A lone titan stood on the city pier, enjoying the mild, warm summer air that brushing up against her with the distinct scent of salt water. Gulls soared overhead, their caws ricocheting off one another, and the sun sunk shyly behind the glittering skyline as streaks of faded pink and gold painted the evening sky.
Anyone who knew the reclusive empath could have told it was a special occasion—not by the way she was dressed, which was predictably reserved and understated in jeans and a blue shirt—nor even by the package she carried under her arm, a square item wrapped in red paper.
It was the way she held herself. The sorceress, so often tucked away beneath the shadow of her hood and cape, now stood erect, her head raised slightly higher than usual.
Waiting patiently on the wooden planks of the pier, her shoes scuffed against the rough splintering boards as Raven mentally reviewed the battle with Mad Mod from earlier that day.
I should have ripped up the staircase so Starfire could have landed a more direct shot, she contemplated.
Beastboy did pretty well handling the hypnosis, but Cyborg must have been running on half-charge with all the hits he was taking. I wonder if Robin has finished—
A familiar sleek, glinting motorcycle roared up, tires squealing as the rubber burned against asphalt. A black cloud of exhaust choked out from the pipe, and Raven covered her mouth as she was jerked from her thoughts.
"Sorry I'm late," the thief apologized as she climbed on the back of the seat. "I had to make a detour to pick someone up."
"Who?" the dark titan began to ask, but her question was drowned out in the revved rumble of the engine. Red X leaned forward and pulled out into traffic, weaving between the lanes that were jammed up with irritated drivers, blaring their horns in the Friday evening rush.
The sorceress saw the passengers in the cars stare out curiously at the couple who aggressively darted through the blockade, and she bent her head lower against X's jacket, hoping to evade recognition.
Where is he going? Raven wondered soundlessly, as cafés and high-rise apartments flew past them.
Probably that greasy taco stand he loves so much.
She mentally rolled her eyes, but stopped to fearfully tighten her grip around the reckless driver as he made a hairpin turn and swerved to avoid an oncoming truck. The rogue twisted his head back briefly when the danger had passed, grinning at her stricken expression.
He said "something different" though, Raven resumed with a shaking breath. His idea of something different would be going to an expensive restaurant and strutting in with jeans and leather to make a scene.
Raven fervently hoped this would not the case. The last thing she needed was unwanted attention with the civilians and a track record connected to a notorious figure.
"Hey Princess, snap out of it. We're here." Jason cut the engine and Raven looked up tentatively at the place in front of them.
A garish, red-and-blue sign above proclaimed: "Welcome to Chester Parmesan's!" in looping script. A huge cut-out of a smiling rat wearing a sports jersey and holding a baseball bat was beside it. Clusters of kids pushing and clinging to their parent's shirts made their way into the pizza arcade, their shrill whines rising up like a discordant choir.
"You're joking," Raven said flatly.
"I'm not." Jason shot a sideways glance at her.
"I don't do kids."
"I know. But do this for me. There's someone I want you to meet."
Together they walked into arcade and the buttery, artificial smell of stale popcorn met their noses. Everywhere around them colorful strips of lights flashed temptingly from games, and shrieking children tripped across the carpet, their fingers drenched in pizza grease.
Raven was reminded distinctly of Melvin, Timmy, and Teether, the three kid-heroes she had once babysat, and she thought how much they would love this soiled, self-gratifying venue.
"Over here," Jason gestured, and he led her over to a vinyl booth where a young boy sat, counting out tokens on the grey plastic table. He looked up as the two approached, and Raven's eyebrows raised, immediately recognizing the dark, tousled hair and calculating, mischievous eyes.
Jason rested his hand on the boy's shoulder in an unusual gesture of familiarity.
"Aiden, this is Raven. Raven, Aiden."
Aiden studied her carefully, his large green eyes sweeping over her with an unnerving exactness. The empath could sense waves of apprehension rolling off of him, and she tried to relax the sharp lines of her face.
"You're his girlfriend?" he abruptly asked in a brusque manner, without offering even a cursory greeting.
"Don't be so cheeky," Jason rebuked him, giving the youth a swat on the head.
Raven blinked at the boy, unsure she'd heard correctly.
She'd never actually thought of giving a name to what she was to Jason. It was always "hero and villain"— albeit with few blurred lines, and a good amount of kissing. The word "girlfriend" and her name hadn't ever been used in a sentence together before, and it sounded strange to Raven, like a hat that fit too small.
