Come to the Edge
Ravens and crows are like any other animals; they host the possibility
of genetic abnormality and mutations. Albinism, for example, because
there were white ravens and crows. Whether they were thought to be
positive or negative all depends on different cultures, and it didn't
really matter after all since whatever their existence meant was all
artificial anyway. In her case, however, Raven of the Teen Titans was
dying to tag the creature with a meaning. She had been visited and
revisited and revisited by this said bird in her dream inconsistently
over the past few months, and it bothered her even in her meditations on
the roof of the Tower. A white shape flashed inside Raven's closed eyes
like a curtain blown into a window. That again. Things had been down
right miserable inside her mind lately. With disgust she frowned and
opened her eyes a slit, and saw the red marks on her skyward palms like
lava cracks.
"Friend Raven!" cried an obvious voice, startling her. She instinctively
curled her fingers and withdrew her arms a little into the shadow cast
by her back. "Would you like to join us for supper?"
Raven didn't need to look to recognize Starfire's voice or her peculiar
grammar, the voice which, after almost a year of constant oppression,
still incited that prickling sensation all over her dark skin and a
terrifying hunger within her ribcage. She promptly answered, "No."
"But," Starfire was reluctant to admit defeat, but proceeded cautiously,
for she knew not how much was too far with Raven. "You have not dined
with us last night either, and today the whole day as well."
"There are things I needed to do," The last thing Raven wanted was to
have Starfire linger any moment longer for her fear to break lose and
her tongue to fling hostility. It was not exactly the other girl's
fault, it was just bad timing. Raven was in the midst of turning things
over in her mind, and she felt her control taking a dive like a broken
fuel indicator at Starfire's presence.
"Oh.... Perhaps...is it something..."
"You can't help with," Raven finished for the Tamaranian too quickly and
harshly before she could stop herself. She took a couple of deep breaths
and began again calmly, "Sorry Star. Please leave me, alone." It was
almost a whisper when she finished, but it left no ground for arguing,
and Starfire felt it. Although she didn't want to leave unaccompanied,
she took Robin's advice and let Raven be. Raven remained unmoved for a
while after the other girl left, but black energy was slowly gathering
all over Titan Tower roof top, betraying her otherwise apparent
calmness. The creak of the Tower's metal gate to the roof as it began to
misshapen begged the sorceress to acknowledge her lost of control. Star
believed in me...as a friend, and I treated her like shit, just because
I am too scared to even try and return her feelings...but how can I! How
can I risk letting any feeling go when it might just wring loose all
together like a mad dog? I feel for her too much...She uncurled her
fingers to see the markings. No...I can't...I shouldn't. Dammit! I don't
deserve to be with the Titans, I'm just a monster cooped up, feeding and
growing on itself.... Another creak. Raven, Calm down. Calm down.... She
closed her eyes and forced herself to take in a deep but ragged breath.
"Azarath...Metrion...Zinthos..." chanted the sorceress, but after barely
an hour of that she realized she was disturbed beyond meditation. She
needed something immediate. Her eye lid lifted, and her sight rested on
the glistening white belt of moon light floating atop a restless sea.
She fell, like a stone, and sank like one too, down, down without any
attempt to stop, toward the seafloor. It was autumn and the water was
freezing cold at night, sucking the heat out of her, the agitation. And
she sank, until she could feel nothing else but the stinging coldness
that was beginning to numb out as well. I will drown if I don't do
something now. As troubled as she felt, suicide was never a
consideration, so she dragged her body ashore. Her hunching form was
indistinguishable from the rocky terrain, and she stared at her sharply
defined shadow in front of her where there was no lamp post or any other
artificial light sources, catching her breaths. There won't be shadows
if there was no light. She was the shadow, the night caped. The light
that the darkness, this darkness, needs to exist...is her. She glanced
at her hands, and, satisfied, levitated to reenter the Tower through its
tortured roof gate, fixing it by the way.
I'm...having this dream again. It was gloomy, no light. She stood on an
earthen path with rocks rough enough to be felt through her boots. Mere
feet in front of her stood a white raven. It was of such a pure white it
was radiating softly as the only light source there. It's not supposed
to be there, but where is it supposed to be? She felt anxious. I need to
hold on to it, or it'll...ah! As she was thinking so, the white raven
beat its wings and took off, fading into the muddy mist. Panicking,
Raven took off after the bird, running. Suddenly she ended up before a
cliff with wind blowing so strong she sometimes was forced to take an
involuntary step. Beyond the cliff was a belt of impenetrable thick,
white fog. Stop! Don't go further! She beckoned to the bird, but it flew
straight into the fog, and vanishing almost instantly upon contact.
