Okay, I am SO SORRY that this took so long, and I promise I will never put you all through this misery again! I DO have an explanation, though, if you want to hear it. See, I got very sick (I have this disease thing, you see, but I can't remember the name) for like a whole week, and then once I got better, this chapter sort of went down the drain. So then I had to start all over again but I had major writer's block. But than Savi, my newest hero(ine) got the writer's block away, and I was free to write – but then I got sick again! And after that, I got grounded!

If you asked me, I'd tell you that while most of the praise goes to Savi, a whole lot of it also goes to AOL Instant Messenger, which we used to get rid of our writer's block! Yay! HOWEVER, I am not using Green Day (unfortunately) because I changed my idea and Savi's into something kind of different. Anyway, if you're one of my readers reading this and you want to talk to me (I know I want to talk to all of you!) then you can leave your AIM screennames (if you have any) in your review for this chapter so I can talk to you and you can all help me if I get writer's block again! Oh, and one more thing, I'm going to make this chapter extra good for all of you waiting so long!

Dedication: Even though I'm not using her idea of putting the song in, I'm using her idea to do something else, so I'm really thankful to Savi, and I'm still using some of her idea. Thanks so much!

Disclaimer: IDOTT! I must get on with the chapter that is to be extra good to please my reviewers and readers, so I'll start now! This is going to be good, guys, I promise! I can't believe I made you wait more than a month!

Chapter Fourteen: Together and Apart

The Tamaranian Prison:

Blazefire sat angrily on her bed, glaring at the cold stone floor. She didn't say anything, and she didn't look mad at particularly one thing, just life in general. Still, Starfire wasn't sure, so she walked cautiously up to her sister.

"Sister?" she asked softly. "Perhaps there is something you wish to speak to me about? Like, perhaps, why you seem so lobstery?"

Blackfire laughed, but Blazefire kept staring at the floor, not even bothering to correct her sister. "This is pointless," she said in a scratchy voice. "My love life, my normal life, and now my life in prison. You know what I want? I want to find my soul mate, go back to the Tower, and of course get out of prison – though maybe not in that order."

"This is a plan that we all share," Starfire said, "but we must wait until the time is right to escape from here."

"Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to tell the guys not to come," Blackfire said. "Raven and Melanie sound like they don't want to be a part of this, and we can't do it without them."

"But perhaps Rhustin might come," Starfire said hopefully.

Just as she said this, they heard a sound at the door. Blazefire rushed in front of her other two sisters with blazebolts sharply glowing in her hands, her gloomy look at once turning into her fierce, determined one. "This might be our chance to get out," she explained.

They waited a few seconds for the door to open, but it didn't. Instead, they heard voices erupting from outside. The three sisters crept up to the crack in the door and listened intently to the verbal fight between…

Blazefire gasped. There was a fight between Cyborg and Rhustin – about her.

"What are you doing here?" Cyborg demanded.

Even through the huge metal door, Blazefire could tell Rhustin was smirking. "I'm here to get my girl, of course. I mean, since you couldn't rescue her, it's my turn."

"We just got here!" Cyborg argued. "We still can save her!"

Rhustin laughed. "You had your chance. It's gone now."

"You had a chance, too, and you didn't take it!"

Rhustin laughed. "Well, I'm rich, good-looking, and I've already had her heart once. People like me are allowed to have second chances. Third-class, half-robotic, unromantic idiots like you only get one."

All three of the girls winced at this. Blazefire made an I-told-you-he's-a-bastard look at the other two, then continued to listen.

"I don't think she's the kind of girl who cares about those things," Cyborg said stiffly.

"How would you know? I've known her my whole life, and most of that time we've been close. The time you have known her, you've fought with her." They heard a sharp bang, and then a hand on the doorknob.

"He kicked Cyborg!" Starfire gasped.

"Or punched him," Blackfire corrected. "I'm impressed. Can I have this guy?"

"This might be a guard," Starfire said. "With a key. It's taking a while."

Blazefire nodded. "You're right, guards never remember which keys are which at feeding time." She got in front of her sisters again, very protectively, with blazebolts glowing. "Maybe the bang was Rhustin and Cy getting kicked out-"

She stopped mid-sentence as the door opened to a handsome prince-like man – could it really be Rhustin? Then she realized that he'd done what she idiotically had done just days before – he changed his entire image for her. And it was nice – no wonder Cyborg had been pissed. Still, she glared at Rhustin cautiously. "Nice try," she said, "but I can still see the snake in you."

