Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Titans or any of the characters associated with them.
Author's Note: Well, first thing's first. I am so sorry about taking such a long time with this chapter. I realize that it's taken me a month and then some to get it posted and I apologize. Really, my only excuse is that I just had trouble getting the inspiration to write. Around half of this chapter is something I wrote in around 3-4 hours. I think that it's only fair that I give special thanks to azkabanfan. This person just sent in a review, and it got me to kick my butt into gear so I could stay up all night and finish this thing for you guys. Kudos azkabanfan!
Second, I kind of want to apologize for the content of this chapter. A lot of it is merely introspect into what the characters are thinking, especially Beast Boy and Raven. I figured that it was important to put this in to clear up anyone's confusion about why the 'big fight' occured. I realize that last chapter, I said things would be going downhill and start picking up the pace. I guess I kind of backed out on that a little with this chapter. Just consider it the "mystery" portion of the story. Anyway, though at first the chapter may not seem interesting, I promise, there is dialogue toward the second half.
Chapter 10
Raven stormed furiously down the hallway and into her room. She only wished that the door was not automatically shut by a computer so she could have slammed it herself. 'How dare he!' she was thinking. How could Beast Boy have the audacity to try and tell her how she should conduct herself! Who decided it was okay for him to tell her what she did and did not need to sort out! Absolutely nobody! He had no right to do or say what he did. He had just waltzed right into the common room and tried to force her into a conversation, just like always. This time though, rather than leaving the third time she told him to stop bothering her, he persisted in trying to make her to talk. He had tried to make her discuss with him her actions from the previous days. As if she owed him an explanation! Her actions were none of his business! So what if she had had a slight mishap within her mind. She almost always kept her emotions under control, and had a right to get mixed up about something for once in her life! That did not mean, however, that Beast Boy could make her talk to him about it. Moreover, since when could he tell her who she had feelings for? It was her own life, and she could be with whomever she wanted! And she did not want to be with a brainless, joke-telling idiot like him.
It was at this point that Raven realized about half the objects in her room had become absorbed by her overactive powers. Various articles were beginning to float up and down, while pictures frames were cracking and books were gliding around the room. Knowing what to do after having dealt with such situations all her life, Raven began mentally reciting her mantra. Practically on cue, all of the items started to return to their properly assigned spots. The damage that had been occurring slowly began to subside. Continuing to regain control of herself, Raven began muttering things under her breath in aid.
"Don't be mad." She spoke to herself soothingly. "Just let the anger flow away." Her belongings continued to settle themselves as she uttered these words. It seemed that, for the most part, everything was back in its place or beginning to straighten up. "He isn't worth it."
Every item in the room shot off of its shelf and crashed into the floor.
"Damn!" Raven shouted in frustration. She simply was not in the mood to put up with her powers' unruliness at the moment. As much as she was currently trying to suppress it, she was absolutely livid with Beast Boy and what he had said. Not to mention the fact that her past week had been an emotional roller coaster. She had what could be a very important task to accomplish, and couldn't do so with her powers constantly getting in the way as they were. She desperately needed to find a way to control them, or else continue endangering the rest of the team and their new mission.
Raven began rubbing her temples in a small attempt to calm her nerves. This action granted her a bit of tranquility, albeit only a small amount. Because of this newfound peace, or out of mere exhaustion, her powers receded and gave her some degree of control again. The items that had been damaged or knocked over were not fixed or put back, but it was good enough for the time being. As long as she was able to at least function normally, she needed to get to work.
After pondering for a moment, Raven realized that she had no idea where to start. She could read any newspapers from the past month or so to see if anything overly suspicious had occurred without the Titan's noticing. Likewise, she could go down to the tower's information room and look through any of the city's records they had managed to collect. Both options entailed sorting through a vast amount of information; she would have a ton of work no matter where she started. Seeing as Beast Boy probably didn't even know that the information room existed though, she opted to begin there.
