"Umm, I'm not going to lie, I don't were anything is in this place; your guess is as good as mine." Bumble Bee said, looking from store to store trying to find one that deemed worthy of her time.
"What of you, friend Jinx? Do you know of the stores in the mall?" Starfire asked, eyes wide with wonderment at the variety of new and shiny things that hadn't been there during her last visit.
"Star, I don't know how to casually shop, I stole more things then I bought." Jinx admitted.
"So how do you get the things you need? Like, you needed to shop some time…right?" Bumble Bee asked, perplexed at the situation.
"Amazon; I try not to buy things from places I was caught stealing from." Jinx dead panned.
"What about you, Raven? Know any stores?" Bumble Bee asked, knowing the answer but thought of going for it anyway.
"I don't do malls; I'm not a fan of large groups of people." Raven replied.
"Well I do remember one place in which I have a great deal of fun; I could show you if you do not mind?" Starfire asked, and the others simply shrugged and followed the alien.
Raven paused once she had an idea of where the orange titan was taking them. Soon the others caught on - well it took Jinx a large bouncy castle to get it - but Raven knew from the emotion flying about that it was a large room full of small children.
Jinx leaned in closer to whisper to Raven, "is this a day-care? She didn't take a convicted felon and all around bad luck charm to a room full of compressed air and small children did she? She couldn't be that stupid…could she?"
"Stupid, no…naïve, yes, that she very well could be." Raven whispered back.
The children, upon seeing the Titans, or Starfire, took off in a mad dash to greet them. The deafening noise that was there calling card caused all but Starfire to cringe.
"Oh my god, why?" was all Raven could hear due to the noise that was already making her head throb in pain.
Bumble Bee, due to her experience with Mas Y Menos, got on one knee and begun talking to the children is a calm and quite manner "hey, shhhh, hey lets calm down a bit. My buddies have a bit of a headache so let's go play over there, okay?"
Many of the children were fascinated by the trio behind the hero turned babysitter, one even spoke up "Is that a cape, how does she get her hair like that…can I touch it, please?" The kid begged, not noticing the look of dread on their faces.
"I don't do kids, so ummm, can we go?" Jinx whispered to her counter part
"I don't do people. At all, but I think they would follow us if we ran." Raven dead panned, both not wanting to be there and understanding that there stuck.
"Says the girl who can fly." Jinx joked over the noise of kids who just realized Bumble Bee had wings.
"And leave you here all alone? I'm not that heartless." Raven kidded back.
"I think I can out run them; might look like I stole something but…who is calling me?" Jinx said as she reached for her phone, finger in her ear she begins to shout.
"What? It's loud in here, hold on I'm in my own little personal hell here, let me leave." With that Jinx began to walk out the doorway, the noise somehow unheard when the doors shut.
Raven could hear the man on the other side talk "ok, you're going to be kinda really mad, but first…do we need a toaster with four bagel slots or is just two ok?"
Jinx face when from playful talk to annoyance "Why would we need four, we never really used it, Jak are you stupid or do you like wasting my time? It's a toaster, I don't care."
"Yes I love wasting your time, it gets my rocks off…so I was in the mall and I saw this great toaster and I was all 'I needs it now' but I didn't know if we need four or if two bagel slots were all right. Don't get all hissy with me." Jak shot back.
"If you're following me…" Jinx let the threat carry.
"Give the phone to your better half, you are being quite unreasonable. I do not appreciate it." Jak said, growing a bit smug as the last words were said.
Jinx just handed the phone to Raven, who was just dumb founded.
"What is this about a toaster? Why do you need a new one?" Raven asked, hoping it would end quickly.
"Ok I went home after I got a call and noticed that the toaster was broken so I was all 'let's get a new one' so I went to the magic place to get things and thought I would be courteous to SOMEONE but no, can't do that, can I?" Jak said mater-of-factly.
"Just buy the toaster then, on a scale to one to ten how necessary was this?" Raven asked, exasperated at this point.
"ELEVEN AND A HALF, and I did. I bought a glass one to see the magic happen." Jak said as if this wasn't one of the dumbest things she ever heard, giving up, she handed the phone to Jinx.
"What the hell Jak, what the hell?" was all Jinx could say at the moment.
"Ok, I know but the other one melted, OH forgot. Don't come home, we were fire bombed…melted the shit out of the toaster" Jak explained.
"What do you mean we were fire bombed? Do we still have a house?" Jinx asked, her voice somewhat hesitant, as if she didn't want to know the answer.
"We never had a house silly, we live in a apartment." Jak joked his voice way to calm for the situation.
"NOT THE POINT" jinx yelled in to the phone.
Between laughter Jak said "the kitchen is shit. Hell the dining room is burnt to a crisp; took a good hour and a half for the fire department to even be called. You know that shitty birthday present I gave you?"
"The fire proof giant box thing you gave me? Why?" Jinx asked.
