Chapter 3: Alternate Beginings

[Unknown Time passes]

Rachel awakens inside of her mindscape and surveys all the ruin and heaviness. The feeling of despair hangs heavy and is palpable in the air as she floats about. Her psyche is shattered completely. She lost her best friend, lover and partner forever. Rachel could see an image of a cheetah running past her and thinking it is Gar she speeds after it **** to catch him. As it and Rachel rounds a corner inside her mind she comes across a body being held by Super Boy. “Please god no” she whispered in horror as she realizes the charred body is her mate…Gar. Unable to fight the tears she wraps herself in her shadow and loses herself. Time passes and after what seems forever she emerges a ghost of her former self. “What do I do now?” she says as she unfolds herself into reality. As she opens her eyes into what she suspects is her apartment she stretches “Something isn’t right” She says as she reaches out with her mind to find her Titan partners. She was not only unable to find Starfire, Cyborg nor Nightwing but it felt like they didn’t exist. As Rachel looks about and wonders where she is. This world was almost the same as the one she hailed from. Thinking about where Gar passed she rocketed into the sky and flew as fast as she could to what she knew as Metropolis. Landing on the outskirts she looks at the sign she thinks confused [What is a New York, where is Metropolis?] Rachel suddenly felt a pulling sensation in her mind. Following it she flew into the city, found an alley and donned an illusion to hid her identity. As she walked an unknown city in an unknown dimension she followed it to an apartment. Knocking on the door finally she is greeted by the last person she ever expected to see“J-Jinx, what are you doing here?”

“That is a long story and here my name is Nicole Diaz, NOT Jinx so shut it!” Nicole says as she pulls Rachel into the apartment and looks around before shutting the door. “I ask you again, how and why are you here in this weird place?” Rachel asks as her emotions rapidly spiral out of control. “You need to calm down or you will burn this place down.” Nicole says to Rachel as she yells towards the back of the apartment “Hey Toni get out here, you will never believe who showed up.” A few movements later Rachel’s jaw dropped as an old friend strolls out of a room wiping the sleep out of her eyes and stretching. “Argent, is that you? Ok WHAT the hell is going on” Argent hearing Rachel’s voice spins on a dime and asks surprised what and how is here. Rachel flashing to Gar’s **** hangs her head and explains everything, while she is doing the room steadily dropping in temperature and causing icicles to form in the sink. “Rachel you need to calm down” Nicole says as her teeth chatters. “I have never seen you lose control this much” Toni says as she grasps Rachel’s hand.

“Gar Died” Rachel says between sobs as she feels the pain, the hurt. “Gar died and to make it worse I never got the chance to bury him.” Both Tony and Nicole are stunned. They knew of Rachel and Gar’s relationship and it inspired them in the past. Toni rushes to her room to grab a blanket while Nicole lowers Rachel to the couch. Toni comes back, drapes the blanket over the three of them and hold Rachel while she cries. Later that evening Rachel wakes from an emotion induced sleep and notices Nicole relaxing watching TV and Toni preparing dinner for the 3 of them. “How did you guys get here and how are you surviving? This world seems to lack magic” Nicole looks at the celling and sighs “We don’t know. We were both sleeping and when we woke we were here in this apartment. We survive by using our powers” she says mumbling the last bit. “You are doing WHAT?????” Rachel hisses glaring at the two of them. “Good and Evil doesn’t exist here like it does in our world. There are varying degrees of grey and rather submitting to my baser instincts and previous life I manipulate here and there to make enough money to keep us afloat and happy but not so much to draw attention. I’d rather do that than try and be normal and get caught. No telling what the authorities here would do to metahumans like us.” Rachel seeing the logic in this considers what she could do with her new life. While the options are vast but she thinks to her personality and skillset. [You are a really good listener and could use skills to help people who are as emotional imbalanced as you are/was/will be/can be. Over the course of time she finds her path and the journey begins.