"...How 'bad' exactly are we talking about here, Doctor?" Cyborg said.

The light was too bright for Raven's eyes after the darkening gloom outside, it was abrasive, enough perhaps to bring on one of her migraines.

The doctor explained to Raven and her friends the gravity of Robin's condition in a juxtaposition of panic and concern. Raven listened intently; the words "severe fatigue", "general risk of possible Anemia" and "overexertion" were the only ones that processed clearly in her head. Beastboy and Cyborg stood behind Raven & Starfire, anxiously shuffling their feet and growing impatient at the doctor's pretentious terms and lengthy explanation, wishing that they would already be allowed to enter the room.

The hospital hallway was like something out of Star Trek. Everything that could shine, did shine. There was stainless steel, sleek floors and the art on the walls were all-natural images in colours as bright as glacier melt-water or spring flowers. The air had a pure fragrance, not sterile, just clean. In the background played music at just the right level to give the patients and staff an emotional lift. But the best part was the ceiling, just clear and high arched. It was like standing out in the open without the risk of rain.

"You can go see him now," the doctor finally says.

Even before the doctor finished his sentence, Cyborg and Beastboy immediately push open the door and the faint hue of blue light, combined with the peaceful moonlight was shining over and a bonny black silhouette greets them from the sole window. 

Robin was lying down on a hospital bed. 

Starfire, as quietly as she could, approached him and sat down at the edge of the bed. Robin stirs, took a couple of short weak breaths and moves his hand, his bare hand.

"Star..fire..." he croaked, groping the space in front of him.

Starfire: "I'm here, beloved..." whispered Starfire, carefully reaching up and giving his hand a light squeeze. 

Raven walks into the room like the floor will give out under her body mass. Every step is so light that she makes no sound at all. 

It took a few moments for everything to fall into place, for her eyes to adjust to the components streaming into the room. She is so nervous yet still she comes, walking softly forwards. The anxiety sits below her horrified gaze, her posture, her unspoken words... 

In those kinds of beds lies everyone's future unless they are lucky enough to pass in their home. Today it is a friend, a young man... a friend, who believed in her and who went through hell for her.

"Ra..ven..."

Starfire turned to see Raven's face, catching her off guard, only to find Raven has shared her worry with Robin's words; tension, shock... she was just as taken aback.

Raven: "Robin...?" She rests her hand on his, feeling the coldness in his fingers.

Robin weakly opens his eyes and grasps Raven's hand and squeezes it tightly. Raven looked down at her leader's hand; an intravenous line was placed into one of his veins. The hands that were once so strong, so brisk, and so powerful now looked weary...weak.

Raven turns her attention to her leader's face and sees that he was looking at her through tired and despondent eyes. 

"I'm sorry," he speaks in a hoarse voice.

Managing to swallow past the baseball lump in her throat, she choked out. 

Raven: "For what?" 

"I wasn't there to protect you..."

Raven turns away and bites her bottom lip. Why? I'm the one who should apologize.

Raven: "It was my problem...I should've thought of a better way to handle it." She mumbled.

Robin: "You only handled it in the way you could think of at that moment," said Robin, his voice faltering. He cleared his throat and spoke again. "They said that you've gone too far, but I don't give a damn what they say about you...I'm on your side no matter what and I'm proud of you for taking care of your sister and for thinking about those other girls that pig had violated. If I only have half of your guts, I would've snapped that bastard's damn neck in front of everyone in that meeting."

Raven: "You don't have to do that," replied Raven, brushing his comments aside. "I'm a grown woman. I'm supposed to be handling things on my own."

Robin closes his eyes for a moment and murmured, "No. Even if you're old enough, and married, I'm still your leader. Looking after you isn't an occupation where I can retire after some time; it's a duty and I'll only relinquish that duty when I'm dead..." He opened his eyes once again, a perfect spring sky and his weak smile warmer than the gentle sun. "That's what families are for..."

Raven looks away once more. Robin's palm rested on her cheek and Raven was surprised to feel how cold his hand is. She casts her eyes at her leader once again.