Rather than walking and having to chance running into her new least favorite person, Raven decided to use her powers to move herself to the information room instantaneously. When she arrived in the usually unused room, she began to look around the cluttered bookshelves in search of anything that might be of use. Many of the articles stored in the room merely contained reference information on various systems and functions that went on in the city. For instance, one book contained maps showing all major banks and financial buildings, sewer systems, and underground subway locations, should any of the information ever prove useful when pursuing a villain. Raven even came across the hard copies of each of the Titan's information and history. Though she was a bit tempted to take a peek at them at first, she did not, due to the fact that it was an invasion of privacy.
Raven found what she had been looking for when she came across a collection of books labeled "Jump City: Statistics and Records". The various volumes were sorted by date, one published for every quarter of a year. Unfortunately, no volume had been published for any of the recent weeks, and the last one distributed only covered up to around two months ago. Raven was at first skeptical that reading through the writings would yield any results, but decided that they might possibly contain some indirectly useful data.
Using her powers, Raven took hold of the ten or so books and levitated them onto the nearby desk. Seeing as the lackluster room was generally used only for storage of dreary books and such, the furniture was dusty and unkempt from lack of use. Raven brushed some of the dust off of the chair and took a seat in it. Opening the first book dated "2001 January-March", she began her search for clues.
Beast Boy angrily threw himself down onto the couch, crossing his arms in anger. He had never been so pissed in his entire life! What exactly was Raven trying to pull with him anyway? One day she was sucking his face off, the next, she was completely ignoring him. One day she was all over him, now she was acting like nothing had happened. Was she trying to torture him, or did she just like being a stubborn bitch about everything? She wasn't even acting like she wanted to work things out. All she really seemed to want was to go on pretending nothing had ever happened!
But something had happened. Whether or not Raven was willing to admit it, something was definitely going on between them. It had started as only a slight friction, a slight accident that had occurred that night about a week ago. Now however, it had turned into a full blown calamity. As was evident from their previous argument, the situation did not appear to be leaving any time soon. Raven could scream "deny!" all she wanted to; the circumstances were not any less real.
Beast Boy had tried to work things out with her. He really had wanted some good to come out of what had been going on for the past week. When Raven seemed to have entirely opposite sentiments though, it had angered him. She was being completely inflexible about trying to patch things back together. Though he admitted he had gotten a bit more upset than intended, he was still wholly perplexed as to why she would want things to continue the way they were now. She couldn't want to continue their current "dance" of wavering between affection and anger, could she? Then again, he realized, it shouldn't have surprised him that much. The two of them had such a love-hate relationship all the time, it had practically become a fact of life. Why she only seemed to have these shouting matches with him though, was still a mystery all its own.
As Beast Boy continued to mull things over, he began to realize that his anger was slowly leaving him. Rather than being furious with Raven as he had been a few minutes ago, he found himself being replaced with a confused, only slightly ticked offfeeling. He still had no understanding whatsoever of her puzzling motivations or intentions, but was at least no longer completely enraged at her.
A loud crashing sound suddenly snapped the changeling out of his thinking. It had sounded like it came from the general direction of Raven's room. Knowing that all of the other Titans were off in other floors and sections of the tower, he figured that whatever it was had to have come from her. He got up off the couch and ran into the hallway connected to her room to check it out. Though they had just had what could arguably be their worst fight since the formation of the team, Beast Boy would have never been able to forgive himself if he let anything happen.
He was halfway down the hallway when he heard Raven shout "Damn!" from within her room. Though he wanted to make sure she was okay, their recent abrasion still made him a bit hesitant. From what he had heard, she sounded as though she was uninjured, albeit quite upset. Knowing how Raven's powers correlated with her emotions, he assumed she was just experiencing a bit ofher usual "emotionalaftermath" from their argument. Given that he was still a bit miffed at her for being so stubborn, and thus not too concerned, Beast Boy figured he should leave her to sort out the issue by herself. Besides, he still had work to get to, no matter how boring or tedious it was going to be…
Robin opened the door to the dimly lit evidence room and stepped inside. As he made his way to the back of the room, he glanced warily at the various masks, weapons, and other items the Titans had attained from their victories. Out of all of the "trophies" in the room though, none brought forth quite as many memories as the one he kept in the very back: Slade's. No one villain had caused him so many worries, sleepless nights, and just large amounts of general stress. It was astounding how one person (presumably) could be so blatantly obviousin his clearly criminal intentions, yet more elusive than all other villains combined.
