Part of helping calm the situation she had caused was to leave the scene. She was ordered back to the tower, and for some time she had it to herself. She knew that when they returned she would be questioned, and so it came to no surprise when she got the message to head over to the meeting room. The area was off limits to the lower ranks, and it was not often put to use unless there was something grand to meet and discuss. This was certainly grand, and in the worst way. There was an invasion. Her past was coming to haunt her and history would repeat itself. Even though she had time to compose herself, the grief was raw on her face as she stood next to the board tracing idly on the thin film of dust. She was writing the Tamaranean word for home, and then drew a slow line across smudging the foreign letters.
Her grief was not for what she had done but what had to be done, and for what would need to be done, if it even could be done. For once in a long time, the team's Tamaranean, energetic and happy, was not full of any optimism of what the future held. She looked down at her hands, closing her fingers in and out of her palm. That was not always a freedom granted to her. She heard the door open, and dropped her hands, turning to face who was entering. Whatever was in store for her now, she did not fear. She knew far more terrible things were in store for the future.
Raven was the first one back to the Tower and consequently the first to enter the room. She hadn't been doing much of anything on the scene, not before the chaos tore through the festivities. Afterwards, her focus was on healing those in danger of death, and surprisingly enough, there weren't many of them. When the order came to return to the Tower, Raven was gone in a second. The traditional first kiss of the New Year would have to wait.
Perhaps on a normal basis she'd have waited until Robin returned as well, gauging his reaction, analyzing his thoughts on the matter before taking action herself. But on a normal basis, it wouldn't have been Starfire who was the topic of the meeting, and that alone changed Raven's behaviour. The door opened for her before Robin and Beast Boy and Cyborg were even back on the premises, slow as the boys were without teleportation, and Raven entered the room silently.
Starfire stood on the other side. The empath's eyes took in the scene, flitting over to the crossed-out word that she couldn't read on the board before going back to her best friend's stricken face. She didn't understand all that had happened, and she certainly wasn't in favour of death, even that of an attacking alien, but Raven knew there was more to this story. The anguish rolling off her teammate was evidence enough. Raven cocked her head to the side, surveying Star, and then she stepped further into the room, allowing for the door to close behind her. For a long minute, she was silent, choosing to select her words carefully. Starfire was hurt and upset and in rare form; Raven did not want to add to that.
When at last she opened her mouth to speak, the only thing she chose to say was, "Star.... Are you okay?"
Under the blanket of night, a green pterodactyl flew over the bay. Not too far off in the distance were the lights of the Tower. The green lizard closed his eyes as Beast Boy took a deep breath. The smell of crumbled buildings, fire, and panicked humans still hung in the air. Garfield had assisted the JCPD in crowd control. Red Star went after Starfire, and the city wasn't reduced to rubble, so things at the epicenter had must've gone somewhat gracefully. He wasn't even sure of the details.
The emergency crews of Jump City had the situation under control by the time his communicator went off, summoning him to the meeting room. Seeing as the meeting room hadn't been used in quite some time, he knew the matter was serious. Saying his goodbyes to the men and women in uniform, he felt relieved having assisted in keeping the commotion on the streets to a minimum. From there, he took to the sky.
As he descended upon the roof of the Tower, he morphed back into his human form. Once his feet touched the solid surface, he sprinted towards the meeting room. Running through the various hallways, he finally barged into the room. Green eyes landed on Starfire, who looked very forlorn. And then Raven who looked, well, like Raven looks. The smallest of clouds passed from his lips as he sighed.
But, that was followed by a dramatic gasp as he found himself rather exhausted. Between helping with crowd control, flying to the tower as fast as his wings would carry him, and then running to the room, there wasn't much time for him to stop and collect his breath. "Is everyone..." he gasped. Pausing as he took a few more breaths, resting a hand on the back of his chair. "...alright?"
This was a disaster. While it was a direct quote from the media storm Robin had done his best to handle in the aftermath of buildings collapsing in the middle of one of Jump City's most attended annual festivals. The difficulty was that his own teammate had caused the collapses when she had attacked and killed what he had learned were alien scouts. He couldn't tell the press that, though, so he had concocted a story about suicide bombers that the press didn't quite seem to believe.