Robin looked weak...really weak. The man who her companion once was had no correlation to the one who was lying down on this hospital bed. Though another image of her leader lying down incapacitated on the hospital bed, swollen, bruised, and wounded, this one was much more painful to look at; how painful to know that it was Raven who had inflicted this kind of damage...a damage that was a thousand times worse. There was a heart monitor beside his bed, its lines rising and falling in coordination with the rhythm of his cardiac muscles, a nasal cannula providing supplementary oxygen to aid his respiration while medicines and fluids passed through the IV.

This site before her tore Raven's heart asunder.

I did this to him, thought Raven in horror. This is all my fault.

Raven: "Please...don't talk anymore, don't push yourself too hard...for my sake..." 

Robin: "I'm always proud of you, Raven..."

Raven: "Robin," Robin's tone forced Raven to face him. "Please don't talk as if you're on your deathbed..." She said softly. 

The nurse returns beside Robin's bed; she loads a syringe, and inserted the needle into Robin's vein and administers the medicine — Robin smiled weakly.

"Raven..." he said, his voice fading.

The weak tone Robin had just used instantly flooded Raven with fear; she watched in terror as his eyelids slowly drops and his head sank heavily into the pillows as though he is made out of lead. Raven held onto Robin's slackening grip, frightened that if she would let go he would slip into that abyss... where she could never hear or see him again...

"It's the nitroglycerine; it's for the chest pains," the nurse informs her, obviously reading the panic on Raven's face. "Patients who aren't used to this medication make them lethargic."

Raven nods wordlessly; she holds Robin's limp hand and presses it against her face. The nurse excused herself at Raven and the Titans, finally leaving them alone with Robin.

There were no words exchanged between Raven and her friends as they wallowed in the grave stillness of the room...the heart monitor beeping, the sound of oxygen rushing through the plastic tube, and Robin's steady breathing.

◉ ◉ ◉ ◉ ◉

*beep*  *beep*   *beep*    *beep*

Silence once again sweeps into the room and only the beeping of the machines remains.

Time passed when Beastboy morphed into a cat and shifted his position, stretched and purred as Cyborg was sitting down beside him, sleeping soundly in his chair. Starfire strokes the cat's head, so light he wasn't disturbed then pulls a cozy blanket for the two.

"I can manage now," whispered Starfire moments later. "The morning is hastening and you have to get some rest."

Raven must have fallen asleep for when she blinks she felt a certain heaviness in her eyelids; the scent of the sterile bedsheets filled her nostrils and she lifts her head a little higher. Despite being bleary-eyed, Raven could see Robin's profile in a clearer view.

Raven: "That's my line, Star..." replied Raven in a muffled voice, still clutching Robin's hand. "This is my fault. It's only right that I should compensate for what I had done and that's to take care of you and him."

Star stood up from her seat and wraps her arms around Raven's head.

Starfire: "It wasn't your fault...it was nobody's fault," said Starfire as she strokes Raven's hair in her gentle touch. 

Raven sat silently, staring at Robin; her lips downturned into a pout.

Raven: "I wish it was me who's lying down on this bed," uttered Raven miserably.

Starfire: "Shhh...Do not say that. Robin can hear you," whispered Starfire gently in that sweet, soothing tone, burying Raven's cheek into the crook of her neck. Raven felt Starfire brush her hair back with her fingers and kiss her head gently... "Don't blame yourself for what had happened, your friend does not want to hear that." 

Raven brings her bottom lip beneath her teeth and shakes her head. She buries her face on the sheets. A lump in her throat was starting to form. 

As if that will make Robin better again, thought Raven angrily; she took a deep breath in order for that lump to disappear instead of becoming that liquid that would seep from her eyes...

"There's no one in the house at the moment and Y/n's all by himself..." Starfire said gently.

Due to the course of events that had happened, Raven momentarily forgot about Y/n, but to her surprise, Raven did not feel annoyed. As a matter of fact, she did not feel anything at all.

