Hey… yeah, I'm not done with the other stuff. But I will be! Soon!
Anyway, this was written for EmaniaHilel's wonderuflly inspiring challenge. It's a one-shot, completely pointless in content but really… therapeutic to write.
The challenge: to use any out of four quotes in any story depicting any pairing including Raven.
Pairings: RaeRobStar. (though a bit more of the former than the latter. Duh.)
As quotes, I picked:
"And from their eyelids as they glanced dripped love."(from Hesoid's "The Thegony")
"And when I look into her eyes it's the way I feel inside…like the man I want to be." (from Ricky Martin's "She's All I Ever Need") (Boy, that brought back memories…)
Time: Circa five hours. (I'm a Very. Poor. Typist. )
Summary: Robin's in Rio, Beast Boy's at the beach, and Cy's eating dirt. What better time for the two femmes on the team to have a little heart to heart?
Disclaimer: All I own regarding the Teen Titans is my Robin action figure, a Teen Titans Go! issue, and three DVDs. The rest is DC's and CN's.
She goes to the roof, only to find Starfire has already taken over her usual spot by the Eastern edge. Raven sighs; with such a big Tower, you'd think there'd be more than one brooding spot on the Titans' quarters. However, Starfire is the one person she isn't used to sharing it with—except for perhaps Beast Boy. And come to think of it, she doesn't see Cyborg in the roof all that often…probably doesn't like heights. Ok, so maybe Robin's the only one who rivals her for roof privileges, and even he prefers the stridence of the training rooms to the stillness of the rooftop.
Robin. Stupid, spiky-haired jackass, with his cocky grin and those gorgeous hands. Raven is willing to bet the acrobat is the reason Starfire is up here in the first place. Or at least, his absence is. Leave it to Robin to throw the entire Tower out of synch just for a 'quick trip to South America'.
Yeah, sure, you say South America and suddenly Rio's the educational voyage of the season.
Okay, so maybe the fact that the Bat-Bitch's going along has her slightly on edge. Never mind that she's six years older than Robin and that Batman's also going. Never mind that they are setting a trap up for one of the main drug lords of the continent. Never mind that he'd been grumbling all the way into the plane and had had to be practically dragged out of the Tower and away from his precious crime lab.
Azar, I bet there're beads involved.
No, she isn't jealous.
The door slams shut behind her, smoke filtering through the edges. Starfire glances back, startled.
Ok, so maybe she's a little jealous—but it's nothing to worry about.
When she sees who it is that intrudes upon her solitude, Star smiles softly in greeting. Raven sighs; escape's impossible now. Resigning herself to a healthy girl talk—alien warrior princess to half-demon heiress—Raven goes to join the Tamaranian by the edge.
"Greetings, Friend Raven." Star's voice is somewhat subdued, though as pleasant as always. "I'm glad you have joined me in preparing to observe another glorious setting of the sun. I have read the event is particularly lovely on this season."
"Star… sunset's not for another two hours."
"I have no desire to miss it." She explains, eyes fixed on the horizon. "I was told that it is customary to observe the setting of the sun when one's mood is located on the blue spectrum, and I do not wish to overlook any Earthly traditions."
Raven isn't sure whether she should point out that sunset, when it comes, would not only happening on the opposite side of the Tower, but wouldn't be much of a spectacle if those huge cumulus clouds had any say in it. Deciding she has time to ponder on this, she goes for the more obvious response.
"You're sad." Not a question. She knows the answer already.
"I miss Friend Robin."
"He's only been gone three days." And he'll be gone two more.
"Is that not enough time to miss him?" Raven almost answers, no, but instantly feels like a hypocrite—three days are, surprisingly, enough time to miss somebody.
Or maybe just Robin.
"Wouldn't you rather be inside, doing something else to take your mind off him? Time goes by faster when you keep occupied." That's possibly the longest sentence I've said all week.
