Secret Apprentice: Chapter 5
The Star and the X
Chapter 4 - Chapter 6 (AO3) (FF.NET)
Summary: Starfire has a fun date with her new friend. She gets to feel "normal", “human”. Her happiness doesn't last long. As time flies by, her problems get worse. The rain won’t wash her doubts off and in the Tower her best friends are waiting for her with questions that she won’t want to answer. Will a strawberry dress make things better?
Chapter 5: The Star and the X
Red X and Starfire landed on the entrance of the mall. He had put on his mask and immediately clocked himself so no one would see him. “I haven’t been to this mall, but it was the most close one”, she turned around and couldn’t see him. “X… I am sorry, Jason?”, he took a minute before letting her know she was by her side. He had never imagined he would hear her call him by his real name. Could this become a regular thing for her? For them?
“Did I let him fall?”, she was walking around by his side with a worried look on her face. “I am here, but I don’t think I should enter like this”, she heard his voice and ran to him with her arms stretched out trying to feel his body and she did. She wrapped her arms around his body. “Jason! I am glad that you are well, I thought I lost you”. He held his breath in, why was she so happy for him? He exhaled. Everything about her was so different and new to him, he couldn’t understand her but somehow it made him feel warm inside. She stepped back and took his hand and flew him up. This time she only took him a hundred meters above the mall. With her free hand she took off his mask. “We are out of Jump City. We shall not be recognized”, he turned around to see Jump City miles away from where they were. He could still see the back of the Teen Titans tower. “You said it was the closest”, she avoided answering and flew down again.
Without letting go of his hand, she pulled him into the mall. It was a small one, it wasn’t too crowded and there were just a couple of security guards. Nobody seemed to care when they entered.
They walked into the first store they found. “We shall get you a new glorious fit of the out”, Starfire stated as she walked through the aisles. She stopped at the man’s side of the store. “What style do you prefer?”, she asked looking back at him finally. “I think I can do this by myself”, Starfire looked around. “There is one thing I haven’t planned”. She got closer to him. “I do not carry the money”, she whispered. He chuckled and took some out of a pocket behind his belt. “Slade payed me just yesterday, we may as well enjoy it”, he gave her the money and she looked at it amazed. “This is too much of the money!”, she tried to keep her voice down. “Stealing from the Teen Titans pays well”, he answered. She gasped. “I do not think I should use this money if it is-“, Jason put his hand back in his pocket and took out a black card.
“Here. My mh... I guess you could say, my dad? he gave me that card. He said I could use it in case of emergencies, and I think this qualifies as one”, he shrugged his shoulders. “Oh, you have a father”, her eyes opened up in surprise, “Well, he’s not actually my... It’s complicated. Just take it, the code is 1608”, she came closer to him. “Why is it 1608?”, he sighed at her question. “It’s my birthday”, he answered softly. “Oh! That is so kind from you father”, he didn’t answer. “Get some clothes and I’ll meet you at the ice cream shop, okay?”.
She took the card. It had Jason’s name on it. When he was about to leave, she hugged him. “I shall thank you for this plastic version of the money”, she gave him a kiss on his cheek and walked away. Jason froze on the spot. Lucky for him, she walked off without looking back at him.
After an hour Red X was ready. He walked to the Ice Cream shop. He was wearing black skinny jeans, black combat boots, a black t-shirt, a brownish leather jacket and a black backpack to keep his uniform in. He stopped himself a couple of stores before the ice cream shop. He looked at his reflection in a jewelry store. Would she like how he looked? Why did he care about it? He really wanted to look good, at least for her. He tried to fix his hair to make it look more casual. He ended up making it look a little like Robin’s, but like an I just woke up version of Robin’s spikey hair.
When he got to the ice cream shop, he looked around for Starfire but she wasn’t there, so he sat in one of the tables that were near the glass door and he waited. He looked at his brand new watch. Ten minutes went by and no one came in. 30 minutes. 40 minutes. 1 hour. Nothing.
Jason was half worried for her and half worried for the card he gave her. He got up and went out to look for her. He looked in every store of the first floor, but he couldn’t find her. He went to the second floor and repeated the same process. He walked around for another hour maybe, he looked at his watch again. 2pm already. They didn’t have much time to get to the museum, it closed at 5pm if it was like the one he used to visit when he was a kid in Gotham.
