Doll House – I Am
"I am an act or deed that inspires a grin."
"I bring with me a feeling of cheer- lessening trouble and replacing fear."
"I need no thank you and ask for no pay – I only wish to brighten your day."
"You'll be amazed when you suddenly see all the good things you could do with me."
"What am I?"
…
…
Time had not stopped for Barry. As such he could not afford to lie there forever, staring blankly into the empty space above his head.
When the Crooked Man dropped him into the next arena, he had hit hard and Barry didn't get back up. He didn't spring to his feet to race after some clue or challenge. Instead he lay where he'd been dropped and just looked into the air.
A large part of him knew that every second he spent on the ground was another second that he might be needed back in the real world. There were people he had to protect, people he owed it to – reasons to get up and keeping going. But for some reason he couldn't manage it. Not a single inch and the longer he laid there the more he began to wonder – had anyone come looking for him?
He knew his friends; if they set their mind to it they could find him anywhere on earth or this solar system – probably further if they really threw their back into it. If they tried, they could do anything. Yet here he was very, much not rescued. How long had he been down here? Days? Had no one noticed his absence?
Wait – Barry reasoned with himself – they had to notice. His boss would be furious that he was slacking off and surely Batman would be irritated that he missed a league meeting. So had they noticed he wasn't there and just not cared enough to come looking? Noire was probably still too angry with him to care where he was, probably never bothered coming back to the house. Hal was off planet no doubt, he wouldn't know Barry was missing and even if he had – there were more important things to do then worry about one earthling.
"No." Barry hissed to himself, jerking himself upright finally. "No! Stop thinking like that, it's not true."
He was just stressed; it was just this place getting to him. Barry didn't really believe his friends thought so little of him.
But maybe…maybe they should.
That thought came into his mind and refused to leave again. After all what good had he done here? Everyone he tried to help had died, fake or not. He'd seen Batman – a Batman – kill a Superman. Watched a fake become self aware twice and both times seen them die, even choose to kill themselves if it would help him progress. Everywhere he turned there was more failure and at each failure he was reminded that this game was made to prove he was a hero.
Barry hadn't lost yet, but what had he proved? That he wasn't a killer, that he was a good person, yes. But he'd also shown that he was a useless person without his powers. Without them he was unable to save anyone.
He wasn't fast enough.
Just as Barry was beginning to feel a crushing helplessness overcome him, a small weight dropped into his lap. When Barry looked at it, he found a knife with a note attached to it. It was very similar to the first note that the Crooked Man had left him, simple and on a single scrap of paper. He chose to put the knife down by his side, slowly and with care, he wanted nothing to do with it and Barry certainly refused to use it for anything CM had in mind. The note seemed a bit safer to handle. When Barry turned it over it only had two words scrawled on its surface.
'Play Nice.'
Momentarily confused, Barry was given a rather immediate answer as something barreled into him too fast to see. Taken off guard and thrown a good distance across the floor, Barry's rattling brain tried to catch up with what had happened. First he recognized the blow as a punch, and second he recognized the speed – someone had just hit him at super speed.
It was foolish but for a split second something like hope bloomed in his chest, even after having been given what was very likely going to be a black eye in the near future.
"Eobard?" He tried; unable to think of any other speedster he'd met recently that hit him like that. He didn't stop to consider how ridiculous that was.
Abruptly there was a mass of red and yellow standing in front of him, vibrating violently but already Barry could see that this replica didn't quite look the same as the Reverse Flash had. Too small and thin to be Eobard and the eyes were not the eerie red and black he knew. Instead the face that grinned back at him when the figure slowed enough to properly register – was his own.
"Oh you have got to be kidding." Barry got out just before the fake him hit him again.
This time the punch only pushed him down against the ground and the replica Flash followed him. In mere seconds he had a knee jamming up under his ribs and both wrists held down by a stronger set of his own hands. The knee against his chest violently slammed into him and Barry hacked up a cough. If he lost a rib in that blow it wouldn't have surprised him.
Barry distantly registered that the knife he'd been given was a good distance away from them. He couldn't be sure how far the fake Flash had tossed him; he might have even kicked the knife out of reaching difference while Barry was distracted with everything else that was going wrong at that exact moment. He wasn't sure how useful a knife would really be right now but Barry could have at least used it for some form of defense.
The other Flash was looking down at him and Barry tried to place the emotion. It certainly wore the same ones that Eobard did, something bordering manic glee and disgust. Barry didn't think his face could contort in such a way and the sight was a far cry from pleasant.
"How's the view down there, Barry?" It asked him conversationally and Barry managed to grin back even as he was robed of air.
"Not quite so bad, it'd be better if there wasn't some cheap knock off blocking the view though."
"Oh, that's mean." The fake Flash scoffed and Barry made a guttural sound of pain as the knee pressed against him dug in harsh. "Maybe not as mean as that, a close second though."
