The Five Deaths of Ignorance
- Thread starter Zephyrus
- Start date
Mortal Gods
A Xenocide Production
AN: Not really much to say here. My enthusiasm for writing has waned greatly these last few months, as my few followers have no doubt noted. IÆve tried to force myself to get moving. Admittedly, it is partly out of laziness and partly out of lack of inspiration. So I decided to bang this one out in the hopes that it would start me back on the right path. I hope it works. This is my second foray into TT fanfiction, and I hope I donÆt butcher it mercilessly.
á
Summary: Every bird must someday die. Fly away, little robin.
á
Disclaimer: I cry myself to sleep each night in the hopes that the copyright gods will hear my prayers and grant me Teen Titans. IÆm considering converting.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is one thing that they will never discuss.
No matter how close they are, no matter how strong the bonds of family may be, it is something that they clasp closely to themselves, almost obsessed with the unspoken rule of silence.
It was something that they never dared to speak of, and so they kept it locked up in that dark place where secrets are whispered but never spoken.
It hangs over their heads each day, and every waking moment it murmurs in the depths of their consciousness, a slumbering beast that they dare not call attention to, lest it waken.
It bleeds into the long silences between them, when they merely sit and stare at each other, almost unwilling to reach out and connect with another person. Thankfully, these silences are few and far in between, and they do everything in their power to ensure that kind of painful awkwardness never gains a foot hold in their home, whether it be by playing a videogame at louder than comfortably acceptable levels, ensconcing oneself into the depths of the white noise of a book, keeping the mind and body strong and sharp with strenuous training, or carefully immersing oneself in a foreign culture.
It was something that they breathed in each day, a faint taint in the air that permeated their being. It crept into the dark corners of their minds and lay there, festering and slowly growing beyond their means to control. It was intangible, yet it grew so powerful that one merely had to extend oneÆs hand to feel it writhe in the air between them.
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It colored their interactions with one another. It chose their words. It dictated their movements. And it planned out every moment of their lives.
They all have their ways of avoiding the discussion and theyÆve perfected the motions they go through to do so. They are a well oiled machine of selective ignorance and they know it.
Robin, the eternally stoic and cold protÚgÚ of the Dark Knight, can no longer deny the existence of this glaring fault in his team. Truth be told, even he did not want to face the truth of things, which went against every instinct that his mentor had instilled in him.
His training had taught him to be ruthless, calculating, and unflinching. His team had taught him to be warm, relaxed, and human. These two integral natures inside of him warred for dominance, and as the years went by and the battles grew deadlier and fiercer, Tim could not refute the sound logic that Robin presented to him.
Robin knew that sometime, in the far flung but ever nearing future, the Titans would engage an enemy that was stronger, faster, and smarter than them. And when that day came, they would be dethroned as their namesakes had been before them by the younger, upstart gods.
It would come.
Someone would make a mistake. A finger would slip. Someone would be a fraction of an inch too late. Or strength might fail them at a crucial moment.
So he trained them. He beat into them the desire to survive, the will to fight, and a sort of quiet desperation to make sure that the person standing next to them made it through each battle relatively unscathed. It was a mantra that each spoke in their own heart, driven by the steady beat of the heart of the team.
Then came Terra. Terra was the first blow that shook the foundations of their faith. Though faced with surmounting evils and atrocities committed in the shadows of their City, the Titans still had not lost that sense of innocent naivetÚ, the belief that good would always triumph over evil, and no one could tarry so long in the dark that they could be brought about to see the light. The death of Terra shattered that belief into a thousand granite pieces and scattered the dust into the quiet places of the earth. On that day, the Teen Titans became merely the Titans, as if to mark the passage from childhood to the dark, solemn halls of truth and adulthood.
They trained even harder, pushed each other to the brink, determined to hold on as tightly as was humanly possible.
But despite all the training that Robin could give them, the day would come. And when it came, it would be the end of everything.
T-T-T-T-T-T
The end began with the sound of labored breathing.
