#DamiRaeWeek2023

[redstreetsahead]

Damirae Post-Flashpoint Drabble for Damirae Week

The universe would provide no gifts to this new world. No lucky happinesses.

Yet even still.

“Raven.” The girl would offer doubtfully, extending her hand.

“Robin.” The boy would respond tersely, ignoring it.

------------------------------------------------------------------

The universe was cruel. But even she had always granted small mercies.

In the world before, the daughter of a demon found love with a boy who was raised to become one.

It wasn’t fated, wasn’t common. Not like the things the universe couldn’t stop, such as the bashful reporter with a secret destined to fall for the sharp-eyed colleague sure to find it out. Not like the princess who would mourn the body of the pilot that had shown her a new mission.

Their love had been one that flourished against all odds.

When the girl was willing to condemn herself, he walked through hell itself to save her. When the boy was supposed to take his final breath, she forced life back into him. Even after pushing each other away, they found each other again. And again.

The world was supposed to continue with them together. They had fought their challenges, triumphed over them. The universe had allowed them happiness. Their own shining light in the darkness. A small consolation in the broken world that the heroes would have to rebuild.

That should’ve been the ending. A planet on its last legs that would rise up again. Not because it deserved to, but because the Earth was surprisingly hard to destroy. It would have recovered eventually. In centuries, maybe. Not without casualties, of course, but a price always had to be paid.

The promise of a price paid was why even when the speedster reversed time, the universe was still willing to grant small mercies. A price would be paid for this new world, and small, unsurprising happinesses could still bloom.

But the universe had been slighted. A sly magician refused to watched his planet suffer again. In one brave, stupid, heroic, final act, he had damned himself while saving the world. Slighting the universe in the process.

And thus, the universe would provide no gifts to this new world. No lucky happinesses.

Yet even still.

“Raven.” The girl would offer doubtfully, extending her hand.

“Robin.” The boy would respond tersely, ignoring it.

The would meet later in this new world. He would be older, harsher. She would be older too, sadder. He would be a monstrous human, and she a humane monster. They would fight, and hate, and ignore.

The universe was cruel. 

But that did not mean she was not curious.

There would be an understanding that can only occur between people like them. There would be glances, looks with the kind of fire that was most certainly not hatred. There would be the chance for two people to find the kind of solace that felt both impossibly familiar and entirely unknown.

And if two people as broken as them could stitch together happiness from nothing but their own tragedies… 

Well, the universe would find others to enact revenge on.

[roverjamball]

DAY 2 - 18.07.2023 Part III

 "Let me take care of you... please."

Raven and I walked to the front of a club’s entrance, by-passing the line, receiving myriad of dirty looks. Todd provided working capital, a portion of which Damian could use to bribe the bouncer for quick entry. 

“Lamar has prospectus for a spa, a car wash, a food truck. What do all these places have in common?

“Paper money.” Kori supplied.

“He’s shopping for a way to launder his money. He did a pretty good job in making it look like my friend Lizzy stole the money. But if he suddenly has million dollars in his bank account …” Todd trailed off

“Raising all kinds of questions.” Raven completed Todd’s thought. 

“Yeah.” Arsenal said, leaning towards Raven. Green Arrow’s protege joined their planning session right after Raven and Damian agreed to rotate as support. 

Harper, tall, muscular - had to be for effective bow work, collar-length red hair tied back, tanned skin- outdoorsy. He looked glad to have Raven on board, not at all perturbed at the loss of Kori, their usual third. 

Starfire was sitting this one out. A sabbatical Raven called it. She explained how Kori missed Mari’ first steps. And Raven confided in him that Kori was terrified that Mari would fly, or summon star bolts and Dick would be helpless. 

“He's looking for a front business, a way to make it look like he actually earned this money. “ Todd continued to fill them in. Raven and I, disguised of course, went with the outlaws to meet Lizzy. An old acquaintance of Todd’s.

“I want to meet her. Bleeding hearts, have you seen If her story checks out?”

They had, but I wanted to do my own homework. With my expertise in micro expressions and Raven’s gauge on her emotions, deception would be difficult.

Lizzy was in her late thirties, short, wide brown eyes, swarthy complexion, now deathly pale. She kept licking her lips, a nervous childish gesture.

“So he needs to clean the money. How does that help me? I do the books, any error ” Lizzy asked, looking to Todd for answers. She’s smiled at us, polite, her worry was evident. She seemed to be  under genuine pressure. It was also obvious that she had come to Todd for help. She sounded Gotham native, her English accented as if from a rough part of the town, the East side.

“I'm gonna talk to Lamar. I'm gonna convince him he should wash his money with me. And that is something you can take to your Boss.”

“Okay. Yes. Thank God.” The woman Todd promised to help said. Gratitude shinning in her eyes. She was at the end of her rope and all her hope rested on Todd making this work.

A look of determination crossed Raven’s face. She hated it when lowlives picked on the little guy. And Elizabeth a C.P.A., daughter of a working woman, the very definition of little guy. Her younger sibling, a boy got caught up in drugs on campus, but Todd as Red Hood worked up a deal in exchange for information and the boy would soon be out on early parole. 

Elizabeth aka Lizzy did the books for Valentine, a club started by residents of Crime Ally, children of  workers, pawns and enforces, who wanted something different for themselves. Something of their own, that they built from the ground up. And they did. It was a rival to Iceberg Lounge, Penguins club. 

Our way in is a money launderer. Well-known, mostly white-collar stuff. He has a thing for young men with green eyes. That’s where I come in. Raven was to act as my back-up or date, once I lure him into the club's loading bay. Then Todd’ll ask for an introduction. Our part was to lure and that’s it. No need to give away our numbers.

But their Target this night swings both ways, so Raven would either back me up or also play lure. Double the chance of success. My math was on Raven. She’s gorgeous, all dressed up for a good time, and given a choice I’d pick her to heap attention on. 

It’s difficult to play bait, to lure someone to a secluded location, against their better judgement. Come on too strong, and they’d smell the set-up. Play too hard to get and they may think, oh well plenty of fish in the sea. 

To meet his known preferences, I’ve coloured my hair light brown, Raven’s a redhead. Cover all our bases, and preferences. We want to be noticed. 

In a formfitting knockout dress of cream to showcase her complexion and green contacts Raven looks like nothing more than a confident fun loving snooty club girl looking for a good time. Primped and glossed, a look of total confidence she gracefully walks to the front of the line. 

Mesmerised the bouncer opens up the velvet rope to usher Raven inside. Putting the bribe money back in his pants pocket Damian follows her in, completely ignored by the bouncer, his eyes following Raven, till she is lost in the sea of bodies. 

You and me both, Damian thinks, as they split up. At the bar, Raven sits on one of the stools that opens up as the song changes. On the seat, eyes closed Raven sways to the beat, camouflaging the glow of her eyes at the use of her powers. Getting read on the whole club in a short period of time uses significant power. Using that much power sometimes causes Raven’s eyes to swirl with electric energy, no way mistaken for mundane.

No doubt the men and women admiring her, Raven won’t be lacking people offering to buy her drinks. The lights of the club play on her exposed skin, the white dress glows, luminescent. Just enticing enough. Noticeable, eye-catching,  but not supernatural. 

Deep shadows envelop Damian while he scans at the club’s patrons. Looking for their mark. If he goes for Raven, Damian will back her. If not after twenty minutes in the limelight, Raven will take over surveillance, while Damian puts himself on the chopping block.

Checking the feed on his smart watch, Damian recognises their Target in one of the club’s VIP alcoves. 

He is closest to the location. Should he signal Raven or make a play for the mark? 

The alcove seats six, and young men and women party hard, shots and hard liquor bottles fill the table. Some powdery substance covers the table in lines, but the mark don’t seem to partake in it, just being a good host maybe. 

Raven, catching some hint, glances over her shoulder. A coy look this way. Raven, didn’t accept any offers that came her way, no matter how beautiful they were, no matter how they smiled and laughed. Refusals were non-existent, the offerers just changed their mind, and laughed, finding other options more to their liking.

Unsurprisingly, the choice is taken from Damian when the mark comes out of the VIP area, goes straight for the red-head at the bar, leaning over her, the tall man whispers in her ear. 

Damian’s attention is split. 

Clubs are the worst for any op. Crowds of strangers to monitor, inebriated and prone to behaving oddly, making it difficult to gauge motive or intent. The loud pulsating music makes hearing impossible, and reading lips while lights flash creating sporadic darkness is a joke from hell. 

Fifteen minutes later, the mark seemed oblivious to everyone except the redhead he’d plied with drinks and now half-helped, half-lifted towards the loading bay behind the club.

“Pardon.” Raven says with a breathy laugh, in a passable French accent. Stagers and clings to the mark, further forcing him to hold her, his hands occupied and attention focused solely on her, while she subtly frisks him for weapons, disguising it as handsy passion.

Raven chose French as her cover, while Damian Italian, so they could communicate without being easily understood by others.

Out into the loading bay Raven stumbles, weaving threw a maze of boxes, leading him to the far wall, away from any windows and the club door. Cutting off all viable exists.

Catching the door before it shuts, Damian follows them, waiting for Raven’s signal. Todd is here somewhere in the shadows, ready to ambush and Damian treads lightly so as not to be heard. 

“Non, you going too fast, some fore play non?“ Raven admonishes, her signal to move in, the second part that he is armed, but the weapon is disabled. 

Todd, soundlessly came up behind them, Raven manipulated the shadows into revealing him in the most dramatic fashion. 

Red helmet gleaming, a combat knife unsheathed, Todd looks from Raven to the money launderer. 

“Take a hike.” He says to Raven pointing to the parking lot beyond the loading area. 

Raven lets out a panicked screech and rushes off, as fast as  her heels can carry her, glancing around in fright for signs of danger,  then a few moments later she is lost in the darkness of an alley. 

Turning to the shaking man, “I just want an introduction.” 

The man tries to run, Todd grabs him by the neck and putting pressure on a pulse point, waves about the serrated knife threateningly. 

“It's not too much work. Chances are good that this guy, Lamar, is talking to friends of yours. I just want to make my pitch.”

“That’s insane, I can’t do that. The next day, you go all Red Hood on his ass and stuff starts exploding. Then fingers get pointed at me, I vouched for you.”

Fear wafted from him, Damian could see it on his face,  what was bizarre was that he could now also somehow sense it. 

What was happening to him?

Twisting the knife this way and that, casually Todd spoke in the most reasonable tone, “I’m  working up a cover I.D. for an associate.”

 Better if you don’t know any names unsaid and understood. 

“Just a guy from out of town, a friend of a friend of a friend. The blow won't get back to you. Scouts honour.”

The man, skiffs his alligator leather boot off the rough ground, it's dark and quiet behind the club, soundproofing goes both ways, the techno music a low hum on the outside and the trucks and lorries of vendors, and suppliers don’t disrupt the party mood. 

“I guess I could work it through some intermediaries.”

 “Good.” Todd concludes. Letting the man go, can’t deprive of too much oxygen without him fainting on us.

“Doable.” The small man hedges. Now a few steps away. Feeling brave from that distance. He’s said yes to an introduction, but with his pride hurt, it's going to cost Todd. Or should I say Lizzy. 

Right now Damian wants to shake the greedy asshole, but if he gives this Lamar a heads up they could all be in deep shit. So the bribe money would get used up here. 

“Expensive.” The man says in the silence, brave man, taking heart from the fact that the RedHood hasn’t shot him yet. 

“How much?” Todd put much menace in his voice, the blade would cut less than his tone. 

“To get someone to vouch for you, put you in the room with the guy say a grand.” He says, but then when Todd moves to take a step towards him, he quickly qualifies, “Promise nothin' will happen to him, maybe I can do five hundred.”

”A grand, will do.” We may be putting the screws to him, but things could get bad before they got better. Todd would hate to use the girl’s money, but she had insisted. She was no charity case. Her words. 

 * * *

Well, that was a productive night. Todd waits until the calls of introductions are made, giving their mark a number to pass along to the inquiring buyer. The thief would get what was coming to him. He trusted Todd to see it through. 

Todd would run point, Harper would play the money launder with a business to clean the money and they’d call us or others in for support or fresh faces as required. 

Our part done, I sneak back into the club, walk slow, casually out the exit, looking for Raven. 

Raven finds me, still in that dress, but no longer a red-head. Drags me into a secluded clove. Raven peppers kisses all over my face, her roaming hand pulling me, clutching me to her, checking my body for harm as if I was in any danger. Satisfied, and no longer frantic, Raven moves away, much to my dismay. Looking confused at her behaviour. 

I smile, reassuring her all attention from her is always welcome. 

Always! 

Another I would not allow this possessiveness, with Raven I relived in it.  She cares, she cares, my brain told me excited at the prospect. 

Moving deeper into the shadows, Raven opens a portal to Rendezvous at Todd’s safe house/staging area for this mission. 

The whole de-brief I was busy thinking of how amazing Raven would look out of that dress. Todd’s Intel was good. Recon through. Objective achieved, without revealing Raven or my involvement. With their numbers hidden, the Outlaws would have their pick of avenues for approaching this thief who pinned his theft on Todd’s friend. It went on and on. The sound background noise, not much for the ceremony we all; Raven, I with the Outlaws, sans Kori sat in a lose circle on miss-matched furniture.

I loosened the top buttons of my shirt, it wasn’t hot, no AC, luckily the waining night was cool. Clothes for clubbing were usually uncomfortably tight, the objective was fashion, but the way Raven sneaked glances at my chest, I’d happily bare it. Not as alert as I usually was, I didn’t realise the meeting was over till Raven came towards me, her stride graceful, but tiered. 

It was her fault, I thought as I followed Raven from the Outlaw safe house via portal into Titans Tower. I’d made arrangements for Kent to monitor the city during the night as we were here with the Outlaws. 

This was not Titans Tower, I looked around after stepping out from the stark darkness that was in Raven’s portal. 

The wood work was extensive and older, chips and scars in the furniture, mostly antique and the walls were coloured all wrong for the Tower. 

It took me a moment to realise, we were at my loft. I was staring at the floor to ceiling book case and potted plant, herbs I’d bought hoping to impress Raven. And here we were. Outside my bedroom. This was not at all Titans Tower, my brain kept saying. No Logan or Kent, we were all alone.  

Relief exploded in me! Giving free reign to every other emotion I’d been holding back. Before he could think, he had Raven pressed against the wall of his living room, his mouth on hers and his hands touching her body like he’d wanted to all those nights during patrol. The whole day they’d been out, he been controlling himself.

“I want you so much,” he breathed into her ear, coming up for air. “Tell me you want me. You want this.”

“Oh Damian!” She moaned. “Don’t stop.” That was a yes. 

He let himself go, Raven wrapped her legs around his waist and kissed him as if branding his lips with hers. He’d never been so thoroughly owned, possessed. Her touch screams desperation and longing. He agreed wholeheartedly. He too could’t wait a breath longer. 

Their hands explore, Damian lifts Raven, her legs link across his lower back causing hot friction, making him unbelievably hard. 

Rethink the bedroom and almost take her against the wall, a desperate thought. Their first time, if things went that far, there was so much he wanted to do to her, every explicit fantasy he’d indulged in, tasting her, making her explode with just his mouth was the first, and then so much more, the night was young, he wasn’t going to be rushed.

Before he gave into the urge to rip her dress off like she was demanding, Damian took a fortifying breath. Discipline. He remembered years of gurgling training, patience, as he lay Raven, reverted back to her old-self, on his bed. 

So beautiful. All honey gold flesh, her lavender eyes deep purple with desire, her musk filled the air and she shed her clothes. One moment dressed, next, her dress was gone. 

She laced her fingers through his hair and pulled his mouth back down to hers. As impatient as ever. He let her take the lead, but they weren’t rushing this. Her naked flesh interrupted by her undergarments, that her slowly removed. 

He kissed her without restraint, letting his hunger tell her what words failed to convey. Her head fell back and gasps coated his lips while her nails dug into his shoulders as if she’d die if she let him go.

“Yes!” She chanted. 

“We don’t have to go further. I’ll spend the rest of the night tasting you.” He said. Raven hesitated, she was naked under him. But he wasn’t going to push. 

Raven nodded shyly, her eyes dark with desire for him, her breaths short pants, her body trembling with expectation. Expectation he wanted to fulfil. Oh yes. He’d love that.

A feeling surged in him, too ferocious to be called anything as mundane as lust or need. Before the day was done, you will know that you are mine. I am already forever yours. 

Raven’s voice deepened as he slid down her body. “Too many clothes.”

She snatched at his shoulders. His shirt disappeared, then his pants winked out of existence. Where they went he didn’t know or at the moment care. Skin on skin, Raven soft, supple, firm, against his roughness. 

Raven leaned back, looked deeply into his eyes, and that was all it took. His hand went to the back of her neck, and his mouth came down on top of hers in a scorching kiss that let her know how much he wanted her. His tongue rubbed against hers. He felt her touch on his soul, saw how she saw him, what his tongue was doing to her. 

The kiss was wet, wild, and incredibly hot. He couldn’t think. Only feel. Surreal and intense. She had the softest lips and her taste made him whole. 

He couldn’t seem to get enough of her fast enough. One kiss, and intense desire he’d never experienced before knifed through him. Raven wanted him, almost as much as he wanted her. 

Raven wasn’t passive. Every bit as wild as he. Her fingers threaded through his hair, and she let out a low groan when he ended the kiss. 

She wanted! And she let him know, another and another! More! More! 

And as he went down her body, her hand encased him, holding squeezing, stroking him and he licked her. He burst into flames and Raven arched her back, a look of shocked rapture on her face. 

*************

Damian watched Raven sleep. Her hair on his chest, one possessive leg over his, her arm on his chest. She surrounded him and he didn’t move lest he wake her. The last day had been a lot, followed by nearly a week of high alert. Magical humans were missing and JLD constantly briefed all teams. 

All this was worrisome and it ate at Raven. She tried not to show it. A soft spot for magic users. Damian could feel Raven inside him, he wasn’t sure when it started, undeniable was the place she held in his heart. And now his awareness extended to hers.

“I love you Beloved,” he murmured. Raven’s breathing stayed steady and deep. Still asleep. Wrapped in his arms, on his bed. 

He’d not planned this, but after a mission and the week they’d had tensions and emotions ran high. He hoped their time together was genuine, not a result of heightened emotions. 

For a woman to accept a man’s suit, there was usually a gift. An exchange of tokens of affection; to make them official. A jewelled switchblade sat in a velvet case. Sliver, tempered and doubled-edged, wicked sharp, shaped like a lipstick case. It had a tracker compartment, so they would always know where the other was. Raven had her empathy and he’d have a tracker. Embedded in a gift. 

All the gods above and below, but he was bad at this. 

“Sleep well beloved, see you in the morning,” and then Damian surrendered to thoughtlessness.

[damiraeweek-damiraeevents]

[sweetmuffincakes]

Are there damirae fanfiction for damiraeweek2023? If yes can you please tell me what are those?? Im dying to read it

[roverjamball]

DAY 2 - 18.07.2023 Part - I

 "Let me take care of you... please."

It was a little after sunrise. Pinks and oranges mirrored in the waves, reflected on the Tower. Violet clouds were chased by streaks of yellow and lavender.

Another night of patrol. Raven slept all day yesterday,  at least she was holed up in her room. But her eyes looked tired, even before they left for patrol. Raven looked like she could be related to racoons, judging by her black circles and how hooded her eyes were, Damian wondered if she got a wink of sleep.

This morning she had some time to catch a quick shut eye before they headed for Grayson’s full-day barbecue.

I watched Raven sip the tea I brewed for her. A camomile, to hopefully help her relax, and get some real rest. Slowly, sip by sip the tension leaked out of Raven’s eyes. Gazing into the horizon was their daily ritual, how 

My partner. Not only during patrol, though we were that, night shift was our patrol, she was more than that, Raven was also my battle partner. There was no one like her. 

On my urging the Titans were trying out a fighting style, dual warriors against an opponent or opponents. As opposed to breaking up into individual fights, or even teams of three, which I wanted to try out later.

Baby steps.

Fighting in pairs was less scattered, Damian thought. In pairs, with a partner who watched your back, you watching theirs, the field of vision increased, easy to switch opponents, if one of the pair got overwhelmed, there was a back to brace on, which opened up multiple attack combinations. An increase in the field of vision when surrounded was invaluable. 

Most Titans didn't look up. Even the ones that could fly. Starfire was an exception of course. Her planet, warriors took to the skies. They had an impressive strategy as they charged an enemy from above and below.

The first time I was glad to have Raven at my back, I awoke strapped into a machine, Raven and our Team equally immobile. I watched in horror as the machine activated. Brother Blood glowed with health, filled with energy. And I could feel the excruciating corresponding loss of my own life force. 

Normally restraint, Raven was incensed. She unleashed herself, destroying the death trap, she flew into battle. Where Logan, Blue Beetle, and even Starfire failed, Raven annihilated. Damien felt his life force replenish as Raven put down the husk that became of Brother Blood. Vengeful angel. 

Damian shook his head, dispelling the memory. It was more than a few years now, but being that helpless, with the knowledge that his team didn’t even know he was in trouble, did a number on him. 

Raven turned, looked at him question on her face. Concern for him. Shaking his head again, he waved in dismissal. She frowned. I’m here, her eyes said. Her deep beautiful eyes. Was her compassion that of a teammate or more. Was he kidding himself here? 

