What is up everyone! I have only recently rejoined the Teen Titans fandom and I thought of this story that seemed too good to pass up. I am not super experienced in writing fanfiction, but I welcome all constructive criticism. This first chapter will be lighthearted, like a calm before the storm. This is a dark, emotional, tragedy fanfic about what happens when an unimaginable, unspeakable tragedy will permanently rock the Titan's lives, and devastate them to the core. The essence of the story is the Titan's searching how to move forward, when moving forward is impossible. The Titan's lives are about to change forever and only coming together with love and endurance as a family can they overcome.
The story is based within the universe of the original Cartoon Network series but will have references to other DC properties and the Titans for the most part will use their real names. It is also slightly Arrowverse adjacent. No big connections but you may see Arrowverse call outs and references pop up now and then.
Finally, I am a big fan of the Garfield and Raven ship and that will be a huge part of the story moving forward. Enjoy!
Chapter 1: Premonition
"Raven", the voice deep, menacing voice growled to her, "Your soul belongs to me". She began to break out in a sweat, her gem burning in her head as she heard the sounds of people screaming. Raven found herself looking on from the top of the Titan's Tower, trembling as she glanced down at her hands, which were warm, wet, completely covered in blood. Raven's eyes widened in panic, and fear and tears rolled down her face she looked up and, like a nightmare from the Underworld saw the explosions, buildings collapsing, Jump City burning. "Calamity comes", the voice told her.
Raven gasped and opened her eyes, her pillow drenched in sweat and she threw her hands to her head still feeling the burning sensation around her gem. She writhed in bed while holding her head, wanting to rip the gem from her own head, begging the pain to cease. She threw the covers off and staggered out of bed and stumbled to the bathroom and grabbed onto the sink for support, staring into the mirror, breathing heavily. "No." she whispered. "Not again."
As the pain in her head began to subside, offering her relief, she sighed and looked at her face in the mirror. Her face looked pale, well, paler than her usual complexion and her eyes were tired. She was not expecting to be on patrol duty tonight, so she decided to forego her usual outfit and dressed herself in jeans and a simple black t-shirt. She grabbed her cloak and wrapped it around herself and drew up the hood regardless, wanting to seem as normal as possible to the others.
Jump City had been relatively quiet for at least a month, the Titan's usual suspects and enemies not making any big moves. The Titan's patrolled the city in shifts, using a police radio to listen in for any situations that were too big for the police. Aside from the Titans stepping in to help stop the occasional bank robbery attempt or outbursts of violence, it was nothing the Jump City police force had much difficulty in managing.
The peaceful respite gave the Titan's new opportunities for down time, even though Dick emphasized they needed to still train and go on patrols to stay sharp and not grow complacent. They all knew it was only a matter of time before the Titans would be needed to serve Jump City once again in a major emergency, so they took advantage of their downtime while they could. It was Raven and Kori's night off, a night to relax in, but they always kept their communicators on them in the case they were truly needed.
The first thing Raven heard as she proceeded towards the main living area, was Gar laughing and Dick telling him that he was insane. The smell of pancakes, and the sounds of late morning breakfast and conversation hit her. She stopped and took a deep breath, still troubled by what she had seen in her dream, or was it a premonition? She was startled out of her trance as Kori floated past her and cheerfully greeted her with "Good morning Raven!"
"Uh…morning Kori." Raven responded, gathering herself and trying to sweep the dream from her mind. The first thing she saw when she entered the living area was Gar sitting at the long bar in the kitchen area with a plate of pancakes stacked ten high.
Dick Grayson simply stood there in shock staring, watching Gar squeeze out the last of the syrup all over the overly tall stack. "Garfield, not only have you wasted all of the pancake batter and the last of our syrup, surely you know this wont end well right? I mean, my god, you're going to get so sick!" Dick tried his best to sound frustrated but ended up laughing in amusement. "You're an idiot."
"Hey, I'm an idiot who's about to be up fifty bucks! I mean what do you expect? A bet's a bet. When has this beast ever turned down a bet?" Gar declared, picking up his fork and knife in one hand and pointing to himself with the other.
"He has to eat every bit of it too or he loses the bet." Victor said smirking, teasingly waving the two twenty's and the single ten in Gar's face. Dick sighed and turned away. "Don't say I didn't try to warn you when you're sick on patrol tonight." He kissed Kori good morning as she floated into the kitchen. "Here babe, I'll get some eggs and toast going."
"Morning Rae!" Gar said, his mouth full of pancake and waving his fork at her.
"Uh-huh" Raven replied in a bored tone, hiding her smile under her cloak over the ridiculous situation she had just witnessed.
"Oh Raven, hey. You're finally up. Your blueberry waffles are in the freezer." Dick said greeting her.
