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Jedi wrote parts in this Chapter.

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Chapter 5

When Stars go out

Outside the bathroom, Cyborg, Beast Boy and Raven were frantically banging on the door, trying to get Starfire's attention. The Tower shook around them, plaster cracking and metal bending. Ozone filled their nostrils, and eerie red beams leaked under the door, charring anything they touched.

"What's happening?" Beast Boy shouted.

"There are remarkable amounts of energy coming from behind the door." Raven stated frankly.

"Oh, really? Anything else obvious we need to know?" the irritated animal-morpher retorted.

"Star's in trouble! Stand back! This door's comin' down!" Cyborg shouted, and hauled off to deliver a shattering blow to the door.

Then the world exploded.

The door erupted outward, shattering in the air, sending fragments of wood flying like spears across the hall. Red waves of energy followed in the wake of the door, further obliterating the wall, incinerating plaster, carpet and wood, and slagging metal. The concussion caught the Titans off guard, hammering them like a tsunami, throwing them like rag dolls. Raven managed to hastily erect a shield and deflect the worst of the sailing debris, ending up sprawled across the couch. Beast boy was hit by a chunk of wood, and spun crazily before crashing with bone-breaking force against the view screen. Cyborg, standing in front of the door, caught the worst of the blast. His left arm was slagged instantly, and he was thrown across the room with the force of a meteor, blasting through the far wall, sending fragments flying, and crashing across the floor before coming to rest rather ungracefully against a pillar.

The blast abated, and the stunned comrades gingerly picked themselves up from the remainder of their living area.

"Everyone okay?" Cyborg called, staggering shakily to his feet.

"I'm alright, but I think Beast Boy took a hard one," Raven called. Cyborg shuffled across the room, emergency lighting glaring angrily off his cybernetic body. Beast Boy lay twisted on the floor, unconscious. A long shard of wood jutted from his shoulder, bleeding profusely.

"See if you can wake him, I need to check on Starfire," Cyborg turned to assess the damage and see if he could locate their Tamaranian comrade, and froze.

"He broke a rib, so I mended it, but he'll need to get to medical right away. He's coming around..." Raven halted, staring past Cyborg.

The bathroom, and most of the walls surrounding it, was gone. The city skyline rose up in the background, a peaceful backdrop to a scene of carnage. And dominating it all, a blood-red orb, crackling with energy, occupied what was left of the bathroom.

Cyborg and Raven stared, and the orb settled to what was left of the floor, dying slowly, reluctantly, revealing a figure. The orb split as it died, finally settling around the stranger's clenched fists, pulsing and burning, as if yearning for release. The stranger stood barefoot amongst the burning wreckage. Bone-white hair cascaded down the figure's back, partially covering tattered black clothes. She stood proudly, staring defiantly down at the city.

"Oh, I feel like week-old road kill," Beast Boy staggered over, draping an arm around Raven for support, and his gaze settled on the stranger, "and who the hell is that?" he croaked.

"I don't know, but she has a lot to answer, starting with, where's Starfire?" Cyborg put more conviction than he actually felt into the question.

The stranger still did not move, but continued to stare at the city skyline.

"I said, where's Starfire?" Cyborg demanded more forcefully.

"She is gone," the voice was feminine, but deep, and carried a strange undercurrent, as if it echoed, even in the open. It was proud and strong, and full of malice.

"Okay, perhaps I wasn't specific enough. Where has she gone?"

"Away," the stranger finally turned. The tattered clothes barely concealed the shapely body, and her eyes burned with red fire. "She has gone away."

"Okay, this chick is getting on my nerves," Beast Boy grumbled, "So, Miss Riddle-Me-That, where, exactly, is away?"

"I am away. She has gone away. Now there is only me."

"Okay, this is starting to make sense," Raven nodded thoughtfully. Cyborg and Beast Boy stared as if she'd grown horns and scales. "I think this is Starfire."

Beast Boy and Cyborg both absorbed the figure standing before them. The clothes were the right cut, if they could be pieced together from the rags, but seemed to have been burned black without being incinerated. Her hair had been bleached white, and her eyes glowed with an angry red light, as did her power, but it was, most definitely, Starfire.