“Refill” he asked, offering to take her cup, put some space between them, clear his head. 

Raven stepped closer, her gaze steady on his, difficult to be evasive with an empath. Handing her cup to him, both his hand occupied, he should turn to go, but I couldn’t tear his eyes off her, I think I forgot to breath. Using more will power than he thought he had, Damian took a step a back,  before he could move away Raven hugged him. 

That got his attention. Taller than her by more than a few inches, she wrapped herself around his chest. Raven reached just under his jaw. When had that happened. He’d known his vantage point with her had changed, but now Raven felt tiny in comparison. Soft and vulnerable. Her hands roaming his back. Kneading his mussels, she soothed him. It took all his willpower not to hell with the mugs and clutch Raven to me.

“Damian!” She whispered, lifted her face, eyes penetrating my soul, I couldn’t look away if I tried. “Let me take care of you ... please."

Sweaty, bags under her eyes and tiered from patrolling all night, Raven was ridiculously beautiful, his breath caught in his throat. The earnestness in her eyes as she looked up at him, it broke his heart.

Terra’s betrayal flashed in his mind. It had stung. Till that moment, Damian considered himself incapable of compassion or empathy. But strung up and helpless, immobilised I still felt sorry for Terra. Slade’s manipulation and childhood trauma led her to reject love and acceptance of the Titans, for Deathstroke, viper, and Traitor.

As Terra double-crossed us, the traitor, faithless, Slade would do the same to her. Maybe not that day, maybe not the next, but eventually he would barter her to the shrine of his ambition. And then she would be left alone, friendless. I tried to tell her so. I got thrown to her too. But the conditioning was too deep.

“I’ve always hated you.” She didn’t believe that. Terra couldn’t believe anyone could love her, care for her, accept her. 

“The titans treated you like family, and you threw it all away.”

What a waste. 

Everyone had their theories. I asked Raven, she was the one who Terra knocked out, the one whose idea it was to cerebrate Terra. In the aftermath Raven sat with me as I healed, from physical wounds at least, she helped accelerate the healing process for all of us. Then when I was mobile and feeling sorry for myself, Raven found me, she gave me a puppy and said she had hope. 

Hope. 

I had hope. A life that was mine. Not Ra’s al Gaul not Batman, no Wayne Enterprise or the Daemon Head as my legacy. I was 19 years old, an adult for nearly a year and I wanted to be my own man. 

I wanted so much. 

Wrapped around me, her body pressed into mine, our warmth mingling, the salty breeze string her hair, I nodded. There was nothing else to do. 

I looked into the eyes of my beloved, it was like looking out onto the cosmos. Vast, terrifying, awe-inspiring. 

Raven was just a girl, so much power but she was just one person. 

His gaze roaming over her, while baffling awareness kept growing, he felt them overflow, surprised when they didn’t become a physical presence between them. Her breathing hitched. This close she couldn’t possibly miss his emotions, that the turmoil was cause by her.

Damian braced himself and went for it. “Let me take care of you” I echoed. 

Her jaw dropped, but she didn’t move away. She held his gaze and after the shock subsided, he saw the understanding in their deep purple depths. Embrace the shift in their relationship, or reject him, what would Raven do?

Finally Raven looked away. Embarrassed at the evident double standard. She nodded. Then ever so gently she wrapped her arms around his waist, embraced him, her face above his heart.

Cups in each hand, Damian still managed to hold her.  Raven wanted him. I’d hoped she would, dreamed of it, but now that it was happening..

My arms around her shoulders, pressing her to him. Awkward with the mugs but the happiest he had ever been. Embrace the fruition of months of fretting. Her smaller form engulfed by his. 

I will take care of you, beloved, he vowed silently. Raven snuggled closer, sighed. Purple energy incased his fingers and their mugs, he let go and the mugs winked out of existence. With newly free hands, Damian not one to squander any opportunity, touched Raven. For the first time not as a friend, nebulous they may yet be, Raven accepted him as something more. 

Threading his fingers in Raven’s lux curls, he unbraided her hair. She leaned into his touch. A jolt punched his palm, shooting through his nerves. It was the strangest feeling, as if his world suddenly expanded.

Raven’s framed her face, waterfall of curls glossy dark hiding her from him. So he pushed the strands back, massaging her scalp, soothing her as she had him just moments ago. Slowly Raven relaxed, as if in response.

Did she feel it too? 

He wanted this woman more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. He knew he was staring, realised that everything he felt was written on his face, but he couldn’t make himself stop. Damian wanted Raven to know. 

No shields between him and her. He wanted to feel it again, the invisible current that bound Raven and Damian into one.

Unbeknownst, off to the side on the shore, that Raven had been staring out into, among the pebbles play a crumbling object. Round rock of some sort. Sitting in with the other rocks, so eroded by the ocean and sand. Baking  in the sun and long after the lovers committed to each other in soft voices, leaving the balcony, it too disappeared to nowhere.

*******

“I looked around a bit more, and tried to reach out with my senses, to detect any trace of the unsettling energy that hovered around that building. Nothing. Gone now," I recounted. "But we didn’t  hang around.”

“Then?”

“Damian played get away driver, we got outta there.” I don’t mention how he held me to him, or how safe I felt. How I could simply rest for a while, even after such an attack. 

“The Light… Faries? Gifts ? To scare the fire monsters?” Donna asked. Considering various lore of our world, eyes squinting in concentration.

“Could be. The ‘gift’ if it was that, when I looked back, gone. No visual, I sensed nothing.”

Damian nodded. “I used a freeze bomb. Bought me enough time to retreat. I only faced one of the beasts. I think I caught it by surprise. Didn’t give chase.”

“Wasn’t interested in you maybe?” Kon asked. Did the wandering flame besties have a mission or were they regular Joe trouble makers?

“The other power, was ….. substantial. Elder or godlike. It’s gone too. But I think I sense it off and on.” Damian could hear Curiosity in Raven’s voice. He looked back, but she was looking out the window, lost in thought. 

We all pondered this. 

“Like the Scarab?” Jamie asked. Placing a comforting hand on Raven’s shoulder. Jaime has experience with flashes of light leaving behind unwanted ‘gifts’.

I smiled back at Jamie, touched by his concern for me. The incident was odd, the fire monsters appeared on our route to the Tower at around the time we’d head back and a besides magic, harsh aroma hung in the air, a pungent combination of chemicals that seared my nose when I took in a breath. 

T-Car glided down the street, camouflaged as an SUV. Conner drove, Damian navigated while Donna and I sat behind them. Gar and Jamie sat behind us right at the end. We were off the see the Graysons.

Damian and Gar cooked up a storm, a tofu salad sat between Gar and Jamie, hummus, tzatziki, frozen assorted veg burger patties sat in airtight containers in a cooler on the car floor beside me. 

Titans were going to barbecue. The Graysons were celebrating Mari’ first birthday and everyone and her sister were invited. The birthday girl was closer to two by now, but we celebrate when we can, between alien invasion, asylum breakout, joker gas or sex pollen outbreak. 

We reached case de Grayson, a hour and half from the Tower, a hop skip and a jump via portal, but we gotta maintain appearances in the neighbourhood. 

A two story house, bright under the sunny blue sky, at the end of a cul-de-sac, surrounded by trees and shrubs. I’d asked so Dick showed me a hidden back gate he used for emergency vigilante exit. Magic wards created by me, fuelled by ambient magic and the green keeps nosey neighbours from looking too closely. And the three underground levels were hidden from view, did not come with standard the house. 

The house, painted various shades of blue with lilac accents blended well, the epitome of suburbs, surrounded by tall local trees and in the back, a few plants in special pots from Tamaran. Recognise a few, as we moved around the house, I saw homely comfortable furniture, clearly influenced by tasteful Wayne manner and something alien that could possibly pass for modern. 

The wood was old and scared in places, Romani art hung on the walls, Flying Graysons poster prominent placed among the wedding photos, and Mari’s baby pictures. Littered around the house in bookshelves and glass cases Tamariania artefacts lay disguised as specially commissioned art pieces. Objectively, I thought they pulled it off. 

Why risk it you may ask? Jamie had. After Mari’ was born Kori’ wanted her to know of her heritage. That I could understand. For better or worse our parents were a part of our make-up.

We entered the property as a group, then split. Donna missed Diana, she kissed my cheek, very European and was off to find her. Donna and I dressed together. I loved the sisterhood she exuded. I left the same way, and to have those feelings returned was an empathic high difficult to describe. 

We wore reverse outfits. Donna wore a navy silk coverall, a tank top underneath in lavender, the day was warn, but nights chilly. Her lasso I magicked into looking like a braided belt, looped the hoops around her waist. 

I wore a white tank top with black stars, a grey segmented skirt, paying homage to Amazonian battle skirts. I carried my charms, power stones and powders in bracelets, arm bands, neckless and anklets, all with greco-Roman influence. Real silver, which holds enchantment best, criss crossed my arms and neck, ankles.

Damian came to collect me when it was time to leave, dressed in formfitting forest green shirt and grey cargos tucked into ocher tightly laced hiking boots. To carry my stuff, hold my hand while escorting me to the T-car, like a proper gentleman caller, I was informed when I sensed Damian outside my room. 

I was thrilled, I didn’t even tease him, and I still haven’t stopped grinning. My red faux jacket was to complete the outfit, an ode to Donna’s old get up. But taking my hand in his, flipped it and then Damian kissed each knuckle. 

“You can wear mine,” Damian offered, between kisses, “if you get cold.”

My temperature reacted with each brush of Damian’s lips, heating up my skin, a jump in an ice lake seem the only cure.

Gar and Jamie entered the house before us, promptly  found the TV and game counsels. About fifty tofu and ham burgers were gulped, drowned with a gallon of soda before the day was up. 

Kon followed us in, nodded in farewell, was out the patio door, which led to the back garden right to the Kents.  Super hearing seemed to work like echolocation for the Kryptonians. 

Clark loved Dick like a son, an orphan optimistic child, climbing ceilings and hanging of chandeliers. It was love at first leap. They laughed, watching something off the side, blocked by the house, but I could guess. Mar’i.

Damian held my hand, helping me out of the car. My cheeks burned. I didn’t mean to, but I couldn’t hold his gaze. Looking away, suddenly shy. But I squeeze in return. Showing my approval. 

Having not let go of my hand, Damian carries; the ice box filled with dips and such, Titus’s leash, his own jacket, a short sword sewed into its spine. He refused to let me help. 

I drew the line at my tiny satchel, gold for Donna’s lasso, the strap on my left shoulder, the bag, a small little thing bounced about my right hip. It carried my phone, decked with a Emily cover and a lip gloss. Anything else I’d swipe from Kori.

 We walked linked hands, Damian and I, from the front door to the kitchen. I waved and Damian with his hands full nodded in greeting to all we passed; Oliver McQueen passing Dianh some tissue, Victor in all his camouflage glory not a bit of his gunmetal suit showing, joins Gar and Jaime, petting Titus along him way. 

Jason we find in the kitchen area, he and Roy Harper wanted fir Oliver to pass before they carried a case of Rum and an open cooler full; juice, soda and tonic. Jason saw us, nodded in greeting, and then noted our hands clasping each others. 

At a raised eyebrow from Jason, before a single word left his irreverent mouth, I offered to teleport the stuff they’re carrying. Jason smirks, I’m buying his silence. He knows it, but under that attitude is a big brother who would wreck the world for Damian.

Superheroes didn’t have parties very often. They needed to cut loose and relax the same as everyone. Scheduling conflicts aside, at one time or another between one person and another there was bound to be, in such relevantly small community, some bad blood. Some mission, fight brawl, investigation, handled in some way that was all wrong.

Jason Todd, the second Robin, the Boy Wonder who refrained from killing the man who murdered his sorry excuse of a father, was now Red-Hood. Whose primary weapon were guns, with live ammunition. 

Speedy, now know as Arsenal was Oliver’s former protege. He was a recovering alcoholic, currently and Outlaw with Jay helping his teammate ferry rum. 

But we kept our peace, Jay was irreverent, but he’d die before ruining Mari’ belated big birthday. Roy too hid in the kitchen, waiting for Oliver and Dianh to pass, avoiding messy emotional flare ups. The idea of the potential  flare-ups would normally give me a head-ache. Today, even sleep deprived and tiered, Damian next to me, I floated on cloud 9.

Quirking an eyebrow at Jay, I focus on the boxes, I see where I want them, the image clear in my minds eye. Darkness rushers to de my bidding, the rum and mixer drinks enter the nowhere, a place between dimensions, and a moment later it all reappears on the grass, near an impromptu outdoor wet bar. 

I unleashed an increasing restless Titus, free the Great Dane gave my fingers a farewell lick and bounded out the open patio door, to the garden. 

Eyes flowing him, I spy a proud Bruce tossing Mari up in the air, to the girls giggling delight. Still no flight it seemed. I hope Kori was okay. I know she hoped her daughter’s Tamaranian abilities would show themselves by now. 

Other off duty JL mingle, eat, drink and play. Hidden form the road by trees, shrubs and magic, Mari and her parents celebrate her first birthday, seven months after the fact.

Jason stifled his laugh, drawing my attention back to him and Roy. 

“There you go, then. I’ll try a rum, vanilla soda, liberal with ice,” I said, fanning my face, and gave Roy a deliberate glance at Jason. 

Roy took the hint, his arm wrapped around his friends shoulders. “Thanks Rae. Get right on that.”

With Roy dragging him along, Jason still managed to nudge Damian on the way out to the garden. The nudge elicited rolled eyes at his brother, Damian’s annoyance surface level at best. As Jason passed, Damian a head taller than me, I noticed was fast catching up to Jason, in hight and mussel. 

Thankful to Roy’s intervention, I make a silent promise to seek out and help Roy cope with all that drinking going on around him. Jason spots Kori standing with the Donna and Diana, waves at her and the Outlaws proceed to join them. The women so tall and beautiful, almost dwarf the two men. 

I turned back to see the cooler stashed above Kori’s two door fridge, dips, soda emptied and laid out on the counter. A platter filled with veggie patties of various types and onion, lettuces, sliced tomato and cheese slices ready for the grill.

“Damian! I would’ve helped!”

Damian responded by pecking my cheek, handing me my favourite pop, captured my hand in his, inter locking our finger. I feel as if I’ve come home. His eyes shine an emerald green with purest emotion, and I’m a goner. 

Alone in the kitchen, he raised his brows in question, is this okay? Were we ready to out our relationship to the super community at large? I mean his father is here. Batman! But I’m exited to tell Kori all about us, and Damian broadcasts exited, anticipation to mirror my own. Whatever this is between us, it won’t flourish in the dark, in secret. 

Damian insists he won’t hide from me. Empathy being part of my very cells, to accept even aspect of me. To keep his shields open, or ask me to curb my senses. It took a minute but I convince him to shield his mind like he was taught first by the League of Shadows, improved by me on that foundation. I won’t have him defenceless that way. Reinforcing his shields with mine, I promise I in no way handicapped.  

“Kismet,” Damian says, I only nod, unable to speak over the emotional storm raging in me. I feel it too. Destiny. But the way he gazes at me I think he does not grasp the extent of it, metaphysical and literal. 

[roverjamball]

DamiRaeWeek2023

Master List

Day 1 - "I've got you and I'm not letting go."

Day 1 - II

Day 2 -  "Let me take care of you... please." Part I Part II Part III

Day 3 - "I think I'm in love with you and I'm terrified."

Day 4 - "Why are you so good to me?" Part I and Part II

Day 5 - "I have to do this to save the world.” “You are my world."

Day 6 - "I'm not going to leave you. You're never going to have to suffer by yourself again, I promise."

Day 7 - Free day |Forbidden love | Moving in together

[roverjamball]

 DAY 2 - 18.07.2023 Part II

"Let me take care of you... please."

Feeling before hearing Raven come closer, Damian loaded the plate with another grilled veggie patty, bun and more grilled potato chips. Added mustard from the condiments and the second soda he held in the crook of his arm.  

When he could feel her warmth in the air and smell the lilac Jasmin scent that clung to her, he closed his eyes and savours. His hyper-awareness of Raven hadn’t lessened , but only skyrocket after their confessions this morning. 

The day was winding down as early evening approached. Over the aroma and sounds of a bustling cookout, Raven hits his senses with the impact of a sledgehammer, making his need to touch her almost painful.

      He forced that desire back, surprised by how difficult it was. To make matters worse, Raven seemed to feel the same desperation for him. Damian was not sure how he had this knowledge, but he did. 

Looking at his amazing, lovely Beloved, from the conner of his eye, she walked to him, smiling, her form lithe, his heart raced. He’d never lacked self-control before. Certainly he had ever let that part of his body rule him. It was always mind over matter for him, a quest for total self-control. Raven tugged at his heart in a way that ensured no one else would do. So he supposed he better get used to the practice of this form of discipline.  

Damian felt a charge in the air. That confused him. He turned and told Raven so. 

She blinked at me, her eyes turquoise, reflecting the indigo sky, winded for a quick moment, as if surprised. 

“What is it? Is that normal?”

She looked at me, thinking about it.

“Zatana and Zack are here” Raven said, tasting the air, she turns back towards the house. I follow her gaze. Sure enough the Zatara’s walk out to the patio. Dick rushes  to greet them, passing the pie Zatana brought to Wally West. A moment later an empty handed West leaned an elbow on Dick’s shoulder, chatting with Zatanna as if he’d never left.

Zachary Zatara greeted Grayson and West, then left the group. His eyes roaming the crowd, searching. About 5’10” skinny, styled black hair, eyes covered in fancy dark glasses, dressed in ironed khaki pants and a navy shirt Zachary moved about the crowd, polite, but not staying beyond a short greeting. A bottle of some kind in his hand, with no label Damian could discern, the bottle pulsed oddly. No one else seem to notice. 

Raven grabbed food off his plate, drawing his attention back to her. Her focus on compiling a burger, loading it with condiments and pickles rang false. It took long minutes to finish her food. Damian handed her a tissue napkin once she was done. Ready to wait it out. 

Raven stiffened, but took the offered item. Still avoiding his eyes. Moving closer, giving her space, Damian slid his jacket over her. It wasn’t yet cold, he was hoping his overture would help her relax. 

Shrugging her shoulders Raven used her free hand to adjust his jacket more comfortably. At long last she met his gaze. 

“You can tell me anything. You know that right. Raven?”

“I’m a creature of emotion, Damian. Strong emotions …..” Raven began to fidget while glancing around as if hoping an exit would magically appear. Considering that she could create one of those Damian relented. 

He felt his eyes soften, she could tell him anything, he loved this girl. How could she not know that.

“Later.“ If Raven’s discomfort did not convince him, rapidly approaching younger Zatara did. Did she sense the  encroaching magician? 

Zachary Zatara sauntered towards them, waving an oddly shaped bottle at Raven by way of greeting. Completely ignoring Damian.

“Guess.” He said to Raven smugly. Taking a step forward to give the magician a quick hug, she moved away from Damian, and when she came back to him there was more distance between their bodies then he liked.

“Damian meet Zach, Dr. Fate’s nephew. Zach, Damian Wayne-“ but Zatara cut her off.

“Zachary Zatara, world famous magician.” The boy spared Damian a glance, his eyes conveying that of course everyone knew who Zach was, and if they didn’t they weren’t worth his time, his arrogant look implied. Then focusing only on Raven he said exited “and bearer of the elusive elixir. Raven I’m sure you’re dying to try it again.”

“Oh?” Damian looked at Raven. If the Boy magician was going to ignore him, Damian would focus on Raven as well. 

Smiling at the boy politely, Raven nodded at Damian and said, “there’s this magical bar, Oblivion-“

“Lets party. Raven, do the honours.”

Raven, out of thin air produced three glass. They floated for a second and then landed with a soft thump. Before Zachary blocked his view, Damian recognised them as brandy tumblers he’d seen in Grayson’s bar. 

“The bar’s a pocket dimension. Very selective about who it lets in.” Raven said, as the magician poured till two of the three tumblers were brimming with a slivery reflective liquid. Even form this distance Damian could sense the otherness form the drink. Was this safe? 

“Alcohol Raven,” smiled as he brushed her hair back, she wore it lose and long. He tried to not sound like a prude, hard liquor didn’t faze Raven, but this seemed dangerous. “You don’t know what’s in it.”

“Don't even worry about it,” the magician said, side stepping Damian, he move to Raven, “we snuck some from the house of mysteries. Many times. That one time was a wild night.” Zatara insinuated at more than their shared history.  

“Zach, how’d you manage it! Constantine or the League Dark-“

Jealousy burst out of Damian like a nuclear explosion. He watched ‘Zac’, he could take him down before the pompous waste of space reached Raven. He debated shoring up his shields, embarrassed for feeling so. They hadn’t even been on a date, but already Damian wanted to punch the magicians smug face in. Fighting for control, Damian tried to cool his anger. Then he felt reassure pouring out of Raven, directly into him. Like a comforting, I am on a friends should.

This barbecue at his brothers house, was their first official outing as a couple. That’s the hope. They may have been teammates for years. Damian may have admired her beauty for long as he knew her. Regardless of them being partners, spending every night of the last six months, patrolling the dark together, saving lives, solving mysteries, relying only on each other. As a couple, their relationship was frustratingly new. All that was missing was the gifting of a courtship present of a personal significance. This wasn’t casual. 

