(Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans. Can I stop guarding my ass now? Please raise your hand if you're a lawyer working for either Warner Brothers or DC Comics, or whoever else might own the rights to the Titans.)
-CHAPTER EIGHT-
"As you can see, Marsdale College has virtually anything a student could ask for in an education," said the vice principal, who was conducting Robin, Raven, and Beast Boy's tour of the school. They had already seen several different classrooms, the large, impressive auditorium, the several reasonably-sized gymnasiums, as well as the single massive one, the racquetball courts, the tennis courts, the weight room, and the Olympic-sized indoor swimming pool. The vice principal, a tall, skinny man by the name of Rittersfeld, had also gone on at length about Marsdale's extensive wireless internet technology, the small class sizes, the quality of the teachers, and so on. The three Titans were impressed despite themselves—even Beast Boy had found something to get excited about.
"Dude, they even have batting cages here!" he said, as they waited outside the principal's office. Their tour had finally finished, and Vice Principal Rittersfeld had told them that the principal wanted to see them. He had then gone into the principal's office himself, and had not come out since. That was nearly ten minutes ago.
"We aren't here to play around, you know, Mark," Robin said, calling Beast Boy by his assumed name. "We can't just slack off of what we came here to study."
Hmmmm…that's nicely ambiguous, Raven thought with a smirk. Let's hope Beast Boy remembers to keep quiet—the principal's secretary is right there.
Only a dozen feet away, the secretary, Miss Peterson, kept typing, apparently oblivious to the conversation.
"Well, yeah, but you want us to fit in, right?" Beast Boy said. Miss Peterson looked up at them, and both Raven and Robin froze.
Oh, shit, they both thought. You'd better not blow this, Beast Boy.
"I mean, here we are visiting the States, and what's more American than baseball? When in Rome, eh guys?" Beast Boy finished, waggling his eyebrows at them. Miss Peterson went back to her typing, and Raven and Robin breathed perfectly synchronized sighs of relief.
"I'm not that dumb, guys," Beast Boy whispered. "Have a little faith. You were the ones who wanted me to come along, after all." Robin grinned sheepishly at Beast Boy, knowing that he had a point. Raven remained expressionless.
The three sat in silence for another few minutes—silence, despite Beast Boy's near constant fidgeting. Even when Raven turned so she couldn't see him, she swore she could still feel his annoying-ness oozing out of him.
Dear Lord, he's going to drive me round the bend, she thought. Wait, who the hell says "round the bend" anymore? Why am I asking myself questions? It's already happening, isn't it? I'm going crazy. And these damn glasses Robin gave me just keep slipping…
"Alright, Principal Baker would like to see you now," Vice Principal Rittersfeld said as he finally left the principal's office. The three Titans filed past him into the office, and Rittersfeld closed the door, leaving them alone with the principal.
"Well, then! I'm sure you've already heard this from Mr. Rittersfeld, but please allow me to welcome you to Marsdale College!" Principal Baker boomed. He was a large man, perhaps not quite as tall as Rittersfeld, but with a much broader build. He was middle-aged, with almost entirely grey hair, but he looked like he had been quite athletic in his prime. He seemed like he should be a sports announcer or something, and he certainly had the voice for it. He stepped out from behind his desk to give them each a firm handshake, saying their names (or rather, their false names) as he did so.
"Richard Black, I presume! And Grace Roth! And you must be Mark Davis!" Baker said. "It's always so nice to have exchange students at the school. Broadens the students' perspectives, you know!"
"Uhhh…I suppose so," Robin said.
"Of course you do!" Baker said, beaming at them. "As your host here for the term, I hope your stay will be comfortable and all that—if you need anything, anything at all, just let me or one of the other members of the staff know."
"Thanks," said Robin.
"Well, I like to get to know the students a bit, so I hope you won't mind telling me a bit about yourselves!" Baker said.
"Um, well, I'm from Lansing Public High School in Vancouver, I'm planning on majoring in chemistry when I go to college, and, uh, I study martial arts as a hobby, particularly aikido," said Robin, effectively just rhyming off his cover story.
