The Flash

by Richard Knaak

  “Come on, bro! You’re the man who nearly drowned Central City! You’re not just a wizard of weather, you’re a god! Show it!”

  “A god…” That was how it had felt the first time Mark had discovered his powers. That was how he had felt last night after devastating Iron Heights.

  “Just look what you did to the prison!” Clyde gleefully remarked, once more mirroring his brother in thought. “That’s what we need!”

  “That’s what we need, yeah.” The Weather Wizard considered the event. “Maybe a way to magnify what I just tried… but that still might not be enough.”

  “Maybe I’m the smarter one after all…” Clyde jested, leaning close. “Maybe instead you could take some other powerful natural source and magnify that. A ready-made source already pretty damned powerful… like a river, you know?”

  “Like a river,” the Weather Wizard repeated. “A river, a storm, anything huge…”

  “Now you’re thinking! There should be plenty of places in this fancy city that could generate such power! The river, though! You could stir that up pretty good, build up some strong raw power! Think what you could do with that!”

  Mark nodded, his gaze already toward the unseen body of water. “Yeah. Think what I could do…” After a moment, though, he frowned. “But I still don’t know how to turn it all to bringing you back. Something’s just not right. I don’t know—”

  Clyde growled. “You’re not letting me down again, are you?”

  The Weather Wizard was quick to placate him. Hands spread in apology, he answered, “No, Clyde! Never again!”

  “The river’ll work… and it’ll also bring out the Flash. You thought of that, Mark?”

  “Yeah. I thought of that.”

  Clyde suddenly stood beside him, whispering in his ear. “And there’s something else. Look at the power you have. The Flash, he’s got some power too. There wasn’t any Flash until that same night we changed! We got control of the weather; he got to be quick on his feet! You know what that means?” Clyde’s smile resumed. “He’s a source of power for us too, Mark! We could use the Flash to help bring me back! Kill two birds with one stone—hell, three, counting getting rid of Detective West! You know wherever the Flash is, West eventually turns up!”

  The Weather Wizard shook his head in an attempt to clear it. Clyde’s words kept echoing though. The river. The Flash as a source of energy just like the river. Killing the speedster and the detective.

  Clyde alive again.

  Clyde alive again.

  That last thought was all Mark needed to shove aside his misgivings about the logic. Clyde would live. He would be able to wipe out his greatest failure. His brother would live.

  Thunder roared again. Rain continued to come down hard.

  “Looks like a nice night for a stroll on the river walk,” the Weather Wizard remarked.

  * * *

  “So, here you are,” Iris declared in a frosty voice. “You’ve been avoiding me, Barry.”

  Barry sat at an empty desk on the far side of the lab, a coffee in one hand, a screen with the local news in front of him. He looked up sheepishly at Iris. “I haven’t been hiding. Cisco needed to run a bunch of tests after last night and they went on so long I just crashed here! Honest!”

  “You couldn’t call, at least?” she asked with tremendous skepticism.

  The dark-brown eyes that Barry usually enjoyed staring into now proved too stern for him to meet. He finally had to look away. “The storm fried both my communications with the lab and my cell.”

  “And all the phones here weren’t working either?”

  He stood up. “Listen, Iris. It was late and I’d been running all over Central City. I was more exhausted than I thought, I guess. I think I searched through every hole I could find trying to—trying to—”

  The frown on her face grew stronger. She knew what he had been about to say and why he’d held back from actually saying it. “You didn’t find him. You didn’t find Mardon! He’s still out there, waiting to kill my father!”

  A tear plummeted down her cheek. Aware of just how strong a woman Iris was and how badly this was affecting her, Barry reddened in shame. “Iris, listen. I’ll find Mardon. I won’t let anything happen to Joe. He’s been there for me so much of my life. You know how I feel about him… and how I would never want to fail you! I’d give my life for him!”