Then, she heard the bird - how she knew it was the bird she couldn't
reason - beckoning, summoning her to come forth. Below the cliff was
bottomless pit. An absolute fear gripped her and she lowered herself to
the ground against the clawing wind, and would not go near the cliff.
But the wind was growing stronger and stronger, and for the first time
the secretive Raven wished she hadn't her cloak, for it was catching the
wind like a sail, pulling her closer and closer to the edge. Just once
the sorceress turned her face to look back down the lightless pit, and
realize she was already at the edge. Then a sudden gust in the current
and she fell.
"AAH!" Raven awoke with a violent, whole-body jerk and felt water drops
trailing down her temples, once again. She lay still in her bed, feeling
frustrated and furious that she wanted to scream, and did not. What
monster was that bird which haunted her light or dark, taking away her
sleep, driving her mad, and destroying her inside out! ...fuck sleep,
it's lost.
The kettle screamed sitting on fire, prompting Raven to leave the window
in the living room. She turned the heat off and poured the hot water
through a ceramic filter holding herbs that rested on top of her mug,
capped it, and walked back to the window. No light was on in the living
room. On the other side of that sheet of glass the world was black too.
The moon had set during her four- hour sleep, and only a few sparkles
that were the distant street lights marked where land might separate
from water. She took one hand off the warm mug and reached out to press
her palm against the chilly glass. It was too early in the morning, the
coldest hours of a day. She suddenly felt like a bird which, failed to
understand glass, persistently fly into the uncompromising barrier,
thinking it was free. Her hands phased through the glass, and drew back
to warm up against her mug. When will the bird break its neck? She had
thought about telling Starfire her overflowing feelings for her, several
times. She was afraid. Unbridled joy, righteous fury, and boundless
confidence... she was everything Raven was not, or rather, could not be.
Her heart was soft, feeling, and innocent; Her own was rigid, confined,
calculating. Sometimes she envied her, who never had to check and
process each and every reaction each and every moment of her life.
Sometimes she wondered why she fell so hopelessly in love with someone
so incompatible, the exact opposite. Three weeks ago she noticed the
change in the relationship between Starfire and Robin before anyone else
did. Now she couldn't tell anything even if she dared to. She would only
trouble and wreck her relationship with the whole team. Those feelings
that died and rotted never seeing the light of day was now transformed
into a pulsing cancer mound. She felt like she was walking round and
around in a negative cycle, with each turn grinding and chipping her off
a little at a time. Now it was only the question of which one would
break her first - the cancer mound or the natal monster sealed inside
her.
Something red and blue flashed where the street lights were lined up.
Then again. And again. And soon Raven was looking at four police cars
gliding along the coast line at high speed toward opposite directions,
in teams of two. More colored lights twinkled between slim city
buildings. Probably chasing a burglar. Since she wouldn't be sleeping
anyway, she phased through the glass and flew off to stick her nose into
the business, leaving her unfinished tea on living room table.
A group of four policemen were talking excitedly next to an open-door
police vehicle when one of them noticed a shady figure suddenly
approaching them from seemingly out of nowhere, and alerted his
comrades. As they quickly drew their guns another one recognized the
person and halted the other three, "It's Raven of the Titans."
"What's going on here?" Raven asked.
"I see we're not the only one not getting sleep tonight," the first
police to recognize Raven said, "A serial arsonist just broke outta
jail."
"Do you mind me helping with this?"
"Not at all! But you don't have to. It's just an arsonist," the same
police answered.
"It's okay. I'm not getting sleep tonight anyway," Raven said with a
slight smile, "which jail did the arsonist broke out of?"
"City Juvenile Correction Center," Another policeman said quietly, his
eyes met those of his comrades, who shared his frown.
"Something's wrong?" Raven inquired, finding the reactions of the law
enforcers odd.
"Yes...he appeared to have outside help. The walls to his cell collapsed
inward upon outside force, but there was no signs of impact from other
objects nor explosive. It was as if the entire wall collapsed on its
own. And another strange thing is probably just coincidence, but today
happened to be his eighteenth birthday. If he's caught he would be tried
in a full court and receive full sentence this time,"
The policemen's communicator buzzed to live. They've tracked the young
man down to a half torn down building - one of the many that he helped
burn down. After getting the address of that building Raven took off,
hovering above the cityscape.
The building had all its windows blown open by either flame as it burned
or water from the fire trucks, but it was still difficult to see where
someone might be hiding. Its neighboring buildings were dragged into its
tragedy, and were both abandoned as well due to excess amount of fire
damage. The three of them stood there, lightless in each of their
windows, like three tombstones. Without the moon, the interior became
almost pitch black, and even Raven couldn't see much of the open-sky
third story with its roof torn off. Police cars surrounded the building
from back to front like wolves at a reindeer, but policemen were
hesitant to move in. From above, Raven saw them all shielding behind
their car doors, guns drawn. She landed and spoke to the inspector.
