Chapter 3: Doors

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Three hours.

Three. God. Damn. Hours.

Quietly Barry cursed the loss of his speed for the hundredth time as he opened up another red door, only to find this one was boarded up with wooden planks – a considerable improvement from some others. Only a few doors actually opened and so far those that did usually lead to a brick wall or some sort of impenetrable forest – but there was one that seemed to be covered in hair. Nightmares would be following Barry for weeks after that one.

At least if Barry had been as his usual speed he could have checked through thousands of them by this point – as it stood now, he was probably only into the early hundreds and the endless halls of red doors didn't seem to be running low on more potential disappointments.

Slamming the last door he'd tried, shut, Barry let out a wordless snarl of frustration. He already felt exhausted by this game and literally nothing of importance had happened. Did CM – Barry had decided to refer to the man in his initials because saying Crooked Man every time he wanted to curse him took too much energy – just want him to die of boredom or starvation?

Well Barry knew which one would come first – he'd be dead long before his stomach gave its first rumble.

It might have been a blessing or a curse that his imprisoner had remained silent during the whole three hours. Not a peep, no gloating or offers of advice – nothing. Barry had to say, not having a villain actively go out of their way to mock and taunt him was…different. Refreshing even.

Still, after this long Barry was beginning to worry the man had just gotten bored and left – that was something Tricks might do and at this point Barry wasn't' sure what type of psycho he was dealing with. It could have been Cold's meticulous calculating mind, the Tricksters spontaneous misadventures or even the insatiable loathing that came from Thawne.

The unknown was really bugging Barry at this point – but with at least one hundred thousand more doors waiting to be tried, he had all the time in the world to speculate about his new 'friend'.

About if he was telling the truth about his identity.

Between each new, disappointing door, Barry had plenty of time to stitch together what he did know.

What he knew about the original Crooked Man was limited – scraps from what Bruce was willing to divulge. The man had never committed a crime before in his life and then one day he was suddenly barking mad. Killed his parents and then set his sighs on a children's home – an orphanage under another name. According to all accounts, he'd also died that same day. A clean record all his life and then suddenly one day it all went out the window – just one single day.

Distantly Barry's own accusing words rung hollowly in his ears. 'Put a bullet right between your eyes! Fell from the seventh floor!'

"Sounds pretty lively for a corpse." Barry muttered bitterly as his hand wrapped around another perfectly polished golden doorknob. A few rattles and halfhearted tugs revealed this was one of those false doors. When the first door refused to open three hours ago Barry had spent a good amount of time studying it. Looking for a lock, barricade or some sort of object that halted its opening.

What he found was that the door wasn't even real. It was like decoration – didn't open at all. However with the benefit of hindsight, Barry concluded that all the doors were decoration, seeing as the ones that opened didn't even go anywhere. Seemed to be a lot of that going around recently – things that went nowhere.

With frustration mounting and his patience wearing thin, Barry employed a new tactic – think like the bat. What would Bruce do when trapped in this sort of maze? Knowing the stubborn bat he'd probably ignore all the bait, refuse to play their game and find a way out – a bit late for that idea now. So plan B was put into motion and what was it the bat did best? Be a detective of course.

"So hey!" The silence had actually gotten to the point where Barry was imagining hearing things – so he decided enough was enough and filled up the empty air with his voice. If the creepy guy was listening he might just answer and perhaps he could try out his own detective skills. "This game of yours, I was thinking that maybe we could spice it up a little."

"Not that this door opening business isn't enthralling." Time to find some clues. "But how about we add a little something extra?"

A few seconds passed and…nothing. Barry could have torn his hair out purely from frustration. What sort of inconsiderate fuck sets up this sort of game and then abandons it before it's even started? Had he gotten bored because Barry hadn't found his riddle? Was this all a ploy to infuriate the speedster?

Barry damn near began shouting before suddenly, there was a sound.

Faint, barely audible under standard circumstances, but in this empty maze of doors – it sounded like thunder. The noise continued for a few seconds long, long enough for Barry to recognize it as something being scrapped against wood. The scratching continued until Barry found the source.

One of the many red doors was unexplainably being made the barer of a message. Despite the flips of joy Barry stomach was doing to see that something was actually happening, the low wails of the door being carved into by an unseen force made his skin crawl unpleasantly and Barry kept his distance.