The Tower is a dark and lonely place at night. Night deepens the shadows, enlarges the gloom, and builds up the towering strawmen of nightmares that haunt the dreams of children.
Only the Infirmary was lit; pale, alien lights that weren't comforting or warm. Harsh fluorescence illuminated five faces, one of which lay deathly pale in a bed, clothed in medicinal white robes. Silence, that thing they obsessed over and coveted so, blanketed them so thickly it was tangible. The sharp tang of defeat, guilt, and misery lay on the tip of every tongue.
Robin's voice was cold with fury. "Why wasn't anyone watching?"
Four heads studiously refrained from meeting the whites of his eyemask, which never left the form that lay so still before them.
"How could this happen?! We've trained day in and day out to prepare for this eventuality and not one of you even SAW her go down!?" Robin's voice was a razor, slicing deeply into their skin with each vehement utterance. He was right, they all thought. Absolutely right. Why didn't we see? It was all there right in front of us and yet here we are, watching one of our own struggle to breath in and out.
Eyes were glued to the unsteady rhythm of the chest.
"It just happened, man." Cyborg said quietly. "Nothing we could have done about it."
In and out.
In.....a stuttering pause....and out.
"Things don't 'just happen', Cyborg. We train so things don't 'JUST HAPPEN'." Robin was on the verge of losing control. He never yelled in anger. Never belittled a teammate in the heat of the moment.
A small, elfin lad slowly raised a hand to comfort the leader. "Dude, we're not perfect. Even she would admit--"
"She knows we're not perfect, Beast Boy. There's a hole the span of my hand in her chest." The withering retort and cold glare stopped Beast Boy's hand just shy of Robin's shoulder. It hovered a moment, then brought itself back down to rest on the railing.
"I do not think that you are perfect either, Robin."
Robin stiffened and drew his mouth into an angry line. Cyborg and Beast Boy watched; in and out...in and out.
Emerald eyes met his and held his gaze for a few moments. There was no warmth where there usually was, only pity and perhaps a touch of fear. Robin looked away first, whirling towards the exit.
His cloak whispered softly against the metal doors as they closed on his heels.
T-T-T-T-T-T
Robin was alone with his thoughts.
The elevator hummed quietly as it rose up through the depths of the Tower, towards RobinÆs quarters. The Tower was big enough so that each Titan could choose a room to his or her liking without having to worry about convenience or design. Cyborg chose the laboratory to be his quarters, mostly because it was one of the few places in the Tower that he could securely recharge his internal power source without fear of being attacked when vulnerable. It was also just up a ways from the Infirmary, unofficially his domain as well. Beast Boy had once lived on the top floor with both Raven and Robin, but since Terra had come and gone, he had moved to the same floor where her room still resided, empty and full of the smell of the desert. Raven and Robin preferred the top floor, each for their own reasons. Raven liked the privacy and solitude it mostly afforded her, though the others had had an unwelcome tendency to knock on her door whenever they pleased. Robin was similar to Cyborg in that he chose his quarters based on need and convenience. Whenever the main computer sounded an alarm, he was closest to the command center, and thus, was always the first Titan to respond. Batman had literally beaten vigilance into Robin and it was not such an easy thing to forget.
The doors opened and Robin whisked out into the corridor, stalking angrily down the brightly lit hallway.
His thoughts churned with rage and fear. Fear over the crumbling of this team heÆd worked so hard to build into an effective crime fighting force. Anger over the obvious low regard the other Titans seemed to hold for each otherÆs safety.
He reached the door to his room and almost kicked it when it didnÆt slide open fast enough to suit him. It closed behind him and he was left in a relatively dark room, with only two lone lamplights and the faces of his enemies peering out from crumpled newspapers to keep him company.
Face expressionless, he strode to his Wall of Faces and began once again the ritual of reading off the names of villains the Titans had faced and triumphed over time after time.
The H.I.V.E. Academy students: Jinx, Mammoth, and Gizmo.
Blackfire, StarfireÆs darker and decidedly less ôniceö counterpart.
Brother Blood, a Headmaster of H.I.V.E. and one of CyborgÆs biggest foes.
