Disclaimer: I do not own the Teen Titans or any other DC character listed here.
Deeper – Chapter 3 Down Time
My dear Dawn Child,
The research in Twilight Canyon continues. My wife is joining me next week to study some highly unusual glyphs that we found in the cave containing the cache that we found. Apparently, weapons were not the only treasure there. The markings are perfectly preserved, and we hope to translate them soon. They match other glyphs of unknown origin that I've seen over in Chaco Canyon. We can translate them, but we don't know we made them. I will send photographs in a few days. I think you will find them fascinating.
Thunder Horse raised the flashlight to scan the markings on the wall. Translations were difficult but intriguing; the difficulty made them even more fascinating. He called over to his wife, who was unpacking equipment at the mouth of the cave.
"Karen, you must see these."
"What do they say?"
"It will take a while to interpret the whole thing, but it says something about . . . worlds, coming, destroy . . . "
I am happy to hear that things are coming together for you. I understand your concerns about "the item" being loose out there. I think it is wise to defend yourself in any case. Your abilities may enhance whatever training you get. Your friends seem very dedicated to you. I am sure they can help you out with this.
"Can you teleport through outer space?"
Her left eye popped open and sought out the source of the noise. Kid Flash. So like his cousin, she thought. I should know better than to meditate outside of my room.
"Bart, again, I do not teleport, I –"
"I know, I know, you move through yadda yadda yadda." He waved his hand over his shoulder. "But what about space."
"When we went to New Chronus with Donna, I did move from a planet to a ship across space, yes."
"Is there any place you can't escape from? Do you have to worry about moving from climate to climate? Or pressure to pressure? Do you have to go from like place to like place? That's what's tough about space, you know. Besides the cosmic rays and the extreme cold and the . . . "
She sighed a deep summoning-the-patience-of-Job sigh. "Why do you want to know this?"
"Well, think about it. You never know where you're going to end up. Or need a Plan B. Everyone's gotta have a Plan B."
"And yours is . . . ?"
"I'm working on it!"
Do not worry too much about what to say to him right now. He may find talking about it as awkward as you do. But I have seen you together, and you do take a comfort in each other. Grandfather often said that the truth often has funny ways of coming out on its own. Like a fire concealed in a bale of hay, it does not stay hidden for long. I do miss his wisdom. When you visit, I will tell you more about your great-grandfather.
Karen Thunder Horse pulled her hair back into a ponytail so she could study the glyphs more closely. She brushed centuries of dirt away with a delicate brush.
"Charlie, here . . . this reads almost like prophecy . . . and he comes, the destroyer of worlds . . . and something about bloodlines . . . stars . . ."
"Or maybe just a legend. This is going to take a while to translate, my love. I am glad we took the month off from the clinic."
Have fun on your "outing". Let me know what happens. Please visit us soon. May the Great Spirit protect and guide you on your path.
Charlie
Cooling air swam around them like water. The last rosy rays of the sun winked through glowing clouds and melted into the sea to the applause of a croaking frog.
"Bravo!" Gar shouted at the bay. He examined his companion with amphibian eyes. "An encore tomorrow night?"
"Indeed," she replied, glad for the company during her nightly ritual. She had had this company every night for a month. Some nights he was a cat, others a parrot, and sometimes just his human form. His shape depended on his mood. Now he was a frog. His mood was difficult to comprehend at the moment – a hint of honey-smoothness that always made her a little uncomfortable, that same smoothness she'd tasted when he first saw her in the--
She closed her eyes. Forget about it. She had exiled the dress to the back of her closet ever since that day. She absently rubbed her aching left knee. I don't even know why he made me so . . . angry . . . She preferred to not think about it. They never discussed it, but it was always there. Cassie had mentioned that it was an elephant in the room, but she wasn't sure what elephants had to do with it.
He hopped a little closer to her hand. "Wanna see me turn into a handsome prince?"
She offered him a vacant look as her only reply.
He sighed and shifted back to human form. He shivered like he always did when he made the transition from cold-blooded to warm-blooded. The white of his uniform appeared more pink in the fading sunlight. He scratched his head.
"Are we going to have to have fairy tale training, too?"
O Thunder Horse,
My training has begun. Since it is the summer, I am starting with a two-week-long intensive training 'camp' that the school offers. I enjoy it as I have no other instruction in my life. It is so strange and yet so wonderful at the same time, to learn to control the movements of the body so exactly. The sensei is not at all what I expected. In fact, I am not sure what I expected in the first place. He is a gentle soul who reminds me of my former teacher in many ways – and yet he is different in as many ways as he is the same. He is incredibly patient with all of us. I am making many friends – it is easy to bond when everyone feels awkward.