Apparently a shot was fired at the policemen earlier, but they didn't
know how many people or how many guns were there. She offered to check
the building out for them, and the inspector gave her a communicator to
carry. She levitated against the adjacent building to the highest floor
of the ruins, and phased through the walls from there.
It was dark and difficult to see anything. Perfect. Raven glided along
the dark walls without a sound, phasing through them instead of using
existing openings. The top floor was cleared. She dropped through the
floor, careful to look around the space before landing into it. Second
floor was clear too. "He must be on the ground floor," the inspector
buzzed, "We'll take it from here, thanks for your help, Raven." Doesn't
want me to take his credit away, huh? Nonetheless, she decided to drop
to the first floor anyway. She was at the far corner from the front
entrance, so she anticipated the chance of dropping right on top of the
hiding arsonist, but she didn't expect to actually hit the jack pot.
Really, the jack pot.
The one time she didn't check before landing, a large and powerful hand
reached out from the shadow next to her and grabbed her left hand that
held the communicator. Raven swung her right fist around, only for it to
be caught by her captor's other hand. "Slade!" She struggled to free
herself, "What are you...Arrgh!"
"My, my...Don't we meet often?" Slade must have been smirking behind his
mask. He clenched his hand tighter, crushing the police communicator in
Raven's hand. "Might as well come along, hmm? I have something to show
you and you alone."
When the police flooded through the ground floor they found no arsonist
or superhero, except the crushed communicator. "Must've thought the
inspector rude and let the arsonist escape on purpose," they said.
In the cellar of the ruined building, which was all cleared out, the
ground and the walls and the ceiling were all scribbled with curving
pictures and characters of foreign language, like a cult room for some
deviant practice. Across the room there was a search flashlight pointed
upward, serving as the only light source. In the middle of the room a
dark-haired teenage boy in prison uniform lay on his back like he just
fainted from a violent punch. His clothes were drenched. What is this?
"A binding spell diagram," Slade said, earning a shocked look from his
captive, whose wrists were clamped behind her back in his hand. "And
something else. I want you to meet your friend here on the floor, who
we'll soon release."
"'We'?" Raven asked weakly. She had received a powerful punch in her
abdomen from Slade that knocked most of the wind out of her, and broke
her chant earlier when she tried to fight back. Now she simply played
along, keenly waiting for a chance to escape. Scanning the dim room once
again, she saw a figure wearing dirty trench coat sitting in the corner
to her right. The figure turned to look at them. He was wearing an
animalistic, totem-like mask that resembled some sort of fanged
creature. A cougar? The rest of him was covered in his coat and its
hood. The man stood up, and towered over Slade by a whole foot. He was
slim, and wore leather gloves. "Who is he? You were the ones that helped
this arsonist escape prison, weren't you?" she asked.
"His identity does not matter to you." said Slade, "And yes, we took
this young man out, though he did not exactly ask us to. Shall we
begin?" Slade finished motioning his head toward the unconscious boy on
the floor. The masked man nodded, and walked pass them to the edge of
the round diagram on the floor, and knelt down with his back to Raven,
mumbling.
"What are you trying to do?" Raven asked, but received no answer. The
masked man continued to mutter incomprehensible sounds, and made minute
maneuvers barely an inch above the ground diagram with his hands. The
round diagram began to glow dimly and hum, and its inner circular
components began to spin. The spinning brought on increasing rotation of
the entire drawing, and it then brought to life the other round drawings
on the walls and the ceiling it was touching. Raven had never seen
sorcery like that, although she was a sorceress herself. The boy began
to stir, and once he was conscious he panicked at his situation. His
fingers twitched at failed attempt to move and get back up, and he made
a few choking sound before he could manage an understandable sentence.
"What are you trying to do!" the boy screamed like a drowning person
fighting to get a mouthful of air.
"What you have been yourself trying to do through all your past arsons,
Agni," said Slade.
"Release him!" Raven yelled.
"That," said Slade calmly, "is what we're doing."
