Chapter 3
Raven passed the next few days at Titans Tower. Garield and Victor spent the time getting the tower in livable condition. This mostly meant cleaning out Garf's old room. This also meant cleaning out and revamping all the old training facilities. Both Vic and Garf agreed that they'd been out of the crime fighting line of duty for too long and that they both needed to get back into shape, Garf more so. Raven spent the time learning what had happened in the world during her years of "seclusion". It turned out that quite a bit had happened.
After the sickness, Jump City had remained lawless and isolated from the rest of the nation. The state of the city was determined to be nearly as awful as "No Man's Land" in Gotham City, across the country. Perhaps the two cities were equally chaotic, but in different ways. In getting Gotham's feet off the ground, all emergency government aid had been drained. Recently, some of Jump City had managed to rebuild; the area of the city right on the bay looked an operated almost as it did before. Out of the mile radius of the rebuilt city there was still a six mile stretch of rubble and lawless land. "The Wastelands," as the area was called, was Nightwing worked the hardest to protect, not that his job was any easier in the rebuilt part of town. The overcrowding and lack of resources (such as jobs and electricity) bred a lot of violence.
Raven learned most of this through what Vic and Garf told her. The rest she inferred from her own findings.
She was sorting through some of her old possession when she heard a knock at her door.
"Hey Rae. It's me," she heard Vic's voice call through the door.
"Come in," she called back.
The door slid open and in popped Victor's head.
"Hey," he said.
"Hey."
"Whatcha' doing?"
"I'm trying to remember all this stuff."
"By making a mess?"
Raven looked around her room. All her possessions were strewn everywhere. Books were in piles on the floor instead of on shelves. Drawers had been taken out of her desk and dressers and emptied onto the floor.
"It does look that way, but no. By studying each thing I own." She was carefully examining all the objects in her room to try and remember all of her experiences as a Teen Titan. All of her memories of that time were quite literally locked away in her mind. Certain items managed to unlock bits and pieces and sometimes whole chunks off her memory. Some were good and some were very bad. Whenever something triggered a memory she would either tape it to the wall above her bed or place it on her night stand. So far, not so many things had been collected in either spot.
"How's it coming?" he asked.
"Alright, I guess."
"Is there any way I can help?"
"Not really." She noticed he grew a little sad by this. "Thanks though. You've helped a lot already" She gave him an appreciative smile. His own smile returned.
"It's nice to see you smile. It's a shame you couldn't do it more before."
There was an awkward silence when he brought this up.
"So," he started again, trying to end the awkwardness, "Is there a reason you're doing this now?"
"I couldn't sleep." She suddenly remembered what day it was and looked at her clock. It was already 4:30 A.M. "I need to go," she said, floating up and levitating her clock toward herself.
Vic was confused, to say the least. "Where are you going at this hour?"
"I have to go find Rob… Nightwing."
His face grew worried. Before he could say anything in protest, she was out the window and on her way to Jump City.
(RRRR)
Sorry there wasn't toomuch going on in this chapter. Just needed it to work some stuff out.
I'm glad folks are liking this story. Robin and Raven have always been two of my favorite characters and I like the idea of them being together. Especially in the universe set up by the cartoon. Especially when Starfire isn't a distraction.Time travel has always been something that I feel rarely works well in stories/movies because it operates on the basis that there is a future waiting for you to go to, i.e. fate exists. I don't particularly believe in fate. That's why when I saw "Forever is a Long Time," I saw it as a good place to pull what I'll call a "Mari Trunks."
It's also good to know a few people like the way I've aged/matured the characters. While Robin is awesome, but Nightwing is the shit. Plain and simple. He's also more the type I see Raven with. While the Teen Titans have their place in crime fighting, I think the people they grow up to be are a few of the most facinating characters DC has to offer. (SideNote:espcially Robin and Speedy/ Nightwing and Arsenal. :sigh:Those crazy kids. :shakes head:)