Chapter 1
Beast Boy raced into the living room, jumping and shouting, "Finally! I thought this day would never come!" He paused to look around the room. Robin and Cyborg were locked in a video game battle while Raven was off by herself, reading a book. Beast Boy ran over and popped up behind the couch between the two battlers.
"Dudes! How can you be playing here when the Mega Arcade just opened in town!" the green boy exclaimed. The game was suddenly paused and both Titans turned to look at him.
"Mega Arcade?" Cyborg repeated quickly.
"It's got everything from the original Pac Man to virtual reality!" said Beast Boy, a dreamy look coming into his eyes. "The Mega Arcade has hundreds of games on five stories, plus tons of empty monitors where you can bring your own games to play on state-of-the-art equipment." Cyborg and Robin exchanged glances. In an instant their game was turned off and they were rushing toward the door dragging Beast Boy, who seemed to be off in a dream world thinking of the arcade.
"Wanna come, Rae?" Cyborg called over his shoulder. The girl didn't look up from her book.
"Spending hours in front of a screen for senseless entertainment while my brain melts is not my idea of fun," replied Raven in her monotone fashion. When the three reached the door, Starfire floated in.
"Star, do you want to go to a new arcade that just opened?" questioned Robin.
"I cannot. I must visit my home planet of Tamaran for the day." That even got Raven's attention, and she glanced up from the pages.
"Why?" Robin asked quickly.
"Blackfire has requested my presence. She was caught quite close to my galaxy after her banishment and brought into custody so she could be taken to another jail on another planet. It is only for today, I will be back by morning, friends," replied Starfire cheerfully.
"You're not going alone," Robin said determinedly. "Not after what happened last time."
"Friends, she is in prison. She cannot harm me," Starfire said. She looked at each of them. "Please, do not worry. I will return tomorrow." Suddenly Beast Boy snapped out of his daze, shaking his head to clear it of the remnants of his daydream.
"You're leaving Star? Before you see the awesomeness of the Mega Arcade?" he asked, sounding somewhat hurt. Raven glared at Beast Boy, but he didn't notice.
"She's bound to have a better time visiting the jail than at that mind-numbing arcade," the dark girl spoke up. When they all turned to look at her, she went back to her book.
"Well, if no one else is coming, I say all aboard the T-car," the green skinned boy announced. He was about to march off when Robin grabbed the boy's collar and pulled him back.
"Why is Blackfire contacting you now? She's been in jail a lot of times before," the masked boy said.
"Yes, perhaps she has had that time to think about what she has done. She probably wishes to apologize," replied Starfire with an encouraging smile.
"Yeah, man. What's so wrong with her calling? She is Starfire's sister, after all," Cyborg added. He and Beast Boy were waiting in the doorway. "You're looking way too much into things."
"And wasting the time we could be spending at the Mega Arcade," said Beast Boy. They fervently waved for Robin to follow them.
"I shall see you all tomorrow," Starfire announced, then flew out of the room.
"Come on, dude!" Beast Boy shouted, trying to hurry Robin.
"I just don't think it's a good idea for her to go off by herself," he defended with a somewhat apologetic shrug. He followed them out of the room and the doors slid closed behind him. Raven heard Cyborg say, "Forget it. Star can take care of herself."
A few minutes later Starfire had left and the T-car sped out of the tower. Raven had the house to herself. For once, there was actually peace and quiet. It was a strange but welcomed sound to her. Of course she enjoyed being around her friends, but she cherished her alone time.
After two more chapters, the girl's stomach prompted her to set down the book and head to the refrigerator.
"Beast Boy better not have slobbered on everything again," she mumbled to herself as she rummaged through the fridge.
"Raven," a voice hissed as she brought out a bottle of juice. She knew that voice all too well. It sent chills down her spine every time she heard it. The glass she was holding dropped to the floor and shattered. Raven spun around and wildly scanned the room. He wasn't there. More chills ran down her spine. The girl had always hated the games Slade played, but surrounded by her friends she knew she would be fine. Now, without that circle of safety, she suddenly felt alone, intimidated, and scared. But where was he?
