Fan Fiction ❯ Teen Titans X ❯ A Little Bad Luck Never Hurt Anyone Pt. 1 ( Chapter 3 )

This chapter is insanely early. The reason for that is that “A Little Bad Luck…” was suppose to be one chapter but it went to long so I cut it in two. I'll be working on this fic more, because I'm still trying to figure out how to write chapter 3 in Mirror Images. That's the really confusing chapter and I have no idea how to go about when Tai and Kari go into the new dimension. Help would be appreciated lol. After that though it should be smooth sailing.

This chapter was suppose to be longer and cover how Jinx interacted with the Titans the next morning, but when I got to the end of the chapter I just had to stop because it just seemed perfect and went along with my one line enders that I seem to be adopting for this story.

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Teen Titans X

Written by: Juggalomalice

Chapter 3: A Little Bad Luck Never Hurt Anyone Pt. 2

“I'm going to go check on Beast Boy and Cyborg.” Raven said and without waiting for an acknowledgement she left leaving X and Jinx alone.

X himself turned around and was about to make his exit until he felt something grab him by his wrist and held him so he couldn't leave. It wasn't a forceful hold. More like how a child holds a parent's hand when they want to tell them something important. X didn't even bother to look back. He knew who it was.

“What is it Jinx?”

“It's you under that mask isn't it Robin?” she asked in an innocent manner. She felt X's wrist tighten in her hand. She gave a little laugh. “It's alright. I heard about you becoming Red X, but I didn't really believe it at first. Don't know why. Just didn't”

“Is there a point to all this, Jinx?” X interrupted her hoping to end the conversation.

“Sorry, I just wanted to tell you thank you. Just between you and me you're kind of the reason I came back here, to Jump City.”

“What are you talking about?” X asked clearly confused by her statement.

“I woke up halfway through your fight with Blood. I saw what you did to him.”

X was silent as he refused to acknowledge her comment.

“It's ok. I won't tell anyone. I just want you to know that I was really impressed by you then. The way you fought so hard to protect your team. To protect your friends. I've never seen anything like that. There isn't really any real friendship in the Hive. If you fall you become nothing more than a stepping stone for someone else. It's different for you Titans though, isn't it? I mean you're all real friends. I've never had a real friend. While I watched your fight with Blood I asked myself, If I was a Titan would Robin fight that hard to protect me too? I really liked the feeling I get every time I think that. That's why I came back. I was hoping things could be different between us. I was hoping we could be friends maybe.”

X was quiet. He didn't know how to answer her. Jinx was a Pandora's Box of emotions and he had no experience with how to deal with any of them. He remained silent for a few moments till the silent sobs of Jinx caught his attention. He glanced over his shoulder to look at her at last and immediately regretted it. Jinx was crying again, but not out of sadness like earlier. Her lips where curled in a small smile and her eyes glistened with an unseen hope. It was one of the strangest displays of conflicting emotion X had ever seen. X continued to stare at her eyes and the fact that he was merely paying attention to her made her smile grow larger.

There was a strange click of realization inside X's mind or maybe his heart. He wasn't sure, but before he knew what the hell he was doing he had pulled out a cloth handkerchief and was gently wiping the tears and smeared makeup off of Jinx's face. He wiped away her dark mascara and the smeared bright pink blush on her cheeks. To X's surprise even without her blush on Jinx's cheeks were still a bright red shade and seemed to be growing darker.

Jinx looked up at him. Her pale face, no longer accentuated with makeup, was still very pretty. As she stared at the skull mask of Red X her eyes trembled, but not in fear. She briefly recalled how gentle he was when he wiped her tears. She almost didn't believe this was the same young man she knew that had kicked her and her team's butts more then once. Now he stood before her, his hands gently resting on her shoulders in a reassuring manner. She wanted to just collapse in his arms. To fall into him and his embrace. She wanted too. But she couldn't. She wouldn't. Her face continued to burn till she was forced to look away. Even then her face continued to be red.

“I'm putting a lot of trust in you Jinx.” He said after what seemed to be an eternity of silence. Jinx looked up at him. Surprised that he would tell her, a former enemy, something like that. “Don't let me down.”