This went on for a few more agonizing seconds. Whenever the force against his ribs and stomach would let up it would a brief relief before it came down again, just a bit harder each time. It was rather disconcerting to see himself partaking in small time torture with a grin on his face. The replica did look alarmingly like him, except while Barry was in his day clothes; the fake was in the Flash suit. Someone wearing that suit should never partake in something like this – it just wasn't right.
Then finally the fake settled on a consistent pressure that was not quite painful enough to make Barry see stars but still too uncomfortable to make breathing an easy process.
"You were laying there for an awful long time, I thought you'd given up before I even got my chance."
"Oh my god, did he make you to talk me to death?" Barry managed with a biting laugh.
"Something like that."
The Flash then gradually eased the pressure off of Barry entirely, until he was left to drag in ragged breaths at his leisure and the fake was back on two feet. With a casual air of mild amusement the Flash paced. Not the determined back and forth Barry knew from Batman's steady steps, but a more airy, dance sort of pattern.
"What should I talk at you with? There's plenty to pick from – I could bring up that dead mother of ours and remind you how that was entirely your fault. When we were just a kid not being 'fast enough' was already pretty bad, but then to learn that the only reason she died was because you made an enemy in the future – well that's gotta sting."
He paused, regarding Barry with a cruel smirk.
"But low hanging fruit, am I right?"
While Barry pushed himself onto his side and then more gruelingly up to his feet, the other him made circles around him. Never following the same path he had in the loop before, always skimming across the ground with a sort of lightness that Barry couldn't remember ever having moved with himself. Sometimes he heard people complain about or admire the fluid, constant motion speedsters would move with at times. He'd never seen it from the outside before; it looked like he was moving on air rather than the ground.
"Doesn't help that Bats has his finger prints all over the dead parent bit. Well if we can't use that, how about something a bit fresher? There's always your failure as a friend to Hal – I mean how many people do you know would actually be so terrible as to force their friend to fly into space for refuge? I'm only coming up with one name here. Do you still blow up his phone with messages when he's off planet?"
A pause, as if Barry might answer and then a laugh when he didn't.
"Oh who am I kidding, I know you do. I'm you – of course I know! FYI, I think we might have misspelt guardian in that last one."
Barry's lungs were still struggling and old aches and pains from his tumbles around the Crooked Man's games were beginning to mount up. It felt like no part of him had been untouched in all of this, Barry wasn't sure exactly how much more movement he could possibly get if the Flash kept knocking him down like that.
Regardless, now that he was back on his feet Barry did try to prepare for another strike. Watching as the Flash danced around him, occasionally flittering in and out of sight as he jumped to another location at super speed. Barry was not known for being graceful, everyone in the office said so. But looking at his own body moving now, the Flash did look incredibly graceful.
Moving more like a predator than Barry had thought possible in his own skin. He was positive he didn't look like that when he moved as the Flash – but then again he had never seen himself quite like this before.
Of course, it wasn't as impressive when you remembered that Batman moved with a lethal grace all his own. Without super speed to add fluidity to his movements.
"No?" The Flash asked, when Barry didn't verbally respond. "Disappointing, how about the kid then? You'd think after losing both parents of your own you might have a bit of an idea how to look after another orphan. Yet lo and behold – you can't manage that either. How fast did the kid end up hating you? Did you set a record for fastest hated foster father? You know, before you let him get killed of course."
The words about Hal and Noire spilling from the fake's mouth were grating on his nerves like mad, but even the replica had admitted that it was his job to talk at Barry. He'd seen this routine before, show a familiar face and dig at weak emotional spots. Just because he knew the gig didn't mean that it didn't occasionally hit its mark.
Barry simply clenched his fists and waited it out. Trying to think of what the challenge here was even if he was weary beyond belief at this point.
"Really, nothing?" The replica pouted but to Barry he didn't look the slightest bit upset. The fake looked like he was having lots of fun at his expense.
"You see, I didn't actually think you'd make it this far. I mean – I'm you and I know me – so I figured you'd cave somewhere around the second challenge." Barry was back on his feet, the Flash continued to chatter at him. "Seeing even a criminal like Snart put a bullet in his head must have been a shocker. But hey, it's not like there's anything you could have done. Right?"
The fake's face twisted up into a gleeful sneer. "You didn't want to be hurt after all."
"You-!" Barry snarled viciously, memories of the replica Len's faint smile and words about the things that were dear to the real Captain Cold still felt too fresh a wound in his mind.
He wanted the fake to shut up, to stop talking with his voice and smiling with his face – in that damn suit no less. He could try to push aside all of the replica's snide comments about his failings in the outside world because he could still trust in his friends. But in here, where there was nothing but him and his own mistakes – it all felt too raw and so Barry snapped.
