"Come in Raven," Beast Boys voice sounded at her side. She snatched her communicator and opened it.
"What."
"No need to be bitchy," Beast Boy snapped. "Look, Robin wants you to go meet the new guy at the Tower since you missed out yesterday. Where were you, anyway?" Beast Boy asked, curious.
"Class," Raven lied quickly. She scolded herself- what use were years and years of training in mental fortification if she couldn't convincingly lie out loud? She had most likely missed the call while in the shower, which wasn't her fault, but if she was being honest, she had never before intentionally left it in a place where she couldn't hear it. By the time she'd received Robins message, it had been too late.
"Riiiight, cause that's the most important part of our mission, our education."
"Why does he want me to do it?" She demanded, "Cyborg's the only one who knows what tests to run."
"Cy's taking radiation readings of Andrews melted model this morning. They're still on campus. He'll meet you there, but Robin doesn't want David to show up with no one there."
"Why doesn't he do it himself?" Raven wanted to ask why Robin wasn't telling her this himself, but she knew the answer to that one. The connection between the two was especially faint- now Robin was hiding from her.
"He wants you to get a read on him. You know, with your mind trick stuff."
"Fine." She hung up before Beast Boy could deliver any more information.
She pulled a T-shirt over her head. Taking a moment to concentrate, she absorbed her body and phased through the ground.
David nearly leapt out of his skin when she appeared next to him on the front lawn of Titan Tower.
"Are you coming?" She didn't care that she was being short- she didn't feel any of the fear Andrew had expressed coming from David, so she felt free to remain in her bad mood. She heard him following but didn't bother to wait, pressing her palm against the door panel and stepping inside.
"So you have super-hearing?" She asked dryly, opening the elevator and stepping inside. "That's an unusual mutation for radioactive exposure." She ran her fingers through her damp hair, shaking water from the ends.
"That's what the others said," David replied conversationally, joining her. She took the opportunity to eyeball him— he had clearly taken time to do his hair in the morning, and his leather bag and boots looked fairly expensive. "I didn't even know our school had had radiation exposure."
"It was covered up," She said. As the elevator rose, he kept adjusting thick-framed glasses perched jauntily on his nose. When the doors slid open, she walked so briskly down the hall that David had to speed up, though she was much smaller than him.
"So, uh, what kinds of tests are you doing? Andrew said you did this thing with a metal detector?"
"It's a heavy metal detector." Raven replied. "We'll have to wait for Cyborg. I'm just the doorman."
"Look, I know you're busy," David said hurriedly, picking up on her annoyance. "I'm sorry this was such short notice, it's really the only time I don't have classes."
Raven felt bad- David wasn't responsible for her mood and didn't have to bear to brunt of it.
"It's fine," She sighed, uncertain if she had managed to achieve a reassuring tone. "It's my job."
"You can look around," she offered, "but don't touch anything."
David looked intrigued, nodded, and began to poke around the lab. Raven sat on a cold steel table and tried to calm her emotions.
As Cyborg seemed to be taking his sweet time, she thought it was as good a time as any to try to get a read on David. She waited until he was out of sight behind some equipment, and then sat quietly in a chair. She sent her mind out into the lab, searching for David's.
She realized she couldn't find him.
She stood up quickly, alarmed. She sent her mind out in all directions, searching for the telltale supernova of emotions that comprised the human mind. Nothing. A sense of dread crept into her chest— no one's mind flew under her radar, not even aliens. No one that wasn't extremely powerful, and extremely dangerous.
Raven summoned up black matter from the space around her, carrying its comforting warmth in her hands as she stepped through Cyborgs lab. The machines towered above her, some reaching to the ceiling, obscuring her view. She listened hard with her ears and her mind, every nerve in her body tingling.
There was a metal clatter to her right. She spun and realized, too late, that it had been a diversion. From the other side came David's fist, colliding with her temple and knocking her to the ground.
Raven hit the floor, stunned by the starbursts in front of her eyes. She shook her head violently, trying to clear them. Before she could, David started kicking her. She counted, one, two, three kicks to her chest and stomach, each sending her a little ways across the floor until she hit the wall.
Raven pulled herself out of the pain and into her mind. Her body was using her arms in a vain attempt to protect itself- the dark matter had faded from her grip. She turned her head, locking eyes with David's, which were suddenly alive with manic energy.
Her eyes rolled back in her head, and she blasted him. David flew across the room. When he landed, he didn't move.