Red X, RobinÆs own alter ego in a foolish scheme to draw out his own arch enemy.
And of late, Slade, the TitansÆ most cunning, relentless, and tireless adversary.
Of all these enemies, each a challenge that some in the Justice League would have had trouble dealing with, a Titan had been felled by a group of small time crooks; bank robbers.
The person who had pulled the trigger had been a mere boy, the scared nephew of the ringleader. Raven had been behind him, to his right, as he had tried to talk the thieves down from violence. TheyÆd somehow gotten ahold of some illegally modified Sounder 375s, courtesy of the Powers Corp. He hadnÆt seen precisely what happened, but the next thing he knew, Beast Boy was screaming for help and the boy had been blasted through a row of desks by CyborgÆs sonic cannon.
Robin turned to see a scene he had prayed to whatever God would listen that he would never have to see. Raven lay sprawled awkwardly on the cold linoleum, blood pooling beneath her, soaking into her uniform and hair, and welling up between her pale lips. Time slowed to a crawl and Robin instantly divined every minute detail of the pale sorceressÆ features; from her dull amethyst eyes to her marble laced skin, from the blood founting from her wound in time to her erratic heartbeat to the crimson stain clashing with the white floor.
Completely on auto-pilot, Robin spun into a crouch, letting fly two birdarangs from his hand. Robin noted with grim satisfaction that the two birdarangs embedded in the palms of the leader and third henchmen ensured that they wouldnÆt be handling a gun anytime soon. If he was as accurate as he suspected, theyÆd probably only regain sixty percent mobility in those hands.
It was a small price to pay for the near murder of a Titan, Robin reckoned.
In between RavenÆs incapacitation and her transportation to the Tower, RobinÆs memories were a haze of fog and flashing lights. He knew the routine of handling the authorities and the red tape that accompanied them by heart, having done it often enough in Gotham and the City by now. By the time Cyborg had her stabilized and they had gathered in the Infirmary, he was angry.
Angry was a mild understatement. He was filled with a cold, controlled rage that someone on his team, a team that he had sweat and bled to form, something that was just as much a part of him as his own beating heart very nearly got killed as a result of someoneÆs negligence or incompetence.
His negligence.
His incompetence.
ôI should have been watching,ö he muttered.
The macabre wall of faces jeered him in silence.
SladeÆs picture in particular seemed to be mocking him, amused at his feeble attempts to be a leader and a protector.
Still the same, prideful bird as ever, arenÆt we, Robin?
An eye set in a metal mask flashed in amusement from the newspaper.
Robin grit his teeth, hissing, ôShut up.ö
Throwing a tantrum like a small child wonÆt make the demon girlÆs hole in her stomach any smaller. I like to think that I taught you better self-control than that.
RobinÆs hands curled into fists at his sides, the leather squeaking softly. He squeezed so hard that the tendons on his arms stood out in basque relief and his hands were trembling.
You shouldnÆt be angry that I speak the truth, dear boy. If you had been watching, if you had been paying attention, you could have saved her. But you were far too focused on talking, on being weak.
YouÆve gotten soft.
Soft laughter echoed in RobinÆs ears.
ôShut the FUCK UP!ö
He reached up and tore Slade from the wall, ripping him to pieces and wishing he was tearing the manÆs throat out. The bits of paper floated to the floor like so much snow and yet, he was still shaking with rage.
The laughter didnÆt stop.
Snarling incoherently, Robin tore down the faces of his tormentors, gathering them in huge wads of paper and savaging them with fervor. Rage unabated, the paper barely had time to fall from his hands before he reached out and snatched the small ceramic lamp on his nightstand, ripping the cord from the wall and hurling it at the door on the far side of the room.
It shattered with a loud crash and ceramic littered his floor with a satisfying tinkling sound.
Panting heavily and sweat pouring down his temple and back of his neck, RobinÆs anger left him and he felt hollow, less than a whole human being.
He tiredly surveyed the carnage and pinched the bridge of his nose.
He had lost control.
Over everything.