"Oh, excellent!" Baker said. "And what about you, Miss Roth?"
"I'm also from Lansing High School, I plan on majoring in either English literature or journalism, and my hobby is reading," said Raven.
"Ah, very nice!" Baker said. "And you, Mr. Davis?"
"Uhhhh…I'm from Lansing High, I hope to major in, uh, biology, possibly going on to medical school, and my hobby is, um, playing video games," Beast Boy said.
"Wonderful!" Baker said. "Well, it's nice to meet such obviously talented youngsters like yourselves! I have to get back to work, now, lots of paperwork to be done, but I hope you will enjoy your stay at Marsdale, and I'm sure we'll be seeing each other again soon!"
With that, the three Titans said goodbye to the principal and left the office. Vice Principal Rittersfeld was waiting for them outside, and showed them to their rooms—Robin's and Beast Boy's were next to each other in the boys' wing of the dormitory, while Raven was off by herself, surrounded by strangers in the girls' wing. After Rittersfeld left, they decided to meet in the library, perhaps one of the only places on the campus that would be relatively devoid of students. First, however, they had to go to their rooms and unpack.
OOO
"Exchange students, huh?" said a red-haired boy. Robin thought he had heard him being called Garrett by one of the other boys.
"Yeah, that's right," said Robin as he tossed the duffel bag containing his clothes into his room.
"From Canada?" Garrett asked with a leer, and Robin nodded. "My dad says that only commie liberal wimps come from Canada."
"I'm sure he does," Robin said mildly. He was trying to match this Garrett boy up to something stored in the database that was his mind.
Hmmm…if Garrett is his last name, he could be the son of Lucas Garrett, the former CEO of the DeTraille Corporation, Robin thought.
"Tell me," he said out loud. "I heard someone call you Garrett just now—would you be the son of Lucas Garrett?"
"Oh, you've heard of my dad?" Garrett said. "It's no surprise, really, he's a pretty famous businessman."
"Yes, well, next time you see him, please give him my condolences for losing his company to Wayne Enterprises in that nasty takeover a month ago," Robin said, keeping his mild tone, but smiling viciously on the inside. This Garrett boy had already struck him as a bully, and Robin absolutely hated bullies. Taking this one down a notch or two would feel good, and probably make the whole school a slightly better place.
"Yeah, well…" Garrett began with a snarl, but stopped when he saw Beast Boy dragging his oversized suitcase down the hall. He smiled in a way that would put a viper off its lunch, and motioned to two boys who were built like linebackers, obviously his stooges.
"Man, this thing is a pain to lug around," grumbled Beast Boy, who was used to carrying the suitcase effortlessly as a gorilla. He looked up as the two stooges loomed over him, casting a shadow over his whole body.
"Uhhh…Hi there?" he said.
"That runt a friend of yours?" Garrett asked Robin. Robin narrowed his eyes.
"Yeah, he is. Why do you ask?" he said.
"You know, a runt like him could get seriously hurt if he's not careful," Garrett said with a sadistic smile.
"Uhhhh…Ro...um, Rick? Little help over here?" said Beast Boy, but Robin ignored him.
"You're absolutely right," Robin said. "But then, we'd always have the tape from that security camera to see exactly what went wrong."
He pointed at a small, discreet video camera mounted on the ceiling about ten feet down the hall. It was pointed right at them. Garrett snarled and called off his stooges.
"Have a nice stay," Garrett said, his voice dripping with sarcasm, as he walked off down the hall.
"Thanks, I will," Robin called after him, unable to resist.
Robin, one; elitist asshole, zero, he thought with satisfaction, and went to help Beast Boy with his suitcase.
OOO
"Oh, a new girl!" said a perky blonde girl. "Are you, like, one of those Canadian exchange students?"
"Yeah," Raven said, and left it at that. The girl, of course, did not.
"Oh, my gawd, like, I don't think I would be able to deal with how totally cold it is up there," she said. Raven grimaced—she could practically feel her IQ dropping.
"I mean, I am such a summer person," the girl continued. "People always say I'm, like, all summery and stuff. Isn't that right, girls?"
