A snarl of fustration erupted from Raven's half curled lips as the door to her room slammed shut behind her with a deafening boom. She didn't care if the rest of the team heard her, she wanted Robin to know the extent of her rage. How dare he blame her for the loss of the last 'Hive Five'. Would he rather have a Batman copycat dead on the concrete?
A crackle like a roaring fire told the young girl that her powers were on edge, dancing energetically at the ends of her fingers, sending sparks off in little black lightning bolts. At avoid blowing up her priceless bookcase, she took deep breaths through her nose, then slowly letting the flow of air escape her lips. The crackles died down, if only by a little. The half demon had found that although she had more control over her powers and herself than she once did, the demon inside her demanded respect and constant attention and the more she released her powers, the easier it was to gain control over.
With a flick of her wrist, all the candles in the room burst into life, casting long eerie shadows of her few prized possessions.
Methodically the young girl sat ridge on the side of her queen size bed, bringing her legs inward into the locus stance. Although not the most comfortable position, it prevented her from falling asleep and the constant stiffness in her legs gave her muddled mind something to focus on. Counting breaths got titius very quickly.
Now that Raven had a clear enough mind, it started to roam back to the short fight a few hours ago, it had been the first real fight the team had had in months. It was a good feeling. The rawness of the new brusies she could welling up at the surface of her pale skin and the ache in her muscles made her feel alive. Since locking Dr Light up from good, no super-powered villians had graced the titans with an action packed day, only petty human crimes took up a few hours a week of the titans too abundant time.
At first this "holiday" seemed a life saver to the team. A time to unwind and get some well deserved rest. But old habits die hard. The team's delicately constructed livelihood and friendships were starting to strain and crack after their most reliable and team building activity of crime fighting became a distant memory.
Cyborg, the lovable half robot, the strongest cornerstone of the titans, reduced to rubble in time. After each battle, the half man was used to returning to his garage, full of ideas and plans for new gadgets and weapons to make their crime busting jobs easier. Updating existing gadgets to keep up the the villians ever expaning net of weapons and traps. Without the drive to do more for the team, Cyborg found he had little purpose anymore. But not wanting to come to terms with that miserable conclusion, the team often found him locked away in his room, making and tinkering with gadgets that seemed to no longer have purpose in the first place.
If Cyborg felt he had no purpose, then he had no idea what Robin was feeling. The workaholic showed all signs of withdrawal symptoms after only a few weeks of minimal criminal activity. He was losing his purpose as the leader of a crime fighting group with no crime to fight. Robin knew he should be happy, but something was missing. An itch constantly there, begging, no demanding, attention. It was like taking a warrior out of war and taking their sword away from them. But Robin wasn't one to face the facts, especially these facts. He would still drag his team into their normal routes of training and patrols, helping the police and visiting other titans. Acting as if everything that had happened in Paris had never happened.
Like everyone, Beast Boy had loved the new vacation from work. Endless undisturbed gaming time, pizza deliverys every night, mountainous pilles of movies to watch. But soon the gaming got boring, pizza became bland and the mountain of unwatched movies became a mountian of watched movies. The energetic, fun-loving titan was running out of things to do. His best friend locked inside his room and his control freak leader becoming even more short-tempered, Beast boy was left with no one to play with. Yes there is Starfire, but even she, with her flamboyant nature, began to drift away.
Even though Raven knew Starfire was one of the least affected by the lack of criminal active, she was affected by the way her team were dealing with this. The drifting away from each other was tearing the naturally social alian into pieces.
How did she know all this, you ask. Being able to read people's thoughts and feelings can be both a gift and a curse. She knew what was the problem with her team and how they were effected. But at the same she wish she didn't know, so she wouldn't feel this dreadful feeling when she saw how miserable they were and knew there was nothing she could do...
She will pay for this! Was the thought fueling Kyd's bruised body though the batterings he was getting from the sea. Each time a surge of salt water englufed him, he came back up spluttering and cursing, trying to restart his lost rythem each time. With only doggy paddel under his belt, it only added to his embarrassment which fueled his anger. Completely soaked and frozen, it took every fiber in his body to keep on course towards the giant 'T' hovering above him. If the long swim had been time to think of his plan, he had not taken advantage of that fact. He had never felt this much hate for someone for a very long time and it clouded his mind with evil thoughts of the cloaked girl, of stealing her last cookie and of leaving little spiked objects on the floor for her to stub her stupid big feet on.
Storming up to the double door with as much confidence he could muster, he gave it a menacing glare. A stand off between metal and flesh. The metal was the first to make its move, a red beam flashed, hitting him in the chest, moving its way up and down his body. A feeling of exposure made him want to wrap up in his cloak and teleport far, far away. But he didn't have his cloak. He stood tense, ready to run at the sight of twenty mechine guns all laser-pointed at him. The red beam disappeared. All of Kyd's muscles contracted. A second ticked by. The door made its final move.
A soft ping was emitted. The doors slid open effortlessly. "Welcome back, Raven." A soft feminine voice said softly.