"That hurts," he said with a grin, "but I'm just like this because your father hired me to help in battle."

"So you got a crown?" she asked with a snort.

"No, your mother gave that to me. She said it was made for her son that she never had."

Blazefire snorted. "That's her pathetic way of saying she wants you to marry me."

He shrugged. "Perhaps. It wouldn't be so bad for me."

She glared at him. "Oh, yeah? Well, it'd be pretty infuriating to me, but you don't care about that, do you? Maybe you should, though, since you've known me my whole life, and you're first-class and good-looking and you've had my heart before, right?"

He raised his eyebrows. "Look, I was just mad," he said quickly.

"Just leave," she said angrily. "None of us want you here!"

"Is that really true?" he asked, walking slowly towards her.

Her silver eyes gleaming furiously, she hurled a huge blazebolt at him that knocked him through the still-opened door, through the brick wall of the lower-level castle room surrounding the dungeon, and a few miles backwards. Into the dust (he was long out of sight), she whispered, "It's completely true." Then she collapsed.

It was just at sunset, and Lana felt the urge to let her hair down and sit in the pleasant breeze. She walked up the tower's stairs, through the ceiling, and onto the roof. She gazed peacefully at the setting sun, her blonde hair blowing softly behind her from the wind. Her Tamaranian clothing was gone, as were her sluttish clothes. Instead she was wearing a comfortable sweatshirt and warm-up pants, with fast-running sneakers laced onto her feet. She felt almost perfectly content – everything about her life was perfect, but… well, she couldn't help but feel a distraction, like something was missing.

Her father had agreed to leave her peacefully on Earth without contact, and her mother even visited her occasionally. She felt like she should be perfectly content at that moment, her silver eyes glistening in the dull sunlight and her mind concentrating on nothing but the moment at hand. Everything had worked out for her in the end; she was fine. So why couldn't she stop feeling an empty spot somewhere inside of her?

Just when the sun was gone and all there was was a little color above the horizon, she felt a gentle tap on her back. She turned around, a little upset that her moment was gone but still glad to have company, and looked her new onlooker in the eye.

"Cyborg," she said in disbelief. "You're… here."

Memories came flooding back to her just as the moon came into view, bringing a new fear to her life. Rhustin and Cyborg had left her, left every part of her world, and promised not to ever come back. After a year of longing for them, she had realized that she could find happiness without them, and she did just that. After two years, it was almost like they had never existed, and after three, as far as she knew, they really hadn't existed.

But now that he was looking at her, his tall body and his caring eyes – even his mechanic eye seemed soft and reassuring – she remembered all the things that had happened before she had forgotten about him. Memories of Rhustin being cruel and sly came back to her, and memories of Cyborg being brave and leaving his entire world behind just so she could be happy. Now that she was looking at him, she felt guilty about him leaving all those years ago. She was nearly twenty-five now; she had spent three years forgetting him and six years regaining her happiness. Now she felt guilty that she had ever been happy.

"Yeah," he said softly, "I am." Then he paused, and looked at her with no expression in his face. "I mean, I can leave, if you want me to."

She couldn't believe all he was doing for her after she had been such a bad person to him, letting him leave without even saying good-bye. "No, please don't go," she said softly. "I can't – I mean, I didn't…" She trailed off, then found herself thinking straight again once she looked straight into his eyes. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"I haven't been waiting nine years for an apology," he said softly, touching her face with his smooth, metal fingers. Even though they were mechanical, she could still feel the warmth in them, and it comforted her. "I've been waiting nine years for this," he said even more softly. He leaned in, she leaned in, and their lips joined. It was the most magical night of her entire life. She spent the whole night like that, sitting next to him, basking in the moonlight with him. It was now, she realized, that she was truly happy. The hollow spot was filled; the emptiness gone.

When Blazefire awoke, she found herself in a stretcher, being rolled out of the prison. She stared at her two sisters through the open door, and they looked sadly back at her. "Where are they taking me?" she mouthed to her sisters, for she had a certain robot that she wanted to speak to immediately – however, she couldn't find the strength to fight.

Starfire looked pathetically at her sister and mouthed back one word: "Away."

"Lana!" Cyborg shouted over all the commotion of the castle guards. He rushed over to the ones around her stretcher with the rest of the team and started to blast them away. Robin used some of his gadgets to undo her ties to the stretcher, then Melanie and Raven rushed over to her and helped her out. Beastboy, Robin, and Cyborg then fought the never-ending stream of guards as Raven tried to heal Blazefire and Melanie tried to give her as much life as her still-not-full-fledged powers allowed.

