Night of the Cursed

by A-LionGleek

The titans have finally returned from Tokyo, but before long they end up at work once again to foil the newest plot cooked up by their arch nemesis, Slade, and his new compatriot Vandal Savage. And to make matters worse, if they don't stop this plot, then there will literally be Hell to pay! Rated T to be safe.

18. Salvation

Hey there everybody! I hope you haven't all lost faith in me, because here, at long last, is a brand new chapter! I am SO sorry that I kept you guys waiting for so long. Let's just say that things got complicated. But now, at long last, here is a new chapter! And in this epic new chapter, the final battle begins. Will the Titans be able to stop the demons and prevent Apocalypse take 2? Or have they finally come up against the challenge that not even THEY can hope to overcome? Find out, in this fantastic new chapter!

But first, just to remind you all, I do not own Teen Titans, the DC Universe in general, or any religious elements. Got that? Good. Now, onward with the story (and please do not hesitate to leave me feedback either, regardless of whether or not you are a guest or registered user).

Chapter 17:

Salvation

For a brief moment, the Titans could only stare wide eyed and open mouthed at the massive ocean of demonic smoke that was now rocketing out from the Devil's Gate and seething around in the air above them. After a while, Beast Boy whistled, and said, "We are in serious trouble."

"You think?!" Cyborg yelled.

"What are we gonna do?" Starfire asked Robin. "Friend Beast Boy is correct. Their numbers are far too large for us to have an easy chance at defeating if we fight them."

Robin directed a hard-eyed glare towards the writhing ocean of demonic smoke in the sky, and then positioned himself so that he once again had his sword in a battle-ready position before saying, "We do what we always do Star; we fight anyway."

"You heard the man," said Cyborg. "As bleak as this situation might seem, we're just gonna have to suck it up and fight our way out, just like usual."

"Too true," said Raven. "Still, at least we won't necessarily have to defeat all of them on our own."

"You got that right Rae," said Beast Boy. "We just need to defeat enough of them to give our fearless leader the time he needs to successfully open the Stairway to Heaven and the rest will be history."

"Exactly," said Robin. "And if we go down in flames, then so be it."

Starfire directed a nervous look upwards towards the mass of demonic smoke, then gulped, nodded her head, and said, "If you say so friends." Then she took on her own battle ready position. And before long, right as the Titans continued to stare at the storm of demons, every single one of the gigantic plumes of smoke landed on the ground one by one, solidifying into corporeal form not too long afterward.

As one, all the demons turned their heads to face the direction of the Titans, smirks on their faces as they were expecting to see their comrades from the first advance party at the very least, and potentially them wiping the floor with Robin at the very most. But at the sight of what actually did end up being what they saw before them, they all developed a shared look of surprise. "What the . . . ?" one of the demons shrieked.

"Titans go!" Robin yelled. In a flash, the five teenage heroes rushed towards the massive army of demons, Beast Boy even going so far as to turn into a lion and lunging towards them. The demons didn't even get the chance to get themselves into proper position for battle before the Titans were upon them.

For the next few minutes that followed, the battle that unfolded was truly a massacre, and not in the demon's favor. Every which way, more and more demons continued to meet their demise as the five teenage heroes continued to take them out without giving them any time to get over their apparent surprise. Within ten minutes, almost half of the army of demons had been vanquished, either having been blasted to dust by Cyborg, Starfire, or Raven, cut down by Robin's sword, or savagely ripped apart by Beast Boy in his lion form. Even as all this was happening, Robin found himself very surprised that his friends seemed to be killing off demons alongside him so easily. But at that moment, he wasn't nearly so worried about how that was possible as he was about just killing as many demons as possible so as to allow himself sufficient time to summon help.

However, after those ten minutes were up, the demons that remained finally managed to get over their initial shock and properly prepare themselves to defend and counterattack. Fortunately, in spite of their now having to actually worry about attempting to block and defend themselves against counterattacks from the demons, the Titans still managed to hold their own quite well.

Robin continued to hack and slash at the demons that attacked him with his sword, effortlessly causing them to explode into dust all around him. Cyborg continued to blast his attackers with his sonic cannon and other mechanical weapons, as well as beating more than one of them aside with swings of his metallic fists. Raven shamelessly used her powers as if her life depended on it (though it could be argued that it in fact did), effortlessly blasting demons, crushing them with telekinetically hurled objects, or even flat out ripping them apart or crushing their hearts from within their chests. Beast Boy fought like a whirlwind. Even though the odds continued to rise against him, more and more demons fell to his might as he continued to unleash all the power he had against them as a lion, crocodile, gorilla, rhino, and even a wolf. Starfire, meanwhile, unleashed so much of her star bolts and laser beams that the night seemed to turn to day.

As it turned out, Starfire actually couldn't have felt more proud of herself as she continued to fight and defeat more and more demons. "If only my sister could see me now," she thought to herself as she blasted yet another small group of demons to dust with a single well-aimed star bolt blast. "I'm sure that this would be the kind of thing that, if she were to see it, would give her the kick."

At that moment, her thoughts were interrupted when she heard the sound of squawking coming from behind her. She turned her head just in time to see a wind demon flying down towards her with its taloned feet at the ready so that the wicked sharp claws would jab straight into her back. Starfire rapidly kicked the demon in the beak, sending it hurtling backward, then rapidly turned around just in time to deal a swift forward jabbing punch to a second wind demon that had been in the midst of an attempt to run her through with its beak while she'd been distracted by its comrade. The two demons recovered within a few seconds, shrieked in unison at the Tamaranean, and then both soared towards her simultaneously. Starfire swooped downwards out of the way, and thus the two demons ended up painfully colliding head-on with each other.

Starfire had just enough time to direct a brief smirk at the now considerably disoriented wind demons before she heard hissing coming from behind her. She turned her head in time to see a poison demon standing right there with its frill unfurled, and its mouth open and dripping with venom. It appeared that the creature was on the verge of spitting acid at her. Starfire hurriedly fired her eye beams straight into the demon's open mouth, and the demon howled in agony as smoke started pouring from its mouth as a result of the blast, and it stumbled backward straight into a tree before slumping down on its backside, hissing in pain, before then bursting into dust.

The next few demons that attempted to attack Starfire fared no better. A fire demon that attempted to pounce on her from behind while she was still looking in the direction of the now incapacitated poison demon was sent flying backward by a kick to the stomach. A shadow demon that attempted to bite her from the side got pounded right in the jaw by her right fist. A water demon that attempted to prepare a water spout to fire at Starfire from its hands was blasted to dust by a star bolt before it was even half finished in charging up its attack. And a thunder demon and poison demon that ran at her from two opposing directions fared even worse when Starfire ducked right as the poison demon attempted to sting her with its tail. As a result of Starfire ducking at just the right moment, the poison demon's barbed tail stabbed its thunder demon partner right in the heart, and the golden yellow demon screamed in pain before bursting into dust. The poison demon had only just realized what had just happened to its partner in the attempted attack on Starfire before the Tamaranean grabbed it by the tip of its tail, tore the tail right off its body, and then thrusted the barbed stinger upwards straight through its throat. The stunned demon had just enough time to gape at the Tamaranean and gurgle weakly in pain before collapsing into dust.

Beast Boy, meanwhile, was fighting an equally intense battle of his own. Roaring in fury as a lion, the changeling bravely stood his ground as several demons surrounded him and prepared to attack. Right as the one directly in front of him had positioned its tail as if about to sting him, he pounced on it. The demon had just enough to grunt in pain before the mighty green lion slit the infernal monster's throat with its claws. Beast Boy had just enough time to let out a roar of challenge before a nearby thunder demon rushed towards him from his left, howling in rage. Beast Boy roared, turned into a crocodile, and swiped the demon's legs out from under it with a swing of his tail. No sooner had the thunder demon landed when Beast Boy snapped his jaws around the creature's tail and tossed it aside. A fire demon to Beast Boy's right then decided to try its luck at pouncing at the changeling, only to be sent flying backward when the changeling turned into a rhino and smacked it upside the head with his horned snout.

Even as the fire demon was thrown aside, the other demons were still not about to give up. Snarling angrily, a shadow demon charged towards Beast Boy, only for the changeling to turn into a gorilla, grab it by the horns, and then violently yank them in a counterclockwise direction, snapping its neck. Seconds before the now dead shadow demon collapsed into dust, the green gorilla grabbed onto one of the creature's horns, wrenched it off, and turned around in time to slit the throat of the thunder demon he'd earlier tossed aside as a crocodile. The luckless thunder demon burst into dust, and the changeling turned to face the one demon that remained of the group. The demon in question, a water demon, now looked quite terrified, and it hurriedly turned to attempt to flee. The demon never even got the chance to take a single footstep before Beast Boy turned into a wolf, snarled in bloodlust, and pounced on it. Within seconds, the sound of the demon's agonized wailing and the bloodthirsty snarling and growling of Beast Boy's wolf form filled the air as the changeling proceeded to violently rip the demon apart.

At the same time that Beast Boy was very graphically introducing the luckless water demon to a very new version of Hell, Raven was proving herself to be a far more serious threat then the Luciferian demons had ever before considered the spawn of a demon from a rival form of Hell, let alone one that was only half demon. A contingent of fire demons attempted to surround the sorceress, only to be sent flying by a sudden whirlpool of shadowy energy before they could even form half a circle around her. A group of poison demons materialized in the area that the fire demons had been attempting to reach and prepared to spit their venom at her. Raven summoned a force field right as the demons spat the venom, and the corrosive acid harmlessly splashed against the shield. Before the demons could attempt to prepare a second venom spit attack, Raven lowered her shield, chanted her mantra, and blasted them away with a storm of shadowy meteors. A group of thunder demons then appeared, their hands crackling with electricity, only to be crushed by a series of rocky slaps that arose from the sides and pinned together against them like snapping alligator jaws at a snap of Raven's fingers.

No sooner had Raven dismissed the shadowy energy holding up the rocky death traps, and the slabs of earthen material slammed back down to where they came from, when the sorceress heard the snarling of yet more demons coming. She glared at the area from which she'd heard the sound coming from just in time to see a large pack of water demons rushing towards her. Growling silently, she yelled out her mantra and lifted her hands up towards the sky. In a flash, a massive storm of shadowy lightning bolts plunged down upon the demons and blasted all but one of them to dust. The only one that wasn't instantly killed was left severely winded and gasping for breath on the ground. Raven summoned a ring of shadowy energy around its neck and lifted it up into the air, where she then tightened the ring and caused the demon to cough and hiss in pain before finally ending its misery by snapping her fingers and causing it to explode into dust.

Cyborg, meanwhile, was beating down demons left and right. Mere seconds after Raven caused her most recent demon attacker to explode, Cyborg sent an entire trio of poison demons rocketing backward with a single sweeping punch. "Yeah that's right ya'll!" Cyborg yelled as the three demons were knocked away. "Ya'll don't mess with Cyborg and get away with it!" He then converted his right arm into a sonic cannon, aimed it at a group of water demons running towards him from that side, and fired. As he unleashed the sonic laser, he started to spin himself around in circles, causing the beam to rapidly rotate counterclockwise and blast almost every single demon that was positioned around the bionic teenager. Only a small group of thunder demons managed to avoid getting blasted to dust by jumping backwards out of the way right as their comrades were finding themselves on the receiving end of Cyborg's blast. Before they even had a chance to charge at Cyborg again when the sonic laser assault ended, they were sent flying backward by a powerful shockwave of ultrasonic noise waves. "Booyah!" Cyborg shouted as the demons were sent packing.

At the same time that the group of thunder demons were cast aside, a group of shadow demons materialized in the area where they'd been standing and roared at Cyborg in challenge. Cyborg took on a battle ready position, ready to take them on. Then the shadow demon at the very front of the group proceeded to lunge towards Cyborg, its claws and fangs at the ready. Cyborg grabbed the demon by the horns and lifted it upwards. As he did this, Cyborg yelled, "He catches, he aims." He then positioned the demon as if he were about to throw it straight at the other members of its group. "He shoots," he yelled as he threw the demon straight towards its brethren. The demon crashed headlong into the rest of its group, sending them all hurtling backward. "Score, for Cyborg!" Cyborg hollered with his right fist raised up in a victory gesture.

Then Cyborg heard the sound of a demonic roaring coming from behind him. He turned his head just in time to see a fire demon standing not too far behind him about to attempt to hurl fire balls from its hands straight at Beast Boy and Raven. The two chromatically challenged Titans in question were quite distracted by their own current attackers at that particular moment, and thus wouldn't stand a chance of noticing the upcoming attack in time to evade it. Enraged at the sight of the very cheap shot that this fire demon was about to take, he barreled towards it. "Hey you!"

The demon turned its head in the direction that it had heard the voice coming from and let out an indignant snarl as it turned its body fully around to face the cybernetic teenager that had now interrupted it's attempt at blindsiding the shape shifter and half demon sorceress. Cyborg skidded to a stop in front of the angry demon, his fists clenched and his face painted with a glare that clearly stated, 'No way are you messing with my friends'. The demon growled, caused its teeth to burst into flames, and then thrusted its head and neck forward in an attempt to bite Cyborg with its fiery fangs.

Cyborg stepped aside in time to avoid ending up on the flaming end of the demon's fangs, and the two stepped around to their respective left sides in an attempt to get a clear view of each other again to initiate their next attack. Then, right as the demon had its right side facing Cyborg and turned its head, Cyborg jumped up onto its back and wrapped his arms around its neck. The demon snarled in irritation, and tried to snap its still flaming jaws around Cyborg's neck, but the bionic hero was positioned in a way that left him out of reach of the demon's teeth, and the demon ended up uselessly turning itself around in circles.

The demon then eventually managed to knock Cyborg off of him by banging him in the chin with the top segment of its mane of horns. Cyborg landed on the ground on his back, and the demon rushed towards him before lowering its jaws towards him in yet another attempt to bite him. However, the method the demon had used to get Cyborg off of it had inadvertently given Cyborg another idea on how to prevent the creature from biting him, and he grabbed onto the demon's horns and pushed upwards on them right as the demon was seconds away from sufficient biting distance, leaving the demon ineffectively snapping at the thin air just inches above Cyborg's chest and neck. At that moment, as the demon continued to snap ineffectively at him with its jaws, Cyborg managed to let go with one hand, gather up some dust with the hand in question, and then fling it upwards into the demons mouth.

This unexpected attack not only extinguished the fire around the demon's fangs, but also gave Cyborg the added bonus of the demon willingly straightening back up and slightly backing off as it coughed and sputtered from the unexpected dust that had now gotten in its mouth. This gave Cyborg just the right amount of time he needed to get back up on his feet and prepare himself to face off with the demon on equal footing once more.

Seconds later, the demon recovered sufficiently enough to turn to face Cyborg once more. It had just opened its jaws and started to roar at Cyborg before it then had to swerve downward to its right to avoid getting slugged right in the face by Cyborg's left fist. When the two combatants straightened back up on both their feet once more, Cyborg ended up having to swerve downwards to his own right to avoid getting roasted by a small fireball that the demon spat at him. He then swung his right fist at the demon at the exact same time as he was straightening back up onto his feet, only for the demon to dodge by rearing its head upwards so that the bionic teen's fist swung harmlessly just beneath the creature's chin. The demon then dodged a second punch, this one from Cyborg's left fist, by stepping backwards and to its left right as Cyborg's fist was heading towards it yet again.

At this point, the two combatants stared each other down. It seemed that their current fighting tactics weren't getting them anymore. Both of them then decided that it was time to change things up. Unfortunately, the demon beat Cyborg to the punch in the race to determine who would successfully change tactics first. It snapped its now flameless teeth at Cyborg in a feint maneuver. Cyborg, unfortunately, fell for it, and he stepped back. Cyborg cursed himself mentally after this when he saw the demon chuckle and direct a smug look towards him. Glaring, he thrusted both fists forward and back in a rapid-fire motion. The demon snapped its teeth at the area where it had been expecting Cyborg's fists to reach before they abruptly drew back. Unfortunately, Cyborg didn't even get the chance to celebrate his momentarily having appeared to have caught the demon out on his own feint maneuver before the demon then jumped towards him.

In a flash, the demon's feet latched onto the cybernetic hero's stomach, its arms wrapped around Cyborg's neck, and it leaned its head over Cyborg's shoulder and started snapping its teeth (now on fire once more) at Cyborg's back in an attempt to bite him there. For a brief few minutes, Cyborg struggled to keep himself from getting bitten by the demon and allow himself to recover from the nasty surprise that the demon had now treated him to. He eventually managed to press his right hand against the demon's throat and push it upwards before swinging his left fist towards its now exposed jaw. The demon was forced to let go and jump off of Cyborg to avoid getting punched.

The two combatants rearranged position once more, ready to yet continue their duel. The demon decided to initiate the first attack, hoping that this would give it an edge, and it charged towards Cyborg. Cyborg swung his right fist at the demon, and it was forced to jump back mid-charge to avoid ending up on the painful end of the metallic fist. The demon growled in annoyance after recovering, and it spewed out a small jet of flames at Cyborg. Cyborg hurriedly side stepped to his right to avoid the fire, and the two warriors faced each other yet again. The demon spat around another jet of flames, but this one was so much larger and faster than the previous one that Cyborg was forced to duck his head and completely bend forward in order to avoid getting blasted by it.

Cyborg was just starting to lift his head up when he saw the demon swing its right claws towards him and he was forced to duck again. However, Cyborg soon decided to take advantage of the silver lining that his current inconvenience in bodily position had provided. In other words, he grabbed the demon by the legs while he was still bent over to evade the demon's current attacks and lifted upward. This caused the demon to become uprooted from the ground, and it found itself awkwardly flailing around and shrieking and snarling in surprise and fear before Cyborg turned himself a full 180 degrees and slammed it down on the ground.

With the demon now lying down on its right side, it turned its head to face Cyborg and swung its tail towards him, Cyborg leaned backwards to avoid getting smacked in the face by the demon's tail, and he hurriedly rushed forward the instant the tail had retracted back from its attempted swing at him, leaned down on his hands and knees by the demon's head and started punching it repeatedly in the face. The demon snarled and growled in pain and exasperation as Cyborg's fists repeatedly slammed into its face. However, as its tail and feet flailed around from the impact, it managed to get its left foot positioned on Cyborg's abdomen, and after a couple tries, it managed to push sufficiently enough against the bionic teenager to effectively push him off and kick him away.

Cyborg landed on his back with a thud, and the demon straightened back up onto its feet, swinging its tail from side to side smugly in an arrogant victory gesture. After finishing its smug apparent gesture of victory, it stepped back a couple inches in preparation for lunging right on Cyborg while the bionic teenager was still down. Unfortunately for the demon, Cyborg managed to get back up on his feet before it could finish preparing itself for its pounce, and he let out an inarticulate yell of rage before running back towards the demon.