This time however, it seemed that Slade had altered his game plan slightly. Rather than being conspicuous with his purposes but elusive with his actions, he was just being generally advertent with everything. Other than the apparent complexity of the criminal activities that was typically characteristic of no one else, they had no direct clues that he was even involved at all. Hopefully, whatever Robin accomplished here in the next few hours would provide some kind of useful insight as to what was going on.
Finally approaching the back of the room, the Boy Wonder found one of the boxes that he had designated for objects pertaining to Slade. He pulled it out toward himself and lifted the lid that was covering its contents. On top of the sundry items contained within it, staring back up at him was the dead, empty mask of Slade. A surge of emotions suddenly shot through him as memories of mistakes, fights, and lost battles came back to mind. Out of all the feelings rushing through Robin, irritation, regret, and anger, the most prominent was…worry. To him, Slade was his responsibility. Countless times, Slade had put the people of the city and the members of his team, the people he was responsible for protecting, in serious danger. And countless times, Robin had failed to stop him. This was, at least in his view, the final straw. He had to stop him, and he had to do it this time.
Lifting the lifeless mask from the box, Robin began his search…
Starfire landed on the ground in an ally between two buildings. She had been flying about the city aimlessly for the past ten minutes trying to come up with some place to start. So far, she hadn't come up with much, seeing as she really had no idea what exactly she was supposed to be looking for anyway. It was for this reason that she decided to begin a more detailed search on the ground.
After searching around for an hour or so though, Starfire found that she was encountering the same fruitless results. Nothing really seemed out of the ordinary. Various people were walking around the sidewalks and buildings, going about their daily business. Shops and restaurants were open, full of innocent customers. There was no evidence of any criminal or otherwise out-of-the-ordinary activity. Everything was functioning normally, and nothing seemed out of place.
Sighing, the weary Tameranian girl sat down on a nearby bench in defeat. She must have searched over three quarters of the city, only to come up completely empty-handed. At this rate, she could probably spend hours searching the rest of the city, and still produce absolutely no significant information. She might as well simply give up and go back to the tower to see if anyone else had found anything.
While contemplating what to do, Starfire became vaguely aware of a strange, metallic noise behind her. Turning around to locate the source of the sound, she noticed the lid on a manhole being lifted up from underneath. Assuming that someone was trying to get out of the sewer, she dashed over to aid whoever it was. The phenomenally strong girl bent over and lifted the plate of metal with ease.
"Hello Earth citizen! Do you require any assistance in getting out of the sewage?" She asked, holding a hand out to the hole in the ground. Someone else's slightly dirty hand reached out of the relative darkness and grasped her own. Applying very little effort, Starfire aided in pulling the man up until he was, for the most part, sturdy on the ground.
"Thank you." The man replied distantly, standing up. Once he had gained his composure, Starfire took a second to look at him. He was wearing a loose, yellow workers uniform, meaning he was probably doing some kind of work for the city. Judging from his face, she concluded he was somewhere in his middle ages, late thirties or forties. He had short hair that seemed to be unnaturally light-colored for someone of his age. She also noticed that he seemed to have an eye-patch covering some injury of his left eye, and a bit of a mysterious, shady presence about him. All in all though, he appeared to be just another person doing nothing but going about his daily affairs. The only thing about him that seemed at all puzzling was the fact that he was holding on to a large, brown bag.
"You are most welcome sir." Starfire replied to the gentleman cheerily. "Tell me, are you perhaps one of the many people that do work for the city?"
"Well yes, I am." the man answered, pointing to the 'Jump City' insignia stitched just under his shoulder. "But I'm just a sewage worker. Puts food on the table, but it isn't the most glorious of jobs." As he spoke, Starfire noticed a somewhat unique quality to the man's voice. It seemed to have a certain degree of control to it that wasn't typical of most other people. It was almost as if, similar to his slightly shady appearance, he was trying to conceal something about himself. Though it reminded Starfire of something she knew she should have remembered, she remained polite anyway, due to the fact that the man's occupation in the city could potentially provide her some helpful information.
"Most excellent. Tell me, do you perhaps know of anything strange that has been occurring in the city lately? Anything of importance or suspiciousness?" Starfire asked.
