"Did you have a plan?" demanded Robin, a safe distance away from the foster parents' home, slowing to a walk and clutching more tightly to Raven's thrashing form. "Where can we take her? She would have been better off at the asylum."
"You don't mean that," said the other girl. They were all ignoring the stares of the people around him, whose wide-eyed gazes were drawn to the flailing grinning girl.
He stared down at the girl in his arms. "I don't." He didn't need to confirm it; she already knew. He was tired. He wanted his family back, too.
"Maybe she needs to go home," suggested the other. "Maybe it'll help."
"Titans Tower has been locked up for ages," he contradicted, knowing immediately that she meant Raven's real home and not Azarath. "And she—she was on the verge of—" He made a miserable gesture toward her with his head. "—of this even back home. And—" His rage was building, his fury at what had been done to everything he'd known and cared for.
"And you've seen it," he finished. "Hard to miss, isn't it? The place is broken down and empty. There's nothing left to be home. She wouldn't even recognize it."
Well, thought the other girl, no one even recognized her. But that really didn't stop her from being who she was.
Maybe it did, though.
"Still, I think we should take her home."
He didn't argue further, only carried Raven on. The other girl followed still, observing poor broken Raven in silence. She was dressed in the same leotard as always, wearing the same chain belt, though cloakless; but the outfit was rumpled and torn slightly, and tiny injuries covered the girl's ashen skin, as if she'd had to fight to keep it.
They reached the tower and went up and up and up until they entered the cross of the T. Robin turned one way to take Raven to the place that had once been her room, but the girl turned the other, to stand at a broken window and look out over the sparkling expanse of water. The glassy surface shone too bright for this day.
"Come here," ordered Robin from down the hall, and as if out of habit, she obeyed. Slipping into the pressing darkness of Raven's room, she strained to see through the gloom. Night vision wasn't her power either.
Robin held up a little glowing orb, one of all his gadgets, revealing himself to be standing beside the bed. There were only tattered remnants of sheets, and the mattress leaked stuffing, but in the familiar place, Raven had finally calmed. At least, her eyes had closed, and she only trembled instead of thrashed. But even in sleep, the insane grin lingered on her pale face, and the other girl had to look away.
"What generation of Titan are you?"
"Oh," she replied uncertainly. "I'm—from the original group."
"No you're not," he disagreed, tone surprisingly mild, if shocked at her reply. "There are only five of us. And you aren't one of them."
"I know," she said. "But that's what I have to say. I came alone, don't you remember? And left early. I'm not a generation." She trained her eyes to the floor. "I don't even know if I qualify as a Titan."
"No one qualifies as a Titan anymore," said Robin.
"No," she agreed. "I don't suppose anyone does. That's why so many people came to the reunion. Why did you come? You've gotten nothing out of it. I saw."
He looked at Raven. She braved a glance. Maybe that smile looked lesser. "We'll make her okay," asserted Robin, as if saying it would make it true.
"Oh, not we," said the other girl. "Well, not me. You'll make her okay. I've had my reunion. I'm not staying."
"I remember you now," he said. He looked at her, but she wouldn't look at him.
"And now," she replied, "I've had my closure."