I know, I know, it's been years, but I do still live! I've just been busy working on my own private story to dedicate much time for fanfiction. But here it is! A collaborative effort from both Narutodippy's and myself to bring you chapter three of pain!

Disclaimer: I, nor Narutodippy own teen titans.

Warning: Mentions of rape and Suicide. Chances are, if you've made it this far, you already know this isn't a story meant for kids.

OoOoOoOoO

The Space Between

Day came in black, the copious scores of clouds blocking out the sun. Lightning struck the sky silver in small explosions of plasma. The glow shed its etherial light for a moment of time, freeze framing a boy garbed in green, red, and black. He stood alone in a room as empty and cold as his eyes. His bare hands held clasped between forefinger and thumb a lone mask. Unbridled eyes looked at the thin material as if it were the first time seeing it; looking as if debating something that was impossible. There was a shift in his stance, a flicker of life in wavering sea of gray. It came, then went, leaving the ocean flat and dull.

Another lightning strike, another flash of white, another deafening crash of thunder, and the mask fell to the floor forgotten.

The ambient glow of the overcast sky rung with the aftermath of the electrical display of raw power, shedding its amaranth aura into the gelded prison Robin stood in. The glow filtered in around him and danced among the shadows. He became silhouetted next to the wardrobe he stood before. His shadow fell on it, but his reflection found him. A million tiny version of himself laid in the half broken frame of the shattered mirror. Pieces were scattered along the surface of the wood and strewn to the floor. Blood still lingered on the edges of the fragments, but it had been forgotten. Everything had been forgotten.

A set of gloves, vibrant and green laid overtop each other neatly as if laid out by a doting parent. Below them was a yellow belt bearing many compartments. The gloves were taken first.

With slow mechanical motions, he drew on his gloves, feeling the familiar tingle of fabric along his hands. It dragged along fresh cuts on his knuckles, pulling on raw flesh. A chill reached his spine, but the shiver never came. He was numb to it all.

Three weeks

His eyes wavered for a moment. His hand stilled over his belt, as if frozen by it. With an unknown force, his head turned towards the door to his lonely room.

Days gone past filled his mind like fog. Three weeks of interactions. Three weeks of emotional Degeneration. Each moment was clear enough to be happening again in his minds eye. He let them down out the present as he could almost hear Cyborg's voice.

"Robin, you can't be alright with Slade rap-...with what Slade did to you," Cyborg spoke as he stood next to his friend, concern aging his face to years beyond him.

Robin gave another swing at the punching bag, this one considerably harder than the last. The object swung in a large ark, giving a squeaked cry for mercy. A strong arm came out and caught it dead, stopping its wild swing.

"Come on man, talk to me. You've been shut up in your room for days, then all of a sudden you're all smiles like nothing happened." Cyborg let go of the punching bag to step closer to the shorter teen. "It's not natural to bounce back like this,"

Robin glanced at his long time friend, a smile playing on his lips despite the subject at hand. This only fueled Cyborgs concern.

"I told you and every one else already, it was just bruises. Nothing I couldn't heal from and certainly not the worse I ever had," The smile on his face seemed to tilt to one side, as if it were glued on crooked.

Cyborg sighed with a deep rooted exhaustion.

"The bruises aren't what worries me," Cyborg spoke before he set his finger on Robin's brow. "It's the wounds he left here,"

Robin gave a small laugh, shaking away the touch. The way he shied back seemed too fast, too sudden.

"I'm fine Cyborg. What kind of hero would I be if something so trivial broke me?" It had the tone as if it were a joke, but it only served to further heavy the mood. Cyborg felt a tension rippled across him.

"It would make you human Robin," He set his hands on the smaller teen shoulders. He could remember only a few days ago how cold and limp they had been. How close to death this person before him was.

"No one expects you to be fine. No one wants you to pretend everything is alright,"

That smile, the infuriatingly fake smile, didn't waver. It seemed to only grow. Robin reached up, pushing Cyborgs hold off him with a casual nudge.

"I'm fine Cyborg." that smile twisted and his eyes sunk in, the hollow glimmer becoming fathomless. "Just fine,"

Then he was back. He felt his heart beat, his steady even breathing. He turned his eyes down to the dresser and what was left for him. Three weeks that had led up to this moment.

He picked up the lone yellow belt that was set on his wardrobe. It was light this time. Empty of everything. There was a soft click as it clasped around an oddly thin frame. It hung slightly to the side, lopsided on its bearer.

The rain beyond the window began to fall. The first few drops made small gray patches on the glass. In a torrent they blocked out the world, hushing it all away Soon those drops became rivers and the sky began to sob.

It created such a calm sound, like a mother shushing away a child's worries. Then came a brilliant flash of blinding light and the deafening rumble of thunder that made the earth shy back. The sound didn't seem to find him. The wild storm pressed against the glass, but could not wrap its wild hand around him. He was distant from this world and all its activity.

Pail listless orbs drifted away from the world to the room he had become familiar with in the past hour or so. It was immaculate. He had gone through absently and cleaned it of any life. The bed had been stripped bare and set with new sheets. His desk was barren, anything that had once been there either burned or thrown away. Life itself was gone from this room. It made his mind wander again.

In three weeks you ripped me up

What would they think, he wondered. What would they do? Question pulled at him. Greedy little things, tickling the edge of his mind, teasing at what little was left of him. They tried to bring something out, tried to scratch past the surface, but there was nothing left to bleed.

And tore me down.

He turned his shrouded eyes to the gray sky expanding out to him, whispering him name, calling for him. He breathed. He stood there an inhaled it, the taste of what was to come.