"Son of a btch," Raven muttered, coming back into her body so that she could stand. Sharp pains radiated from her mid-section as she moved. Gritting her teeth, she stood against the wall. David was thirty feet away, lying still.
She looked around the room, breathing heavily. Her communicator had disappeared from her belt during the assault- she spotted it nearby. Using tables and machines for support, she made her way painfully over to where David lay. She tested the air around him with her mind, still not hearing a single thing.
His eyes were open, staring straight up into nothingness. She felt panic rear inside of her until she squashed it- she hadn't aimed to kill. Painfully lowering herself to his side, she bent over him, placing two fingers over the artery in his neck.
The pulse was rapid, pounding against her fingers. Her eyes fell to his. She yanked her head back and heard the click of his switchblade.
He felt her blood seep onto his fingers. He watched her eyes as they flickered, and her body slumped against his. He held her gaze. Only when the dark matter faded from her grip did he remove his blade from her side. He shoved her light frame out of the way and sat up- curse words and death threats streamed incoherently from her mouth, but she stayed on the ground. Machines hummed in the silence that followed.
He stood, feeling dizzy. Now he had a problem. There was no keeping his cover after this. Reluctantly, he pulled out his cell phone.
"I- I think I've been compromised."
"Dam straight, motherfuc-" David ignored her. Her words were barely more than a whisper, anyways.
"Can you repair your cover?"
The voice was asking if he could modify enough minds to continue his work.
"I don't think so. When they come there will be too many to do at once."
He listened to the silence. It seemed like eternity before the voice spoke.
"You will stay there. You will take out as many of them as you can. If you survive, you may return." The line went dead.
His blood was running cold. He had just been told, essentially, to commit suicide by Titan. There was no way he would survive an attack by all four of the remaining enemies. He was only halfway through training, for crying out loud! No other student had ever had to take on their full force during their internships!
He tried to think, fighting off panic. He'd already taken down one Titan- she would bleed out by the end of the day. But the other four…
Perhaps the H.I.V.E. would forgive him if he brought them a gift. He knew who was likely to come for her first- rooting around in the minds of her teammates David had uncovered the emotions in the leader that Robin kept secret, even from himself.
Pocketing the cell phone, he bent and pulled the Titans handcuffs from her belt. Taking her wrists, he dragged her a short distance to a table, leaving streaks of red on the smooth floor. She was quiet, the muscles in her jaw clenching tight. Snapping a cuff on one wrist and passing the chain behind a table leg, he cuffed the other. She groaned slightly but remained still, lying on one side. He then crossed the room, snatching up the communicator. It was beeping- someone had tried to call her already. He didn't have much time.
Dropping the communicator on the floor, he raised a boot and smashed it.
DOC MANAGER WONT LET ME PUT A DIVIDER IN
Robin was feeling anxious, and it was Ravens fault again. She hadn't answered his first call- he knew she would be at the tower by now and wanted to know what her read was on David.
"Dude, if she found something bad, wouldn't she have called you?" Cyborgs arm was in pieces, his detached hand methodically cleaning the parts of the sonar canon. Turns out, the radioactivity present in Andrews model had triggered a full shutdown of Cyborgs mechanical parts- he had texted David to reschedule their meeting.
"She should make a report either way." Cyborg looked up at the tone in Robins voice.
"What is up with you two?" He asked, eyebrow raised. "One minute we're all waiting on you to start making out, the next you're avoiding each other. Did you two bang?"
"No!" Robin snapped. "We didn't bang. I don't know what's wrong with her."
"Sure, it's obviously something wrong with her."
"Both of us, okay? Leave it alone, Cyborg."
"Why should I?" Cyborg shook his head as his hand attached the last few pieces on his arm. He stood and deployed the cannon, checking the sights. "You're not calling her right now because of whatever's going on- you're letting it affect our job."
"I'm calling her right now," Robin stood and stormed into the hallway, making for the stairwell. He angrily pulled out his communicator, glanced at the screen, and stopped in his tracks.
"Robin!" Cyborg came barreling out of the room. "Raven's communicator!"
"I know," Robin stared at the Alert, letters flashing in bright red, that told him Ravens communicator had suffered critical damage.
"Get the others," he commanded as they ran down the hall. He took the stairs four at a time, Cyborg at his heels. They burst from the door. "Get to the tower!"
"We'll meet you there!"
"And trigger a lock down at the tower!" Robin shouted after him as they parted ways at the landing. "No one without a code goes in or out!"
Robin sprinted across the street to where his motorcycle was parked. Adrenaline started the engine, and he roared off in the direction of Jump City.