In hindsight it was not his best idea ever to try and hit the Flash.
The put down came faster than Barry could register. A blur, crack and suddenly pain. The Flash had taken him by the back of the head and slammed him nose first into the ground and Barry was sure it was broken. The spew of blood choked his airways and for a few horrible seconds Barry inhaled blood and dust against the ground, unable to get a single untainted breath of air into his lungs.
"But of course it wasn't your fault was it, Barry? You didn't do anything. So how could it be your fault?" The hand tangled in his hair jerked Barry back off the ground, a sticky trail of blood dripping to the ground as Barry's spine arched back up off the ground, dragged easily by the Flash's strength. "That's the most wonderful thing about you, Barry. So moral and kind but completely unable to move forward if it hurts others."
"Isn't it nice? To live in a world like that, where everybody can be innocent by just doing nothing."
Then the fake dropped him and Barry fell into a heap on the floor. Sticky blood was already beginning to dry across his face and his half hearted attempts to clean it off with the back of his hand only ended up smearing blood all over his mouth and cheek.
"Have I gotten your attention, Barry?"
He had, and Barry noticed that the Flash had dropped him a bit closer to the knife he'd been unable to reach earlier.
Behind him the Flash was pacing again. Barry could only just hear his feet skidding across the smooth surface of the ground and the occasional snicker. His eyes stayed on the ground, on his own balled up fists and the steady dripping of blood.
"You see that's the key to you, Barry. All that speed, and nowhere useful to put it. All that potential, and no spine to actually make something of it. You can't go back – oh no, of course not – but you don't seem to move forward either. Running in circles."
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Think about it. In here, out there – how many times could you have protected someone if you were just a little bolder, a little braver? If? How many lives could have been helped if you'd just been a little more willing to snuff out the most unsightly ones."
"You're talking about murder." His voice was thick with blood, the words being forced from his throat came out slurred – not the snarl Barry was looking for.
"In its most basic form, yes. But killing isn't the root of your failures, no, no – that would be your egotism. Because you're so precious about dirtying your hands, you're not willing to do what needs to be done because it'll make you feel bad. Like a child trying to maintain the moral high ground. Sorry to break it to you, but we're not children anymore.
Barry was only partially listening to the other him; his gaze hadn't left the gradually growing puddle of blood between his hands. He had registered the danger, knew that there was every chance that the Flash would simply get bored of chatting and phase his hand through his own very human heart. It was a possibility but at the same time Barry had come to expect certain things from this little game.
One being that the Crooked Man valued being right far more than he did actually killing Barry.
"You don't see it?" The Flash asked curiosity leaking into his words, as if he couldn't fathom how Barry didn't agree with him. "The backwardness of it all? Nobody likes being hurt, you are no exception to that rule and so what do you do in order to avoid being hurt? You do nothing. Oh sure, you put on a nice show, run around in the suit, smile and say the right words. But when it comes down to it – you never properly hurt anyone or do anything."
It was becoming a chore to ignore the fake and Barry noticed once or twice the Flash's feet skimming in and out of his line of sight – his pacing had closed into a tighter circle. Barry could only assume he was getting agitated with so little a reaction from Barry. He needed a thought and he needed it fast, he couldn't match up with the Flash's speed and if he let the fake keep talking, he'd begin to listen in earnest.
"You refuse to hurt others but keep hurting them through your immobility and fear of being hurt yourself. A coward that can't stop running in loops, can't move on forward and looking back is too painful. If you hadn't been so afraid of hurting someone you would have killed the Reverse Flash – spared all the people he has killed. How about Grodd, or even Top – you could have stopped them. But you didn't."
The fake skirted in an out of sight a third time and Barry had just started to shift himself up, towards an upright position when a powerful blow to his ribs came from the side. The force of the kick threw Barry a small distance across the room and left him sprawled back on the ground, aching in places he thought had healed enough to be forgotten.
What he hadn't forgotten was the position of the knife. Barry felt its smooth handle against his forearm and without too much thought; Barry curled his fingers around it and tucked it safely under his sleeve.
The fake didn't even pause in his chattering.
"Are you not listening, Barry?" It spat at him and Barry could distinctly hear the fake approaching him at a human pace. "You're clearly not absorbing this. The Crooked Man won't teach you the way things actually are, he'd have you be an idealized hero. He'd have you keep living in that fantasy world where no body has to die. So I'm here to help you break out of this delusion you have where being a 'good person' is enough."
Another kick, lighter, less violent, meant only to push Barry onto his stomach and then a much firmer pressure came down on his back. The fake jammed his foot down between Barry's shoulder blades, he probably knew that it was an empty gesture, Barry was unlikely to be getting up any time soon. The trail of blood leading to his current position and the newly blooming bruises across his jaw were the surface wounds, injuries under his clothes and skin would be more severe.