The gaggle of girls that seemed to be following the perky blonde around nodded emphatically in unison. They were all similarly dressed, and many of them had obviously bleached their hair in an attempt to be just as blonde as the ringleader. Aside from the occasional brunette, they were virtually indistinguishable to the untrained eye.
What have I done to deserve this? thought Raven.
"So, what kind of music do you listen to?" the girl asked. "You do have music in Canada, right?" Raven twitched.
"I mostly listen to Bach, although I like Chopin, Grieg, and Beethoven as well," Raven said.
"You like classical music?" the girl asked incredulously, as if it was some kind of taboo. The gaggle of sycophantic girls all seemed to agree with this assessment, and stared at Raven as if she had some kind of horribly disfiguring disease. Raven grinned inwardly, and decided to mess with them a little.
"Oh, and sometimes, when I'm in the mood, I listen to Led Zeppelin, or Pink Floyd, sometimes the Clash, although they're kind of different…" she began, stopping when she saw the girls' looks of horror increase.
Oh, yeah, they're stereotypical pop bitches, Raven thought. So very easy to mess with.
"Uhhh, well, as long as I don't have to hear any of that stuff, that's fine," said the perky blonde. "See you later."
The gaggle of girls turned as one and trailed after their leader as she walked away. Some looked over their shoulders to stare at Raven as they went, like she was some kind of freak.
They're probably not used to meeting someone who isn't exactly like them, Raven thought. I really hate people.
She was about to go back into her room to unpack when she heard a small noise coming from one door over. She turned, preparing one of her better verbal barbs, but stopped when she saw that the girl who had made the noise wasn't a member of the perky blonde's little tribe. In fact, she was a short, skinny girl with mousy brown hair—certainly not up to spec for the 'in' crowd. She appeared nervous, and something about her told Raven that this was her usual state.
"Um, hi," the girl said, in barely more than a whisper. "I'm Catherine."
"Hi. I'm Grace," Raven said. "Uhhh…nice to meet you."
Catherine smiled weakly, and looked around to make sure nobody else was in earshot.
"There's something strange going on in this school," she whispered. Raven froze.
"Like what?" she asked. Catherine looked around again, like she expected someone to start yelling at her at any moment.
"I…I don't know. I can just feel it," she said, and retreated back into her room.
"Wait, what do you mean by…" Raven said, but Catherine had already closed her door.
Great, thought Raven. All but one of my neighbours are pop-crazed airheads, and that one, while she might have information that is useful to us, is so neurotic that she won't hang around long enough to tell me anything.
Raven sighed and stepped into her room, closing her door behind her.
OOO
Half an hour later, the three Titans met in the library. Just as they had expected, it was virtually empty.
"Of course it's empty," said Beast Boy. "Who would want to be in some dumb old library studying when there are batting cages around?" Robin and Raven both sighed.
"Okay, moving on," Robin said. "I think I've got a pretty good picture of where the security cameras are throughout the campus, at least the main part of it."
"What, just from that little tour?" Beast Boy asked.
"Of course. I was looking for cameras the whole time. You didn't think I was actually paying attention to the tour, did you?" Robin replied.
"Unfortunately, nothing they showed us today will be of any help in the investigation," Raven said. "If they're working on anything out of the ordinary, it won't exactly just be sitting out in the quad, will it?"
"No, it probably won't, but we'll still take the time to scout around the main part of the campus tonight," Robin said. "Getting to know the terrain is always a good idea—we can decide on some escape routes in case things go wrong, take note of places that might bear further investigation, and so on. After the tour today, that should only take us about fifteen minutes or so."
"So then what are we going to do for the rest of the time?" asked Beast Boy. Robin looked around to see if anyone was close enough to hear, and continued in a low voice.
"Well, you will be scouting around in the lower levels in fly form," he said. "Raven, see if you can find some large source of magic, or reality weaknesses, or whatever it is. I'll be trying to get into the principal's office to see if he has anything around that might help us with our investigation."
