"Okay, he's totally not getting a meat feast if I want my veggie, but what do you want? Seriously, a sandwich? You do know that you're allowed the cheesy, crusty goodness that's pizza, Esp," chuckles the changeling, hooking an arm around delicately curved shoulders to turn the small brunette away from the counter. She shrugs under his shoulder as she lets him guide her through the tables.
When they reach the small table that houses their friends, with Cyborg and Starfire hunched over it in a gruesome arm wrestle, Robin cheering on his girlfriend, much to Cyborg's annoyance as he shouts trash talk at her. Raven, on Cyborg's opposite side, shifts over, placing the book that Esper had given her in her lap as she makes room for the two.
Beastboy sits the brunette down and drops himself beside her on her other side, immediately narrating the death match of locked wrists. Esper giggles and sits forwards, placing her chin in her hands when she feels a tap on her shoulder. She twists round and sits back when Raven closes the book on the final page with a delicate smile.
"So, you okay? After all...that?" She doesn't expect her to answer, she never will, but when Esper grasps her hand and gives it a soft squeeze, as if to say 'I will be,' Raven finds the smile widening on her porcelain features.
But then, the sorceress is pressing the book into Esper's fingers slowly, without a reason why other than the quirk of her lips on her face. The brunette feels her brow lower as she grips the book softly, the weight of the leather-bound book dragging her hands downwards. When she looks to Raven for an answer, she feels her own hands squeezed, as if to say 'to remember me.' She doesn't expect Raven to answer her anyway.
When Starfire presses the back of Cyborg's hand down to the table and Cyborg questions Beastboy's orders over his pizza when their lunch arrives, the two Titans delve into an age-old fight over pizza toppings. Robin attempts to diffuse the situation by throwing his hands between the two and attempting to question the short brunette opposite him, already biting into her food.
The trash talk dies down and as Esper slowly lowers her sandwich back onto the plate, Robin begins to question her. "So, Esp, now that you know why, what do you think you're going to do now?"
As he speaks, his words get quieter with the growing reality. It had taken a week at most to slowly drift back into normalcy, and Esper had been strapped into a cast on her ankle, from where Slade had sprained it slightly. But now that she was able to move around without her cast, a month later, they had begun to formulate a plan of what would happen when she wanted to leave.
Beastboy and Starfire had both fought the idea that she should join them, with her powers and dedication as well as their friendship. But Cyborg had shot them down with an 'it's her choice whether she wants to stay or not' with Robin backing him up with a 'besides, Jump City might bring back...to many memories to stay.'
However, plagued with the question, Esper inhaled and exhaled, folding her hands into her lap as her brow creased. If she were to be honest with the five heroes surrounding her, she had thought about this as much as them. "I want...to go find the others."
It takes them a moment to realize what she meant, before Cyborg leans forwards. "Wait, you mean to tell me you wanna go look for everyone that got away, including Phase and Illusion?"
"Jason and Tamkeen," corrects Beastboy, speaking around a mouthful of vegetarian pizza. Esper silently thanks the teenager for the interruption.
Cyborg rolls his eyes, feigning a joking slap to Beastboy's head as he bites into his own crust of pizza. "Jason and Tamkeen, whatever. But after what they tried to do, to get you back to Slade? Do you really wanna risk that?"
Esper shrugs, still content with her voice remaining silent as she looks to one of the five to send her message across. Thankfully, Starfire pipes up as she detaches her lips from around the neck of a mustard bottle. "Like Esper, both Phase and Illusions are as much as victims as her in Slade's experimental procedures. Though it may not excuse their behaviour, it is part of the reason." When the others are no longer looking, and Starfire's raising the mustard bottle to her lips again, the green-eyed girl winks over the rim at her.
"There's still the fact that this is dangerous, and I totally know you're not talking about just those two," says Beastboy, shuffling forwards to slide into her eyesight. His brow is lowered and she can see the worry play out on his features at the prospect of the unknown. "You wanna find them all, don't you, Esper?"
For once, Esper finds the air floods into her lungs easily when the memories submerge every thought and feeling inside of her like a broken dam. When she remembers boys that crumbled like mountains, when she remembers girls whose feet took wind against the concrete, she finds herself smiling. Some people were born to be lucky; these people were born to be fighters.
"Yes," she breathes, confidence flooding her veins as she bites back into her sandwich. She chews around her food and her words, and swallows. "If there are others like me, I...I want to help."
Robin sits back and crosses his arms, and though the stoic leader didn't trust her at first, she knows that he has every ounce of trust in her decision. "Okay, so, when do you think you're gonna leave to do this, now that you're better?"
When she doesn't answer, the reality sets in and the table falls quiet for a while, as they grasp at the fact like straws on how long she's been moulding her departure. But, as quickly as the silence came, it's overtaken by the crack of Beastboy's loud burp, prompting Cyborg to toss an empty paper drinks cup at the lime-green boy. The table erupted into laughter as the two turned to trash talk, dodging food and napkins to the face.
The day spreads into sunset by the time they fall back into their car and continue the steady journey home, Beastboy muttering jokes in his sleep as he falls on Raven's shoulder. Starfire talks animatedly with Robin, who desperately keeps his eyes open to pay attention to her and her jokes. Esper sits at the window, eyes slipping shut as she feels the car swerve and dip. The silence and casualness calms her.
But she knows it's time to go, and when they file out of the car and she heads for her room, the others are deafly quiet. She packs slowly, every new item she'd acquired in her stay with the titans seeming to remind her of them. The last item she packs is the tattered and dirtied jumpsuit she'd worn for months, for years, on end until her friends had invited her.
