Training Day (teen titans)

[whiteraven]

Raven watched the girl's intensly, but most of all she kpet an eye on Shockwave. There was something wrong about the girl, how she acted, her apparantly lack of any training. Yet Raven could feel her power like a surging electrical current within her. She didn't trust the girl, not a bit, and not for the first time she wished Nightwing would go on a bit more than instinct when taking in strays.

A sudden movement caught her eye, Dick sat down heavily on a bench and held his chest. He was in pain, that much was obvious. Not wanting to draw attention to her friend, she didn't even look in his direction. However, she reached out to him telepathically, trying to deduce what it was.

It wasn't hard to deduce the origin of his hurt. Though the attack itself stumped her, it had Gwen's name written all over it. Unnoticed, Raven clentched her jaw. She exerted just enough of her power to smother the pain. A discomforting shock blossomed sharply in Raven's chest, then died.

*Shockwave is trouble.* She said in Dick's mind. *That was her attack, her power. We'de be fools to trust her, and something about her..."

Raven didn't finish, she knew what it was now. Shockwave reminded her of another Titan who had joined in much the same way, acted much the same way, and betrayed them. Terra.

[Shockwave]

Gwen looked to Batgirl who created a shield around her mind. She watched admirably as the young woman skillfully protected her thoughts. Turning to Raven, Shockwave opened her mouth to ask her opinion on how Gwen did with her mind-protection, only for her thoughts to be interrupted by Nightwing who promptly took a seat on the nearby bench. It almost appeared as if he restrained a groan of pain as he clutched his chest.

Gwen's ashen gaze immediately shot to Raven, awaiting a swift order of needed service or her plan of action. When the hooded young woman said nothing, Shockwave looked from her to Nightwing, again and again in a sudden confused, afraid chaos. She had no idea what she was supposed to do in this situation. Is this a test? She asked herself frantically while she ran her fingers through her red hair. Finally, throwing her arms in the air in an indecisive defeat, Gwen ran towards Nightwing, slid on her knees upon the wooden flooring, and shook his arms furiously. "Nightwing," She called loudly, her face shrouded in a sincere worry. "Are you going into cardiac arrest?!"

Gwen jumped to conclusions as she played the M.D. television shows in her mind, with men and women, cloaked in white, rubbing two metal pads together and shocking the man on the table into consciousness. Face it, Gwen would have no idea what she was doing.

"Ra-- Raven, what should we do??" Shockwave looked to Raven, released her hard grip on Nightwing's arms and waved hers up in emphasis. "Hurry, tell me to do something before I fall into a pool of self-pity if he dies!" She announced loudly and got up from the floor, appearing right in front of Raven with a pleading expression.

[whiteraven]

Raven fixed Gwen with a hard glare. "Calm down." She ordered, her voice cold as ice. It was one thing to be worried, but must she pretend it was the apocolypse?

"Your lack of self control - over your powers and your actions - is annoying to say the least. In you're present state of incompetance I highly doubt there is much you could do to seriously harm a seasoned fighter like Nightwing. If you hope to gain control over your powers, you would do well to start with trying to restrain urges to overeact."

Raven pulled her hood up again, shielding her face from the world. She took a deep breath, palm trees and M.D. television shows? Shaking her head, the hodded hero couldn't help but wonder where this... Shockwave... had even come from.

[Shockwave]

Gwen froze as Raven lashed out, seriously annoyed at the young woman. She rolled her lips into her mouth, biting onto them, as she received the lecture. She needed it, no doubt, but Gwen would never admit that. She liked the way she was, even if it were distracting, histrionic and plainly awkward. But it was true; if Shockwave truly wanted to be the heroic Shockwave, she'd need to learn to think things through.

But the vividly red-headed woman honestly felt the sting of Raven's words when she brought up her lack of control with her powers. I've tried! Gwen exclaimed inwardly. I have tried so hard! Immediately closing her eyes, Gwen knew that she would begin to cry if she didn't contain herself. She looked much like a child being scolded by a teacher for eating the paste-- embarrassed, ashamed, and completely vulnerable. There was no way she could prevent Raven for reading her mind at that point. Gwen was working to hard to keep herself contained and to not make a fool out of her, had she not already.