Under his sleeve, the knife he'd grabbed sliced along his arm and Barry winced as he began to bleed from a new wound. Even as it began to stain his clothes, Barry didn't react beyond that small expression of pain and amongst all the other pains he was feeling – it was hardly suspicious. The Flash didn't notice anything amiss and went on with his chitchat.
"Let's look at it from an example point of view shall we? Seeing as you're such an incredibly slow learner." The fake dug his heel harshly into Barry's back and to the fallen man's credit; he only growled a sound of pain as opposed to whimpering.
"If you'd been harsher on Noire he never would have gone out to fight his brother. He wouldn't have gotten hurt if you'd just hurt him first – it's fine if it's out of love, right? Even Hal refuses to stay by your side anymore, it would have been better if you'd just told it to him straight – even if it hurt his feelings at the time. Instead what do you do? You sit around, idly looking at your phone while wondering what otherworldly creature is trying to kill him this time around."
Barry said nothing, he had nothing to say. He was simply listening to his own thoughts taking human form and spitting them back at him. They were offhanded little thoughts, the sort that crept into his head late at night and were swiftly buried by sleep. If they reappeared during the waking hours, they could be shrugged off with a little frown and quiet reassurance that it was just a single, nasty thought.
It bore no real weight.
But the weight on his back felt very real. The words his doppelganger was practically overflowing with were increasingly more difficult to shrug off and the tight feeling in his chest was impossible to ignore. Knowing he was being twisted only helped so much, after a while even knowing he was being manipulated failed to offer solace from what the fake was saying.
It was as if the Flash could feel the change in Barry's silence. He'd been ignored earlier but now the quiet man under his foot was definitely listening, and the fake sneered.
"It's honestly very funny, Barry. Because you're so piss scared of hurting anyone else you just keep hurting yourself over and over again. Because of that you've created a wall between yourself and them. Is it really any wonder that no one has come to help you?"
The replica wasn't voicing CM's opinions. Barry knew that by now, the man made the replicas, but they tended to branch out and become their own creatures before long. Len and Eobard had been perfect examples, but they'd changed into better versions of themselves. This replica had distorted even more, it no longer followed the Crooked Man's rules on heroism, it was promoting a type of behavior that would have this version of the Flash loose the Crooked Man's game in a heart beat.
Despite knowing this, Barry didn't feel comforted. This was supposedly the final stage of the game and there was no riddle in sight and as far as he could tell there was no challenge. It felt very much like the replica had overtaken this round. Not unlike how the Lacie fragment had twisted her own level. So why hadn't the Crooked Man stepped in yet? He couldn't fear this replica like he supposedly had the fragment – right?
The Flash then rather casually lifted his foot from Barry's back and crouched down next to him. Just so that he could lay a patronizing hand atop Barry's head in some mock form of comfort.
"But that's fine. We can fix all of that, all you have to do is be quiet and stay there on the ground. So long as you never do anything – I'll be able to exist and if I exist, we can rectify your mistakes."
His grip on the knife tightened and the replica's smile twisted upwards.
"They won't even know you've been replaced."
Enough was enough, Barry had found his limit.
The Flash must have seen it coming, there's no way he hadn't been able to spot the knife as it whipped up from under Barry's sleeve. In the time it took Barry to launch himself up off the ground and grab for his concealed weapon, there should have been some kind of retaliation. He couldn't possibly have failed to realize Barry's intentions as he brandished the weapon.
He'd first thought that perhaps it was surprise that kept the replica rooted in place as Barry plunged the knife deep into his gut. But even when surprised the speedster should have been able to do something besides stare at Barry as his stomach was torn into by the serrated edge of the blade.
Barry realized a bit too late that the fake had seen it, and simply opted not to move. He now stood there, crouched over Barry with a knife gouging out his gut and a manic grin on his face.
"There you go." The fake coughed, a small spot of blood colouring his bottom lip. "Wasn't so hard was it, Barry?"
He'd made the mistake of thinking that the replica wasn't still acting on the Crooked Man's behalf. He'd failed to realise that the replica had been goading him into lashing out in a single thoughtless attack. The Flash hadn't been promoting the Crooked Man's ideals because he was trying to get Barry to go against them, not because he was acting out of his own volition.
Barry had made the mistake of being so afraid and angry that he'd attacked. He'd been furious with himself and that lapse in judgment changed things.
A speedster would not succumb to wounds as simple as this and for a moment Barry held onto that hope. Thinking that he'd be able to subdue this Flash until he could think of a more permanent – no murder based – solution.
Except either the Crooked Man had not extensively covered the healing of speedsters, or simply chose not to give Barry the chance to remedy the situation because the Flash looked very much like he was dealing with this stab wound the same way a human would.
