Did anyone ever say that Robin went over the edge? Naw, he's still floating in the desperate pool of insanity. In the middle of it.

Disclaimer: still the same

Chapter 5

"Raven, wake up. You need to return to your own life. Raven? Raven!"

She groaned, her eyes fluttering open to see a fully grown Bravery sitting beside her, gently shaking her. "How...?" she groaned quietly.

Bravery smiled. "We had a little fun with the xinothium. Intelligence figured out a way to reverse the...um...how did she say it?...adverse effects on our vertical growth and make us bigger again," the green-clad emotion replied.

"Does that mean she can...?" Raven didn't finish the question, for she feared the answer. Her hands instinctively went around Beast Boy's head, and she bit her lip, waiting for the reply.

Bravery shook her head sadly. "I'm sorry, Raven, but not even Intelligence can figure out a way to reverse death," she said.

She sighed. "It was a nice thought," she muttered, resting her head on Beast Boy's.

"I'm sorry," said a voice behind her, and she felt a hand on her shoulder. When she turned, she looked up into sad, remorseful eyes.

"Love? What do you have to be sorry about?" she asked sadly. "You didn't do this to him."

Love shook her head sadly. "I know, but I suggested his role. I wanted him gone so that you would be able to love Robin, but now I realize that even the part of you that loves Robin needed Beast Boy. It's a strange thing, really, love for family and friends. It's almost infinite, and I think that's what you unlocked inside of yourself. I'm sorry I ever tried to get rid of him," she sighed.

She nodded. "It's okay. You didn't mean anything by it. I've felt jealousy before, remember?" she reassured the distressed, pink-clad emotion.

Little Love came running up to her. Actually, Love II ran up to her. She was now fully grown, though her energetic personality was still present. "Come back to talk to me soon, okay?'" she sobbed. She glanced over at Beast Boy. "I must only have seemed like a small child to him..." She reached out to pet his hair, then hesitated. "May I?"

She nodded. "Of course."

Love II stroked the green hair, now plastered down with tears and sweat. She whispered something that was unheard by anyone else, and tears poured down her face and onto his own. Raven could make out part of what she was saying, "Oh, my sweet, optimistic, fun-loving Beast Boy, my loving, caring, affectionate friend..."

Love's hand came down on her sisters shoulder. "Come on, Raven needs to get back to her own life. She may still be able to help the others," she said quietly.

"Who is there left to help?" Timid asked quietly, appearing out of the forest. "Everyone's gone."

Raven bit her lip. "I don't know. What am I going to do when I get back and nobody's home except a depressed teenage guy?"

"If Robin's even there at all," Bravery muttered, then glanced around at the angry expressions around her. "What? It's true!"

Raven shook her head. "I guess I had to take him back anyway," she sighed, closing her eyes and beginning her chant.

"Goodbye!" "We'll miss you!" "Come back soon!" the cries came from around her, and she tried to tune them out as she concentrated her mind on bringing both herself and Beast Boy back to the present.

Jinx had never been inside Raven's room before,except when she had been inside to invade the wardrobe, and what with her boyfriend being elsewhere and the other occupant of the tower being...moody, to put it mildly, she found herself wondering what was inside now that the girl had changed.

Well, it was a very big change in the room, but not because of personality changes. Stuff was strewn everywhere, and bookshelves had fallen all over the place. She sighed. Perhaps, now that she was on the good side, she owed it to Raven to tidy up a little bit.

She spotted a stray plug and started in surprise. She hadn't known that Raven had electricity in here. Stepping carefully over the empath's fallen figure, she plugged it in. Several small machines lit up around her, showing her Raven's bloodstream and brainwaves. Currently, everything was a flat line, but even as Jinx watched, there was a slight pulse in the green line on the screen.

At first, she thought that her eyes might be deceiving her, but there was no mistaking it; it happened again. "Raven's coming back," she whispered incredulously, as reality set in. A broad smile broke over her face at this new ray of light. "She's coming back!" she shouted once more.

She threw open the door and rushed into the hallways. Where was that darn Red X. "She's coming back!" she shouted into the training room, where a startled Red X jumped up off of the exercise equipment.

