Chapter three: Fate is Cruel

It was dark within the cold corridors of the Metro Arts Technologies Museum. Guards walked up and down the long hallways. Security cameras covered each corner. The museum was a heavily guarded place, for it held and displayed some of the most advanced technologies scientists invent these days. One particular exhibit displayed all sorts of different working clocks, but there was one clock that was valued above all the rest, The Clock of Eternity. With its round clear dome containing bronze spheres rotating every second, The Clock of Eternity was said to control time itself. The clock shall never stop counting down every second of life.

Suddenly, the doors to the clock exhibit burst open blowing the doors off the hinges with huge force. Dr. Garvitz walked through the rising dust with a glint on his chrome Warp suit.

"Halt!"

Dr. Garvitz turned around and saw two armed guards running towards him. They had their guns pointed straight at him; all he did was allowed a smirk and waved a quick hand at them. A sudden wave of energy went flying through the air straight for the guards.

"Freez-,"

The guards were frozen on the spot like thick icicles. Dr. Garvitz turned back around and entered the exhibit. He walked up to a certain display that held the valuable Clock of Eternity in the middle of the exhibit. He looked down at the prize that was tempting him inside. He started to chuckle.

"You would think after ten years they would put this into tighter security," He stretched out his hand to take back the Clock, but was distracted by a flying bird-a-rang. He smiled again; he knew who was behind him.

"For your sake, you'll keep your---," Robin couldn't seem to finish his one liner, his eyes went wide, Starfire gasped.

"Warp," she said quietly. Dr. Garvitz stepped closer into the lamps; his chrome suit began to glisten in the light. Raven caught the color of the suit immediately; disturbing images from her vision began to haunt her mind.

"Garfield…," she whispered to Garfield, who was in fighting stance right next to her. He had heard the sudden plea in her voice, and turned to her. He saw her expression full of fear looking straight at the "silver" armored man. He knew why she was worried.

"Not quite my dear," cooed Dr. Garvitz to Starfire, "The Warp you know I believe is now…lost in time. In the future I am known as Dr. Garvitz, Head Scientist and Owner of HGX Incorporated, and soon to be the richest man in his century, but in this time you may indeed call me 'Warp,'" he said with confidence, "Now, if you will excuse me, I have a clock to retrieve, I'll deal with you in a moment,"

Another bird-a-rang flew by him again, he dodged it with ease.

"Not in this century or the next," said Robin, he got into position and shouted the command, "Titans, go!"

The Titans sprang into action. Warp set his thermo blasters to level one. Robin was the first to attack, he started to jump kick him, but Warp easily protected himself with his thick metal hands. Robin began to do more hand to hand combat, but no prevail. Warp blocked each punch, backed away dodging a punch and he pulled out one of his exploding discs and threw it towards Robin. He quickly responded to one of his own discs, they both exploded in mid air. The smoke blinded the two enemies, but Warp took a guess and fired his thermo blasters at the black silhouette of Robin through the smoke. Robin flipped back to dodge the surprising laser's heat. Then, Starfire and Raven came into play.

Starfire threw her flashing green starbolts at the villain. Raven summoned unhinged doors and empty display cases. Warp deflected these attacks with a protective force field. He turned up his thermo blasters up three levels to level four and began to fire at the two heroines. They both dodged the attacks and flew back. A sudden sonic blast came from behind catching Warp off guard. The smoke from the blast began to rise and Warp couldn't see what was ahead of him. Cyborg quickly jumped down to attack, but he wasn't fast enough. As the smoke began to rise and Warp could see his outline showing through, he braced himself and flashed another wave of energy freezing Cyborg when he touched ground.

Garfield began to get a running start at the villain. He jumped and transformed into a ferocious lion. Warp aimed his blaster at him. Garfield was on his toes ready to strike. Warp had fired the blaster, Gar started to pounce, but both were cut off by a wall of black energy.

"No! Stay back!" shouted Ravenwho was the source of the black wall. The green changeling morphed back into human form to look up at her.

"Raven, I'll be okay! Just let me-,"

"No, I am not going to risk losing you," this was what she was afraid of; Garfield's pride would motivate him to stay in the battle. But he knew better than to argue with Raven at this time, so he backed away to safety, the energy wall began to fade, and Raven could breathe a little easier. Raven summoned three large pillars and threw them at Warp. Warp fired his thermo blaster at the pillars letting the broken pieces spread out everywhere from the attack.

Then Robin came from behind, took out his bo and attacked. Warp blocked the shot with a few deflections of his hands. Robin tried again, no good. He would try again and again until Warp had grown tired and caught Robin unexpectedly with a shock ray in his right hand. The ray was powerful enough to send him crashing into a series of display cases knocking him out.

