Bright Line

Chapter Five: Vacuous Quantifier

"Robin! You're awake! Can I talk to you?"

A blonde head appeared in the doorway. She waved at him, small hand firmly attached to a jar of peanut butter. After just over a week of eating properly, Terra already looked better. She wasn't nearly so pale and her eyes had lost that dull, primal quality of a starving animal. And she had stopped gorging herself at every meal—as if she didn't know how long it might be until she got any more food.

He hadn't been planning on having any long conversations, because he felt awful, but he was tired of being unconscious—a change of pace sounded nice. Hopefully, no one would decide to force him to go back to sleep. Robin had been sleeping forever. "Sure," he said.

Walking into his room, Terra stuck a pink, plastic spoon into the peanut butter jar, examining it critically. "I'm super sorry that you got sick, and all."

"It's not your fault," said Robin. He studied her anxious expression and a thought occurred to him. "And please don't think that it had anything to do with last week, when you were sick. I think that was just a twenty-four hour thing."

Terra's eyes went completely blank, forehead wrinkling slightly. "Sick?" She paused for a moment around a mouth full of peanut butter. "Oh, right, sick! Yeah, I'm glad that you don't think I gave it to you or anything like that." A nervous giggle. Avoiding eye contact.

Liar.

If he hadn't known that she had faked it before, he definitely knew now. But why? Had she really not wanted to eat with them that much? Doubtful. Then what could…he lost the thought, turning to cough into his hand. For a long time. "Sorry," he choked out hoarsely.

Terra shifted her weight, twirling her hair around her finger. "It's fine." The spoon went back into the peanut butter jar as her face turned serious. "Can…well, can I ask you some things?"

"Okay," said Robin, wondering where this was heading.

Hesitating, she turned his desk chair around and sat in it the wrong way, forearms resting against the back. Robin gritted his teeth and didn't say anything about the misuse of a chair carefully chosen for its ergonomics. "Well, you know that I haven't been here for very long, and I don't exactly know everything there is to know about all the guys we fight…" She paused for some more peanut butter. "And…umm…I just wanted to know."

He waited for a second, until it became apparent that she wasn't going to continue, then felt his lungs catch again. "Wanted to know what?" he managed to say before succumbing to another coughing fit.

Terra looked at the floor. She twisted the spoon around in the peanut butter, absently, fingers shaking slightly. Then, suddenly, a deep breath, and her real question burst out, faster with every word…almost like a confession. "What's really so bad about Slade, Robin? I know we fight him and I know you all say he's bad and stuff, but how do you know? How can you be sure? What's he done that's so horrible?"

Somehow, the question blindsided him. Maybe he should've expected it, but he didn't. At all. And he couldn't breathe. Couldn't breathe and he was still coughing and Terra was staring at him and she had to have an answer now…and all the good answers had taken a permanent holiday. Yeah, Terra, I can tell you exactly what's so bad about Slade, in more detail than you ever wanted to know.

Actually, he supposed that if he was the leader he believed himself to be, he would tell her. Anyone with such an irresolute attitude about the people they fought needed to be corrected, and firmly, before things got out of hand. But he couldn't bring himself to say it, opened his mouth and then closed it because he was a rotten, dirty coward. And the day Slade did to Terra what he…well, Robin would know exactly whose fault that was. But he still couldn't say it.

He drew in a shuddering breath, mind frantically forming around a compromise. "I know, okay. We all know. Slade is…Terra, take the factorial of the most horrible person you can imagine, and you'll start to have some idea of how execrable he is."

"Huh?" said Terra.

"He's bad, okay?"

She chewed her lip, swirling the peanut butter with more vigor. "That's what you guys said to me before. But I just don't get it. Just because a person has done some bad things, does that make them, you know, bad?"

"No. Terra, no." It sounded like he was punishing a disobedient puppy, but Robin didn't care. He felt cold. Even colder than he had been feeling recently. "There are two kinds of people: good and bad, wrong and right. You're either on the side of the law…or you're not." He sneezed, which he was pretty sure didn't really help him seem authoritative.

