Quick Note: Sorry this one took so long guys, the usual excuses apply :c I don't even know where the inspiration to finish up this chappie came from, to be honest. I'm just happy to be posting it and actually kind of happy with the way the ending came out. The rest is meh.

Fake Left, Break Right

By Socially Suicidal

Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Titans or Jason Todd, all I own is *the original form of the character*- Jay.

Chapter Fifteen: In the Gray

"Let me go, Raven." Robin repeated slowly this time, demanding, for the second time, the empath to release the magic constraining his limbs.

Appearing conflicted, Raven's eyes flicked back to Cyborg, "Rae," the bionic youth pleaded, "Star and BB need us. They're in bad shape with X… or… whatever." He stuttered, shaking his head seemingly in attempt to clear the confusion.

Unable to argue with the well-being of her teammates in question, the purple haired girl reluctantly allowed the energy to fall away from her leader, amethyst eyes avoiding the sure to be piercing masked gaze directed at her. Rubbing his injured hand instinctively, Robin wasted no time before he had decided the course of action for his team to take, "You guys go ahead and help them; I'll stay here with this X and get some answers."

"No," protested the empath immediately, "You two go, I am more able to restrain him," reasoned Raven, motioning offhandedly to the still suspended thief. Said thief gave a mechanical chuckle, mirthless and self-deprecating.

Scowling, Robin shook his head, about to give a heated rebut before being interrupted by Cyborg, "Heck, guys, you two go and I'll stay with this idiot."

Neither Titan bird had a logical argument to the tin man's suggestion, both nodding slowly.

Robin cast a frown down at the still scantily clad empath before he turned on his heel and exited the room, "Cover yourself up and hurry," he had mumbled coldly as he regarded her. Lips twitching in a similar frown, Raven quickly summoned her discarded clothing and made quick work of dressing in her bathroom.

After hurrying to the common room and securing a mechanical restraint on the abnormally silent masked thief, Raven focused her energy and the enigmatic swirling black bird that was her signature rose from the floor, sweeping both her and her leader up in its massive wing.

Predictably, when the birds arrived, Starfire and Beastboy had been restrained in their respective manners in accordance with the usual happenings associated with Red X. Beastboy, morphed in elephant form, was seated upon an unhappy Starfire who had an x clamped over her mouth, the two of them stuck together in a mess of a sticky red x. The former bat apprentice growled, kicking over one of the museum's displays before stalking away.

The empath sighed before calling out for him, "Wait, Robin, your hand!"

A distant grunt was the only response he graced her with. Resisting the urge to run a hand raggedly down her face, Raven turned toward her two unfortunate comrades, calculating the method with which she could free them.

When she took a step forward, the green eyes of the alien princess widened as she began violently thrashing. Unable to understand the muffled shouts of her teammate, Raven only paused momentarily before continuing her approach. With another step came a rather painful blow to her stomach as Red X materialized and slammed his foot into her midsection.

The wind taken forcefully from her, the empath managed to skid back only a few feet before regaining her balance and falling into a defensive position, wheezing. "X!" she coughed, summoning shards of energy and sending them spiraling in his direction.

Dodging the attack with a cold laugh, the second X of the day sent a barrage of shuriken at the empath. "Your leader is too hot-headed for his own good." One of the blades nicked the disoriented sorceress's shoulder as she stumbled out of the way with uncharacteristic gracelessness, "And for yours, clearly."

Hissing, Raven clutched at her shoulder as minute amounts of blood seeped from under the fabric of her cloak, "Tell me what you want, X."

"Now, now, are you in any position to be making demands?" X teased, gesturing to her incapacitated teammates mockingly, "You're all by yourself."

Teeth grinding, the empath pulled her hand from her shoulder and summoned dark energy to surround her tightly clenched fists. Her normally dry voice was dripping with venom, coated in ice, and just thoroughly pissed off, "That's more than I need. Azarath Metrion Zinthos!"

A large vent in the ceiling was engulfed by dark energy and came crashing down on the thief, who narrowly avoided complete destruction as he leapt out of harm's way. Frustrated, Raven flung her arm out and jerked it toward him, chunks of the nearby wall sent sailing after him seconds after.

