"

Beast Boy's voice faltered as the corny joke that usually ensued from his lips remained under covers.

"This isn't Gotham, Robin," Cyborg muttered suddenly. His lips were set in a firm line as he still held on to his leader. "It's been two years already, can't you see?"

Something terrible seized him, but Robin swallowed the lump at his throat and gently pushed Cyborg's hands away. He walked past the silent group, then stopped and turned his head slightly.

"…. I'll be back. If the alarm calls, then I'll get there."

"But…."

"I said I'll be back," Robin repeated firmly, beating down Starfire's plaintive rebuttal. Before anything more could be said, he walked out of the training room… alone.

"What's with him?" Beast Boy scoffed, gently reaching out a hand to the damaged mat. He let his fingers linger at the exposed sponge as his normally bright green eyes darkened to a more serious hue.

Cyborg sighed and rubbed his titanium scalp as if prompting his mechanical circuits to compute something for him. But he knew that no amount of computation could even begin to unravel the mystery that was the Titans' leader. Whatever morsel of information he found always resulted in being only a minor ingredient to a stew of endless conclusions, so in the end he simply gave up and let natural observation be his tool in predicting the Boy Wonder's moves. All that observation was collectively washed down the drain today, though, and now Cyborg found himself in a rising predicament. He turned around.

"Are you…" he blinked. He looked down at Beast Boy, who was still crouched over the damage. "Where's Raven?"

"Huh? Oh… I'm guessing the roof," Beast Boy replied, his eyes still trained on the mat. "Starfire probably followed her, so it's all good."

"Why do you keep staring at that mat?" Cyborg asked curiously.

Something strange glittered in the changeling's eyes, and Cyborg found himself even more miffed at the situation when Beast Boy suddenly stood up, his lips set in a firm line. Suddenly the prankster seemed more mature, more serious, even a little concerned.

"It's not what I'm looking at, Cy," Beast Boy explained in a quiet voice. His gaze lingered on the mat once more before he looked up at his friend. "It's what I smell from all of this."

At Cyborg's raised eyebrow, he continued, giving a half-hearted wave in the direction of the damaged mat. "I smell fear, Cyborg. Not just shock, but pure fear. Something so… solid, that it's still there."

Looking down, Cyborg followed Beast Boy's hand as the changeling mapped out a general area for his observation. Cyborg's eyes dimmed as he quietly recalled Robin's punch. A computer-generated video file played in his cybernetic eye, but he didn't need that to remember the almost savage nature that Robin acted with near the end of the training session. With a heavy sigh, Cyborg crossed his arms across his metallic chest.

"Well… I'd be scared too if Robin suddenly decided to black my eyes out," Cyborg muttered. "One kick of his could knock down Cinderblock... even if it looked physically impossible, so his fists at close range wouldn't be so pretty either. Probably felt some heavy amount of rage to do that much damage."

"That's the funny thing though," Beast Boy replied, although he did not smile. "He was scared too. If Raven was that scared something would've exploded… heck, maybe Robin would've. But it's…. I dunno."

"Uh huh. Well, with that said, it's your turn to clean that mess," Cyborg noted. Beast Boy blanched.

"What? B-But I just cleaned last week!"

"Your name's on the list, BB."

"…. Gosh, fine. I'll go clean it up. But only if you do the dishes and allow me to cook my tofu tonight!"

"As if that's ever gonna happen…"

"HEY!"

"Alright, alright! Jeez. Go start cleaning."

At Cyborg's statement, Beast Boy frowned but went over to the broom closet in the training room to retrieve a mop and bucket. Cyborg whistled a tune as he left the massive training hall, and soon Beast Boy was alone with a soapy bucket and a decidedly limp mop. With an apprehensive sigh he grabbed a replacement mat and took apart the damaged piece, but not before shuddering at the sudden influx of information from his heightened senses. He finished his cleaning an hour earlier than expected.

Evening had fallen into the city by the time Starfire ventured up to the roof. Contrary to Beast Boy's speculation, she had only hovered close to the roof and watched Raven from afar. Of course she was concerned for her friend, but years of continued restraint had shown her that Raven tended to deal with emotional issues better by herself. Only when Raven showed signs of stirring out of her meditation was when Starfire floated out from the stairwell.

Raven had already showered and changed back into her crime-fighting uniform, something that Starfire was mildly sorry to see. She had only seen Raven in casual clothes for a select few occasions, but she had decided long ago that Raven looked better with a varied wardrobe.

"Were you waiting the whole time?" Raven asked quietly.

Slightly taken aback, Starfire fumbled around for an answer, but Raven had turned in time for her to execute a feeble nod instead. Something twitched in the corners of Raven's mouth, but Starfire didn't dare to hope that it was a smile.

"While I am somewhat… miffed about why you did so… thank you."

Starfire breathed an almost inaudible sigh of relief as Raven's words registered to her. She was beginning to think that her waiting would have produced somewhat disagreeable results, but Raven had been somewhat receptive as of late. With that in mind, Starfire intended to use the slight influx of emotion to maybe induce happy thoughts into the morose sorceress.

"I am… somewhat concerned over your well-being," Starfire replied candidly. "Friend Robin's blow was most excruciating indeed to the training mat, but it would have been even worse if it had hit its…." she gulped. "… intended target."

Raven remained stoically silent at that statement, and Starfire found herself fidgeting. A cold breeze filtered down to the Tower roof and Starfire shivered, goose bumps forming from the physical and mental chill. Raven shrugged, and stood up, brushing away imaginary clumps of dust.

"It's not what I had expected," Raven admitted finally. "But I can't blame him."

Something in her voice alerted Starfire immediately, and she looked up just in time to catch a glimpse of something foreign glinting in Raven's eyes before they clouded over to their normal dulled state. She continued to stare, wondering if she was simply seeing things as she gazed into the midnight-blue eyes. Raven noticed her stare, and w looked away, facing the chilly night skies.

"Raven… it is alright to admit that you were frightened by Robin's actions," Starfire murmured. She looked away to the cement below her, hugging herself for both warmth and some sense of self-comfort. She looked up at Raven once more, a surge of something she would associate with either bravery or foolishness prompting her to her next statement. "I was… very frightened for you."

Raven's eyes widened an imperceptible distance, but she did nothing to reply. Instead, she kept her eyes trained on the stars that spread out their heavenly map before the two, weathering two more gusts of cold air in the process. Starfire took the silence as a somewhat mixed blessing.

"… I'm going to go inside," Raven announced, but when Starfire did not follow, she turned and watched the alien shudder at a recent blast of cold air.

"I shall be staying up on this rooftop for a few moments," Starfire replied with a small smile. "Venus is said to be particularly bright tonight."

Raven said nothing, but unclasped her cloak and laid the cloth around Starfire's shivering shoulders. She phased through the roof and presumably down to her room, leaving the Tamaranean up at the roof with a dark blue cloak that was somewhat short on her frame. But the warmth that lingered in the fabric stopped her shivering altogether, and she wrapped herself in the cloak, jumbled thoughts multiplying almost until they reached the amount of stars in the skies.