Annual #2, 1997
Stars In My Eyes!

This story is told from Sadie’s point of view. She recounts the first three times that she met Jack (the circus in Starman #7, Charity’s Shop in Starman #10, and on the street in Starman #17) and how afterwards they went out for dinner and dancing a few times, eventually becoming lovers. She notices one night after they make love that Jack seems to be depressed. She asks him why and he explains that he’s afraid of falling in love with her because he can’t think of any hero who didn’t eventually lose his love to his heroism.

Chapter One: First Months and a Lawman's Choice
Pencils and Inks by Stefano Gaudiano

Jack tells Sadie the story of Brian “Scalphunter” Savage who, while having many dime novels written about him, was a real Western hero, along with Bat Lash, Johnny Thunder (not the JSA member) and Jonah Hex. In 1891, seven years after becoming Sheriff, Savage investigates a robbery at the home of rich socialite Margaret DaVere. He eventually tracked down some of the stolen items and returned them, after killing one of the men who committed the robbery. Margaret thanks Savage with a kiss and then a lot more besides. A week later, a romanced Savage leaves his current love interest; a gold-hearted prostitute named Annie, to pursue a relationship with Margaret, noting that his feelings for Annie are strong but his love for Margaret is stronger. Two things make Savage change his mind. First, he feels that he sticks out like a sore thumb trying to fit into the world of a socialite. Secondly, the brother of the man who he killed for the DaVere robbery attacks him at a party. As he throws a knife into the man’s chest, he looks at Margaret and the two realize they are too different for their love to work. Jack concludes the story by saying that a few years later, Brian and Annie got back together, got a farm and a son and that Savage died during a bad time for the Law in Opal in 1899.

Chapter Two: Summer and a Father's Choice
Pencils and Inks by Gene Ha

Months pass, and on a summer night later, Jack and Sadie talk again about love and how some heroes, as Wesley Dodds said, find a certain sexual excitement in their heroism. Jack says he doesn’t think that’s quite true and that it’s just a rush you get from facing death that makes any life-affirming act (like sex) seem better. They drive out to a point overlooking the rubble of Ted Knight’s old observatory (which we find is now going to be used as the site of a Starman museum), Jack tells Sadie about his father’s sacrificing love for heroism.

It was sometime in the 1960’s when Ted Knight and the first Black Canary became crime-fighting partners. The two also became partners of a much closer nature, something Jack credits the adrenaline rush of heroism for. The two were both married and they talk about how they both love their spouses but also love each other. They are both confronted leaving a hotel by a detective named Dan Frazier. Frazier reveals that he was hired by The Mist, but that the photos he has of the two in coitus are too good to be handed over to him. He tells the two heroes that he and some friends will be robbing a bank in Opal sometime later, but if he won’t release the photos if they promise not to stop him. After some hard thinking, the two decide to stop Frazier and deal with the consequences of the photos. Later, after Frazier was arrested, he told Billy O’Dare and Red Bailey about the photos. The two cops found them and “accidently” burned them. Afterward, Black Canary and Starman decide to end both their partnerships and not tempt fate again. The day after they agree to this, Adele tells Ted that she is pregnant with David.

Chapter Three: Winter and a Brother's Choice
Pencils and Inks by Steve Yeowell

After Jack is injured in a fight with Shakedown, Sadie visits him in the hospital and asks him to tell her about the story of how his brother sacrificed love for heroism. Shortly after he became Starman, David asked Ted for advice on what to do with his girlfriend, Anne. David didn’t feel it was fair to be Starman and then ask Anne to marry him, knowing that he could leave her a widow at any time. He talks to her, and tells her about the 1940’s Flash (Jay Garrick) and how his wife was put into danger constantly because of his life. He says she was strong enough to risk that but that he isn’t sure Anne is that strong and doesn’t want to risk her life finding out. So with a heavy heart, David dumps Anne and flies off into the night. It was the next day that David was killed by The Mist’s son.

Sadie then comes out and confesses that her name is not really Sadie Falk. She said she lied about it because she wanted Jack’s help in something regarding her brother and was afraid her name would scare him off. She said she planned to try and woo him and get his attention hoping that would make him more agreeable but that she never intended to fall in love with him or sleep with him. She says her real name is Jayne Payton and that her brother was Will Payton, the Fifth Starman. She then asks Jack to help her find out what happened to him. The issue ends with a silent Jack staring at the ceiling, things totally open as to how this relationship will end…