There was one place where he hadn’t looked: the hair salon. He slowly made his way to the place. The big glass windows let him see who was inside of the shop. He didn’t see Starfire in any seat, nor in the counter or in the back. Still, this was his last chance, so he entered.
The woman at the reception greeted him and asked if he wanted to get a haircut. He shook his head and kept looking around. A blonde woman saw him and approached him laughing. “Now you must be the boyfriend”, he looked at her confused. “I am looking for a girl mh... she has green eyes and-“, the woman cut him off and put an arm around his shoulders as she pulled him to the back of the salon where there was a white closed door. “Your girl is right here”, as the woman said that, the door opened.
Starfire came out of the backroom. She was wearing a short pink dress with strawberries all over it, white combat boots, her fully green eyes looked human, but they were still green. Her red hair was dark pink now and she had curled it just a little bit, so it fell gracefully past her shoulders. He was more than surprised, he was speechless, he was blushing for sure and his heart was beating faster again. “Fuck”, he thought as his feelings took over his whole body. “Oh! Jason, you were wrong when you said that I could change anything I wanted instantly. It took much longer”, she complained. Starfire walked out of the bathroom and went back to the seat where her other things were. She had changed her backpack for a pink one in which she kept all her secrets and now her purple uniform.
The hairdressers laughed at Jason’s surprised expression. He turned around to look at Starfire, but he didn’t move from the spot where the woman left him. “Go, kid or you’ll lose her”, he heard from another hairdresser. Starfire took her things and she walked to the counter. Jason finally moved; he almost ran to her.
After paying, the two teenagers walked out of the place. “You look... What is the world that Beast Boy uses?”, she asked putting her backpack on. “Oh yes! You look cool”, she smiled at him. He hadn’t said a word still and there were a lot of words that he wanted to say, but he couldn’t. “I like your jacket; it looks glorious on you. Do you like my dress?”, he cursed in his mind. Yes, he liked her dress but that wasn’t the only thing that he liked. “You do not like my dress?”, she asked. Her shoulders relaxed and she pouted again. Why was she being like this? Why was she acting like this? What did she want from him? “I like it, I... You look beautiful, Starfire”, that last sentence came out so softly that only she could hear it since she was just next to him. “Oh, thank you, friend!”, she hugged him, stopping them in the middle of the hall. When she let go of him, he felt his cheeks burning. He cleared his throat. “I wish to show this dress to Robin”, as she said that he felt a familiar feeling: jealousy. He had felt this for a while know, especially because of Dick. “We have to hurry, or we won’t get there in time”. He changed the conversation. Starfire pulled him to a hall that conducted to the emergency stairs. There was no one there. She took off her backpack and opened it. He waited, looking at her, taking in every detail of her face. He wanted to remember this moment with her alone even if it wasn’t special to her.
She showed him the button she took from Red S’s belt. He took it. Their eyes met as she extended her right hand and he held it on his right one. He stepped forward, closing the distance between them. She smiled once again and lifted him from the ground, making her way out through a window. He pushed the button making them invisible to those around them. Jason didn’t see her either, he could only feel her warm skin through his hand. And the wind. He could hear her giggling here and there. That was enough for him to imagine her smile, her hair and her face full of joy.
When they landed on a side of the museum, he pushed the button again. There she was. Her hair covered her face and she was laughing as she tried to push it away. He put the button in his pocket and helped her uncover her face. It was her hair. He thought it was a wig, but it was in fact her soft hair. “So, you will have pink hair from now on?”, he asked when he could see her eyes again. She shook her head. “It is not permanent. I can wash it off. Do you like it better?”, she asked tilting her head. Another one of those things Starfire did that had an effect on him that he couldn’t put into words. “I like it, but red is your color”, she giggled and now that sound also had that effect on him. “Now, how does this work?”, she looked at the big building beside them. “Haven’t you been on a date or something to the museum?”, she shook her head. “I haven’t been on a- Oh yes! I was in Robin’s date with that Kitten girl. It was a dance that was a date and I did not enjoy it first”, she pouted again. This time Jason took her hand and pulled her to the main entrance.
