Another installment, very in line with the first. I probably should make it clear that this is intended to be a series of one-shots.
This one is set very early on, after the Titans meet but otherwise pre-series. Passing episode reference to 4x07, "The Prophecy" and a more specific reference to 5x10, "Go!". A note on a brief reference to S.T.A.R. Labs: technically, they don't have a site in Jump City, but they do have one in New York, which is where the comic version of the Teen Titans start out, so I'm conflating the two a little to suit me.
Chapter summary: Raven receives an impromptu lesson in zoology.
The Titans were, Raven supposed, "hanging out." She'd only first heard the term upon meeting Beast Boy and hadn't known what it meant. In the weeks that it took for the tower to be built (a relatively quick process with S.T.A.R. Labs at Cyborg's disposal combined with their superpowers), she visited the library and tried to find out. (The active library, that is; not the dilapidated one housing ancient, eldritch secrets, which she knew instinctively to avoid.) She crept in during the night, after the lights were off and everyone had gone home. It was still and quiet, blissfully absent of the distractions that came with being surrounded by other people. Using her telekinesis, she flipped on a reading light and perused books until she found what she was looking for, a jokey but helpful guide to English slang, colloquialisms, and vernacular. For the most part, even having grown up knowing English, she wasn't familiar with a great deal of what the book had to share. Much of it was vulgar or otherwise downright stupid, but at least she knew then what Beast Boy had meant by "hanging out." More or less.
This all came back to her as she looked up from the book hovering in her lap. She became aware of Beast Boy and Cyborg, who were sitting on the couch behind her, playing a video game. So far, video games were not one of her favorite Earth pastimes, but the boys seemed to enjoy it and even bond over it, despite their bickering and jostling. It was all good-natured ribbing, Raven sensed. She felt amusement, excitement, anticipation, and even love from them. If that bright, loud game gave them all that, who was she to take it away from them, even if it made her a little antsy and sometimes (often) gave her headaches?
In her periphery, Starfire and Robin were sitting at the kitchen counter. Robin was sipping from a mug of coffee and reading a newspaper, which Raven had learned was an inky almost-book, printed every day to give the denizens of Jump City the latest news from around the world. It was remarkable, Earth being so large, that they could have global news somehow, miraculously, delivered to their tower every morning, but Earth was full of such curiosities. Starfire was preoccupied painting her nails, a little bit of pointless pampering she liked to indulge in because it was colorful, feminine, and very earthlike. The paint chipped off quickly in their line of work, so she'd remove it with nail polish remover after a day or so. Even so, Starfire liked picking out the colors and admiring how pretty her nails were and she even liked the smell of the nail polish remover, regardless of how long the paint lasted. Satisfaction rolled off her in waves.
This, Raven suspected, was "hanging out." They weren't all interacting, but they could've been doing what they were in private. Instead, they elected to go about their business in their main public space, in each other's company, just for the sake of surrounding one another. It was still a foreign idea, yet here she was, doing it anyway without even having made the conscious decision. It was as though she'd simply appeared here. She looked down at the open book in her lap, the words as meaningless as a foreign language. Every time she tried to refocus and recall the characters she'd been so invested in a few minutes ago and what they were doing, the words swam away and her gaze shifted to somewhere beyond the page.
Raven was so caught up pondering "hanging out" and all its implications that she didn't notice the commotion behind her. It slowly registered that there was some sort of scuffle, the couch shaking and Beast Boy and Cyborg's voices rising.
"—grass stain!" Cyborg said, followed by a jerk and an "oof!", both large enough that they had to have come from him. Beast Boy gave a high-pitched chatter, a strange sound to Raven. She knew he must've shifted, but she couldn't imagine—
She looked up in time to see Beast Boy in the form of a creature so small that he could surely fit in the palm of her hand. He was standing on the back of the couch, chattering at Cyborg. He had a thin striped tail longer than himself, which she watched as it draped itself over the edge of the couch and twitched. It almost sounded like Beast Boy was cackling.
It must've sounded that way to Cyborg too because he swiped at Beast Boy, who reflexively leapt back and over the back of the couch. Before he could land in her book as something potentially larger Raven reached out and caught him by the tail, Beast Boy letting out a surprised trill. She dangled him in front of her, examining him with a scowl. He trilled again, shyly.
"You almost landed in my book," Raven said.
Beast Boy gave a short, sharp squeak, so high that Raven winced. She scrutinized him a moment longer, noting the soft fur between her fingers like nothing she'd ever felt before. Though he was currently in animal form, whatever animal he was, Raven could still sense how apologetic he was.
And how scared he was.
