"What are you doing out here?" Raven turns around in surprise at the question and finds a pale skinned woman with wild dark hair, wearing a sleeveless black tank top, skinny jeans and a studded leather bracelet on her right wrist and a small swirl of a tattoo under her right eye. Raven would have been surprised at her attire in the freezing conditions, but he fact that she can see her in this state and what Raven can sense from her, it is obvious who the woman is.
"You're not what I expected." Raven notes as she looks back at the pile of rocks where her body lies.
"Nope, I'm just me." The woman replies as if amused.
"So… I guess this is how it ends then." Raven sighs. "I had started to hope it wouldn't have been like this." She says and gestures at the broken landscape.
"And it's not, I'm not here to take you away. Unless you really want me to?" Raven sends her an odd look. "My brother just asked me to hang around for a meeting, I figured that would be with you. What?" She asks as Raven just sighs.
"There's far too many people who find me interesting." Raven replies.
"Come on, sit down." The woman says as she pats the rock beside her. "What's the matter?" She asks after Raven sits down. "Some people spend their entire lives trying to get noticed by higher powers and even then they freak out when they finally meet me."
"I am not one of them." Raven sighs as she folds her arms. "People keep picking me out because of who my father is… And I am not him and his power is not mine. But that's all people seem to see or want to see."
"Not those people, not any more." The woman nodes at the plateau where the League and Titans are. "Not the brooding one back in Gotham or Azerath."
"People like you." Raven corrects.
"Well not me." The woman smiles. "I am only here because I was asked to, but my job had me there when you were born, when you killed your father and when you passed into Tartarus."
"You weren't inside that place?" Raven asks.
"Oh no, that's a realm of the dead and I don't go there normally because people in there are where they believe they need to be. I just pick them up and send them off to the ferry if they believe they must. But I was there when you crossed the threshold of the door, when you did that, you died, technically. But I wasn't the one following you when you left."
"Didn't feel like I died then." Raven notes as she remembers the battle and what came after.
"Of course not. It's simply a transition you make to make everything make sense, living people in the land of the dead doesn't make sense. I was there too when your friends went in after you."
"So… What am I to you?" Raven asks after a moment.
"I am not quite sure, too gloomy perhaps?" The woman replies with a smile.
"Never thought I'd hear that from Death." Raven notes, instantly reminded that Garfield would have been on his back laughing if he heard it. "Look at this." She says and motions at the ruin of the valley. "I caused this, everything I've done and tried to be over the years is ruined. I've hurt the people I care about, physically, mentally and spiritually. And I don't even know how many people have gotten hurt elsewhere because of me. I have no reason to be happy."
"Because you choose to only look at all the bad stuff Gloomy." Death smiles. "You need to look at the bright sides as well. Hmm I think I know what you are now. A phoenix."
"A phoenix?" Raven asks.
"Yup, that's what I call them, I've seen a few of them before; you rise, you fall, you burn and then rise again." Death replies before she notices something and looks away. "Hmm. Look, I'd love to keep on chatting, but I am afraid you have to get back in your body before it's too late."
"At the moment, not coming back seems to be the safer option for everyone." Raven mumbles.
"Well, you'd end up travelling with a company." Death notes at the plateau. "And there are some who are just waiting for me to hand you over." She nods at a distant peak where Raven can just make out a few tiny lights. "Always look on the bright side of life Raven, the negatives aren't worth the time." Death says as she rises. "I will see you again one day, don't waste what you have till then." She says before she vanishes.
Raven looks up at the peak again before turning to the plateau, her battered friends have lost, she can feel that much, their fight with her had drained them, rendered incapable of holding back a tide of fresh adversaries. "They need me." She thinks before she expands her senses to cover the globe, the damage is done and still ongoing but not growing. "The Earth needs me." She continues and turns to look at the tons of rock covering her body and readies herself to face the other part of her before she moves down to it and enters it.
