Episode 44: A Star Reborn
Takes place 12-17 April 2011.
Short version
A Star Conqueror that was being studied breaks out of containment and attempts to flee Earth, along with a second Conqueror that incorporates Starro-tech. Both are destroyed, in each timeline.
Longer version
Paul hires Jade to help plan and execute the ambush on Nabu. He also finds out that she's not necessarily averse to dating him, although he doesn't pursue it immediately.
Lantern Gardner tells the Team about Star Conquerors and assigns them to help transport samples found in the Antarctic to STAR Labs. However, the sample trucks are attacked en route by three demons, which after being defeated turn out to be humans transformed by "Devil Jizz", an elixir that temporarily transforms humans into demons, used both recreationally and for combat.
Paul reveals that the trucks were decoys, and the real samples are on Miss Martian's Bio-Ship. However, the researchers there turn out to be infected with Starro-tech, and attack the Team.
A larger Star Hunter then appears, along with a second Star Hunter incorporating Starro-tech, and Lantern Gardner turns out to be under their control. However, with help from Miss Martian, who transforms herself into a Star Conqueror, the Team takes them down, and the Star Hunters kill themselves to avoid interrogation.
In the aftermath, Paul visits Lex Luthor and puts his cards on the table, pleading with Lex to help him destroy the rest of the Light and start over, uplifting the world with him instead of with crazy supervillains. However, Lex turns him down.
The Renegade timeline sees Lynne starting at a school for metahumans, and spending time with the other girls on Team Grayven. Specifically, the Renegade has Lynne, Misa, and Sunset try and figure out a way to stop a war in the Middle East.
He also goes to investigate the Star Conqueror in the labs. He runs into the Team, who are accompanied by Aquaman. They (begrudgingly on Aquaman's part) work together to stop the Star Conquerors from escaping.
The title refers to the revived Star Conqueror.
- Cyanide Pill: Canis Minor rigs the captured Star Conquerors with explosives so they can't use their telekinesis. When Aqualad tries to interrogate them, though, they decide to trigger the bombs rather than talk.
- Energy Absorption: One of the Devil Jizz users is able to drain almost all of Paul's ring charge when he tries to brand it.
- The Gadfly: The Renegade briefly lets his neighbors think for a moment that the burgers they're eating were made from the Star Conquerors he killed.
- I Did What I Had to Do: Grayven takes his three teenage girls out to the Middle East, has a short discussion about ethics, then lets them resolve a civil war. At first, they're upset that they can't find a solution without killing people. Then they do it anyway.note
- I Surrender, Suckers: Invoked verbatim by a Star Hunter in the Renegade timeline in an effort to buy time to escape.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Lantern Gardner is out of sorts at a regular spar. Because he's fallen under the influence of a Star Conqueror that's planting compulsions and not letting him get enough sleep.
- Power-Upgrading Deformation: The Team is attacked by three people who used a Super Serum to temporarily take on demonic forms.
- Puppeteer Parasite: The Atlanteans recently dug up a Star Conqueror, and in this episode it breaks free of containment, spreading individual face-hugging stars around. In the Paragon timeline, it even has control of Lantern Gardner.
- Redemption Rejection: Lex considers Paul's offer to wipe out all the other members of the Light and start over on a more sane footing, and knows Paul has the power and motivation to do it, but is too paranoid about the mind-affecting capabilities of the orange light to accept.
- Super Form: Miss Martian shapeshifts into a Star Conqueror, granting her improved multiprocessing and immunity to pain. She later demonstrates the effectiveness of this form when she beats Paul in a spar.
- Truth Serum: Zatanna binds one of the captured Devil Jizz users to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: One of the STAR Labs staff refuses to use the Cure-tech, on the grounds that it hasn't been properly tested, just whipped up in a few hours by a telepathic gestalt of mad scientists. Paul is impressed by her awareness, and reflects on how easily he's just accepted the bizarreness of the comic book world he's in. Unfortunately, it turns out that the real reason she protested is because she's already infected with Starro-tech, and the Cure-tech is apparently working just fine.