Each letter was unhurriedly, painstakingly carved into the wood and all Barry could think while watching the slow progress was that moving at a regular pace was maddening. When the unseen force stopped scratching its way against the wood, Barry finally allowed himself to step forward and have a good look at what CM had left for him.

"What the hell?" Barry groaned, beyond frustrated when he read the words crudely carved into the door. It didn't actually make sense at fist, the letters looked vaguely familiar if just a little warped. It took Barry a solid ten seconds to realize they were backwards, like they'd been written from the other side of glass.

Frustrated Barry audible groaned and began to trace his fingers over the marks to make out the words. It wasn't difficult – simply tedious. After tracing over each letter, Barry felt his irritation flare up again – it felt like CM was toying with him.

'What would you suggest?' Between CM's disembodied voice when he first arrived and the small note he'd dropped to Barry some odd three hours ago – this way of communication was by far Barry's least favorite.

Well at least the guy was still listening to him and hadn't just wandered off to do god knows what else.

Satisfied that he was no being heard and listened to, Barry continued the routine of checking doors and immediately being disappointed by them. But now he added a bit more running commentary to the mix, filling up that suffocating dead air with his own careless string of words.

"Alright, well how about some context?" Barry suggested as he gave another door handle a half-hearted tug. Nothing. He barely had the energy to be angry anymore, let alone surprised and so without a fuss he moved onto the next.

"You see, here's the thing buddy. You obviously know a bit about me to set up…whatever this is." Barry gestured to the halls of doors, still having trouble finding a reasonable explanation for it all. So far he'd created theories ranging from the realistic to bizarre – his favorites so far included a healthy dose of magic beans.

He'd been working this gig long enough to get tossed into mirror worlds, through portals, time and even other dimensions – there was little room left for cynicism. Still Barry didn't completely rule out the possibility that this was completely normal, void of supernatural elements – a few of Bat's trouble makers had a knack for making the natural world appear surreal.

Stories of the Court of Owls, labyrinth came to mind. Barry suppressed a shudder when recalling the expression Bats had worn when recounting the event to his team. It was necessary to share such details but it seemed even the Batman could be shaken from time to time.

What had happened to Bruce down in the labyrinth was something the man kept close to his own heart and memory – whatever had happened to him down there was just another secret he'd be taking to the grave. Just another thing that the Batman failed to share with those that cared about him.

Barry was going to try talking to him again about trusting his team a bit more. But he knew it wasn't about trust, not really – Bruce was holding back for other reasons and Barry could only catch glimpses of those reasons through the man's all but impenetrable mask.

For the time being Barry's only goal was the come out of this little game without the same air of dread Bruce had hanging off of him after he'd escaped the labyrinth.

"But," Barry continued after another door yielded nothing of use. "I still don't know the first thing about you."

Barry wasn't alarmed this time when the sound of wood being cut into drifted through his ears. Instead he abruptly stopped and located the new messenger board. Knowing the game this time Barry had no trouble getting the message, tracing the words more quickly the second time around.

"I am the Crooked Man."

"Yeah, okay, sure." Barry rattled off with a roll of his eyes. "You say that but who says you're the Crooked Man?"

Furiously the familiar complaints and denials banged against Barry's brain. Screaming over and over again the facts Bruce had laid down for him. The Crooked Man was dead – bullet between the eyes, off the seventh floor.

"Besides, who was the Crooked Man anyway? You know my name and my hero persona – so what is your name huh? Give me something here."

Villains weren't known to be precious about their identities; most gave it away without a care. Barry always saw it as a mix of pride and a blatant disregard for others. The purpose of a secret identity was simple – to protect yourself and more importantly, your loved ones.

The fact most villains didn't bother with it had always struck Barry as a sign that either they didn't love anyone or they simple had no one to love. It was a strange sort of feeling that left the red speedster with.

Distantly Barry thought of his least favorite nemesis – Eobard Thawne. The man had put him through hell and back more times than he cared to count, thrown him through time periods and loops Barry didn't know could exist. The yellow speedster was everything Barry hated and everything he fought against – but there was a time, brief as it was, that Barry really did feel pity for the man.

The man had no lightening rod, nothing tying him to life. Really all the Reverse Flash had in the end was himself and his own hatred for Barry. Not a person alive cared for him and Barry had often wondered if Thawne had ever been loved or cared for another.