Yeah: two kinds of people, sure. Which one are you? After what you did? You have no right, no right to lecture her…

"But…" Terra stopped herself, gulped, and then began again. "Are you saying that there's no forgiving people, not anyone, just for doing a few bad things? You can never know if they'll keep doing them or not, right? You'd have to give them another chance, right?"

Robin was having trouble remembering if this was still about Slade, or if it was about someone else entirely. What he did know was that he was absolutely not allowed to pull the blanket over his head and tell Terra to go away. "Are you going to give them another chance when they've killed you and everyone you care about?"

"Well, no, I guess not—I mean, of course you shouldn't kill people and stuff," Terra said thoughtfully. "But…like…" Her fingers were in her hair again, twisting it and tangling it around her ears.

"Like what?" Robin reached for a tissue.

Terra took a deep breath. "Umm, so say I have this friend, and he did something, you know, bad. But, I mean, he's not a bad person, really he's not, so I just don't understand how you know, what you look at to tell which one of the two kinds of people he's supposed to be. You know? Maybe he's, like, sorry and stuff, you know?"

There were too many "you knows" in her question, and he couldn't seem to parse it; he could barely suppress the urge to yell at her that no, actually, he didn't know. Why couldn't people just say what they meant? "Terra, bad people are bad people. It's as simple as that. And Slade's not just bad, he's evil, and he can never 'be sorry' enough to make him good." He looked her in the eyes, trying to force himself to focus on her rather than thoughts of Slade, saw something that shouldn't be there, and shivered. "Who's this friend?"

"Oh, oh, nobody important," Terra said quickly.

She doesn't know anyone besides us. She's talking about herself. Oh, god, she's talking about herself. What had Terra done—and why hadn't he stopped it, and had he just said exactly the wrong thing, convinced her she could never be good, and why was he such a failure, why couldn't he just… He couldn't breathe.

"Hey, Robin? Are you okay?"

No. No, he wasn't okay. He'd never be okay again. Terra was leaning forward in the chair, as far as possible without falling on her face; she was starting to look concerned, as if she had just realized what she'd said. He should deal with this. He should keep talking to her until he figured out why she was confused and what to say to change her mind.

But right now, he couldn't be in the same room with Terra for one more millisecond, couldn't bear to discuss what made Slade evil, couldn't work to figure out what he needed to tell her to fix things.

"I…I need to go take care of something," he said, and he was out of bed before he had finished the sentence, trying to figure out where he had left his shoes.

"Umm—but—where are you going?" The chair was flat on the floor again as she slumped against its back, looking small and defeated.

Robin grabbed a water bottle off his desk with the feeling that maybe he'd been looking for something else. "Gym. And we'll talk about-- Tell your 'friend' that we'll talk about him later."

He found what he was looking for a few steps later when he tripped over his shoes. Terra covered her mouth with both hands, absolutely horrified, but he was too angry to think of a justification for his behavior. He yanked them on without even a glance at Terra, opened the door and stepped out into the hall.

She followed him out and started to walk down the hall after him, voice becoming more and more diffident with each syllable. "Well, I don't really think you should do that…because you're sick and stuff…and…did I say something wrong? I'm sorry…really, I am…are you mad at me? Robin?"

He thought about saying something but every word seemed to fall out of his mind before the next one started and he couldn't figure out what she'd just asked, so he just ended up sneezing again.

"Okay, well, I'll see you…later?" The tiny footsteps behind him stopped, and he knew that she had given up on going with him. Just as well. He had absolutely no intention of continuing the conversation, not right now, but he didn't want to have to explicitly tell her that she was not welcome. At least she could take a hint—if beaten senseless with it. He needed to exercise, needed to clear his mind.

And anyway, he had been lazy. Hadn't trained in almost two days. He needed to make up for lost time, and he needed to be alone. It would give him at least a couple hours to figure things out, to analyze this new problem, to accept the fact that one of his own team was uncertain about the way right and wrong worked…and to figure out what to do about it. If there was anything to do about it.

