ii. Chapter One
Raven had never been one for primping, but she had stared into the mirror for a long time once she returned from the museum, safely holed up in her room. After the initial shock had worn off, she had been unable to resist the temptation.
With the lights turned up high (without her powers it was too much trouble to light all the candles, and she had no matches anyway) she stood in front of the large mirror on her bureau, sometimes drifting away from it, and always coming back again, drawn in by the obvious differences whenever she saw them at the edge of her vision. Finally, she gave in and just stared, with the lights blazing fluorescent on her white, white skin, studying herself from all angles.
Like Beast Boy had said – hair, eyes, chakra. That was the most apparent.
Only hours ago, her hair had been indigo and so had her eyes. That had been her mother's legacy, her mother whose beauty had been too incredible for it to be repeated in her daughter. Raven could remember consoling herself with her hair and her eyes as a child, back when she used to compare herself to Arella, fiercely wanting to be a woman like she was, elegant and statuesque.
She didn't even have that much anymore and she didn't know exactly what to feel… but that was something she had never known. Even her own emotions were often alien and inexplicable to her.
And now her hair was mouse-brown and so were her eyes. Her chakra had vanished, another severed connection to her mother and her powers. And her skin, while it had always been pale, had lost its gray, otherworldly quality and become… normal was the only way to describe it. Flesh-colored, like a human's skin, like Robin's, like her mother's.
Normal was the only way to describe any of it. When she looked into the mirror, the girl staring back at her could have blended in on any street in Jump City. There was a kind of ordinariness about her.
Her features were the same, anyway, it was just the coloring that had changed, so perhaps that ordinariness had been there all along.
Be rational, she told herself.
But the only thing she could think of was how unnatural her uniform had become. It looked strange to see her new reflection wearing the cloak and leotard.
Without pausing to consider it, she peeled off her suit, stripping down to her underthings before the mirror and seeing that the flesh color had in fact spread over all of her skin.
She looked at her body dispassionately, small and lean and curvier than Starfire's but somehow less desirable. She was short, she realized, without the ability to float making up for it. Not the shortest on the team, that was Beast Boy's position (or was it? suddenly she was not quite sure), but still –
What did it matter? Why was she even thinking of this?
Raven glanced at the pile of her uniform on the floor. She didn't want to climb back into it, but she had no other clothes and she felt stupid for caring about it at all.
She pulled out a fresh suit from her closet and put that on. She tugged at the sleeves. It felt wrong. Like she didn't deserve to wear it, now that she was – there was no other word for it – now that she was useless (And how long would that last…?).
Blotting out the feelings that accompanied that thought was a little more difficult than it used to be, but she had spent all her life practicing. She left her room, needing to get away from herself, purposefully not glancing in the mirror on the way out.
A moment later she had to go back to turn off the lights. Normally, she would have used her powers to do it.
There was nobody in the halls as she made her way instinctively to the living room. She half-hoped nobody would be in there either, even though she knew that was unlikely. She didn't want to see them – after all, what could she say to them, or they to her? But she didn't want to be alone either.
She paused outside the door to the living room, her mind wandering back to the atmosphere inside the T-car on the ride home – tense, awkward, palpably silent. No, she didn't want any more of that.
But Raven was used to not getting what she wanted.
She tapped the control pad, and the doors slid open.
Surprisingly, though, the room was empty and silent, except for what sounded like soft snoring coming from the area around the couch. She tried to float noiselessly over toward the sofa to investigate before she remembered that she couldn't do that anymore. As it was, her body gave a funny sort of lurch, with her feet sticking flat to the ground and the rest of her trying to move forward.
For the first time since she could remember, Raven fell flat on her face.
"Uh, Raven…?"
As she peeled herself up off the floor, she could see Beast Boy staring groggily at her from over the back of the sofa where he had apparently been drowsing. Ugh. At least he hadn't actually seen her fall. She would never be able to live that down.
"Where are the others?" she asked, without preamble, pretending not to be embarrassed.
Beast Boy blinked at her a few times, then rapidly shook his head to clear it. He stretched, yawning, showing off the pearly fangs among his regular teeth.
"They went off to search for our thief as soon as morning hit. We would have told you, but Robin said – well, we thought you'd want to be alone…" he trailed off. When she looked out the window, she saw with a start that it was already light out. She hadn't noticed in her room with the blinds closed. "Robin says if we find that jewel thingy we can find out what happened to your powers and how to get them back."
"My powers…" she repeated, faintly.
That was assuming she wanted them back in the first place. The thought bubbled up out of nowhere.
Of course she wanted them back. What was she without her powers?
…What was she…?
Raven shook her head. It was pointless to think about it.
"What about you?" she asked, focusing back in on Beast Boy.
"Well…" Two spots of pink appeared on his cheeks. That usually wasn't a good sign. "Somebody had to stay behind and, you know… protect you," he finished in a small voice.
"Oh." She couldn't think of anything better to say.
Protecting her.