"What do you want, Slade?" she called, carefully searching the shadows of the room from where she stood.
"Just to talk," was the reply. It came from nothing, yet it came from everywhere. If she looked left, it sounded like it was coming from the right, and vice versa. Her paranoia made her mind play tricks on her.
"Why?" Raven shot back. Her hands clenched into fists but she still did not budge from her spot in front of the fridge. His menacing laugh pierced the silence and Raven took a step back.
"Because, dear child, there are things that need to be discussed." What kind of an answer was that? The dark girl took a few insecure steps forward. By now she was sure he wasn't in the room, but his haunting voice still frightened her as much as if he really was present. There was a communicator somewhere, and to find it she had to keep him talking.
"What sort of things?" Raven asked.
"How I can help you better than your friends – if you can even call them that." The girl hastily opened all the cupboards, but there was no communicator.
"You help me? I don't think so. I'm surprised you even knew my name. Last time anyone knew, it was Robin you were after," she said, inching her way across the room, searching every closed space she came across.
"I know many things about you, Raven. I perhaps know you better than the Titans. Do they really understand you?" asked Slade. The girl pulled the cushions off chairs and couches and checked under tables. Where was it?
"They understand enough," she hissed with frustration.
"Enough? But not all of you. They don't even understand all of what you allow them to know. You have many deep, dark secrets, child. Would you ever divulge them to the Titans?" he persisted. It wasn't under the couch or other large pieces of furniture. Heck, she even lifted the big screen TV, but only candy wrappers and a few of Beast Boy's lost socks were under there.
"My problems are my own," snapped Raven. She never liked it when people pried into her life, and she was seriously hating this. The sooner she found that communicator, the better.
"But isn't that what friends are for? To share the burden? To help you through your problems? Or don't you trust them?" He paused and waited for a retort, but she gave none. "Ah," came the smooth reply in an understanding tone. That made her cringe even more than the laughter. Where was that communicator!
"You're afraid of their reaction. What's the worst that could happen? They could turn their backs on you... or kick you out of their group–"
"They accept me!" Raven shouted to the space around her.
"That's all you've wanted, isn't it, to be accepted? How can they accept you when they barely know you? But then again, what do you really know about them?" The dark girl halted.
"I know what everyone else knows," she replied slowly, obviously thinking about her words.
"You know so much yet you don't trust them?" said Slade. Raven could sense the almost taunting tone in his voice. He was playing with her.
"Why do you care?" the dark girl asked, her voice choked with frustration.
"My dear, I'm just pointing out that they may be friendly toward you, but you have no true friends. No one who understands what you've been through. Have they ever volunteered to get to know you better?" he queried.
"Yes," Raven was quick to strike back. "Starfire did. She knows much about me."
"However, she only asked because she had to know about you. If you two had never been switched, she wouldn't have bothered with it." Raven seemed to had given up on locating the communicator and instead focused on the debate.
"They don't ask me about my life because they know I don't like talking about it. And they respect that."
"You don't want to talk about it because then you would have to explain your secrets, which brings us back to the fact that you can't discuss such matters with your friends because they're not as close as you would like to think." His voice slowed, as if he wanted to make sure she got the point. "My dear, it may be nice to know they care about you, and that shallow fact might get you through part of your life, but you will always feel a void. You will always long to be understood, to be able to talk about your secrets freely to someone who has the slightest grasp of what you've gone through. To have the support of someone who feels the same as you. To have the encouragement that you can get through it and remain, for the most part, unchanged. Your so-called friends can never give you that, Raven."
There it was. Attached to one of the remotes on the floor. It blended in quite well with the device, but through his long-winded speech she had found it. Darkness surrounded the communicator and it rose to eye level.
"And you're saying that you can give me all of that?" Raven asked slowly.
"Yes." The girl's fist tightened and the communicator was crushed into numerous electrical pieces.
"This discussion is over."