The demon snarled in irritation at its failed attempt to finish Cyborg off, but nonetheless readied itself for the yet again prolonged duel. Growling, the demon swung its right hand claws at Cyborg, only for Cyborg to step back slightly mid-rush to avoid getting slashed across his face. Cyborg had just straightened himself back after successfully avoiding this attack when he then had to swerve downward to his right to avoid getting smacked in the head by the demon's tail, which it had swung towards him right as he was in the midst of straightening himself back out from dodging its earlier claw attack. In spite of failing to hit Cyborg with the tail swipe attack, the demon had managed to allow itself to unleash the attack in a way that would allow it to spin a full 360 degrees and allow it to still be able to conveniently reposition itself if the attack missed.

No sooner had the demon found itself once again face to face with Cyborg when it roared, and lifted its right foot in preparation to unleash a powerful stomp kick. Cyborg, however, was prepared for this, and he grabbed the demon by its now uplifted right ankle. The demon howled and snarled in both surprise and irritation as Cyborg continued to lift up on its ankle and attempt to completely send it off balance. Before long, in the combined efforts to upend his opponent (in Cyborg's case) and escape from the opponents grasp (in the case of the demon), the demon eventually managed to push against Cyborg's hands sufficiently enough to cause Cyborg to lose is grip. However, Cyborg managed to recover from his losing grip on the demon's foot by wrapping his arms around the demon's neck and initiating a forward somersault, causing both himself and the demon to tumble over onto the ground. In the midst of this, both of the two combatants landed on their backs, the demon landing on the ground and Cyborg right on top of the demon.

Cyborg was the first to get up on his feet after this, and when the demon got back up as well, he hurriedly stepped back to avoid getting stabbed in the face by the demon's attempted tail sting attack. When the demon attempted to attack Cyborg again, but this time by swinging its horns towards him in a rightwards slashing attack, Cyborg repeated his earlier dodging maneuver before then wrapping his arms around the demon's neck again before it could reposition its head to face him once more.

The demon growled and snapped its jaws irritably as it proceeded to start pushing itself against Cyborg in an attempt to force him into letting go of it. Cyborg masterfully stepped backwards in time with the demon's pushing so as to avoid getting knocked off balance by the demon's efforts to get him to let go. They managed to turn a complete 360 degrees before the demon eventually changed tactics and gave him a sharp elbow strike to the chest with its left elbow. The jarring and painful impact caused Cyborg to let go and stumble backwards completely off balance. The bionic teenager's back ended up crashing right into a large solitary tree that happened to be right behind him, and the impact caused the tree to uproot and come crashing down on a small group of thunder demons that were starting to gang up on Starfire from behind.

Starfire turned her head to look behind her after hearing the crash and the pained snarling from the thunder demons who'd been about to ambush her. She just managed to see the thunder demons pinned under the tree and groaning in pain before they burst into dust. She then managed to see Cyborg not too far away from the downed tree, and she hurriedly yelled, "Thank you friend!"

"No problem!" Cyborg hollered before he was then forced to pay attention once more to his own opponent.

The demon had started rushing towards Cyborg, and it soon snapped its teeth. Cyborg instinctively moved back, only to realize too late that the demon hadn't even moved towards him when snapping its teeth, thus learning that the bite had only been a feint. The demon then breathed fire at him, and Cyborg did a belly flop dodge to evade the flames. No sooner had Cyborg gotten himself into a crouching position when he then had to jump back to evade the flaming x-shaped slash attack the demon sent his way. Fortunately, as a result of his having to dodge this latest attack from the demon, Cyborg managed to get himself fully straightened up on his two feet, and he hurriedly reached forward and grabbed the demon by the wrists, one in each hand before the demon could prepare itself to unleash another attack.

Now having gotten a full hold on the demon, he started moving around and maneuvering the demon's arms in an attempt to flip it over on its back, even pressing the top of his head up against the demon's neck for good measure. The demon however, sufficiently struggled and pushed against this, and eventually, after turning a complete 360 degree circle, Cyborg was forced to let go when the demon ignited its hands as if in preparation to toss fire from their and the resulting heat seared Cyborg's hands.

Cyborg stepped backward quite a few steps after this, and when he saw the demon start to move towards him again, he was very quick to attempt to recover from the incident by swinging his right fist. The demon stepped back mid-charge to evade the attack, only to snarl in irritation when it discovered that the move had been a feint on Cyborg's part. It didn't even get the chance to calm down from its anger and resume its charge before Cyborg initiated another punch, but this time for real. As a result, Cyborg's right fist plowed effortlessly into the demon's jaw and sent it stumbling backwards.

When the demon managed to recover and straighten up again, it roared again and again as both it and Cyborg moved in a half circle in their respective directions yet again. After positioning themselves so that Cyborg was standing nearby where the now fallen tree had once stood and the demon was standing where Cyborg had originally been, the demon roared and attempted to rush towards Cyborg once more. Unfortunately for the demon, it was forced to take a step back when Cyborg swung his right fist towards it, and then take another step back when Cyborg swung his left fist towards it.

No sooner had the demon evaded the most recent punch from Cyborg when the cybernetic teenage hero jumped towards it, wrapping his left arm around its neck and clenching his right hand around one of the horns that made up the top portion of the demon's mane of spikes. Cyborg then tugged on the demon in an attempt to force it down upon the ground, only for the demon to roll over to its left and cause Cyborg to let go so as to turn his impact into a roll of his own. After they'd both gotten back on their feet, Cyborg latched onto the demon once again, but this with his left hand clasped around the horn and his right arm wrapped around its neck. This time, as he pulled downwards on the demon he was attempting to both force it down towards the ground and break its neck.

However, the demon then cleverly decided to use Cyborg's own momentum against him by leaning downwards with it instead of fighting against it like it already had before. In doing so, it was now hoping that when it tumbled down onto the ground, it would send Cyborg tumbling down with it. Fortunately for Cyborg, he was able to catch onto the trick just in time to let go right as the demon was about to tumble.

As a result, the demon landed headfirst on the ground, and then tumbled over before coming to a crash landing on its right side. Snarling and roaring in rage from having turned itself into the sole victim of its own trick, the demon managed to position itself so that its right arm and leg were still lying down on the ground, its left arm, left leg, and tail were flailing around in the air, and its head was positioned so that it was directly facing Cyborg. The demon snapped its teeth towards Cyborg once, then unleashed a jet of flames from its mouth, then a second, and then a medium powered ultrasonic roar. While Cyborg was able to step back in time to evade the bite and the two jets of flame, he was forced to step back even further in slight disorientation as he ended up on just the edge of the roar's attack range.

While Cyborg was disoriented from his minor contact with the roar attack, the demon got back on its feet and roared in challenge. Cyborg, however, rushed right towards the demon while it was roaring and proceeded to jump upwards, wrapping his arms around its neck right at the same time as he was landing on the creature's back. Thus Cyborg effectively made it look as if the demon were now giving him a piggyback ride.

Snarling and howling with rage, the demon started rushing erratically around in all directions in an effort to buck Cyborg off. Cyborg, however, managed to hold on tightly, and he eventually managed to get a good strong grip in which he had both hands on the demon's jaws. Thus, with his right hand gripping the tip of the demon's upper jaw and his left hand gripping the tip of the demon's lower jaw, he started to pull with all his mind, forcing the demon's jaws open and causing it to start becoming perilously at risk of getting its jaws snapped.

At this point, with its roars and snarls now sounding far more terrified and fearful than angry, the demon desperately struggled against Cyborg's grip on its jaws. After a few close calls, it managed to tumble to its left, causing Cyborg to momentarily lose grip. However, the demon had only managed to get itself positioned so that it was lying down on its left side and facing the area where Cyborg had originally landed before he then found Cyborg gripping at its jaws once more. Cyborg had managed to jump over the demon and land behind it right as it was repositioning itself, and now he had it fully at his mercy.

Howling now in despair, the demon tried once again struggled as hard as it could to push its jaws back into a more safe position against Cyborg's hands. When this failed, it unleashed its fire breath. For a moment, the demon gained a brief reprieve when the unexpected burst of flame surprised Cyborg sufficiently enough into letting go. However, Cyborg then placed his right hand back into its original position on the demon's lower jaw and started pounding his left fist on the demon's nose like a hammer. For a few minutes, the demon managed to stalwartly keep its jaws shut tight in spite of the brutal pounding it was receiving. Eventually however, Cyborg managed to hit it just hard enough for it to open its jaws in reflex and unleash a pained roar.

That single opening was all Cyborg needed, and he fully reasserted his earlier grip on the demon's jaws before starting to pull at them again. The demon unleashed its fire breath, roaring in agony and despair. But this time, Cyborg was prepared for the possibility of the demon unleashing its fire breath, and he managed to avoid letting go. Before long, the demon managed to let out a final despairing roar before Cyborg finally caused its jaws to snap with an unnerving crack. In a flash, with its face frozen in wide-eyed shock, the demon started crackling with red lightning, its fire breath alternating between pure flames and fluttering puffs of smoke. Eventually, the fire breath stopped alternating and became stuck in full on smoke form, and the red lightning stopped altogether. The demon was now dead. Cyborg let go, and the demon's head plunged back down on the ground with a thud. Seconds later, the entire corpse burst into blood red dust.

No sooner had the demon burst into dust when Cyborg straightened up and caught a glimpse of a small group of demons standing nearby, gaping at him in shock and horror. Cyborg directed a smug grin towards the stunned demons, wagged his finger at them, and then said, "That's right ya'll! Ya'll mess with me, and you only mess up yo'self!"

The demons growled angrily at this. "Kill him!" yelled a thunder demon that appeared to be the de facto leader of the group, and the entire group rushed towards Cyborg as one.

"Oh it is on," said Cyborg as he intertwined his fingers and flexed his hands outward. He was definitely ready for more.

Meanwhile, Robin was calmly battling a five member group of demons with nothing but his sword. Even as he continued to slash at the demons with his sword and block and parry their attacks with it, he remained perfectly calm and collected. After all, unlike with Savage, these opponents were skilled enough for him to be very unwise to risk losing his temper.

Before long, only one demon was left among the group that Robin had just now been fighting, and it was now on its hands and knees with a slight scratch on its left wrist. The demon in question, which happened to be a female poison demon, snarled venomously at the Boy Wonder. "You may have defeated me and my comrades," it hissed coldly, "but you have won nothing tonight. You will fall yet to the power of the Knights, if not to the remainder of this army already present."

"Well too bad you won't live to see that," Robin growled before then beheading the demon. The demon burst into dust, and Robin quickly retracted his sword. Having briefly won himself a reprieve from fighting, Robin calmly thought to himself. "Still, she does have a point," he quietly stated to himself. "We may be doing ok for now, but sooner or later, we can't expect to defeat every single one of those things on our own."

The Boy Wonder then turned his head to face the direction of the machinery designed for opening and closing the Stairway to Heaven. "For that matter, I guess now's as good a time as ever to get that other gate open and summon the cavalry." His mind made up, Robin leaped in the direction of the machinery in question and rushed towards it as fast as he could, his hand digging into his utility belt for the Paradisiacal Key.

. . . . .

However, little did Robin or any of the other Titans know that one of the demons that had arrived with the rest of the Infernal Army (sans the Knights of Hell) had not at all yet joined in the fight, and was currently hiding behind some rocks nearby the still open Alpha Devil's Gate. This demon, was none other than Carnax, the demon who'd been the leader of the squadron that had been hired to assassinate the Titans after the failure of the first hired advance party, only to end up captured and interrogated by the Titans before finally being exorcized back to Hell. Now, having been given the chance yet again to go out into the world outside Hell, Carnax was eager to both make up for his earlier failure and to get revenge on Robin.

However, like all the other demons, he had been caught quite off guard when he saw the Boy Wonder's reportedly dead friends standing right there in the valley alongside their fearless leader and right nearby the dust that remained of Regulus's advance party. However, rather than initiating battle like all the other demons present, Carnax had decided that it would be far wiser to take cover and sound the alarm to the Knights of Hell. He knew all too well that the Titans were more than capable of handling themselves against the vast majority of the demons currently present, and that if anyone could help tip the scales against them, it would be the Knights. Admittedly, he'd had trouble making his way through all the hectic chaos going on, and had also briefly gotten distracted when he'd caught sight of the battle between Cyborg and the other fire demon. In fact, due to how that particular fire demon was Carnax's elder brother Sanguiroth, he'd been very tempted to join in the fray right then and there after seeing Cyborg vanquish the other demon. But in the end, Carnax had decided that attempting to get revenge would do neither himself nor the invasion any good if he only ended up getting himself killed as well. And so, with great reluctance, he'd turned away from the area where Cyborg was, left him to fight it out with the demons who had chosen to try their luck against him after the death of Sanguiroth, and finally taken cover before summoning a Hellish bowl, filling it with the blood of a snake he'd happened to catch nearby, and making attempts at setting up an Infernal chat with the Knights.

"Come on, come on," he growled as he attempted again and again at getting the conditions just right. The fact that he was currently in a hurry combined with the added distractions from the chaos going on around him was not making it easy for him to do the proper procedure for setting up the call correctly. After another few tries, just as Carnax was on the verge of losing his temper entirely, he finally managed to get it right, and the blood swirled around before taking on the slow moving vortex appearance that meant that the call had come through.

Seconds later, Carnax heard the voice of Samael state, "You called?"

"Lord Samael, the Titans, they're here!"

"Titans?" Samael stated with disinterest. "Don't you mean Titan?"

Carnax snarled in irritation. "No! I mean Titans! All five of them! They're here in this valley right now doing battle with the rest of the army!"

"What!?" Samael's voice boomed from within the bloody vortex. "That's impossible! We killed the other four!"

"Well it would appear that you didn't finish the job!" Carnax snapped angrily. "Because right this very moment, all five of the Titans are present in this valley doing battle with our forces."

"We did finish the job!" Samael shouted. "We tested the corpses ourselves, and there was radio silence on all four of them!"

"Well if that's true," Carnax growled. "Then how is it that they are alive and in this valley right now!?"

"What's going on?" came the voice of Lilith. Samael turned his head and saw Lilith and the other Knights of Hell standing not too far behind him.

"Excuse me," Samael said to Carnax before then replying to his mate, "Carnax has recently informed me that the Boy Wonder has in the end chosen to come to the Valley of the Portals to head our forces off."

"For some reason, I feel like I shouldn't be surprised," said Lilith.

"Yes indeed," said Samael. "However, he also is currently claiming that the other four teenagers that we killed earlier are there with him and are doing battle with the remainder of our forces as we speak!"

Lilith's eyes widened, and her jaws dropped open incredulously. Even Asmodeus, Azazel, and Abaddon seemed genuinely surprised by this news.

"That's impossible!" Lilith howled. "There was radio silence on all four of them! I even felt the alien's corpse leave her body after I'd snapped her neck while still inside her! They can't possibly be alive!"

"That's what I just said," Samael roared. "Yet even now Carnax is still under the ridiculous impression that they have somehow managed to survive!"

"I'm not kidding!" howled the voice of Carnax from within the fiery vortex behind Samael. "They are alive and well, and in the valley fighting our forces alongside their fearless leader! I swear it on Lucifer's Crown!"

"Well that should put this idiocy to rest," Lilith chuckled.

"He could be telling the truth you know," Abaddon growled.

"We are not having this discussion again Abaddon," Lilith snapped.

"Are you still there?"

At the sound of Carnax's voice coming from the vortex, Lilith very noticeably paused, and her eyes widened as she realized the implications that came with this information. Samael also seemed very surprised and unnerved by how Carnax was still alive after swearing on Lucifer's Crown to the truth behind his claims that he and his mate were almost certain would turn out to be lies. At the sight of this, Abaddon merely glared, and folded his arms across his chest. Asmodeus chuckled, his frill extended and tongue sticking out, and then said, "Well that certainly blows a hole in your statement doesn't it?"

Lilith chuckled nervously, pointed her finger at Asmodeus and stated, "Now, now, let's not be hasty."

"Lilith, we don't have time for this!" Abaddon growled. "Just admit that you and your mate were wrong, and let's get out there and deal with the problem!"

"Calm yourself Abaddon," said Samael. "There's still yet hope that Carnax could be lying about this matter. The magic of the vow may just be acting a little slow, and we may yet receive further proof as to whether or not his claims are true . . ."

"We've already received plenty of proof!" Asmodeus shrieked. "You're just too proud and blind to admit it!"

"Asmodeus!" Samael roared, "I will not tolerate such insolence from you!"

"Oh cry me a river Samael!" Abaddon growled. "Don't you see we now have much bigger things to worry about!?"

"There is nothing to worry about!" Samael snarled. "Carnax is just overreacting! That's all!"

"I am not overreacting!" Carnax howled. "I've already sworn on his Malevolence's crown that I'm telling the truth and lived to tell the tale! Isn't that enough?!"

"Silence heathen!" Lilith snapped. "Sooner or later, the magic behind the vow will do its work, and your claims will be exposed as the lies that they are . . . !"

"SWITCH THE CALL TO VISUAL!"

At the sound of this nightmarishly loud roar from Azazel, the other four Knights of Hell turned their heads and gaped at their compatriot in shock. Even Asmodeus and Abaddon were surprised at how much volume the usually calm and collected Azazel had mustered in his current unexpected temper eruption. Even Carnax appeared to be shocked as he still hadn't yet made any comment.

Azazel snarled, glared towards the fiery vortex on his end of the call, and angrily hissed, "Carnax, that's an order."

"Oh yes, right," said the voice of Carnax. After a sound of him whispering some unintelligible Latin words, the inky blackness within the fiery vortex gave way to reveal the face of the very much still alive and well Carnax staring towards them. "Now what?"

"Let us see the battle going on in the valley of the Portals," Azazel stated calmly with his arms folded across the chest. "Let myself and my four erstwhile comrades see what you have claimed with our own eyes."

"Oh yes, indeed," Carnax stated before hurriedly repositioning the blood filled bowl he'd used to make the call so that the five Knights of Hell could get a full view of the battle going on in the valley. At first, all that the five high ranking demons could see was a vast number of demons randomly battling and giving off battle cries. However, when they heard an eerily familiar voice shout, "Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!" they managed to catch sight of Raven hovering around in the air before a large sphere of shadowy energy materialized around her and began to expand in all directions, thus flattening all the demons standing underneath and around her from on the ground. When the sphere vanished, a considerable area of ground around the spot she was hovering over was completely empty of demons. Before long, a single water demon lunged upwards towards Raven, snarling in rage, only to be stopped in midair by Raven merely extending her hand towards it. For a brief moment, the demon was left hovering and flailing uselessly around in the air. Then Raven snapped her fingers, and the demon exploded into dust.

