Issue 5: "...As Fast as you Can, Pt. 2"

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[Admin]

The Flash
Issue Five: "...As Fast As You Can... Part Two"
Written by Brandon Herren
Cover by Brandon Herren
Edited Brandon Herren

[Brandon]

My name is Barry Allen, also known as the Flash, the fastest man alive. Something that seems to be working against me at the moment unfortunately. My day started out just fine. A nice breakfast with Iris, a productive day’s work at the lab, a small disaster or two averted this afternoon, and then I ran headlong into a nasty trap of Dr. Spectro's. I don't really know what this is about yet but I’m sure he’ll be cutting in on the radio in my earpiece in a moment to gloat. Whenever one of these small-timers finally gets a plan to work they ALWAYS gloat.

This doesn’t entirely surprise me coming from Spectro though. He was a brilliant man before, well, let me back up. Tom Emery was once an acclaimed and leading physicist of research into the theory of wave-particle behavior in relation to photonic elements. A mouthful but he really knew his stuff. He led the field for almost two decades until a terrible car accident took his wife. He tried to continue but it was soon apparent the traumatic event had taken his sanity as well. Doctor Emery started making bold claims that he could harness the power of light itself. He left the scientific community in disgrace and it wasn’t long before he started showing up in fashionably questionable men’s apparel to unveil his latest scheme to “revolutionize the world” and feed his own shattered ego.

Granted, once confiscated a few of his inventions have been very beneficial. His Color Warper device from a few years ago in particular was used heavily in the latest innovations in optometry. A testament to how a cruel turn of fate robbed this man of a brighter destiny. I’d almost feel sorry for him if he wasn’t such a pain in the butt.

Ah, here he is now.

[Brandon]

“I trust you are off to a good start, Flash.”

“Get to the point, Spectro.”

“Such seriousness. Having a bad day?” Spectro gives a self-satisfied laugh while going over the controls to the large golden mechanism in front of him. “Let’s review shall we? You are currently moving at 250 miles per hour and, oh about every minute the speed setting will double. You have to match it to keep the explosive device currently strapped to your chest from detonating. Attempt to vibrate out of it or remove it in any way and it will explode. Come within a hundred meters of my device and it will activate. There is no escape. Get ready to increase your speed, Flash.”

The disc strapped to Flash’s chest begins beeping and he doubles his speed.

“I don’t understand. What do you have to gain from this?” The Flash moves quickly through the farmlands of Illinois, being careful to avoid cars and populated areas.

“Everything.” Spectro states this coolly as he works. He looks around at onlookers gathering on the streets around the town square of Blue Valley. Then he checks the status of his prisoner on the ground nearby trapped inside a static energy bubble. Kid Flash struggles to speak to his captor.

“W-what… are you… ?”

“Please. Save your strength and just watch.” Dr. Spectro finishes his programming and hits a large green button on the top of the panel. The huge gun-shaped machine comes to life and the internal motors hum, it crackles and turns slightly before a gray beam shoots from the multi-faceted jewel lodged in the end of the cannon. The strange light falls on the buildings, cars, and bystanders as the entire device makes a steady rotation. Where the beams falls it leaves a gray and motionless scene in its wake, and when it finishes the barrel of the ray comes to rest back in its original position, pointing straight on the horizon and directly at the Sun.

Spectro has a pleased look when he turns back toward Kid Flash. “Beautiful.”

[Brandon]

“What is it, Spectro? What is the ray for?!” Another few beeps and Barry picks up speed again.

BOOOM!! The air breaks around him as he cracks the speed of sound into Mach One.

“Settle down you hyperactive freak. I’ll be more than happy to tell you. It’s not like you’ll be here to see it any way.” He runs over the control again and stares at the small screen. “There. It’s ready. In just under a minute this glorious little invention of mine will fire a beam toward the sun. After moving at an angle through the refraction of the atmosphere it will be refocused and complete its journey in just over 8 minutes. Once it makes contact, a line will be established and it will draw power directly from its pure light, returning to me in another 8 minutes.”

“On what principle?” The Flash’s voice now resonated through sensors in the neck of his costume, picked up and translated to normal speed by the chip in his earpiece radio.

“Zero-point energy! As you may have noticed from the first hand experience you had with my prototype earlier, I have devised a way to draw kinetic energy from photonic activity. And if my theory proves correct, when I attempt to draw the power directly from a star… well, it should get interesting.” Spectro lets out a low chuckle. “I will able to tap into the limitless power of the cosmological constant itself, the energy that has radiated throughout time and space since the Big Bang first ignited the universe!!” Spectro hits the large button and the beam erupts this time out across the horizon toward the low hanging Sun.

