A/N: Just a quick note to let you know that this is set anytime between Titans East and Birthmark.

When Dick opened his eyes again, he didn't see the blood-soaked ground but instead fluffy white snow. "Where are we?" he whispered, wiping the remaining tears off his face.

"Long Island," Donna answered, standing up and offering him a hand.

He took it, preparing for the jerk of travel, but she just pulled him to his feet. Brushing the excess snow off his costume, Dick got a good look around, eyes spying a house that looked like it could have been the whole of Rhode Island. "Whoa…and I thought the Manor was big. This place is like a country within itself."

"The kitchen and bathroom are in different time zones," she joked lightly.

That got him to laugh. "What are we doing here?"

"You know someone that lives here." Her hand pointed out in front of them, to someone in the snow.

It was a small green rabbit hopping through the drifts that suddenly turned into a tiger and ran what seemed to be a small obstacle course. Upon completing it, the tiger morphed into a human, though equally green. "Oh, go Beast Boy, go Beast Boy, you're the man, oh yeah! New record, all right!" He did a celebratory dance there in the snow and Dick couldn't help but smile.

"Beast Boy lives here?" He raised an eyebrow. "Never would have guessed that. Doesn't seem too terrible."

A small, sad smile appeared on her face. "Keep watching."

"Stop saying that. I don't like it when you say that. It means something bad is going to happen." He watched Donna as she sighed lightly and reached for his hand. Again, it wasn't to take him anywhere else, but for comfort. Maybe for him, maybe for both of them. Yet he couldn't help feeling better as her fingers threaded through his.

Someone cleared his or her throat from near the house. They turned to look and after years of being the child of a socialite, Dick knew this man was the butler. There was nothing comforting about him and he also knew that this man wasn't Alfred. "Master Logan," he said, "It's time for dinner. The sun set several hours ago, you should have come inside."

"Aww, don't be like that, Questor!" the green teenager begged, but walked towards him. "It's Christmas Eve."

"Yes, well, as true as that may be, you need to come inside before dinner gets as cold as it is out there." The pair went inside the house where Beast Boy changed into a dog, shaking off the excess water from his fur. "Lovely," the butler rolled his eyes. "I spoke with Master Dayton."

Beast Boy changed back to his human form, a large smile on his face. "He and Rita are coming home for Christmas? She said that she wasn't sure, but that she'd do her best because she really missed me too! I've been practicing so hard, I was hoping I could show Mento what I could really do and he'd let me back on the Doom Patrol, and—"eHe tHe

"They won't be able to make it," Questor continued. "It may even be a few more days till they can get back."

The green man looked devastated as he struggled to find words. "O…oh…I, well, yeah, they're really busy this time of year. People need the Doom Patrol. But I'm sure she tried…Rita always tries."

Dick watched as Beast Boy stared at the floor in sorrow. "Dayton? Does he mean Steve Dayton? As in, the fifth-richest man in the world?"

Donna nodded. "He's Mento of the Doom Patrol. And here I thought you knew everything."

He glared lightly at her. "I just can't believe that Beast Boy is Steve Dayton's son. Why does he keep asking me for a moped? Dayton has, what, $80 billion?"

"The same reason you never ask your billionaire daddy for anything. And he's his adopted son, actually. He was adopted by Dayton's wife, Rita Farr. Garfield and Dayton got each other by association," she explained.

"Rita Farr?" Dick contemplated the name as they followed Beast Boy through the house. "So, she must be Elasti-Girl."

She blinked in surprise. "Yeah, that's right."

He smirked. "See, I do know everything. Except I didn't know his name. Heh, Garfield?"

"Yeah, ok, Dick," Donna rolled her eyes. "Come on." The entered the dining room. The large table had ten chairs around it, but could easily fit more. There was one plate and Gar sat at that setting. He seemed very small in such a big room.

As he watched Gar push away the slices of ham and concentrate on the mashed potatoes, Dick couldn't help but comment. "This is depressing."

Garfield echoed his thoughts with a loud sigh, setting down his silverware. "You know, Quest, I'm not really hungry." He pushed back from the table, leaving the cloth napkin on his chair.

"It's going to get cold, Master Logan," the butler reminded him.

"Yeah, well, that's why they invented microwaves, isn't it?" Sticking his hands into the pockets of his jeans, he shuffled into the next room where there was a ten-foot-tall Christmas tree, the floor surrounding it covered in a mountain of gifts.

Questor looked a bit sad for his young charge. "You know, I won't tell if you want to open one of your gifts now."

Gar picked up one of the presents, reading the tag: To Gar, Love Rita. She had even drawn a little heart. "Nah, I don't really feel like it right now." He sat down in one of the large couches, watching the snow fall outside.