At the sight of the very same half demon sorceress he'd killed now very much alive and well, Azazel turned his head to face Samael and Lilith, his eyebrow raised. Samael grinned sheepishly, and stated weakly, "It may yet mean nothing . . ."

Then the demons' attention was drawn back to the vortex at the sound of yet another familiar voice. They looked at the vortex just in time to see Cyborg spinning around with both of his arms converted into sonic cannons. Within seconds, Cyborg had mowed down a considerable number of demons into dust. No sooner had Cyborg stopped spinning when he converted his right arm into what looked like a chain saw with flames coating the blade and ran it through a fire demon that had just now attempted to run up to him and strike from behind. The demon had just enough time to shriek in agony as the active immolated saw jabbed straight through its abdomen before it went up in lights and exploded into dust.

At the sight of this, Asmodeus directed a glare of his own towards Lilith and Samael. Lilith chuckled nervously, waved her hands around in the air as if trying to alleviate herself of some of the stress, and said, "Hey, this doesn't mean that all four of them have turned out to be alive. I mean, the ones my mate and I killed may yet . . ."

However, at the sound of a very familiar feminine voice unleashing a feral battle cry, Lilith paused, eyes widened in horror, and turned to face the vortex once more. Her mate and fellow Knights of Hell directed their attention to the vortex as well.

Just as Lilith feared, none other than Starfire had now appeared on the 'screen,' and she promptly unleashed a massive storm of star bolts at a group of demons around her, blasting them to dust. Seconds later, she turned her head to face another area, let out an angry yell, and fired her eye beams. At the sound of an agonized howl, Carnax maneuvered the bowl just in time to let the Knights of Hell see a shadow demon who now appeared to have somehow had his right arm sliced off of him howling in pain before they then saw a pair of orange hands wearing purple gloves grab him by his horns and yank him backward. The screen then changed position again just in time for the demons to see Starfire pick up an object that was very clearly recognizable as the severed arm of the shadow demon they'd just seen and start slamming it down on the demon in question again and again.

Lilith gulped in terror at the sight of the Tamaranean warrior princess she'd earlier possessed and killed beating that single minor league shadow demon to death with its own arm. Eventually, after the demon and the arm burst into black dust and Starfire took off back to the air with a snarl of rage, Lilith hung her head, clearly ashamed. Samael placed his arm on his despondent mate's shoulder. "There, there, don't fret. This could yet prove to be . . ."

At the sound of what appeared to be a mixture between a scream of shock and an agonized howl, plus an unnerving noise that sounded like a massive creature snapping its jaws and crunching something, the Knights of Hell all directed their focus back on the 'screen' just in time to see Raven glance behind towards what turned out to be none other than a very real green t-rex snapping its jaws open and shut on a luckless thunder demon that appeared to have been right behind the sorceress and about to strike her from behind. The demon in Beast Boy's mouth howled and struggled desperately in spite of his wounds to somehow escape from the death trap, but then a final emphatic snap of the dinosaur's jaws turned him to dust. At the sound of an enraged howl, Beast Boy turned his head in time to see another thunder demon that now appeared to be very, very angry running towards him in a velociraptor-like style with his claws and fangs at the ready to slice at the dinosaur. Seconds later, the demon jumped up and latched onto the right side of the mighty t-rex's face before clawing and slashing at him relentlessly. The t-rex growled in pain and annoyance as it proceeded to snap its jaws at its attacker again and again.

At the sight of some very familiar scars on the demon's back that looked like the kind that could be left by a whip, Samael's eyes widened in a look that appeared to be of even greater shock then the one that had been on his face when he'd seen the very shape shifter he'd earlier killed alive and well. "That demon," he spluttered as he pointed at the irate demon that was currently battling Beast Boy. "I recognize him! That's Simenon!" And indeed it was, for Samael would have recognized that demon anywhere to how he himself had been the one to inflict those scars on him by lashing him with a whip as punishment for insubordination.

"That other demon must have been Xintax," Lilith stated solemnly. And indeed this theory made quite a bit of sense to both Samael and the other three male Knights of Hell. After all, the only demon that Simenon had ever shown such emotional attachment as he was currently demonstrating was his twin brother Xintax.

Seconds later, in dramatic cinematic fashion, Beast Boy the t-rex managed to snap his jaws around Simenon's tail, yank him off of his face, and then swing him around in the air a couple of times before letting go at a position that would allow the demon to go flying and crash head first into one of the cliff walls at the entrance to the valley. Simenon collapsed down onto the ground after its impact with the cliff, only to then get smashed by a large cluster of rocks that fell off the cliff and down on top of him after being dislodged from there by Simenon's impact with the cliff wall. Soon after being crushed, yellow dust spouted out from underneath the newly formed rock pile, indicating that Simenon was now dead. And then, in a near carbon copy of an iconic scene from the very first Jurassic Park movie, the mighty green t-rex turned its head to face the 'camera' and emitted a mighty "RRRRROOOOOAAAAARRRRR!" while rearing its head upwards.

Then the view of the battle was rapidly yanked into a position that allowed for the Knights of Hell to look directly into Carnax's beyond furious face. "Did you see what just happened with Simenon and Xintax?!" he roared. "I could have been just as good of a brother as Simenon just proved himself after I saw that infernal Robot vanquish Sanguiroth! But no! I chose to be a good soldier and inform you of the epic setback responsible for his death! And how have you rewarded me!?"

Carnax then pointed his finger accusingly at Lilith and Samael before irately howling, "You two insulted me, called me a liar, and disregarded even my vow on his Malevolence's crown as to the truth of my words! And it is only thanks to lord Azazel's mercy that you finally decided to be smart enough to believe me!"

At the sound of this, Azazel, Asmodeus, and Abaddon grunted, turned their heads towards their two guilty fellow Knights, and glared venomously at them. After all, they knew very well in their own way exactly how Carnax currently appeared to feel. Samael and Lilith gulped, and hung their heads, clearly ashamed.

"And I don't know how that dastardly caped crusader's friends are alive, but I will tell you right now . . ."

"Check his soul," said Abaddon.

Carnax abruptly stopped talking after hearing this unexpected order from Abaddon. "What?"

Abaddon growled. "Check. His. Soul."

Carnax gulped upon hearing this tone from Abaddon, and he hurriedly excused himself before turning his head in the direction of Robin. After catching sight of Robin fighting his way through several demons as he appeared to head off towards some strange machinery in the distance within the valley, he then proceeded to do as Abaddon had instructed. In the process, his eyes turned completely bone white as he accessed his soul vision. This ability allowed demons to literally look at peoples' souls.

When Carnax got an eyeful of Robin's soul at that current moment, his eyes would have widened if they hadn't been locked in soul vision mode. He hurriedly switched his eyes back to regular mode, turned back to his call, and said, "I've looked at the Boy Wonder's soul, and it's been branded."

At the sight of Samael rolling his eyes, Carnax hurriedly continued, "And yes Samael, I know that it has the usual branding of the mark of his Malevolence's father on it. But I also have noticed that that same branding currently has some sort of Hellish runes enshrouded around it. Now I'm no expert on this kind of business since I'm just a soldier, but I think he may very well have recently made a deal with one of our kin."

"Then it is obvious how his friends are alive and well at this moment," said Azazel. Smirking as if in grudging respect for the Boy Wonder, he then explained to Carnax, "It would appear that while my comrades and I did indeed succeed in killing them, the Boy Wonder turned out to not be above making a deal with one of our kin to have them brought back to life." He then chuckled, turned his head to face Samael and Lilith, and then stated, "And I know just the demon that the Boy Wonder made a deal with, don't you agree?"

At the sound of this, Samael and Lilith groaned, and stared up towards the ceiling of the cavern. They did indeed know all too well just which demon Robin had very clearly made a deal with. "Oh Nehreezah," Lilith thought to herself. "I thought I taught you better."

Azazel grunted, turned his head back to Carnax, and said, "Fear not Carnax. We shall be arriving soon. But first we will need time to prepare. As the original plan was for us to join in considerably later this evening after you lot had overrun Dante's Isle, we have not yet made the final preparations we need to make before we take part in this battle." As he said this, he directed a meaningful look out of the corner of his eyes towards Samael and Lilith as if challenging them over yet another careless error on their part.

"How soon should I expect you to arrive?" Carnax asked.

"Within the next half hour or so," Azazel responded.

"Very well then," said Carnax. "What do you want me to do while I wait?"

"Just make sure that you and the others can keep the Titans busy long enough for us to arrive," Azazel replied.

"I can do that," Carnax stated.

"Good," Azazel snorted. "Signing off." The vortex vanished. He turned to face his four compatriots, clapped his hands together, and stated in a serious tone, "Alright Knights, you heard what I said to Carnax. Let's get a move on!"

Asmodeus and Abaddon were gone in a flash. However, right as Samael and Lilith were about to follow, Azazel grabbed them by the shoulders and held them back. The two demons turned their heads to face Azazel, who glowered at them. Just as his two compatriots had opened their mouths to ask what was going on, Azazel beat them to the punch by saying, "For the sake of this mission, you are hereby temporarily demoted."

At the sound of this, Samael glared at Azazel in a way that seemed to ask if Azazel had gone insane. "Are you crazy?!" he roared. "You don't have that authority! I outrank you!"

"On the contrary," Azazel snarled. "As a fellow Knight of Hell, I have equal rank to yours."

"Equal rank doesn't matter in this case," Lilith snapped. "You can't do this!"

"I can and I just did!" Azazel growled. Before Samael and Lilith could say anything else, Azazel pulled on them and roared, "There's no time to argue! Right now we have too much at stake to let you risk pulling anymore imbecilic mistakes!"

Azazel then let go of his two compatriots, pointed at them in an almost accusatory gesture, and yelled, "Now you listen up! This attempt at allowing his Malevolence to escape has gone long enough with both that foolish Savage carelessly screwing up and you two letting him get away with it! But all that ends now, and with two conditions! First condition; for the remainder of this mission, regardless of the outcome, I'm in charge! And if I'm not around, Abaddon is! Second condition, when we encounter the Titans, we do it my way; take them by surprise, play around with them, and then kill them! Final decision on how and when is my business, not yours! Now if you don't like either of those two conditions, then I'll call Abaddon and Asmodeus back and you're on your own! So go ahead, come storming up to the valley, roar out your presence to the Titans the moment you leave the Devil's Gate, or even just walk right up to them and give them a wave and ask them to slice your necks for all I care; but right now, I've allowed you to either make careless mistakes or let Savage get away with his too many times now to hear anymore outlandishly stupid ideas. Ok?"

For a brief moment, Lilith and Samael gaped at Azazel, for they had very rarely ever seen the usually calm and laidback Azazel blow up and take charge like this before. Then they gulped and hung their heads. "Yes . . . brother," said Samael.

"Understood," Lilith stated.

"Good," Azazel growled curtly. Then he pointed his finger at them with a 'no-nonsense' glower on his face and barked out, "Now let's go! Move! Move! Move!"

At this point, Samael and Lilith most certainly did not need to be told twice, and they bolted down the tunnel after Abaddon and Asmodeus with Azazel rocketing after them yelling and barking at them to hurry up.

. . . . .

Meanwhile, back at the valley of the Portals, Carnax had chosen to both fulfill and disobey Azazel's request to keep the Titans busy. Granted, he wasn't going to just sit around and twiddle his thumbs waiting for the Knights of Hell to show up. However, he wasn't about to actively assist his friends or ask them to assist him in his current self-assigned task. The way he saw it, the rest of the demons would be perfectly fine on their own against the four resurrected Titans. "As for me," he thought to himself with a snarl as he directed his gaze towards a certain spiky haired, traffic light color uniformed, teenage caped crusader, "I'm taking care of the Boy Blunder myself."

And he truly did intend on getting his own way with battling Robin and taking him out. The way he saw it, Robin was his own personal nemesis. After all, in spite of how Raven had been the one who'd committed the exorcism, Robin had been the one who'd given the order for the exorcism to be carried out and reduced him humiliatingly from the brave soldier he usually was to a sniveling coward willing to do anything to avoid an exorcism that he'd ended up undergoing anyway. "One way or another," Carnax snarled to himself in his mind. "That teenage nightmare is mine." And so, with a final irate snarl, Carnax snapped his fingers and teleported away from his hiding place where he'd made his Infernal Chat with the Knights of Hell.

Meanwhile, Robin continued to struggle through the chaotic mess the valley had become as he made his way to the area where the machinery for opening the Alpha Stairway to Heaven was located. He even ended up having to draw out his sword more than once to hack his way through a living sea of demons. But eventually, he found himself only 20 or so footsteps away from where the arcane machinery stood. At that point, breathing heavily in both tension and relief, he drew out the Paradisiacal Key. He was now truly ready to state the phrase that would be required for unlocking the first true gateway to Heaven.

However, just as Robin had lifted up the Dante's Key to full arm's length in the air to speak the words to activate it while continuing to run, he suddenly got sent flying to the side when an unexpected weight came crashing into him. The Key flew through the air and fell straight into the hole of the machinery it was supposed to be placed within. Robin crashed face down on the ground, groaning in pain as he felt the same weight that had knocked him over both remain on him and shift onto his back.

"Well, well, well, if it isn't my old jailer."

Robin's eyes widened at the sound of this voice from above him. He turned his head to get a good look in the direction of the weight above him, and his eyes narrowed as he recognized the red demon crouching upon him with a wolfish smirk on its face. "Carnax," Robin growled.

"You remembered my name," Carnax stated. "How touching."

Robin snarled, pressed his hands up against the ground, and then pushed hard on it as if attempting to force himself upward. However, he had barely even lifted his head a few inches off the ground before he felt something press up against the back of his head and slam his face back down on the ground. "Sorry," came Carnax's voice. "But I'm afraid that I can't allow you to get up. After all, after all that's happened to potentially derail this mission thanks to you, particularly the considerably powerful game changer I just saw in your hand, it would be most unwise for my kin and I to let you survive past the end of this night now wouldn't it?"

The demon then chuckled, licked his chops hungrily, and pressed his claws down on the back of Robin's head before saying, "And I can tell you right now Boy Blunder, I've been looking forward to this moment.

At that point, Carnax lifted his hands off of Robin's head so as to allow the Boy Wonder to talk. Robin lifted up his head, growled, and said, "Yeah well, you're not the first scumbag who's said that to me."

Carnax chuckled, shook his head side to side, and then retorted calmly, "True, but I can certainly assure you that I will be the last."

"I wouldn't be too confident about that," Robin stated with a hint of arrogance. "I've survived against considerably worse opponents that could reduce you to dust before you even had a chance to blink."

"You were just lucky when you fought them," Carnax stated in an equally arrogant tone of his own. "They underestimated you, and got careless. But I can assure you that I won't be taking any chances."

"Oh really?" Robin asked, not letting any signs of fear from the demon's recent comment show. "Then why am I still alive? Why did you feel the need to even let me know that you were the one whose about to kill me? Why didn't you just slice my throat or bang my head on the ground or do something similar to that the moment you first pounced on me? Or better yet, why didn't you just roast me or pin me up against something with your telekinesis before using that same power pinning me up to snap my neck?"

Carnax seemed to think to himself, then he shrugged, spread his hands out to his sides as if to say 'fair point,' and then said, "I'll admit, I could have done any number of those actions instead of what I'm currently up to." Then the demon smirked, looked back down at Robin, and continued, "But then again, what would be the fun in that? You wouldn't understand since you've never really killed anything; but there's just something about personally killing something with your own hands that just makes you feel so powerful and alive. Especially when you get to watch the fear and pain in the victims' eyes before they go out. Ah yes, the sweet sensation of it is truly remarkable. And oh how much sweeter it is when you get to play around with the victim and torture them beforehand. And that's why I'm going to personally kill you with my own two hands complete with razor sharp claws; and I'm gonna do it slowly, and painfully."

Robin shook his head side to side. "Now you are one sick puppy."

"I'm a demon," Carnax chuckled. "What did you expect? Honestly, you may think you know what demons are like thanks to your experiences with the daughter of Trigon, but I am a world away from that mongrel you sold your soul for."

Robin was so surprised at Carnax knowing that bit of information that he didn't even get the chance to explode in anger at him for calling Raven a 'mongrel'. "How did he know about that?" he thought to himself.

"Please," said Carnax. "Did you really think I wouldn't know?" Robin looked up at Carnax, who grinned, and then stated, "I took a good long look at your soul I did." Right after he said this, he turned his eyes white as he activated his soul vision. The sight briefly caused Robin to turn white as well for Raven had managed to bring the matter of demon soul vision up at one point in their research over the course of the previous two days. Then the demon's eyes reverted back to their regular red color, and it continued, "And boy you have one seriously jacked up soul. Whatever deal you made must have been seriously powerful. But then again, I guess I shouldn't even need to look at your soul to tell how powerful the deal was; after all, seeing your friends here alive and well long after Lord Samael said they were dead and gone should probably have been proof enough."

Robin, however, now wasn't even listening. "He knows about my deal," he thought to himself. He then directed a look towards the demon from out of the corner of his left eye. "If he knows, then who else?"

"In fact," Carnax then stated. "If it hadn't been for Abaddon's very clever idea for me actually take a look at your soul, none of us would have ever been any the wiser as to how your dead friends managed to come back in time to help you attempt to foil our efforts to release his Malevolence tonight. And boy, I will say, the Knights themselves are quite intrigued by the little matter of what I saw when I checked out your soul."

At the sound of this, Robin cursed mentally. "Of course; I forgot, the Knights are going to come here soon as well."

"Oh they'll be coming a whole lot sooner than you think," Carnax then said. Smirking, the demon explained, "You see, while I was hiding, I managed to make a little 'long distance call' to the Knights. And needless to say, over the course of that little discussion, they may or may not have chosen to come earlier than Lord Samael and Lilith had originally planned due to both the unexpected setback of your friends coming back from the dead and the matter of your soul. At this point, they should probably be on their way within the next 5 or 10 minutes, and arrive here within the next 20 to 25 minutes, if not sooner."

Robin mentally swore. "This is starting to get even worse than I thought," he thought to himself. If what Carnax had now claimed was true, then he needed to get himself out of his current situation and summon the angels before the Knights of Hell arrived. But how?

Then Robin noticed a certain other device that he'd ended up drawing out of his utility belt alongside the Paradisiacal Key without even realizing that was now lying on the ground right next to the machinery designed to open and close the Alpha Stairway to Heaven. At the sight of the object, Robin directed a smug smirk towards the device. "It must have bounced off the machinery and landed there after it got knocked out of my hand alongside the Key," he thought to himself. Upon thinking this, he surreptitiously stuck his hand inside the utility belt compartment where he'd been keeping both the Key and the device he'd now glimpsed, and found his smile widening when he felt the one thing he still needed for his current on-the-fly plan to work.