Blazefire's eyes slowly turned to Cyborg, who was fighting everyone but dying to turn around and see if she was okay.

"Blaze," Raven said sharply, "don't look at him if it won't make you happy. You can't be stressed right now, just concentrate on something besides Cyborg." She obviously knew about the strange relationship between the two.

Blazefire grabbed Melanie's hand and focused on nothing but getting as much power as imaginable. She did get full health back, and though Melanie was looking a little pale, she got up, raced in front of her teammates, and closed her eyes. Then she did the exact same thing she had done on the first day she met them: she created a huge blazesphere and hit everything in front of her without taking up much of her own strength. Then she turned to Cyborg and whispered, "You. Come with me."

As she flew up the bottom-floor stairs and the next ones, next, next, until finally she reached the top floor, Cyborg followed her loyally. Once they reached the top floor, they saw her father, who had a smirk on his face.

"I'm so not in the mood," she said simply to her father. With that, she cast a blazebubble around him, trapping him inside for the moment, burst through the front doors and into the sunlight, and ran far away.

Cyborg followed unsurely. He couldn't help but think there was something different about her. She didn't look happy or headstrong, but she looked determined and much wiser than she usually appeared to be.

"There's something I need to talk to you about," she explained to him once they got far enough away. In fact, she was worried that she'd have gone so far that she'd have bumped into Rhustin.

He looked at her in surprise. "I guess it's kind of private," he joked.

She gave an uneasy laugh. "Listen, I had a dream when I got knocked out. I don't really know how long I was knocked out, but it was a pretty long dream."

"You had a dream," he repeated confusedly. "Okay."

"It had you in it," she explained, then paused, frowning. "Well, I guess it had all of us in it – the team, my parents, Rhustin, the Tower…"

Cyborg winced at Rhustin, but let her continue.

"But I guess you were the main part of it. It's just that…" She shrugged. "It took place in the future. You, Rhustin, and my dad had all left. I was glad you were all gone, but it had been nine years, and I was still missing someone. Well, when you three left I was mad at all of you, so I didn't think it could be any of you." Her face looked nervous, and her eyes were starting to get watery, but her voice stayed strong. "But one day I was watching the sun set, and you came, and it all came back to me, and…" She looked down, her voice shifting slightly.

"And what?" Cyborg asked in disbelief. Was it possible that she actually loved him?

"And I realized that you were the one I had been missing."

This wasn't an outright "I love you," but he didn't care. He smiled down at her. "Oh, yeah?" he asked with a grin. "Well, I'm not going to leave you, so don't you worry about that."

She smiled up at him. He leaned down to kiss her, she stood on her toes and started to wrap her arms around his neck…

"What's going on?" Robin demanded angrily to no one in particular. Without warning, Cyborg had followed Rhustin into the lowest level of the castle, then through the dungeon doors. Before they knew it, Rhustin had been knocked miles back through the brick wall of the castle, and Cyborg and Blazefire had taken off.

"Blazefire and Cyborg are probably either ending their whole relationship or starting a whole new one," Raven said with a shake of her head.

"Wow, Raven, funny how you did the exact same things!" Beastboy said in a mocking, hurtful voice.

She rolled her eyes. "You're the one who ended us, and I did not start anything with Slade," she spat.

"Break it up, you two," Melanie said, rolling her eyes. "Listen, I say we should go check on Star and Blackfire, then we can find the love triangle."

They all nodded – Robin, Red X, Raven, and Beastboy – and went into the building.

It was coated like icing with Tamaranian guards.

"Once those guys died, Star's dad must have heard," Melanie said uneasily. "I say we run. There's no way we're getting into that jailhouse."

"Let's resort to Plan B," Robin suggested. "Starfire and Blackfire are in there for good, at least for now. Let's go find the others."

"It's not like you'll get the death penalty for getting funny for once and calling them The Love Triangle," Melanie said teasingly.

Robin sort of glared at her, then turned around to face the others. "Let's go," he said, and they all left.

"Not so fast, Robot Boy," Rhustin said as he threw a warning dagger very close to Cyborg's head.

Cyborg immediately moved apart from Blazefire to scold Rhustin. Before he could even begin to use his colorful words to Rhustin, Blazefire stepped in front of Cyborg and said, "Just give up, Rhustin. Go find some bad girl you can stalk, okay?"

Rhustin was about to say something when the Titans ran over to them.