Raven was getting a dreadful feeling about what was going on. She could
feel a nameless pressure emitting from the working diagrams, and it was
growing. But was it the diagram or the strange sorcerer? The boy's face
was beginning to twist as in great pain, he made beast-like noises, and
tears dropped down the sides of his face. I don't know what they're
trying to do, but I've seen enough. The boy's gonna die! Although she
would most likely not finish her chant before Slade knocked her wind out
again, she tried anyway, as quietly as possible. Just before the last
phrase, however, Slade suddenly released her, and shove her forward
while the masked man ran past her. Without the sorcerer the spell
diagrams were still spinning in increasing speed. She turned around to
see Slade struck a lighter. "I'll let you two young ones get to know
each other better, alone," he said, and tossed the lighter toward the
drenched and still struggling boy. In that instant she realized the boy
was not wet with water, but oil. "Azarath-Metrion-Zinthos!" Her black
energy froze the falling lighter in time, but the pause had let Slade
and the masked man escape. A hand shot up and grabbed the lighter. The
boy had somehow lifted himself from the ground on an elbow, gripping the
lighter with his other hand, and his eyes were twinkling furious colors
as if they were glass balls with fire in them.
"Release me!" the boy hissed. The flame of the lighter licked his hand,
and instantly turned him into a human torch. His hand dropped and he
rolled around in the circular diagram, screaming, as his life quickly
burnt out. Suddenly just as Raven thought the boy dead the fire feeding
off him turned around and got sucked back into his charred body with
loud hissing sound. The strange feeling of pressure she felt before came
back multiplied, and she felt for a split second an instinctive urge to
run. Some kind of creature is getting loose. Agni.....it's the demon of
fire. So he has a monster inside him too...no wonder Slade called us
friends. I see now. He was an experiment, and I'm probably next. The
dead boy's body burst back into a ball of flames, growing in size and
pulsing and roaring. Within seconds the fireball filled the basement
cellar, destroying the binding spell diagram and forcing a stumbling
retreat from Raven up the cellar trap door. From the trap door she could
see shadowy cracks appearing between swirling fire, like cracks on an
egg. The demon's about to break out. She imagined how it would be like,
what could happen, to the city, to her four friends... to 'her', if Agni
was to run loose. She remembered how her team had had to fight a fire
element before, and how nothing in their abilities could weaken the
creature. Now she was alone.
And she would be alone. No one would come. If no one found out about
what was going on no one would come. And she would be alone, concealed,
and whatever action she should take, concealed. Less than a handful of
people on Earth know of the heritage Raven had brought with her from
Azarath, and she had no intension on letting that number grow. I don't
want to risk hurting or losing my only friends, especially Starfire. She
wrapped the ruined building with her black energy, forming a dome shaped
barrier. She then rewrapped a few more times, one layer within another.
There. Now nothing could get out, and nothing could get in. She didn't
have to worry anymore, and almost as soon as she thought that she felt a
horrifying uncontrolled surge of emotion and berserk power welling up
from within. It was then she finally realized how much she was
destroying herself from the inside out by ignorantly and stubbornly
hammering down all these loose feelings without ever sparing a look at
them. The inevitable quality inspection time had to roll around sooner
or later, and each bad nail taken care of. Yanked back up. The lump of
cancer cells was being dissected, and upon the first cut, out sprang
like from Pandora's Box jealousy, shame, guilt, self-hatred, anger, and
frustration. "C'mon, demon. Let's see who's a bigger monster," From two
converging black stripes on the fireball rolled open two pale yellow
orbs that were met by four blood red eyes.
The eastern sky was turning pale velvet, and the sun was due within
three-quarter hours. As the Titans leader Robin was up and getting ready
for his morning workout by finishing his breakfast. He walked into the
living room, downing his orange juice. It was going to be a beautiful
day. He noticed Raven's deserted mug on the living room table, and
thought it odd for the girl who always cleaned up her trail. He had just
picked up the mug when he saw a spot far into the city light up orange.
He nearly dropped the mug when a blazing, horned giant with charred lava
plates confining parts of it to a stable shape rose up above the
buildings. A huge, black, bird-like giant with long mane rose up after
it to force it down, seizing the flame giant by its throat with its
clawed wing. Before submerging into the cityscape, the black giant cast
a backward glance to the Titan tower, and he saw its four red eyes.
Robin dashed up the hallway, and banged on a certain metallic door, like
a hound with its tail on fire. "Raven! Raven! Are you in there? Raven!"
There was no response. The alarm rang throughout Titan Tower, snatching
the rest of the three Titans out of their respective dreams.
"Hey, where's Rae?" Beast Boy asked when they were all assembled in the
living room.
"She's out," Robin replied, earning three confused and unconvinced look
from the Titans, "She'll meet up with us later outside. For now we must
move out without her. Star and Beast Boy stay close to the rest of the
team. We have a new enemy, and we don't know what it can do. I want us
to stay close and nobody going in alone. Titans, GO!" Secretly, Robin
prayed and hoped Raven had heard the Titan signal beep, and would get a
grip of herself before the rest of the team got to the scene.
