Three's Company - Chapter 7: Normality
TC 7 - Normality
The Tower was starting to get back to normal. Or perhaps their new arrangement was becoming their new normal. The first time Cyborg had walked into the common room to find Beast Boy and Starfire sat next to each other on the couch, he had paused, honestly unsure how welcome he would be. Until Beast Boy craned his neck around to look at him.
"There he is! You up to challenge the Street Combat master?" he asked, grinning wickedly. Cyborg smiled back.
"Sure am. But I guess I could play you until they get here," he teased. Beast Boy grumbled wordlessly.
"Burn," Raven added, eyes still glued to her book as she lay across them both, her head in Starfire's lap and her legs in Beast Boy's.
"Hey, you're supposed to be on my side," Beast Boy chuckled. Raven, still reading, raised her hand and waved an imaginary flag.
"Go Garfield, ra ra ra," she deadpanned. Beast Boy tried and failed to frown at her and looked up at the screen as Cyborg tossed him a controller. Starfire leaned down to speak quietly to Raven.
"Did Cyborg not understand Garfield's claim to the mastery?" she asked. Raven finally looked away and up into Starfire's eyes.
"He did, but by pretending not to he insinuated that Garfield is incapable of such skill," she explained. Starfire nodded and giggled.
"I see, it is the trash talk!" she said. Raven smiled as well.
"Exactly," she confirmed, and while she wanted to return to her book, she found her gaze locked as Starfire beamed down at her. Her fingers ran gently through her hair and then tapped her on the nose.
"Boop" Starfire said, giving Raven one more smile before turning her attention to the screen as the game started. Raven resumed reading her book, unaware that Cyborg had watched the entire exchange. Honestly, he had thought that seeing Beast Boy with either or both of his girlfriends would be strange, but the way Raven had looked at Starfire, that was the real eye-opener.
"Come on, Cy, choose your guy," Beast Boy complained. "Afraid to face me?" he growled, baring his teeth and flexing his arms. Cyborg snorted.
"Yeah, right. Prepare to get stomped, salad top!" he cried.
"Same to you, meat head!" Beast Boy answered. Their battle was ruthless and long, each of them knowing the other too well for either to claim a quick victory. A new wrinkle was that Starfire, who had always cheered for everyone who played at the same time, was very much on Team Beast Boy this time, though she was careful not to move around too much for Raven's sake. Narrowly, Beast Boy won the first round.
"Well done, Garfield!" Starfire sang, throwing her hands up.
"Wooooooo," Raven drawled, turning a page. Cyborg grumbled through a smile at the one-sided support. With a sadistic grin, he took the next round.
"Do not give in, Garfield! Victory is still within reach," Starfire said, leaning over and shaking him by the shoulders. To his credit, he only chuckled as she released him back to his game. The final round was even more closely fought, each fighter warily chipping away at the other until they each had only a tiny amount of health remaining - the next one to land a hit, any hit, would win. Eventually, Cyborg saw his moment, a mis-step from Beast Boy and charged in to deliver the final blow. But it was a feint. To his horror, Beast Boy's character leapt up and, by the barest of margins, avoided the attack. Then, while Cyborg's character completed the sequence, Beast Boy darted forward and tapped him with a jab, his weakest attack. With a dramatic wail, Cyborg's character threw itself to the ground in appropriately dramatic slow motion.
"Nnnnnnnnooooooooo..." Cyborg groaned.
"YYYEAAAH!"Beast Boy cheered.
"Victory!" Starfire sang, clapping her hands before reaching for Raven's book and tossing it into the air. She took Raven's arms and yanked them around Beast Boy's shoulders in a clumsy embrace before wrapping the both of them in her own. Raven only blinked and casually levitated her book down to the floor safely.
Even Nightwing's finely honed detective skills took a moment to interpret the scene: Raven awkwardly but passively sandwiched between Beast Boy and Starfire on one side of the couch while Cyborg whimpered into his hands on the other, the monitor still flashing his defeat at the room. He opened his mouth to speak but quickly looked away when Starfire took Beast Boy's head in her hands and tilted it up, leaning over to kiss him. He was honestly surprised at himself. He took a breath and forced himself to look at his friends... and grimaced. It hurt. He had no right to hurt but he couldn't help it. He would just have to live with it, after all he was happy with Barbara, honestly. The reminder of what he had softened the pain, and he even found it in himself to smile at his friends a little.
"Krrrhhhh? Ghhhr?"
Starfire broke the kiss and looked down: Raven's face was smushed into Beast Boy's chest by her own, and she quickly relaxed her embrace. Raven took a deep, exaggerated breath before looking over her shoulder at her sheepish girlfriend.
"Thank you, Kori. Fond as I am of your cleavage, I'm not sure I'm ready to die in it," she said. Beast Boy's eyes were as wide as saucers and Cyborg burst into a laugh so violent it was followed immediately by a coughing fit.
"Is that so?" Kori asked, her smile becoming sly instead, and Raven was certain her throwaway gag would have a more lasting impact that she'd thought. What the hell, why not play along? Raven took a long glance at Starfire's bust then smirked as she returned to her green eyes. No words were needed, and Starfire grinned back, showing teeth. Despite having evolved from felines, Tamaranean canines were only slightly longer than a typical human's, in fact Beast Boy's were much more pronounced. And yet, somehow, Starfire's smile had a distinctly predatory vibe to it, and Raven felt heat creep up her neck. Even from his more distant vantage point, Nightwing recognised - and remembered - that look. He cleared his throat and tried to act like he hadn't even seen the last few minutes.
"Who's hungry?" he called out, examining a takeout menu. The heat in Starfire's smile diminished, but she didn't look away from Raven.