They were greeted by a security guard. The first thing that caught Starfire’s attention was the big T-rex skeleton in the middle. She was about to fly to it, but Jason pulled her closer to him. “No flying, Starfire”, he whispered. “But Beast Boy-“, she pleated pouting once more. “That’s not him, it’s a skeleton from a real dinosaur”, her eyes grew bigger and she ran to it. She walked in circles around it and only stopped when she saw a screen with a text about the history of that skeleton. She read it. While she read the text to Jason, he looked around. He counted the guards, the cameras and the workers. He even counted the public, there were a lot of kids since it was a Sunday. “They do not exist anymore? They did not mention that Beast Boy can turn into different types of dinosaurs”, she complained poking the screen trying to correct it. “Let’s move”. Jason pulled her away once more.
They spent hours walking around, she read everything she could, even the emergency signs. Meanwhile, he kept looking for the cameras, keeping track of every detail that could be useful to Slade.
On the basement of the museum, there was an exhibition about aliens. They detailed how the most famous ones came to earth and there was a miniature replica of the ship that brought Starfire to Earth. The Gordanian’s ship. Her eyes lit up and she held her right hand up with a starbolt ready to blow the replica. “Hey! Calm down, it’s not real. It’s like a toy”, he grabbed her hand. She hid the starbolt so he wouldn’t get hurt when he touched her. “They used me like a toy. They experimented on me and they hurt my people”, her eyes went back to normal and he could see tears starting to fill those emeralds up. She had probably burned the contacts, he figured.
Jason slowly put down her hand, still holding it in his. He sighed and looked at her, not knowing what he could say to make her feel better, what she had just told him was horrible and there was no possible way that he could compete against the pain they caused her. Her tears started falling down her cheeks and she just let her head down. He hugged her, putting his arms around her waist and she wrapped her arms around his neck. She sobbed in his chest for a while until she felt like the pain had washed off, at least for now. Then, she looked at him again, stepping away to see his face. “Thank you, X... Apologies, Jason. I feel better now, and I must thank you for being a good friend to me”, Jason just smiled. He didn’t know what to say to that too, but he couldn’t think about it for much longer because she leaned in and put a soft kiss on his right cheek. He immediately froze again. Those same new feelings came back. It felt like he had something going on in his stomach, but it wasn’t painful, it wasn’t
uncomfortable either. And his heart was beating faster. Also, his cheeks were probably red, at least a brighter tone than his regular pale color. He wanted to do something. He wanted to kiss her back but not on the cheek. What if he just leaned in and did it? It wouldn’t be a bad thing? Would it? She smiled at him and turned away. He was so focused on her that he missed the man that came in to announce that they would closing in 10 minutes. She nodded and went back to tell him. “We must get back to the lodge. Are we done with the checking of the security system?”, she asked. “Yes”, he walked to the door and she followed him. The two went back to the entrance. He looked around once more just in case he missed something. She was looking around too and when they got out of the museum she sighed. “I had so much fun, that I did not get to do the checking as well as I wished to do”, she confessed, her shoulders fell back down, and she pouted. Once again, he wanted to kiss her. “Robin always says that to remain focused is a great ability. I must say that sadly I lack that ability”, she giggled. There he was, Robin. There was no way that Jason could have Starfire. There was no way that he could kiss Starfire. She could only think of Robin. Robin this, Robin that. It felt like a harsh reminder that he needed to get back to his side of this game.
“You should get back to the lodge, I will get home on my own”, she looked shocked at his statement, maybe a bit sad? “Are you sure?”, she asked. Did she want him to stay? No, there was no way. “Yes, don’t let me keep you away from your Robin”, Jason handed her the button from Red S’s suit. She looked confused now. Maybe a bit angry? “Are you okay?”, she asked as she saved the button in her backpack. Now he was confused. If she was angry, why would she worry about him? He ignored her. “Jason, please, did I say something wrong? Is it Robin?”. Touché. “No, Starfire, it’s your Robin”, he turned around and ran away from her, she didn’t follow him this time. He was right, it was her Robin. That’s why he had to do it, he had to become the new one if he wanted a chance on a new life.
Starfire sat on a bench in the park until it got dark. Something about looking ‘normal’ made her feel different. Nobody recognized her, she didn’t have to fight crime or be with a masked Robin. She wanted to have a day like this one but with him, no masks, no powers. Just Dick and Koriand’r or maybe Kory with the human eyes.