"But enough talk," Robin then heard Carnax say. "It is time that I go ahead and kill you and send you down to Hell a year and a half early so that you can both fail to foil our plans and be prevented from summoning some most inconvenient reinforcements from his Malevolence's father through use of that very annoying counterpart of the Key to his Malevolence's realm. After all, as the only true human among your little team, I doubt that that key of Dante will work very well if you're not around to activate it yourself."

Robin smirked, turned his head to look straight at Carnax, and stated, "That's where you'd be wrong Carnax."

Carnax raised his eyebrow. "Oh really?" he then asked. "And how would that be possible?"

"I'll show you," Robin smugly stated before then pressing on a button on the unseen machine within his utility belt that he'd been touching, a trigger device.

Seconds later, a brief buzz of static was heard, and then Robin's disembodied voice was heard saying, "Key of Dante, hear my cry! Your time has come, at the world's greatest plight!"

"What the?" Carnax shouted. "What are you doing?"

"Not much really," Robin responded.

"Abandon not the world, to Lucifer's eternal night! Open your gate and release Heaven's light!"

"How are you doing this?!" Carnax growled. "You're not even talking!"

"Why don't you look right in front of you?" Robin retorted with a hint of arrogance.

"Send forth the angels in all their might, so that they may smite all evil within their sight!"

Carnax looked up from Robin towards the machinery, and his crimson eyes widened at the sight of the device lying down next to the machinery for the alpha Stairway to Heaven, an audio recording device. This very same device was now shouting out a full recording of Robin's voice uttering the Paradisiacal Key's activation phrase. At that moment, the recording then played, "Let them yet prolong Lucifer's reign of terror and fright!"

"NO!" Carnax roared before teleporting off of Robin's back. Robin wasted no time afterward in getting back up on his feet and rushing towards the machinery once more.

Seconds later, the recording proceeded to play, "And bring victory to those who stand for all that is . . . !"

In a flash, right as the final word was about to be spoken by the recording, Carnax reappeared from his teleportation; and when he landed, his clenched fists plunged right down on the device and smashed it, thus effectively silencing it permanently. For what seemed like an eternity, Carnax remained where he was, gaping intently at his clenched fists as sparks flew out from underneath them. Eventually, when the sparks finally stopped, and he lifted his fists, he found himself panting in relief and exhaustion as he gazed upon the now very heavily smashed metallic ruins that remained of Robin's backup plan.

However, seconds as he was about to place his hands down on the ground to get himself back up, he felt a searing pain enter his back. Carnax yelped in pain and shock as he felt the terrible pain in his back, and he managed to direct a look behind him out of the corner of his eyes, only for his eyes to widen as he saw none other than Robin standing at a crouch right there behind him with his sword plunged straight into the small of his back. Robin snarled silently at Carnax, and then coldly stated, "I don't need you alive anymore."

Seconds later, Carnax's jaws involuntarily snapped open, his eyes widened even further, his arms snapped at full length, and he howled in agony and despair as he proceeded to become engulfed in flashes of red lightning. Within seconds, the magic of the sword finished its work, and Carnax exploded into dust. Robin sheathed his sword, grunted wordlessly, and then picked up the Paradisiacal Key before lifting it up into the air. He was now ready once more to initiate the beginning of the end for Lucifer's plans that night.

Within seconds, with all the other demons hopelessly distracted in their efforts to take down Robin's fellow Titans, the Boy Wonder lifted his head up to face the night sky and triumphantly shouted, "Key of Dante, hear my cry! Your time has come, at the world's greatest plight! Abandon not the world, to Lucifer's eternal night! Open your gate and release Heaven's light! Send forth the angels in all their might, so that they may smite all evil within their sight! Let them yet prolong Lucifer's reign of terror and fright, and bring victory to those who stand for all that is right!"

"NO!" howled every single one of the demons remaining as they all turned their heads to face the direction that Robin was in seconds after he finished uttering the phrase that would spell doom for them all. But it was now too late for the demons. Too late did they stop what they were doing and turn their attention to Robin and the Paradisiacal Key. Too late did they turn their heads to face that area and prepare to rush off to stop the Boy Wonder. Too late did they finally realize that they'd already lost. For at the very same time that all the remaining demons, plus Robin's four fellow founding Titans, turned to face the area where Robin was, the Boy Wonder slammed the now brightly glowing Paradisiacal Key into the groove within the machinery designed to hold it.

Seconds later, a beam of white light sprang from the tip of the glowing white gemstone and rocketed upward at a slant towards the sky. When the beam reached a particularly high elevation, it seemed to strike an invisible barrier and transformed into what looked very much like a snowy white lightning bolt that began to crackle and spark violently. As this happened, and the demons and Titans watched from below, the apparent invisible barrier in the sky that the beam had come into contact with came into view in the shape of what looked like a giant circular angelic rune.

At the sight of this, the Titans all smiled. They had now truly won.

"Oh boy," Beast Boy thought to himself. "Time for these ultimate bad boys to get their butts kicked by the ultimate God Squad."

"Oh what a beautiful sight," Starfire thought to herself dreamily.

"And to think I've spent the last 5 or so years of my life thinking this stuff didn't even exist," Cyborg thought to himself in half amusement and half regret.

"I never thought I'd feel so happy to see something so obviously angelic in nature," Raven thought wistfully to herself.

"This is it," Robin thought to himself. "We have won."

The beam then vanished, and the angelic rune in the sky seemed to melt in upon itself and transform into a massive glowing portal of golden yellow energy. For what seemed like an eternity, the massive audience of demons and Titans that stood upon the ground gazed upwards at it. While the Titans gaped at it in awe and triumph, one could tell just by a single look at the faces of the demons that they were all feeling very real fear at the sight of the portal.

One especially low ranking demon turned his head to face another demon standing right next to him and fearfully asked, "Can we run now?"

As one, all the demons turned their heads towards a single demon. This demon in particular, as the general of the Alpha Squadron of the 1st Infernal Legion, was the highest ranking demon out of all the standard soldiers of Hell. He was second only to the Knights of Hell and similar greater demons, who in turn were second only to Lucifer. This demon, however, appeared to be just as fearful as all his countless underlings, and that was really saying something. Before long, the quivering well adorned black colored demon gulped, shivered involuntarily, and brokenly stated, "Yes."

No sooner had the demon said this, when in a flash of light, a massive storm of what appeared to be bolts of lightning began to burst out of the portal and rocket down towards the valley. As the lightning bolts got closer and closer towards the ground, all the beings gathered there noticed with awe (in the case of the Titans) and fear (in the case of the demons) that they were colored much the same way that the demons were when in their incorporeal forms.

"Those must be the angels in their incorporeal forms," Robin thought to himself. "But why would they be colored in the same way as the demons?"

Seconds later, the giant maelstrom of red, blue, green, purple, yellow, and black lightning bolts came to a jarring halt just above the valley. With a flash of light and an almighty bang, they explosively transformed into a large army of very human-like beings dressed in brightly colored long sleeved robes that closely resembled the kind worn by priests, acolytes, and similar church affiliated people. The robes in question were colored in the same way that the figures themselves had been in incorporeal form. However, the feature that allowed people to recognize them with zero doubt as to what they truly were, were the large feathery wings sprouting from their backs. There was now no doubt about it whatsoever; the angels had arrived.

At that moment, the angel at the very front of the entire group, a particularly tall and well-built individual with silvery white feathered wings and matching silver white blonde hair and steely gray eyes pointed downwards at the army of demons. "Our enemies stand beneath us! Do we dare let them stay?"

As one, all of the brilliant winged figures shouted "No!" with a matching glare of anger and hatred on their faces.

"Indeed not!" yelled the leader. He then lifted his hand, and a large sword appeared in his hand in a flash of light. "Attack them my brothers! Attack!"

As one, all the angels unleashed an inarticulate war cry, summoned their swords, and swooped down towards the demons. In a flash, the Titans all made sure to hurriedly get out of the way just before the angels were upon the doomed demons. Within seconds, as the Titans proceeded to watch from their position nearby the machinery in which the Paradisiacal Key had been placed, and thus safely out of reach of all the chaos, the angels and demons proceeded to take part in a truly epic battle. To attempt to describe it in overly large detail, would have been a blasphemy. That was just how the Titans felt as they watched the two armies slash and blast at each other with the angels even sometimes going so far as to cause their hands to glow and place them down on the demons' heads, thus causing them to immolate from inside (effectively smiting them).

As the Titans watched, they all couldn't have felt more relieved. In spite of the considerable odds against them, they had won. The world would be saved once more. "Heck, for all I know, maybe the angels will even know of a way for me to get out of my deal without having to risk Nehreezah killing off my friends," Robin thought to himself. Then he mentally grimaced at the thought and mentally shouted, "Idiot, don't get ahead of yourself."

Then he remembered a very important detail he'd gathered from his earlier conversation with Carnax, and his eyes widened. "Guys, we need to get to the Devil's Gate and close it now," he then stated.

"What?" Beast Boy asked. "Why now?"

"I mean it Beast Boy," Robin stated. "We need to close it right now, before the Knights of Hell arrive."

"Robin," said Cyborg, "you heard what that first squadron we took out before the rest of this mass swarm came out said. The Knights won't be arriving for hours yet."

"No really," said Robin. "Just before I activated the Paradisiacal Key, I had an encounter with Carnax."

"Wasn't he not the demon that we interrogated back at the tower?" Starfire asked.

"Yes," Robin responded. "But that's past the point. Before I dispatched him, he said that he managed to give the Knights a . . . long distance call of some sort while we were all busy fighting off all those other demons before I summoned the angels."

"Long distance call?" Beast Boy asked in disbelief. "What the fudge is that supposed to mean?"

"An Infernal Chat," said Raven. The other Titans all looked at the dark sorceress, and she clarified, "It's a special type of magic that allows you to directly communicate with a being within Hell from outside Hell."

"Thank you Raven," said Robin. "And Carnax also managed to tell me that over the course of his Infernal Chat, he was able to sound the alarm to them about our presence here, and he said that as a result of this, they are now planning on coming here earlier than they originally planned. And they could arrive at any moment now unless we close that Devil's Gate within the next few minutes."

"Well I guess we arrived just in time then," said an eerily familiar voice from right behind Robin.

. . . . .

Robin's eyes widened at the sound of this voice behind him. The other Titans' eyes also widened as they both heard the voice and actually caught a glimpse of who had just now appeared behind their fearless leader. In a flash, Robin turned his head, and his eyes widened in shock and fear at the sight of a very familiar Slade-sized golden yellow demon with a quite literally devilish smirk on its face. "Azazel."

Azazel smacked Robin right in the face with a swing of his right arm, and the Boy Wonder was sent flying to the side. Robin landed on the ground hard, and he managed to pant and gasp briefly before he then felt an invisible force push him further along the ground, lift him up, and then pin up against a nearby large rock. Robin shrieked in pain upon impact, and then found himself growling and snarling as he found himself struggling against a tight telekinetic grip for the second time that night.

The other Titans positioned themselves as if they were about to rush off to Robin's aid. However, seconds before they could lunge in their fearless leader's direction, they shrieked in shock as they to found themselves flying backward as the result of an invisible force. Before long, they were all pinned up against one of the cliff walls surrounding the valley. At that moment, they all heard another unsettlingly familiar voice say, "I believe you've been involved with our business long enough." The four Titans looked in the direction of the voice and saw none other than Azazel's four compatriots standing a couple feet in front of them with their hands outstretched towards them much like Azazel had his own hand outstretched towards Robin.

At the sight of these demons, particularly Samael, Beast Boy found himself snarling in a rage, and he even turned into a wolf and started snapping his teeth in the red demon's direction. Sadly, Lilith kept him tightly pinned against the cliff wall. Lilith's mate and other two compatriots, likewise, made sure that Cyborg and the girls were similarly kept pinned up against the wall alongside him. Samael had his hand extended towards Starfire, who had her eyes and fists glowing but was unable to move her hands or face into a proper position she needed to be in in order to successfully fire her star bolts or to aim her eye lasers at anything that wasn't the space directly above Samael's head. Abaddon was at work in holding back Raven, who had her eyes glowing black as she attempted to use her telekinesis to lift up some rocks to throw, only for Abaddon to use his own umbrakinetic abilities to cancel out Raven's efforts. Finally, Asmodeus was the one responsible for pinning up Cyborg, who had converted his right arm into his sonic cannon, but was unable to lift it up into proper firing position thanks to the strength of the demon's telekinetic grip. Robin, meanwhile, found himself bitterly feeling a sense of déjà vu as he himself found himself once again having his face be the only part of his body that he could move.

Azazel chuckled, directed a wolfish grin towards Robin, and then said, "I will say Boy Wonder. I would be lying if I said that I hadn't expected you to pull something off to stop us after what happened back in that valley earlier. But I must admit, even I'm surprised at just how far you managed to go. And of course, let's not forget that little trick you've now managed to pull by getting ahold of the Paradisiacal Key and summoning his Malevolence's estranged younger brothers. Even I have to admit that I certainly didn't see that coming." Azazel then leaned forward towards Robin with his grin now widened even further. "Well played Boy Wonder; well played."

Robin growled, glared at Azazel, and then hissed, "Yeah well, you had it coming. And newsflash, even your king's quote on quote 'brothers' wanted us to win this time. They not only actually allowed us to get here on time, but they even sent that key down here specifically with the intent for us to use it if we failed to stop Savage from opening your home's gate!"

"Oh really?" asked Azazel. He thought to himself, and then chuckled. "Well I certainly must admit that that actually doesn't surprise me. After all, everybody has their limits, and I'm sure that due to how close his Malevolence has actually gotten this time in his current plan, I guess they must have decided that this time would be an appropriate moment for them to make an exception to their 'never directly intervene' rule."

Azazel's face then took on a more serious expression. "But never mind that," the demon stated. "It's time for me and my compatriots to take care of some final business before his Malevolence's original three brothers inevitably arrive to join the fun." He then grinned maliciously. "Still, I guess it wouldn't hurt if my compatriots and I tortured you lot a bit beforehand."

Robin only glared in response to this comment. "You can threaten us as long as you want devil," he growled. "But in the end, it will amount to nothing. My friends and I will stop you. I don't care what it takes."

"You've certainly got that last bit correct," Azazel admitted with a smirk. The demon gestured towards the other four Titans and said, "After all, as much as I expected you to not just sit around and take your world's impending doom without a fight, even I wasn't expecting you to turn out as suicidally reckless as you have turned out to be in the end. And believe me, I'm not talking about summoning the angels when I say that."

"Well then what are you talking about?!" Cyborg yelled.

"Silence!" Asmodeus howled. "Unless you want to be reduced to a pile of smoldering scrap metal and bloodied guts!"

"Calm yourself Asmodeus," Azazel stated calmly without even turning to face his compatriot. "There is no need for history to repeat itself . . . at least not yet anyway."

"What do you mean by that?" Raven asked.

"Never you mind, daughter of Trigon," Azazel responded coolly before looking back at Robin once more. "And for that matter, I'd best take a little look at something good old Carnax was so kind as to bring up during his little chat with us earlier."

At the sound of this, though he showed no external sign of it, Robin felt as if his blood were turning to ice. "He's gonna look right at my soul," he thought to himself. This was bad. Not only was Azazel about to get full confirmation of what Carnax had found out about his deal, but he was about to do it right in front of the other Titans. "I am so screwed," Robin thought to himself. Not only was he potentially going to get killed and sent to Hell early, but his friends were about to catch him in yet another lie.

Chuckling nervously, he said to Azazel, "You know, whatever it is you've got planned, I have a pretty good feeling that you'll have to lower your hand in order to do it, and that would mean releasing me from your telekinesis."

"Oh really?" Azazel asked with a smirk. "Well if that's true, then go ahead and punch me right now." Right as Azazel said that last bit, he abruptly lowered his hand that he'd extended towards the Boy Wonder when he'd activated his telekinesis. At that moment, Robin wasn't sure what he found more surprising; the fact that Azazel had so abruptly dropped his hand down, or the fact that the telekinetic hold on him still remained in place afterwards.

At the sight of the visibly surprised look on Robin's face, Azazel chuckled, stretched his now intertwined hands up in the air before then saying, "The interesting thing about demonic telekinesis is how the stronger the demon, the stronger the ability. Take the lower tier demons for example. Their telekinesis is so weak that they can only move inanimate objects and have absolutely zero capability of moving any animate living objects whatsoever. Then consider the medium ranking demons; while they are capable of moving both animate as well as inanimate objects, they have to maintain both a steady physical position as well as a full mental concentration in order to keep it in place, much like you were expecting to be the case for myself. And then, with greater demons such as myself, the other Knights, and similar higher ranking demons, while they do have to extend their arm and hand towards the object at the same time they concentrate on it in order to activate their telekinesis, they need only maintain complete concentration in order for the ability to stay active, as you can see here. And finally, his Malevolence himself is so powerful that he can activate his telekinesis without so much as moving a muscle." Azazel then looked straight back at Robin, a smug grin on his face. "How's that for powerful?"

Robin gulped, and hung his head in shame. "This is even worse than I thought," he thought to himself.

"But enough delays," said Azazel. "It's high time now that I got to my little bit of business I mentioned earlier." The demon then leaned forward towards Robin, a hawk-eyed glare on his face, and then his eyes turned bone white and he spent what seemed like an eternity gazing intently at Robin while the Boy Wonder could only stand tall as best as he could in his telekinetic imprisonment and put on as brave a face as he could muster. Then Azazel's eyes reverted back to normal, he nodded his head, and he said, "I must say, Carnax certainly wasn't kidding. Under other circumstances, I'm sure Samael and Lilith would be quite proud of their eldest. I haven't seen a contract of this magnitude since the day Samael collected Tom Walker's soul. Well, like father, like daughter I guess."

"Would you quit talking in riddles?!" Beast Boy snapped. "What the fudge are you talking about?!"

"All in good time changeling, all in good time," Azazel responded coolly.

"You're one to talk," Robin interjected. "You yourself have already said that you're limited on time, and here you are telling Beast Boy that all will be revealed in good time."

"Oh that's rich coming from you," said Azazel. "Last time I checked, you don't have nearly as much time as the majority of your predecessors have had. Just think, do you really believe that you have enough time to take care of all you want to have done before your time comes Boy Wonder?"

"That's not gonna work on me Azazel," said Robin. "What's done is done, ok? I've accepted what I had to do, and for the sake of the world, I've put it behind me. As for the future . . . well I'll just cross that bridge when I get there."

