Secrets Aren't Meant to be Kept

The Fading Essence of Raven

The Fading Essence of Raven

"What just happened?" Cyborg looked at the burning building. Only an hour ago, the building used to be the permanent residence of different companies. The most important one was the tech firm that occupied the top three levels of the building.

"We lost. That's what happened." Nightwing answered beside him.

Although Nightwing's voice was calm, Cyborg knew that he was furious. They all were.

Slade had played them like a fool, just as he had been doing for the past two years. They were no closer to finding out Slade's purpose for coming out from hiding and returning back to Jump City than when he first appeared.

All that they knew was he had been targeting and stealing from tech companies around the city. What he was taking from them; no one was sure.

The buildings were either destroyed like the one today or there wasn't a trace that Slade had been there in the first place. It was frustrating that they couldn't gather anything on Slade.

He still had his suspicion that Slade was using their past against them. But once again he didn't know what for.

"Did you think he made it out?" They all turned to look at Changeling who was standing at the end of the row next to Starfire. A second later, they turned back to the burning building.

When they had seen the timer on the bomb decreasing dangerously close to zero, they immediately headed to the exit. No one had been focused on Slade to see if he had escaped or not.

Secretly, he hoped that he didn't.

Although he was still sorting through his feeling about Amy, he didn't believe she should have died in the back of the vehicle like that. She should have been put on trial and held accountable for her decisions.

But, he guessed that it didn't matter. She was gone now.

"Look there." They turned to the direction that Starfire was pointing. Slade's face was on a large screen on a building near them.

"Titans," he said, "I am very, very disappointed in you. Haven't I given you enough clues, enough time, enough patience? And yet, you couldn't stop me. Maybe the next time I appear, you all would be more efficient at the responsibility that you all claim to have taken as the city's protectors. "

The screen went blank.

"Argh!" Nightwing punched his fist against his palm. The look on his face clearly showed frustration. "Let's go home!" He turned and walked away.

"Someone needs to stay until the authorities come." Starfire reminded him.

He stopped and threw his head back. "Great."

"Go back to the Tower. We will finish up here," Raven said.

Cyborg looked towards Raven. Although it was hard to tell, she had the opposite reaction to Nightwing. She seemed to be relieved.

As he thought more about Raven's reaction, he realized that she had been behaving weirdly lately.

After seeing her reaction in the cave, he could understand her attitude to Slade leaving. However, there had been other things that were off about Raven, such as changes in her fighting strategy. She no longer went into a fight head-on. Instead, she stuck to the shadows and helped out here and there.

Sometimes, it felt as if she wasn't trying to fight.

"I should stay and help out." Nightwing said, causing Cyborg's attention to shift back to their leader.