Raven took a particularly bad blow and her concentration faltered,
weakening, in turn, the multiple barriers she had placed, allowing Agni
to break a hole in the roof of the domes. Oh shit! Was all Raven could
think of. She quickly captured Agni again before he could escape further
beyond her imprisonment, and subconsciously glanced toward the Titan
Tower sheepishly, hoping no one had noticed. A little later the Titan
beeper went off. She, a part of her buried deep inside this titan of
darkness that she was, like a lone little white star in a lightless
universe, heard it. That remaining glint of conscious, however, had no
power over her body now, and could only sit with her knees drawn to her
chin, and weeped like a child. No doubt her friends would be there soon.
The only thing that kept her from running amok and threatening the city
was the battle she was engaged in. She couldn't even bring herself to
fix the hole Agni made, and she did not want to think about what would
happen if she couldn't go revert back to normal.
"Looks like Raven's already here somewhere," Cyborg said, looking at the
silent black dome covering a ruined building with Robin and Starfire.
The building appeared to be at a complete stand still. Nothing could be
seen through the window frames - the window frames that were still
visible themselves anyway. Thick clouds of steam were trapped inside the
dome, and water drops gathered all over its surface. The water would
evaporate again without starting to drip down. Steam was rising from the
top of the dome as well. There was enough steam for five trains at full
speed. "What the Hell is going on in there?" he knocked on the foot of
the dome with his metallic fist, and it was apparent that no entry was
allowed.
"Hopefully Beast Boy will tell us," Robin said, noting at a newly formed
crack and some soundlessly falling rubble behind the black screen. Not
only vision, but sound, too, was prevented from leaving that barrier. A
green hawk circled around the smoke tower once and descended, morphing
back to normal Beast Boy without waiting to touch ground.
"It's totally crazy in there!" was Beast Boy's best description of what
he saw, and since it was very uninformative Robin made the changeling
take them both back up so he could get a look himself. Beast Boy turned
into a pterodactyl and took to the air with Robin's arms in his claws.
From the hole on the top Robin could see the interior of the building
completely obliterated from top floor all the way down, leaving only the
four walls standing. He could also see the different layers of energy
shields Raven had put up, outside and inside the building, which was
what kept anyone from seeing the actual battle. To call it a battle was
not quite fitting. No wonder Beast Boy was lost at words, for all Robin
could see through pillars of smoke were two currents of energy, one
black, one yellow, whirling above, beneath, and around each other, each
trying to overpower the other, in one big container. He could feel heat
emitting off from the hole.
"Get closer," Robin said to the green pterodactyl, "see if we can get in
through the hole." Before they could get to the edge of the hole,
however, it was evident that the heat was too intense for human flesh.
Beast Boy set down the Titan leader on the roof of an adjacent building,
which was one story taller than the ruins. From the top of this building
they could see dim orange light glowing at the mouth of the black dome
like an active volcano. They were immediately joined by Starfire and
Cyborg, and Robin explained what he saw to the duo. The only way they
could get to Raven was to have her dispel the magic barrier, but doing
that would let the fire giant loose, and perhaps Raven's rampant energy
too.
"Perhaps I should try," Starfire said, "The Tamaranian climate has
always been rougher than those of Earth's. Perhaps I can stand the
heat."
"It's too dangerous for you go in there alone," Robin said, "We have no
idea what we're dealing with." Besides, I doubt Raven would want anyone
to see her like...whatever state she's in now.
"Friend Raven is in there alone," Starfire said, a look of determination
and worry on her face, "If I am the only one that can help I will help
her."
Robin was still reluctant to let Starfire take the risk, but he had to
refrain from letting prejudgment make his decision for him. Be sensible,
it's that or do nothing and God knows what'll happen next. Raven might
be killed alone. "Alright, Star," he said, "But be careful. If you can't
win just run away, and grab Raven with you." Starfire nodded with a
smile, and flew off toward the gleaming mouth of the dark dome.
Starfire approached the skyward opening cautiously, pausing mere feet
above it and looked down inside. It was hotter than the hottest day she
had ever experienced on Earth, but not unbearable. She looked back up to
her team mates, and gave an O.K. gesture before diving downward. The
opening suddenly sealed up right before Starfire reached it, forcing her
to brake in mid air and landing on top of the dome. A low, compounded,
and distressed voice rang out, "Stay back!"
"Friend Raven?" Starfire asked uncertainly.
