by Barry Lyga
Dig folded his arms over his chest. “When you’ve got one option, it’s automatically your best option,” he told Rene.
“Whatever.” Wild Dog leaned back in his chair and pretended to check the computer again.
Dinah pulled Joe aside. “Cop to cop, Joe: You trust him?”
Joe quirked his lips. “I don’t know for sure. I’ve seen informants suddenly lose their nerve, undercover agents go bad . . .” He winced as he said it—Dinah’s own boyfriend had been an undercover cop in Central City and eventually turned into the murdering Vigilante. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be.” She brushed it off. “Ancient history.” Her eyes flicked to Larvan’s workbench. “Let’s just keep an eye on this guy, OK?”
“Hello, my beauty . . .”
Bert Larvan squinted into the microscope as he gently peeled back the artificial exoskeletal material constituting the shell of the bee Joe West had retrieved from the bodega. It was a near-perfect replica of Megachile pluto, the largest of the Indonesian resin bees, once thought extinct. Brie, his technological genius sister, had developed the nanocircuitry and the synthetic aeronautics algorithms that made the bees possible. Bert had been at her side—sometimes literally, sometimes virtually—explaining the physics and anatomy of biological bees. She had incorporated his knowledge, using her genius and his to synthesize something never before seen—an artificial replica of life so perfect that it was indistinguishable from the real thing. Except for the improvements.
Probing gently with the point of a scalpel that had been honed to mere microns, he located the slight catch on the underside of the bee that opened its sealed inner compartment. Within lay the metaphorical heart of the mechanical “bug.”
Bert grinned to himself.
For you, Brie, he thought.
18
At the end of all that ever was and ever could be, the Time Trapper stood motionless before a holographic control panel that spun, twisted, and flashed on its own.
Here at the End of All Time, reality teetered on the precipice of outright ablation. The machinery at the Time Trapper’s disposal had been defunct and ruined millennia ago, and so the Time Trapper had reached back through history, summoning each component, stealing each tiny circuit, each diode, each power source from a moment when it would not be missed, then assembled the pieces together into the necessary machinery.
He—
(And the Time Trapper was not truly a he, just as the hours and minutes have no gender. Yet the first human the Time Trapper encountered—the captive speedster racing powerful circles to energize certain machinery—was male, and so the Time Trapper had chosen to think of itself as he.)
—had painstakingly connected the components, developing the circuitry and computerization that would bring his plan to fruition.
He took no pride in his work. The machinery was merely a means to an end. The machinery was a doorway to his machinations, to his glory.
With the self-designation of he and the completion of the machinery, something new tickled at the Time Trapper’s consciousness: an awareness of himself as himself. As a discrete, independent being.
With this realization came the emotion of satisfaction. The Time Trapper’s first experience with emotion.
Along with satisfaction came a new sensation: doubt.
There was a chance, the Time Trapper realized, an infinitesimal chance that he could fail. That his plan could come to naught. He realized this dispassionately, without self-recrimination or mortification.
And for the first time in his existence, the Time Trapper experienced . . . anger.
Those arrayed against him had no right to challenge him! He was the Time Trapper! The essence of all reality! The natural end point of All That Was! The short-lived specks of dust from the past had no claim to his victory!
And yet they rose up. And there was a chance—small but real—that they could prevail.
He thought. For the first time in his existence, he pondered. If he were defeated, what would that mean? Would he care any longer, if he were destroyed?
He decided it did not matter. Even if his enemies vanquished him, he still craved revenge.
Another new sensation to join the anger: a hollow yearning for vengeance. And since there was no one else to avenge him, he would need to avenge himself.
He pondered how best to achieve this goal. How best to assure his post-defeat victory. He would need an agent in the deep past to do his bidding.
As he had with his machinery, the Time Trapper reached out into history, stretching his temporal grasp. He found pieces here and there, the wretched discards of the long ago, bits of circuitry, forsaken and unmissed. Dragging them forward through time, he watched as they assembled themselves at his invisible will, forming a simulacrum of life, a robotic core clothed in synthetic flesh, imbued with staggering power.