"Oh but what about your faithful friends?" Azazel countered. He then leaned forward with his face coming inches away from Robin's own. "Are they willing to wait that long?"

At the sound of this, all the other Titans found themselves feeling especially unnerved. "Robin," Starfire stated in a half pleading and half fearful tone. "What is he talking about?"

"Ah," Azazel said as he briefly took a glance at the four subordinate founding Titans before then looking back at Robin and stating, "So you haven't yet told them your newest little secret." Robin's only response was a withering glare.

Azazel chuckled darkly. "Well I guess now's as good a time as ever for them to become aware of don't you think?" Robin growled inarticulately, and tensed himself up as if struggling to break free from Azazel's telekinetic hold through sheer willpower.

"Well Titans," Azazel stated as he proceeded to turn his back on Robin and start walking straight towards the Boy Wonder's four fellow teenage heroes. "I'm sure you are aware of how your fearless leader has kept a considerable number of secrets from you since day one of your relationship with him. In fact, I'm sure there's quite a long list of secrets he's kept from you that you both are aware and unaware of that I could rattle off right here and now if I had the time. But now's your chance Titans. Now's your chance to find out a particularly earthshaking secret of his that he hasn't even yet kept hidden from you for a full 24 earth hours. In fact, now's your chance to actually hear it come from right out of his own self-righteous beak."

Azazel then turned his head to face Robin once more. "Why don't you tell them Boy Wonder? Tell them, how you had them brought back from death!"

No sooner had Azazel shouted those last four words, when Robin's four resurrected friends tensed up, their eyes widening in shock and disbelief. Azazel seemed to sense this, as he then turned his head towards them once more and said, "That's right, you heard correctly. Death. Those blackouts you had earlier? They weren't the result of any coma. And better yet, that 'dream' you shared about being in the outskirts and antechamber of Heaven and meeting his Malevolence's goody-goody little brother Gabriel? That wasn't a dream. It's a memory. You were really in Heaven. You were dead."

"Dead?!" Beast Boy asked incredulously.

"Oh yes Changeling," Samael responded. "You, that sorceress you fancy, your robotic best friend, and the alien princess were dead as dodos. I tested you myself with my mind reading after I'd finished roasting you up, and there was radio silence on you. Your soul was long gone."

"Indeed it was," said Azazel. "And so was yours," he then continued as he pointed at Raven. "Though how it ended up in the realm of his Malevolence's father, let alone any form of Heaven whatsoever, is certainly beyond me."

"You got that right, and you were dead to," Asmodeus hissed as he then directed his gaze back at Cyborg. "In fact, its' a miracle that the acid I put in you didn't manage to completely melt you down from the outside as well as the inside."

"Correct you are," said Lilith. She then directed a smug grin towards Starfire before stating calmly, "And before you ask, yes, they indeed were dead. I saw it through your own eyes and heard it through your own ears. And yes, I killed you as well; and no, I didn't manipulate into strangling yourself or whatever cock and bull your boyfriend told you. I snapped your neck a full 360 degrees. I felt your soul leave your body. You were as good as gone."

For a moment, the other Titans were completely speechless. "Well if that's true, then how the heck are we alive right this very moment?" Cyborg managed to ask.

"Now that is where things get interesting," Abaddon stated before turning his head to face Azazel and nodding as if to say 'continue'.

"Indeed," Azazel agreed. Pointing his finger at Robin, the yellow demon continued, "About an hour and a half or so of grieving, your fearless leader managed to figure out a way that that careless oaf Savage had actually ended up unintentionally giving him the most conveniently available means at the time of undoing the damage that my compatriots and I had done. You see, due to how he had both cleverly managed to commit all the information within the Infernal Tablet to memory and arrogantly believed that he'd worked for us so long as to warrant our putting in a good word for him so he would no longer require his possessing them, he had up and abandoned the Infernal Tablet and Fallen Tools at the valley where we killed you, even going so far as to throw them right at your fearless leader's feet. However, as a direct result of this, instead of rubbing the loss in his face the way Savage had intended, this action proved to serve a rather different purpose. For instead, using those very objects, your fearless leader summoned my niece Nehreezah, one thing led to another, and in the end, he made a deal."

For an agonizing five minutes, the other Titans were completely speechless. They all looked each other in the eyes, and then looked back towards Robin and the Knights of Hell with a mixture of disbelief and uncertainty on their faces.

"That's," said Beast Boy. "That's impossible. That can't be true!"

"Yeah," said Raven. "I know Robin, we all do, and he'd never do something like that."

"But he did," said Azazel. "He summoned Nehreezah, bargained with her, and in the end, he gave her the Infernal Tablet, Fallen Tools, and his soul. And in exchange, he got you four back from the dead, alive and well, and raring to go and resume your noble quest to stop us from finally invading Earth and allowing his Malevolence the chance to escape earlier then foretold. And of course, at this very moment, the Infernal Tablet and Fallen Tools are all back in his Malevolence's Crypt where they used to be, courtesy of Nehreezah." Azazel then looked back at Robin. "Needless to say Titans, even if by some miracle you all manage to escape from the current conditions we've placed you under, your fearless leader is a dead man walking."

The other Titans directed their attention towards Robin, their facial expressions silently, but nonetheless clearly, both asking him if whether or not Azazel's claims were true and begging him to deny any truth behind them. Robin grimaced, and closed his eyes, not daring to silently admit to Azazel telling the truth by turning his head, yet unable to speak and lie in objection to the Knight of Hell's claims.

"And now that we've gotten out of the way, it's high time we finished our little bit of business here."

Robin opened his eyes and looked directly at Azazel just in time to see that not only was the demon now looking directly at him once more, but also appeared to have summoned a large medieval sword from thin air that he was now grasping tightly in his right hand.

Azazel smirked, directed his gaze towards the intimidating weapon in his hand, and said, "A fantastic weapon swords. Always were one of my favorites." He looked back at Robin. "I'm sure you are aware of how I am credited with being the creator of weapons. Well I can certainly admit that I was the one who first designed all the weapons of medieval times and further back that your kin wielded, and that after I was cast down alongside his Malevolence after his failed rebellion, I proceeded to have the ideas for all my creations placed within the minds of the humans who would later reinvent them for human use.

"Of course, it is a real pity that so many of my old inventions are used so rarely anymore. Of course I won't lie this time; there are some weapons that your kin have created in the days following my exile from Heaven and subsequent demonification that are actually quite fascinating. But nonetheless, if given the choice, I will always chose one of my own inventions over one of your kin's modern day gadgets any day."

Azazel took a step towards Robin, his yellow eyes agleam with a malicious pleasure. "As unpopular as they may be nowadays, there's never any greater sensation I've felt then to wield one of my own creations." He then chuckled, spun the sword around in his hand in a trio of counter clockwise loops, and said, "And as you will soon experience, it really wouldn't matter in the end what weapon I choose; after all, whether it be by bullet or blade, the end result is still the same."

The instant Azazel said that last bit, he lifted the sword up into the air, positioned it so that the blade was pointing straight at Robin, and took a step forward as if challenging Robin to a duel. Robin's eyes widened at the sight of this, for he had a very bad feeling about what Azazel was about to do. Sure enough, Azazel then said, "And yes, as you have guessed, it is time for you to die."

"Now we're talking," Samael said as he, Lilith, Abaddon, and Asmodeus turned to face their respective captives and raised their right hands as if about to telekinetically snap their necks.

"Patience now," Azazel said without even turning to face his fellow Knights of Hell. "I didn't say it was time for all of them to die just yet, I said it was time for him to die." As he said the last bit, Azazel gestured towards Robin. "As you recall, last time we had him helplessly pinned up and forced to watch as we killed his friends. But now, in light of the circumstances, I believe a reversal of roles is in order. In other words, I believe that this time, we should have the other four Titans pinned up and forced to watch as we kill their fearless leader."

The other four Knights of Hell thought to themselves, and then nodded as one. "I guess that would be fair," said Samael.

"It would certainly be poetic," said Lilith.

"And that is why you are now in charge for this mission," said Abaddon.

"Yes," hissed Asmodeus. "Let us watch."

Azazel's four compatriots promptly turned their backs to the four subordinate Titans so as to get a good view of Azazel for when he dealt the upcoming dramatic final blow to the fearless leader of the Teen Titans. Azazel smiled at the sight, looked back at Robin, and then lowered his sword so that it was pointed straight at Robin's abdomen instead of the area directly between his eyes.

Robin's eyes widened at the sight of this. "No," he thought to himself. At the sight of Azazel licking his chops and allowing a toothy grin to come on his face, Robin instantly realized that Azazel was being dead serious. He had to find a way get out, and quick. "I'd be a little less eager about this if I were you," Robin then said.

"Oh really?" Azazel asked. "And why's that?"

"You care about your own family don't you?" Robin asked. He directed a sidelong glance at Samael and Lilith. "As you are so certain to claim, I made a deal with Nehreezah, Samael and Lilith's eldest daughter; and just like you said, her relation to them makes her your niece."

"So?" Azazel asked.

"Well like I said, that makes Nehreezah part of your family," Robin continued. "And considering how heavily and passionately she's been training and practicing under her parents' tutelage for the position of head dealmaker, I highly doubt that she'd take to kindly to her own uncle slandering her integrity by not allowing her newest customer to not live out his full allotment."

Azazel seemed to think to himself. "Hmm, I have to admit, you actually have a fair point." He then directed his eyes in another direction. "Still, the fact that she's family doesn't put her above the law, and she did commit insubordination by allowing his Malevolence's plans this evening to be derailed through her business with you." He then closed his eyes, nodded his head up and down, and stated, "But then again, I am only her uncle. And this particular kind of matter is something that would probably be far more appropriate for her parents to make the final decision on."

Azazel turned his head to face Samael and Lilith, who gulped, looked each other in the eyes, and then appeared to think to themselves, their parental mode clearly on. Then they nodded their heads, apparently in agreement on something, and turned their heads back to Azazel. "He does have a point," said Samael. "As circumstantially treacherous her actions were in making that deal, she is still my daughter."

"Indeed very true," said Lilith. "And besides, I am equally to blame. After all, I was the one who trained and taught her so well in regard to deal making that she just couldn't resist the opportunity that this boy gave her. If anyone's to blame for this entirely, it is I."

"Indeed," said Samael. "But still, like you said family is not over the law, and she did commit insubordination."

"However," Lilith continued for her mate. "Considering what the usual punishment for insubordination is as demonstrated by my mate on Simenon, we can agree that she'd be getting off lightly if you were to kill her latest business partner earlier than he was promised."

Her mate nodded in agreement, as did Abaddon and Asmodeus. "I'd say that sounds fair," the green demon hissed.

"So it does," Azazel stated before turning his head to Robin and saying, "I'm sorry to tell you this, but it seems you shall die after all." He lifted his sword upwards in a backwards arc.

Starfire tensed up, her eyes glowing dangerously as she aimed her eyesight straight at Azazel. But then she screamed and snapped her eyes closed as she suddenly felt an indescribably agonizing pain in the area where her heart was located. It was almost as if her heart was shrinking right there inside her. Her fellow Titans could only gape in horror at this, both unable to do anything and uncertain as to what was even going on.

After what seemed like an eternity to Starfire, the pain abruptly vanished, and she hung her head down towards the ground, panting and gasping in agony and relief. Then she heard the angry voice of Samael state, "Consider yourself lucky that I was merciful enough to just let you off with a warning!" Starfire and the other Titans looked right in the direction Samael's voice had come from in time to see that he had turned to face them and now had his right hand up in the air in a position that hinted to him not too long ago having it clenched into a fist. The crimson demon growled, pointed at Starfire, and then coldly snarled, "If I had so desired, I would have kept on squeezing your heart down until it shriveled up to absolutely nothing! It is only through sheer luck that I stopped it when it was still at a size from which it could grow back! Do not test my patience alien, or you will go right back to the afterlife all over again!" Samael then turned his furious face to the other three subordinate founding Titans. "And that applies to you three as well!" At the sound of that last threat, Cyborg gulped, Raven visibly paled, and Beast Boy cringed, closed his eyes, and even whined fearfully like a dog. Samael grunted, directed a final glare at all four of the resurrected Titans, and then turned to face Azazel and Robin once more.

Azazel nodded his head, smirked at Robin, and then said, "Once again, I hope you're ready, because it's now very much high time I sent you downstairs a good few months early." He lifted up his sword in a backwards arc once again, the light of the moon reflecting ominously off the blade. Robin growled and tensed himself up, willing himself to break free. But alas, he remained stuck tight against the massive boulder he'd been pinned up against. Azazel grinned, changed his grip slightly to indicate that he was about to swing the sword back down so as to allow it jab right into Robin's heart, and coldly hissed, "Farewell Boy Wonder."

At that moment, right as Azazel was mere seconds away from swinging the sword downwards to deal the final blow, Robin saw what appeared to be three snow white bolts of lightning flying at a suspiciously horizontal orientation away from the open portal in the sky straight towards Azazel from behind. Seconds later, much to Robin's surprise, they appeared to develop what looked like three-fingered clawed hands at the very tips just as they were inches away from Azazel's shoulders. The other Knights of Hell also managed to notice at this point, and their eyes widened. "Brother look out!" Samael roared.

But it was too late. Azazel didn't even get the chance to turn his head or stab Robin before the lightning bolts snatched him up by the shoulders and yanked him backwards, sending him flying away from Robin and crashing right into his four fellow Knights. The incident must have caused the Knights of Hell to lose their concentration they'd been maintaining in order to keep their telekinetic hold active, because seconds after the Knights of Hell had all ended up piled up on each other, Robin and the other Titans felt the invisible force pinning them up abruptly vanish, and they slipped straight on the ground on their backsides. Panting in relief, they managed to turn their heads in the appropriate direction just in time to see the three white lightning bolts crash land on the ground and burst into bright light before then taking on the form of three tall individuals dressed in white robes and with massive brilliantly colored feathered wings sprouting from their backs.

However, when those same three figures fully straightened up from their initial one-knee crouching positions, Robin and the other Titans found their eyes widening as they managed to get a full glimpse of the three newly arrived angels. As radiant as their brethren that had arrived earlier had been, these three angels in particular seemed to radiate with grace, raw Heavenly power seeming to pulse from their bodies. And despite the fact that they wore similar colored robes, these three angels couldn't have looked more different from each other. The one standing in the middle of the trio, who appeared to be the tallest, had golden blonde hair, amber yellow feathered wings, and gleaming topaz hazel eyes; and he appeared to have the calm look of a leader. The considerably more powerfully built angel standing to the blonde angel's right had fiery red hair, crimson feathered wings, and ominously ruby colored eyes. Finally, the much smaller angel standing to the blonde angel's left had coal black hair, inky black feathered wings, and matching dark colored eyes.

Upon sight of the dark haired angel, the eyes of the four resurrected Titans widened in recognition. Beast Boy even pointed at the angel in question and yelled, "That's Gabriel!"

"Not just any Gabriel," Robin stated, only now finally realizing the significance of the name despite how long it had been since Beast Boy had mentioned that detail back in the other valley. "The Gabriel. The archangel. The one who bore the good news to Mary. And if that's truly him," he then looked directly at his four friends. "Then those other two angels right by him must be . . ."

"Michael and Raphael," said Raven.

For a brief moment, Beast Boy found himself having to struggle not to snigger at the very least or burst out laughing at the very most upon being reminded of how one of the three archangels was named Raphael (and thus, served as a slight namesake for one of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles). Fortunately, he was able to exert enough willpower to prevent himself from laughing. After all, considering how the archangel in question was right there not too far away from him, plus the extremely angry looking expression on the face of the ginger haired angel, he had a feeling that it would not end well for him if he laughed at the name right there in the presence of Raphael and his two brothers.

Then the blonde angel drew out his sword, and Robin instantly knew that this particular angel was indeed Michael himself. For inscribed on the blade of the sword was the word 'Glorious'; and that was the word he knew from all he'd read to be the name of Michael's own sword. Samael also recognized the sword, and through it the angel wielding it, and he growled angrily at the angel before directing a sidelong glare at Azazel and hissing bitterly, "Damn it Azazel, you waited too long."

Michael turned his head towards the five demons. "Greetings Samael," he then stated to the glowering red demon. "It's been a long time."

Samael growled, forced his way out from the dogpile, and stormed over towards Michael. Coming to a stop at about 12 feet away from the angel, Samael snarled, and then retorted in a low angry growl, "Not. Long. Enough. Michael."

Michael smiled, shook his head side to side, and then stated, "It seems you have not forgotten what happened between us that day."

"Oh you can definitely say that," Samael hissed spitefully. "Believe me, when the last thing you see before dying and coming back to life as a demon is your brother standing before you with his sword through your chest, you'll understand how hard it would be to forget about that day in a hurry."

"You brought it upon yourself Samael," Michael responded calmly. "You could have sided with our father that day. It is only because you both sided with Lucifer and openly attacked me that I was forced to kill you and send you down with the rest of my fallen brothers."

"None of us would have needed to fall if you and Father had only listened to Lucifer," Samael snapped. "If you'd allowed his idea a proper chance, then there would never have been any need for a Hell, and the entire world would have forever been the paradise that Eden used to be!"

"Paradise?" Michael asked dismissively. "Hardly. I couldn't imagine a more dystopian reality than one with not so much as even a concept of free will. And besides, don't you think it was hypocritical of Lucifer to suggest what he suggested after how he himself was responsible for allowing humanity to gain that knowledge that would allow them to be capable of making the choice that our Father chose in the end to let his creations be capable of making?"

"Don't you start on that Michael!" Samael roared. "Father could just as easily have undone the damage and allowed humanity and the rest of the world a proper chance to start over if he hadn't let Noah and his family survive!"

"If it were that easy, then what point would there have even been for Lucifer to let Adam and Eve eat the Forbidden Fruit in the first place?"

Samael snorted derisively, rolling his eyes arrogantly in dismissal. "You wouldn't understand."

"You are correct, I don't understand," said Michael. "And neither do any of my brothers that in the end remained loyal to Father. But just as we can't understand why you and Lucifer both put up such spirited resistance to Father's allowing something that your leader himself made possible in the first place and still continue to refuse to see things our way, neither can you seem to hope to understand how much better off in the end things have turned out to be as a direct result of Father allowing what Lucifer made possible to unfold within a new stronger generation that still exists to this day. And that is why, even at this very moment, we must continue to fight each other and prevent you from making things any more painful than they will already have to be by the time the 666th century ends."

Michael then lowered his sword so that it was pointing straight at Samael. "And thus, even now, my brothers and I must continue to thwart our first fallen brother's efforts at overturning the very thing he used to support so ardently and destroying all that our Father has created in the process. And since it is impossible for you to see reason, we have no choice but to again put an end to your villainy through use of our blades."