"I'm sorry. I'm afraid I don't." He answered. "Unfortunately, someone in this position doesn't receive that much information about anything unless it's just public knowledge."
"Oh, I see." Starfire replied in disappointment. Once again, she was at a dead end.
"Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you."
"No, it is no matter." Starfire sighed. "I was…just wondering." She didn't bother to tell the man the nature of her assignment, seeing as she didn't want to alarm him to the fact that something potentially dangerous could be going on in the city.
At this point, Starfire's eyes happened to travel back to the bag the man was carrying. "Tell me sir, what is it that you are carrying?" she asked out of curiosity.
"Ah, these things?" the worker responded, lifting an object out of the bulky sack he was holding on to. In his hand, he held a small, black, cube-shaped item that was relatively the same size as a cereal box. He tossed the article over to Starfire and spoke. "They're purifiers. The city just came up with them. They filter out any toxins that are so dangerous they create absolutely unworkable conditions. That's what I was doing down there, just implementing them."
"Oh." Starfire said, staring at the device in her hands. It weighed a bit less than she had anticipated, and smelled of strange chemicals, understandably.
"Well, I actually have to be going. As you can see, I've still got a lot of work to do." The man said, indicating the bag still full of black cubes. He began walking away down the sidewalk.
"Oh yes. Thank you for your help." Starfire replied when he began to leave. After a second, she realized that she was still holding on to the mechanism the man had handed her.
"Wait sir! You forgot to take back your…"
The mysterious worker had already disappeared out of sight…
Beast Boy lay sprawled out across the kitchen table on top of a pile of innumerous newspaper articles from recent weeks. He had been searching for hours and found essentially nothing. Granted, the mayor's daughter was getting married in a couple of months, and the Annual Cheese Expo was holding their meeting downtown on the 5th, but none of this wasactually significant. The lackadaisical changeling would have settled for any old crap-ass bit of information if he could just quit now without having to show up completely empty-handed.
However, Beast Boy didn't stop. Despite his prolific boredom, he knew it was necessary to go through everything to be sure he had all of the details straight. Though it was extremely uninteresting, it could mean the difference between the well-being and destruction of the city.
Picking up another newspaper, Beast Boy continued to sort through the seemingly random articles. There were 'Movie Showtimes'…no, 'Highway Cleanups'…not important… 'Hot Cars', interesting but irrelevant…
"Augh!" Beast Boy yelled in frustration. "None of this junk is important at all!" The changeling once again threw his torso down on the table with an exasperated sigh. There just weren't any significant events occurring anywhere in the city. No increased crime rates, no suspicious activity, no nothing.
Out of the corner of his eye, Beast Boy happened to notice an article entitled 'Chemicals Gone Missing?'. Figuring it was practically the best thing he had run into all afternoon, he picked it up and began reading.
'In a mandated inventory inspection, personnel at RNC Laboratories think they may have discovered that certain items kept in a high-security chemical storage unit are missing. Because data files on any previous inventories are at this time unattainable, no conclusive results can be sturdily determined from the current chemical amounts. However, scientists from the lab still claim that a single case of concentrated nitric acid is missing from the storage unit. The case is thought to contain around 20 g (grams) of the potentially volatile substance.
Upon contacting authorities, a thorough investigation was made of the entire laboratory. No substantial evidence has yet to be found. All entrances show absolutely no signs of any break-ins. Police can find no traces of fingerprints, hair follicles, or otherwise traceable particles containing human DNA. Despite this, scientists still claim to be missing one or more cases of nitric acid. When consulting security surveillance footage for the entire facility, it was found that all audio and video feed had been completely severed on the afternoon the scientists were off, Sunday April 16, 2006.'
Beast Boy finished the article. 'Well, that's definitely suspicious.' He thought to himself. Glancing up at the kitchen clock, the changeling noticed that it was nearly six-thirty; the others would be getting back very shortly.
'It's better than anything else I've found.' He thought. 'The others are coming back in like five minutes, and I got bored with this stuff two hours ago. If I just give this thing to them when they get back, I can go and watch TV now until dinner.' Beast Boy smiled and put down his (now finished) research. That sounded like the best idea he'd come up with all day.
