A/N: I Do Not Own Teen Titans in any way, shape, or form.

Chapter 1

It didn't make sense. Where was he? Why was he taking so long to appear? Could Starfire really have been right? Was he really waiting until they were healthy and well enough to fight again? Slade was a sick man; a very sick man. And he would die. Sooner or later, come hell or high water, he would die. Robin was going to make sure of it, no matter what.

It'd been three months since the near destruction of the Titans team. Cyborg was still an ex-member and was not allowed within one hundred feet of the T shaped tower he, himself, had designed and built. Raven and Beast Boy were doing well, but were still healing and going through a bit of physical therapy. Starfire kept as close as she could to Robin, but it was clear she was the last thing on his mind at this point. He simply wanted to catch and destroy Slade for good.

He looked at his desk that was anything but organized. It was completely littered with notes and files on Slade; files that had not moved from the desk in months. Files that Robin went through every single day until there were actual finger grooves on each page from where he gripped them. Dozens of words were highlighted, sentences were underlined, and there were three copies of every page. The wall had notes and loose pages pinned and tapes up. There were various pictures of Slade and clippings of articles concerning him. And yet, even with all of the thousands of facts, he was still at a dead end. And this was what angered him the greatest.

"I can't take this anymore," he growled to himself, running his fingers roughly through his black hair. "I can't take this waiting. I can't understand how he's able to hide himself from me, even though I've got every nook and cranny of this city monitored, not to mention a hundred miles outside of it in every direction. And yet he's still loose. He's still out there. Where the fuck is he?!"

A hesitant knock on the door reached his ears and he turned to it sharply and irritably. "What?!" he said, crankily.

"Oh, um, it is I," said Starfire meekly. "I was wondering if I may… well, could I perhaps… would it be alright if…"

"Starfire, what?!" he snapped.

"Oh, uh, may I enter?" she asked quickly, before he could yell at her again.

He sighed and rubbed his tired eyes. "Alright," he said at last. Slowly the door slid open and Starfire peeked inside, knowing that Robin was not happy she was there. "What?"

"I was wondering if perhaps you would like to go out for the air," said Starfire, looking at the floor. She feared looking him in the eyes, for he had none. They were hidden beneath his mask so that none could see what he was thinking or feeling. At first he adorned the mask to remain mysterious and hide his secret identity. Now he seemed to wear it to hide himself away and give him an excuse not to show any of his emotions. Starfire truly hated that mask.

"No, Starfire," he said, tiredly. "No amount of air could do any good for me at this point."

"But I believe it will help you to do the clearing of your mind," said Starfire. "Perhaps if your mind is clear you will be able to think better and discover a forgotten fact about Slade that could help us apprehend him."

"It doesn't work that way, Starfire," he said, coldly.

"Oh," said Starfire simply, knowing that Robin was not going to follow her suggestion. She really didn't care if he got fresh air or not. She simply wanted to spend time with him, to be close to him. To feel the love that he used to shower upon her by simply facing her direction and giving her a secret smile behind their teammates' backs. She wanted him to hold her again, to kiss her, to make love to her. He did none of these things now. All he could think about was Slade. And she hated Slade all the more for it.

"I'm going to be working in here all day so make sure no one bothers me," he said and turned back to his work.

"Does that include me?" she asked; a slight bite in her voice. "Am I not to bother you as well? Like I am bothering you now?"

Robin was still for a moment, but then began to sort through his files silently. Starfire felt a horrid pain in her heart and felt tears fill her eyes. She clenched her jaw and exited the room, anger flowing through her veins; anger and pain. This wasn't fair. This just wasn't fair. She quickly flew to their room, where she slept alone most nights, and collapsed onto her bed. And there she cried into her pillow, as she did most days.

Raven lay on her stomach on a bed in the physical therapy center in the hospital. Her left arm hung off the side of the bed, dangling helplessly. Her doctor sat right next to her and gently took hold of her arm. He slowly began to move it back and forth until Raven could swing it herself. The pain was tight and sharp, but slowly began to fade away. Once it was gone she swung her arm a little farther until the pain returned. She continued this action again and again.

"Alright, it's been a minute," said the doctor, helping her to slowly cease the swing of her arm. "You okay?"

"Yeah," she said. "It still hurts, but it's getting better."

"Good," said the doctor with a smile. "That's what I wanted to hear. Well, you're done for the day."

"Thank goodness," she said and slowly lifted herself up, with the doctor's help. She held her arm for a moment as a small amount of pain struck her then climbed off of the bed. She thanked the doctor and made her way out of there to wait for Beast Boy. She placed her hand on her bad shoulder and allowed her powers to take the pain away. She was glad that she was able to slowly start healing her injury, which meant it wasn't as serious now.

She and Beast Boy had to go to physical therapy twice a week to try and speed up their healing. Robin was paranoid and sure that Slade was going to attack them at any minute, so they had to be ready to defend themselves. She actually enjoyed the physical therapy because it allowed her to get out of the tower and away from Robin for a little while and Beast Boy felt exactly the same.

"There you are!" he said with a smile, meeting her in the lobby area. "I've been done for almost ten minutes."

"Ten minutes?" said Raven. "You're going to yell at me for making you wait ten minutes?"

"You know we're going to see Cy," said Beast Boy. "It's been forever since we've seen him and I want to spend as much time with him as possible."

