The next morning …
After performing his morning meditations and grooming himself, Spock checked the program he left running on the Titans' mainframe. It was still running and appeared to be on schedule to complete by tomorrow morning. Spock could have sped up the process by using more cores on the mainframe, but concluded that Cyborg might notice that and for the time being he preferred that the Titans not be aware of his research.
He headed out to the common room. Almost a month had passed since he arrived and he found himself becoming accustomed to sharing a roof with his distant ancestors. And even if Starfire turned out to not be a true ancestor, being able to meet and study an actual Tamaranian, who in his own time frame were an extinct race, was intellectually stimulating.
The sliding door opened and Spock entered the room. It was precisely 7:23 AM, the same time he always arrived in the room. As expected, Robin and Starfire were training in the gym, Raven was in her room meditating, Cyborg still in his charging station and Beast Boy was sitting on the couch, running a crude simulation on a primitive computer he called a "GameStation".
Without looking back Gar shouted. "Vegan breakfast is in the frying pan on the stove"
Beast Boy would always make enough breakfast for the two of them, as he was delighted to have another vegetarian in the house. The only two things that varied each morning were what he would make (today it was scrambled tofu eggs, tofu bacon, and hash browns). Spock pondered on why vegetarian humans would recreate non vegetarian food with vegetarian ingredients. It was illogical.
The other thing that would change every morning was which simulation Garfield would run on the computer. Today it was a simulation that involved non realistic monkeys. Spock thanked Garfield for preparing the meal, and served himself breakfast. As he ate he watched the changeling interact with simulation, which was mostly chaotic, unrealistic and somewhat inane. The Kobayashi Maru simulator it was not.
Spock finished his meal and placed his dish and cutlery in the dishwasher, and as he always did every morning he began to head back to his room.
"Mr. Spock?"
The Vulcan stopped and turned around. "Yes, Mr. Logan?"
Gar chuckled. "I already told you that Mr. Logan is my dad's name. Just call me Gar."
"Yes, Gar. What can I do for you?"
Gar picked up the other game controller and waved it at him. "Wanna play?"
"If by 'play' you mean if I wish to join you in interacting with your simulator, the answer is no."
"What?"
"I do not wish to 'play' with your GameStation."
"Why not?"
"It seems to be pointless waste of time."
"It's not a waste of time …. dude … don't you Vulcans like to have fun?"
"I find satisfaction in intellectually stimulating activities."
Gar snickered. "Rave used to say stuff like that, until I taught her how to have fun."
Spock arched an eyebrow. "And I presume that you believe that you can teach me how to have 'fun', correct?"
"I know I can teach you." He waved the spare controller at the Vulcan. "Sit down and I'll show how to play the game."
About 30 minutes later …
Raven had completed her morning meditation and as she did every morning she was heading to the common room to prepare her own breakfast. As the doors opened she heard her boyfriend's agitated voice.
"I didn't know it was possible to get a score that high. Dude! I just taught you how to play! How did you do it?"
Raven surveyed the scene on the couch. Spock looked as dispassionate as ever, while Gar looked utterly agitated.
"It is quite simple. I analyzed the attack patterns the monkeys utilize and created effective counter measures based on the probability of which pattern they are most likely to use in a given scenario. Whoever programmed this simulation did not create good algorithms."
Gar stopped playing. "You mean you used math to beat the monkeys?"
"Effectively, yes."
Gar dropped his controller and leaned his head back. "Dude! You just ruined fun!"
Raven burst out laughing. Gar turned and glared at her.
"It's not funny, Rave!"
Still laughing, she replied. "Oh, it's very funny."
"Didn't you hear what I said? He ruined fun!"
"No, he only ruined Mega Monkeys, which is fine with me. You spend too much time playing video games. It rots your brain."
"Too much time? What am I supposed to do with my spare time?"
Raven crossed her arms, her mirthful expression now gone. "Well, you could enroll in that online degree program in zoology I've been suggesting over and over to you."
"You really want me to go to school? I thought you loved me."
"Miss Raven is correct. A baccalaureate degree in zoology would help you be a better changeling. An advanced degree would be even better."
She turned to the Vulcan. "A very logical assertion, Mr. Spock."
"Of course, I would never suggest something illogical."
Gar sighed. In his mind he could hear Starfire's first comment about Vulcans: "They are the strange."
At the moment the other 3 Titans entered the room, with Robin leading the way.
"Good, the two of you look recovered. Now that we're all together we need to talk about what happened yesterday. It's very obvious that ..."
Cyborg shoved Robin aside as he pointed at the screen, which announced that Spock was the winner with a score of 10,648,123. The tin man became slack jawed before recovering his composure.
"Spock, did you really break the 10 million point mark? My best score is only 6 million."
"I did not engage in any subterfuge, if that is what you are asking."
