Speedy's Room

[Aly]

Her foot connected with Raven's side just as she had let go of Speedy. Batgirl felt really sorry after it was done. She hadn't realized that Raven was coming back to normal before she kicked her. Before she knew it, however, Raven was back up and black tendrils were weaving around Barbara's arms and legs, squeezing tightly. She closed her eyes, ready for whatever Raven would do before she was knocked to the ground with extreme force.

When she opened her eyes again, Speedy's room was a wreck. Raven was cowering in a corner and Speedy was just getting up. She herself was laying on the floor, head knocked on one of the corners of Speedy's car-shaped bed. A warm wet substance leaked from a cut on her head, seeping through her hair and mask.

Blinking the stars away, Batgirl sat up slowly before making it to her feet, slightly woozy. She wavered on her feet before looking up to see Speedy comforting Raven. Comforting that demon? Barbara was in shock. After all that Raven did, Speedy was comforting her? She herself was BLEEDING here! Speeking of which, she could feel the blood run out from under her mask and drip down her cheek slowly.

Bringing her hand to her head, she walked slowly over to Speedy and Raven. "Speedy? What are you doing?" Her voice was rising as she pulled her hand away, which was now slightly covered in blood. "Did you not see what she was just doing to you? She tried to kill you!" Now her voice was edging on the verge of hysteria. Suddenly, she grabbed Speedy around the waist, linking her hands together before pulling him backwards into the center of the room, away from Raven. "Get away from her!" She was honestly afraid for Speedy's life. Not just in a teammately way, but more than that.

[Silv]

Usually when the Titans disappeared down the hallways to their rooms it was an unspoken sign that they were going to rest or whatever and didn't want to be disturbed. Robin had come back from patrol, sore, tired, and a little miffed at running into Red X. He'd said a curt goodbye to Beast Boy before storming into his room and closing the door behind him. Every time he met that thief in battle Robin felt compelled to gather up the research he had gathered and get back to work. It wasn't near as bad as his obsession with finding out who Slade was, but this was more of a duty since he had been the one who created the persona and weapons of Red X.

As he sat down to work, taking a drink of the water bottle he'd brought back to his room with him, he pulled out his laptop and powered it up. It was connected via satellite to the BatCave's computer and he often used Bruce's hackfree file storage for his own work. Bruce didn't mind because it meant he could keep an eye on Dick, and Robin liked it because it was secure. The Boy Wonder stretched his back out before beginning, wincing slightly at the new bruises he'd acquired, and then began to pull up files on his computer.

It went like this in silence for the longest time, with the only sound being the clicking of his gloved fingers on the keyboard. Then, an explosion rattled the tower and the alarms went off bathing the Teenage Thunderbolt in varying patterns of redness and darkness. “Trouble!” he said, springing to his feet and racing out of his door heading for the source of the explosion.

He found signs of trouble scattered across the entire floor, but it appeared the epicenter was in Speedy's room. The Boy Wonder raced forward, glad there was no door he had to kick down to get to his friends. The first one he saw was Raven, lying on the floor. “Raven!” he cried as he raced forward to kneel besides her and check her vitals. She was still alive, good.

Then, his masked gaze slid up to the embracing figure's of Speedy and Batgirl. His masked eyes widened for a second and then his face hardened. He didn't like the way her slim hands were wrapped around his waist as though some sort of anchor. “What happened?” he asked, his tone coming out harsher than he'd expected it to. It appeared that Raven had lost control, but that rarely happened, unless.... What had they done to Raven? His jaw clenched as he waited for his answer.

[Bry]

Raven stared up into his eyes, wanting so bad to cave, to give in a forgive him. But the break was still there. She could feel it, aching in her chest. Images of Speedy locked around Babs, kissing her, holding her....
And now being pulled away from her.
Raven struggled to sit up, slowing her breathing, catching little bits of control back. She glared over at Babs and Speedy, opened her mouth to speak, but Robin beat her to it. She turned her head and looked up at him.
"Nothing," she said, pushing to her feet, steadying herself against the wall. "Nothing happened." And now she was protecting him.... Something was wrong with her. She took a look around the room; obviously her lie wouldn't go uncontested. She amended herself, looking Robin in the eye. As well as she could through his mask.
"I'm sorry, Robin," she said quietly. And she was. Sorry for losing control, sorry for setting the alarms, for causing a panic. Sorry for what this new development would do to his mental state. "I lost control. That's all."
She took a step, moved to brush by him, unable to stand being in the room any longer. She could hardly look Speedy in the eye, what with her precious control and her pride shattered next to his legos on the floor.
And she just didn't want to look at Babs.

