Disclaimer: I DIS-CLAIM what I am writing. I do not claim Teen Titans. I don't even own the title; it was going to be used as an ep title.
NOTE: Whenever one of the girls is named it is referring to the body being occupied, otherwise the actual person may be specified in (these).
Chapter 6: It's No Panacea
The titans had returned to the tower after the weary battle and, forgetting Mad Mod, had taken to their respectable rooms.
Starfire (Raven) was the first to wake the next morning. Grudgingly she pulled on the skirt and halter before braiding back her hair so it would be less of a mess. When finished, she stood back to look over the alien body.
She sighed, Starfire's skin was loosing all its orange sheen and sinking quickly into a sort of limbo between gray and orange. Not only that, but was it her imagination or was her flame red hair a bit...darker?
But before descending to her room the night before, Cyborg had proposed a solution. Somehow he was going to stop, and possibly reverse the change. Starfire, could only hope.
Stumbling slightly into her boots, Starfire made her way downstairs to wait for the other Titans. Yesterday ran back through her head forcing her to analyze everything. The fight in the bank stuck out in her memories, when she had been staring up into the ceiling, a strange feeling had taken up village in her physical mind. She had always praised herself on being independant and able to take well enough care of herself, and yet...
Robin had gone and saved her life. It rattled her way of thinking.
When breakfast finally rolled around, the Titans had all been awaken, though the usual breakfast banter was absent.
It may have been because of Starfire and Raven's presence. Both girls, having changed drastically during the night. Raven, more than Starfire.
Raven's hair had grown out past her shoulders, a sort of washed out color that matched her skin of a unrecognizable color. She tried to cover it under the cloak, but the lengthy garment could only hide so much.
"So, ah..." Cyborg leaned back from the kitchen table finishing off his hearty meat breakfast that he had slid past Beast Boy (Beast Boy had been oogling the two females). "Shall I see what I can do for you two?" He glanced first at Starfire, then Raven.
Starfire pushed her nearly uneaten plate away and stood, Raven following suit. "You are able to fix this?" Raven asked almost afraid of the answer.
"After all the research on Beast Boys DNA I've done, I'm pretty sure." The cybernetic boy pushed himself up from the table under Robin's strict gaze.
"And you won't mess them up more?" Robin added carefully.
Starfire shot him a stark glare as Beast Boy gave a light snicker.
"They can't get much worse," Cyborg shrugged off Robin's comment. "They're nearly a complete mix now."
Starfire mumbled something under her breath while examining the ends of her hair, the tips looked like she had dipped them in violet paint.
Cyborg rolled his chair closer to the screen in front of him. His fingers rapidly tapping across the keyboard in a rapid-dash movement. The two girls lounged about the room to wait for his diagnosis.
Starfire still held a small white gauze to her inner arm where Cyborg had earlier extracted some blood. Raven's, she noted, had long since sealed up and the girl was sitting patiently looking about.
"I've got good news." Cyborg added finally pushing himself back, still seated while his chair made a soft scream across the floor as he did so.
Starfire pulled off the gauze to see the blood had clotted. "And?"
"I think I've got the procedure to stop, and reverse your biological changes."
"How soon can it be ready?" Starfire asked looking down at herself, her hair had begun to bleed a strange fusion, as her skin continued to morph. Raven, on the other hand was just reaching midway, her changing less noticeable.
"It's a chemical solute that'll need to be transfused directly into the blood stream, so not a lot of prep is needed. I could have a batch mixed in about an hour."
"And it will reverse the effects?" Starfire challenged, she didn't like the sound of a transfusion.
"Yes, it will be specially designed to locate and terminate foreign chromosomes and matter that are making you take on the others traits. Kind of like an Anti-Raven and Anti-Starfire solution." Cyborg informed before turning back to the computer.
"That sounds safe." Starfire muttered to herself before standing. "Well, beep me when it's ready." She stood and turned to Raven. "Coming?"
Raven still sat watching Cyborg's back as though she hadn't heard. "No, I'd like to talk with Cyborg."
This twitched Starfire's attention for a second, before she backed out. "I guess I'll check on Mod, we seem to have forgotten him." Then, without another word she opened the door, shutting it silently after her retreat.
Cyborg finished typing his sentence, having heard Raven's faint excuse. Quickly saving he turned back around to face Raven. She looked a bit forelorn as she scratched at a discolored patch of skin on her arm.
"What's up Starfire?" He asked at last.
"Cyborg, are you sure it is only our bodies now mixing? What if our beings were conjugating as well?" Raven's eyes darted a second before she looked up.
The boy paused, confused. He tried a more outright approach: "What's this really about Star?"
Raven wrung her hands in her lap as she fought for the correct wording. "I feel as though...I may be...I think I am becoming Raven." Raven sputtered, still tongue tied in her expression.