He hadn’t yet introduced Raven as his girlfriend, to his father or his brother. He’d meant to and he would, Raven definitely told Kori everything about their relationship by now. It had been two hours since he’d last seen her. Magic made the garden behind Grayson’s home bigger than it should be if you go by land records. 

Jason cornered him a while back. His teasing merciless while he grilled him veggies and mixed him mocktails. Teasing him some more, you’r a man now, have some rum, out hair on your chest. Hilarious. I bore it with a straight face. Can’t react with Jason, don’t know what he’d read. 

 Roy just smiled, telling him to be nice to their girl. Well at least one brother was some what introduced to his Beloved. After their change in status. Just not the one whose house they were in.

Their relationship nascent, Damian’s jealousy was out of proportion, and not warranted. Zatara was making moon eyes at her, but Raven laughed and joked with him same as with Jamie or Kori. They shared a history. One that Damian was not a part off. 

Again, Damien felt a wave of reassurance through an awareness he felt of Raven. A shared space, one only they occupied. 

Damian watched Zatara offer Raven the magical drink. The liquid fizzed quickly and dissolved, only to pop on the surface, and then to be still as a cool and reflective the next. 

Raven offered him her glass, Damian snorted. He wanted to keep a clear head.

They clinked their glasses, and Raven took a small sip, her body language showed she enjoyed the flavour. The Zatara boy chugged his in one go. This wasn’t a frat party. It was his brother’s house. A family gathering. Irritation filled Damian. Never had he been this aware of his emotions, now that Raven could read them.

I promise not to hide from her, even with feelings so petty, the promise to bare his insecurities is difficult to keep. Just like any other promise, actions spoke louder than words. Besides, he did not love Raven because she was beautiful and powerful, with strength of character, her courage and commitment, had a lot to do it too. 

Raven would never knowingly break faith. She cared for me, he had known that, and this week it was proven  as  romantic interest. Raven would do anything for Kori or the Titans, but she was dating him, Damian. And if Raven wanted something casual, there was no way she’d pick him, bare her soul to him the way she did. 

What was a magical drink? For Raven, Damien already had plans to visit Antwerp and Surat, the best cut jewels would grace her body. For her bridal gift, Damian would scour the world for the most magical and prosperous gem.  Gems, he would then set on the hilt of a dagger he’d wanted to gift Raven for a while. A fitting bridal gift. Raven deserved happiness and life of peace. And as long as he was alive, as long as she allowed it……

The liquor must have gone the wrong way, because Raven coughed, doubled over, her free hand going to her throat, and pure liquid poured out. She stared hacking as if unable to breath. Her eyes bulged, breaths coming out in gasps.

Damian rushed to pat her back. 

The magician was there too, taking her glass form her, staring at her with puppy dog eyes. Raven tried to collect herself. But most techniques started with taking a deep breath, Raven tried that, which only lead to more coughing. 

Damian dutifully patted her back. Hoping that would get the liquid outta her lungs. Did magical alcohol behave differently from normal sprit liquids?

Raven stopped breathing. Her heart still beat, and she got a look of concentration on her face. A moment later, silvery liquid spewed out of her mouth. She hadn’t taken any kind of breath or even a gasp for over a two minute. The liquid kept pouring out of her mouth in sporadic bursts. 

Damian just held her, this impossible feeling blossomed in his chest, that if he let go Raven would just disappear.

Finally after another full minute of hacking coughs and hardly breathing, Raven finally drew in a ragged breath. And then another.

 Damian was so relieved. Only then did he notice they’d garnered an audience. His glare seem to do the trick, and everyone suddenly had important conversations to get back to, and they had to get back to them right now. 

Only Kori rushed in, undeterred by Damian’s hostility. Holding Raven to her, checking on her, the Tamaranian’s movements frantic. That gives him a measure of peace. It was somebody else in the same boat as he was. 

“Pass the water, Zachary,” Kori admonished urgently. 

“I’ll get some,” Damian said, give Raven some space now that she was no longer gasping for breath, Kori covered her with her body, shielding her from the crowd. He could safely get her water. 

“Thanks,” she said, her smile glorious, red eyes and stuffy nose, and beneath it was a growing look of trust that tugged on his heart in thousands of threads. 

On the picnic table, near the discarded drinks, a breath away from Raven’s glass, unnoticed lay an old crumbling circular object. It waited a while, but when the party moved on,  just as it had quietly appeared, it again disappeared. 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Elegant sofas, stuffed chairs, and panoramic views of the lush garden, foliage from all over Earth and other planets, mainly Tamaran and Azarath was not what held Damian’s attention. 

On one couch, Raven assured us that she was fine. Her cheeks a beautiful red from embarrassment, Kori held her hand, rubbed Raven’s back and over all looked about her with concern. 

Dwarfing Raven by more than a foot, taler that Damian by a smidgen - a recent development, Kori hovered over Raven, worry evident on her glamoured face. The glamour didn’t disguise her expressions. It was something Raven and Victor came up with. Some sort of techno magic blend, I’m not too sure of the theory, but practically Kori looks human, holograms and glamour, code and spells working in tandems. 

Jason sauntered in, sitting opposite, Kori and Raven on a lone overstuffed chair. The living room was cosy with the biggest couch occupied by Raven and Kori, who  while fawning over her, took a quick break to nod at Jason in acknowledgment.

Jason sat like the chair was a throne, his legs splayed, relaxed as if he didn’t have a care in the world. Grinning Jason raised his bowes as his gaze swept the Den, Damian standing by the Desk looking out at the curious barbecuers. 

“Feeling better?”

“Fine!”, finally had enough his Beloved it seemed. “Everyone needs to stop asking me that.” Raven snapped, eyeing the young Zatara lurking by the doorway of Grayson’s den. No one said a word, but Todd smirked as if he knew something.

Lone vigilante, who always works alone is a myth. In actuality working alone will get you nowhere. You need friends- police that you can trust, informants with their ears to the ground who provide leads, intel and experts. Batman has Alfred and the Justice League, and I have Raven and the Titans. But the way Todd was looking at Raven…  

“Now, do you want to wear that? Or do you want to put something else on?”

      Damian gave Todd a confused look. “For what?”

She paused, her guilty expression confirming that she’d singled Jason somehow. But when ? While chocking? With Damian right there, feeling what Raven’d been feeling, how had he not noticed. And come to that, Damian had a new awareness of Raven, feel her distress at not being able to breath, at how Damian could now perceive the unusual, disturbance that was created by the Zatara’s appearance and the oddness for the bottle little Zatara carried.   

“Jay, suggested we go clubbing after.” Raven tried to stall with false cheer. As if by now she hadn’t guessed at their connection.

He went over and knelt in front of her so their eyes were nearly level. Her expression was anguished, and anguish ripped at him, too.

“Nothing too taxing,” Jason interrupted. “Just switching up the tail, lil’ D. Nothing to worry about.”

Damian nodded. Sure he and Raven could be fresh faces. If she wanted to help Todd out, Damian was game. 

Damian let his hands rest on her knees, he felt guilt and relief pouring out of Raven. Was it because Jason covered for her? Or because he, Damian was ok with the job?

Did Raven think that because they were together, she had to check with him? He hoped not. Her expression was guarded. 

Damian rose from his crouch in front of Raven, facing Kori and Todd. 

“Can I help?” He offered, “with your cover. Unless its already sorted out. Todd?”

The next thing, Raven touched his cheek, moving to him, her gaze never flinching. “Okay.”

Her touch amplified his feelings, Raven was warm and beautiful, he could smell her scent; Jasmin and outdoors mixed with his baser one. It was like fire to this senses. 

Raven lifted her head. He met her halfway, her lips velvet and her body a satiny cage as she held him like she was afraid someone would snatch him away if she loosened her grip. 

He never wanted to stop kissing her. 

A pointed throat clearing, Todd of course, forced Damian to stop kissing Raven, he’d have ignored it but she seemed embarrassed. At the same time she didn’t let go of him and Damian could see Raven’s disappointment. He smiled at Raven, a cocky grin, a promise to kiss her senseless, later.

Later she mouthed, her cheeks and neck flushed prettily.  

[roverjamball]

Day 7 - 23.07.2023

Free day | Forbidden love | Moving in together

Weighing operational risk is tricky when your life is on one side of the scale. It's even worse when your Beloved teleports next to you. 

“What's it going be? After a career spent doing bad things for so-called good reasons, it's hard to say exactly where you draw the line.”

“I’m here,” is all Jason says. 

Batman grunts.

Damian'd had enough hours ago. He raised a fist to rest his head, and was not at all tempted to puch the table. Just for something interesting to do. But he put up with the bureaucracy of the Justice League, joined by the LD: Dark, Raven’s NightForce, the Outlaws, because after his rant about how they would ”together” a couple of nights ago, he felt he couldn't complain. Well not too much.

Raven, speaking with the Zataras’ threw a quick smirk his way. Beloved probably got feedback from their bond, making his expression of polite disinterest as Batman and RedHood gripped at each other over logistics, useless. 

Damian had always known that father loved Todd. You don't react the way father did when Jason died if you are indifferent. His father would have committed murder, taken a life which was so against his principles, his trauma that obviously Damien knew his father felt the loss of someone he loved deeply. Someone who was family. 

Similarly, you don't become the Red Hood and use guns, the very weapon that killed your mentor's parents, if you yourself didn't feel too much. But now that he shared Raven's empathy, Damian glimpsed the purple within the red of hate and anger, and whiere is lightned to blue and lilac. He experienced what the hurt meant. How Jason Todd the street rat orphan felt about his city, and how the Multi-billionaire orphan felt. And how they both were desperately trying but failing to meet in the middle.

Specifically, today sitting beside his father and across from his brother is all but blood, Damian was forced to observe and perceive everything from their aura to their mood, their words gave to the overtone and undertone. Between the lines of what was being said by his brother and his father.

And now, as he had a better understanding of their dynamic and history, Damien was forced to contend with what Raven lived every single second of her life. He had to grapple with the fact that she may never take anyone's side because after you literally walked a mile and somebody else issues, all the presumptions and assumptions were useless. There could be no judgement, only empathy and compassion.

Maybe exasperated!

The months after he and Raven became one, Damien would get impressions of magic. He could send something that he couldn't before. That dimmed to some extent when Raven was captured. His extra sensory perception was dampened and he could only get impressions of Raven's feelings and emotions. Everything changed when Raven and Damien promised to be together. It was implied forever and always. a vow that was more than words. it had intent. And now these last few days Damien had a better understanding on what it meant to be Raven. Other peoples aura, moods was one thing, but sometimes there was a tactile sense involved. This morning he punched Donna and it was as if he had punched himself. He was so surprised that he actually took Donna's knee to his abdomen, not being fast enough to block it! and then to add insult to injury, he felt Donna's second-hand embarrassment for him at not deflecting her!

So, even though he was hurt Raven'd hesitated. The gut punch when he saw in his Beloved’s eyes the need to flee. The need to shut down. To leave everything behind, including him!  Damien, who had been frantic with worry, but had controlled it, so as not to be useless when it came time to find her! fight for her!

Him, who had worked to master the magical bond between them so that he may actually find her. 

And then finally, after dealing with the Outlaws and the NightForce and the worst one Constantine, and after fighting monsters that would give any sane person nightmares, when Damian reached his beloved, his precious one, she all but flinched. Raven was conflicted about Damian. The home they built with each other. She looked at her captor, the man-child Klarion as if he understood her better than Damien did. These last few days had been an experience in humility. He thought he understood how Raven an empath half-deamon walked lived. Just like he judged the dynamic between his brother and his father. So now he had to grapple with the fact that even the things he knew were actually those he only presumed to know. 

Under the conference table, a soft hand covered his clenched fist.  He got the impression of the heat of his wrist clasped in as if his own much smaller hand, while also the sense of the actual touch of Raven on him. 

The dual perceptions while not entirely new were nonetheless, jarring.

Slowly, with each breath all extra sensory perception reseeded. And he was alone in his head. He breathed a sigh of relief. To be himself again. Atlast. Then instantly Damian felt ashamed. 

Damian took a deep breath, and let it out. Well, he’d promised her unfiltered Damian. Whether he liked it or not, he was glad to be himself again. Turning to face her, Damien waited for condemnation in her eyes. Superman commanded the room. Calling an end to the break and people started to trickle back to their seats. Many paused to speak with Raven, get her opinion on something, in sympathy or a clarification of some earlier discussion. Mostly, she got nods in support.

The meeting was called to order. To my relief and chagrin, now was not the time and place to have an honest personal discussion.

With a single gesture from Raven’s free hand, a little cloud of darkness, bound towards the centre of the table and with a flash of purple light, the darkness created a 3-D render of the caverns where Raven had been held. 

Questions were asked. How many of the kidnapped were in the caves? 

From the central cavern, where the ceiling was so high it had its own cloud system, the perspective zoomed and panned in till finally, it stopped, vaguely humanoid figures close to 100 in number, cowering under a low ceiling father into the earthen complex. 

The Hawks inquired about the presence of Nth metal. To which Raven relayed the impressions, she was able to make out while incase in it, and the information relayed by the Cavern system itself. 

“From what I understand, the metal has sense, an autonomy of sorts. Its properties such that it can restrict or disrupt magic or enhance.” 

“The Metal decides?” Victor Stone his human brow raised. 

Raven and everyone looked at the Hawks seated on the JL side of the table.

Hawkgirl nodded in grim fascination. As if to say that’s right, but these are secrets of my home world. Specific to Thanagar. Their crash in ancient Egypt was considered to be the only source on earth. The fact that the transuranic metal was naturally occurring and abundant on earth, confirmed by a second magician, added orange of mild alarm to the Hawk couple’s warrior-like aura.

And Damian could sense others’ emotions again. But with Raven holding his hand, literarily, the impressions were nebulous, not easily confused with his own feelings or opinions. Like reading micro-expressions or body language. One had to be careful not to mimic behaviour. Here too, he’d have learned to take in the information. Be aware of it, without internalising or rectory.

It was a wonder Raven mediated so much.        

“Are their other cavern systems?” Batman asked.

“Ancient sites, co-opted by the agents of chaos? Yes. I have an impression of a few and so would everyone with me in the cavern.”

Constantine bobbed his ‘cigi’ in confirmation. Asshole ashed right on the state-of-the-art console. 

The Zatara boy’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he squeaked a nervous yes.  

In his peripheral, not vision, but a perception nonetheless, Raven was amused at his inner monologue. And Damian realised he’d instinctively reached for Raven, which opened their bond. A bond that created a private channel between just them. It was like passing notes in class. Under the teacher’s eyes, Damian was as if a backbencher, whispering a running commentary, while Raven tried hard to keep her face impassive. 

Damian remembered days at Titans base during Grayson’s droning, Raven made astute humorous observations in his ears. And he’d quirk a brown in response. 

Or how their eyes would meet across a battlefield, Raven go high and Damian going low, absolute clarity, a moment of connection, culminating into a perfect takedown. 

He’d honed situational awareness from before he could walk. Being Talia Al- Ghul’s son he could do no less. Damian found that  at some point his awareness included Raven’s position in real-time. An instinct, like sensing a throwing star even if he couldn’t see it. A strike beyond the 180º line of sight. While in combat, focused, where nothing could faze him, Damian realised he’d look for Raven. 

When Father sent him off to the Titans, I  don’t think he banked on me making a genuine emotional connection. He thought I’d make friends, sure. Even after the thing with Grayson and Kori, Father was rather short-sighted when it came to me. Now he was mildly nervous for his youngest, loving one of the most powerful beings on earth, with a complicated history to match his own. And it had been terrifying, looking at himself through his father's eyes. But, if the trade-off was being without Raven, being with her but only half-heartedly, then he would learn to handle it. Insignificant as a candle in a hurricane. 

Yet this, this perfect understanding between them, sharing a whole conversation in a look, a shorthand developed over years of history and conflict and partnership. And now a tangible metaphysical bond, to know what he felt was returned! That was everything.  

[roverjamball]

"I think I'm in love with you and I'm terrified"

DAY 3 - 19.07.2023

“If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favourable”. - Seneca

Our gazes locked, beautiful amethysts looked into mine, we shared a shining moment of epiphany. 

"I think,” Raven says. But before she can deflect, I felt along the bond we share, stronger now that Raven was right here before me, touching, her shutters were about to come down, so I rush in. 

“I'm in love with you,” I say.  

Five months since their assist at the club in Gotham, and Todd kept calling them back in. They were more Outlaws than Titans at this point. 

Mostly Damien and Raven together were needed. They worked well off each other, having been a team for so long and now that they were together, sync was to a whole new level. 

But sometimes Todd only called Raven. Those times were the worst. Whenever he could Damian backed her, Outlaws or no Outlaws, but that wasn’t always possible. He was needed in Gotham or was approached by League of Shadows; associates or intermediaries, splinter groups any or all hoping to get their hooks in him. This one had been one of those times. It was handled, suffice it to say they wouldn’t be looking to Damian to be their Demon's Head.

Damian was not an assassin, if someone needed killing and there was no other way, then he was not above it. He wouldn’t start it, but he’d sure finish it. But taking on targets, be it in the name of the greater good, that was a slippery slope. It could tarnish ones soul. 

“There is always a choice,” he’d said while immobile, at Slade’s mercy. He tired to live by it every day, some days, days when Raven wasn’t hurt and bleeding, were easier than others. 

After nearly month of being away, Raven was back, and soon she’d be back in his loft, eating his food and then at long last tucked in his bed, wearing his clothes. Clothes that she liked to filch. Much to his delight, but they played that it was cleverness on her part, that he was put out and not that every part of him was hers, let alone his things. 

“I'm in love with you,” I repeat. Raven seems speechless. Her face blank. 

Raven had to have guessed of course, I thought as I waited for her to respond. 

I’d said I would and have been an open book to her. Our connections, a bond that flows both ways, allows for nothing less. Raven need never repress any side of herself with me. But it had to be said. Out loud. I didn’t just want to say it, I wanted it DECLARED. To Raven. The world. 

Raven looks stunned for a moment, colour  returning to her face, cheeks flushed, she laughs in shock, looks at me as if I’ve lost my mind. For a moment I fear I may have miss calculated, my heart stutters, but then Raven smiles at me, a shy unsure thing. Giddy, is what I feel from our emotional tie. 

“I care for you deeply Damian. And of any person alive, I care for you the most.” Her look of apprehension belied her words. Give me some time, her eyes pleased with me. 

He wanted it all. Her to declare what she felt, as he had. It was obvious that she did feel. She opened up to him in a way that she had with no one else. But for now he was more than happy to be the person she cared for the most. Now that she was standing there in front of me, safe, healed, her hair wet, fresh form a shower, I noticed a hamper by the bathroom, filled with grimy, torn clothes. Clothes she’s escaped in. I could admit how anxious I’d been. How close had he come to losing her. 

I checked her for burns, wounds. I sent a prayer to any higher power that listed, bring her home to me. I’d begged. And she was here, in my arms, warm, soft smelling of herbal shampoo and rose soap. Not a scratch on her, from what I can see, and I can see a lot. Though with Raven’s preternatural healing that could mean nothing. Yet, she was safe at this moment. And sometimes this moment is all one can count on. 

“Satisfied” she said, her eyebrows raised over eyes crinkling in mischievousness.

I was. Relief, then an explosion of raw emotion, coursed through me. Did Raven feel it? It must leak through me. Again I made a conscious decision, not withhold anything, I let it all out. I wanted to know how she felt, always, so didn’t  ever hide how I was feeling. 

It was like waking up after days of anguish to find that anxiety was gone. Where there had been only confusion, there was suddenly nothing, and other feelings rushed in to fill the sudden void. 

A month apart. I thought I would never survive it. With Raven before me, I wonder how did I survive without her.

Excitement, a nervousness that accompanies expectation flowed threw my body. A surge of warm emotion rolled together with bubbling exuberance. 

Raven giggled, there was a note of hysteria in it, which I ignored. Her happiness, however, mirrored my own and I hugged Raven to me, sharing her joy. Our excitement compounded, overflowing. 

Raven, the goddess of darkness, and in those shadows, these feeling were new, budding but no less vibrant. The sensual pleasure of the feminine mysterious scent of her, looking at her face, so close to mine, genuine joy and something more mysterious, her dark hair playing on my arms, goose flesh riddled my skin where it touched. The connection between them sparked, as strong as he remembered it. Reinforced by nearness and touch. It felt like coming home after a long, terrible trip, and he grinned at her like an idiot.

I needed to feel her skin under my hands, to feel her pressed to me. And so I did. She was alive, and in my arms. 

The need, was a hunger I felt in my core. I needed her, all of her, as much as I needed air, more even, if that was possible. 

And I finally told Raven. She meant everything to me, and it was enough that she was here. I'd never been very good at expressing myself verbally. But now, I felt free, unburdened.

By the time Raven was released from medical, I’d gone half mad getting back to the Tower. I patiently waited while she showed, and now I was already pressed up against her. 

Raven let out a gasp in surprise, but I leaned gently into her, walking her backwards, carrying her, pressing her shoulders to the door. Slowly, savouring I lowered my mouth to hers, she moved to meet me half way. Her lips were soft, sweet, hot. She went still for a second, then let out a low sound and wrapped her arms around my neck rubbing my shoulders, kissing me with abandon. 

I could feel her, relaxed and calmness in holding me.  The excitement of anticipation coursing through her.