"Who?" he asked quietly, and she saw him turn away for a moment to regain his composure in an attempt to hide whatever emotion he had just been hiding.

"Raven!" she shouted exuberantly. At the point, anything was good news, even if this meant having to deal with someone in the hospital wing who would need attention much of the time...

"She is?" he repeated, and he had to really struggle to keep his voice devoid of emotion.

She nodded. "Come on. She's waking up!" she cried, grabbing his arm and practically dragging him through the halls.

"I've never seen you this happy before," he said as he pulled away when they reached Raven's room.

She grinned at him, but her eyes fell. "At this point, any news that isn't horribly depressing is good news," she sighed.

He nodded. "Yeah, I guess you're right. Let's go see this ray of hope, shall we?" he joked lightly, pushing the door open.

The machines had started to beep more incessantly, and, oddly, something green flickered beside Raven's still figure. 'What's that?" Jinx asked when she noticed it.

Suddenly, Raven's arms started to move around the space that had flickered, and tears started to flow down her cheeks depite her unconscious state. The green flicker came back, but this time strengthened. It grew until it filled up the space Raven seemed to be grasping. It was a green face, completely still. "Beast Boy?" Red X cried out despite himself. "I thought..."

Jinx couldn't help but be surprised as well. As she watched, the green light eventually grew to become the whole body of Beast Boy. But she wasn't paying attention to the brilliant magic taking place, but rather the fact that the changeling did not move, and that his hair was plastered to his head with sweat and...tears. "Something's not right," she whispered to Red X as she saw the tears fall more freely down Raven's face.

Suddenly, Raven's eyes snapped open, and the girl gauged her surroundings. She pushed herself up, one hand still clutching Beast Boy's own hand. "Jinx? What are you doing in my room? And Red X? I thought you were...?"

Jinx smiled sadly. "Don't worry about it right now. As for right now, we're taking you both to the hospital wing. You've got a pretty nasty gash on your leg, and it looks like he's unconscious. We need to treat those wounds," she admonished gently.

Raven's eyes filled with tears once more as she glanced over at Beast Boy. "I don't think you can do much for him," she admitted despairingly.

Red X's eyes widened. "You don't mean...?"

Raven nodded her confirmation. "I lost him when we were fighting Anger. Apparently, xinothium is also present in my mind, although I think we got rid of it all," she explained, her tears struggling to make themselves known.

Jinx burst into her own tears. "NO! This was supposed to be a good thing!" she shouted, refusing to believe Raven.

Raven was about to say more when her gem began to blink rapidly. She looked down at it with a mixture of surprise and confusion on her face. She looked around at the walls of her room, and finally asked, "Why isn't the alarm going off as well?"

Jinx looked at the floor. "We disabled it. It kept going off all the time ever since..."

Raven's eyes narrowed. "Ever since what?" she pressed.

Jinx couldn't find her voice to answer, so Red X did for her. "Robin went off the deep end," he said bluntly, earning a hard glare from Jinx.

"Oh no. What did he do?" Raven asked, fear rising in her voice.

Jinx put a hand on the empath's shoulder. "He didn't kill himself. It's even worse than that, though, so he might as well have," she said quietly.

"He didn't go to Slade, did he?" Raven asked, realization and fear hitting her all at once. "Did he?" he repeated.

"Raven, I'm sorry..." Jinx sighed miserably.

The tears poured down the empath's cheeks like torrents of rain. "I just came back from the worst fight of my life only to find my old life in shambles," she muttered, mostly to herself. She looked down at her blinking gem. "I've got to talk to him and try to talk sense back into him!" she declared, getting up and dusting herself off.

Red X stopped her. "I don't think so. I've already tried that. He's beyond hope," he said.

"Maybe I can change that. After all, he'll think I'm back from my grave," Raven pointed out, shoving his hand off of her shoulder.

Jinx shook her head. "There's not much help you can give, even now. He's so far gone that he's ENJOYING it!" she nearly shouted.

Raven turned to the reformed witch with emotionless eyes. "All I can do is try. Don't ask me to hope, because I can't anymore. My hope is gone with those two boys, and I don't need you telling me that I can't try to prevent my best friend from living an empty life." As she spoke, her voice was close to a whisper, yet she commanded their attention with her words.