  If Barry thought that would make her feel better, he discovered immediately that he was very, very wrong. Iris eyed him as if he had just stabbed her through the heart.

  “You really don’t get it, do you, Barry? Do you think I just worry about—”

  The lab shook from another round of thunder. Barry and Iris instinctively grabbed one another for support. The thunder was followed by an intense wind howling so loud that it sounded to Barry like a huge pack of wolves just outside the door.

  “Something’s happening!” Cisco shouted.

  They hurried over to him. The screen before Cisco danced with constantly shifting numbers and coursing wave lines. Barry was not well versed in the data Cisco was studying, but he knew that the fact that everything on the screen mirrored the havoc now going on outside did not bode well.

  “It just started,” Cisco added. “Off the charts on several scales!”

  “Mardon?” Barry asked.

  “If it isn’t, we’ve got a whole new problem to deal with! It still doesn’t read like him… but there are similarities at times. I know I’ve seen something like it, but—”

  Emergency sirens went off outside.

  Barry turned to Iris. “I’ve got to go! I promise we’ll talk.”

  “Barry, I wanted to tell you that—”

  But he was already gone.

  * * *

  As the Flash, Barry covered the distance between S.T.A.R. Labs and the nearest siren in the blink of an eye. He paused under a store overhang and contacted Cisco.

  “What’ve you got for me? So far it’s just a really bad storm. No specific danger.”

  “Getting reports now! The Mayor’s office has declared a State of Emergency! Hills collapsing! The river is pouring over its banks! Get down to Second Avenue—”

  “Already there!” responded the Flash, having left the overhang as soon as Cisco had mentioned the street by name. “I see it!”

  “It” was a ten-story building listing badly to the north. Worse, he could see that despite the terrible weather, several people had actually insisted on going to work. Now those same industrious souls found themselves in terrible danger.

  The reason for the listing had to do with the ground, where a sinkhole had abruptly developed. The sinkhole’s presence seemed odd to the Flash, not something he would’ve expected. “Cisco, you getting a visual of this?”

  “Yeah! That doesn’t look right! According to the data I’m calling up, the ground there shouldn’t be susceptible to that!”

  “Mardon?”

  “Him or another meta.”

  Barry grunted. “Let’s at least hope we’re sticking with Mardon.”

  The doorway stood at a precarious angle. The Flash saw that no one inside would dare step through. Already, several chunks of decorative stone and twisted pieces of steel decorated the entrance. Barry considered clearing the way out first, but determined that the rubble was in fact keeping the rest of that side of the building from completely collapsing.

  With that choice unavailable to him, the Flash went with what was left. He sped through the entrance quickly but so carefully that nothing was disturbed, raced up to the top floor and began checking office after office. Whenever he located a trapped worker, he took hold of them and raced them outside to safety. At first the Flash took a moment to question each about other possible victims, but soon realized he could search the building faster and more efficiently.

  As he worked to clear the third floor, the Flash felt the building rock. Whoever or whatever had created the sinkhole had done so with the intention of the building not taking too long to colla
pse. To the Flash, that sounded just like Mardon.

  One after another, he carried the workers from the building. Barry knew that each time he paused to set a victim safely down, precious seconds passed.

  With the building starting to rip from its foundations, the Flash doubled his speed. Finally, he had the last one out.

  A heartbeat later, the office building collapsed into the sinkhole, the upper floors breaking off and spilling into an empty parking garage across the street.

  A terrible wrenching sound made the Flash immediately turn east. There a fearsome wind ripped out the nearest trees from the nearby city park by their roots and tossed them into the air.

  As he shooed the workers to safety, Barry contacted Cisco again. “We’ve got a tornado here! Mardon’s got to be close by!”

  “Still can’t get a good reading—” Whatever Cisco wanted to say beyond that was lost in a crackle of lightning that left only static in the Flash’s earpiece.

  More trees were torn from the ground. Barry watched them warily. For a moment, they spun madly around the vicinity of the park, but then suddenly they flew toward him.

