The room was mostly dark, with candles scattered all around, lighting the room just enough to see one another. They were all sat in a circle, in the middle of which a symbol was drawn on the floor. None of them quite knew what to expect. Some were skeptic about this even working, some were worried that this plan would fail just like all the other ones they had tried so far. But everyone was dead quiet. At this point, they were willing to try anything at all.

A spell was cast and the symbol lit up. For a while, the room was still incredibly silent with the exception of the silent otherworldly murmuring of Zatanna as she continued the spell. It felt like everyone was holding their breath as they waited for something to happen. The air was so dense you could cut it with an axe. It was the fourth… fifth? Time that they were doing this already.

Jaime argued that if the spell didn't work the first time around, it wouldn't work for the next three either. But Damian insisted to try again. And again. And again. He wasn't going to give up this easily when this was probably their best shot at finding her. And at saving her. There was no way he was giving up on this plan just yet.

"Damian…" Kory whispered, leaning closer to the boy, "I think it's-"

"Not yet, Kory," he was quick to interrupt her, his green eyes never leaving the changing rays of light in front of him as he desperately tried to find something that wasn't there before.

The Tamaranean sighed softly and sat up straight again, though her face expressed concern. For Damian. For Raven. For this whole thing. It felt like they had been at it for hours and with little to no results. Whenever they thought they found something, it disappeared almost immediately and their hopes were shattered over and over again. But he didn't want to give up. He couldn't.

"Just a little longer," a quiet voice grabbed Kory's attention and she looked over to Gar who gave her a small smile as a silent request to give it a bit more time. Even in this dimly lit room she could still see that there was hope in his eyes too. They all wanted to find her. And despite how baffling the idea sounded at the time, she was certain Zatanna knew what she was doing, so if there was anyone who could help them, it had to be her.

"Zatanna, is that… it?" Donna's voice suddenly made everyone jerk up and look at where the girl was pointing. Everyone released a quiet gasp when they saw a levitating orb amidst ever changing the rays of light.

"It is," Zatanna nodded and frowned a little bit, readjusting her focus, "now we have to hope we don't lose it this time before I determine where exactly she is."

The orb seemed to be constantly changing shape and disappearing, like a beeping dot on a radar screen, but Zatanna did her best to keep track of it.

"Why does it keep doing that?" Kory asked the magician.

"I think… She's trying to stay on this plane." She responded.

"What do you mean this plane?" Gar asked, slightly confused by the phrasing.

"Her aura disappearing and reappearing like that means that she's trapped between two planes of existence. Dimensions, if you will," Zatanna explained as an idea crossed her mind.

"Stand aside." She instructed the Titans, who got up immediately and stepped back, as she cast a spell that made a holographic-looking map appear right above Zatanna's symbol on the floor. But it didn't look like any map any of them had ever seen before. Now, every time the orb disappeared from the light rays, it appeared in the map below it, making her release a hum in confirmation of her suspicion. All the while, the team just exchanged worried and confused look among one another, waiting for an explanation.

"She's stuck between Earth and… purgatory," Zatanna stated, seeing the confusion in the room. "Since she's neither alive nor dead, she can't go to heaven. Or hell. But she's forcing herself to stay here. That's why she's falling in and out of existence."

"Great, we have that settled, can you find her now?" Damian was glad they finally got a stable connection, so to speak, but he was getting impatient and just wanted this to be done and over with. Zatanna nodded and tried to pinpoint where on Earth Raven was currently at. And a tense silence settled in once again until the others noticed a frown forming on her face.

"Is there a reason why she would be in the Middle East?" Zatanna asked suddenly and Damian frowned.

"Probably for the same reason I've been keeping an eye on that place." He replied and saw it in her face that she expected him to elaborate, but, honestly, he didn't feel like it was the best idea right now. "Explanations can wait, we need to get there."

"Is there a way we can contain a soul somewhere?" Donna asked and looked at Zatanna.

"There can be a way, yeah." The woman nodded after a moment of thinking.

"Nrut eht pam otni a ssapmoc!" Zatanna cast a spell and the holographic map shrunk down to the size of a compass, levitating right above her right palm.

"Maybe we should get some backup before going there," Kory suggested.

"Yeah, if Raven shows up… God knows what could happen," Jaime finally spoke up after being quiet this whole time. Of course, no one wanted to admit that they were scared of the possibility to face their friend, but the reality was what it was right now. Anything could happen and they weren't sure they were ready for it yet.

"We'll do it when we get there," Damian responded dryly before shifting his gaze to the magician again. "We have no time to lose. Any chance you can help us with getting to where she is?"

Zatanna smiled a little with a nod and cast another spell: "Deal su ot s'nevaR luos!" And with that a portal opened right next to her and everyone walked through, stepping onto a very familiar place to most of them once they were on the other side of it. This place brought back memories. And it was weird to be here again.

"It's straight ahead of us," Zatanna said once she came out of the portal as well, oblivious to the inner tensions among the team members. Quickly pulling themselves together again, they followed the marker on their magical compass. But the further they walked, the more it seemed like something was off.

"Guys, do you remember this place looking like this?" Jaime asked somewhat unsurely.

"I mean, it looks the same, but… It feels different," Korry added with a frown on her face as she looked around.

"It's giving me the heebie jeebies," Gar shook a little as he felt a shiver down his spine.

The team exchanged words about how creepy the place felt and something about dark forces surrounding it, while Damian was deep in thought about how he could've missed all this. Nothing in any of the surveillance cameras ever changed. Checking it even now, everything seemed to be in order. God damn it! How could he have been so stupid? Of course she'd hide her tracks! It seemed like full demon mode Raven had quite a few tricks up her sleeve. And he didn't like it. This meant she was even more unpredictable than he had anticipated. But then…

A sudden stop.

A collective gasp.

"Well, I was wondering when you'd all show up," Seeing the group in the distance, a mocking laugh came from a certain red-skinned girl, currently sitting on a chair on top of the hill, making it look almost like a throne. But it wasn't the most shocking thing about it. The more frightening fact was that she was surrounded by hundreds of demons at the bottom of the hill with a portal opened behind her where more demons kept coming from.

"She'd been raising an army this whole time," Kory gasped, looking at the horde.

"How did we miss this?!" Jaime exclaimed. "Robin, how did we miss this?"

"This place is surrounded by magic," Zatanna was quick to explain. "Can't be detected by normal cameras."

Jaime cursed under his nose, while Kory tried to reach Dick to call for backup because at this point it was crystal clear that they would need it, but to no avail. "Comms don't seem to work either."

"Great," Damian gritted his teeth and looked directly at Raven who easily caught his stare as well. Even hidden behind his mask, she could feel the hurt and rage in his eyes.

"That's why the soul's roaming around too," Zatanna then mused with a hint of sadness in her voice, looking up at a small glow in the foggy sky. "It's too weak to pass through the barrier."

"Then we have to break it," Damian said, looking up as well.

"The only way to do that might have to be-"

"I know," he frowned at her and spoke with determination, facing forwards again. "We will break it."

If there really was no other way this could go, the least they could do was to save her soul. He made a promise and he intended to keep it. But he wasn't going to abandon the hope to save her till his very last breath.