Chapter Two
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She was looking at him but not really seeing him. Her eyes were glassy and distant, and they possessed changing hues as she gazed on. Now, Beast Boy had seen his fair share of the wild and crazy things Raven could do, but he definitely hadn't seen this trick before. Her shoulders slumped a little and her hand gripped the doorframe, bracing herself as she swayed on her feet. He started to move forward to steady her when her free hand shot up, stopping him. He froze, arms outstretched, waiting. She took a shuddering breath and her lips began moving, mouthing out words she was saying too quickly and too softly for him to understand. The natural response would have been to let her do whatever it was she was doing, but the sickly color of her skin and the shiver in her shoulders made Beast Boy uncomfortable. He wanted to grab her and physically still her like he would have done for anyone, but Raven was different. Raven had always been different. When strange things happened to her the Titans had learned to let them play out first; a lesson that had tried each and every one of their patience many times over, only for things to work out in the end.
This, Beast Boy tried to convince himself, would hopefully be one of those times.
Her words began to slow down, her whispers becoming clearer. Without warning she pulled in a deep gasp and said five words with vivid clarity.
"Nunc Lento Sonitu Dicunt…Novo."*
There was a pause, another deep breath. She blinked slowly and then seemed to suddenly see him anew, her expression changing from dazed to comprehensive and then content. A grin, no a smile lifted her lips. No, not even a smile anymore. She was positively beaming at him now, her eyes looking much, much lighter in color; not so much violet as they were fuchsia. Different, yet oddly familiar. She sighed happily and let out a small laugh, standing up straighter in the doorway. All the frailty she had been exuberating moments ago was completely gone, and the color of life had flushed back into her cheeks.
Beast Boy would have probably been less afraid if she had started glowing red and breathing fire.
"Sorry," she said enthusiastically, running both hands through her hair. "You totally caught me halfway through the transfer. That was, seriously, one of the weirdest feelings ever. It was like this thing was on autopilot," she said, plucking at her uniform and shrugging. "What a rush!" She flashed another happy smile at him but then wavered a bit as she took note of Beast Boy's frozen stance, wide-eyed stare, and petrified eyes. She lifted a hand to her mouth and giggled at the sight of him.
Giggled.
"Are you okay?" she asked, raising an inquisitive eyebrow. Beast Boy's eyes flicked from her face, to the floor, to the ceiling and then back to her again. The Tower was still standing, the earth hadn't been torn apart to swallow humanity as a whole, and Raven looked like Raven, but this couldn't possibly be the same girl. Raven didn't tilt her head like that, or talk like that, or touch her hair. Ever. "BB?" And Raven never called him that. "You're cute when you're awkward." And Raven definitely never called him cute.
Beast Boy's arms dropped to his sides, his lower jaw jutting out in confusion, his eyes narrowing. "What's wrong with you?" he demanded. "What happened to you? What the hell was that just now?" He pointed at her face. "And why are you so cheerful?"
"Oh, well excuse me," she said mockingly. "I apologize for feeling fantastic."
"You never feel fantastic," he shot back. "You feel 'fine'. You always say that you're 'fine', never 'fantastic'. I've never heard you use that word in a positive connotation. What happened?" he repeated, his distressed demeanor apparently amusing to Raven. "Was it that noise from earlier? Did you get attacked? Are you possessed?" He slipped past her and bounded into her room, looking around determinedly for any sort of foul play or depiction of a horrendous crime scene, but it was no use in the darkness. "Wow, turn off the lights, it's so bright in here," he grumbled sarcastically. Behind him Raven giggled.
Again.
He flinched at the sound.
"I was just about to fix that." There was a breath of wind and all the candles in the room illuminated, filling the area with flickering, soft light and revealing that the source of the noise had been her dresser drawer: it lay face down on the floor in the center of the room, its edges chipped and splintered. "Oh yeah, and that was an accident. Sorry!" She floated around Beast Boy and lifted her hand towards the dresser. It rose back onto its legs, reassembled itself, and then settled against the wall. "My powers sort of fluctuate when the transfer happens. Usually I'm more concentrated, but it's like, four in the morning, and we had that battle, and the healing kind of pooped me out, and I was just completely not in the zone today." She ran her fingers through her hair again and they got caught in the tangles. "And I'm also appalled at the fact that I probably look totally hag right now." She wrinkled her nose at Beast Boy before turning towards the mirror hanging on the wall and picking up a brush. Behind her Beast Boy stared in shock, lips pursed and eyes wide.
"I'm not really sure what to address first," he finally said slowly as the weirdly animated and now humming Raven began brushing at her hair. "This 'transfer' you keep mentioning, you brushing your hair, you humming, or you saying things like 'totally hag' or 'pooped out'. See? Even imagining you saying those words doesn't make sense, but you actually said them and yet I still can't believe it happened-…."
Raven met his eyes in the mirror and winked. "You're also cute when you're forgetful, BB."
