Disclaimer: Teen Titans isn't mine, in case there was any question on the matter.

None of these are meant to be connected, by the way; I just need to stop Terra-obsessing. I am considering doing something longer and more linked, though.

Deep

(major AU, post-Aftershock)

He had been sifting through a stack of papers six inches thick when he heard it. A tentative knock, small and staccato. It halfway reminded him of a little kid who had been dared to knock on the neighbor's door and then run. He expected to open the door to an empty hallway but looked down at Terra, who seemed uncomfortable and quite a bit intimidated.

"Hey," he said.

"Robin, can we talk?"

No, because Raven will kill me, absolutely kill me, if she sees me being nice to you. "Okay. What do you want to talk about?"

Blue eyes looked past him solemnly. Ever since they had revived her, Terra had been different. There was something about her, something stuck just out of reach where he couldn't figure it out, and it had bothered him because Robin always figured everything out. She seemed…hollow? Maybe. Like a tree stump that rotted from the inside.

Terra shrugged, then sighed. "It's just some…stuff. Y'know, I can't exactly talk about it out here, not here." She gestured to the openness of the hallway.

He thought he understood, wished he didn't, and dismissed it, telling the sick feeling in his belly to go away. "Okay, sure, we can talk in my room if you want."

She nodded and followed him inside. If she had any reaction at all to the state of his room, she didn't show it. Desk buried under mountains of research, bed immaculate because it hadn't been slept in for days. Sleeping was a waste of perfectly good time. You could sleep when you're dead. And he didn't want to be dead, at least not yet, not till he put Slade in a place where he'd never come crawling back again.

Terra waited until he closed the door, hands folded in front of her and intertwined together. "I just wanted to ask you about…well, it's kind of personal."

That sick feeling was back, rising in his chest, cold and constricting. Stop it. This is not the time. She needed him to be the strong one. "You can ask me, Terra, I don't mind."

Silence. Her eyes darted from his desk to the apple core in the trash can to the posters on his wall. And finally, "YousleptwithSladedidn'tyou?"

Robin had known that she was going to ask that, had known that it was coming for a long time. And yet somehow, it was still horrifying to hear someone say it out loud, to give a name to the thing that he had ignored and buried under work and training. It made everything real again, somehow. He didn't answer, couldn't answer. Saying it would make it permanent.

"Didn't you?" She was flushing deeply now, already afraid that she had made the wrong assumption, possibly wondering how she'd ever look him in the face again.

"Yeah," he said. Damn it. Damn his honesty and damn Slade. "…but I didn't want to." Right, because that makes it okay, Dick.

"Me neither. Okay, well, I guess I sort of did. I don't know anymore. I just…oh god, Robin, I can't tell Beast Boy, I just can't!"

He was worried that she was going to cry, and then he'd have no idea what to say. "You should. He wouldn't hold it against you. I think he's kind of suspicious anyway."

"Does Raven know?"

"Yeah."

"How does she…"

"We deal with it," said Robin. The truth was, they didn't deal with it, they just didn't talk about it and Raven knew not to say anything when he would go into his room for hours and study maps until his eyes didn't work anymore. That's why she was great, and someday he would be able to kiss her without closing his eyes and seeing a mask and a single, hateful eye. Or maybe not, but Raven was great anyway.

"It's…something deep, isn't it?" Terra paused, almond eyes narrowed. "Like, you think that it shouldn't matter all that much and that you should forget about it or whatever, but it's hard to forget. He can really get a hold on you."

"Slade's like that," Robin spat. "He's a real deep person."

"You're wallowing in your bitterness, you do realize?" She giggled. Something of the old Terra sparked to life, then died.

"When you've been raped by Slade, I think you earn some right to wallow," he said.

"He didn't rape me. Just so you know."

"Oh. Okay."

Her mouth hung open for a second or two, then she grinned impishly but he knew that she was really more shocked than anything else. Shocked that he didn't insult her or scream at her or tell her to go away and never come back, because she was disgusting and sick and what kind of freak would ever… "You're so mature, it's nauseating, y'know," she said.

"It'll be alright, Terra." He wasn't sure which one of them he was trying to convince. Maybe it was the sleep deprivation.

"Robin?" She was so thin. He had never noticed that before. You could reach out and break her (and Slade had). It made him angry.

"Yeah?"

"Do you hate yourself sometimes, for what happened with…him?"

"Every day."

She pulled at her hair. "We have to have hope, though, I guess. Have to move on. I mean, we can't let it rule our lives, right? Right?"

He knew what she wanted him to say, but he had forgotten how. "I don't know what hope is anymore, Terra." The words came out with hollow conviction, like pebbles tossed into a well.

Want

(post-Aftershock)

Anorexic little slut.