Raven saw her reflection in his eyes, which looked more earnest on such a small, primatial face, and sighed. She hadn't known him long, but she took pity on him. "It's okay," she said. He relaxed a little, the sharp edge of his fear dulling. "What are you, anyway?" He started to wriggle and chatter, but the fear she still sensed from him more than anything prompted her to set him down gently.
Once he was safely on the ground he shifted back to human and scooted backwards, away from her, looking a little sheepish. Neither of them were comfortable around each other yet, but Raven thought she hid it better than that.
"Uh, hey, Raven," he said. He sounded tenser than he did when talking to Cyborg. He rubbed his lower back, lowered his eyes to the floor between them, and smiled nervously. "That kinda hurt. That tail wasn't prehensile, you know."
"Oh. Sorry." Coming from her, it didn't sound convincing, but she really was sorry. He might get on her nerves, but the solution was to establish boundaries, not instill fear. Foolish though it might be, she hoped that this time things would be different. She was still prepared for him to start recoiling in revulsion and avoiding her like so many had before. Already she had to contend with knowing that he was still so uncomfortable and wary of her to an extent he wasn't with their other teammates. She didn't want to cope with him being frightened, too.
"It's okay," he said. Echoing her own words back to her set him a little more at ease. When he looked at her, there was no longer as much anxiety. Raven didn't smile, but she smoothened her brow and closed her book expectantly.
At the thump of the heavy book, Beast Boy gave a start. "Oh! Right! I was a pygmy marmoset."
It was a rare occasion when Beast Boy knew something Raven didn't. She might've expected him to be boastful, but to his credit, he was modest. In fact, he seemed excited to share. "They're the smallest monkeys in the world, native to South America, but there are some smaller primates. The smallest is the mouse lemur." To illustrate, he shifted to another primatial creature, one that wasn't so easy to look at; its eyes were large and bulging, the pupils so small they could be missed entirely. Thankfully, he shifted back to human after just a few moments.
Above her, Cyborg was leaning over the back of the couch. "Show off," he said, miffed about whatever had set off the scuffle in the first place.
"Oh, Beast Boy!" Starfire said, flying over to join them on the floor behind the couch, her nails already dry. "You were so cute!"
"See?" Beast Boy said, sticking his tongue out at Cyborg. "Starfire liked it. And I bet Raven did too. Huh, Raven?"
"You don't have to answer that," Cyborg said lowly. Raven didn't know how she would've answered, anyway.
"Your 'pygmy marmoset'," Starfire said slowly, trying out the words that, despite her ability to absorb language, still sounded peculiar on her tongue. "That was an 'animal', yes?"
Behind Beast Boy, still seated at the counter with his coffee and newspaper, Robin looked up. He'd probably been paying attention since the moment Starfire came over, but he was good at listening whilst looking like he wasn't. However, he now set his newspaper down and openly watched the huddle of teammates behind the couch.
Meanwhile, Beast Boy and Cyborg were both giving Starfire odd looks. She hugged herself, glancing between the two of them. "Did I say something wrong?"
"You don't know what animals are, Star?" Beast Boy asked, his ears drooping. Animals were his livelihood; Raven supposed it might make sense that he'd be a little disappointed.
"I do not know what 'animals' refers to," Starfire admitted.
Then again, how could any of them expect Starfire, an alien, to know or understand what animals were? She'd learned their language instantly, through preternatural means; so of course, she knew the word, but she knew it without context. The boys had overlooked it, but Raven understood this in a split second. The ability to learn someone else's language in an instant was handy, but could only do so much. It was no supplement for life experience, of which Raven herself had very little.
Starfire went on. "We have wildlife on Tamaran," she said, "but not like anything I have seen you turn into, Beast Boy."
"Oh," he said, scratching his head. He glanced at Raven as though to ask her something, but then seemed to think better of it. When he turned away, Raven told herself she was relieved. "Well, yeah," he said, "a pygmy marmoset is an animal. That's what I do, turn into animals." He demonstrated by turning into a small housecat, one of the few animals Raven could name on sight, and rubbing up against Starfire's knee. When she hesitated, he put his paws on her leg and pushed his head into her hand, forcing her to run her palm down his sleek back.
"You want me to pet you?" she asked, brow furrowed. She did so, her fingers rigid and her movements stiff at first, but soon got into a rhythm as she became accustomed to it. Beast Boy purred loudly, tail curling around his back paws and his eyes closing. Starfire continued petting him, looking quite awestruck about something so mundane. She asked, "What is that noise you are making?"
Beast Boy opened his eyes, but then let them slide closed again. When it was clear that he was unwilling to pull away and shift back to human, Cyborg said, "He's purring, Star. It's something some cats do automatically that means they're happy. Or afraid." Beast Boy's ears flicked in approval.
