Swipe Chapter 4: Continental Breakfast, a teen titans fanfic

"Swipe" by Ed Alger aka "SecondLevelWriter"

Brand names, like Wheaties or Nike or Reebok or whatever, are trademarks of their respective companies. Try to think of it as free advertising. Also, references to Dungeons and Dragons are property of Wizards of the Coast.

Timeline: This story takes place between "Winner Take All" and "Betrayal".

----- Chapter 4 -----
Continental Breakfast

Jinx's sleep was a restless one, and plagued with nightmares of her still being alone in the city. Nobody left to turn to, nowhere to run and hide. She was still haunted by visions of the gates to the academy being slammed in her face, Mammoth and Gizmo fading into the shadows without her, and both Slade and the Headmistress scowling disapprovingly at her. She cowered before them, silently pleading and begging to be let back into the academy. Slade gave her no response, only that burning glare. Jinx fell against the iron bars of the gate, overcome with grief, before crumpling to the ground and sobbing... all alone.

But then a new sound caught her attention. Music?

Very loud music, in fact. Something about a safety dance, as far as she could make out.

It was then that Jinx jerked awake, her eyes still stinging with tears as she sat bolt upright. She looked around the room in half-asleep confusion, trying to remember the events of last night.

She had jumped from the roof of a building, wanting to end her nightmares along with her life. Then.. something.. no, someone caught her... and brought her here. She remembered him telling her about deserving a second chance at life.

And that certain someone was cooking breakfast, judging by the strong scent of bacon.

He was also singing along to the music she heard in her dream.

"We can dance if you wan-to! We can leave your friends behind! 'Cuz yer friends don't dance, and IF they don't dance, well they're... no friends of mine!"

The sorceress pulled herself out of bed, finding that her ankle had healed well enough to walk on, and followed the voice into the next room. She stopped in the doorway to what appeared to be a very large kitchen, or perhaps a kitchen combined with a dining room.

The room itself resembled the living room, with nearly all of the walls knocked out save for the support beams. The only exception was the preservation of the stove and refrigerator, which seemed oddly placed in the middle of the room against the single surviving section of drywall. In the nearest corner from the doorway sat a simple wooden table with two chairs of similar make placed at opposite ends.

Just then, the singing chef appeared from behind the other side of the wall. In each hand, he carried a heaping plateful of scrambled eggs, bacon, and toast. He nodded to his guest as he continued singing along to the song and carefully placed their breakfast on the table. He returned to the amused sorceress and took hold of her hands.

"C'mon, Jinx! Do the Safety Dance with me!"

"Are you out of your mind?" Jinx sounded as if that were a rhetorical question. He wouldn't give her an answer anyway until he had pulled her into the middle of the room.

"Not yet, but it's still early! Come on, S! ...A! ...F! ...E! ...T! ...Y! Safety... DANCE!"

"Let go of my hands, Swipe!" she continued to protest, despite stiffly mimicking her dance partner's movements.

"Whaddaya mean? You're doing great!"

"But I hate dancing!"

"Aw, don't worry! Nobody's watching!"

With no other options, the sorceress finally decided to feign injury, "OW! My ankle!"

The plan worked, and the dance was over as quickly as it had started.

"Sorry, are you all right? I didn't think I was that rough a dancer."

"It's okay," Jinx muttered, fake-limping to the dining table and gingerly sitting in a chair. "Maybe some other time."

Swipe sat in the chair opposite of hers, and picked up her left leg, "Lemme take a look at it."

"No, that's okay. I'm sure it'll be better later today," Jinx replied, trying to squirm away.

"Seriously, Jinx. Let me look at it," the rogue insisted, giving a quizzical look to her striped stockings, "And how do you get into this get-up every day?"

"I SAID LEAVE IT!"

Wide-eyed, Swipe carefully returned her foot to the floor and drew his hands to his chest as if Jinx might bite them off if they got another centimeter closer to her. Without another word, the girl started eating her eggs, taking each bite with an annoyed huff. After a moment, Swipe would begin eating his own breakfast, albeit with an air of dejection.

Wishing to break the silence between them, the rogue asked his guest a question.

"Do you have any parents?"

Jinx nearly choked at the inquiry. Nobody had asked or cared about her parents while she was in The Hive. For a while, she herself had forgotten about them entirely.

"They... they're dead. They died when I was a baby."

"Oh.. geez, I'm sorry. I didn't know. Did you ever find out what happened?"

"It's okay. No, I never knew. They never told me when I lived at the orphanage," she took another slow bite of her eggs as she spoke.

Swipe had stopped eating altogether, "How long were you there?"

"... Until I was enrolled in The Hive, five years ago."

Another sore spot. This conversation was going from bad to tragic.

"Why are you asking me all these questions, anyway?" she inquired, fixing a curious look on him.

"Just, um... just wondering. I'd like... to... get to... um, know you," the rogue found himself stammering, and his face was burning up from embarrassment.

The bemused sorceress smirked to herself, "What about you, then? Where are your parents?"

Swipe looked a bit surprised at first that she'd ask him a question, but he gave her a grin before replying, "My parents live in Washington, near Redmond."

Jinx nodded, casually tearing a piece of bacon in half and eating it, "And how long have you lived in Jump City?"

"About 6 months. I've done a lot of wandering."

The sorceress popped the other half of the bacon in her mouth, "Mm-hmm.. When did you first find out about your abilities?"

"When I was 8. I was walking home from school, and I saw this pie cooling on a window sill..."

The conversation continued, with each finding out more and more of the other. Soon, Jinx was laughing at the jokes he was making about his experiences with the Titans, including the one about the bakery. And Swipe listened to every story she had to tell about her days in the academy, and her own battle against the Titans. After nearly an hour of talking, Jinx decided to ask a different question.

"Say, are we going to be doing anything today? It's already going on ten."

For a moment, Swipe simply blinked at her, perhaps caught off-guard by the question. Once the words had registered, he nodded profusely, "Y- Yeah! Where'd you want to go? That is.. if you're feeling up to it."He nodded towards her sprained ankle.

"It should be fine," the hex-caster replied with a grin, "Why don't we go to the shopping mall?"

The thief tilted his head, "What for?"

Without giving him an answer just yet, Jinx walked to a mirror near the far doorway, gazing at her reflection all the while. Her lavender hair, while disheveled, still retained most of its horseshoe-like shape. Her black goth-ish clothes were torn in various places. Even if they were intact, she wouldn't hate them any less. They represented the old Jinx. Old, and worthless.

"It's time for a new look."

End of Chapter 4

In Chapter 5: A trip to the mall! Things couldn't possibly go awry there, right? Right?