Bargains and Balance
You guys have any idea what the title means? (First person to guess right gets intel on future updates before they happen. ;)
Anyway, here we go.
Chapter V
Raven found herself awaking in a blue room which was a large difference compared to her white room. What confused her the most though, was that there wasn't a single door on any of the walls except to the bathroom. The layout was identical to the white room, however, so she didn't need to do any more exploring.
Raven sat down and put her face in her hands.
She had not clue what was happening and Raven hated not knowing anything. The only thing she did know was that Slade was going to make some sort of deal with her father. Who obviously hadn't been completely defeated after all. And not only was it just a deal, it was a huge deal. And it made her nervous.
Mostly because it required her. And her powers. What worried her the most was that if she managed to get out, she wouldn't be able to use her powers ever again.
Raven fell onto her back onto the bed with her hands crossed on her stomach and closed her eyes.
It had been a full eighteen days since she had last seen her friends, and she had made all sorts of prayers to whatever god she could think of. Mostly she struck a deal with the universe that if she ever got out with her life and her powers, she would fully appreciate her friends and she would show it.
Especially a certain green changeling. Beast Boy had been popping into her mind more than she could count every single day, more than the other Titans. She had gotten over her confusion and after talking with her own mind (in a perfectly sane way), she just decided that it was just a phase that would pass once she got acquainted with him again.
Yet, a small part of her mind hoped it wouldn't, but she didn't want to go there, so she let that thought stay in the back of her head.
Raven groaned.
Yeah, the Titans had better get here soon or she would just wither away with worry. And no one wanted to see that happen.
She sighed. Raven was not enjoying herself at all.
When Beast Boy entered that room, the first thing he saw was a balding man behind a desk full of papers, straight across the room. The man was sitting very close to the back of his chair as if he wanted to melt into it. He also looked like he had just wet his pants.
"W . . . wha?!"
Beast Boy was now standing across the desk from the man and leaned forward and grabbed the man's shirt collar. His patience was super thin and this small, wimpy rich man really just knocked Beast Boy over the edge.
"You listen, and you listen good. You answer every question I ask you truthfully or else . . . well, we wouldn't want to find out, would we?"
Beast Boy had dragged the man across the desk with one hand so that the man's confused and terrified face was right in front of his masked one.
The sweating man nodded quickly and trembled. Beast Boy was almost disgusted.
"Your name," he demanded.
"S . . . Sven G . . . Guile. Sir."
Beast Boy leaned closer as well as pulled the man closer.
"Now, Sven," he whispered, "tell me, any interesting projects you've been working on lately?"
The man looked like he was about to nod then shook his head.
The changeling glared holes into the man's eyes and the man gulped.
"I'll give you one last chance. Been doing any interesting jobs lately?"
Sven stared at Beast Boy until Beast Boy threw his shades to the ground and intense green eyes looked into the fearful, wimpy brown ones.
"Itwasn'tmyfaulthemademedoitandIdidn'tmeantohurtan yoneI'msorryifIdidanythingtooffendyou," the man said in one large rush.
Beast Boy threw the man onto the ground and practically bellowed, "WHERE'S THE DELIVERY GOING? WHERE IS SHE?!"
The man almost started crying.
Beast Boy once again grabbed the smaller man's shirt and lifted him up to eye level.
"I . . . it's u . . . underneath t . . . the pa . . . paperc . . . clip f . . . facto . . . o . . . ry," the man sobbed.
Beast Boy looked into the man's closed eyes in disgust and absolute hate.
"No wonder Slade got to you so easily. You better be telling the truth, or I'll be back. If she's hurt, I'll be back. If she's gone, I'll be back. If you run, I'll find you. Tell anyone I was here, and I'll be back. And trust me, we both don't want that to happen."
Then Beast Boy knocked his forehead against the other man's and the man fell to the floor in unconsciousness. Beast Boy winced.
"Ow. Now I know why Robin hates headbutts."
Then Beast Boy snuck out of the building disguised as a green cat and headed back to Titans Tower.
Cyborg knew Beast Boy just as well as Beast Boy knew himself and knew exactly what Beast Boy had done and was doing that night. That's why he took a break from looking at the computers and after putting a blanket on Starfire who was on the couch again, he sat at the kitchen island drinking a Coke and waited for his friend to walk in the building.
Sure enough he got an alert on his system that told him someone had entered the building like it always did, regardless of if the person had correctly entered the code or not.
A green ferret slinked it's way onto the counter and turned into Beast Boy sitting on the counter dressed in his normal Doom Patrol costume.
"You did what you specifically said you weren't going to do," Cyborg said.
