All of them screamed at the sight that crashed against their eyes, a red haze falling around them like a montage of their sudden, stunning terror. Cyborg froze where he stood, denial flying from his lips in a repeated mantra, a prayer to rectify the mistake. Beast Boy fell to his knees, a sob the only sound that could summarize the stillness, the silence that would forever steal away his laughter. Starfire fell from the sky, plummeting to the ground as her joyful flight was cut short in the face of despair.

She watched, her apathy broken and dying at her feet while the blood pooled around his shivering body.

They had all seen it. They had all felt the vision worm its way into their minds and lodge there, to curse their dreams and turn their sanity against them. They all shook to the very core with an unnamed, previously unfelt emotion that they could not describe.

There was the broken bo-staff- and it lay buried in his chest, straight to his honest, loving heart.

The silence ended and they forgot the enemy, the danger- the fight. They forgot justice. But they would remember that in time.

Starfire was the first at his side, screaming his name in wretched desperation, clinging to his shoulders and hair, begging him not to leave her alone. His heels dug into the pavement, his hands gripping the ground in a fierce, invisible struggle not to float away. His breath was ragged, sinking in and out of his open mouth, a faint music of dying gasps the only sound she could hear.

"Starfire shut up and move!" Raven knew- hoped- maybe, maybe she could do something. Could she stop the bleeding? Could she take that much damage into her own body and save him? Could she cut out her own heart and give it to him instead?

She would, if she could.

Her heart broke, her soul shook, the street lamps flickering in and out of existence, as she laid eyes on his paling face. He saw her and smiled dazedly, red lips pulling painfully over bloody teeth. Her fingers trembled as she touched the wound, the source of his agony. She could feel his life floating away like steam beneath her fingers.

"Robin- Robin listen to me-"

"Hi…Raven…"

"Shhhh, don't talk-"
"Can you do something?"

"Please, friend Raven! Please, do something!"

"Shut up!" She screamed fiercely. The others backed away in fear and grief, too shaken to do anything but obey.

"Robin, listen to me, I can't- I can't take it out…it's controlling the bleeding- if I take it out then you'll hemorrhage-"

"Take…care…of them…"

"No, please- please don't say that-" She was sobbing uncontrollably, the tears slipping past her eyes despite her control, landing with tiny despondent noises onto the red of his shirt. The blood pooled and blended into the color of his costume, shattering the reality that his body was broken beneath her. "I can do something- I can, please just don't give up." Her words were wet and fractured, broken by the despair that wracked her inner sanctum. She could not control her shaking fingers as she touched the wound and tried to heal him. His fingers wrapped weakly around her wrist, forcing her to look into his blank white mask.

She tore it from his face in a moment of stunning clarity and saw the last of his life gathered into the blue irises he had hidden from her for so long. He seemed vaguely surprised within the pain; his startled gasps for breath the only sound. Then he smiled and touched her face with the last of his strength.

"Don't leave me."

"I love…you…"

She buried her face into his neck, blood tangling in her hair but she didn't care- she couldn't care- he was gone, his blank blue gaze as empty and enigmatic as the mask had ever been. The world rang with silence, her sobs cutting the darkness into sorrow. She cried so hard she couldn't breathe; she didn't want to breathe. She didn't want to move. She would not let the world move past this moment, the time between his last, evanescing sigh.

And then it began to rain.

And the red pooled around the gutters in the cleansing torrent, and spilled into the sewers below. She slowly rose from her hermit position and gazed at his staring face. Her fingers gently closed his eyes, willing him to sleep, to shut his gaze until they were past his sudden, untimely good-bye.

She turned to face her weeping friends, her clothing stained with red, and together carry the burden of despair.

A/N: And then there was four. I drew picture recently that sort of showed this scene, so now I'm writing it. I don't know why.