Let's see now. As of 9:32 AM, July 12, Chapter 18 got 56 views and 7 reviews. You all know what that means: 49 people get their food turned into tofu or meat, depending on what it isn't. Pentagram?
Pentagram: You got it, boss. (Casts spell) It is done.
Excellent. Now then, enough out-of-story magic, let's get back to my literary wizardry (or 'litzerdry' as I like to call it.)
DISCLAIMER: I don't own Teen Titans, Magic: the Gathering, Homestar Runner, the Addams Family, or any laws of cartoon physics. I also don't own Momir Vig, Simic Visionary. (sobs) Oh, Momir, I pine for you!
BETWEENBROWNANDPURPLEISREDBETWEENBROWNANDPURPLEISRED
The night of Raven and Beast Boy's first date, no one noticed Raven's hair had started reddening. Two fluff-filled days afterward, however the changes were far more dramatic.
Raven herself was the first to notice these changes. As she dragged herself from her room to the nearby bathroom, she thought the strands of hair falling into her face seemed off. When she entered the lavatory, her reflection made it seem as though the mirror needed its color adjusted. Snapping awake, she rushed to the mirror, to confirm what she saw. Her head resembled a half-eaten apple. Raven's hair was practically crimson, while her skin tone had paled to an almost albino hue. She summed up the situation and her reaction to it in a single syllable. "Crap."
During breakfast that day, she ate with the hood of her cape up, even though she was wearing casual clothes with it. Everyone noticed, but Cyborg was the first to express concern. "Uh, Raven?" he asked, "You feelin' OK?"
"Fine," she replied, just a bit too quickly. "I, er, my head just feels a little cold, that's all."
The other Titans looked at each other uncertainly, then uneasily resumed their morning calorie consumption. Beast Boy merely poked his oatmeal repeatedly with his spoon.
After breakfast, Raven sidled up to Starfire and whispered, "Starfire, can we talk?"
"Cer-" the princess began, at her usual cheerful volume. After a quick shushing, she restarted, more quietly. "Certainly, friend. What is it you need to discuss?"
"Wait in your room, I'll talk to you there." Noting Starfire's uncertainty, Raven decided to employ a tactic she dreaded: appeal to Star's love of all Earth female customs. "It'll be 'girl talk.'"
The Tamaranean barely suppressed a happy sound, and practically broke the sound barrier in her rush to her room.
Watching this spectacle, Raven put her hand to her concealed forehead and sighed. "What have I gotten myself into?"
STARFIRESROOMSTARFIRESROOMSTARFIRESROOMSTARFIRESROOMSTARFIRESROOM
When Raven entered the dreaded domain of her cheerful friend, said friend was almost quivering with delighted anticipation. Upon seeing her friend enter, Starfire nearly pounced on her and began spewing words. "Hello, sole female friend excepting Bumblebee! What is it you wish to discuss during this 'girl talk'?"
"Well-"
"Is it perhaps related to the Tlem'gark I gave you that you insisted was not at all related to Beast Boy?"
"Actually-"
"Though your recent expressions of great joy around him seem to indicate otherwise. Or perhaps-"
"STARFIRE!" Raven shouted, desperate for a word in edgewise. "Let me explain!"
Starfire covered her mouth in embarrassment. "I apologize, Raven. Please begin."
The empath sighed as both girls sat on Starfire's bed. "Sorry, Star. Anyway, I have a big problem." Starfire opened her mouth to try and guess Raven's problem, but was silenced with a meaningful glare. "You know my powers were exhausted after I used the Mox Jet."
"And you explained they would regenerate within a single Earth week." Starfire added, finding it difficult to remain silent during 'girl talk.'
"Yes, well, I'm kind of ahead of schedule." With that, she brought down the hood she'd been wearing since breakfast. Starfire gazed upon her friend's contrasting visage. "I know," said Raven, "it's kind of a shock."
Starfire's look of awe shifted to one of delight. "Friend Raven, I simply must, as you say, 'do your hair'!"
"What?" The recovering half-demon had been expecting momentary shock, but desire for a makeover? 'It's Starfire we're talking about,' commented her Rude aspect, 'I ain't surprised.'
"This pigmentation is simply gorgeous! I must experiment with its arrangement!" continued the adoring alien. Her hands reached for a comb and, most ominous of all, her massive collection of Earth hair accessories.
"Starfire!" cried a desperate Raven, "I didn't come here for a makeover, I came for advice!"