ôFuck,ö he whispered.
T-T-T-T-T-T
Of the four, only Starfire stayed with Raven through the night. She sang a soft lullaby about the love of a mother for her child in her native tongue of Tamaran, which somehow seemed foreign in the heart of the cluster of concrete, technology, and steel.
The Tower is a dark and lonely place, after all.
-------------
Fin.
...or is it?
A Xenocide Production
AN: Not really much to say here. My enthusiasm for writing has waned greatly these last few months, as my few followers have no doubt noted. IÆve tried to force myself to get moving. Admittedly, it is partly out of laziness and partly out of lack of inspiration. So I decided to bang this one out in the hopes that it would start me back on the right path. I hope it works. This is my second foray into TT fanfiction, and I hope I donÆt butcher it mercilessly.
á
Summary: Every bird must someday die. Fly away, little robin.
á
Disclaimer: I cry myself to sleep each night in the hopes that the copyright gods will hear my prayers and grant me Teen Titans. IÆm considering converting.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is one thing that they will never discuss.
No matter how close they are, no matter how strong the bonds of family may be, it is something that they clasp closely to themselves, almost obsessed with the unspoken rule of silence.
It was something that they never dared to speak of, and so they kept it locked up in that dark place where secrets are whispered but never spoken.
It hangs over their heads each day, and every waking moment it murmurs in the depths of their consciousness, a slumbering beast that they dare not call attention to, lest it waken.
It bleeds into the long silences between them, when they merely sit and stare at each other, almost unwilling to reach out and connect with another person. Thankfully, these silences are few and far in between, and they do everything in their power to ensure that kind of painful awkwardness never gains a foot hold in their home, whether it be by playing a videogame at louder than comfortably acceptable levels, ensconcing oneself into the depths of the white noise of a book, keeping the mind and body strong and sharp with strenuous training, or carefully immersing oneself in a foreign culture.
It was something that they breathed in each day, a faint taint in the air that permeated their being. It crept into the dark corners of their minds and lay there, festering and slowly growing beyond their means to control. It was intangible, yet it grew so powerful that one merely had to extend oneÆs hand to feel it writhe in the air between them.
á
It colored their interactions with one another. It chose their words. It dictated their movements. And it planned out every moment of their lives.
They all have their ways of avoiding the discussion and theyÆve perfected the motions they go through to do so. They are a well oiled machine of selective ignorance and they know it.
Robin, the eternally stoic and cold protÚgÚ of the Dark Knight, can no longer deny the existence of this glaring fault in his team. Truth be told, even he did not want to face the truth of things, which went against every instinct that his mentor had instilled in him.
His training had taught him to be ruthless, calculating, and unflinching. His team had taught him to be warm, relaxed, and human. These two integral natures inside of him warred for dominance, and as the years went by and the battles grew deadlier and fiercer, Tim could not refute the sound logic that Robin presented to him.
Robin knew that sometime, in the far flung but ever nearing future, the Titans would engage an enemy that was stronger, faster, and smarter than them. And when that day came, they would be dethroned as their namesakes had been before them by the younger, upstart gods.
It would come.
Someone would make a mistake. A finger would slip. Someone would be a fraction of an inch too late. Or strength might fail them at a crucial moment.
So he trained them. He beat into them the desire to survive, the will to fight, and a sort of quiet desperation to make sure that the person standing next to them made it through each battle relatively unscathed. It was a mantra that each spoke in their own heart, driven by the steady beat of the heart of the team.
Then came Terra. Terra was the first blow that shook the foundations of their faith. Though faced with surmounting evils and atrocities committed in the shadows of their City, the Titans still had not lost that sense of innocent naivetÚ, the belief that good would always triumph over evil, and no one could tarry so long in the dark that they could be brought about to see the light. The death of Terra shattered that belief into a thousand granite pieces and scattered the dust into the quiet places of the earth. On that day, the Teen Titans became merely the Titans, as if to mark the passage from childhood to the dark, solemn halls of truth and adulthood.
They trained even harder, pushed each other to the brink, determined to hold on as tightly as was humanly possible.
