They stand in stunned silence, scarcely daring to believe it might be over, until Cisco abruptly slumps down to the floor.
"Cisco! Are you okay?!" Iris moves to help him up, but he waves her off.
"Yeah. I'm never ever going to sleep ever again, but yeah, I'm okay."
Breaking out of his daze, Barry rushes over. "Oh my god, Iris, how did you do that?"
Iris returns his hug, and he draws strength from the feeling of her heartbeat. Alive, alive, they were all alive. "I'm pretty sure I forgot a verse or two, but the important thing is that it worked."
"Good thing you did that demon research." Barry gives her one last squeeze before letting her go.
"Actually, I did my research on ghosts. And that wasn't from my research… I actually wasn't sure it would work."
"Then what was it from?"
Iris blushes. "A Swiftly Tilting Planet. One of the sequels to A Wrinkle in Time. It just… sounded right, in the moment. I memorized it years ago, just… just in case, y'know? I didn't believe any of it was real, but it sounded so convincing, and I figured it couldn't hurt to learn..."
"Okay, the demon's gone – now what do we do about the swirling vortex of doom!?" Cisco cuts in, drawing their attention back to the prototype. Which has not ceased to be a Doomsday device despite the defeat of its designer. The floor beneath it moves like putty, insubstantial, and sparks frizz at the edges of the tear in the universe, arcs of lightning sometimes crashing outwards unpredictably. It has begun to revolve, slowly turning in place, and the whole room turns with it, loose bits of debris being picked up and pulled into its dark center. The grating, howling sound is a weight on his ears that tastes like granite.
"Can't we just pull the plug?" Barry squints against the stabbing darkness and tries to figure out where the cord is…
"Sure, we could do that, if you don't mind running the risk of creating a singularity that will consume three-quarters of the solar system," Cisco shoots back. "We have to disrupt its angular motion first."
"So… we either need a really, really fast-moving object, or a really heavy object, to push past it." Barry casts about for something, anything they can use – his eyes alight on the wheeled chalkboard behind the lab bench. (It still has the last message Wells wrote on it: It is time.)
"Guys… I think I found something."
Cisco follows his line of sight. "That… could work. You'll have to get the angle just right though… and you'll have to pass really close to that thing for it to have any effect."
Barry nods, and determinedly pushes down the nausea that rises in his gut at the thought of getting any closer to that pulsing wrongness, at the realization of just what a risk he's going to take.
"Barry…" Iris does not look at all happy.
"There's no time to argue, Iris; you need to be ready to pull the plug when Cisco tells you to."
Lips pressed into a tight line, she nods, gripping his shoulder tightly for a moment before moving into position near the power outlet, skirting the edges of the room and keeping as far back from the prototype as she can.
Barry confers with Cisco, lining up the heavy chalkboard for best trajectory. It isn't as heavy as it could be, so Barry's going to need to run with it as fast as he possibly can to have enough inertia to disrupt the momentum of the tachyon prototype. All too soon, it's the moment of truth, and Barry takes several deep breaths. He sets his shoulder against the chalkboard and tenses his legs, but he feels frozen in place, and panic starts to creep into his thoughts, because what if he isn't fast enough?
"You can do it, Barry! I believe in you!" Iris shouts to be heard from across the lab, over the sucking, howling vacuum of the dimensional tear.
"Run, Barry, run!" Cisco gives him a push for good measure, and then Barry is off like a shot, pushing the massive chalkboard in front of him and slamming his feet against the tiled floor, closing his eyes and trying not to think of anything except faster, faster, faster.
Gravity does funny, unexpected things as he runs, and he nearly loses his footing several times as he tries to compensate. He makes it to the other side and lets go of the chalkboard; it crashes into the far wall and the slate breaks into a thousand pieces. Cisco shouts "Now!" and Iris pulls the plug at the same time that a stray bolt of lightning arcs outwards from the portal and strikes Barry in the chest, knocking him backwards into the chemical cabinet.
"Barry!" Two voices cry out in unison, rushing forwards.
Dazed and feeling as though his every nerve were on fire, all-over static tingle and his heart pounding in his chest, Barry manages to pull himself upright and out of the mess of broken glass.
"I'm okay, I'm okay!" He's not sure that that's true, but he's awake and he can move, and after being attacked by a demon and nearly sucked into a black hole, he's counting the fact that he's even alive as a win. Still… "Do you think getting struck by lightning from a portal to a hell dimension will have any side-effects?"
"Nah man, I'm sure you'll be fine."
fin