[Kenni]

Speedy shook his head slowly as Raven took the team leader for a ride. As if this was all her fault! How could she even insinuate that? He was guilty but grateful. It was terrible being dragged back from her, right at the moment her eyes had opened. Would they ever get a chance to talk this out? But there was Robin now, staring at them. He let the arm outstretched to Raven's back, the last effort to implicate himself as the founding father of this catastrophe for her, fall to his side uselessly as he simply allowed Babs to hold him there. Why had her warmth gotten so lukewarm all of a sudden? The blood however, sticky warm and wet, he noticed, and frantically began wiping, or rather smearing from her cheek beneath her mask, holding her face still for a moment before turning back to face Robin, as if to try and apologize for not noticing the bloodflow earlier in his haste to check on Raven, now letting his other hand drop to his side as well, now about to speak to his good pal Robin. What to say, what to do...

This was the moment of truth.

"...We tried to stop her."
He crushed 'The Princess' underfoot, a careless, dazed step to the left.

And again, he'd lied.

[Aly]

Things were slowly taking on a fuzzy appearance. She leaned into Speedy slightly to keep from falling over. The dizzyness still hadn't subsided as she slowly disentangled her arms from around his waist. Suddenly, she spotted Robin stepping over the rubble and going straight to Raven's side. What was she, chopped liver? She was bleeding over here, and Raven was the one who had done it!

She looked up into Speedy's face as he began wiping the blood from her cheeck. She had hardly noticed it until now as the warmth smeared across her cheeck as he attempted to wipe it off. Some of it did, though, but the blood continued to run from the small cut on her scalp. 8-year-old-style bedframes were actually pretty dangerous.

When Speedy finished with her cheeck, she returned her gaze to Robin, who was still crouched beside Raven. The demon. The she-devil. It made her anxious to see him so close to her. She wanted to pull him back like she had with Speedy, but she was so woozy, she didn't think she would be able to do it.

Memories of earlier before Raven had intruded crossed her mind and a slight flush crossed her cheeks. "Robin..." She had wanted to make Robin jealous, and this is what happened. Speedy was covering up for it, too, it seemed. Maybe Speedy was just as worried about Robin finding out as Barbara was to wanting Robin to find out.

[Silv]

Robin might have known the other two longer, but he and Raven had held a connection when she went into his mind. The link went both ways. His scowl deepened as Raven attempted to convince him that nothing had happened and nothing was wrong. But he knew she was lying. The Raven he knew didn't lose control for no reason. There had to be a reason, and the fault lay with Roy and Babs. His upper lip curled into a sneer when Speedy continued Raven's lie and he shook his head, gesturing to Babs. “You should take her to the infirmary. It's probably nothing, as facial wounds bleed a lot, but she might have a concussion.”

[Bry]

Raven's head snapped around at Speedy's words, though it was a bad move to make. She gripped the door frame tighter, so as not to fall. She stared directly at Speedy and frowned, her eyes dark, shadowed, but in control.

She'd just inadvertantly taken the heat. He'd broken her heart, and she was the one confessing. Somehow, she just couldn't put the pieces together well enough to figure out how that made any sense.

"Yeah, they tried to stop me. Got caught in the cross-fire." Her voice caught unconvincingly, so she quit talking.

The look in her eye was one of no mercy. Whatever could've been forgiven before--whatever could still be forgiven--this lie would be the worst. This lie told her she meant nothing, she was pretty toy, and a way out of trouble. She glared at him a moment more, then turned and left the room, making her way slowly, so slowly down the hall while tears began to fall down her cheeks.

This was a mess.

Love was a mess.

She'd rather face Trigon.