"Huh?"
"I feel so down casted and excluded."
"And you think you may be taking up Raven's personality?" Cyborg tried to put her strange conversation together. Of all the talks he had with the Titans, hers were always the most difficult to understand. She wasn't forthright like Raven or Robin, and she didn't skip around the issue like Beast Boy. Starfire fell in between the extremes that made it difficult to tell what was truthful and where she was skirting, not to mention her naive nature.
She nodded, score one for Cyborg.
He thought this possibility over; Raven's personality certainly hadn't changed, so there was really no reason to suspect. Surely if they were acting differently Robin would be the first to point it out-
Robin. The thought made him wonder.
"Star, would this have to do with Robin?"
This sparked the girl's attention. Her eyes lit at his name and she sat forward. "I cannot touch him, or be with him like this. He must always spend time with me, though it is not truly me. I am feeling this hurting because I know he is only being a gentle man but it seems as if there is a difference, or maybe I am the difference in how we interact. And then there was my meditation, and the roof, and now our beings assimilating, and-" Raven gasped for air, the end of her run on ranting sounding a touch hysteric. Her powers had taken a turn to swoop out knocking a few of Cyborg's gadgets off the shelf, and blowing up something in the distance.
Cyborg swallowed, wide-eyed. Talk about opening up...
"Have you talked to Robin about this?"
She nodded, looking as though she were trying to convince herself. "But it is not the same!" The chair Starfire had just been sitting in folded in half as easy as if it were twigs.
Cyborg, now alarmed at the way the damage was progressing, attempted to calm her. "Why not? If he says it will be okay, you should take his word for it."
Raven (Starfire) bit her lip, her eyes downcast. "I-" Her voice broke off as she wiped a hand across her eyes that had become a touch bleary. The black tendrils that had just been picking up a few of Cyborgs books dissipated, the manuals falling in a mess on floor.
Cyborg was struck only a second by the image of a tearful Raven amid the mess. Cyborg pushed back his chair on impulse, pulling himself to his feet. Without a second thought he grabbed Raven and pulled her into a hug, what body Starfire occupied mattered not to him. Only when her shoulders had relaxed, and her sniffling subsided did he let her go. When she looked up he summoned up his brightest smile for the girl. Her powers seemed to have calmed themselves finally.
"Now, would you like to help me put together the antidote?" He patted her lightly on the head when she finally smiled back at him.
"I would like that." Raven added finally, pushing her premonitions to the back of her mind.
Starfire took the stairs up to the higher right side of the tower. After putting Rancid behind bars they had completely forgotten about Mod. If she had any sympathy she might have felt bad for the neglected criminal, too bad she was already exceeding her yearly limit.
She stopped only a moment to enter her access code into the door before it slid open.
What greeted her was a strange sight indeed.
Mod had moved over to the the far off wall, dragging one of the steel chairs with him. It looked as though he had proceeded to bash the chair against the wall in hopes of escape. How did she know this?
When she walked in Mod was in mid-swing. He sat on his behind close to the wall, the chair over his head as he crained his head to see what had made the sudden noise. When he spotted Raven, he instantly dropped the chair beside him.
"Cyborg built this room, not even his sonic cannon can penetrate the walls." Starfire noted, walking a bit more into the room.
"I'm afraid not dearie. But what else is 'ol Moddie to do, the silence of this place could drive a bloke mad."
"I think it's a bit late for that." Starfire bit back, pulling a chair out to sit at the table.
After minute or two of silence, Mod pushed himself to his feet with much difficulty. He proceeded to move back toward the table, taking a good look at Starfire in the mean time. "Well, you 'ave certainly changed."
"And Cyborg has the cure. What I'm here for is to see if you've looked over the remote." Starfire nodded to the middle of the table, where the remote still sat.It looked so harmless without batteries.
"I bet you'd love to hear I've got it all figured out, is that right love?" Mad Mod plopped uncerimoniously into a chair across from the alien.
"Answer the question." Starfire let out a long sigh.
"I 'ave. And if you lot can get me the parts, Moddie can fix you up somethin nice." The old man sat back, grinning as though he had just won himself a large prize.
"What do you need?" Starfire asked almost instantly, his confidence seemed to give the girl a flitting image of hope, however strange that was.
"I'll start with a spot of tea, maybe chase it with some bisquits..."
Starfire gritted her teeth. Food be damned, she would starve him if he didn't work! And just as a nasty retort spun on her tongue, she imagined the rest of the team's response to her anger.
Starfire and Beast Boy would be fearful, and wonder why she was being so harsh to someone who was going to help them. Cyborg would scowl at her lack of a conscience, and Robin...
She could just imagine his face, and after he had gone and saved her life.
