Now, I'm hard pressed to understand why, and it's disheartening to see something I labored over get lost in the crush of information traffic. So I have to conclude one of two things. Either one, no one cares enough about the story to read and leave a review, which is, of course, a possibility, or two, the story sucks so bad that no one bothers to leave a review.
This is where you guys come in. I beg you, onegai shimasu, take twenty minutes out of your busy internet schedule, look it over, and be honest. If it sucks, tell me so. I'll take whatever advice is given and use it to improve myself. If you like it, and want it to continue, please, tell me so. As much as I enjoy writing that story, if no one is reading and enjoying it, than I'm wasting your time and mine. I hope that all it is is that the little blurb used to describe the story isn't catchy enough to capture the minds of fickle young readers, and once I get a few people to give it a once over, they'll realize hey, this story has merit, and I wanna see it continue.
Of course, I am open to the possibility that I'm just blinded by my own ego, and that it sucks worse than a vacuum cleaner in space.
So here's your chance, fellow writers. Hit me with it. I'm a big boy, an' I can take it.
Anyway, I have a horrible tendancy to shift moods during conversations between Rob and Rae and I apologize for that. I would just mention that trying to write this Robin is something a difficult prospect for me... he's rather unpredictable. Since I can't ask myself what would Robin do, and then write that, and I can't ask myself what would.. AHAHA... sorry. Not gonna name him directly. Some of you already know and some of you are still clueless, so I won't go further with that. Suffice to say that a blend of the two is difficult because they are, in some respects, very alike, and in others so very different.
Plus, this Robin has the infinite ability to get under Raven's skin.
So if this chapter don' make much sense, I 'pologize. I go where me muse takes me, and she be a crazy bitch, she be.
Just so you guys know, the song below IS the theme song for this story. It so exemplifies the relationship growing between our two odd birds that I listen to it while I write.
On wit' the show foo'.
"This is so hard for me, to find the words to say. My thoughts are standing still. Captive inside of me. All the motions start to hide, and nothing's getting through. Watch me, fading I'm losing all my instincts. Falling into darkness. Tear down these walls for me, stop me from going under. You are the only one who knows I'm holding back. It's not too late for me, to keep from sinking further. I'm trying to find my way out... Tear down these walls for me now. So much uncertainty, I don't like this feeling, I'm sinking like a stone. Each time I try to speak, there's a voice I'm hearing, and it changes everything. Watch me crawl from the wreckage of my silence, conversation fading. Tear down these walls for me, stop me from going under. You are the only one who knows I'm holding back. It's not too late for me, to keep from sinking further. I'm trying to find my way out tear down these walls... Every time you choose to turn away, is it worth the price you pay? Is there someone who will wait for you? One more time. One more time..." -These Walls, Dream Theater
And the carnival began.
The flashing blue and red lights strobed out, lighting the scene with an ethereal sort of glow, like flashes of red shift, blue shift. Moving towards, and moving away. The T-Car arrived first, just barely ahead of the first few squad cars, disgorging a desperate Tameranian as surely as though she had been fired from a cannon. Seeing the blood on Robin's face and his uncharacteristically haggard look, she threw her arms around him and hugged him so hard that Raven was quite sure his head would pop off.
He grinned tiredly under the loving assualt.
"Friend Robin, are you alright? You look as though you have been hit in the face with the truck."
"Stop sign, actually." He answered, as casually as if he were refering to what was in the newspaper today.
Starfire blinked. "That is the... what is the word... irony?"
"Ironic." Raven corrected automatically, her head still throbbing from the deep contact. "And it isn't... ironic, actually. It would have been ironic if the stop sign had been what made him keep going. Since Rancid just tried to take his head off with it, it doesn't exactly qualify as ironic."
"What is it then?" Star looked between the two of them as though watching a tennis match.
"Painful." Robin winced. He watched absently as the paramedics on the scene patched up the now handcuffed Johnny Rancid.
"Dude... you SO kicked his ass! Way to go, man!" BB grinned at him enthusiastically.
Robin didn't react to BB's compliment. Instead he turned to Cyborg. "The bomb?"
"Defused. It was close though. I wanna know where a two bit punk like Rancid gets ahold of military grade explosives."
"That's an excellent question, um... Star? You mind letting go for a second? I just put my shoulder back into joint and I'd like to keep it that way."
Starfire blushed prettily, releasing him and hovering nearby, her arms demurely clasped behind her back. "I-I'm sorry, friend Robin, I'm just so pleased that you're alright."
