My digital copy of this comic doesn't have a credits page, but it was written by Phil Jimenez, drawn by Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and inked by George Perez. I can't think of a better team to bring Donna Troy back to life, as they've all had extensive experience with Donna and the Teen Titans. One might call their style old-fashioned, but in this case, I prefer to call it classic.
Our cover shows Donna Troy in silver armor and seemingly charged with electricity. And this is more or less a direct scene from the story inside. Surrounding her are the Teen Titans (Bart's in the bottom left corner) and select members of the Outsiders. Superboy is absent, as he's still working out his identity in Smallville. Robin is also missing, presumably sitting at home with his broken arm. Nightwing, however, is present, even though he technically quit the Outsiders fairly recently. But in all honesty, the story of Donna Troy's return simply could not be told without Dick Grayson.
Our story begins at Outsiders headquarters, where the sudden appearance of a small glowing sphere has spooked Shift. Believing this to be connected to Brainiac, he tries to destroy the sphere before Starfire and Nightwing stop him. Shift is surprised to see Nightwing back in Brooklyn, but Dick doesn't have time to explain his appearance. Arsenal bursts in with his daughter, Lian, and Jade, and Roy immediately draws an arrow on the sphere. But Nightwing stops him, too, as both he and Starfire recognize the sphere and believe it's a sign that Dona Troy is alive.
On the other side of the country at Titans Tower, Cassie is looking at photos of her with Conner, wishing he'd come back to the team. She then pulls up a photo of her with Wonder Woman and Donna, wishing she could talk to Donna about the recent reveal of her father's identity. Beast Boy comes running by as a gazelle, telling Cassie to follow him. They meet up with Cyborg and Raven, standing in front of Donna's statue. The same glowing sphere from earlier is floating in front of the statue's face, and all the older members of the Titans seem to recognize this.
Bart comes running in, saying he saw the sentry alarm go off, and he asks if Brainiac, Luthor or even Superboy have returned. Suddenly, the sphere opens up into a bright portal of light. Arsenal pops out of the portal, asking the Titans if they're coming or not. Bart asks Cassie what's going on, but she's just as perplexed as he is. Beast Boy, Cyborg and Raven, however, are just as excited as they can be. So they all get inside the sphere, which is much larger on the inside, and seems to resemble a giant heart with large, red arteries going off in all directions. The sphere itself is hurtling through space, much faster than the speed of light.
As they travel through space, Raven learns of a horrible war being waged between Rann, Thanagar, Colu and Throneworld. The old Teen Titans reminisce of their first adventure to space, and Cassie is having a hard time believing Donna might be alive. Ever the detective, Dick begins to wonder why Donna sent the sphere to them instead of coming to them herself. Bart spends his time exploring the sphere, noting it must be some sort of tesseract (something he's had experience with), but he can't quite figure it out.
The talk about Donna turns to the titan gods and Donna's past association with them. And by titan gods, we're talking about the actual titans that battled Zeus and everything in Greek mythology. Everyone seems to agree that these gods are responsible for Donna's resurrection. Bart confirms with Cyborg that he's met these gods before, and he asks if they're anything like Orion and Darkseid. Vic confesses ignorance on the nature of deity, but one thing he can say for certain is that being a god doesn't automatically make one good. Both Raven and Cassie somehow sense that Donna is in terrible trouble, and before long, our heroes land on an alien planet called Minosyss.
As they all get their bearings straight, Wonder Girl spots a city up ahead and Kid Flash takes off to check it out and look for Donna. Bart quickly returns, but before he can report on what he saw, all the rocks around our heroes are revealed to be soldiers in disguise. Bother Cyborg and Bart are shocked they missed this, and Nightwing orders everyone not to hurt the natives, since they are technically trespassing on their land. Our heroes retreat to the city, but fall right into an ambush. As they try to defend themselves without causing too much damage, Bart asks Cassie if she thinks these aliens did something to Donna. But once again, Cassie is just as clueless as Bart.
The fighting is suddenly put to an end by a large male alien named Athyns (which Bart thinks sounds like Athens). Athyns is able to speak the other aliens' language and convince them the Teen Titans and Outsiders mean them no harm. The older Titans have a past history with Athyns and are on friendly terms with him. Cassie realizes that he must be a titan seed like Donna, and asks him to take them to her. So Athyns reluctantly leads our heroes to Donna, and we're treated to basically the same image we saw on the cover. Except we realize that the electricity around Donna is actually a cage.
All this is being watched from afar by the titans. They have essentially brainwashed Donna and sent her into the middle of this war. While the titans ultimately believe their cause is just, they are worried that if Donna is shown the truth, then their plan will be imperiled. One of them, Coeus, struggles with this act of dishonesty.
Back on Minosyss, Beast Boy has turned into a bat to quickly survey the surrounding area, reporting back there's only smoke and dead bodies for miles, presumably caused by Donna and her "pals." Bart says he saw lots of kids hunched over their parents' bodies or fighting over scraps of food. He's read about places like this, but seeing it firsthand is a completely different experience. Bart asks Cyborg why the gods — the people with all the power — do this to people without power. Shift says the nature of life is big people spitting on little people, and that will never change. Cyborg responds by saying if he believed that, he would give up being a hero.
Athyns explains to our heroes that he sent the travelsphere to them in hopes that they would be able to snap Donna out of the insanity caused by the titans. Arsenal tries reasoning with Donna, saying he knows she would never allow anything to happen to all the innocent children around them. Cassie shows her a picture of the two of them with Wonder Woman, begging Donna to remember who she is. During all this Donna has been ranting and raving about the justification of this war. But her old friends do make a compelling argument, causing Donna to become confused. She cries out to her "husband" Coeus, who defies the other titans and interferes by freeing Donna from her cage.
This is the second of a four-part story. It is dense, deep stuff, calling back characters, places and ideas from old stories I've never read. So I feel exactly like Bart in this situation — armed only with a slight knowledge of who Donna Troy is, and otherwise completely out of his element. Bart does feel rather isolated in this issue, with both Superboy and Robin sitting this adventure out. He's never really had that strong of a relationship with Cassie, so he invariably finds himself turning to Cyborg with all his questions. However, Cyborg is unable to make this story any less overwhelming for Bart or me.
Next time: Part Three of Donna Troy's return.
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