"There! That too! When do you ever call me that? Or say that to me? And what does 'transfer' mean? Transferring what? What do you transfer that's making you act so strange?" He was completely lost. Only moments ago they had been bantering back and forth in the kitchen, him with a prankster's flair and her with a chillingly composed countenance. Now she was talking in a voice that was a few notes too high and grinning like it was the most natural thing in the world. It was such a drastic change, and usually drastic changes in Raven's moods weren't a good thing.
There was a long, thoroughly uncomfortable silence that stretched out between them, one that caused her smile to falter and diminish completely as they stared at each other through the mirror. She turned back around to face him fully, her sunny attitude gone.
"Are you…are you serious? Do you really have no idea what I'm talking about?"
"Oh no, I do."
She grinned. "You do?"
"No! I was joking, of course I don't!"
She frowned again. "So you don't know?"
"No, I do not know."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "Really?"
"Okay, we're not getting anywhere," he said, looking around as if hoping to find a third party in the room to help him understand the situation. "What happened to the moody, stoic and smart Raven that I'm used to?"
"Well, she's obviously not here," Raven said, shrugging. Beast Boy's brow furrowed deeper.
"Huh?"
She sighed, a stale half-smile gracing the corner of her mouth. She ran her hands through her hair, again. It was becoming distracting, and not in a good way. "Oh, Rae," she breathed, saying her own name with such weight; an action that did little in the sense of comfort. "Sometimes…ugh. Sometimes I just get on my last nerve, you know? Like, seriously, could I be more of a loner? Raven, you can be so uptight."
"Wow, okay. Well, glad you're finally able to admit that, but this arguing with yourself bit is kind of freaky." It was probably the first time in never that Beast Boy had been the one to be irritated with Raven, but she was acting, (there was no other word for it), ditzy. Unfocused. Way too carefree. Uncontrolled. Laughing at his jokes and brushing her hair. Winking and speaking with the vocabulary of someone from the streets of Jump City rather than the monasteries of Azarath. Talking in riddles like some cryptic debutante.
She twirled a strand of her hair around one finger, looking at him through her lightened eyes. "Beast Boy," she said. "Take a good, long look at me. You've seen me before."
"No duh."
"I'm serious!" She floated over to him and hovered before his face, looking him dead in the eyes. "A real look. You know me. I'm not just Raven. I'm…I'm me."
His gaze was riddled with skepticism, but he forced himself to try and think. Where had he seen those eyes before? Or heard that godforsaken giggle? It hadn't been the first time he had heard Raven giggle, but it definitely wasn't often. It was rare. Extremely rare. Once in a blue moon.
Or, more specifically, once in an unfortunate encounter within the depths of a mysterious and powerful hand mirror all those years ago…
"Oh my god," he cried, his surprise marred by the monotone of his voice. Realization, it seemed, had robbed him of pitch. "You're not the real Raven! You're one of Raven's emotions." He pointed at her, shocked. "You're…you're Happy Raven!"
Raven beamed. "I knew you wouldn't completely forget about me."
"But how…what…why are you out?" he demanded, scanning the room, searching for the hand mirror. His eyes locked onto the object sitting silently on the bed, as if it had been tossed aside after its use. "Did you escape? What did you do with Raven?"
"I am Raven."
"I meant the real Raven!"
"Are you saying any one of Raven's sides aren't real?"
"You know what I mean!" Beast Boy exclaimed. She made a face at his short temper. "Where is she? Did you trap her inside here?" He rushed to the bed and picked up the mirror, staring into its surface as if he would see the Titan caged inside and banging against the glass to be let out. The tangible Raven just rolled her eyes and flew over to him, gently pulling the mirror from his grasp.
"No, I did not trap her inside her own mind," she said calmly, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "She let me out. Willingly."
Beast Boy blinked. "What?"
She sighed and folded her legs under herself, wrapping her cloak around her body. "I'm a little peeved that I—well, I guess, she—didn't tell anyone about this before. That's oddly irresponsible of us, you know? What if something bad had happened, or we needed help? I was never really a fan of our tendency for secrecy."
"Happy Raven," Beast Boy said lowly, looking stern. Raven grimaced.
"You make me sound like a gnome," she complained. "Can you just call me Rae? I always kind of liked that."
He waved the comment aside, ignoring the impulse to laugh. "Stop that. Tell me why you're out here and the real Raven isn't. Now."
"Well all right then, Robin," she recited, sticking her tongue out at him. He had the grace to at least look sheepish.
"All right, sorry. Please tell me why you're out here and the real Raven isn't. At your discretion. Preferably now."
"Better. Kind of." She rolled her eyes at him but spoke anyways. "You might want to sit down for this. It's a long story."
Beast Boy grumbled a complaint but sat down on the bed anyway. Rae offered him a reassuring grin, but his features remained stone. "By all means, please begin," he said blandly.
"I think it was a month or two ago that Starfire was talking to me—us—about control and focus. We were having a, I guess you could say, difficult time controlling our other sides."
"Don't you always?"
