Disclaimer: All things DC are not mine

In this chapter, random League members will appear as I remember them, so it might be a little weird. Oh well, memory's not perfect. Another note - I kind of forgot about Terra for a while so she gets some action in this chapter. Maybe I should keep better track of my characters...

"Speech"

Thoughts


Tamaran - Capital

A majestic city, with thousands of buildings built near a solitary mountain, atop which was the royal palace, and around which was built a great wall, towering above the barren landscape, dwarfing everything else in size, awe inspiring... The mark of a powerful people, but even that was far overshadowed in the light of the reddening heavens.

The crimson horizon. The sky, splashed with blood, glowing with some sort of sinister light, as if millions of souls, maybe billions of souls were rising into the air, their pale energies lighting the mask of sanguine that blanketed everything. Death... a scream, not one of pain, or fear, but some unearthly howl, bloodthirsty howl, that scream sounded, echoing throughout the skies. And then another, a third, hundreds, thousands, more... the noise was incredible, and unnerving. Many of the Tamaranians who had come out to battle stood paralyzed by the sound, stricken with fear, at the sheer destructive power implied by those screams.

"Burn." The word seemed to pierce through their very souls, tearing at their innards.

Not a moment later, the sky was lit with fire, blazing intensely. Massive columns of lava burst from the ground and rose up, past the clouds, incinerating everything in their paths. Flames rocketed down from the sky in massive spheres, each one landing hard on the ground, scorching the earth, leaving blackened craters everywhere. And from each one rose a demon, or several, some large, some small, each with four yellow eyes, reddish skin, black claws.

"Raven's eyes were red," Nightwing mumbled from atop the Tamaranian capital's walls. "But other than that the resemblance is there."

"So they are Inferno Demons, as Raven once called them."

"Yes. The strong ones will have psychic powers, but most of them seem to only have fire manipulating abilities and abnormal strength and speed."

"Only?"

"Well it could be worse. Those shadow demons were really annoying."

"We're still way outmatched."

"Yes. Of course. But what do you want me to say? That it's hopeless? That we can't do anything at all?"

"I don't know. False hope seems pretty bad too. Let's be real here. Can we hold them off, or are we going to die?"

Nightwing didn't respond. He looked down as the fire kept falling, burning everything there was to burn, though much of Tamaran had already been scorched into a wasteland by previous assaults from the Gordanians. But still, the once recovering soil, a shade of lavender, was now pitch-black, completely dead. And the demon army kept growing.

None of the fire fell on the city itself - that would be a waste of troops, of course, sending in the demons one by one into the middle of their enemies, and even if it might have been probable for the demons to claim victory that way, it would belie the prudence that the demon commanders had shown in their tactics. So instead, it seemed as if they were in for a long siege.

At last, the infernal screaming stopped, and the demons assembled, gathering into groups of maybe ten or twelve.

"What are they - duck!"

From each group, a massive fireball flew out, empowered by all of their magics combined, and rammed into the walls surrounding the Tamaranian capital. One headed straight for the apex of the city, the royal palace, and everyone gasped, but then a figure flew up and blocked the fire, eyes glowing faintly red. And then it headed back down for the outer wall, to where the other League founders were.

"Good work, Superman."

Superman turned. "The fire's a nuisance, but it seems like the fortifications to the walls we made were successful. They're holding up for now. The buildings though-"

"We'll cover that," Hal waved to John Stewart and both of them flew up, rings flashing.

Green spread over the city, blocking the rain of fire, and the demon assault was halted.

"I've been meaning to ask you guys about that," Hawkgirl looked up. "Without a recharging station, their rings will run out of power. And last I checked, there were none near here. What will they do after that?"

Superman looked down. "They'll become civilians. Or maybe they can help inside the Watchtower. I don't know."

"We'll deal with that when the time comes," Batman grumbled. "Right now, we've got bigger issues."

Hawkgirl gritted her teeth. "Let's just get this over with. Can't believe you guys dragged me away from that last fight."

"Earth was overrun, we couldn't do anything. You would've gotten your ass kicked - hey! What are you doing?!"

