The building was vibrating, and through the open window, the reason was apparent. Four great turbines thrummed twenty feet below.
Suddenly he felt moisture on his face. Turning back, he saw water drizzling through the air. High above, a slate-gray storm sat directly atop the dam. Though he was only fifty feet from the base of the dam, very little of the rain reached him. By the look of it, however, the downpour might fill the reservoir to overflowing in just a few minutes.
Green Arrow squeezed through the window and hung there to get his bearings. Over the deafening hum of the turbines, he also heard the distinct sound of metal ringing on metal. He dropped to a catwalk that ran around the interior, one story above the floor. It was enclosed in a chain-link screen. On the far wall stood a huge bank of dials and gauges, as well as a control panel. Two men in company coveralls eagerly smashed the instrument board, pounding it with crowbars.
The chain-link screen prevented Green Arrow from taking a shot at the two. Their rage would be Bivolo’s doing, so he needed to take them out with the least possible damage.
He started toward them, but the ringing sound of boots on metal heralded the arrival of a third workman, climbing stairs that led up from the ground floor. His uniform identified him as a supervisor. Blocking Oliver’s path, he hoisted a huge wrench that looked like it belonged in a cartoon.
The man rushed him and swung the wrench in a vicious arc. Ducking under it, Green Arrow shoved the man against the chain-link. The guy growled, broke free, and lashed out again. Oliver had to do something before a lucky blow connected with his head.
Sidestepping another swing, he felt the wind brush his chin. He grabbed the back of the man’s head, bent him forward, and delivered a hard knee to the soft gut. The man’s breath whooshed out and he collapsed to the catwalk, gasping and disabled.
One of the men with crowbars glanced over his shoulder.
“Hey! Robin Hood beat up Tony!”
“Good!” the other guy shouted, and he continued bashing dials, but the first man left his post and came sprinting around the far corner.
From his bandolier, Green Arrow pulled Cisco’s device used to defuse Prism’s rage effect. He flicked the trigger and it emitted sharp bursts of colored light. The man with the crowbar winced and drew back. He stopped and stared, and Green Arrow landed a solid punch. The crowbar clanged to the catwalk, followed by the man himself.
The final man continued delivering blow after blow to the control panels. Dials shattered. Buttons and toggles hung broken from their housings. Oliver moved closer, held up the device, and whistled sharply to get the man’s attention.
“Shut up!” The crowbar came swinging back. It clipped Oliver’s hand and batted the device through the chain-link fence, sending it to clatter among the turbines below. The worker never turned from the task at hand.
Green Arrow knelt to hook his bow on the man’s ankle, and jerked him down to the catwalk. The man dropped hard, eyes wide and confused. One kick sent the crowbar out of reach, another put his opponent down for the count.
When Oliver stood, he caught a glimpse of a fourth man down on the main floor. Also wearing coveralls, the man lay partially hidden behind one of the huge generators. Green Arrow went to the stairs and slid down, forearms on the railings, feet up. Hitting the cement running, he made for the rumbling turbine, and stopped. The workman struggled to push himself off the floor.
“Are you all right?” Oliver asked.
The man glanced back over his shoulder with glowing red eyes.
This time Oliver felt a raw flush of anger, almost like a surge of pain. His mind flooded instantaneously with tragedies that had been visited on him. The injustices. The lies he had been forced to tell. The deaths he had been unable to prevent. It seemed as if someone was always testing him, always provoking him. The thought filled him with blinding rage.
No, not blinding—because he clearly saw the man standing in front of him. Bivolo was the one who had used innocent men as weapons, not even caring if they died in the process. Green Arrow bent his rage into clean, spotless focus, like staring down a powerful telescopic sight. Prism had the gall to smile in triumph as he strolled past.
“You left those guys alive,” Bivolo said, sneering. “Very sloppy. Take care of them.”
“Bivolo!” Oliver shouted.
Bivolo stopped, and turned back, his face twisted in disbelief. “No way,” he said. “Maybe you didn’t get a good look. I said kill them!”