But despite all the training that Robin could give them, the day would come. And when it came, it would be the end of everything.
T-T-T-T-T-T
The end began with the sound of labored breathing.
The Tower is a dark and lonely place at night. Night deepens the shadows, enlarges the gloom, and builds up the towering strawmen of nightmares that haunt the dreams of children.
Only the Infirmary was lit; pale, alien lights that weren't comforting or warm. Harsh fluorescence illuminated five faces, one of which lay deathly pale in a bed, clothed in medicinal white robes. Silence, that thing they obsessed over and coveted so, blanketed them so thickly it was tangible. The sharp tang of defeat, guilt, and misery lay on the tip of every tongue.
Robin's voice was cold with fury. "Why wasn't anyone watching?"
Four heads studiously refrained from meeting the whites of his eyemask, which never left the form that lay so still before them.
"How could this happen?! We've trained day in and day out to prepare for this eventuality and not one of you even SAW her go down!?" Robin's voice was a razor, slicing deeply into their skin with each vehement utterance. He was right, they all thought. Absolutely right. Why didn't we see? It was all there right in front of us and yet here we are, watching one of our own struggle to breath in and out.
Eyes were glued to the unsteady rhythm of the chest.
"It just happened, man." Cyborg said quietly. "Nothing we could have done about it."
In and out.
In.....a stuttering pause....and out.
"Things don't 'just happen', Cyborg. We train so things don't 'JUST HAPPEN'." Robin was on the verge of losing control. He never yelled in anger. Never belittled a teammate in the heat of the moment.
A small, elfin lad slowly raised a hand to comfort the leader. "Dude, we're not perfect. Even she would admit--"
"She knows we're not perfect, Beast Boy. There's a hole the span of my hand in her chest." The withering retort and cold glare stopped Beast Boy's hand just shy of Robin's shoulder. It hovered a moment, then brought itself back down to rest on the railing.
"I do not think that you are perfect either, Robin."
Robin stiffened and drew his mouth into an angry line. Cyborg and Beast Boy watched; in and out...in and out.
Emerald eyes met his and held his gaze for a few moments. There was no warmth where there usually was, only pity and perhaps a touch of fear. Robin looked away first, whirling towards the exit.
His cloak whispered softly against the metal doors as they closed on his heels.
T-T-T-T-T-T
Robin was alone with his thoughts.
The elevator hummed quietly as it rose up through the depths of the Tower, towards RobinÆs quarters. The Tower was big enough so that each Titan could choose a room to his or her liking without having to worry about convenience or design. Cyborg chose the laboratory to be his quarters, mostly because it was one of the few places in the Tower that he could securely recharge his internal power source without fear of being attacked when vulnerable. It was also just up a ways from the Infirmary, unofficially his domain as well. Beast Boy had once lived on the top floor with both Raven and Robin, but since Terra had come and gone, he had moved to the same floor where her room still resided, empty and full of the smell of the desert. Raven and Robin preferred the top floor, each for their own reasons. Raven liked the privacy and solitude it mostly afforded her, though the others had had an unwelcome tendency to knock on her door whenever they pleased. Robin was similar to Cyborg in that he chose his quarters based on need and convenience. Whenever the main computer sounded an alarm, he was closest to the command center, and thus, was always the first Titan to respond. Batman had literally beaten vigilance into Robin and it was not such an easy thing to forget.
The doors opened and Robin whisked out into the corridor, stalking angrily down the brightly lit hallway.
His thoughts churned with rage and fear. Fear over the crumbling of this team heÆd worked so hard to build into an effective crime fighting force. Anger over the obvious low regard the other Titans seemed to hold for each otherÆs safety.
He reached the door to his room and almost kicked it when it didnÆt slide open fast enough to suit him. It closed behind him and he was left in a relatively dark room, with only two lone lamplights and the faces of his enemies peering out from crumpled newspapers to keep him company.
Face expressionless, he strode to his Wall of Faces and began once again the ritual of reading off the names of villains the Titans had faced and triumphed over time after time.