Her slender, warm body and softness moulded against my hardness. My hunger roared, and I controlled it, the kiss, my tongue lightly teasing. Raven, impatiently deepened the kiss, her lips almost desperate, low whimpers vibrating through her mouth and into mine. 

I started to feel a little light-headed, having Raven, wet and wrapped around me could surely do that. Her robe came lose, dark blue against glowing skin. It was all too much and not enough. I was feeling disoriented, some part of me warned against it, I only pressed harder against her, kissing her neck, barred shoulder, taking her hands under my T-shirt as a resounding yes!

I slid one hand over her hip, under her robe to curl about her naked waist. Raven pulled her to me, and I responded, her breath hot and quick, against my throat like soft butterfly wings. I felt each exhale all over my body, like I was a ringing tuning fork.

We’d been taking things slow, but it seemed Raven was as ready to really be one with me this night. There weren’t many secrets between us, but one and with the way Raven’s sent filled the air, her feelings bombarding wave after wave. 

We would be…

Lifting one leg to press against mine, winding around my hips, pulling me nearer, Raven murmured “I love you.” A kiss then “ I missed you”, she said mindless in sensation.  

I lowered my mouth to her throat, tongue tasting her heartbeat, racing just like mine was, and she arched against me, “Damian”. She chanted my name, encouraging me. 

How did I get so lucky I thought, gently biting her pulse, sending quivering shock waves through her. Raven shook against me, letting out quiet sounds of deepening need. 

Our connection snapped into overdrive. I could feel it all. Sensation flooded our starved systems .

Too long.

“Damian”, she called to me and I found her eager lips with mine, and her fingers tightened in my hair, drawing me hard against her.

My dizziness grew. Some coherent part of me, a small part not focused on Raven, thought my reaction odd. I struggled to follow that train, but passion and need murdered any reasoning brain power.

Raven shuddered. She stopped kissing me and pressed her palm against my chest, my heart beating against her worryingly fast, turning her face away from me Raven distanced us. 

I came too myself then. We were wrapped in midnight energy. Raven pushed again, gentle, and as I move out of the aura, the disorientation lessened. 

My lips still burned to touch hers again, but I closed my eyes, feeling reason return. I took slow, shuddering breaths and backed away from her. My heart beat manageable. Fast still from …. Well we were about to be very intimate.

“What happened?”

Raven looked as shaken as I felt.

I led Raven to a sofa, unable to totally forgo skin contact. Shoring up my shields, I held her cold had in mine, warming her up. She emerged from shifting shadows, her robe covering her again, much to my irritation. 

"I could feel you,” she said, after a minute of sitting in silence.

"I could feel you too. It …" I shivered. "It felt …..…I was, heaven.”

Raven looked shocked, her jaw dropped. 

Adorable. I had rendered her speechless. Didn’t happen that often. I kept my lips pressed, lest I laugh. 

“Sex with me is dangerous. Intimacy with me, is to share in my power.” She paused at his raised brow. She’d told him that. This wasn’t their first time being intimate. 

Life was energy, Raven had explained, each cell contributed to a beings life, storing energy. And sharing touch, tasting each other they shared that energy, that was life. But it was much stronger this time. Was it the time apart? Their tie making up for lost time?

His expression was neutral, but when Raven looking guilty, for being an empath, having daemon lineage, he sheath with anger. Ostracised by the League, by Azarath, when she couldn’t help how she’d been born? This beautiful women was a goddess among mortals, kind and funny, a healer. So strong in mind, her sprit was a marvel. 

His beloved was gifted, amazing, a marvel not cursed as she beloved, as others treated her. 

“I don’t think I control your mind,” she went on. “I mean, I’ve never tried, not during. …..I don’t want to, but its difficult to focus during…… anyway,” she continued in a brisker tone. “I know I’m stronger than an average person, mentally. And lost in sensations, being an empath, well there isn’t much control during such an emotional high.” Bitterness crept into her tone. 

"Sex is more than just sensations. It's a union of the energy of two lives. And it's explosive. It's the process for creating life. For creating a new soul. Think about that. Power doesn't get more dangerous and volatile than that.”

I nodded, frowning.

"Love is another kind of power, which shouldn't surprise you. Magic comes from emotions, among other things. And when two people are together, in that intimacy, when they really, selflessly love each other, it changes them both. It lingers on in their aura, even when they are apart."

“That is when I can’t hide anymore from the fact that something is very wrong with me.” She said it as if they were the most hideous actions. Raven wanting what everyone wanted. Someone of her own, to love her, hold her and share in her passion. He couldn’t disagree more. Her compassion, her empathy  made her miracle, just as. Just Raven

“I have to control my thoughts,” Raven continued, as if confessing to the worst sins ��my feelings when I’m upset, so other people don’t get infected by my emotions, get manipulated.”

Her voice trailed off and she kept glancing at him as if expecting him to berate. She spoke of her amazing abilities with more shame than he’d heard the Joker or Black Mask speak, after killing untold number of innocents. For money or just for the heck of it. 

“Wait,” he said in a carefully controlled tone. “I remember you told us, at fourteen you truly realised your uniqueness. You didn’t know what you were before then? What did Arella, the Azar tell you about your father till then?”

Pain filled her expression, her shield locked down tight, I got no impressions from the tenuous bond between us. 

Raven’s face said it all, her posture, she was closing in on herself. “My teachers never mentioned my father. If I’d ask, as I did when we had little time together, Arella changed the subject or got angry. Azarath was different than earth. Its own culture. I wondered who my biological father was. No one said anything, but they let me know I was tainted blood.”

She closed her eyes. I reached out with my emotions. Showing her, you are special to me, how wonderful she was. 

“They did the right thing. It was necessary for mother to be kept apart from me. I couldn’t then succumb to strong emotions and be taken over by Father.”

Oh, how well I know that pain, Beloved

Her words excused Azarath and Arella’s actions, but her eyes filled with tears. Raven tried to blink away the telling moisture, stop it from spills down her ashen cheeks, her shields held, but the hurt was evident. 

Her mother, all of Azarath for years kept her lineage hidden, training to suppress all emotion. An empath. Her life, childhood devoid of warmth, a mothers love.

No wonder her eyes held such desperation. Her own mother had broken her, and Arella’d let it be done to her own child, when Raven had been at her most innocent, vulnerable. Punished for no fault of her own.

Yet Raven hadn’t stayed broken. Somehow, once she learned of her dark lineage, his fierce Beloved picked up the pieces, found strength of sprit in herself. She avenged her mother, became a hero who saved the very world. Now, every time she took on the likes of Brother Blood, her own Father, Raven was trying to suppress the parts of herself Arella taught her to despise…and also, without realising it, trying to earn her mother’s love.

How well he knew, the others, when they found out of mother and grandfather, well when it wasn’t names it was how they treated him. And sometimes, even Father’s eyes held doubt. 

Raven shouldn’t have had to be that strong. No one should. 

“Damian, I think I'm in love with you and I'm terrified.” The sincerity on her tear streaked face broke my heart. 

I crushed her to me. She came willingly, her trust a salve to my soul.

Relieved. That’s how Damian felt. 

Raven, he’d hoped cared for him as he did for her, their bond was proof, an empath as strong as Raven would bond with her love. 

There were glimpses, when Raven’s shields were down, he could sense that she also … yet, he never realised how much he needed Raven to say it. Out loud. To hear it form her own lips. He was right. Nothing else in the world had a sweater sound.

“Damian, I think I'm in love with you too and I'm terrified.” 

He’d need to work on convincing her that they were ride or die. For he would die for her, and with startling clarity Damian realised that he was willing to kill for Raven’s well being. For the latter, he’d give her no reason to be terrified of her feelings for him. But judging by the emotions coursing through him, possessive, protective and he’d admit, strongly irrational, if Raven felt half of what he did, the world should be terrified. 

She must’ve sensed his thoughts, felt his emotions, because Raven smiled tentatively, blinking the tears from her eyes. The next moment her lips were on his chest as she clutched at him, desperation rolled in the part of Damian’s mind their connections occupied. Their bond a part of unconscious, stronger, more stable now, must be the declaration of love from them both that gave it such strength. 

Raven’s eyelashes like butterfly wings on his skin. Raven wrapped her arms around him tighter, and Damien felt euphoria burn brightly inside him. Coursed through his veins. His heart beat so fast, he thought he would explode, the beats an epicentre. Was surprised when it didn’t. Her ears could surely hear, with her nearness Raven could surely feel what she did to him?

Her head bent he could see her hair was as always the darkest night. She hadn’t bothered to put it up, and it spilled over her shoulders down to the curve of her breasts, midway down her back. The light from the windows played on the dark strands, coaxing deep-purple highlights from the mass of loose, heavy waves he loved to play with. Her face was a soft oval, with a small but full kissable mouth and her high cheekbones, that rested on his heart.

Feeling mischievous, he very deliberately said, “me too, Beloved.”

*************************************************

I snuggled into Damian’s side, as soon as he sat beside me. It was amazing how comfortable she felt with him. His arm around her shoulders felt just right, and their bodies fit together in a lovely, cozy way. She had the brief thought they might fit in other ways, too. She shivered, but not with cold.

Beloved! She was his already, in her heart she’d known that, and Damian’s actions, emotional aura told her he also saw her as his and he, hers. But now the words were said and heard. Words have power. Perception is reality. If she could see it, she could create it. Her magic primarily will based. 

Still, it was getting chilli, Raven pointed towards fat pillar candles she’d brought with her last time she was here. Scattered around the room; on a work table she co-opted, stand alone shelves without anything flammable Damian installed especially, corner tables, window sills. With a bit of will and concentration, a blue glow lit her room, glowing orange and yellow when she reduced the intensity. 

She turned back to find Damian smiling at her, his face golden in the flickering light, his eyes the deepest forest that when she looked into she knew she was home. Raven couldn’t keep the smile off her face either. 

Damian not to miss any opportunity, kissed her face, her neck, all the while telling her how he loved her. Making promises of forever, of happiness, devotion. Of loyalty. 

“I hope you know what you’re doing”  Constantine had said when Raven spoke to Doctor Fate of her feelings, she’d asked if it could be dangerous. 

“Unclear”, the agent of Order said. He didn’t seem to care enough to discourage her. So perhaps her relationship with Damian didn’t have big-picture consequences?

Me too, I thought a while later, as I led Damian to our bed. I also hope I know what I’m doing.

[roverjamball]

DAY 1 - 17.07.2023

 "I've got you and I'm not letting go."

Raven enters the Titans tower, Damian, following her. He close the door he’s been holding for them. 

 Team Leader for the month continued to berate me as we climbed up the Everest, to the top floors that house living quarters, dining and kitchen area. Damian lead, I was slightly behind him. Trying to to lag.   

The patrol was routine. Except for the fire, of course. Which was probably some kind to trap. Either way it would need investigating. This was the day from hell.

Most days Damien and I took the nightshift. I was more alert at night. Shadows, they spoke to me. This was not something I had really noticed, but when we ended up doing three nightshifts in a row, I realised how the cool darkness could feel, freeing. The night Spoke to me in a way that nothing else had before. Shadows, not usually sentient, were always aware of her, always eager to do her bidding.

Raven counted the steps, Damian's, tall, lean frame, ate up the steps beside her. His breathing steady, as if they were out for a stroll. She on the other hand was tired, her legs ached, magically depleted. After being up for almost 48 hours straight, fighting fire creatures, warding a whole building only for the creatures to vanish and rousing unnatural flames, I was a little flames out. 

The previous two days, from what felt like dawn to dusk had been filled with Justice League briefings, mandatory Justice League, briefings. There was a threat. It was spooky. Ant that was all Constantine could or would tell them. One magical and one norm was the new protocol. And though they could’ve asked out of Night Shift, Damien and Raven both decided not to.

Raven was mentally cussing the person who designed the tower, this insanely long staircase, and the fact that the elevator was lowest in the list of priorities for renovations of Titans Tower. Maybe she should teleport the architect all the way up and help him feel each stair, head first, on his way down. 

So involved was she in the violent, yet satisfying fantasy, it took her totally by surprise when they reached the kitchen. 

Raven blinked, further surprised to find that Damian had stoped in the middle of the corridor, and was speaking to her. I turned to look up at him, my senses searching him, what question? Only to sink into his green eyes. 

Wide eyes shone like sea glass under dark brows. Add to those mesmerisers, straight thick brows. Damian’s wavy hair, now covered with soot, ash, his warrior bearing, lean like a professional fencer, his beauty could lead her to any number of sins, and Raven was turning into a poet, trying to justify why she couldn’t take her eyes off her teammate.

Thick eyebrows were raised in question. Look away. Look away Raven told herself. 

Damian was far too perceptive by half, even suffering form smoke inhalation. And then Raven made the mistake of looking at his mouth, soft lips compress in a lush line as if annoyed at being ignored. Tempting softness beckoned Raven. She had watched him clean up after the fire was put out, ash and soot patchwork, still his magnetism caught her. She didn’t want to notice such things. 

Seep deprivation, Raven thought, yes that is the only reason.

“Huh?” She asked. 

They’ve been awake for over 48 hours in one go. And haven’t had much rest before that marathon either. A good excuse to be out of it. Reason, not excuse. 

The night had been quite, but Raven sensed unease in the air. Damian noticed, he suggested they linger a bit before heading back. Donna and Conner would release them in an hour or so. Damian called for his bike, a fun self drive feature, handy. It stoped below their perch and Raven teleported them to street level. 

Damian hoped on, side wheels retracted into the bike, no longer required for balance. Raven took to the skies. They would run parallel sweeps, Raven taking high ground and Damian covering her. 

Doing a final lap before turning in, a few blocks from the Tower, Damian informed her a building was on fire. The FD had just been called. FD would take 20 minutes, budget cuts, while Damian and I were less then a minute away. They passed by the area most nights on the way home, office buildings dominated and then closer to the pier godowns and warehoused were plentiful.

I cast my senses out. There was something there. It needed investigating.

I landed on the roof while Damian went in through a window, creating a zip line for evacuation, if needed. It was early morning, midnight oil a old memory. Even so. Patrolling guards or any number of people could be trapped.

My boots slipped and slid on the tile floor as I sprinted around a corner and toward the doors to the middle of a grand foyer reception. The place had an abandoned feel to it. 

Streetlights provided light in the dusty hall, and left huge swaths of blackness crouching and observing my progress. The reception of one office to doors to various utility closets. I was looking for anyone trapped in. Stretching my senses I listened, listening to the hum of the universe, speak to me, I thought. 

Moving faster, my cafe-length magical cloak black in the darkness swishing against my legs. I heard a rustling, hissing sound and I’m not sure why, ducked to the left, taking cover of an alcove doorway. 

A ball of some kind of noxious-smelling substance, zipped past me, engulfed in blue-white flame. The ball of foul I don’t know, hit the floor, sparked and promptly exploded. I broke to lock and ducked into the room behind me, heat of a hungry fire shot towards me and half melted the wooden door. 

It got hot for a second, and wooden door would’ve  burst into flames but for the wards I'd woven the moment I touched the doorframe. 

I called to Damian, but my magic was interfering with the com technology. I could pull my magic in, but then the door would burst and I didn’t like my chances of hand to hand with a thing ablaze and alive. 

Another flaming glob crackled toward me. The substance, whatever the hell it was, clung to what it hit and burned with a supernatural ferocity. It had already burned metal doors to slag in the dim hall behind me.

The goop hit my shield, it slid off the protective spells, spattering the walls on either side of my door. I flinched . The walls wouldn’t hold it back and it was getting hot. 

Checked behind me, the light from the street lamps and the fire revelled luckily, restrooms. Water! 

Light was growing back where I'd come from, as flaming missiles chewed into walls and floor, spreading with a malicious glee. The door held.

I ran for the windows by the sinks, in was an older building, a few stories tall. Slamming the locks, opening the safety bar with my arm and barely slowing down, I pushed with my will. Plumbing broke and as the pipes burst out, they poured with vengeful force guided by my magic on the flame creature. Once the water honed in on the magical flame monsters, knocking them down took minimal concentration.

I climbed out the window, onto a ledge. Three feet wide, if that. The warded door and water kept the burning creature out, but for how long. I’d regroup, find Damian and then we’d finish this. Slowly I moved to the next set of windows, more than a few feet away, a side way shuffle. 

Don’t look down. One step at a time. I could teleport but I wasn’t sure if the creature could track that. I pressed against the side of the building. Teleportation was an option of last resort. I wasn’t even high up, but this close to the ocean sea breeze nipped at me. Pulling my cloak. I focused on making my self streamline. I wanted to levitate, this narrow ledge, only a few stories high was getting to me more than I thought it would. 

A sudden weight hit my back, it was all I could do to hold onto the window sill, something pulled viciously at my hair. A wolf like creature had leaped off a dumpster below me. It held on, finding purchase on the ledge, started biting at my neck and ear. It hurt. I tried to spin and throw it off, but it had a good hold. If I pushed harder, I’d lose a ear. The creature could easily pull me down, out weighed my by a mile, a short drop but it would do me damage. 

I stopped struggling, the wolf thought it had me, I could feel its triumph, primitive thoughts, ruled completely by instinct. I couldn’t fight it off physically, heavy with power musculature. Instead focused on where the creature touched me, my bare skin, “Sleep” I pushed into the creature. Elation and catching me, its guard was done.  Feeding compulsion and power where its molten fur met my skin. My voice echoed in the empty streets, “sleep” I willed it, feeding more power into the command. I fed it empty fields, a full stomach, lazy afternoons with shade for a nap. 

The pressure ended abruptly. The command took hold. A thud sounded below me. Heavy body hitting metal. 

Compulsion took effort, will, concentration, I lost focus of the water to fend off flaming monster in the building. The fire creature burst threw my magically barricaded door. Rushed into the restrooms, zeroing in on me. Heading right at me. More pipes broke, spewing water all over the restroom with the creature in it. Did little good, wet, flames diminished it come for me and I lunged to the side, now all the way out the side of the building to avoid a collision, but now I fell. 

My will no longer focused on water cannoning, I blinked into shadows, out of existence. Only to reappear somewhere else. Disoriented I appeared in the middle of a hallway. Smoke, an acrid smell filled my nose, my vision limited. Still in the same building then.

I was about halfway to an exit, not a fire exit she saw, so the door maybe locked. Walking to the middle of a corridor as I pulled my magic into me, I saw it was the ground floor. 

Robin still unreachable. 

Something ripped the steel doors behind me inward, against the swing of their hinges. A low, bellow erupted from further inside the building. I felt it like thunder.  Calling energy to me, my power manifest dark ebony a deep purple. Shadows move to me, eager to please, puppies to her master. 

Panting, I looked down the hallway and then to the exit. There was maybe twenty meters between me and the exit. I’d be out, a barred door couldn’t hold me, but then I’d have led who know how many fire creatures after me. I sensed three. I faced two of them, one would sleep for a bit, but the other could re-group and I’d face two again. 

I have successfully developed a standard operating procedure for dealing with big, nasty monsters who wanted to kill me in excreting ways. Run. But I couldn’t apply that here. This building was going down, business, shop hopes and dreams would burn tonight. We shall see. I just hoped Damian was all right. He could hold his own. 

I breathed in pants, pulled on a mask to cover my mouth and nose. My eyes watered from the heat and smoke. 

Water water everywhere, I thought. Finding the reserves of the building, the infrastructure around. Ah!. In an overhead tank, I had spotted something white and round when I landed on the roof. There was three fire hydrants nearby. Only one close enough to make a difference. I reached out to them. 

Just then my com crackled. “Raven?”

“Get bike. “ I kept my sentences short and urgent. “Exit off the west parking lot. Over looking the high rise expansion.”

“Copy” his voice crackled in my ear. 

“Be ready to carry me out.”

No response. I hope my message was heard. If I ran, the monsters zeroed in on me, would follow. If I escaped, they may scatter in the sleeping city. My magic and will held them at bay. No man made flame retardant material had a prayer against supernatural fire these creatures were throwing around. It was like greek fire. 

I pictured the building in my minds eye. Then spread my awareness all over. My power coated each wall and window and vent. I wanted to contain the creatures in which ever area they are, but I don’t think I can do both. Find them all to keep them in, contain the flames. 

Adrenaline surged through me. My heart hammering in my chest. The world slid into sharp focus. I saw it all at the same time in half a second: two creatures converged from different areas to me. Their shape flickering in my minds eye. The whole building is covered in my energy, spread too thin I panted, should’ve practice more. 

“Seal.” I say. But my voice is normal not a force to be obeyed. I pore my will into the command.

“Seal”, I say again, my voice an eerie register, even to my own ears. I picture what I want. Identify the creatures to the ward. Keep these in. Contain the unnatural flame. Snuff in out. Deprive it of oxygen. 

Damian! I sense, him coming from one side, lower face covered with a modified oxygen mask, eyes red from smoke. I find the sprinkler system and feed some magic into it. I give the water intent and power.

Something new, other touches my senses. Closing in. Not from the mundane, not having the same signature as the creatures, they are not of the entity, its power setting my senses on high alert. 

Undeterred, I showed the ward the differences in the air. Mundane and magical and foul. The darkness that are shadows creeps towards me. As if to assist. A stranger on the street watching me lose energy, someone it considered of itself, coming to help.   

Avalanche of power, magic rushed at us. Honing in on me, it fell in waves. Damian was closing in, keeping the power contained was beyond me. The colossal power must have found a way around my ward, it was like an extra dimensional opening. 

