Hot crimson blurred Diana's vision and she fought to see the gnashing jaws and claws of her petty enemies. She wiped her brow with the back of her hand- crusted already with dull brick red- and it came back with fresh blood. The adrenaline pumping through her veins made her numb to the wound that had been slashed above her left eye. It served also to keep her feet planted and her sword raised; she gritted her teeth as fatigue overtook one of her comrades (in the haze of battle she couldn't tell whom) and they stumbled in the path of parademons.

A blow landed them at Darkseid's feet and Diana saw a crumbled streak of purple. The Amazon, flanked by Starfire, streamlined past a band of Titans and the Young Justice team fighting ought of an encirclement of parademons. But the purple cloak had lifted from the floor in a movement more fitting of shadow than blood and flesh.

Had she been on the other side of Raven, Diana might have seen the fire of her skin and the murder in her snarling lips. Khadija al-Azraq had been occupied with weaving the winds about Darkseid's form and casting him in nature's chains. Her concentration was broken; she'd seen Raven's demon assume control over the fatigued girl, Pride now faced Darkseid.

Robin felt the shift and, in his distraction, was struck full-square and set upon by another of the relentless groups of parademons tumbling from many portals across the courtyard. His gloved hand squelched as it fell in to a pool of blood- accumulated from the drip-drip-dripping of an Amazon's severed arm. He managed to avoid the daggers of a parademon with a kick to the face but as Robin scrambled to get up, shoving back the bodiless arm, claws dragged across his chest. They returned again to puncture his abdomen. His grandmother's spells weren't enough to muffle the pain or stop the talons from passing through his skin. Her work had reduced the distance that the digits had passed towards his organs- it was excruciating all the same. He'd faced worse but the fatigue wracking his bones made the wounds scream.

Pride heard his pain and the demon unleashed her soul-self. The winged shadow hung over the bloody fighters and shrouded them in darkness- dusk had fallen early under Raven's demon. The throng of parademons halted at the portal. Darkseid, confused, glanced at the sudden black canopy. The heroes followed suit, standing on a mesmerised battlefield as if they'd all paused for a renaissance artist to capture the scene.

A pent-up cry of fear and hatred broke through Raven's throat and passed the barriers between realms to hit the pits of hell. Her soul-self descended with a vengeance and swept through Darkseid. At once the hypnosis was broken and combat resumed.

Raven might have heard the low chuckle of her father from his prison and she struggled to keep his chains from breaking. Pride was coaxed by his whispers of helping them win. Damian had been injured- she'd felt it- and that tipped the demon's self control dangerously.

Constantine and Zatanna too had arrived to the scene, some fifteen minutes prior, and the Scouse noted the development to the magician with concern. Constantine and Khadija (smeared with blood from a gaping laceration that sickeningly brought to the Brit's mind a slaughterhouse) were now besides Robin, lashing at parademons.

Elsewhere, Superman was struck from the sky by an omega beam.

Closer the city, Miss Martian was set upon with flames from a burning car, hounded by parademons.

Darkseid had conquered billions, across the galaxies before he'd made his way to Earth. Those billions kept his supply of parademons at a surplus; they didn't stop.

He'd regained his footing from the shock of Raven's attack, but couldn't respond for he was faced now with Zatanna; and because the demon had already been swept to the twitching form of her love. Constantine had conjured as strong a protective dome as he could manage around the boy. Khadija al-Azraq knelt at his side. Raven pushed through the magician's shield as if it were butter and she a knife. 

Khadija's face was trumped in paleness only by Damian's as she murmured over her grandson's blood-soaked form. Raven called out to him, four eyes battling anger and anguish. He stirred, trying to lift himself up. His muscles wailed. The magic of the green bead was waning; Damian's blood wouldn't cease.

The three jagged marks in his stomach were a bloody mess. The gashes above them had ripped at the surface of his skin- they ought to have burrowed deeper. Raven's head spun and she thought of her dear Damian who not even the greatest of nature's sorcerers could stop from bleeding out.

But healing was in Raven's bloodstream.