The Wykkyd boy couldn't believe it, would not believe. The place were all villians were forbidden from, but all wanted to go. The hero's lair. Just opened its doors for him. Him! Before his head exploded with all his questions. He took his first step into the place where no villian dare go.
It had not been hard to navigate the long, dark halls of Titan tower, since the place was idiot proof with signs pointing this was for the Lounge, this was for the training room, this way for the medical room. But there was only one name he was looking for. Raven's.
The corridors were deserted as he casually made his way though his nemesis home, not a single soul inturrupted his hunt. Which suprised him. With a slightly clearer mind after entering the heated building, the realisation of what he was doing settled like a stone in his stomach. He couldn't just walts into her room, grab his cloak back, maybe punch her in the face for good measure and walts out again. He would be mad if he thought that would work. But it seemed to be his only option as another of his enemies loomed before him. Only this door was scarer as the words engraved in it sent shivers down his spine.
The material was soft between her fingers, but at the same time rigid. It was flexible but also sturdy as Raven tried to recreate the movement the batboy made when he used the fabric as a blade. Extending like wings, the cloak reached a further distance than she had expected, a deadly hazard in her small room as it sliced effortlessly halfway though her ancient wardrobe. Letting go, the black fabric became limp and slumped to the floor like any normal cloak would.
Rubbing away another migraine, Raven collapsed in a fustrated manner into the locus position on the floor. After what felt like ages of experimenting with the material, the only thing she could conclude was that it wasn't from Earth. How helpful. Time for a new technique. Laying the culprit of her fustration across her lap, she closed her eyes and focused her mind upon the very fibers of the cloak. Deeper into every strand of that fiber. Into every hair that makes up that fiber. Raven felt her eyebrows screw up in confusion, she had expected to find layers of the same material, only what she found was multiple fabrics, crisscrossing across each other. Raven wanted to dive deeper into its secrets but something stop her.
There was someone in her room.
Raven's eyes shot open and she twisted around quickly to confront the intruder. "Beast boy! how many t-" She cut off when her eyes locked on a pair of pupiless, red eyes. The boy looked tiny and scrawny without his cloak, what remained of it hung around his shoulders. He was frozen mid-swing, one of her mask sculptures raised over his head. Water dripped down his boots and a strong smell of salt filled the room. Both stayed rooted to where they were, eyes locked in a silent stand-off. His eyes were wide with shock, from what she could tell from his pupiless eyes. She broke eye contact to glance at her prized statue held over his head, ironically it was the sad face, her favourite one. How dare he break into her room and even think of useing her own statues to hurt her.
"Put. That. Back." Every word was spat with venon. He had picked the wrong day to mess with her.
When she noticed his eyes narrow, she was already moving out of the way. The stone statue came down with bone breaking force, Raven was pretty sure that if the floor was wasn't made of reinforced concrete under the rug, the impact would have left a dent.
She moved fast, much faster than him, that was for sure. After leaving his homemade weapon, he had to revert to hand to hand combat. The demon girl throw his precious cloak behind her onto the bed, freeing up her hands for the fight. Now all he had to do was get past her to it. Easier said than done. Her room wasn't exactly the open, spacious flat they had fought in just a few hours ago. This was constricted, cluttered with breakable objects and just a few walls away were her team mates. After a few minutes of trying to dance around her, throwing punches all the while, Kyd relised she wasn't using her powers, only the occasional sheild to stop a punch of his or stop a ornament from smashing on the ground. He guesses that she really didn't want to damage the artifacts in her room. Well too bad, he thought as he knocked over as many things as he could in his attempt to reach his most prized possessions. However the thought that the rest of the Teen Titans were just a room away frightened him. This had to be the quickest, quietest, most effective fight he had ever been in if he wanted to get out of this alive. But he would have to sacrifice 'quietest' if he wanted to get anywhere near the bed. However all the progess he gained by destroying her things was lost as the hooded girl drove him back with accurately aimed punches to the head and stomach. A trunk however prevented him retreating any further. A kick to the abdomen sent the small boy spirling over the trunk, knocking it over. The ancient trunk lid broke open upon Kyd landing onto it, and a large, bound white book fell out.
Gasping to try and reclaim his breath he lost from the impact, Kyd expected the girl to follow him, to hit him while he was down. However when he looked up, her eyes were not on him, but on the book laying beside him. Thinking fast and hopeing it would work, Kyd grabbed the book and threw it across the room. As he had hoped, Raven's violet eyes followed its flight. Taking advantage of her distraction, the boy jumped up, barrelled his way past her and practicly flew onto the bed. Kyd scooped up his cloak like it was a lost, old friend and cuddled it to his chest like his life depended on it, not able to hold back the genuine smile that spread over his lips. When he glanced over at the only other person in the room, he relised his life did depend on the material between his fingers from the look of pure hatred he was getting from the small girl. And he smirked mischievously.
Kyd Wykkyd quickly teleported away with a massive grin on his face that made Raven's blood boil just as her door smashed open.
"Dude! Did you have a party in here without us!" Beast boys high pitch voice sounded as she suspected they were surveying the messy chaos that was now her room. It was going to be a long evening, that was for sure.