I know I said this would be up eariler than usual, but things didnt exactly work out how I had planned, forcing me to not be able to keep that promise. But on the bright side, this chapter is a bit longer than the others and should be a bit better of a read than the last few ones (I hope). As always, keep the review coming, even if it's to point out something I messed up. I'm not nearly as experienced in writing as some of you must be so I try to take all the advice I can get.


They were gathered around the computers, faces downcast at what was being done. The whirr of machinery and buzz of electronics was drowned out by the screams of someone in intense pain. None of them were enjoying what was going on, but it had to happen. It had to happen if she ever wanted to come back. From sunup to sundown she would have to endure all manner of invasive tests, without any kind of sedative. It had been only several hours but to Beast Boy it had seemed a lifetime. He could hardly stand to witness this. He stood frozen, eyes locked on hers and face ashen with a sickly feeling spread throughout his body. The only reason he stayed were the screams.

She was screaming for him.

When he first heard it he had jolted up, and the other titans were afraid he would try to get in the chamber with her. But he just stared at her, sympathetic pain plain in his eyes. The absolute need one had for the other was all that kept him there, and her alive.

The pain was unlike anything she had ever felt, or ever dreamed of. It was worse than the beatings she had received from her once master, so consuming was it in its intent to destroy her. It felt like fire coursed through her veins, never relenting an instant, never giving even the briefest respite from its hateful touch. Every breath she drew was an absolute struggle, every blink of an eye seemingly a yearlong war. But she couldn't give up, couldn't allow the blissful touch of death to embrace her. This was what she wanted. She wanted to be a Titan. She wanted him.

He was the only one she saw through the veil of agony, his emerald eyes locked with her blue ones. She saw how much it hurt him to watch her suffer, knew that he would have traded places with her in an instant. So it passed this way for hours, the air in the chamber growing hot with sweat and adopting the coppery odor of blood. Her limbs seemed to wink out of existence, her eyes tunneling, her head growing heavy. The restraints binding her to the table seemed to disappear. She felt…free, though her body had seemingly ceased to be a part of her, her mind had been honed to a razors edge. And the tip was pointed at him. He kept her alive, and she kept him alive. It was a complete symbiotic relationship, both parties fueled by an intense desire to escape the pain they had hidden for so long. They found that escape in each other. They found true happiness in each other. She knew that she would survive this, if only to hear his voice one last time. She would have suffered through an eternity of this to have him.

Then it was over. Slowly her body revealed itself to her again, bringing with it a heavy numbness. Dots moved around her vision, slowly taking the shape of people she knew, what seemed like a lifetime ago. Voiced rang out though she could not hear what was being said. Her world was spinning; she was falling back from reality, falling into a deep pool of unconsciousness. She let it happen, she had passed the test and there was no reason to fight it anymore. Her world turned into a bubble filled with emotions surrounded by memories. The last conscious action she remembered was returning the squeeze of a hand from that green boy she had fallen so madly in love with.

Hours passed, then days. She was not awake for any of them. But he refused to leave her side. Keeping constant vigil over her frail form he waited. The other Titans had retreated to the briefing room to decide her fate, and he had been excluded to keep watch over her.

"So that's it then? Is everyone ready to vote?"

"Yes."

"Yeah…"

"I am ready."

"Show of hands, all for…and all against."

"So it is decided?" said a voice, heavy with resignation.

"Looks that way Star. Who wants to break the news to B.B?"

"I will, it will make it easier."

"O.K. Raven, call if he gets out of hand."

The form retreated from the room, and began its trip to the infirmary. It was surprising; they had all come to a unanimous decision. She was glad it was this way. Reaching the infirmary, she opened the door and stepped in. Beast Boy stood up, his demeanor changing from one of silent attentiveness to nervous anticipation.

"So…what is it? He asked, the tightening of his jaw muscles showing he was prepared for the worst. Rave sighed, looked him in the eyes…and smiled.

"She stays."

His hug was crushing. Normally she would have thrown him through the window for this, but in this case it seemed better to let it slide.

"But I thought the vote had to be unanimous for her to stay?"

"It did."