  “Got to be trickier than that, Mardon,” the speedster remarked. The Flash easily dodged one tree after another. Still, he knew there had to be more to come. The Weather Wizard would not waste time on frivolous threats. Mardon had to have something bigger in mind—

  Caitlin’s voice crackled in his ear. “—overflowing along the entire walk! Do you hear me?”

  “Overflowing? The river?”

  “Yes, it started just a minute ago! Cisco’s calculating the extent of it now!”

  Barry grimaced. The trees had been a violent distraction. Once again, the Weather Wizard had turned to water for his true threat. This time, though, he had not turned the ocean against the city, but rather just the river.

  Not just, the Flash corrected himself. The river ran through the heart of the city. While compared to the devastation the tidal wave would have wrought, the river would still be capable of enough destruction and chaos to leave the middle of Central City in ruins, at an additional cost of hundreds of lives. By the time he reached the public walk, the water was already pouring into the nearest buildings.

  Picking up his speed, the Flash ran along the edge of the overflow, back and forth, creating a counter wave of wind that began pushing the river back into its proper channel. As it did, Barry narrowed his path, keeping the turbulent waters from returning. When he reached the end of the flooding, he crossed at the nearest possible point and repeated his efforts on the other side. Racing back and forth from one bank to the other, he soon had the river flowing as it should.

  Gasping, Barry came to a halt.

  “You okay, man?” Cisco called. “Your readings are showing you pretty burned out! Haven’t seen you this exhausted in a long time!”

  “I just need—I just need a moment to—catch my—”

  More sirens went off.

  The Flash quickly looked around. “What is it?”

  “The hills along the main highway! Report says they’re all collapsing due to the rain and wind!”

  “On my way!” Barry raced to the highway. Despite the storm, there were several cars on the highway attempting to go in either direction. Several had already had to bypass two lanes buried in dirt and rock from one collapsed slope, but as the Flash neared, he saw that an entire section large enough to crush dozens of vehicles had begun to break loose.

  I can’t let the slide reach the highway! Eyeing the already collapsed area, the Flash had an idea. He raced over to the rock and earth and began taking armfuls over to where the other section was falling apart. Again and again and again, the scarlet speedster carried a load to the area before the collapsing hills. There, he packed the earth and rock together until it was hard, then went for more.

  When he had exhausted what there was from the initial slide, the Flash raced up to the current collapse itself and took what he needed. That served him twofold; not only did he gather what he needed for his earthworks, but he lessened part of the collapse.

  And then he had a barrier so large and so thick that when the collapse finally reached it, the earthworks cracked and crumbled somewhat… but held.

  The Flash stared at his work then, fighting his intense exhaustion, stiffened. “Cisco! Caitlin! Either of you hear me?”

  “Go… head,” Caitlin responded.

  “Where’s Joe? Does Iris know?”

  There was another crackle from the communicator… and then, “…duty… quarters…”

  Barry ran as fast as he could, only the physical barriers in his path slowing him at all. Despite his incredible swiftness, he prayed he was not already too late.

  Now at last he felt he knew the Weather Wizard’s plan. Mardon had set not one but a series of distractions. None of these destructive incidents had been his true intention.

  The Weather Wizard had wanted to keep the Flash occupied long enough to avoid being there to protect Joe West.

  “Barry!” Cisco shouted in his ear. “We should have a better connection now!”

  “Joe’s in police headquarters?”

  “Yeah, but there’s something else! I’m getting some worrying readings from you! It’s like you’re suddenly burning out! You need to get back here so we can see what’s going on!”

  Barry couldn’t argue with Cisco’s analysis of him. He wanted desperately to curl up right where he was and sleep for a month, but knew that he dared not stop tonight until he at least made certain Joe was safe.