"I have a treat for us tonight, m'dear," Gar said as he settled into the sofa. He held out a plate slathered with a fluffy concoction.
She took the plate from his hand and sniffed it. She eyed it suspiciously.
"It's cheesecake. All girls love cheesecake."
"You can make a cake out of cheese? Is it cheddar?"
"Oh, Raven. You silly goose. It's cream cheese." He winked at her. "You can eat cheese, right?"
I believe this training will be useful outside the dojo as well. They often loose a great guttural cry that they call a ki-ai. It is supposed to focus energy, which they call ki at this school, in a certain direction. I can see where an empath might find such a thing useful. Some of the other students here are self-conscious where the ki-ai is concerned. It must be their lack of early education in such matters. One classmate whispered to me that it made her feel 'silly'. When I whispered back that nothing could be sillier than standing in my pajamas downtown in the middle of the day, she laughed. I am not sure why; I was not trying to tell a joke. But she did relax. Her ki-ai is quite formidable now.
"So, which movie shall we watch tonight, my little Escape Key?"
She padded over to the massive media wall on the far side of the room. She trailed her fingers along the spines of jewel cases, searching . . . searching . . .floating up the wall to examine the highest shelves . . .lazily scratching the underside of her left foot with her right toe as she thought . . .
He tilted his head as he studied her movements. It was not so strange anymore, seeing her in that hooded sweatshirt that had "Property of Titans Tower" emblazoned on the front. Good old Bart. Those shirts were a good idea. He was actually getting used to seeing her in regular clothes, doing regular things. Since he had first met her, she had seemed so unreal, so distant, that it was difficult to comprehend her doing something so ordinary as eating or brushing teeth or doing laundry . . . which of course she had always done. Even daughters of demon overlords have to have clean socks.
And the child of an evil force is all most people ever saw in her. But he saw what they didn't. He saw a girl who needed affection more than most people did; affection she had never gotten. A real girl. That's what he saw when they first brought her home. That's what he saw when he picked out the perfect room for her, the one warmed by the evening sun, the one full of the light that he knew she needed. That's what he saw in that red dress . . .
He grimaced inside. She hadn't worn it since that day. Forget it.
He wondered how difficult it was for someone used to living on such a cosmic scale to bring themselves down to an earthly level. After spending so much time with her over the past few weeks, he knew how difficult that adjustment was for her. But he thought he had the key: they had similar problems. No one took him seriously. Well, except maybe her. But everyone else took her far too seriously. And everyone else's feelings always rubbed off on her.
If she is ever going to relax, we're going to have to relax around her, first. And I practically live with her, for the luvva Mike. It's my job to josh her every once in a while.
He was glad for Charlie's recommendation. And he was equally glad that he had promised to help her with it. It gave him a reason to laugh other than to hide his own pain. He wanted to use it to heal hers.
At least I had six years of my own parents loving me. She had no love at all. It's amazing she's still sane after that. And on top of it all, deep down she thinks she's evil. But how could someone be that good and that bad at the same time? He tilted his head the other direction. Nah. Not evil.
"Here," she said as she handed him the disc.
"Space Trek: 2022?" The register of his voice rose to the ceiling. "You want to watch my old show? You actually want to see me play Tork?"
"I have never seen it. There was no such thing as television in Azarath, so I missed its first broadcast. Show me, Tork."
What a wonderful roommate. Definitely not evil.
Garfield is trying so hard to get me to laugh. The last time I laughed seems like a lifetime ago; but I did laugh once upon a time. So much has happened since that I think I have lost the capacity for mirth. But I must admit a certain lightness of heart since our "studies" began. For his attempts, I am truly grateful.
She curled her bare feet beneath her. The creamy taste of cheesecake and his sweet-and-sour apple candy essence were indeed pleasant. It almost made her forget the embers of ache that had been burning a low fire in her joints all day. He was laughing at himself in his old costumes, and the sound was soothing. It reached out and drew her closer every night that she heard it. Tonight, she felt the warmth of his thigh against her bent knee.
"Now, that was a bit of an inside joke, there, because the guy that played the captain, he always—"
"Inside joke?"
"Something that's only understood by people in the same group." He turned to her. "Or by only two people."
She arched an eyebrow. "Do we have any inside jokes?"
He grinned. "Like when I say: 'your cloak – never leave home without it.' That's our joke. Not everyone would get it. Or maybe this one – a Tamaranean and a Pacifist walk into a bar –"
She held up her hand. "I believe I understand now."