She said a desperate, choking, "Let me- please- I can-"

Khadija allowed her.

"R-Raven...I'm okay...It's..." Damian spluttered. Blood flecked his lips and painted the inside of his mouth. "Mashi -l haal..." he mumbled that it was 'no big deal' in his native tongue.

She wanted to pour healing in to him. But Pride was loud and she didn't know when her arms had become red skinned and Trigon said he could make it all go away because everyone was tired and- and the empath was overloaded with the mourning of an Amazon three metres away for her love and Batman's fear that he couldn't see his son and Etrigan's bloodlust and...

Damian, cloudy-eyed and grasping in white knuckles Raven's cloak, saw it happen first: the girl crumbled.

"CONSTANTINE!" She shouted and the water ran down her cheeks freely now. "Constantine I can't keep him- I-" then her voice was hallowed and chilled his spine. "Oh Azar he's out..."

"Bollocks!" The magician hissed.

***
The burden was lifted from Raven's mind and- having suffered silently under the strain for so long that the load had become white noise to her- she clocked her father's immense weight. Like a bird of prey launching from her shoulders, Raven felt Trigon's unleashing jolt her being. A split second of mindless agony passed.

Then sweet bliss and the girl fell, slumbering peacefully over her boyfriend whilst bloody battle battered at Constantine's shield.

Before her eyelids closed, now only a pair of them as her skin lost it's demonic nature, she looked over Damian and saw not but his resting form as they'd been what felt like eons ago, cocooned in sheets of white and resting in tranquility on pillows of white. In her delirium before the relieved exhaustion consumed her, Raven thought that she should love Damian for a very long time indeed.

The small gem on her forehead collapsed, crumbling over Damian's lap. It was done.

Lord Trigon loomed over the pitiful, squirming ants and bared a menacing grin. He might have looked to the fretting caped insects scrambling to make sense of his presence, shot a glance at the forces of magic amongst them (how amusing, the spouse of the Demon's Head still living...), raised an eyebrow at the amusingly grotesque creatures harassing the colourful fighters; but that was all too trivial.

There was a usurper to worry about. A being that Trigon had observed through his daughter's eyes. A puny, young creature, as he saw it, who regarded the demon lord, at least twice his size, with animosity.

Some of the flying 'Earth's defenders' might have targeted him; that was insignificant to Trigon- they were less than pinpricks. Less so even were the mindless minions of the armoured creature. He was hungry for blood and challenge. Raven had starved him of the satisfaction of the hunt.

"What being are YOU that would align itself on the Earth's side?" Darkseid boomed the first exchange. He rose from the floor, kicking away parademon and heroes alike, and raised his eye-level near the demon's.

Trigon laughed a volcanic sound (Khadija al-Azraq felt the Earth moan dreadfully in response). He grinned at the pestilent child before him, so proud of the little portals and weak forces he'd amassed.

"YOU ARE FOOLISH IN YOUR YOUTH." Trigon's words made prattle the chunks of rubble and set off a horrid cacophony of beeps from the abandoned cars of the city. "SUBMIT TO THE WILL OF HELLFIRE."

Darkseid's face of stone contorted violently, shifting with bemusement and spite. Who was this- this spirit who would snatch the throne from his as he was about to take it.

"It is you who shall submit! TO DARKSEID! THE SUPREME GOD!"

The demon lowered his head and chuckled, "SUPREME GOD? Well fool," he opened his arms, each longer than an average apartment block, and beckoned, "teach me your heresies." And Darkseid barrelled in to him.

In the same moment, the core gods of Egypt broke from the Duat. They solidified from vapours of divine spirit. At their head was the god of death, as vast as the demon lord and snarling, jackal-headed. Trigon drew back a first to strike Darkseid.

Anubis cried out with the voice that came from the shadows themselves. "THIS CHAOS SHALL END!"

And far below, Damian called out meekly for his friend.

A.N:

O.O

What can I say???

I love you guys so much. I love writing this book and *snif snif* it may be nearing to a close.

I hope you enjoyed today's chapter and stay tuned for next week's!

Thank you

-Bats :P