Barry has never feared anything in his life half as much as he fears the Speed Force.
Staring up at the ceiling of his childhood bedroom, Barry tries to simultaneously assess and dismiss the sensory input he receives. He shouldn't be here. There is no place in the multiverse he belongs less: he has never, ever, ever left the realm of the living before, no matter how far he has traveled from home, no matter how far he has strayed from his original universe. He doesn't belong anywhere but the realm of the living. Being alive in a space where "being alive" isn't compatible jars him. Living implies being a part of space-time: having relevancy and a temporary residence in the multiverse. Living is moving forward, possessing a body, seeking meaning.
Outside of the multiverse, Barry cannot be alive. But he isn't dead, either, insensate to his surroundings and erased from existence: he is awake. He can see the ceiling. He can hear the strange, quiet noises produced by a false breeze, hear a rhythmic movement mimicking life in some distant corner of the universe, a sign that he is not alone, tiny, tiny sounds meant to shatter a perfect, unbearable silence.
In the Speed Force, Barry is neither dead nor alive: he just Is.
Attempting to grasp the nature of his new reality, Barry latches onto the only thing he can in this space: I have to get back. As long as he is alive, there has to be a way.
Am I alive?
In his mind, a vital switch is turned off, making it difficult to focus on what he needs to do next. There is no "succession" of events: only existence. As he wanders through the room, taking stock of everything, he feels disoriented. He doesn't know what to do, how to be alive in a space where being alive is incompatible, where time does not exist.
No: it exists. But it behaves like a vacuum of time, suffocating, silent; it also behaves like an excess of time, overbearing, overwhelming. Standing in the center of the room, Barry takes in the stillness, the utter lack of temporal change, and realizes that it is All Time: neither past nor present nor future, it simply Was, and Is, and Always Shall Be.
Feeling desperately for an anchor before he loses his mind, Barry pauses at his old dresser, staring at the little plush Apatosaurus mounted on top of it. Beside the plush is a pristine copy of an old flip book: The Runaway Dinosaur. Barry feels his heart rate slow down as he stares at it, something approximating calm stilling the anxiety running through his mind at the simple reminder that hey, hey: I am someone. I'm just very far from home.
When he stops, it is misdirection. Nothing moves, here: all is stillness. Movement is the illusion supplied by his own mind: a sense of pausing in time, a sense of moving forward again, even though Barry knows he both has not moved and is still moving, simultaneously. He drifts through the space, using stationary objects as a grid, wordlessly thanking the Speed Force for supplying that much: without time, without a sense of motion, he could not hope to orient himself.
Take a deep breath, he encourages himself.
The air tastes like lightning, like a storm, like his very last breath.
He swallows hard and pushes forward, resolving to find the door that will lead him home. Instinctively, he knows that it is not here, in this room. This is where he was entombed, laid to rest, but this is also where he woke up, centered again. The answer he seeks isn't here, but it is Somewhere, Somewhere, Somewhere.
Unwilling to let it torment him – too many uncertainties, too many disobedient – nonexistent – laws of physics contending for his attention, he tries to focus on the illusion. He keeps a hand on the wall, tracing it to create a tactile grid, balancing the strange, fuzzy, intrusive field of view his vision provides. The Speed Force keeps him blind, he realizes, still holding onto the wall. He can see, but these images are lies.
Taking in another deep, illusionary breath – none of this is real – Barry lets go of the wall and puts a hand on the top of the staircase. He exhales and shifts his right foot towards the very edge of the top stair. For an indefinable period – only measured by each habitual inhale and exhale – Barry stands there. At last, he leans forward and takes a single step into the abyss.
The Speed Force catches him, soft wood sliding against the sole of his shoe even as his heart races in his chest. He thinks, It's okay even as he stands there trembling between the first step and the next, terrified at the height, the depth, the indefinability of it all.
As if it can sense his hesitation – and Barry is certain it can – the Speed Force quietly, unobtrusively banishes his anxiety. Barry looks down and sees only a single step in front of him, and the fear shies away because there is a fond, overwhelmingly trusting sense that Dad will be there before he hits the floor if he falls. It's okay, the unseen father says, I've got you.
Barry takes another step, and he does not fall.
He doesn't know how long it takes him to reach the base of the staircase, but he feels refreshed, enlightened, more whole as he steps onto the ground level. But the Speed Force allows him to look around, and he feels a tightening pain in his throat because Dad isn't here, Dad never was here, and he is alone.