Hawkgirl flew off, past the green shield and charged into the front line of demons, mace sparkling with white energy. A powerful blow sent a couple flying - she dodged the retaliation and struck out again, but the demons managed to evade the attack and countered. Fire spread everywhere, but then a tornado formed around her, creating a flaming whirlwind of death, incinerating the demons around them.

"I didn't need your help," Hawkgirl grumbled.

"Right now, all of us need all the help we can get," Flash looked serious for once, staring at the mass of demons coming toward them. "We can't be reckless. Even I'm not being reckless -"

"Well it's great that you can admit your own faults. But I'm not sitting there waiting for them to stop throwing fire at us. We take the fight to them."

"Alright, but we should stick together so we can guard each others' backs."

"Fine."

Another hard push into the demons. Atop the wall, Superman watched in silence for a few moments, and still remained silent as Wonder Woman flew past him, joining the fray.

"Shall we join them?" Batman turned.

Superman put a hand over his face, shaking his head. "This is suicidal! How can we stop these monsters by ourselves?"

"If we do not stop them, who will?"

A frown. "I know that, Bruce. There is nobody else. But if you stop to think about it rationally for a moment-"

"That's the thing I normally do. But these creatures are beyond all rationality. We can only fight. And protect."

A brief silence. "I suppose you're right. But no matter what, J'onn's staying back in that palace. Can't have him see all that fire."

"I don't disagree with you on that. Come, let's go help our friends."


The demons proved to be weaker than their shadowy counterparts, but the battle lasted much longer, for they were relentless; uninhibited by light or anything else, with seemingly boundless energy, they continued fighting past all exhaustion. Perhaps less powerful upfront, with a narrower range of abilities, as the heroes grew tired, they were no less dangerous.

One by one, they withdrew, until only Superman was left fighting. He looked back, realized that he was alone, and returned to the wall, eyes watching everyone else darkly.

"These things have a lot of stamina. They just don't know when to give up."

Batman caught his breath. "But they still have no way to enter the city. As long as we have some time to recover, we can keep doing this and they won't be able to do a thing. Eventually, their forces will run out."

"Um, Bats," Flash pointed out at the sea of fire spreading across the land. "Hate to break it to ya, but..."

The League founders rushed to the edge of the wall and looked out. Several gasps ensued. Massive demons, each almost a hundred feet tall, giant versions of the smaller ones beneath them, advanced at the wall, eyes glowing. Superman looked back.

"Looks like break time's up."

"So soon?" Flash grumbled. "Guess we don't have a choice though. Alright, Supes, let's go-"

"Duck!"

Intense flames, nearly white, rocketed out, blasting into the walls, spreading out slightly as they made contact, then spilling over, nearly scorching all of them alive. And then green light spread around, guarding them, the Tamaranians, and the Titans from the demon fire. There was the terrifying sound of rock cracking, probably the wall, and the earth shook tremendously, sending everyone to the ground.

Superman got back up first. "Can't take the chances of those demons getting near. Bring them down before they reach the city walls!"


A pair of pink eyes stared out at the horizon, at horde of demons barely held back by the scant group of heroes who had just begun to retreat. She turned away after a few moments, looking back into the room she had been given.

Honestly she was surprised that nobody had come to talk to her, to ask her to fight with them, or even to console her about Raven's death. Not that she cared much about it anymore. None of them cared about her anyway, maybe besides Batman and Nightwing. Even so, they might have had the decency - well, then again, everyone was also in shock, still in disbelief that Earth had actually been taken from them, that there were billions of people that were going to die because they had failed...

Now that she thought about it, it was pretty awful. What had been the purpose of her life, of any of their lives? Weren't they supposed to use their powers to help people? Well, that wasn't always the case, was it... I did my fair share of bad stuff, unknowingly... and knowingly. But I never hurt people. I never wanted to, I just wanted to be accepted. And I definitely didn't want them to all die. But now that I think about it, what did I do to stop that? What did I ever do to help anyone? I couldn't even help my best friend. The only person who understood me.