In a city that knew the Titans better than their mayor it wasn't easy to convince people that bombs could explode with green energy like that. They probably wouldn't have even entertained the idea if it hadn't been Robin feeding them the false information. The death tolls were in. It wasn't too bad considering, with only twenty-three, but the number of people in the hospital went into the hundreds. Now that the rubble was clear, and the wounded taken care of, Robin still wouldn't have time to rest.
The Boy Wonder slumped in his seat safely inside the T-Car and scrubbed at his masked eyes in an agitated fashion. It was good that Cyborg was driving, because Robin was tired from trying to calm the media, and adoring public. He was also a bit grumpy, and on edge, because there was only so many times he could be asked whether Starfire was still safe to have in the city before he felt like punching something. In the face. Hard.
Robin had no idea what to do. It was a situation that came up often enough. Their day job was dealing with the unexpected, and sometimes unexplainable. Starfire killing people? That went far beyond both and smacked him straight in the achy-breaky heart. He didn't know how to tell her that she'd killed twenty-three people, and wounded an odd hundred others, because in his mind this simply wasn't something Starfire did.
“I'm alerting the others to meet us when we get back,” Robin told Cyborg, a message flicking across the T-Car's onboard screen seconds later. He'd already relayed as much of the situation as he knew to Cyborg which was probably another reason for the tenseness in the recirculated air. So far only he and Cyborg knew the total damage, and it was Robin's job to inform the others. He accepted the responsibilities of leadership. Even the unpleasant ones. But sometimes, sometimes a dude just needed advice from his friends.
“I don't know how to tell her,” Robin confided, shifting uncomfortably in his seat, his masked gaze flicking towards his second-in-command as they neared the tunnel to the tower. “Whatever these aliens were...they hurt Starfire,” he scowled out the window at the sky, “and now they've made her hurt others.” Innocent others. Others that the Titans had sworn to serve and protect.
He could relate. And he wished, with all his heart, that she couldn't.
Cyborg's hands were tense to the steering wheel. What a night. He had been the closest to the stage the time the big screen fell. He had felt the tremors when Starfire impacted. How Robin was able to sell that lie in front hundred or so witnesses he wasn't sure, but he had tried his best to help his leader diffuse the situation; which was difficult since he felt like yelling at the top of his lungs for space. He hadn't felt so wound up since Brother Blood.
He had only really seen her when he came in to diffuse tensions between Kara and the robot on scene. In the initial chaos he had seen the bot healing people, which they really needed at the moment. He had pulled her aside and got her with Raven to try and do damage control, impromptu offering a communicator even though she had turned against Supergirl. That had been something. Old loyalties had him rallying to Starfire's side in his heart, but Supergirl wasn't wrong. What Starfire had done... It had angered him a lot. He had never expected to see something like that from her.
What were they supposed to do now? Robin spoke what they were both thinking. In tense silence he listened, and then took a deep breath through his nose. His eyes never left the road. "What gets me is... We've been through a lot together, and I've never seen her like this. We faced Trigon, we've nearly lost you to Slade--all these things, and she's always been as we know her. Now some blue people come from the sky and... she lost it."
His frown deepened. They were coming up to the tunnel. They were coming closer to having to face her. "We all have our secrets, and we're entitled to them--until they hurt someone. Her attack was personal, Robin. I love her like a sister, but I don't know what was going through her head, or what is going through her head right now. She can't hide from the truth, and she can't withhold it either. We have to tell her how it is, and she has to explain herself."
He parked the T-car in the garage. There was an elevator just outside that would take them up to the floor where the room they were meeting in was at. He could feel his heartbeat rising in the pulse that sounded so loud to his ear. The elevator door opened and he turned down the hallway. He got access to the room, and opened the door for himself and Robin to enter. It seemed they were the last ones there, unsurprisingly. It was time to get some answers.
Robin stiffened in his seat, his face hardening at the reminder of all that they had been through. Some of it had been personal, and the mention of Slade in particular set the Boy Wonder on edge even farther. Nothing, however, had been personal enough to set Starfire off. Like Cyborg said, this was big. This was big, it was personal, and it wasn't going to be pleasant. The T-Car rolled to a stop, and Robin took a deep breath before opening the car door and hopping down to the ground. “I know,” he said, and sighed in defeat, as he followed Cyborg towards the elevator. It was time to be the leader again. It was time to make the hard decisions.
