Chapter 3

Terra got up for a moment to refill her glass of soda again before sitting down.

It didn't take Raven's empathic skills to know that Terra was really nervous as, up till that accident, her life was pretty good. She didn't harbor any ill will towards Edward, knowing that he did what he was asked.

Cyborg noticed her nervousness and when she sat down, he gave her a hug and said, "You're doing good, Terra. We got your back, remember that."

"Thanks, Tin Man," she said with a small smile, "Well, after the rescue, I don't remember much for a while. That's why I don't remember you, Edward. I'm sorry."

"No worries," Edward said, "you had a head trauma, I didn't expect you to remember me. Actually, it didn't dawn on me that our lives crossed when you were a little girl. That makes me even happier to know that while you had things rough, you have friends here that care."

Terra shook hard and that was Beast Boy's cue to be supportive of his girlfriend.

"I'm here, Terra," he said as she quietly wept for a moment. Robin got a box of Kleenix and handed it to Beast Boy.

[I wonder how long it's really been since Terra had a home where people care about her,] Edward asked Raven.

[Too long, dear,] Raven replied, [There's a lot of emotional damage that is still healing. This is a huge step she's taking and, well, she's not sure how we will react to the next part of the story.]

Edward sighed, [Should I call a break to let her calm down?]

[No,] Raven replied, [She's not in a panic state. She really wants to tell us the whole story.]

Terra recovered a minute later and said, "Mind if we stop for a few minutes?"

Robin said, "Not at all. This has been going on for a few hours.

"You got anything special planned for dinner, Chef?"

"Not really," Edward replied, "Just some burgers for the meat eaters and some tofu burgers for Beast Boy."

"Sounds good!" Cyborg said with a smile. He enjoyed Edward's burgers immensely, as did the rest of the gang.

"I take it Rae and I should start those?" Edward asked.

"Might as well," Robin said.

Edward shrugged and got up. Raven followed of course. She had improved to the point that Edward was comfortable letting her cook for the team finally. She did well when she cooked for Edward and herself, and, he finally relented and let her cook for the team. The first time she did a solo meal for the Titans, they were happily surprised. That made the young empath quite happy that night.

Well, Edward got the garden burgers out first and after adding his seasonings, pan fried those in olive oil and added some soy based cheese to the burgers. Edward didn't have the heart, though, to ask why Beast Boy didn't mind real cheese on his pizza, but, insisted on vegan cheese for other things. For one, it didn't melt at all like regular cheese did. But, he was respecting Beast Boy's wishes.

He plated the patties and grabbed the burgers that Raven had prepared as Edward cooked. He smiled as he gave them the once-over. Those went into the frying pan as well.

Several burgers, though, he fixed different, mainly for Cyborg. Those, he took a good chunk of Velveeta and inserted into the middle of one raw patty and put another patty on top. After carefully sealing the burger, he put that on as well.

It took about 30 minutes to get things prepared, but, the team sat down to a nice meal. Needless to say, everyone enjoyed their dinner, especially Cyborg when he discovered his "Juicy Lucy" cheeseburger. Also, Starfire loved it as she preferred to drink mustard like it was Pepsi, and, there was plenty to go around.

Then, an hour after Robin called a break to let Terra prepare the next part of her story, dinner was consumed and the dishes put in the dishwasher.

"Let's continue," Terra said after the last items were put away.

[Mid-September, 2000]

Young Tara was still in the hospital after her rescue and, well, there had been complications from the lack of oxygen and the head trauma.

She became moody and temperamental as a result of the injury. Her personality had been altered and, well, eventually a new doctor named Dr. Helga Jace was brought in to see what was wrong.

Tara suspected, in her young mind, that this Dr. Jace had some plans for her. What plans, she obviously did not know.

It didn't matter, though, not right away. Tara was having trouble remembering things prior to the plane crash and it was frustrating her to no end to know that her memory was not as good as it was. She didn't even remember the kind stranger who helped her and Brion.

She didn't even believe her brother when he tried to tell her that he rode a real life dragon.

As time passed, Dr. Jace realized that the major personality shift was a permanent thing as well as the memory problems. She was also working on an experimental drug that she hoped would at least help her brain to recover.

The problem was that the injury was also affecting Tara's ability to walk and even other motor skills. It wasn't severe, but, it was bothersome to the young girl to have to relearn how to walk and she took those frustrations out on whoever was nearby. She somehow knew that she couldn't talk to her father that way, but, others were subjected to Tara's new stubborn streak.

Dr. Jace got Harold's permission to treat Tara with the experimental drug, even though it had not been tested on anyone else. In other countries, this was highly unethical and potentially illegal. However, Dr. Jace couldn't be concerned with that as the CT Scans showed an area in Tara's brain that had suffered more damage than other areas. If it wasn't repaired or starting to heal soon…it would eventually kill her.

Well, the treatment was started shortly thereafter and within a couple of weeks, Tara's mood had improved as her motor skills started to improve as well.

A month after the treatments began, Tara underwent another CT Scan and the damage to her brain had shown a remarkable improvement. But, they also noticed something else. Her DNA had been altered in the process. There were differences in the genetic pattern that were baffling folks all around. But, they finally decided that the changes, however slight, may not cause many problems in the near term, but, they also knew that as Tara got older, there was a chance that puberty might trigger those changes.