"Thanks." Raven said, retrieving them, waiting for Dick and Kori to finish using the toaster, watching awkwardly as Victor taunted Garfield through his fourth pancake, continuing to hide her amusement. "Dick's right you know, Gar, this one wont end well for you. Not that I'm complaining or anything, by all means carry on, I know I'll get plenty of entertainment and mileage out of this." Raven said with a smirk from under her hood. Gar gave her a look of annoyance, which then shifted to a look of pure determination.
"Why do you hide your face this morning?" Kori asked coming to stand next to her.
"Huh? Oh, I just, sort of, had a rough night. I don't look my best." Raven said awkwardly, turning away from Gar and averting her eyes from Kori.
"Well, it's just us here." Dick said reassuringly. "You don't need to have your hood up in the morning."
Raven sighed and pulled her hood down from her face, doing her best to look normal as she put her waffles in the toaster. "You look tired" Kori remarked.
"Again, I just had a rough night, I'm fine." Raven said, keeping her eyes on the toaster, trying to keep the annoyance out of her voice.
"Well, if anything's bothering you-" Dick began, before quickly being cut off. "I said I'm fine.", Raven said impatiently, taking a breath to keep her rising frustration in check so as not to snap.
"Alright, hey, that's ok. You can rest more later since you're not on patrol duty tonight." Dick said, raising both hands in concession. He knew Raven too well, and what battles not to fight. "Oh also, could you please eat in here with us this morning? You've been in your room a lot lately when off duty and we like seeing you."
Raven appreciated his words, and she knew her friends were concerned about her, but she could not reveal what she had seen until she was sure, not yet. "Whatever." She said shrugging, putting her two waffles on a plate and moving to sit at the bar.
"Oh no, man…" Gar said from across the bar. Gar simply sat there, one hand on his stomach, trying not to move to much as visible discomfort spread across his face, staring at the last four remaining pancakes as Victor laughed.
"What's wrong Beastie? You're not getting full, are you? After all, you said so yourself that you have the stomach of a lion, right?" Victor asked crossing his arms with a cocky smirk. Gar opened his mouth to protest, but then quickly closed it as another wave of discomfort washed over him.
"Gar, just…just don't." Dick said sighing. "You, me and Vic are on duty tonight and you'll be puking your guts up if you continue. The girls have the tower to themselves tonight."
"Ah damnit, man!" Gar said banging one fist on the bar and Victor chuckled with a satisfied smirk. "Too bad man, I guess the beast within just didnt have what it takes this time." He waved the cash in an annoyed Garfield's face before stashing it away.
"You know you enable him, right?" Dick asked, raising an eyebrow at Victor.
"Oh, come on, it's always funny watching Beastie try to do anything, besides, a little challenge and determination is good for the kid" Victor said, still smirking.
"Cyborg is not wrong" Kori said, giggling. "I always find our Beast Boy entertaining."
Raven stopped herself from smirking and held back a laugh as Gar went to go plop down on the couch in front of the tv in defeat, turning on the PlayStation 4.
Kori leaned over and whispered in Dick's ear, looking in Gar's direction and quickly pulled away, giggling again as Dick smirked. It was an open secret between Raven, Victor, and Garfield that Dick was planning to propose to Kori on one of their patrol missions later in the week and he had asked the team to act as normal as possible to keep it a secret.
"Alright, we have a few hours of downtime before I want you all to go through the training simulations. I'm honestly feeling like a late morning nap myself." Dick said. Kori quickly floated over to him and held onto his arm, walking with him out of the living area.
"Yo Beastie! Want to play some Overwatch before work tonight?" Victor asked, striding over and plopping his large frame onto the couch next to Gar. "Here's your chance to redeem yourself. Death match, you and me."
"To be honest with you, Cyborg, those pancakes upset my stomach bro, and I'm sleepy again." He considered it for a moment, and then saw Vic's cocky, smart ass grin again. "Ah what the hell, you're not humiliating me again. You ready?"
"You two are idiots." Raven said to them in a bored tone, taking her unfinished waffles to her room. "You could always join us one of these mornings, you know Rae, been looking for a third team member for a while." Gar said in a tone that implied she was missing out.
"No thanks. I can't imagine a more annoying way to spend a morning." Raven said as she walked out of the living room, essentially lying to herself that she wasn't interested, and she doubted she sounded in any way convincing, but there was more on her mind at the moment that she couldn't share with the others until she was sure it was true.
Raven didn't have much of an appetite as she sat on her bed and forced herself to finish her breakfast, still not feeling her best. She placed her empty plate to the side and slowly reached up her hand to touch her gem. The area of her head around the gem felt tender and tingled slightly. If this was what she thought, she would have to tell the other Titans, to prepare them, in case the terrible happened.
She heard Gar and Vic shouting at their game from her room and she forced herself to lay down to try and get caught up on her missed sleep, an unsettling feeling coming over her.
We have reached the end of the first chapter, and soon things are about to go bad, and go bad very quickly. As I said, these first few chapters are the calm before an unspeakable storm. The Titans have never gone through what is about to happen. The chapters might not be super long, but I hope its worth it in the end. Also, I welcome reviews and constructive criticism! Thank you!