The butler looked as if he was going to say something, but we interrupted by the phone. A minute later, he came back into the room. "It's for you, Master Logan. I'll put it on speaker phone."

He placed it in the cradle and then there was a feminine voice. "Gar, honey?"

"Mom!" Garfield bounded up out of his seat, staring at the handset as if he could see her face.

"Hi, sweetheart," Rita said pleasantly. "I'm sorry that we couldn't make it home for Christmas Eve."

Though she couldn't see it, Gar shook his head, "No, it's not your fault. Do you think you could make it home tomorrow? We can spend Christmas together."

She sighed. "I…I don't think that's going to be possible, Gar. I'll do my best to get home as soon as possible. You're going to be good for Questor, right?"

"Of course, Mom," he grinned. "Quest and I are old buddies."

Rita laughed. "Alright, I guess I'll take your word for it."

Suddenly there was an explosion in the background and a male voice calling, "Rita, get off the damn phone!"

"Steve, I'm talking to Gar!" she shouted back.

"The fucking kid doesn't matter right now, we need you over here!" Gar visibly flinched at Mento's angry tone.

"I'm so sorry, sweetheart, I have to go. I'll call you tomorrow," Rita promised. "Merry Christmas and I love you."

"Be careful!" He managed to say before the dial tone reached his ears. "And I love you too…" Gar picked up the handset and pushed the off button before throwing it against the wall in frustration, watching it shatter into several pieces. He brushed off the tears that rolled down his cheeks.

Dick clenched his fists. "Dayton's an asshole!"

Donna nodded. "He and Gar tolerate each other, but he adores Rita, as much as he did his birth mother. I bet Bruce is looking pretty good right now."

"Yeah, he is," Dick longed to reach out and give his new little brother a hug as Garfield sunk into one of the overstuffed armchairs, giving way to his sobs. "I'm sorry, Gar. Donna, can we leave?"

She reached for him and in a moment they were somewhere else entirely…

Dick immediately knew that he wasn't at the million-dollar estate anymore. He recognized the area though. "This is Cooper City, it's like a few miles away from Jump. Who do I know here?"

She pointed to a tall, largely built man who walked along with a slouch, the hood of his sweatshirt pulled over his head. "I think you can guess who that is."

"Cyborg?" He followed him up the steps of a brownstone. The inside was cluttered with metal parts, as well as what seemed like blueprints for complex mechanics.

"Victor, is that you?" a male voice called, poking his head out of what seemed to be the kitchen. "Where have you been?"

"Just out for a walk," Victor grumbled from beneath the hood. "What do you care?"

The man sighed. "I'm your father, Vic. Of course I care."

Victor moved some papers out of the way to sit on the couch, grumbling to himself. "Care enough to make me a monster." He held up his hands, looking at the metal where flesh used to be.

"I just thought you should know that I have to go into work tomorrow," he explained to his son, stuffing papers and parts into a titanium briefcase.

"Tomorrow's Christmas," Vic noted. "So of course you're going into work. Silas Stone, the world's greatest workaholic. King of putting everything else before family."

Silas slammed the case against the kitchen counter. "Dammit, boy, the work I do is important!"

"I know that!" Vic stood up angrily. "I know that you think it's the most god damned important think that ever existed. More important than your son, than your wife! Important enough to you your own flesh and blood as a guinea pig over and over again."

He pointed his finger at his teenage son. "Listen here, Victor. I won't have you disrespecting me like that."

"I hate you. It should have been you," Cyborg hissed. "You should have died instead of her."

This stopped Silas in his tracks, giving Victor enough time to run back out the front door, slamming it so hard behind him that it almost fell off it's hinges. Dick and Donna followed as Vic made his way down the street, pulling gloves over his mechanical hands to hide them.

He stopped at a nearby flower stand, pulling his face deep into the hood. "Can I get a bouquet of pink roses?" he asked the woman, putting some bills on the counter.

She picked up one and handed it to him with a smile. "Merry Christmas."

"Yeah, you too."

"Where's he going?" Dick asked Donna. "He never mentioned a girlfriend. And if you say 'Just watch' I'll leave you right now."

She smiled and said nothing, just grabbed his hand and pulled him along. They approached the Cooper City Cemetery, watching as Victor intuitively weaved his way along the path.

"Hey, Mom," he greeted the tombstone when he finally stopped. The gloved hand ran across the words, reading: Elinore Stone, Beloved Wife and Mother. "Merry Christmas. I knew Dad wasn't goin' to come, but I thought you deserved a visitor. And pink roses were always your favorite."

Victor sighed. "I don't know how you stayed married to him for so long. Maybe it was because ya'll were so interested in everything. Especially your work and making sure I was the best. I tried, Ma, I really did. And…if it wasn't for that stupid accident I wouldn't be here.