Tempted though he is to stand and weep, to sink into an inconsolable stupor of kill me or save me, he feels Speed Force in the space around him, in him, there is no line between them, and then a quiet but powerful relief sinks into him. I am here, the unseen mother says. You are not alone. Trust me.
Feeling safe, secure, he looks down at a pair of shoes – my shoes – and smiles. He looks around and smiles because this is home as he never thought he'd get to see it again, home with Mom and Dad, home when none of the extraordinary and terrible things had ever happened to him. This is home of the nights before, the days before, the life before: everything pure, unbroken, light and bright and familiar to his eyes, his hands, all his senses, as if he never left it.
A rustling noise draws Barry's attention towards the living room as something snaps lightly, repeatedly, like a tape-measure. Barry wanders closer, following the sound, and as he steps around the corner he expects his mother and father to be standing in the living room, waiting for him with familiar, fond smiles. He expects Dad's hey slugger to be complemented by Mom's so good to see you, Barry as she pulls him into one of the most soothing hugs he has ever known. He expects them like he expects sunrise, nightfall, and breath.
Instead, he finds lines of police tape drifting across the threshold separating hallway from living room, all the hairs on his neck and arms standing upright, horror building in his chest. Barry sees Joe, examining something on the floor – nothing's there, nothing's there, it isn't real – and he can't look away. Eleven-years-old again, Barry watches Joe write up a report, a detached but bitter sorrow in his voice as he says, Yeah. My daughter is friends with their kid.
"Joe?" he asks, voice raspy, torn, devastated because no, no, no. They can't be gone. Please.
Joe rises from his crouch, genuine affection in his voice as he looks right at Barry and says, "Good to see you, Barry."
Even though he's friendly, warm, there is something – Off about him. Even before Joe says it out loud, Barry can feel it: You're not – "Joe," the phantom finishes, still smiling.
Fear builds in Barry's gut until he wants to run back upstairs and lock himself in that room, to curl into the smallest space possible, to escape this, this strange disorienting unacceptably Other universe. Instead, he has to look into the eyes of the monster that is not-Joe, frozen in place, and say without shivering terror, "You're not." Take me home, he begs the Speed Force. Wake me up. Please.
"No," not-Joe says, soft, unpresumptuous. Easy, boy, he entreats, like he's handling a recalcitrant horse close to bolting. It's okay.
Feeling that soothing presence soul-deep, Barry stills, not merely frozen in place but voluntarily in the same room as this – whatever, and asks, "And … all of this? It's not real?" He needs to hear it out loud.
But the groom knows how to handle him: the Speed Force doesn't even bat an eyelash. "How do you feel? Being back here?" not-Joe asks in that same measured tone, utterly quieting, utterly calm, come here, it's okay, I'm not gonna hurt you.
Barry doesn't go near it and the anguish builds and builds and builds until he can't not give it voice, it will destroy him if it stays inside him: "I feel awful," he admits, hollowed out, exhausted, terrified, in pain.
Not-Joe comes closer, lifting the police tape and nursing a cup of coffee. His voice is different. The calming timber is deep, otherworldly, simultaneously unconcerned but deeply moved for him. "We thought you'd be more comfortable talking to someone who looked familiar and in a place you knew," not-Joe explains.
"We," Barry says out loud, "who is we, exactly?"
The monster which is not-Joe says in a different tone, "That's a little … hard to explain."
Barry thinks, Please, please, please.
He doesn't even know what he wants, anymore. The craving is lost, Somewhere, just like the way home. But he needs it – desperately needs it – and as he looks at not-Joe he realizes what it is: I need something real.
"Sit," not-Joe asks, repeating himself when Barry doesn't move, bright-eyed, gentle, and Barry has to comply.
He sits on the edge of the table, feeling the wood underneath his palms, watching not-Joe hungrily, trying to associate him with reality, with something-home, with something-alive, with something-that-can-help.
I can't be alone, he thinks.
You're not, the unseen caretaker says, we are here.
"How much do you know about the Speed Force?" not-Joe asks.
Barry thinks, I don't want to know. I'm not ready to know. But there is a side of it he does know, a side of it he can explain: a tangible, real, lightning-like personality. "It's the source of my powers," he replies, leaning on it. "It's what makes me a speedster."