He stayed buried under the debris for a short moment before red beams shot from the pile, the lasers cutting through it easily as his lithe frame jumped out from it. The attack she had prepared proved for naught as his form flickered in the air just as the sound of the door being knocked down echoed through the place.

"X!" Robin called, the strain of his voice indicating that he had realized he was too late and X had disappeared.

"You let him get away!" He ran in, rounding on Raven furiously.

She actually looked shocked by the accusation; pale lips parting as she stood speechlessly with one arm around her torso and the other hand gripping her bleeding shoulder.

"Yes, and I did this to myself," she spat venomously, turning on her heel, "I'm damn near traitorous, blunder head. Just call me Trigun."

The Boy Wonder stuttered recognizing his mistake too late, reaching toward her fruitlessly.

"Raven-!"

But she had vanished already.

When she returned to the Tower to find the resident half robot shut down alone in the common room with an empty set of restraints, the empath was hardly surprised. She expected nothing less of the quick-tongued thief. Sighing, she wondered how she could possibly continue facing him if he continued hurting her friends. There was simply no justifying it. A voice whispered that perhaps the cutting, sarcastic remark she had made to Robin held more truth than she had intended.

Shaking this heavy thought away, Raven paused momentarily to stare down at the blank face of her surrogate older brother. He looked peaceful, for once. She decided to leave him to her other teammates' care before she phased out of the room, leaving it vacant and silent once more.

Finding the apartment had been easy enough. The address he had written on her arm was clear and she had spent much of her time in this part of Jump when she first arrived from her own planet. Raven hesitated minutely before she descended from the ceiling and landed silently on the dark carpet in the humble abode of one Jason Todd.

The apartment was screaming for want of sentimentality, there were no pictures or personal items strewn about, no essence of the man that lived there. The furniture looked hardly used, a tell-tale sign of how little time the dark haired youth spent there. The few things she could see were meticulously placed – a few books, here and there, an old newspaper or two.

She glanced at her surroundings and decided she wouldn't expect a former apprentice of Batman to live any way else.

Said former apprentice finally made an appearance into the small living room. She had expected him to be at least surprised by her sudden presence, but he seemed to have suspected she would come when she did. He had been waiting for her.

Jason, and she could refer to him as such in good faith as he had discarded the Red X costume and was donning something akin to what she saw him in during those ridiculous basketball clinics, approached her solemnly, arm slowly extending. He looked every bit the tall, athletic youth she had once known as Jet, and then Jay, but, for some reason, seemed more aged. Perhaps it was the effect of her newly acquired knowledge of him.

She regarded him suspiciously and stepped back a fraction. He followed suit as if he didn't notice her recoil.

"Raven," he began, exhaling her name resignedly as his hand came down to grasp her shoulder. Flinching, she jerked away as sharp pain reminded her of the injury she had earlier sustained from the other Red X. He blinked in confusion for a moment before stepping forward and gripping her by the arm.

"Just a little cut," she mumbled a quick explanation, trying to pull away once more to no avail.

Wordlessly, he pushed her cloak over her shoulders, revealing the bloodstained slit in her leotard where the shuriken had grazed her. The scowl that overtook his features reminded her entirely too much of her leader and her eyes sharply found something else to focus on.

"Tell me about the other Red X," her normally drone, bored tone had an edge to it that he didn't fail to notice.

He hesitated before her eyes, sensing his pause, darted back up to give him a pointed glare.

"We have a system," he confessed, tugging gently at the tips of her purple hair and receiving a slap on the hand for doing so, "I tell him where he can find what he wants to steal, how to get in, and what to do with it in exchange for his covering for me when I'm out somewhere else. Like a decoy."

She rebuked, hissing her distrust, "This is impossible. I would have sensed your aura, especially that night on the roof."

Jason sighed, running a hand over his face. "That first night on the roof wasn't me, Rae. It was the real X. He found out about the pendant and told me where it was and how to get it in exchange for a dip into my xenothium supply. He wanted to bring it to you, I was still figuring out your security system at the time, and he promised not to hurt you, so I let him."