"No. I enjoy thinking about Friend Robin."
"You don't seem to be enjoying yourself right now."
"I am enjoying the thinking, but I am still sad that we have parted." Raven feels dizzy just considering the notion of two such conflicting feelings existing at once. Immediately after, she feels ridiculous—of course people feel more than one feeling at a time. What confuses her is the fact that Starfire's perfectly clear on which is which and where they come from. Without thinking, she asks,
"How do you do that? Keep your feelings distinct, individual?" She bites her tongue back before she can continue, Because ever since I can feel again, everything inside me is a mess and I'm almost ready to give up on trying to match a name to every silly sensation, let alone figuring out what they all are meaning to say. Shit! Shit! Shit! She isn't sure how, but Robin has to be blamed for that slip of the tongue as well.
Starfire looks a bit startled—it isn't everyday that her empath friend actually invites confidences. Or conversation, for that matter. She recovers from her shock instantly, however, and a smile twice as radiant as the headlights of the T-Car splits her face. She looks almost ready to burst with something along the lines of, Oh, joyous day! Friend Raven, I am ecstatic that we have finally attained the level of friendship necessary for us to converse regarding our innermost feelings and secrets! I am anxious to know you better, and to share with you, my Friend, the happenings of my heart!
Thankfully, the sometimes silly princess is not stupid. In fact, for a Tamaranian, she's really quite smart. For an Earthling, too. So instead of crying out with delight, she remains discreet and muted, answering the query with a simple, "I am not sure. I simply look to my heart and they are already there."
Raven thinks she will burst a vessel. I don't know. I don't know! That isn't the answer she'd been hoping for—not that she'd actually expected a useful answer. But she figured, if she'd let it out, then the at least she might get something profitable out of the embarrassment. Swallowing back something sarcastic, she manages to further the conversation with an eloquent, "Oh?"
"I suppose," Star continues, nervously noting Raven's displeasure, "that it is made easier because I know where to look. I, ah…" the redheaded glances at Raven, apologetic for her clumsy explanation, "I know the inside of myself? I am not sure how I might word this notion… It is as if I already know how to feel even before I actually do, and thus I… I expect what I will find when I look to my heart. I know what to look for?"
Of course; knowing oneself is the basically the same as understanding oneself. Curious that she, who spends as much time in silent contemplation as I do hunting down old Sweet Valley Twins paperbacks, would have more insight into her own self than I, the supposed introspect—one might wonder what's the use of all that meditation if I still can't figure out what's got me so riled up lately.
Then she remembers—control. Right No pleasure for the Dark Girl.
Something on her face must've reflected the nature of her thoughts, because the next thing Starfire says is a concerned,
"Friend Raven? Is there something you—" Do not say 'require to discuss'! "—something on your mind?" Raven catches the slip, and feels surprisingly touched that the other girl would know how to…if not best, then suitably address her. She almost smiles, and decides that alone is enough to warrant an answer—even if only a short one.
"Not on my mind."
"Your heart, then?" Taken by surprise for the second time in as many minutes, Raven marvels at the redhead's sudden perceptiveness—she'd never realized Star could be so insightful. Perhaps she'd always been this way, but does nothing with the knowledge she acquires. She peers at Star, trying to discern the truth behind those big, friendly eyes. Nah.
But she still answers,
"Yes. No. Maybe." And if she hadn't guessed it before…
"I see."
Dammit!
"Hmph." The non-comitial noise doesn't deter Star, who has gotten it in her head that Friend Raven is in need of moral support—her favorite kind! Well, second, actually—it is so much better when support requires the use of starbolts. Slyly, or so she thinks, Starfire seemingly changes the topic.
"I have been meaning to inquire, Friend Raven—what exactly are the results of your glorious defeat of the Trigon?" Seeing right through it, Raven raises an eyebrow.
"Why?" Another fitting question could be made to address why exactly she's putting up with this rather uncomfortably intimate conversation—this last query, however, leaves Raven stumped.