I always wanted to make something of myself, but now I've realized that that was so selfish and stupid. She took a deep breath. I'm so stupid. What am I doing, just sitting here? I should be out there helping them, doing something... helping those guys, who caused all of this. Her eyes narrowed. Yes, that was true. If they hadn't mistreated Raven that much, if she wasn't made to suffer so much, maybe she would never have left and maybe she wouldn't have done something as stupid as run into the heart of the enemy army to try to kill someone she knew she couldn't. Maybe Raven wouldn't have had to die, because she felt so bad about everything. Yes, because they had made her feel so bad, by shunning her, by calling her dangerous and a demon, when all she wanted to do was help... and fit in. But no, they never understood.

Well, they didn't directly make it happen. But still, they basically tortured Rae. For years! That's just -

Ugh. It's not like I can make a difference anyway. I'm just tiny and insignificant. Like all the rest of them. The only one who was ever important was Raven, but nobody realized it. And now she's gone. Why bother anymore? A small, very cynical smile crossed her features. Now I really sound like her. Stupid Rae. Rubbing off on me. Her eyes closed. And opened. What would you have done? Duh. Help them. Even if you didn't want to. Wasn't that what you always did?

These guys didn't deserve your help. They didn't deserve to be your 'friends'. You were too good for any of us, especially me, the useless, selfish girl sitting in a corner alone, watching everyone die. A sigh, and she stood. I guess I can't be like that anymore. Not when everyone's dying. And everything's getting blown to bits. Ugh. What am I doing, thinking so much? Rae was supposed to be the philosopher, not me. Time for some action.

A flash of pink, and the room was empty.


Blue light, green light, red light, mace, fist, blade, nothing seemed to work. Unlike the regular demons, the huge ones seemed to have the ability to use their soulselves to a great extent, able to form shields and energy blasts alike, similar to the ones that Raven used. Only here, it seemed that their powers in combination, though weak on offense, were able to provide a nearly impenetrable shield of pure black energy as they advanced closer to the wall of the Tamaranian capital.

Superman flew down, frustrated, red light fading from his eyes after yet another failed attack.

"No luck?" Batman beat down a demon and turned, dodging an attack from another fiend's claws.

Superman zapped it back with his heat vision and looked up at the giant demons towering above them. "You mentioned something a while back about disrupting their mental powers using some sort of sound device. Think it might work?"

"Already tried," Batman gritted his teeth and hurled a bomb at one of the giant things.

And as expected, darkness shrouded its body, blocking the explosion before it could reach it. "It doesn't work. That stuff can block sound too. In fact, as far as I can see, there's nothing it can't block. Our only saving grace seems to be that they can't attack while defending."

"That won't do much good. They're advancing pretty quickly. At this rate..."

Batman looked at him wearily. "A repeat, huh."

The kryptonian stomped the ground, giving off a yell of rage. He turned back, fire burning in his eyes. "We can't let that happen. We'll beat these things. We swore that we would."

"If we could keep our promises that easily, life would be pretty simple, Kal-El."

No reply. Superman flew up again, continuing his assault. Of course, it did not work. No matter how much power he put into his attacks, the darkness would not budge.

Fire lanced out, burning at the city again, and this time, it was intense enough in some places to send chunks of the wall flying to the ground, burning some of the Tamaranian warriors to death. The other ones steeled themselves, preparing for battle, but the terror in their eyes was evident - they probably thought that they were all going to die, and rightly so.

The enormous demons advanced on them relentlessly, pushing forward, closing in.


"Jinx!"

The pink haired girl rushed over to the group of four heroes - wait, four? Nightwing - right, he mentioned that he had a plan - who were busy battling back the horde of demons swarming around them. Pink light flared out around her and struck the ones in the immediate vicinity, causing them to collapse in pain.

"Your powers seem to be holding up well." Cyborg greeted her. Upon receiving no reply, he turned to look at her, noting the dark expression on her face. He sighed. "Still upset?"

"Nothing we have time to talk about now," Jinx responded perfunctorily.

"I was worried, you know. You turned into Raven for a while-"

"Raven had a good reason to act the way she did."

"I'm not saying she didn't. It was just... you were so quiet. And you wouldn't see anyone. Before you were so lively-"

"I still am," Jinx's eyes glowed brightly. "Plenty lively."