"Now you're talking," said Gabriel as he proceeded to summon his own blade, his dark eyes agleam with a spirited energy that the Titans had all seen before in Beast Boy's eyes. The ginger haired angel, who the Titans could now very easily tell was Raphael, merely grunted and summoned his own with a silent gritted toothed snarl on his face.

Samael snarled, his red eyes blazing with rage. "Indeed, and perhaps this time I shall finally reverse roles so that I'm the one stabbing you through the chest!" In a flash, he summoned a wicked looking blade that looked very eerily like a small sword carved from an animal's jaw bone and colored in a way that made it look as if it had been immersed in blood that had ended up drying up on the weapon like paint, and then swung it at Michael with an inarticulate shriek of fury. Michael calmly parried the blow with Glorious; and within seconds, the highest ranking Arch Angel and eldest Knight of Hell proceeded to take part in an epic duel that only an angel and demon could be capable of fighting.

In a flash, Lilith unleashed an inarticulate shriek of her own before zooming off to fight alongside her mate. Michael calmly summoned his shield and proceeded to fight both Samael and Lilith with only his single sword and shield against the two blades wielded by the literally demonic duo. Abaddon to join in the battle against Michael as well, only to have his path blocked by Gabriel.

The dark haired Arch Angel pointed his sword at the furious Knight of Hell. "Sorry, but my eldest brother prefers to fight against two adversaries at a time thank you," said Gabriel.

"Why you little scum," Abaddon growled. "I'll show you why you should treat me with proper respect!" he then shouted as he proceeded to summon his own nightmarish blade and then teleport out of sight.

Gabriel simply turned to face the area behind him and positioned his sword appropriately right as Abaddon reappeared in that very area. "Nice try brother," said Gabriel, "but as your former teacher, did you really think I'd fall for my own trick?" Abaddon snarled incoherently, and the two dueling combatants promptly proceeded to rapidly teleport in and out of sight in random directions and places, all while continuing to clash their blades together in a flurry of clangs and rattles.

Asmodeus, meanwhile, fared no better in his efforts to gang up on Michael alongside Samael and Lilith. For right after he made it within three feet of the battle in question, he had just finished crouching in preparation for pouncing into the midst of it when Raphael materialized right in front of him as if he'd teleported. At the sight of the now livid Asmodeus, Raphael growled, lifted his sword up in a battle-ready stance, and savagely roared, "It ends tonight foul fiend!" Asmodeus snarled in rage, his frill extended and tongue vibrating rapidly in the air from his open jaws, before lunging at Raphael. Raphael knocked him to the side with a swing of his arm, and the demon went sprawling. Then Asmodeus jumped back up on his feet, summoning a long bony spear with a blade similar to the ones on the swords wielded by his three comrades at the tip. "Have it your way then," Raphael snarled before swooping towards Asmodeus with a inarticulate battle cry. Within seconds, Raphael and Asmodeus proceeded to fight furiously with each other as they clashed their blades together.

For a moment, the Titans stood together in the area where the Knights of Hell had all been standing before beginning their battles with the Arch Angels. "Boy those guys sure make one badass God squad," said Beast Boy. At the sound of this, Robin, Cyborg, and Raven rolled their eyes while Starfire raised her eyebrow in confusion.

Then Robin seemed to remember something, and he turned to the other Titans before saying, "Well regardless of that, we still have work to do. The angels may be here now and helping us, but we still need to get the alpha Devil's Gate closed before any of the fallen demons get the chance to regenerate and come right back out."

The Boy Wonder turned his head in the direction of the Devil's Gate. "Fortunately, as luck would have it, the Infernal Key is still right there by it. All I need to do now is get to that machinery, get ahold of the key, and then utter the words needed to close the gate."

"Won't that just lock out the demons still outside?" Beast Boy asked.

"Not necessarily," said Raven. "Whenever an afterlife portal closes, they unleash a gravity field that causes any natives of the realm that the portal leads to that are still within the immediate vicinity to automatically be sucked back into the portal directly before closing entirely. With all the demons released that haven't been killed yet still in this valley, closing the Devil's Gate will allow all of the ones still alive to be dragged right back to Hell."

"Well that certainly makes things easier," said Cyborg.

"Indeed," said Robin. "Now here's the plan guys. Since I'm the one present with the best chance of successfully activating the power of the Infernal Key to close the gate, I'll go over to the machinery designed to work in opening and closing it so that I can get ahold of the key and close the Devil's Gate from there."

"What about us?" Starfire asked.

"I want you guys to keep a close eye on all the demons," Robin responded as he pointed to where the still battling demons and angels were. "And if any of them manage to break off from their battling to try to head me off, I want you guys to keep them busy long enough for both the angels to finish them off, and for me to reach the Key. Got it?"

"You got it Rob," said Cyborg.

"Affirmative," Raven stated.

"Sounds like a plan to me dude," said Beast Boy.

"Understood Robin," said Starfire.

"Good, Titans go!"

In an instant, the Titans split up; Robin running off in the general direction of the Devil's Gate while the rest of the Titans rushed off to get into a position that would allow them to get a view of the demons in the valley so that they would be able to catch them in the act if they attempted to head Robin off. And when they managed to catch sight of a small group of minor demons break off from the main battle zone and attempt to scurry off in Robin's direction, it didn't take long for the other Titans to block them off and dispatch them.

However, what none of the Titans had noticed was how Azazel had not gotten involved with any of the fights between the Arch Angels and his four compatriots. Due to how much an impact he'd had with the ground and the rest of his compatriots after the Arch Angels had yanked him away from Robin and thrown him down, it had taken a good bit of time for him to get his bearings back after the considerable state of disorientation he'd found himself in came into effect. But at that very moment, right as his four compatriots were in the midst of battling the Arch Angels and the four resurrected Titans were busy with holding off all the minor demons who were lucky enough to break off from the main battle to attempt to head off Robin, Azazel himself managed to notice Robin rushing off in the general direction of the Alpha Devil's Gate and the Infernal Key. At the sight of this, he snarled, his yellow eyes gleaming with fury. "Oh no you don't," he growled. "I'm not letting you get away that easily." He then proceeded to cloak himself with active electricity and revert to his incorporeal form. As a result, much like how Samael was capable of becoming a flying stream of flames whenever he switched to incorporeal form while cloaked with flames, Azazel appeared to take on the form of a gigantic snake-shaped mass of multiple bolts of electricity. No sooner had Azazel taken on this form when he rocketed off towards Robin. The other Titans, already distracted as they were in fighting off all the minor ranking demons attempting to head off their fearless leader, were too busy to notice Azazel as he zoomed right over them towards Robin.

. . . . .

For another few minutes, Robin continued to run through the small forest between the Devil's Gate and the clearing where the Knights of Hell had been holding him and the other Titans. "Any moment now, any moment now," he thought to himself. When he later entered another open area filled with rocks located not too far away at all from the Devil's Gate, the Boy Wonder began to run even faster. "I'm almost there," he thought to himself.

But then, a gigantic serpentine mass of lightning crashed 'headfirst' onto the ground right in front of Robin, and the Boy Wonder was sent flying backward. He slammed down hard on his back, and he grunted and groaned in pain before finally managing to get up. And right as Robin was in the midst of getting back up on his feet, the mass of electricity converged together into the form of a demon.

Right as Robin was about to lift his head back up to look in front of him, he heard a familiar voice say, "Going somewhere Boy Wonder?"

Robin snapped his head up to look in front of him, and glared at the sight of Azazel standing right in the charred up area where the mass of lightning had landed in front of him with a glare of his own on his face. "Need I answer?" he growled sarcastically.

"No," Azazel growled bluntly before then abruptly rushing straight towards Robin at a lightning fast speed.

Robin's eyes widened, and he hurriedly jumped to his right just in time to avoid ending up on the receiving end of either Azazel painfully colliding into him, or getting sliced across the stomach by Azazel's wickedly sharp left hand claws. For a brief moment, as Robin soared off to his right and Azazel zoomed right through the area Robin had originally been standing, time seemed to go in slow motion with Azazel directing a hateful glare towards Robin as his claws just barely missed the Boy Wonder's stomach. Then time reverted back to normal speed, and the literal speed demon was gone in a flash.

Robin landed on his palms and turned the impact into a trio of somersaults before skidding to a halt in a position that would allow him to look in the direction that Azazel had managed to skid off to.

As it turned out, Azazel had now managed to come to a stop as well, and he directed a furious glare towards Robin before rushing towards him once more. Robin hurriedly jumped out of the way again, and he continued to do so for another five minutes before eventually getting sent flying backward as a result of the demon zooming along right in front of him and slamming its fist into his face while he was in the midst of dodging the charge that he'd dodged just seconds prior.

Robin went sprawling on his back, and he managed to sit back up in time for him to hurriedly make a back flip to dodge a leaping fist slam that Azazel attempted to pound him in the chest with. Robin didn't even get the chance to straighten back up before he was forced to back flip yet again to dodge a swing of Azazel's spiked tail. For the next few minutes, Robin was forced to continue to back flip further and further away from the Devil's Gate in his efforts to avoid ending up on the receiving end of a series of punches, kicks, claw slashes, bites, and even tail swipes. After back flipping to dodge the 26th attack in Azazel's rapid series of blows, the demon coated his right hand in electricity and karate chopped the ground in front of him. The blow caused both a shockwave and sent three ground-based lightning bolts racing across the ground towards Robin. Robin jumped through the air and soared right over both the demon and the electrified shockwave.

The Boy Wonder landed on his hands and knees with his back facing the demon, and he turned his head just in time to see Azazel, with his back still turned, engulfing himself in a gigantic crackling sphere of electricity. Seconds later, with a sideways spreading out of his arms, Azazel caused the sphere of electricity to explode into eight lightning bolts that each flew out in a different compass-based direction. With absolutely no time to dodge, Robin instinctively positioned his cape in a way that would allow it to hopefully shield himself from the blow.

As it turned out, while the cape thankfully managed to serve as an effective enough shield to prevent Robin from getting electrocuted, the lightning bolt managed to strike the cape with enough force to cause Robin to go sliding backwards. Robin gritted his teeth and maintained his cape shielding position. Unfortunately, Robin was keeping such strong focus on maintaining his shield that he forgot to check the area behind him, and he ended up getting tripped up and landing on his back when his feet slammed right into a large tree root located directly behind him.

Robin groaned, shook his head side to side with his eyes closed, and got himself up into a seated position just in time to see Azazel lunge towards him with his claws both extended and cloaked in electricity. Robin hurriedly jumped away in time to avoid getting sliced in half by the x-shaped slashing attack that Azazel unleashed with his electrified claws. And when the Boy Wonder then started to continue running in the direction he'd jumped to dodge the electrified x-shaped slash, he was just barely able to avoid getting blasted by a lightning bolt breath attack that Azazel attempted to shoot him with. Even though he was able to avoid getting directly hit by the breath attack, the blast was still able to briefly cause him to stumble as a result of how very close behind him the bolt had struck, and he slowed down in his running just enough for Azazel to successfully pounce on him from behind.

Robin slammed face down on the ground with Azazel on his back firmly pinning him down. Robin managed to turn his head to look in Azazel's direction in time to see the demon cause a chidori-like sphere of electricity to appear upon his opened right palm. Robin's eyes widened at the sight of this, for if this attack were anything like the special Naruto universe ultimate chakra attack that it resembled, he did not want it anywhere near him when Azazel slammed it down. Desperate, he drew out a smoke stick from his utility belt and threw it up in Azazel's face. Azazel hacked and coughed as the resulting thick cloud of smoke abruptly blew up in his face. And as the demon was disoriented and coughing from the smoke, Robin managed to knock him off with an elbow strike and then throw a freeze disk at him before running back off towards the Devil's Gate once more, leaving Azazel completely encased in ice.

Unfortunately, Azazel still wasn't done yet. And from within the massive block of ice encasing him, he caused a circle of lightning to drop down hard on the area directly surrounding the ice. The resulting electrical popping caused by the lightning bolts' impact with the ground proved powerful enough to cause the ice to crack, and then shatter. No sooner was Azazel freed from the ice when he roared in outrage towards Robin, coated himself in electricity, and then assumed his incorporeal form before rocketing after Robin. And as Azazel zoomed towards Robin, all the multiple tendrils of electricity that he'd become merged together to create one single massive bolt of lightning, which then reared up and rose high up into the air.

Robin was just a meter or two away from the opening and closing mechanism for the Alpha Devil's Gate when the giant lightning bolt that Azazel had become slammed down mere centimeters in front of him. The Boy Wonder was sent rocketing backward and he slammed into a large boulder. Robin got back up on his feet just in time to see the giant lightning bolt rapidly careening in all directions while bouncing off of every random surface it struck much like a beam of light being reflected off of glass. In a flash, Robin was forced to start jumping and back flipping all over again in a mad effort to avoid getting rammed by Azazel. Unfortunately, when a particularly close dodge caused him to go sprawling, Robin found himself with no time to successfully dodge when Azazel then proceeded to unleash yet another full-frontal charge. Robin hurriedly positioned his cape to shield himself, and the gigantic bolt of lightning that was Azazel plowed straight into it, sending the Boy Wonder skidding backwards across the ground before eventually pounding hard against one of the cliff walls surrounding the valley.

Robin slumped across the cliff wall, his cape falling out of its shield position, and he groaned before looking up just in time to see Azazel back in corporeal form rushing towards him with another chidori-like orb at the ready. Panting in exhaustion and terror, Robin leaped out of the way, and Azazel's electric attack slammed against the cliff wall hard enough to leave a sizeable crater. Azazel turned his head away from the newly created crater within the cliff face in time to see Robin running back towards a series of trees, growled, and pointed his left hand towards the Boy Wonder before sending a maelstrom of lightning spouting from his fingertips.

Robin jumped off behind a large group of rocks and trees just in time to avoid getting charred by the lightning blast. As the lightning continued to zoom past his current hiding place, Robin heard Azazel yell, "YOU CANNOT EVADE ME FOREVER BOY WONDER! SOONER OR LATER YOU WILL COME OUT OF HIDING! AND WHEN YOU DO, I CAN ASSURE YOU, YOU WILL DIE!"

Robin took deep breaths from his hiding spot. He knew that he couldn't stay in hiding forever. Assuming Azazel didn't eventually come walking right over, he himself would eventually have to leave anyway if he were to make it to the Devil's Gate and get ahold of the Infernal Key. But just as Azazel was correct in that Robin would have to come out of hiding at some point or other, Robin also knew that the demon hadn't been kidding when he'd said that he would kill him. Grimacing, Robin thought desperately to himself. What was we going to do?

The lightning attack ceased, and Robin found himself feeling quite confused. Why had Azazel shut off his electrical attack? Then he thought to himself. "Of course," he thought to himself. "He's probably trying to draw me out of hiding." He snorted, turned his head to face the direction that he knew Azazel would be located from the other side of his hiding place. "Well if he thinks that just shutting off his attack alone will trick me into getting back out into his attack range, he's very much mistaken."

Unfortunately, Azazel was indeed much smarter than that, and he then stated, "You know Boy Wonder, I'm surprised at how very unheroic you are acting right now. I always thought you to be braver than this; yet here you are cowering behind a bunch of rocks and not even attempting to fight back. That's certainly not the behavior I've come to expect from you after all his Malevolence has seen of you." Robin tensed up, growling silently. Azazel had been very clever just now in using these particular vocal barbs. Among the many things Robin hated was being called a coward. Even now it was taking all his will power not to fly off the handle and jump out of hiding.

Azazel sensed his target's rising anger, and he decided to stoke it up some more. "And what about your friends?" he then asked. "You've already sacrificed your soul and a free trip to Heaven in exchange for their coming back to life and a one way ticket to Hell. Just think about how worthless all that effort would be if they were to die again in the midst of doing battle with all the demons beneath me in rank that they are currently fighting. And that's assuming that my compatriots don't manage to successfully escape from the Arch Angels in time to go after them themselves you know!"

Robin snarled loudly, and he was forced to clench his fist around a tuft of grass to keep himself from exploding in anger. "Keep it together," he growled to himself in his mind.

Azazel chuckled maliciously at the sound of Robin's snarl, and he then looked up towards the sky before saying, "You've faced so many villains and criminals without any fear before now. Heck, you were able to face his Malevolence's idiotic Azarathian counterpart without as much as a shiver. Why has your bravery suddenly chosen to abandon you against me? In fact, even before you became a hero, you were brave enough to soar his Malevolence knows how many feet above the ground alongside your parents without a net beneath you to shield you from falling!"

Robin tensed up and froze in a mixture of shock and rage. If he'd had pyrokinetic touch, then the grass in his hand would have shriveled into ashes. "How dare he?!" He thought to himself in a fury.

Azazel then feigned making a realization, and he yelled, "Oh wait! Maybe that's why you're being such a coward right now! Maybe the reason you're now so afraid to go up against me like a man in the face of death and an early trip to Hell is the fact that it is only through a sheer timing miracle that you were able to avoid falling upon the same tragic fate as your dear beloved mummy and daddy! Isn't that right, Dick Grayson!?"

Robin roared, an inarticulate guttural cry of pure rage, and he climbed up on top of the rocks he'd been hiding behind before lunging at Azazel with his Bo staff at the ready. Azazel, having expected for the Boy Wonder to come back out of his hiding place from the way he'd come in as well as completely weaponless, was taken by surprise at the direction from which Robin had come back out of hiding as well as the fact that he had his Bo staff in his hand, and he hurriedly lifted up his left arm to block the blow Robin was about to strike him with. The staff clanged against the demon's left wrist, and Robin was sent hovering backward before landing on his feet.

With an angry growl, Robin retracted his Bo staff, slipped it back into his utility belt, and then took on a battle-ready position right there by Azazel before then snarling, "You can call me a coward, endanger my friends, and even compare me to Slade; but no one disrespects my parents!" With an enraged yell, Robin summoned his sword. With an acknowledging grunt, Azazel summoned from thin air the very same sword that he'd been ready to stab Robin with earlier before the Heavenly intervention. In a flash, the two warriors began clashing their blades together in an epic showdown.

Meanwhile, the other Titans had just finished taking down yet another small group of demons, and they managed to overhear the sound of the clashing blades. They looked behind them, and saw only the shadows of their fearless leader and the electrokinetic Knight of Hell fighting each other. For a brief moment, Starfire seemed about to zoom off to her boyfriend's defense, but the other Titans gestured for her to stay back. Starfire seemed scandalized at first by this reaction, but then she calmed down when the other Titans shook their heads and reaffirmed their gesture in a more calm matter. "This is his fight Star," Cyborg said. "He can take care of himself."