"I am simply curious; I have observed a great many changes in your behavior of late, the start of which coincides with the date of your triumph, and desired to know if there was any relation between them."
"I…" You don't have to answer. But she still does. "I can feel… again."
"Could you not before?" That's some Class-A sensitivity right there, Bright Eyes.
"No." Raven turns her eyes to the rocky beach below, as if the right words to describe her previous existence were strewn on the sand. "I could… in theory. But nothing ever really… got to me, I guess. You remember what it was like—when we traded bodies? I knew how I would've felt, I just… didn't feel it? I couldn't, because whenever I did, Trigon's influence would've turned me a demon. It was… like living in a vacuum with glass walls; I could tell what was happening outside, but nothing ever happened inside."
"And now?"
"Now… it's the other way around, I guess. Like the glass has been broken and the world's rushed in all at once. I mean," below, Beast Boy rushes out of the Tower and trips over a rock, landing facedown in the dirt. The changeling gets up, glances around self-consciously, brushes himself off, and runs right on into the water. Raven smiles a little, and turns to face Starfire. "I used to be able to feel, back when I was very small. They didn't lock… me… away until I was old enough to be a threat. So all this years, I was able to remember a little of what it felt like to… well, feel; sometimes, I would get tiny tremors of some emotion, little hints of how I wanted to feel... but that was it. I used to think that my emotions were fighting against the barriers in my psyche, and sometimes they pushed just hard enough that a little whisper broke through. That's why I meditate so much, why I was always so keen to not feel… I knew that the barriers weren't as strong as they had been made out to be, and I couldn't be so selfish as to put all of you in jeopardy just so I could experience the shadow of emotion."
"I do not understand why your emotions presented such danger." With a hint of exasperation, Raven answers,
"I told you: my powers are controlled by—"
"That is not what I meant—I do remember that. I meant to ask how they relate to the Trigon."
"My emotions fuel my powers, which were like a beacon to him. He could literally feed on the power my soul self emitted, and use it as a trail to guide him to me. Without emotion, my powers were weak enough that they weren't much help."
"Then how did he find you?"
"Slade."
"Oh."
"Right."
"You still haven't said—what has changed?"
"Basically? I can feel. I still have to exercise control, and restraint, because my powers still feed off my emotions… but the barriers are gone. I can feel. I don't always know what it is I'm feeling, but I can tell the emotions are there…here," Raven amends, glancing down at her chest. "And I don't have to worry about Trigon."
A few seconds of silence follow, in which Starfire tries her best to exercise restraint. Feeling as if she would fly apart into a thousand orange pieces if she didn't express her contentment, the Tamaranian gives up and explodes,
"How wonderful!" The alien latches her arms around the empath's neck, her otherworldly strength making the enthusiastic embrace quite perilous for the purple-haired Titan. "Friend Raven, I am most delighted for you—is feeling not marvelous? I must know how you feel about—how—I must know your feelings regarding everything!" She thinks for a moment then says the first thing that came to mind, "How did you truly feel about the traditional Tamaranian dish of Moderated Childlike Joy I prepared for dinner on the previous Tuesday?"
The one that had me retching all the way into Saturday? Deciding she won't die with a lie on her lips, Raven tells the truth with the little air she has left in her lungs.
"Hated it." That deflates Starfire enough that she lets the half-demon go. However, the Tamaranian is determined to not give up.
"That is fine—share with me, then, I beg you, the moment you have felt most wonderful since you've regained the use of your feelings!" And the interesting part of the conversation is over, I see… Deciding this is a question worthy of dodging, the empath states dryly,
"Define 'wonderful'." Starfire looks confused for a moment, and then so immersed in thought that Raven decides she can probably leave the roof without the redhead noticing it. That would, however, be tremendously unkind… and strangely enough, she's curious to see what the alien makes to be the definition of wonderful. Finally, she hears her sweet voice, still a bit unsure,
"I suppose… that by employing the word wonderful I meant to inquire for the moment in which you've felt most grateful to have your emotions back…what reason makes you most thankful for the ability to feel…Yes, that is what I wanted to know." As she completes the sentence, she shows no signs of realizing just how intruding her question is.
