A/N I don't own the Teen Titans. I do own this story and I've recently gotten some very good inspiration on for this story. I already have the next chapter (or two) written in their entirety and I will post them after this gets a few reviews. As always, if you like it or hate it please review! Thanks and I hope you enjoy,

CrimsonBlade117.

Valley Of Discovery

The Beast's attack went unfinished for what felt like an eternity to Beast Boy; his stunned mind was dazed enough that his thoughts became very surreal as he gazed at the scene that was before him. He needed to wrap his mind around what was going on, it seemed as though time's nearly unalterable current had been somehow halted to those around him, though its flow continued to wash over him.

Shock from both the situation and his numerous injuries clouded his thinking as he tried to understand what exactly was happening. That was going to take a while from how shook up he was, but luckily time appeared to be in vast supply.

First he checked his personal condition, which was far from optimal. He felt like his body had gone through a meat grinder, almost every part of him hurt. For now though he pushed through the pain, letting numbness take its place. He thought it best to ignore it because feeling sorry for himself wouldn't do anyone any good.

Beast Boy blinked blood from his right eye as he tried to take in the situation before him as best as he could in his nearly delirious state. From the way that the Creature was above Raven, pulling back ready to attack, it looked as though even the insubstantial force of gravity would eventually pull it back towards her.

'But gravity can be so powerful,' he thought to himself, 'in the right or wrong situations gravity can be amazingly powerful…..vicious even.' Suddenly, as if transported through time and space, he saw a peaceful little town, it was so beautiful, so simple. He had no idea if this town were real or a delusion, but he was taken in by all that he could see. It was almost like he could see everything at once, taking it all in instantly.

The dawning sunlight cleared the surrounding mountains and sparkled off the dew on the buildings, the grass, the sidewalks. With light sparkling off of every surface the day begins for that town, that beautifully innocent town.

Suddenly Beast Boy was standing on the outskirts of the community, a radical change in perspective from the nearly omnipresent view he had only moments before. Before him Raven was held effortlessly off the ground by the same invisible force as she had been before his thoughts had taken him here. The sun highlighted her silky hair as it shone on her back and into Beast Boy's eyes with its dawning brilliance.

Beast Boy heard chimes faintly over the breeze, as if from far behind Raven. Then he realized that sound wasn't chimes faded from the distance, but chains hanging loosely from Raven's arms. The reason he heard them at all was because that the ends not shackled to Raven's wrists were slowly rising, slowly and inexplicably drawn above her head.

As her hands and arms limply began to follow the chains upward as though she were a marionette her head began to turn to her left, slowly looking away from him to the ground just to her left.

He could feel himself step forward, but he had no idea why he did.

'That's a lie and you know it…..' his own voice echoed through his mind as his body moved without his urging. '….you may not have told your body to step to her, but you know you wanted it to.' that practical no-nonsense voice from deep within told him.

'But what made my body want to step forward, something had to happen or something……right?' he asked himself an instant before he realized what had spurred him to move towards Raven.

Beast Boy could feel the fingers on his right hand slide up the side of her face by her eyebrow and feel her heavenly soft hair caress his fingertips, fingers and the back of his hand.

'Her skin…her hair….God she is so soft…' he uncontrollably thought to himself as his other arm wrapped around her back to pull her lightly to him as he turned her face towards him with his right hand. 'I can't be…..I couldn't….' he thought to himself as he felt his body lean in closer to her on its own accord. He knew he had nothing consciously to do with his body's movement, inside he was frozen like a deer in the lights that shown from her vivid violet eyes.

He wasn't consciously telling his body to do this, but that sure doesn't mean his heart didn't almost explode in his chest as his lips touched her cheek and began kissing, moving slowly over her now closed eyes. He could taste the salt on his lips and her heavenly skin as he closed his eyes and breathed her scent in.

'How could such a beautiful girl ever deserve to cry?' he wondered to himself, intoxicated by her scent, beauty, the feel of her skin on his lips and the tears he tasted as he kissed them away. He could feel his mouth opening to say something, just like how his body moved on its own earlier…..this was going to stop.

He was so tired of whimping out whenever he tried to tell Raven how he felt and saying some retarded joke that earned her disgust. He never would've been able to feel as alive as he felt right at that moment, kissing Raven's tears away, if it hadn't been for some compelling force that pushed him to it. Otherwise he would've just frozen and not have experienced the rush that flooded his body at that second.

"I've always really liked you Raven," he said, taking the initiative and not backing down or running away from his emotions, " when I've made all of those dumb jokes and stuff, I was always just freaking out because I was around you, I didn't know how to handle how you made me feel. I've never been able to say it, but you're what I've wanted the most in this world." He could feel himself begin to tremble lightly as the words poured out, but what stopped him was not cowardice or fear but the look on Raven's face as he opened his eyes to see what her reaction was.

Raven felt the tears run down her face.

She felt the hope and despair tangle, mesh, fight, bite within her, felt the darkness's claws slash at her hope blindly, gashing her with its rage, even as indirect as it was. How could she feel like everything would be okay in the end but feel an acidic and all consuming hopelessness all at the same time?

She felt her chest heave with choked sobbing agony.

Earlier in an instant she had seen inside of the Enemy. She had seen its hate, its rage, felt the raw blaze of its malicious power begin to lick around the edges of her being, threatening to consume her even in that instant. Inside of all of that hate she felt a sexual hunger, almost diffused. It was as if the Creature wasn't male, but something diffused male characteristics into it. She theorized that before that infusion of male characteristics it had been a nearly sexless entity of hatred, gore and horror.

With their enemy being that entity of hatred, gore and horror, where could there be room for feelings, love, and hope? And with that terrible internal conflict raging deep inside her she looked into those beautiful green eyes, feeling the wetness from both his kisses and her tears evaporate and cool the skin around her eyes.