Starfire stopped petting him, her hand hovering just above his scruff. "You are not afraid of me Beast Boy, are you?"
Beast Boy meowed—or, what Raven inferred to be a meow, from what she knew of cats—and pushed himself back into Starfire's palm, so she resumed petting him. "I will take that as a no," she said. No, Beast Boy did not fear Starfire, Raven could sense that much. He would never fear Starfire.
The petting motion was natural to Starfire now. Raven watched avidly, as though the sight were as enthralling to her as the book she'd been absorbed in not too long ago. For while she recognized and could name a common domestic housecat, she'd never actually seen one in person before, let alone touched one.
"This cat form is delightful," Starfire said. "You are very soft."
Raven thought of the pygmy marmoset she'd held, or more like dangled, not too long ago and wondered if cat fur felt the same—if all mammals that had fur or hair felt the same. She knew a smattering of basic zoology from some old texts that had not been part of her curriculum and from her evenings spent hiding in the Jump City library. But when it came down to it, she knew very little outside of what was on paper. Cyborg had mentioned that the sound Beast Boy was making was purring; Raven knew what purring was, what it meant, and what animals made that sound, but had never heard it before. Maybe because she knew it to be a sound of contentment and maybe because she could sense that very contentment, Raven found it to be soothing.
After a while, Raven couldn't say how long, Starfire stilled. When he hadn't been pet for a few moments, Beast Boy opened his eyes and gazed up at her. Raven blinked, regaining her senses and heard Cyborg shifting, as though they were both coming out of a trance. What could have entranced Cyborg so? Cyborg, who was surely the most worldly out of all of them, and to whom a common housecat must be nothing of importance? For all her new teammates didn't know about her, there was a great deal Raven had yet to learn about them, too. "Are all your animals like this?" Starfire asked finally.
"Nah," Cyborg said. Beast Boy, eager at the opportunity to show off, took a few steps back and contemplated his next move, tail swishing. "Right now, BB's just a common housecat. There are lots of kinds of housecats, called breeds, and lots of other kinds of cats. And cats are only one type of animal…"
While Cyborg discussed cats, Beast Boy demonstrated first a handful of housecats, turning into a large fluffy one with a long tail, then one with hardly any tail at all, then a hairless one, then something with very long hair and a small, snubbed face. Raven guessed these were breeds, but couldn't name them. The texts she'd managed to read on zoology, which was not a subject particularly relevant to her life until now, did not include many pictures, or at least not enough to cover even a fraction of Beast Boy's arsenal.
Then, Beast Boy shifted into a much larger animal, with a shaggy mane around its neck and a long, thin tail, tufted at the end. When he opened his jaws, what had previously been small, pointed teeth were now large, formidable canines, and the sound that came out was hardly a meow. It was low and threatening and despite herself, Raven shuddered and shrank back before she could stop herself. Starfire, though awed, seemed to have a similar reaction, hovering off the floor where she'd been seated and moving a few paces back.
"That is a cat?" Starfire asked, caught by surprise. From his spot at the counter, Robin laughed good-heartedly. Raven had nearly forgotten he was there, and to be reminded was somehow embarrassing. She hadn't thought Beast Boy, Cyborg, or Starfire had noticed her recoil, but Robin might've.
"A lion, Star," Robin said. "King of the animals." Evidently, Raven was not the only one who'd neglected their leader; all three of their teammates turned their heads to look at him. He set his empty mug down and shrugged. "What? I was finishing my coffee. And I already know what cats are."
"So do I," Cyborg said. He waved a hand down to Raven and said, "Rae probably does too. You don't see us avoiding this."
Raven was reticent, but no liar. With her normal disdain, Raven could've rolled her eyes and said something sarcastic about how ridiculous and unnecessary this all was because of course she knew what cats were, how could she not? She could've excused herself, citing boredom or a need to meditate, or she could've said anything at all and her teammates wouldn't have thought twice. Instead, there was a moment punctuated by her silence, broken only by Beast Boy grunting and tossing his head. Raven resisted the urge to look up at Cyborg, to see what he'd made of it. He might not have made anything at all.
At any rate, Beast Boy was not about to let an awkward silence slide. He turned back to human and said, "C'mon, Rob. Join us. This is fun. We're having fun. Right, guys?" He looked around to the three of them, his gaze quickly skipping over Raven and settling pleadingly on Starfire, his best hope for support, and the person he was doing this for—as far as he knew, anyway.
"You are," Cyborg said. Beast Boy huffed and turned into a snake of some sort, with a flat hood around its neck. He coiled most of his body, lifted his head high, reared back, and spit at Cyborg, who yelled and jerked back. That got Robin laughing again, which only helped to serve a now very satisfied Beast Boy's point. He darted his forked tongue out and let his hood close.