"Hmmm…I haven't been able to sense any big focus of unreality in the school," said Raven. "It must be shielded somehow, but I'll see what I can do to break through. I would also like to take a closer look at one of those security cameras, if possible."
"Why?" asked Robin.
"There's something…weird about them," Raven said. "They don't feel right. It's like some kind of suction or something…that doesn't make sense, does it?"
"Whatever. If you think there's something strange about the cameras, then follow your instincts and check them out," said Robin. "Is there anything else?"
"Um, well, I don't know if it's important or not, but one of my neighbours said something weird to me," Raven said. "She said that she felt like something strange was happening in the school, but she didn't say anything else."
"That's interesting…she might know something. Try to talk to her to find out what she meant, but do it tomorrow," Robin said. "For now, get some sleep—we'll start our reconnaissance at midnight, and it'll probably take us a few hours. Our classes start tomorrow, and it probably won't be a good thing to be dead tired for them."
The other two Titans nodded, and they all went their separate ways.
OOO
Principal Baker sat in his office, his elbows resting on his desk, his fingers steepled in front of his face. He was staring at his computer screen, where the files for the three new exchange students were displayed. He frowned, and hit the intercom button on his desk.
"Miss Peterson, could you come in here, please?" Baker asked. Almost immediately, Miss Peterson opened the door and entered the office.
"Yes, sir?" she asked.
"Those new exchange students…have you checked their backgrounds?" Baker said.
"Yes, sir."
"And…?"
"They've all checked out so far, sir," Miss Peterson said.
"Hmmmm…so they're either genuine, or just very good at their jobs," Baker mused. "Tell the staff to keep an eye on them—their timing is just too convenient. And even if they don't pose any threat, it won't hurt to be careful. After coming so far, we cannot afford to be discovered now."
"Yes, sir," Miss Peterson said, and turned to leave the office. As the door closed behind her, Principal Baker went back to staring at his computer screen.
-END CHAPTER EIGHT-
Author's Note: I hope I'm just being paranoid about this, but this seemed like a really crappy chapter to me. Way too much exposition again, but hopefully the payoff in future chapters will be worth it. Also, I realize that having Baker pretty much outright confirm the Titans' suspicions about the school kind of dampens the suspense a bit, but the exact plan has yet to be found out. There should be a little more action next chapter, and at the very least there will be some minor high school stuff for all those of you who get a kick out of that (although I can't guarantee any kind of quality).
About some of the school characters that appeared in this chapter: I am in no way trying to put down all rich kids, or all pop princess types, or all kids who go to private schools. I would, however, very much like to put down all those who act like these jerks do. As for private schools, I take a rather dim view of private schools in general—I don't see the need, since I think that if some of the effort that went into a few private schools could be put into the public school system, things would be better for a lot more students. Also, I I've only ever met very few people from private schools who weren't horrific snobs. This last thing might just be a problem of perception, though, since between the snobs and the non-snobs, it's mostly just the snobs who ever go around flaunting that they went to such-and-such a private school, while the non-snobs stay quiet. Also, about the principal and vice principal: the vice principal doesn't really represent anyone I know, but Principal Baker is partially a caricature of my high school principal. He was basically just a politician, the kind of guy who would ask you about yourself not because he actually cared about you as a person, but because he wanted to appear to care about you as a person. I might not have pulled off getting that into Baker's character, at least so far. My high school principal was also big and loud, but I think that made it in with no problem. The fact that Marsdale College apparently consists mostly of sports facilities is my way to poke fun at my high school's tendency to focus attention on the various sports teams, rather than, oh, say, academics. It's a school, for Christ's sake, not the goddamn YMCA. The only public recognition I, or anyone else, at my school ever got for anything related to academics was when me and two other students wrote one of those math contest things in Grade 11, and beat the scores of two OACs (basically grade thirteen in Ontario, which has now been phased out) who wrote a single contest together. That was the only time I ever saw someone's academic achievements even mentioned in a school assembly, and even then it was just for humour value. Sorry for the rant, but that still kind of pisses me off.
