That night Starfire had the same recurring dream. The dream was of her homeworld. Tamaran. Not as the way she knew it, but as a wasteland. Barren of life. Destroyed by the armies of a galaxy combined to stop the dreams of a madman. Destroyed because of one man's ambition. Destroyed by the weakness of the one person who should have protected it. The Earth came into view, only it was not as it was now. It was also barren. A vast wasteland of death brought upon it because of the part it played in one man's plan to control all things sentient. Her friends came into the dream, as ghosts. Standing in the destroyed Titan's Tower near the skeletons that must be their remains. They looked at her, but on their faces was not a look of anger. Or disappointment. The long dead ghosts looked at her with the look of Hope and spoke "You can save us Starfire". Starfire woke with a start. She was covered with sweat remembering the dream. "That will not come to pass." she said to herself.

After Slade left once again Starfire got up. She suspected Slade had been drugging her food to promote her sleeping during his absence, so she had been going without eating. Her ears and back felt much better. She suspected that Slade and the doctor had made their estimates of her recovery compared to a human. For Tamaranians fighting was a common thing, so their bodies recovered quickly. She left the bandage and earplugs in place though, so Slade would not speed up his plans, as she needed time to think.

Starfire spent the following day in the hangar and the armory again. She was not a technical genius like Cyborg, but she had learned many things while being held captive in the events leading to her time on Earth (and joining the Titans). Plus, all the time she had spent watching Cyborg build things had not been wasted. Starfire, if anything, was an attentive watcher and listener. Once Cyborg even pulled her aside and showed her how to fix the T-Ship. She was the only Titan who could survive in the vacuum of space, so training her how to fix the ship seemed only natural and could possibly save their lives. Cyborg had also showed her how to arm and reload the ship's weapon systems in case the automatic missile launchers jam (he had installed more weapons in the ship after their several trips to space). Plus she had learned how to deactivate space mines after her encounter with them while the Titans worked with Val-Yor. Starfire saw the clear outlines of the Titan's ship in the one Slade now owned, it was obviously designed from one the older versions, long before Cyborg had made most of the modifications to the current model the Titans used.

At first Starfire thought about trying to disable the ship Slade would use to travel to her homeworld, but she knew that it would be fixed quickly, and that her tampering would be evident. She went inside the ship to examine it. Inside was mostly storage space, it takes a lot of supplies to travel in the vastness of space. She examined the cockpit, the instrument panels looked similar to Cyborg's design. She sat in one of the seats for a moment, it was well designed, intending to keep an occupant comfortable for long periods of time at high gravities, with double seatbelts (chris-crossing across the chest) to keep the occupant safely in place. She sat for a moment looking around the small compartment. In the back of the cockpit compartment fastened to the wall was a pair of space suits. They were secured to the wall with several straps, unmoved by even the worst turbulence. She shook them slightly and they didn't move. She noticed that he had even prepared a suit for her (probably out of instinct since all humans needed one). She felt the material on the suit. Such a flimsy material to depend on to save a human life in the vacuum of space, and neither of the suits had any apparent means of propulsion. The occupant was intended to just float in space or use the magnetic feet to walk on the surface of the ship. There were rocket boosters that could be attached to the suits, but they were stored in a compartment over where the suits were. Starfire left the ship and then hanger area. She had seen all she needed to see.

Slade was having another long day. This time he was at one of the manufacturing plants that made the robots he so often used for security and his offensive operations. After watching these robots get destroyed with single hits time and again he had decided to take a personal hand in their design and testing. He did not want his conquest plans slowed by inferior design in his support troops. It had taken him all day, but he finally got the design improved and the factory refitted. He returned to the base where he kept Starfire. He took the elevator down to the control room and looked at his screens. Starfire was in her room lying on her bed. She was not asleep, but neither was the television or radio on, or any other kind of entertainment. She was apparently content to stare at the ceiling. Slade reviewed the memory of some of the cameras he had in various locations within the base. After a few moments he saw his apprentice had spent the day exploring various locations of the base. He then spent the next hour watching as she went around the base, down to the hanger and even inside the ship. But, he saw that she did no harm, so all that interested him was the fact that she was apparently well. Their departure could be moved up. He glanced up, she was still awake so he went to her room and knocked quietly. When she answered, he opened the door and spoke to her: "Pack whatever personals you need in one bag, we are leaving tomorrow afternoon" he closed the door to the surprised look on her face. He went to his sleeping quarters after that, this had, after all, been a very long day. Slade had to rest up for tomorrow he had a lot to accomplish before lunch, for his afternoon would not be spent on earth.