"He might not agree." The replica ground out, obviously not immune to pain. Yet somehow still hell bent on talking. There was no respite from it. "But he's a fool. Thinking heroes can be all good and all powerful. That's fine, you can kill him…and then you can go to the outside world and do what I would do."
The refusal was on the tip of Barry's tongue but he couldn't seem to speak at all as more blood pooled on the floor and the replica got paler and paler. It was a daunting few minutes; neither the real nor the fake moved an inch. Barry's hands had released the knife after his momentary lapse of sanity and were pressed firmly against the Flash's wound as if he could stop the blood flow. But here where there was nothing but what the Crooked Man made for them, there was no hope of an ambulance, or bandages.
They had nothing but time and even the replica couldn't talk after enough of his internal organs had been broken. He was bleeding out, right in front of Barry and all the man could do was sit and wait for it to be over.
In the time it took for the fake to begin to slump and turn fully limp, Barry felt nothing. That may not have been an accurate description; it felt more like the world had just dropped out from under him. He'd been helpless before, he'd failed before, but Barry didn't think he'd ever been in the same position as he was right now.
Where what was happening was entirely his fault, with no excuse there to save him. He couldn't fall back on youth, inexperience or a lack of speed – it was just him sitting in an empty space with a dying version of the Flash with him.
He knew then that he was helpless and alone.
No one was coming to save him this time and he hadn't been able to save anyone else. From the moment this started he'd been losing and losing. Time and time again, failing at every turn.
Now as the replica began to stop breathing and the blood stained almost every inch of the both of them, Barry sat still and waited. He couldn't say what he was waiting for, the end probably. Something to stop or start, anything to let this particular scene be over.
It only took a few seconds after the fake's body had turned completely limp and still for something to happen.
At first Barry didn't register the footsteps, he was still staring blankly down at the Flash in his arms. A distant, not entirely complete thought brushing across his mind, he wondered if the Flash's face would be exactly the same as his. He wondered what his face would look like when he'd died. He never tried to lift the mask.
The steps grew closure, their echo finally registering in Barry's head when the sound was almost directly in front of him. Barry gradually lifted his head, noting that someone was standing in front of him. It took a few more seconds before Barry could force his head up to properly look at the person standing over him.
He was met with a smile.
Barry didn't say a word, he already knew who the man in bandages was. The Crooked Man had told him early on that should he fail even one of his challenges, it was automatic failure. Even the man's odd appearance wasn't particularly jarring to Barry, he simply looked over the man, bandages, scars and all, with the same vacant expression he'd looked on his own dead doppelganger with.
The Crooked Man only smiled wider.
"Looks like that's that. I do hope you enjoyed yourself."
A small click echoed around the empty space and then a gentle pressure against his head. There was a brief silence as the smooth metal of the gun's barrel against his skin began to warm and Barry couldn't force himself to return the gaze of the man staring down at him.
"I am satisfied with just this. Thank you for making me your enemy."
Then there was an earth shattering explosion and everything turned white.
…
…
It had been dark the first time he perished. It had been dark when he'd awoken.
And it went without saying that it would end in darkness the second time.
If he were to be dramatic about it all – and he so often was – he'd claim that the sun didn't exist anymore. Nor did the moon glow and he'd long forgotten the tiny stars that shone up there to keep it company. Everything was dark and in some small part, buried deep within his mind, whispered that it would be light again is only he would remove the fabric wound tightly around his head. It kept his eyes glued shut under the scratchy material, refused to allow him any light.
The rest of him denied that logic. It may have been fear or disgust that kept him from first removing the coverings. If he did pry them from his face he'd be forced to see that the sun did still shine in the sky, the moon still rose to keep the night dwellers company – and he'd accomplished nothing.
The hollows of his bones rung out in a dreary whistle as what was left of his flesh squirmed and writhed restlessly. His eyes had been sealed shut from the moment he had woken up and now he had one free he could see no better in the darkness, but even so the broken man lifted his hand up to the sky. The broken man pulled his hand in front of his gaunt face and twisted elongated fingers testing their movement, seeing just how well his reawakened body could function.
It would suffice.
The broken toy had become a broken man and now that man intended to remain, as he always should have been – crooked.
The words spoken in the fleeting moments before he'd awoken played out in his head, repeating and swirling through his unseeing eyes over and over again. Simple little snippets of conversation came back to him. He could not recall the face of the person he had conversed with, but the words remained long after the memory faded.
Names, ideas – goals. It slowly returned to the crooked man as he lay in the filthy gutter where the monster had left him. The cold drops of ice hitting his face and slowly adding weight to his shredded clothes must have been rain – the low thrum of sound would have been life. He didn't need eyes to know this place and he barely needed memory to know what came next.
He would have to leave, and so he did. Before the stitched together pieces of his body could be found by those still in their first skin, the crooked man dragged himself from that place. He had work to do, things had to be done and he could not afford to leave anything up to chance. He'd left too much up to chance in life and the result was this – an outstanding failure.
