Warning: This story is rated R for a reason! There are some adult themes, cutting, violence, bit of lemon (maybe later on) and some other stuff that younger people may not want to read about! Please consider this before you dive in, thanks!
Disclamer: I don't own Teen Titans, if I did, there would be alot more episodes about Beast boy, Raven and Cyborg ('Cause I love them). I also don't own the lyrics to 'Counting Bodies like Sheep to the Rythm of the War Drum' which belong to one of the greatest friken bands on the earth, Perfect Circle.
Forenote: This is about four years after Slade was 'destroyed', everyone is a bit older, I'll have an image link later on.
Wicked
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...Don't fret precious I'm here, step away from the window…
Go back to sleep
Safe from pain and truth and choice and other poison devils,
…See, they don't give a fuck about you, like I do...
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Raven stood before the mirror, arms splayed, holding onto the edges of the sink for support. The dark blue towel hung loosely about her breasts, it slowly slipped and fell from her body, she made no move to stop it. Lifting her head, she confronted the mirror as she had countless times before. Violet eyes gazed listlessly over her scarred torso, absentmindedly brushing locks of wet hair from her face. One finger traced solemnly over her latest scar, arching through her chest and behind her shoulders, dancing over pock marks made by shells and glass and trenches of flesh that had never filled. A quiet smile, sardonic and frightened by her own appearance, perched on her face. It was an empty gesture, so much like the ones she would give Beast boy or StarFire when they told their idiosyncratic jokes, made to insist upon others her humanity. Her fingers touched an open sore, causing tears to spring to her eyes.
"Damn" She whispered, the mirror cracked before her, lines racing through its surface, thin as the thread of a spider.
Sighing, she began to slip into a fresh uniform, its sullen color draping quickly over her blue-gray skin. Even though she knew no one else would be up, she still couldn't imagine walking around of tower of glass in a bath robe. Fastening her cape, she walked slowly through the dark hallways, stopping at each of the Titans doors. Every night since they had moved in, she had done this, saying everything she could never say to them out loud. This helped to keep her emotions in check, allowing them just enough freedom and truth to get her through another day of forced smiles and comforting lies.
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"Robin, you pushy bastard, why can't you just understand?" Raven whispered, knowing Boy Wonder happened to be a light sleeper. Her forehead rested upon the cold metal panels that made up the walls in Titan Tower, each hand pressing softly around the fresh bruises on her stomach. Though she had known Robin the longest, he was one of the elusive members of the Titans, she thought he of all people might understand.
"If you knew…if you knew…" she could not finish her sentence, though the thought of being isolated was terrifying, she knew they could never really see what was going on. That was how she protected them. Closing her eyes, she began to grit her teeth as a fresh pain seared her back. Raven knew this was one of the prices she would pay until she died.
She reached behind her, feeling the damp place just inside her shoulder with her left hand, and using the right to prop herself against the wall. Though her body was a variable maze of battle scars, many had been of her own creation, punishment for failures and feelings.
"It has to be this way…"
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Regaining her footing, Raven edged slowly down the hall, seeking her next release, Starfire.
The beautiful alien had been both Raven's best friend and the bane of her existence. Starfire was everything Raven could ever wish to be, powerful, beautiful, emotional, innocent, things Raven could hardly comprehend.
"Star…" Her bloodied hand touched the metal, leaving tiny marks upon its chrome finish. The halfling didn't worry though,the Titans had a way with which they missed many small details such as that.
"Star…you will never know how perfect you are on the inside. You will never know how much I want to be you, even for a moment, I would give anything just to…just to…just to feel something on the inside. Nothing has been the same since-" Another sharp pain singed her thoughts as Raven felt tears forcing themselves upon her eyes.
"Oh gods, I swear over the body of my mother I will never let him touch you…" Her voice was low and strained, its deadpan replaced by a threatening melodic tone. The tears she tried so desperately to hold back spilt upon her gray cheeks, her hands clenched, knuckles white with disgust and anger. A low, black aura began to lace in between her fingers as they rhythmically opened and closed, Raven's breathing hastened and the chakra mounted on her forehead pulsated deep within its chambers. The shattering of a light bulb in Starfires room awoke the brewing demoness, her heart pounding and jaws aching.
'Thank Azra Star sleeps likea log,'
Looking down at her hands, she saw tinyglobes of bloodhad formed where her fingernails had bitten into her flesh. The small droplets were entrancing as the danced along the lines of her pale flesh, seeking to pool in the center of her hand.