"More so than usual," she said, and the remark held a dark undertone that seemed to not sit well with the happy Raven. "We started meditating with Star more, trying to regain full control, but it wasn't working as well as it used to. Suppressing things was starting to become harder, so Starfire came up with an alternative solution.
"Essentially both Star's powers and ours reside in our emotions, although it's just a difference between black and white. Starfire lets her emotions out to use her powers; righteous fury and the freedom of flight, you know. And we keep our emotion in to use ours. Anyway, Star and I were talking and the real Raven was telling her that it was putting a lot of strain on her mind to keep her emotions in check." She looked suddenly guilty. "After a while, all of us start to act like any other caged being: we get restless and antsy and it gets harder and harder for the real Raven to keep us under her control. So, Starfire suggested that, instead of meditating to keep all of us in, why not try meditating to let some of us out?"
"There's no way she agreed to do that," Beast Boy interrupted. Rae smiled a little, nodding in agreement with him.
"You know her well. The real Raven squashed that idea but quick, so Star let it go. Ironically, we didn't. Raven kept thinking about it, and the more and more she did, the more appealing and more logical the idea seemed. Maybe it was a little of me and a little bit of Bravery that helped make the final decision, but eventually the real Raven felt optimistic enough to actually give it a try."
"Raven decided to let go of her emotions?" Beast Boy asked, flabbergasted. "That's insane."
"Is it?"
"Well, yeah. She's all about control. Where would she get the idea that loosening her grip would help her out?"
"I don't know," Rae said with false wonderment. She stared pointedly at him. "From where or from whom could she have ever gotten that idea?"
Beast Boy threw up his hands in defense. "Hey, I'd try and get her to watch a movie or play a game, not unhinge the hierarchy of her mindset!" He shot her a glare that she ignored.
"We're not completely unhinged. We started off super cautious. Only myself, Timid and Knowledge were let out in the beginning, and only for a few minutes each day. Raven knew that of her sides, we'd be the less troublesome for her, and the most unlikely to take advantage of the situation to venture out and do whatever we so chose. But those few minutes each day did absolute wonders for her mentality. She actually slept for a whole night afterwards; isn't that wild? She rarely gets any sleep at all.
"So we started a set routine. Every time we meditate she lets one of us out for about twenty minutes to, basically, stretch. We get full control of this body to release our pent up energy, so long as we don't take an uncharacteristic advantage. At first she confined us to the solitude of this room, but as the weeks kept on and the stress began to lessen, we found more of us receiving more freedom. Bravery went out once during a training session, and Knowledge came out three times when we played chess with Cyborg. I've come out a few times when Starfire is around and wants to talk. Hm, funny. I was wondering why she'd shoot me confused looks sometimes. I can't believe she didn't catch on."
"Star's optimistic. She was probably just excited that you opened your door," Beast Boy replied offhandedly. He leaned his elbows on his knees and stared at the floor, thinking. Rae turned the hand mirror over and over in her lap, the jewels along its frame glinting in the candlelight. Outside birds started chirping, betraying that the new day was not but an hour away.
"Hard to process?" she asked quietly. Beast Boy scoffed.
"That's an understatement." He looked over at her, his expression a mixture of conflicting emotions. He opened his mouth to ask something, hesitated, and then closed it again. A moment paused before he tried again, although it wasn't the first question he had wanted to pose. "So…where's the real Raven during all of this?" he asked. "Is she still there, listening or something?" he asked, waving his hand around her head. She laughed and swatted his hand to the side.
"No. She's in our mindscape, meditating. When she relinquishes control of her body it leaves her time to truly clear her mind and focus completely on meditation."
"Raven never gives up complete control," Beast Boy stated, speaking with all seriousness.
"I know. But she has. And she did, and I don't blame her for wanting to do so over and over again. It alleviates her stress, and she has such a better hold on emotions that would have otherwise been difficult to restrain." She stretched her arms over her head, the mirror still in her hands. "I imagine it's like breathing fresh air after being cooped up all day. Handling a splintered mind can be troublesome. It must be such a relief for her to not have to worry for a few minutes at a time." She flopped backward onto the bed, her legs swinging in the air before plopping over the edge. "Not to mention how great it feels to really get out once in a while."
Beast Boy twisted around to look down at happy Raven, stretched out along her bed. So that was why she seemed so much more at ease. He could imagine the weight of trying to control oneself to get old fast, and so to just let go would be a much needed blessing. If her emotions could express themselves openly more often, then they wouldn't be so desperate for any opening for release…that meant Raven could laugh without Happiness wanting to explode at the chance, or Raven could talk without Timid or Sadness bursting forward at the smallest opportunity.
"I didn't fly for almost a week once," he started to say randomly. Rae lifted her head to look at him. "And then one day I was on the roof and I took one look over the edge and just jumped off. Everyone freaked out because I kind of just fell freely for a bit. I morphed at the last minute and nearly clipped myself on the rocks along the water." He looked up, shrugging. "I never deprived the flying animals inside of me their sky for long after that. Same with the creatures that needed to swim or climb or run. It wasn't really fair. And I didn't want to spontaneously jump off any more buildings."