His head hurt so much. Didn't matter.

He liked lifting weights. It was easy, easy like running and like fighting. No thinking required, and yet it somehow simplified everything, made it manageable. Even though he couldn't stop thinking. Robin knew enough about psychology to know that trying not to think just made you think more, but he didn't know enough to figure out how to turn it off.

It was better this way, because the world became nothing but the bench and the weighted bar above his head…and that made things okay. Feet flat on the floor; bar stabilized over upper chest, elbows locked, arms straight; momentary stop; bar lowered slowly to chest in a controlled manner. He felt a little shaky, but that didn't matter. At least he could breathe. And he hadn't been able to, when Terra had asked him about…all of that. Lying down made it easier, too: easier to focus, because ever since this sickness started, he kept getting dizzy when he tried to walk. There was a slight lingering sense of helplessness, of course, but it wasn't overpowering: knowing that he had the ability to raise the bar again and again cancelled it out.

Eight times, twelve, twenty-seven…then he lost count but kept going because he felt a little better every time he completed a rep, and if he could just do this forever…

"Richard. Grayson. What. The. Hell."

The words surprised him, and he lost the delicate balance, and that bar was going to break his face and kill him until a dark, outside force picked it up. Stopped it, stabilized it inches away from his nose, lifted it easily to rest on the rack just behind his head.

"Get up. Get up and look at me and tell me why you've gone insane." Raven's voice; he recognized it now. And she was angry.

He turned his head slightly, cheek damp against the bench, and stared at her in disbelief. "How did…how did you…"

Raven took a few punctuated steps towards him. "Terra knocked on my door a few minutes ago, absolutely terrified because you had made the worst decision of your life and had gone to the gym when you could hardly walk."

"I can walk just fine…" he started to argue, but she interrupted him.

"That's not what Terra told me. And given your track record of lying about your health, I'm going to take her word over yours." She considered this for a moment. "Not to mention that you were about to drop that bar and break every bone in your body."

"How would it have broken my legs?" he asked, confused as the detail captured his failing attention.

"That is not the issue! Are you insane? What were you thinking?"

"You surprised me—that's all; I can handle this," said Robin, sitting up because he didn't like being in such a vulnerable position.

"Uh-huh." Raven didn't say anything else right away; she turned around purposefully and grabbed one of the straight-backed chairs over in the corner. Dragging it over to the bench, she sat on it with finality, rearranging her cloak and crossing her ankles. "Remember last week? When I said I'd give you the benefit of the doubt?"

"Yeah…"

"You just lost it. You're not leaving that bench until you've explained what's going on." She noticed something and glared at him furiously. "And if you so much as touch that barbell again, I'm going to bend it into a coat hanger."

And she would, too, wouldn't she? Robin would have laughed if he weren't fighting the urge to vomit. His hands were shaking, but it wasn't from the weight lifting. "Nothing's going on—I'm sick, if that's what you mean." He coughed, as if to prove his point, but managed to stop after just a couple, wondered if she'd stop asking him questions if he just kept coughing.

"How stupid do you think I am?" she asked.

He swallowed, took a deep breath, and pretended to think very hard about it. "Fairly stupid, if you're that convinced that I'm falling apart."

"It was a rhetorical question. And you knew that. You're also being really, disgustingly avoidant, and all it's doing is keeping you here longer…and convincing me even further that something's wrong."

Robin had always wondered how long it would last, how long it would take before he had to tell them. He'd tried to prepare himself for it, both for the horror of telling them, and for the rejection that would follow. But now, faced with the possibility of everything just…ending…he wasn't ready for it, wasn't ready at all, even though he'd thought maybe he would be. Robin closed his eyes, both because the light was hurting him and because he didn't want to look at Raven anymore. "Nothing's wrong," he said quietly, not even convincing himself.

He heard her shuffle uncomfortably, taking a few seconds before she answered. When she did speak, it wasn't with venom, and the strange feeling in Robin's temple told him that she'd been in his head. "Look. I know you're upset. Believe me, I know. To tell the truth, I've been feeling it for awhile now."