Right, so setting aside my hang-ups regarding high school, both public and private, I would just like to say something about the temporary chapter I had up before posting this. As I said in its Author's Note, it was not meant to be a real chapter in this story. It was just meant to be a bit of a preview of where my ideas are headed. Once I actually get started on writing that story, I might, of course, change a few minor details, but hopefully I'll be able to keep it basically the same (if only so I can re-use what I've already written). If you missed seeing the preview before this (official) chapter replaced it, I might post it again at the end of this story, if you bug me about it.
About the title change: I still haven't decided yet, so feel free to keep sending me ideas!
To My Reviewers:
VashTheStampede7123: Thanks! I will certainly try! Ugh, accursed exposition—so painfully boring, yet so very, very necessary.
Rusty05: Well, you see, I am able to write so much because I have no social life. Just ask my friends! Wait, no, that doesn't work… Basically, I just try to write at least a bit every day, and sometimes just hit a rush of productivity and finish a bunch of chapters in the space of a few days. It's been a while since I've had one of those rushes, though.
nevermoretheraven: Well, while Roth would, technically, be Raven's last name, there is a certain division between Raven and her parents (at least from what I have seen), so I don't think she considers herself to even have a last name. As I said above, I still haven't decided on a title change, if any, but it's still under consideration.
Wild Spirit of Darkness2: Yeah, I've noticed that a lot of characterizations of Raven have her basically spilling her entire past (whichever rendition of it the author picks) in a massive wave of exposition, which, as you said, isn't exactly how Raven is portrayed in the cartoon (or, I would imagine, in the comic book, either). I did have the massive wave of exposition, but no past spillage! Go me! Wait, 'magic cow demons'? Ummmm…where did I ever mention cows? And as I said in the Author's Note to that temporary Chapter 8, that wasn't anything to do with this story, it was just a preview of where my ideas will be going. The 'for now' means that that little snippet will be a part of a full story later on.
Blackbird: Hey, I'm all about taking jokes and running with them, as far and as fast as I can. It should be an Olympic event. I've seen a few fan fictions with Raven going by Rachael Roth, but I didn't know that was in the comic book. It occurs to me that some people might be a bit confused about what I mean by 'the comic book'. I don't mean the 'Teen Titans, Go!' comic, I mean the real, serious comic book that was around long before the cartoon. Although, I haven't read either of them. (I suppose I should have put that note in my Author's Note, instead of in a response to a review—oh, well.)
CloudsHalo: Unfortunately, as I said in my Author's Note, quite a bit more exposition and set-up this chapter, but hopefully it will pay off. I can't be at the top of my game all the time (if I ever have been, for that matter), and exposition is a bitch to work with. About the disguises, I considered having Robin wear his usual civilian outfit from Batman: The Animated Series at first, only to have it unanimously rejected by the other Titans, but I decided against it. I'm not sure why. As for Raven's shirt, I have no idea if that T-shirt actually exists, but if it does, I would like one. And the snippet from the temporary Chapter 8 will be going in its own separate story at some point. Just not this point. Maybe several points from now.
staticsponge123: That was one hell of a long sentence. Breathe! Fearing nothing must come in handy. But, then again, 'nothing ghost or mortal' does leave room for the undead, so stay away from zombies! Hit you again, you say? I normally don't do requests, but violence is always an option…
Dea Lunae: Raven might not beat up a teacher, but I'm sure she'll want to. Oh, yes, she'll want to. Next chapter should have a bit of their first day of classes, after their little scouting run for the night. My ideas for stories have so far stayed away from dedicated "Titans Go to School" stuff, since I think that's kind of a slippery slope that leads to "OMG! The Titans Are My Friends!" stories, which I think are a bit immature. But then, I'm a soon-to-be-twenty-one-year-old who still watches kids' cartoons, so who the hell am I to talk about immaturity?
GS Dragono: Read the Author's Notes, man! Especially if the story changes abruptly and you don't know what's going on. That temporary Chapter 8 was just a preview of some ideas I'm working on for future stories which will be loosely connected to Stalker and my previous story, Duplomatic.
Ugh. Two in the morning. Bedtime for me now.