"Ugh," Cyborg said, wiping spit off his face. "Wait, is that venom? Can you make venom?"
Beast Boy only gave a lazy flick of his tongue.
"I do not think this one is so cute," Starfire said, leaning in close to examine his smooth scales. "It looks very different from the cats."
"That's a snake, Star," Robin said, since Cyborg was busy trying to clean off the possibly venomous spit. "Specifically, a cobra. A spitting cobra. I don't know what kind, though."
Starfire lifted a hand. "May I?"
Beast Boy swiveled his head and raised it to flick his tongue at Starfire's finger, which she took as consent to run her fingertip over the back of his head. Again, Raven watched, mesmerized. She knew what a snake was, could define it and perhaps even give a rough description, but she'd never seen one, and had never imagined that it would have such dark eyes and such glossy scales. As she watched Starfire's finger glide steadily, slowly down Beast Boy's back, Raven tried to imagine what it would feel like.
"You are cold," Starfire said, "and very smooth. You are like a spudling from Tamaran, but less… slimy. Tell me, do humans eat these 'snakes'?"
"Eww, no," Cyborg said emphatically, leaning over the back of the couch again. He looked unaffected by the potential venom, at least for now. "I like meat, but those would be nasty."
"You have never tried?"
"Star," Robin said, "there are some animals you just don't eat."
Starfire didn't appear to be placated by this, but she let the matter drop for now. Her attention was again caught up with Beast Boy, whose form was so spectacularly different from his previous feline ones that she seemed to be in disbelief. As she inspected Beast Boy further, her expression fell. "I do not think I like these 'snakes' very much," she said, pulling away and looking at her finger as though she expected to see something rubbed off on it. She curled it against her palm and looked back at Beast Boy.
Raven wasn't sure what made her say it, but she nonetheless found herself saying, "I think they're cool."
Hearing her voice for the first time since the pygmy marmoset that kicked off this whole scene, her teammates turned to her. Raven, feeling their eyes like lasers, became a little timid. But what she'd said wasn't all that surprising or out of character, and so the attention didn't last long. Beast Boy raised the tip of his tail in what might've been thanks. Then his serpentine eyes glinted, unnervingly humanlike. Raven's eyes narrowed.
In the next moment he was shifting into a bird, one Raven knew very well. She scowled. He cawed merrily in response and came to perch on her shoulder, his sharp talons digging into her skin and his weight making her shoulder ache.
"Not funny, Beast Boy," she said. He flapped his wings and gave an ugly croak as though mocking her. Given his shyness earlier, he was being rather bold now. Raven would've been glad for it were it not at her expense; as it was, she swatted at him and he gave a raspy call of protest, only to switch to her other shoulder.
"I do not understand," Starfire said, sitting back with her legs crossed and head tilted. "Beast Boy is a joke?"
"He's a raven, Star," Raven said, practically growling, which only delighted Beast Boy more. "It's a kind of bird." Lest he be too pleased with himself, Raven yanked his tail feathers, causing him to squawk in alarm and flap his wings. To her frustration, he lost his balance but not his grip, tearing the fabric of her leotard and scratching the skin beneath. She let go of him then, both disgruntled. Cyborg was stifling a laugh, his sense of self-preservation stronger than Beast Boy's. It hadn't taken them long to learn better than to laugh at Raven, but at least Cyborg made a stronger effort not to. Raven appreciated it, but she could sense his amusement as clearly as if he were truly laughing. Robin's, too.
Robin…
Starfire was leaning forward in wide-eyed wonder to see Beast Boy in his raven form, even if he wasn't staying still. Beast Boy was a constant mess of flapping wings and mussy feathers as he tried to keep his balance while Raven did everything she could to dislodge him, short of using her powers. Raven twisted and pushed and even flicked his underbelly, but no matter how much she tried, Beast Boy was persistent and frustratingly crafty. He wasn't going anywhere.
Starfire seemed less interested in the struggle than with Beast Boy himself. In the middle of Raven grumbling some threat to an insouciant Beast Boy, Starfire reached out to touch him. Both Raven and Beast Boy froze. Even Cyborg, who'd been watching with a hand over his mouth, paused, waiting.