Rae's smile was so bright and genuine that he couldn't help but return it. "She remembers that," she said simply. Beast Boy nodded and knew that, although the story had been random, it had perfectly portrayed the fact that he understood.
"So what happens when you're out here and she's in there?" he asked, indicating the mirror. "Like, for instance, does she know I'm here?"
"Nope," she replied, and he sighed in relief. "Like I said, she's gotten comfortable enough to give over everything. It's me and it's all me right now. Anything I do, all the memories that I make, will essentially be hers but she wouldn't be able to recall them easily. They'd stay with my side of her mind and be nothing more than a déjà vu to her. A buried recollection."
"Talk about segregation," he mumbled. "Does that work the other way, then?" he asked curiously. Raven sat up on her elbows, grinning wildly at him.
"No, sir. We know everything Raven knows and are aware of everything the complete Raven experiences. Like what happened in the alley, or the kitchen." She sat up. "I never knew you had such a big crush on us."
"Whoa, whoa, that's, uh…no, that's not really it," he stammered, unready for the sudden shift in conversation. He was still stuck on the idea that the Raven he knew was relaxing in the far reaches of her own mind and letting her happy-go-lucky side of herself run amuck with a hair brush. "That's all just in good fun between us. I just joke. Raven and I, we joke."
"That's a funny way to joke," Rae said coyly, shooting Beast Boy an unconvinced look. "Even between friends. You don't joke with Starfire like that."
"Have you met Robin?"
That just made her laugh.
"Well, whatever the reason for your…teasing…I think it's kind of my obligation to tell you that it's, well, getting out of hand."
"What? You too?" Beast Boy groaned audibly and let himself slip off the bed comically, landing in a heap on the floor. Rae laughed again, heartily and loud. Comedy was always his easiest scapegoat in an awkward situation.
He rose to his knees on the floor, leaning his upper body on the bed and looking at her. She was sitting cross-legged now, grasping her ankles and smiling at him. "Is it really?" he asked, somewhat sincere. "Honestly, I didn't know. I thought we were okay."
"Oh no, don't get the wrong idea," she quickly said, reaching out to touch his hand. He jerked a little, his first initial reaction to pull out of her range, but it seemed rude so he let her. It was weird because it was Raven, but at the same time, it wasn't. "I'm loving it! Like I told you before, I always thought your jokes were funny, BB. Now I, or rather she, can show it more. So it's okay, at least on the surface."
"But," he prompted, knowing that there was a huge one that followed her initial statement. Rae's smile dropped and she pursed her lips, thinking about what she was going to say next.
"The real trouble we're having isn't with any of the normal sides. Stress builds with us, but never to the point where it physically hinders the real Raven."
"So, who's causing the trouble?" Beast Boy prompted. She grimaced.
"Something…well. Hm." She bounced her knee as she tried to find the words to explain what she needed to say. "You know," she started, "even though the teasing and the touching is light and funny…well, we're still human." She tugged absently at her hair. "And we're still a girl." Beast Boy just shrugged, not understanding her meaning. "And we've been…kind of deprived."
"Deprived of what?"
"Affection." She raised her eyebrows, hoping he'd understand. He didn't and just shook his head. Happy Raven suddenly didn't look so happy anymore. "BB, when you deprive something, it starves," she all but whispered. "So then, when you give it a taste, it becomes ravenous."
"Okay." She looked at him with expectancy but he just stared back quietly. She sighed. Beast Boy waited.
"BB, remember the last time you saw me?" she asked sweetly, tilting her head coyly to the side. He narrowed his eyes and gave her a half-smile, half-grimace.
"Yeah, that was an interesting day," he said, remembering how he had been at his awkward stage in life and the Happy Raven had insisted they hold hands all the way to the Tower…much to his embarrassment.+
Raven wrinkled her nose at him. "Don't act like you didn't like it." She shifted her position on the bed to lie on her stomach, right in front of his face. "I like you, BB," she said. Beast Boy cocked an eyebrow at her, grinning.
"Really?" he asked sarcastically. She nodded. "So, what does that mean? Does that mean just you like me, or does all of Raven like me?" He tried not to sound as intrigued as he really was. Out of curiosity, of course. Nothing more.
"That's not really the point I was trying to make," she said dramatically, rolling her eyes and completely avoiding his question. "What I was gearing towards was that…there's two sides to every coin, something you probably know better than anyone. Don't you ever have trouble separating your human side and your animal side?"
He shrugged. "Not so much. Like I said, if I let the creatures exercise what comes naturally to them, then I'm pretty much okay. When I was younger, I guess I did. And, you know, in battle."
"Because it gets your blood pumping and your basic instincts start to kick in, right?" she said lowly, her gaze dropping as she traced her fingertips over the fabric of her bedspread. Beast Boy looked down at her hands.
"Yeah."
"And when you want to attack an enemy, you have to remind your animal side to not take it too far, right? Your human morals have to override natural animalistic instinct."
Beast Boy hesitated before finally saying, "Yes."