“I won't. I promise!” she answered quickly with her trademark smile.

“Good, I've set the security systems to recognize you as a guest for the time being. So long as you don't do anything destructive you should be able to wander the tower freely.”

“But I thought I was an official member?” Jinx pleaded.

“You are, but you just can't expect us to trust you right off the bat. You'll be sleeping on the sofa here in the commons room where you're actions can be surveillance by the security cameras. After a while if you earn enough of the team's trust you'll get your own room like everyone else.”

Jinx gave a slight pout. “I guess I kind of deserve that huh? So who will be watching me?”

“I usually monitor the cameras, why?”

Jinx put her hands behind her back and gave X a cat like grin. “So you'll be watching me?”

“Most of the time for security reasons.” X answered not sure where she was going with this.

“Just make sure not to peep while I'm changing Mr. Red X. But if you do I won't tell anyone. I have a pair of black lace panties that I'll think you like.” She said with a flirtatious giggle.

X gave a nervous laugh. He wasn't expecting that and had no real answer to it. He turned away from Jinx and headed towards the door. He stopped for a moment and looked back at her before leaving. “There are extra pillow and blankets in the closet over there in case you need some.” He said pointing at an obscure closet that no one seemed to notice. “Also when Khalid wakes up tell him he's a Teen Titan.”

“Khalid?” Jinx asked confused.

X pointed at the sleeping apath before walking out the room to do whatever it was he does so much.

Jinx walked over to the sofa and threw herself on the opposite end from Khalid and buried her face in her hands.

“Uh, what the hell was I thinking? Why was I so flirty and girly around him? I'm so embarrassed.”

“Sounded like you like him.” said a monotone voice from Khalid's sleeping figure. Jinx froze and she stared at the white-haired young man. One of Khalid's brown empty eyes shot open and looked back at her.

“You were awake the whole time! You bastard! How much did you hear?” Jinx nearly yelled as she became filled with shock and embarrassment.

“Enough to tell you kind of like him, but not enough of to really care far what was said.” He answered her in his empty voice.

“So I guess you know you're a full fledge Titan then, huh”

“Yeah.”

“I'm Jinx as I'm pretty sure you know by now. You must be Khalid right?” She asked as she stood up and sat closer the black dressed matter converter in an attempt to get to know him better. It wasn't obvious at first, but the closer she got to him the more her powers started to pick up a strange cold emptiness from him. It was weird and difficult for her to understand making her a tad bit uncomfortable. She tried her best to ignore it, but in the end she had to scoot a bit further away from him then she had originally planned.

“So Khalid, tell me about you. You know my story. So what about you?” Jinx asked in a curious manner, though it was obvious that Khalid's strange life readings were still bothering her a bit even at her new distance.

“Nothing special.” Khalid answered as if is life was the most boring in the world. “Just a crazy guy trying to find someone he lost along time ago and doing odd jobs here and there to get by.”

“Who was it?” Jinx asked clearly interested.

“None of your business.” Khalid answered swiftly.

“Ok, don't get worked up by it. I was just curious. What about your powers? Care to tell me about those?”

“I mainly rely on my fighting skills, but I'm capable of performing matter conversion. This is the ability to manipulate and convert matter into any shape or size I want.”

“Really?” Jinx asked him as if she doubted what he said. “Prove it?”

”On what?”

Jinx looked around her quickly to look for a test subject for Khalid's powers. She spotted a half-eaten apple on one of the end tables. Probably left by Beast Boy, but that was irrelevant.

“How about on that apple there?” She asked pointing to the half-chewed fruit.

Khalid didn't even bother to look at where she was pointing and said, “I can't work organics.”

“Oh” Jinx said as she looked for something else that would be missed. It wasn't long for right next to the apple was an empty soda can of some brand Jinx had never heard of before called Faygo. She stood up and quickly got it and handed it to Khalid. “Will this do?”