The H.I.V.E. Academy students: Jinx, Mammoth, and Gizmo.
Blackfire, StarfireÆs darker and decidedly less ôniceö counterpart.
Brother Blood, a Headmaster of H.I.V.E. and one of CyborgÆs biggest foes.
Red X, RobinÆs own alter ego in a foolish scheme to draw out his own arch enemy.
And of late, Slade, the TitansÆ most cunning, relentless, and tireless adversary.
Of all these enemies, each a challenge that some in the Justice League would have had trouble dealing with, a Titan had been felled by a group of small time crooks; bank robbers.
The person who had pulled the trigger had been a mere boy, the scared nephew of the ringleader. Raven had been behind him, to his right, as he had tried to talk the thieves down from violence. TheyÆd somehow gotten ahold of some illegally modified Sounder 375s, courtesy of the Powers Corp. He hadnÆt seen precisely what happened, but the next thing he knew, Beast Boy was screaming for help and the boy had been blasted through a row of desks by CyborgÆs sonic cannon.
Robin turned to see a scene he had prayed to whatever God would listen that he would never have to see. Raven lay sprawled awkwardly on the cold linoleum, blood pooling beneath her, soaking into her uniform and hair, and welling up between her pale lips. Time slowed to a crawl and Robin instantly divined every minute detail of the pale sorceressÆ features; from her dull amethyst eyes to her marble laced skin, from the blood founting from her wound in time to her erratic heartbeat to the crimson stain clashing with the white floor.
Completely on auto-pilot, Robin spun into a crouch, letting fly two birdarangs from his hand. Robin noted with grim satisfaction that the two birdarangs embedded in the palms of the leader and third henchmen ensured that they wouldnÆt be handling a gun anytime soon. If he was as accurate as he suspected, theyÆd probably only regain sixty percent mobility in those hands.
It was a small price to pay for the near murder of a Titan, Robin reckoned.
In between RavenÆs incapacitation and her transportation to the Tower, RobinÆs memories were a haze of fog and flashing lights. He knew the routine of handling the authorities and the red tape that accompanied them by heart, having done it often enough in Gotham and the City by now. By the time Cyborg had her stabilized and they had gathered in the Infirmary, he was angry.
Angry was a mild understatement. He was filled with a cold, controlled rage that someone on his team, a team that he had sweat and bled to form, something that was just as much a part of him as his own beating heart very nearly got killed as a result of someoneÆs negligence or incompetence.
His negligence.
His incompetence.
ôI should have been watching,ö he muttered.
The macabre wall of faces jeered him in silence.
SladeÆs picture in particular seemed to be mocking him, amused at his feeble attempts to be a leader and a protector.
Still the same, prideful bird as ever, arenÆt we, Robin?
An eye set in a metal mask flashed in amusement from the newspaper.
Robin grit his teeth, hissing, ôShut up.ö
Throwing a tantrum like a small child wonÆt make the demon girlÆs hole in her stomach any smaller. I like to think that I taught you better self-control than that.
RobinÆs hands curled into fists at his sides, the leather squeaking softly. He squeezed so hard that the tendons on his arms stood out in basque relief and his hands were trembling.
You shouldnÆt be angry that I speak the truth, dear boy. If you had been watching, if you had been paying attention, you could have saved her. But you were far too focused on talking, on being weak.
YouÆve gotten soft.
Soft laughter echoed in RobinÆs ears.
ôShut the FUCK UP!ö
He reached up and tore Slade from the wall, ripping him to pieces and wishing he was tearing the manÆs throat out. The bits of paper floated to the floor like so much snow and yet, he was still shaking with rage.
The laughter didnÆt stop.
Snarling incoherently, Robin tore down the faces of his tormentors, gathering them in huge wads of paper and savaging them with fervor. Rage unabated, the paper barely had time to fall from his hands before he reached out and snatched the small ceramic lamp on his nightstand, ripping the cord from the wall and hurling it at the door on the far side of the room.
It shattered with a loud crash and ceramic littered his floor with a satisfying tinkling sound.