Green Arrow stared deep into the red eyes.
Rage surged, filling him, burning red hot. With slow deliberation, he pulled an arrow, nocked it, and drew back the string.
He lifted it to point directly between Bivolo’s eyes.
30
“You can’t do this,” Bivolo said. “Why aren’t you enraged?”
“I am,” Green Arrow replied coldly. “And my rage is directed at you.”
“Oliver!” Felicity’s panicked voice shouted in his ear. “What’s happening?”
The arrow flew.
It impacted Bivolo’s forehead with a sharp crack, sending a grayish foam expanding into the air, to cover his face. The force knocked Bivolo off his feet. As he hit the floor he clawed at the hardening foam, tearing it off in chunks.
Green Arrow fell on him in an instant. He wrestled the man’s hands away and kicked him over onto his stomach. Dropping a knee onto the small of his opponent’s back, he cinched Bivolo’s wrists together with a zip band. He bound the ankles, too, and left him trussed helplessly on the cold floor. The foam was air permeable, so Bivolo wouldn’t suffocate.
Green Arrow knelt next to the writhing figure, head down, taking in long breaths, fighting the urge to hurt him.
“Oliver,” Felicity said, “are you all right?”
“No,” he ground out. Every emotion cried out for Prism’s blood, but he held onto his rage as he had done for much of his life. “No, but I’ve got it under control.”
After a few moments he regained his calm, though he had a pounding headache to show for it. Rising to his feet, he climbed back to the catwalk. The three men were moaning. Abruptly the background vibrations were shattered by a high-pitched alarm, and strobe lights from the ceiling. In his ear he heard the conversations again between the Flash and the team at S.T.A.R. Labs.
“He can’t keep it up for long,” Caitlin said.
“He won’t have to,” Barry answered. “The water’s already washing over the top of the dam, and the floodgates haven’t opened to relieve the pressure.”
Oliver took calming breaths to fight the lingering pain in his skull.
“Working on it,” he said. Oliver helped the closest man to his feet. The supervisor, Tony, was disoriented.
“You’re that Arrow guy, aren’t you?” he said. “Where’s the Flash?”
“What’s that alarm?” Oliver demanded.
“It’s the overwash alarm.” A second man got to his feet. “There’s water topping the dam. We need to open the floodgates.” When they reached the control panels and broken glass crunched under their feet, Tony groaned. “The switches for the gates are smashed.” He eyed several gauges too high up on the wall to have been destroyed. “Oh, crap. I bet we have maybe five minutes before we get operational and structural failure.”
“You mean the dam will burst?”
“Yeah, probably.”
“Don’t you have a backup system?”
The third engineer joined them and rubbed his head, wincing while he scoured the controls, testing buttons and switches to see what still worked.
“On the top of the dam you can trigger a hydraulics release on each of the three gates,” Tony said. “Frankly it’ll take longer than five minutes to climb up there.”
“Tell me exactly what I need to do,” Green Arrow said. “I can get up there in time. You three grab that man on the floor, and use the time to get to high ground. Be careful of him—he’s dangerous. Whatever you do, don’t look him in the eye.”
&nb
sp; The three men made no move to do as he said. They continued to pry panels off the control board.
“All those people living downriver don’t have five minutes to get to high ground,” Tony said. “We need to fix it.”
“They’ve already been evacuated,” Oliver responded, even though he didn’t know that was totally true. The supervisor studied him, and turned back to work.
“Even if that’s the case, we’re not losing a whole dam on our shift. That looks bad on the resume.”
Suddenly a shattering boom rocked the powerhouse. The men looked up expecting water to crash through the roof. The air tingled with electricity. No flood came. The turbines continued to whine.
“What the hell was that?” Tony muttered as he applied a voltage meter to some exposed wires.
“What’s wrong?” Oliver said into his mic.
“Barry’s down.” Felicity’s voice was urgent. “Can you respond?”