Instead Starfire took a deep, deep breath, letting it sooth off her tongue and take with it, the bitter resentment. "I'll have food brought up to you." She managed.
Mod nodded, a small smile twitching at his lips.
"And then the parts list?" She tried to keep her tone calm.
"Quite right," Mod pulled off his glasses before wiping them across the harsh fabric of his shirt.
Starfire pulled off the communicator that was clipped to her belt and quickly flipped it open. She opened the com link to Robin's commuicator. Almost immediatly his face appeared.
"Sta-Raven." He managed to catch himself at the last second, but not before Starfire noticed. His expression seemed to had changed slightly, but through the haze that was technology, it could just have been the interference. "What's up?"
"Could you have dinner sent up to Mod?" Starfire asked in her most patient of voices. "And possibly a pillow?" She choked out, surprising herself, there went her yearly limit.
Robin seemed confused, and then pleased at Raven's disposition. "Uh yea, oh and Cyborg was just looking for you, he had some help so the solution was finished quicker."
"I'll be right there." She added before cutting off the link and replacing the gadget.
"Tally 'oh then," Mod nodded as Starfire stood to leave. "I'll just be waitin for meh crumpets."
Starfire rolled her eyes at his thickening British accent, while hoping he would be getting tofu, or maybe one of Starfire's exotic puddings.
"Now," Cyborg grabbed one of the needles he had just sterilized and poked the sharp tip into a thick purple mixture. "The injection will take place immediately, within an hour or so the effects should be gone completely."
"I feel a 'but' coming on." Starfire added watching the needle with a keen eye.
"Yea." Cyborg sighed as he pulled back the needle so the fluid was pulled into the cylinder. Robin and Beast Boy sat a bit across the room watching as well. "The solvent will only work as long as it stays in your blood, and after some research..." Cyborg had measured out the first solution and set the needle down grabbing the second one. "Because of both of your alien blood, it won't stay in very long."
"So it will stop working?" Raven asked, now watching him fill another needle with a orange substance.
"Essentially. Raven, you will need a shot every twenty-four hours to keep the effects away, and Starfire, you'll need one every six hours."
"You mean me?" Raven asked suddenly confused with the whole mess.
"Yes, your body's blood, Raven's blood, is quite dominant and heals itself very quickly, it will rid of my solute quicker and you will start changing again."
"And we'll have to get these how long?"
"Until Mod finds a way to seperate you two into your respectable bodies."
Starfire groaned as Cyborg picked up both needles and a couple cotton swabs. "So who's first?"
Starfire stuck out her arm looking away as Cyborg loomed closer with an orange filled syringe. "Some panacea," She growled under her breath.
Just as Cyborg predicted the solute began to work immediately. By the time dinner had to be thought up the girls were back to their usual looking selves.
Starfire sat back on the couch, taking long deep breaths. She could see the small puncture wound on her inner elbow where she had been injected, but it had been worth it. She may not have wanted to look like Starfire, but she wanted to look like a mixture even less.
Raven was enjoying it as well. She kept taking glances at her old body, and smiling when it looked like her old self.
"I've got a list!" Robin announced climbing down the stairs. He grinned as he rounded the couch to plop down between the two girls. On reflex the two leaned in to see the list, ignoring Beast Boy who was complaining about dinner, or lack thereof.
"Let's see," Robin cleared his throat to read aloud. "An alterable remote. Wiring. Batteries. Electrical tape. A computer. Scissors. A generator. And one Co-" Robin swallowed at the last thing on the list.
The two girls read it over, a silence falling between them.
"Over my dead body." Starfire declared automatically, frowning while she pushed herself up from the couch.
"I must agree with Raven, it may not be a good idea." Raven added, looking troubled herself.
Robin couldn't blame them, who'd want to see Control Freak again anyway?
"DUDES!" Beast Boy's yelling had caused the trio to finally snap their attention to him. He was looking exasperated pulling at his green fluffy hair. "The blue furry food just ate the last of our food!" He yelped before whimpering about his lost tofu.
"And?" Starfire supplied.
"I'm hungry!"
"Um." Raven stood from the couch, and offered Robin a hand up. "May I suggest an outting of pizza?"
Arriving at their usual pizza spot, the team was met with only one small hitch. Because they were now in public, well, certain liberties couldn't be allowed.
Namely the fact that Starfire had to sit beside Robin, while Raven slid in between Beast Boy and Cyborg, literally across from her boy. After a minute of their arrival a waitress slid over on a pair of high roller skates, grinning all the while.
"May I take your order?" She looked over the five, as the great food war began.
"Veggie Supreme!" Beast Boy crooned trying to make himself heard over Cyborg who was already shouting for a couple Meat Lovers pizzas.