It was unlikely, and so when Barry first encountered the Reverse Flash – it had been practically the same time he met Eobard Thawne. He didn't hide his true identity because there was no reason to – nothing to protect.

Barry didn't have that luxury, if it could be called that, he had many people he cared about. His identity was important to him – to keep them safe. And now some lunatic claiming to be a dead man knew it.

But that did leave Barry with an interesting thought – did this man have anything worth protecting?

The next message came more slowly, like the man was thinking about each word he wrote down, and it took all of Barry's strength not to bang on the door to get him to hurry up. He was already on edge with the loss of his own speed and it didn't help that CM seemed content to take all the time in the world. Evidently patience was a virtue this particular man had in abundance.

"You want to play another game? Then I'll add rewards. Find my riddles, complete my challenges and in each stage I will leave scraps of the past for you to find."

Despite having been able to weasel something out of CM, Barry was still left with the maze of pointless doors and not the first idea on what he was suppose to do with them all.

"Should have asked him for a door that actually goes somewhere instead of a damn history lesson."

This was rapidly turning into a real game Barry might have sat down to play with Hal. It had optional story content on top of the five levels and end challenges. Hal had always been better at video games than he had and Barry found himself longing for his friend's uncanny knowledge on such things.

With little else to do, Barry glumly reached for yet another door, wondering idly if this one would be bricked up or glued shut.

Just as his hand closed around the brass handle however, there was a sudden tremor that vibrated up Barry's arm and caused him to jump in alarm. He still had his fingers closed around the handle when the door suddenly swung inwards, bringing Barry with it on its path. That brought Barry forward a few clumsy steps and forced him to look up at the person on the other side of the door that Barry had most certainly not expected to open.

Who could blame him? After hundreds of duds there just so happened to be one that not only opened but also had someone else on the end. And on the other side of the very much open door, there stood a familiar face looking down at Barry with the same surprised expression.

"Hal?"

"The one and only." That certainly sounded like Hal Jordan. In an instant Barry's expression brightened and he lunged forward to give the lantern a tight hug. After three hours of this nonsense he didn't care if Hal complained about the casual contact, but much to Barry's surprise, Hal returned the embrace almost as eagerly.

"How did you get down here?" Barry asked after the two broke apart, keeping one another within arms length.

Hal wasn't in his Green Lantern uniform, instead he was wearing the same brown jacket he always had on and a familiar grin clung to his lips. He was definitely a sight for sore eyes, but his presence here did stump Barry. Just how many people did CM intend to string into this?

It was also fairly jarring just to see Hal again, he'd been off world for so long and without so much as a phone call, Barry very nearly made a joke about hardly recognizing his long time friend. He knew perfectly well that Hal had a whole universe, or sector, he had to protect – but Barry had been growing a little weary of these long bouts of silence from his best friend.

Being trapped with him in a never-ending maze might have been overcompensating just a tad though.

"Woke up here." Hal explained offhandedly and with a curious look up, he broke away from Barry to look into the maze of doors that was on Barry's side of the door. He'd expected Hal would have the same set up on his end but when Barry peeked in he found that the door lead to a small windowless room.

"Got sucker punched by some wacko in bandages." Hal continued in a disgruntle tone. "Cooked man or something."

"Crooked." Barry correctly distractedly as he hovered in the doorway, not yet certain it was safe to venture inside. He must have been overwhelmed by the fact a door had actually opened. Who would have thought doors could do that?

While Hal explored where Barry had come from, the Flash tentatively inspected the small box of a room Hal had popped out of. Inside the small room there was a desk, a chair and a small, rickety looking bed. Lined up along the walls were shelves, simple beams of wood jutting right out of the brick work – what drew Barry to them was the fact that they were empty.

"Five shelves…" Barry muttered under his breath, observing each shelf with some concern.

So far he'd found nothing and now the first door to lead somewhere lead here? Barry might be giving it too much thought but there was a sense of dread in the pit of his stomach that told him that this was somehow important.

"Optional story content." He mused to himself, stepping fully into the room to have a proper look around.

With so little in the room it didn't take long for Barry to have a look at everything. First the bed, which didn't so much as have a crease in it. It looked freshly made, might as well have been a whole new bed for all the use it appeared to have. However that did nothing to change the fact it was still a small, uncomfortable looking thing.