"I can't sit here and do nothing while they're doing who knows what to Raven. Plus, your info helped a lot." Beast Boy shrugged as he jumped off the counter and dug in the fridge. "I know where Slade's new lair is."
Beast Boy had a thing of orange juice in one hand and tofu in the other and closed the fridge with his foot.
"Still, B. I don't like you going out at night with that creepy armored guy running around and apparently taking Titans."
Beast Boy shook his head and chugged the Orange Juice out of the carton. He wiped his mouth before he continued.
"When Slade wants something, he gets it. It's been almost a full month, and there have been no attacks or raids or anything. That means he wanted just Raven. The only thing I can associate Raven and Slade with is Trigon, and I don't want to."
Cyborg stood up. "We should get Robin and wake Star. She's been asleep for seven hours and Hair Gel needs sleep, so we just need to get this over with."
Beast Boy nodded. "You get Robin. I'll get Star."
Cyborg shrugged and left while Beast Boy crammed the last of his midnight snack in his mouth and put it all back in the fridge. He walked over to where Starfire was softly snoring and gently shook her awake.
She, apparently slept lightly with very sharp reflexes and punched him across the room. He groaned and sat up.
"Dude! What was that for?"
Before Starfire could apologize in a long tirade of concerns, Beast Boy said what he'd been wanting to say.
"Star. We know where she is. We're going to find Raven."
"Are you sure this is it?" Robin asked everyone aloud.
Cyborg looked at the map linked to his system. "Well, it's the only part of the city that's underneath the paperclip factory."
They reached an intersection in the nasty tunnels and paused as Robin held his light and shined it down each tunnel which seemed to go way farther than the light travelled.
"Great. This is wonderful. And here I was, waiting for Slade-bots," Robin muttered.
"I'm guessing his first line of defense is this maze of sewers while the second line of defense is Slade-bots. Then the third line of defense is Slade himself which then means if we find Slade, we find Raven," Beast Boy said.
Cyborg looked at him more than slightly impressed. "Man, B. You've gained something smart."
Beast Boy didn't reply because that one comment brought back other comments made by a certain someone about his lack of brainpower.
"Slade would hide something in plain sight. Branch out, but not too far and search the walls and the floor through the water," Robin instructed.
The Titans did so and it wasn't long before Starfire found something significant, and exactly what they were after.
They all gathered around her to find among a thick cluster of graffiti the words "SW forever" inside a heart. Robin looked at it carefully.
"This has to be it. The big man in Gotham told me Slade's real name. Those are his initials." Robin pushed the heart which immediately sank into the wall, and the whole section of the wall slid to the side like a door, and revealed a long blue hallway with many door on the sides.
Robin and Beast Boy looked at each other before shrugging and stepped onto the clean yellow tiled floor. A low beep was heard before the closest eight doors opened, and Slade-bots poured into the hall. "That's what I'm talking about," Robin said. He pulled out his bow staff. "Beast Boy, transform into something small and find Raven before Slade gets here. Titans, GO!"
Slade had just left the new room after giving her her dinner which she refused to touch this time, regardless of her aching stomach.
Raven had had enough of Slade and realized that if she wasn't healthy, she wasn't of use. So she refused to eat, even if it meant getting sick.
This time, the speech had been about how she was moved due to a change in plans, new unexpected difficult variable, he safety again, blah blah blah.
Raven was again practicing her self defense when she was about to stop and start her nightly meditation, when the doors slid open. Her back was to the door so she sighed and without turning around said, "I swear, you make one more comment about my safety and I'll find a way to stick your head in a portal, close the portal and cut your filthy, annoying, deceiving, ungrateful -"
Raven turned around and her words choked in the back of her throat. "B . . . Beast Boy?" she whispered.
He was taller, more muscular but in a lean sort of way, but he had the same grin. The same eyes. Even if they looked a little worn out.
"Hey, Raven."
She just stood there. "I get it. This is some sort of test. Some sort of trick. Good one, Slade. I'm rolling with laughter."
She turned around, but Beast Boy grabbed her arm and turned her to him again. "It's me Rae! It's really me! Remember when I covered Starfire with that prank balloon? Or when you talked about respecting that I eat fake meat. Or how about when I said on the roof that day that you were a great friend? My friend." His voice continued to get quieter until he ended with a whisper.
Raven searched his eyes and saw an intense desperation in them that Slade wouldn't have been able to create.
She put a hand on his face which had gotten a little thinner from who knows what. She had no idea how long he had been worried about her and how much he had gone through.
"It's you," she whispered.
Then she did something Beast Boy never expected Raven to do at all.
Bam. 'Nother cliff hanger. :P
Sorry, peeps.
But keep giving reviews.
And Kaarlinaa, I think I granted your request to a certain extent :P
Till next time,
-Belgaria