"STAY BACK!" came Raven's dire warning. In the midst of fighting,
through the boiling and waving air, at least one of her four eyes had
caught a glimpse of red and purple, and closed the gap in time. She was
standing in a furnace of Agni's power. Hours of stand off had taken
visible deduction in both of their energies, but after breaking out of
her barrier Agni had apparently gained power while she had not. Why? He
was not free for more than a few seconds, and nothing had happened
during those few seconds. What has caused him to rekindle?
On the roof of Raven's confinement, Starfire summoned up two hand-full
of neon green star bolt and drove them down against the black energy.
The two forcers neutralized each other, allowing Starfire to open an
entrance with her bare hands, and she was inside.
Agni roared, stretching his short, lizard-like jaws, blew up the flames
on his body, and struck. Raven stretched out her feathered claws to
catch the other monster's full body lunch. The force of impact knocked
her backwards against the melting interior of the suffering building,
singing her. He had both his claws around her throat, and hers around
his. Steam was coming off where they made contact with each other, and
further distorting the interior's visibility. Was it her suffocating
brain that had begun to hallucinate or had the fire demon just grew more
powerful while strangling her? The red in her four eyes had begun to
fade, and one of the two pairs had begun to close. Will I die? Suddenly
Agni let go of her, reared back and howled. A tiny, red-and-purple
figure swirled around the flaming giant, and hovered in mid-air right
between the two giant creatures. It seemed Starfire had somehow got
through her barrier and got her out of a tight one. Agni's tiny eyes
found his new enemy and his burning fist quickly followed. Starfire
crossed her arms, ready to defend. A huge, black wing swung around and
shielded the alien, and she looked up, locking eyes with Raven's demon.
Suddenly the dark demon's body stretched toward all direction, and
became a translucent black wall between Starfire and Agni. Immediately
the temperature on this side of the wall dropped to an understandable
degree, and the loud hum of the fire demon's burning quieted. Agni on
the other side was quite angered at that turn of the event, and launched
a series of fierce, but fruitless, assaults at the wall. Before
Starfire, from the field of energy, Raven emerged as if rising from the
river of the dead. Her cape was gone, and the rest of her clothes singed
with holes in them. Her purple hair was unusually long, and her eyes
were still red, with an extra pair, squinting, as if trying to hide
their existence. "I don't know how you got in, but you're leaving," the
demonic Raven said with the same low and composite voice.
"I am not," said Starfire defiantly.
"Do you want to die?" Raven asked.
Starfire was confused at the question, and her face showed it. "No....
Do you?"
Raven did not answer, instead she said, "Come back to the basement here
when this is all over and find the glyph in blood. Now get out before I
hurt you. There's nothing for you to do here." Starfire may be ignorant
about many things, most of which Earthen, but she was certainly not
stupid. She didn't know exactly how, but she felt that the other girl
had already given up on something. To live, perhaps. When she saw that
Raven was about to turn and disappear back into the black wall, she
pounced without further thoughts, grabbed the other girl firmly by her
waist, and flew upward through the steam clouds to find where she came
in. Raven was surprisingly cold to the touch - in her arms and on her
shoulder where the wild sorceress' hands were clamped, trying to pry
herself free. So cold it provoked goose bumps all over Starfire's body
despite the humming heat around them. They reached the thinnest, the
top, part of the domed barrier, and Starfire liberated one hand to
charge it with star bolt. She pressed it against the shield,
neutralizing it, but before she could open it her hand was seized by
Raven's, who, with a forceful jerk, managed to break free of Starfire's
weakened hold, levitating in mid air. "Is that how you got in?" Raven
asked. Starfire nodded. The irony of it, that Starfire should be able to
neutralize and pry open my entire barrier with her bare hands. "I'm
going back, and you're not," said Raven, "I think I know how to put out
that oversize match. Wait till I get a hold on Agni, then break out to
tell the others what's happening. They need to know," She turned back
and shot toward her energy wall. It was waning and disappearing. Agni
launched his final attack, knocking the energy wall to nothingness with
his horned skull. Heat and noise of combustion instantaneously surged
and flooded the dome, raising it to almost unbearable degree for
Starfire. Black energy streamed out of Raven's body, and stretched into
the shape of a humongous bird. It slapped its entire self against Agni
tactlessly, creating a loud hiss and sending steams pouring out from
them, blocking them from the sight of Starfire. The bird wrapped its
wings around the fire demon, and morphed into a soft membrane,
entrapping the demon within it. Air. It was air. How can I not see the
simplest of rules? Fire needs air, just as darkness needs light. I'll
smother you! Agni roared, and ripped and pummeled at his prison with his
hands. He realized what Raven was trying to do, and what it would cost
him. He lost his nerves at that recognition, and blasted all he had
against Raven's energy net, trying to kill her before she kill him. His
body grew paler and paler as the heat and energy inside Raven's
confinement built up, until what she was containing looked more like a
mini sun than anything else. Smoke began to rise from Raven's hands as
if the black energy she commanded was being tainted by Agni's fiery
energy. My power is running out. I can't hold him much longer. I'm
nearing my end....