Raven instantly has an answer—not one she'd conjured with her mind, but one that had come to her by some other means, fresh and intense in her mind's eye. She sees the common room, pale starlight intruding the darkness by way of the bay windows. A boy sitting by himself in the sofa, so still he might not be alive, face fixed towards the point where sea becomes sky and mind-light years away. She approaches from behind the piece of furniture, almost hesitant to intrude on this strange vigilance—and yet at the same time unable to continue her way into the kitchen. He doesn't hear her coming, but nevertheless doesn't startle as she calls out in her raspy voice,
"Robin?" He turns to her dazedly, as if in a dream. Perhaps he'd been asleep after all. She notices the mask is on the seat beside him. He doesn't reach for it or cover his face, and she wonders if maybe he's forgotten about it. "What are you doing?"
"Huh?"
"It's close to three."
"Oh." He yawns suddenly, the muscles in his back and arms tensing into a stretch. "I must've dozed off…"
"Why weren't you in your room in the first place?"
"I meant to, I was just waiting for…" he rubs the sleep from his face with gloveless hands, and Raven realizes this is one of the few times she's seen him out of uniform, in red pajama pants and a white wife-beater. "…never mind. Are you going to bed now?"
"Yeah, I just finished off in the roof and wanted a…" She trails off, suddenly curious. "Wait. Were you waiting up for me?" He winces guiltily and gives her a tiny smile.
"Yes?"
"Why?"
"I do that sometimes."
"Excuse me?"
"Well, I know you like to meditate at night, specially when there's no moon and the tide is still and black… and I just kinda don't want you to be all alone in the Tower? 'Cause everyone's asleep and I just… "
"Meditating is something I do by myself. What's the difference if the rest you are asleep or not? Besides the obvious decrease in noise, I mean."
"Nothing, I guess. I just feel better if I know you're all okay and in bed before I go to sleep."
"That's a stupid reason, Boy Blunder."
"Fine. I don't know why I do this. Happy?" he smiles a little, as if amused by his own inability to explain himself. "I just do. I like to know you're okay and I like thinking it's just you and me and the sleeping Tower. I like that I'm watching the sea and the sea's watching you and I can hear when you come down from the roof and slide into your room and a dreamless sleep." Dreamless sleep. He knows why she meditates at night. For a split second, she considers demanding he reveal how he came to know this, but decides to wait until he was done. "Is it a problem?"
"How do you know I meditate at night to…"
"To ward off the dreams?" She nods, and he sighs, looking away. "Because I have them, too, some nights." At his words, she cringes, her mind instantly rioting in flames and half-memories. The link. She should've guessed that would happen. Especially when she could sometimes dream his dreams—of flying, of falling, of the family he lost and the parents from whose eyelids as they glanced dripped love, even as they're dragged down into the sawdust. "They're awful, Raven. I don't know how you stand them."
"I don't. I meditate."
"It doesn't always work."
"No. But it's the best I can do." She hesitates, unsure, and then adds, "I'm sorry you have to see..." Death. Destruction. Mayhem. Chaos. Genocide. Torture. Putrefaction. Hopelessness. "…that too."
"I'm glad—" her surprise must've shown on her face, because he clarifies, "—at least that way, you're not alone in…there. And I know what's happening, and I can help you."
"I don't need help." A lie. And despite herself, it warms her to think that she isn't as alone in the hellfire as she seems to be in her nightmares—somewhere in the flames, Robin is looking for her.
"I didn't say you did." It occurs to her to drop the annoyance and simply be grateful—grateful that someone's waiting up for her after she's done battling demons. Grateful that someone's him.