Not-Joe smiles, pointing to him. "Yes," he says, emphatically. Then, in the same breath, he finishes, "And no." Holding up both hands, not-Joe elaborates in a hushed, prophetic voice, "When the first subatomic particles sprang forth from the Big Bang, to form reality as you know it, we were there." Speed Force was.
Overcome with his awareness of it, Barry tilts his head, unable to suppress tears. Staring in awe-inspired terror at it. Right here. Right now.
Speed Force is.
"When the last proton decays and stops vibrating," not-Joe says in oratorical remembrance, too self-assured to be predictive; they've already lived it, "and plunges the universe into heat death," not-Joe continues, unalarmed, "we'll be there, too."
Speed Force always shall be.
It's surreal. Worse: it's unreal. There is nothing real here, nothing but Speed Force. Nothing but the great Was and Is and Always Shall Be presence.
In front of him, speaking in Joe's voice, with Joe's smile, and Joe's easy manner, because Barry cannot see it in any other form.
It's still too much.
"I'm talking . . . to the Speed Force?" he asks. Not-Joe nods. Do not be afraid. "Isn't that like saying I'm having a conversation with gravity or light or—"
Not-Joe just smiles.
Those aren't from this universe – this Other-verse, this Beyond-verse, this Extra-verse – and it's like memories from another person want to erase who he is, right now, and shape him into who he will be. Unable to bear that thought – I will not forget who I am – Barry rises, pushing himself away from it, away from Speed Force.
And in that same unworldly tone, not-Joe says, "You need a minute."
Barry stares at it. What the hell are you? he wonders.
I am, the Speed Force replies.
"It's okay if you do," not-Joe says out loud, unreal, less than Speed Force, equally Speed Force, somehow both a manifestation of that reality and an unrepresentative translation of it. Here is something you can understand. You cannot know me. But you can know a part of what I am.
"It's a lot to take in," not-Joe commiserates, like he knows what Barry's thinking, but he isn't upset like Barry and he can't be upset like Barry and maybe Barry can't be upset because if he dares to let the sadness in it might consume him. If he lets any emotion in, it might consume him. There is no stop-gate here: only eternity, infinity, ultimate.
It's too much.
"So you're saying I'm-I'm talking to the source of my power which just so happens to look like … my adoptive dad?" he repeats, like he needs a minute to process it – like he hasn't already had ten billion, billion, billion minutes to do so, to the end of his own universe, beyond, to All Time.
Too much, he tells it, and the Speed Force quiets down, deafens him, letting him process only a single facet of this new reality at a time, not all at once but in infinitesimal, digestible pieces.
"That's trippy," he whispers.
Not-Joe laughs, and in spite of himself, Barry is warmed by it, reassured by it, like it is real. "We pretty much invented trippy here," not-Joe says, and the affection is all Speed Force, all know me as I know you.
But Barry resists it. You're too much. "Look, I'm-I'm not sure why you brought me here," as if you did not die, "but you need to send me back. My friends are in terrible danger from Zoom."
Not-Joe smiles. Calm. Unshakable. All Time.
Then a shadow passes over the space and Barry feels it, feels that Other presence, a genuine, electrifying contact which almost makes him sob with relief.
Real, real, real.
"Did you see that?" he asks not-Joe, needing to share infinity with someone, even someone who isn't real, who isn't human, who isn't.
Not-Joe doesn't respond to it, unmoved. All he says is, "You're not going back."
Barry's heart stops.
He won't stay here forever. He won't.
"Not until—" the Other presence passes by Joe, a speedster, a shadow, an entity which is unlike and like everything Barry knows, I know you.
But not-Joe doesn't finish. Barry prompts him: "Until what?"
Not-Joe comes up beside him, slowly extending an arm and pointing towards his quarry. "Until you catch that."
Barry runs to the door, looking out, and there it is: flying down the streets, inhumanly, breathtakingly fast.
A thrilling lack of hesitation surges through him as he runs after it. It's faster than him – a lot faster – but he has motivation and time in spades. I will run forever if that's what it takes, he decides.
So he runs, and runs, and runs, leaving not-Joe and not-real behind.
. o .
It's healing.
To run is to be alive: moving forward, exerting himself, every atom in his body engaged in the movement. He runs until he is out of breath, runs until he is stumbling with exhaustion, and runs until he reaches the park, coming to a halt, heart pounding, lungs burning, hands on his knees.
That's a fast ghost, Barry thinks, panting, as he watches it vanish over the horizon.