Starfire waited a few hours after Slade had gave her the information. She had been laying there since coming back from the hanger. She had been lost in thought once again, remembering the legends from her childhood. Remembering the stories, the statues, the pride in Galfore's voice as he told her about how real heroes acted. The love a hero has for his people, the courage a hero has in the face of his enemy. The sacrifices a hero is prepared to make, to save those they love. She thought of her friends, and she did love them. The Teen Titans. They had rescued her and brought her into their home when she was a stranger. She owed them so much. She was ready to repay her debt to her friends in any way she could. She would repay her debt to Slade as well. Slade telling her about their early departure left her with few options and little time. She would be panicked if she hadn't heard the weariness in Slade's voice when told her. So, she had waited for Slade to fall asleep before she acted. Even with his advanced constitution he was only human. Even Slade needed to sleep. She went to the control room and inspected the screens confirming Slade was nowhere on the base where a camera covers (of course there was no cameras in his room). With haste she ran to the armory and after a little searching found what she needed. She had spied it the other day while touring the base. She had hoped to come up with a better plan, but this device would have to do. With little effort she pried the outer shell apart and pulled out the guts. With a little effort she got the core of the device to fit into her bag. She then put the shell back together so it would not look tampered with. She carried her bag toward the ship, it was heavy though, and so was her heart. "This should cover my debt to Slade" she though somberly and she took it to the ship, placing it in the locker inside the ship that had been assigned as hers.

Starfire then went back to the control room. She knew about the security cameras, even the one in her room (Slade had not put on in the bathroom or the area near her closet where she would probably change. Just covering her sleeping area, which could be seen as a security precaution or to ensure she was safe). Starfire was not an expert with computers, but being raised on a technologically advanced planet (compared to the Earth) meant she had used computers like a human student used books in school. Also, her time with the Titans had taught her a lot about how security systems worked. With a little trial and error she found where the cameras stored their video. She erased the last hour of work she had done in the armory and hangar, and after she cut and paste, it seemed as if she had never left her room. The video was not perfect, seemed to skip a few times, and the clock was off, but she hoped Slade would be too busy tomorrow to inspect the security data too closely. Starfire then went back to her room. She could sleep now that she knew her friends, and even Tamaran itself would be safe.

(Rewind to the morning of the same day again)

Cyborg was ecstatic. He had spent all night working and his work had finally paid off. It was on days like this when he was glad he was only half human, he could brush off sleep and he was not physically affected like his teammates. He has spent the entire night trying to reactivate any of the spy devices he had left in Slade's current base. They had all been systematically tracked down and disabled, but Cyborg's final phases of bugs were built with many more backup systems than before. To make these new bugs he had resorted to alien technologies. Some of this technology came from a few items Starfire had kept in her room to communicate with her homeworld. Of these new types, five had been placed in the base Slade was currently at. Of these, he had only been able to get any type of signal from two. He slowly tried to coax them back to live after weeks of inactivity. Spent hours typing into his keyboard furiously, and eventually hooking up himself to the computer directly to hasten the process. One of the bugs died outright after he tried to get it to reboot. The other accepted his command weakly and with some hesitation restarted. The first image he got from it was of the monitors of the security center. He couldn't believe his luck. With this the Titans could monitor his entire base. Cyborg remembered placing this one himself and smiled. It's coloring exactly matched the wall it was on, and it's frequency was one meant for deep space communication (meaning it was not on any frequency humans used, and almost certainly wouldn't be detected).

He had called in the other Titans and they all were thrilled to be able to see Starfire, even remotely. They took turns monitoring her while continuing to try and find a way to free her. If they can't do that, at least prevent their departure to her homeworld or prevent Slade from reaching it.

Raven, meanwhile, was still immersed in the literature from Starfire's room. She had been forced to learn some basics of the Tamaran language in order to translate many of the text, but now she could read more of the books. She believed somewhere in these many books she could find the key releasing their friend, but it was getting hard to be confident when she was looking for what seemed like a needle in a field of haystacks. When Robin came in she was reading one of the books that looked like it was meant for a young reader. When asked, Raven explained that many of the strongest beliefs a person has is instilled on them at a very young age. Robin silently agreed and left her to her reading.

Cyborg had Beastboy helping him build a new type of drilling projectile meant specifically for boring holes into the hull of a ship without causing any damage to the ship itself. The device was so complex that you had to install all the components after you built the shell, which is why Beastboy was needed to crawl inside with the parts and assemble them inside. Cyborg was giving him detailed instructions through a camera and making specialized tools.

Robin was kept an eye on Starfire. He watched her explore the base thru the monitors in the security room. Robin panicked when Slade told Starfire about their early departure. He immediately called the Titans to a meeting. It was crunch time. One way or another they had to stop this departure. By the time the meeting was over and Robin returned to his post watching Starfire she was exploring the base. He watched as she went down to the hangar and explored the ship. When she went to the armory he called Cyborg over.

"Cyborg, what is she doing?" Robin asked

"It looks like she's tampering with an anti-matter space mine"

"Is that dangerous?"

"Nah. "Cyborg replied "Anti-matter is so dangerous there are a lot of fail safes built in. One of them is, no anti-matter device will detonate while in any type of atmosphere. No matter how thin the air. This is to prevent accidental genocide or the destruction of spaceships"

"You think she knows about those safeguards?"

"Sure, I was showing her more effective ways to disarm mines after Val-Yor, she caught right on."

"So why is she putting it inside a locker inside the ship? Wouldn't it be harmless unless it was outside the ship in the vacuum of space?" Robin asked

"Yeah, unless you could bring the vacuum inside the ship." Cyborg said half jokingly. Then stopped. Robin was staring at him.

"We can't let them leave the atmosphere" Robin said.