"Not that I blame you. There isn't a day goes by when I don't think of how I could have saved you and I didn't. If you were here, then maybe everything I am…everything I've become would have been worth it." Victor pushed his hood down, almost as if he felt bad talking to his mother that way. "But I can't stand being with him anymore. If I was still me, then I could be on my way to the Olympics or Harvard.

"No one will take the freak though. I've got nowhere else to go. I don't understand why he did it," Vic swallowed to get the lump out of his throat. "Was it just so I could be a test dummy for his stupid experiments again? He can't have wanted me. He should have known I wouldn't want to be this useless lump of scrap metal." He wiped a tear rolling down the human side of his cheek. "Why couldn't he have just let me die!"

Donna put a hand on Dick's shoulder, leading him away. "I think he deserves to be alone."

They walked out of the graveyard in silence. "What happened to Cy's mom?"

"Both of his parents were research scientists for S.T.A.R Labs. They were looking in to a long-range inter-dimensional study when his father let a blob-creature into the lab and it attacked his mother. Vic tried to save her, but she died and he lost most of his body in the process," she explained.

"So his father replaced it with the bionic parts," he finished.

Donna nodded. "He and his father were never particularly close, but after Elinore died…Well, with the Titans he found people he didn't have to hide with and a place that would get him away from Silas."

Dick considered this for a long moment. "So, aren't you going to do your angel thing and take us away from this?"

"Actually, our next visit is right around the corner." Indeed, they turned the corner and someone familiar caught his eye.

"Raven! What is she doing here? Are we following her too?" Dick tried to focus on her as she hid in the shadows.

She shook her head. "We can't get too good of a focus on her. She likes to run."

"She looks scared," he noted, watching her. "But what of?"

"You would have found out eventually," Donna told him.

Dick walked across the street towards her, but she was already gone by the time he got there. But something else he saw froze his heart. He read the headline of the newspaper aloud. "'Jump City in Discussion with Terminator'?" His eyes scanned as much of the article as he could read.

The mayor of Jump City, our neighbor to the north, is under discussion for the liberation of the city from Deathstroke the Terminator. Deathstroke, who we've also come to known as Slade Wilson, took over the city late last month along with his assistant, a meta-human known only as Terra and another terrorist called The Ravager.

There was a large picture before the paper was folded, the rest of the article out of sight. "Slade took over my city," he realized breathlessly. "But…how?"

"Without the Titans, Jump had no protection. Other heroes are more interested in their own cities." Donna held out a hand to him. "Time to go."

Wordlessly, he took her hand and the images of his city's destruction disappeared.

The house in front of then was familiar. He'd seen it on T.V. before. "This is Oliver Queen's house. The Green Arrow lives here."

"Then I guess you know who we're here to see," she walked inside, leading him to the living room where Green Arrow, Black Canary and a Green Lantern were standing around a redheaded teenager.

"We'll be back as soon as possible. If you get any more hints to the location of that drug ring, feel free to investigate," Green Arrow told him. "And no parties."

"And be careful," Hal Jordan added.

Black Canary leaned over to kiss his cheek. "Merry Christmas, Roy."

"You two, Di," he smiled.

The men were turning towards the door. "Let's go, Dinah," Oliver called.

"I'm coming," she rolled her eyes, gave Roy a wink, then followed the men outside, blonde ponytail bouncing behind her.

Roy waited until the door shut before flipping it off. "No parties my ass. Screw you, Queen." He marched up the stairs of the mansion. "I don't have to invite a lot of people over to have a party."

"I heard that Green Arrow and Speedy didn't always get along," Dick muttered. "Especially since he began dating Dinah Lance. I wasn't aware that Roy was this hostile."

Donna sighed. "No one else is either. He's generally so good-natured that people don't notice or the chalk it up to a bad day. Roy doesn't like being ignored though."

Dick snorted. "I can understand that. Bruce and I…we never got this bad, at least not while we were living in the same house. He always said that Queen was one of the most irresponsible men he'd ever met. What good excuse does he have to leave Roy alone on Christmas?"

"He, Black Canary and Green Lantern are looking into some corruption in city hall."

"That shouldn't take too long," he shrugged. "They'll be back by Christmas."

Donna sighed. "No, they won't. Afterwards, Oliver booked a cabin in Tahoe for the weekend, to apologize to Dinah for cheating on her last week."

Dick shook his head. "All the things I heard about Oliver, I always thought that was just Bruce. He really can be a jackass though, can't he? Lemme guess, Roy's gonna get back at him with a big party or something. Well, he deserves it."

"Don't say that," she pleaded with him. "Take it back."

"Um, ok, I take it back. What's the big deal?"

She didn't say anything, just walked into Roy's room. He rubbed his hands together and got on his knees to look under his bed. "C'mere, you."