She took in a very deep breath then, deeper than normal. Her hands started to shake and he reached out for her wrists, trying to steady her shaking. They looked up at each other, eyes meeting, and the lightness in her stare was swirling like it had moments ago when she had first appeared at the door. Beast Boy quickly withdrew his grasp and pushed off the bed.
"I know it may seem strange," she said in an eerily offbeat tone. "But Raven has an animalistic side too." Her body went unnaturally still and her eyes went blank, staring off into nothing. Beast Boy jumped to his feet, alarmed.
"Rae?"
"Raven…" she rasped, her voice tired and dead and monotonous. She slowly laid her head down on the bed and rolled lazily onto her back, her arms over her head, her eyes unblinking. "Raven…."
"Wh…what are you doing?" he asked, sounding very much like a clueless boy. She just lay supine, the once competent Raven instantaneously diminished to an unseeing shell. She inhaled and started muttering to herself again, just like she had done in the doorway earlier.
"Wow," Beast Boy groaned quietly, running a nervous hand over his face, his head shaking. "Sometimes, Rae, you can be so inconsiderate."
Transfer. It had to be that. After everything Happy Raven had explained to him he would have to be an idiot to not figure it out. He didn't really understand how she had gone into transfer mode so immediately, nor was he too keen to know the details of it, but it would seem rude to just leave in the middle of the process. He figured he would wait it out, maybe say hello to whatever new emotion popped out, and then be on his way.
But on the bed Raven seemed to be having a better time with the transfer than before. She was writhing around on her back in slow, sensual motions, as if she thoroughly enjoyed the softness of her bed. Her hands gripped the bedspread and she let out a low, almost inaudible moan. But Beast Boy heard it. And Beast Boy was watching it all happen. And Beast Boy was getting a little more uncomfortable than he would have thought…and for completely unexpected reasons.
Then Raven's mouth opened and her eyes widened and she gasped. A candle burst into smoke and wax near the dresser and the door slammed shut with a resonating bang. Raven went rigid, screamed, blinked once, and then sat up straight to face the opposite wall. She stopped moving. Seemed to have stopped breathing. Nothing more than a sudden statue.
Silence stretched out in the room.
Beast Boy was frozen to his spot, at a loss at what he should do.
Her shoulders slowly began to move and breath returned to her body. She turned her head to the left slightly. Her arms rested at her sides. She spoke to him, and her voice sounded sinister.
"Finally."
Beast Boy wondered vaguely if there was a manual on how to deal with Raven and her powers. He knew she wasn't completely out of the ordinary for him, (was there such a thing as an ordinary superhero?), but Raven's powers were so much more foreign to him than most others. His DNA was unstable, his best friend was more machine than man, he hung out with an alien and he listened to a guy who wore a cape. But Raven was much more than a girl who could do magic; she was half-demon and had to deal with struggling with her own emotions in order to use her abilities. Which meant that there were times when she would lose those struggles. Beast Boy had been there at those times, and now, after seeing her gasp and writhe on a bed, he figured this could probably be one of those times again.
And ninety percent of those times had ended in almost complete and utter disaster.
"Rae." He walked around the bed slowly to see her face. When he stood before her she looked up at him and her eyes—her eyes that were usually so collected, calming and comforting—were smoldering in their sockets. They were no longer fuchsia, nor were they their normal violet color. They were black, and it was startling. "Are you the real Raven or are you…part Raven?" It sounded ridiculous even as he said it.
"Part?" She reached up and touched her neck, her eyes never leaving his face. "Just a part?" He watched her carefully as she looked down at her fingertips, touched her cheek. Looked at her clothes. "Raven."
"Okay, so I doubt you're the real Raven," Beast Boy confirmed, stepping forward and kneeling in front of her. She watched him. "Because the real Raven doesn't act so oblivious. So then the question is: which one are you?"
"Which one am I." She didn't sound confused, but she did sound off. He couldn't place what was different with the way this side of Raven spoke, but it was definitely odd. Her bangs fell forward and hid her eyes, and he unconsciously reached up to brush them away. Her hand instantly flew up and caught his, holding it against her skin. He panicked, almost jerked free from her grasp, but her hold was tight.
"You're the one," Raven said, eyes narrowing at him. "You're the one who touches her. Who presses her. Who pushes."
Uh-oh.
There were still so many sides of Raven that he'd never seen, let alone met. He hoped that if this was one of them that it was one that wouldn't hurt him. He pulled his hand back and she let him go.
"Um…uh…yeah, sorry about that," he meekly apologized. "Do I have to explain this to all your sides, Rae? I mean, you and I, er…well, it's just a joke between friends, you know? I didn't mean to be…mean…."
This Raven blinked slowly at him and rose to her feet, staring down at him. She suddenly oozed dominance and control, even more profoundly than the real Raven, and it left him more intimidated than he wanted to show. Beast Boy rose to his feet as well so that she was forced to look up at him, but the height change did nothing to hinder her confidence. "You misunderstand," she said. "I was not accusing you. I was merely attempting to confirm who you were. Beast Boy. Changeling. Immature, talkative, the one who teases with touch." She grinned. "Those are what she classifies you as."