Red X nudged her out of her reverie, forgetting that the boy was awaiting her response.
"Er, yeah—I guess," Raven answered hesitantly.
It was Jason who reacted to this first.
"You guess?" He snorted derisively. "You guess? What, are you my mistress instead?"
A pale pink flush rose to Raven's face.
"Don't say that kind of thing in public!" she snarled through clenched teeth, in a low voice.
"Aiden's still a little rough around the edges. Boarding school hasn't entirely cleaned up his manners," Jason informed her, poking the boy in the shoulder when Aiden pulled a frown at him. The kid turned his attention back to Raven, focusing intently on her face.
"I've seen you on TV," he declared matter-of-factly. "You're the creepy titan, the one that never answers the news woman's questions."
A temple throbbed in Raven's brow, and she narrowed her eyes at him.
"Allllright, let's go get some more tokens," Jason cut in loudly, wrapping an arm around Aiden's neck and dragging him over to the counter, where a bored-looking attendant lounged languidly.
When they returned, Jason crouched at Aiden's height and said in a stage whisper, "Want to hear something I know about Raven that you don't?"
The boy's eyes widened like the coins he clutched in his hands.
"What?" he asked eagerly, waiting for the dirt.
"She can play a mean game of Whack-a-Rat." The thief winked at Raven.
"Wait a minute, I don't think—" the sorceress began to protest, sensing this was a poorly disguised joke directed at her pummeling of Malchior.
"Really?" The boys eyebrows shot up, impressed.
Raven recognized her only chance at redeeming herself as someone other than the "creepy titan".
She sighed, then tried her best to crack a smile. "I've never been defeated," she told him in her sardonic monotone.
Xxx
It was one of the most unexpected afternoons of Raven's life. She beat the arcade's Whack-a-Rat high score single-handedly, and the machine spit out a pile of tickets at her, making Aiden whoop delightedly.
The boy had his obnoxious moments, not much unlike the older version beside him— although, whenever the youth let a swear word slip out, Jason was always within earshot to tell him to clean his mouth out.
"One of us has to have manners," the thief explained as he set a platter of steaming pepperoni pizza down at their table. "And it sure isn't going to be me." He grabbed a slice, folding it in half like a hot dog, and shoved it back into his mouth.
"No," Raven agreed dryly. "It's definitely not going to be you."
He smirked, and Raven felt sure he was acting boorish just to annoy her. He swallowed, chugged a glass of soda and then let out contented burp.
"It's my birthday, so you have to be nice to me," he reminded her mockingly.
"I never read any rules that said you have to treat an animal like a human on its birthday," Raven shot back, crossing her arms across her chest.
Jason clutched at his heart, pretending he had been shot.
"Ouch, Bluebird. You know that really hurts," he lamented in a wavering voice.
Aiden slurped down the last of his stringy cheese, licking the yellow grease off his fingers before Jason tossed a napkin at his face.
"Use it, kid."
Wiping his hands clean, the boy stood up with the tickets the three of them had amassed. He clutched them tightly as he told his two seniors that he was going to pick out a prize, and ran off toward the counter.
Jason let out a sigh as soon as he left, dropping his goofy act.
"Thanks for putting up with him. He's not the most charming, but he means well. At least, his attitude is a lot better than mine when I was his age."
Raven gave him a rare, wide smile. "It's your birthday, and he's your family. I've dealt with worse."
She set the red package down in front of him, the one she had carefully wrapped this morning.
"Speaking of which," she added in a sly tone. "Happy birthday."
She leaned in toward him and brushed her lips across his cheek, careful to keep the public affection to a minimum.
A hand grabbed her leg beneath the table and squeezed tightly, and Jason's glare had a playful, cagey spark.
"That better not be all," he warned in a menacing tone, his hand not leaving her thigh.
"Open the present," Raven laughed, unable to help herself, and she pushed the package closer to him.
The rogue ripped away the crimson tissue paper, revealing a used but evidently loved copy of Heirlooms of Gotham's Oldest Families. Jason grinned, turning it over in his hands.
"Thanks, Raven," he said, studying the back cover. "I've been meaning to steal this from you." Leaning over before she could protest, he pressed his lips firmly against hers, tasting like lemon-lime soda pop and a hint of breathlessness.
Aiden came back to the table at that moment, and he gagged at them as Raven pushed Jason away embarrassedly.
"Not in front of people!" she reproached him in a low voice for the second time that day.
