Summary: A drabble series of various Titans and villans having a chance meeting with one ordinary citizen and learning what it really means to be a hero.
Drabble Three: More Than Enough
Starfire was fluttering like a butterfly in stress and panic. Things were worse than bad. Worse than a villan trying to conquer the city! Worse than a global predicament! The worst of the worst!
Christmas.
The time of year where humans flurried across shopping centers, buying presents for loved ones with reckless abandon and where Christmas feasts were both large in size and expensive in type. Where more pounds were gained, and money lost, and where romantics eagerly fluttered from store to store, buying their sweethearts holly and tinsel. And poor Starfire was suffering the same epidemic as she had for her first Christmas last year. It had been disastrous as she assembled gifts from her own planet Tamaran, with chaotic results. Poor Cyborg still occasionally suffered glitches in his system from her present of a piece of alien electronics. Raven had to restrain the vicious book she recieved with her powers before sealing it into a chest and locking it away. It still rattled sometimes.
Which led Starfire to her latest crusade in the city mall.
She tore apart stores selling everything imaginable, everything her friends might like even remotely...but that wouldn't do. She needed presents that weren't terribly obivous, and not too overly emotional. Something that would last for a long time, but not be quickly dashed away into a chest. Locked up. And rattling. Starfire's better than average came to her advantage most of the time, swooping from store to store. But sometimes it was a curse, especially when she moved so fast she sent and older girl sprawling to the floor, items skittering across the mall floor like marbles. Apologizing as fast as she had moved she scooped up the scattered items. Few even noticed the girl had fallen, except for a small pack of well dressed schoolgirls, sniggering from their table at the food court.
"Fine...I'm fine..." the girl waved off Starfire's apologies as she piled everything pell mell back into the bag. Starfire was momentarily confused by her choice in presents. Cotton balls? Wood and plastic? Stickers and glitter? How odd....
"Please excuse my clumsiness for I am as dim as Gorhothian Blogtrotter-"
"Goodness sakes I'm fine!" She turned to glare at the table of snotty girls, giggling even harder at Starfire's "Gorhothian Blogtrotter". "Get lost you little brats! Go shrill like hyenas somewhere else!" she snapped at the girls, shooing them away from the embarassed Starfire. They drew themselves like offended rattlesnakes before darting off exclaiming offendedly all while shooting glowering glares at the girl, which were returned doubly.
"Ignorant twits." she muttered. She turned to an equally surprised Starfire, "I guess you're having present trouble too?"
"Too?" echoed Starfire in confusion, "You are also suffering a loss of picking presents?"
"Nope, but I've met a lot of people lately who have," she beckoned her to follow, "C'mon. I'll show you something that might come in handy."
"Somthing handy," turned out to be a platoon of tables, many filled with children but with a vareity of others as well. Myra, as Starfire learned the girl's name, had been shopping for the table's neccessites. Starfire timidly took a seat near Myra who handed out items for various table attendants.
"Our company's running a non-profit project for Christmas, where people can make presents for their friends and family if they can't afford or find any. You don't pay anything and can make a whole bunch of different things, photo frames, mittens, etc." Myra explained, holding out some packets of glitter and stickers to Starfire, who took them catuiously. Myra then sat down next to Starfire, helping a small child on her right while Starfire was left pondering what to make.
It had grown dark outside, and Starfire had still not made up her mind.
The children were all gone, with only a few elderly, and shabby, folks left to tinker with the items on the table. Myra seemed to notice Starfire sitting forlornly alone, and made a beeline for the chair in front of her.
"Still having problems?" she asked gently. Starfire nodded sadly.
"I am afraid I do not know my friends at all..." she confessed, fiddling with a plastic frame, "I think I do sometimes, but when I really need to know...it never seems to come. Just, a blank space..." Myra looked over the unfinished plastic frames, messed up mittens, and torn pictures left by clumsy children. Then she looked back at Starfire.
"It's hardly a picnic," Myra said slowly, picking up and undone frame, sparkling with glitter, "but more often than not, friends know each other best." She closed and empty space, "They're who you depend on when you're family can't, don't, won't, or have no clue on how to help you," She added a few stickers. "Most times they form your character, who you like can say a lot about you," She glued on foam stars, "But in the end, the finished result is always better than the beginning one," She slipped in a picture. Holding it out to Starfire, she smiled, fresh and warm as baked bread. Starfire took it and looked at the finished frame.
It was a galaxy of foamy stars, shiny planets and moons, and miniscule stardust, all in a perfect little square. In the center of this obscure universe, a dark haired girl held a blonde baby gently in her lap. Starfire saw who meant most in Myra's universe, even without knowing his name. She made to hand it back to Myra, but she shook her head.
"Keep it. Maybe you'll find out who's in the center of your universe too." she winked slightly and walked away, taller than a statue. Starfire put the frame delicately away in her coat pocket, and began to work...
On Christmas Day, the Titans were collected in the living room. All of course...except for Starfire.
"She's still asleep?" Robin wondered aloud, "I thought she'd be estatic for Christmas,"
"She's just exhausted from Christmas shopping is all," Raven said. She had seen her come in late last night, eyes weary but pleased as she shooed her away from her concealed bag.
"You don't think she's off...y'know...space shopping?" asked Beast Boy nervously. He still had nightmares about the piece of furniture from last year's Christmas.
"Nah...chill out BB. She knows better than to repeat that fiasco." Cyborg soothed, although he inwardly shuddered at the memory. They didn't have much longer to wait. At that moment Starfire burst in, looking dazzling in a tinsel trimmed outfit.
"Friends! Good cheer! It's Christmas!" she trilled musically. She handed out small, square presents, all wrapped as her friends looked curiously at them. What could it be? They all unwrapped hoping for the best, and dreading another galatic packages.
They were all surprised with picture frames.
But not ordinary ones. They were each different for each Titan. Raven's was dark and swathed with a gauzy, iridescent dark cloth and light glitter with small fake rhinestones set in to mak e it look like a piece of the galaxy, with their own stars. Beast Boy's was painted green with many foam leaves, stickers of animals peeking through the fen. Cyborg's was a light blue, with a microchip design, circular stickers with swirls placed at random, yet organized, places. And Robin's was with many, many stars of all colors, with a small, but noticeable pink heart in the corner. The frames all held a picture of them as a group, picked from their first Christmas.
Raven smiled secretly and tucked it away behind her cloak. Beast Boy chittered like a monkey over the design. Cyborg bragged over his intricacy. Robin looked curiously at Starfire from where she possibly coudl have gotten this.
Starfire just smiled, hands clasped over a picture of a girl holding a baby boy in a small galaxy...