Starfire thought to herself. "Very well friends," she said. "I do hope you are right."

"Don't we all," said Beast Boy.

Then they heard demonic snarling from behind them. "And on that note, we have a job to do. Take this!" He shouted the last bit as he proceeded to turn to face the newest batch of enemies just before turning into a stegosaurus and sending them flying backward with a swing of his tail (but not without stabbing a few of them with the spikes on it).

Meanwhile, Robin and Azazel continued to fight their duel. Unfortunately, as Robin soon discovered, he was now in way over his head. Savage had earlier claimed to have countless years' worth of sword fighting practice; but if Azazel had made such a claim, it would have been a full truth. No matter what trick or maneuver Robin thought of and attempted, Azazel was always able to almost contemptuously block or parry it again and again. And even worse, he had even ended up proving himself capable of using moves that Robin himself had either always found too difficult to attempt or didn't even know existed. And with that in mind, Robin could already tell that against his current foe, despite all his many months and years of practicing, no amount of training could have possibly prepared him to combat against Azazel's centuries and centuries of experience.

And as if that factor weren't enough, as Robin soon bitterly noted yet again after blocking another stroke from the demon, Azazel was also inhumanly strong. Every time Robin had blocked one of Azazel's own attacks with his sword, Robin's arms had always been left feeling terrifyingly numb afterwards to the point that it had been a miracle that he'd recovered in time to dodge or block any subsequent attacks. The demon's attacks had struck with just that much force. And after another few minutes, Robin finally managed to make note of another factor regarding the demon's strength that caused his eyes to widen in horror. The sword that Azazel was wielding was a broadsword. From all he'd learned about weapons during his time under Batman's tutelage combined with his history lessons at the school he'd attended in Gotham City, he understood how broadswords were so large and heavy that they required a two-handed grip from their wielders. However, the factor that had caused Robin's eyes to widen just now was the fact that Azazel was effortlessly wielding this massive broadsword . . . with only one hand gripping the pommel.

At the sight of Robin's wide-eyed look of fright, Azazel grinned, briefly activated his mind reading on Robin, and then stated, "You are correct Boy Wonder; this is indeed the variety of sword that even the strongest of your kin are only able to wield through use of a two-handed grip. That being said, the fact that I'm able to wield one quite literally single-handedly speaks volumes of my strength, now doesn't it?" Robin growled in response, not all that keen on making small talk.

Azazel chuckled, feigned thinking to himself, and then grinned smugly. "And while I'm at it," he stated. "Another useful factor that comes with the strength to be capable of wielding a broadsword with one hand means not only that it would be easier to use a shield if I had chosen to use one, but that I can also wield two broadswords at once!" And then, much to Robin's horror, he extended out his left hand and caused a second broadsword to materialize out of thin air within reach of his left palm, which he then clenched tightly around the newly summoned extra sword. Azazel smirked at Robin, swung his two swords in counterclockwise circles, and then gestured them into battle-ready positions before yelling, "Let's see how well you fare against me now!"

With a triumphant roar, Azazel proceeded to start swinging both of his swords at Robin. Robin found himself fighting desperately to avoid getting sliced up by Azazel as he hurriedly blocked and dodged to the best of his ability. At one point, he even ended up having to an artful side flip motion in order to slip through the empty space between both swords as they swung at him from opposite directions.

Before long, as if the battle hadn't become unfair enough for Robin, Azazel then started cheating again by causing electricity to spread from his hands to the blades of his swords! And when that happened, Robin knew that it was all over, for after the third time he parried an attack from one of the newly electrified swords of Azazel, he found his arms feeling so numb from the effect of the electrical current's spread that he couldn't even lift them up to raise his sword anymore. Azazel sensed this, smirked at the panting face of the Titans' fearless leader, and then stated coldly, "It's over Boy Wonder," before sending Robin's sword flying out of his hands with a single swing of his left hand sword. The sword hurtled through the air before landing right through the head of one of the minor demons battling the other Titans, incidentally killing it.

When the Titans saw Robin's sword lying in the dust of the unfortunate demon afterward, their eyes widened in horror, and they turned their heads in time to see Azazel standing triumphantly before the now unarmed and very defenseless Robin. Starfire's face took on a horrified look of sadness, and her hands went up to her mouth. "No," she said quietly to herself at the sight of her boyfriend in his current very obviously one-sided conditions against Azazel.

Azazel then uttered a triumphant villainous laugh, pointed his right hand sword at Robin, and caused a bolt of lightning to shoot out of the blade. The burst of electricity struck Robin right in the chest and sent him rocketing backward before then crashing painfully against yet another cliff wall. Robin slumped to the ground, groaning in agony from the combined damage from both the lightning bolt that had struck him in the chest and his impact with the cliff wall. By the time Robin finally managed to open his eyes, he saw that Azazel had managed to teleport to the area directly in front of him. Without warning, the demon positioned his two broadswords so that they crisscrossed in an x-shaped fashion with Robin's neck stuck between them and the cliff wall. In fact, all Azazel now needed to do was to move the swords in just the right way, and they would slice Robin's head right off his shoulders in a scissors-like fashion.

Robin's eyes widened as he realized just how serious a predicament he was now in. Azazel chuckled maliciously, directed a smug grin at the Boy Wonder, and then stated, "Your death has been delayed long enough Boy Wonder. Any last words?!" As he said the last phrase, he tightened his grip on the pommels of his swords as if about to enact the deadly scissors motion. Robin gulped, now panicking mentally as he thought in true terror as to what he could do to escape from this situation. Then he managed to unobtrusively look past Azazel and notice something that he had completely missed while in the midst of his one-sided combat against the Knight of Hell.

Within the valley were only a pitifully small number of demons, and the Knights of Hell were the only greater demons present. And not a single angel had fallen in the midst of their combat. And of course, Azazel's four fellow Knights of Hell were not only still desperately doing battle with the Arch Angels, but were also seeming to wind down in their energy and strength levels. It was clear that the demons would have no victory tonight. Robin smirked, his usual cocky grin coming back on his face, and then said, "Why bother killing me now? It wouldn't do you any good."

"Oh really?" Azazel asked cockily. "And how might that be possible?"

"Why don't you look behind you?" Robin asked.

"Do you really think I'll fall for that trick?"

"You're the mind reader; why don't you determine for yourself whether or not it's a trick?"

Azazel thought to himself, and then turned his head to look behind him. At the sight of the very scene that had now inspired this incredibly last ditch plan of Robin's, Azazel's amber eyes widened in genuine surprise.

Robin smirked as he caught sight of Azazel tensing up in shock, and he then stated, "You see? Even if you kill me now and send me to Hell early, it still wouldn't change a thing. You'd still end up getting defeated and sent back down to Hell anyway by the angels, who would probably even manage to somehow grant my friends the guaranteed ability to close the gate for me. Your precious leader's plot would still fail this evening. And you certainly won't be able to overrun the magical defenses of this island at this point before it sinks into the ocean at turn of day local time either. Face it Azazel, with the angels present, practically your entire army on the last few footsteps left before defeat, and Lucifer's mission now completely doomed to failure, you might as well give up now. You've already lost. As long as the angels are here in full force, all hope that you and the rest of your kin would have to fulfill your master's dream tonight is completely destroyed; and that's really saying something considering the fact that you and your master are supposed to represent the end of all hope for humanity."

At the sound of this powerful comeback from Robin, Azazel thought to himself angrily. But then his eyes widened as he realized that Robin was indeed telling the truth. "You're right," he then said. "As long as the angels are here, my compatriots and I indeed don't stand a chance of fulfilling his Malevolence's dream tonight anymore." Then he glowered towards the machinery designed to open the Alpha Stairway to Heaven, and he came up with a plan to combat the unexpected ace that Robin had now conveniently drawn out of his sleeve. "But of course, the angels need only depart unexpectedly before the remainder of my kin outside Hell can be sent back, and we may yet have hope for his Malevolence's dream coming true this evening."

Azazel looked back at Robin with a glare, pointed in the direction of the Stairway to Heaven operating machinery, and stated, "You are aware of how if an afterlife portal is closed while any of the residents from whatever realm it leads to are still out and about within the direct area that the portal is located in, then the afterlife beings in question will be sucked back into the portal directly before it closes? Well now, all that needs to happen is for someone to close the Alpha Stairway to Heaven, and all the angels will be locked back up in Heaven, and my kin and I can continue on as before!"

Azazel growled, dismissed his two swords in a flash of light, and clenched his fists before saying, "And since you've so kindly allowed me to realize this, I'll make sure that you can't pull any tricks on me by doing the deed myself!" He then turned to face the machinery where the Paradisiacal Key was still positioned and roared, "And best of all, unlike when opening the gate, the Dante's Keys don't need to be placed within their respective machinery in order to close their respective portals!"

In a flash, Azazel extended his right hand towards the machinery for the Alpha Stairway to Heaven, and the Paradisiacal Key zoomed through the air straight into Azazel's outstretched hand, which clenched around the dazzling white gemstone as if his life depended on it. He heaved in a mixture of exhaustion and euphoria. "This is my moment of glory," he hissed triumphantly to himself.

Little did Azazel know that Robin was no smirking smugly at the demon from behind. "He's fallen for my little trick; hook, line, and sinker," he thought to himself.

Azazel, completely unaware of how Robin had now tricked him straight into a trap, took a step forward towards an area where everyone in the valley would get a clear view of him, and loudly roared, "Everyone! Listen to me and feast your eyes on what I have in my hand!"

In a flash, all the angels and demons turned their heads to face Azazel. Robin's fellow Titans, meanwhile, had already been facing the area due to their fearfully watching the entire scene unfold before Azazel's dramatic call to attention. However, only Raven and Beast Boy had currently managed to realize just what Robin had managed to trick Azazel into doing. Meanwhile, Azazel's four fellow Knights were also beginning to get an unsettling feeling as to what Azazel was about to do.

"He'd better not be about to do what I think he's about to do," Samael snarled.

"Samael," Lilith stated fearfully. "Surely you don't think he's actually going to . . . ?"

"Don't be ridiculous," Abaddon growled coldly. "He's smarter than that; and he'd never be that stupid at a time like this."

"I wouldn't be too sure about that," Asmodeus hissed. "After all, he did seem rather angry before from what I overheard, and anger can cloud even the smartest of judgments."

"Well nonetheless, he'd better not . . ." Samael began.

However, at that very moment, Azazel grinned snidely towards the angels and stated, "Sorry to end the party boys, but it's time for you winged lot to go back home, FOREVER!" Immediately after shouting this, the golden yellow Knight of Hell raised his hand clutching the Paradisiacal Key into the air, his entire body now positioned the way Robin had positioned himself before activating the Key for the sake of opening the Stairway to Heaven.

At the sight of the way Azazel had positioned himself complete with uplifted hand clutching the Paradisiacal Key and even his head raised upwards to look up towards the sky, the eyes of the other four Knights of Hell widened in horror as they realized that Azazel was about to do exactly what they'd been hoping so desperately at that moment that he hadn't been about to do. "No, no, no!" Samael howled as he and the other three Knights of Hell proceeded to teleport away from the Arch Angels as fast as they could to stop their compatriot from uttering the words that would truly destroy all remaining hope they had of fulfilling their master's dream that evening.

But it was too late. No sooner had Samael, Lilith, and the other two A-named Knights of Hell materialized right there next to Azazel when their electrokinetic comrade finished shouting out in a misguided tone of triumph, "The world is safe! The threat is no more! Return to Heaven, where you were once before!"

A bolt of lightning flashed in the sky, and an almighty boom of thunder was heard. Azazel smirked, a wolfish grin on his face as he thought of the great triumph he believed that he'd now gained for his kin and master. But then he turned his head to again face his fellow Knights of Hell just in time to finally notice that they were now all both standing right there next to him, and had an identical look of horror on their faces. "Azazel," Samael stated fearfully. "What have you done?"

Azazel raised his right eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

"The Key of Dante you fool!" Lilith shouted. "If those things were that easy for us to use, then why didn't we just use the Infernal one to open the Alpha Devil's Gate ourselves!?"

"Use it ourselves?! Are you mad?!" Azazel roared. "You know that such an attempt, or even one to use the other two Keys, would only end with us being unwillingly sent straight back to Hell at square one!"

"Exactly!" Samael shrieked.

Azazel gave another confused look for a brief few seconds. But then he looked again at the white gemstone in his hand, and his eyes widened in horror as he finally realized what he had done. "No," he stated solemnly in terror. "No this can't be happening!"

But it was. Seconds after Azazel came to his earthshaking realizing when a mighty storm of hurricane force winds burst out of the still open Devil's Gate and billow around the entire valley. And as the winds continued to bluster around the valley's interior, all the minor demons that still hadn't yet returned to Hell (whether through retreat or by death didn't matter at that point) proceeded to shriek in despair before being yanked up into the air by the winds, at which point they were unwillingly forced into their incorporeal forms, which then began to crash and coalesce together to form a massive billowing tornado-shaped column of demonic smoke.

Samael had just enough time to direct a furious snarl at Azazel and savagely roar, "You imbecile!" before he was yanked away by the winds and reverted to his blood red smoke form.

"You should have let my mate remain in charge!" Lilith howled before she was yanked away in her mate's footsteps by the wind and forcibly reverted back to her own icy blue smoke form.

"Curse you," Abaddon growled before he joined his two mated compatriots in the sky and was transformed into his inky black smoke form.

"No!" Asmodeus hissed shrilly in despair before he too was yanked up into the air by the wind and forcibly reverted to his verdant green smoke form.

Azazel briefly gaped in horror at what was happening before then turning his head to look behind him just in time to see the wide grin on the now standing Boy Wonder's face. "You," Azazel growled. "You tricked me!"

"You bet I did," Robin stated nonchalantly. "And it wasn't really all that hard either once I'd found the right elements to use to my advantage."

"Why you," Azazel snarled. "I'll kill you!"

Azazel then attempted to rush towards Robin with his claws at the ready. But at that moment, right as Azazel was four or five foot steps away from Robin, the winds picked up again, and Azazel found himself uselessly running in place as if on a treadmill as the winds pushed heavily against him. Seconds later, the wind finally grew strong enough for Azazel to lose his footing, and the demon blew backwards for a few seconds before grabbing onto a small boulder rooted into the ground.

As the demon billowed through the air like a flag as he maintained a desperately tight grip on the boulder, Azazel growled bitterly, "No fair! My compatriots and I should have been a victory celebration by now while we feasted on the entrails of all humanity!" Then he looked upwards towards Robin with a hateful glare on his face. "How did you do it!? My kin and I should have won! How is it you managed to still defeat us in the end!?"

"It's called the natural order Azazel," Robin stated coldly. "It's the freaking number one rule for the entire world! Just as your low and puny master is destined to lose in his final attempt to destroy all that God has created, you and all other forms of villainy out there are destined to fall to the power of heroes like me!"

"Why you," Azazel growled as he clenched his left fist. Unfortunately, this particular action turned out to be a big mistake, as it caused his right hand's grip on the boulder to start to loosen. "Oops," Azazel stated in shock as his right hand briefly slipped. "No!" he shouted as his grip was finally lost completely and he went flying upwards and back straight towards the giant tornado of demonic smoke. Before long, he collapsed into his golden yellow smoke and effortlessly merged with the very top of the tornado, which just happened to be where his four fellow Knights were located.

With Azazel now taken care of, the tornado began to spin around and be dragged back towards the Devil's Gate. As the tornado was slowly sucked away by the gravity of the portal, five dragon head-shaped formations that looked very much like the heads of the five Knights of Hell appeared at the top of the tornado and unleashed what sounded like a mixture between a dragon's roar and a despairing 'no!'. Then the tornado's 'tail' entered the Devil's Gate, and the tornado was sent whirling around in circles as it slowly sank deeper and deeper within the portal, the five smoky Knights of Hell unleashing their despairing roar all the way. And before long, they too were yanked beneath the ground's surface and were forced to unleash their roar of defeat one last time as they rapidly descended back down to Hell alongside the remainder of their brethren.

All of two seconds passed after the despairing roar of the Knights of Hell finally went silent before Robin rushed over to the machinery designed to open the Devil's Gate, snatched the Infernal Key up into his hand and lifted it up into the air before triumphantly shouting, "The power of nobility has won, and hope is restored! Retreat back to Hell, where you may harm the world no more!"

The crimson gemstone glowed with red light, and a gigantic flame-shaped geyser of red light erupted from the gaping hole in the ground as the eight segments of the hatchway designed to seal it off started sliding slowly out from the sides of the hole towards the center of the hole so that they could close together. The geyser became more and more slender and less impressive as the hatchway grew closer and closer to closing completely. Eventually, with a satisfying booming noise, the hatchway closed up entirely, shutting out the geyser. And then an unmistakable locking noise was heard. The Alpha Devil's Gate was locked once more. The world was safe.

. . . . .

Robin smiled as he heard the sound of the Devil's Gate locking. Never had he felt more proud of himself. "The world is truly safe now," he thought to himself. Then the Infernal Key began to glow with a blinding red light that abruptly seemed to encompass the area around him and forced him to close his eyes. When the light faded away and Robin opened his eyes, he noticed that the Infernal Key had apparently vanished into thin air. Robin's eyebrow rose at the sight of this, but before he could question it out loud, he heard a voice behind him say, "An ingenious contingency of Dante's isn't it?"

Robin turned his head and saw none other than the three Arch Angels standing behind him. At the sight of the brief surprised tensing up Robin made at the sight of them, Gabriel smirked cheekily at him, Michael simply stared calmly at Robin, and even Raphael let a slight smile come on his face. When Robin had noticeably calmed down, Michael continued, "As you have seen demonstrated, every time one of Dante's Keys are used, they are designed by a spell he cast upon them to automatically teleport back to where they came from the moment they have been used both to open and close their respective Afterlife portals." Michael smiled widely. "Though of course, I probably could have allowed your quite knowledgeable friend from Azarath to explain this to you."

Robin thought to himself, uncertain as to just how to respond to what the Arch Angel had just said. "Um, thanks," he eventually stated. "I guess."

Gabriel chuckled. "Someone's got his tongue out of sorts."

Raphael smacked the dark haired angel on the back of his head. "Come on now Gabriel," he grumbled. "Be serious now."

"Calm yourselves brothers," Michael said patiently before again directing his gaze towards Robin. "But nonetheless, there's no need to be guarded and formal. All heroes should treat each other as equals don't you think?"

"Well," Robin began. "Yes, I suppose so." He then looked directly at Michael. "But still, you have to understand, I'm talking to an angel, and a rather high ranking one at that."

