Chapter 36
It was the day before Halloween and Betty was in the barn along with Barry, Jughead, Dilton and Polly. Polly was down on the main level and was directing Barry in what to do with decorating the place while Jughead was reviewing the menu. Dilton was up in the loft and was apparently working on a music playlist, but he was just staring at his computer screen like he often did. Betty meanwhile was also up in the loft sitting on the couch not helping still sulking over the fact that this party was evening happening.
"You know Betty if you were helping this would go a lot faster," Polly called up to her sister.
"Just making a case for me not to help," Betty replied.
"Oh get over it," Polly retorted a hint of frustration in her tone.
Just then the barn door opened.
"Hey guys!" Sheila greeted everyone as she entered.
Everyone looked over to see that Sheila was carrying a pair of boxes.
"What's in the boxes?" Polly asked.
"Betty and Barry's costumes," Sheila replied.
Barry was over to Sheila in a flash, rather excited.
"Don't you want to try it on Betty?" Barry called up to Betty.
Betty somewhat reluctantly and slowly got up and came down from the loft, not bothering to use her super speed. Barry was practically bouncing with excitement beside Sheila as Betty made her way over to them.
"Come on put them on!" Sheila said excitedly as she handed Betty and Barry a box each.
Betty cracked the box open a bit and looked inside.
"Really?" Betty asked.
"Come on just put it on," Sheila said.
"I'll race you," Barry challenged Betty.
"Pretty sure you'll win," Betty said.
"I'll give you a one second head start," Barry offered.
Betty sighed and set the box on the ground and opened it. Then using her super speed she put the costume on. A second later Barry did the same. In less than a second the two of them were standing beside Sheila wearing the costumes she had made.
Barry's costume was a tight fitting full body suit that included a hood/mask combination that left only his mouth visible. It was a bright red and had a symbol that was a white circle with a lightning bolt on the chest.
"This is awesome Sheila!" Barry exclaimed as he looked down at himself.
Betty meanwhile wasn't quite so impressed. Her costume was a blue tight fitting long sleeved top with a short red mid-thigh skirt and a pair of red boots. There was also a red cape and a small mask that covered her eyes and nose. Betty tugged at the fabric looking a little unimpressed.
"What's with the mask?" Betty asked Sheila.
"To hide your identity of course," Sheila replied.
"And the cape?" Betty inquired.
"Well you can jump really high right? So you can use it to sort of glide like that Bat guy in Gotham does," Sheila said. "I got the idea when I saw that video of him last week."
Betty had seen the same video, however that man's cape had been made from a rather sturdy fabric; not the red nylon or whatever it was that this cape was made from.
"The idea is nice but I don't think it's going to actually work," Betty said.
Sheila's face fell.
"You hate it don't you?" Sheila asked disappointedly.
"I don't hate it," Betty said. "Honestly I'm impressed you were able to make this so quickly. But the cape is just…"
"Just what?" Sheila asked.
"It's not going to work how you want," Betty said. "It'll either rip or I'll just end up plummeting down to earth like I normally would."
"Well why don't we go and test it?" Jughead suggested.
Everyone else agreed and chimed in.
"Alright fine," Betty relented.
Everyone except for Dilton who was still busy on his computer went outside the barn and Betty stood lined up with the field. After making sure that there weren't any cars nearby, she took three running steps before she leapt up into the air. Betty launched herself a good two hundred feet up. She then grabbed the edges of the cape to try and glide down to earth. However as she had suspected, the material was far too flimsy to let her catch the air and she came plummeting down to the ground. She was able to land running but her feet sank into the dirt and she ended up running out of her boots which got stuck.
She was pulling the boots out of the ground and wiping them off when the other came running over.
"Okay so maybe you were right," Sheila admitted.
Betty decided not to rub it in, but just gave Sheila a smug smile before leading the way back to the barn. Betty picked up her clothes and the box the costume had come in when she did.
"I'm going to go put this up in my room," she said. "I'll be back in a bit."
Betty made her way back to the farm house, going in through the side door that entered the kitchen. Inside her mother was in the kitchen baking. Alice was making cookies and cupcakes for the party tomorrow.
"Oh is that your costume Betty?" Alice asked as Betty came inside.
"I guess so," Betty said.
"Betty your friend worked hard to make that," Alice scolded her. "You should show a little more appreciation."
"Yes mom," Betty muttered as she made her way through the kitchen to the stairs and went up to the room she had claimed as hers, which had been her mother's room when she had grown up here.
Betty stopped and looked at herself in the mirror. She had to admit that Sheila had done amazingly well in make the dress proportionate for her, despite the fact that Betty hadn't helped her with measurements or anything.
Betty then noticed that the ring she had bought the other day was sitting out on her dresser. She picked it up and put it on. The blue of the crystal actually matched the blue of the costume.
"Hmm maybe I can wear this with it," Betty thought to herself. "I get my powers from a magical ring or something. Not because I'm an alien."
Just then she heard something outside her window. Betty ran to the window and opened it up.
"Betty, Dilton just picked up something about an armed bank robbery in Greendale," Barry said. "Come on now is our chance to prove ourselves."