His hypothetica dominium. Master of molecules. His retroactive, posthumous agent of revenge.
With a powerful burst of energy, the Time Trapper hurled his creation back through history, to where his foes would never find it. Should all reality not fall to the Time Trapper’s plans, the agent would activate.
And enact brutal revenge.
The Time Trapper laughed a mirthless laugh.
“Even if they find a way to defeat me, they will lose.”
19
In Central City, in the S.T.A.R. Labs Cortex, Mr. Terrific ran a hand through his hair and blew out an overwhelmed breath. He was still reeling from what Barry had described to him just now.
“Can you do it?” Barry asked. “Can you build the treadmill we need?”
“Wow. Uh. Wow. Yeah, it’s possible. I mean, throw enough time, money, and tech at something and almost anything is possible. But it’s gonna take a long time to design and build this thing.”
“We don’t have a long time, Curtis,” Oliver said with gruff earnestness. “The Multiversal crossovers are . . . are . . .” He trailed off and looked to Barry for the science of it.
“The crossovers are weakening the vibrational differences between universes,” Barry explained. “Eventually, all universes will occupy the same space in the same moment. And when that happens . . .”
Mr. Terrific gulped. “The entirety of reality will go bye-bye. Got it. No pressure or anything.”
“There are ten thousand speedsters at your disposal,” said James Jesse. They’d contacted him at the makeshift refugee housing nearby and told him about their plan, explaining the stakes. As the nominal leader of the Earth 27 refugees, he’d pledged their help. “Building it will be a snap. We just need the design and some guidance.”
Mr. Terrific nodded solemnly. “Got it. But just the design of it. And it has to work, perfectly. Or we might not get a second chance. Look, guys, I could really use another genius or two.”
“Happy to help,” Ray said, raising his hand. “But you’re right—the more the merrier.”
Iris sighed heavily.
“What?” Barry asked, putting an arm around her.
“I know where we can get one more genius.”
In the Pipeline, Barry, Oliver, and Superman approached the cluster of cells that held the Crime Syndicate of America. Power Ring had managed to pluck himself off the floor long enough to collapse on the bunk, where he lay facedown, groaning in his sleep. Superwoman had curled into a corner and was fastidiously braiding her hair, as though to show her jailers that their prison did not bother her. Johnny Quick was doing push-ups.
Ultraman slammed both fists against the unbreakable glass, his face contorted in rage and outright shock. “You! You there! I’ll kill you! I’ll especially kill you.” Barry and Oliver looked from Ultraman to Superman and back again, then to each other.
“They hardly even look alike,” Barry said.
“Anger and hate come through to the surface,” Oliver commented.
“I’m gonna kick your butt into the Phantom Zone!” Ultraman screamed. “I’m gonna rip your heart out and throw it from here bac
k to Krypton!”
Superman coolly regarded his evil Earth 27 duplicate. “Calm down,” he said without heat or anger. “You’re not going anywhere, and the sooner you realize that, the better it will be for you.”
Much to everyone’s shock, Ultraman went silent, his face pressed against the glass in an uneven oval of drool and breath fog. Regarding Superman with narrowed eyes, he slumped, rocked back on his heels, and trudged over to his bunk, where he sat facing the wall.
“Some people just need practical advice,” Superman said as Barry and Oliver gaped at him.
The cell at the end of the corridor held Owlman. He stood behind the center of the glass door, hands clasped behind his back, leering at them as they closed in on him.
“They always come to me for help,” he said, smirking. “Bruce Wayne always figures it out.”
It was less than ideal, asking Owlman to pitch in on the treadmill project. Barry would have much preferred to breach to Earth 38 and get Brainiac 5 to help out. But Brainy had his hands full detoxifying Earth 38’s atmosphere and repairing the massive infrastructure damage caused by Anti-Matter Man. For the same reason, Lena Luthor couldn’t make the trip to Earth 1, either.
Which left them with an evil version of Bruce Wayne.
“We can use your help,” Barry admitted. “In return, you’ll get significant consideration when it comes time to decide your future.”