She walked through the park until it started raining. She quickly tried to run for cover but there was nowhere to go where she was standing, so she stayed there. The water started washing the pink dye off her hair. She looked at it as she returned to her red-haired self. The dress got wet and she could almost feel her uniform back on her skin. She clocked the backpack, it was time to go home.
She walked through the park, then she ran and then she flew. The cold normally affected her powers, so she flew slowly until she reached the tower. She landed on the main entrance. She felt tired, she felt sad and because of that, she felt weak. Starfire entered the code on the panel at the door. There she saw her teammates; they were looking at her with confused stares.
Starfire entered into the first floor. She stopped just two steps away from the door. “Star, we have to talk”, Robin started. He had his mask on and his voice sounded sad? No, that wasn’t it. Angry? Not at all. What was it? What could he be feeling? Why was it so difficult to know his feelings? Oh right. She knew what he was feeling, at least what it sounded like. He sounded disappointed.
“Where were you, Star?”, Cyborg’s voice sounded disappointed too. “I...”, there was no way she could tell them she went to the lodge, that Slade was there, that Red X was there and then she had a date with the last one in a museum. Was it a date? That’s what it looked like. Like those movies she was always watching that Beast Boy passionately hated. Why couldn’t she have a date with the one she wanted to? “Where?”, Beast Boy sounded disappointed. “I was mh...”, could she tell them about the pink hair? What about the lenses? And the dress? She looked down. Her dress was all wet. “Tell us, Starfire”, Raven sounded disappointed. “I went shopping”, she tried fixing her wet dress. She wanted Robin to see her in that dress so badly and now he had seen her, but he didn’t say anything. Was it so bad?
“Look, Starfire...”, Robin walked up to her. The way he said her name sounded like how her mom used to call her before telling her to go to her room because she had done something bad. And in this case, she really had done something bad. “We saw you flying off today, you didn’t just fly away from the tower, you disappeared...”, he paused. He was really struggling to say what he wanted to say, but she already knew. And she was struggling too but she had too much pain inside to let it out. Robin looked away from her. Why couldn’t he look at her? “You hate me”, her shoulders fell, she looked down and sighed. “No, Starfire. We just want to know how you did that because...”, he paused again. Did she break Robin again? “Because you looked like Red X”, Beast Boy pointed out from behind Robin. “And after the weird encounter we had with him we wanted to know if you, mh...”, Cyborg paused too. Raven walked up to her. “Starfire is there any chance that you are working with Red X on something?”, the Tamaranean stepped back and they all looked at her like she had just confessed. “I am not”, she immediately responded, looking back up at them. Her eyes lit up for a second, but her feelings were too confusing for her to be just as angry as she needed to light them up for good. “Then why did you disappear just like he does?”, Robin asked. He came close to her once more.
She sighed. Why? The reality was that she did work with him and it got worse because he also was working with Slade. She couldn’t tell them about Slade, she had to protect her planet, and this was the best way. But Red X. Jason was different. He somehow had helped Robin once. Maybe she could make them see him as she did. As her friend. “Robin, you know he is not just a bad person. He helped us once. And when I needed it, he helped me too”, she explained tearing up. Maybe it looked like she was crying because of what she was about to tell them. Maybe they figured she was going through something. But the fact was that she was crying because she was about to lie to her best friends.
“When we fought him at the building he told me that he wanted to mess with us, with you Robin and with me that night that he stole the T-ship apart from taking it. But when he did not see me, he tried once again at the building. But he noticed that I was not myself and he asked why I wasn’t there the other night. I- I just told him the truth and he did not know how to react. He just listened so I continued talking. I was so sad at that moment that I told him that I wanted to disappear. That is when he touched my face, which Beast Boy saw from the window. But he didn’t just touch my face, he gave me something else. He gave me a button like the one in his belt and he told me to use it in case I felt like that again. That is why I used it today and it felt well... I did disappear. I felt better. I felt free”. At least she wasn’t totally lying. When she looked back at her teammates they all looked shocked.
