Hi guys! Sorry about the wait! I wrote this a little while ago before school really picked up but I never got around to finishing it sadly. I just figured I can just post this and come back to it later and edit it if I feel like.

Sadly it's not as long as the other chapters.

This is more of a chapter where you guys can just soak in what you've read so far before I get to another actionfest.

I hope you guys like what I have so far and if there are any improvements that can be made/should be made, I'm all ears!

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Chapter 26: A Moment's Reprieve

Beast Boy caught his breath as he took in the scenery; Jump City was completely enclosed inside a large black wall. A cold wind brushed against the 5'8" Titan. He felt a shiver go up his spine; he didn't like being in here- it was ominous and unnerving. Beast Boy looked behind him and placed his hand on the forcefield. The smooth dark, cold surface reflected his face.

He looked back towards the ever widening hand grasping the breach was still there. He heard the sound of fighting in the distance and immediately jogged to the spot.

Raven slashed a zombie in half then fired a white energy blast at a three wights coming in on her left. The zombies were blasted into the air, Raven teleported above one while it was still in mid-air and slammed her feet into its' head. She used the momentum to spin-jumping to the other one. Her force of her blows caused the zombies to plummet to the ground and shattered their skulls.

Next she threw her dagger at another zombie's head while crushing zombies head with her foot. Raven waved her hand and stopped several fire demons. A few seconds later, a purple light began to engulf their bodies and started to attack fire demons and zombies. The empath heard growls and glanced up to see six wyverns charging at her. She slammed her palm into the ground, her shadow stretched to the creatures coming for her. Her shadow produced long spikes that impaled one. It roared and screamed as it clawed the black stake impaling its' body. The other creatures ignored it's own and continued the assault on Raven.

Raven's shadow zigzagged and twisted, catching two more in the black trap. But the remaining few were now in spitting distance and a wyvern spat a wad of acid at the Azarathian.

She swiftly dodged before another shot acid at her; the acid grazed the hem of her coat. The three remaining wyverns spat more acid at Raven but the sorceress raised a shield and blocked the acid attack, then sent the shield back at her assailants. Two moved to the left and right while the other was slammed by the wall. Raven leaped high into the air, forming a black whip and planted herself on the stunned wyvern. She then wrapped the whip around the monster's mouth and neck. The empath pulled on the reigns and held on tight as the creature tried its best to rid itself of the troublesome maiden. Raven steered it to the right where it slammed into one of the beasts.

The other wyvern clawed her mount's face while her ride slammed its' tail into the other. It went staggering back and spat acid at the rider and mount. Raven ducked low while the acid hit her mount which let out a irritated growl. The acid had no effect on its' fellow creatures, and the wyverns scales were too tough and produced a special protein that nullified the acid. Raven smirked at this advantage and charged the one that attacked her seconds before. As she was charging it, the third wyvern rammed into the two. The force of the attack sent Raven flying off her mount, but she tucked and rolled when she hit the ground.

The two wyverns were still attacking her mount. One crunched its' jaws into her mount's neck while the other bit into the leg. Raven could hear the crunching of bones and the ripping of flesh. Roars filled the air the wyvern's leg was ripped off and flew in her general direction. The enchantress stepped to her left, as the leg landed two feet from where she was just standing. She watched as the creatures mauled the other; one eye was clawed out, a large chunk of its' neck was missing, its' tail was missing, and it had been shred to ribbons.

Raven let out a slight frown, she had intended to ride one of them to the breach. She glanced back at the dead corpses of the other wyverns and cast another necromancy spell. The creature twitched before rolling onto it's stomach and shrieked. Raven ordered it to attack the other monsters while she dealt with the wights and fire demons.

The black-clad enchantress enclosed a zombie in black magic before ripping it in half. Then she turned her attention to several dozens of demons, and lifted a two-story building before dropping it on them. Raven panted, her gaze turning back to the wyverns again. The undead wyvern had severely injured both wyverns and the two other lizards distanced themselves from the zombified one. A second later, the undead wyvern exploded. Its' bone, scales and organs splattering everywhere. The two were just out of reach of the explosion and turned their gaze to Raven. Raven lifted the building again and chucked at the scaly beasts. One moved out of harm's way while the other was not so lucky, and completely crushed by the building. It was reduced to a scaly, bone-crunched stain.

