Chapter 2: The End

If there was one thing no one could change about Raven, it was the fact that she hardly slept through the whole night. Every night, for as long as she could remember, Raven would always get up, wander around the empty corridors of the tower, read a new book, or make herself some tea. Just because she was in a new environment now, it didn't mean her habits would change.

Wait. New environment.

Raven groaned. She had hoped that when she woke up, she would be back in her bed, either realizing that the Titans had saved her from Red X's clutches, or preferably, that it was all some weird twisted dream.

Sighing, Raven turned over on the mattress. She missed the comfort of the Titans Tower; she missed the comfort of her room. She missed waking up in the middle of the night, grabbing a book from her bookcase and reading through it like she had never seen the book before in her life.

Most importantly, she missed her friends. Raven couldn't help but wonder if they had noticed she was gone. They must have. Robin must have.

Robin.

It wasn't that Raven particularly liked Robin that way; he was just the only one who could understand her. He never called her creepy, weird, or antisocial. He accepted her for who she was, and she could never ask for a better friend.

Raven touched the "x" that was still plastered over her mouth; her fingers skimming the edges, looking for a loose point that would help her rip it off.

She looked over at the clock, seeing that it was 2 AM. Maybe, just maybe, Red X wasn't up. Maybe, just maybe, she could escape from him. She didn't need her powers. She could walk. She'd find her way back if it was the last thing she did.

More determined than ever before, Raven stepped out of her room, carefully sliding the door back to its original closed position. Her footsteps were quiet and cat-like, almost tip-toeing past Red X's bedroom. She wondered if she should peer inside, see if he was still sleeping in there; see what monstrous face was behind that mask of his.

But Raven had no time.

Soon enough, the sun would be up, and he would realize she wasn't in bed. He would realize she escaped, and go looking for her. Unless she moved fast enough, she would get caught again.

Raven managed to get to the front entrance, silently opening each lock, and pushing the door open.

It was raining. Great.

Raven trudged through the wet terrain, wandering in what she hoped was not a huge circle.

One of the many negative sides of having an "x" over her face was the fact that she couldn't breathe through her mouth when the polluted air was making it hard to breathe through her nose. She refused to pass out… and wake up in Red X's house. If he bothered to save her, that is.

Would Red X save her?

Probably not. From what Raven knew, he wasn't much of a good guy. Then again, he wasn't much of a bad guy either. So what was he?

Raven mentally reprimanded herself. The last thing she needed was to go on thinking about Red X. It had come up as an obsession, no; Raven was not turning into a Robin. She was not obsessed. Not in the slightest. She was just curious; she wanted to know who or what was behind that mask, why he separated her from her friends, and what he did to her friends, if he did anything at all.

Coming up to the edge of a cliff, Raven groaned. She could see the Titans Tower on the other side of a large gully in the distance, but knew there was no way to get to there if she couldn't fly. Frustrated, Raven pulled at the "x" again and again, hoping that it would magically come off this time.

She grabbed at the edges, the corners, and the front; hell, she even tried to open her mouth enough to bite it with her teeth. Yet no matter how hard she tried, and how hard she wanted the contraption off, nothing worked.

Taking a couple steps back, Raven began to shift and move around, stepping over rocks and sticks as the "x" resisted against her fingers, sticking strongly to her face.

"Mmmph," Raven managed to mumble, falling in the process.

However, instead of landing on the wet ground like she had anticipated, she was still falling, and falling fast.

"Mmmmph!" Raven screamed, pulling more aggressively. The realization that she had fell off the cliff came to her quickly, and she was now hoping that the "x" would come off before she reached the bottom.

If matters couldn't get any worse, Raven was falling backwards.

Her fingers grasped at the corners one last time, and with a final effort, Raven strained to pull the thing off.

But it wouldn't move.

Outstretching her hands, Raven managed to grab a lone branch hanging off. The branch looked as if it was about to split from her weight. She took the opportunity to calculate her death; see how far she was from the ground. Immediately after looking down, Raven regretted doing so. The bottom was black and she could see nothing past twenty feet.

Crack. She could hear the branch breaking slowly, each snap caused Raven to wince.

This was her end.

No more books. No more tea. No more chances at happiness. No more pizza. No more Titans. No more Robin. No more Cyborg. No more Starfire. No more Terra. Even if she didn't want to admit it, she knew she would miss Beast Boy too.

