A/N: Welcome to Resurrection chapter 4! As always please leave a review and tell me how I'm doing. Thanks!
Kara stood frozen in place for what felt like an eternity, with a shocked expression frozen as well. "Barry? The flash Barry? No, no, that can't be. He's dead! Maybe he's a bizarro or a shape-shifter metahuman or alien?" Kara thought, deciding that this can't actually be him. Kara reached out a hand as if she was about to cup his face. Barry stood still until Kara swung at Barry with all her might. Barry, shocked, moved to duck away from the punch. Kara proceeded to kick Barry, him dodging each kick.
"No, no, no, no! Kara, it's me, Barry! You- Your name is Kara Zor-El, born of Krypton until it was destroyed when you were a kid. You crashed here on earth and moved in with the Danvers. You're one of my best friends." Barry said in an attempt to persuade Kara that he was actually himself. Barry grabbed a chair and placed it between them as he backed away. Kara seemed unfazed, as she smashed the chair and moved in.
"I'm not a shapeshifter!" Barry cried, trying to get Kara to believe.
"Then you're Bizarro!" Kara shouted, charging up her heat vision. Barry continued to back away until he hit a wall.
"If I were Bizarro, would I have saved you? If I were a shapeshifter, would I be able to use my powers?" Barry shouted, hoping that she would believe before having to take her down. Luckily, Kara seemed to start to believe him. Kara's eye's stopped glowing and she slowed her pursuit.
"B-Barry?" Kara whispered, realizing that the man in front of her was her longtime and best friend.
"Yes, yes it's me!" Barry sighed, relieved that he didn't have to do anything that he would later regret. Kara launched herself at Barry, nearly crushing him, again. Barry wrapped his arms around her and vibrated ever so slightly so that he wouldn't be crushed. After a long time of just standing there, both seeing each other for the first time in two years for Kara and 40 for Barry, they separated.
"But-but HOW?! How are you alive? Your body was just a-a bag of blood!" Kara shouted, still in awe of what she was seeing in front of her.
"Right after I died, I woke up in the speed force. That's what gives me my speed. They said that because of the good I did with my powers, that I was able to be resurrected as long as I worked for them for 40 years." Barry explained, sitting down on the couch, motioning for her to sit next to him.
"How have you not aged? You look just like you did two years ago."
"The speed force exists outside of time. I didn't age there because to my body, time wasn't passing."
"Wow. Who else knows?"
"No one. I told you first because I need advice, and you're the only one who knows what I've gone through feels like."
"What do you mean?"
"In the speed force," Barry explained, "I was a bounty hunter. I went after speedsters who threatened the timeline or the multiverse. Some of them only wanted to fix something in their past, such as me with flashpoint. Most, However, used it for evil reasons. Destroy their enemy as a kid, create a dictatorship, and other horrible things. I was to protect the timeline of as many earths as possible. I was successful most of the time, but there was one time I failed. On an earth almost identical to mine, a man decided that he wanted to go back in time and create the atom bomb for Germany before America could. This moment was early in my training, so I wasn't as powerful then as I am now. I nearly had the guy when he managed to land a shot into my chest while I was distracted saving a hostage. At that time I couldn't heal fast enough to take him down so I had to watch as a salvo of nuclear missiles launched into the sky. I eventually healed and flashed over to America trying to warn everyone of the disasters soon to come. I was too late and I arrived to do a wasteland of screams of pain and cries for help. Every country other than Germany was wiped out by nuclear blasts and fallout. Even then Germany soon followed because of the tarnished atmosphere. Even now when I close my eyes I hear more screams than anyone could ever imagine. The things I saw, the corpses, the destruction, the loss, it was more than you could ever believe. I grabbed onto that pain and used it as an incentive to train harder, train better. I'm scared to show myself to the rest of my friends because of what they will see in me. The Barry that they lost is by no means the Barry that has returned."
Kara was dumbfounded by what she heard. The horrors that he had seen were far more than what she saw. Granted, she knew the people that she lost, but she couldn't see the deaths. And Barry didn't know the people that died but he had to see their bodies, the viscera, the blood. Kara then remembered the mission to save her from Darkseid. One of the first things that Barry did was kill the two parademons that were charging at him. He was right. The Barry in front of her was not at all the Barry that died two years ago.
"So you came to me to ask how you should handle facing your friends and family with the pain you carry around?" Kara asked, trying to think of a way to help him.
"Y-yes," Barry responded, afraid to look Kara in the eyes. Before now the weight of the wasteland attack didn't bother him. he needed it to make sure no more innocents were killed. But now he had to look his friends in the eyes and let them see what he has to carry.
"Well, the first thing that you will have to do is talk to them about your killing policy. I don't see you being able to stop immediately considering that you killed those parademons without a second thought. As for them seeing the burden you carry, it comes with being a superhero. Granted, only a few see have seen loss on that scale, but loss none-the-less. They will see what you're going through. They may not be able to understand the amount itself, but they won't shun you for it."
"You know, I counted the number of deaths one day. I pushed it down, but talking about it has resurfaced the number. The earth was far more populated than either of our earths. A total population of 13.7 billion people, 6.3 of that were kids. To this day I regret trying to save that one hostage. Because of that, everyone, including that hostage, was killed off. I now use my increased thought speed to run through the possible outcomes and choose the one with the least amount of deaths. Usually, the choice is morally correct, but sometimes it is most definitely questionable."
"Well, that's for you and your team to decide whether or not to continue doing that. Just remember that sometimes you can't save everyone. Now, you are going to go reintroduce yourself to your team."