"I am. And I feel a great... thirst," she said, drawing out the word as her face moved closer. Then she booped Raven on the nose again and stood up to go and peruse the menu. Cyborg was already there so Beast Boy was the only one who heard when Raven muttered to him.
"I knew I would regret you teaching her that word," she said. Beast Boy, whose eyes had followed Starfire as Raven's had, replied back in a subdued monotone.
"Don't even lie, you don't regret a single second of that." Raven sighed.
"Yeah. Yeah, okay." She stood and joined the others perusing the menu. What would she have? The room flashed red and the monitor displayed an alert, meaning the Titans would have to go hungry a little while longer.
"Titans go!" Nightwing cried.
It was a simple alert, but far from easy. An enterprising criminal, eager to climb to the top of the crooked heap, had managed to acquire advanced weaponry. While many villains decided Jump City wasn't worth the effort of confrontation with the Titans, they were more than happy to interfere in small, petty ways, by selling their technology to people stupid enough to use them. And so the Titans found themselves pursuing a beaten up truck while a man in the back fired a high-powered laser weapon at them, laughing all the while.
"Hahahahaaa! Give it up, Titans! You're no match for... Laser Man!" he cried. Nightwing, giving chase on his motorcycle, groaned.
"Ugh... he doesn't need a laser to beat me. If he keeps using that name I'll surrender," he muttered.
"Maybe that was his evil, evil plan all along," Cyborg replied through the radio, following in the T-Car. Nightwing snorted, then twisted the accelerator. Starfire, Beast Boy and Raven darted around in the air, holding their quarry's focus while Nightwing advanced. He passed the truck and, with an artful but unnecessary flip, landed on the vehicle's hood. He crouched and saw the driver, a terrified but otherwise unremarkable man. Nightwing looked him in the eye and shouted.
"Maybe just pull over now and get it over with." The driver glanced fearfully over his shoulder. "Don't worry about him," Nightwing shouted, and clambered toward the cackling man in the back. With an embarrasingly short martial display, his enemy was subdued and the truck slowed to a safe and complete stop. Nightwing none-too-gently booted 'Laser Man' to the ground, tossing the weapon to Starfire as she landed nearby. "Recognise it?" he asked.
"Hmmm... perhaps," Starfire said, eyeing the weapon critically. "It bears a resemblance to Rannian technology, but the materials are all different. Perhaps it is reverse engineered."
"That makes sense," said Cyborg, exiting his car. "No way anyone would waste original alien tech on this guy." Beast Boy alighted next to him, shifting from bird to man.
"This guy?" Laser Man hissed. "THIS GUY?! Nobody disrespects Laser Man! Self-destruct, minimum radius!" With that command, the weapon emitted a shrill beep and, a second later, erupted into a bright, red light about six feet in diameter, with Starfire vanishing into it.
"Star!" Beast Boy cried, running forward.
"Hahaha! Laser Man is always ready. LASER MAN IS ALWAYS... always... ah nuts," he ended weakly. The light from his destroyed weapon faded and, much to Beast Boy's relief, revealed a smoldering but largely unharmed Starfire. She glanced down at her scorched outfit, then glared at him with barely restrained malice.
"I. Liked. This. Outfit." she snarled, tightly. Her eyes glittered dangerously and green light lanced out from them, burning a line only an inch from Laser Man's fingers as they sat on the ground.
"Whoa! Hey, come on, don't hurt me! I got kids out there somewhere..." he tried. An unnaturally deep voice seemed to surround him in answer.
"They'd be better off without you." With that, pools of shadow sprang up around him, tendrils of darkness emerging to wrap around his limbs and hoist him high into the air and face to face with a volcanically angry Raven, eyes red and promising vengeance. "Give me one good reason not to rip you apart and throw the remains straight to hell," she asked, with alarming calm.
"I-I-I-I-I-I-I-," he stammered. Fortunately for him, he wasn't alone.
"Because I asked you not to," Starfire said, rising up to them. Raven appeared to pause to think.
"Very well," she muttered. The shadows vanished and Laser Man plummeted with an undignified shriek, until Starfire caught him and dropped him at Nightwing's feet. He was quickly cuffed and picked up by local law enforcement. Raven had made a point of floating high above the ground but within his line of sight, her eyes glowing just enough to be seen in the shadow of her hood, and he squirmed under her watchfulness. Nightwing watched her in turn, cautiously. Beast Boy and Starfire had embraced, showing their gladness, but Raven would only hover and stare at her enemy. When he was taken away, she finally descended to the ground. Her head was bowed, so her cloak covered her eyes, and she took Starfire's hand in both of hers, holding it wordlessly. They decided to pile into Cyborg's car to head back, and she never let go.
Later, back at the Tower, Nightwing called the others to attention.
"We need to discuss what just happened. Raven. Don't you think you took things too far?" he asked. Raven didn't even glance up at him.
"No," she said.
"Raven, you traumatized the guy!" He-"
"He tried to kill my girlfriend. He's lucky I only threatened him.," she interrupted. She had tilted her head up now, and a single, deep blue eye glared up at Nightwing.
"You only meant to frighten him?" he asked, a little mollified. Raven snorted humorlessly.
"I meant to make him so afraid he won't be able to hear my name without soiling himself. Considering how furious I am... I believe I showed admirable restraint. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to meditate before I yank the Tower off the island and throw it into the sea." With that, she turned and marched to the door, her cloak billowing behind her. Beast Boy and Starfire made to follow, but she shook her head. "I'm sorry. I need to be alone for a while." And she was gone.
"Well," Nightwing said, rubbing his temples, "that could have been worse, I suppose." Behind him, Cyborg switched on the TV.
"Uhhhhh... Dick?" he said. Nightwing turned and saw the screen showing amateur footage of Raven's display all over the news. He groaned.
"It's worse."
Uh. Hi.
-Jack