Finally, Jinx spoke up. "I don't think you'll do much, but if it makes you feel better, than you can go ahead and try," she sighed.

This was going to be the most fun he'd had in at least a month, he thought as he crept through the old warehouse. Not only would he be stealing a very valuable weapon, but he would be able to get his revenge. He would be stealing from Chang and Light.

His footsteps were light as he ran across the balcony, and he remained undetected by the guards as he placed a small gas bomb in the venthilation system. Only the weapons room would be unaffected, and that was where he would confront those two villains for the last time, without their henchmen.

He closed the door behind him as he entered the lab, grabbing several different instruments powered by xinothium. These would all be very helpful indeed, he thought as he pocketed them.

"Look who we have here," said a voice behind him that he immediately identified as his most hated enemy.

He whirled around, eyes narrowed and voice loaded with hatred. "Chang, long time no see," he retorted angrily.

Doctor Light came up behind the villain. "What happened to you?" he sneered, looking the former Boy Wonder over.

He growled ferally. "I've had some life changes since our last encounter. Needless to say, this time I won't be going easy on you at all. I'm not bound by any 'hero's code' anymore," he grinned maliciously.

Doctor Light smirked back. "Then this should be an interesting challenge," he laughed, charging up for an attack.

"A very short challenge, actually," he smirked back, pulling out one of the blasters he had stolen earlier. Cocking the weapon, he leveled it with Chang's chest and fired. The man fell to the ground with a groan, though the eye movement signified that he was still alive. Shame.

"Didn't you already learn your lesson?" Doctor Light sneered, sending a blast of xinothium flying towards him.

"Nope," he replied smartly, dodging the attack nimbly and attacking with his own weapon.

"It's not me you're mad at, you know," Doctor Light said almost laughingly.

"Right. Because me growling at you doesn't mean anything," he replied sarcastically.

"You're mad at yourself, aren't you?"

He stopped dead in his tracks. Light had hit a nerve. "I-"

"You wish you could have saved her, don't you? But you couldn't, and now-"

Doctor Light was cut short by a hoarse cry from the former Boy Wonder as he lunged forward to attack. He was holding an extremely sharp gadget, something very similar to his old birdarangs. Blow after blow fell down, and he didn't register anything but the intense hatred he felt for the man before him. He kept going, practically ripping the man apart limb from limb until he had the villain pinned beneath him.

"Say hello to Starfire for me, won't you?" he snarled, bringing the weapon back for the final blow.

"ROBIN!" shouted a voice in the doorway. He paid no attention to it, and drove his weapon forward for the final blow, but it suddenly stopped.

"What?" he gasped, looking down at his arm, which was now covered in a very familiar black energy. As if in a daze, he looked up to see Raven.

"Please..." she cried, tears pouring down her cheeks even as she held out her hand to stop him. "Don't make me hurt you," she whispered, her lower lip quivering.

But he was immune to tears. Nothing mattered to him at the time but destroying the pathetic man before. "Don't try and stop me, Raven. He has it coming," he growled, using his other hand to prepare another blow.

He suddenly felt himself being forced up against the wall, though she had not touched him. She came up right in front of his face, her soaked cheeks and lifeless eyes now right in front of him. "Please. I didn't fight for a month just to come back to this!" she sobbed.

He looked away as his heart pricked with emotions, a new feeling to him after weeks of seclusion. "He's the one...who..." he growled, not wanting to talk about it.

"He did Starfire in, didn't he? Robin, please, don't do this to yourself! You can't change it! Please, move on!" she urged, choking on the emotion in her voice.

He turned to her, placing both hands on her shoulder. "Raven, please. Don't try and stop me," he whispered, then turned to see Doctor Light and Chang gone. He whirled on her. "Look what you did!" he shouted angrily.

She backed away slowly. "I didn't..."

"They got away!" he shouted, grabbing her arm forcefully.

"Robin..." she stuttered.

He growled angrily at her. "Leave me alone!" he shouted, tightening his grip.

With one last, fearful look back, she phased through the wall, leaving him alone. He grabbed his hair with his fists, rolling on the ground. "What's wrong with me?" he moaned finally.