"First of all, it's been a week and a half," said Raven. "And second, you only want to spend time with him so you two can play in the arcade at the mall. Why in the world would I want to cut my physical therapy short just to watch the two of you make fools of yourselves?"

"Cuz you love watching us have fun!" he said with a big grin. Raven rolled her eyes and walked past him. He quickly turned and caught up with her as they exited the hospital.

In the three months since everything had happened the two had found themselves alone a lot more than usual. They wanted nothing to do with Robin and talking to Starfire always ended in confrontation, so they stayed away from her as well. And Cyborg had moved away, so that left the two of them alone with each other. Not to mention they both went to physical therapy together as well. Not that either of them minded all of this alone time together. But at times it was very uncomfortable. Neither had admitted their deepest feelings for the other yet and the tension just continued to build and build.

They got into Beast Boy's car, a small two door that Cyborg had thrown together for him one month, and headed towards the mall where Cyborg would be waiting for them in the food court. As much as Raven hated the mall, it was still better than going home. And, she didn't want to admit it, but she did like to watch Cyborg and Beast Boy have fun. With all that was going on in their lives, it was nice to see them enjoying themselves.

"So how's your shoulder?" asked Beast Boy, turning his attention from the road to her for a moment.

"Fine," said Raven, half shrugging, since it still hurt to move her shoulder. Two bullets in the shoulder might not kill you, but it sure could lay your arm up for a while. "I think I'm getting more movement in it each week. How did your session go?"

"Awesome," he said with a large grin. "It doesn't hurt as much to move around anymore. I can do most of my stretches without a second thought!"

"That's good," said Raven. "Considering you were shot nine times, that's very good, actually. I think you're doing better than me."

"Come on, you know I'm all talk," said Beast Boy and he let out a few coughs. "I still can't breath very good. Why'd that bullet have to pierce my lung?"

"Better than it piercing your heart," said Raven.

"True," he nodded.

Poor Beast Boy had a small shard of the bullet still in his lung and it caused him to choke and cough now and then. He had it checked out a few times and all the doctor's agreed that, other than causing him to cough once in a while, it really wasn't doing much damage and didn't need to be removed. It was one of those rare instances; that's what they said.

They pulled into the mall parking lot and Beast Boy quickly parked. He jumped out of the car and headed for the entrance excitedly. Being shot hadn't slowed him a bit, and, in a way, Raven was jealous. Her shoulder bothered her more often than not and she still couldn't raise her arm very high. She took her time getting out of the car, knowing where Beast Boy was heading anyway.

"Come on!" he called from the door.

"I'm coming," she said. "You don't have to wait for me."

"Of course I do," he said with a smile.

"Why?" asked Raven, raising an eyebrow as she approached the door. As soon as she reached it he quickly pulled it open for her. "Oh. Uh, thanks."

"No problem," he said with a smile.

Raven felt her self blush slightly and quickly ran inside and away from him before he could see. She hated it when he did small gentleman-like things for her. It just reminded her that, as wonderful as he was, they couldn't be together; wouldn't be together. He didn't like her like that and he never would. He'd said it himself to Slade. He was still in love with Terra and he always would be.

Beast Boy watched Raven quickly walk through the doorway and followed her inside. She was already walking at a fast pace and he had to sprint to catch up to her. She always seemed to be running away from something, but he wasn't sure from what. She would be fine one moment and then the next walking so fast he had to jog just to keep up with her. Something was scaring her, upsetting her. He just wished he knew what it was. He wanted to make her feel better. He wanted to protect her. Hell, he'd scoop her up and run with her if she'd let him. But he knew she wouldn't. Raven just wasn't like that. Besides, she was in love with some guy that everyone knew the identity of but him. And the day he met this mystery guy he was going to kick his ass for not taking care of Raven like he should. There were few and far between that deserved to be loved by Raven. He only wished he was one of them.

"Hey!" called Cyborg, waving to them. He was standing in front of the arcade and had a large smile on his face.

"Hey!" Beast Boy called back happily. "Sorry we're late. Ravens therapy took ten minutes longer than I thought it would."

"So sorry," said Raven, rolling her eyes.

"You're not late," said Cyborg. "Now, come on, I've been waitin all day to beat your green ass."

"Well, you're gonna have to wait a while longer," said Beast Boy with a smirk. "Cuz you're not gonna beat my ass any time soon."

"We'll see about that," said Cyborg and the two men ran like children into the arcade.

Raven sighed and took a seat on a bench outside of the arcade. She had nothing to do but people watch, and so she did. She watched as countless amounts of people walked passed her; of all shapes and sizes. It took a lot for her to keep all of their feelings from absorbing into her. Sitting in a mall was a real endurance test for her, though her teammates didn't know it.

Cyborg and Beast Boy sat in their little fake cars that were represented on the screen. Both were driving like madmen on the course within their screens and were very serious. But that didn't mean Cyborg didn't 'accidentally' kick Beast Boy or Beast Boy didn't 'accidentally' nudge Cyborg once in a while like they were still children.

"So, any Slade updates?" asked Cyborg as he 'drove'.

"Of course not," said Beast Boy, his eyes glued to the screen. "I swear he's keeping low just to mess with Robin's head and drive him insane."

"He's already insane, man," said Cyborg.

"Tell me about it," said Beast Boy. "He's such an asshole. He makes poor Star cry every day.

"She needs to dump his ass and get outa there," Cyborg sighed.