She leaves behind a hair tie Starfire had given her and hefts the bag over her shoulders. She slowly walks through the tower, nostalgia taking over her senses. Then she finds herself in the garage.
Her breath clogs in her throat. Everyone is stood in the middle of the room, waiting for her. Behind her, Cyborg claps his hand on her shoulder, and she jumps at the sudden touch, but he now knows to talk before anyone can notice it. Now, she has pride.
"C'mon, I wanna show you something," he says, and he starts to herd her over to towards the group of Titans, and they part for the two of them to stand between them. Cyborg then opens his closed fist, revealing a red and silver disc, no bigger than the size of his palm. He tosses it to the ground with an excited smirk on his lips.
Beside Esper, Raven raises a brow. "Uh, you do know that's just a disc and –"
"Shh!" Cyborg hisses intently, and a whirr fills the room. Esper can practically feel him vibrate in excitement behind her, hands still curved over both her shoulders. Suddenly, the device starts to shift and twist its metallic body into something bigger. It takes on a sleek shape, with a rounded edge and a down pointed front, like the tip of a spear. A motorcycle of silver and yellow stands where the small disc once stood. Their jaws drop.
The teenager jumps forwards, catching their gazes as Esper slides a hand down the curved edge with a starlit gaze in her eyes. Cyborg smiles as she starts to rattle off components of the motorcycle, ignoring how Beastboy moans about Esper obtaining a motorcycle for free, whilst he had to work for his moped. "It's for you Esp, like a going away present. It's state of the art, and it handles just like my T-Car and I know how much you like it and –" Cyborg is paused halfway through his sentence when he feels arms wind tight around his middle, clutching at him like a lifeline. He finds Esper curled into him and his own hand lands on her head, combing through the messy curls of her short locks. His expression softens as her embraces her. "You're welcome."
She pulls back with a quirk of her lips, still unused to being so elated around others. Suddenly, before she can choke out the words, her arm is suddenly grasped and she turns to find Starfire hovering above the ground, over-bubbling with ecstatic happiness. At her chest, she clutches a piece of paper.
Esper already prepares herself for her redheaded friend's excitement. "Esper, I wish for you to have this. Like Cyborg, I also obtained a departure present for you," she says, and presses the object into Esper's hands. The girl smiles and takes it gingerly, only to have her lips part in slight disbelief. It's a picture of them all, but only Starfire is the one posing, poking over at the side of the photo in the front. Behind her, the other titans and Esper are sat at random points on the semi-circle couch. She had taken it at a random moment, with Beastboy throwing a fry into his mouth, high above his head beside Robin who lounges back with a game controller against Beastboy. On Beastboy's other side, Cyborg and Esper, who's wearing an animal balloon hat made by Beastboy, are giving encouragement, with Raven sat back against the chair watching with a vague interest over a mug of coffee. None of them have seen the camera that has captured a single moment in their hectic lives.
"I am regretful to say I was not able to find a frame in time, I hope you shall forgive the mistake in human companionship etiquette," she says, her eyes tilting away from the girl. It's only for a moment, before she grips the shorter into a hug tightly, crushing the picture between them before Esper winds her own arms around her. "I shall miss you dearly, my friend."
The shorter pulls back with a grin and turns back to the others. The first she see's is Raven, who shakes her head and pulls her cloak slightly inwards. "I don't do hugs," she answers, and Esper nods, completely understanding of Raven's introverted tendencies.
Turning away from the empath, she finds the masked leader, who opens his arms for her. It's a sign of trust that she's been able to grasp, though one of the hardest things to gain from Robin, and folds into him gladly. She draws back from him with a smile and retracts her arms, only for the boy to press a circular yellow device into her fingers. A large white 'T' in a black circle stares up at her from his hands, and she raises a brow. He chuckles, takes her hand and drops the communicator into her hand. He folds her hands around it tightly. "As far as we know, you're always a titan, Esper. If you ever need help, don't hesitate to call."
She nods eagerly and tucks the circular device into her jeans pocket. Lastly, she turns to Beastboy, who is a completely different matter to the others. His arms are crossed over his chest and his eyes are pointed downwards, not daring to look at the large brown hues. She goes to pat his shoulder in an attempt to give her goodbye, only to feel arms wrap around her waist and pull her into a tight hug, just beneath his chin. She chuckles against him and curls her own arms over his shoulders tightly, relief flooding her veins as she pulled back.
Though his bottom lip was pouted, it arched upwards into a smile as he pulled back the hair off of her shoulder kindly. "Come back home safe, okay, Esp?"
She nodded and pulled him back into another quick hug before detaching herself from him and standing back. Behind her, she feels Cyborg slip the bag from her shoulder and place it into the compartment at the rear of the motorcycle, whilst Starfire passes her the silver and yellow helmet with a black visor. She slips it on, and throws her leg over the side, hands moulding into the handlebars. She smiles at her friends.
Behind Cyborg, Raven raises a brow. "Esper, you do know how to drive that, don't you?"
"Er..."
With a laugh, Cyborg explains it handles as simple as the T-Car and Raven rolls her eyes. Starfire clasps her hands with Robin, biting back a cry as the door to the garage opens. Cyborg lets Beastboy drop an arm onto his shoulder casually, and sends the girl a wave as she disappears under the curved mouth of the garage and down the road, away from the tower and her friends.
Yet, six months after, when that same communicator blares red beneath the shrouds of leaves and bracken in the Amazonian jungle, she answers it.