"How long?" He looked at her again, cautiously, afraid of the answer but wanting to be able to fully process it when it came.

"A few months," said Raven. She was choosing her words slowly, carefully, as if stepping around a field of land mines. "Since around that…incident…with you and Slade, back in November."

'That incident.' What a perfect description. He felt nausea mingled with a bubble of hysterical laughter that he fought back, starting to cough again. And he couldn't tell her not to talk about it because then he'd have to tell her why and that would be talking about it, but, oh god, what if she already knew why, and… Robin swallowed the lump in his throat, with effort, hating the burning, prickling sensation behind his eyes. He blinked to make it go away.

Raven switched gears immediately as if she'd felt his reaction. Of course she felt your reaction, he reminded himself furiously. That's the point. "And no, for the millionth time, none of us blame you for that, okay? So if that's what this is about, stop being a martyr. We've all told you exactly how much we don't blame you. And we weren't kidding, Robin."

He leaned his forehead into his palm miserably. "You don't get it."

"No, obviously I don't, but I can't get it unless you tell me, so if there's something you'd like to explain about it, I'm listening," said Raven. She leaned closer to him, eyes deep and serious.

Robin focused on the slow rotation of the ceiling fans in an attempt to look anywhere but Raven's face. He knew that this would be the end of the team—or at least, the end of the team with him as a part of it—but all the same, not having to hide anymore would be good. He had to deal with her reaction, first, though, and he just didn't want to see it; wanted to fast-forward to when he could just leave them all and not have to feel like he did right now. Maybe he could just leave, just walk away and not answer. But it wouldn't be fair to them to leave without an explanation. He had to let them reject him. This was so screwed up.

"I don't think you want to know," he said finally, more a compromise than anything else.

"Yes I do. I'm…" she paused for a minute, as if she were wrestling with herself about something important. "Well, I've been around the block, let's say. You're not going to destroy my fragile, feminine soul by exposing me to unpleasantness—I promise."

Truth be told, he it hadn't occurred to him to worry about that, because of course Raven could take care of herself…the real problem was whether or not he'd survive what she would say to him. He started coughing again, and she pointed meaningfully to his water bottle.

"…and I'm not going to think less of you, before you get that abhorrent idea. There is nothing you could say to me that would make me lose respect for you. No, not even whatever thing you're thinking of." She was completely sincere, and he knew it, but at the same time, he didn't believe her. She didn't know.

"Stop reading my mind," muttered Robin.

Raven smiled, very slightly. "You know I'm not. Want to get back on subject?"

"No."

"Robin." She looked straight at him, and he could have sworn that she could see behind the mask, behind everything, and it made him want to hide somewhere. "What happened last November?"

He had never intended to say it. But her serious face and the fever and the memory of Terra's confusion somehow came together to make him say it, in the most horrible kind of way because he had no control. It was like those dreams when you know that opening that door isn't a good idea, and you're yelling at yourself not to do it, but all the same, you can't stop. "You know that…that he blackmailed me, right?"

Raven nodded, silently.

"Well, he made me…do things. Said that I had to prove that I belonged to him. That I was his. Are you disgusted yet?"

"Disgusted with Slade, yeah," said Raven, features colored with uncharacteristic fear…dread…something. "What did he make you do?"

When he tried to say another word, he couldn't get around the lump in his throat: he was too close to reliving, and suddenly no time had passed at all since it happened, and he couldn't breathe and couldn't forget…he dropped his head into his hands, grinding the heels of his hands into his eyes and digging his nails into his scalp. Focus on the physical pain and it will be easier, the pain you can control…

"--bleeding!" Raven's voice cut through the roaring in his ears, and he looked up to see her reach for his hands. He pulled back, and she stopped, eyes soft and helpless, and that was a really unnatural, disturbing look for Raven. "Do you want me to…"

"No!" No, he didn't want her to heal him, because he liked bleeding, it kept him in the present, kept him focused, and why was it so hard to talk…

"Robin, it's okay, don't cry…"

Gentleness. Sympathy. Fear of whatever could reduce him to being so pathetic. He hated it—all of it.