Tara was released from the hospital after 6 weeks of the treatments. She still had to do physical therapy daily to rebuild her strength and help her brain re-wire itself, if that was needed. That, Tara hated with a passion. No one blamed her though for what had happened.

In fact, the early investigation was showing that there was a pressurization problem initially and because the engines were working harder to maintain air pressure, it was a matter of time before one failed. The port engine suffered an oil leak, which, in turn caught fire at the worst possible time. The wing stall was the final straw that broke the camel's back. The pilots, of course, were given a proper funeral with full honors for bringing the plane in safely at the cost of their lives. King Harold stipulated that Markovia would pick up the costs of the funeral and to make sure that the widowed wives were looked after for life by signing a royal decree to that effect.

But, Tara readjusted to being back home. It took some time, though. She was having trouble remembering things still and her moods were reflecting that.

"It'll be OK, sis," Brion said one day, "You have to give yourself time to heal."

"Easy for you to say!" she retorted, "You weren't out as long as I was, were you?"

Brion replied, "Tara, I know you were out the longest, and that you were hurt more. That doesn't mean you can take it out on everyone else, though! This wasn't your fault, either."

Tara stormed off, though. She didn't want to hear it. Brion sighed in frustration as he had been trying to get through to her without much success.

Tara was confused, though. She had been told that her injuries had healed, yet, she didn't feel right. She felt weird and she wasn't sure what the heck was happening to her. She didn't like it, though.

Yet, as time passed, Tara's outbursts trended down and she started to be happy again…

[Mid-August, 2004]

Tara had turned 10 finally and she was bordering on puberty. But, it was also becoming obvious that while Tara was the King's daughter, she didn't look much like Brion. The regular Joe Sixpack was starting to notice this as well and Harold had to eventually make a decision: Admit that Tara was born out of wedlock and disgrace the throne and possibly be forced to abdicate, or, send Tara away for good and stripping her of her right to be a princess. To the advisors, some of who resented the fact that maybe the king had been in power too long and wanted him gone. They were not stupid enough to have him assassinated. They already tried that play and His Majesty and children survived the attempt. Oh, they were good at covering their tracks, but, the attempt was supposed to have resulted in that plane exploding, hopefully in mid-air or on impact with the ground.

But, after the rescue by that interloping Dragon, they had to lay low for years. Now with the daughter on the verge of assuming her mother's looks, it wouldn't take long for people to start whispering that she looked nothing like the King's late wife and since the King had not remarried since then, well, it wouldn't do to have the princess be known as illegitimate.

So, they planned a different way to get rid of him or at least discredit him. They would expose young Tara as motherless. They were, after all, thinking of the kingdom, right?

Well, a few days after Tara's 10th birthday party, the advisors went to see the King.

"Your Highness," they said in a letter, "We, the undersigned royal advisors, having the best interest of the Kingdom, respectfully request that the child known as Tara Markov either be publically revealed as being an illegitimate child or that she be stripped of her title and exiled from Markovia.

"We fear that should it become known, that His Highness will be discredited before the eyes of our friends and allies and that irreparable harm should befall the throne. It would give our enemies a chance to sway wavering alliances against the kingdom.

"If the child is removed from the country, though, we would go along with any cover story His Majesty would desire to tell the people."

It was signed by most of the advisors.

King Harold's face purpled in rage and he said, "Get out of my sight before I have you executed! How dare you blackmail me like this?! Pack your things and GET OUT OF THE PALACE…YOU'RE FIRED!"

The palace guards rushed in, hearing the sudden raised voices and Harold said, "Remove these traitors from this building, immediately!"

The guards grabbed the advisors and, with weapons drawn, frog marched the advisors out of the building…all of them.

The advisors weren't even given a chance to present their case, but, Tara happened to see and hear what was going on. Her father had just tossed out his friends and one advisor yelled out, "You haven't heard the last of this! We'll expose your little girl as a pretender to the throne!"

Tara shouldn't have heard that as something snapped within her. She ran to her room, in tears and as she cried, she didn't see a soft yellow glow in her hands or feel her hair starting to stand on end. The ground trembled, ever so slightly, just enough to be noticeable by folks in the palace.

Tara's powers had been activated and set her on a path that no one could foresee…

Man...This is going to be hard to write with a different central character. Now I know how JK Rowling must have felt moving on from Harry Potter. *Chuckle*

I'm going to be splitting time between this and "A Titan's Wedding", please don't expect rapid updates on this one. The Muse is not very forthcoming with this one and, honestly, I've considered scrapping this story a few times. However, recently, I did have one person favorite/follow this, so, I'll try to keep plugging at this.

What sucks...I wrote "A Titan Thanksgiving" in less than 36 hours and that was literally a spur of the moment story. I had that idea the night before Thanksgiving and wrote a majority of it around Thanksgiving dinner and had it posted Friday morning. "Terra's Story" (Yeah, I changed it to avoid people thinking I was retelling the episode...been there, done that) is fighting back like Malchior in a bad mood...*sigh*

Ideas welcomed!