Its magic beckoned me. Making promises and offers, all without words. Emotions: belonging, power, family, support, understanding and finally acceptance. 

It took a monumental effort of will to restrain it. I was a rock, small and unmovable. The power and its promises an ocean. The waves could go on right over me, but I would lay there, stationary, not at all affected. 

The creatures surged, drawing my attention, a frontal assault. Keeping my wards up, while pushing water at the flames was taxing. Walls burst all around, the plumbing breaking out, drenching the beasts; the sides, front, back while the sprinklers worked double time, pouring water from above. Magic combined with water seemed to be effective. Steam rose, mixing with smoke, filling the air. It was hard to see. 

Attuned to seeing into levels and dimensions far removed from reality, and therefore inefficient at observing the merely mundane, I was now suspended in the narrow space between the living world and the dark shadow-world, I could survey all that was Metaphysical. My vision doubled magical and mundane superimposed. 

With smoke and steam obstructing my normal vision, this magic shadow-world sight was worth the loss of the former. 

Magic brushed against me, insubstantial but saturated with power. It was too large, I couldn’t perceive its limit. I began to tremble with the effort. I strained to stay upright.

An explosion of magic, a blaze of white brighter than the nearby street lights. The entity was here. The light bathed the creatures. There were three of them, vaguely animal like, made of flame, the constant water combine with my power did not fade them, but they shied away from the blinding light. 

“Evac?” I head in my ear, Damian was here, he reached me. I felt relief in my very bones. Damian was here, safe and he would back me up. 

An ancient colossal power that observed me, I felt it judging me. The magic pulled me forward. I only barely got my barriers up. Belatedly, I threw one around Damian. 

The pressure held, roaming around my shields, against their shape, strength, a long pale beam of light tasting, testing. Its focus was solely on me, Damian or the creatures beneath its notice. In a moment it retreated. I heard a clinking sound. I think I was losing it, my shields, the warding of the whole building, holding back the creatures, dousing them with powered water, it was a bit much. 

The remaining light coalesced into something luminescent, it landed on the tile floor to the side of me. The power was finally truly gone. And it left behind a present. Good thing too. Damian and I we no match for it. Not with out major preparations; artefacts and back up.

On the floor was the object, it that was hard to describe. It had a physical and metaphysical presence. The double vision was giving me a head ache, and sapping at my power reserves. It had markings on it, scratches in the groves. A misshapen shape, it could be an octagon, a hexagon, a disc of some sort, of what sort I just wasn’t sure.

I nodded to Damian, he walked the perimeter of the area. Taking in the scene. We could leave, no need to stand and fight. The wards were in place. Able to function without my intervention. They would hold. Back to my senses, I found that we were alone. Damian and I. 

I looked up and around, the creatures must have backed off. They were gone, leaving only charred animal footprints on the floor as proof of their passing. 

“Stand back.” Damian walked to the luminescence. It finally faded, leaving nothing behind. 

I staggered to the exit. The door was locked. I sagged on it. Right now a stiff wind could flatten me. 

Damian gestures me to move away, staggered to the side I leaned on the wall, he took a running start and rammed the door. It shuddered. Where it was weakest, he rammed it again. Wood splintered, metal groaned, the doors burst open. Ignoring my protests Damian lifted me and we shot out into the darkness of the parking lot. 

The fresh air was startling, it tasted so good. I stumbled, blinking, trying to get used to the darkness after the red glare. After images dancing before my eyes. The symbol etched on the coin predominant. 

I hear a bike reeving, the headlight turn on and helmets come out its sides. I run to it assisted, mostly carried by Damian, push on with my will, climb the rear seat and sag. Spent. 

Damian mounts the bike behind me, securing me to him. "I've got you Raven, and I'm not letting go."

“Go!” I mutter. Go”

We duck into an alley. Sounds of sirens and flashes of red blue light pass us. Their howls deafening. Damian turns to check on me, passing me water canteen.

“What the hell is that?" 

“Back at the Tower.” I held back a groan. The fire was out, a fire truck couldn’t have done much but with the fire monsters gone they had a chance putting out the embers. 

As Damian drove us away I pulled my directive back from the building. The fire hydrant I had repurposed went back to normal and the sprinklers pushed out regular water found in any tap in the city. 

And now we were back at the Tower, standing together, Damian facing me.

Damian shrugs resigned to having to repeat the question. “Would you like breakfast before turning in, Raven?” Damien asked, but ever so aloof and polite. Typical, Damian. 

His eyes never leave my face, I love my name on his lips. At 19, Damian is so much bigger than me. Taller, broader. His face losing its youthfulness, and with the right get up he can look younger, older, Arab, Afghani, Caucasian or Latin descent. I used magic to help, but with Damian it was all micro expressions and body language. 

Back to his question. Spend more time with Damian while he inevitably cooks us breakfast, because my skills in the kitchen were basic at best! Answer a hundred questions. Or, or go off to sleep, hungry. 

Her body needed sleep and food. She’d gone without one and now going without the other wouldn’t in anyway, restore her.

Raven nodded, realised she’d been staring and looked down and away. Oh crap sure signs she was hiding something. Hide the slip. Move, move, she told her body. Did an about turn towards the kitchen. Put some distance. Actions speak louder than words.

Before she could, Damian open the door for her. His whole body was in her space. Trying to repress then urge to gauge Damian’s response to our closeness, as he behind me, too close for comfort. 

I worked to control my breathlessness. But Damian filled my perception in every way.  His face leaning over my right ear, his warm breath grazing my temple. My whole body tingled from the contact. Unless I moved forward, or leaned back a fraction of an inch, I’d be braced against him. Too close. 

At times like this, when Damian was gentlemanly towards her, opening doors or pulling my chair for me to sit, I felt something. Correcting my stance during practice or training. Offering me a ride when I’m tired at the end of patrol, giving me a leg up to climb on his unnaturally high Robin cycle. With him this near me, touching but not touching, when his very presence surrounds, he makes me feel safe. 

I hope I didn’t pause for too long, get a move on, Damian followed me, our combined smoke flavoured miasma dispersed into the largest, most modern kitchen anywhere, ever. 

The kitchen was a priority over fixing the elevator, food trumpets a few extra stairs. Jamie words not mine. I thought of using a portal when I didn’t disagree. Good food the way the Titans did it was usually worth the hassle of a few, million extra stairs.

The right side of the kitchen faced the ocean, floor to ceiling reinforced glass with metal panelling. In times of emergency or lockdown, bars and shutters would enclose them in darkness, but right now hints of sunrise, seeped threw. Hints of stars, twilight still evident. 

After Tera’s betrayal, the priority was structural integrity of the tower and defences, after that armoury and training room. Even before the living quarters, the kitchen was done up.

“Pancakes?” Behind her, Damian stood almost touching, his words vibrate through her back. She still felt unsteady, but managed to move unaided. She conquered the stairs, a few feet to the kitchen she would manage.

“Aha” she said, monosyllable reply, is best, Raven decided.  

Going into the kitchen, she moved purposefully towards the sink cleaning up the best she could. Then the cupboards. Raven pulled out the necessary pots and pans, while Damian entered the pantry, returning a moment later with required ingredients; butter, flour, salt, maple syrup and honey. 

His voice echoed in my mind, a continuous refrain “"I've got you and I'm not letting go.”

When I thought back to those words, how Damian sounded as he said them, how he held me close and warm.  His arm around my waist, secure and strong against my back. 

Placing the items on the counter, Damian moved to  one of the breakfast bar. Removing his cape he folded it and draped it on the back of a chair. He smells like smoke just like she does. Then arm guards came off, followed by all outer pieces of armour; leg guards - that moulded mussels, chest plate, domino mask, equipment belt. Stop, she thought, eyeing him covertly.

 To her dismay, Damian even pealed off his reinforced buttoned tunic, now dressed only in pants, and an athletic temperature regulating black t-shirt, the kind most of us wore under our suits. Unaware or unconcerned of side glances Raven gave him, Damian moved about the kitchen,  cleaning up, washing his arms after pushing his sleeves above his elbows, scrubbing his face and neck. Water clung to him as he drank a swallow after rinsing his mouth.

Arranging the utensils in only half of his Robin uniform. Pants that moulded his thighs, defined, long legs and a thin temperature regulating athletic high neck T-shirt, sleeves pushed up to his elbows, revealing warm sinewy muscles. 

Oblivious, Damian continued, drying off, measuring ingredients, finding dishcloths, wrapping an apron around his waist. His body, lean and hard, flexed, stretched, his sure hands working kitchen appliances, mixing and tasting. It was embarrassing how much it all appealed to me. 

This was the worst part of the morning routine. Damian had only recently, a couple of months ago, started to feel comfortable removing his armour, which he usually kept on, even in Titans Tower. And now Raven felt like an asshole for not removing her cloak and equipment belt when he was so comfortable with her. 

Raven debated using magic to change out of her smoky clothes, but with her mind so addled, she may end up picturing something ridiculous, and be utterly humiliated. No thank you. 

Facing the floor-to-ceiling windows, Raven chose the   table furthest from the kitchen. Ever this early it smelled of coffee, the automatic timer must have activated. 

Quit stalling. I remove the cloak, balling it on a chair - warding saved it but would need to be washed, belt pouch - carried magical items, powders and herbs equipped with multitools and gadgets, like our communicators and such, I set down carefully across the table. Magic and technology don’t mix too well, techno-magic was possible, I’d tried my had at it a bit. But as a rule I kept them separate, powders in glass or lead jars, mostly inert to magic. 

Keeping it simple, I unlace and remove my boots: an organic vegan compound Gar created to replace leather, soft soled and light with re-enforced heels and toes, they had two loops for silver knives, Anthems. By the power of my will I send them to my room. Then I sent the cloak to the hamper and my belt which had technology, I left alone. 

Not wanting to be barefoot in front of Damian, I summoned slippers and unbraiding my hair, still smelling of smoke, I took a moment to get a hold of myself.

All this took less than two minutes. Was she being rude if she didn’t continue to help Damian with breakfast?Decided that she was, he was as tiered as she felt, Raven went to set the table. She could do this without distractions if she kept her eyes averted.

Setting the table with plates, glassware and cutlery, Raven while giving Damian a wide berth, opened cupboards, pulling out a platter and placed it on to Damian’s left. 

She went back to the pantry, found some ripe summer mangoes, proceeded to peel and cut them to go with the pancakes. As a cook, she was okay, but cutting, mixing ingredients was an essential part of being a magic practitioner. The fruit was cut in perfectly thin slices, garnished with mint and a bit of red pepper sprinkled on the side. And it didn’t make sense, but Damien liked a bit of roasted spice with his pancakes.

“Thank you” Damian said indicating the platter and cut fruit. His voice was low, it had a husky quality to it that made even the most clinical assessments in the heat of battle, sound, intimate. Planning logistics sounded private, spoken in the dead of night. His voice was rough, smoke damage. 

It would be beyond rude if she left him there while he cooked for both of them, but she didn’t know what else to do. The table was set fruit, honey, maple syrup placed on the table, awaiting diners. 

Damien had two pans going on the burner and soon pancakes word begin piling up the platter. Raven probably would eat three, Damien would probably have four or five, but if he didn’t make some for the other Titans, he would never hear the end of it.

I forced myself to grope for reason but found only fog, a fog Damien routinely created around my mind; every time he spoke, looked at me or I looked at him. I had figured that if I look just off his ear, it would seem I was looking at him, and I would only see him in my peripheral vision. I felt it dilutes the intensity and his effect on me, at least a little bit. 

“After we finish breakfast, Damian”. Raven said, I kept my gaze on him. No emotional compulsion.

I pick up the platter of pancakes, taking away Damian’s access to it, once it had enough pancakes for the two of us. The others weren’t even up and they could wait for breakfast after Damian had eaten. Damian had been awake longer than even she had.  

The corner of Damian’s mouth twitched, Raven was struck again by Damian’s beautiful lethalness. Without even trying, his dimples and the beginning of stubble made him distinctly handsome. 

Damien put the kettle on one burner and turned off the heat of the second burner, leaving the pans as is.

 “For later” his smooth voice assured her. Surprisingly a placating smile graced his lips. 

Carefully balancing the planter, Raven turned away, she moved away for the kitchen, to their table by the windows. The Sun rose over the horizon, lighting the ocean in pinks and oranges. The whole sky was lightning as she placed their food on the table, arranging the cutlery. 

Damian’s long-legged steps were easy beside hers, and she envied the way he seemed so at home in his own skin. Feeling every step Damian took, getting closer and closer as he pulled a chair for her to sit, Raven wasn’t sure how much more she could take. Just keep it professional. Less pathetic that way.

For the last couple of months, most of the night patrols were Damian and Raven, what partnered She’s caught herself staring at him a moment too long and would look down a street, or anywhere else abruptly, so as not to keep staring at him. 

As if perpetually aware of her, Damian responds to her sudden movement. Trusting that she must’ve seen or sensed something that he missed. It was happening with such frequency, these last few weeks, it was getting ludicrous.

 She could notice things like that, she reasoned, despite the fact that she would never fall for him. She could appreciate his appeal. His movements across any space, for instance. He was fluid and aloof, like a wolf that could take off at any moment with great speed, even though at the moment he was simply beside her. She wouldn’t touch him, however. She had a feeling she’d end up losing a lot more than a limb.

[roverjamball]

Day 5 - 21.07.2023

"I have to do this to save the world.” “You are my world."

“Meow.” 

I clenched my teeth. "I'm not different in any way that matters. I'm not any better than anyone else. I’m not some unicorn, that poops gold and farts rainbows” Not something I’d usually say, but magic dampening and neck deep in quicksand with nth-metal, led me to pull strength from Constantine. I had to use sarcasm because if I didn’t laugh I would surely cry. 

It was that hopeless.

“Granted," said Klarion. Witch Boy. Lord of Chaos. 

Then his cat mewed [move it along. The hour approaches] The dark magician nodded at his cat not cat, message received. Then turned back to me.  

“Raven,” the demented skinny man lamented my name,  “Century from now, your Titans, mortals, what have you, will be rotting in the earth, whereas, with the help of reality-changing magic, you could very well trans-morph with the gold and summon rainbows.”

“Meow.”

“Yes, well! The point is, all these allies and friends will be ashes to ashes dust to dust, while you are just beginning to come into your full strength. You look like a mortal, Rachel Roth. But make no mistake. You aren't one.”

"Oh, shut up.” That was also my name, ‘Rachel Roth’, and I owned it. I was Raven. But Roth was my mother’s name and mine too by birth.

Sometimes the best way to get information is to provoke action and set people in motion. And then see after shaking some trees what falls down or flies away. 

And then finally follow the quarry to its nest.  

People were missing. 

People are always being kidnapped, was the standard response. It was a fact of life. Human life, animal life, doesn't matter, life has no value in this desolate world. 

There were places where the numbers were up more than usual. After a while, it was noticed that most of the people who were missing had a commonality. They had more than a kernel of otherness to them. 

A thief; getting into places, secure spaces without opening any locks. 

Street magician, sleight of hand so perfect that even the best Carney would have a hard time finding the pea. 

An artisan, whose ceramics glasses and plates, when drunk and eaten from cause, headaches and vomiting. Charlatan charms and bracelets that somewhat did, what it is the seller said they would. 

A gipsy with a crystal ball that could actually read minds and tell the future. 

These missing people were at the fringes of society. Living on the street, some running cons. All of them living some way or another off the grid. 

Many were informants, called upon during bizarre occurrences, trusted police or vigilantes, wanting only to protect their charges. When the coppers and Justice League affiliate noticed that people who weren’t wholly mundane were missing in large quantity, word slowly trickled to JL. And JLD was on the trail. 

They warned us that something was up, that others like us were in trouble, and then told us to not worry our pretty little heads about it. 

Traci; 23 and a newly minted urban studies major, Zachary 24 world world-famous magician and I 21 sociology grad by day and Titan by night, investigated. By magical means and the oldest detective means. And good old fashioned Leg work.

Slowly, others, and still others, aware of their abilities joined us. Giving us information about the disappearances; where things like that happened and describing how. From what we gathered all incidents had one thing in common. One second the people were there the next, they weren’t. Vanished into thin air. 

We reported to the JL: D, were patted on our collective heads, told to travel in pairs as the new protocol dictated while assuring us; everything was under control. Under control how? Anyones guess. 

But people, weird, fantastical, strange and vulnerable,  fated or ill fated, people like us were still disappearing. 

“A portal or teleport of some kind?”

“Most likely.”

“But how do you teleport a practitioner against their will?”

“Lack of formal training?”

Magicians, for that matter anyone can stop others from teleporting them. Just like avoiding a punch. Yet, even the best martial artist can be sucker punched caught unaware, in a moment of vulnerability.

I’d left myself open. 

Certain powers, and abilities could be used while still shielding myself. But not this. If I wanted the very air and the ground to relay its memory, I had to be open to it. It is easier with water and solid objects. The impressions here were fresh in the air, just like scents on a strong wind. 

Psychometry, or object reading, process whereby facts or impressions about a person or thing are received through contact with an object associated with the subject of the impressions. Rings, photographs, and similar tokens are often used, but sometimes the physical presence of a person may bring about images or visions in the psychometrist’s mindthat correspond to real facts.

I was wide open. Getting a subtle impression from the air. Magic, powerful presence. Not a normal hedge witch or street magician. The power belonged to one being among a crowd, yet it stood out. A volcano of power surrounded by candle flames. These people hiding here or gathered here taking strength in numbers didn’t stand a chance.

The nearby windows were hollow, open to the elements. Old buildings gave infinite impressions, happy to have my attention, chatting in my mind.  This had been a factory. Toys were made here. I moved forward in time, tell me of the last few days I ask. Building begrudgingly answered. 

Meetings. A gathering of people.

 Squatting. 

But also a lizard brain safety in numbers. 

Some sort of persuasion or outside force. 

I relayed the information out loud. 

Traci was taking notes, I don’t always remember much detail after a psychometric reading. The information flooded, then flowed through me. 

In that place, found by Zach’s contacts and Traci’s urban magic I felt I needed to de my part. 

It was too easy. But also a bit much.

I spoke as fast as I could, not sure how coherent, with no time to consider my words. Flashes of visions, scents and sounds that would only later make sense. 

I got cocky. 

I’d quested too freely, too deep with out proper anchor. 

The cement concrete became as if liquid. I began to sink into it. Strangely, I could again feel a presence near me.  The artefacts of chaos and darkness.  

Was it guiding me? Leading me to freedom?

“What do you feel Raven“, Zachary asked, from far away. As if underwater. 

“I am getting impressions. The very air is charged with power and memory. The room is speaking to me”.

“Can you ask it what happened” Traci nudged. 

I tried to focus the flow of information into coherence, closing my eyes and listening. Opening my mind. 

I could hear Tracy, crouching trying to read scratches on the concrete floor. I could hear Zachary walking the perimeter of the room, gauging the type of magic that saturated the air.

Yes, there was something here. 

How did I access it? I asked the building, dilapidated as it was. 

It hesitated. Apprehensive. 

I plead with it, to open to me. You can tell me, I said. Silence. The chatter stopped.

 I failed it seemed. Another dead end.

I heard Tracy and Zachary call to me. Call my name urgent frantic even, and then I felt the power. It reached me. Trying to tell me of another plane.

The ones you look for are here, it said.

Show me, I send it. 

If you’re sure, then come.

There was a feeling of displacement, movement from one place to another, sudden and forceful. I try to take back control, direct the transition. If not, then send the destination to Zac or Tracy.

I felt myself too open, and

With a sigh, I opened my eyes.

To find that the old debilitated dirty building had changed around me. I could make out the vague outlines of the cravens, maze of interconnected lines. Ethereal, insubstantial. It was as if that world had faded, and another had sprung up in its place. In this one, I felt like I was floating. Insubstantial in darkness.

I stumbled, trying to get my bearings. Something jolted me. And then I was pulled, I got the impressions of minds. They were trapped, so scared, dejected and lethargic. 

Where are these the missing people? The people with trickles of magic. The ones that we’d been looking for? They reeked of neglect. 

Almost a hive mind. 

A Herd mentality.

 I tried to go to them, try to include them in my shadow self. Pull them out into the light, to Zach, Tracy, anywhere. But I was sucked further. A blur of motion, like a video playing on 5x speed. I felt dizzy, drunk with emotions, and the magic saturating this place. 

It was time to get out. 

Come back with help. 

I prepared to leave, focusing on Alice & Zach. 

Here the magic was thick, dense, muggy like air in a bog, I tried to stay separate from it. But couldn’t help it. I breathed in. The force of chaos sent me to my knees. 

Damian, I called. I reached for him. 

Damian! 

Our link solidified. 

I could just about make out his drowsy continence vanish. My love was alert and my heart swelled to feel his presence.   

Damian instinctively reached out to me. “I’ve got you Beloved. And I won’t let go.” 

I held on to him for all I was worth, but it was like hanging off a cliff while holding dumbbells. Gravity pulled at me. Damian put real effort into holding on to me. Not psychically trained, yet Damian was a force of will. And he willed me safe. Almost crushing my metaphorical hand.  

For a brief moment the world paused. A standoff. 

Damian tried to pull me closer, to clutch me to him. I yearned to be held. To have Damian hold me. To for a while be safe, just till I caught my breath. Just till I could figure out how to cut the snare that pulled me to parts unknown.  