“Yes,” Oliver answered, and then to the engineers, “I’m going up top. The Flash needs me.”
The three guys all looked up. “The Flash is here?” Tony exclaimed. “Why didn’t you say so? If the Flash needs your help, what are you doing standing around here?”
That actually caused Green Arrow to grin. “You’ve got three minutes before I trigger the emergency release.” He bolted for the stairs and slid down.
“Make it four,” Tony replied loudly. “This thing is a mess!”
* * *
Outside, Green Arrow returned to the cable dangling from the top of the dam. Hooking it into the bow again, he triggered the recall and ran up the concrete face as the pulley drew in the line. Fast water poured past his boots. He slipped and the wind sent him flying to one side. The ravine below spun far beneath his feet.
He slammed against the concrete, paused to gather his breath, and then started climbing again. Vibrations rumbled under his boots.
Reaching the top, he detached the line, and loaded an explosive arrow. The rain continued to fall, but it wasn’t a solid sheet any longer. Breakers crashed against the dam, piling water along the top, threatening to knock him off his feet.
He spotted the Flash awash in the foam. Barry was unconscious, but had wedged face up against one of the hydraulic poles extending from a floodgate assembly. He just as easily could have been washed over the top of the dam into the ravine below, or simply drowned.
Moving to his side, Oliver snapped an ammonia capsule under Barry’s nose. His eyes flew open and he splashed awkwardly in the water.
“Easy, easy.” Oliver helped him orient himself. Barry focused on Oliver’s familiar face, and relaxed. They both stood in the ankle-deep water.
“Did you blur out again?”
“I don’t think so. I threw a lightning bolt at Mardon, but he threw one at me at the same time, and they crashed into each other. What are the odds of that?”
“In this line of work, pretty good,” Green Arrow replied. “Did you get Mardon?”
“I don’t know.”
A lightning bolt crackled over their heads. On the west side of the dam, Mardon staggered into view. Electricity flared around him and wind tore at his clothes.
“I mean no,” Barry clarified.
Oliver grabbed the Flash’s arm and pulled him off the end of the dam. They dropped behind a brick wall just as another bolt seared the air. Barry lay on the sodden ground catching his breath. Oliver peered over the edge of their cover. In the distance, Mardon clutched his right arm as if it was broken.
“He’s injured,” Green Arrow reported. “Does that wand of yours still work?”
The Flash pulled the metal rod off his belt. Though badly scorched, it hummed to life, only to die again. He inspected it and made a few adjustments. This time it glowed a faint blue. He sighed in relief, but switched it off.
“That lightning strike nearly drained it. It won’t survive another one.”
“I can create a distraction while you run for him.”
Barry shook his head. “I’m not up to speed—not yet. Another lightning bolt, and that’ll be all she wrote.” He leveled a curious stare at Green Arrow, and handed him the weather wand. “Can you shoot this on an arrow?”
His attention still on Mardon, Oliver took the cylinder. It only weighed about two pounds.
“It’s a tough call,” he said. “It may be too heavy.”
“What if all you have to do is hit him? It doesn’t have to be precise.”
“Under normal circumstances, I’d give it better than a fifty-fifty chance.” Green Arrow hefted the wand in his hand again, and looked around. “But with conditions like this? The wind whipping…”
“What if you didn’t have to worry about the wind?”
“What are you thinking?”
The Flash pulled himself up to peer over the top of the brick wall alongside Green Arrow. Mardon remained at the far end of the dam, seventy-five yards away, peering steadily in their direction. He stretched out his arm, and lightning struck a few feet in front of their hiding spot. They both ducked.
“We’ve got to move now,” Barry said. “He’s getting stronger.”
“And if they don’t get those floodgates open, the engineers below estimate five minutes before it starts to crumble.”
“When was that?”
“About five minutes ago. What’s the plan?”
