Robin and Raven arrived on the street where Beast Boy's were-form was doing battle with Zarach. The Beast's frustration was easily evident. "I can't hit this guy," he sent telepathically, frustration heavy in his mental voice. "He just keeps dodging and reaching in to cut me."

Raven's eyes widened, and she launched a black beam of negative energy into the fray, narrowly missing Beast Boy and causing him to stumble off the the side. Zarach, too, needed to leap aside and snarled in frustration. "Don't let him lead you into a spiral," she called out with no other explanation.

With the element of surprise lost for both sides, they took a brief moment to regroup. Zarach took a ball of blue energy in hand and pressed it against his side, visibly healing his injuries. Beast Boy retreated to rejoin his colleagues, but kept his distance and remained in a possible flanking position. His form shifted back to his humanoid one, but his aspect retained the animalistic mien of his previous form, teeth bared, eyes narrowed, and claws grasping air with a slightly hunched pose.

Robin slunk backwards to rejoin the shadows along the building's edges. The sun was lowering in the sky, and the atmosphere was beginning to fire with purples and reds as the day began to give way to night.

Raven spared a glance at the dusk sky and knew her time had run out. Her oath would be fulfilled, her enemy destroyed, and her friend-

(mate)

-rescued. There was no other option.

"He does not escape," she spoke, voice convicted and carrying to her teammates. "He is mine," she slipped briefly into her demonic duo-tone, "and I fight him alone. No matter what you see, no matter what you hear, you will back me up. Robin, hobble him. Beast Boy, hold him here. Zarach," and here she gazed towards Jon's body and its unwanted passenger, "the terms of your agreement with Jon have been fulfilled. No more games. We end this now. Make peace with whatever powers you must.

"Titans, GO!"

The street exploded with darkness and fire.

The blue glow faded from the air as Cyborg trudged forward, implacable as stone, towards the fallen scores of zombies he had cleared from the hall. He took a moment at each unliving corpse to kick the shapeless head, mercifully ending the animation that held these people in thrall. His face was expressionless save a tightening about the eyes each time he was forced to end the life of the citizens he was sworn to protect. It was necessary. He had a sister to save.

Unfortunate, but necessary.

His reserves were running low. The protracted battle was very energy intensive, and the scale of the emergency had precluded a recharge mid-day. The wide-angle resonant beams he was currently using were most effective for clearing the hallways, but drained his batteries far faster than he would have liked. Too much more and he would have to resort to melee combat in order to preserve energy for basic movement.

He had already cut power to most of his ancillary systems. He had cut his GPS, WiFi, his wide-frequency communications protocols and turned his tracking and targeting systems for his missiles offline, along with a dozen or more systems that he did not have an immediate need for. Communications stayed on, but radio only, cell and satellite both shut down. Starfire needed him to complete this mission, and he would be damned if he failed because his fucking batteries ran out.

Providence smiled upon him and he came to another fire axe. He punched through the glass and ripped the weapon from its mounting, heedless of the noise. He welcomed the chance to put down more of these things that had hurt his family and thrown his neighborhood into chaotic disarray.

"First thing I'm doing when I get back to the tower: burn every zombie movie we own. Beast Boy can cry into his soy-milk for all I care."

He had reached the blood bank, and opening it revealed two more targets. He dispatched them with machine proficiency, throwing the axe to pin one against the wall and grabbing the other by the face. His thumb lodged in the creature's mouth and his middle and ring finger sank into the eyes. He squeezed, scraping the frontal lobe downwards into the shattered remnants of the upper jaw. He backhanded the head off of the snarling zombie pinned to the wall and retrieved his axe.

Cyborg proceeded to the cryo units that held Beast Boy and Starfire's blood. He grabbed a bag and shoved as many of the slightly pink blood packs as there were available, grinding his teeth as he noted that the grand total came to four. Checking the refrigeration racks yielded another bag, only a few weeks old. He turned and exited the room, bag slung over his shoulder, and made his way to the frames that once held the front windows to the hospital.

