3. Primal Rage vs. Animal Instinct
"Sweet little Beast Boy!" she said with her hand on his throat. "I know you. I hate you. Everything is so easy for you, isn't it? Life is just joy and laughter."
Stunned for a moment, Beast Boy quickly realized the gravity of the situation.
"You think you're better than me, don't you?" she snarled. "Well, I'll show you"
Her hand closed around his throat, and she meant business. He tried to pull it off with both hands, but couldn't. How could Raven be this strong?
"What do you know about pain? My pain? My pain! I'll make you suffer."
Her grip was suffocating him. He broke free as a large gorilla, but gashed his head on a stalactite and stumbled backward, falling into the shallow pool of water with a splash.
Rage stood up now, summoning her strength. "I will kill you all. Make you suffer."
He became a small fish and swam to the furthest point of the pool where he reverted to his true form and ducked behind a cluster of stalagmites.
"Raven, what are you doing? It's me, your friend!"
"I'm not Raven!"
"Yes you are! Maybe you're the demon part of her personality, but you're still Raven!" he pleaded.
She directed her thoughts upward and a black aura enveloped a big stalactite. It broke off with a crack and then she propelled it with great force at his location. He ducked further behind the rock formations. The projectile smashes into the rocks, covering him with shards.
"Please, Raven! Stop!" She wasn't fooling around. She was really trying to kill him.
This can't be happening! he thought.
In first couple years of knowing Raven, he had been a little afraid of her, in the back of his mind. But as he, and the rest of the team, had gotten to know her better, it became apparent that she would never hurt anyone. She didn't even want to use excessive force again bad guys! That had emboldened him a bit in teasing her, although she could defend herself pretty well with cutting remarks and sarcasm, and maybe remotely giving him the occasional wedgie.
For an instant, his mind flashed back to the one time she had really hit him, a time they never talked about. He had been teasing her, and had crossed the line on a sensitive subject. Too late did he realize how sensitive. She just looked at him and he could see the hurt in her eyes and the glistening of tears. Using her power, she picked him up and threw him backwards into the wall, hard. Even then, she'd asked, "Are you OK?" before storming out of the room. The look in her eyes had hurt more than the bruises.
But now, that Raven was gone. And the demon wasn't flashing back to times in the past.
She was now breaking off clusters of stalactites and making them spin before hurling them across the cave at him. In a deafening crash, delicate structures, formed by dripping water over millions of years, were obliterated.
He jumped between rock formations for better cover, and took a direct hit as one struck his knee and made him fall. He scrambled the rest of the way behind the bigger formation.
"I don't want to fight you!" he cried. "Please, let's just stop and talk for a minute. Slade is our enemy. We need to get out of here before he finds us."
But demons aren't much for listening to reason. "I hate you!" she shrieked. "Because you hate me. All of you hate me."
"No, Raven. I'm you're friend. I want to help you!"
"Liar!"
Her dark energy ripped loose a boulder and hurled it at the location where his voice was coming from. It shattered calcite columns like a bowling ball smashing through the pins. Beast Boy mostly got out of the way in time, but the pain stinging his back told him he wasn't quite fast enough.
Desperately, he tried to think how to escape. He could go back the way they came, or he could hope to find another exit. The water had to get out of here somehow, and it was flowing toward the far end of the cave.
It was too dark to see what was over there, but a bat wouldn't have any trouble. He transformed and echo-located his way around the rock formations, flying erratically so she couldn't zero in on him.
Rage couldn't see him in the dark, but she was cunning. She anticipated his plan. The bat detected rumbling in the ceiling above the far end of the cavern and veered off. Soon the roof of the cave collapsed in that area, sealing it off.
He transformed back to human. "Raven! You're going to kill us both!"
Using so much energy had exhausted her and she collapsed to her knees to rest. Beast Boy rested for just a moment and then returned to bat form and made for the way they had came in. He almost made it, but she made that narrow passageway collapse too.
The bat could detect no other exit. He made it to the safest spot he could find, across the pool of water from her and settled in. As Beast Boy, he crawled into a crevice for better protection.
What could he do? He desperately tried to think, and hold down his sense of panic. The pain was becoming unbearable, and any animal form would still have a certain degree of damage. Raven was weakened at the moment, but who knew how long that would last? He might be able to find another way out, or slip through the rubble if he had the time, but he couldn't do that with her attacking. He would be too vulnerable.
He could try to disable her. He could charge her as a large animal, but he would be exposed. He could try to knock her unconscious, but if he failed, he'd be an easy target.
The demon stood up again. She had a new idea and she liked it. She howled with joyous rage.
Long jets of black energy shot from her outstretched hands, and then became flame. She blasted away in the darkness in his general direction until she needed to pause to rest and build up her energy again. Small fires burned in among the rocks. Steam hissed where dripping water met the hot rock.
"You hate me! I know you hate me. Just like all the others! I'll kill you all. I'll make you suffer."
