Chapter nine is here just for you. I hope people don't get confused, I noticed that I tend to jump around in time a lot, but I try and keep it fairly orderly. Anyway, I know it's been slow building for awhile now, but here's where it takes a turn and things start getting faster.
Chapter nine. Enjoy.
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"Raven, could I have a word with you?" Raven had just been of the verge of asking Beast Boy the questions she had been wanting to ask for what seemed like an eternity when Robin had entered and posed his question.
"Uh, yeah," she said, turning away from Beast Boy to look at Robin. What horrible timing he has. He seemed to be fidgeting nervously, which she found to be quite strange. His eyes kept darting to Beast Boy and then back to her. Suddenly there came to her a most terrible thought. Had Cyborg discovered something in BB's blood tests? Was that why Robin looked so nervous? Raven's heart felt on the verge of tearing from her chest.
"Rae?" The voice that spoke her name was so quiet that Raven wasn't sure she had actually heard it. It sounded almost pathetic. She turned back to the green skinned Titan and he looked up at her meekly. "You'll come back soon, right?" She hesitated before answering. Something about the way Robin was looking at her made her think she might be gone awhile.
"I…" Her gaze had wandered to the floor before she realized it and she could feel tears trying to break away from her eyes. She looked up after a moment and smiled. She wasn't going to look scared. She was going to be strong for Beast Boy and not jump to horrible conclusions. "Of course I will, Beast Boy," she said, rubbing her hand soothingly across his arm. She turned and followed Robin out, dimming the lights just before she exited.
Alone now. Empty rooms were so much more terrifying than filled ones. It was too quiet. The silence buzzed in his super sensitive ears and every slight noise caused him to jump. He sucked in a breath and let it out slowly. "I'm being silly," he said. It was silent again. He had almost expected someone to answer back.
After about ten minutes he was sure Raven wouldn't be back any time soon. He wanted to be mad at her, but found that he couldn't. Exasperated, he slid down the surprisingly comfortable hospital bed and pulled the sheets up over his head. Everything around him smelled ultra clean and unnatural. He decided that he wouldn't be able to fall asleep, but before he knew it he had slipped into a land of dreams.
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"Why are you locking the door?" Raven watched confused as Robin pulled a key from his pocket and inserted into the handle of the door that led into the infirmary.
"Starfire?" He said suddenly and without answering Raven's question.
"Yes, Robin?"
Raven hadn't even noticed the alien girl was standing there until she spoke. She had been sitting in a chair as if she had been waiting for them.
"I want you to stay here until I come get you." Robin started to walk away and motioned for Raven to follow him. He continued to talk to Starfire as he walked. "No matter what happens, don't let Beast Boy out, and call me if anything is up." Starfire looked distraught at perhaps having to deny Beast Boy exit from the room, but did as she was asked, nodding to show she understood her task.
"Robin," Raven said, sounding quite annoyed at being ignored by the Titan's leader. "What's going on?"
"I want to show you something," he said, voice suddenly filled with a mix of concern, sadness, and what Raven perceived as a hint of fear.
"What is it?" Raven's voice was now one of complete concern and she instantly forgave Robin's previous rudeness. "It's the tests, isn't it?" She asked. "What's wrong? What does Beast Boy have?" Robin's face held nothing but confusion.
"No," Robin said, still leading Raven. "I think Cyborg is still working on those. What I need to show you is on the t.v."
"Jesus Christ!" Raven suddenly felt an immense anger toward Robin. "I thought there was something incredibly wrong and you just want to show me something on t.v.?" She felt like striking the Boy Wonder.
"There is something incredibly wrong," Robin said, and Raven feared she had spoken too soon.
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Cyborg wiped his brow of the perspiration that had gathered there and then went immediately back to the task at hand. He stood, hunched over an elaborate computer system, his fingers skating over the various keys around him, all of them alight with color. Behind him, the vast chamber of his metal room stretched on, filled to the brim with technological equipment, and echoing with beeps and clicks.
Very gently, his metal fingers held the vials of blood he had drawn from Beast Boy's arm and inserted them into a spot on the panel in front of him. A hiss noise was heard and the warm liquid slowly seeped from the pair of matching vials and was drunk up by the thirsty computer. He cracked his neck while waiting for all the blood to drain, easing some of the tension that had built up into his neck, and then set to work.
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Raven watched the television patiently as the news story unfolded in front of her. It scared her, yes, this was true, but it also seemed to fit. It made some amount of sense, and she accepted it.
"I should have stopped him from leaving," she said when the story had ended, referring to earlier when Beast Boy had stormed out of her room. "I knew something like this would happen." Robin shook his head sadly.
"Don't you dare blame yourself," he told her, "the fault here does not lay with you." Raven sighed and nodded.
"You're going to make me tell you, right?" It was unavoidable, and the demon knew it.
"You have to, Raven," Robin said, "it's important. I need to know what's going on for the safety of my team and for the safety of the city." She nodded again, but said nothing. Somewhere in the room around them a clock ticked out every second in a painfully loud electronic click. Raven could hear her leader's even and steady breaths, but she could also hear his heart, and it sounded as if it were trying to break itself free of his chest.