Khalid too the can and balance it in his palm so that Jinx could get a good view. Once it was evenly placed on his hand a small yellow like light shot forth from his hand and rippled though the can as it instantly melted into a liquid state. The super heated metal flowed over her pale hand as the sickening smell of burning flesh began to fill the air. He then formed a fist with the hot metal still inside his hand. An audible sizzle creped out of his hand as more of his flesh was burned and a few wisps of smoke came through his fingers. Jinx was watching the display in pure horror.

“Are you crazy?” she yelled. To which Khalid said nothing. He merely put his hand out and opened his palm. Jinx was expecting a lump of cold melting followed by clumps of burnt flesh or blood to fall out. Yet to her surprise nothing like that happened. Instead white flower petals fell from his hand like a miniature blizzard. Jinx was very impressed to say the least with the amazing yet graceful display. To her dismay though the petals gave no odor so the smell of burnt flesh still ran rampant in the room.

“You know scientifically that's not possible? Also, don't you think you could have made a flower that had a nice smell to help block out that nasty flesh scent? ” Jinx added in an attempt to playfully annoy him.

“I was never one to obey the laws of science. Anyway, can you name anything that's scientifically possible about your powers?”

“Guess not.” The young sorceress admitted. “I still say you should have made roses to help with the smell. Speaking of that how's your hand?” She asked barely remembering his sizzled hand.

Khalid flexed his brunt blacked hand and black skin broke off and fell to the ground like a snake shedding its skin to reveal a new lair of unscathed pale skin. He lifted the newly reborn hand to her. “It's alright I think and I happen to like that white flower. Even if it does have no odor.” Khalid stated in what almost seemed like an offended voice.

“Hmm didn't know you could do that.”

“Whatever.” Khalid was growing impatient with the Jinx's questions. He was about to go back to reading his book in an attempt to ignore. Unfortunately Jinx was not the type to be ignored.

“Hey Khalid, you don't think I could you know… borrow your powers for a bit do you?” Jinx asked in a run around manner.

“Why? What did you have in mind?” Khalid asked not liking the tone of voice the girl was getting.

“Nothing bad I assure you.” She said as she once again smiled her cat like grin.

Elsewhere in Titans Tower, Red X was in the Crime Lab reviewing and researching various case files like he did every night. His back towards the door as he read some files. He heard someone knock on the other side of the door.

“Its' open.” He said without looking away from the report he was reading.

The metal door slide open as Raven calmly walked in, the door sliding shut once she was in.

“Raven, what can I do for you?” X answered as he noticed the empathy come in.

“I was hoping you could answer a few questions for me X” she said in her monotone voice. X wasn't sure if she wanted to talk about something serious or not. It was hard to tell with her, but if tonight was like any other night it would end up in a harsh argument no matter how they started.

“Ok, what did you want to ask me?” X asked as he put the file he was reading into a folder and look at her.

“Well I've been trying to figure out why Johnny Rancid had attacked Khalid.”

“Johnny's a crazed egotist. Not all his actions are rational.” X stated without much thought.

“Yeah, but it's just out of his style. He knew exactly who he was looking for. He knew where Khalid was and he specifically singled him out in the whole crowed. He even ignored us to pursue him. On top of that he mentioned that he had a job to do. Didn't you find that strange?” She asked X in an accusing voice.

“Actually I didn't give it much thought. Johnny is completely random sometimes. He's usually just about random chaos. I wouldn't be surprised if he took on a contract for Khalid.” X answered again with little thought.

Raven stared at X and shook her head. “God damn you X. I can't believe you did that.” She said in an angry tone.

“What did I do?” X asked in his defense.

“God damn it X! Don't play stupid. You put Johnny up to it didn't you! You put a god damn contract kill on someone! Why to hell would you be so stupid to do something like that?” She yelled at him as a nearby computer blew up. She didn't care though. She continued to stare at X clearly madder then she had ever been.

“That's what I hate about you Raven. You're to damn perceptive.” X finally admitted.

“I can't believe you would do that and for what? To test Khalid? Someone could have gotten seriously hurt. Johnny had intended to kill him you know? Khalid nearly ended up killing Johnny. What the hell were you thinking!” she continued to yell frustrated since she couldn't understand X's thinking.

