Stardust opened her apartment door quietly, expecting her mother to be asleep at this hour, but was surprised to see her awake and sitting at the kitchen table.

"Mom, what are you doing up so late?" she said, closing the door quietly to avoid waking anyone else in the thin walled, four-story building.

"I wish to apologize," Kory said. "For the disagreement we had earlier."

"Oh yeah... that." Stardust took a deep breath. "I'm sorry too. Can we forget about it?"

"Yes, let us imagine it never happened," her mother said joyfully. She still spoke the same way she had when she was a teenager, but her voice was womanly and much more mature.

"Awesome," Stardust said, smiling. Then she cleared her throat and sat on the edge of the table. "I've gotta tell you something, so don't get mad at me, okay?"

"I will not be angry at you."

Stardust looked at her fingernails. "I know you told me to never use my powers unless it was an emergency, but tonight I had to. This robotical thing came right out of the ground and was attacking me, and I didn't know what else to do. I couldn't run away- well, I could have, but it would have just followed me back here. So I fought."

Kory smiled softly. "Stardust, your powers are a gift that do not need to be handled shamefully. I only requested holding them back so other students at your place of schooling would not look at you any differently than anyone else. When you have to use your powers, you just have to. Sometimes there is no getting around it."

"I know. But when I used them tonight I kinda felt like I was disobeying you- like I was doing something wrong."

Kory looked crushed and angry at herself. She reached out a hand and took Stardust's. "I am sorry for making you feel that way. Please, from now on use your powers for good when you feel the need to, not when you believe I would want you to." Now she smiled. "I have seen you in training, and you handle your emotions well. I feel you no longer need my guidance. I have trained you well enough."

Stardust smiled too. "That's true. I couldn't have had a better teacher."

Kory opened her arms. "I wish for an embrace!"

Stardust laughed, and they hugged. Kory's history for hugging people too hard had not really ended, but since they both had super strength, they crushed each other in a loving way.

Stardust pulled back from the hug and brushed her long hair back with her hand. "There's something else. Well, not really that big of a deal, but I guess it's something."

"What is it?"

"I met someone before I fought with the robot."

"You have made a friend?"

"Maybe, I don't know. They didn't stay around for long- he didn't stay for long."

Kory's eyes softened. "You have met a boy?"

Stardust shrugged and blushed. "I don't really know him."

"What is his name? What does he look like?"

"His name's Rorek. He's a little taller than me, and he's got long hair, and he wears armor. He has super powers. And he talks with a British accent."

"Is he handsome?" Stardust blushed harder. "Yeah."

Kory leaned forward in her chair and put a thin finger to her chin. "He seems to be familiar in some way. But I cannot place it."

Stardust swallowed hard. "I probably won't see him again. But anyway, I'm gonna go on to bed. It's late."

"Yes. I wish you a good night."

"Night."

Stardust went to her small bedroom and changed clothes. School had just started back a few weeks ago, so she had plenty of new outfits to choose from for the next day. As she sorted through them, she came across one she had never worn before, though she had known it was there. It was a Tamaranian uniform, though unlike most of the people's on the planet, hers was a light blue instead of purple. She had seen her mother's before, the one she had worn when she had been part of the Teen Titans years ago. Stardust's was a lot the same, but the armor covered most of her arms except her elbows, and most of her hands except her fingers, her neckplate was different, and much more of her skin was covered. But the skirt and the boots were the same, only blue. She sighed and threw it all back in the closet. She didn't even know why she had the uniform, but suddenly found herself dying to wear it. But she just closed the closet door and fell into bed, and as she laid there she also found herself thinking about Rorek and his sharp blue eyes. She pulled the covers over her head.

The next morning came in a couple of hours. The alarm clock almost split Stardust's ears, and she reached over and slammed a fist on the clock, smashing it to bits and rocking the nighttable. She peeked from under the covers and sighed. Her bad.

"Stardust, I am leaving for my job now," Kory said from the other side of the door. "Please do not be late for your schooling."

"Yeah, I'm going. Bye, Mom."

"Good-bye."

Stardust got out of bed and changed clothes in the bathroom, ate breakfast, brushed her teeth, and grabbed her heavy backpack. She heard the bus already outside, and she locked the door and went out to catch it before it left without her. She could just very well fly to school and beat the bus there with time to spare, but she still wanted to seem as normal as possible, so that's why she took the bus. She sat down in a seat by herself, as usual, and fell asleep quickly. The bus seemed to stop two seconds later, so she dragged herself into the school.

Everything she did at school she did alone. Unfortunately, she had no friends, which remained a mystery to Kory. Stardust was friendly and likeable, but the other students seemed to sense something different about her. She couldn't just say, 'Hi, I'm half-alien and I have super powers'. It just wouldn't work that way, so Stardust found it best to hide it all.

By the end of the day, she was so tired she was about to drop. She carried her backpack on one shoulder, oblivious to everything, until the halls were so crowded there wasn't space to breathe, and countless people ran into her. She tried to ignore them, but it was nearly impossible, so she just kept walking. A few minutes later the halls cleared out some, and she let herself relax a little. Suddenly she thought of Rorek again. Where did he stay on these cool, windy nights? And where was he now?

Someone's shoulder hit hers hard, purposefully. Her backpack fell off and hit the floor.

"Watch where you're going," the girl that ran into her growled. Courtney was her name, and she was tall and big-boned, almost muscley. Not out of proportion for a girl, but she was definitely someone that nobody messed with. Stardust ignored her and reached down for her backpack, but the girl kicked it across the hall and crossed her arms.