Instead, I found myself yanked away from Damian, sinking into the ground. Rough terrain, cavernous, with a soft ground filled with crevices, the ceiling to high it seemed to have its our atmosphere. I tried to spring lose, when that didn't work I tried inching my way out. I soon realised, my powers and magic practically neutralised.

And that is how I found myself. Submerged in Nth metal quicksand. 

Wait, Damian said as I was yanked away. I’m coming. I held onto his promise. I jst had to hang on, to survive. Damian was coming. 

I scan the darkness, reveal secrets to me I push to it. The darkness did, obeying my command, albeit sluggish, like never before, still difficult to see. And then I saw. The cavern that I was in had an opening, in the low torchlight the very people I was trying to find, trying to save, were shuffled out in front of me, out of my reach, and I could not do anything. Do nothing but feel their misery and fear.

So immobilised was I, surrounded by nth metal, sinking into the very earth that their terror, panic, apprehension, compound mine. I tried to find my centre, take I moment of calm, but was lost in a haze of their dread.

Until a tall lanky boy, with slimed black hair kneeled before me. Looking at me as if he had found something, he’d been searching for his whole life. And we have been conversing for more than four days. 

"You are different.” The Chaos Lord continues. “You are a freak. In a world of millions, you are all but alone.” 

The tall, skinny dark-haired-eyed Agent of Chaos leaned over me. No bite in his words. He sounded giddy at my oddities. A human with Trigon’s lineage. There were so many out there who wanted to explore my powers, saw me as something more than human. 

But when Klarion looked at me, he laser focused on me, he saw a person. An equal. Even immobile, without access to my powers, it was gratifying to see understanding and acceptance in those dark eyes.

"Which explains my popularity," I quipped, but I couldn't put real zing into it. Something in my throat felt heavy.

Klarion and I had these chats every day, for hours. With no sun, and being underground, I’m not sure how much time had passed. The rumbling of my stomach told me it had been days. I was using up all the stored energy and I didn’t have much fat reserves to begin with. Following a trail of missing people did not lend itself to regular nutritious meals. If I’d spent a month solely at the Tower before this, it’d be different. Magic could only help so much. 

I watched a minion pour cream for the ever-present Teekl, but Klarion placed a saucer before the magical cat himself. 

"You're afraid, but you don't have to be. You're above them, Raven. There's an entire world waiting for you. Untrodden paths you could take. Allies, who would stand with you over centuries. Who would accept you instead of shunning you? Who would respect you instead of scorning your precious bloodline? You could find a place where you truly belonged.”

The first time we had a similar conversation, I’d let it roll off me. Like a drizzle of a water resistant windcheeter. As time wore on though ______

I thought of the Titans and the Outlaws. While they accepted me, others in the superhero community, those who didn’t even know me distrusted me on principle.

“The ritual, Raven do you ever wonder why it worked? That wasn’t the first time those ridiculous humans tried it. You know that don’t you? As a matter of fact, they tried it many times. It only worked once. Don’t you want to know what happened? In truth? Why you were born? No questions about your mother? She died when you were young. Perhaps her death wasn’t all your fault?”

Oh, that hit the spot. He’d chosen to use words that struck hard on the oldest wounds in me, a child's pain that had never fully healed. It hurt to hear those words. It stirred up a senseless old hope, a yearning. It made me feel lost. 

Empty. 

Alone.

"Raven," the Witch Boy said, his voice almost compassionate. "I used to be much as you are now. You are trapped. Lying to yourself. Pretend to be like any other magician or sorcerer because you are too terrified to admit that you aren’t."

I didn't have an answer for that. 

The Artefact, crumbling and old pulsed power. Klarion offered out to me, on a silver platter lying near my un-submerged face. The only part of me that wasn’t immobile. If I bent my head just so, the artefact would touch the third eye, right above my nose. 

That wasn’t a coincidence. I was certain everything here was planned and purposeful. If a little rushed. 

The artefact, identified by Klarion as one of Chaos and Darkness was drawn to me. To my other nature was my best guess. My other side I worked so hard to suppress. The darkness reacted to my thoughts, still oh so sluggish. Magic negated, but for my empathy, that was about it. 

Klarion kneeled before me, eyes alight with intelligence, power and understanding. We are alike his expression conveyed. And he honestly did believe that. I could sense it in him, the conviction. 

Klarion saw a universe with us together, nothing romantic in his manner, no leering or touching, he maintained a polite distance. Still, I saw it in his eyes. The longing to have another like him. A partner, a companion. I felt it too, just not for him. But the time in captivity was changing all that. Klarion was starting to look good. He was tall and I liked that in a man. Klarion and I both had an affinity with darkness and magic.

 Zachary and Tracy; magic users also were not shunned like I was. Not to my face, or Kori would with polite aggressiveness defend me. But I was on the periphery of our community. 

Damian was Batman’s son. Kon, was Superman’s clone and adopted brother. Donna was an undisputed Amazon. Gar was Gar, and he had the doom patrol. 

JL:D had Constantine as a member, with a talent for lying. For sticking the knife in when people least expect it. Then walking away with a smile and a wave before they even realise they're bleeding.

Klarion, gaze direct, no pretence or guile in his eyes. I couldn’t look away, and then I didn't as in the corner of my eye I spied Teekl’s shadow shiver. Teekl moved to join us, all the while her shadow tried to detach itself. 

What in the world?!

The tall dark boy scoffed when his cat rubbed against his knees, picking her up and putting some distance between us. 

He may try to hide it but I affected him. As he worked me, I worked him. Klarion would be an asset to the NightForce. I don't think he’d considered that. Somewhere down the line, I was part of the plan, but now he had unlimited access to my company, and the depth of feelings confused him. They certainly did me. I’d have dismissed his interest as I’ve done with others, but these months with Damian have given me a nuanced outlook about such attention. 

 Damian, who didn’t even know I was missing, to come looking for me. When I contacted him, he’d been sleeping. To the uninitiated our frantic communication could easily be dismissed as a bad dream. 

Despair hit me, and it hurt, worse than the bullet to my leg had a few days ago. 

I couldn't stop myself from imagining what it would feel like to bleed to death, right here under the earth. All the time I’d wanted the earth to swallow me up, and save me from embarrassment, it finally happened, and maybe I will die. The bullet wound healed, for the most part, an echo of a dull ache no longer a hot, burning line on my side. 

I had expected, when I was trapped in earth to feel dizziness and cold. Weakness to fade into a warmth that became perfect, endless darkness. Death. But Nth metal kept me warm and more or less comfortable, while it restricted access to magic.

Azar help me, I didn't want to die. I'd seen the others, poor souls, shrivelled and driven mad in these maze of caverns. What they suffered was maybe worse than death. And chances were that if I took the offer, my demon part might coerce or corrupt me into the same thing. 

I'm not a saint, I don’t profess to be. I, with my heritage that wasn’t always good enough. I've had dark urges. I've been fascinated by those urges and violence I felt from others. Attracted to them. And more than once, I've given in to them. It was a weakness, the demon in me, the Agents of Chaos could exploit. I wasn't immune to temptation. My demon, with help from Klarion, would drown me in it. It's what Daemons do.

“I’ve made my decision.”

Klarion watched me, dark eyes steady, his hand on Teekl perfectly still.

“Karma," I said. "Isn't that how it goes? Don’t want to tip the balance too far.” I wasn’t religious. But I won’t help create Chaos. Darkness was my friend and I accepted my place as precious to it. My other nature and I had things to work out, I may be a monster, but I won’t be evil. 

Teekl licked her paws. The minion picked up the silver platter, covered the amulet of chaos with a cloth and stepped to the side. Awaiting word from Klarion.

"Are you certain, Raven?" Klarion said in a quiet voice. "This is your very last chance.” 

I suspect as much. He was to recruit me, the ancient amulet, the first salvo. Even if Klarion didn't want to, he answered to others. A consortium of hierarchical leadership? I’d never know, I was about to breathe my last few breaths. 

I slumped weakly. Which wasn’t much, the earth held me without a lot of slack. There didn't seem to be much point in pretending. I'd made the call, I held on as long as I could. Stalled for what felt like weeks. And that was that. 

“I am,” I said, putting more power into my words, if this was the end I would go strong, with will and purpose.

Klarion stared at me impassively for a long moment. The pain of my rejection radiating off him, came to me in waves of agony. None of it showed on his face, no change in his expression. He hadn’t been ready to hear, let alone believe it. 

Then he stood up, the cat on his lap moved to his shoulder and said, "I suppose we’ve chatted enough.”

Teekl meows in his left ear. Klarion's expression flickered with annoyance.

“What?” His voice came out tight and impatient. 

The cat mews again, a bossy sound.

“Where is my mind today? You bring the platter. You the items.” The grey-haired minion opened the clothe partition hastily put up once I was found, and left the cavern. The platter with the amulet of chaos was still close.

“If you won’t join us Raven, we have other uses we can put your power to. Not as potent as having a willing participant, but I’d hate to waste your precious blood.” 

I felt a chill at his words. I remembered the feel of Brother Blood’s machine pulling at my life force. It was always blood with these guys.

While they waited for the older grey minion to fetch magical paraphernalia; candles, chalk and the like, an ancient woman brought the platter closer to me. Close enough to touch. 

I moved as far away as I could. Which, embedded in the cavern floor, was not far. 

In a panic, my other half and I call to darkness. Every shadow, of a person, ones caused by the flickering of torchlight in sconces, in the high ceiling, all shiver. Eager but bound. Trying to, but unable.

Klarion tapped his black booted foot in impatience, ignoring me. The corners of his eyes swing to me from time to time defiance of his actions. 

I, as subtle as I could be, focused on the shadows. In the cavern, with only sconces for light, the ceiling and floor between each torch was rife with flickering dark. 

I showed them trouble, I would need to exit this place and go somewhere safe. Surrounded by Nth metal I was truly trapped. 

Nothing happened. The darkness was pulling and elastic. There was just not enough give to reach me. 

“This need not be the end, witch boy.”

Klarion turned to me, eyes squinted as if he contemplated something dangerous. I met his eyes and then looked away, not wanting to see what was in them. There was no escaping it, I could feel what he felt, superior shields, control, all for nothing, Lord of Chaos or not, no one could hide from my empathy. 

Neither could I. That’s why, even though sometimes I was so angry with the world if you could feel what others felt if you could walk the mile in their shoes. How could you wish unto them disorder and chaos? 

Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference. That’s how it’s defined and I agree. It is the capacity to place oneself in another's position. With bits of Nth metal surrounding me, unable to block anyone, I experienced the full brunt of Klarion’s.

“Oh yeah?” Klarion looked intrigued. “Join you? The NightForce. Be an agent of Order instead?” A scoff followed each question. But he was intrigued. Curious. Always questioning. Klarion was nothing if not an independent thinker. 

I yank with all my might. And I feel a tug in return.

A heartbeat later there was a wheezing grunt, and the grey minion flew back through the doorway. He landed hard on his back. Candles, chalk, an athame - black handled, engraved and inlaid with gems, a double-edged silver blade around 9 inches, and other magical paraphilia strewn about him. He grunted on impact, a pained croak, pulling his hands to cover his head and curled into a foetal position.

Klarion sighed, turning away from me, his gaze leaving mine with difficulty. 

"What now?" Klarion looked bored. As an immortal lord of chaos he could take a lot of punishment without ruffled hair. But when he saw the minion laying on the ground, the corridor open, Klarion’s face went pale, his eyes widened, and he took a pair of quick steps to stand behind me, swiping the black and sliver anthem at my throat. 

Even Teekl, shadowing him recoiled, rolling back away from the opening.

* *  * * I * * * *

I took a moment to assemble my thoughts. Get into the mindset. Calm and focused. One way or another he’d be seeing Raven soon.

Constantine’d been stymied. None of Raven’s objects created enough of a connection for his spells to locate her. 

“Tracking spells are like any kind of targeted thaumaturgy. You create a link, a channel to the target, and then pour energy into that channel. In the case of a tracking spell, you’re basically just setting up a continuous trickle of energy, and then following it to the target—kind of like sprinkling sand in air when you want to gauge wind direction.”

“Okay,” Damian said. “I understand, mostly.”

“The way to foil a tracking spell is to prevent that channel from ever being formed. If it never gets created, then it doesn’t matter when the water gets poured. There’s nothing to cause it to start flowing. And the way you prevent the channel from forming is to shield the target away from whatever focus you’re using to create the link.”

“Like what? What could possibly disrupt the… channel.”

“Not a lot of things. If the anchor in my spell doesn’t match up to an end, no link gets created. So, unless I had something with a strong connection to her, she’d be hidden.”

“And that’s the only way to beat a tracking spell?”

“That’s just in BatBrat,” I said. “A good circle of power could probably trace her. With enough power and proper knowledge. And from the way little Zatara and Tracy explain Raven was pulled. Against her will. She didn’t go into hiding.”

Zatara nodded. 

Tracy with an I 13, Zachary Zatara and other members of the Night Force, yet another group Raven was a part of, joined the rescue party.

The party being; Todd and his outlaws. Minus Kori, but if this didn’t pan out keeping Koriand’r from tearing up the world would be difficult.  

The objective, rescue Raven. Clues to enemy objective and the missing people was secondary. 

“Get Raven, get out. Watch your backs. Pair up and each pair find another pair to compensate for your weaknesses. “

Now they only needed to find Raven. 

“The target and the seeker being in separate dimensions, or multiverses, theoretically could disrupt the flow.” The JLA: Dark member continued. “Magic energy originating on one earth doesn’t cross into other worlds very efficiently—and before you ask, I tried tracing spells of many kinds from places before I even approached you. Yes, where the veils are thinnest, too.”

Damian frowned. “What about me?” he asked. “You were able to find Raven once before.”

The British Magician grimaced. 

I rubbed at my tired eyes. There had to be a way. Even magic-disrupting collars can’t block Raven’s empathic abilities. And we had a bond. A two-way bond. If only he could learn to access it. To reach he as she had reached out to him all those many days ago. 

Constantine sighed as if reading my thoughts, he said, “I suppose it could be liberating to take a leap of faith, to shrug off the burden of proof for the promise of hope. It takes trust to turn darkness to light."

****** II *******

“It would feel like you’re torn in two.”

“What?” Damian asked. Finally, it was truth time. 

“Having your bond hijacked by a tracking spell. Like having half of you amputated.”

“I thought JL was one of the good guys,” Todd quipped.

“THERE AREN'T ANY GOOD GUYS, AND THERE AREN'T ANY BAD GUYS. THERE'S JUST US. PEOPLE. DOING OUR BEST TO GET BY.”

Constantine said in a normal tone of voice. “We’ll need Nightmare Nurse,” he continued. 

“Healing any magical injuries no matter how grave. She healed the Phantom Stranger when mortally wounded by a magical spear.” Damian quoted her dossier. 

Damian stared at Constantine with piercing eyes. “So you did  find another way?”

Constantine hesitated for half a second. It felt like betraying Raven’s confidence, like sharing something that belonged only to her, to tell her lover and no other. But sooner or later Robin and then the Bat family would know.

He’d called upon Madam Xanadu after Raven had told them about the bond she formed with her Robin. He asked for a favour. John asked about the Titan couple's future. The daughter of Trigon, his vanquisher in love with the Daemon Head. 

“The girl told you?” Madam Xanadu had said. “Well, she is a half daemon and the most powerful empath.”

“Is it true?”

“Yes. It is a distinct possibility.”

“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

“Blame Dr. Fate,” she told him with a sardonic twist of her lips.

The daemon birds, as they were known in the community, were in for a rough ride. 

***********

I closed my eyes. Concentrated. A direction I felt most compelled to go. Tap into the bond. I tried to ignore the pain of loss and hopelessness. 

My instincts were screaming at me, I didn’t know magic, yet something horrible was happening to Raven and I lacked the ability to find my Beloved. 

I focused on breathing, on the need to be whole again. To be re-united. I let those instincts consume me, filling me until I couldn’t focus on anything else. I needed to get to Raven. I needed to leave right now and go...there.

“I have it,” I said hoarsely, fighting relief. The battle was yet to come. 

Raven had been taken. It was time to get her back.

Opening my eyes I noticed the marking of the circle was lit up. 

“Brace yourself. And be ready. We’re going in.”

 *******III ****

“Constantine!” Klarion snarled. "Kill him." 

There was a second of startled silence, and then the minions went for the closest magical objects. The one nearest the opening, still on his back didn't get his weapon out in time. 

Damian a sword drawn, in the Robin suit of green armoured tunic and red accents, that Raven magicked, came through the opening after Constantine. 

Followed by Zach, Alice and Jason.

Raven’s heart leapt at the sight of him. Klarion, the quicksand, nth metal all but forgotten. 

Damian had taken out three minions in half as many seconds, and he hadn't stopped moving. 

The sword flashed again, and the barrier the minions hastily put up collapsed. The backlash spilling them onto the floor. The sword was not his regular fair. It was sharp and lethal, but the blade smoked as it destroyed any magic attack that hurled its way. The engravings on the side looked familiar. 

Klarion promptly stepped forward, putting up a second ward, while Teekl rushed to face Damian and Jason.

Jason’s held silver colt in each hand, flashed faster than any automatic ever could.  He cocked the barrel one last time and backed off. Damian took lead, while Jay reloaded.

Teekl dogged each strike. But didn’t gain any ground, in-fact she backed, slowly, at a disadvantage. 

The sword whirled, while the guns barked. The brothers were flanking the cat, who grew in size, impersonating a sabertooth tiger.

Klarion yelled in triumph. 

Raven followed Klarion’s gaze and was horrified. 

She saw creatures flood the area. The beasts; a nightmare blend of every creature she’d ever seen. An ape with tentacles for arms, a sphinx’s human face surrounded by a lions mane and whiskers.

Klarion laughed in glee. The Lord of Chaos may have aged himself to look 20 something, he acted 12. 

Constantine only partially successful in holding the opening. The creatures parted, some were hit, most avoided his defences. Holding back the tide, preventing him, Jay and Dami from being surrounded seemed improbable. With Teekl at their back Raven’s rescuers would soon need rescuing. 

Raven maybe the one submerged in nth metal, but the cavern walls were full of the stuff. Magic was not doing well for anyone, not like brute force.

My other half rebelled. We were not cattle, but Raven, she said to me. Speak with the Nth metal. Quick while everyone is distracted.

Ok. Together, lets do this. I focused on the nth metal. Stretching and focusing the part of me that was other. That could communicate with things and objects. Give them a voice. Know their existence. Empathise with their experiences. 

I spied a redhead, at the other side of opening. The Amazon moved faster than my eyes could track, felling beasts left and right. A whirlwind of steel, she turned the tide. 

Backwards chanting and power blasts took care of any of the beasts Artemis missed. A nightmare creature, when it would try and enter their cavern would suddenly disappear. Sometimes I’d watch the same beast that  earlier disappeared, from the opening appear in front of a hard surface, and crash into it.  

I tried to reach the beasts. Communicate. Calm them. I sent Darkness, as my messenger. Convince them to flee. To leave my friends alone. No harm would befall them. Go.

But to convey information without physical contact, usually as easy as breathing, with the presence of nth mental was all but unattainable. 

The area was awash with the sounds of battle, grunts of pain in all manner of voices; human, mammal and bird. 

Klarion walked to me, slowly retreating from continued the magical and physical onslaught. Dami and Jason were relentless. Even Teekl, now the sole focus of Constantine was of no help to him.

As the nth metal ate at his wards, the witch boy was  fast running out of options. Using the athame he’d swiped off the cavern floor he approached me with intent. 

Trapped, I was to be a hostage for bargaining too. Oh the humiliation. 

Klarion brought its tip down to rest against the side of my neck. The room became almost completely silent. Damian kept his blade to Teekl's neck, bound by chains Constantin had conjured, while Klarion did the same to mine. 

Damian, my love didn't look like the same person I'd kissed and made love to. Not that he had physically changed, so much as that the sheer presence of him was different. Features hard as stone, his eyes determined to do his worst. I’d never seen him like this before. 

When he had moved, it had been with a dancer's grace, speed, and skill. His eyes flashed with a silent strength, and his hands and forearms were corded with muscle. The sword's blade gleamed red with blood and torchlight. Klarion's shadow stretched to me, while he edged a bit farther back from the Magician and the brothers who advanced on us.

I took a couple of deep breaths and narrowed my focus, my thoughts, until the pressure of earth against numbed my body, and called to the deadly darkness a few feet away. It was to me all that existed.

Focus. I brought up all the defensive energy my other half had secreted out to bare. We, I pulled to the limits of our/ my capabilities. The cavern had shown me this was a place of magic. So the nth metal occupation was recent. The Nth metal wasn't one note, I felt. It could do more than just take magic.

With all the fineness we could manage, my other half and I, in concert pulled.

Klarion’s shadow jumped, and Klarion’s jaw slacked in shock. His shadow, Teekl’s joined everyone else’s shadow, rushing to her. And formed into a dome around me. The shield imploded from inside me to out. Pushing the knife from my neck. And Klarion alongwith it. 

With the cavern’s help and the darkness as leverage, I’d created a barrier between me and the quicksand as well.

The Lord of Chaos, quick on the uptake hit my domed obsidian forcefield, slamming against it in mindless, shrieking rage. Any one of the hits could have demolished a small solid structure with a bit of effort. 

The dome held. 

Klarion let out a frustrated shout.

The blows against the shield could have crushed concrete within seconds, and I knew I was not going to be able to hold the defence in place much longer. 