"That's…disappointingly simplistic." He tried to lighten the mood with a laugh, but it came out contrite. "I kind of thought I meant more to you than that, Rae."
She smiled then, slowly. It was unnerving. "You do mean more to her than that," she said. Beast Boy frowned.
"Her?" he asked. "Not 'us'?"
"Not 'us'," Raven repeated.
"Why do you talk about her as if she's a completely different person?" he noticed. Happy Raven hadn't done that. It had been difficult for her to separate talking about herself and talking about the real Raven. This one, however, did it with ease. "You are Raven."
Her grin widened as she began circling around him, like a predator to its prey, a motion that had never sat well with Beast Boy. "The relationship between Raven and I is blurred along the lines. Somewhere down the road we became so estranged with each other that we no longer felt as one. I now regard her as a guard, for she cages me deep within." She lingered near his shoulder and he glanced down at her upturned eyes. "To a place she does not like to venture to."
"Who are you?" Beast Boy asked, feigning composure.
"I am many things that have fused into one, clinging to each other because we have nothing else to cling to. I am the things Raven does not like to feel. The ones she is most terrified of." She watched his face, her eyes studying him. "No," she said, as if answering a question he did not ask. "I am not Wrath or Anger or Fury. She accepts Wrath and acknowledges it, although she fears it. Me she neither acknowledges nor accepts."
Beast Boy took two steps back, frowning down at her. If Raven didn't like this side then he definitely felt no obligation to like it either. "And what would Raven not want to accept?" he demanded. She lifted her chin again and it sent a chill down his spine.
"Impulse. Depravity. Cruelty. Desire. Sexuality." She said such things monotonously, reading off her names as if they were emotions that did not bring with them an air of some foreboding…or inviting darkness. Beast Boy tried not to think of this girl as intriguing but he couldn't help it. Depravity? Cruelty? Sexuality? Things he never thought Raven struggled with…and which he now knew she did her best not to. "Does it frighten you or excite you?" she suddenly asked, her tone even. Beast Boy blinked, caught off guard.
"What?"
"Does it frighten or excite you?"
"Um…." He didn't think anyone could have had a good answer for that sort of question.
She started to move towards him again and he backed away even further. He didn't want to look at her. She seemed unnatural in Raven's body, not at all the way Happy Raven had seemed. He didn't want to be in the room anymore; was no longer curious about the transfer and its outcomes. He wanted to leave.
"Don't," she said, once again responding to his unspoken words. "Do not leave."
"Get out of my mind," he demanded. "Raven doesn't invade our privacy unwarranted."
"I thought I already told you that she and I are not the same person."
"All the more reason I should go." He probably should have been staying, trying to figure out a way to send this Raven back into the depths of a neglected subconscious. She obviously was not meant to have control over this body, and if Raven was meditating in la la land then she had no idea that her body was being possessed by a darkness she had long denied.
But her eyes were too black, her expression too cold, and Beast Boy didn't want to be around either.
"But you are the reason I am here," she said calmly. "You are the reason I surfaced."
He didn't want to be the reason.
"Why would you come out for me? I'm not anyone," he told her. She shook her head.
"Wrong." Her eyes bore into him and shivered again. He wasn't particularly liking that this Raven restrained itself to single word responses followed by lengthy pauses. It left an empty space in the air filled with tainted implication. He turned toward the door and slid it open to leave, but her next words drifted over and halted his motions. "You are very much someone. You do things to her that make her feel things. You do things to her that make me feel things. We so rarely share any sort of interest, but we share you. Your touch ignites us."
Beast Boy had never felt so much guilt overcome him…because he was starting to understand what she was talking about.
"I'm…not here to ignite you," he said awkwardly. "Especially not you."
"Not me? Or not her?" He didn't answer. She chuckled, low and with no joy. "No sarcastic quip? No idiotic joke to be made? How disappointing." Beast Boy looked back at her over his shoulder, his face caught in an embarrassed grimace. "She couldn't possibly find you interesting based on your personality."
That hurt.
"I guess that's my cue then," he mumbled, stepping out into the hallway. His intention was to lock her in the room until Raven took control once more and this bully of a shadow was suppressed. There was the off chance that she'd just teleport to wherever she wanted, but he didn't want to think about technicalities at the moment. He just wanted to leave.
He started to slide the door shut but she stepped forward and stopped him, placing her body in the frame. She looked up at him with a vague sense of pity mixed with curiosity; the kind of curiosity a passerby gives to something dead and misshapen on the side of the road. Her eyes passed over his entire being, raking through his hair and heading downward, taking in his body with her gaze. He felt extremely exposed under her scrutiny.
"You smell like night," she said, leaning forward and inhaling his scent. He leaned away, his hand still on the door in his attempts to close it. She pushed on it with her own hand, keeping it open. "And you do hold a significant level of physical appeal." He blushed. Horribly. "So maybe the interest is purely primal." She bit her lip and Beast Boy couldn't help but stare. "Touch me."