She had been four when she realized that her guards were there for the sake of the city and not for her. She remembered her mother holding her so tight that it hurt, not so much stroking her hair as pressing it flat with hard, cool hands. There was a loud noise when the balcony collapsed, and even though she couldn't see around the white-cloaked shoulder where her face was pressed, she knew that she had killed the baby bird that she had tried so hard to reach, wanting to stroke the tiny down-covered body. Its slim little bones had been so clearly visible beneath the day-old skin...
Okay. Enough with the golden childhood memories. Those weren't going to help her now.
"That… still doesn't explain why you're here," she said finally.
Beast Boy stopped looking uncomfortably at his lap to stare at her pseudo-indignantly over the back of the sofa where he was still sitting. "Hey! I can take care of the baddies just as well as anybody else!" He paused. "If… any decide they want to show up, that is."
"What did you guys do?" she asked, trying not to care. "Draw straws?"
"No!" he began hotly, and then faltered. "I – I said I would do it…"
"Oh," she said again, taken aback in spite of herself. After a moment, she forced herself to respond more fully. "… Thank you."
He grinned at her, flashing teeth. It was strange, but Raven found that she didn't mind that he was the one who had stayed behind. Starfire would have smothered her with understanding, Robin would have questioned her about the gem, Cyborg wouldn't have known what to do with her, and neither would Beast Boy, exactly, but he would know enough to pretend that nothing had changed, that she could be sure of.
If she could pretend that nothing had changed, she wouldn't have to wonder what she would do if her powers never returned, or what she would do if they did. She wouldn't have to wonder at all.
"So…" said Beast Boy. "Do you want to, um – research that gem thingy? 'Cause if you do, that's cool, I won't complain or anything…"
Slowly, Raven shook her head. She knew it was the right thing to do, the best thing to do, and she did want – need – her powers back, but she found herself saying…"It can wait until the others get back."
She didn't want to have to think about it. Any of it.
Beast Boy looked surprised, but he bounced back quickly, like he always did. "O-okay, well, there's lots of other stuff we can do."
"…Like what?" she asked stiffly, prepared to regret it.
"Uh… GameStation?"
She rolled her eyes. "I don't do video games."
This was the point where, under normal circumstances, she would have gone back to her room and found something to do by herself, but these were not normal circumstances, and right now she just… didn't want to be alone. She couldn't be alone.
Against her will, she shivered.
"Wait!" said Beast Boy. For the first time, she was grateful he had cut into her thoughts. "I've got it! We could watch TV, or a movie or something – you'd do that, right? Or we could play ping-pong, or foosball, or dodgeball, or any kind of ball – or we could dance, or – or we could read depressing poetry, I know you like that, or we could just… you know, talk… um –"
"Stop," Raven cut in. "You're being ridiculous."
He thumped his chest. "It's what I do best."
"I know," she said flatly.
He just smiled benignly and shifted to look at her more fully, resting his forearms on the back of the sofa. She wished he would get mad at her sometimes. Maybe she should have been grateful that he didn't, but she hated to feel indebted to anybody.
"Raven… I think you should choose" he said after a moment. His eyes were all earnestness and promise. "I'll do anything you want to do. I mean it."
Why did he have to have those offbeat moments of sensitivity? He probably wasn't even aware of it, and it was too unsettling, and she didn't want to think about why. She told herself not to be affected by it.
"I… don't know what I want…" she admitted, once she had found her voice.
"Should I keep suggesting things?"
"No."
Raven crossed her arms over her chest and looked down at her uniform. It was beginning to itch, which was strange because it never had before. Probably a psychological effect of her discomfort with it, she reasoned, but that didn't make the itching go away. Briefly, she thought of asking Beast Boy if he had any clothes she could wear…
No. No. Bad idea.
And as uncomfortable as she felt in her suit, there was also an odd reluctance within her to part with it, as if keeping it with her would keep everything safe and the same.
"Okay. Why don't we watch a movie?" she said finally. That would pass the time, at least, until the others returned, with or without the gem. And then… well, then she would see. She felt as if she were in a sort of limbo – she, and Beast Boy, here in the tower, just waiting.
Because you didn't get a lot of waiting in Titan's Tower, unless you counted the waiting for Robin and Starfire to hook up already, and that was a whole other story, one Raven didn't really want to have any part in… Firmly, she stopped her mind from wandering.
"Great, now we're getting somewhere," said Beast Boy, grinning. The amazing thing was that he actually meant it. On her a phrase like that would have come out sarcastic, no matter how she tried to say it.
Beast Boy hopped off the couch and wandered over to the shelf where they kept the movies, next to the TV. "So… what do you want to watch? Action? Comedy? Romance…?" At that he looked over his shoulder at her and wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.
Raven rolled her eyes and came up next to him to look at the selection. She wasn't exactly an avid filmgoer. Most of the titles were unfamiliar to her, and she certainly hadn't bought any of them herself. But there had to be one there that would keep her from losing her mind for a few hours.
"How about this one?" Beast Boy suggested, holding up 'Donnie Darko.' "It's dark and creepy. I bet you'd like it."
That stung. Why had that stung?
"Not everything I like is dark and creepy," she told him, frowning. Try as she might, she couldn't keep herself from glancing sideways at him when she felt him watching her.