"Robin! No!" Starfire cried out. Starfire and Raven were the only ones left. Garfield had enough. Cyborg was frozen, Robin was knocked out, he needed to go in, and he didn't want the girls to fight alone. Starfire and Raven were trying their best to stop the fiend with starbolts and flying pillars. Warp had countered every attack; he sent one pillar towards Raven knocking her out of the air and onto the ground. Then he was caught by surprise by a ramming green rhinoceros sending him flying across the exhibit. Raven gasped at his sudden attack. Warp went straight through the weak museum wall on the other end. Flying blocks of plaster and wood went everywhere, knocking the display case that held the Clock of Eternity on to the ground rolling on the floor. Weakened by the force of the hit, Warp got back on his feet breaking off the rubble that covered him. He suddenly started to give off an electric discharge and his regulator began to flicker.

"Gah!" he shouted. He started pressing it hoping that a worm hole would appear, but nothing happened, it kept on flickering, "Blast, the infernal thing must be jammed,"

"It looks like you're stuck here," said Garfield morphing back to human form. Warp looked up with a sudden anger on his face; he quickly fired his thermo blaster. Catching Garfield off guard, yelling in surprise, it hit him directly sending him back into a glass display case that shattered on top of him, covering his entire body in broken glass.

"No!" Raven yelled after him. Starfire came back into play after trying to get Robin to wake, who still remained out cold, and she fired starbolts at the villain in pure fury. She kept him preoccupied while Raven went to Garfield's side. She saw the pile of glass and broken display cases piled together, she looked around to see if she saw any movement, nothing. She began to fear that he was dead, but it couldn't be true. She started moving shattered glass and broken displays out of the way, praying that he was still alive. She moved one particular large piece of rubble with her mental abilities and saw a large green shelled turtle. She sighed with tremendous relief, he was alive. He morphed back to human.

"I told you to stay out of this," said Raven. She extended a helping hand to him; he took it gratefully and stood up, brushing off the dust on his shoulders.

"And I told you not to worry," he said, "I won't let you fight alone, and I'm not going down that easily, I've got you to protect me,"

He placed a hand on her cheek; she sighed and placed a hand on top of his.

"Gar, I—," she started but was suddenly cut off by an explosion from the ceiling above. Starfire went crashing towards the ground next to them. Warp's thermo blasters were fuming from the recent gun fire.

"Starfire!" shouted Garfield. They ran towards where Starfire laid on the ground. She started to moan in pain, but she wasn't completely unconscious. Garfield and Raven looked down at Starfire; she looked like she wasn't going to fight for awhile. The two both looked up at each other.

"Looks like it's just you and me," said Garfield. Suddenly, a blast of laser heat hit the ceiling above them. Garfield and Raven turned around to face Warp. He looked weak, his chrome suit began to lose its shimmer, he was breathing hard, and he then switched his thermo blasters up another level of destruction. The blasters began to glow within.

"No one…can defeat me…I am from the future," Warp stuttered. Garfield and Raven got ready to fight, but before they attack Garfield said one more thing.

"Protect me, and we'll be fine," Raven nodded in return, but she sighed in concern, afraid that she may not be able to protect him. But she would do everything she had to keep him alive, even if it meant sacrifice. She loved him too much to lose him.

Warp began to fire; the green Changeling turned into a green bull and began to run towards Warp, trying to dodge all the firing attacks. Raven had shielded Garfield from the fiery attacks. The green bull rammed into what he thought was Warp but was a blue force field. Warp smirked behind the force field, it faded away and he threw one of his electric disks at Garfield. He turned into a field mouse to dodge it, but Raven caught the disk with her telekinesis and countered by throwing the electric disk back at Warp. He gasped and the counter attack caught him off guard, for he was blasting his thermo blasters at Garfield. The electric disk sent Warp back into one of the larger displays of ancient clocks from behind. The huge amount of force from the blast shook the wall and ceiling where Warp had landed, and from the lack of pillars, the ceiling began to crumble on top of him.

"AAHHH!" he screamed as he tried to shield himself from being crushed beneath the rubble. The bits of wall and plaster from the ceiling fell on top of him and he was silent; the dust from the shards of weak rock began to settle in. Garfield morphed back into human, Raven landed right next to him taking a hold of his arm; they stood there looking straight to where Warp once was. The long silence was enough to confirm the both of them that Warp had been defeated. They watched the dust settle, and then turned to face each other. They both smiled and hugged each other tightly in victory.

Little did they know, Warp was still very much alive. He was breathing heavily from the sudden pressure of the rock that pressed against his suit and the anger that he felt because they thought they had defeated him. This is not over yet, he thought. He switched his thermo blasters up and up until it couldn't turn anymore; all the way up to the last level. He waited patiently for the two Titans to get in range.