Panting heavily and sweat pouring down his temple and back of his neck, RobinÆs anger left him and he felt hollow, less than a whole human being.
He tiredly surveyed the carnage and pinched the bridge of his nose.
He had lost control.
Over everything.
ôFuck,ö he whispered.
T-T-T-T-T-T
Of the four, only Starfire stayed with Raven through the night. She sang a soft lullaby about the love of a mother for her child in her native tongue of Tamaran, which somehow seemed foreign in the heart of the cluster of concrete, technology, and steel.
The Tower is a dark and lonely place, after all.
-------------
Fin.
...or is it?
I changed my mind. A short snippet of what is to come.
-----
The raven is the link between life and death. It perches in the shadows and dines in the twilight. It gorges on the eyes of the dead and mocks the blind with raucous calls.
The raven does not deal in absolutes. It lives in a world of eternal dusk, where neither light nor darkness reigns. The raven is not good nor evil. It simply is, though some have come to learn that the ravenÆs neutrality doesnÆt mean that it is equally affable to those who dwell in darkness or light.
Raven knew quite well the persona she was donning when she took the name of such a nefarious bird. In truth, the raven was what she aspired to be. Neither good nor evil, light nor dark. If she should lean towards either, she would unleash a hell upon the universe worse than SatanÆs dominion himself; Trigon, her father.
So, by donning the dark cloak of neutrality, she hoped to save the universe, her world, and her friends.
And now, on the verge of death, Raven was fighting the most titanic battle of her life.
Rage, the personification of her father, one of the most powerful emotions that she struggled to control, sensed weakness. Rage was TrigonÆs key to Raven and through that key, absolute control over her and a gateway to Earth. Having such a tenuous hold on life, RavenÆs mental prison that she had fashioned for Rage was weakening, rust eating away at the cold iron and links weakening in the large chains.
The once tranquil sky of her mindscape bled to red and it took the combined strength of all of her other personas; Bravery, Timidity, Happiness, Wisdom, and Sadness, to maintain RageÆs prison.
But slowly, ever so slowly, crimson seeped into the cracks of her mind.
In a small moment of black humor, she thought of the hostile invasion of the crimson as the Red Aviary, intent on caging the raven in a bloody mist.
Quite soon, she'd be peering through her cage into four crimson eyes.
------
More will be forthcoming....eventually.
-----
The raven is the link between life and death. It perches in the shadows and dines in the twilight. It gorges on the eyes of the dead and mocks the blind with raucous calls.
The raven does not deal in absolutes. It lives in a world of eternal dusk, where neither light nor darkness reigns. The raven is not good nor evil. It simply is, though some have come to learn that the ravenÆs neutrality doesnÆt mean that it is equally affable to those who dwell in darkness or light.
Raven knew quite well the persona she was donning when she took the name of such a nefarious bird. In truth, the raven was what she aspired to be. Neither good nor evil, light nor dark. If she should lean towards either, she would unleash a hell upon the universe worse than SatanÆs dominion himself; Trigon, her father.
So, by donning the dark cloak of neutrality, she hoped to save the universe, her world, and her friends.
And now, on the verge of death, Raven was fighting the most titanic battle of her life.
Rage, the personification of her father, one of the most powerful emotions that she struggled to control, sensed weakness. Rage was TrigonÆs key to Raven and through that key, absolute control over her and a gateway to Earth. Having such a tenuous hold on life, RavenÆs mental prison that she had fashioned for Rage was weakening, rust eating away at the cold iron and links weakening in the large chains.
The once tranquil sky of her mindscape bled to red and it took the combined strength of all of her other personas; Bravery, Timidity, Happiness, Wisdom, and Sadness, to maintain RageÆs prison.
But slowly, ever so slowly, crimson seeped into the cracks of her mind.
In a small moment of black humor, she thought of the hostile invasion of the crimson as the Red Aviary, intent on caging the raven in a bloody mist.
Quite soon, she'd be peering through her cage into four crimson eyes.
------
More will be forthcoming....eventually.