“But Johnny wasn't killed and Khalid wasn't hurt either. Nor was anyone else. On top of that Khalid proved he was an excellent fighter. Everything worked out perfectly.” He answered Raven as if he was explaining the simplest thing in the world to her.

Raven refused to be quelled. X had done something really stupid and incredibly risky. “Damn it X, don't rationalize this. You're lucky it didn't turn out for the worse. I admit Khalid is better than anyone else we met but innocent people could have been hurt and for what? Because you wanted to give a candidate a pre-req exam?”

“But it didn't!” X stated harshly, his voice taking on a sound that sounded like a low growl. “It didn't go bad. Everything went exacting like I planed it. I needed a member who, in a worse case scenario, could act and defend himself as an independent unit. Someone who didn't need to rely on the team so much if at all. That way I didn't have to worry so much about them getting injured or worst.”

Raven stared at him and blinked. “So this is about protecting us is it? We're not children X. We knew the risks we took when we joined. On top of that we're your friends. The least you could have done is trust us enough to let us know what you were planning.”

X vaguely remembered a time when Starfire had told him something similar. Having Raven repeat words that were so similar hurt in some manner. He snorted and turned his back towards the dark empath.

Raven gave a heavy sigh as she saw him turn his back to her. A lump of ice fell down her throat into her heart where it joined what seemed like an ice berg. Another night she tried to get close to him and another night she had ended up pushing him further away. She was barely learning now why Starfire had quit her attempts and left. She lowered her head in failure.

“You know X, I know you just want us to be safe, but if you keep pushing everyone away you won't have anyone left to protect, because they all will have left by then.” She added as a final thought. X didn't answer and she didn't expect him too. She turned around and headed towards the door. Her hand reached out for the panel to open it, but she pulled it back when she heard X's voice from behind her.

“Would you leave too?” he asked. It sounded like a rather sad and hopeless question. So unlike how he was now.

Raven slowly turned around to face him again. She had placed her hands over her chest because she felt like her heart was going to burst for some reason. X still had his back towards her. “What did you say?” She asked him as if she didn't believe what her hears heard.

“If everyone left, would you leave too?” he clarified, but still spoke in his strange heavy voice that Raven had never heard him speak in before. He didn't look at her. Just stood there with his back towards her. Holding himself up by his hands that were on the edge of the table.

Raven slowly walked up behind him. She reached her hand out for his shoulder. She drew closer and closer to him, but when she was about to touch his shoulder she hesitated and pulled away for a moment unsure of what to do. X continued to remain silent as he awaited her answer. Raven summoned up her remaining courage and again reached for his shoulder only this time she made contact with him. She held her breath is if she had just accomplished some amazing feat like climbing the tallest mountain in the world and she expected any moment to fall off to her death. X didn't move though. He let her rest her hand on him and didn't even tense. Filled with some new courage from the fact that X didn't push her hand away she placed her other hand on his shoulder and rested her head against his back. Again X didn't reject her action. She stood still, breathless over what she had just accomplished. This was the closest she had been to him since the time he had taken her to the amusement park after they had defeated Trigon. She slowly breathed out in an attempt to calm herself, but she could feel her face burning red hot.

“Robin,” she said at last in a bold attempt to connect with him by using his original name,

“No matter what happens, I'll always be here with you.”

End chapter 3

No ending rant today. Nothing except that I planted a little commercial shout out lol. It's a pretty obvious one. I'm sure everyone noticed it. Oh yeah, does anyone know what kind of flowers Kanna (From Inuyasha) wears in her hair. A hundred thanks to the person who tells me. Oh, how silly of me to forget. (guess there will be a rant)

What's this about Raven and Robin at an amusement park? Shortly after Trigon was defeated Robin to Raven to an amusement park to help her relax. They even took a photo together. Shouldn't have told you that. Anyway, the picture will resurface in the later chapters so don't forget about it.

Who is Khalid looking for? If you have to ask yourself this you're clearly missing all the hints I've given out so far lol. If you do figure it out, don't say anything. You'll ruin the surprise for the people who don't know yet. (Or for those who don't read my intro and ending rants)