It doesn't scare him that it's fast. Not-Joe said to catch it. I can.
For some reason, the simple objective – catch it – is the single most doable thing in the universe to Barry. He can't control anything here. He can't even dictate his own state of being – am I dead or alive? –but he can run.
Hunched over, he senses her before he sees her.
Flushed with endorphins, Barry turns to Iris and says her name because I'm not alone, I'm not alone, I'm not alone.
"We're glad you made it, Barry," Iris says, razing Barry's hope to the ground.
"Not-Iris," he breathes out, exhausted.
I am alone.
I am here, the Speed Force responds. It's okay.
But seeing a second phantom is almost too much and Barry doesn't many times he can endure "too much" before he breaks. "It's just you again," he heaves, hoping to convey some of his frustration and pain towards it.
Unperturbed, not-Iris holds out a hand, gesturing towards the bench. "Sit, Barry," not-Iris tells him.
Come, the Speed Force says, rest.
"Sit," not-Iris insists when he does not move.
I will not rest in peace.
"You're always on your feet," not-Iris comments, taking a seat, unlocking the door and taking the first step, showing him that it's okay. It's just another space: not a coffin.
He falls onto the bench beside her, careful to keep as much distance as he can, afraid of being too close to her. Too close to it.
"You remember this place? Where we first kissed?" not-Iris asks, and how could he forget?
You'll forget everything, with enough time.
"Yeah, of course, except that wasn't you," Barry tells her. You're not Iris.
The Speed Force seems almost disappointed as not-Iris says, "We thought you'd find this place and our appearance less upsetting. Yet you seem upset."
I died. I have a right to be.
"All right," he says, ready because fuck it, he is not going to be terrified of Speed Force forever, for eternity, for All Time, here. "My friends," he says, and it helps steady him, memories of the living, "my city," there's a lump in his throat and an echo of Oliver's voice: it's your city. "My whole world," Barry finishes, "is in danger. Zoom is on a rampage with the powers that he stole from me and you are keeping me here."
Utterly nonplussed, not-Iris replies, "You were given a rare and precious gift – and you rejected it."
Why did you forsake me? the Speed Force asks.
"No," Barry says, turning towards not-Iris, them, whomever, refusing to be at fault, you did this to me, "I did not reject it. I gave up my powers to save someone's life. To be a hero. I nearly killed myself trying to get them back when you brought me here, wherever here is!"
You think you own your own creation, the Speed Force tells him.
Terror cools in Barry's chest as not-Iris says, "That's not what we meant."
Stay angry. "Okay," he says, but he's losing momentum because there's a truth to it that hurts. "If you would rather have given these powers to somebody else, why did you give them to me?"
Not-Iris looks at him like he's joking. Or just terminally oblivious to reality, as if he was born but never woke up to it. Disbelieving but utterly unsurprised, not-Iris answers, "Because you're The Flash, Barry."
The anger is easier, then, because: "I don't understand. If I am The Flash, then why are you doing this to me?"
Everything dies. Even you.
The Speed Force is unapologetic; not-Iris is, too.
Barry feels like it'll eat him alive, then, insisting harshly, "Why do I have to catch this thing before you let me go back?"
When not-Iris turns her head away, Barry feels the Speed Force retreat from him, a paralyzing fear extinguishing the anger because no, no, no don't leave me I'm sorry don't leave I can't be alone here. "Please," he begs, "I will do whatever you want just let me back right now so I can help my friends."
Not-Iris doesn't speak.
And then he hears a voice, an actual, real, human voice, and Barry could cry but mostly he's utterly enraptured as a tornado appears out over the water, Cisco's voice resonating from within it.
"What is that?" Barry demands, aware that this has to be a trick, everything here is,nothing is real, but not-Iris doesn't speak. "What is that?" Barry presses, insistent, afraid, borderline hysterical.
Not-Iris comes up beside him. There's no warmth in her voice as she says, "Those are your friends. They want you to come back."
It's an ache in his gut so profound he almost can't speak. "Can I?" I don't have to be here. I don't have to die.
Not-Iris actually laughs, saying in a sweet, honest voice, "Of course." Barry turns to stare at her and she amends, "But if you do, it'll be without your powers."
And for the first time since waking up in that room, Barry realizes that if he is to have a life beyond this, to take down Zoom and help his friends, he can't come back as fully human again. He can't do it without Speed Force. He'll die. Everyone will.