"Star! You're okay! Sort of," Beast Boy ran to envelope her in a friendly hug. Without warning, and faster than any of them had ever seen anyone move, Starfire's hand lashed out, backhanding Beast Boy across the jaw. His jaw cracked, and he flew back out into the ravaged living room. Star's eyes ignited, and the power around her hands grew in intensity, until it seemed as if they should burn her hands from her body.

"I warned you once, Titan," she hissed, "Starfire has departed. Now there is only me. Do not insult me with inferior titles."

"And you are?" Raven inquired steadily as Cyborg knelt to help his aching friend.

The stranger who had once been their trusted friend turned once again to the city.

"I am Darkfire."

"Darkfire, huh? Well isn't that just gothic?" Raven demurred, her hand haughtily resting on her hip. Something about the way 'Darkfire' carried herself spoke worlds about how dangerous the Tamaranian had become.

"Be silent, Dark One," Darkfire's words carried an unspoken threat, "Or your treachery shall become a somewhat higher priority than theirs." Darkfire's eyes blazed toward the distant city, pain and hatred leaking through her calm demeanor like water through a sieve, but her power still remaining syruped inside.

"Treachery?" the three Titans stared, disbelieving. How could Starfire really be thinking what they believed she was?

"Yes, treachery!" Darkfire whirled, a dervish of energy and anger, "Treachery, betrayal, lies! You never loved me! You never cared for me! You only said you did! You care nothing for me!" her eyes glowed dangerously, and her hands lifted from her sides. She floated above the rubble, an angel of vengeance.

"Buh, Shtar!" Beast Boy murmured around his cracked jaw, wincing in pain. Raven reached out, channeling a thin thread of energy into the break, sealing it whole, reducing the swelling, "Robin was the one that told you that! Not us! We love you, Star!" his eyes filled with tears, pleading against the wall of confused hatred.

"You have been warned, Green One!" Darkfire blazed with energy, "Starfire is gone! Lie to me no more, Betrayer! Just cease your treacherous existence!" Darkfire released the pent-up energy, opening a dam to unimaginable force. It fired from her hands and eyes, blazing forth in terrible, destructive glory.

"Down!" Raven yelled, throwing up a shield around the Titans. Darkfire's power hammered the shield, battering it implacably, wearing Raven's reserves down. "Get going, I can't hold it!" Raven urged her comrades, "I'll distract her while you two drop the bitch!" Raven threw all her might into the shield, fighting back against the streams of red fury beating down upon her, incinerating the floor, walls, furniture.

Beast Boy quickly morphed, a peregrine falcon, zipping from behind the shield, weaving crazily through the beams of destruction, escaping with singed feathers. Cyborg leaped up through the ragged ceiling, using the upper floor to his advantage, sprinting for Darkfire, ready to drop down and pin her.

Darkfire had no intention of giving him that advantage.

The beams of energy increased in intensity, bashing Raven's shield back against her. Raven frantically held onto her concentration, knowing that if the shield fell, she would die. The shield became a bulldozer, pushed by the engine of energy poured forth by Darkfire. It pummeled Raven against the wall, beating her into unconsciousness, the shield falling, the wall crumbling atop Raven, beams of energy pouring in with deadly accuracy.

Cyborg saw Raven buried under the pile of rubble, saw Darkfire's energy pour in. Cyborg didn't know if Raven was alive or dead, but he knew that if Darkfire wasn't stopped, she intended to kill many more. He prepared to punch a hole down on top of Darkfire...

...and the floor erupted upward, Darkfire emerging in a blaze of black clothes and streaming red fire. She grabbed Cyborg by the neck, her grasp leaving dents in the armored neck, and dragged him upward. They crashed through floor after floor, Darkfire seemingly unfazed by the pounding, Cyborg being mercilessly beaten by rubble and debris. They rocketed out the roof of the Tower in an explosion of metal and fire, and continued into the sky.