[Brandon]

The Flash speeds up again as he zooms from the Eastern Seaboard out across the open sea of the Atlantic Ocean, moving so fast as to not break the surface tension of the water. He immediately began to cut a wide arc around back toward the west. He aims at Panama and hopes that running against the turn of the planet will give him surer footing when his speed would become more dangerous in the coming minutes.

Doctor Spectro stares in delight as his laser-like beam is feeding into orange-colored skyline. The sun would be setting in about twenty minutes. A full five minutes longer than he will need to become the most powerful being on the planet.

“How will you store the energy, Spectro? In your death ray? Sounds kind of risky.” The Flash interrupted his moment of victory.

“Oh no. The power will be all mine. It will collect in the battery cells of the exo-suit I’m wearing now. I won’t need it long though… once I’m all-powerful.”

“And here all this time I thought your technicolor leisure suit was just for impressing the ladies.”

Spectro’s expression drains into one of disgust. “How dare you.” He hisses. “Everything I do is for my wife!” He reaches down and bumps the Flash’s speed bomb up several times by remote.

The Flash blasts forward until his speed matches the new high mark and the beeping stops.

Okay, maybe not the best idea.

He hurtles forward across the Pacific and closes in on the shorelines of Asia.

Dr. Spectro takes a deep breath and regains his cool. “You might know how to push my buttons, Flash, but now I can push yours too.” He looks at the estimated time on his screen. It won’t be long now, he thinks. “And what will happen to you Flash? How long can you keep this up? You mess up now and you’ll cut an explosive path along the planet that will be miles long. You could steer toward Antarctica and sacrifice yourself now like a good hero but I’ll doubt you’ll give up that easily. Not with so much at stake.”

The bomb beeps again, faster this time and Barry moves across the Northern section of the Soviet Union, trying to avoid populated areas. His speed is getting harder to control by the moment.

“If you make it long enough, what will happen will depend on how your powers work I’m guessing. If your body has mass in that state then I figure it will increase until you either get lodged in the event horizon or maybe just slingshot off into space. If your body transubstantiates then you could very well run yourself right outside of existence.” His face lightened again. “Yes. I think I like that idea quite a bit. Good-bye, Flash. Forever.”

And with that Flash’s speed increases as he moves toward his imminent doom.

[Brandon]

It’s dark as Flash speeds across Europe. His yellow boots fall in rapid succession as he weaves and tries to stay on path with previous runs he’s made over the continent. Another acceleration and he’s hurtling over the Atlantic, his mind racing at the same time, searching for a way out of his dilemma but he comes up with nothing. The light flashes on the bomb again as he moves over Nova Scotia and he flies through the northern part of Canada. With each step he knows his run becomes more dangerous. The faster he’s going when the bomb explodes, the more people will die. He also knows how risky Spectro’s plan is, how easily he could destabilize the Sun and destroy everything. Another jump in speed and he's moving from day into night again. Circling the globe faster and faster, desperately trying to avoid every object he passes. He concentrates on each movement and his mind still races. He cannot fail. He’s been in tight spots before but has always had a plan, a way that was always in the back of his mind how he would prevail. But not now.

He searches futilely for an answer. If I only had more time. What would Jay do?

And with that he knows what he must do.

[Brandon]

Spectro looks around the scene of frozen, grayed onlookers and then down at his now unconscious prisoner and pities all of them. They will not be able to witness his glorious moment, his ascension, and he pities them. The deranged Doctor then passes over his monitor one last time and knows it will be only moments. He moves into position at the back of his device and watches the beam as it continues to feed into the sky and with eyes wide he waits.

[Brandon]

Jay is sitting in his favorite chair on the deck adjoining the back of his home in Keystone City. His hand moves furiously over the pages of his book of crossword puzzles and after a second he throws it on the stack of other completed books. He sighs to himself and looks up at the sunset and notices something strange in front of the Sun. He leans forward and squints, trying to determine what it is he’s seeing exactly when his wife Joan opens the sliding door.

“Jay, sweetheart. I think something’s wrong with your old radio. The one you used with the Society. It’s making some kind of noise.”

“What?” And a nanosecond later he is in his room and opening the trunk containing all his old equipment from so many years ago. He pulls the radio out and flips the knob over and a fury of sound bursts out of the crackling speaker. At first it only screeches a high-pitched whine until he begins vibrating his own body, moving his metabolism up to a speed where the sound is audible.

“Skreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesooooooooooooooeeeeeeeeeeee barrycallingjaygarrickineedyourhelp irepeatthisisbarry calling Jay Garrick. Please respond! This is an urgent message!”

“Barry! What’s going on?!”

“Thank God, Jay! I don’t have much time! Dr. Spectro has Wally in Blue Valley. Do not attempt to approach him, he's too dangerous!”

Jay looks over at Joan who appears in the doorway of their bedroom. “Go ahead.”