Now Robin grinned. "Thanks Star. I appreciate your concern."
Raven rolled her eyes slightly and looked away.
It was entirely normal... a typical after battle reunion, and yet for Raven something had fundamentally changed. Her head felt full of... of him. She supposed it was the strength of the emotions involved that caused it... neither of them had been prepared for the incident, her caught up in her sudden, sympathetic whim, somewhat apprehensive about the stranger that had been moving around in Robin's skin, terrorizing Rancid. For his part, the moment had been full of pain, and anger... some small amount of guilt as well. She knew this, now, because of her connection to him.
In fact, if it hadn't been for that connection, she wouldn't have known he was feeling anything.
Such overwhelming emotions, especially coming from a source which had already wormed its way far too close to her fragile heart...
The wreckage of the minivan and Rancid's hawg chose that moment to explode. Several of the police officers hit the dirt, covering their heads with their hands as small bits of flaming debris rained down on the stunned crowd. The teen titans turned to the sudden concussive blast as one, various degrees of shock on their faces.
All save two.
Raven looked away, her ears burning with embarassment and mortification. She knew who was responsible for that near catastrophe.
Robin looked at her, a calculating... no, perhaps that term is too harsh... a measuring look on his face. He also knew.
Still, he said nothing. The firefighters pushed past the stunned group, immediately on hand to begin fighting the conflaguration.
Robin rubbed the back of his head tiredly, breaking the shock of the rest of the group. His body language drew the eyes of his team to him without him even saying a word. Even Raven found herself staring at him.
If she didn't obsess about him so much, she might have hated him for how he unconsciously wielded authority.
"Well, all things considered team, I'd call this a victory. Good job, Titans. Get some rest. You've earned it."
Starfire stared at him with slightly troubled eyes. "Perhaps I am not understanding your syntax, friend Robin, but you seem to be excluding yourself from the rest of us. Are you not a part of the team?"
He stopped, straightening unconsciously, as though someone wasn't playing by the rules. He turned to Starfire and grinned. "Sorry, Star. No rest for the wicked. There's a lead I want to look into."
Raven gave him a slightly confused look... What lead?
Cyborg voiced his own concern. "You got somethin', Rob?"
BB raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, did Rancid spill his guts?"
Robin turned sharply, looking back at Rancid being loaded into the ambulence. Several police officers got into the ambulence with him. They were taking no chances with the super criminal. Even if he was unconscious and beaten to within an inch of his life.
"No... it's probably nothing, but I won't get any sleep until I check it out." He half muttered this, walking towards his R-cycle. He looked tired and worn, which worried the rest of his team.
Robin never lost his composure. There was only one thing that made him look human.
Rather, one person.
They looked at one another uneasily as he mounted the R-cycle, a set and determined look on his face. Raven bit her lip for a moment, weighing the pros and cons of the decision before her. She made a snap decision that she'd probably regret in the future.
"I'm going too." She blurted out, somehow managing not to sound sheepish. The rest of the team looked at her as though she'd grown a second head.
"Someone has to keep you out of trouble, oh fearless leader." She intoned sarcastically, then drew herself back into the sheltering confines of her cloak.
She hated it when they looked at her like that.
It was almost as bad as when they looked at her like she'd grown a second set of eyes.
Robin, however, merely looked away, his eyes narrowing slightly in thought.
This, however, started an avalanche.
"I'm going too." BB piped up first. "Can't let you have all the fun, Rob."
"Yeah, you ain't the only one who can get a clue." Cyborg muttered, crossing his arms resolutely.
"I too, will join you." Starfire blushed prettily. "I find that I am often clueless, but I believe burdens should be shared."
Then she yawned hugely, and clapped her hands over her mouth as she did so, looking guilty.
Robin turned back to them and shook his head shortly.
"I said get some rest, damn it, and I meant it. I don't need you all slowing me down. Cyborg, you can't have but dregs left in your battery... BB, you just changed into a hyena and I don't think you even noticed, and Star, I wouldn't be surprised if you fell asleep flying home."
He looked at Raven, then... he started to say something, then thought better of it. "You know this isn't a good idea right now, Rae."
The team looked down as one, varying expressions of hurt or guilt visible on their countenances. Even Raven wasn't immune to his tone. Still, she had questions that needed answers, damn it, and how dare he run off like this chasing after the phantom of a phantom after what...
