The world was reduced to the flicker of torchlight and the low, rhythmic chant that vibrated through the cold stone floor. Wally West came to with a throbbing in his head, his thoughts fuzzy. The last thing he remembered was a figure in a dark coat, a flash of something metallic, and then… nothing.
Now, he was on his knees in a vast, subterranean chamber. Around him, maybe two dozen people, their faces hidden deep within hooded robes, moved in a slow, shuffling circle. Their voices were a single, unified murmur, chanting words in a language he didn't understand, but the feeling was unmistakable: reverence. Fear. Awe.
In the center of their circle stood a man. He wasn't hooded. He wore a strange, polished stone mask that seemed to drink the light, and his posture was unnervingly still. This was Alchemy. And before him, towering over the scene, was a statue. It was crude, ancient, carved from black rock, but its form was chillingly familiar. A muscular humanoid figure, its body seemingly armoured in jagged, overlapping plates, and a helmet with a single, sharp crest where a face should be.
A cold knot tightened in Wally's stomach. This was bad. This was very, very bad.
Alchemy's voice cut through the chanting, not loud, but carrying an authority that silenced the room.
"He is the first," Alchemy began, his voice echoing slightly in the chamber. He gestured to the statue. "Before the Flash, before any of the pretenders who came after, there was He. He is the source. The wellspring from which all speed flows."
Wally tried to speak, to demand what was going on, but his voice was a dry croak. Alchemy's masked head turned slightly towards him, as if he'd heard the attempt.
"You seek what the Flash has, Wallace West. You hunger for it. You watch him, your hero, and you feel the emptiness where that power should be." Alchemy took a step closer. "But what he has is a shadow. A reflection in a dirty puddle. What I offer you is the ocean."
One of the hooded figures stepped forward, holding a small, carved stone box. Alchemy opened it. Inside, resting on a bed of black velvet, was a large, shimmering crystal. It pulsed with a faint, sickly orange light.
"The Philosopher's Stone," Alchemy said, lifting it. "It doesn't create. It reveals. It restores what was meant to be."
"What are you talking about?" Wally finally managed, his voice cracking.
"Another life," Alchemy said simply. "A life where you were not left behind. A life where you were fast. Where you were Kid Flash." The name hung in the air, a phantom promise. "The Flash, in his arrogance, believes he created the Speed Force. He thinks his little run birthed it into this world."
A dry, humorless laugh escaped from behind the mask. "He is a child who found a river and claims he dug the bed. He does not know its true depth. He does not know the predator that lives in its deepest, darkest currents."
Alchemy held the stone aloft. The orange glow intensified, casting long, dancing shadows from the statue that seemed to writhe like living things.
"There is one who was there at the very beginning. Not the beginning the Flash remembers, but the true beginning. The first crack of lightning in the primordial dark. He is speed itself, pure and absolute. He was cast out, imprisoned not in a cage of bars, but in the prison of his own existence, trapped for eternity in the moment of his own creation."
The chanting began again, louder now, more fervent.
"He has seen the end of all things. He has seen his own glory, and he has seen the Flash's failure. He is not a man. He is an idea. The idea of motion. And ideas cannot be killed."
Wally felt a pull, a strange, magnetic draw towards the glowing stone. Memories that weren't his own flickered at the edge of his mind—the feel of wind tearing at his costume, the blur of a cityscape, the roar of a crowd chanting his name. The life he was supposed to have. The emptiness inside him ached.
"He will return," Alchemy's voice rose, becoming a declaration. "He will tear his way out of his prison and reclaim what is his. This world, this flawed, slow world, will be remade in his image. A world of perfect, unstoppable velocity."
He turned fully to Wally now, the stone's light blazing.
"The Flash believes he can play god with speed. He shares it like a toy. He has no idea what he is meddling with. But He knows. And He has chosen you, Wallace West. Not to be a hero. But to be a herald. To be the proof of his power, and the instrument of the Flash's downfall."
"No," Wally whispered, but the protest was weak. The phantom memories were so vivid, so real. The promise was a drug, and he was an addict taking his first hit.
Alchemy took the final step, placing the cold, pulsing stone against Wally's chest.
A scream was torn from Wally's lungs, but no sound came out. The world dissolved into a agony of orange light. It felt nothing like the stories he was told. This wasn't a river of energy; it was a torrent of broken glass, shredding through his cells. He felt his body contort, his bones vibrating, his skin burning with a cold fire. Visions assaulted him—a suit of jagged, silver armour, a endless void of screaming lightning, a feeling of immense, lonely power that stretched across centuries.
He collapsed onto the stone floor, gasping, the orange energy crackling over him like static. It was unstable, painful, wrong. But it was speed. It was everything he'd ever wanted, and it felt like hell.
Alchemy looked down at him, a satisfied stillness in his stance. He then turned his gaze upwards, as if addressing the very ceiling of the cave, the city above, the man he was taunting.
"Let the Flash have his moments of joy," Alchemy said, his voice dropping to a venomous whisper. "Let him play with his power. It only makes the reckoning sweeter."
He spread his arms wide, a priest at a dark altar.
"I herald his beginning!"
The cultists fell to their knees.
"I herald your end, Flash!"
He brought his hands together with a sharp clap that echoed like a gunshot.
"I herald the God of Speed…"
The orange energy around Wally flared, and for a single, terrifying second, a phantom image of the jagged statue superimposed itself over Wally's writhing form.
"...Savitar."
The name echoed in the chamber, a final, chilling verdict. On the floor, wreathed in painful, alien lightning, Wally West shuddered, a herald whether he wanted to be or not. The game had changed. The god was coming.