There was silence inside beyond the grinding of the gears that hauled the compartment through the levels of their tower. Thoughts swirled around in the young leader's head, and he leaned against the side of the tiny room in deep contemplation, until the doors opened with a ding and a woosh. The distance down the hallway towards the meeting area was both the longest, and the shortest distance Robin had gone in awhile. He nodded to Cyborg, slipping through the open door, and glanced at the three of his teammates already in the room. His gaze slid past Raven, who by now probably already knew he had nothing good to say, slid apologetically past Beast Boy, and landed on Starfire.
“Twenty-three dead,” he announced, not even bothering to sugercoat it as he strode into the room with Cyborg. They were the last to arrive. Thankfully. “At least a hundred more are wounded.” each statement seemed like a blow he was dealing his own team. “Damages ranging into the upper millions.”The Boy Wonder stopped at the table, placing his hands on the smooth, if slightly dusty, surface and leaning forwards on them. “Starfire,” there was no accusation in his voice, but she wouldn't be able to find comfort there either. Not until he knew more of what was going on. “You need to tell us what happened,” this time there would be no Kara to interfere, "and what's coming."
Post by Elenaphant on Mar 14, 2015 14:50:51 GMT -6
Seeing Raven before anyone else was a small, momentary comfort, if only because she knew by the very definition of her power Raven could understand and feel her pain. She saw it as much in the way she appraised her. There wasn't the anger she was expecting to encounter. Starfire wanted to ask how bad it had been out there, now that she had time to reflect on her actions, but the words did not come. They both silently stared at each other, though Starfire had to avert her gaze earlier and grip the side of her arm. The question seemed standard but the answer was difficult. Of course she was not 'okay'; it would be that nothing would ever be 'okay' again!--this, she wanted to snap at the friend who was only showing her concern. So instead, Starfire, the usually expressive with both words and gestures, only shook her head subtly as if to say 'do not ask'.
Beastboy's entrance was louder, and it startled her for a moment. Her gaze drew up to the team's, as Cyborg had often affectionately (so Starfire chose to believe) named, 'green bean'. Her hand dropped from her arm and she bit her lower lip as he collected himself. There was a water cooler in here, perhaps she ought to offer him a cold drink to better collect himself. He also inquired about the well being of things, in more general terms, and this time it had an answer--but not from her. Robin had come in that moment, entering the room with authority and grim news. Twenty-three dead... There was a tight feeling in her chest and her throat closed up. In the moment there was a grief-stricken look, and that was when he turned to her and did not ask as the others did, but rightfully demanded the explanation.
She swallowed back the proverbial lump in her throat and turned away from them for a moment. "I was in the New Year's Eve crowd celebrating with the rest of them," she started, and how far away from that moment she felt right now. "A woman had bumped into me, and it would have been any other incidental encounter did I not notice a very specific band on her wrist. I knew the sheen of those numbers well; that was a Citadel scout. In... service to the Citadel we would labour in their factories and make them for hours," she said, to explain how she could be so certain at a glance. They would not understand how it felt to be transported back to that past by a mere glimmer.
"I was... in a strange state when I saw it. There was this part of me wishing I did not see what I did, and did not know what it meant. I followed them out of the crowd. They had entered an alleyway and were using the band to transmit whatever information they had gathered. That was how I knew for certain, beyond any deniability, the mournful truth. There was an invasion of this planet already underway."
She took in a deep, shuddering breath. History all over again. "I will not lie and say I would not have engaged them anyway," she said with more resolve, her voice stronger now. It was the voice of a person who hated, and would willingly--even gladly--kill someone. "They left me no choice when they caught my scent. They knew what I knew, and I knew that I had to eliminate them before they went back and told the Citadel they were found out."
Starfire turned around to face them again. "Whatever I did tonight, I did because it was of the utmost importance that those two had been eliminated. Now it is all for nothing... We will not last to see another New Year."