"Until we meet again," Rhustin said with a tip of his crown to Blazefire. Then he whistled, and his spacecraft came up to him. He hopped gracefully into it and flew away. As he did this, he said to Blazefire, "I don't give up easily."

"Is he a bad guy or a stalker?" Melanie asked with a shake of her head.

"Bad guy," Cyborg responded, while at the same time Blazefire replied, "Both."

"Cyborg, just because he wants Blazefire doesn't mean he's a bad guy. And we don't have time to go chasing after stalkers when Slade, Philip, and Stonefire are all on the loose."

"They might get him to join them in my place," X commented.

"They won't," Blazefire said quickly. "He's worthless when it comes to fighting. I mean, he's great with the sword, but no match for us."

"So…" Robin shrugged. "Back to the castle?"

"We won't survive a moment in there," Cyborg said.

"We've got to do it," Melanie said simply. "For my homegirls," she joked.

"For my sissies," Blazefire laughed.

"For our friends," Raven said seriously, turning back to the castle.

It had been nearly an hour, and while the Titans were weakening, the loads of soldiers on Stonefire's side were still holding up. It was looking bad.

"Surrender the girl," the head general of Stonefire's soldiers ordered to Robin, "and we will let the rest of you leave undamaged."

"Nice try," Cyborg said sharply.

Blazefire, however, was losing her strength again, and she could feel herself as well as the others weakening. "I will go," she said solemnly, stepping up toward the general after grabbing Melanie's hand for a little more life.

"Very well. You all may leave." He turned to Blazefire. "You," he said with a nasty grin, "are following me."

"Where am I going?" she asked. "The prison's that way," she added, pointing to the castle dungeons.

"You were a bad girl," the general said with a smirk. "Now you're going to the bad prison. Away from everyone else."

"Lana!" Cyborg gasped as the guards 'escorted' him away from the castle, but she made no response. Instead she gave him a small smile and followed them bravely into the huge royal Tamaranian prison, where she would stay. Alone.

"I can't believe this," Melanie said in disbelief. "I mean, as sweet as that was of her, I cannot believe this happened."

"Fathers are a thing of evil," Raven said darkly. "She must be helped by a different route."

Beastboy rolled his eyes. "You want to tell us the plan, or not?"

"We shouldn't strike so obviously – the normal 'Oh, she's in a prison over there, let's go save her' thing. Instead we should fight in back routes. I'm thinking of helping our friends and also triggering a revolution at the same time. If I can just think of a plan that maybe the Founding Fathers or FDR made in war…"

"How about Lincoln?" Robin suggested. "The Anaconda Plan. We should strike from all directions at important things."

Cyborg nodded. "We should find some of their strongest points – leaders and important cities and castles – and take those down first. Then they might surrender Blazefire. We can deal with the actual revolution later."

"That sounds good," Raven said, "but you both know that the Anaconda Plan was part of the Civil War and not the American Revolution, right?" she asked, laughing.

"Yeah, of course," they both lied quickly.

Melanie, Red X, Beastboy, and Raven all laughed mockingly, then sat down to think with the others who, needless to say, were glaring at them.

"Obviously, Stonefire needs to be dealt with," Melanie said as they sat down, so she wrote his name down on a sheet of paper.

"Yeah," Cyborg said, "but he's the hardest. We should put his name down last."

Melanie nodded. Then, beside "Stonefire," she scribbled down the words "dealt with last." She smiled at her neatness.

"We should have brought a laptop," Raven said, rolling her eyes.

"I can write fast enough!" Melanie snapped.

"I think she meant so this could be a little more organized," Robin said with a stifled laugh. "But don't worry about it. What, where, or who else should we worry about now?"

"The castle that Blackfire and Starfire are in," Beastboy suggested.

"That should be right before Stonefire," Cyborg said. "We kill everyone in his castle, then we deal with him."

Beside all of Stonefire's data, Melanie wrote, "Tamaran's Capital Castle – right before Stonefire."

"There's the place Blaze is in," Melanie suggested. "Should I write that down for last?"

"No, it's like we're writing a backwards list," Raven said. "We should save Blazefire right before we destroy the castle. Then she can help us destroy it."

Melanie nodded, then wrote that down as well – "Place that Blaze is in. Just before Tamaran's Capital Castle."

"Let's decide what we should do first," Robin suggested.

Red X finally had an idea after learning how to fit in with the Titans. "I know," he said. "Let's try writing the list first to last. First we should try to blockade all their major cities – you know, stop them from getting any supplies."

