The Legends of Forever by Barry Lyga (books to read for beginners .txt) 📕

At his side, Superman flew at top speed as well, holding the Time Sphere above his head.

“How are you managing to keep up with me?” Barry asked. For that matter, how am I managing to speak in the time stream? Some things, he decided, were better off unexplored.

It was a good and valid question, though—other than the occasional speedster, Barry had never encountered anyone who could keep up with him.

“I’m pretty fast myself,” Superman said with a grin. “But truthfully, I’m drafting off your speed and using the vibrational wave behind us to push me ahead and pace you.”

Barry nodded. As with the time he’d run to the thirtieth century, the time stream appeared to him as a wildly wavering tunnel of rigidly set-off concentric circles in rainbow colors. Also as with that time, he imagined that the numbers of the years whipped by him as he ran: 2058, 2199, 2207 . . .

Faster than before. Everything was faster than before. He had entered into that rarefied aerie of reality where rules no longer applied, where the speed of light was just a good idea, not a law. He’d transcended mere corporality and mortality. He was speed.

3010

3581

Wait. Had they already gone through the Iron Curtain of Time? Rond Vidar told them it was in the year 3102.

Maybe this will be easier than we thought. . .

He kept running.

4983

5879

Millennia crushed beneath his feet. Every stride a thousand years or more. Sweat beaded under his cowl, dripped down into his eyes, wicked away into the heat-chill of the time stream, where friction burned but had no time to scald. To Barry’s horror, he stumbled, his right foot coming down at an odd angle. For a nanosecond, he thought the universe blurred into place around him and he caught a glimpse of the Spires of the sixty-fourth century.

“You can do it, Flash,” Superman encouraged alongside him. “Kara told me you’re the bravest man she ever met. She believes in you, and so do I.”

Reinvigorated, Barry slapped one foot down after another. They were well into the 9000s now, then the ten-thousandth century. The techno-magical era of Abra Kadabra was long behind them.

One hundred centuries down. Hundreds of millions to go.

He kept running.

28

“So, in other words, the TV Barry Allen screwed up, messed with history, then re-messed with history, and we’re the ones who get punished for it? Not cool.”

Cisco was tired of hearing himself say it over and over again. He had managed to press forward a little bit before—though he didn’t know what before really meant when he kept reliving the same seconds. He had to try again.

This time, he tried reaching out differently. Not forward toward the Trapper, but to the side, for his own TV doppelgänger. The Time Trapper had said that TV Cisco had regained his powers. Maybe there was a way . . .

And then he saw it.

He saw the Crisis.

At the same time he was struggling through his own Crisis, the TV Multiverse was suffering its own. But the TV crew’s Crisis had led them the other way, chasing a villain to the Dawn of Time, not the End.

“Ah, you see it, do you?” the Time Trapper interrupted. “They have re-created their Multiverse from the beginning. They’ve merged universes that once were separate. This has destabilized their timeline, though they do not realize it. Making it ripe for the taking.”

Wait, what? Cisco’s mind spun. This wasn’t even about the Multiverse he called home? The Time Trapper was trying to take over the TV Multiverse all along?

“And now, back to your torment. . .”

“So, in other words,” Cisco said, “the TV Barry Allen . . .”

29

Mr. Terrific blew out a relieved breath that he’d been holding in. According to all the data on the screen before him, everything had worked to perfection. The treadmill had done exactly what it was supposed to do, and the strike team had absorbed and channeled the energy. The Earth 27 speedsters were already headed back to their temporary refugee digs, their jobs done.

Now he just had to wait.

He mentally fist-bumped himself in congratulations, then turned to Owlman, who’d walked over from his own control pad. “Nice work. We’re done!”

Owlman craned his neck from side to side. “Well, you’re done,” he told Mr. Terrific, and then casually punched Curtis into unconsciousness with a single precision blow to the jaw.

He cracked his knuckles and began tapping at the control pad.

30

Joe and Rene both reached for their guns in the same moment, a reflex born of necessity and honed over years of training and time on the streets.

Before they could even take aim, Larvan gestured and his bees shot forth, covering the distance between him and the two cops in a hot second. Joe’s wrist burned at multiple stings, and he couldn’t keep his fingers closed—his gun clattered to the floor, as did Rene’s.

“Bert!” Joe cried. “Think this through! A couple of beestings aren’t gonna stop us. I’m about two seconds away from picking up my gun—”

“Ever been stung on the eye, Detective?” Larvan’s lips jerked into a twisted smile. “Oh, you’ll recover. Eventually. After a week or so of blindness.”

Joe had been halfway into a crouch, reaching for his gun. Two of the bees hovered just a few inches from his face. Waiting. Patient. It was wholly unnerving to see them like this. He was used to bees fleeing if he moved too fast, but these were quite willing to outwait him.

“Uh, Joe?” Rene’s voice had risen to a note of panic Joe had never heard before. “Is this when I’m supposed to mention that I’m allergic to beestings?”

Joe groaned. Off to his side, Rene was staring at his own wrist, which had swollen like a baseball.

“Let me get medical attention for him, Bert! For God’s sake!” He didn’t know how allergic Rene was. A massive anaphylactic reaction could occur at any minute and close off Wild Dog’s breathing passage. Or he could be fine for hours.

“Did you really think I would help you