The world was wrong.
This wasn't what he'd been expecting when he woke up. All the work he knew he must have done with his own two hands had gone to waste. The shadow was playing hero but not the way that he had taught him to and the shinning light that had been his greatest hope had turned his back on justice entirely – he'd become a villain.
"It's not right!" Familiar words tore spitefully from his chest as the Crooked Man paced back and forth in furious little jerks of motion. "I left the world in their hands, did I not make them perfect? Were they not flawless, where did I go so very wrong?"
He'd poured over the possibilities time and time again, trying to see a fault in his plan, some sort of unforeseen error in his hero creation process. But he found none. They'd suffered a great lose, one that left them with the responsibility of creating a better world in memory of what they once held dear – exactly how he'd always envisioned it.
It was only his life's work. The single most important thing he'd ever done and the only thought to have ever dominated his mind – and now it was ruined. All things considered, he was handling this outstandingly well.
All the same his chest felt hollow, left only with the aching sense of dread he thought he'd left behind when he left the world for the first time. Something had to be done about this; it had to be done now.
And so he turned his attentions to what he believed to be the source of the problem. The same day his body crawled its way, heaving and clawing back into existence, the Crooked Man took himself and all his various aches and pains, into a familiar city. Without the moon or sun to light his way, the Crooked Man instead guided himself with simple touches on the walls around him, familiar with the cities core – it was home.
Even as his eyes began to become restless and demand to be unsealed so that he could look properly onto the living landscape, the Crooked Man ignored them. Sight was a wasted commodity in that moment; it would only distract him for what he really needed. In the darkness he could all but see the lingering lines of red and gold – like wisps of lightening fading too slowly.
This new way of seeing didn't strike him as strange, instead it only validated what he already knew to be true. He was born to create heroes, and now to fulfill that role he had to follow the red path and find its source. Even if that path led him far from home and into a place that was unknown to him.
He had to find the red man – the one with speed in his very bones and then, he had to tear that out of him.
It hadn't taken him long to find his failures. He needed only to follow the threads of light and dark. The two brothers were easy enough to string along. A killing here, a murder there – slap on the bright one's trademark and before long the fighting began in earnest. A bit of pushing to add strain on the red man's life, a small enchantment on a house door and the stage was set. The shadow had done the rest.
The work was finished, and the Crooked Man had completed it all wonderfully in his mind.
So well that now he had the famous hero exactly where he wanted him. It was almost too easy, sometimes he'd been enraged by the man's resilience and once or twice even doubted his own resolve thinking traitorous thoughts like 'maybe he is a hero'. But finally, after many rooms and games – he had the Flash on his knees.
The poor fool hardly looked a man, keeling in a pool of blood, clutching an empty doll like it had once been a human. The dolls were hardly alive, let alone human, he had not created them to live for more than one level – the Flash was kind to mourn them, but kindness did not make a hero.
"I didn't need life to know you." The crooked man rasped, telling his story to the broken toy at his feet, a grin splitting his face from ear to ear as he spoke. It didn't seem like the Flash had registered anything he'd said on his walk over. Instead it looked like he'd become more of a doll than the fakes had been. It was a mercy he wouldn't live as long as they had in this state.
Barry didn't speak, instead he sat at his feet on his hands and knees, head bowed with what the Crooked Man guessed was tears lingering on his face. Funny, he had been a broken toy, made into a broken man and then finally made into crooked one. This one was quiet the opposite. Once a hero, then a man and now a toy.
All that was left to do was break him.
The red man didn't look like he once had. The suit was gone and in its place there was a human. Blonde hair matted, clothes torn and his will left shattered into pieces around him. As the Crooked Man observed his contestant for the title of hero, he couldn't help but think that he was barely even capable of being a man anymore.
The person that was Barry Allen would cease to exist once he was done. First the Flash, then Barry Allen and finally, a broken toy.
Finally nothing.
"Looks like that's that. I do hope you enjoyed yourself
Gently the echo of a gun being cocked rung out in the eerie silence of the Crooked Man's little home, then the cool metal of the gun's barrel came to rest tenderly against the former hero's forehead.
And as the Crooked Man looked at the broken hero with a crooked little grin, he was still able to utter the words that had repeated over and over again in his head the day he woke up.
"I am satisfied with just this. Thank you for making me your enemy."
Then there was an earth-shattering explosion – but it had not come from his gun.
A dread grabbed the crooked man violently as the world he'd spent so long cultivating, began to split apart. This couldn't be, it wasn't supposed to happen like this! The seal he'd left on the door wouldn't open until the two little monsters united; he'd driven a wedge between them too large to be over come in a matter of days!
