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

The dust cloud parted before them. The sphere hulked over them, one-third of it cleanly sheared off by Mick’s power ring-generated blowtorch. The edges of the incision had already cooled in the near vacuum. Barry wondered briefly if the atmosphere inside the sphere had outgassed. It was possible Eobard Thawne was already dead from vacuum exposure.

Good riddance, Barry thought with uncharacteristic savagery. He was not, by nature, bloodthirsty or given to revenge, but Reverse-Flash had murdered his mother. There would be no tears wept at his demise, however it happened.

Mick and Superman glided up to the makeshift opening and peered within. Barry dashed up the side of the sphere—tricky footing, running on a curved surface, but he made it—and teetered on the edge, looking down with them.

“Looks like an environment field snapped into place when Heat Wave breached the hull,” Superman said. “I can just barely make out an atmosphere in there.”

Barry ran around the edge of the opening for a better vantage point. When Mick sliced off a piece of hemisphere, part of the inside of the sphere had collapsed in on itself. There was debris and wreckage down there, like sediment left in the bottom of a bottle of apple cider vinegar.

Within the sphere, a series of overlapping treadmill belts intersected along the inner wall. What appeared to be antennae jutted out here and there, aimed at the center of the sphere. The tech was eons beyond anything Barry had ever seen before, but the geometry of it all made perfect sense: gathering energy from the center of the sphere, from Thawne’s running, then piping it along the antennae and beaming it like Mick’s ring had shown them.

Speaking of Thawne . . .

There. He spied a swatch of yellow fabric among the wreckage.

“I have to be sure he’s dead,” Barry said. He zipped into the sphere, startled momentarily by the brief tickle of the environment shield as he progressed from vacuum to artificial atmosphere.

“Hurry, Flash,” said Superman. “My telescopic vision isn’t at its best, but it looks like the other team has reached the asteroid with Cisco’s prison.”

“Yeah, plus now that we’ve yanked the batteries out of his toys, I’m betting the freak in the purple bathrobe is gonna be looking this way any second.”

Mick was right. Wobbling a bit, Barry raced down the concave surface of the inner sphere. He tossed some debris aside to uncover Thawne entirely.

And gasped.

A jumble of emotions slammed into him simultaneously—disappointment, horror, anger, shock, regret. And at the same time, his speed-enhanced mind ran through all the possibilities in an instant, arriving at the only possible conclusion.

“It’s a trap!” he yelled.

38

Supergirl finished her conversation with Mr. Terrific, who assured her he would follow her instructions and get her plan to help Joe in motion. Before she signed off, though, Iris nudged her to one side and leaned in to speak to Curtis.

“Have you figured out exactly what Owlman did to the treadmill yet?” Iris asked, her voice laden with urgency.

Still on-site at the treadmill, Mr. Terrific waffled a hand back and forth. “Hard to say. He lowered the frequency, which boosted the power of the signal. I’m not sure why—the strike team was already in the time stream and theoretically already had the power they needed. The speedsters are already off the treadmill, but this thing stored up a lot of their power, and now Owlman has it pumping through the conduit to S.T.A.R. Labs.”

Supergirl was still amazed at the whole let’s build a giant treadmill plan, but the idea of all that energy flowing to S.T.A.R. Labs cut through her wonderment and filled her with dread.

Iris shook her head. “Just pull the plug.”

“That . . . doesn’t sound like a great idea,” Kara told her.

Mr. Terrific concurred. “I don’t think we should do that. We’re talking about a lot of energy here, Iris. I don’t know for sure what’ll happen if we shut it down before we really understand the modifications Owlman made.”

Iris summoned Felicity to join her and Kara in their conversation with Curtis. “What do you think?”

Tapping a pen against her top teeth, Felicity considered. “I think Curtis is right. And I think if Owlman is sending all that excess energy here, there must be a reason. He’s ordered and pragmatic, not chaotic and crazed like the rest of the Crime Syndicate.”

At the words Crime Syndicate, Supergirl’s spine stiffened.

“The Crime Syndicate. His partners.”

“What about them?” Felicity asked.

But Iris had already figured out where Supergirl was going with this. “He’s using that energy to break them out of the Pipeline!” she exclaimed. “Kara, let’s go!”

Together they ran out of the Cortex.

The security system in the Pipeline showed all functions green, meaning that the Crime Syndicate members were still locked up in their cells. Iris paused outside the entrance to their wing of the Pipeline.

“What are you waiting for?” Supergirl asked. “Doesn’t green mean go on Earth 1, too?”

Iris bit her lower lip. “Just because the readout is green doesn’t mean something hasn’t happened in there. Owlman might have already sprung them.”

Supergirl considered this, frowning, then brightened. “Well, Barry told me they weren’t all chummy with one another. Maybe they’ve already knocked each other out.”

“Ha! I wish. They’re all on a strange Earth. Better the devil you know, right?”

“Yeah, I guess Owlman would prefer his old frenemies to the uncertainty of gathering allies from Earth 1.”

Iris reached out for the lever to open the hatch into the Pipe-line, but Supergirl touched her hand.

“You know I’m not going to be super-helpful if there’s a bunch of released villains in there, right?” Supergirl said quietly.

Iris shrugged. “I’m hoping they’ll see the costume and your sunny confidence and not even try to fight.”

Supergirl snorted nervous laughter. “Oh, great. I love this plan.”

They stepped into the Pipeline together, and Supergirl proactively struck her most powerful arms-akimbo pose, figuring it might intimidate whichever villains were on the loose.

But the cell doors were still closed. The Eddie Thawne of Earth 27 slept on his cot, while the