Raven: "He's not a kid I need to look after," Raven remarked in a voice that was so void of emotion while raising her head, glancing over her shoulder.

Starfire: "I know that, but it is in our duty to keep the tower safe. As we must go patrol in a few hours." her sister figure reminded.

A wave of rage started to course through Raven at the reminder of those damned troublemakers; Her chest tightens into a knot like a cramp and a quiet rage builds inside. Raven wanted to blame this all on that perverted politician and felt a savage urge to find him at this very moment and give him a beating so severe that he would look worse than Robin.

But maybe... Raven thought, prompting herself that if maybe she had just controlled herself...maybe none of this would have happened. Either way, there was no use regretting or thinking what could've have happened; it was not the right time to do what she was planning. That old fart was already taken care of as Robin said earlier; her leader's word was more than enough to settle the conflict. Besides, it would only add trouble; Robin was more important than anyone else. She wanted to forget that ordeal with the politician, for the problem that she was facing now was much more serious.

Raven did not need to leave and point a finger at the culprit responsible for doing this to her friend...she needs only to look at the mirror. After all, if she had not assaulted the mayor and had simply snarled insults at him, maybe none of this would have happened.

It was better to compensate by abiding her friend's behests.

Raven finally stands up, smooths a hand over her face, and lets out a sigh weighted enough with fatigue as she does so. 

Raven: "I'll handle everything," Raven whispers with the tiniest of smiles, before turning to her sleeping teammates. "Just look after them Star, look after Robin."

"Cyborg and the nurses can look after him every once in a while—"

Raven: "Star, please, can you do this for me?" asserted Raven with a firm but gentle voice, facing her. "Don't wear yourself out too for my sake. We're old enough and more than capable. I'll patrol by myself and I'll take care of the tower."

Starfire cast her with a gaze, calculating. Then she nodded with no further protest and smiles wearily. 

Starfire: "I am certain you shall be able to. Pleasant Shlorvax, Raven."

Raven shifted her glance at Robin one last time. Shows her concern by silent attention.

I've already let you down so many times, but I'm not going to do it again; this is going to be the last. Hang in there, Robin...

Then she turned the doorknob and exits the room; she felt the eyes of her teammate on her, letting her chest rise as she inhaled the thought. 

She could feel a searing pain in her heart.

◉ ◉ ◉ ◉ ◉

By the time she was already outside the hospital, the lump in her throat appears again; Raven clears her throat loudly and stands silently. In the fog the city is blurred like an old painting; it could be a great work drawn by expert hands. The buildings and the cherry trees are silhouetted black, two-dimensional. The streets yawn in every direction with only the old newspaper dispensers and street-lamps to break the view between buildings so high that the tops disappear in the swirling grey and white. It doesn't smell right at all, in fact it smells of nothing but the damp trees not yet in bloom. Without the fumes of the traffic its odour is as fresh as any meadow without tincture of grass. Raven's footsteps echoed like stones off a cave wall.

Raven takes a deep breath and her black hemisphere appears and sinks into the ground, in the process of taking her with it—

"Target Acquired." Whispered sinisterly in her ear. A blonde female in a rubber suit blending with the mist; she's been set in place for nearly an eternity and her neck muscles are fit to spasm. Her elbow has melded to the damp concrete and her body heat melted the snow, for this one moment. "Just say the word and I'll end this now. This city's fate will be at your hands." 

The sniper in the prone position, trigger-finger poised. Ready to put someone out of his misery, Real pretty. The scope's crosshair fixated on Raven's heart— to add more insult to injury.

"Not yet," says a voice in her earpiece. The one she knew was on her side. The one that was determined to do this right. "The night is still young. Your vengeance will come."

"What?!" She holds her earpiece, blinking for a moment in stunned disbelief. "You don't understand. There are no second chances with this bitch!" 

"You made short work of Robin, but Raven is a very different proposition. One for which I am fully prepared."

"She's better off dead!" The female argues back.

