Chapter 14: Mr. Argumentative
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Raven was spending most of her time with Starfire the rest of the day. She wasn't exactly sure if the woman wanted to give her work or just hang out. She was acting like she had too much coffee this morning.

"Rachel! What do you think of these designs???" She answered as she had the past few minutes.

"They look great, ma'am."

"Oh joy!" Starfire loved Raven's input. Probably because she was another woman to talk to. Being surrounded by men is rough. Raven knows. She's done it forever. She's only had a female client in a mission like this one other time. And even then the mission only lasted about a week. "Thank you, Rachel!"

"My pleasure, Mrs. Grayson." As annoying as she was, she felt her pain. Part of her didn't even look like she wanted to be here. Then Raven got the idea: Was she dragged into this? It was far fetched. That much she knew, but it was indeed a possibility. Maybe she could get the answer out of her.

"Rachel? Could you do something for me?" Raven walked over to her desk showing her interest. "Would it be too much trouble to finish this design for me? I have to make a conference call."

"Not a problem, ma'am." Raven took the necessary papers and put them down on her desk. Starfire picked up the phone and proceeded to take notes and look at her documents.

"Indeed. Nightengale is a large problem that needs to be solved." She said supposedly chiming into a conversation. Raven sighed quietly.

The diagrams were of a car, and a skateboard. Raven assumed she wanted a new design for the skateboard and a newer looking car.

The car was a BMW 7 series looking car. Pretty old one by now. They were up to 11 series. But it looked more or less the same. A luxury car. The magnets had no colored lights labeled, no color to the car itself and the car was extremely basic.

Raven made the doors a different, more modern shape, made the lights indicating where the magnets were light blue, the trunk came down to a point, and she enlarged the top of the car and made it a little longer, turning it into a Grayson Inc. Exclusive, which the company desperately needed more of.

Raven moved onto the skateboard. It had simple, white colored lights to indicate the magnets and the classic union jack at the bottom. First, the union jack had to go. That wouldn't fly. The design had to be unique and different. So Raven drew cat's eyes glowing green with extreme detail. Good thing she minored in graphic design. All that was left was to do was put the company logo on the skateboard. She did so as best as she could. After turning the lights red she put the designs in the computer and printed them out so it would be easier to see for building purposes.

Raven pulled them out of the printer and went back to her desk.

Starfire was upset about something.

"I do not care how this problem is addressed at this point. Personally I think it would be more beneficial if the police took it into their own hands Victor. We have enough on our plate as it is!" She said into the phone. She seemed to have abandoned the notes and was working on something completely different and irrelevant to her situation.

Raven organized her papers and pretended not to listen in on what was happening. She needed to know what was going on on the other side of that call. Starfire was facing away from her so this was the perfect opportunity.

"Azerath Metrion Zinthos." She whispered the words and closed her eyes. She enhanced her hearing to that of a bat and could hear clearly what was going on.

"You are right to a point, Star. But we need to make sure that our own work is safe from her." Cyborg stated.

"We were hacked last night. But it was just the cameras. If they broke our firewall that easily then they could have easily gone into our computer system and gotten whatever they needed. But they didn't." That was Garfield's voice.

"They still can." Cyborg added.

"We do not know if Nightengale is working with anyone." Starfire stated. "She could have done the hacking herself."

"Not to burst your bubble, Kori, but Nightengale hasn't had a report of hacking anything. Ever. She has to have a partner this time that is an adept hacker. No amateur can get through my provisions." Cyborg boasted.

"You sound like Dick, Vic." Garfield commented sounding slightly annoyed.

"Either way, I think the police should take care of this."

"As much as we talk, Star, we can only help make the final decision. Dick is the one who calls the shots about these things and you know it. You should talk to him." Cyborg suggests.

"Vic, I don't think that's the best idea." Gar warned.

"Why? He's her husband. He'll listen to her more than the two of us." Something was whispered. "Oh."

"Yeah."

"Well in that case you definitely need to talk to him." Star groaned and begrudgingly faced the fact that he was right.

"Very well. I'll send Rachel down with my results tomorrow, Vic."

"Alright."

"Later, Kor." She hung up and Raven returned her hearing to normal.

Starfire looked sad and a little worried.

"Is...everything ok, Ma'am?"

"Hmm? Oh yes, everything is quite fine. Mr. Grayson and I just had an argument last night."

"Oh. I'm sorry for intruding."

"No no not at all!" Raven put the new designs on her desk.

