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

brought Caitlin with her to interrogate Madame Xanadu. Not because Caitlin was a doctor, but rather because Caitlin turned out to be a good shot with the cold gun. She stood at the foot of Xanadu’s bed and took careful aim.

“Try anything tricky or witchy or magical,” Iris warned, “and Caitlin will turn you into a popsicle.”

Madame Xanadu showed no concern at this pronouncement. She sat up a little straighter in bed without so much as a glance in Caitlin’s direction.

“There is no need to threaten me.”

“You’ve been conspiring with Owlman.”

Xanadu clucked her tongue. “Conspire. An interesting word. It literally means ‘to breathe together.’ So . . . yes, I have found it prudent to mingle my breath with his. That does not mean we share the same goals.”

“I think the death of your Earth 27 counterpart drove you mad,” said Caitlin. “And you’re trying to bring the same fate to our world.”

Xanadu shook her head. “Quite the contrary. I’m trying to save what is left of this Multiverse and the other.”

“You have a funny way of showing it: sabotaging the treadmill.”

“That was not an act of sabotage. We did nothing to impair your friends’ run to the future. We merely . . . modified the treadmill for an alternate purpose.”

Caitlin hefted the gun significantly. “No more riddles and half-truths. Tell us what you’re up to.”

Xanadu sighed at Caitlin’s display but still did not look at her, focusing on Iris.

“Iris, I’ve foreseen it. We all have, the fifty-one remaining Madame Xanadus across the Multiverse. Flash and his team cannot stop the Time Trapper. As his name implies, they are running into a trap.”

Iris felt a chill. “Then why did you let them go?”

“Because we needed them to breach the Iron Curtain of Time. And now Bruce has reconfigured your treadmill, turning it from an engine into a weapon. A pulse of vibrational energy so powerful that it will destroy the Time Trapper at the End of All Time and collapse the universe into its next form.”

“But . . . but Barry and the others . . . They’re at the End of All Time, too! What will happen to them?”

Madame Xanadu’s expression told Iris everything she needed to know. “This is why I needed Owlman. His narcissism made him desperate to save the universe so that he could live. And at the same time, I knew I could rely on his ruthlessness to do what had to be done.”

“No,” Iris said, wiping furiously at a stray tear. No time for sadness. Only anger and action. “I don’t believe you. I can’t let this be a suicide mission.”

“Never fear. Our plan will not work.”

Caitlin groaned from the foot of the bed. “What? Then why go through all of this in the first place?”

Madame Xanadu smiled her enigmatic smile. “Because something else will.”

“This is absolutely nuts!” Iris exclaimed.

With a soft, slow shake of her head, Madame Xanadu said, “This is how it must be. This is how it shall be. This has all been foreseen, including Bruce’s betrayal and the destruction of the Time Trapper and the heroes at the End of All Time.”

“Will I ever see Barry again?” Iris asked.

Madame Xanadu folded one hand atop the other and closed her eyes. For a long time, she said nothing. Then, with a small, placid smile, she said, “You already have seen him again.”

53

Luthor wore a prison jumpsuit, so the Trapper had plucked him from one of the many times he’d been incarcerated on Stryker’s Island, the special airborne prison for super-criminals.

He also wore a smarmy smirk. Superman hadn’t much cared for that expression when they’d been kids—he liked it even less as an adult.

“I don’t have time for you, Lex. Get out of the way.”

“Oh, how I’ve missed that confident, solipsistic tone of voice!” Lex crowed. “As though you were the only person in the world who mattered. And I’m sure you actually believe that. Which is why . . .”

Superman marched over to Lex and did what he’d been wanting to do for years but couldn’t—wound up his fist and punched him squarely in the jaw with every ounce of strength in his body. If he’d done this under a yellow sun, Lex’s head would have become a grayish-red free-floating mist. Without his powers, though, only two things happened: First, Lex shut up and dropped to the ground, unconscious.

Second, Superman realized he’d probably broken a couple of bones in his hand. It throbbed with radical pain.

Worth it, he decided, gazing at Lex’s prone form beneath him.

Shaking the pain from his right hand, he stepped over Lex and rotated the console toward him. He knew alien and future technology, true, but this was something beyond even him. He worried at his lower lip. Think, Clark. Prove that you don’t solve every problem with your fists.

He glanced at Lex. Appearances to the contrary.

The wiring and cabling of the machinery seemed chaotic at first. He blocked out the battle raging in the distance, blocked out the enormity of the Time Trapper, and focused on the task before him. Soon, it started to make sense. He began tapping at the screen. Tentatively. Experimentally. A set of concentric circles widened and a green light flashed. That didn’t seem right to him. He tried another series of taps—the circles tightened on each other and the light faded into crimson.

I think this is it. I think I’m moving the Curtain closer to the present.

There was another console nearby. His own console was about as red at it could get, but the concentric circles still weren’t overlapping. There was a gap there. He knew it in his gut—the circles had to meet, had to become one. That would mean the Curtain had arrived at the present moment.

But to do it, he would have to manipulate both consoles at once. And the other console was out of reach.

What was he going to do?

“I’m hope this makes sense to you,” Oliver said. “Because to me it just looks like a stereo committed suicide.”

Sara nodded in agreement. She and Oliver