“Star... I am so sorry you felt like that”, Cyborg was the first one to talk. “Me too, I didn’t know, or I would have been there for you”, Beast Boy joined in. “Starfire, we all would have been there for you. I am so sorry. I should have felt something. I should have helped you”, Raven came closer. Her three teammates hugged her and when they moved away Robin stood still in front of the alien princess. He walked up to her, he put his right hand on her cheek, caressing it with his thumb. “Starfire, you should have never felt that way. You brought us together. You are the heart of the Teen Titans. You can’t leave us. You can’t leave me”. Beast Boy hugged Raven’s right arm. “I am gonna cry”, he whispered. “Kiss her already”, Cyborg yelled. “We are not looking”, Beast Boy covered Raven’s eyes and she tried to push him away.
Robin kissed Starfire’s forehead, then he kissed her nose and when he was about to kiss her lips, he stopped. “I love your dress, Star”, she blushed. Her eyes closed as soon his lips were on hers.
The rest of the team cheered for them. Well, Cyborg and Beast Boy did. Raven was still trying to get BB’s hand out of her face and when she did, she smiled at the sight of the couple in front of them. “I’ll get the kids out of here”, she took the shape shifter’s hand and dragged him to the elevator, pushing Cyborg in the way.
When Robin’s lips left Starfire’s, she opened her eyes. “Is it too late to ask you and your dress out on a dinner night?”, Dick asked softly. Her teammates were already gone so the silence that surrounded them made his voice echo a little bit in the big entrance of the tower. “Robin, would you please give me some time to do the fixing of myself?”. She tilted her head. He smiled at the sight of her cuteness. “I’ll wait, Star”, she smiled back. “And Robin, could I get a date with Dick Grayson?”, she tilted her head to the other side. He chuckled. “Anything else?”, he asked jokingly, and she just shook her head. “Then Koriand’r and Dick are going on a date”, she clapped in excitement lifting herself just a bit from the ground. She held his hand and took him to his room as fast as she could. When she let go of him, she flew in small circles. He had never seen her this excited, he thought. And she got excited easily. “Go get ready, Star, or we will be dinning at midnight”, she nodded with her eyes closed. “I must get ready for our date”, she said that last bit slowly and then she flew away to her room. He stayed there for a bit just thinking about her. He was happy that she felt better, but he was sad that she felt so bad in the first place. When he was about to enter the room, he stepped on something watery. It was a tag from the store were Starfire had bought the dress. It said that it was a limited collection from the mall outside Jump City. It was not the mall were Starfire regularly went. There was something about it that made him wanna check it out, but he had a date to get to, so he rushed into his room and put it away with other paperwork he had from his investigations.
Back in Starfire’s room, she was trying her best to dry her dress. She had put the backpack in her closet, and she wasn’t paying attention to it. She was trying her best to get her outfit to look as good as it did in the afternoon. Then she looked at herself in the mirror. She looked almost like she did back in the mall. She turned to the door and when she was about to leave, she heard it. A beeping interrupted her happy thoughts. It was Slade. She ran to it and opened it. Slade appeared on the main screen. “Children...”, Red X was in the call too. “Plan A has failed. I am entering Plan B but I need one thing more. I need some things from the Titan’s tower that will help me contain your sister and I need the Tower to be empty in case she decides to attack you”. “I have to tell my friends”, Starfire answered worried. “No, we need to keep your friends out of this, so take them away from the Tower. Your sister has decided to come with me to Earth and I will try to debilitate her with Plan B, so she doesn’t put Earth in danger. But I need you to obey me or else the plan will fail too and then she will invade the Earth with no mercy. Leave the Tower and turn the security system off. We will get to Earth at midnight, be prepared”.
A/N: Chapter 5 is up! This chapter is so soft. I guess you can tell more about Jason in this chapter. I loved writing his struggle with what Starfire makes him want to be, because he also wants it but ugh. I really loved writing StarX. But my favorite part is when she opens up to the Titans about her depression. I loved how united the team was in the animated series, so I wrote it thinking about their unity and how much they cared for each other. Raven doesn’t like when her friends are in pain, so I think she would be so sad to know that Star felt like that and that she didn’t sense it. Also, Cyborh the OG RobStar shipper.
Chapter 6 spoiler: “I won’t hurt you”, he would never hurt her if he knew who she was.