And yet the world continued to shake and tear at the seams. Overhead the dark void that had been the endless ceiling above began to crack and crumble away and in poured light.
The crooked man shrieked. Even the bandages over his eyes could not block out the flood of light from the outside world. Dropping the gun in a panic, the crooked man's hands flew up to his face, feeling out the coarse material of his unchanged bandages as he desperately tried to block out the light. But just as he could see the threads attached to the man in red and his two failures, there was nothing that could block out what he saw behind his own eyelids.
The outside world was too bright, too full of life – it wasn't a place for him.
"Barry! Barry, you better not be fucking dead right now!" Someone's voice came with the intense light and the crooked man could just see a green thread appear through the downpour of brightness. The green light was here, why was he here? He shouldn't be here – he was supposed to be away from the Earth, far away from this place.
"Lantern!" Another voice barked and that one the crooked man really remembered, it was the dark one. The bat.
Ice like terror ran down his spine, he knew that in life he'd been a native to the city that produced the terrifying creature, that fear carried over with him into this life.
This was terrible; they would ruin everything by being here! The Flash was supposed to be alone, no one was supposed to come for him!
Although he was a coward, even he could not ignore the feverish need to free his eyes from their bindings as the burning glare began to sear its way into his mind. So he scratched, and he pulled with a strength he didn't remember having and when he finally tore one eye free from its bondage, his vision was further assaulted.
One eye was all he dared to open and even he was a touch surprised when sight truly came back to him. It was not the way of seeing he remembered in life, a murky wash of his new way of seeing the world moved over the reality before his eyes. The Flash still sat on the ground, blood drying over his arms and chest but the crooked man's world was no longer the perfect empty void he'd created for Barry's final game.
The intruders had torn open the sky and when the crooked man looked up—
"The…The sky." High up above, there was the moon. For a few seconds he could only stare at it, he hadn't seen the stars or moon in what felt like an eternity. They did still exist…
"Oh shit… Hey, Barry! Barry come on, what are you doing?" He couldn't stare at the sky forever, the intruders had spotted Barry and the green one had already dashed for him, spilling words of concern.
Rage gripped the Crooked Man more furiously than his fear or awe had. His world might have been shattered but it was still his. With a single throw of his arm a glass box flew up between the intruders and them. Barry seemed to balk when he saw the glass wall. Ah, that's right – this wall meant death to him.
The green one didn't hesitate, throwing what seemed to be a massive mallet at the glass wall and the Crooked Man cringed a bit as the wall shuddered – he felt that one. But the wall stayed steady and kept them separated.
It was for his protection as much as it was to keep Barry trapped. They'd damaged the section of his world he'd put over the house, it wouldn't be long before it completely pulled itself apart. Crooked Man knew he'd have to leave to a safer section of his world before that happened, of course even if they tore him to bits and pieces, it was entirely possible he'd wake up stitched back together.
If the monster decided he was worth putting back into a man shaped creature a second time.
"You weren't invited." The pair looked his way but he wasn't the real danger. The world was still holding itself together enough to obey his commands. It was the Bat that first realized the danger; he gave a shout of warning to the flying man just before a large section of the ground shot up in an attempt to impale the pair. If the Bat hadn't shouted, he would have skewered the green man. Irritated but not about to let up, the Crooked Man threw a few more attacks their way. The walls and floor were his to command and while the flying man managed in the air, the Bat was limited to the ground so he became the primary target.
Batman was fast, stupidly fast for a non-powered hero. Infuriated by just seeing the Bat who chose fear over hope and inspiration as a hero's core, the Crooked Man brought a section of ceiling tumbling down towards him. But when Batman leapt out of the way, he was caught by a section of floor that shot up and speared into his shoulder.
The snarl of pain he let out sent a little chill down the Crooked Man's spine. If that human got past his glass wall there was every chance he wouldn't get stitched together again. He sounded less human than any of the others despite being one of the few perfect humans left within hero ranks. Fear was a strong motivator and the Crooked Man aimed to crush the man between two bits of wall.
It would have worked as well, had the lantern not made a large green block between the two sections of wall. It was incredibly difficult to shatter the construct, although the Crooked Man did try. When breaking the block wasn't applicable, he chose to break the man.
The lantern was not nearly as fast as the Batman had been and it only took one sneaky blow from behind to throw him hurtling towards the ground. The Bat shouted something at him, something about concentration but it didn't seem like the green lantern could hear past the very possible concussion he'd just received.
Momentarily distracted from the Bat, the Crooked Man raised his hand only to drag it back down and with the motion, pull down a large chunk of ceiling intending to crush the flying man first.
A ceiling collapsing towards a prone figure that couldn't defend itself… He hesitated.
That momentary lapse of certainty cost him dearly and even once he'd shaken off the sudden feeling of unease to bring the debris falling at full speed again – it was too late.