Raven's expression hardened as she broke into a sprint and swung her dagger high over her head. Luckily for her, the last wyvern was exhausted, which made it an easy kill. She turned her heel and foot as the last one hurried over to her and magically propelled herself forward. Raven stabbed it in the stomach as she slid underneath it. With her acceleration, Raven ripped through the creature as it roared. She stood up twenty feet away as the creature's organs and blood emptied out to the ground.

Raven stood among the defeated corpses of zombies, fire demon ashes and wyverns. The empath panted, her body succumbing to fatigue. She heard foot steps to her right, thinking it was another enemy. Instinctively, she raised both her daggers in circular motion, her body moving almost on its' own. She stopped in mid-slash and stopped as she eyed the target.

Her breath grew very still as her eyes locked with emerald. Raven's black daggers made contact with green skin and black cloth. Blood dripped from the shallow cut on his neck and terror paralyzed him.

"Beast Boy...?"

The green man gulped before his face formed into an awkward smile. Thankfully, Raven had enough control to stop herself from slashing him to pieces.

"Hey...Rae..."

Raven dropped her arms and the breath had been taken out of her lungs. She was so surprised she dropped her weapons, took a minute to register that he was actually there, and confirm she had not hallucinated.

"You idiot! What the hell are you doing here?!"

"I..."

"How did you even get in here?!"

"I don't know..."

"How did you get past my shield?"

"I don't know..."

"How were you able to even move? My blood spell was enough to stop everyone. My magic was strong enough to where they couldn't even breathe!"

"I don't know..."

"How is this possible? How is this possible?"

Beast Boy watched as the Azarathian was at a loss. Raven pinched the bridge of her brow in frustration.

"Look...I followed you in here because I wanted to help."

"Help? Help?! You idiot! Look around you! There is nothing you can do! We're both trapped here and we're both going to die in here!"

"What?"

Raven sighed. "This is an inter-dimensional world. Nothing can get in or out. You've basically just killed yourself by coming in here."

"Neither of us is going to die!"

Raven scoffed. "Optimists..."

"Rae...what the hell is going on?"

She sighed again before she looked around and pointed to a half-destroyed building. The pale woman floated over to said building and motioned for him to follow her.

"While we're in here, time will flow a little slowly. So I guess I have some time to explain."

The two Titans moved through a large hole in a building, found a small spot and sat down.

Beast Boy looked at her; she was tired, sweaty, covered in dirt and blood.

"Rae...what's going on?"

"The stone you saw before was marker. It trapped everything within the border in a different space. It means that it is impossible for anything to get in or out of this place. As for all of Jump City, it has been moved to a completely different location."

"I don't follow."

"Everything around you is a sort of substitute, a fake, aside from you, me and everything that comes out of that rift. I've transported the real Jump City elsewhere. Anyway, there's no way out."

"There has to be!"

"Don't you get it? I did this! This place is locked under me! If I die, everything in here will be sealed forever!"

"You're not going to die! Neither of us will!"

"How did you even get here?"

"Again. I don't know, when I saw you casting your spell, I charged head first to help you."

"But that's just the thing: you shouldn't have been able to move at all, to begin with."

"Well then, maybe I'm just awesome!"

Raven frowned and put her hand to her chin, thinking hard. She tilted her head down at the ground, her brow furrowed as she tried to recall anything. Raven slowly raised her head as she met his eyes, a moment of realization. Her eyes grew wide as she recalled when she touched Beast Boy's cut with her palm and their blood mixed.

"My blood..."

"What?"

"That's how..."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"When I touched your cut with my hand, our blood mixed. That linked you to me! That made you immune to my blood magic!"

"That's cool! This means you can't use blood magic on me!"

"That's not the problem, you idiot! We have no idea what kind of negative effects this could have on you! For all we know, your lifespan could have been cut in half!"

He gulped as the thought crossed his mind as he just watched Raven comprehend the consequences of her actions. The green man decided it best to change the subject, at least to get her mind off of things.

"Hey. When did you decide to grow out your hair?"

Se looked at him, confused at the sudden change of subject. The empath figured she'd humor him and just go along with it.

"I guess I didn't...I didn't really notice how long it was getting. I've been preoccupied."

"Well...it...uh looks nice" he smiled.

"Thanks" she smiled.

"How come you changed the color of your clothes?"

"Huh?"