Once it went down, Klarion was going to literally tear me limb from limb. I gave the shield my all, and felt as the darkness was slowly breaking down. Unable to protect my magic from the effects of nth metal. 

I resisted the urge to just give up and rest. I’d fought for so long. Fighting my other half. The temptation of my powerful heritage. Resisting the temptation of the answers and acceptance Klarion offered. 

I longed, now more than ever, to just let go. Why did I fight to hard. For whom. Damian was better off without me. We were new, he’d move on, after a while. 

Then there was a roar, and a flash of brilliant light. The invisible force emanated from it, dropping us all like bowling pins. 

I hardly felt it. 

My shield collapsed. Overloaded. 

I felt the release of energy, a wave of fever-hot magic that swept over me in a sudden, potent surge. 

The status had been shattered. If momentarily. .

I only half saw Damian rise, the cat in his hand, rush towards me. Artemis reached Jason, helping him rise. 

The amulet of chaos appeared to me again. It’s stone reflects the light from the torches and the activated portal to the side of me.  

It gleamed! 

A burning began on my neck. Raven’s whole body pulsed, the amulet, in a bid to be useful took some of her fatigue. Nth metal may obstruct magic, but it was a good conductor of heat, and had kept her temperature regulated. 

The stone glinted in tandem with my heartbeat. I could feel where it would go. 

How it would sit, neck to breast bone. 

How it would warm me. I’d never be alone again, the amulet of chaos whispered to me. 

That world looked so good to me. No pain. Never alone. I’d never be shunned as I’d not ever care. Laughing and free. Beyond morality and consequences.

It said all the things a part of me longed for. To not feel. To never empathise. 

I felt Terra’s pain. I tried to ease it. I got attacked from behind for my troubles.

I wished to only feel my feelings, to be selfish. Why did I bow to the whims of the JL? I could take them all. 

Superman is susceptible to magic.

Batman, Wonder Woman or even the Flash - none could stop me. They were weaker.

Less. 

Take this very crisis and question. arms to my magical brothers and sisters creating safe heavens. They pretended to be the ideal above us all when they were less than dirt.

When people suffered, where were the mighty Leaguers? What support did they offer us; Tracy, Zachary and I. Forced to investigate alone? Unprepared, when information was readily available with the JLA!   

Darkness created stairs. 

And I climbed each one, finally I was out. 

I was done with mortal laws. 

I’d stop suffering, the pain, the inequality any which way I wanted.

Or not. 

Their wows, and desires and needs …. A constant cacophony.

I looked over at Klarion. 

Only a few moments had passed. The Witch Boy was  prone on the floor. Sitting up, he met my gaze, then looked around for his familiar. 

He understood. A Lord of Chaos got me. They way no one on my so called side did. 

And the cat could come too. The epitome of indifference, she’d be such fun!

Damian reached me as I stepped off the darkness, onto the cavern floor. The cat that was not only a cat jumped off my love. With an unnatural leap, she landed on Klarion’s shoulder. 

I stood on the caver’s floor. 

Free. 

Our captor defeated, our lover before us, our allies are safe I added.. my other side rejoiced. 

The power she’d held safely in herself leaked out in bursts, like air from a deflated balloon. The magic worked to heal us, absorbed into our remaining cells. 

Constantine, with the caver’s help, stood by the activated portal. 

Cut off from any support, surrounded by Nth metal Klarion pretended to dust off his tailored navy suit. He rose, looking for any avenue of escape to magically appear. But with Nth metal abundant in the cavern, and the way out of the cavern guarded by the NightForce and Outlaws….

Damian handed me a canteen of water. There was a pouch for that in his utility belt. I took it, parched as I was. Avoiding touch. Not wanting to be an empath again. 

The flask upended, every drop consumed, I tossed it back to Robin. Who caught it one-handed, he didn’t approach, nor did he move away. 

He tugged on the hood, face hid, I savoured the shadows and the aura of menace they created. 

 He said softly, “Ah, Beloved. I So love when you look at me just so.”

No no no! No feelings. Not mine, not his. So more. 

But my other half preened like a cat accepting praise that was her due.

Damian just raised an eyebrow. 

I, …..

His features cleared, as if made of glass. Nothing showed. 

Oh! He’s hurt, my other side prodded me. She was very vocal. Especially concerning Damian. Her displeasure evident. 

Damian nodded to indicate the portal, his face open but also not. His expression said, that no matter what she chose, Damian was always going to be there. 

Oh! Feelings! 

Overwhelmed I was rooted.

When I didn’t move, Damian moved to me. 

At the portal his brother, his brother’s team and my NightForce wait. 

I feel their absence, as each person, one by one left my sight and my SIGHT.. 

The loss of their aura to my senses. 

I hesitated. 

What of my freedom?

These people came to free me. They risked so much, so that I may have a choice. 

Damian didn’t touch me. Not physically. Not by look or gesture did he try and hint at our relationship, our obligation to the other. 

Yet. Invisible threads pulled me to him. I sensed his presence when he entered the cavern. And the lack of it, as Damian moved further and further away. 

I sucked in a breath. 

Longing travelled faster than light, cut me to the quick.

Then very slowly Damian bends his back, and with measured movements, Robin wraps one arm under my knees and one below my shoulders. Gently he holds me to him. 

The fastest way out of here is the portal. Damian's sure strides will reach it soon. 

The cavern reached out to me. Confused. Why wasn’t I leaving? Was that not the goal? Should the portal be closed again? And did I know, keeping it open took real effort?

I laughed. 

And was startled by the sound. 

Rusted as it was, it held a mortice of joy. 

By the time Damian neared the portal, Klarion stood up, glancing around frantically. Surprised at not his lack of captivity.

I lay my had on his shoulder and Damian stood still. so close his face betrays. he just wants to get me to safety. 

Undecided. 

The tantrum aside, the threat I felt looming was real. 

“I have to do this.”

Damian gave me no response. But he’d stilled as if he heard me. Jay and the others were nowhere. Only he and Constantine remained. 

“To save the world.” I pleaded. I tried to explain the suffering I constantly felt. ALL. THE. TIME!

Pleading with me, as if their pain and want and greed is my own. 

“You are my world,” Damian said softly. His back to the portal. I heard his words as if spoken into my heart, my very soul.

“Your power isn’t something to run from. I see you.” The unspoken voice of Damian echoed through our bond. 

Silence fell, and the only thing I could hear was my own ragged breathing, the roaring of my own pulse in my ears. 

Eyes were clear, her gaze hard I commit our reserve. The red part of me, that is instinct and survival objects. 

“I won’t do it. I will not allow them to force me to hurt to protect. I alone will decide.”

Fair or not this was the hand I was dealt.

It was my choice.  

And so I made it.

Reaching out to all the despair and hopelessness in the cavern system, the cave shows me the captives. Open. Unseal. Release. 

And then they are free. 

Humans, not quite human, all magical are free. 

The cavern shows me the way out and I relay it in their minds. 

The hive mind is scared to move. Afraid of punishment. The drain of their will is significant. 

With Damian holding me I merge with the hive. 

The is a way out. Look. 

There are so many obsticals. We are so tiered. What is the point. 

The point is, you are alive. Fight for the right!

We will ponder on it, some say. I want to go home some say. 

Slowly the hive produces individuals. 

Help each other. Help yourselves. 

Yes, the cavers tell me, they are moving. I can shrten the Parth to the Portal. Go! I’ll get them out.

With one last look at Klarion, furtive glances this way and that had led to resignation. 

My offer for friendship is real. I send him. I have no expectations, only that you do not abuse my trust. I know he coveted that. No manufactured false promises are needed.  

His breath exploded out with relief. Teekl purred in response. Wariness left his aura as he straightened from his fight-or-flight crouch.  

He’d also revealed an important detail that, unlike the other half-truths shared with, she could actually fix.

Unbeknownst, they were going on a rescue mission.

We, my other half and I, thank the cavern. Only with the cavern’s intervention on my behalf let the Nth Metal release its hold on me. 

Sending healing power, what little I have leftover from what my other half safeguarded, towards the beasts. I can hear their injuries and I can’t not respond. So I unleashed healing upon them. With the understanding that if they met me in battle, there would be no mercy.

There was a flash of ice blue light, a swell of darkness, and then Damian and I are home. 

Where when I go there, they have to take me in. 

***************** VI*****

A shadow flickered across her face. Seeing that others  were so unchanged when she hardly recognised herself,  hurt her. 

Raven hid it quickly. She was a proud, but Damian saw pain, outrage, and sadness flicked one by one. 

He would have to be careful if he saw Klarion. Because Lord of Chaos or not, he would not survive the encounter. 

Raven deserves, to decide her own fate. 

He wasn’t sure who he wanted to strangle more, the agents of Order or Chaos.

Her eyes were clear, her gaze hard.

Waves of power and danger had emanated from Raven and washed over Damian like some seductive potion.

Their eyes had met across the room and an electric current zapped along their bond.

“We need to talk you and I.”

Raven only nodded, and when the night of her welcome home party wound up, Damian led her to the edge of the island. 

The rough pad of his thumb trailed across her cheek and over her lips. Raven throbbed at his touch. She dropped her lashes, avoiding the emerald fire in his eyes, afraid of getting scorched once again.

It didn’t work.

His calloused palm cradled the side of her cheek. His lips touched hers, and she melted.

She gasped out a breath against his mouth, he breathed it in, as she wrapped arms around his him to stay upright.

Azar! help her. She’d fallen under his spell as quickly as she had at the carnival.

But now she had responsibilities. Things were happening that were bigger than her. She planted her palms against his chest, and her fingers tingled to explore the hard slab of muscle that shifted beneath his armoured tunic.

“I have to do this,” he repeated her words to her, kiss  and travelling south down my body. “You are my world.”

[roverjamball]

"Why are you so good to me?"

DAY 4 - 20.07.2023

Part I

“If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favourable”. - Seneca

I opened my eyes and saw Raven standing in a clear space, all the furniture in my loft arranged to one side, her eyes closed. 

Crouched, balanced, allowing the perfect view of her supple butt, her hands held before her, undulating as if bobbing on invisible waves. 

Raven had all but moved in with me, time apart its her mysterious missions made us inseparable when she came back. The tower or my place, we were joined to the hip. It wouldn’t last. Raven was already needed and so was I. 

For now her clothes in my closet, toiletry all over my bathroom counter, college reading material, course work and magical supplies in my study or a special cabinet in my kitchen. A kitchen I very much wanted to make it ours. 

All that could wait. Upcoming missions and assignments or patrols could wait. I was enjoying the NOW.

As I watched, she moved, arms and legs gliding through gentle, circular motions. It was an Azarathian meditation.  A meditative form of exercise, Raven mixed in movements from martial arts she learned from Koriand'r, Troy, others as well, as Grayson’s acrobatics. As she continued her graceful motion, gathering light sweat on her brow, he saw his influence predominant. That brought him no amount of satisfaction. 

Raven wore my T-shirt - the only blue one I had, a pair of my linen pants, the drawstrings tightly knotted around her much more slender waist. They swallowed her, my clothes. She moved with the graceful simplicity of a natural talent honed by practice. I saw her face as she turned this way and that, a few cartwheels thrown in, her expression one of peaceful concentration. 

Deliberate power and control.

Watching her in silence, cataloging my own aches and pains, I realised there were none. That Raven had healed me. 

I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. On one hand, Raven cared for me, couldn’t see my pain, could do something about it, and  did. It was a gift, an act of love. I in turn didn’t want to be the cause of any discomfort for her. I start planing turn about. 

Raven suddenly smiled, her eyes closed but crinkled on the sides.

"Don't let me stop your drooling.”

As if I could stop. My heart would stop first. 

"Why are you so good to me?” Raven had said.

Her voice had been small and sad, like an abandoned kitten awaiting the next hit. Braced for it, not sure where it would land. Somehow, Raven was convinced she didn’t deserve more to life than saving people and keeping herself in check, to protect others. 

I’ll change that, he swore. But then, he’d held her and himself to their bargain. He would be open with her. Let her in, not fret over any monetary anger, irritation or jealousy Raven sensed from him. Raven had been an empath all her life. She deserved total honesty. Not bluntness, but honesty, and he’d make her laugh. That was his mission. 

He opened his mind shields, a bond they shared flared, potent, wondrous in his mind, his feelings saturated the air between them. What he felt as he watched Raven move. What simply looking at her body, longing for her did to him. How profoundly she affected him.

Opening her eyes, she rolled them at me. Her cheeks red, her eyes shining with joy, but hooded with darker things. She was absolutely stunning. I was stunned into speechlessness. 

Moping her glowing face dry, Raven tossed the towel on my table, sensuality in every step, she took towards me. 

“So eager to try again,” she said. Her eyes dark, filling with the same heat I felt racing through my body. Eager didn’t begin to cover it. Restrain myself from waltzing off the bed and dragging her to it. 

Raven laughed. A full husky sound, a promise, and a dare for me to do my worst. I felt it when she let her chains and shields go. Her emotions are lust love and hope, desire, and tenderness. I could feel them all, I believed I’d been challenged. 

***************

Damian found Raven on the roof of Titan Tower. They hadn’t seen much of each other this week. On the very spot she had given him Titus, Raven sat, facing the ocean, her back to him. 

“Do you ever want to let go?”

She nodded. “Yeah.” Pointed to an earthen cup, to her right, halfway full of silver liquid. The sides were stained with a metallic sheen so Raven must have already drunk a bit.  

Damian moved closer and saw beside Raven the same bottle Zachary Zatara brought to Grayson’s barbecue. When had she gotten hold of that? They left together that day so many months ago, and he didn’t remember packing it into the T-car.

 “I don't know the details about what happened, but yeah.“ Raven went on. Her voice furlong. “Kori remembers but she won’t tell. I think she wants so spare me. And every time I let those feelings go, the more I get lost in passion, rage or despair. I gain preternatural strength, let loose, and remove all chains, stronger, more powerful I get. And the worse I feel after." 

She shook her head.  "Sometimes I think it would be easier to just let loose my other half. To stop being human, stop hurting. If it wasn't for the real possibility of absolute destruction …”

"It would turn you into a monster?”

Finishing off the drink from the tumbler, she nodded. The like the world couldn’t even imagine her eyes said. After the battle with Trigon all those years ago it was hard to believe anything worse. 

"But a happy monster?” Damian joked, hoping to cheer her. He released one of her hands to tilt her head back, caressing her ear with his lips. This was not how he hoped their reunion would go. Her helping Jason and the Outlaws was becoming too frequent an occurrence. His brother called her in and she disappeared like she was a part of his Team not a Titan with Damian. 

What happened during her time away? He wished she would trust him. Share with him. Her other half was a part of her and he would love any part that belonged to Raven. His beloved, if she would only show him. Open up to him. Give her time, he told himself. But even as a sense of urgency beseeched him, Damian would take what  Raven was ready to share, as she was right now. 

Raven finished drinking from the bottle, all in one go. One bug long controlled gulp. Bottoms up ! There was a lot of self loathing there. 

“Deamons can’t love.” Her jaw hardened. “They aren’t human. Wouldn’t even have a soul.”

Oh, Raven had a soul. Four eyes or two, her soul was like a shinning beacon. Her soul self was as magnificent, glimmering with a pearly black sheen, mystery and power, compassion rolled into one. 

Taking her hand in his, warm, supple, trembling with emotions, Raven relax a smidgen, giving him a wane half smile. Their connection surging between them, no barriers, Damian showed all Raven was to him. Holding her to him,  barred his memories that went with the emotions, from the moment he saw her, when he called her witch girl, when she healed him after he recklessly provoked Jamie, she assured him that he was the heir to the League of Shadows a murderer, had a kind and generous soul. And when Damian told Raven, in the hell dimension of all places, that home was with Raven.

“"Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in." ―Robert Frost”

Suddenly, she was gripping him as tightly as he held her. “Please, Damian, be careful.”

Raven was telling him something, her eyes desperate. Saying things her words couldn’t. 

He snorted. Ever worried about others than herself. Healer of souls. No one will ever hurt you Beloved, not as long as I draw breath. 

“No part of you, not a single cell is evil. If the other-you, is a part of you, then it has the same choices you did with your farther in the Hell dimension. Same ones I did, when I faced Grandfather.”

His words were merciless. Raven would appreciate that. Brutal honesty works better at times like this, than generic platitudes. 

Logic and rationality. Raven chose him, and he could only be himself. 

This was the truth as he saw it. 

Raven who could read people, could gauge the truth of his words, not sentimentality, instead his raw unfiltered opinion. Much more impactful. He could see the factual assessment seep in. 

Not yet ready to believe it, Raven’s profile was thoughtful. 

She put down the bottle. And then it stayed there. 

Long after the Robin and his Raven left, it was joined by an ancient, worn out, as if discarded bit of metal. Until it too, vanished. 

*************

days, nay weeks later

Raven didn't need to be an empath to understand that the twist to Klarion's voice was fury, grief, deep seated pain. Lord of Darkness sure, but Chaos for Chaos sake was evil. That was a choice. One she wasn’t sure he wanted to make.

“Ditto, witch boy. You, don't see me trying to destroy the world, just to get even with some stupid asshole. Everyone suffers, especially those who have been kind. Those who are good. Not prefect, but trying nonetheless. It's foolishness.”

Everything around me faded to flimsy transparency. I remained in the nth metal quick-sand physically—I could feel the broken pressure on me—but it was overlaid by a vision of the cavern as it may have existed long ago.

Location unknown, following a magical trail not many could follow. 

Separated from the Night Force. 

Chances of rescue were slim. But more important, once I was incased—and it was coming now; I could feel it, a faint stirring of power that slid along the edges of my magical senses, like some huge and hungry dragon in the darkness — it was going to shut me off from the rest of the world, magically speaking. 

Hold me immobile? More than likely. 

That meant that I wasn’t going have access to any power to use to defend myself, any more than I’d be able to breathe if someone plunged my head underwater.

Fight smarter, not harder, I hear Damian’s voice in my mind. Think it through, he said. 

I did. 

Then I drew in power, being pulled to wherever, they’d not find me unprepared — a lot of power. If there wasn’t going to be any magic available for the taking once I reached the destination of my host’ choosing, I’d just have to bring my own. All I could get my hands on. 

Usually I draw in power only when it’s ready to flow directly out of me again, channeling the energy through my mind and into the action. And only for something big, did I need ambient power. I normally had enough reserve. 

I fuelled up. Gorged. I’d always been scared of myself, my heritage, what unfettered Raven would look like. If I was to survive I’d have to let that fear go.

 Imagine being full, but eating still. Food is fuel. In without ever letting it out. The power, it built up as a pressure behind my eyes. With no outlet, the energy made my body temperature rise rapidly, a few degrees at the least. My muscles and bones screamed with sudden pain while my vision blurred as I was being pulled into  wherever. The unknown. 

I saw red, flickered with spots of black. My other nature close to the surface like never before, but for once helping me, drawing in more ambient magic, shoring up extra reserve as if she was a different person, not just an other part of me. Something to think on later. Right now she was taking the brunt of the pain holding so much power was causing.

Static electricity crackled with every single pull, bright lilac and painfully sharp, until it sounded like I had firecrackers going off in my ears. My head pounded like every New Year’s hangover I’d ever had, all in the same spot, and my lungs felt like the air had turned to acid. I concentrated on keeping my bearings, my wits about me. I was being pulled faster and faster. I stopped fighting the pull. they had me, I was being relied in and from the weakness in my bones, the loss of power, I was nearly there. 

In a last ditch effort I called out to Zach and Alice. And Damian. Of course to Damian. 

But it was too late. 

I was being pulled in. Crushed from all sides. Weak as I lost connection. Surrounded by Nth metal. My other half borrowed deep inside me, creating a vacuuming, holding in as much energy as she could. The insulation was like a barrier between anti-matter and matter. 

Once things settled, I became accustomed to the loss of one of my senses. I realised I’d been here before. If not now or in person, then ethereally. Feeling it was true. There were…sensations to the vision, not just sights. 

I watched as time sped up, as divisions sprang into existence. Statues and stalagmites, formed and deformed. Beings came and went, became blurs, erecting the very structure I was standing in. They carved delicate art into the walls, then painted everything with vibrant colours. Lived, loved and died. 

Why put these carvings, these sigils in this strange place? Time slowed again, and the beings: human , no there were all sorts of native earth creatures, proficient in the ways made something — the construction may have taken days, maybe months — gathered together out front. I joined them. Saw the cavern wall swirl, a light erupted from it and then dimmed. 

A portal. Shimmering blue whereas mine was deep purple.

The swirl of light stabilised. Other-worldly beings issued forth, into the cavern, from elsewhere. Both  People were dressed in symbols of deep and vibrant colours. Elaborate. Ceremonial. Humans wore ancient clothing.  Humanoid creatures of legend wore their recognisable standards. 

If I could focus I’d be able to date this scene playing out before me. The mirage was so real, but for its transparency. 

Could this be some type of first contact? The first time humans met with other-world magical beings? Alien magicians? Or what some civilisations would later call gods? Except our collective wisdom, our records also told me that the Out-Worlders had met with humans in ancient Egypt centuries earlier.

The scarab hieroglyph, for example; Kheper, refers variously to the ideas of existence, manifestation, development, growth, and effectiveness, the beetle itself was a favourite form used for amulets in all periods of Egyptian history. 

The Blue Beetle scarab was attached to Jamie. 