Cyborg struggled against the slender female's grasp, to no avail.

"Starfire, listen to me! You are still a Titan. You still have friends! We still need you!" he began to gasp as they rose higher. Darkfire stopped, and raised him up, eye-to-eye.

"Liar," she hissed through her teeth, "Watch the city below, and know that for every foot you descend, another betrayer shall die!" she hurled Cyborg downward with unpalleled force, Cyborg rocketing down, a silver meteor in the fading afternoon light. She turned to the city, ready to begin her vengeance.

Beats Boy suddenly swooped in above her, changing from peregrine to tiger, landing atop her, digging in his claws for purchase, trying to drag her down, wound her, do anything to stop her. Darkfire seemed to care about none of it. She twisted impossibly, grabbed him by the nape of the neck, and hurled him after Cyborg, following behind, her eyes blazing.

Beast Boy fell, finally noticing the plummeting Cyborg.

"Hold on, Buddy!" he called as he changed back to his normal form, then continued into pterodactyl morph, folding his wings and screaming after his friend.

Cyborg slammed into the roof of the Tower, shattering five square meters of metal and plaster, and continued down, slamming through floor after floor, each slowing his descent fractionally, every millisecond saved another that the reptilian Beast Boy used to catch up. Beast Boy rocketed through the gaping hole in the roof and the floors below, tucking his wings tighter, screaming in fear, fear for his friend, fear for his own life, fear for everyone if they didn't stop Darkfire. Cyborg crashed through the last floor, a 250-pound rag doll, Beast Boy feet behind, opening his wings to change direction, lest he slam into the ground himself, his claws opening, his eyes closing. Time seemed to slow, Cyborg feet from the ground...and Beast Boy's claws grabbed hold of Cyborg's remaining arm, nearly halting his descent, nearly breaking Beast Boy's legs and wings as he strained against gravity...and won. Cyborg's limp body scraped across the ground as Beast Boy shot back up through the destroyed floors, finally dropping Cyborg's broken body back in the ruined living area and collapsing in exhaustion next to him.

Cyborg's human eye fluttered open, and the now-human Beast Boy smiled in relief. But Cyborg focused past Beast Boy, at the enraged Darkfire. She screamed in fury and released a fiery beam of energy. Cyborg shakily raised his remaining arm, his energy blaster springing forth and returning a single icy beam.

The beams locked, each fighting for dominance, both combatants struggling with will and energy to gain the upper hand. A pile of rubble moved as Raven struggled out from underneath, bleeding from a dozen cuts, more bruises. The exhausted Beast Boy stared in awe at the arisen Raven and the mighty battle. Raven took in the locked beams, slowly being forced back toward Cyborg.

"Cyborg, release the beam!" Raven was exhausted, too, but was the only one who could save them. Cyborg glanced over, grimacing, acknowledging Raven's presence and orders with a nod of relief. Raven cast out her hand. "Now!" she cried as her power enveloped the three Titans. Darkfire's power slammed into the shield, shattered, and punched through walls, floors, ceilings, ruptured power cables, ventilators, power generators. The Tower shook, and bloomed into a fireball of immense power, mutilated metals, plasters, wood, glass, flying about in a maelstrom of destruction.

When the smoke and debris cleared, the Titan Tower was gone. Darkfire slowly floated above the rubble, searching for any sign of her fallen foes.

There was none.

Darkfire smiled viciously, turning to the distant city, flying determinedly towards its hated and helpless citizens.

Behind her, the smoking rubble of the Tower lay still.

R&R Please.

P.S I am indeed gratiful for the Reviews. I like everyone's input and advice, but about Raven and Beast Boy falling in love. That won't be happening. See if Raven were to feel, show or even think about the expression love. She would open a portal to hell and demon monkeys would fly out, because her father can influnce her. If you saw the cartoon you would know what I'm talking about. Don't get me wrong I would love the idea, but I'm trying to make this story go along with the comic characters, how they express their feelingsand how they are based. Believe me when I say that, I have quite a few ideas up my sleeves for this story, but you guys are going to have to trust me.