"I guess I should start from the beginning," she said softly, and that's exactly what she did. She told the story of how she had discovered Beast Boy the night before, and how he had been incredibly intoxicated. She told of how the two had talked and how Beast Boy had explained that there wasn't something right about him, something that scared him and struggled to break free. The Beast, Raven told Robin, or something like it.
"Do you mean that thing that Beast Boy turned into for awhile when he got covered in chemicals?" Robin asked. Raven replied in the affirmative. "I thought that it hadn't been any trouble since then?"
"No, it hadn't," Raven told him, "until now. It seems like it's trying to break free, at least that's what Beast Boy says. That's why he was drinking, he believes alcohol is the only thing keeping it down."
"But why is that such a problem?" Robin was confused. "It wasn't incredibly hard to deal with before."
"And that brings us to the next point in my story," Raven said. "The Beast before and The Beast now are different. The former Beast was, for the most part, good, he saved me, remember?" Robin nodded. "This Beast… this is different. This Beast wants nothing but death, destruction, and chaos. Whatever it is thinking floats up to Beast Boy and makes him see these things, forces them upon him. And what I saw in his head, the thing that I hesitated to speak because it scared me so bad, was the incredibly horrible and extremely graphic deaths of you and I and all the other Titans at the hands of Beast Boy himself."
Suddenly Robin's communicator sparked to life and he knew instantly that it was Starfire trying to contact him. He set off toward the infirmary now determined to stop Beast Boy using all means necessary.
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In Cyborg's lab his computer screen flashed data at an incredible speed. All the tests were coming back negative and the metal teen was in a bright mood. The only thing he felt worried about was the aids test, for which they would have to continually test Beast Boy for at least another eight months.
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Robin wasn't even halfway to the infirmary and already he could hear Beast Boy's furious knocking and screaming to be let out. The green Titan was practically family to the Boy Wonder, but he would die before letting Beast Boy harm anyone else.
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Without warning the screen above him flashed and Cyborg's speedy typing stopped. He stared up at the monitor confusedly. The words "Anomaly Detected" scrolled across the screen.
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Starfire came into view as Robin neared the infirmary door, which had literally buckled outward under Beast Boy's rage. The alien girl's face was a mixture of fear and concern. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words were allowed to leave before the hallway they were in was racked with and incredible explosion that sent them both to the ground.
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Cyborg's fingers wandered in a seemingly random pattern across the keys in front of him. He pushed a final button and studied the screen above him, the results of his ministrations flashing across its surface.
"What the…?" His confused question caught in his throat as a far off explosion shook his room and sent some of his smaller gadgets off their shelves and onto the floor.
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Beast Boy's knuckles had bloodied and his hands ached beyond anything he thought possible. His voice had gone hoarse and his throat stung, begging him to stop his shouting.
"Let… Me… Out," he cried, breathlessly. He looked down at the communicator he had in his hand and saw that the screen had gone black. Jinx had left him. For some reason he wished she were back, he would rather her be here than be completely alone. And trapped.
The entire wall farthest from Beast Boy suddenly exploded, sending him flying ten feet across the room and landing with a sickening thud in a heap. His instincts as a Titan took over and he was on his feet instantly. He yelped in pain as he stood, a terrible burning ache ripping across his side.
The thick grey smoke that hung in the air began to clear and the dust began to settle. A slim figure appeared among the debris and took a step forward. Jinx emerged from the shadows in a flourish of whipping wind that tore through the hole she and the other members of the Hive had created in the side of Titans Tower.
"Jinx." Beast Boy hissed, narrowing his eyes.
"Who did you expect?" She asked evilly, "Santa Claus?"
"What the hell are you doing here?" Beast Boy took up a fighting stance, wincing at the pain that twisted through him.
"I'm here to break you free," she said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "Hurry up and follow!" Over her shoulder the green Titan could see the other members of The Hive Five in the cabin of some sort of hovering craft just outside the hole in the wall.
"Why the fuck would I go with you?" He spat. She smirked at him and he didn't like it one bit.
"Because," she said, "you saw what you did to those people and you know that the other Titans aren't going to stand for it. They were the ones that locked you in this room, after all. The next step is locking you in jail." She took a step closer to Beast Boy and he could see the way her eyes glowed a bright purple-pink color. "And besides, I know that you're scared of that thing inside you." Beast Boy's skull ached and swam in a pool of dizziness as jinx brought herself close enough for him to smell her breath, warm with a hint of mint. "And Slade says he knows how to cure you."
Behind them the door to the infirmary began to be forced open. It had been bent into an unnatural shape under Beast Boy's rage and the task of getting it open was a tough one. Jinx grabbed the green Titan's arm and pulled him toward her ship, and Beast Boy didn't object. As he stepped into the ship, holding the hospital gown tight to keep it from flying open, the infirmary room door was saturated in dark energy and pulled away from its frame. The ship began to pull away, and the last thing Beast Boy saw before leaving the Tower for what might have been the last time ever was the wide, shocked, hurt, angry, confused, sad, and incredibly beautiful eyes of Raven.