The two groups looked familiar with one another, so their first encounters must have happened earlier. The variety of earthlings made me think that the meeting rotated. Now the humans had built some kind of huge receiving area in these caverns. These cavers that I was at this very moment caught, had held dozens of other magical beings, wasn’t any type of shrine. It was a place where these multi-planets and possibly universe people sat together at tables, before boards, to…

Trying to figure out one another’s occult languages perhaps? Yes, they were writing words, glyphs, and sigils the precursor to runes. They were gesturing, explaining to one another. Magic was an all-encompassing catchphrase, there were so many specialities and subs; cabalistic, shamanistic, sorcery, witchcraft, wizardry, necromancy, enchantment, spell working, incantation [reverse speak used by the Zataras], devilry, divination,  voodoo, hoodoo, sympathetic magic,  charm casting, hex, jinx; mojo, orenda, makutu, sortilege, thaumaturgy, theurgy…..

Time sped up again, and I counted dozens of meetings in a matter of minutes—each time the portal in the cavern wall activated and closed and opened again. I think I even saw some Earth magicians go through the portal. To the Else-where. 

Then…. It all stopped. There was danger. Too dangerous to travel. To meet. For exchange for congress, for community. 

A beast. Was it a metaphysical representation, or an actual real creature? I can’t say, not for certain. Even without Nth metal interference, it would be difficult. 

I saw something in my mind then. An assembly of thousands of magical beings — of a hundred different races — gathering to fight…something dark, something rising from rage and hate, with a set of piercing red eyes.

It…destroyed them, the cavern said. We fought. One and all, We ultimately won. But the price was so high…

Was it something like what was happening now? Was that why Klarion and his posse were gathering people with minor magical talent? Who had joined up willingly and what was the game plan? Were these kidnappers doing bad things for, what was in their minds ‘the right reasons’?

“How?” I asked. “How did you win?”

We made it become non-magical, the cavern sent me. The memories imprinted into it every time people touched it, travelled through its portals, and carved into its surface.  I do not know how. Few survived…and those who did know how…did not. 

Cavern…inscribed memories into the walls, which…were now reaching me somehow? 

A portal. 

My way out?

Time is unnatural here, but the sands are strange even by those standards.

I felt the vision begin to fade. It was coming to the end of its memories.

“Wait,” I send to the cavern. “You can reach me while exposed to nth metal. How?”

Why wouldn’t I be able to? the impression returned.

“Those are the characteristics of nth metal. It blocks magic” I tell it.

Then a different sort of impression came upon me, as had happened during the previous vision. Transparent and ghostly. I understood it better because after spending time here in the almost timeless, I became stronger in my powers, and better at listening. The Cavern helped. It felt like dozens, maybe hundreds, of minds reaching to me from within the histories of the cavern.

Further…they encouraged me. Even further…

They presented for me something like a wall. I forced my mind against it and, and could not get through.

*************

“Oops.” 

There are advantages to training with someone you are close to. Knowing each other's moves makes training more effective. Being involved in each other's personal lives can also make training a lot more painful. As Todd was finding out first-hand.

“Something on your mind lil’ D?” Todd rubbed his jaw. Even gloved I packed quite a punch and even padded, Todd felt it. 

Good. 

“Not really.” I don’t wait for Todd to hold up the padded training pad, taking power from my hip I aim a roundhouse for his ear. 

He jumps back just in time and the kick lands perfectly with a thump. Legs back on the ground, braced, I advance, punching with as much anger and frustration I’d been holding in since we lost contact with Raven. 

In Damian’s experience if something was complicated, more than a little off, then Todd was likely to shoot it just in case. That’s why involving himself in Raven’s magic-related investigation was so out of character. Was there more to their relationship than met the eye? There had never been a hint of anything more than a friendship built on mutual respect. I knew for a fact that Todd liked that crazy strong red-headed Queen of the African Amazons. Who the hell ever heard of such a thing?

If they had used Raven…. That I could not forgive.

The facts were, Raven was missing, after the last ‘lending a helping hand on a thing with the Outlaws’, where for some reason even the magician boy was required, Raven called me to say she’d be delayed. That was more than a month ago. 

He felt a disquiet in her when we last spoke like she was worried and trying to hide it. But that’s what most of my family did, so I didn’t think much of it. Ever sarcastic and compassionate, Raven was mired in contradictions. And it was hardly a conversation to have with magic boy, Todd and Artemis on the other side demanding her attention. 

“Are you all right?”

"Shot," she said. "It'll heal.”

"Did you beat the big bad?”

"They got away," Raven said. She didn’t sound too sad about it so it must have been a near thing. "We stopped an epidemic. Nearly got Roy.”

"Oh," he said quietly. "I'm sorry.” I wished Harper the best, but knowing Raven, she’d heal Harper and any others before taking care of her own healing. 

Raven yelled, instructions they sounded like, but not into the Fone. 

“Off to save the worlds?”

“I am vengeance, I am the night,” she growled, true levity in her voice for the first time in weeks. It soothed my soul and I let the evasiveness go. 

I laughed, letting it pour out of me, Raven saw the true me, I was ridiculous with her, silly.  And I missed it. I missed her. Us. 

She joined me, her laugh more subdued, no less genuine. There was a hysterical quality to it, which I pretended not to hear. I’d not heard my beloved laugh joy for it seemed forever. A pang threw my heart. I wanted to make her happy, but this messed up world we lived in …. And that was it. Radio silence. 

As soon as I’d gotten wind that something was amiss, I’d called her. When she didn’t answer, as was common during missions, I tried to reach out through our bond. And it was as if there was only air, the space the bond occupied in my mind was empty, deserted. Cleared out.

I had to know, was I abandoned or was Raven in trouble? And so I tracked Raven to one of my brother’s safe houses in Gotham. Now his brother, who could see the pain, and panic I was in, wasting his time, fringing ignorance. I could read him like a flashy sigh trying to sell me bullshit. And the worst part was Todd saw I wasn’t fooled, still, he persisted!

Todd's words didn’t give him any inclination, but his eyes said - leave this alone if she wanted you to know, you would know because she would tell you.

* * * *

“What's wrong, Todd? I've never seen you drink that slowly.”

“I just think you'd be better off focused on the Titan thing and forgot the whole "magical" business, 'cause it's not looking pretty.”

“Well, what is it?”

Jason signed. 

I raised an eyebrow. 

“Well, I did the triangulation on that phone -- You know, the one that our hotel-room-torching mystery man Was using? -- And I found it.”

“Well?” Did he need Damian to touter it out off him?

“The thing is, the phone is down at the old Gotham conservatory.”

“Wasn’t the conservatory declared a national park?”

“Yeah.”

“Isn’t it closed? Yeah, for like 20 years.”

“It's just a graffiti magnet. Bored teenagers meet up to drink there.”

“Is that what they're calling it nowadays?” Artemis drawled. 

“And the phone is just sitting there?”

“It's such a setup, D, it's not even a setup, you know? So, what are you gonna do?”

“I'm gonna go down there.  Check it out.”

“Of course you are.”

“Free climbing?” Damian asked. 

“Yeah,” Todd said pulling up a 3-D topographical image with specs like hight, depth, vegetation and weather data. 

For a covert operative, there's often a fine line between hunter and hunted. Letting someone hunt you is just another way of finding out more about them. And this quarry was exempt from my aversion to hunting.  

“Cellphone signal's coming from out here.”

Of course, there's also a fine line between following up intelligence and walking into a trap.

“Doesn't get more exposed than this, does it? You sure you want to do this?”

“ Yeah, I'm sure. Stay at your positions. Cover me as best as you can.”

Hillside Conservatory allowed no cover. On a cliff of a lone hill, I free-climbed to the top. Always two points of contact with the hill, moving from one point of support to the next, slow and methodical. Mussels loose with exertion, my grappling hook tucked into the usual utility belt, climbing chalk in an open pocket. Robin outfit in colours to camouflage me during the climb. 

It behoves a Robin, when walking into a trap, or as I saw it going to retrieve Raven’s upto now unreachable burner, that suddenly popped up on Todd’s Outlaw triangulating software, to bring back up. 

By way of sniper, I had Todd, by way of Amazon I had Artemis and for my flyer I’d called in Victor. Excellent with tech, he outfitted our coms, a meld of organic and tech, untraceable, the size of invisible to the naked eye.

Ready for the really challenging leaps, there were none, it was a routine climb, and twenty minutes later I’d reached the top.

“Check” I say before pulling myself up the cliff face. I didn’t sense anyone, but with so much overgrown bio matter none of our sensors were reliable. 

No cover either, and plenty of foliage if one wanted to stage an ambush, but against gunfire, not so much. An it was night, a glowing full moon night, but night all the same. 

I blinked twice, night vision activated, useless. With so much biomass, thanks to Poison Ivy for turning as already thriving greenhouse into an untamed mess. 

“Check”

“Check”

“Copy.”

 I return to normal vision, relying on moonlight from cloudless sky. It's odd this night, there is plenty of cloud cover over Gotham just a few kilometres away. The hillside is exempt from any clouds and at midnight, the moon overhead spotlights the glass of the hothouse perfectly. Curious. 

“You know your magical herbs, Damian Al Ghul?. It's my "new friend" cigi.” A voice carries in the slight breeze. I can hear the soft thump of heavy glass on damp wood. I turn slightly right, to the old picnic tables that were a part of the botanical gardens. 

“I don’t smoke” is what I said, leaving unsaid that I don’t drink or smoke or anything with scum. I recognise the owner of the voice. The dossier is long and sordid. 

“Okay, well, we both know you checked up on me, and we both know that I have the access you need. I’ve got this communicator don’t I?” He took a drag of this smoke, stubs of smoked cigarettes littered the green of the abandoned hot-house. 

“Really, the only question is whether we can figure out a way to work together.” Dark blue eyes looked at me, I didn’t look away, he was a predator in his own right. About average height with a soft but not pudgy build, before me stood the answer to all my questions. 

“I help you, you help me. So what do you say we make this a take-it-or-leave-it moment?”

“I'm not sure what I'd be taking.” 

I was staling and we both knew it. It was all about Raven with me. With her missing, our bond, her side of it tenuous as best, I was not negotiating from a position of strength.

“A job, for starters. You're perfect for it. Say yes, and I start the ball rolling today, and you’re reunited with .…” he left it open-ended.  

I kept my calm. Face impassive.

“Say no, you'll never hear from me again.”

“No!” Said Victor in my ear. 

I could feel Jason’s indecision from a kilometre away.  Todd was worried about me, and Raven’s disappearance weighed on his conciseness. His Amazon mirrored his emotions as if they also shared some kind of bond.

The man before me raised his brows in question, it was almost as if he detected Cyborg’s com in my ear. That was impossible. I couldn't even feel it. It was all but invisible to the naked eye. When Victor pierced my ear drum, I didn't even feel it.  

“What's the job?” I ask, get as much info out before giving any answer, intelligence gathering basics. Even if I was a wreck, my brain worked on autopilot. 

“I can't give you the details just yet, things to put in place. But it won't offend your Bat-brat sensibilities. Trust me.” That greasy smile if aimed at me another time would have eared anyone a knock-out punch in the head. Today, the way things stood, oh I was going to regret it. 

“So, in or out?”

As a Vigilante, you often have to do things you don't like, for people you don't trust. You don't always get to choose who you do business with. When the devil himself is offering the thing you want most, sometimes you dance with the devil.

I took a deep breath, and walked around the magician, circling him. I’d have to agree, but I would hold out for better terms. 

Constantine suddenly stood at the opposite end of the clearing, facing me. 

“Alright, let us have a demonstration of my bona fides!”

The Magician's right hand moved in a simple outward motion, and the dew over in the green in the clearing suddenly thickened and swirled with colour and light. For a few seconds, the image was hazy. Then it snapped into focus.

I could see a hard rock surface. Carved and chiselled into caverns for habitation. The lack of stalactites and stalagmites was a huge hint. Raven was in a cave system.

Raven was trapped somehow, not only because she was half embedded in the very earth. 

The cavern floor was soft, seemingly malleable. Raven was strong enough in physical strength to slowly crawl out. Without realising the depth of my feelings for Raven, the last year, so afraid to lose her. We’d been over almost every possible avenue of capture, lost in the wilderness, cut off from your power scenario my frightened mind could think up. And my fears were creative and brutal.  

If you don’t wear your breathing apparatus when gassed, having it in your tool belt is less than useless. I had Raven teleport us all over the world, with or without gear. We’d hike, swim, wade, and climb in tough and tougher terrain until I was satisfied with Raven’s preparedness.

[roverjamball]

DAY 4 - 20.07.2023

Guardian × Prissoner| God's/Angel & Devil AU "Why are you so good to me?"

Part II

I know now why I did it. And I wonder if Raven even then felt as we confessed to feel now. Before she disappeared that is.   

So Raven was aware of how to escape quicksand. But a malevolent presence hovered over her. And I realised that our connection was dampened by something in the cavern, creating a barrier.  

The vision began to fade. Raven was hanging on and I felt an urgency to go to her. She was alone and diminished in a way that I couldn't comprehend. 

The clearing was the mundane, albeit flowery hillside again. The moon hung lower than before. So the vision must’ve lasted longer than I perceived it had. 

All the desperation and longing came rushing back. Stronger than before now that I’d seen my beloved. 

Of course, that was why the magician had shown me Raven: to manipulate me.

“Yes,” said the Blond Brit's cold voice, pretending to be empty of emotion. The image began to slowly fade away. “It is a true seeing of Raven, as she is even now. I give you my word. No tricks. No deceptions. This is as is.”

I heard the truth of it. I was not magical in the true sense of the word, but I had instincts. I looked through the translucent image to where the Magician waited. 

“No,” a sombre Jason said in my ear. 

Constantine’s eyes were narrowed to glowing blue slits, lit by the red glow of his cigarette. I faced him for a moment. The cold wind gusted over the hilltop and stirred our cloaks. I stared at him, at ancient eyes full of the knowledge of the dark in our world. 

I remembered my imprisonment by Terra. Slade had me embedded into a wall. Immobile. Helpless. I remembered the things they had done to me. But it didn’t look like they had harmed Raven—yet. That could change. 

I knew that neither Raven in the image nor the man on the hill meant anything to Constantine. I knew that if I went forward with his bargain, I would probably end up on the chopping block myself.

Of course, that was why the British Magician had shown me Raven: to manipulate me.

It's not entirely thought. There was a distinction in what was done. Constantine had shown me Raven, in her current situation to make perfectly clear exactly what choice I was about to make. It for sure might influence my decision, but when a stark naked truth stares you in the face . . . shouldn’t it? Was it manipulation if it was with truth and frankness?

It was freeing. This hope it gave me. Showed me what was fighting for. And as I stared at my Beloved’s fading image, my fear vanished. If I wound up like, if that was the price I had to pay to make my daughter safe, so be it.

If I was haunted for the rest of my life because my dearest beloved needed me to make hard choices, so be it.

“Make your choice. I may need you too but I haven’t got all day.”

This was war I thought, and required hard choices.

“I'm in.” 

That greasy ‘trust me’ smile again, I gritted my teeth, my face a mask of disinterest, and my contact turned into a mirage, then disappeared before my very eyes. 

“Be in touch,” words flustered in the wind. I was once again left standing in the Gotham national park, alone. Unless you count Todd, Artemis and Victor spaced with line of sight about a kilometre away. 

Just this one job and I’ll be closer to finding Raven. If one faithless English magician could be trusted.

*

“I’m going to make sure you’ll be safe.” He knew how arrogant he sounded, but he was telling her what he believed to be true. He would kill anyone who tried to hurt her.

****

How much longer was it going to take for them to hear any news? Hope was all he had and as every second dwindled by, he lost more and more of it

[roverjamball]

DAY 1 - 17.07.2023 II

"I've got you and I'm not letting go."

He expelled a breath. Sometimes, Damian wished. He wished in a deep dark part of his heart that Raven would hell with his privacy. And just look into his heart. A quick glance even. Every night from months now Damien expected Raven’s control to slip and then finally it would all be out in the open

Another part of him, the sad, lonely part, thought maybe Raven's control had left and she knew how he feels for her. She knew the depth of his emotion and that’s why she couldn���t look at him. Like now, again she alerted her gaze. 

Sometimes, during patrol Raven would react to something, she would quickly look this way or is that, but there was nothing there. For the first few times Damien thought it maybe stealth attack that he hadn’t detected, but it never panned out, and so now apart of him is compelled to believe that Raven has sensed what he feels, but does not reciprocate and is not sure how to let him down gently.

Raven said nothing for a time. Damian couldn’t decide if it was an awkward silence or not. Sounds of fork on the plate, normal china and steel clinks filled the air. Over the acrid scent of smoke soaked clothes and singed hair, the kitchen smelled like a home-cooked meal. It gladded him to see Raven gulping down the food I prepared for her. To share with her, his life. 

“Damian,” she said, her cutlery arranged to indicate the end of her meal. “I’ve been trying to… Things are really complicated now. With who your father is, and the way things are at the Justice League… Sometimes things don’t really go the way we want, and we—” 

Damian leaned towards Raven, going as far as the table would let him. He wanted to take her hand in his, but he didn’t. Be cool he thought. 

“Is this about the fire? Ready to talk?”

She opened her mouth and looked at him again. Then he saw her expression close down.

“I wanted to say, the meal was just what I needed.”

“Thanks,” he said. Thanks for not trusting me enough to say whatever you just wanted to say. When her plate was empty, even embroiled in a dilemma Raven finished her food. “You helped.”

She smiled wanly, like she wanted to say more but didn’t know how.

“Should we clean up?”

“Sure. But let me. Let’s have tea,” Raven tilted her head "out on the balcony.”

Damian walked out onto the balcony. It hung literally over the sea. As if standing on a cliff. Damian usually cooked, so as per their morning routine, Raven would clean up. It didn’t matter that she helped out throughout the preparation of the meal. After a while, he’d learnt to nod, agree, and then just go ahead and help her. Today he was torn between washing beside Raven, and putting some space between them.

Damian heard foots steps, accompanied with the tart smell of his preferred tea blend. Raven entered, dressed, only in her midnight, blue outfit. No cloak or boots, just purple flip-flops pink toenails? More magician, than vigilante, Raven’s outfit reflected that. But after Brother Blood, Grayson had insisted on an armoured breastplate and a bullet-proof material for Raven’s arms and legs. 

One morning Raven appeared with spider silk, which she claimed was bulletproof. While answering the call of an elephant with plastic embedded in its flesh, she found a species of spider that had naturally evolved to create strong and elastic webs. When the spider saw her helping its friend, it created the material for her as a thank-you. and now it was part of her armour.

From above, they could hear the muffled voices of sea birds speaking. From the top of Titans Tower to their flock, flying overhead or perching on rocks below on the island. Damian stood looking out at the sea, trying to put himself in a frame of mind to finally confess his feelings. A person, even a vigilante or a member of the league of Shadows could only be on high alert for so long.

Raven handed him a mug of tea. Which he took, her fingers lingered, and I instantly felt warmth seep into my being. He had taken a step closer than necessary to take the cup, now mixed in with fragrant tea, the air smelled of Raven.

“Damian..” Raven said. Her lips parted. Their faces so close, he could hear her breath. 

Damian thought that he’d picked up a lot of what she was going to say, but one doesn’t interrupt this beautiful girl. Unless one has finally worked up the courage to reveal his heart to her.

Once Damian realised he hadn’t, he hadn’t worked up the courage, at least not yet. He settled in for the next best thing. To simply stand with Raven. All alone in the world, the birds, the ocean, and the sunrise, while she thanked him for breakfast. and they talked of how they longed for uninterrupted sleep. 

Next time, Damian promised himself. Life is short, he knew this.

"I've got you and I'm not letting go.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Behind the Titans, now off to bed, distracted by thoughts of one another, on the table where Raven had laid her belt of pouches, after she picked it up, slipped it on her shoulder on her way out, appeared a disc shaped object. Disfigured and crumbling, ancient and powerful. 

"I've got you and I'm not letting go."

[roverjamball]

Do you plan on making more chapters for this in the near future for How Damian met Raven, again, once they were older and hooked up

Also are you posting for damirae week this yr?

Thank you so much for getting in touch! I definitely wish to finish/end the story of how Damian matter even, again once they were older and hooked up.

Im just real apprehensive about writing the hooked up part. I have read amazing work which inspired me to endeavour. I hope I do.

I got interested in Tumblr during lockdown, though I had always been interested in Fanfiction. And it took me two years before I participated in the week/weekends. I’m really looking forward to participating in DamiRaeWeek2023.

The problem is, I haven’t learned how to write short stories yet. It’s all very long form and that takes a lot of time. Continuous time to finish a cohesive story, if not, then I end up losing the thread.

[roverjamball]

Raven is missing and Damian is focused on finding her. read on to see how the chips fall ………!

day 5 added

Don’t hesitate to interact.

DamiRaeWeek2023

Master List

Day 1 - "I've got you and I'm not letting go."

Day 1 - II

Day 2 -  "Let me take care of you... please." Part I Part II Part III

Day 3 - "I think I'm in love with you and I'm terrified."

Day 4 - "Why are you so good to me?" Part I and Part II

Day 5 - "I have to do this to save the world.” “You are my world."

Day 6 - "I'm not going to leave you. You're never going to have to suffer by yourself again, I promise."

Day 7 - Free day |Forbidden love | Moving in together