Jason frowned at his cousin, annoyed he had chosen that moment to intrude.
"He's not people. He's a person," the thief muttered like a smartass.
"You know what I mean," Raven sighed.
Aiden slid back into the booth, a green plastic dinosaur in his hands. He wore a devilish grin that reminded the sorceress of one she had seen on another's face before.
Jason studied him warily.
"What did you do?" he asked, folding his arms with suspicion.
Aiden shrugged, fumbling with the dinosaur and making it rampage across the remaining cold slices of pizza.
They didn't have to wait long to get their answer, though. A cluster of apathetic, tapped-out Chester Parmesan staff surrounded them, all clapping in non-unison. One came up behind Jason and set striped birthday hat on his head, struggling to make the flimsy cardboard cone stay put on the unruly ebony hair. Another set down a heavily-frosted cake that had the face of a rat giving a thumbs up, and the words beneath it read: "Happy Birthday Kiddo!"
Seeing the cake's inscription made Jason chuckle, but Raven was not amused at all when a big costumed Chester lumbered up behind them, wrapping each arm around the empath and Aiden, squeezing Jason in between them.
"Say Parmesan!" instructed a staff member with a camera, and the two cousins obediently hollered "PARMESAN!"
Raven stared mutely away from the camera, horrified, until Jason gave her a sharp jab in the ribs with his elbow, making her gasp "Parmesan!"
The camera clicked, the listless staff members gave a tired "Hooray!", and they dispersed to leave the trio to their cake and photo.
"You little punk," Jason laughed good-naturedly once the crowd had left them. "I should've known you'd do something underhanded like that."
Aiden was shoveling forkfuls of chocolate cake into his mouth, and when he tried to answer crumbs tumbled out.
"Slow down, little man. You can talk when you finish chewing."
Jason turned to Raven and nudged her with his shoulder, lifting up a plate of cake as he did. "How about you feed me some, huh?" he asked, giving her a suggestive wink.
"Don't even think about it," Raven threatened, but she accepted the slice he passed to her.
"Aw, look." The thief jabbed his fork down at the photo on the table. "We have memorabilia."
Raven eyes lighted on the incriminating photograph, with the two grinning fools and the uncomfortable titan grimacing at the camera, and she lunged to grab it.
Jason was quicker though—he scooped it up and slid it inside his jacket pocket, before she could snatch it away.
"I'll be taking that," he smirked, and went back to eating his dessert.
"You can't—don't blackmail me with that," Raven hissed to him under her breath, sizing him up with her dark violet eyes.
Jason's own eyes widened in surprise and he pointed at himself in an exaggerated gesture.
"Me? Blackmail? Why, I'd never dream of it," he declared innocently.
"That's not what your file says," Raven said under her breath, but Jason shot her a warning glance and she ceased voicing that train of thought.
Xxx
"I'm sorry I can't stay any later with you tonight," Raven said in a voice that was laced with regret.
She and Red X stood just outside the doorway of the arcade, leaving Aiden within, gleefully occupied by a fourth cup of game tokens.
"The Titans are obligated to show up at the Wayne Enterprises 225th celebratory gala." The empath sighed, glancing down at the rough, warm hands that were shoved into his pockets. "If I had a choice, I wouldn't go—"
"I understand. It's going to be quite the event. Invitation only."
A hand withdrew from the thief's pocket, waving a cream-colored parchment in the air, embossed with curling golden words.
"Of course, how could I not attend as well, being an upstanding member of this community?" Jason continued, a rascally grin on his face.
Raven looked dumbstruck at his card, a legitimate invite scrawled onto it, allowing him into the most coveted and prestigious gala Jump ever hosted.
"How did you—did you steal that?" she demanded indignantly, her eyes flashing.
"Nah," Jason said coolly, folding the parchment up and shoving it back into his jeans. "I've got friends. You know, in high places." He flicked Raven on the nose in an imperious but lighthearted gesture, then wheeled back around toward the arcade.
"See you later, mistress," he chortled, whistling a low tune to himself as he stepped through the sliding glass doors and back into the rabid kid-pit.
Xxx
So I realized after writing this chapter that I pretty much took a teen titan and a villain and put them smack dab in the middle of the "real world". I hope this didn't come off as too AU; I wanted to portray a ridiculously normal experience with some very unlikely characters.
I figured, hey: if an introverted Teen Titan can date a cocky criminal, then is it that far off that they might go to a Chuck E. Cheese-esque place? Fits into my equations.