“You attach the wand to an arrow, I’m going to run straight at Mardon. You fire the arrow behind me. It can draft in my wake through Mardon’s interference. At the last second, I’ll dodge aside, the arrow will hit him, and the wand will shock the power out of him. Good guys win.”
Oliver eyed him suspiciously.
“No, really,” Barry said. “It’ll work. He’ll be focused on me.”
“That’s what I’m worried about.”
“Look, Joe and Digg are down below us with who knows how many others. If this dam breaks, they’re going to die. Period. So do you think you can hit Mardon?” Barry wasn’t angry. He sounded desperate.
“I can.” Oliver reached into a pocket on his tunic and pulled out a small roll of duct tape. Taking a simple razor-tipped arrow, he placed the wand along the shaft, moving it up and back, testing the balance. Finally he tore off some tape and affixed the wand to the arrow. He scowled, looked up, and nodded.
The Flash came up on one knee, still hunched behind the brick wall. He eyed the glinting razor edge.
“That looks sharp.”
“It is.” Green Arrow drew the string. “Just so you know, this arrow travels at two hundred miles per hour.”
“Guess I better hit two hundred and one, then.” He took a deep breath. “On three. One. Two. Thr—”
There was nothing but a blur left behind.
Green Arrow popped up over the brick wall and fired.
The arrow flew after the red streak. Lightning flared from Mardon’s fingertips, sweeping across the top of the dam, trying to intercept the Flash. It crashed around Oliver, throwing dirt in the air and sending phosphorescent illuminations sparking across the surface of the water.
The Flash froze just a few feet from Mardon.
Green Arrow gaped in horror.
The arrow struck Barry…
…and passed through his body. Yet there was no impact, no blood. The arrow hit Mardon square in the shoulder. The wand flared blue and sparked. Mardon erupted in an electrical storm, his screams audible over the roar of the wind.
The Weather Wizard crumpled to the ground, wreathed in smoke.
Green Arrow vaulted the brick wall and ran out over the top of the water-swept dam. He splashed through water so deep it was hard to see the concrete surface. He couldn’t fathom why the Flash was still upright. As he drew closer, he faintly saw the landscape through his friend’s body.
Barry was blurring.
Instinctively Oliver reached out for the red shape, and his hand slipped inside it. His arm went numb and he jerked back, clutching his tingling limb. The Flash hung there, suspended and intangibl
e, trapped in a stance that should have been impossible to maintain.
The dam shook under Oliver’s feet. He looked back, expecting to see huge chunks of concrete calving off into the ravine. In several spots across the expanse of the structure, water frothed up into the air. The flow grew irregular, even as the roar grew louder.
The increased clamor came from below the rim, along its face, but it wasn’t a breach. The floodgates had opened. The thundering deluge drowned out all other sounds, while the flow of water around his boots diminished until it was gone. The reservoir’s surface dropped beneath the rim. The dam stood intact.
Green Arrow walked to Mardon, who lay in the mud gasping shallow breaths. Blood seeped from the wound in his shoulder. It wasn’t fatal, and Oliver couldn’t summon much concern over it. The wand still glowed.
“Oliver?” Felicity called out. “What’s happening? We’ve lost Barry’s vitals.”
“Mardon and Bivolo are down. Send someone to take them into custody. Report to Detective West that the dam is safe, at least for the moment, but keep people out of the floodplain for now, just in case.”
Caitlin asked insistently, “And Barry?”
“He blurred going after Mardon, but he’s alive.” Oliver gazed back at the shimmering image of Barry Allen. “I think.” The Fastest Man Alive was completely still. Not quite in this world. He wondered what Barry was seeing, if anything. As he tried to stare into those young eyes, he expected to find concentration and focus, but saw only the indistinct image of a face.
With a fatigued breath, Oliver sat heavily on the wet ground.
“I’ll wait here with him.” He studied the unnatural figure of his friend, and said, “Don’t worry. The good guys won.”
31
When Mardon faded out in front of him, Barry thought one of the scattershot lightning bolts made contact. But then he knew. He was blurring!
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