I decided not to drive you all nuts and make you wait for this chapter… Just kidding, I wouldn't have done that. They're getting hard to write, since I still only have a vague idea of where this is going (I have the end already; it's just a matter of how we get there), but I promise to do my best. Enjoy!
I do not own the Teen Titans.
---Chapter Four: Brutality---
The five were very suddenly having a bad day. The jocks had finally gotten enough confidence to take them on, even though it meant fighting one of their own. They had cornered the group near a set of lockers, encircling them slowly. Dick instinctively pushed Starfire behind him. Vic cracked his knuckles, ready to fight. Raven's hand went to her forehead and she felt her knees weaken as another vision came on. "Not now," she whispered, annoyed at herself and afraid for her friends. Gar caught her as she fell, his concern only for Raven. The other three watched their bullies warily.
"Gar," Dick said sharply. The shorter boy looked at the group's default leader. "Yeah?"
"Take Raven to the nurse's office."
Gar nodded and adjusted his hold on Raven so he could carry her. Two jocks instantly blocked his way. Gar glared at them. "Let me through."
One of the jocks grinned. "And what if we don't?"
Dick's flying spin-kick, hitting the speaker from the side, answered the question. "Go, now!" he yelled to Gar. The boy took off as best as he could, trying not to drop Raven. The jock Dick had kicked rubbed his jaw. "Let him go," he said to his comrade, who was about to run after Gar. "He's not the one we want." He turned to Dick again, a sadistic grin creeping onto his face. "That's the one we want."
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Raven read the spell three times before she got up and gathered the ingredients from her supplies. The words were complicated and the amount of power required for the spell substantial, but the ingredients were fairly common ones. She poured and measured carefully. All five Titans were sick of the superhero game. Today Starfire and Beast Boy had nearly been killed. True, Raven had managed to sufficiently heal them on the spot and both would survive without any permanent physical damage, but she had seen the looks in all of her friends' eyes.
She had seen Beast Boy's fear of dying so young.
Starfire's sadness at leaving her friends.
Robin's guilt for allowing the two of them to get hurt so badly.
Cyborg's painful acceptance of the facts.
She had been the one whose heart cried out in strong denial, much to her own surprise. So when the five of them had finally made it home, Raven had gone straight to her room, locked the door, and started going through her spell books. None of her friends thought it unusual. None of them knew what she was about to do. Enough was enough, Raven thought. The five of them deserved to be normal teenagers: Starfire on her planet with her people, the boys on Earth with their parents, and…
Raven paused. To be normal meant for her that Trigon was not her father and she had never seen Azarath. She too would have lived on Earth, with her mother.
Raven finished setting up the spell and began to chant. This would make everything better.
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Dick went down hard when a jock punched him in the face. Vic was already grappling with three others, so there wasn't anything he could do about it. Starfire, however, saw her newest and closest friend go down, and it let loose a fury stronger than any she'd ever felt before. Starfire's eyes glowed with a strange green light. Equally bright balls of energy formed around her hands. She flung a starbolt at the jock who had punched Dick, sending him flying. The others, even Vic, stopped and stared at her in amazement. "No one hurts my friends," Starfire said firmly. The jocks exchanged looks and ran, not willing to deal with a super-powered alien girl. Starfire rushed over to Dick, who was sitting up with a pained expression on his face. He smiled at the sight of her. "I'm okay, Star."
"But you were hit very hard…" she protested.
He stood up carefully, grunting in mild pain. "Yeah, but I've been hit harder. We should check on Raven and Gar."
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Raven gasped and her blue-violet eyes snapped open as she sat straight up. In an uncomfortable chair next to the nurse's cot she was on, Gar jumped, surprised by her sudden movement. He blinked at her. "Raven?"
Raven stared past him in horror. "It was me, Gar. I cast the spell that made this happen. It's my fault the Earth is going to be destroyed." He stood up and went to her, and she cried into his shirt as he hugged the girl he'd been in love with since kindergarten. They didn't say anything. They couldn't have even if they'd needed to.
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By the time Dick, Vic, and Starfire had made it to the nurse's office (after a long talk with the principal, during which all three received detention for a month), Raven had already been sent home. Gar was also gone, and the bell rang for class, making it impossible for them to go find him, since they were at the end of the day and Starfire had gym with the other two boys as her last period. Dick assured them that he would call Gar, and Starfire promised to report on Raven's condition.
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It turned out that Dick didn't have to call Gar. He called the young acrobat himself, asking to come over and talk. Mrs. Grayson answered the door and directed Gar to the kitchen, where Dick sat doing his homework. Dick pushed his Algebra II book aside.
"What did you want to talk about?"
Gar held up a stack of papers. "These visions Raven's been having? I researched stuff like it on the Internet. I printed out almost everything I found. None of it's good. When an actual psychic has a vision, there's a little drain on their energy, but they're fine. If what she sees is true, Raven wasn't meant to be a psychic in this reality. Each vision puts more strain on her mind."
"Her headaches."
Gar nodded. "Yeah." He swallowed hard. "If she keeps having them…"
Dick looked at his friend. "What'll happen?"
"She'll die."
Dick looked away. "Such is the price of salvation."
Gar slammed his papers on the table. "Bullshit! Do you want her to die?"
"No. But if the things she sees can help us save the world, isn't one life worth it in the grand scheme of things?"
Gar took a deep breath. "Not when it's hers. I'm not going to let her die."
Dick snorted. "And how are you going to stop destiny?"
"I don't know yet."
Dick's eyes hardened. "Then I suggest you find out before you start complaining again."
Gar stared at him. "What are we going to do, Dick? What are we going to do if Raven dies and we still can't save the world? We're just five teenagers, without superpowers, messing with forces and things that we can never hope to understand! How the hell are we supposed to save the world?!"
"Dick, is everything all right in there?" Mrs. Grayson called from the living room.
"Everything's fine, Mom," Dick replied. He lowered his voice again. "Look, I don't know how we're going to pull it off. I just know that somehow we will."
Gar turned away. "Being normal sucks," he said quietly. He turned again to pick up his papers, and then he left. Dick went back to his homework.
---End Chapter Four---
So now you know what happened, and our favorite pairing is slowly building. What do you think? Review please! I love all of my reviewers, by the way. This story has the most reviews for the smallest number of hits out of all my stories, and I don't consider that a bad thing. Y'all are awesome! Yes, I just said "y'all." Funny thing is I'm not really Southern.