"Raven!" Starfire had found her way through the dense steam clouds to
where the sorceress was having her life burnt up along with her last
bits of energy.
"I told you to leave me!" rage and fear boosted up inside Raven when she
realized Starfire was still inside her barrier. She could not bear the
other girl seeing her self like she was - that unbalanced, monstrous,
and insecure part of her she inherited against her own choice.
"I will not leave a friend in battle alone!" Starfire retorted.
I don't want to be just your friend. "I don't want to be your friend!
Get outta here!" Starfire, Raven saw, was visibly shaken by her last
comment, and she felt immediately sorry.
"...Why?" Starfire asked quietly, "Have I done something to anger you?"
"No," Raven answered crisply, desperately wishing Starfire would just
shut up and do as she was asked. Agni was pressuring intensely against
her hold.
"Or have I hurt you somewhere?"
"...no," Raven was having difficulty lying now and she felt like she had
just dug a grave for herself.
"Perhaps it is something I say..."
"NO, Star! It's just me!" Raven cried out with distress. The strain of
Agni inside her grip and Starfire's interrogations combined finally
short-circuited Raven's sensible section of mind, "I'm too bloody in
love with you and I don't want you to be awkward with me if you know so
stay away!" Oh, no...what did I just do? The brilliance of the now
amorphous blob of white light that was the fire demon Agni suddenly grew
exponentially as he finally burnt out and exploded with a long howl,
shattering her confinement.
Outside, the male Titans gazed on almost with joint heart attacks, as
the steam built up denser and denser inside the black dome until it
looked like a thunderstorm could erupt any moment within it. The energy
barrier suddenly began to fade, came back full, faded again, and went up
in the air and vanished all together. The steam poured out of its
container looking solid like cream, and rolled and filled in nearby
streets as if it was a live creature with a mind to consume all. At the
same time a blinding white light flashed from within the steam clouds
accompanied by a scorching heat wave. The light and heat died as quickly
as they came, and Robin found himself blinking several times to regain
his vision as a white circle shrank in front of his eyes. "Are both of
you alright?" he asked, looking around. Beast Boy was crouching on the
floor with his hands on his head, mumbling something about singed hair.
Cyborg was kneeling on one knee, a hand on his stomach as if he was
having a running cram. "Cy?"
"I think the heat burned some fuses, but I'm not sure yet which ones,"
Cyborg said. Things seemed to have calmed down where the black dome once
stood, and the steam clouds were running out.
"Why don't you stay here, Cy? Beast Boy and I will go look for Star and
Raven," Robin said. Cyborg looked like he wanted to protest for a
minute, but instead just grumpily gave them a wave of his hand.
Robin and Beast Boy stepped past uneven ground with patches of charcoal
and graphite black. The whole place looked like it was made of a molten,
unmoving, and unidentifiable material. They walked lightly as a pair of
cats out on a hunt, wary of what they were stepping on. The walls of the
ruins were melted, curved, and caving in at the top. Upon Beast Boy's
pulling on his cape, Robin turned and saw behind them what roughly
resembled a four-tip star bit of wall that maintained some of its
original texture and light colors, stretching from edge to edge of the
wall. Through one of the holes in it that were the windows Robin could
see Cybog's head and shoulder peeping out from the edge of the roof of
the adjacent building. He waved at him once before returning to their
expedition. The sun had yet to surface, and the pre-dawn, hazy light
made it difficult to see down the basement, though the moistures had
been evaporated. "Star?" Robin asked the gloomy void below, "Raven?"
Raven felt cold and every single cell in her body was resonating pain.
What's going on? She opened her eyes and grudgingly made out the shape
of a ceiling-less, misshapen, dark room in which she lay. The lightless
walls of the room seemed to stretch up dozens of feet, framing in their
middle a murky pond of blue-purple space. I can't move. Then she noticed
the darkest darks at the base of the walls were slowly closing in,
eating away all recognizable shapes, and inching toward that small pool
of weaken light like a living amoeba monster. She was frightened, but
couldn't get herself to move a finger, less to say escape. The darkness
touched her fingers and feet, and it felt burningly cold. She closed her
eyes in anticipating fear. Through her eyelids she saw something glow.
Her eyes fluttered open and caught in the closest distant ever since she
first saw the creature a raven of the brightest white standing on top of
her chest. The bird radiated as before, keeping the darkness at bay.