"What?"
"Touch me. Touch me the way you always touch her. In the alley. In the kitchen. You're not exactly shy." She reached out with her free hand and ran her fingers down his chest and over his stomach. He jumped back at the action, jarred by her brazenness. "I'm giving you permission this time."
"I don't need your permission," he snapped. He shook his head, angry that she was making him flustered. "I mean, I don't want your permission. I'm not going to touch you."
"No? But I want you to." She leaned farther into the hallway, her arms suspending her in the doorframe. She had Raven's face and Raven's body, but all Beast Boy saw was a completely different—and completely disturbed—stranger. "Please?" she suddenly begged.
"No," he spat, the disgust apparent in his voice. "Get back in the room."
"Don't tell me what to do."
"I can't tell if you're acting like a psycho or acting like a child."
"If you come back inside I can show you I'm not a child."
"N-no," he said, angry that he had stammered. "No way am I going back in there."
"I know that that's a lie," she hummed. "I can feel your intrigue."
"Don't mistake intrigue for confusion."
"And don't mistake conversation for approval." Her head lolled to one side as she looked up at him. "I don't want your words. I want you to be the good little pet that you are and touch me."
Anger bubbled in Beast Boy's chest and his hands curled into fists at his sides. "I am not a pet," he hissed. She grinned.
"Yes, you are. They all think so. She thinks so. You're the pet, kept for amusement and scolded when he shits on the carpet."
"Shut up," he said, although his immense anger made his voice shake. She swayed from side to side.
"Touch me and I will."
"No! Now get back…." Beast Boy's words trailed off and he stopped talking, his head turning quickly to look down the hall. Raven straightened up and followed his gaze, watching with narrowed eyes. Silence passed and then they could both see a shadow glide along the wall, the tell-tale flow of a cape apparent even from their distance. It was Robin, passing the mouth of the corridor on his way to the stairs.
"Then again, there's always Robin," she drawled, smiling maliciously as her eyes soaked up the image of his shadow. "And she does have such a deep connection with Robin…." Her hands dropped from the door and she started to head towards the Titan's leader. Fearful and desperate and not wanting to find out what would happen if she ever reached him, Beast Boy lashed out and grabbed Raven by the arm, pulling both of them into the room and slamming the door shut behind them.
"Are you insane? You can't just go after people like that! This is Raven's body! You're supposed to respect that!" He had her arm in a vice-like grip, glaring down at her in outrage. All previous hesitations had dissolved in light of the possibility of this imposter degrading Raven in anyway. The rage he suddenly felt was all consuming, leaving him shaking and tense. He jerked her arm unceremoniously and she let him, her eyes lazily trained on his grasp. "What you do has consequences, and I am not going to let you run rampant with Raven."
"You're touching me," she said quietly, completely ignoring his words. Her gaze flicked upward, half-lidded, sinister. "Touch me some more."
With a sound of repulsion Beast Boy let go, shaking his head. "You may be part of Raven but you're not her in any way. You're time is up. I'm putting you back." He had absolutely no idea what he was talking about, but he couldn't let Raven's body be abused in the hands of this…side. He strode past her and over to the bed, snatching up the meditation mirror. Almost as soon as his fingers wrapped around the hilt it was whisked out of his hands and shot into Raven's, who caught the device easily. He cursed her powers under his breath.
"Strong words. Always strong words," she said. "Never accompanied with strong action." Beast Boy growled deep in his throat, a primal reaction he only ever succumbed to when he was truly angry.
"What is that supposed to mean?" he hissed.
"It means that you're all talk with absolutely no walk," she spat, her composure rapidly leaving her. "A teaser who doesn't have the balls to go all the way."
"What?"
"She said so herself, did she not? 'I only back down from a real challenge'? You've posed yourself as an empty threat; always a boy but never a man."
Hurt seethed through Beast Boy's veins but he converted it to anger. Sometimes, Raven could be a real bitch. "And you're Raven's judge, is it?" he demanded, stomping over to her. "And yet you'd be nothing without her. A parasite with no home."
"Rather a parasite than an empty shell."
"Rather an actual person than a neglected side of myself."
"I may be neglected but I am still here. You think I'm different from your precious Raven? Like you said, I am Raven. These thoughts were culminated from her own. These perspectives were made by her. The words I speak are the words Raven thinks but hides away to spare you and your childish feelings." She said the words with sharp certainty, her lips curling into a smile at the hurt she was rendering to him. Tension pulsated between the two, escalating them both to the point of battle. Had he ever had such a fight with Raven before? Never. No matter what this manifestation said it wasn't really Raven. It was made by her discarded thoughts, and Beast Boy knew that a person was made by the things they chose to show and not by everything that passed through their minds, said or unsaid alike.
"She'll destroy you," he said, glaring down at her with as much intensity as she was giving him. "I've seen Raven battle herself before and, back then, Rage was a lot more powerful than you are now. She'll disintegrate you."