"You mean you actually voted for her to stay, I though you didn't trust her?" He said, giving her a curious stare.

"I didn't. I still don't completely. But the fact that she survived those test means that she is free from outside control, and is strong enough to be a Titan again." She said as she turned around to leave.

"Raven." Beast Boy called, causing her to turn around.

"Thank you."

"If keeping Terra around means there's someone else you can annoy other than me, than I'm all for it." She said, her normal tone returning.

Soon he was alone again, except for Terra, who remained unconscious. Monitors hooked up to her read off streams of data, but none of them made sense to Beast Boy. All he knew was that she was getting better, the deathly shade of gray she had worn after the test being replaced with her usual healthy glow. She should be waking up soon he reasoned; time to go get her a welcome back gift.

But what? He was broke, so fine jewelry was out of the question. Poetry wasn't exactly his thing, and he didn't know what kind of clothes she would like to wear. A thousand ideas began to trickle through his mind as he glanced down at her, and noticed her eyes were moving.

She was dreaming.

The city was silent and wreathed with smoke. She pushed herself up off the cement, her body bruised and sore. She had no idea where she was, except that it was in Jump-city. Silently she began to walk towards the bay, the shadowy form of Titans tower guiding her. Not a single person was out on the streets. Not one bird called out, all forms of wildlife seeming to have vanished from whatever was going on. She kept to the shadows, not wanting to attract attention from whatever was out there. But the shadows seemed to follow her, the way they stretched their tendrils towards her. She suddenly had a terrible feeling of vertigo, and an intense desire to be off the streets.

Ducking into the nearest apartment building, she walked along its lobby, her steps echoing in an unnatural way. It was pitch black, and she quickly produced a flashlight from her utility belt. That's when she noticed what she was wearing, the clothes she had on when she first meet the Titans. She hadn't worn that outfit ever since she left. What was going on here? She clicked on the flashlight, its weak cone of light spilling across the lobby. Cobwebs hung from the ceiling, dust and months of built up detritus littered the floor. The place looked abandoned, but she heard the faint sounds of talking. Slowly she continued forward until she was at the front desk. The sound was coming from the stairwell, off in the corner. She could have sworn she had just seen someone duck in there.

"Hello? Are you all right? Hello?!" She called, but nothing responded. Not wanting to let a possible source of answers get away she raced into the stairwell, following the wisps of smoke that trailed higher and higher. Finally she stopped, breath coming in ragged gasps, her legs begging for rest. The door to whatever floor she was on opened, seemingly by its own will. The call to enter was overwhelming, and she pushed her body for the few more steps it would take to enter that hall.

She stepped through and the world seemed to change, leaping towards her then back again. It was even darker here - her flashlight wasn't even able to penetrate the gloom anymore that a foot. Things seemed to race along the walls, the scratching of tiny legs filling her ears. Echoes of things drifted in the smoke that blanketed the air, snippets of conversations held long ago. The only source of light was a string of gold coming from between the floor and a door at the end of the hall. It was the only place to go, the way back out seeming to have vanished. Slowly she crept towards it while the echoes and scuttling getting louder with each step. Anxiety flooded her and she wanted nothing more than to go, but she couldn't stop walking. Despite her protest her body trudged forward, step by step towards the door. She looked around, but whenever she focused on something it seemed to melt away, being replaced by something entirely different. Eventually she stood before the door and her hand reached out on its own and turned the handle. Static rushed through her vision like she was looking through the lens of some old camera. Her body was hers again, and despite her fierce rubbing, her eyes would not return to normal.

She was in the bedroom of a small apartment. There was a window, but only a grainy white was outside. It looked like the rest of reality had been blasted apart. She heard a whimpering from the corner and turned towards it. Cowering In a corner was a small girl, no more than 9. Quickly she moved towards the girl, kneeling down in front of her. The girl was crying.

"Shhh" Terra cooed softly.

"Where are your Mommy and Daddy? Do you know what's going on here?" She said, concern and puzzlement creeping into her voice.

"The bad person took them" the girl said between gentle sobs.

"What bad person? Where did they go?"