When the Other speedster flashes by, Barry stares after it, feeling a tug in his soul to go after it, like it holds all the answers, like it is important, more than important, everything. Not-Iris says, "The choice is yours."
Barry doesn't even hesitate.
. o .
The Other speedster loves to run.
It runs with abandon, zipping across Barry's sightline from time to time as confirmation that it is near. Barry runs after it with equal enthusiasm, surprised at how good it feels just to run, to pour all of his emotions – all of his anger, frustration, bitterness, fear – into it. Chasing after it, he becomes aware of the timelessness around him, how he does not age, how he only tires when he stops for a breath.
When he surrenders himself to his environment, letting the Speed Force guide him, he runs and runs and runs, never slowing, never speeding up: just moving.
It's the best thing in the world.
And then it ends and his calves ache, his stomach hurts from how tired he is, and there's tension in his back and jaw that won't abate. Coming to a halt in a graveyard, Barry looks around, trying to find it, just wanting to end the game because he's so-tired, so-tired, so-tired and he just wants to go home, to be alive again, to be with his friends, Speed Force be damned.
"Who are you pretending to be now?" he asks, staring at a trench-coat standing in front of a grave, and then the trench-coat turns and Dad smiles at him.
Now it isn't Dad helps. It enables Barry to hold onto the pain long enough to say, "I don't have time for this."
"Yes you do, Barry," not-Dad says helpfully. "You have all the time in the universe. Literally."
All Time.
Barry walks closer to him. Confront it. Don't let it break you. "No I don't," he insists heatedly, "and how can you stand there in judgment and accuse me of rejecting my gift? Do you have any idea how much I've done since I was first struck by lightning? How many people I've helped with the power that you gave me? What I've sacrificed?"
He almost doesn't even need to hear it out loud. He can feel it. Through not-Dad, the Speed Force says, "Of course we do. You've saved countless lives. And now," not-Dad says, walking away from him, towards the grave, and there's an ache in Barry's gut because he knows, he knows what's coming, "you are the only thing standing in between your world and unspeakable evil. And yet for all of that, you've never been here."
It's her grave.
Barry can't speak, can barely breath, a hand rising to cover his mouth as he falls to his knees in front of it. Seeing it – the real reminder of what he cannot fix, what fifteen years of trying and trying and trying could not fix – makes his heart ache. Fifteen years of searching could not unveil his mother's murderer; that would come down to Eobard's own hubris, a need to draw out Barry's Speed. Fifteen years of searching could not stop his mother's murderer; it would come down to Eddie to do so when Barry was held up, defenseless, in Eobard's grip. Fifteen years of searching could not bring his mother back, even though he has always believed in – has become – the impossible.
Fifteen years could not fix that night.
Like Harry said: it was a fixed point. She was never, ever, ever coming back.
"Why did you bring me here?" he asks in a rasp, all of the fight taken from him, surrendered.
"Your mother's death happened to you, Barry," not-Dad says, and how dare you arises in Barry's heart because he doesn't deserve to speak of it when he cannot feel it. "It made you who you are," not-Dad replies, undeterred, "but have you accepted it? Really accepted losing her?"
I can't lose my mom, he thinks, noiseless tears sliding down his face. I can't.
"Maybe that's why you couldn't come here," not-Dad says. "That would make it … real."
And Barry thinks, You're not real, and it gives him the strength to speak. "I know it's real," he says, swallowing back each hitching sob the Speed Force does not deserve to hear because you took her from me.
Bar, it seems to respond, everyone dies. That is All Time.
"Every day I have to live with that," Barry says, trying to hold himself together because no one else will, here. I am alone. "I had a chance to save her," Barry admits. "You saw what I chose."
"And you're at peace with that decision?" asks not-Dad – the Speed Force, it's real, it's speaking to him even if the illusion of his father is simply that.
I'm not at peace with anything, Barry thinks. My world is at war.
But it goes deeper than that: to the Speed Force itself, this mystic power that could not save his mother, could not right his past, could not save everyone. I can't save everyone, he thinks. I can't even save myself.
No, he's not at peace.
"At peace," he whispers, disbelieving, because there is no such thing. Rest in peace is the only one he knows, a peace he will not accept, a peace he can't live with. I'll take the war, he thinks bitterly. I'd rather live at war than die in peace. "How could anyone be at peace with letting his mother die?" he asks the Speed Force. "Deciding that his life was more valuable than hers?"