Once there was a moment of silence when Raven finished with her words, a deep, wavering intake of air was heard throughout the training room. "Yeah, I do need help." She replied as fast as her mind would allow. She didn't want anyone to hear the obvious weakness in her voice. Gwen was not the confrontation type. She wanted to bend to make others pleased. The young woman wanted to make friends, not be cast away as some reject. Again. Though she was completely unaware that Raven was doing nothing besides telling her what she needed to know and not plotting her downfall, Gwen forced the ends of her mouth to curl upwards. "So, uh," She began, dropping her gaze to the floor in front of Raven and taking a step backwards. "Could you help me with my self-control issues?" Shockwave asked frankly and honestly, hoping that the veteran hero would see her through and know that a good training was what the girl needed.

[whiteraven]

((lol, the hodded hero))

Raven looked at Gwen for a good long minute. Her emotions were running wild and the shield she had worked so hard to construct might as well have never existed. But her words surprised Raven.

She admitted that she needed help, and she asked for it. There were few people Raven knew who could do that, expecially feeling the way Shockwave was. Unless, of course, the girl was an exceptional actress. She probably was. Still, to train the girl, Raven would get more information on her, and she needed more information.

She stood up, face covered and cloak swirling majestically around her ankles.

"Stay here, train with Nightwing." She ordered, "We'll talk later." Then turning to face the other two girl's as well, she told them, "Keep practicing with your shields. Practice bringing them up at random times until you're able to do it subconciously."

She nodded to Nightwing, making a mentle note to check in with him later, and swept out of the room. Raven stopped just outside the door and leaned against a wall, organizing her thoughts. As she ordered the jumble of what she had taken in from the room, the painful shock began to grow in her chest again. First thing was first, she needed to expel whatever Shockwave had done.

[Dick Grayson]

Nightwing stood when Raven left the room. She always did harbor suspicions about newcomers. Especially ones as obviously powerful as Shockwave. She had some pretty strange abilities that he hoped Raven would eventually uncover and teach the girl how to control them.

"Let's just focus on fighting then" , he said with a smile as he looked over to the two young girls.

He rubbed his chest and pounded it was. "It was probably just a weird mixture of your powers and this suits own electrical impulses.." , he explained carefully as he swept one of his hands over the bright blue parts of his uniform.

He smiled and winked. Things had gotten a bit grim in here, and that was no way to train. "Okay...so you're not trained in combat..how about gymnastics?"

[Shockwave]

As Raven made her leave, Gwen winced in embarrassment. It was just her way of doing things; she had an infinite bucket of shamelessness. There was no possible way that Gwen way perfectly fine with her excessively blunt and obtuse quirks. She hated the fact that wherever she went, she made a fool out of herself. But that's who she was, right? Raven had disappeared from the room as she had appeared earlier before. Gwen turned to the other girls with a completely crimson face. Still, she smiled awkwardly.

Once Nightwing began speaking, Shockwave clenched her jaw on her lips, keeping herself quiet, to erase the humiliation she had just experienced from her mind. She was thankful that Nightwing was so easy with dealing with tense situations, and she appreciated his attempt to make things more easy-going, but Gwen found herself fleeing inwardly.

"It was probably just a weird mixture of your powers and this suit's own electrical impulses..."

Gwen allowed a small, throaty chuckle to escape. She smiled crookedly at Nightwing's wink along with his constant push to keep the training moving. With a nod, Gwen announced, "I can do a cartwheel..." and trailed off as she clearly demonstrated. Her legs were oddly straight and her feet cycled to the ground naturally. Interestingly enough, Gwen had actually pulled off a successful cartwheel.

Ashen eyes widened. "Whoa!"

[Batgirl]

Before she raised her mental shield again, Batgirl hissed (rather angrily)to Shockwave "I only have one rule when dealing with people who hurt my friends: You hurt them, I hurt you!" Upon saying this Batgirl again raised her shield so Shockwave couldn't tell what she was thinking. After she'd raised her shield Batgirl thought(privately,to herself)"I saw the way Raven was looking at Shockwave and there's just something not quite right with that girl. Shockwave's just trying too hard and maybe I'm being too judgemental too soon. What would have happened if my mentors had given up on me as I'm tempted to do with Shockwave?"[/color]