The princess stopped leaning towards the hapless telekinetic, but still held the comb in an unsettlingly predatory way. "Very well, friend. On what is the situation you wish me to advise you?"
"Well…" Unfortunately, Beast Boy and Raven had agreed to keep their relationship a secret from the others, and their teammates were still in the dark. "It's about me and…Beast Boy."
Starfire leaned in close. "Has friend Beast Boy impregnated you?"
"WHAT?" The shock was so great, a few wisps of dark energy managed to form around Starfire and shove her back a little. "Gar and I haven't done anything even remotely close to that! We've both agreed to at least wait until…" Raven's words caught up with her. "Oh Azar, I just admitted we're going out, didn't I?"
Starfire nodded. "You also referred to Beast Boy as 'Gar.' This is, perhaps, a pet name for him?"
Raven blushed, making her skin match her hair very nicely. "Yeah. The problem is, I feel so free emotionally around him anymore, but my powers are coming back really quickly."
"And with your powers driven by emotion, it would unsafe for you to be near friend Beast Boy, at the risk of unintentionally harming him."
"Exactly. If I want to enjoy time with the guy I, well, love, I risk killing him. If I avoid him, he'll think something's wrong, our relationship will deteriorate, and then we'll both be miserable. So what do I do?" Starfire looked at her friend worriedly during the rant. "What?" Raven asked.
"Friend Raven," Starfire said cautiously, "it would be easier for me to contemplate your situation if you were not pacing-"
"I pace when I'm frustrated, Star. No offense, but deal with it."
"It is not the pacing itself that disturbs me, Raven. It is that you are doing it on the ceiling."
Raven looked down…er, up. Then, as per the Fudd-Coyote Principle of Gravitational Uncertainty (You don't fall until you realize you should be falling.) she dropped off the ceiling. "Ow!" She rubbed her side. "Stupid fluctuating powers…" The sorceress's gaze snapped to Starfire. "Well? I'm off the ceiling. Get contemplating!"
The orange girl considered her friend's problem at great length. Finally, she came to a realization. "Friend, I feel that the best course of action is to…"
"To what?"
"Pardon?"
Raven's brow furrowed. "Starfire, you just trailed off after saying 'the best course of action is to'. That doesn't help me."
"Did I?" asked the alien. "I apologize most sincerely. As I was saying, it would be best if you…"
RAVENSROOMRAVENSROOMRAVENSROOMRAVENSROOMRAVENSROOM
Beast Boy nervously knocked on Raven's door. She never invited him to her room. Until now, she'd either forbidden access or offered him an unwritten open-door policy. Furthermore, the note he found in the fridge, embedded in the tofu (Raven had no delusions about where Beast Boy was most likely to find something.) said she needed to talk with him. It was never a good thing when one's girlfriend said she needed to talk to one.
The door opened with its usual pneumatic hiss. It was darker than usual inside "Come in." called Raven, her face lost in the shadows.
Entering, Beast Boy brandished the slightly soy-smelling message. "Raven, why'd you say you needed to talk to me?"
"Well Beast Boy, I've been thinking and-"
"You want to break up with me?" The expression on the changeling's face could give any kicked puppy a run for its money in the betrayed trust and affection departments. "But I thought-"
Raven commanded, "Beast Boy, stop." He stopped. "Don't jump to conclusions," she chastised, "you remember what happened when you kept doing that during the whole Jet thing." There was a dark chuckle from her trunk, which stopped promptly when she kicked it. "Anyway, I still love you, I just wanted to let you know something."
The shapeshifter breathed a huge sigh of relief. "OK. I was worried there for a second."
Raven smiled. "It's nice to know you care so much. Anyway, this isn't where I want to talk to you."
"Where then? The roof?"
She shook her head, then lifted her hand mirror. "In here." Before he could argue, she activated the mirror, and the resulting dark cortex pulled both teens into Raven's mind.
INNEVERMOREINNEVERMOREINNEVERMOREINNEVERMOREINNEVERMORE
Raven came to a graceful landing on one of the floating rock-thoughts in her head. Beast Boy's entry wasn't quite as graceful, though he did manage to strike the manifestation with his entire face at the same time. After he pulled himself up, the changeling asked. "So, aside from free rhinoplasty, why'd you bring me in here? You hate it when I'm in your mind."
"We wanted to talk to you," said an authoritative voice. Paths of the floating psuedostones assembled themselves into paths, all of them intersecting on the chunk of mental stone Raven and Beast Boy stood on. The speaker, clad in leotard, glasses, yellow cape, and a perfect copy of Raven's physical form, approached calmly.