Beast Boy couldn't even begin to guess what the meaning of the tangle of emotion and tears on Raven's face meant. All he needed to know was that he cared deeply for her and she knew it. Hugging her to him with his right arm around her waist he caressed the tears away from her face with his left hand as he hugged her head to his chest.

"Beast Boy……" Raven could hear the quavering weakness and fear in her voice that was just as strong as the hope, love and strength she felt within her. "….thank you so, so much. But you have to….you have to look…..look behind me…." she said as her voice trembled in trepidation of what she knew was behind her.

Not understanding what she was so afraid of Beast Boy did what she told him, ready to defend her from any threats that may have hidden there. What he saw was a dam…..it was so huge he could barely see the top of it, with huge mountains on both sides, stretching out for as far as the eye could see. It was a huge perfect barrier of mountains except for the gap which the man-made dam blocked.

Looking closer he could see a small inlet at the bottom of the dam in the middle. He could just make out the Beast, held by huge chains that glowed with millennia old spells, enchantments and barriers. Two chains led to shackles on each wrist and ankle and a shimmering harness of energy which crossed over its chest and went into the all behind it held it tightly a little more than an arms length away from the cage which surrounded it. Bars that conducted sizzling currents of powerful energies and enchantments horizontally crossed the small indentation that constituted its prison.

It may look like Beast Boy in a certain physical sense, there's no confusing the two beyond that. Bloodlust shown in its green eyes and a sheen of sweat coated its green hair, but the madness which seemed to burn within its eyes like a live and hungry flame ruined the jewels that shone from within. They were mere copies, ruined and corrupted by the pure and unadulterated evil that the Beast was.

The Creature's bindings held tough as it raged constantly, unendingly tugging, and yanking, it even bit at them as rage overpowered its senses. When it put enough force into a pull or yank on the chains its fists would sometimes connect with the bars and smoke would rise from the flesh charred by the powerful energies coursing through the cage.

"I have destroyed entire galaxies in an instant! I have torn the throats out of so many innocent beings throughout this universe that I've almost bored of it!" the crazed Monster screamed with shrill and blood curdling rage. Beast Boy held Raven to himself tighter as the Beast kept screaming curses from its powerful confinement. The Creature laughed quickly and dryly, "Well…..I've almost tired of it…." it trailed off eyeing Raven's body, its eyes coming to rest on her throat.

Suddenly the Monster's fury was instantly harnessed and controlled, its arms hung at its side as it focused all of its hate, all of its fury and all of its thirst for blood onto those innocents before it. To Beast Boy and Raven it felt as if all the air was violently sucked from their lungs as the world crumpled around them like a drawing in the hands of a dissatisfied artist.

The entire space that was between the dam and them crumpled, shrank and disintegrated into nothingness as Raven and Beast Boy were ripped towards the cage and its terrible occupant. In that terrifying and disorienting instant Beast boy could feel himself trade places with Raven; when they blinked back into existence she was facing towards the Monster as Beast Boy stood protectively in front of her, pressed back into her as he felt her bury her face into his back.

The Beast's eyes were so heated with rage Beast Boy could almost feel the hatred from them sear his skin as they pierced him to his very core. "I will escape this you pathetic wretch. I will get out of this pitiful semblance of a prison and I'll taste the sweet air of your world. I'll take over your body, but I'll leave your senses in pristine condition. Then….." it trailed off as it looked over Beast Boy's shoulder. Raven felt her feet leave the ground as the shackles on her wrists pulled her up high enough for her to feel the Beast's blazing gaze as it fell on her terrified face.

Then it used the tremendous power of its concentration to push its arms to their breaking point, pushing them with such force that it actually grabbed the sizzling bars with its hands. With not a single wince of pain as its hands literally cooked it pulled itself forward, straining with its biceps against the harness of energy around its chest. Successfully it pulled itself closer and closer to the bars as it whispered its terrible and twisted promises.

"……then I'll go hunting. With your captive audience I will find your radael." it said as its eyes flicked over to Raven and began to glaze over with a terrifying blood lust, totally ignoring the rising smoke from its sizzling hands which still clung to the bars, pulling it forward.

"Wherever in the world she is, I'll feast upon her flesh. Whatever plane of existence she flees to, I'll find her and violate every aspect of her being." Beast Boy's stomach turned as he smelled the charring flesh and heard the sick intent in the words. Something deep inside of him snapped as they echoed through his mind.

"You will not lay a single finger on her!" Beast Boy screamed as he took a step towards the cage which held the Creature who claimed to have destroyed entire galaxies in an instant. He was only about five feet from the bars that were cooking the Monster's flesh as it taunted him. "I'll stop you right here, right now! How dare you threaten Raven and me!" Beast Boy screamed as rage overpowered him and again he stepped toward the prison which held his foe.

As Beast Boy neared the cage he saw the expression on the Creature's face change in an instant, from icy and controlled rage to a smug and self satisfied smirk. Seeing its opportunity the Monster pushed its muscles past the breaking point and lunged forward, pushing its right arm through the gap between the bars. It didn't even seem to feel the searing pain as its arm was cooked on both sides as it extended more and more outside of its confinement. Beast Boy could see the smoke rising from the seared flesh on its arm and hand, but those claws……they hadn't lost their razor's edge due to the obliteration of its flesh.

"So easily manipulated!" the Beast screamed as its deadly blades began their unstoppable descent towards Beast Boy's throat, ready to deliver their lethal and effortless kiss.

A/N: I hope you enjoyed that, I'm currently very close to getting out the next chapter. I hope you enjoy my stories,

CrimsonBlade117.