"No, it's not okay, Raven, don't you get it? I slept with him! I had sex with Slade. Yeah, I know. He made me, because he'd kill you guys if I didn't, and so I… Well I did. And I won't make excuses because I--" He broke off, shaking his head. "And I'm not crying." He wasn't, but even he admitted that his voice sounded strained and choked and awful.

Raven's face was blank, unreadable, forehead wrinkled slightly and mouth wide open and slack. He had never seen her speechless since they'd met, and it looked very out of place on her. Fists clenched, knuckles deathly white, she exhaled with force. Say something, just say how much you hate me and how you never want to speak to me again…

"I…" She had to try again, several times, as if she'd forgotten how to make a complete sentence. But when she finally found something to say, it made him jump back in shock.

"I'm going to kill him. I'm going to fucking kill him."

It wasn't so much the profanity, but the death threat. They all knew the anathema on killing, and Raven's close encounters with it when she'd lost control of her powers were more than enough to turn her into the biggest pacifist of them all. But there was murder in her eyes, volatile energy ricocheting just underneath, and Robin half-expected them to glow red. It was absolutely terrifying, even when he was pretty sure that it wasn't intended for him—and that both relieved and confused him.

"Don't you think that's a little misdirected? Raven, I don't think you understand." He was desperate to convince her, because he couldn't handle this false hope; it was worse than hatred, so much worse… "I…I had sex with Slade."

"You mean Slade raped you," Raven seethed. "And he's dead. He is beyond dead. I'm going to-- oh god, that's supposed to be on the ground!"

Her eyes widened, hand flying to her mouth, and Robin twisted around to see the barbell floating dangerously in mid air: except it was saturated in the overflow of Raven's powers, crackling with dark energy. Even with tears in his eyes, Robin was the leader (at least until he got thrown out), so he dealt with it, the near-disaster focusing him on the present better than anything else could have. "Raven, breathe, think about something else..."

Raven drew in one shaky breath after another, eyes closed, and finally brought the barbell to rest on the gym floor. She mumbled a sheepish apology.

"It's okay…you're upset with me…it's a lot to take in…"

"No, you dolt, what could possibly be wrong with your head that would make you…" She stopped herself with effort and tried again, voice softer. "I'm upset with him, Robin. And believe me: the only reason why I haven't already gone to hang him with his own intestines is that I can't leave you here in the state you're in."

He couldn't even begin to address most of her argument, because the room was starting to get fuzzy around the edges and putting more than one thought together seemed like running a marathon, so he settled for refuting the obvious mistake. "I'm not in a 'state'."

Raven ignored that. She closed her eyes for a brief moment as if she were getting things organized, then took yet another deep breath and turned to face him. "Okay. First of all, you're going back to bed before we have to haul your unconscious body to the hospital."

"I'm sick, sure, but I'm not that…"

"Yes, you are. I haven't had trouble with my powers for over two months. You're incredibly ill, and you're so upset that I'm about to lose all control just by having to deal with what you're spilling over. Look at me." She leaned closer but not enough to make him uncomfortable. "I don't know the details, and I don't need to know them. Nothing was your fault. Believe me when I say that we will be talking about this later, but you're too sick to argue with right now."

He wanted to challenge that, wanted to insist that she had to leave him alone and let him get back to work…but, at that moment, he knew that they'd reached a point where he was no longer allowed to insist that. Or anything. Because now Raven knew. The idea that he couldn't pretend anymore was somehow both reassuring and terrifying. "Okay," he said, feeling more defeated than he had in a long time.

She stood up, motioning for him to follow. That trademarked control was back, but it was thin, manufactured, stretched. "Good. No, don't worry about the weights; I'll put them away later. Do you…do you need help walking?"

"No, no way," he answered quickly, with equal parts embarrassment that she'd even think he might need help and aversion to the possibility of her physically touching him.