"I’ve got a bomb strapped to me! I’m going to need you to do something. It’s the only chance I have!”

"Anything, Barry!”

"I need you to go to S.T.A.R. Labs in Metropolis. Contact Ray Palmer, a professor there on a research project. Tell him I need the device we’ve been reconstructing. Tell him I need Pat Kanigher’s treadmill!”

[Brandon]

“To love the one who loves you, To admire the one who admires you, In a word, to be the idol of one's idol, Is exceeding the limit of human joy; It is stealing fire from heaven.”

Spectro stares straight ahead. “For you, Emily.”

A surge of light runs down the beam into Spectro’s mechanism and then into him. His body begins to glow as the energy builds inside him. He floats off the ground slightly as a maniacal laugh grows in him. “YES! The purifying light!! I am becoming… a GOD!!”

[Brandon]

The Flash watches his steps and tries to plan his approach. He knows he has only one chance and needs to hit the treadmill exactly right. He moves into Metropolis at a deadly velocity and moves quickly to the wide street in front of the S.T.A.R. Labs building. He catches only a glimpse of Ray Palmer in his white lab coat and Jay with the orange glow of the sun shining on his helmet. He has the barest moment to wonder if he will ever see them again before his feet land on the sturdy metal device. It was invented by a tormented genius to move through time, only to end in disaster, but where he failed Barry succeeds.

My feet move on Kanigher’s treadmill at a lightning pace. Energy crackles all around and I know it has activated properly. Once I know I’m okay I pour on the speed. Moving faster than I have ever attempted before. The world shimmers around me and I leap into a subspace tachyon stream, breaking free from reality altogether. Day and night flash by at a blinding pace as I continue my run in one spot, and the world speeds by around me. Blurs of movement are all around and I push ahead even faster. The sun and moon zoom by overhead in a stroboscopic effect that is a little disorienting at first. The Earth is still there so I know that either Spectro or myself must have been successful. Or this is an alternative timestream. I stop that train of thought immediately because I know it will only drive me crazy. Days and then weeks pass in just seconds as time moves ever faster. Soon a darkness surrounds the world and it is difficult to tell what is happening. After a few moments things return to “normal” and I keep going. Weeks turn into months into years into decades, all moving by in a blink. Buildings rise and fall and the city grows around me. Soon there are incredible, shining towers all around. Into centuries and the city disappears. Time is moving so fast now there is only a flickering twilight glow as daylight and night become one. I keep going and cities come and go, after a time becoming almost unrecognizable as the millennia move by at a blinding pace. The world becomes a strange place, changing and shifting as if it is alive around me. And finally everything is gone and the sky goes gray. All plants and trees vanish and the Sun swells into a red giant as it moves above. I slow my pace enough to make sure I’m at the right place and then jump out of my time tunnel back into the real world.

[Brandon]

“Welcome everyone to tonight’s event aboard the Galaxy Queen!” The orange man blinks twice as both sets of his eyes move in succession. “For your entertainment viewing pleasure we present this evening… The Last Day On Earth!”

Pondreez Nollonon looks out over the large dining area and smiles at the guests. Over his shoulder and all along the far side of the room is a long transparent wall, the view below being of a long-since-dead Earth. A large number of other vessels and platforms float about weightlessly, all of which protected by heavy forcefields. He straightens the thin plastic tie on his neck and continues.

“It’s good to see so many humanoids onboard this time out on our pangalactic voyage. You are all no doubt here in due respect as I know more than a few of you had ancestors originating from this homeworld. Now if you will all return to your seats the show is about to begin.” Pondreez scans his notes briefly on the holo-plate in the podium in front of him. “Earth! A fascinating planet as you all know that has played an important role in the history of the galaxy for quite a while, most notably in the middle eras. Home to an unusually high number of interesting figures and extraordinary heroes, there is little denying what a wondrous and important planet it was in its time. And now in the year that would have been known as 5,023,891,301 C.E., we are going to see it off with a proper ceremony, one that we will all witness momentarily when large destabilizer bombs will all be detonated in unison. It should be a spectacular display so you may want to take a moment to…” The tall orange man stopped and listened to an unheard voice, placing his hand over the orb microphone floating nearby. “Are you sure? From when?? But I thought this event was chrono-checked. Right. Okay. I see.” He clears his throats and proceeds. “Ladies and Gentlemen and Gender Non-specifics. It appears that we are in for some unexpected excitement. I have just been informed that we are about to witness a Random Time Event originating from the Earth’s 21st century. Here it is now!”

There was a brilliant spark on the planet’s surface below.

[Brandon]

The Flash races across the desolate world clearing half the planet before vibrating his molecules free from of the Speed Trap, the explosion ripping along in his wake and cutting a fiery stripe across the surface two thousand miles long. He doesn’t break pace for an instant and moves quickly to complete his circumnavigation. The detonation of the device causes a chain reaction and the world begins to crumble into a violent and apocalyptic cataclysm as Barry returns to the tear in spacetime just as it is closing.