"You didn't happen to have all your important things there did you?" Jak asked, his voice finely serious.
"Where are you? Just tell me where you are. This isn't funny at all." Jinx shouted at him.
"I can see you now, your pink hair helps…why are you at a daycare?" Jak asked before he hung up the phone.
The two could smell smoke before they saw Jak, his once blond hair was covered in soot as well as his clothes. His shoes, more than likely Converse's, were blacked by ash, bits of it were all over him. The originally purple V-neck was now riddled with what was likely most of what was once his home.
"What's up fruit cup?" Jak shot to the girls, who were amazed that he did in fact have a box in one hand, which was now also coved in soot as well.
Jinx looked at his face, tear stains on his cheek, which frightening Jinx. Jinx had seen him cry once, and that took two cans of tear gas and a tazer to his calf. On a scale on one to ten this was now in the 'oh shit' section.
"How bad is it?" Raven asked after the not so brief silence over took the three outside of the day-care, which ironically was just radiating so much happiness that Raven found it hard to be sombre.
"Don't think about it, it's a buzz kill. Random question; why is the green guy crying in a chair?" Jak asked, walking backwards through the doors of the day care.
"Well since you brought it up, that 'little gem' you told me turned out to be a bomb shell, I thought I was proving a point not ruining a life, dick" Jinx whispered as to not teach small children a new word.
"If she wasn't handing it out like it was free candy maybe she wouldn't be in that predicament. She made her bed, to bad someone already slept in it. If you get what I'm saying." Jak argued, having to beat around the bush to keep innocent children innocent.
"So you're saying that her and Slade…" Raven asked, more out of disbelieve than an urge to know.
"Word around the camp fire, yup. An apprenticeship with a bit more bang for your buck, other than the whole pedophilia thing, but yea." Jak spoke receiving a glare from Raven for his use of a certain word.
"Appropriate? Really couldn't have chosen a different word there man?" Jinx asked, aware that he was being glared daggers.
"If looks could kill, but come on, do you really expect a bunch of little kids to understand the word, in fact she had potty mouth first," Jak wined, point a finger at Jinx.
"Don't point fingers at me smokey, I'm not the one walking in to a day-care smelling like a forest fire." Jinx shot back.
"Ohhh, you're lucky this toaster is made of glass or I would throw it, hard" Jak said a bit too loudly and Bumble Bee happened to hear him threaten Jinx.
"What was that big man? You starting something? 'Cus I will finish it" Bumble Bee threatened.
"Calm down girl scout, what are you going to do? Pull my hair? Psh, I just escaped a burning building. Your worst nightmare, I call it a Tuesday so shhh, all right." Jak threatened back, either not knowing how this would end or not caring.
"Tell me this man; what's your name? I want to know what to put on the tombstone." Bumble bee rebutted, using flight as a way to gain a few inches on soot covered fool.
"Wanna know what I learned in the core?" Jak joked at the now red faced heroine
"What ,do tell what?" Bumbled Bee half screamed
"How to hit a woman, hint hint, it rhymes with 'in the mace'. So back off home girl." Jak yelled back, children now looking agape, neither frightened nor indifferent. One could almost say expedient would be the right term.
With that Bee swung, her somewhat small fist connecting solidly with Jak's jaw, rendering him unconscious, laid out on the floor.
A small child walked up to the still puffing hero and spoke. "Yeah I didn't like him either, he smelled like smoke, ewww."
The group stood there debating on what to do with the unconscious man, it was a tie between leave him there to come to and put him in the T-car until he woke up.
"We need to do something, sparing until one sleeps is quite unhealthy." Starfire said, not getting why he was hit in the first place.
"Talkin' back to Bee is apparently dangerous too." Raven joked.
"HAHAHA…cute." Came from the floor, as the once silent man awakened.
"Problem solved, looks like we don't have to do anything…Jak, leave." Jinx demanded.
"Oh I am, to my second home, you know the number feel free to never call, oh and homey D, that's one hell of a right hook you got there." Jak complimented as he got up, noticing the not so small stains now on the floor.
"So, we can leave now? I think it's all ok at this point to go back." Bumble Bee commented.
"Yeah I guess, where did Star go?" Raven asked, wanting to leave before someone realized what had just transpired there.
"Bouncy castle, I think." Jinx said, looking at said area.
Indeed she was there, and within the few seconds she was in there Starfire managed to get in to a game of ring around rosie.
"No wonder you don't go anywhere, it's between the 'boy's club' and this. How did you survive?" Jinx whispered in to Raven's ear, somehow the whispering sensual, whether it was Raven's mind or Jinx intention the empath couldn't tell, all she knew that today was a long day.
A/N well it only took forever for this to get done, had to get a new laptop witch took much longer than expected, but feel free to throw some motivational words at me if my pace isn't quite up to your speed, but yes working on the next chapter as I finish this one…