It was a repeat performance of last night, now with at least six hundred percent more awkwardness. His heartbeat still hadn't returned to normal and he still felt nauseated, and Raven kept looking at him like she wanted to cry. Everything was exactly as he'd expected: exactly as he'd feared. He'd never even be treated like a normal human being again, much less a leader. For some reason, walking to the gym had been much easier than this. To her credit, though, Raven didn't try to help him—just watched him very closely as he held the wall for support. Even when he fell into a spasm of coughing that left him on his knees, one hand clutching at the wall while the other weakly held him up from the floor, she just waited until he recovered and stumbled back to his feet. He didn't look at her, but knew she'd feel how much he appreciated that small consideration.

"Can I have my computer back now?" he asked once he'd opened his door, voice little more than a gasping croak.

"I hope you're joking," said Raven. The look she gave him suggested that she was absolutely not leaving until he was in his bed…so he complied, just because he wanted to be alone more than anything. And because the idea of Raven helping him was too sickening to entertain. Raven busied herself with retrieving something off his desk, something she must have left there last night, next to the pills.

"Thermometer," she said, handing it to him. It was one of those disposable kinds wrapped in plastic. "I'm going to trust that you're capable of holding it under your tongue by yourself."

Robin didn't see why that was necessary; he knew he had a fever…did it really matter exactly how much? But he did it anyway, because the other option was too humiliating to fathom. The thermometer beeped after a few seconds and he gave it back to Raven. There, are you happy now?

Her eyes widened and she muttered a curse. "105.2—how are you still alive?"

"Umm…"

"That was another rhetorical question right there," she said gently, forcing a smile. "And I think you might have the flu."

"Great," he muttered. Even more missed days of training than he'd thought; that much more difficult to make up for lost time. And what if they had a call while he was sick? He…couldn't think about that right now. It was too much, because he couldn't even accept the fact that Raven knew, let alone how he'd manage to fight when he couldn't even lift one hundred pounds.

She made him take some more medication: he wasn't happy about the sedatives, but maybe if he could just sleep, he'd stop being so useless, be able to focus. Sleep was just something he had to endure, and it was easier than trying to analyze the consequences of what he'd done. Maybe it was even a punishment he deserved. He couldn't say for sure: stringing thoughts together was becoming more impossible by the minute and the fever wasn't helping.

Raven sighed. She went to put the bottles where they belonged, and stayed there, which he liked because it gave him some space…and space was good. "Listen. I'm not gonna say 'everything will be okay' or any of those trite reassurances. You know who you can talk to if that's what you're looking for. But --Robin, look at me-- you won't believe me now, and you won't believe me next time I say it, and probably not the next either, but I'm going to keep saying it. You have nothing to be ashamed of."

He chose to ignore that. "You can't tell anyone okay?"

"You're not listening…"

"Swear, Raven. Swear you won't…" he forced out, holding back another cough, needing to get this one promise before he could let himself think about anything else.

"I won't, and I swear, on whatever you want me to swear on,so stop worrying about that. Just sleep now, okay?" The horror and fear and disbelief were still thick in Raven's voice, but at least he wasn't picking up any hatred. Yet. Must be the fever messing with his head.

"Sure," said Robin, so quietly that maybe Raven hadn't even heard. He turned away from her and pulled the covers over his head.

He heard a click, and the lights dimmed. "I'll check on you later. You are not to leave your bed—and I know you heard that, so don't even think about pleading ignorance."

"…'kay…" He was too tired to wonder where the childish response had come from. He didn't recognize the cracking voice. But it apparently satisfied Raven, because she didn't say anything, though he knew she was standing there, staring at him…and it was somewhat unsettling but he just didn't care enough to be bothered by it. At some point, she probably left. But looking up to check took more energy than he was willing to expend. Raven could stand there and watch him if she really wanted to. It wouldn't make any difference: he had no secrets from her anymore, nothing that could possibly compare…

Sleep. It was just something he had to endure, because he had to be able to do his job, had to protect them. As long as they'd let him. There was nothing to be done about it, kind of like—well, like that.