Not-Dad crouches beside him, saying, "Do you really think your mother would have wanted you to die for her?" Then, quiet, calm, he asks, "And all of the people that The Flash saved as a result of that decision, what about them? Do their lives have value, too?"
Barry thinks of all of those people he pulled from burning buildings, who he rescued from muggers and metahumans, who he pulled out of the line of speeding cars and errant paths, who he gave his heart to through love letters, buying coffee for people, rebuilding the city, rebuilding everything because he broke it, he broke it, he broke it –
He sees the black shadow on the grassy hill and feels a powerful surge of hatred towards it, towards the Speed Force, because how dare it judge when it cannot know what living is like, when its only experience of living is watching his pain. "I don't have to listen to this," he rasps in not-Dad's direction, getting to his feet. "I have to get home."
Without waiting for a response, he takes off, slow, steady, wins-the-race, moving in the direction of that Ghost, that Other, with burning tears still on his face.
. o .
The only passage of time here is Barry's movement, but eventually even the Speed Force aligns with his expectations for darkness, and after an eternity it goes dark, cold, breath visible as Barry chases the ghost around and around and around.
Everything is numb, cold, and he doesn't know what to do but he just can't catch it, no matter how fast he runs it's always faster, infinitely faster, speed-of-light faster, and he doesn't stand a chance. He'll die before he catches it. I'm going to die here, he thinks, feeling the ache in his chest until he can't stand it.
There's no point going home without his powers – he's less than useless to his friends, he's a lure for Zoom – but he can't bear the thought of dying here, alone, either.
You're not alone, the Speed Force says.
Shut up, Barry replies, walking painstakingly up the street, pausing in front of his house.
He knows before he opens the door that she's in there.
He thinks about not opening it, about resuming the chase, an easy, steady, recognizable thing, a cycle of living, a reminder that he is, in some way, still alive. But his weary legs carry him to the front door, and his tired feet cross the carpeted floor to the table where she sits.
Seeing her – like she is that day, like she was that day, like she will always be that day – renders everything else silent. All he can see is her. All he can say is, "Mom." But he forces himself to say, "You're not my mother," and refuses to cry when she frowns, hurt on his behalf. Unable to take it, he asks, "Why are you doing this to me?"
Soft, almost apologetic, not-Mom replies, "We're not doing anything to you, sweetheart. You're just so tired. Sit, Barry." Gesturing at the table, she repeats gently, "Sit."
He doesn't want to. He has to keep going, to keep moving, in order to live.
That's not how you live, the Speed Force replies. To live is to stand still and know peace.
"You were right all along," Barry says, and he can almost see that indefinable being in his mother's warm eyes, her tangible compassion. He feels it: Speed Force. He can see all of them: Dad, Iris, Joe.
You were right, he thinks.
You weren't wrong, the Speed Force replies.
"I haven't accepted it," Barry admits out loud, unable to hide from it – from any of this – anymore. "Not for a second. I don't think I ever will."
Not-Momlooks at him with the kindest smile. "My beautiful boy," she says, "you have to find a way."
"How?" Barry asks. Desperate. Pleading. Please.
Not-Mom replies, "I don't know." Barry's heart sinks, but looking at her, he knows a certain peace: that even without knowing what it is, a solution is there. "But I know this," not-Mom continues, "what you've become is wonderful, a miracle even, but it won't make bad things stop happening to you. Even The Flash can't outrun the tragedies the universe is going to keep sending your way," she says, and Barry thinks of that shadow, that ghost, that joyful Other which runs and runs and runs, the we, how it is utterly and simply unafraid to be alive. "You have to accept that," not-Mom says, "and then you can truly run free."
Run free.
"I know," Barry says, struggling to get the words past the lump in his throat, aware of a devastating duality to the situation: the ultimate reality of the Speed Force but his own reality waiting for him, a reality without his mother.
And it's been fifteen years but honestly the pain? Sometimes it's worse than the day it happened.
"I just miss her," he whispers. "I miss you so much."
"What if I told you that she's proud of you?" she says. "And of the man that you've become."
He has to, has to, know. "Who's telling me that?" he asks. "The Speed Force or my mother?"
Not-Mom smiles, putting a hand on his face, warm, soft, substantial, and whispers, "Both."