"Angry isn't the same-"

She raised an eyebrow. "Are you telling me to forget? They took Raven from me."

"From us."

"No. From me. You guys already... never mind. Forget it. They took Raven."

"I know that, but you don't see us getting so upset, do you?"

"That's partially why I'm so angry," Jinx frowned. "But more at myself than anything."

"For what?"

"For not being there for her," her voice tightened.

"Relax, Jinx. She went off by herself, there's nothing you could've - Jinx?"

Her brows furrowed - she looked furious. None of them had ever seen her get really, really mad before, but Cyborg supposed there was a first time for everything. Beast Boy, Starfire, and Terra turned as well, noticing the huge disturbance in energy behind them and were surprised to see Jinx overflowing with jagged pink light, pure rage etched on her face.

"Relax?" She muttered. "I thought you wanted me to be lively. Well fine, I'll be 'lively' as you say. Shit's gonna go down."

Pink light rocketed out, flying toward one of the giant demons with terrifying speed, crashing against the black soulself shield. And then pierced straight through, hitting the demon straight in the chest. It was still for a moment.

And then the demon coughed out blood, collapsing to the ground. Eyes narrowed in concentration, Jinx turned her attention to the next one, gathering energy for her next attack.


"What the - did you see that?" Superman landed again.

Batman nodded. "She took one out."

"But how? That looked just like an ordinary energy blast. Is that girl stronger than all of us combined?"

"In a way," Batman gritted his teeth and kicked down another demon before turning to Superman. "Her powers aren't based on normal energy. They manipulate probability, a law of the universe, so naturally they are impossible to block. My file on her states that she can use both standard energy waves but her 'hexes' can cause all sorts of strange things to happen by changing the luck of the target."

"Well, whatever the case is, looks like she can get rid of those things for us."

"Hope so," Batman frowned. "I'm running out of gas. Looks like the others aren't doing so great either."

"As long as that wall doesn't come down, we'll be fine. We can take our time to recover."

And as he spoke, two of the giant demons reached the wall and in a huge flash of flame, several sections were incinerated, allowing the smaller demons beneath them to flood through into the city. The Tamaranians came forward and met them head on, driving them back.

"Just had to say it, didn't you."

Superman gave him a glowering look and flew over to the broken sections of wall as quickly as he could, diving straight into the midst of the demons. Above him, another huge demon approached and tore down another section of wall before it was felled by pink light, sent crashing down to the ground. He grimaced. Sure, it was dead, but the damage was already done - at the rate that the large demons were falling, the entire wall would be down before Jinx killed them all. It did take some time to concentrate that much hex energy, after all.

He turned back out to the flood of demons approaching.

"Batman! We need to find a more defensible position!"

The dark knight fought his way through their enemies, forcibly making a path back to the wall. "I realize that," he grumbled, "but looks like not everyone's back yet."

"Who's still out there?"

"Looks like Hal, Flash, and Hawkgirl."

A sigh. "The three that don't know how to retreat. Can we find them?"

"We'll need J'onn. But I don't know if he'll be able to use his telepathy properly in this situation. Too much demon bloodlust floating around."

"It's worth a shot. Someone needs to go back and get him-"

"I'm already here," the martian appeared beside them suddenly, fighting back a few demons.

"J'onn! I thought I told you to stay back in the palace-"

"I'm sorry, but I could not. Not after seeing the wall go down and so many of the Tamaranians die. I cannot sit back and let other people risk their lives."

"The fire-"

"I will be able to handle it."

"Well, not now. We need you to find-"

"I heard. I'll try."

They fought back the demons for a few minutes, until another rumble shook the earth and another section of wall was torn down. One of the huge ones swept an enormous claw down, carving apart the buildings in its path, belching a blanket of fire onto the city. Superman hissed and began flying over, but a jagged pink bolt of hex energy beat him there, causing the thing to topple backwards, crashing apart another section of wall. He frowned.

"Not sure if that did more damage than good, but I guess we would've had to take it down eventually."

He looked back out at the demon armies, eyes scanning the horizon. Three more large demons left, but there were still several in the distance, approaching too rapidly for his liking. And all the while, fire continued to rain down from the sky, splashing the land with scorching heat, searing everything. He flew back down.