CM told Barry that he would leave clues as he progressed, this was the first thing he'd actually found – if the man did not deliver Barry was going to be furious.

As he was looking through the drawers in the table, Barry did wonder why he'd bothered asking for that little tidbit to be added to their 'game'. There was the initial boredom that prompted him to say something but under that there was a genuine need to know. Barry had seen some crazy, awful things before, including people coming back from the grave but in this instance he was dearly hoping that the Crooked Man was dead.

If this was really the same man from all that time ago, Barry needed to get rid of him as quickly as possible. Sweep him under the rug essentially, Barry just had to do anything to keep Noire from ever seeing the man or knowing he was back.

Was he being too protective?

Thinking back on the argument between Noire and himself, Barry couldn't help but acknowledge the dreadful feeling curling in the pit of his stomach. Perhaps he was the one that ought to be sorry – he was only trying to look out for the kid, but Barry could see how that concern could very quickly become over bearing.

Just as that though began to truly trouble Barry, his hand brushed against something was wasn't wood. A small jolt of excitement run up the length of his spine as a small scrap of paper was retrieved from the bottom drawer.

Trying to flatten it out was difficult but Barry didn't need the note to be flawless, just legible. It took a bit of work but finally Barry was able to make out the tiny, fluidly written words on the paper.

He'd found one of CM's riddles.

'I make you weak at the worst of all times. I keep you safe, I keep you fine.

I make your hands sweat, and your heart grow cold; I attack the weak, but seldom the bold.

I cannot be bought or sold, however I am still a cruel man's gold.

What am I?' - CM

Running over the words soundlessly once or twice, Barry's eyebrows furrowed slightly. A small part of him was relieved that these really were riddles, straightforward and judging by size and wording alone – not difficult. However Barry wasn't Bruce and he didn't have the Riddler as a primary villain – he was not an expert in this sort of game.

It was at this point Barry recalled a vital piece of information – he god damn hated riddles.

"Barry? I think I left my damn wallet in there – could you grab it for me? I spent way too long in there already, I'm not going back in." Interrupted by Hal's voice from outside the door, Barry almost jumping not having realized he was that tense to begin with.

"Sure." He wasn't exactly keen on playing delivery boy but Barry figured he'd make Hal open all the doors from now on. Three hours in a small room against three hours opening doors – they could trade roles for a bit. At least Barry assumed Hal had been there for three hours.

Really? All that time in this small room and Hal hadn't done anything? A quick glance around at the simple room told Barry that if that was the case, Hal must have just sat still and waited, because nothing was touched. Knowing the hotheaded Hal Jordan, that didn't seem quite right.

And get his wallet? That just didn't seem to fit either. Maybe it was just the riddle circling eerily around in his brain, but Barry began to feel uneasy.

"Hey Hal." Calling out to the occupied lantern, Barry kept his gaze on the dingy little room. "How long were you in here for?"

No answer.

"Hal?" Now Barry turned to look back out the door, worried that his friend was going to vanish back into thin air.

A chill ran down Barry's spine when he found Hal standing practically on his heels, staring down at him coldly. "So you found it?" Hal murmured, glancing at the riddle in Barry's hands before a soft sigh slipped from his mouth, followed immediately by a smile. "Finally."

It happed too fast for Barry to even see it really unfold in front of him – it was rather jarring to be the one on the other end of that sort of speed for once. In a flash of yellow Barry was tossed out of the little room and back into the hallway by what he could only assume was one of Hal's constructs.

As his body slammed back against the far wall, jammed painfully between a door and the wall, Barry's mind flooded with too many questions to count.

Each breath burned as he forced it down, slumped against the wall as he watched Hal slowly exit the room after him – ring glowing brightly in the empty corridor. It was glowing the wrong colour – a vibrant bright yellow hue surrounded Hal as opposed to the correct green shade that he always wore.

"Why do your…" Barry gasped, struggling to grit the words out after being winded. "…powers work?"

Perhaps it was not the most important question at that exact moment but Barry had been cut clean off from the speed force and Hal – yellow or not – had complete control over his powers. Excuse Barry for feeling a bit cheated.

Hal didn't offer up an explanation as he approached Barry's aching body, another yellow construct forming as he drew closer. Barry's vision was a little unfocused, having sustained a pretty substantial blow to the back of his head, but even without his powers Barry was no coward nor the type to take a beating laying down. Friend or not.