"I don't think that," he said.
There was a silent moment, during which she refused to look at him, pretending to examine her shoes. She felt a rush of relief when he finally turned his attention back to the movies. She should never have said anything in the first place.
"So… are you trying to tell me you'd rather watch 'Shrek 2' instead?" He held up the box. She stared at the cartoon characters on the front of it and came to a conclusion.
"This is Starfire's doing."
"Uh, yeah," said Beast Boy, putting it back on the shelf. "But it's actually pretty funny for a kids' movie. And I don't think there's anything wrong with watching a movie about a green dude –"
"Of course not," she murmured.
"Hey, you know why us green guys have to stick together?" he asked.
Raven sighed. She dearly hoped he wasn't going to say what she thought he was going to say.
Unfortunately…
"'Cause it's not easy being green!"
She groaned.
"Yeah, you're right, that was pretty bad," he conceded. He turned to examine her. "You know, you sure say a lot without actually saying anything."
She stared at him. "What?"
She knew it had been a mistake to ask, because immediately afterward he launched into unnecessary explanation.
"I mean, you do a lot of sighing and eye-rolling and glaring, and then when you do talk, it's like you try to use the smallest amount of words that you can –"
"So?" she glared.
"See, that's exactly what I'm talking about!"
Irritated, she folded her arms and looked away from him.
"If you followed any person in the city, all day, on any day of the year, nearly all the conversations you heard would be completely pointless," she said blackly. "Just like this one."
"Dude, this conversation is not pointless," he protested.
"Why not?" she challenged.
"Because people need to talk about pointless things! That's how they get to know each other." A moment later, he ruined the effect by confusedly adding, "I think…"
"Whatever," she said.
But… she hated it when he surprised her by being partway right.
"Aw, come on, just admit that it's not pointless. You know you wanna –"
It was almost fortunate that they were interrupted when they were, because it only could have escalated into bickering from there. They never did pick out a movie, though.
A crash of shattering glass cut Beast Boy off. The sound was as big and as shocking as an earthquake. Both he and Raven whipped their heads in the direction of the window that had been broken in and was now a gaping hole leading out to the bay. A figure floated in the empty frame.
Raven's eyes widened. It was the thief. He wasn't wearing his mask, but he appeared not to have changed clothes since the night before and the floating board was a dead giveaway. Uncovered, his face was lean and young and utterly normal beneath a mop of bedraggled dark hair.
Raven had the sneaking suspicion that Robin and the others would not have the jewel with them when they came back.
"What did you do to it!" he asked. Even in his anger, he just didn't look all that threatening. "It's not working. What did you do?"
"Uh… what are you talking about?" asked Beast Boy, scratching his head, apparently about as scared by the return of the thief as she was. Raven glared at him. He was the one with the powers here. He was supposed to be doing something.
"The jewel!" The thief answered, and stabbed a finger at Raven. "I saw you do something! What did you do?"
Raven slowly moved past Beast Boy and closer to the intruder, knowing she had to take action, but not what she would do. Something that she thought might be adrenaline was welling up inside her. Her heart was pounding in her ears.
"I didn't do anything that I know of," she said, voice calm and measured. Inside she was fluttering. "If anything, that jewel did something to me."
"Raven…" said Beast Boy. But she couldn't let him stop her.
"Something to you…?" echoed the thief, looking pole-axed. The words seemed to strike him."Oh… that might be…"
The board began to move backwards, away from the window, picking up speed. But – she shouted.
"No!"
A surge of desperation rushed her – she could see her powers slipping away, slipping away from her for always, and with or without them she was alone, but at least they were hers and as long as she had them she had a place in the tower and she needed that place more urgentlythan she had ever needed anything.
Before she knew what she was doing, Raven was running for the empty window, launching herself flightless out into the air, with her cloak riding out on the wind behind her.
She heard Beast Boy calling her name, but soon his voice was far away because she had found the edges of the thief's board with her fingers and was holding on, hanging on, as he flew from the tower at full speed. If she looked down she knew she would see her feet dangling high over the bay, so she looked determinedly up, trying hard to swing a leg over the side of the board.
"What are you doing?" asked the thief. His brown eyes were wide and worried. Strange, but Raven didn't have the energy to care.
"I need that jewel," she grunted. Finally she got one foot up and used the leverage to get her knee to follow. By the colors rushing under her she could tell they were no longer over the water but over the city.
"Let go," said the thief, squatting by her but not touching her. "I don't want to have to –"
"No!" She had brought one arm up now. The thief stood, and abruptly she realized what was coming, just a moment before she felt the tingle of heat that quickly turned to burning wherever her body touched the edge of the board.
She gasped and looked up at the thief, eyes wide and unseeing. It was no time at all before she let go.
With the wind buffeting her, tangling her cloak about her, Raven fell.
A/N: Alright, if the thief seems a little lame, well, that's because he is. You'll see. Eventually.
Anyway, thanks for all the wonderful reviews! I'm glad people are enjoying this story.
Now, please review? It would make me really happy :)