Stay.... The white raven tilted its head and stared at Raven sideways. I
finally got this close to you. Suddenly the white raven turned its head
face to face with Raven, opened its beak, and Starfire's voice boomed
out, "Raven!" The sorceress opened her eyes for real this time, and saw
the same ceiling-less cellar and the same misty morning framed over it.
The walls and its enclosed space now looked shorter and more concrete.
There was no white bird. She felt warm and when she tried to move she
triggered a tearing pain throughout her whole body - even frowning hurt.
"Please, you mustn't move," Starfire begged with shaky voice.
"I'm not dead yet...?" Raven's voice wormed out weakly from her cracked
lips.
"No, but you are hurt. Please remain still. I shall go find the others,"
The others...I wonder if they're okay? When Agni blew up Raven retrieved
her energy from the dome, and used up whatever she had left and more to
contradict the force of his explosion, shielding Starfire and,
coincidently, the rest of the Titans behind her. She didn't know that,
of course, and feared for their survival through the blast. Her front
side was badly burnt and in worse areas her skin was melted away,
exposing various hues of glistening pinks. There was almost no clothing
left on her, and whatever was left was sticking onto her melted skin.
"Star...can you stay?" Starfire bit her lower lip, and nodded with tears
in her emerald eyes. She knelt down next to the shorter girl, and
hesitantly but gently brushed strands of hair out of Raven's face,
fearing to cause her more agony. She felt like apologizing, but she
wasn't sure what she wanted to apologize for, so she just knelt there in
clogged silence for ten, fifteen seconds.
"I wish I can help ease your pain," Starfire said quietly.
"It's nothing you can help with," Raven said matter-of-factly, and smile
a little, "but words of encouragement are always welcome." It was then
Robin's voice came down from above, and she saw the silhouette of his
spiky head against the brightening piece of sky.
"Robin!" Starfire cried out, and the Titan leader hastily jumped down
upon her summon, followed by Beast Boy. He cringed upon seeing Raven's
condition, and before he said anything the maimed sorceress promptly
stated,
"I won't die."
"Glad to hear it," said Robin with relief, "let's get you to a hospital.
Star?"
Starfire carefully and tenderly picked up Raven in her arms, while the
latter tried not to frown too much due to the pain, and took off to the
nearest hospital with Beast Boy guiding in the form of a swallow.
Several days later Raven was visited by Starfire in the hospital she
stayed in. The alien girl wore street clothes, trying not to attract too
much attention, according to her, and carried a book in her hand. Raven
lay in raised hospital bed, still sporting bandages, but otherwise had
recovered in most parts. "That doctor just told me I can leave
tomorrow," the sorceress said to her visitor.
"The others shall be overjoyed to have your company once again. You have
recovered swiftly," said Starfire with a wide smile, "and your
power...?"
Raven pointed a finger at a mug on a night table next to her bed, and
levitated it a few inches off the table top. "That's it for now, but
it's been coming back steadily though slowly," she said. Starfire had
brought over a chair and seated herself next to her friend. Although
Raven's condition had improved enough for her to hold a book with her
own hands, she still allowed herself the luxury of being read to. "So
what've we got today?"
"Poems by authors from countries near and far," replied the alien,
opening to a marked page, "This one is by a man from a place called
France:
He said, "Come to the Edge."
I said, "I can't, I'm afraid."
He said, "Come to the Edge."
I said, "I can't, I'll fall off."
He said, finally, "Come to the Edge."
And I came to the Edge.
And he pushed me.
And I flew.
Author's notes: This is my first time writing AND finishing a fan
fiction, as well as my first Teen Titan and shoujoai fan fiction.
Originally, it was meant to be a short one-shot, inspired upon having
the poem "Come to the Edge" (different version, by Christopher Logue, if
you're interested) read to me in a graduation ceremony (not mine). What
happened was I had already signed up for a summer workshop which left me
no time or energy to write this continuously. It ended up taking me 3
weeks. I wanted to apply the poem to Raven's efforts in dealing,
understanding, and mastering herself (her falling for Starfire being
part of it), which by the end of this fic had just began to happen. The
animated version is the only version I know of, and not well either, for
I never saw all of the episodes, so I'm pretty sure there would be
things that seem odd or wrong to educated Titan fans, and it's okay to
let me know, but don't think I'll definitely revise the story if it
requires too much of a make over. What's done is done! I, however,
always look to improve in the future, so let me know what you think of
the plot, consistency, dialogue usage, wording...etc, and, most
importantly, what you understood and what you couldn't get. I realized I
kept trying to encrypt a lot of stuff. Don't bother flaming. I'm fire
proof.
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