"Yeah, we could lay 'siege' to them, like they did in Lord of the Rings!" Beastboy said excitedly. "Then they'd just die!"

"There are six of us – me, Robin, Melanie, Red X, Raven, and Beastboy," Cyborg said as Melanie was taking notes and a furious speed. "Let's lay siege to six cities."

"Assignments?" Melanie asked.

"Out of us," Robin said, "I honestly believe that Red X is the most powerful." Red X beamed. "He should blockade the capital city."

Melanie nodded and smiled at her friend's wisdom, then wrote this down.

"Raven is also very powerful. I'd suggest she be in charge of their sister city, where Blazefire was raised," Robin said. "It's just east of here. I don't know what it's called, but…"

Melanie was already scribbling, "City due east of TCC."

"I'll take their mother's home city," Cyborg said. "It's probably important."

"It's called Jarganan," Robin said. "Starfire told me," he explained.

The rest of the cities were assigned, and they all said their good-byes and split up for the siege of Tamaran and what would hopefully become a revolution.

And Blazefire? Well, at least she knew that she and Cyborg were together, even while they were apart.

Me:

Okay, before anything else, I found out how to use lines, and I kind of got carried away, sorry about that. They're so cool, though! I mean lines as in those page breaks. Now, back to my stuff.

Finally, I am done writing this! After writer's block, groundings, starting over, illnesses, and more writer's block, and also over a month of waiting, I am finally done with chapter fourteen! I promise I'll have chapter fifteen up within ten days of now! If I break this promise, I want you all to flame me!

Actually, if you want to flame me now, I completely deserve it.

But I don't and never will again make you wait this long!

I'm so, so sorry! I'm also sorry that this was kind of shorter than usual!

Really, I am!

Okay, on with the responses.

Pookey: I know, I tell my friends I love them all the time, so don't worry about it. I love you too, in a friendly way! Sorry I didn't use Green Day, but it didn't really fit the chapter. And after the next chapter, which isn't much more CyLana fluff but more siege stuff (still fluff, though, not all battle) is the ROBIN AND STARFIRE CHAPTER! YAY!

Solodancer789: You are a cruel and evil being. Still, watch this. I OWN TEEN TITANS! Here come the lawyers. HEY, LAWYERS, I DON'T REALLY OWN THEM, BUT NOW THAT YOU'RE HERE, SOLODANCER789 STOLE THE GRAMMY! NOT ME! AND MAKE THE MOB GO AWAY! Yay, the mob is gone, and the lawyers are back:) thanks for reviewing.

Warprince2000: It is so, so, so fun to talk to you when you're not just saying the usual stuff! Anyway, I think it's a really good idea, and it could definitely be possible. I mean, the whole thing about him being the joker in the group as a cover-up is really well thought-out, and the 'why does he cover up his hands' thing is even more funny, and really right at the same time!

TeEn TitAn 14: I would if I could, but I can't. Still, tell me how you liked this chapter, because Cyborg and Lana are important, too! And I love praise, and you're the best praise-giver that I know, so thank you so much! You're so sweet! No, Robin just said that because he didn't trust X. X will earn their trust and become – well, I'm not going to say anything else, but the guy wouldn't die, I'm not that harsh. Rob/Star all the way is right, and X won't like Star by the end – he'll like someone else! I'm shutting up now.

Savi: I know! I guess the show's more popular than I thought, and I'm glad! Oh, and applause for your jig… okay. You're right about Green Day and that song, I wish I could have used it, but it didn't fit right. Thank you SO MUCH for your idea, and I'm sorry I made you wait so long! And now that this is done, I'll try to read the next chapter of your story!

Critic: You're right, but I had to give the dedication to someone else, sorry! All your other ones were right too, and thanks a bunch, but how do you like my story? You never mentioned it, so I just wanted to know. Thanks!

Mr. Rogers: Um, okay… did you like it, or not? I'm not trying to be rude or anything, but you kind of… didn't say anything that meant anything here. Still, thanks!

Meangenius: I know I'm cool – hello, you're my sister. You, of all people, know that I'm cool. Heehee, just kidding! Well, even though I AM cool. But… well, next topic. Star was mad, you know? MAD. I don't blame her at all. It's hard for her to be nice so much, I bet. I think I'd blow after that, too, even if I was Star. Thanks for reviewing, sorry for the wait!

I love you all so much! Thanks for waiting!

Lovin' Writin',

The Kweenmeister3000 nn