  As if some power heard his thoughts, Joe West chose that moment to exit police headquarters. He had his coat tight around him and glanced from side to side as he hurried through the storm. The Flash noted that Joe kept one hand near where his gun would have been located.

  Lightning turned the area as bright as day.

  The Flash spotted a figure standing on the headquarters roof.

  “Joe!” The Flash darted over to him, plucking him up and carrying him to a safe location—a police substation—more than a mile away. He paused only long enough to let the detective see him, then raced back.

  The lightning had just begun to fade when the Flash returned. He picked up his pace, then leaped. His feet had just enough traction to give him time to make the next step up. In the blink of an eye, the speedster ran up the wall to the roof.

  There, a strong wind nearly threw him back off. The Flash struggled against the wind as he tried to focus on the figure ahead. Try as he might, he could not make out the man distinctly. Yet there was something familiar in the stance.

  As if realizing the Flash was there, the figure started to turn.

  At the same time the wind’s ferocity magnified tenfold. Barry dropped to one knee as he struggled to keep from being blown away. Shielding his gaze with his hand, he tried to keep the turning figure in sight.

  The shadowy man dissipated just before he would have faced the Flash.

  Barry gasped.

  4

  “I swear he was up there,” Barry muttered, “and then the next second, he wasn’t!”

  “Wouldn’t be the first metahuman we faced that had some crazy power like that,” Cisco said. “Teleport from one spot to another—”

  “No, he didn’t do that. If he had, I might not have paid it much attention. No, this guy broke up as if the wind scattered every little piece of him like dust.”

  “That doesn’t sound like a very comfortable way of traveling,” H.R. offered from the desk he had his feet up on. “Breaking up each time.”

  “Creepy all right.” Cisco typed. “Nothing even close on Dustman yet—”

  “Dustman?” Barry and H.R. uttered in unison.

  Cisco made a face at his own suggestion. “Yeah… maybe I’ll wait until we know more about him before I try to give him a name…” His expression changed to one of exaggerated pride. “But I promise you that when I do, it’ll definitely be another Cisco Ramon masterpiece, right up there with Captain Cold and Prism!”
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  “I’ll bet it will be,” Barry replied with a grin.

  “You scoff, but I’ve been thinking about a full set of trading cards and everything… Think of the market…”

  “Providing there’s a city left,” H.R. pointed out.

  “Yeah. Getting back to which… our mysterious new meta. Funny how he was there just where you’d expect Mardon to have been.”

  “I was wondering about that too,” Barry returned. He still wore his suit, but had pulled the cowl back. It should not have been a bother to change quickly, but he was still suffering after-effects from his earlier intense exhaustion. Cisco had already had him run a few times for some tests and while those runs had not been especially grueling, simply having added them to his already wearying night once more had Barry thinking wistfully of a bed… or at least a flat surface he could trust.

  H.R. scratched his chin in thought. “One would assume that maybe he’s working with the Weather Wizard?”

  “Wouldn’t be the first team-up,” Cisco agreed. He frowned. “Maybe he’s the source of those odd readings… although if so he barely even registers as alive!”

  “Yeah, that wouldn’t be a first, would it?” Barry countered. “Some of our previous adversaries didn’t exactly fit the description of ‘alive’.”

  “No, suppose not. Did Joe see him?”

  “Nope. I got him out of there the moment I spotted the figure and only brought him back after it vanished. Described it to him, though, just in case.”

  “What’d he say?”

  “He wished that just once we’d cross paths with a metahuman with the power to make flowers blossom or some other innocuous ability.”

  Cisco shrugged. “Probably end up being carnivorous flowers. With poisonous pollen to boot.”

  “Yeah.” Before they could discuss the subject further, Barry’s phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID. “Iris. I haven’t had the nerve to speak with her after last night. I know nothing happened to her father, but the mere chance that someone got that close to him has only made her more anxious. I can’t blame her, but I also can’t carry Joe off to some safe place and lock him up there until Mardon’s captured.”