He casually dispatched the random zombies that got in his way, a sweep of his axe or a vicious punch that barely slowed him as he trudged towards his goal. Dusk greeted him as he came to the front of the building. Sparing a glance below, he picked a landing site and jumped the three stories to the ground, landing with a hellacious clatter and adding a few more pot-holes for the maintenance crew to fill in when the nightmare finally ended.

The triage tent was silent as he clambered towards them. Cyborg gave off the impression of a warrior from days when combat was at the end of a sword and war required looking directly into a man's face as he died. His armored body was discolored and streaked with blood, bile, and brains. He carried a similarly gory axe in his primary hand, and his other arm terminated in the barrel of his cannon, glowing an ominous blue while his cybernetic eye glared red. His face was expressionless until he gazed upon his fallen teammate. He moved to rush towards her, and the commissioner stepped in his path.

"Move," Cyborg said with a steely voice.

"Cyborg, you're a walking infection hazard. Give us the bag and get under the shower. Scrub up and join us."

Cyborg made to move past him, and the commissioner clocked him across the jaw. Shock more than injury, caused him to stop and take a step back. "You listen to me, you walking soup-can. You go over there right now and you'll kill her. Give us the goddamn blood and clean yourself off. Once Dr. Sarin here says you're cleared to enter the triage tent you can come in, but I'll be fucked if I let you in there right now, you beautiful biohazard." A pause where Cyborg locked eyes with the commissioner. "I GAVE YOU AN ORDER, TITAN! HAND OVER THAT BAG IMMEDIATELY AND FOLLOW DR. SARIN TO THE DECON TENT, OR SO HELP ME GOD I'LL TEAR YOU APART MYSELF AND SELL WHATEVER'S LEFT OF YOU ON EBAY!"

Wordlessly, Cyborg passed the bag to the commissioner and turned to his indicated guide. They walked over to another tent and the commissioner let out a breath he had been holding. "That went better than expected," he muttered as he re-entered the triage tent. "Here's your blood, you pack of vampires."

"... we prefer the term 'phlebotomist'."

Commissioner Murphy stared for a moment and said, "Do I look like I give a fuck you-"

"I know, I know," the nameless doctor said with a grin. "Ebay. We'll take it from here."

As the bag was hustled away from him and the doctors busied with their work, Karl could only chuckle. "Asshole. I like him."

The blood was hung and replaced the saline drip. The cryo-blood was set to thaw, and the tense sort of waiting that accompanies trauma treatment set in. Cyborg eventually returned, battered and scuffed, but clean. He moved to Starfire's bedside and took in the damage.

Her face was half-covered in bandages, and her golden skin had a sickly yellow pallor. Her eyes were fitful, opening and closing and looking around in confusion. They locked on Cyborg and she muttered something in Tamaranean, the only word he could make out being, "knorfka."

"Galfore's not here, Koriand'r," he whispered back. "You're on Earth, with the Titans. It's me, Cyborg."

She paused and some clarity came to her eyes. "Cyborg?" she whispered.

He smiled back, a tear collecting in his eye. "Yeah, your goofy older brother." He took a breath and grabbed her hand, giving it a light squeeze. "You're going to be alright, Star."

"I failed my mission," she muttered, looking away. "The V'lha ruthanorks kept coming, and I was too weak to fight them."

"Bullshit," Commissioner Murphy interjected. "We were able to hold that cordon because of you. You saved the lives of countless police and citizenry. You did good work, Starfire."

She turned her head away and began to weep emerald tears, muttering to herself in Tamaranean again. One of the doctor's sighed. "She keeps doing that, drifting in and out of lucidity. Hopefully the blood will strengthen her."

Cyborg shook his head and a tear fell from his remaining eye. "She's not delirious. She's mourning. Hear what she keeps saying? Bumgorf? That means 'children'." He sighed. "In fighting the zombies at PS118 she also slaughtered countless children." He drew the blanket up over her head and slapped away the hand of the doctor that tried to pull it back down. "In her culture, showing weakness is impermissible. Clear out of here. I can take care of her."

The doctors and Commissioner pulled back and drew the curtains around her bed. Cyborg pulled the blanket back down and stroked her uninjured cheek. "It's ok, Star. It's just me. You did well. We're proud of you."

Starfire continued to cry until she passed back into unconsciousness.