Raven smiled, the hollow gesture merely used to exonerate the anger that had possessed her only moments before.
With small, aching movements, she headed toward Cyborg's room, taking the stairs rather than the elevator. She could feel the blood trickle down the small of her back, pooling and spreading through her uniform. Raven knew her condition was far from dire, and the pain managed to distract her mind from the task at hand. Reaching the landing, she pressed the blood she carried so ceremoniously in her palm against her cloak, waiting as the material dried her hands.
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Raven and Cy had always been close. She knew she could always count on him, and she was there to console him in his darkest hours. How she longed to tell him everything, everything that had happened to her, to tell him why she had changed, why she had to change. Every day she went without murmuring a word of her tragedy killed her, paying in blood and in her dreams every night for nearly a year.
This…this would kill him. Raven knew how much Cy tried to protect her, to be the brother she could look up to, and if he found out she had been keeping this from him for a year, things would never be the same.
Pressing one hand to his door, she eased her shoulder down on the silver panels, relishing the chill that ran down her spine.
"Cy, I want things to go back to the way they used to be…before any of this happened. I'm pulling the Titans apart, and if I could just tell you…If you would listen I swear I would…Cyborg I…Victor I-" Something from within Cyborg's room stirred, she quickly pressed herself into the shadows, allowing her powers to conceal her body.
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With a whirr, the door opened, revealing a hazy, but aware Titan. Cyborg was the largest and oldest of the titans, 19 going on 20 now, he had aged little since joining the titans, mostly due to his hesitation to upgrade his system.
"Hello?" Calling groggily to no one, the behemoth squinted his human eye, though it really altered nothing as his cybernetic one could already asses the situation. Infrared suggested someone had been here, gazing silently at the floor, he followed to where the footprints vanished into the wall.
Raven.
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"I know you're out there, Rae. You know where I'm at, when you're ready to talk…" Sighing, he stepped back into his room. With most people, he would have pressed, but Rae was a special case, she needed room. It was times like this he was most worried about her. Locking herself in her room, hardly eating, coming out to help fight crime, and then back to her dungeon. He couldn't understand why she was doing this to herself, why she was doing this to the team, to him. As the doors slid shut, he rested his metallic forearms on the frame, his hands closing into fists and his head bowed.
Ever since he had been recruited, Raven had been there for him. She seemed to understand what he was going through, though she was half demon, and he half robot, they were both alienated from society. Without parents, without homes, they had quickly found solace with one another.The Titans were a family, it was his job to make sure they were all alright. But Raven wasn't alright, and he couldn't understand why she wouldn't talk to him anymore.
"Raven…why won't you just talk to me?" Cyborg said, standing upright, and letting his hand graze along the wall as he returned to his bed. "I just want to help…"
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Steping forth from the shadows, Raven began moving toward her final confession, Beast Boy. He, above all was the one she had to speak to every night, he alone could keep the nightmares away. Raven wavered slightly as she approached Beast Boys room. He knew everything. He had been there, and he had seen. He had seen more of her soul than any other person alive, and in some ways, she blamed him. She knew it was rash, and she knew he could not have saved her, his life could not have made X stop. But every time she saw his green face, she could feel her knees weaken and her stomach churn.
Beast boy had done everything he could to stop Red X, but it was all in vain.
She knew the changeling blamed himself, but she couldn't tell him everything was alright. Not after everything he had seen, everything she had told him. Nothing was alright anymore.
"Oh gods…Beast Boy…" She was still yards from his room, one hand placed on her knee, the other on the wall. She could feel another vision coming on, its ripples distorting reality as she struggled to hold on to what lay before her. Raven closed her eyes, concentrating all her energy on teleporting back, back to where she could scream without anyone hearing, back to her dark lair to lie comatose while visions and night demons wracked her slumber. Her mind fell out the bottom of her head, sinking slowly into the sweet emptiness of dark magic, and falling atopa rumpled bed.
As she felt the last of her conscious mind failing, she reached out to drape her blankets over her body, but where covers would have been, she found only the softly sleeping form of her friend, Beast boy.
"shi..."
Note from Z: So, what do you think? First online story, first TT fanfic, first for alot of other things for me. This is the first chapter of a really wicked, in a bad way, story. Please, C&C so that I can write the next chapter/fix my style/give up, and not too many flames, not feeling very pyro right now.
Also: Everyone is older, duh, Raven is having some major problems right now, duh, because of something that happened between her and Red X, and the only person who knows is BB. I'm really slow at working into a story, so I'm sorry if this chapter is a major drag.