"J'onn-"

The martian's brows furrowed. "I am trying. There is too much demon energy blocking everything. It is hard to get past it- Shayera!"

A mace suddenly burst through the line of demons sweeping forward and Hawkgirl appeared, with a very battered, very bruised Flash supported on one of her shoulders.

"Flash got beat pretty badly," she muttered. "Lucky I was there to save his ass or else-"

"Get him to safety! You still okay to fight?"

"Tired, but still holding out. I'll be back quickly." She flew off.

"So that leaves Hal."

"If you're having trouble, I might be able to find him for you," a voice sounded from behind them and they all turned.

"Zatanna," Batman grumbled. "Took you a while to show up."

She shrugged. "Sorry, was working on something. It takes quite a bit of magic to do some things, you know. Not all of it can be done instantly."

"Well whatever it is, I hope it'll stop them, and fast. Walls aren't going to hold out much longer."

"Oh, it'll stop them, but anyone who's trapped out there will stay trapped out there. We've got to get everyone inside the city first. And I mean, inside inside. Not a step past this wall."

They looked around. "Looks like almost everyone is. Demons drove us back pretty far. Diana and John are over there and the Titans - wait, one of them's missing."

Zatanna blinked. "Yeah, Dick - well, Richard - "

"No, not Richard. He... had something to go do. The Tamaranian. Starfire."

"Less talking more looking people!" Superman shouted back at them, beating back some more demons.

Then suddenly, as they pushed one wave of red skinned beasts back, the fire raining down above them changed course and shifted, pouring its scorching inferno straight over the city, lining the streets with crimson flame. From each one rose another demon, and quickly they accumulated, eyes glowing excitedly.

"A flanking maneuver. Zatanna, you have to activate whatever it is that you were working on. And fast."

"But Hal-"

"If we wait too long, we'll all go down!" Batman muttered angrily. "If only there was some way to reach him, or to help him get back here-"

"I can try," the magician replied. "Give me some space."

Zatanna muttered a few words and a glowing orb appeared in the air, scanning sections of the sea of demons, looking for anything remotely green, anything that might stand out. And then she gave off a startled cry of surprise as the enormous demons loomed above the walls around them, smashing down with their fists, spewing fire everywhere. Rock crumbled and bodies littered the ground everywhere, and all the while, the demons that had flanked them began to approach from the rear.

"Zatanna! We don't have any more time!"

"But - I -" She looked at Batman, a sorrowful glint in her eyes. "He'll die. And so will the Tamaranian princess."

"And we all will too, if we don't stop them."

"It's on your head," she sighed, and spoke a few words backward.

Around the city, suddenly, the earth began to crumble away, forming a deep abyss surrounding the ruins of the wall guarding the capital, spreading outward quickly. From within the abyss, emerald light rose up and pushed outward, a barrier to block the demons, repelling those that tried to break through. The demons caught above the growing chasm fell down, shrieking, and disappeared in bright bursts of flame as the darkness overtook them.

And then all of their eyes flew wide as green light spread beyond the barrier, forcing a path through the demons. Hal Jordan flew forward but stopped as he reached the barrier, a sinking feeling in his heart. He looked at them, the other League members, his friends, a hard set to his face, but his mouth trembled. Zatanna turned away.

"So this is it," he muttered.

Green light spread again, but fire overwhelmed it and the demons piled on top of him, carving his body apart.


"Whoa, I got you," Beast Boy rushed up, supporting Jinx's body as she fell back.

She held a hand to her head, blinking in and out of consciousness. Used too much power there. Didn't think it'd be that tiring. "Thanks," she breathed out.

Her eyes closed. Beast Boy's eyes widened. "Cy! Hey, Cy! Get over here-"

Cyborg rushed over and looked down at the girl laying on the ground. "Relax, BB. She's fine. Probably just tired."

One eye opened very slightly. "Yeah, BB, so shut up and let me rest."