Owlman craned his neck to and fro, taking in the entirety of his cell. “You mean there’s a possibility of a life outside this thing? How nice.”
“You’ll have to go to trial for your crimes—”
“Trial?” He cut Oliver off. “What trial? How can any Earth 1 court claim jurisdiction over crimes committed in another universe?” A pause. “Allegedly committed, that is.”
“We have plenty of witnesses from Earth 27,” Barry pointed out.
“Still. Find a court that will claim jurisdiction. We may blaze some new trails in the field of Multiversal jurisprudence, Flash.” He laughed. “It’s a moot point. I’ll help. Of course I’ll help.”
“Really?” Oliver asked.
“I need a Multiverse to live in, too,” Owlman pointed out.
“Then let’s get to work,” Barry said, and he thumbed the switch that opened Owlman’s cell.
Mr. Terrific and the Atom projected their early, rough schematics for the treadmill on the big monitor at the center of the Cortex. Owlman stood below it and stared up, hands behind his back, occasionally grunting.
“Seems workable,” he said somewhat grudgingly. “What are we standing around for?”
While Mr. Terrific and Ray worked with Owlman to finish the design of the treadmill, Barry and Iris slipped away into a side corridor. They held each other at arm’s length for a moment . . . and then Barry breathed out a sigh of relief and leaned back against the wall.
“I am . . . so tired!” he said.
Iris laughed and hugged him tight. “Me, too. Someone should invent a super-caffeine. Maybe HR is out there doing it.”
“In the future, they have something called Kathoonian stim-shots,” Barry told her. “I don’t what they are or what they do, but don’t they sound great?”
“Can we have a minute?” she asked, cheek pressed to his chest. “Can we have just a minute for us, before it all goes crisis-y again?”
He held her close. “I think we can have more than a minute. It’ll take a little while for Curtis, Ray, and Owlman to finish the schematics, even with Superman’s help. And then the treadmill itself . . . even with ten thousand speedsters working on it, it’s not going to be built in an hour.” He kissed her forehead. “Let’s get some sleep. Been a while since we snuggled.”
Iris sighed into him and let him lead her into one of the S.T.A.R. Labs rooms they’d retrofitted into a bedroom.
20
The next morning, Sara and Mick took a car out to the eastern edge of Central City, opposite the side of town where the Gem City Bridge connected to Keystone. Here, past the highway that encircled the town, Central City gave way to a plain that stretched to the horizon. Dust, scrub, and weeds held dominion.
“That’s a big treadmill,” Mick said with something close to awe in his voice. Heat Wave did not impress easily, nor reveal it. But Sara knew him well enough to tell—behind that stone-dead expression, Mick was gobsmacked.
It was a big treadmill. Huge. Gargantuan.
The framework was made of polished molybdenum steel that measured more than four hundred feet long and a hundred feet across. The belt shone blackly in the morning sun, oiled and sleek on rollers the diameter of telephone poles. Grip bars rose up at regular intervals along the front, with arms along two sides for further stabilization. The back of the thing was open. A series of stout tethers hung from the rails. Sara imagined how it would work—speedsters in the front and at the sides holding on to the bars for purchase, with the ones in the middle tied together to keep upright. Altogether, the treadmill was an acre in size, sprawling over the flat land outside Central City like an alien mother ship.
“It’s like a piece of exercise equipment from God’s gym,” Sara said.
“Couldn’t they just have built ten thousand normal-sized treadmills?” Mick said. He produced a bottle of beer from his jacket and took a pull.
“Wouldn’t work.” A new voice made Mick jump. Sara didn’t. She was League of Assassins trained and had heard Mr. Terrific coming up behind them ten seconds ago.
“We need the vibrational energy from the speedsters to be perfectly in sync,” Mr. Terrific went on. He had stripped off his Fair Play jacket and tied it around his waist, wearing only a grease-smudged, sweat-stained T-shirt. In one hand, he held a torque wrench. His eyes gazed out from tired hollows. “If we tried to link together thousands of treadmills, we’d introduce subtle errors in the frequencies. So . . .”