"You didn't." She treats him a rare, enigmatic smile. "Thank you." He grins right back, and the starlight catches his eyes for the first time, infusing them with brilliance and leaving her breathless.
"For you, Rae? Anytime." She decides she doesn't mind him calling her that, after all.
And the next time the hellfire slips into her nightmares, a hint of red and green and yellow—nothing but a blur on the edge of her vision—keeps her from drowning in the acrid smoke.
But this can't be the answer to Starfire's question, not when it could conceivably be summarized into, 'your Boy.' The girl beside her is staring at her, puzzled at how long it's taking for Raven to answer and at how the empath has turned her head to face away, as if she would hide what she was thinking from her.
"Raven?" the dark-haired girl opens her mouth, pauses, closes it again. Starfire remembers something said earlier, something in her heart. Raven usually isn't this easy to read. With a kind smile on her lips, the alien gently asks,
"It involves Robin, does it not?" Raven's eyes widen, and for a second she starts to deny it. But then she catches sight of the understanding in Star's glowing eyes, so she just says,
"Yes." The jealous thing inside Star begins to stir, but she fights it down, though not enough that she can stop herself from asking in a rush,
"Do you love him?" Raven frowns at how nosy she was being all of a sudden, but says,
"I… don't know. I could. I might already." It's the truth; can she help it that out of all the Titans—and there are so many nowadays—Robin caught her eye the most? He was beautiful, yes, but more than that he saw the world and all its layers—her layers—and he wondered and examined and fixed because that was his nature. He was passionate and full of hope, for everything and everyone and her, and he always seemed so eager to help her shoulder the burdens of her existence, so insistent in his desire to understand, to help and protect and save.
As if the deepest wish of his heart was to know hers completely.
And if that weren't enough, then he'd also climbed down into hell just to rescue her from the fire and deliver her into her true destiny. And if those weren't the makings of a mighty powerful crush, then her understanding of the subject was terribly off.
Starfire swallows another wave of jealousy, all the time thinking that this is Raven and not Kitten and she loves her, and that this is something wonderful and it is not for her to decide who either Raven or Robin loves and everyone is free to feel as they do.
Or rather, forced to feel as they do, she thinks in a rare moment of negativity.
This time, it's curiosity more than jealousy that makes Star asks,
"Why?" Raven frowns, thinking for a minute before answering slowly, her eyes fixed on the beginnings of a storm, many miles away.
"He... sees me." She thinks back to the common room, to his eyes gleaming with starlight and something else. She continues, "And when I look into his eyes it's the way I feel inside… like who I want to be."
"You have observed his eyes?" Star tells the stab of pain if her chest to go away and stop making things difficult.
"Once."
"They are blue, yes?" Raven nods and answers,
"Yes."
"I imagined they would be." Raven looks to her companion in surprise, prodding her to elaborate.
"Did you?"
"What other color could they be?" Star sighs and looks past the edge of the roof, down into the surf. "Blue. Like the ocean... the way it looks when I am flying above it."
"Yes." Raven closes her eyes, trying to remember the exact shade. She's right; like flying and falling and the sea swallowing me whole. That would've been the end of the conversation, except Starfire had more questions.
"Friend Raven?" Raven sighs, reopening her eyes.
"Yes, Star?"
"Who are you inside?" Raven startled, the none of your business already readying itself to jump off the edge of her tongue. But the sun was straight on Starfire, and her skin looked more golden than ever and she wasn't even looking at Raven but attentively fiddling with her wrist guard and she softened, just like that, because you can't yell at something like her.
"I… I'm not sure, Star. I don't know…" she frowned, "I used to think I did, but then…"
"Is that why you require Robin, then? To see in his eyes and discover who you are meant to be?" Amazingly, that made perfect sense. Baffled, Raven could only answer,
"Yes. I suppose that's the reason."