"Patience is a virtue, my dear. Stand down. Your revenge is at hand."

"No, I've waited long enough. She dies. Now!" She pressed on.

"I asked you nicely the first time," The voice warned her, their voice stern. "I'm not going to do it again. Stand. down."

She saw it all transpire in her mind's eye, and though a lone finger tremored at the trigger, she resolutely held it still.

You are this close to having things go very bad for you. Don't screw it up!

Finally, her hand dropped limply from the trigger ands he reluctantly from the cold ground, holding the rifle one-armed. 

She listened.

Hours of tedium and pain followed by an adrenaline-filled escape that lasts all of one minute or less before the place swarms with cops — all scratched foolishly. 

She knew better. She should've done what must be done while they had the golden chance.

You'll regret this... 

She whispered.

 ◉ ◉ ◉ ◉ ◉

When Raven emerges from the ground, finding herself on the shore's edge Y/n was next to the tower's entrance with Silkie at his ankles. Silkie welcomed her with a loud squeal, trots towards her and rubs his head against her heeled shoes.

Raven stands before Y/n, he regarded her with steady, serious eyes. There was a look of irritation in Raven's eyes. Her insides quivering but her face set hard. Like she had cried her tears, suffered her wounds, walked her hardest roads. 

There was a moment, just a fraction of a second, when his face showed puzzlement. It was all the encouragement she needed.

Raven: "Robin's in bad shape, but he's stable now," Raven announces with a small huff. She knew that if Y/n may not care about her, she was certain that he does care about Robin. It was for the sake of letting him know the state of his proprietor.

"I see," said Y/n. "When will he be discharged?"

Raven gives a noncommittal jerk of her head and half a shrug which looked more like her shoulder had a spasm. "He needs to go through the Bypass surgery—" her voice stops abruptly as though the air was suddenly held arrested in the middle of her esophagus. She clears her throat and continued, "There's... a two-week period before the surgery since if he's operated right away his body won't handle the stress, and also the doctors and nurses have to observe him and... Then... after the surgery, he'll feel better after four to six weeks, so..." Her voice breaks away as her chest heaved.

Though a lump has suddenly lodged itself into her throat, making it difficult to get the next words out. Raven's soft tone did not. Her arms lifted from her sides and folded over her chest, her stare averts away, then that stoic voice gave way to something disquiet. "Robin is going to stay in the hospital for quite some time." 

She didn't do anything after that, but just hung her head.

"I'm sorry to hear that," said Y/n quietly. 

At his words, she stares — as if she's looking for the right word— at him. They look at each other for a few moments; Raven did not disclose any hint of her worry and fear in her features. She watched him with a steady gaze, sorrow pooling in her heart. 

Raven finally looks away, gyrating her gaze to the floor, and putting on her hood; she could feel Y/n's eyes on the back of her head, but she didn't feel conscious and walked past him without another word. Whatever rancor Raven had towards Y/n seemed to belong to a past that was no longer quite connected to her; amidst the panic and fear that she felt in a short span of hours had left Raven numb, partially stunned. 

When Raven had reached the privacy of her bedroom, she sank into the mattress and curled into a fetal position. She did not even get up to remove her cloak. Raven clamped it tightly around her shivering body and felt her heartbeat course something in her body that she did not feel for a very long time and it prevented her from closing her eyes and succumb to the calmness of sleep.

Raven lay there, immobile, eyes open, unable to seek refuge of the calmness of sleep. Remembering what her friends told her that she ought to properly rest for her tasks in the upcoming hours. Knowing she was set for patrol duty today, and knowing she had just mere hours until then,

The world is as silent as if it ended in the night. The sun is still resolutely below the horizon and the street is as dark as some old-school black and white movie. 

Raven finally convinced herself to close her eyes and try to sleep, but the image of Robin lying down in the hospital bed - terribly ill for her sake - is burned in her retina.

Sleep did not come. 

Raven stared at her bedroom window until the dark night sky transitioned into light blue... as daybreak approaches.