[Brandon]

I’m back in the warp space but this time I’m riding a stream of anti-tachyons backward in time. I know my legs are running at a frantic pace but I’m only barely aware of them now. My surroundings are little more than a web of lightfields, crisscrossing and interconnecting everything outward into an impossibly complicated pattern. I look down at my body and it is transluminal. A warm glow flows through me and I feel like I could run all the way back in time to the beginning of the universe without even trying. It’s... calling me... I believe. No, something else is. I look again and I can see the larger picture. Lattices of subrealities spiraling upward and downward, and at the top there is a bright spot. At once I know that all of the energy inside me is connected to that point and is the source of my power. It is an indescribable beauty and I feel like I must continue to move toward it. Join with it. With the Speed Force. And I will be happy. Yet…

Iris.

I know I can’t be happy without Iris and my thoughts change suddenly. I shake off the thrall of the force that is pulling me toward it and refocus my attention back on my destination. I’m moving in on it rapidly. A moment longer and I’ll be home.

[Brandon]

The Flash drops his speed and launches off of the treadmill in Metropolis, wind swirling in his wake, and over the Earth once more.

Spectro is basking in the growing energy around him. He breaths deeply and feels the power pour into him. This is his perfect moment.

“Spectro!”

His eyes snap open. “What? Aren't you dead yet?”

“No, I’m alive and free, and coming to stop you!”

“You’d better hurry. A few more minutes and I will be invincible!”

The Flash hits the western coast of the United States and adjusts his trajectory squarely on Blue Valley.

“Go ahead, Flash. Just to show you how powerful your new master really is. Give it your best shot!!”

“I plan on it.”

Flash Fact: The Earth rotates 25,000 miles in a single day or at a speed of just over 1000 miles per hour. But for the next few seconds, I'm going to change that.

The Flash roars into the city aimed directly at Spectro. He runs at him headlong only to stop dead in front of him and down into a squat, his hands lying flat on the ground. His energy field feeds into the earth underneath him and there is a low rumble coming from all directions at once.

Spectro looks down at his almost prostrate opponent and is confused. “What…” And his expression changes immediately to disbelief as he drops to the ground. He feels his power draining away and is furious! He lifts a hand to strike out at the speedster but doubles over instead. Streaks of lightning and energy leap around wildly as the still glowing Flash looks up to see the Sun dropping below the horizon at an unnaturally fast pace. It moves out of sight and the pulsing beam severs. He waits another few seconds until the last bit of power fades away.

Spectro looks at himself and then back at the Flash. His eyes are enraged! “How?! WHAT DID YOU DO?!?”

The Flash stands tall in front of him and replies lowly and calmly, “I beat you,” and punches Dr. Spectro out.

Barry leans over to catch his breath and sees Wally coming to. The young hero shakes his head and looks around. A second later he zips next to his partner and surveys the scene as the street lights overhead flicker on prematurely. Sirens and horns are audible in the distance. “How the hell did you do that?!”

“Wally,” he heaves, trying to regulate his breathing. “Watch your language.”

Wally laughs and pats him on the back. “I have to be honest. I was worried there for a minute.”

“Yeah. Me too.” He raises and moves around. “I thought he had me.”

“So?”

“I traveled ahead in time and dumped the bomb at the end of the world. Then I came back and siphoned Spectro’s zero kinetic energy into the Earth’s rotation, speeding it up briefly to break his link with the Sun. I didn't even know I could do that with kinetic fields. And I'm not sure if I can do it again.” He states casually.

Wally cracks up. “Okay. How was the trip then?”

“Weird.”

Wally ponders over the machine for a minute. “Is Spectro capable of building something like this by himself?”

“In theory, but the actual components? The technology? We’ll need S.T.A.R. Labs to give it a good, hard look, but I think something is going on here. He may have had help.”

“Otherworldly help. Wooo!” Wally wiggles his fingers.

Barry laughs. “Let’s go. The police will be here in a few minutes. But, let’s walk for a little bit first, okay?”

“Sure.”

“I guess your break is almost over. Tell me about these friends of yours in New York. Do they use profanity too?”

“You realize I am an adult now, right? I can swear all I want.”

“Not while you wear that costume you won’t.”

“So, I’ll get a new one. I could be The Quick! Or, Superspeedster! Oh, how about Highspeed?”

They continue to talk but Barry also thinks of his family: Iris, Wally, Jay, Joan. And, he feels relieved everything worked out. But a lingering thought hangs in the back of his mind. When he first made his jump into the timestream there was a darkness in the days ahead.

Something was coming. Something terrible.

[Brandon]

The End!

[mockingbird]

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