Raven stared intensely at the book, but she had given up on trying to read it a long time ago. Hold it up anyway and move your eyes back and forth to make him think you're reading. Which book was it? She couldn't remember. The words floated unseen on the page as she watched him from the corner of her eye. He was moping. Again. Slumped against the couch, head cradled in his palm, looking at a photograph. She couldn't see what it was from here, but she knew. It was always the same. Ratty, pale hair and a puckish grin. Simple, dirty clothes and boyish hips. A perky little Brutus if there ever was one.

He had not really been happy since…the day it happened. They all thought he was the same as before, telling terrible jokes and pulling even more terrible pranks and merciless teasing, like always, but Raven knew. When he smiled, it looked like his face was about to crack. He'd laugh just as loudly as before but it was void of emotion. It was like somebody had sucked all the life out of him. Somebody had. And she had ratty, pale hair. Raven hated her. Hated her for what she had done to him. And…for what she had taken away.

Whenever the two of them were together, Raven had been polite, in that way you would behave when you knew that your thoughts weren't allowed but you couldn't let anybody else find out. That way you would be just so, disgustingly helpful while you wished that things were different. Wished that she would vanish into thin air along with her stupid, bony legs and funny looking face. Raven could see what was happening between them and she knew, just knew how he would hurt when it was finally over. And it would be over, because Raven knew the things that never got told, the things she hid but didn't hide well enough: he wasn't her first and he wouldn't be her last. That girl had always been headed for a bad end: sometimes, she could sense the vague touch of her emotions, obscured in violent instability. No one with a mind like that would ever be normal. Raven hated when she was proven right.

Anorexic little slut. Ugly traitor. Idiot, idiot girl. What had he seen in her? What did he still see in her that made him cry at night when he thought Raven couldn't sense it? Life's not fair. If she knew anything at all, it was that. Anything you want gets taken away by a psychopathic blonde. She was dead, but she still took everything away from her. And Raven bet that she'd brag about it, right now, if she'd had the voice to do it.

He was moping. Again. She couldn't see the photograph between his fingers, but she knew. The slut grinned up at the camera, waving an emaciated hand. Those hands had done disgusting things but he didn't know that, and if he did, he didn't care. Ratty, pale hair fell about her shoulders and Raven wished that it were hers. She hated blonde hair but he liked it, apparently, so that was good enough.

Excuse

(Immediately post-Betrayal.)

Walking through the mud, slightly in front of him, his huge hand pressed against the middle of her back. The force was rough and kind all at once, guiding her in some unseen direction that she was too tired to guess at. She was leading the way. And yet, she wasn't.

Around a corner and down an alley as the rain started to pick up; her shoes were caked with dried mud under fresh mud, a new layer added each time she tripped into a puddle. Experimentally, she slowed her step a little, just to see what he'd do. Push, went the hand. They walked a little farther, and she watched the rows of boarded up windows go by above her head. It was really strange to look up at rain: almost as if it was all falling straight down into her eyes and nowhere else. After awhile, she couldn't stand it anymore, and averted her gaze.

A few more steps, a plush looking car lurking in the darkness, glaring down at her. He opened one of the back doors as if what he really wanted to do was tear it off the hinges, but he was too good for that so he didn't. Looking at her expectantly, he pointed.

"Get in, Terra."

Looking at the door, looking at him, fighting a decision she had already made but didn't want to admit. Bad choices had a distinct feeling. So did missing someone. And how you felt when you looked into their eyes and saw their world splinter into little pieces of you, pieces that would never be the same and would never go away. The catch in their voice, the slumped shoulders. That kind of pain didn't really originate in your heart, like all the movies said. It was more in your throat, hard and lumpy so you couldn't swallow it.

And what had she done?

Darkness, nothing else inside that awful place but of course she was only talking about the car. Chipped fingernails grabbed the edge of the door for support as she slid into the seat, door slamming behind her as soon as she had gotten to the point where she probably wouldn't get her leg stuck in it. If this had been a horror movie, there might have been shadows. But it was too dark for that. You needed light for that. In horror movies, the little girl got in the car with the strange, evil man because she didn't know any better, not because she…well, this wasn't a horror movie, anyway.

Moving forward now, wouldn't be much longer, wonder what would happen once they stopped moving, because eventually they would have to and then it would all sink in, finally. She supposed that it was all for the best. In the end, what other choice did she have? Sometimes hurting someone was the only way to set them free. Maybe it was awful right now, but sooner or later, she'd see. Sooner or later, they'd all see.

Except for when that was nothing but an excuse, gulped down desperately in hopes that it would dissolve the lumpy thing in her throat. There was nothing to see, nothing except a bad, bad little girl. The raindrops pelted down on the window, vindictively, each bead of water hitting the glass with a sound like a cry.