Authors Note: Hello my dear readers. Thank you so much for staying loyal to my stories, it truly means a lot. I ran into quite a lot of difficulties, my computer was fried, and I almost lost all my work. It took me a long while before I managed to save up the funds to build a computer. So I'm happy to announce, that I am back. I have been thinking about all of you, and it truly warms my heart to see that this story, and a few others still get reviews, and that some of you have been checking back for years. I promise to not leave any of you hanging, and will resume almost ALL my stories over the course of this year. I have also changed my username from Paine Falis, to ZanarkandRose. Again, thank you all for your love and support, and please enjoy. I know this chapter is quite short, and may have lots of grammatical errors, but please. Enjoy. 3

CH.9

Sunlight poured through Robins parted curtains, landing perfectly in his eyes. He grunted and turned around in his bed, wrapping his arms around Starfire. She snuggled against him, and smiled,"Good morning Robin. Did you sleep well?"

"Morning Star. I slept pretty good, especially with you by my side."

"I am glad to hear it. It is getting late Robin, perhaps we should get up now." She stretched, and gently pried herself from his grasp.

"Yeah, you're right." He sat up and rubbed his neck,"Are you hungry?"

"Yes, I am. Though I would prefer to shower before I eat."

"Okay, anything specific you're hungry for?"

"Um, may I please have the cakes of pan? They are most delicious!" she smiled as she put her clothes on.

Robin smiled, his bright blue grey eyes shining,"Yeah, pancakes. I'll make them right now. You go shower." He put his robe on, and watched her walk out his door. As it shut behind him, he glanced out the window," Today's another day. Sorry Raven, but, we have to put our search on hold for you for a while. We haven't patrolled the city in a week. Once thats done, we'll get right back to looking for you."

He walked out the room, and saw Beastboy in his boxers, pouring a large amount of cereal in a bowl, and overfilling it with soymilk.

He groggily looked over at Robin,"Morning dude."

"Morning Beastboy." He walked over to the fridge, pulling out fresh milk, eggs and flour. Cyborg walked in, his small nightcap on his head.

"Morning ya'll. What are we having for breakfast?" He saw Robin holding eggs, and he immediately sprung to life,"Nah, man, I'll cook breakfast. Today is a bacon, eggs, ham and waffles kind of morning." He grinned, pulling out a chef hat, placing it on top of his nightcap.

Robin frowned,"Well, Starfire was in the mood for pancakes."

Cyborg grinned smugly,"Ohh, are you guys at that part of the relationship? Princess gets what she wants?" He teased.

Robin hesitated to answer,"Well..."

Cyborg laughed,"Chill man. I gotcha. Pancakes instead of waffles, no problem."

Beastboy began snoring on the couch, the morning cartoons playing in the background.

Robin decided to shower himself, since Cyborg decided to take over breakfast.

Starfire passed him in the hallway, "Is the breakfast ready?"

"Should be in a while. Cyborg decided to take over again."

"Very well, I'll see you at breakfast." She gave him a quick kiss, and floated off to join her friends.

After Robin showered and dressed, he headed down the hallway, where breakfast was already being consumed by his teammates. Cyborg pointed to a plate, notioning that it was Robins.

Starfire scanned the table,"Excuse me, but may I have the mustard please?"

Cyborg rolled his eyes,"Aliens... Sure, hold up." He set the large bottle in front of Starfire, who smiled and doused her pancakes in a heaping amount.

Robin and Cyborg shuddered, while Beastboy had awaken from his slumber and was back to surfing channels.

The alarm sounded off, causing everyone to drop their forks and spoons and rush over to the large computer defensive system.

Cyborg typed more codes into the keyboard, and began scanning the monitor,"Lets see where this source is coming from"

"Is it those creatures again?" asked Robin.

" like Plasmus escaped from prison again, and is terrorizing the city."

"I was hoping it was more of those strange beasts, so that they might lead us to Raven.." Starfire frowned.

"Don't worry Star, we'll find her one day, but our city needs us." said Robin, as he and the group ran out the door to fight Plasmus.

As Jak looked behind him, his eyes were wide with shock, the large ram head ready to crush Jak and the small rat on his back. With every ounce of strength, he yanked Raven upwards, and quickly activated his light eco shield, causing the ram head to stumble backwards, unable to pierce the unpenetrable barrier. Raven had her eyes squeezed shut, preparing for the worse, yet nothing came. She slowly opened her left eye, and gasped, placing a hand over her mouth. Jak was a ghostly white blue, a blueish white shield was surrounded them.

"Wh-what's happening?" Raven asked, looking up at Jak who smiled.

"Wow! What a close call! Jak just saved our asses!"

"Its one of my other abilites, I learned this while I was touched with light eco." Jak answered, turning around to face the ram head once more. It charged at the barrier, still bouncing off, its eyes glowing brighter with frustration.

