Concealed

Respite

Starfire's pupils diminished in dissent. "Must we merely be friends? Can you not, for a few moments, allow us to be something more?" She traced circles over the latex of his mask, attempting to reach his eyes and his heart.

Her woes couldn't crack Robin's obstinance. "There is nothing more. We're heroes, Starfire. There's no room to tolerate vulnerability. Villains wouldn't hesitate to exploit you as my weakness, and if there's even the slightest possibility you could be hurt, I won't take that chance." Star could tell this particular question had weighed on his mind, long before she could even fathom it herself.

"Robin.." Starfire tremored with a final plea of his name, the future she had always believed to be destined slipping through her fingertips.

"I have to go." The bite of his rejection sliced through her like a thousand hidden cuts, each one more knawing to her psyche than the last. The door she had been so eager to bound through locked irreversibly. 

And Starfire wept.

-

Chapter Three

"Where are you going?"

Robin froze, the peripheral lavender silhouette a curvaceous blip on his radar. In his hand, a strangle-clutched oversized duffle bag. In that, his suit. A new one. Kevlar-coated black and popped blue stripes trailing from his fingertip to his collarbone, the camouflaged look would be more practical for a Jason stakeout. No draped flag of a cape, no neon colors that would dance against the dark, and most importantly; no recognition. He could live in comfortable anonymity, with a disguise that didn't smear the public image of the Titans or play into Jason's knowledge of the old costume's weak points.

However, there was a different weak point that he hadn't considered.

"Where I'm going is none of your business." Nice excuse. That will totally make her drop it.

Robin braced himself for a classic Tamaraian explosion. Surely there would be some 'clorbags' thrown around, and then she would flash those damn puppy-dog eyes that always made him-

"I see." 

Wait. That's it?

Starfire bundled her flambé mane into a draped ponytail, lugging a tiny lilac satchel. "I must depart as well. I shall see you later." Her thigh-high stockings broke the spell of gravity, eyeing the opposite bank of the lagoon surrounding the tower.

Robin yanked her back to the earth's pull. "Where are you going?" The zipper of the purse parted for a small stick of plastic. A pink toothbrush.

"As you said, 'it is none of your business.' " She fluffed her bangs for emphasis, her green dagger eyes like sugar-coated poison. "You have made it very clear that you do not want  what I do to be your business." 

Ouch.

"This request is as your leader. There's nothing personal in the matter." He yanked at the strands of his slicked noirette mop, a liar's tic. 

"Robin," Starfire ruffled his hair just like they used to do. "I think it is more personal than you will ever know." 

She swung the bag over her shoulder as she shot away like a star, accidentally oscillating some of her toiletries down to the balcony. The toothbrush bounced to his feet. 

What just happened?

-

"Welcome to my humble abode." 

Red X twirled his keyring like a yo-yo, snaking his muscular arms around her from behind. He watched as Star's olive orbs whizzed from the towering white walls framed with tasteful abstract art, to the polished marble island of his kitchenette and the red-tinted safe for his weapons, like a kid at an amusement park overwhelmed with all the fantastic rides.