Starfire was currently in the very endings of her investigation. She still had yet to find anything overly significant, and was flying over the edge of the city by the bay in a last attempt at locating anything important. So far, the outskirts of the city proved to be about as useful as the center. There was again, absolutely no trace of suspicious or criminal activity to be found anywhere. Starfire however, would not be deterred. She had decided to look over every portion of the city thoroughly, even if she never actually found anything. It was her duty.
The Tameranian came to be flying over a large warehouse right next to a dock where a ship had apparently pulled in. Using her exceptional hearing, she happened two notice to men outside the warehouse yelling at each other profusely. She decided to go down and help out.
"What makes you think I know what happened to it Mack!" one man screamed at the other.
"Well Dave, its yer' fuckin' job. You were supposed to make sure we had the full shipment!"
"I already counted 'em all when they came in two days days ago! They was all there when I counted."
"Yeah, well since when can you count?" Mack muttered under his breath.
"Hey! Don't talk that way 'bout me!" Dave shouted, lunging at Mack. They had almost gotten into a full-blown fist match, until Starfire finally arrived and interjected.
"Men! Please, cease! Do not fight each other this way!" She shouted, separating the two. Once the men had calmed down, she spoke again. "Now, what is it that caused you to behave this way?"
"That idiot lost part of our shipment." Mack yelled."Now the boats here to get the delivery, and thanks to him, we're missin' a box!"
"I didn't lose it! I counted every one of 'em!" Dave protested.
"Well then where is it? You stealin' stuff?"
"Nuh-uh! Nah!" Dave yelled again, trying to lunge at Mack.
"Okay! Stop!" Starfire shouted, forcing the men to remain in check. "What is it that is missing? Perhaps we can…locate it?"
"It's a box of textile adhesives. Hexamine-based." Mack responded, looking at a clipboard he was holding.
"Oh." Starfire replied, realizing she had no idea what a hexamine-based adhesive looked like, much less how to locate a box full of one. "And what exactly do these look like?"
"The box they're in is made of cardboard, and it's about three by four feet." Mack told her.
"Where was the last location you saw it?"
"In the warehouse." Dave said, pointing. "We got a whole shipment of 'em two days ago Sunday night. I counted 'em then. Now they ain't here."
"Well then, perhaps we should check there." Starfire suggested. As the three of them began to walk toward the warehouse entrance, Starfire's communicator went off.
"Star? Are you there?" Robin's voice called from the other side.
"Oh, yes Robin, I am here." She replied, raising the deviceto her face.
"Are you about finished?" he asked. "The rest of us have finished up."
"Yes." She sighed. "I suppose I am." She hadn't actually found anything, and didn't think she would fair any better while searching for a missing case of adhesives.
"Okay, well, the others and I decided that we'd just go out for pizza rather than eating Beast Boy's…you know…cooking."
"Oh, do you mean the one by the video store?"
"Yeah, that's the one." Robin replied. "If you get back and we're not here, just go there."
"Okay, I will try to be home as soon as possible. I hope to see you soon Robin."
"See ya then Star." Robin said, cutting off the connection.
"Earth citizens," Starfire began to the men behind her as she rose off the ground. "I am afraid I must go now. I hope you locate your 'adhesives'." With that, she flew off toward Titans Tower.
"It's your fault."
"No it ain't!"
"Hello?" Starfire called out as she entered the living room. "Robin? Raven?" No one answered. She figured they must have already left to go eat. She decided to head back to her bedroom for just a moment. She still had the small device that the old sewage worker had forgotten, and needed to put it away somewhere.
Heading down the hall, Starfire entered her lusciously bright and pink-colored bedroom. She walked over to her desk and sat the small, black apparatus down. Satisfied that she now had nothing left to tend to, Starfire headed to the roof and sped off toward the pizzeria downtown.
"Honest. Nothing!" Cyborg stated. "I must'a gone through a hundred video surveillance files and even more news files. Not a thing!"
"I know what you mean." Robin, seated next to Cyborg, responded sternly. "I had the same results. I looked for hoursand didn't find anything pointinganywhere." Next to Robin was Beast Boy, with Raven seated to the other side of Cyborg. The four of them were sitting around a single table in the outdoor portion of the pizzeria waiting for their order to come up.