"I finished. Are these ok, Ma'am?" Starfire was pleasantly surprised.

"These are much better than ok! They are wonderful! You are quiet creative! Where did you get the idea for the cat eyes? And green! A gender neutral color! Perfect! The lights as well!" Starfire kept complimenting her, but it was in one ear and out the other. It looked like she was paying attention, but really she was just trying to figure out a way to get more information about the argument they had without pushing any sensitive buttons.

"Ma'am, I am not trying to step out of line, but Mr. Grayson seems to be causing more harm than good lately." She sighed.

"Indeed, I'm afraid you're right. I feel as if he enjoys arguing nowadays."

"What did you two argue about?"

"Gar." Raven raised an eyebrow

"Garfield? Why? Isn't he the one doing the arguing, not the other way around?"

"Well, that much is true, but I think that he is...'the jealous'." Raven was even more confused.

"Jealous? What did Garfield do to make him jealous?"

"Gar and I are simply close friends. I confide in him often and I guess Dick does not like that. It is not my fault that he listens to me more than Dick does sometimes." Raven gave her a subtle pitiful face. "Do not look at me that way. We are fine. Relationships come with problems..."

"You sound like you're trying to convince yourself." Raven thought aloud.

"Well..."

"Does it happen often? Arguing I mean."

"I hope you are not the implying what I think you are the implying."

"I am not."

"Our relationship is not of the toxic type, Rachel, if that is what you were lead to believe. We have arguments every once in a while. But not every day."

"That's not what I was thinking at all, Mrs. Grayson. I just want information, but I don't mean to cross any lines."

"Good." Starfire thought for a second. "I am glad we have another female on our team. Even though we have only known eachother for a short time, I feel as if I can trust you as much as I put my trust within Beast Boy."

"Because I am a woman?"

"Men are quite difficult to handle when the day enters and exits." Raven thought about the strange way she phrased it and then she got what she was trying to say, and then mentally faceplamed. She meant 'day in and day out'. Matt must be rubbing off of on me.

Raven nodded in agreement.

"No kidding."

"Do you have a special someone?"

"No. I don't really hang around men by myself a lot." Matt's voice saying 'liar' echoed in her head. Come on, Brain! Half my job was about lying!

"Have you ever had one?"

"I have, but I dumped him a long time ago." She meant that in the most literal way possible.

"You are not lonely?" Raven smirked.

"Do you always ask this to singles you meet?" Raven guessed.

"Perhaps..." She replied bashfully.

The two shared a calm laugh until the desk clock blared, the time 3:30 flashing on the screen.

"Huh."

"Time flew by quickly did it not?"

"Mhm." Raven gathered her things.

"Wait! Rachel!" Starfire called after her as her hand touched the handle. "Here." She gave Raven her designs back? "They are saved into the computer, so you may keep them. Is that not wonderful?" Her mood had done a backflip in the matter of 10 seconds. That's Starfire for you.

"Thank you, Mrs. Grayson." And with that she left to go home.

After leaving the building she realized how many police men and women there were. Even some JCWF (Jump City Weapons Forces; the Jump City equivalent of the USA SWAT team) were there standing guard in their black suits with high grade military guns.

She felt hot just looking at them. It was unusually hot today at ninety degrees. They had taken so many provisions, maybe even going a bit overboard. But still, this was a huge problem. The more measures they took the more Raven beat herself for making such a dumb mistake.

She was in a relatively good mood, but seeing the JCWF dampened it a bit. She decided to take the road less traveled home so she could be alone with her thoughts.

And oddly enough her mind was blank. She couldn't even think of Seth and Lucy. Her body was on auto pilot again, just going where her brain knows to take her while she is off in God knows where.

But that didn't stop the cars from whizzing by. Without the limitation of friction, maglev cars went extremely fast. She enjoyed the breeze they kicked up. Especially since the air wasn't polluted with gasoline and oil that smelled like crap.

She was glad she got to live her adult life in a mostly exhaust-free society.

Finally something for her to think about. She let her feet do all the work as her mind started to wander.

It wandered until it stumbled upon the conversation she just had with Starfire.

"You are not lonely?"

The phrase repeated over and over in her mind.

"You are not lonely?"
"You are not lonely?"
"You are not lonely?"

"'You are not lonely?'" she eventually spit out her thoughts from her mouth for everyone to hear. Everyone meaning a couple of pigeons

"Am I lonely?" She asked herself.

She didn't answer her own question the rest of the walk home.