"Damn, Cy was right. You really are acting like Raven. Well, maybe not exactly like her. But you-"

"BB, shut up," Cyborg tugged at his hand. "We are not going there now. You know how she feels-"

"Right. Sorry. Wasn't thinking. Um-"

"Jinx, you alright?" Cyborg walked over to her, kneeling by her side. She nodded. "Alright. We're gonna go look for Starfire, so just stay here for now. We'll come get you later."

She sensed them leave and she was alone, resting in a spot hidden between two fallen rocks, in a rather comfortable position, slowly feeling sleep creep up on her. The pinkette breathed deeply a few times, resting quietly. I wonder how you did it, Rae. You know, giving your life for all those people who didn't even care about you. And you didn't really care about them either, did you? I mean, not wanting people to die is one thing, but sacrificing yourself for them is like... why'd you do it? She breathed deeply again. I guess I get it though. You don't think about it. You just do it because that's just what a hero's supposed to do. Ugh. Thinking too much is hard. Just gotta act when you need to... she heard some footsteps come near her, but this time she didn't open her eyes, too tired to care who it was.

"Jinx," a low grumble, probably Batman's.

He peeked between the rocks and looked at the girl sleeping on the ground, exhausted. Wordlessly, he shifted a rock and lifted her body off the ground, feeling her lungs expand slowly as she breathed quietly. Abandoned, just like her, huh. Maybe not overtly abandoned, but you're still one of the outsiders, a crossbreed between villain and hero. No wonder you guys were such good friends. But, his mouth tightened. Raven's gone now...


A face, staring up at the sky, eyes unblinking, the ghastly pallor of its dead flesh already beginning to moisten as the body fluids seeped onto the skin. Another one, a female, staring at directly at her, eyes also wide with shock, part of her head crushed under some rocks. And then further, a horde of bodies, scattered about, some crushed, some burnt so badly that the flesh had fallen right off of the bones, charred, unrecognizable, and some carved by up the demons' claws, sliced in half, guts spilling out everywhere...

She blinked, then realized her body was stuck under a boulder. She moved it off of her and looked at all of the fallen Tamaranians in horror, with immense sadness building up inside her. It had not been this bad on Earth, no, it wasn't quite the same. They weren't her kind, they weren't her people, and they never faced the demons and gave their lives to defend their homeworld. This... was just different.

Starfire tried to get up but found that her right leg had broken, a miracle partially due to Tamaranian toughness that only her right leg had broken and her ribs had bruised a bit, but nevertheless she could not walk. She tried flying, but the sight of all of her people, the ones she was supposed to protect as their princess... no, she was supposed to protect them because they were friends...

She ground her teeth together and hurled a starbolt at the ground, steaming with rage, but a moment later that shifted and tears flowed down her face. She buried her head in her arms and wept as quietly as she could, not wanting anyone to see her weakness. After all, as a Tamaranian warrior, she did have appearances to keep up. If she could not be strong, then what kind of example was she setting for everyone else? If she could not fight or show courage, then how could she expect that from all of her people?

She crawled over and touched one of the bodies, the hand, clammy with death, and cursed at the ground, slamming her fist against a nearby rock, breaking it apart. Would it not be better if we were to surrender, so that my people would not have to suffer? For them, this must be pure torture... All of their loved ones dying, it was no different than Earth after all. Despite being a warrior culture, it would have been equally as devastating, say, if she had to watch Nightwing, Cyborg, Beast Boy, Terra, all of them die in front of her eyes... No, that was not the worst part of it. The worst part was everyone dying, and sacrificing their lives, and still the situation seemingly hopeless. All this bloodshed, and what was accomplished? Nothing. They would still all die, in the end it seemed. So why bother going through it?

She wiped the tears from her eyes and stared at the ground, steeling herself. No. We are a proud people. We cannot go down without a fight. Death would be better than servitude to these demons. And then she was a little more calm, a little less angered, grieved. Perhaps... Perhaps I understand a little better. Is this what you went through, Raven? No, it is not quite the same. I know, I failed to understand you, as everyone else did. But perhaps I understand now a little of your pride and stubbornness. You were very brave, were you not? You fought for a long time without hope, just as we are doing, but without the help of friends... She closed her eyes. Friends... I am sorry that we could not understand you in time. I was blinded by my emotions and thought of you as a demon when you were so much more... She opened her eyes, gaze hardening. We may all die here, but we will die with pride in our hearts, knowing that we did not give in to the demons until we were all destroyed.