She is where she wants to be; the council room, where the aspects of her emotions are seated and waiting for her, save for Carnage, who is lying on her stomach in the middle of the room covering her head with her hands.
"What am I going to do with you Carnage?" Raven asks dryly as she looks down on the fallen aspect that keeps its face in the ground. "I spared you before, gave you a voice and a place to call your own… and this is how you repay me?!" She shouts at the aspect that twitches in fear and covers her head.
"Wimp." Rage growls.
"It wasn't her." Suspicion notes. "Not entirely." She gets a number of looks and nods from the more cerebral aspects, if Carnage really had been alone in this, she would not be cowering like this.
"Right." Raven grumbles as she looks at them. "Come to me." The minor emotions fade at her command and the Primal's rise from their seats before they move to her and disappear into her leaving her in her white attire. "Up." She growls and pulls Carnage to her feet, she notices something beneath the hood of the otherwise wide eyed and fearful emotion. Carefully she pushes Carnages hood back and finds a red-glowing Omega symbol stamped into the skin of her forehead. "Who did this? What happened?" She asks.
"I… I don't know." Carnage stammers. "I woke up in the fortress… I-I felt compelled to follow… To serve…"
"Dear old dad." Raven growls, recognizing the submissive streak Trigon added to Carnages' personality. Without the rest of her to back her up Carnage could be ordered around by people with an aura of authority as long as she wasn't upset. "And…?"
"The Hawkwoman's mace… angered me, woke me up." Carnage hisses as if she had been done an injustice.
"So you thought it was your time?" Raven asks harshly. "Imprisoning me in my own head while you waltzed about? Have you any idea what you have done?!"
"You were already entombed!" Carnage snaps. "Yes I took the chance to be in control for once, and don't think you'd have been any different if we changed cloaks!"
"And how did the world treat you?" Raven asks calmly after using half a second to decide to change the subject. "Did you like dancing around to Talia's tune?"
"Bravery wouldn't help me break it!" Carnage snaps.
"Bravery is me and of course they wouldn't cooperate with you while I was imprisoned, and with all the harm you've done to us in the past. And in case you didn't get it the first time, you are a part of me as well now, and you have been that for the last two and a half years. You can't operate alone any more, gain control of me and you stand on your own, without anything to help you from this end but the function I gave you. Not that it would have been any different if it had been Father pulling your leash." Raven replies as Carnage instantly starts fuming with anger, but Raven doesn't care, it was time Carnage to be told the hard truth.
"Father loved me! He had a destiny waiting for me!" Carnage snaps. "I would have been a Queen!"
"You would have been a servant, nothing more. It wouldn't matter what titles you would have acquired, you would always just be a servant to him, never an equal." Raven shrugs, that much is just a basic observation of any group of demons, the leader never had an equal in rank or power, it was just too dangerous for them. And Trigon was no different in this regard, even if he elevated her, he would never permit Carnage to become a threat to his position within the Eighth Pit.
"Was I ever an equal here?!" Carnage continues and waves at the room.
"I diminished you, true enough. But you have been an equal here, your voice counted as much as that of Knowledge, Bravery, Hatred and the others. I let you do what you please in your corner of my mind same as I let the others, that is the extent of the freedom I can give you, which is far more than Talia or Trigon would have." Carnage is about to snap at her again before it hits her and she just looks stumped.
"I-I would have had lands, minions, servants!" She starts and works her anger back up. "I would have carved out my own corner of Hell! I would have carved it to my liking if it should take a thousand years and the lives of billions to do so!"
"Yet you would come and go as Trigon wished it, decorated it as he saw fit. As for minions, you could just make some here if you wish for any. Down there, well you have seen them, if they aren't plotting your murder, they are mindless automatons."
"I'd get some who weren't!" Carnage snaps, both of them knowing Carnage preferred free-willed but terrified servants because they had greater entertainment value to one that would feed off fear and misery.