"What?" Betty asked confused.
However Barry suddenly took off. Betty cursed silently for a second before taking off after Barry. She didn't catch him until he came to a stop outside the bank in Greendale about half a block away. The place was surrounded by squad cars.
"Apparently they've taken hostages," Barry said. "Dilton picked up a call from Greendale to Riverdale asking if they could spare some officers, it sounds like they've got some heavy weaponry."
"And you figured we can just run in?" Betty asked.
"No, obviously we have to come up with a plan," Barry said. "This won't be like when we stopped Midge."
"It would help if we knew what they were after," Betty said. "If it were simply cash I think they would have gotten out of here before the police arrived."
"That's probably true," Barry agreed. "Do you think maybe it's something in a safety deposit box?"
"That seems likely," Betty said.
"Well how about I handle the guys watching the hostages you get the guys in the safety deposit box room?" Barry suggested.
"I don't know, I mean that's putting the hostages in danger," Betty said.
"We can't do nothing," Barry said.
"Yes we can, we let the police do their job," Betty said.
"No, I'm going in," Barry said.
Before Betty could stop him Barry raced pass the police blockade and into the bank. With a sigh Betty went after him.
Inside Betty saw Barry had already disarmed one of the robbers guarding the hostages and was in the process of disarming the second one. Betty didn't see any others so she made her way towards the back of the bank she saw three men inside the safety deposit room opening up safety deposit boxes.
Suddenly she came to a dead stop feeling weak, she quickly realized what it was. There was green meteor rock in one of the open safety deposit boxes that one of the men had tossed out into the hallway. Betty dropped to one knee as she felt her strength drain away. She didn't notice crystal on the ring on her finger glow momentarily. A moment later Barry was there.
"Betty I…" he said then noticed that she was down.
Betty pointed at the meteor rock and Barry instantly understood. He grabbed it and sped off. However as he did the men in the room suddenly noticed Betty. Once the meteor rock was gone Betty got to her feet.
"You're a little early for Halloween girl," one of the men said as he pointed a pistol at Betty.
Betty just gave him a half smile. She went to run in and stop them but she went about two steps before she realized she wasn't moving at her super speed. As she came to a stop the man fired his gun and Betty suddenly felt a pain in her left shoulder. She looked down at it and noticed she was bleeding.
"What the…" she muttered before she dropped to the ground.
A moment later Barry reappeared and he saw Betty on the ground. He quickly ran and disarmed and knocked out the three remaining thieves before picking Betty up and racing back to the farm with her.
Veronica arrived at her recently acquired bit of real estate. She watched as multiple flatbed trucks wheeled into some large transformers. Her plan was to try and recreate the accident that had put Barry Allen into a coma. Of course generating the same voltage as a lightning bolt was going to be difficult.
Veronica had considered perhaps building a lightning rod to try and tap an actually lightning bolt, but unfortunately the weather for the next month in Central City looked to be relatively clear, and she needed to work fast to avoid the suspicion of her father.
Just then she received a call from him. Annoyed Veronica answered the phone.
"Yes father?" Veronica answered brusquely.
"Veronica why are you purchasing a great deal of electrical transformers?" Her father Hiram inquired.
"Well since my other research was kyboshed by you firing me I decided to move onto working on alternative energy ideas," Veronica lied hoping her father bought it.
There was a pause on the other end.
"Alright, let me know how things go," Hiram said before abruptly ending the call.
Veronica looked at her phone surprised. She had expected her father to be far more suspicious of whatever she was doing. That in and of itself made Veronica suspicious as to just what her father was up to. However she knew that she needed focus on her current work.
Just then a black sedan pulled up nearby. Moments later Daniel and Iris West got out, Veronica walked over to meet them.
"What's going on here? What is all this?" Iris asked.
"I'm sure you're aware that this is the place where Barry was found in a coma," Veronica said.
"Yeah so?" Daniel asked not caring.
"So from my understanding there was some sort of accident where he was struck by lightning," Veronica replied. "I'm going to try and recreate that accident."
"Why?" Iris asked.
"Because I believe that the accident gave Barry powers; powers that somehow allowed him to travel through time, and that's how he killed your mother," Veronica answered.
"Why would Barry from the future want to kill our mother?" Daniel questioned.
Veronica shrugged as she replied, "I can't know a person's motives."
"So why do you want to recreate the accident?" Iris asked.
"Because then I can give you the same powers that Barry has and you can go back and save your mother," Veronica replied. "But only if you want to."
Daniel and Iris looked at each other for a moment, both of them clearly considering what Veronica was offering.
"We'll do it," they both said simultaneously.
Veronica smiled and nodded.
"Then we've got quite a bit of work to do," Veronica said.
Uh oh, what happened to Betty? And did Veronica really learn nothing from the whole Midge ordeal? And which of the West twins will get the powers? Daniel, Iris or Both? And will those powers even be like Barry's? Things to come in the upcoming chapters. Also this is a little story line I added in for a contest over on DeviantArt to write a story where the main character loses their powers. I'd link to it if I could but unfortunately there's no sharing of links. Message me if you're interested to check it out. And as always, please review.