After what the two of them had been through? She shook her head tiredly. Too much had changed in too short a time. She wanted to sleep, dreamlessly. She wanted to meditate for hours.
She wanted answers that fit her nice, ordered world view. Answers that had nothing to do with Endless, or Nightmares... or eyes and ravens and has-been gods.
She looked up, having reached a decision. She fixed Robin with a steely gaze. "When is later, boy wonder?" She whispered.
His face went stony. His masked eyes met hers and they found themselves locked in a contest of wills. She tightened her lips.
He looked away for a moment, his expression hard. It softened after a moment.
"Alright. Raven, you're with me. The rest of you, get some sleep... you need it. Keep your communicators close. If anything pops up that Raven and I can't handle alone, I'll call you."
BB looked between the two of them with an expression that was three quarters surprised shock and one quarter poleaxed steer.
It didn't help that at the time, he WAS a steer.
"What the heck just happened?"
"The birds just reached a "Decision"." Cyborg sighed, making quotation marks before slumping tiredly and rolling his eyes. "And that's way too much stubborn, stiff necked stupidity for me to deal with this late in the... early in the morning." He corrected, after an internal time check.
Starfire hadn't moved from her downcast position. As Cyborg gently started to lead her back to the T-Car she cast a single imploring glance at Robin, which he didn't meet. Then she gave Raven a tired, hurt look before she ducked back into the T-Car. BB slumped into the car, too tired for once to even make a snappy comeback.
The T-Car roared off into the distance, leaving the two birds staring at one another.
Her stance was slightly combative... aggressive even, as though she was preparing for a fight. He started to say something, then seemed to think better of it.
She broke the tension with a tentative jab.
"You going ride that thing without a helmet, Robin?"
He glanced at his helmet, shattered and useless on the street. Then he looked at her as though considering how seriously to take that comment.
There was a guardedness between them now, and she found herself startled at how much that hurt her.
He shook his head after a moment. "No. There's no hurry I guess. Come on." He dismounted and started walking the Cycle down the street.
She blinked at his sudden accomidation, then followed him quietly, hovering only a few feet off the ground.
"Where are we going?" She asked quietly.
He didn't look at her as he answered. "Rancid wasn't in town prior to at least yesterday... I know that for a fact. He can't do anything quietly... unless he's sleeping something off. So he had to get into town in a manner that he normally wouldn't consider."
"Add to that the fact that his boots had some rock salt crust on the heels from where he dug them in to get more traction..."
She raised an eyebrow. "By sea? That's pretty farfetched."
"It's better than nothing. Besides..." He looked at the sky. "I have a feeling we don't have to be exact. We just have to be... close."
She looked confused. He continued.
"This was a distraction, Raven. Rancid didn't get that hardware by himself. He's working for someone... and I have a feeling I know who that someone is. The only person in the world someone like Johnny Rancid would be afraid of."
She narrowed her eyes. "Slade?"
He nodded. "The thing is, why go through the trouble of enlisting Johnny Rancid? Why not use any number of your own made to order goons to do it? He's marshalling forces, Raven... he's gathering power, and he can't afford to use a scrap of it for such a small portion of his plan."
His face grew intensely concentrated, he seemed to be staring off into the distance. There were several emotions in his voice, emotions she was now beginning to recognize because of her connection, however ethereal, to his psyche. Anger, disgust, mixed with shame and just a bit of grudging respect, even admiration.
He admired Slade, and he hated himself for it.
Something clicked suddenly for her. She stopped suddenly in her tracks, lowering herself to the ground. Robin stopped and looked at her quizzically.
"You think he's involved with my father again."
He never batted an eye. "Would Trigon let go of a useful tool he'd gotten his claws into?"
"Never." She whispered.
"There's your answer."
"You think he's doing something... something to do with Trigon."
He nodded.
"So you KNEW you'd need me to find him. You KNEW you'd only have to get close enough for me to resonate with the Taint." She was gaining speed, getting angry, a cold wind blew back her hood and she narrowed her slowly crimson turning eyes at him.
He said nothing. Simply stared.
"You manipulated them... manipulated me, so they'd be hurt and tired, and then you let me think I was doing it to protect you, let THEM think I was going to keep you safe."
Again, he didn't refute her claim. He simply watched her with those damnably hidden eyes of his.
"Tell me Boy Wonder... What the HELL are you? Where do you get off playing with them like that?" She spit.
His eyes narrowed. "Don't you mean playing with you like that? Let's be honest here."