Stardust tried to keep herself calm, but she hadn't slept the night before and she was not in a good mood today. She jumped forward and grabbed Courtney's shirt, lifting her off the ground and slamming her into the wall. Stardust's eyes glowed purple and she pulled back a deadly fist, then noticed the terrified look on the other girl's face. She threw her to the ground and glared down at her. "Do you have a problem?"

The entire hall was silent. All of the kids were frozen, staring at her with frightened expressions. Stardust knew her glowing eyes must have been the thing that scared them, or her effortless lifting of the other girl with one hand. Probably both. She turned to them. "What's wrong with you? Didn't expect me to defend myself, did you?" She pointed a finger at Courtney. "And if you have a problem, you can meet me off campus. How about it?" Courtney shook her head quickly. "Didn't think so." Stardust's eyes turned back to normal and she flipped her black hair over her shoulder, then picked up her backpack and walked out of the school without another word.

She didn't want to take the bus, so she walked home, throwing her backpack inside, then left again. When she was in the woods, she went back to the spot where she had met Rorek the night before. The ground was torn to pieces and the nearby trees were black and some split in half. She sat down pulled her knees to her chest.

"Something troubles you, love?" Rorek. Her head snapped up almost joyfully and she saw him sitting on a tree branch a few yards up.

"Rorek! I- I didn't see you. Uh, where have you been?"

"Different places since last night. I was hoping you would come back here."

"Oh." She was dumbfounded. But she guessed a lot of girls were around Rorek. "Well, I had school today, so I would have come earlier, but I really couldn't."

"It's quite all right." He jumped down from the tree, and she got a better look at him. His hair was almost white, though she didn't know how, and his eyes were a much prettier blue than she had thought last night, and he was wearing armor, and he had a long scarf around his neck, and she thought he smiled but she couldn't really tell because of the muffler covering his mouth and nose.

"I wished we could have talked more last night," she stuttered. "But it was late, you know."

"Since I'm not from around here, perhaps you could show me around your town?" he suggested politely.

"Sure. Come with me." She showed him around nervously, but he seemed pretty calm as he toured the city. When they got to the bridge, she took his wrist and flew to the highest beam she saw, and they both sat down.

"This is quite a view," he said, looking out over the water.

"Yeah. Sometimes I come here at night, and all the city lights reflect on the water- it's really beautiful."

"I would imagine so."

Stardust sighed. For some reason she felt like she could just spill her heart to him. "I had a problem in school today. Her name's Courtney, and I got overly angry and made the mistake of letting everyone know I have super powers. Who knows if I'll go back to school again."

"Why not?"

"People will think I'm a freak. And I'm not a freak, I'm just different."

"That's true." He shifted his weight and turned to look at her. "Do you mind telling me why you have powers?"

Stardust looked away. "My mother. She's from a planet called Tamaran. Or in other words, it's alien powers."

"Is your father from that planet also?"

"No, he's completely human. I'm surprised I inherited as much power as I did from my mother. Starbolts, eye beams, flight, and super strength- the whole nine yards, you could say. But they're not always so easy to control. They're driven by emotion, so I need to be careful of what I feel so I don't blow things up or stuff like that."

"You seem to be doing a good job, as far as I have seen." He reached out, his fingertips touching her arm. She blushed and smiled, then opened her mouth to speak, but the bridge suddenly shook violently, causing them both to lose their balance, but Stardust used her power of flight to stop herself from falling, and she caught Rorek by the arm on the way down.

"What was that?" she exclaimed, then the bridge literally split in two. She gasped as she saw an awful-looking sea monster emerge from the water. Each of its teeth had to be as long as two people. Civilians screamed below, but luckily there hadn't been many cars on the bridge at the time.

"I guess we should take it upon ourselves to stop this creature?" Rorek suggested, clutching Stardust's wrist tightly.

"I guess so." She kept her grip on Rorek and flew down towards the monster. "You keep that thing busy and I'll try to save the bridge." She dropped him near the monster and flew under the bridge, which was just moments away from hitting the water. She placed her hands on it and started pushing upwards while flying. The bridge moaned as its weight fought Stardust's strength, but she was far from giving up now. She growled as she kept pushing, and when she opened her eyes she saw that Rorek had already defeated the monster and was on his way up to help her. She pushed with all her might, and the bridge finally evened out, and Rorek soldered it together with his powers. She flew up beside him and grinned. "Good job."

"Thank you." They left the bridge and went to solid ground. Then they were blinded by a camera flash, and Stardust was horrifed to see news reporters surrounding them.

"We thought the Teen Titans were long gone," a woman said into her microphone, "but it seems we have new heroes in our city." She turned from the camera to Stardust and Rorek. "Anything you kids would like to say?"

"Um..." Stardust stammered. She looked at Rorek, but he offered no verbal help. "It's uh, all in a day's work I guess."

"Have you sworn to protect the city and the civilians within?"

Stardust narrowed her eyes and looked into the camera, allowing herself to smile slightly. "I haven't before, but now I do. Either on a team or by myself, I'll do whatever I can to keep this city safe. I've noticed that, no offense, but the PD is not enough. This city needs something more, just like it used to have years ago. This city needs the Teen Titans. And so just to let everybody know, I am Starfire's daughter, Stardust. And I will protect the city, as much as I can. The Teen Titans should not just disappear. You need them. But the best I can give you is, well, the next generation of Titans. Me."