"She fears me," Raven whispered, her words dripping venom. "I am the monster in her closet that she can't take her eyes off of. Why do you think she's been having such a difficult time controlling herself? I grow with each day, with each tantalizing touch that you offer her. Yes, Garfield Logan, you feed my very existence with every moronic action you display."
"Liar," he spat, but he knew he was wrong.
"Raven is a pathetic shell of a woman," she went on, their faces so close he could feel the resentment she was presenting radiating off her skin. "A stupid little girl with a stupid little crush on a stupid little boy." She said each word with emphasis, throwing them into his face. Her hands reached up and caressed his neck in vivid contradiction and Beast Boy shoved her away brutally. "Such trivial dramas in the life of a half-demon who lives to be a saint and yet she can't come to terms with the turmoil that riles her body. Only a broken little doll would melt at a touch from these green hands, and when she does I am the one who is left behind to feel the tremors." She clamped her hands more securely around his neck this time, her fingernails digging into his skin. He cried out but she ignored him, occupying herself instead with the scent of his hair. "You are simple and mundane but you are the very reason I stand here now. I have been given a taste of miserable existence, and I find I am ravenous."
Beast Boy barely had a moment to blink when Raven's black power sprang up between them and blasted him backward. He flew away from her and landed on the bed hard, the breath knocked out of him. He coughed, outraged that Raven had actually attacked him, (he didn't give a shit that it was the depraved, cruel, crazy psycho bitch side of her), and he sat up to either yell at her or transform, but was abruptly stopped by lips crashing down on his own and hands shoving him back down onto the bed.
She had crawled on top of him and was kissing him in a way that he couldn't even believe, let alone comprehend. Fire exploded within him and his pounding heart threatened to beat free from his chest. He grabbed Raven and pushed her off, staring up at her in complete and utter shock. "What are you doing?" he screamed. She stared down at him with glassy eyes, her face flushed and her own breath coming in ragged.
"Feeding," she whispered before tearing his arms away and colliding with him once more.
Thought did not have time to form in Beast Boy's head. For a few seconds all he could think about was the feel and taste of her mouth, her weight on his body and the sensations these things were doing to him. He grabbed her shoulders again, moving to free himself once more, but she pressed harder against him, held tighter, and it was as if a wave of fire burned over his skin. His breathing began to match hers and he was consumed by a strident need to kiss her back, to hold her closer, to feel her skin. His hands left her shoulders and he wrapped his arms around her, crushing Raven with an instinctual need pulsing in his stomach; a need he found to be too sudden, to singularly unique and far too potent to be completely his.
…but she was ravishing him, arching her body into his, her hands clawing painfully at his neck and hair. He feared the intensity that she was displaying but, of course, was relishing in the simple act of sexual desire, responding in kind to the exchange. Blood pounded as her hips pressed into his and her legs intertwined with his body, her thigh pressing against him as he viciously kissed her back…
And then he remembered that Raven wasn't just a girl, she was his friend and his friend was a particularly special person with the ability to feel another's emotions and impress her own in turn.
This hunger he could feel choking his mind wasn't his, it was hers, and she was seeping the feeling into him, making him respond. Making him stay.
Embarrassment, shame, fear and nerves fueled him to break the contact and shove her off. He scrambled off the bed and half stumbled across the room, trying to put as much distance between them as possible. Raven simply sat on the sheets, her breath heaving but her expression showing nothing but satisfaction.
"Mmm," she hummed, her fingers tracing over her lips. "So the boy can feel as a man would. Maybe I was wrong about you." Beast Boy just stared at her, back pressed to the door as he slumped onto it, still too caught up in the moment to say anything. She laughed at him, belittling him. "The look on your face and your taste in my mouth is enough, for now. I will give you what you want, but I will require sustenance again. Soon," she drawled. She closed her eyes and raised her face to the ceiling, exposing her neck. "Nunc Lento Sonitu Dicunt…Novo."
She started to laugh again when the sound choked in her throat and her eyes went wide. Her body seized up for a moment and Beast Boy felt his stomach clench in terror. She sat there like a hung animal for half a breadth before her eyelids closed and she feel back against the bed, limp.
Seconds ticked away into silence as Beast Boy just stared at Raven's body lying motionless on the bed. She wasn't even breathing, but he couldn't bring himself to do anything; the rush of adrenaline in his body had almost completely knocked out all his motor skills. He stood there in dread for nearly a whole minute before Raven pulled in a deep but forced breath and then she started to cough and groan and move her arms and legs and Beast Boy suddenly felt that he did not want to be present when she sat up and regained her composure, whether it be the real Raven or yet another one of her emotions.
Without a word he tore the door open, slipped into the hall and slammed it shut before bolting through the Tower and to a place as far away from Raven as he could possibly get.
.
.
.
References:
*Transfer spell: Nunc Lento Sonitu Dicunt…Novo*
-Latin. By John Donne. Originally "nunc lento sonitu dicunt: morieris" which translates to "now this bell tolling softly for another says to me: thou must die". I changed the last word to 'novo', which means 'to change'.
+ refers to Teen Titans Go! comic issue #42