"But that isn't possible. How did you score that many points?"
"It was quite simple. I discovered that if you destroy two of the 'bosses' with a single shot, you get a 1 million point bonus."
"But that isn't possible. Believe me, I've tried."
"Actually, it is quite easy. All you have to do is ..."
"No, don't tell me. I want to figure it out on my own!"
Robin, who looked mildly cross, cleared his throat. "Can we get back to the mission?"
Cyborg murmured his apology. Robin motioned to everyone to take a seat at the table.
"We were caught off guard by Plasmus and Cinderblock. As we have long known they aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer, they rely far more on brute strength than strategy or tactics. Except that wasn't the case yesterday."
Robin tapped on a datapad and a hologram appeared on the table, showing a portion of the fight on a repeating loop.
"Slade was controlling them." Gar interjected.
"Yes, it's pretty obvious." Raven added.
Robin crossed his arms. "Slade doesn't like to work with other villains, but he has done it before."
"Which means Terra might be back." Raven growled. Spock recalled learning about Terra in his mind meld with the changeling.
"I take that this Terra is an adversary." Spock remarked.
"Was, she redeemed herself." Robin replied.
"That was a long time ago, we shouldn't assume that's still true. I still haven't forgotten that she tried to drown me."
"She tried to kill all of us. It's possible that Terra could be in league with Slade again. We'll keep an eye out for her. Titans, yesterday's mission shows that Slade is actually targeting us, and he lured us into a trap. We won't let that happen again. I'm preparing a strategy so this won't happen. We'll meet after lunch to review it. The rest of the morning is free time."
Robin got up and left with Starfire. Cyborg followed them out, saying he would be working on the T-Car. Before Raven and Gar could leave, Spock cleared his throat.
"Could you tell me more about this Terra that Robin mentioned?"
"She's a traitor." Raven said with a hint of tension in her voice.
"So, she used to be a Teen Titan?"
"She was a plant, a liar and a spy for Slade. She was never one of us." Raven snapped.
"Does she have any special abilities?"
"She can manipulate earth and rocks using only her will power. She's also a highly skilled martial artist, trained by Slade."
Spock nodded and looked at Gar. "She used to be a romantic interest of yours, correct?"
Spock noticed that Raven slightly tensed up, while the changeling hemmed and hawed.
"Not exactly." Raven replied. "She only pretended to be, to gain Gar's confidence."
"So, if I may ask, were you physically intimate with her as well?"
Gar shook his head. "I never even kissed her." Spock noticed a faint smile appear on Raven's face. He wondered how humans coped with the destructive emotion known as jealousy.
"I see. Can you tell me more about her abilities?"
"I can give you dossiers on her and Slade. We also have video footage." Raven replied as she stepped to the main console in the room, and began to type. The giant TV switched from the video game and began to show footage that Cyborg had recorded of the geomancer. Spock watched, making a tent with his fingers. There was over 20 minutes of video. Once it completed he spoke.
"Thank you, this is has been informative. Are there any other villains Slade might associate with?
"Slade likes to work alone." Gar chimed in. "Most villains don't work with others … well, except for the Brotherhood of Evil."
"The Brotherhood of Evil?"
Raven resumed typing. "I just sent you their dossier."
-(-)-
Spock spent the rest of day studying the dossiers Raven sent to him. He then used a search engine to find more information on Slade and Terra, though he didn't find anything beyond what was in the Titans dossiers that wasn't more than speculation and conjecture. For someone who posed such a great threat to world security, there was precious little information about the man.
One item of speculation that caught Spock's eye was the theory that Slade was an alias for a former villain who vanished years before: Deathstroke the Terminator. Unlike Slade, Deathstroke was an assassin for hire, who was content to collect hefty fees in exchange for murdering prominent and well protected people. He had never shown any interest in world domination. The two villains were one eyed and wore similar masks, though Deathstroke's mask was made of cloth and Slade's mask was solid. Intrigued by the coincidences he found, he continued his research. After hacking into military databases, he learned that Deathstroke's real name was Slade Wilson, a military officer who volunteered for experiments to create a 'super soldier', and who later defected from the military. Upon learning this information Spock estimated that there was an 87.93% chance that Slade and Deathstroke were one and the same. If true it would confirm that Slade was an augment, though his enhancements were not achieved via genetic manipulation. Noonian Singh Khan and his ilk were unrelated to Slade.
Spock meditated in lieu of sleep, and completed his meditations just as his program completed its analysis. Spock read the results, which he immediately deleted along with the program.
It was 5 AM and the Titans would all be asleep. He opened a drawer in his desk and retrieved his phaser. He approached his door and and pressed the open button.
And found Raven and Gar waiting for him.
"You know where Slade is, don;t you?" She announced in her gravelly monotone.
"If you think you're going without us … then you're being illogical". Gar said with a smirk on his face.