Hurray for reviews!

Hotshot, samanthe - Thank you both for your continued support. It means a lot to me.

StarSoSweet - Life threatening illnesses change the way people feel all the time, why would Blackfire be any different? As for the bizarreness, well, everyone grows and changes. A white cloaked Raven, meat eating Beast Boy, and fish eating Aqualad are just one way in which they could grow.

Pyro - Nah, I'm not the best. I've seen some other pretty good stuff on here.

Lupine - I'm glad you like it. I've started on a third story but it's a little difficult writing, so it might be a bit delayed (sorry, everyone!). Anyway, hope you like Ch7.

Important Definitions: port is left, starboard is right, dorsal is top, ventral is bottom. Remember these, there will be a quiz on them next chapter. That said, I don't own the titans.
Chapter Seven: Life On A Timeline

The viewscreen on the bridge was again replaced with a computer generated model, this time of the Tamaranian solar system. Titan One was approaching Tamaran from the inside, using the Tamaranian sun to hide behind until the very last minute. They would also be able to utilize the sun for a small gravity slingshot to increase their speed and make them a harder target.

So was the plan before the klaxon went off on the bridge. Aqualad startled and looked back towards Terra. She was staring at her screen with wide eyes. She called her display to the main screen. It indicated the mass of the Tamaranian sun discharging a wide sweeping band of radiation. She could only whisper what it meant. "It's a solar flare."

Aqualad tapped a button on his chair. "General quarters. Raven, shields up."

Raven's hands flew over her console. "They're up, but they were built for weapons and mild radiation. They won't help us much against something that big."

Aqualad opened a communication link to the engine room. "Cyborg, give us everything you have, we need to outrun this flare." He then looked up. "Speedy, get us back the way we came."

Speedy turned the ship in a quick arc, and then gunned the engines, making a cut to starboard in an attempt to outflank the flare on the side. For a moment as the ship accelerated, everyone relaxed. But they were quickly jarred by an impact as the flare hit, striking the ship. Aqualad looked around, almost every console had shot flares and some ventilation tubing had broken from the ceiling. "Damage report!"

Terra replied immediately. "Reading damage in the engine bay. We were struck near the starboard engine."

Cyborg beat Aqualad to the communication grid. "Three of the four engines are still reading one hundred percent. The starboard engine took the brunt of the hit and is no joy. I can fix it though, but it'll take some time. Twelve hours, minimum."

Aqualad leaned back in his chair and exhaled. He was almost relaxed when Robin's frantic voice came through the speakers. "Cryonic systems are failing. Cyborg, Blackfire, get down here and help me!"

Cyborg left the engine bay immediately. He was closest to Robin but Blackfire could fly. Still, Cyborg made it there just a few seconds before Blackfire and was already helping Robin as he desperately tried to stabilize the controls. Blackfire looked at a nearby screen and saw what was happening. The flare had damaged the temperature feedback coil of the chamber. It was reading the temperature as being too low and was trying to raise it by venting the cryogenic gasses.

Cyborg crawled underneath the chamber, trying to manually tie off the vent lines. He pounded on the rime that had crusted around the valves with a wrench. The ice broke away in chunks until he was finally able to get the wrench around the valve and start twisting. Above him, he heard a klaxon sound.

Robin cursed. "The gas pressure is too low, the system is going to revive her." He screamed and kicked the side of the chamber. "We're too late."

Cyborg slid out from under the chamber. "Don't worry, we've still got twenty one hours." He turned to Blackfire. "You might want to get out of here so you don't catch what she has."

Blackfire shook her head and walked over to the chamber as the lid lifted. "We're sisters and I'm going to stay with her no matter what."

A low moan came from the inside of the chamber and Starfire pulled herself up. She still grasped her chest painfully and leaned forward. "Love Robin, friend Cyborg, and…sister?"

Blackfire wrapped her arms around Starfire, ignoring the struggles and shouts that she would become ill. "Yes, sister, it's me. I'm here for you." Slowly, Starfire stopped struggling and hugged Blackfire. They both sat there for a while, crying.

Starfire pulled away a little. "Komand'r, you have broken out of prison just to come to help me? That is most foolish, sister." She looked down. "But it means very much."

Robin arched a masked eyebrow. "Wait a minute. Komand'r?"

Blackfire tousled her sister's hair. "Yes, that is my name. Just like Koriand'r is translated as Starfire in your language, Komand'r is translated as Blackfire."

She took her sister's hands into hers and leaned down to her level to look her square in the eye. "You're the only sister I've got. I just didn't want anything to happen to you and have you think that I don't love and care for you. Starfire, I'm so sorry."