"And you think Trigon would permit that?" Raven asks with a raised eyebrow. "Let me tell you something Carnage. Had you succeeded and the world was turned to ash because of Trigon, then yeah, you might have gotten the lands and minions you desired, but they would be of the rabble Trigon didn't keep for himself. Sure you might have been his one and all, his prodigal child for a while, but slowly he would get bored with you, you'd find it harder to impress and please him as you would need to. Either he would one day decide it would be for the best you were one of his automatons or reminded of your place, like Thrakmar or perhaps as one of the Seedmothers. Or perhaps your own hatred of him and your own ambition would lead you down the road of rebellion, one that would ultimately fail, because all of your power, all your might would be his to give and take away." Raven says as she walks around Carnage that just stands completely still. "He'd permit your rebellion, watch as you fought your way to him in amusement. Then, when you finally stood in his presence challenging his power, he would snap his fingers and take away all the power you have before he would condemn you. Imagine spending the rest of eternity in one of his dungeons, forgotten and alone, while he most likely would raise another unfortunate child to take your place once he had forgotten you exist."
"W-Why… are you telling me this?" Carnage asks, sounding as if she was on the verge of tears, Raven knew it was something Carnage had already speculated herself, but she preferred believing in the fantasy of her own glory rather than the truth that would destroy everything she believed in. "What game are you playing with me?!" She demands.
"Because I need you as much as you need me." Raven replies. "I know I can't survive without you, there are too many who'd want me dead and I don't think I could survive your absence. And you need me, because without me, you are nothing, you know that." Raven just stands and watches it sink into Carnage, it's another realization Carnage had been confronted with, with the death of Trigon and her failure at taking control of Raven, she really was nothing. Carnage was a name she gave herself in the absence of having another, outside of Raven barely anyone knew she was there and even Trigons fallen champion laughed at her from his own prison. And it was her own fault, the punishment for failing her father and her own choice when she took the cape to avoid total oblivion, all that was left now was a rebellious fragment of a greater whole called Raven.
"You can't turn your back on me." Carnage sighs. "I am what I am, and the only way you could change that is by destroying your own memory of me."
"No, you are what you choose to be. That is what I have learned over the years. It doesn't matter how you were born or to what purpose, it's about what you choose to be." Raven replies. "And now, while we are getting swamped by enemies. I am asking you not to be my enemy, together we can be so much more, we need to be in order to survive this and if we make it through we can both be free of this endless squabbling."
"She says to the prisoner." Carnage growls.
"Only if you consider this place a prison, yet I have given you the power to make your place everything you could wish it to be. You want it as large as eternity? You can make it so. You want fawning minions? Create some that suit you. In here you really can make the world in your image." Raven replies as she extends her hand. "Take my hand Carnage, I can't set you loose on the world, but with me and the others, you will have the next best thing and I need you now."
"Just like that, you forgive me? And what about them? Those people outside?" Carnage asks. "After what I did to them, do you think they will just forgive and forget?"
"It is as much my fault for not making you feel welcome that we are back to this. As for the others, I am sure we are both going to face some hard times for what we've done, but I told them again and again, that we are one, what we do good, we do together, what we do bad we do as one. Perhaps we will endure the consequences, perhaps not, I hope we do. But I know that together, we will figure something out."
"You realize if you have your way, we could be spending the next dozen years in a concrete box?" Carnage asks.
"Well that's our fault, and I have always been trying to redeem my own existence. It's only right we atone for the damage that's been done. But so far, we don't know if that's what will happen."
"Suddenly you express optimism where you'd only express pessimism." Carnage notes.
"I was just reminded to look on the bright side; I am alive, people came to my rescue, I have a home and people who care about me. And I want that back, and I like you to be part of it as well. So what say you, will you be with us when we rise again, when we let go of fear, of the limitations and expectations? When we rise and become a new Raven?"
"Things will never be the same if we do that." Carnage continues.
"Things are always changing." Raven shrugs, Carnage smirks before finally taking Raven's hand.