Beast Boy jammed himself as far as he could into a crevice. The pain was now unbearable, but he had to grit his teeth to not scream. He knew he needed medical attention, and fast. She had sealed the exits, he was trapped. So was she, but she only seemed to care about killing him. It wouldn't be long before she discovered his hiding place.
Panic and fear overwhelmed him. He was a wounded animal, cornered and in pain. Animal instinct took over. The strongest instinct was self preservation. Fear mixed with anger and surging adrenaline.
Attack. Take her down. Kill her before she kills you.
Kill Raven.
When she paused her ranting and flame throwing to rest a moment, he struck. As a roach, he silently slipped out of the rocks and part of the way to what was left of the pool of water. As a tiny insect he zigzagged and invisibly crossed the remaining distance to her.
Soon Rage sensed something. Her empathic abilities could only read loud emotions, but she got a brief flash of his anger, pain, and his murderous intent.
And she felt he was close, but where? A Philippine cobra dropping from the ceiling? A velociraptor appearing behind her to rip into her neck? Frantically, she looked around and shot energy bolts at random.
But no, Beast Boy wasn't behind her. He was already on her. A tiny spider stood right over a blood vessel leading directly to her heart. An evolutionary freak, this one had disproportionately long fangs and venom so toxic it would cause instantaneous paralysis.
She wouldn't even feel the bite, but less than a second later she would feel the agony of her heart stopping and her nervous system becoming paralyzed. No time to do anything, or even understand what had happened. She had no chance.
The fangs glistened as they prepared to strike. The venom sac swelled. Goodbye, Raven.
.
He couldn't do it. Strike now, you fool! his mind said. But he couldn't do it. His humanity overruled his instincts. He couldn't kill Raven. No matter what she had become.
He zipped back across the cave to his hiding place and returned to human form, exhausted. He had failed, and now he was going to die. A small moan of anguish and pain escaped from him.
Rage got a vague sense that the danger to herself had passed, and she heard a noise from Beast Boy's location. A black claw began to pull away rocks until she spotted part of his purple uniform.
"Raven, please," he called weakly. "I don't hate you. I saved you from Slade, remember? Just now I had you, I could have killed you but I didn't… I didn't."
"Why not? Because you're foolish and weak just like Raven?" She pulled away another rock, exposing more of him.
"No," he said, struggling to stand up. "Because I care about you. I don't want to hurt you… I can't."
There was a brief pause. "I love you, Raven."
"I'm not Raven," she growled, but, for the moment, wasn't blasting him. The red glow in her eyes dimmed.
"You're a part of her. That means I love you too."
No response, so he continued, "Look, what good would killing me do? How will you feel then? You'll just be alone down here. Let's work together and find a way out."
"I don't need you. I don't need anyone. Kill you all."
"OK." He stood completely out in the open. "OK. If that's what you want, then do it. I can't run, and I won't kill you. I love you, Raven. I guess I've always loved you."
But then her eyes began to burn bright again.
"Love?" she sneered incredulously. The black aura developed around her hands. "No... Such…Thing." Then, howling with delight, she directed all her energy at him.
He tried to move. He tried to transform. But it was too late. The bolt was a direct hit, and he flew backward to the ground. She howled again, and then went into a fit of laughter.
…
Beast Boy lay still on the rocky floor.
"Get up. Get up so I can hit you again," she commanded, no longer laughing.
His body lay still.
Nothing but silence.
"I hate you," she said, but without the conviction that had been in her voice earlier.
His broken body lay still. She couldn't sense any emotions.
She splashed through what little water remained in the pool and stood over him.
"You're not dead," she tried to proclaim, but it was hard to make words. His silent body wasn't breathing. What had she done?
Well, it was stupid of him to come out from hiding. He had gotten what he deserved for being stupid. He always had been stupid. He was the only one that was stupid enough…
Stupid enough to try to love her.
A drop of water ran down her cheek from her eye. She wiped it away, puzzled. But now feelings were rising inside of her. Horror was rising. So was dread and regret. A sick feeling churned in her stomach. What had she done?
She dropped to her knees and touched his neck. There was no pulse. Now tears were running down both her cheeks. What did it mean? Demons don't cry.
"No," she said croaked. Using all her ability, she empathically scanned his body. She sensed no heartbeat, but there were massive internal injuries, and no oxygen getting to his brain.
"No!" she screamed, now filling with panic. "I…can't…lose…you. I can't lose you!"
I could absorb his injuries, she thought. I could try to heal him. Brain death was setting in. Soon nothing could revive him.
No, it's too massive. I don't have that kind of power. It will probably kill me too.
Absorb his injuries now! Now! There is no time, something screamed inside her.
It would take everything, everything she had. She probably wouldn't survive. Then so be it.
So be it.
She took a hold of him and everything faded to black.
[Don't worry, Chapter 4: Sunlight is coming soon]
In the meantime, Robin, Starfire and Cyborg are searching very hard to find them.