The empath blinked. "It wasn't you…" she echoed slowly, before shifting searching amethyst eyes up to lock with his own viridian pair, "When was it you?"

The dark haired male seemed surprised by her question, pausing only for a moment before continuing, "The warehouse at the pier the next night, yeah, that was me."

She leaned back against the wall, deflating as she whispered, "Why couldn't I sense the difference?"

Jason shrugged, giving a short mirthless chuckle, "Beats me, to be honest. I guess because you weren't looking?"

Raven hardly seemed convinced. But she pressed on. "Who is he?"

The male before her gave a non-committal grunt, "Beats me. Some scum bag looking to make a backwards buck, doesn't care who he hurts, has a thing against you guys, apparently," he snorted at the last bit, earning another withering purple glare.

"So you just teamed up with a total stranger?"

Jason sighed, "Not everything is so black and white, Rae," his voice dropped to a whisper as he leaned forward, one arm bracing himself against the wall next to her head and the other coming back up to play with the tips of her hair. Her hand neglected to slap it away, this time. "You're gunna' learn that the hard way, it seems."

His breath licked at her lips and the logical side of her mind analyzed him and her situation. He looked entirely too normal, jet black hair tousled and lithe body clad in a black long sleeved t-shirt and dark jeans. His hunter green eyes honest, but sharp as ever. Observant, searching, earnest? Knowledge and Logic pitched in unison then, no, not earnest, the youth before her was a criminal. He stole and lied and hurt her friends. He broke into their impregnable fortress, destroyed the security that was their home.

The emotional side – she dared not venture to thing if it was Lust or something else, both equally bad – argued immediately. The line was blurred, he was right, they were in the gray. The gray was both good and bad, a mixture, not unlike herself. His breath was warm but not as warm as the heat that radiated from his solid form invitingly. His arm kept brushing against the top of her shoulder, reminding her of his looming presence – as if she needed reminding.

He watched her inner conflict through the hazy, far-away look in her round eyes, "Are you thinking about Robin?" he whispered, voice huskier than she remembered.

She hadn't been, but now she was. Robin, oh Azar, the thought of him sent her thoughts tumbling in all sorts of directions. These were hardly the mental conditions appropriate for her current situation, in the home of, by strict definition, her enemy, vulnerable and injured, trapped between the wall and his body underneath his arm while he twirled absently a strand of her hair. Robin was her leader, her teammate, her friend who would be utterly and completely betrayed if he knew of her current predicament.

Robin was also the leader, teammate, and friend that not two hours ago had sourly and completely rejected her, no pretense or apology necessary. She had showed vulnerability, faith, trust in and to him and in return he slammed the metaphorical door in her face, dead bolted it and burned the whole damn house down.

There really was no bouncing right back after that, no quick forgiveness, no immediate empathy. Even for the empath, especially for the empath. She would never admit it. Ever.

But he had hurt her. Badly. Robin had managed to do what she had previously thought to be the impossible. He had hurt her.

When she had granted him that power over her, Raven didn't know and, as she stared back up into those half-lidded, observant, searching, earnest hunter eyes, she really could not give a single damn.

Not a damn about when or how or why she had given the Boy Wonder power to hurt her. That was something to consider later, in the safe confines of her own bedroom with no distracting, warm breath blowing against her suddenly dry lips. Not a damn about the betrayal her mere presence in this dark, dusty apartment surely was. That was something she was sure she would have to pay for later, but not now, not when there was another being before her willing to do anything in hopes of some sort of forgiveness, penance for sins for which he had no business being sorry for.

Not a damn because he, Jason Todd, former apprentice of Batman, wearer of the infamous Red-X costume, basketball instructor extraordinaire, incredibly convincing actor, was standing before her and he had never, ever dismissed her the way Robin had.

That was all the rationalizing she needed.

"No, I'm not," she whispered back, eyes searching his as not an invitation, not an acceptance or forgiveness of any sort. And he knew that.

And when he kissed her, she didn't push him away.

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