[Kenni]

Of course.
He knew that, Robin..
I know that, Robin.
He was losing his mind.
He'd kissed girls before, though. It wasn't that that had cause Speedy to be off to the point where the injured girl's injury wasn't immediately prompting him to check her scalp for concussion.
It was the timing of the kiss.
It was the timing of being so deeply involved with Raven and almost innocent one moment, then crashing and burning within a lonely asteroid belt of her mind the next.
Next to this girl. This Batgirl. This beautiful, comfortable, bleeding, cra--
Crap. She was bleeding! Another numb nod at Robin; he was too ashamed to speak in his direction.
"...going up."
He swooped her up into his arms. The girl wasn't looking very steady.
"...not f-for us, thing's aren't. Looking, I mean. Ahah.."
Lame attempt, innappropriate time.
'I can still laugh at a time like this? Must be heartless.'
"For..f-for starters! Let's get you all checked out, Ariel."
They were in the infirmary as fast as his numbed limbs could carry both their weight, step after agonizing step, slowly enough not to rattle her anyworse than the afternoon's events already must have.

[Silv]

Robin watched, scowling, as Speedy scooped Babs up into his arms and carried her off. His skin prickled with jealously and his teeth grit together. He didn't need this on top of what was happening with Raven.

And then he turned to go after Raven. She hadn't gotten far. He reached out a hand to jerk her back around, to confront her without the others. “Raven,” he said, his voice edging on dangerous if she continued to lie. “You don't lose control without a reason. And I don't appreciate being lied to by either you or Speedy. But I'm more worried about you. I'm asking again. What happened? ”

Then he saw the tears and the expression on his face softened. “Raven?” he repeated her name, his voice much less harsh. “You can tell me.”

[Aly]

Robin's emotionless voice flooded in one ear and out the other. However, it was enough that her brain picked up that he was attending to Raven still and not /her/. With a scowl, she looked away from Robin, obviously hurt. Well, yes physically, but also emotionally. First she tried getting close to Speedy to make Robin notice her, now when she didn't even do what could get the noticeability, he still didn't notice her! Well, apparently enough to tell that she was hurt, but still. It just wasn't enough. Maybe Speedy would be better for her. Speedy seemed to notice her more than Robin did anyways.

"Infirmary. Yeah." The color drained from her face as Speedy gently picked her up. It caused her head to swim and she closed her eyes to keep from feeling nauxious. When he called her Ariel, she opened rolled her eyes. Not /again/ with all of the Disney references. Yes her hair was red, but she was nothing like the ditsy Disney Princess. She closed her eyes again as Speedy sped through the halls and into the infirmary. Of course, it had seemed like he sped, but he really did walk slowly. Each bump caused pain to shoot through her head like lightning.

[Bry]

Raven stopped midway in the hall, too tired and mentally bruised to continue fighting Robin's words. She took a deep breath, sighed, looked him in the eye.

"They were together," is what she managed to say. "I walked in. And they were together and I lost it."

She bit her lip, tried to quell the tears, and looked down at her hands, the hands that had nearly just killed two Titans, two of her own teammates. Shame welled up somewhere in her chest, next to the hurt and pain and loneliness. She looked back up at her leader.

"I really am sorry," she said quietly. "I thought I could hold it together better than.... Guess I still have some work to do...."
Then, as an after thought though still sincere, she added, "Thank you."

[Silv]

Robin's teeth clenched together when Raven said “they were together” so hard his jaw made a popping sound in protest. In all honesty he'd known. He had seen the small signs. The way they looked at each other. The way they had been whispering. The subtle touches, the secret smiles. Robin had ignored them because he didn't want it to be true. Now it was smacking him in the face like Harley's mallet and he could understand exactly why Raven snapped.

He put a hand on her shoulder in a comforting fashion, or at least, his approximation of one that he'd learned from Batman. “It's alright, Raven. I understand.” he replied keeping his voice as nonjudgmental as possible leaning towards compassionate. He smiled at her warmly when she thanked him, a nonverbal you're welcome. “You go rest,” he told her. “I'll deal with everything else.” he would walk her to her room, then head up to see how Speedy was doing with the medical equipment. Maybe it hadn't been a good idea to send him up there alone.