"Oh, are we being honest now? I thought we were still hiding behind evasions." She spat bitterly
"Find me a better way, Raven. Find me a safer way, and I'll take it." He whispered, staring at her intently. "Find me a way where the only one who has to sacrifice is me, and you KNOW... I'll take it."
She shook with the effort not to give in to the sweet rage... to let loose and carve her name out of the city. She was so angry with him, so bitterlyresentful at his ability tomake her feel. Of course if she were honest with herself, she mighthave noticed there was no small amount of sexual tension there as well. Some things wererequired too much rationaleto notice however, and she was nearly beyondrationalization. She wantedto take what she wanted and leave nothing but ash behind.
He continued as though unmindful of the danger. "There is no other way. You're the only one who can find him. You're the only thing he's after."
He stepped close and she was forced to back up a step. If he got any closer it was all over for her. For them... for the world.
"Call me a cold, manipulating bastard. Call me whatever you want. But before you do that, take a look inside. You've seen what he's capable of. You know what he does. You stare into the abyss every night. You know what stares back."
He forced her to stare him in the face, meet those hidden windows to the soul with an intensity that prevented her from looking away, from denying the truth of his words.
"Better or worse, it's a part of you."
"Manipulate them?" His whisper was fierce and sure. "You're damn right I did. I'd do it again, in a heart beat. Not for me, or you. For them, I'd do anything... give them any small hurt now so they don't have to face a larger one later. So I don't have to explain to BB why human beings do what Wrath makes them do to one another, turn on each other like animals gone mad, gone wild with sickness and bloodlust. So I don't have to see the innocence in Starfire die, see the confusion, the hurt. See the wonder she has for humanity turn to so much betrayed pain. So I don't have to watch Cyborg try to tough it out, all the while knowing that the machine in him won't ever let him forget what it looks like to see Rage unleashed on the face of this planet."
He closed his eyes. "They're children, Raven. Noble, self-sacrificing, loving children."
He sighed slowly. "I know they have to grow up some day. I know sooner or later something is going to happen that I can't prevent or protect them from. Nor am I naive enough to think this would break them. Oh no, they're made of sterner stuff,my Titans. They'd face it and they'd survive, but they don't have to."
"Not while monsters..."
He paused. Took a deep breath, then met her gaze again, resolutely. "Not while monsters like you and me can face it for them."
All of the rage poured out of her as though he'd pierced her a hundred times, each of his words an arrow, stabbing her to death. She sagged, then straightened, looked away from him. She wondered if he knew how close he'd been to being...
He probably did, the bastard.
She knew he was right. All at once it was just too much. She'd grown up the moment she'd seen a world raped and bleeding, and known that it was her fault... that a part of her had reveled in the destruction.
"I don't want to be a monster." She whispered.
"Neither do I." He whispered back, as though confiding a great secret to her.
It was almost surreal, how alone they were after that. The adrenaline fueled insanity that was their pursuit of Rancid had concluded just shy of 1 am, and any sensible or intelligent souls were currently long abed. The streetlights did little to alieviate the early morning gloom, and in pursuit of dark business the two of them found themselves unconsciously drawing closer together, until the little islands of light created by the stark contrast between darkness and illumination appeared to be as intimate and inviolate a space as her own sanctuary.
In the manner of those not entirely sure of their standing with one another, of people with secrets, but not necessarily all of them, revealed to one another, they began to converse. It was pathetically tense at first, there was now too much between them left unsaid for them to be perfectly at ease, but there was also too much left unresolved for them to have their former companionable silence, and so they talked.
Of course, as conversations between her and the Boy Wonder often did, they soon found themselves headed towards dangerous territory.
Nor am I referring to the docks they were headed towards.
"Robin... What did you see?" She asked tentatively, in a sudden striking non-sequitor.
He blinked. "Hmm? See when?"
She was embarassed now, remembering that sudden intimate contact of mind to mind. If she concentrated hard enough, she could still feel it, a slight conduit into the inner workings of the mysterious, familiar stranger before her.
"When we..."
He frowned. "Oh." He turned his gaze back to the street. For a moment she thought he wasn't going to answer her, and prepared to ask him again.
"What did you see?" He said, not looking at her.
"I asked you first." She countered automatically.
He quirked his mouth slightly in what might have been a smirk, if he'd been anybody else. "I saw... a moment of telling humanity."