And Barry believes her. Them. Thank you, he tells the Speed Force, as Mom brushes the tears from his face, emotion finally breaking free. Thank you.
She kisses his forehead, there, comforting, it's okay, and he believes her. It's okay.
She isn't part of his universe anymore, part of living. But she is part of this: part of all that Was and Is and Always Shall Be. And he can always, always come home to this place: to her. She is part of it.
Part of Speed Force, part of All Time.
We're not evil, Barry, the Speed Force says. We are.
And Barry can see how it's active, alive, but in such a way that needs him. It needs direction. And, Barry thinks, it needs him just as much as he needs it: craves being alive and running free and experiencing emotion, finding meaning, as much as he does, only experiencing it through him, these fleeting, precious, irreplaceable moments.
Sitting with his mother, Barry closes his eyes, feeling the realness of her hand against his face, smooth, steady; the rhythm of her breath, the beat of her heart, imperceptible but felt, understood, alive.
Together, they lose track of time, lost in an experience of being, sharing space. Barry is aware of the Speed Force, of the not-home feeling of everything, but with his mom, he feels safe. Loved, protected, cared for.
At peace.
Reading The Runaway Dinosaur with his mom for the first time in almost twenty years, Barry feels the weight of All Time, not as a burden, but as a gift, a reminder that he is the wholeness of his experiences, and their end does not mean their disappearance. Rather, they become part of him: something he can call upon, perhaps imperfectly, most likely intangibly, but even so, his. Things that define him.
When Mom says, You're ready, Barry believes her.
He'll never be ready to be alive. But he's ready to try. He's ready to go home again.
. o .
The Flash is exactly what Barry expects.
He doesn't know how he knows what The Flash looks like – you always have – but as soon as the Ghost enters his home he grabs it and like magic, The Flash materializes.
It is Speed Force come alive, an intermediary, more real than any of the phantoms, as real as Barry, even; alive, dead, somewhere in between. Fully Speed Force, it is something Barry cannot understand, but he can communicate with it, he can embody it, become it, share his existence with it.
Like two souls in one body, they merge, and nothing and everything changes for Barry and The Flash.
The Flash is subdued, waiting, like the Speed Force itself. Ask me, it seems to say, without ever saying a word, and I will be there. Like lightning, it strikes, powerful, uncontrollable. Like lightning, it races through him, empowering him, letting him run, Barry, run! Like lightning, it scatters like stardust into the multiverse, seeding it with potential for other speedsters.
And like lightning, it is drawn to a lightning rod: towards her voice. The Flash likes her, too, sensing Barry's affection for Iris and redoubling it, echoing it, supporting him wholeheartedly. So when Barry merges, he does not lose The Flash; rather, he gains The Flash's unfailing support, power, agelessness, timelessness.
I trust you, he says to that no one, that Other.
I trust you, The Flash responds.
Together, they enter the Speed storm and find their way home.
. o .
No one really knows what The Flash is.
Barry can't explain it adequately, either, that knowing, that presence, that power. All he can say with certainty is that The Flash is magic: capable of the extraordinary. It is kind, too, healing him, putting out literal warm vibes, releasing lightning and heat in manageable doses. It is addicting, like being warm for the first time, a sensation Barry cannot resist indulging.
And it loves to run.
They run and The Flash is his shadow, always ahead but never letting him fall behind, imbuing him with the strength he needs to do it. Barry is fully human, but with The Flash he is something more, too.
A friend of the Speed Force. A representative, a caretaker: a part of the Speed Force.
He is The Flash.
At times, it is more clear than others: when he runs and runs and runs and everything else ceases to be, all existence ceases to matter, except for that urge to run, to be free.
But he always slows down, comes back to Earth, to his city, his home.
And he remembers what the Speed Force instilled in him even as The Flash yearns to run forever.
To live is to stand still and know peace.
Sometimes Barry tries to run from his problems: from his past, from his present, from his future.
But when he can sit on the rooftop at Jitters and see the world and know he and The Flash can handle it, he feels at peace.
There will be other tragedies.
But as long as he has The Flash? Barry knows he can survive them.
We can survive, he thinks, holding out a hand and releasing sparks into the air, scattering the tiniest clouds of lightning, just to let it go, to let it run, to let it free.
Find me, he challenges Zoom, alive, alive in a way that is like a beacon, magnetic, inescapably present, find us.
We're not afraid of you.
And so it is.
And so it was.
And so it shall always be.