She tried moving again, and failing at that, tried flying, but still found that she could not. No, she was not happy, and she could not feel happy as she normally could. Strength bloomed within her heart, but it was a strength of forced pride, masking a greater sense of being completely overwhelmed, alone in her fight...

"Starfire!" A blonde haired girl flew down on a rock and rushed over to her.

"Terra," she was surprised at how hoarse her voice sounded.

"Star, are you okay? We were so worried - we thought that maybe you had-" Terra caught the dark look in Starfire's eyes, much different than the normal expression on her face.

The dullness, with a steely hard quality to them, the thin set of her lips, the slight furrow in her brows... Terra looked around and saw all the bodies laying about and instantly understood. She said nothing, and instead, put one of Starfire's arms around her, raising them up on a rock.

"Come on, let's get you to safety."


"How is she?"

Terra emerged from the room, dark bags under her eyes. "Fine. Broken leg, but Tamaranians heal really quickly. I'm more worried about her mental state. All of those people out there-"

"Star's strong. She'll be fine."

Terra shook her head. "Nobody can be that strong. She practically saw thousands of her friends die out there. You'd think she'd be a little traumatized."

"We'll take care of her when she wakes up," Beast Boy replied. "If she needs us, we'll be there for her."

"Yeah, for sure. What about Jinx? She talkin' yet? She seemed pretty pissed when she came out."

"She's just tired from all that fighting. I guess she was thinking of Raven so that's probably why-"

"Didn't we say never to mention Raven in front of her?"

"Well, sorry," Cyborg held up his hands in apology, "but you know the girl has to get over her some time or another. It's not like she can brood over Raven forever."

"Dunno. Seems like Raven has a way of making people brood."

"Well we were friends with her and she never-"

"Not really friends."

Cyborg paused for a moment and looked at her rather begrudgingly. Beast Boy simply nodded in acceptance. "That is true, Cy. We never really bothered to get to know her. I mean, I sort of tried for a while... Okay, I tried pretty hard. But she was all like-"

"Raven wasn't somebody we should be focusing on right now. For now, we should help the people we can, and then we can think about it later."

"I'm beginning to wonder who we can help. We've failed at everything so far. Look at how many people died out there today! We're just too weak..."

"So what? Do we just give up? You know we can't do that, Terra."

"I know, I know. But I'm trying to be real here."

"Well being real isn't helping."

"Having false hope isn't either."

"It's better than having no hope! I mean, if everyone thought it was hopeless, how long do you think they'd last?"

"Seems pretty awful to have those hopes crushed. Speaking from experience, you know."

"That was your own fault at that time, and you know it-"

"Of course I know that," Terra snapped back at him. "I'm just saying there's no point in believing that we're going to beat these things because we can't. So we should come up with a better plan-"

"Like what, run away?"

"Well looks like that's our only choice, right?"

"I'm sick of running! If that's all we're going to do for the rest of our lives, I'd rather kill myself right here, believing that I'm doing something useful."

"You'd just be fooling yourself."

"Guys," Beast Boy interjected. "Calm down. Seriously."

"We are calm!" They turned to him in unison, glaring. And then realized their own folly.

Terra scratched the back of her head. "Well... I guess I was thinking too much. Probably just better to fight it out and figure stuff out later."

Cyborg nodded. "Too much thinking was never a good thing. Raven proved that a long time ago."

"Let's not talk about her, 'kay?"

"Yeah, good idea."


*Blink *Blink. Pure darkness for a little while, then as her eyes adjusted to the light, she made out the dark shape in the corner, white eyes gleaming, sitting on the ground. Judging by the outline...

"Batman?" Jinx croaked out, her throat dry, probably from all the heat she had to endure from the fire demons.

No response. She frowned, then tried again, a little louder. "Batman?"

He shifted, stretched a bit, and then resumed his sitting position.

"You were sleeping?"

"I was waiting for you to wake up. Guess I dozed off."

"Well, um, that was awfully nice of you, but why?" If this is about Raven, I don't really want to hear it, you know.