"It took a while, but Raven was convinced." This Raven wore a brown cloak and was unbespectacled, but seemed even more serene than the yellow-bearing one next to her.
"Yup, the girl can be more hardheaded than even you, Green Bean." This Raven was nonchalantly twisting a pinky in her ear. Extracting it, she examined the residue and wiped it on her orange cape. Raven avoided Beast Boy's gaze when he raised an inquisitive eyebrow.
"Humph." That was all an all too familiar Raven uttered as she stamped across her bridge, four eyes ablaze.
Beast Boy turned to Raven, astonished. "You let out Rage for this?"
"After we took out Big Bad Dad, Ragey Wagey ain't so nasty," bubbled another familiar Raven. Happy skipped down the path from her realm, pink cape swaying behind her. "Oh, and BB? Great plastic surgery joke."
"You can always rely on Garfield for a laugh or two," agreed yet another Raven. Her purple cape trailed behind her like a severely truncated bridal train, and she gazed at Beast Boy flirtatiously the entire way. He found himself blushing furiously.
"S-stop it. You're embarrassing him," begged Timid, her gray cloak wrapped around her like a security blanket. She blushed as well. "And me…"
"Please, you're always embarrassed. You gotta take life by the throat, girl! Assert yourself!" Brave proudly barked such motivation at her more cautious counterpart, green cloak streaming out in an unfelt wind.
Beast Boy looked around. "Are these all of your emotions?" Raven nodded.
"We prefer 'emotional avatars'," interjected the yellow-cloaked Raven.
"Or whatever. Knowledge also rules over political correctness." So said the now reclining orange Raven.
Raven rolled her eyes. "Let me introduce you to the emotions-" Knowledge cleared her throat meaningfully. "I mean, avatars you haven't met yet. You've just seen Knowledge in action. The orange-cloaked one is Rude."
"Or Lazy," Rude said, "I never got around to deciding which I like better."
"The one in brown is Wisdom," Raven continued.
Wisdom nodded. "Charmed."
"And the purple one is, well-"
"Affection," finished the violet-cloaked avatar. She cooed "Cara mia," and swept towards Beast Boy, only to be stopped by Raven.
"Wait your turn," commanded the original.
Her purple doppleganger trudged her way back to her spot, muttering "see if I ever help you again…"
"So, why did bring me here?" asked an increasingly overwhelmed Beast Boy. The presence of nine Ravens gave him a combination of delight and deep apprehension. Would they all seek retribution for his countless pranks, or smooches?
"Well, it's this." Raven finally dropped her hood. After allowing Beast Boy to absorb her new color scheme, she resumed. "My powers are regenerating faster than I even imagined. I brought you here for sort of an 'Emotions' Last Meal.' Enjoy, Gar." With that, she vanished, leaving just the shapeshifter and her aspects.
SOMETIMEAFTERWARDSOMETIMEAFTERWARDSOMETIMEAFTERWARD
Beast Boy emerged from the mirror, staggering a bit and sporting a few lipstick marks. He recovered in time to realize Raven had become her usual unusual self. "Raven," he said. She turned to him mournfully. "Thank you."
"You didn't…?"
"Just made out. Mind you, with eight girls at once, that gets kind of complicated." He smiled, but noticed her melancholy expression. "Hey, let's check out the scroll. The sooner we get the other Moxen, the sooner we can go out again, right?"
She gave a hint of a smile. "Right." Extracting the scroll and the grumbling Mox Jet from her trunk, she applied one to the other. The eerie antilight faded from the central writing, leaving only black ink. To its right, red lettering erupted, glowing as though someone had painted the characters on with molten rock. Raven looked at the new writing carefully. "Let's see now. This says…"
ENDCHAPTERNINETEENENDCHAPTERNINETEENENDCHAPTERNINETEEN
Heh heh, the tradition of scroll reading cliffies continues! As always, virtupie is offered to those who correctly guess where the Mox Ruby is located. (In this case, ripe red cherry.) I'll see you next-
Pentagram: Uh, boss?
What? I'm trying to do the sendoff!
Pentagram: Well, about my spell at the start of the chapter…
What about it?
Pentagram: Er, well, I may have miswritten a rune or two in the spellform…
Meaning?
Pentagram: All the tofu turned into tofu, and all the meat turned into meat.
Oy. Well, we all make mistakes. Please review, everyone. That way I can send for a mystic runes tutorial DVD for Omnipotent McIlliterate here.
Pentagram: Sorry…