The huge lights that were dangling from the ceiling shook slightly when the beams of light gushed out of them. It was obvious that they hadn't been used in years. The boys who were once absorbed in their conversation now turned their attention to covering their eyes, turning to Starfire in irritation.
"Starfire! Why did you -?" Robin started, but Beast Boy interrupted him and thrust a finger in front of him.
"Dude! What's that?"
Starfire remained silent as Robin, Beast Boy and Cyborg slowly edged their way towards the edge of the room to gain a clear view of the thing they had been sitting on for the past several minutes.
The dark blue light that had surrounded the room had been quickly replaced with a dazzling white light. It burnt the teenagers' eyes, but as they slowly became accustomed to the new light, it became clear why the darkness had been a certain shade of blue.
Underneath where the cloak had been sitting sat a small circle. Thousands of thin, long lines branched off from it, making a delicate pattern around the room; it was an intricate design and no doubt had some deep, historical meaning to it. The design was black and glowed a creamy white around its edges. It was a sure sign of Raven.
"What is it?" Beast Boy stammered nervously.
Starfire leapt into the air immediately and moved so that she was almost touching the high ceiling. With her perfect bird's eye view, she circled about the room, taking in every view that met her eyes.
"It is many different lines and it is covering the floor completely," Starfire called, almost hypnotized by the beautiful pattern that covered the floor. "There is a large blank space in the middle of the circle in the shape of the letter 'R' – the rest of the circle is covered in long, black lines in a pretty pattern."
Starfire continued to float around the room, as if an answer to the strange picture would suddenly pop up. Her gliding through the air created a soft whoosh which was clear to hear as the boys were stuck in silence, wondering what to make of their situation.
Beast Boy eventually piped up. "Is that Raven's way of telling us something?"
Cyborg knelt down and poked at the black line; it did not waver nor did it recognize his touch. "Maybe… We just don't know what she's trying to tell us yet."
Starfire eventually landed on the floor next to Robin. Her hands were clenched together tightly, as if to let them go would be condemning her friends to a life time of this torture. She pulled them apart, only to place one of her hands on Robin's shoulder. "Robin, what do you think?"
He ignored her worried gesture and thought in silence for a while. "We'll split up into pairs again. I don't want anybody on their own though; we must stick together. Beast Boy, you'll go with Cyborg, Starfire you'll come with me. We need to find Raven and Slade and fast."
Beast Boy nodded enthusiastically and turned to leave the warehouse with Cyborg at his heels, but Robin called them back again just before they made it through the door.
"But," Robin continued. "So we don't need up like this again, we should contact each other every hour or so -."
"Dude, we're going to be at this for more than an hour?" Beast Boy hissed to Cyborg.
"Telling each other where we are, etcetera," Robin finished off, loudly.
There was a tense pause as the Titans waited for the famous command.
"Titans Go!"
Cyborg and Beast Boy dashed out of the door immediately, turning left as they exited. Robin took a quick look back at Raven's pattern before running out of the same door, turning right instead. Starfire zoomed above him, trying to keep up with the fast boy as he raced towards the city centre. As he ran, he took a quick look behind him to see that Cyborg and Beast Boy were running towards a well-known sock shop; it was a good idea to ask near-by citizens if they had seen anything.
It was a five minute walk into the city centre from their and could be easily seen from the warehouse too, but it took Robin and Starfire only sixty seconds to run there. There was a large lamppost that sat on the side of the pavement which Robin caught and stopped by to catch his breath; the city centre was the first part of Jump City to fill up with people and the more people around the better chance they had of somebody witnessing something that could help them in their investigation.
When Robin had caught his breath he turned towards Starfire to give her another command, but she wasn't beside him. Nor was she floating above him. He spun around in several directions, trying to look for her.
"Starfire," Robin called, frantically. Slade couldn't have gotten her too, could he? "Starfire?"
It was almost as if she had just disappeared. The city, although a few people could be seen mooching around, was quiet and uncanny. He could hear his own breath escaping from his lips until a piercing alarm rang through the city centre.
He almost jumped out of his skin and swivelled around to face a large bank. Two thieves ran out of it, their hands carrying guns and heavy bags overloaded with money. They were running towards a bike that waited for them outside the bank on the pavement. And as Robin noticed this, he also caught sight of Starfire. She was hovering above the bike with her starbolts gleaming furiously in her hands.
It was early in the morning; they'd been up for hours and everybody was tired. Starfire was surprisingly ill-humoured for once and didn't see the group of citizens standing in the wrong place at the wrong time.
They were the target of Starfire's starbolts.