She narrowed her eyes. "What kind of-"
"Remember when you were nine, and you were supposed to be with one of your nursemaids, but you hated that they all watched you like you were going to start setting things on fire for the joy of it? You snuck out while she wasn't looking, and you went up to the hillside where the big gladden fruit trees grew, where the other children played. Only..."
She stopped, and he stopped with her. "Only none of them were there... they all went away as soon as they saw me coming..." She whispered, transfixed by the sudden recollection of something she'd only half recalled.
He continued. "That didn't stop you though. You never got out of the temple, at least, not without at least two watchers making sure you didn't get into trouble, or at least your mother. So you ran around... it was like you were trying to pack years of childhood buried under lessons about service and sacrifice into those few stolen hours. Of course, you didn't get out much, and you were still kind of clumsy. You skinned your knee on a rock, while you were playing on the hillside... and it was a nasty cut. You bled all over your robes, and you knew you were going to get scolded, because your nursemaid never failed to point out when you made the slightest mistake to your mother. You started to get angry at the rock, but you were really angry at-"
"Myself. I was angry at myself for being clumsy, and I knew that some of the other children were watching and that made me embarassed..."
"All of the sudden, the rock exploded, and the kids that were watching started screaming and ran away, and you felt..."
She lowered her head. "I felt like I'd killed someone. Like I HAD set something on fire for the joy of it."
He smiled. "When your mother found you after the whole temple got into an uproar because you'd disappeared, she found you at the base of the tree. Only she didn't scold you... she said something to you."
Raven didn't like remembering her mother. Doing that was pointless, remembering her wouldn't bring her back. All the memories did was stir up emotions best left dormant, best locked in a little box and hidden away in her hearts, to peek at carefully from time to time. She felt warmth flooding her cheeks, her eyes felt hot and stung.
"Mama, I broke it, and now all the children are afraid of me 'cause I'm a monster."
"Rachel, sometimes a rock is just a rock, and a dress can be mended."
"But..."
"Are you sorry for what you did?"
"Y-yes..."
"Will you do it again?"
"No..."
"Then I see a little girl, not a monster. Monsters don't have hearts, honey. Monsters don't care who they hurt. So you can't be a monster, because monsters don't cry, do they?"
Raven turned her face away, fighting the emotion down into a bitter lump in her throat and forcing it down, despite the pain. She calmed herself. Slowly but surely, she calmed herself.
"I'm sorry."
The voice caught her by surprise and she looked up at him. He had what was, for him, a chastened expression.
"I didn't mean to bring up something..."
"I never told anyone about that." She whispered. "I'd forgotten that day..."
He watched her. "Some part of you remembered."
"I guess so." She whispered hoarsely.
He furrowed his brow slightly, and it made him look several years older, it was such an expression of seriousness.
"She was right, you know."
"Hmm?"
"Monsters can't cry."
He turned his head back to the direction in which they were walking, his face deep in thought.
She puzzled over what he might have meant by that, and the sudden aching feeling she felt, like someone had punched her in the gut.
She realized suddenly that it wasn't coming from her.
He broke into her musing before she could really analyze that tidbit.
"So... what did you see?"
She swallowed her sudden nervousness. "Nothing that I understood, really. Did... did you really kill Loki?"
Robin stopped suddenly.
She watched him warily.
"Do you trust me?" He asked, mirroring his question earlier.
She was quiet for a moment, considering all she'd seen in the last few hours. She wanted more time to dwell on that little million dollar doozy, but she could feel the moment stretching like a spiderweb, tenuous and wispy, and if it snapped, something between them would be lost forever, it was so fragile.
She intuitively leaped.
"Yes." She whispered.
"No. No I didn't kill Loki. Although that was no act of mercy, let me tell you." He sighed.
"Was it... really Loki? The god of mischief, of Norse mythology? Isn't he supposed to be-"
"Bound in a cavern by the entrails of his dead sons, a serpent dripping venom into his eyes until Ragnarok?" He said dryly. "That's about the score, all right. He got loose, once. Something... happened, and the Norse Gods needed a negotiator, and if there was one thing Loki was good at, it was charming the hoofs off the devil. So they freed him, temporarily. I gather he was never very stable to begin with, and I imagine several eons in a cave with a snake might have knocked loose what few screws that he had left. He attempted a crime outof sheermad spitethat you'll just have to trust me was so terrible that had he succeeded, it would have meant the sanity of thousands upon thousands of beings."
Robin's face looked distant as he walked. "I stopped him."