[Kenni]

Speedy had at least enough of his faculties about him to know to test for her possible concussion. He was speaking constantly to Barbara as they moved down the hallway, and now in the Infirmary. He set her down as gently as possible, apologizing for the rocky descent even going smoothly with the elevator. It wasn't smart to be moving her so much. He had her lying on one of the medical beds, an ice-cooled cloth cooling her forehead above a freshly woven bandage job.
"What's your name?"
"What's my name?"
"Are you feeling okay? ...ahah well,considering well, everything..I'll stop."
Some of the questions were asked curtly and in all seriousness, others not so much. He had to stay himself. At least it kept him from going completely insane. He would have to remove her mask to get at the injury though, and informed her of that. Actually though, at this stage in the game, the comfortable feeling Babs gave him was taking over. Yes, he'd just most likely irrevocably broken the heart of the most interesting, mysterious, intelligent, gorgeous girl he'd ever met in his life, but at least his childhood crutch was by his side to help the selfish archer get over it. Right now though, she needed him. And he genuinely cared about her well-being right now. Hadn't he always, even all those years ago? Wasn't all this a sliver of, then, what he'd..always really wanted? He just didn't know.
He hummed some Beauty and the Beast 'Both a Little Scared', quietly, more to himself and his racing nerves than to her.
The muddle-hearted teenager stroked her long-since cleaned-up face, having to change his careful bandaging job immediately. He cranked his free shoulder and winced at the residual pain from his back; what a drop that had been onto the asteroid; Speedy knew he looked a mess too, but he was nowhere near the shape Barbara was in.
"You should rest. Don't think about anything. I'll take care of..everything. I'll check on you in a little while, but...I'm right here. So, close your eyes a while, hmn?"
He resumed the humming, one hand taking one of Babs', the other wringing out the cooled cloth and replacing it over her brow. He'd have to rouse her gently in a little bit to be safe.

Speedy learned then that he could do the most speaking without saying
anything at all.

Yes, not talking.

That might've saved him a lot of trouble earlier.

[Aly]

Her head pounded as he lay her back on the bed. "I know my name and I know yours." She sighed as she tried to refrain from touching her head. "My head just really hurts." When he spoke of removing her mask, she rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I guess that's okay. Considering everyone already knows my name thanks to Blabbermouth Wonder." She sighed, the sound of her own breath hurting her head.

Speedy told her to close her eyes and rest, and she followed orders obediently. Except for the fact that her mind didn't shut down. It just kept going. Thoughts went to Robin and then to Speedy. She didn't trust her own feelings anymore. Especially with the boy she thought she /really/ liked back in that room with Raven, coddling her and everything after just demanding that Speedy take her to the infirmary. Speedy was nice enough to oblige and Robin hadn't followed. At least, not that she knew of. Memories of when they were younger flooded her pounding brain. Memories of when Speedy and she were playing hide and go seek with Robin trying to find them. She and Speedy had been alone then, just like now, but he hadn't been patching up her brains at the time. They were just little kids without a care in the world. Except that Babs cared that Robin find her. She always wanted him to find her. Even today, she wanted Robin to burst in that door and tell her that he loved her. Of course, that wasn't going to happen.

[Silv]

After making sure Raven was safely to her room Robin made his way to the infirmary. He passed by Speedy shoot a quick, “How is she?” in his direction but not actually stopping to chat. Even if the archer didn't tell him he'd find out as soon as he made it to her side anyway. He slowed down when he reached the infirmary, his combat boots silent against the carpet as his silhouette flashed across the windows in the door. He opened the door quietly, so as not to disturb Batgirl, and made his way to the side of her bed.

She looked so peaceful and fragile laying there like that. He took in the bandaging on her forehead with a scowl and exhaled air quickly out his nose in frustration he hadn't been there to stop whatever had happened. As much as he would have wanted to rush Babs off to the infirmary himself, Raven was the one who could potentially destroy the entire tower. She had become priority because of this.

Robin finally stopped at the side of her bed and reached out to grab one of her hands. He forced a smile onto his face in case she woke up, but said nothing because she looked so peaceful.