Meanwhile, in another world—another ruined Gotham.
Several figures raced through the streets at blinding speed.
This was the Red Death's world. Here, Batman had failed to save Nightwing, Tim, and the others in time. Consumed by self-loathing over his lack of speed, he'd strapped the Flash into the Batmobile and driven straight into the Speed Force dimension.
During that high-speed run, Batman and the Flash had merged into a single being. When he emerged, he possessed the Speed Force—and within ten seconds, he'd killed every villain in Gotham.
Today, he was playing a game of hunter and hunted with the Flash and Reverse-Flash from another universe.
"Cisco, cut east to block him off."
"Caitlin, use your powers to create speed bumps at the next three intersections."
"Run, Barry! Run!"
The one calling the shots was Reverse-Flash. He couldn't care less about the Red Death specifically, but Thea had promised to send him back to the twenty-fifth century. This mission was him honoring that deal.
Barry, Cisco, Caitlin, and Reverse-Flash—disguised as Dr. Wells—reunited after years apart, fighting together for the same objective once again. The old closeness was gone, of course. Neither side bothered to hide the wariness between them. But fate—or perhaps Thea's twisted sense of humor—had thrown the four of them back together regardless.
The tensions were enormous, yet none of it diminished Reverse-Flash's tactical acumen. The others received his orders with a mix of resistance and a longing they couldn't quite suppress.
Fighting side by side again... not bad, actually. The thought surfaced in the deepest corners of each of their minds, but nobody said it aloud.
The Red Death was faster than both speedsters. His intellect surpassed Reverse-Flash's. And when it came to knowledge of Gotham's streets, all four of them combined couldn't match him.
Yet despite every advantage, he and the four of them were at a stalemate. This team—seemingly fractured but secretly unified—was far more tenacious than he'd estimated.
Crimson bat-shaped afterimages trailed behind him. He was looking somewhat harried now, banking hard to avoid the road surface Caitlin had frozen over. He sprinted up the side of a building, but the detour let the Flash close the gap from behind. Reverse-Flash angled in from the opposite side.
His only option was to change direction again, cutting east.
"Cisco, ready! Three, two, one!" Reverse-Flash spotted the enemy entering his trap and barked the countdown through comms.
Cisco could briefly sever the connection between speedsters and the Speed Force dimension. The window was tiny, but at those velocities, even a momentary lapse could shift the entire battle.
He counted down silently, then—without even checking the Red Death's position—unleashed his Vibe powers to cut this space's link to the Speed Force.
"Get... out of the way, Cisco!" Static crackled through the earpiece. A few garbled syllables came through.
The Red Death, who should have lost his balance and hit the ground, wasn't affected at all. Instead, it was their own two speedsters who'd ground to a halt. Seeing the danger, they immediately resumed running.
The Red Death grabbed Cisco by the throat and hoisted him into the air with one hand. No difficulty whatsoever.
"The power of science. I suppose you didn't know the Speed Force can be stored?" The Red Death tapped his own ear, indicating an earpiece—he'd been listening to their communications the entire time.
Cisco also noticed a battery-like device on his opponent's chest. That had to be his Speed Force reservoir.
Their comms were compromised. Their strategy was countered. This round was a total loss for Reverse-Flash.
With his teammates too far away to help, Cisco could only save himself.
He desperately turned his Vibe powers on himself. In the heat of the moment, he performed beyond his limits and slipped into the space between worlds.
The Red Death's hand passed through his fading silhouette. A brief pause—he waited one second, realized Cisco had gone in but couldn't get back out, and laughed. He wheeled around to deal with Caitlin, who was using her deceleration abilities.
"Cisco?" Barry skidded to his side, reaching toward the flickering afterimage. He waved, made hand signals, mouthed words—but Cisco had shunted himself into the gap and burned through too much energy to return on his own.
"Pull him out," Reverse-Flash ordered, then took off after the Red Death.
Barry tried several methods, none of which worked. With no other option, he began vibrating at high speed, searching for the frequency Cisco had accidentally locked himself into. Luck was on his side—he found it quickly and yanked his friend back out.
By then, Killer Frost was already in trouble. Her first instinct had been to take flight, but the Red Death had swatted her out of the air with a thrown lightning bolt. By the time she tried again, it was too late.
She resorted to blanketing the area with her cryogenic field. And as one of Thea's inner circle, she also carried inertia-slowing grenades modified from the Turtle Man's Inertia Wave—but those things slowed everyone equally. She couldn't use them recklessly.
Deploying a grenade would most likely freeze herself in place while the Red Death strolled over at leisure to end her. She needed outside support.
A green-tinted grenade appeared in her palm. She froze everything in a three-meter sphere around herself, no blind spots. Caitlin locked eyes with the Red Death as he circled the perimeter looking for an opening. The two settled into a standoff.
"Fall back!" Their comms were compromised, the initial plan a total bust. Reverse-Flash intervened directly, extracting Caitlin from the field. On the other side, Barry grabbed Cisco and pulled him to safety.
The four regrouped. All of them had decent scientific backgrounds, but how the Red Death was intercepting their communications—that, they couldn't immediately figure out.
Reverse-Flash ran a full diagnostic on their equipment. The problem clearly wasn't on their end—the enemy's tech was simply that far ahead. As a time traveler, getting outclassed by so-called primitive technology was infuriating beyond words.
"This world is collapsing. We don't have much time." Caitlin gazed out the window. The ground trembled in constant micro-quakes. The pale red sun hung so low it looked like you could reach out and touch it. Static electricity churned through the clouds. A full-blown apocalypse.
The fusion of two multiverses was accelerating.
"I can feel a different voice inside the Red Death. This world's Barry Allen is still conscious in there. Maybe we can try to wake him up?" Barry's feelings toward Reverse-Flash were complicated. The old grievances between them defied untangling. He could only force down his discomfort and keep his focus on the mission.
Reverse-Flash still wore Dr. Wells's face. He smiled with pointed implication. "I'm afraid that won't be easy, Barry. Put away that pointless sympathy. Let's stick to reality—we can build a gravitational magnetic field..."
The condescension in his voice grated on Barry. "Have you always been this cold? Did the person I knew ever actually exist?"
Before they could start arguing in earnest, Cisco and Caitlin stepped between them and wrestled their attention back to the problem at hand.