He looked at the expression on her face. "No, this isn't about Raven. Much as I know you cared about her, I also know you don't want to talk about her. And you probably aren't comfortable talking about it, especially not to me."

"So then what is this about?"

"Your powers," he frowned. "You were the only one who could bring down those demons out there."

"Well, you already know how they work, right? It's not exactly a secret."

"I don't know the specifics."

Jinx scratched her head. "I don't really know that much either. Raven gave me one of her books once upon a time and I read a bit, but then I got bored so I didn't really learn that much."

"Then tell me everything you know."

The pinkette thought for a moment. "So my powers change luck, right? I can also change the intensity of my hexes to change your luck more or less. And obviously, the stronger the hex, the longer it takes for me to charge up. But it turns out I can do some really weird stuff, like make things instantly die from bad luck."

"Like you did with the demons."

"Yeah. And I'm guessing it's because they're not really normal energy things, so the demons couldn't stop my hexes."

"When'd you figure that out?"

"When I used to work with the HIVE. Raven could always stop my energy beams but not my hexes. I didn't really like using hexes though, since they would always do weird things and end up hurting people more than I thought they would."

Batman nodded. "Though I'm surprised. You took down a couple dozen of those big demons. Didn't think you had the energy in you to do that."

A small smile. "I'm not Raven, but don't sell me out so quickly. I'm not weak either. Though I'll admit, I'm kind of out of shape. Didn't train for a long time, not after Raven," she took a deep breath. "Anyway. That's all I know."

"Hmm. Alright." The dark knight moved to leave, but then turned back to her. "Hungry? I can bring you some food."

Jinx blinked. "Well, what kind of food? If it's that Tamaranian stuff-"

"That's all there is. Can't be picky."

"Ugh, fine. I'll just not look at it when I eat it."


Atop the ruins of the wall surrounding the Tamaranian capital...

"We are indebted to you, heroes of Earth," Galfore bowed to Superman and Zatanna, but they both motioned for him to stop.

"We're just doing what we can. And not really doing a great job of it-"

"Hey, I think I did pretty good there."

"Okay, the rest of us aren't doing great."

"Nevertheless, you have saved many of our people, and for that, you have our gratitude."

Superman looked down, eyes darkening. "Not enough of your people. And this barrier won't hold out forever. Eventually the demons will break through. Speaking of which, I didn't know you could do that, Zatanna."

"Do what? The barrier? That's Tamaranian power at work. I just made the hole in the ground. Took a while to set up though."

"How long do you think it will hold?"

"Not sure. I don't think the demons will take that long to break down that barrier, but as of right now, they don't seem to have a way to cross that chasm. So, it'll be until they figure out how to do that."

Superman turned his attention to the green light. "Reminds me of Hal and John's powers..."

"Can we please refrain from talking about that?"

The caped hero turned to her, noticing the instantly guilty look on her face. "Zatanna, you didn't kill him. You just did what you had to do-"

"I might as well have killed him."

"It's as much our fault as it is yours. We told you to activate it. If anything, you're the guiltless one because you didn't want to."

"Doesn't change the fact that I did it."

"Zatanna, please. We all became heroes, knowing the risks behind it, and knowing that we would probably die doing this. You saw Hal, didn't you?"

"He looked pretty devastated."

"Not to me. To me, he looked like he knew it would end some time or another it wouldn't have made a difference which way he went."

Zatanna sighed. "You're not as good as Bruce at comforting people."

A blink. "Really? That guy's good at comforting people?"

"Yes, he is. But do you really think we're all going to die?"

Superman frowned. "I don't think about it. I just fight. I learned a long time ago that thinking about it would just lead to trouble. That's why I had so many problems with Darkseid."

"I guess that's a good policy. Should teach it to ol' Master Wayne."

"Tried. Didn't work."

"One of these days, he'll stop brooding. But I guess in times like these, it's hard not to think, huh."

"You have to make a conscious effort not to. Once you do that, all the conflict, it's gone. It's just another fight. Thinking comes after you win."

And the other option... never mind. "You're right," she conceded. "I just wonder what the future holds for us."

"Time will tell."