Dick smirked. "He's got a girl under there, doesn't he?"

Roy slid out with a box in hand. There was a slick grin on his face as he sat as his desk and opened it, sliding out a needle. "Hello, friend."

"That's…that's…is that drugs?"

"Heroin, to be specific," Donna whispered, unable to draw her eyes away.

"He's not investigating a drug ring, is he?"

She shook her head. "No."

Dick watched as Roy opened an alcohol swab and cleaned off the needed. "Roy, you idiot!" He tried to hit the young man, but his hand went right there him. "How could you! You know how dangerous drugs are, how stupid!" He wanted to throw something, to do anything to make him stop.

"He can't hear you," Donna rasped. "Oh, I wish he could, but he can't."

"Why?" He looked at Donna, unable to stare at Roy without feeling sick to his stomach. "With so many things going for him…why?"

Donna squeezed Dick's arm, rubbing it comfortingly. "He's alone. Oliver ignores him, and he thinks that drugs can be a substitute for the friend he's lost. When there were Titans, he saw that as a beacon of hope. If things ever got so bad, there were teenagers like him who would help. He knew as much about you as you knew about him after all. But the thing is, you and Batman, you paved the way for sidekicks. Without the dynamic duo as a sign to keep to it and it'll work, the Green Arrow pushed him aside for the blonde in fishnets."

"But Roy…he's so great at what he does. He's a good hero and if he didn't want that, he'd be a shoe in for the Olympics!" Dick insisted.

"I know that," she nodded. "And if you existed, you could tell him that. Let's go."

Dick was never happier to leave any place in the world.

"So…where are the rest of Titans East?" He asked when they arrived at their next destination, a city unknown to him.

"Aqualad is being kept in Atlantis by Aquaman, Bumblebee ended up joining the Hive, and Mas y Menos are in South America," she explained.

He nodded. "So we're not here to see any of them…who are we here to see?"

"Who do you think we're here to see?"

There was one person that he cared about that had not yet been shown to him and he looked out for a flash of bright red hair. Instead, the first he saw were bright green starbolts being thrown at police officers. "Rok'thar! X'hal us metrin!"

"Starfire," he choked out, watching as she flew past him, dodging gunfire. "What are they doing to her?"

"She's still running from the Gordanians. The lizard men," she clarified. "The President ordered all law enforcement officers to help them capture her."

He couldn't keep his eyes off her. "It's been a long time. But she never gives up, does she?"

Starfire caused a cop car to blow up, using the smoke created to hide in a nearby alley. She paused, panting for breath. "Xankar hwolfan den…"

"She won't be able to last for much longer," Donna told him softly. "It's been a long time and even she can't live running on such little food. Her transformation has already been delayed because her body wouldn't be able to handle it; it would kill her."

Dick managed to pull his eyes away from the alien to look at his angel. "What will happen to her?"

Donna sighed. "Her father sold her to the Gordanians as a slave so they would spare her planet."

"What…what kind of slave?"

She raised an eyebrow at him. "She's not just attractive to Earth men. What kind of slave do you think?"

His heart hurt as he stared at her. The officers saw her in the alley and she dodged their guns, shooting starbolts at them. One hit as she screamed out curses in Tamaranean. "Starfire!" he screamed, wanting to help her, to comfort her.

After taking out a nice chunk of a nearby building with her strength, Starfire was able to fly away, using the sun to blind them from looking after her. Dick closed his eyes. "What do I do? If I exist, I hurt my friends and innocent people. Either I screw up or the world does."

"You're not a screw up!" Donna insisted. She held his head in her hands, making him look at her. "You're strong, and unselfish, and utterly kind. Dick, you are an amazing person."

He smirked. "You have to say that. You're my guardian angel."

Her hands slipped off his face to rest on his shoulders as she laughed. "For such a good detective you are completely clueless sometimes. We get to choose whom we take care of. I want you to be happy. But I know that you can't be happy if you let your friends live like this. So tell me what you want."

"I…" Dick sighed. "I want to exist. I want to be able to help the people I love."

"Good," she smiled, taking her hand off his shoulder and holding it out for him.

He eyed it suspiciously before blue eyes met blue eyes. "I'm never going to see you again, am I?"

"I doubt it," she answered sadly. "But you know I'll always be there when you need me."

Dick considered this, then leaned in an kissed her lightly. "Thank you. For everything you've ever done for me."

She grinned at him. "It was my pleasure." Pressing her lips to his, the joined hands and disappeared.

The next time Dick opened his eyes he was alone.

A/N: Here's the second chapter. The third one will be up before Sunday, since the contest ends Saturday night. Any reviews help me win, so I'd love to hear anything you have to say.

Questions, comments, reactions and reviews are greatly appreciated.