The girl looked up and recoiled in fear, pointing towards the window. Terra looked, amazed at what she saw. It was a bright warm day outside. The sun was radiating off the widows of the adjacent building, and for a moment Terra thought everything was all right. Then she looked down. People from all direction streamed towards the bay, expressions of terror etched across every face. Explosions rolled in the background, buildings crumbling beneath the awesome power being wielded by whatever adversary approached. The sound of fighting drew closer, and she could make out the shapes of men who moved with drilled precision; the military. They streamed around their tanks like ants around a queen, firing into the approaching cloud of dust. An explosion of earth shook the street, dozens of men and machines vanishing into the ground. The rest scattered, seeing the futility in staying, their only concern now their safety.

"The bad person" the girl sobbed "the bad person is coming back."

Terra stood horrified as swaths of people were cut down in their flight by arcs of power. Entire blocks crumbled and as the dust settled a figure revealed itself to the hundreds of dead and dying.

"Who is that" Terra breathed, tears of sorrow beginning to come to the surface. The girl was silent, and remained that way. Terra turned around as a shape flashed towards her. Bony fingers grabbed her by the collarbone, burrowing in to her flesh. A gasp of pain escaped her lips as the creature continued to morph before her eyes. Arms and legs grew longer, skin molted off to revel a suit of rusted form fitting metal armor now encasing the demonic shape latched onto her. Teeth grew then rotted to reveal pointed shards of rocks, quivering in their gums. Dirty hair, the color of rotting straw fell down behind its head. Hateful blue eyes stared into Terra's, and she shrieked it in absolute terror.

"It is I. How quickly you can forget my dear." Her rotting double spoke to her, with the voice of Slade. With a shriek of pleasure the creature threw her out the window.

A groan from the bed snapped him out of his thoughts.

"Terra?"

She was being dragged. Hard bits of rock dug into her knees, and she left a trail of blood behind her. Her vision swam, and a multitude of sounds assaulted her thoughts. It sounded like the ocean, but when she commanded her vision to focus only mud slid past, frothing wildly. Still she was dragged, up hard steps of limestone, past monuments forged from granite and dripping in blood. It was a vision of hell. She mustered enough strength to look up, to see where she was being dragged. She was almost at the entrance of Titans tower.

The entranced loomed closer, the charnel stink of decay pouring out from the blackness beyond. Every fiber of her being seemed to be screaming to get away, to not enter, but she was powerless to resist, the shapes holding her unforgiving in their crushing embrace. She was dragged into the entrance and the world fell away behind her. Red mist covered the ground, and the walls continually shifted, mad portraits appears and disappearing, all made from earth. She was hauled up flight of stairs, and into the main room. Grisly trophies adorned these walls, and she sobbed as their shaped revealed themselves. A small mask hung by a nail, below that the tattered remains of the Boy-Wonder's uniform. Opposite that, on a table crudely shaped from slabs of earth laid a hand, its metallic surface reflecting the dead light that shone in through the windows. The creatures dragged her through the room, into the hall that once led to the Titan's rooms. Past Robins, past Cyborg's, past the others, never ending screams emitting from them, though she could not tell if the screams belonged to her friends. They dropped her in front of what used to be her room, and the door ground open. With a savage push that sent her tumbling the creatures closed the door behind her.

Terra's prostrate form began to quiver in the bed, her groans being replaced with slight screams and Beast Boy ran to get Cyborg as the machines lining the wall began to blip and chime uncontrollably.

It was impossibly large for the dimensions it used to be. The room seemed almost circular, the ends retreating into shadow. They air was still and almost too thin to breath. She struggled forward, intent on finding a way to escape.

"Hello apprentice. Or should I say master…" The deformed twin materialized before her eyes, perched on a throne of bone.

"Look what we have accomplished; we have brought the world to its knees. More than anything I or my master had thought possible. At least until we became one." The creature said, standing up and throwing its arms out in a grand gesture.

"What?" Terra gasped, fear choking back any other words.

"Hmmm? Oh, you didn't know? Of course not, you were too stupid, too naive to realize it. Not even Slade realized it, until it happened."