Now i'm in so many pieces

His feet took him. He moved like a man drawn by stings. He wasn't aware of his world. He didn't feel himself going down the stairs to the docking bay, nor him sitting on his bike. The world was misted over, blotted out by a fog of regrets. Was he going to do this? Was he going to follow through with this subconscious decision? They were questions he didn't find a voice to answer. He took up his helmet and put it on, then drove off.

I can't find myself in them any more.

It was cold and gray. It was noon, but day never seemed to have come. It was dark, darker outside than it had been in his room, but never would it be as black as his mind.

Is this what i'm supposed to be

His bike set lights of red streaking behind him as an after image. A lone animal he rode on, ignorant of the chill of the rain or its fierce bite on his skin. It ripped across him, tried to tear him apart. He rode through it, his fingers going numb. His arms quivered, but it wasn't from the cold.

I don't want to ask this

The roads were barren. It was just him here, just him existing in this lonely world where time no longer played a roll. He sunk into it. He let it wrap it's arms around him and compress until he had no breath to spare. It made his mind hazy. It let more of his demons out to play.

I don't want to face this.

Raven's voice was so clear to him, like the moment was playing again. He remembered her coming into his room, her eyes rimmed with sleeplessness while he had barely stirred. He had heard he come in, but he didn't want to face her, didn't want to look at her. Why had she come to look at him when he had shed his mask, when there was nothing to hide behind.

"Robin?" He wanted to tell her to go away. He pulled the covers closer to his hair and never come out, but that would never do. He reached from beneath the folds of navy blue and found the one thing that could protect him from her. He put on his mask.

The rush of the fabric on his skin was like a shot of endorphins, a blow to his system. The lethargic state peeled away and he came to the surface. That's what he kept saying, praying even.

"Yes?" He asked. He felt a weight on the edge of his bed and the silence that fell with it. He rolled over, his brow arched beneath the black mask he hid behind as the shield it was.

He saw the sadness in her eyes. There was nothing that she could hide from him here, nothing that could slip away into the darkness of his fading grasp of reality. He was after all, Robin, not Dick.

"I'm...No, we're worried about you," The words made an odd feeling try to come to the surface. Somehow Robin knew it did not belong to the person he put forward and buried it as it came. Instead, he smiled that god awful smile.

"There's nothing to be worried about. I'm fine," Raven heard the practice in his voice, the denial. She farrowed her brows, glared at him even. It was the same response, the same words he spewed at them again and again, trying to make it seem like everything was okay when it wasn't! She rose from the bed in a storm of motion, her eyes hot with righteous anger. She couldn't take it anymore.

"Stop pretending your okay! You're not okay!"

There's no telling what i'll do when this is over.

The rev of his motor cycle brought him back to the world. The thunder told him he had arrived at his destination. His eyes drifted to one side, observing the landscape he had taken himself to. Where was he, when had he come here?

It was the bridge, large and spanning, either end lost in a mist that cut him off from the rest of the world. He knew though, he understood why he was here. He felt it in his bones, like the cold of the rain seeping down his spine.

He heard Beast Boy in the rain. He heard him walking by his room, never daring to face the terrible reality of what had happened.

No telling what I'll do right now

He dismounted his bike. He let it fall to one side. The engine gave a small sputter at the abuse then continued to hum softly. It faded out. The world drifted away spare for the small circle around him. He remembered Starfire in the perfect little circle. He remembered her smile, her laugh, her cries for him to wake up, to stop pretending. He could feel her arms on his shoulders, begging him to come back to her, screaming until the sound of her sobs stopper her voice from making sense. He remembered holding her in his arms, trying to calm her down, trying to tell her he was fine, that tears were not necessary. He was alive he told her, he was well, breathing.

He took another step forward, coming to the edge of the walkway. The ocean was down below. So far bellow.

Maybe I am crazy

He took hold of the guide rail before he climbed over it. He could hear the storm, the ocean waiting for him so very far down.

Maybe I am Suicidal

Starfire's lips were always so soft. She wasn't human, but he didn't care. He cared for her, and that was nice.

Maybe I just want to be me for once

But what happened to it being enough? What happened to her hand holding him making things really be okay? When had her kiss turned to ash and left something bitter inside him? When had he stopped looking at her like he loved her? When had his eyes wandered to someone else so much worse?

But who am I to ask for such things?

He wanted her back. He wanted his lifer back. He wanted things to go back to the way they were, before Slade, before the teen titans, before Batman, before the circus, before he ever existed. He wanted to stop existing, stop breathing, stop being something that ever was.

Who am I to want something that I know I don't deserve

He hung his head and looked towards the water peaking its wanton eye through the shroud of the mist and rain. He saw the waves lapping at the edge of the support. It was a distance he could barely grasp. He knew he would have time to think on the way down, time to breath, time to enjoy it.

I know I haven't earned it

He felt a vibration at his hip. It buzzed over and over, like the quivers of a coming earthquake. He looked down and smiled. His communicator lit up again, another buzz as his friends tried to find him. He realized now that they had been calling him for the past few minutes. He took the device off his hip, twisted it over in his hand a few times, then let it go.

He watched it fall to the water below.

He looked up into the rain and let it hide his tears. He smiled at it, and the sky smiled back with a streak of silver staining the sky.

Robin

He took a slow deep breath and closed his eyes.

Dick

He moved closer to the edge, his toes dangling towards the edge of oblivion.

Who are they?

He leaned forward.

Who am I?

And then he heard Slade's voice. It stopped him cold, froze him on the lip of the bridge. He heard those words, that lone sentence that kept him from doing it, kept him still a second more. I hope to do this again. Slade wanted to do it again.

Slade wanted him and that was finally enough for him.

Where is the line that breaks it all down?

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A short Chapter I know, but I thought some suspense would be nice. Does he jump? What about the team, what will Slade's influence have on Robin!? Tune in Next update to find out!

And please review. It really does mean allot to me and Narutodippy.