"Understandable," said Michael. He then spread his arms upwards before saying, "And of course, it would probably be a bit less awkward if we didn't have your friends able to get a clear gawking view of the whole thing." At the sound of this, Robin looked past the Arch Angels at his friends, who were indeed staring intently at the scene before them before awkwardly grinning and looking away. Then a large circular wall of mist appeared around the area that Robin and the three Arch Angels were standing, and Robin could no longer get a clear view of his friends.

Robin directed his gaze back to the three Arch Angels, his eyebrow raised. Michael smiled, nodded his head up and down, and explained, "This wall of mist serves to both give us some privacy for your sake, and also serves as a temporal severing barrier. In other words, all time outside this circle of mist will be frozen, but time will function like normal within. Thus, we'll have plenty of time to have our little talk with you."

Robin thought to himself. "Huh," he said. "That actually does sound quite helpful. Ok, where do we start?"

"Always the straight forward and to the point type," Gabriel stated. He turned his head towards Raphael with a smug smirk. "Sound familiar?"

Raphael let out what Robin could have sworn to be an exasperated groan, turned his head towards his younger brother with a withering glare, and said, "Gabriel, do you want me to jab my sword up your . . . ?"

"Now, now Raphael," said Michael. "There is no need to be vulgar." Raphael growled wearily, and Gabriel looked as if he were about to make a snide comment at the red haired angel's expense. "And no Gabriel, you had better not speak your current mental thoughts out loud right now if you know what's good for you."

Gabriel's face fell in a mixture between a pout and a glare. "You take the fun out of everything," said the youngest Arch Angel.

Robin started chuckling to himself as he watched the antics of the three angels.

"What's so funny?" Raphael snapped.

"Nothing," Robin stated while trying to stop himself from full on laughing. "It's just that well, the dynamic I'm now seeing between you three reminds me so much of the way things are between me, Cyborg, and Beast Boy."

The three Arch Angels raised their eyebrows, then thought to themselves, and then grinned as they also realized the truth in what Robin had said. "Hmm," said Michael. "I will admit, I can certainly understand why you would think so after having now met us."

"Well you certainly wouldn't need a mind as powerful as an angel's to tell which of us you'd see as the Beast Boy of this relationship," said Raphael as he directed a meaningful look towards Gabriel from the corner of his eyes.

Gabriel chuckled, a look of pride on his face, and placed his hands on his hips as if expecting a medal. "You got that right bro," he then stated. "That's me, the prankster and happy-go-lucky comic relief who can still step up to the plate and become a serious leader when the situation demands. Yep, your green friend and I have quite a lot in common personality wise."

Robin chuckled, scratched his fingers through his hair, and then said, "Indeed, and for the record, I have to admit, I wasn't quite fully expecting you to turn out quite the way you did just now Michael."

"And what would you mean by that?"

"Well," Robin stated slowly, careful in attempting avoid accidentally insulting the eldest of the Arch Angels (or angels period). "From what I've seen of you now, you seem to kind of give off a sort of big brother vibe. In fact, that kind of gives me the feeling that you use the leadership style in which you attempt to play the role of everyone's big brother, kind of like Cyborg."

"Is that a problem?" Michael asked calmly.

"Oh no!" Robin stated rather hurriedly. "Not at all! No it isn't a problem. I'm just surprised by this, that's all."

"And what is it about my personality that makes it so surprising to you?" Michael then asked as he folded his arms across his chest and raised his eyebrow. It was clear that he was not going to let Robin drop the matter that easily.

Robin chuckled nervously, raised his hands in a placatory manner, and explained, "Well please don't take this the wrong way, but from what I knew about you from all I'd read and heard, I'd always envisioned you to be a bit more like me personality-wise; and through that, I believed that you'd take on a more militaristic leadership style like I do."

Michael appeared to think to himself, but then nodded his head after only three seconds. "I see. I will admit that your explanation does make sense, even though in the end your thoughts on what I'd be like turned out to be more than a little off target."

"You've got that right," said Raphael. "Yep, the eldest of the Arch Angels and your friend Cyborg have a surprisingly large amount in common when it comes to personality. But hey, you want an Arch Angel that's more similar to you personality-wise? Then you should take a look at me."

"Ain't that the truth?" Gabriel asked cheekily. He directed his gaze at Robin. "Just look at him. All you need to do is say the phrase 'God's will,' and he gets oh so serious and uptight. I mean come on, he's got such large chips on his shoulders that it's a miracle that there's any room left for his wings."

"Hey," Raphael snapped indignantly. "Someone has to make sure that Father's will is properly carried out!"

"That doesn't mean you have to be such a killjoy all the time!" Gabriel responded cheekily. "Seriously brother, grow a funny bone and live a little!"

"I've been alive for countless eons," Raphael stated dryly. "And I was created just a couple minutes or so before you came into existence. If that doesn't count as living, what will?"

Gabriel directed a deadpan look at his ticked off elder brother. "Must you be so literal?"

"Now, now brothers," said Michael, calm as ever. "Now is not the time to be petty. We have a hero to congratulate."

At the sound of this, both of his more noble younger brothers blushed, and chuckled nervously. "Eh, right, of course," said Gabriel as he straightened back to attention.

"Right," said Raphael. "What he said." He himself straightened back up to attention.

Michael nodded, turned his head to face Robin once more, and stated, "I am sure that you are aware of this Richard Grayson." Robin briefly winced at the sound of his civilian name, but he sucked it up and remained standing at attention before the mighty angels. "But you are considered just as much considered a hero by ourselves, the rest of our Heaven-aligned brothers, and our Father as you are by our fallen brothers and the fellow inhabitants of the realm of the living. And indeed, if all your past deeds hadn't been enough, then the great service you have done for us and your world this evening would have indeed been enough to truly prove your worth to be admitted into Heaven's borders."

At the sound of all this, Robin blushed, and hung his head in embarrassment. But even so, he couldn't help but feel more than a little pride at how well complimented he'd just been by Michael the Arch Angel himself.

"Yes, it is indeed a great honor," said Michael. He then sighed, directed a slightly sad looking face of sympathy towards the Boy Wonder, and continued, "However, it is truly a pity that over the course of the very efforts that have only reaffirmed how much you deserve to join us in Heaven at your time of death, you have ended up forced to set your soul on a course for our fallen brother's realm. And such an action, while in its own way a great sacrifice, has allowed for what is truly a great tragedy for one so valiant."

Robin gulped, hung his head once more, but this time in shame. "I guess so," he stated before lifting his head back up. "But surely there's something you can do? I mean, you are angels, and Arch Angels at that. And you are capable of healing Hell-bound souls. I read about that, and Raven herself admitted to reading about that as well."
"We are capable of healing Hell-bound souls, that is true," Michael admitted. He then seemed to take on a sentimental look. "In fact, I still remember very well the day I healed your good friend Raven's soul the previous year in your time."

Robin's eyes widened. "You did what?"

"Oh yes, I'd forgotten that you weren't aware of this matter," Michael stated. "I'm sure you remember how, not too long after Raven banished him back to his imprisonment in the limbo between the dimensions and your world was restored, she seemed to be encased in a massive sphere of pure white light before she descended back down to the ground?"

Robin's eyes widened as he remembered this very detail. "Yes, as a matter of fact I do," he admitted. "But I'd just thought that all that was just remnants of all that power she'd released in the midst of her standing up against Trigon."

"Most of it was," Michael stated. "However, there was a little extra behind that light show."

"Indeed," said Raphael. "We had been watching the whole thing unfold from Heaven. And even after all the heroics and similar good deeds we'd seen her commit, it was only after she took her final stand against her father and undid all the damage he'd wrought upon the world that our Father finally decided that she'd truly earned the right to become a resident of His realm rather than the realm of her father or our fallen brother. And so, when your world was in the midst of its restoration, we came to Earth through Heaven's main gate; and while Raven was still encased in the white light, that was when Michael healed her soul."

Gabriel nodded in agreement, a solemn look of respect on his face. "Very true," he agreed. "And just like that, the mark on her soul left by her father that would have otherwise sent her straight to either his realm, or that of our brother upon her death, became replaced by the mark of our Father. And that, is how she ended up joining the rest of your friends in Heaven after Azazel killed her."

For what seemed like an eternity, the Boy Wonder was stunned speechless. "Wow," he thought to himself. "I never knew." Then he thought to himself again, and remembered what he'd originally asked about that had triggered this sentimental memory for the Arch Angels. "But what about my soul? Forgive me if this sounds selfish, but is there anything you can do to save my soul?"

"Well," Michael stated. "I suppose it wouldn't hurt for us to at least take a look at your soul just to be absolutely certain as to whether or not there's anything we can do." His two brothers nodded in agreement, and the three angels proceeded to place their hands on Robin's chest, their eyes and hands glowing white in the process.

After what felt like yet another eternity to the bewildered Boy Wonder, the Arch Angels removed their hands from his chest, the glow in their eyes shutting off in the process. But when Michael shook his head side to side, Robin almost instantly knew what the Arch Angel would say. "I'm saddened to have to tell you this, but there is nothing we can do."

Robin nodded his head. "I understand," he said solemnly. "But if it isn't too much to ask," he then began as he looked back up. "Why?"

Michael sighed. "It is nothing against you, and believe me, if there were any choice, my brothers and I would be very much willing to heal your soul. In fact, if it had merely been a matter of your soul having the mark of our brother branded upon it the way it was on your friend Raven's, then it would have been a simple matter of allowing your soul's branding from Lucifer to be replaced by that of our Father."

Michael then looked at Raphael, deciding that as the one that had the most in common with Robin in regard to personality, it would be easier for the red headed Arch Angel to continue the explanation. Raphael nodded, directed his own gaze towards Robin, and continued, "But this is a different matter entirely. In fact, the mark on your soul from our Father is still there, but it has been enshrouded by the binding of a demonic soul contract. And a soul contract is something that cannot be nullified by our kin under any circumstances."

"Why?" Robin asked, genuinely curious.

"It is part of the terms that were set for when our Father's game with Lucifer began," Gabriel explained, for once seeming to take things seriously over the course of the encounter. "As I'm sure you are aware, after our brother's fall from Grace that occurred following his failed rebellion, he and our father decided to turn their conflict for claiming of the world's souls into a game rather than an open war. And over the course of setting the terms, among them was that, while souls are allowed to be either healed or corrupted depending on the nature of their soul markings from beforehand, our kin are forbidden from saving Heaven-bound souls that have been marked in a contract with Lucifer or his underlings. And in that same note, our brother and his underlings are equally forbidden from stealing back any souls that have been marked by Heaven's equivalent of such a contract. Nonetheless, regardless, we cannot intervene and undo your contract while you are still alive."

"What would happen if you did?"

"The same thing that would happen if any other rules of our Father's game with Lucifer were to be violated," Michael responded. "The magic keeping Lucifer bound in Hell would cease to exist far earlier than originally designed, and he would be able to just leave Hell and bring about the apocalypse right here and now. And knowing you, I have a feeling you'd much rather go through with the deal then let the entire world suffer for you."

Robin gulped, hung his head, and responded, "You're right, I would never dare let the entire world suffer like that just to save my own hide." He then lifted his head back up. "But nonetheless, you are also correct in that it truly isn't fair for me either. I know that I can't actively work to save myself without running the risk of my friends dying all over again, but I just wish that I could somehow stop this from happening."

"I understand," Michael said sympathetically before placing his left hand on Robin's right shoulder. "And you may yet escape or yet have to follow through with the end of your deal. But regardless, never give up hope noble hero. For regardless of what happens, as long as you look in the right places, there is always hope to be found for even the bleakest of situations."

At the sound of these words, Robin began to feel slightly better, for he knew that the Arch Angel was right. Michael and the other two Arch Angels also smiled. Michael then said, "And with that out of the way, is there anything else you wish to ask of us before we return to Heaven?"

Hearing this, Robin immediately began to think carefully about whether or not there was truly anything he still wanted to talk to the Arch Angels about. Then he realized exactly what he still had left on his mind to now ask them about. "Yeah, a couple things actually." The Arch Angels nodded, indicating for him to proceed.

Robin took a deep breath, exhaled, and then asked, "I'll admit, I'd had my suspicions before and after the incident, and you've now confirmed that you were indeed very much aware of what was happening to the point of even admitting to have been watching it from Heaven, but why didn't your kin attempt to do anything to help us or the world during the time of Trigon's attempt at the apocalypse?"

Michael sighed. "I had a feeling that you would ask this. And believe me, the answer will not be entirely pleasant to hear, but it is best that I be honest with you. For starters, since the beginning of time for all religions, we have always had a strict rule that no beings from one religion are allowed to meddle in the affairs of another religion."

Raphael nodded. "Indeed, and secondly, we had to withhold ourselves from intervening at that time because, like in any other situation that doesn't allow for us to make an exception, we had to allow you and your friends, especially the daughter of Trigon, to handle it all on your own. This was especially in your friend Raven's case, for despite how she had the potential to be evil, she had been spending her entire life up to that point making the conscious choice to follow the path of good instead. And in order to uphold the balance between free will and destiny, we had to allow her to continue to make that choice on her own. If we had intervened and solved the whole problem, then we would have robbed her in that moment of the ability to choose her own path. And that would have made us no better than Lucifer."

"Too true," Gabriel agreed. "And finally, we had to keep ourselves in check because we needed to save our strength. You see, as much as we did to intervene this day, we still need to prepare for the evil far worse than Trigon that is destined to arise at the very end of the 666th century."

"You mean Lucifer," Robin stated.

"Indeed," Michael confirmed.

Robin nodded. "I see."

"You said you had a couple things you wished to ask us?" Raphael asked. "I do believe that that meant you had more than one question."

"Oh yes, right," Robin said, briefly scratching the back of his head in embarrassment. "Um, I was going to ask about the matter of our return to our respective homes."

"What about it?" Raphael asked.

"Well actually," Robin then corrected. "What I meant to say was my return with my friends to our home. I mean, I understand that you can go right back through the portal and that the Paradisiacal Key will automatically be teleported back to Jehovah's Temple after I use it to close the Alpha Stairway to Heaven. But what about when my friends and I depart this island to go home? Is there a specific time that we have to wait for in order to leave?"

"Oh Heavens no," said Gabriel. "The only high maintenance aspect of travel here is the timing with which you arrive. Leaving, on the other hand, isn't any trouble at all."

"And thank Father for that," said Raphael. "It would be a very terrible occurrence if someone were to be stuck on this island at the time it is set to sink back beneath the waves."

"Quite," said Michael. "However," he looked back at Robin, "you will fortunately won't have to worry about using your ship to get home."

"And how would that be?"

"Well since it is now time for us all to head home, I shall go ahead and deactivate this temporal severance so that I may show you."

Michael waved his hand, and the pillar of mist surrounding the Boy Wonder and three Arch Angels dissipated into thin air. Robin had just enough time to briefly direct a glance towards his four fellow Titans and notice their bewildered looks before looking back at the three angels in time to see them cause their right hands to glow and then summon a glowing vertical vortex of white energy directly behind them.

Robin's eyes widened at the sight of the vortex. Michael smiled, extended his hand out towards his right, and the Paradisiacal Key suddenly went flying through the air from where Azazel had dropped it and into the Arch Angel's hand. He handed it to Robin and said, "All you need to do now is to use this to close the Stairway to Heaven once my brothers and I have departed, and you and your friends may simply walk through this portal straight back to your home."

Robin looked at the portal, then at the 3 senior angels. "You are certain that it won't close the moment you depart?"

"Need you even ask? We are angels you know."

Robin grimaced slightly at the reminder of the nature of the beings he was talking to. "Right, of course. But what about . . . ?"

"Fear not," said Gabriel. "My brothers and I have already teleported it back to your home for you while in the midst of summoning the portal. And we even gave it a free washing and fixing up to."

"Well Cyborg will certainly be happy to hear that," Robin admitted.

"So he will," said Michael. He turned his head to face Gabriel. "Sound the signal to return home."

Gabriel nodded, summoned what looked like some sort of immaculate trumpet, and blew through it. At the sound of the noise that came out of it, every single one of the low ranking angels turned their heads, nodded, spread their wings, and took to the air. While airborne, they all took on their incorporeal forms and rocketed up through the still open Stairway to Heaven. Michael looked back at Robin. "Again, you have truly proven yourself as a hero this evening Boy Wonder. But now, regardless of what fate has in store for you, it is time for us to part ways. Farewell noble hero, and I wish you and your friends the best of fortunes in the future." Upon saying this, the fair haired Arch Angel and his two younger brothers of equal rank spread their wings, took off into the sky, and reverted to their pure white incorporeal forms before they followed their younger brothers' path through the Stairway to Heaven.

Robin stared upward in a mixture of awe and sentimentality as he watched the still open Stairway to Heaven. Then he sighed, briefly looked at his now very confused looking friends, and then directed his gaze at the Paradisiacal Key. The caped crusader took a deep breath, exhaled, and then lifted the Key of Dante up in the air. He calmly stated, "The world is safe. The threat is no more. Return to Heaven, where you were once before."

The Paradisiacal Key glowed, the portal in the sky glowed and crackled with what appeared to be white lightning, and then the Heavenly gate closed and vanished from view. Seconds after the Alpha Stairway to Heaven closed and vanished, the Dante's Key designed to open and close it glowed brightly with an overflowing white light. When the light vanished, Robin didn't even need to look at his hand to tell that the Key was gone, for he had felt the space within his clenched hand suddenly become empty as the Key teleported back to Jehovah's Temple. Robin smiled, for now he truly felt at peace and that the world was safe once more.

"Um dude, care to explain what just happened?"

Robin turned his head to face his friends, a wistful smile on his face, and responded to Beast Boy, "Don't worry, I will. But for now, I say we first get off this island and have a good long rest." He checked the time on his communicator. "It's 9:00 pm here, so that means it's only 5:00 pm back at home. Therefore, we should have plenty of time to rest and recuperate at home before I explain in full detail about what just happened here with the angels before bed." He looked back at the portal that the angels had summoned. "But for right now, let's just go back home through this portal and get some rest. God knows how much we've earned it." And at that, despite how the other Titans were still very much wishing for an explanation as to what had happened between Robin and the three Arch Angels, the five teenage heroes proceeded to slowly make their way through the portal, which closed the instant that the last of the five teenagers had entered. Thus Dante's Island was left completely devoid of human visitors once more.

And just like that, this brand new chapter is complete. Wow this chapter's a doozy in regard to length huh? Oh well, I hope you guys all enjoyed it and that you leave a healthy batch of feedback! And again, sorry about the length! And do feel free to ask any questions about this chapter that you wish. Again, hope you enjoyed!

Coming up next: With the Titans' adventure on Dante's Isle officially over, Robin finally does some big thinking about his upcoming deadline, plans for the future are made in this regard, Savage has a final discussion with the newly defeated Lucifer, and the story comes to an end.