They must've made quite the tableau in that moment. Raven's cape was askew, her clothing torn along her shoulders and back, and her hair disheveled. Beast Boy was no better, but he let Starfire pet him as she had when he was a snake, slowly and thoughtfully. Except now Raven was in the picture too, his unwitting perch. And Starfire was leaning in awfully close to better examine Beast Boy with Cyborg and Robin watching too; Raven could feel their stares even without her empathy. The look in Starfire's eyes was of such fascination that Raven could do nothing except gawk, feeling like she was listening to her own echo and yet astonished by how open Starfire could be. She saw mirrored in Starfire's expression exactly what she'd been feeling as she set down a pygmy marmoset, balked at a lion, and admired a cobra. She hoped, fleetingly, a little pridefully, that she'd not been so blatant about it.
Something anxious plucked in her chest. Beast Boy was starting to feel too heavy on her shoulder. Why couldn't Starfire try to reign in her feelings, just a little bit?
Raven said, "Um, Starfire?"
"Yes, Raven?" Starfire was delicately exploring first the feathers on Beast Boy's head and back, then his wings and beak. For his part, Beast Boy seemed a little bemused and unsure. Raven couldn't tell if he was enjoying this exploration or not, but it didn't matter. She couldn't stand looking at Starfire like this anymore.
"You're too close."
"Oh!" Starfire pulled away as though burned, which was a more dramatic reaction than Raven would've liked, but she'd accomplished what she'd wanted, at least. "I am very sorry, Raven," she said, clasping her hands together. Raven said nothing, prodding Beast Boy's underbelly with the side of her finger until he stepped onto that instead, though it wasn't the most natural fit. He felt warmer and heavier against her finger than her shoulder and yet, somehow, it felt better to have him there; familiar, even. She brought her hand down in front of her and, almost automatically, brought her other hand to his back, letting her fingertips stroke his feathers back into place. This close, his pleasant surprise was obvious to her. Otherwise, it would've been easy to forget that he was some sort of human and that she was surrounded by other some-sorts-of-humans who were all watching, watching.
Raven removed her hand from Beast Boy's back and thankfully, Beast Boy didn't respond. A little mischievous, but mostly wanting to shift the spotlight, Raven said, "Don't you have another bird to be?"
Beast Boy cocked his head for a moment then cawed, fluttered his wings, and became something smaller, with a thinner beak. He whistled and took off, making a beeline for Robin, who was not looking so amused anymore. Raven deemed it retribution. She wouldn't be able to recognize a robin on sight, but it wasn't difficult to deduce that the capering, tweeting green bird in Robin's face was a robin itself. To give Beast Boy credit, he'd caught on to her suggestion quickly.
"Very funny, Beast Boy," Robin said, his voice flat. Beast Boy chirped; he clearly thought so.
"Robin is a bird too," Starfire said. "I see." She let Beast Boy taunt Robin a little bit more before saying, "You have many kinds of cats. Do you have many birds as well?"
"Sure," Cyborg said. "Tons. We got hawks, falcons, eagles, owls, shrikes, vultures, sparrows, grackles, blue jays, cardinals, pigeons, seagulls, hummingbirds, woodpeckers… and many kinds of some of those, too. Not to mention birds that can't fly."
Beast Boy flapped away from Robin and, circling over the trio of them, shifted into each bird (or a kind of each) that Cyborg had mentioned in turn. His wingbeats were leisurely and his calls joyous, though the tone and timbre of each bird varied. Raven had to admit that she was impressed. The great majority of the birds she didn't recognize; even some of the names she hadn't recognized. She felt a little foolish and, conscious of how Starfire had looked not long ago leaning over to examine the raven, Raven was careful to make her expression as indifferent as she could.
Beast Boy settled as what Cyborg called a "swallow," an agile but tiny bird, and swooped down to land on Starfire's knee. The swallow seemed more to her liking than the cobra, but being much smaller than the raven, she hardly did more than pat his head with a fingertip.
After some deliberation, Robin stood up and strode over to them. He crouched down to assess Beast Boy, who hid his face under the guise of preening. Robin put his fingers to his mouth and cocked his head, then said, "Impressive, Beast Boy. Your powers are remarkably versatile and could prove very useful." Beast Boy chirped and ruffled his feathers at the compliment.
"Rob, relax a little," Cyborg said. "I know all this responsibility is new and everything, but you don't have to see us as our leader all the time. We're your friends, too."
Robin looked up at Cyborg, who maintained an easygoing smile and posture, though it must've taken him some effort to do under the featureless microscope of Robin's mask. Nonetheless, Robin stood from his crouch as though to give a verdict. "I think you're right, Cyborg," he said, loosely folding his arms and sounding thoughtful. Perhaps it was her empathy speaking, but Raven felt a collective sigh of relief. "I shouldn't just be commending you as a leader, Beast Boy. Your abilities are useful for fighting, but they're also just… cool." He settled on the word uneasily, presumably unused to speaking informally to people his own age. But Raven felt a whispery thrill from him that suggested he liked it.