"Alright," Barry said, standing up and pulling Kara up with him, "I'm willing to bet that your friends, sister, and the DEO are going absolutely insane right now. How 'bout I give you a ride over there, for old-time sakes?"
"Sure!" Kara said, smiling wildly that her "super-friend" was back from the dead. Barry put on his mask, picked her up and ran to the DEO HQ and dropped her right in the center of the area. Alex rushed and Winn rushed over to her and pulled her into a tight hug, as Barry watched from the side. When they separated, Alex turned to Barry.
"And who are you?" Alex asked, on edge from the masked stranger in the HQ of a top secret government facility.
"An old friend," Barry said as he pulled off his mask and smiled. Alex froze up, jaw dropped to the floor. He stayed just long enough for them to see his face, then punched the air beside him and left Earth-38.
"Bu-but he's-"
"Not anymore he isn't. I'll fill you in on it later."
Cisco ran back to the cortex dumbfounded by what he just saw. They hadn't encountered any speedsters other than Wally, Jesse, or Barry ever since Savitar.
"You guys saw that right?" Cisco shouted, out of breath from what he just saw.
"Yeah. Another speedster? And why was he on top of S.T.A.R. Labs, or why was he wearing a suit?" Caitlin asked, biting her lip.
"Did you guys happen to see his face?" Cisco asked.
"Nope. We did catch the outline of it when he motioned towards you, but nothing more. The thing is though, the little that we did see looked a lot like Barry." Jesse responded.
"There's no way it's him! Even if he did somehow wake up in a pine box, he would die again instantaneously because he has nothing inside of his body." Caitlin said, hating talking about Barry. The whole experience was bringing back memories.
"So," Cisco said, "it's got to be a new speedster-"
"Guys," Joe stormed in, "Barry's grave is dug up!" The entire team jumped at Joe's sudden arrival but shock immediately turned to dropped jaws. "I was walking up to his grave when I saw upturned dirt. I talked to the groundskeeper and he said that he thought he saw a man climbing out of the ground, but didn't report it because he thought no one would believe him." Everyone in the room beside Joe looked at each other.
"We just saw a man that looked ever so slightly like Barry. He was on the roof and his back was facing the camera. We only saw the outline of the side of his face and his back, but he also was a speedster." Cisco spoke slowly, as if not believing the words he was saying, let alone Joe's.
"Why don't we go see this grave for ourselves?" Wally suggested, thinking that this can't be Barry, someone simply dug up his grave. It does happen.
"Sure. I'll drive." Joe said, motioning for them to follow.
After a very anxious car ride, the five finally arrived at the graveyard. They all ran to the grave, Joe the only one not expecting to see a normal grave. Soon they arrived at the site. Infront of them was a hole, just big enough to fit a person with the body of a speedster. Around the hole were fresh dirt and small bits of wood. Caitlin was the first to speak.
"Is he still in there?" Caitlin asked, looking at Wally and Jesse. Immediately the two speedsters sprang into action, digging further into the grave. Eventually, they reached the coffin and removed the broken lid. The two climbed back up and stared at an unexplainable sight along with the rest of the group. The coffin was full of dirt, and nothing but. There was no body inside the coffin.
"Wh-where is Barry's body?" Caitlin asked, not knowing what to do.
"There's no way that someone was able to steal his body from a hole the size of what we saw when we first got-" Joe was cut off by a breach opening behind them. The team turned to look at the swirling vortex and froze, fearing what was on the other side. After a moment, a figure in a leather suit and hood with a metallic mask stepped through. Jesse and Wally prepared to run, Catlin rose her arms at the figure, Cisco rose only one, and Joe reached for his gun. The figure didn't twitch at the actions, merely staring at the group.
"Who are you? Did you do this?!" Cisco shouted, fearing the answer.
"I guess you could say that." The masked man said, not bothering to change his voice. The group's eyes widened as they started to recognize the voice. The man bowed his head, threw back the hood, removed the mask, and looked up at a large mixture of expressions. Cisco dropped his hand, widened his eyes, and drew in a deep breath. Caitlin started tearing up and moved her hand to her mouth, covering it. Joe put his gun back, slowly moving towards Barry. Jesse relaxed her muscles but remained unmoving. Wally shortly had a look of shock, but it quickly turned to an ear-to-ear grin.
"Oh, and by the way Cisco, don't call me 'Suit'."
"It's been five months since Barry's death and we still can't find a safe way to defeat this telekinetic," Wally said to the team at the S.T.A.R. Labs cortex, frustrated that the team hasn't found a way to take down Barry's killer.
"All we know is that we have to take him down by surprise. Any other way and he'll shred us alive." Caitlin added.
"We need to think about whether or not killing would be an option." Harry pointed out, earning "are you serious" glances from the entire team.
"Look. I don't like it any more than any of you do, but do you really think that will be able to contain him, let alone knock him out without alerting him? Even if Wally were to knock him out, were not even sure that the pipeline or Iron Heights could hold a metahuman of his power. Wally could, however, run in and send a hand into his chest from behind before the guy has a chance to respond." Harry explained, trying to show that their morals might not be able to work with taking him down.
"I don't know. Do we really want to resort to killing just because it's too hard to not?" Wally asked, not sure how to feel about killing someone.
"I don't know. Do we really want another case of being helpless as he shreds another loved one to pieces? More people could die if we don't kill him when we have the chance." Harry retorted, hoping that someone would listen.
"Let's think about this. We haven't seen him for a few months now so maybe we still have some time." Cisco said, hoping to end the conversation while he could. Talking about the cause of Barry's death wasn't easy for anyone.