"I was so afraid I was going to lose you," whispered Raven into Garfield's ear. Garfield gripped her tightly and ran a hand up her backside to comfort her, telling her that it was over.

"I guess fate has a way of changing, doesn't it?" he said pulling back a bit. Raven nodded in response, she looked around at the other Titans, Starfire who looked weak, Robin who was still out, and Cyborg who was frozen solid. She turned back to Garfield.

"I'll go thaw out Cyborg, you go and try to wake up Robin and Starfire," she said. Garfield nodded and let go of his hold on her. Warp shifted his weight to get into position to fire, he could see only see so much through the small opening between the rocks. Raven turned to attend to Cyborg, Gar turned to go to Robin to make sure he didn't injure himself too badly. Warp charged his blaster up, he focused on the opening, and he saw one of the Titan's silhouette moving closer into range, he wasn't sure which one it was, but he knew it belong to a Titan. He eyes narrowed and he smirked, he fired the blaster; it released its hidden power blasting the rubble that caved Warp to nothing. The beam was huge, the light was blinding, and the sound was unbearable. Raven heard the shot fire and turned to see the tremendous beam coming directly for her. She didn't have time to protect herself, so the beam hit her straight on. She screamed in pain and agony as it sent her flying across the exhibit hitting wall under the balcony, that the Titans had entered on. The force was so powerful that the balcony had collapsed, caving Raven in with the laser's heat.

"RAVEN!" Garfield shouted, for he saw the whole thing. He didn't have time to worry about Warp, he went to get Raven. This gave Warp a chance to break free from the walls that imprisoned him, he pushed pieces off and got up. He started to press his regulator again, hoping he would get it un-jammed. Seeing that he couldn't, he started looking for the Clock of Eternity that rolled off on the floor.

Garfield transformed into a giant gorilla, lifting up the large balcony so he could find her. He started to move things frantically, he felt like he was moving too slow. There were so many heavy pieces of metal. He began to move more quickly, picking up piece after piece, shard after shard, until he saw her hand, he gasped in shock.

"Raven," he moved the last piece that covered her upper body. Her face was bruised and burned from the blast, her uniform was ripped and tattered. She was still breathing, but very faint. Garfield moved one more piece from her lower side, he nearly threw up when he saw her. She was burned so badly that she was fuming. The smell was horrible, tears started to brim around his eyes, this wasn't suppose to happen, he thought. He fell to his knees next to her.

"Raven, talk to me, please…say something!" he tried to keep his words calm, but it was hard for him. He took her hand and rubbed her cheek with the other. She felt his touch and she opened her eyes weakly to look up.

"I guess fate has a way of changing," she smiled weakly. Garfield couldn't stop the flood of tears running down his cheeks when she repeated his words.

"Hang on, Raven, I'll get help," he said. He began to get up, but Raven gripped as hard as she could on his hand to pull him back down with her.

"No, stay here…," she said faintly, "don't leave,"

He did as he was told, she pulled his hand closer to her face and she kissed the side of it. Her lips on his hand were already starting to feel cold. Beast Boy couldn't hold it in any longer, he broke down into a fit of tears; burying his head into her neck.

"Oh, Raven," he cried, "this was not…suppose to happen! This wasn't suppose to happen!" his tears started to soak the front of her ripped leotard. Raven couldn't help but cry with him, she didn't want him to suffer this, she didn't want to leave him.

"You said…I was going to die, not you!" he cried harder, "Not you! You are not supposed to die!"

"Please, don't make this so hard," she whispered, he calm down a bit, but he was still producing an endless river of sorrowful tears. Raven breathed in every ounce of air she could then she spoke.

"Remember, we cannot change the truth, no matter how much we dislike it," These words only made Beast Boy cry even more, he placed his forehead against hers and he still held her hand.

"Don't you leave me," he pleaded to her, "hang on to me, Raven, don't let go," Raven's vision began to blur, she could not make out the outline of his face any longer, but she could still hear the sorrow in his voice. He heard the silence in her breath, which made him stop abruptly.

"Raven?" he stuttered. Raven opened her opens so slightly, she placed one of her hands on his cheeks.

"Keep me in your heart and I'll always be there to protect you…always," she whispered, "I love you," she weakly pulled him down and kissed him one final time, so she could get one last taste of his pure love. He savored every moment, hoping that he would have passed more life through the kiss to keep her alive a little longer.

"I love you, Raven…," he whispered unconditionally, "Raven?"

Her grip on his hand loosened, her breath was no longer there, her eyes were closed, her soul was gone.