It wasn't language she nor Starfire would've ever thought to use; Raven had never even heard it used in such a way before meeting Beast Boy and Cyborg. Since she lived here now, with the Titans, maybe she could try out some new vocabulary. Maybe it would help her fit in, which she'd have to do if she didn't want to stick out.
Starfire chose that moment to ask, "Do humans eat these 'birds'?"
Even as a swallow, Beast Boy managed to convey disgust by clacking his beak and skittering away from her. Cyborg, trying not to snort at the distressed swallow, informed her, "BB here's a vegetarian, meaning he doesn't eat meat. But yeah, we eat some kinds of birds. Don't we, BB?"
Beast Boy looked up at him beseechingly. "Why don't you show the girl? You know, for educational purposes."
"We promise we will not try to eat you, Beast Boy," Starfire said. Beast Boy's dejected tweet made it clear that it wasn't much consolation. Nevertheless, he shifted to a larger, far more ridiculous looking bird with billowing feathers, a tail like a fan, and a piece of skin hanging from its neck. He clucked lamely a few times, taking a few lackadaisical steps in a circle to show Starfire—and, unknowingly, Raven. This bird didn't look capable of flight, but he gingerly extended a wing for Starfire to survey anyway.
"Turkey," Cyborg said. "Goes great with gravy."
"And mashed potatoes," Robin added.
Raven didn't eat meat either, since there weren't animals to eat where she was from and even if there were, the society was so strictly pacifist as to never intentionally harm anything or anyone. Even if their lives were at stake, they would never forsake such a strongly held belief. Perhaps it was her pacifist upbringing that made her think so, but she didn't think the turkey looked very appetizing. From the scrunched look on Starfire's face, she (ironically, considering the kinds of things she ate) didn't think so, either.
"Show her another one," Cyborg said, relishing this—whether it was because it was whetting his appetite or making Beast Boy uncomfortable or both, it was hard to say. "Oh," he said, snapping his fingers. "Show her a chicken. Everyone loves chicken."
Beast Boy gurgled in protest, but shifted into a smaller bird, one with a small, sharp beak and smaller pieces of skin along its nick and crest. He clucked, more softly, and chirruped a couple of times and then extended his wing—again, this bird didn't look capable of flight—for Starfire as much as he could. Starfire ran her finger from his shoulder to his wingtip, brushed over the feathers at the tips, and then explored the underside.
During Starfire's hushed, contemplative study of the chicken anatomy, Raven went about making herself look as presentable as she could. There was little she could do now about the rips along her shoulders, but she took a few moments to heal the scratches, making it look like she was brushing off dust as she waved her hand over them. They were superficial and went away easily, but for anyone who might've been looking, it would've been hard to miss the blue glow around her hand as she touched her shoulder. How "hanging out" had devolved into this, she'd never understand. Unless this still was "hanging out," in which case, she was apprehensive about what she'd gotten herself into.
Suddenly, Beast Boy was squawking shrilly, hopping, and flapping, scattering feathers everywhere. Starfire jolted back. "I am sorry, Beast Boy! I did not mean to! I did not know you were so ticklish—"
Her string of apologies was interrupted by Raven sneezing. And sneezing again. And again.
"Bless you," Robin said, once he thought she was done. Raven rubbed her nose, a little dazed, and quietly thanked him. She couldn't remember the last time she'd sneezed. In fact, she wasn't sure if she ever had. After all, since she was unable to get sick, there wasn't much use for sneezing. Or so she'd thought.
"Are you unwell?" Starfire asked.
In lieu of explaining that her half-demon physiology and all the abilities that came with it prevented her from getting sick, she merely said, "No." She began brushing stray feathers off her lap and promptly sneezed again.
"Bless you," Starfire said, sounding unsure. "This is something you say on Earth when somebody sneezes?"
"Mhm," Cyborg said. "You allergic or something, Rae?"
Raven sniffed. She hadn't considered it. Being allergic was very different from being sick. "Maybe."
Beast Boy decided to help her test the theory. He sauntered over and stepped into her lap before she could object, then purposely tried to get near her face. This may have been the point where Raven forcibly removed him from her person, except that she did indeed sneeze again; hard enough, in fact, with him in such proximity, that a small inadvertent burst of her telekinetic energy propelled him into Robin. Robin caught him, though Beast Boy was left a little stunned.
"Sorry," Raven said.
Cyborg guffawed. "Don't worry, Rae. I think we're all a little allergic to Beast Boy."
Robin eyed the chicken in his hands and said, "Okay, I think we've had enough for one day, Beast Boy." The underlying message was, of course, let's not find out what else Raven might be allergic to and risk a more catastrophic outburst. Or maybe it was just plain compassion for her. Either way, Beast Boy complied, jumping to the floor and turning back into human.