So as Hal bore down on him, a yellow mallet like construct flying high up above his head as he intended to pound Barry into the ground, the speedster – or former speedster – leapt aside just as the Hal look alike threw the weapon down. Narrowly missing Barry as it landed against the door he'd been leaning against moments before.

The door groaned and splintered under the force of the impact but behind it was nothing more than a thick wall of vines so it didn't fully cave in. With a furious snarl the yellow clad Hal turned towards Barry, eyes flashing viciously behind his mask as they narrowed in on the crouching man. The Hal Barry knew would have said something. And insult, taunt or even a few curses but this Hal, whatever or whoever it was stayed mostly silent as it came at him again.

The mallet lost its solid state, becoming a bendy sort of weapon as it lashed out at Barry, once again just falling short of hitting him. Barry dearly missed his true speed – it would have kept him out of reach in this situation but as it was now, Hal might very well out run him. Fake Hal or not that was a failure he'd never live down and if Hal somehow caught wind of it – Barry would never hear the end of it.

So now he had both pride and life on the line – a bit too much to lose in his opinion.

And as the 'not Hal' turned on him again, yellow blasts of light firing from his ring without restraint Barry knew that he was about to be longing for the hours of door opening again, and that this was probably going to hurt – a lot.

With no cover to use in the hallways, Barry took off running in the opposite direction, hoping to lose the yellow lantern in the maze of doors and hallways. A sharp left followed by another and then a right and Barry saw the yellow glow growing dimmer with distance. The not Hal was still chasing him but Barry had enough speed in him naturally to give the man a run for his money.

As Barry went skidding around another corner, narrowly missing a blast of yellow that threatened to nip at the back of his neck as it flew past, the Hal thing finally started to speak. If this was an improvement or not was debatable.

"Why are you running?" It asked in his friend's voice, turning the corner only second after to see Barry dashing off behind another. "Can't you fight?"

Opting to do the smart thing and refuse to answer Barry instead focused on finding anything that looked even remotely different to everything else. The Crooked Man promised there was a way out to every single challenge and at first Barry assumed that meant finding the right door before he died of boredom but it seemed now he'd unleashed a little bit of 'incentive'.

How was he suppose to know if the doors were duds of not with not Hal so close on his tail? He could barely spare the a glance let alone check them. And all the while Hal's familiar voice followed him, a voice he trusted so well becoming unfamiliar and warped with spite.

"Without your speed you're unable to be a hero aren't you? Without it you're not the Flash, not even able to protect yourself – let alone others." Gritting his teeth Barry fought back the spike of annoyance and frustration the comments caused and focused on his running and breathing.

There had to be a way out, there had to be a solution to this. If it turned out CM was a liar and this was all some cruel trap that had no way out, Barry wouldn't be surprised but at the same time he held onto the slim hope that the man really loved his games more than he loved seeing people suffering and there was a reasonable way to best this problem.

That was when Barry remembered the riddle stuffed deep into his pocket. Knowing he had to find an answer to the riddle and pass the challenge – presuming the challenge was the cranky not Hal over there – he needed to somehow fend off a yellow lantern and solve a riddle all without his speed.

There's no possible way! Barry furiously thought as he took another corner, noticing that the not Hal was further behind now – apparently flying wasn't as fast as Barry had first thought.

While Barry was internally lamenting the situation, a small niggling memory began to crawl up his spine and take control of his thoughts. Bruce's training came to mind – hadn't he said something like this himself. That they had to be prepared to be in a situation where powers were not in the equation.

Batman…he'd have no problem with this and he'd never had a superpower in his life, so why was Barry running scared? If Bruce could do it, if Bruce believed that Barry could do it – then he'd just have to do it.

Powers like theirs were a gift but it was not who they were, it could not be all they were, and so with Bruce's scathing but helpful voice in the back of his mind, Barry slammed on the brakes just around another corner and waited.

Hal had fallen behind somewhat and even though Barry was panting heavily after his little sprint around the maze, he was still thrumming with adrenaline. This person wasn't Hal but they had Hal's powers and Barry knew best how to get the upper hand on Hal at the best of times and this person, this thing was a yellow lantern. They lacked will.

Come on Allen. Think, what's the answer to the riddle? Barry's mind was racing at a speed Barry almost forgot he had, repeating the words over and over again looking for something he could have missed, some sort of trick to the words or choice of phrasing.