Nothing the creature said made any sense. Slade wanted her, sure, but he would never have done…this. Right?

"I see you are still too stupid." The she-thing sneered, kicking Terra back.

Instead of cold stone, she rolled onto a soft carpet. Raising herself to her knee, she looked down and noticed she had come to rest on the pelt of some great bear. A wave of revulsion swept through her, every though screaming for release. This couldn't be happening, this isn't real, it wouldn't happen like this. But every thought seemed to be a physical blow, shooting her vision down to the great pelt strewed beneath her. Bitter tears raced to the surface. She wanted to die for this.

The fur beneath her was green.

"Her mind is reacting to all the trauma it's had to put up with. To wake her up would only kill her. If she's going to wake up, it's going to be when she wants to. She's fighting a battle in her head; it's something she has to win to wake up from." Cyborg said, after examining the charts of data now strewn about the infirmary.

Upon returning to her side with Cyborg, Beast Boy had been holding her hand, unable to stand watching her like this. Tears budded from her closed eyes and her body shook violently, as if it was under assault. She murmured incoherent things, her voice holding great pain.

She threw everything she could at her opposite. Golden energy shooting from her hands, bricks, slabs, entire walls were flung at the devil. But it simply dodged or disappeared, reappearing from mist right next to her to deliver a crushing blow. Rage consumed her, and still she fought on. She would take this place apart; destroy it all, she screamed, if that was what it took to kill her nightmare. The creature simply cackled, and continued to evade. Soon the tower was in pieces flung all over, and Terra could fight no more. Weakly she knelt on the ground, twists of metal and stone littering the area around her. The creature strode towards her, victory alight in its eyes.

"Terra, wake up. Please wake up." Beast Boy pleaded, his face just inches from hers. He couldn't sit by and let her kill herself, he wouldn't allow it. He shook her by the shoulders, saying her name over and over, spewing forth his feeling about her, his hopes his dreams, how much he needed her to just wake up.

"Please, I can't lose you again. Just wake up." He whispered, resting his forehead on hers.

A feeling of calm spread through her ruined body, and she felt like someone she cared for deeply was nearby, supporting her.

"This is the world you will create Terra, this is how it will look. Embrace it, and make it happen." The creature taunted stopping just feet from Terra.

Slowly a slab of stone rose up, a golden aura surrounding it. The creature stared impassively as it rose above the shattered girl, laughed at her feeble attempts to resist her.

"Have we not been through this? You cannot hope to beat me. Your rocks are dust to me, your bolts of earth nothing but echoes of your futility. What hope do you have against me?" The creature continued, a mocking smile splayed across its ruined features.

Weakly Terra smiled, holding close to that feeling of comfort. She knew how to win. She began to hear things, strings of admittance, and of love. They were for her and she was not going to lose. The slab hovered over her, its golden sheen beginning to gleam brightly.

"I will beat you the same way you beat an infection." She said, causing a look of bewilderment upon the creature.

"Stop it at the source." The golden energy released the slab, and it plummeted down to the earth.

A scream of pure hatred was the last thing she heard.

She shot up into his arms, into his lips. Both were surprised, but both welcomed it. She trembled violently as he held her to him. Slowly their lips parted, faces blushing. He had been sitting on the edge of the bed, and she curled herself into him, not falling asleep but seeking the comfort only he could give. She listened to his heart beat, eyes closed and a content smile on her lips. Her pain melted away under his touch, and she was able to find the home she hadn't had for so long, in his arms.

The door to the infirmary is open and as Starfire passes by she sees them cuddled together. Stopping in her tracks she stares with rapt enthusiasm, and begins to draw in a deep breath, ready to shout how joyous this occasion is and how it deserves celebrating. A hand quickly shoots up to muffle her cry, and a voice says "Don't."

"But why friend Raven, when this is most certainly an occasion that calls for celebration." Starfire spoke, once she and the Raven had left the couple's earshot.


Well there's the part a bunch of you must have been waiting for. Chapter 5 should be up around this time next week. I have a couple other stories in the works, including a sequal to this one (even though I'm not finished with this story yet), so I am juggling writing all of them.