Cyborg cracked his knuckles and said, "If you're done boasting now, I think it's time for a rematch."
"Bring it on," Beast Boy said, instantly getting back into the swing of things. He leapt over the back of the couch—still human—and reclaimed his seat and his controller. Within moments the game was starting up again, along with bright flashes and action music.
"This has been enlightening," Starfire said, standing up. To Beast Boy, she said, "Thank you for helping me."
"No prob, Star," Beast Boy said distractedly, already engrossed in the game again. She went to collect her nail polish from where she'd left it on the counter and resume painting. Robin stood as well, brushing a few stray feathers off his leggings.
Raven sniffled again, using her powers to gather up all the feathers. She had half a mind to dump the collection of them on Beast Boy's head as revenge, but afraid she might accidentally trigger her allergies again—that did seem to be the most likely explanation—she opted instead to dispose of them neatly in their trash.
She'd enjoyed herself, she supposed. At least, she had before the entire animal kingdom visited their living room. She wanted to be irritated. They, especially Beast Boy, had distracted her from her reading, been loud and messy, and even made her sneeze; all of this while teasing her and invading her personal space. By every means, she should be irritated. She was Raven, after all; stolid, aloof Raven, who nobody dared cross if they had any brains at all. Her teammates hadn't needed to know her for long to know that much. And yet, she'd condoned all this effrontery. And why?
Sure, it had been intriguing to her, too. Like Starfire, she knew what most animals were, and just didn't have any experience to which that knowledge could be applied. All she'd been exposed to growing up was a variety of birds and, if today's lesson had taught her anything, it had been a small variety at that. Even the cat, which books had helped her understand to be a common animal on Earth, was new and exotic to her. It was like a speech she'd memorized and could recite without much thought, but she'd never actually understood the material or even thought about its contents.
While Raven was a good student, her academic curiosity didn't feel like a sufficient excuse for suffering all these indignities. For that matter, calling what she'd just experienced "suffering indignities" seemed altogether too harsh. As she picked up her book from where she'd left it on the floor, realizing she hadn't even remembered to bookmark or dogear her place, she decided that she didn't really know what to call it, whatever had just happened. Nothing like it had ever happened to her before.
Dumbly, she figured that maybe it was called "hanging out."
She clutched her book to her chest and looked up, only to meet Robin's eyes. Her uncertainty must've shown on her face because he frowned and asked, "Are you okay?"
Raven took stock of herself. Physically, she was fine, not even sore from having sat cross-legged on the floor for that long. The scratches no longer bothered her since she'd covertly taken care of them earlier and the allergies, now that the feathers were gone and Beast Boy was human again, were all but forgotten. Taking stock of herself mentally had become just as easy with practice over the years, though took more focus; even so, she found nothing in disarray. Her emotions were controlled, her powers reigned in. Nothing stood out. In fact, she was content. Surprisingly so.
"I'm okay," she said and meant it. "This was… nice."
When Robin looked at her, he did so closely with a look she recognized: it had been on Beast Boy's face earlier, when he'd wanted to ask her something but decided against it. But Robin, as her de facto leader, had less compunctions about prying when he decided it was necessary, and she wasn't so confident that he would decide it unnecessary. By now, avoiding questions was second nature, so she formulated an excuse.
"I'm going to go change," she said quickly, fingering one of the bigger tears on her shoulder. Robin, seeing the excuse for what it was, kindly stepped aside to let her pass undisturbed out of the living room. For this, Raven was grateful; the less they knew about her, the safer they'd likely all be, in the end. And the less likely they'd be to ostracize her in the meantime, especially this early on in their team days. As she walked down the empty hallway back to her room, she wondered when their safety, out of all people, had started to matter to her. It might have started when she started calling this "hanging out." More likely, it might have happened much earlier, when she'd destroyed the Gordanian ship, once and for all, and declared them, now the Titans, her friends.
Friends. What an otherworldly concept.
It was for her friends, then, that she told them as little about her as possible, at least for now. One day, she might be able to open up to them and admit some very non-Earthlike things like "I don't actually know what animals are" without concern for their safety, but until then, if it ever happened, it was best that any information they had about her was strictly need-to-know.
It was better that way, she told herself as she fetched a clean leotard and changed into it. She rubbed the torn fabric of her old cloak between her fingers, remembering what it had felt like to hold Beast Boy's soft tail, to carry his warm weight, to feel the pinpricks of his talons and the smoothness of his feathers. What would it have felt like to pet the cat or stroke the cobra? What about all the other animals she'd seen him turn into, in and out of battle? Or the animals she'd seen just during her brief few weeks in Jump City—squirrels and mice and dogs? What were they all like? For a moment she gripped the torn fabric tightly in her fist, feeling her own cool skin through the holes, and then threw the leotard out. Afterwards, she sat down on her bed, took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and meditated.