This was it, Raven thought to herself. Did she live the life she wanted? The answer was yes. Even if her life ended in this terrible fate, she wouldn't take back anything. The Teen Titans weren't just her teammates, they were her friends; they were her family. They were the people that accepted her when no one else would.

With a final inhale of breath; Raven heard the branch make its final snap before breaking apart and falling towards the black depths below.

"It's all my fault!" Robin shouted again, slamming his fists down on his table.

While the other members of his team were searching for their missing friend, Robin had insisted on staying in his room all day until he figured out where Red X was keeping Raven, why he wanted her in the first place, and what he intended to do with her.

Batman had taught Robin all his knowledge when it came to investigation, yet the boy wonder was still stumped.

"Why does nothing make sense?" Robin yelled, this time grabbing papers and shoving them off the desk.

"Raven," he repeated to himself. "Why aren't you back yet?"

Raven was pretty independent, everyone knew that, and had powers that were unimaginable to anyone on the team. So why wasn't she using them? Why hadn't she escaped? Raven was perfectly capable of fighting Red X, though her hand-to-hand combat was bad; she certainly had an advantage with magic.

"Unless she couldn't use magic," Robin said aloud. "But why can't she? What would Bruce say?"

"Who is the Bruce?"

Whipping his head around, Robin noticed Starfire shyly standing by the door. Oh God, his adoptive father would not be too happy to hear that he was giving away his identity.

"Uh, it's no one," Robin said, although his words were barely audible.

"Robin, I tried to knock on your door, but you did not open," Starfire mumbled, playing with her hair. "I wanted to know if you were all the right?"

Unlike the other times Starfire had come up to comfort him, the stern look in his face didn't soften at hearing her voice.

"What do you think, Starfire? Raven's been taken, and I can't figure out where or why!"

His voice was harsh, maybe a bit too harsh. Fortunately, the Tamaranean girl didn't seem to be too bothered, she was probably used to all of his tantrums by now. That was one thing Robin always liked about Starfire; she was a listener, and she didn't seem to be deterred from helping him just because of his emotional outbursts.

"Friend Robin, the fault is not yours," Starfire answered, walking towards him and putting a comforting hand on his shoulder. "Please Robin, stop blaming Robin."

"But it is my fault, Starfire!" The boy wonder felt like shaking off the girl's hand, but knew it might hurt her feelings, and that was the last thing he wanted to do. "No matter how hard I try, nothing goes right! I was supposed to be up last night! I was supposed to organize my files! But I decided to get one night of sleep because I was so tired. I should've made myself stay up, I would've been able to save Raven!"

"Then, the fault is mine too. I wished to stay up and read the book friend Raven provided. But like you, I was too tired, and chose to do the sleeping," Starfire admitted. "So, Robin, is it not my fault too?"

"No!" Robin spoke, a bit too loudly, and a bit too coldly. He automatically lowered his voice when he saw the hurt expression in Starfire's eyes. "I just… I'm the leader, Starfire. It's my responsibility."

"Then, can you not share the responsibility, Robin? I do not want you to be angry at yourself anymore." She took a pause, and looked at him with her bright green eyes. It was often that she wondered what color Robin's eyes were, but knew better than to ask.

"Robin..."

"Yeah, Starfire?"

"You are my best friend, and I know you mean well, and I know you know what you are doing. But, your friends and I want do the helping. We do not want you to break the down any longer."

Robin stared at her long and hard, choosing his words carefully.

"Starfire, I appreciate what you're trying to do. But this is a family problem."

Starfire's hopeful expression died. Her eyes were becoming wet with tears, and Robin felt bad, but there was nothing he could do. A teardrop fell from her cheek, sliding down her chin, and hitting the floor with a loud thud that made Robin shiver. He would make it up to her after this whole thing was solved. He swore by that.

The Tamaranean backed away, looking at him sadly one last time before sliding the door open, and closed, leaving in the process.

Robin rubbed his temples and stared at a news article of Batman and Robin hanging on the wall. It seemed like so long ago when they were a team. Robin sighed, a feeling of sentimentality waved over him. Without another moment's hesitation, he opened a file that was resting on his desk, a file that he had not looked at in a long time, the file of Jason Todd.

A/N: For those of you who have never heard of Jason Todd, he's the second Robin (Teen Titans!Robin being the first). After being killed by The Joker, he comes back to life and goes under the alias of "Red Hood". A lot of people, including me, think "Red X" was based off "Red Hood", so that's how I'm structuring the story.