"Y'know? Your clothes are like inverted, you used to wear blue with black, now you're wearing black with blue. How come?"

"Why do you ask?" Raven asked slightly defensively.

"Just curious I guess."

"Oh. I wore this cloak because I guess you could say I'm in mourning. From all the friends, comrades and people that I lost over the years."

"So how's a pacifist like you become a merc?"

Raven glanced at him before lifting her head and sighing.

"When you have nothing left to lose, you don't really worry about things like that...you just...drone on..."

"Why did you attack us when you got back?"

"You attacked first. It was mainly an instinct for me to fight back."

"Right, right."

"Then how come you helped us fight crime all those times?"

"I don't know...I guess I was just lying to myself thinking that this was my home..."

"Where were you anyway?"

"I had a vision. That guy in the cloak came back, somewhere outside of Jump City and he murdered someone. I tried to stop him but I was too late, then all this happened."

"We could have helped you."

"I don't think any of you would have been happy if I used lethal force."

"I guess not."

"By the way, are you able to walk? I healed your leg and purged the poison from your body, so how are you feeling?" she asked.

"To be honest, sore and damn tired. I can run a bit."

"Are you able to transform?"

"I haven't tested it yet actually..."

"You should be careful though. We don't know what sort of side-effects my blood magic had on you."

"Rae?"

"What is it now?" she asked annoyed.

"Since we're both stuck in here, I might as well come clean."

"About...?"

Beast Boy frowned, nervously. He was trying to think of the right words to say. The poor green man quickly found himself becoming very anxious; his palms became very sweaty and his heartbeat sped up.

"The last couple of nights...I was kinda...snooping around your room."

"You what?"

"I-I wasn't in your room per se...well except once, maybe twice."

The Azarathian gave him such a glare that if looks could kill, he'd be dead twice over.

"Well, once when you were sleeping."

Her glare intensified.

"And this other time when you had you emotions out and you were healing your back."

"That was you?!" she said as she got to her feet.

"Wow! I cannot shut up when I am scared."

"Beast Boy..." Raven growled.

"Don't hurt me!" he piped as he turned into a mouse.

Her hands glowed black as the tiny green mouse quaked. Raven let out a chuckle which soon evolved into a laugh. He stopped and looked up before morphing back.

'She's...laughing...I...made her laugh."

"Hey...I finally made you laugh!"

"Oh be quiet" Raven said composing herself.

Beast Boy couldn't stop grinning and put a hand on her shoulder. Her purple eyes staring back into his green ones.

"Stop trying to carry the weight of the world on your shoulders, we can help you."

Raven's eyes drifted down and she thought on his words. Beast Boy withdrew his hand and folded his arms.

"And stop bein' so stubborn" he said matter-of-fact.

The empath opened her mouth to protest, instead she frowned but it disappeared as quickly as it came.

The two Titans stood idly for a few seconds until they heard a piercing screech. They covered their ears and shut their eyes until the screeching stopped. That's when they ran outside the building and looked up at the sky.

There were nine creatures flying in the sky. These new enemies were too far away to distinguish features.

"Great!"

Raven's eyes shot to the green man who looked into the sky at the flying creatures with awe and horror.

"Beast Boy...Garfield. We're going to have to split up."

"What?"

"Look, if you can draw their attention away, I can get to the rift and close it!"

She pulled off her cloak and handed it to him.

"My cloak has magical properties. It's highly resistant to fire, ice and lightning. Not to mention, that it has enough of my signature to mask your presence, so it'll confuse them. Take it."

Beast Boy looked at her anxiously before he agreed and swung the black material around him.

"Raven...be careful."

"You too."

He looked at her anxiously before throwing his arms around her. Raven was surprised by the action and returned the gesture.

He slipped on the hood before both Titans took off.

The green man dashed to the right as Raven rushed to the left. Seven of the creatures followed him while the other remaining two followed Raven. He panted as his feet took him as further and further away from his comrade. Beast Boy heard the loud flapping large wings and sped up, knowing that the creatures were gaining. Part of him was curious about what they looked like but at the same time he didn't want to end up as their dinner; last time he got bitten by a giant green lizard and had to cauterize his leg. The last thing he wanted was to bitten again.

Raven on the other hand, was doing a better job at avoiding her two pursuers. She took cover behind and under buildings in an attempt to make her presence go unnoticed. It was working fairly well.

"Almost there..."

End Chapter.

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