Robin's words hit Raven like a ton of bricks to the chest. Twenty-three people dead. Twenty-three lives were lost because of Starfire. At least one hundred more people, wounded, bleeding, broken, in the hospital, all of the above. Raven had to turn away, if not to keep her composure, to at least appear that she could. She faced the wall, took a step away from the others, closed her eyes and felt Robin's anxiety and Starfire's grief, coupled with the heartache of the rest of her team, roll over her for just a second before she pushed it back.
To break would do no good now. Emotion could be saved for later, if it had to be acknowledged at all. Now was the wrong time. But still, she faced the wall.
Starfire spoke for the first time since she'd entered the room and Raven remained motionless for the first half of Starfire's story. She could see it in her mind's eye, the entire night replaying itself from the Tameranean's point of view as if projected on the wall in front of her. Starfire's words ignited the same panic in Raven as the alien girl must have felt an hour or two earlier, and Raven knew there must be more history to the story than Star offered.
The empath's head finally turned with the news that earth was being invaded. Her eyes stared unwaveringly at Star as she turned away from the wall and her mind shut off the impromptu movie her conflicted friend was directing. This news was a bit more enlightening, but the hardness in Star's voice kept the frown firmly in place on Raven's face as she tried to process this.
The earth was being invaded. Starfire spoke with such certainty when she said the planet would not live another year. Raven could relate to that sort of absolute belief in the worst, though she'd dealt with that threat a little differently when her turn had come a little while before and Trigon had invaded.
Logic told Raven that twenty-three lives were worth the rest of humanity, but her empathetic nature wouldn't let her blindly agree with the greater good philosophy so easily. Twenty-three families were now grieving, more lives than just twenty-three were now in turmoil and despair. And it would seem that Starfire was essentially checking out of the fight with her announcement that the earth was doomed. Raven would not give up so easily.
Her gaze slid over to Robin, wondering how he'd respond to the news Star had given them, and then she looked back to the Tameranean. Her voice was low and level. "Star.... Nothing is that certain. We can overcome this threat, just like all the others." She paused, took a breath. "We just need more to go on."
He felt the blood drain from his face upon hearing Robin's words. A knot formed in his stomach. Saliva pooled in his mouth. He felt like he was about to expunge the contents of his stomach. Twenty three citizens. Collateral damage was quite common when it came to heroing. Superman rarely saved Metropolis without a few dozen bystanders losing their lives. But, this was different. This was in their backyard. This was caused by one of their own.
He swallowed that back. This was no time for irrational, involuntary reactions to bad news. Each of the Titans were going to be tested like never before. Far beyond the scale from when they faced Trigon. Green eyes moved from Raven to Robin to Cyborg to Starfire. His eyes then dropped when Starfire began to explain why she did what she did. He gritted his teeth. Ears fell flat and his fists clenched when she said they wouldn't see another New Years.
But, before he could chime in, Raven stepped up. Always calculating. Always calm. There was something about her tone that softened his anger. His fear. His sorrow. "Raven..." he whispered. "Raven is right." he finally choked out. "We've faced every obstacle that has come along our way and have been victorious every time. Even if those victories were drenched in sadness or regret. We still saved our city. We saved our world.
"Starfire, I don't know what you went through with the Citadel, but I've only heard you take that tone a handful of times, I trust your judgement. I trust you with my life. I trust all of you with my life. Twenty three people lost their lives, and that's terrible. But, what is that to the billions that live on Earth? If twenty three people cost us a small amount of time to prepare against the incoming invasion, then I cannot fault Starfire."
He walked up and stood beside Starfire, his gaze turning to Robin and Cyborg. "We should contact the Justice League, and warn them. Ask if they have anything on the Citadel. Every little bit will help."
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Alviss: Darn doesn't show the pic
Apr 18, 2019 7:10:17 GMT -6
force: miss this place. if anyone comes back and sees this, i'm force, i was kid flash here once. you can find me on discord at rook#9485
Jan 12, 2023 13:11:35 GMT -6
The roleplay takes place after the series end of the original Teen Titans animated show, but does not include the movie Trouble in Tokyo. Since then Robin has been on something of a recruiting spree, and many new young heroes have found themselves a home in Jump City as well as Titan Tower.
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