Before he had an answer not Hal was rounding the corner and Barry had to momentarily abandon his search for an answer as this too priority. In a single fluid, practiced motion Barry lashed out and landed one punch square across not Hal's jaw. Without waiting he followed up with another and then a hit to the stomach and then one more uppercut to the face when not Hal bent inward around the gut punch.

In a matter of seconds the yellow lantern was thrown onto his back by Barry, no superpowers involved and a familiar sense of satisfaction welled up inside of Barry.

"See pal, I don't need my speed to run circles around you." Pride always came before a fall and almost as quickly as Barry had, not Hal retaliated.

A yellow rope lashed out at Barry's feet, knocking him clean off the ground and onto his back. The rope wasted no time in wrapping him up in a constricting bind. Barry struggled but it seemed like even the smallest twitch caused the rope to tighten around him – slowly crushing the air from Barry's lungs.

Scarcely seconds later, the owner of the construct was on Barry, foot pressed down on his chest in an action that was more symbolic than it was tactical. The not Hal had a sneer plastered to his face as he held the ropes that kept Barry trapped up proudly. The triumph and glee on his friends face looked familiar and out of place – it was malicious and not at all mischievous like the Hal that he knew. It was frightening really.

"Got you." Not Hal chimed in a sing song tone, tugging on the ropes cruelly with one hand and pressing harder into Hal's chest with his foot. Barry bit back a sound of pain and managed a glare at Hal. "And now you'll stay here with me – forever."

As Barry lay there, he cursed the colour on Hal, cursed it for the colour that Reverse Flash and Sinestro's lanterns wore. Like somehow yellow was the true villain behind all the horrors in his life.

What was it with the colour yellow haunting them constantly?

Then it clicked. In a single obvious thought Barry's mind found the answer it was looking for. Yellow, the answer was right in front of him – CM had literally given him the answer in his attacker. A man clad in the colour yellow – a cruel man's gold.

"Fear…" The word slipped out in a disbelieving whisper, partly because breathing had become difficult. The not Hal recoiled as if the word had physically harmed him, face twisting into something like dread and then anger.

"What?" He snared, the ropes tightening once again but it felt halfhearted and Barry could see the yellow lantern's hand trembling.

"You know Hal, actual Hal, my Hal – not you – once told me that Sinestro's lanterns were particularly troubling because they were cruel. But he also said that they were weak because they suffered from their own power. They lacked the will to control the thing that gave them strength – sound about right to you shaky?"

"Sh-Shut up! You're weak without your powers, just shut up! Be quiet and behave – I won, so you have to say here as the loser!" Not Hal's voice trembled even as he tried to be intimidating and Barry responded with a smug smile.

"Fear. The answer to your riddle is fear."

Just like that a switch was flipped and not Hal practically leapt away from Barry. He stumbled back a few pathetic spaces as the ground began to tremor and shake violently. Then in a single terrible roar the ground pried itself open, crumbling into a large seemingly endless gaping hole. Barry recalled having fallen into the first room, remembered CM's mocking advice to watch his hands and feet.

The doors that had been useless to Barry over all began to crack and fall away into the continuously widening mouth of the void. Those that did not share the fate of falling into the darkness instead began to shatter and fall to the ground as though they'd been made of nothing but glass this entire time – it seemed that after having cleared CM's first trial the world he'd crafted for it was falling in on itself.

Barry felt no need to stick around and watch it decay.

Grinning Barry approached the hole without hesitation, only then did it seem that not Hal remembered he had a job – likely to kill Barry. "No!" He roared, reaching out for Barry but only catching at empty space as the scarlet speedster took a single careless step into the gaping hole. With a small, taunting salute, Barry vanished down into the darkness with not Hal's furious shouts following after him.

As Barry fell through the darkness and down towards what he assumed was another game, he couldn't help but feel a bit disappointed that he had to be alone again. He knew it was a childish, selfish desire but Barry had dearly wanted to see Hal again and even though that person hadn't turned out to be his friend – for a moment Barry was happy just to see him.

He was too older to be missing friends like that, and there were more important things to focus on. Regardless, Barry quietly hoped that when this was all over, Hal might at least find some time to be back on earth and Barry could tell him all about how stupid he looked in yellow.

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