Starfire hugged her sister again, allowing Blackfire to lift her from the chamber. "Oh, sister, I have already forgiven you."

Cyborg hadn't been kidding on his time estimate. It had been twelve hours and he was still hung up on the engines. Robin was starting to slowly come undone but spent his time with Starfire, who had taken over one of the beds in the crew quarters. The countdown timer he had programmed into the ship's systems had just passed the nine hour mark.

Speedy had moved the ship from behind the Tamaranian sun and hid it behind the seventh planet, a gas giant known as Barrean. The massive gravity well of the gas giant would be suitable for the slingshot jump into Tamaran. The ship, with one engine damaged, listed horribly during flight due to the unequal thrust. He had to shut down the port engine to stabilize the ship during flight. This meant the ship lost speed, valuable speed that they would need against the Gordanians.

He was listening to Blackfire, who was sitting at Cyborg's abandoned booster console, explaining the strengths of the Gordanian blockade. She tried to recall everything that would be helpful for them. "Honestly, their weapons aren't the best, but they make up for it with numbers and shields. They have more ships surrounding Tamaran that I've ever seen in one place at a time, and nothing the Tamaranian military has been able to fire at them has made a scratch on the ships." She sighed sadly. "The only real weakness is that one ship serves as a control junction for all the other ships. Disable that ship, you knock out their entire fleet. That's the only way we've been able to defeat them in the past, but you have to find one ship in a thousand. It's going to take a stroke of luck for us to get through."

Speedy leaned against the back of his chair in thought before hearing a haughty voice from his side, the haughty voice which he knew and loved. His pink haired witch spoke up, her hands and eyes glowing pink. "Maybe we don't need luck, maybe they just need bad luck."

Blackfire, unfamiliar with Jinx, looked confused. "What do you mean?"

Jinx smiled and stood up, walking over to Speedy and pulling an arrow, seemingly at random, from his quiver. She checked it and held it out to him. "Net arrow?" Speedy nodded. Her hands glowed again and the pink hex engulfed the arrow, which promptly broke at the shaft before the netting discharged, covering Blackfire and knocking her back.

Blackfire smiled, extricating her from the netting. "Hey, that might work."

Speedy turned around in his chair. "Oh no, no way. First, there's no way Jinx could hit any ships from inside without destroying our ship."

Jinx shook her head. "We have magnetic boots, I could stand on the hull of the ship."

Speedy paled, searching for some reason. "Your hexes would damage your suit gloves."

"I cast a counter hex on my suit before we left on this mission. Just in case I had to do anything while I was in my suit."

"Fine, I don't want you to do it."

Jinx regarded him quietly, her eyes narrowed and glowing pink. "It's not your decision to make."

Aqualad spoke from the doorway to the command deck, effectively saving Speedy. "She has a point." He took his command chair and sighed. "Terra's scans of the Gordanian fleet show that we probably won't be able to disable their shields with our weapons. We're going to need her out there, and Blackfire, too."

Blackfire nodded. "I was planning on it."

The plan was settled long before the engine repairs were completed. It had taken Cyborg fifteen hours, leaving Starfire with six hours remaining. Now the titans had taken their places on the command deck, the only notable absence being Jinx's empty console. Having made it to the Tamaranian solar system, stellar cartography wasn't exactly a high priority, especially when she was the best offensive weapon the titans had to break the blockade.

She was in the crew quarters, securing her suit and magnetic boots in preparation for her duties outside the ship. She had been icy to Speedy for the last few hours, still miffed at his comment. He had no right to make decisions for her, she knew the risks and it was her choice. She leaned back in her chair, her helmet on the table in front of her. Had she paid attention, she would have seen the reflection of a masked figure in her helmet's visor walk up behind her, but she only felt it when he placed his hands on her shoulders and started rubbing softly.

Jinx melted under the backrub. "This doesn't make things better for you."

Speedy shrugged. "I don't want it to. It may not be my decision, but that doesn't mean that I won't fight like mad to keep you safe. I don't have many nice things, so I don't want to lose the ones that I do." He leaned in and kissed the top of her head.

She sighed. "I can't stay angry at you. Not that I was." She stood up as he finished the impromptu massage and put her hair back in a ponytail. "I think it's about time we get started."

Speedy reached behind her to the table and grabbed her helmet. He leaned in and kissed her softly for a long moment before placing the helmet over her head. He could hear, through the helmet, her suit voice running through diagnostics. She looked up into his eyes and mouthed three words to him. "Keep me safe."