"Oh. See, perhaps this is why I am not meant to be with Robin." Raven near-choked. Not meant to be with Robin? The hell…? "I have no true reason to desire his companionship… I love him, only. But then… it is a great deal of love. I thought maybe… Perhaps it is for the best—yes, it must be. I am not what he needs, and I am not what he desires. And I do not… I do not need him. I only want him… but I want him very much… but it is only wanting… I feel so awful. I observe him interact with another… girl, yes, and it makes me want to empty my stomach. I want him so very much… Am I selfish, Friend Raven, to feel like I do?"
Star's eyes are big and liquid, and she fixes Raven with the most heart-breaking look she's ever seen. It makes her want to shake the alien redhead and demand that she explain this sudden negativity. Robin not wanting her? And what exactly is for the best? Raven hates feeling confused and out of control, and the question is on the tip of her tongue when she realizes that she can't possibly ask it. Star might be able to deal with her own feelings and Raven's, but Raven isn't that capable. Asking Starfire to explain this sadness would be getting in over her head. And if she can't help the alien redhead, then pressuring her to answer is nothing but morbid curiosity and an awful payback to the compassion Starfire has shown her today.
Sighing deeply, Raven decides to offer the best she can.
"No, Star." She answers with the last pull of honesty of the evening. "You're the least selfish person I know. And…" It near kills her to say it, but she can't stand not to. "You shouldn't give up on Robin." She swallows, but forces herself to continue. "Not even for me. Don't make his choice for him." And finally, "Love's not something you should give up on."
"For someone who has not had much experience in the matters of the heart, you speak with great wisdom."
"I've had some pretty decent teachers."
Starfire smiles and Raven can't help but soften a tiny grin for the lovable redhead. She shrugs it right off, however, and says,
"Sunset's about to begin…"
"Oh, how marvelous!" The Tamaranian princess is now floating a few inches off the ground.
"…on the other side of the Tower."
"Oh." Star blushes, a little embarrassed by her oversight.
As they switch to the correct side of the roof, Raven briefly wonders if maybe she said the wrong thing. Starfire's loved Robin for nearly four years, and he's never said anything to conclusively show that he might feel the same way. She feels terrible when she realizes that the same thing that's breaking her friend's heart is giving her hope. Perhaps the alien should give up already—forget him and begin to heal. Where the roles reversed, would Raven give up? Should she give up anyway, even if at the moment it would seem she has an edge?
She remembers the image of herself inside Robin's eyes, and realizes she wouldn't.
Maybe she said the right thing, after all.
"The thing about Friend Robin," Star says with an air of finality, as they watch the surprisingly breath-taking bloodbath playing over the clouds "is that you are never short on proof of affection…and yet, you never understand what he might mean by it..." It's not that he doesn't love you. It's that you're not the only one. And since he can't choose, he leaves it at that: love. Only that. "It is most frustrating… yet strangely compelling."
Raven sighs, and thinks that they're both probably in need of therapy. Still, she nods her agreement. Some eight countries away, Robin's re-living the joyous days of his childhood through vicious amounts of violence. On the beach below, Beast Boy has dug himself into a hole. A wave comes, covering the hole. Beast Boy jumps out, hollering, some manner of small fish attached to his posterior. From his sitting position on a rock, Cyborg laughs and slides down the slippery surface of his perch, landing face-down in the sand.
Raven smiles. And we're probably not the only ones.
In two days Star would be back to chasing him and Raven would be back to studying him… and he would probably be back to being strange about both, to eating all of Starfire's meals and to making Raven smile. To making Starfire blush and giggle, and to making Raven feel safe and understood. To being dashing and brave and a source of endless frustration. To not choosing between the two girls that he can't help but love.
But it doesn't matter. Love's not something you give up on.
The End.
I'm too tired for Notes, but I'd love it if you left a review.
--Fée
walks away, absentmindedly humming "She Bangs"