Robin felt the girl look over him with scrutinizing eyes. Carefully to avoid bodily harm, and seem casual as well, Robin placed his hand on top of Starfire's on the table's edge. "One veggie, two meat, and two plain cheese. Waters for everyone." Robin clarified ignoring the stern look Starfire was now shooting his way.
The waitress smiled before jotting down the order and sliding the small notepad into the front of her apron. Her eyes slid over the five of them one more time before she skated away.
Robin let out a sigh before daring to look toward the angry girl beside him. The two boys were finally settling their dispute now that the food had already been ordered.
Raven coughed lightly focusing on the table. Seeing Starfire, but not really her made her feel a burning up through her throat that she could not bare.
Starfire gave Robin a sharp biting look, but it eased off her features as quickly as it had come. He had no choice but to fit his roll he had assigned himself to, and he certainly didn't need her harsh jurisdiction with everything else. But since when had she grown a conscience?
Under Robin's gaze her features softened back into a placid serene nothingness, and he felt himself surprised once more. Maybe she could be lenient at times. He took a bolder step and hoped it wouldn't press her patience too much. He slid his gloved fingers between hers as he had done so many times, but it had never been this stressful before, neither had it given him such a strange feeling. The motion did not go unnoticed by the two girls.
Starfire raised an eyebrow in a typical Raven expression, but green eyes questioned him. He nodded toward their waitress who was now skating back toward their table, five drinks balanced on a serving platter.
"And here you are, your pizzas will be ready momentarily." She set the drinks down in front of each of them before skating off again.
"So I heard you got a list from Mad Mod?" Cyborg had settled the dispute between himself and Beast Boy by a promised round on the gamestation when they got home.
"We did." Raven finally spoke up dragging her eyes from the table top, trying not to blame Robin or Raven for their predicament. "But he wants the help of Control Freak."
Cyborg cringed as Starfire let a harsh scowl mar her features. "And have you considered it?" He chanced. Pause.
Three disgruntled faces looked back at him.
"Alright, alright." Cyborg held his hands up in surrender. He waited until they stopped staring so intently at him. "All I'm saying is that you might want to..." Starfire was looking at him most harshly. "...consider it?"
Starfire huffed, and gathered herself up to retort. Robin could feel it as her hand tightened in his.
Luckily for the cybernetic boy, he was saved as the waitress rolled up. Five boxes of pizza were piled on her hand and she moved around the table to deliver each.
Starfire relaxed once more, attempting a smile to keep up appearances as a cheese pizza box landed in front of her. "Enjoy." The woman looked at Starfire briefly before her eyes flickered to Robin. Starfire was the only one to catch it.
"Robin?" Starfire asked softly as the others started into their pizza.
The boy learned over a little to hear her. "Hmm?"
"I'm going to need my hand back, charades over."
"Oh. Right." Robin grinned and let go of her hand to dive into his pizza.
Cyborg pressed the access code into the door, and the room slid open. After pizza most of the team had retired to their rooms, Beast Boy only sulking to his room when being beaten 10-1 on the gamestation.
Careful not to be excessively loud he moved into the room, as the lights flickered on. Mod was leaning on the table, a pillow buried under his wild white hair, and he was snoring.
"Yo." Cyborg bumped the man lightly, attempting to rouse him.
Mod snorted before turning to breathe into the pillow.
Annoyed, Cyborg bumped him a bit harder. This time the old man nearly fell off his chair as he was startled awake. "Snot, what are you wakin' Moddie up for?" He brushed the hair back and fixed his glasses before glaring up at Cyborg's height.
"Can you really build the remote?" His tone was serious, but not giving anything away.
"Quite right." Mod was starting to get suspicious, why was this boy barging in, in the middle of the night to question him?
"But you need Control Freak's help?"
"Nothin gets past you laddie." He paused and squinted up at Cyborg. "Now what's this 'bout?"
"I'll get you everything on your list."
"That so?" Mod grinned once again wondering just how far the Titans were willing to go to accomodate him while he supposedly helped them out.
"Everything will be gathered by tomorrow evening." Cyborg nodded feeling a deep guilt settle into his stomach, Raven would murder him when she found out.
If she found out.
And as Cyborg made his way back out of the room and closed the door, he could feel a small plan developing within his head.
Man, I've wanted to get Cyborg doin something secretive for a while, and give him a bit bigger part.
Wow, I'm amazed I got so many offers for beta. Hehe, though I could only pick one. So, a million and one thanks to my new beta Sarah Cabbage Patch!
Mmm thank you all for the comments, and suggestions as well. You all keep my enthusiasm up to continue this story.
Tralala, if you think the plot is pretty thick now, there's more to come. I mean, villians are pretty crafty...
-Dragonslayer527