Raven slowly stood up, her body shaken and her mind frazzled,"Okay...but how are we going to deal with that?"

Jak thought for a moment, as the ram head slammed against the barrier once more,"Can you make a copy of yourself?"

"A copy?"

"Yeah, maybe if you do that, it'll distract the metal head, giving Jak enough time to blast this thing back to where it came from!"agreed Daxter.

"I can distract it, and you can take it out. I'll become energy before it gets too close." She took a deep breath, calming her mind, and allowing her heartbeat to slow down. "I'm ready when you are."

"One...two...three!" Jak let the shield down, as he reverted back to his original self. Raven quickly shot an energy bolt at it.

"Over here! Come get me!" she shouted as she launched multiple bolts at the beast.

It shook its head in anger, as it snorted and began to charge at Raven, when it lifted its large feet to crush her, she quickly vanished, Jak sliding in where she was and launched a pacemaker at the behemoth. It growled in pain, as it slowly collapsed, its yellow gem dislodging from its skull.

Raven reappeared and sighed, relieved to see Jak was alright.

"Woohoo! We did it!" shouted Daxter as he danced around the corpse of the metal head, "You two sure do make one hell of a team!" he winked, knowing that there was an obvious attraction going on between the two.

"Are you alright?" Jak asked Raven.

"I'm fine. Are you okay?"

"Yeah." He smiled.

"Hey look! There's a small opening where that thing was laying down!" Daxter walked over to it, and peeked inside. "I see something gold… and shiny!"

"Jak, have you located the precursor artifact from the forest yet?" Peckers voice came through the floating communicator.

"Uh, not yet?" Jak had slightly forgotten about the artifact, and looked over at Daxter. "But we found something."

"I think I can squeeze through here…" Daxter wedged his body into the side of the wall," Hey! Is this that artifact?" He squeezed himself back out, and held up a small golden octagon.

Jak inspected it," Think we just found it. We'll deliver it to Vin right away."

"Good! I'll let Onin know, great job guys!" the communicator vanished and Jak placed the relic into his pocket. He glanced upwards towards the sky, noting that the sun was well past noon, "We should head out, sure you're okay?" Jak asked Raven one more time.

"Yes, let's go" she nodded, as Daxter hopped up onto her shoulder as they made their way carefully back down.

"I'm sorry about that. My powers can go on the fritz if I lose focus or become panicked." Raven looked at Jak. "I almost cost you your life."

Jak shook his head," You don't need to apologize Raven. If it weren't for the light eco, we probably would have been toast." He chuckled.

She smiled; He was strong, smart, caring and very cute. Deep down, she told herself to keep her emotions in check. The first guy she "dated", betrayed her and nearly killed her and her friends. 'Damned dragon' And her relationship with Robin lasted only a few secretive weeks. Her and romance didn't do too well, but unbeknownst to her, Jak was also terrible at it.

They made their way towards the entrance of the forest, taking out any remaining metal heads that they might have missed. The sun was beginning to wane, the clouds becoming a mix of orange, violets and pinks. The large metal gate slowly processed who stood before it, before opening," Good to see you're still alive" the robotic voice called out as it let them into the city.

"Vin isn't too far away from this section of the city. So, we should be there soon," Jak looked around for the nearest vehicle to "borrow".

"So what is this thing?" Raven studied the small object in her hand.

"That is a precursor artifact." Answered Daxter as they waited for Jak to come back. "Jak and I collected tons of those when we first came to the city. They're all able to do different things to help keep the city safe".

"I wonder what this one can do" She heard a honk and placed it in her pocket, as she climbed aboard the hovering vehicle, on to her next destination.

The cops had arrived, and placed a sleeping man into a police vehicle. Plasmus was out for the count, and was headed back to his cell, a permanently induced coma awaited him. Starfire wiped some plasma off her boots, and clapped," We have defeated Plasmus!"

"Took us a while this time. Look at the damage this guy did" Cyborg scratched his head, as buildings and cars lay wrecked and strewn all about the roads.

"Well, at least nobody got hurt." Robin signed off the forms the police handed him, as they escorted the unstable man.

"Dudes I'm starving, can we get something to eat?" Beastboy held his stomach as it growled loudly.

"Anyone up for pizza?" Cyborg suggested.

"Sounds good to me. Once we finish up there, we can head back to the tower and resume the search for Raven." Robin led the way.

"I was thinking, perhaps there may be more books to study in Ravens room." Starfire sat down in her usual seat, the balcony overlooking the city.

"She has tons of books. You'll be looking all day Star" Cyborg shrugged, but she had a point.

"Raven was teaching me how to read in her language. I will try my best" she smiled, knowing that she would stop at nothing until her best friend was back home.