He gestured to the massive treadmill.
“There is no way in the world,” Mick pronounced, “this is gonna work.”
“It’ll work.” This time, Sara startled. She’d sensed Owlman’s approach only at the last possible instant. She wasn’t used to anyone getting the jump on her.
The villainous Bruce Wayne, unlike Mr. Terrific, wore a healthy, wide-awake expression, his eyes bright and his cheeks flushed with satisfaction. “This thing is going to produce so much energy that you’ll blast right through the Iron Curtain of Time.”
“And then what?” Mick asked gruffly. Sara snickered. She knew that tone in Mick’s voice. He wasn’t worried or concerned or afraid. He didn’t even really want to know what would happen next. In his endearingly nihilistic way, he was merely pointing out that getting through the Iron Curtain of Time was only step one in a plan that had a lot of blank spaces yet to be filled in.
“And then it’s up to you guys,” Mr. Terrific said, taking Mick very seriously. “We can’t predict who or what you’ll encounter at the End of All Time. It’s possible this is a one-way trip; there may be no way back through the Curtain.”
“Until we defeat the foe,” Superman said, gently gliding down from above them. “Then the Curtain goes away and we can come back.”
“Until.” Sara clenched her jaw and beheld the enormity of the treadmill. “Your optimism is . . .”
“Encouraging?” Superman asked, standing arms akimbo.
“Misplaced,” Owlman jibed in a gravelly voice.
“Touching,” Mr. Terrific chimed in.
“I was going for not entirely realistic,” Sara admitted. She planted her fists on her hips, realized she was mimicking Superman’s stance, and let them drop to her sides. “We’ll be lucky to come out of this at all. Heck, we’re lucky to get into it in the first place.”
Mick snorted. “Not sure lucky is the word I’d use.”
Barry woke next to Iris. He allowed himself three entire seconds to gaze down at her, drinking her in. The slope of her shoulder as it emerged from the tangle of blankets. The curve of her chin, the line of her cheekbone. Her coal-black ha
ir spilling over her face; the whisper of her eyelashes.
Three seconds was a long, long time to the Flash. He inhaled her. He absorbed her. Every breath took days to anticipate and enjoy.
Iris, I’m not going to stop running until I know you’re safe. I swear it.
Slipping out of bed silently so as not to wake her, he made his way to the Cortex. Caitlin reclined in one of the chairs at the central workstation, a steaming mug of coffee held before her. Barry paused at the entrance. Since the moment Anti-Matter Man had ripped his way through to Earth 1 (had it been only a few days ago? It felt like centuries), the Cortex had been a chaotic bustle of activity, a beehive swarmed by drones under the command of a mad queen. Now it was quiet, unoccupied save for Caitlin.
“Any more of that coffee?” Barry asked.
Caitlin startled and almost spilled hot coffee on herself. “Barry!”
He apologized for alarming her, then went to retrieve his own coffee when she pointed to a percolator plugged in next to one of the transparent dry-erase boards. The aroma from the mug was delightful, but when he sipped, the brew disappointed.
“The coffee quality has really gone downhill around here ever since HR went walkabout,” he commented, settling into a seat next to her.
“Tell me about it.” Her voice was rueful. “If there was one thing that guy knew how to do, it was make an amazing cup of coffee.”
“To HR,” he proposed, raising his mug. They clinked cups, then drank in silence for a bit.
“It’s coming along, I see.” He gestured to the main screen, which showed satellite footage of the massive treadmill. The Earth 27 speedsters, working in shifts and following meticulous plans, had constructed the thing literally overnight and were putting the finishing touches on it now.
“Tell me something, Barry,” Caitlin said, studiously not looking over at him. “Is this going to work?”
“The treadmill? The science is as sound as anything else we’ve ever—”
“I don’t mean the treadmill, specifically. I mean any of it.” Staring down into her coffee. “You’re headed to the End of All Time without a plan or any sort of intel. Just the name the Time Trapper and a handful of superheroes with hope and a prayer. How in the world is this supposed to work?”