Raven, unknown to the others, was still in a fairly bad mood. She was still upset over her and Beast Boy's secret clash of wills, and her emotions were still acting up. Because of her irate disposition, she was completely uninterested in her friends' typical small talk, and was facing slightly away from them.
Beast Boy unfortunately, was having exactly the opposite problem. He couldn't keep his eyes off of them, or more specifically, justRaven. He was still quite angry at her, but found that every time he so much as glanced in her direction, that feeling disappeared completely. He was left with nothing but a prevailing desire to just stare longingly at her beautiful hair and gorgeous face.
"Yo BB! Ya' there?" Cyborg shouted from across the table.
"Huh?" Beast Boy said, snapping away from his dreams of Raven and back to reality. "What?"
"I said, did you find anything?" Cyborg stated.
"Ah, not really dudes." The changeling replied. "Just some article about some missing acids down and some lab called RNC. That was the only out of place thing I found, and even it didn't seem all that big."
"Dang."
"What about you Raven?" Robin interjected. "Did you come up with anything?"
"No" she stated frigidly.
"Uhh...she okay?" Robin whispered over to Cyborg.
"I dunno." The robotic teen shrugged. "They've both been actin' weird lately."
"Well," Robin sighed. "That still leaves us with basically nothing. I guess we'll just have to wait for Star to get here and see if she came up with anything."
"Maybe she did." Cyborg said. "After all, she's gone around the whole city. That's ten times as much searching as any of us did."
"I hope you're right." Robin replied. There was silence. For a moment, none of them spoke. Robin and Cyborg were out of things to say, while Beast Boy was busy going ga-ga over the taciturn girl across the table.
Suddenly, a 'woosh'ing sound broke the silence, followed by Starfire landing on the ground by the teens' table.
"Hello friends!" she said elatedly. "Tell me, how did your searches go?"
"Not so good Star." Robin replied. "We were all hoping that you found something."
"Well, no. I did not." She said solemnly, taking the seat near Raven. "I found nothing of significance to our task. Although I did meet a strange man who worked in the sewer. He accidentally left behind one of his black purification cubes."
"Purification cubes?" Robin questioned, having no knowledge of such devices.
"Yes." She replied. "They filter out toxins so people can more safely work in the sewers."
"Doedn't sound like anything I've ever heard of." Cyborg said.
"Yes, well, he said they had just recently come out." Starfire told them.
"Oh." Cyborg conceded. "Who cares? It's not like I plan on goin' down there any time soon. They can do whatever they want."
"What else did you run into Star?" Robin asked, getting the topic back onto business.
"Nothing really." She answered. "I did stop some men at a warehouse from fighting over the disappearance of some 'hexamine' adhesives though. One man said that the other lost them, while the other insisted they had disappeared between Sunday and today. That was the most exciting thing that occured all day, but still, nothing relevant to our mission."
"So we're right back where we started." Cyborg said.
"Maybe not just yet." Robin interjected, deep in thought. A waitress came by and placed a large pizza that the group had ordered earlier down in front of the teens.
"Why?" Cyborg asked. "What d'ya got?"
Author's Note: Now, many of you might be thinking (or yelling) "Why wasn't Cyborg's little excursion mentioned at all?" Well, to be honest, it's because, as you read from the last scene, he didn't really find anything. I figured that it wasn't really necessary to waste any time describing how Cyborg spent 3 hours finding nothing. If any of you are Cyborg fans however, don't worry. I promise that in the last few chapters (which are coming up VERY soon) he will get his shining moments. Plus, if you want a little plot spoiler PLOT SPOILER he's going to have a small role in getting Beast Boy and Raven together END SPOILER.
Anyway, just to reiderate, don't forget that if you absolutely need to know my progress on the current chapter, you can check my profile for the current word and page counts. I'm not trying to self-promote my profile or anything, (believe me, there's nothing on that thing to promote, haha) but the feature is just there for your convenience should you ever feel the need to use it.
Well, that about sums up everything I wanted to say. I'll seriously try not to take so long on the next chapter.
'Til next time. GoldenBlade416