Much later that evening, when everyone else had retired to their rooms for the night, Beast Boy knocked on Cyborg's door. When Cyborg answered, it was to see Beast Boy looking contemplative and serious, which was such an uncharacteristic look to see on him that Cyborg was immediately worried.
"Everything okay, BB?" Cyborg asked, stepping aside to let Beast Boy into his room.
Once the door had slid shut again, Beast Boy said, "Dude, did you see Raven earlier? When I was doing my animal thing for Starfire?"
Cyborg sensed that this was not the time to tease. He suspected he knew what Beast Boy meant, but he asked anyway, "What do you mean?"
"I dunno. I mean, when she asked me what the pygmy marmoset was, and every time I turned into something new, she looked at me like…" He shrugged, his words failing him. "Like she was…"
"Transfixed?" Cyborg suggested.
"Yeah, that. You saw it too. She looked so much like Starfire. And Starfire I get, I mean, she's an alien, she's never been to Earth before. So, of course the animals I change into must seem weird to her, but…"
Beast Boy trailed off, not sure where he was going with his thoughts. "I wanted to ask Raven, earlier," he said, sounding as somber as if he had been confessing, "if she had wildlife where she was from." He looked down at his fingers for a moment, his hands covered by his customary gloves, and asked, somewhat rhetorically, "She's definitely not from Earth, is she?"
Cyborg had been right. It had been something extraordinary to watch someone who was not from Earth experience for the first time something that, for him, was nothing special. It was like watching fireworks for the first time; tilt your head back, keep your eyes wide open, don't look away—something incredible and miraculous is happening and it may never happen again. Blink and you might miss it forever.
If he'd blinked, he might've missed the fireworks in Raven, too. Beast Boy hadn't blinked either.
Cyborg sighed and said, "I always suspected she wasn't, with those powers and the way she looks and all."
"The way she looked at me today," Beast Boy went on, "like she'd never seen those animals before. I'm not even sure she knew what they were. I mean, lots of people don't know what a pygmy marmoset is…"
"You're right, BB," Cyborg conceded. He raised his arm so he could work on the small screen embedded in his forearm with his other hand. "I've never been able to find any record of her. Even you, me, and Robin come up sometimes on the web, but I never could find anything about her. A girl like that, even keeping a low profile, it'd be hard not to be noticed."
Beast Boy watched him tap on the screen for lack of anything else to watch or think about. Once Cyborg found what he wanted, he maneuvered so that Beast Boy could see. "My sensors always indicated that she wasn't fully human, but whatever else she is…" Cyborg shrugged. "They don't recognize it."
The glow of the screen reflected in Beast Boy's face as he processed having his suspicions confirmed. Aside from Robin, they were all at least a little non-human, so that didn't bother him too much, not on its own. It occurred to him that, if Cyborg's sensors, with all Cyborg's experience and knowledge, couldn't detect what Raven was, that perhaps he should be afraid—more afraid than he already was. It occurred to him that he couldn't, shouldn't trust her. There was no telling where she was from, the extent of her powers, or, most worryingly, her intentions. Beast Boy really didn't like knowing. When he looked up, he saw the same troubled look on Cyborg's face. Except that Cyborg had known this for a while and it had never mattered to him. He never treated Raven any differently. At least, not that Beast Boy had noticed. That had to mean… something.
Cyborg shut off the screen. It occurred to Beast Boy that he knew what it meant: it meant that, at the end of the day, it didn't matter to him, either. "Do you think she'll ever tell us?" he asked. It went without saying that they would not be asking her directly.
"I don't know, BB."
"I hope she does, one day."
"Me too, BB. Me too."
On his way back to his room, Beast Boy stopped outside Raven's door. When he waited and didn't hear anything, he turned into a cat and pressed himself as close to the door as he dared, ears swiveled and alert, listening intently.
Faintly, he heard her monotonous voice, repeatedly chanting a mantra in what sounded like another language. But, coming from her, it sounded familiar.
Comforted, Beast Boy trotted back to his own room for the night.
One more note regarding Raven being vegetarian: she is vegetarian in the comics and so I'm assuming the reasons for that are strict pacifism and lack of available meat. If it bothers you, you could assume that she later gives up being vegetarian (this is set very early on, of course), or do what I did and take a literal interpretation of the line "I don't eat fake meat."
Finally, thank you to Audrey for your help with this!