He says that to truly enjoy yourself, you must lose control. But I have been taught the tightest of control is the only way I can live. So which is it – should one have control or not? It is very confusing.
DC
Her hand froze in mid-air. She grimaced as the ever-growing well of pain began to erupt within her. A grunt rumbled in her chest as she rested her other hand on the small of her back.
Gar paused the show and reached for her free hand. "Bad pain day?" he asked. The laughter had left his eyes.
All she could do was nod and hug herself. Her joints ached and popped like Arctic ice breaking in the spring. Her spine cramped as if some bony hand had wrapped itself around her spine and was trying to rip it out of her.
"That's happening a lot lately, isn't it? Admit it. I've seen you bracing your back."
"Yes." She exhaled sharply.
He reached into a drawer in the end table with his other hand and retrieved a small amber bottle. He released her fingers and poured a few drops of the liquid into his palm.
"I was ready for this. Let me try something, my dear. My turn to be the healer."
He rubbed his palms together as the faint scent of lavender wafted over to her. He took her hand again and began massaging her own palm with his thumb.
"There's nothing wrong with you that a little TLC won't fix."
"TLC?"
"Tender Lovin' Care. Here."
She could feel his fingers probing the muscles of her hand and searching for the right points. She inhaled deeply as he found the spot that matched the agony settling into her back.
"Aaaaaah," she moaned.
"That's it," he coaxed. "Hold on, hold on . . ."
He leaned closer to her to get better purchase on the heel of her hand. She pressed her forehead into his shoulder and clenched her teeth. He continued massaging her hand in silence for what felt like an eternity, and the only sounds in the room were the low hum of the television and her cries of pain.
"I know it hurts, darlin', I know it hurts. Let me finish –"
He reached down to her back. He urged her shirt up and splayed his palm against her tattoo. The heel of his hand embraced the skin behind her spine. The mixture of the oil and the heat of his blood pumping through his limbs relaxed the muscles there. As the cloud of pain receded from her, her breathing slowed down. A low hum resonated in her throat.
"Better?" he chuckled. "I think if you were me, you'd be purring."
"How did you –"
"Research, my little Houdini. Just a little research. Someone's got to take care of you." He returned the bottle to its drawer with his free hand. "I just wish I'd thought of this a long time ago. Maybe then . . . " His eyes looked away ever so briefly. "Never mind."
I wonder why I never thought of this. But he cares. And he understands.
A little TLC. Tender Loving Care.
"So good to be home," she whispered.
She raised her head from his shoulder. Her forehead passed close to his chin, so close she could hear his pulse beating in his throat. He was not letting go of her.
I don't want him to let go.
She hungered for that touch, just like she hungered for emotion. It was sun and rain on landscape that had been dark and dry for too long.
The scent of lavender with a hint of freshly watered canine bathed her face. A stream of green ran behind her eyes as she lowered the lids. There was the slightest taste of what she could only think of as affection on the tip of her tongue. That light, that perfume, that taste, was all she could sense. He hesitates, but still-- She felt his lips press into her temple and linger there. A finger under her chin turned her face up . . .
"Okay, Roy!" A ponderous weight invaded the other side of the couch. "Sounds like a plan. Gotta go now and see what Siskel and Ebert here are up to. See ya."
She felt Gar's eyes following hers to stare at Cyborg. He closed his cell phone and rested it on the coffee table. He leaned back into the sofa and grinned at them.
"So, amigos, what's on the tube tonight?"
My cousin,
As I have grown older, I have discovered that the true magic of life lies in balance: of light and dark, somberness and gaiety . . . and control and frenzy. You must learn to control the control. Keep it when you need it. Let it go when you need to be without it, for there are times when control separates you from that which you need the most. Control the control.
CTH
A/N: I don't know anything about glyphs, either.
The infamous red dress incident is the one that appears in the GJ (current) version of TT #20.
The old series of TT mentioned Gar's stint on Space Trek: 2022 many times. The show had a prominent place in the Beast Boy mini-series that was out a few years ago. I think that mini-series appears in the Beast Boys and Girls trade, but I'm not sure.
The New Chronus adventure that Raven mentions is detailed in the Who is Donna Troy? Trade paperback.
A bit about the lavender:I've had a lot of questions from readers on this one, so I thought I would elaborate. Lavender's essentialoilis known for its healing properties. Here, Gar is not using it for its scent but for its ability to heal. It is often used in aromatherapy and reflexology for that purpose (in real life). However, its scent is so strong that I have to describe it here.CAUTION: I suggest you learn about aromatherapy before using it yourself.