"How can that be possible? Where did you lead this other life? Your whole life has been documented extensively... there's even a couple of biographies about you." She asked, exasperated. "What are you still hiding from me?"
He grinned slightly. "And how would you know that my life has been extensively documented, hmm?"
She didn't blush, but only just barely.
"What are you hiding from me?" She whispered fiercely.
He turned to her again. "What I have to, and only that." He noticed her slight narrowing of eyes and he shook his head. "Raven, there are some things you don't want to know unless you have to. Things that, for better or worse, change your perception of how the day to day universe gets by. You're bright, tough, and alot scarier than I am, but even you don't need more paradigm shifts in a week or two than is absolutely necessary." He sighed.
"I'd have spared you that glimpse into my sordid details if I could have."
He started walking again.
"Do you regret it?" She asked in a subdued tone. For a moment she thought he hadn't heard her, and she was perfectly willing to let the statement be lost on the wind. She felt a pang when he reacted.
He stopped again. "What?"
"You feel it, don't you?" She whispered quietly. "It wasn't just memories. Whatever we... shared, in that moment... it's still there." She frowned. "Maybe it has always been there... and we just knocked it loose. I know I'm supposed to be the expert and everything, but..." She shrugged her shoulders helplessly.
He turned to her, his face pale, then he shook his head slowly. "I..."
She glanced away, fiercely suppressing her galloping emotions. She couldn't do this anymore... gods, she wished she could make this terrible connection between them stop. It was too dangerous... it broke the status quo... opened her up to emotional manipulation on levels that she wasn't used to dealing with, and had no defense against.
He didn't even realize he was doing it, damn him.
He shook his head wonderingly, then took a deep breath. "I don't... regret it." He whispered.
She looked up at him. "What?" She breathed.
"I don't regret it." He said more firmly.
She blinked.
"There are alot worse people to share a bond with. Could you imagine being emotionally tied to Beast Boy?" He grinned softly.
She shuddered. "I think that's one of the Seals that the Lamb is supposed to open on Judgement Day."
Robin smirked now. "...And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see. And there went out another horse that was red; and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword."
She blinked.
"And when he had opened the second and a half seal, I heard the second beast groan come and see. And there went out another horse that was green; and would not shut the hell up, and to whom all, including the Gothic Maiden was emotionally tied, and she did smite the world, in her mercy."
She choked at this, and the two of them shared a quiet laugh.
She looked away after a moment, the mirth leaving her slowly. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to trap you like this."
He sobered immediately, sighing. "It isn't your fault. You just chose a bad time to be compassionate is all. I had... lost control of myself, and you..." He looked down. "Actually, I should be thanking you." He whispered.
"What?"
"You shamed some sense into me." He frowned, his face darkening slightly. "He made me so angry. It was just so senseless... I mean he's always been a punk without a concern for others, but the way he ran down that police officer and just laughed about it..." His mouth twisted slightly.
She watched him silently, sensing he was fighting with something in himself, some undefinable sense of guilt... of shame. Empathy gave her insight into what he was feeling but she wasn't a mind reader.
-What is he feeling guilty about?- She wondered.
"Choices, Raven. People make them, and he just... tore that man's choices away from him, without a concern, without a care."
"Robin, I-" She stopped, her knees wobbling.
He blinked, a concerned look on his face. "Rae, what is it?"
She wrapped her arms around herself. "He's here..." She whispered.
"Where!" Robin was on edge, instantly ready to fight.
Her eyes went blank and she shook slightly. "A dark building... a warehouse, it feels cold... in my gut... can't breathe... can't move... eyes... watching... horror... pain... death..."
Her eyes snapped back into focus. Focus sharpenedfearinto determination. She had a job to do."Quick... I need a map!"
He blinked, then reached into his utility belt and pulled out a folded square. She shook her hands impatiently and he wordlessly handed it over.
She ran her fingers over it, unfolding it quickly, tearing it slightly in her haste to get at it. Her face took on a blank look as she moved her fingers over the slick paper, muttering to herself.
Her finger rooted on a spot as though stuck.
"Here... right here..."
He snatched the map and gave it a quick look before hopping on the R-Cycle. He looked back. "You alright?" He whispered.
She calmed herself visibly and shook her head. "No." She said in her usual monotone. "Let's go."
He frowned, then nodded and wordlessly lead the way in a shriek of rubber on pavement.
A/N: Actually I intended this chapter to be a bit longer, to include what they find, but I think I'll save that one fer later. Gotta do a little research first. He he he.