Ultimately it did not matter, as the lantern's prone form was jerked aside by a single black gloved hand. The bat was proving far more vigilant than the Crooked Man had guessed – perhaps he should have known better than to doubt the Gotham Knight just because he had human blood racing through his veins.
"Lantern." The bat snarled lowly, giving him a small shake. "Focus, keep talking."
The Crooked Man bristled with anger, the lanterns words were what he sought to silence. It may have been that his haste to shut the man up had tipped Batman off – given him a potential weakness to exploit. He had been careless.
But it was the broken Flash that spoke first, voice hushed against the roar of the world ripping itself into pieces.
"No one came." The Flash murmured, echoing the crooked man's thoughts. "I can't...I won't get pulled into another game."
"Barry." The lantern was apparently not out of it enough to let that one slide. Heaving himself upright and shaking off his teammates hand, the lantern began to approach the glass wall again. "We came to get you."
Barry tensed but didn't look up. His arms curled tighter around the dead replica, as if it somehow meant something important. If they took note of the dead Flash, no one mentioned it – they were all fully focused on the living Flash.
The lantern moved again, lifted off the ground and floated towards the glass barrier. The Crooked Man attempted to halt his progression with more debris being fired towards the green lantern. This time his attacks were blocked by the lantern himself, the man was capable when not recovering from a blow to the head.
However his focus remained firmly fixed on Barry.
"Hey…" Green Lantern finally reached the glass wall, pressing his hand flat against it. "Barry, you listening to me? You gotta get up no buddy, we're here now."
"I don't want to hurt people." That seemed to surprise the lantern. Barry spoke quietly, head bowed with his gaze firmly on the cooling body for his double. "You couldn't understand…how terrifying it is. Knowing that no matter what I do, people will always get hurt. Knowing that I will have to hurt people to progress…"
A brief silence followed but then much to both Barry and the Crooked Man's surprise – the lantern laughed.
"Ha, sure I do." Lantern smiled faintly and tapped what sounded like a song's rhythm against the glass. It shuddered more violently than when he's blasted it with the ring. "Bear, I know a thing or two about fear. But it's never stopped you before."
"I can't protect anyone." Barry murmured back, finally looking up at his friend with huge eyes. He must have looked a wreck to his allies. "I can't move forward."
"Flash." Barry tensed when he was addressed by the Batman rather than his green light of a friend. Or perhaps he'd started because he'd been called the Flash – like it held some weight to it.
There was a pause and even the Crooked Man hesitated in attacking any further. Foolish surely, but the gap between the man's words seemed to steal his breath and demand attention. It was as if the next words he spoke would be final – a verdict handed out.
They all knew that the bat could see the cold body clutched to Barry's chest, the familiar face it wore. They all knew what the bat thought of killing – so what might he think of this. The Crooked Man had the most perverse sense of fear – fear not for himself but one that mirrored what he thought Barry would be feeling while he waited for the bat's judgment. As if his own fear were sympathetic towards Barry's.
More likely it was his fear, twisted from the days he still lived knowing that should the bat ever catch him – he would be judged.
"You must keep moving forward – even if your steps are unsteady or you stumble. Trust that you'll find your way." Was what he said and then more quietly. "There are people waiting on you out here, Flash. You can't afford to stand still now."
Seeing the Flash's eyes widen and the green lantern's face brighten into a beaming grin, the Crooked Man's insides turned to ice. Seemingly encouraged by Batman's verdict, the lantern jumped up to speak again. A new found vigor in his voice.
"Come on, Bear! You can't just sit there and let this creeper get into your head." He urged, throwing another swing of his construct hammer against the cracked glass, it gave a bit more and the Crooked Man flinched. "You're the best there is, Bear – speed be damned – get off your rear and prove it!"
"But…" Barry murmured, looking uncertainly at the pair by the glass.
Hadn't Hal left Earth just because he didn't want to deal with Barry anymore? Didn't Noire just want to get out of the house and never come back? Hadn't he always disappointed his team, annoyed Batman? He swore that Hal had even told him that without his speed he couldn't save anyone, but hadn't that Hal also been wearing yellow. His head was aching just trying to make sense of it all.
Briefly Barry remembered being told something important; 'there's every chance he'll be able to rework your own memories. You wouldn't even know the difference – they become fact.'
Those crippling thoughts, they'd just been fears his head had let himself be convinced to be facts. Barry's fingers began to unlatch from his dead replica.
The Crooked Man saw this and in a fit of panic, threw another last-ditch effort at the lantern. The pair had been so preoccupied with Barry that they very nearly ended up crushed between a large slab of the floor the Crooked Man had uprooted and thrown at them. It was the Bat that grabbed the both of them out of the way, dragging them to safety with his grappling hook.
A horrible crash sounded through the decaying world when the slab connected with the fragile glass wall. More cracks appeared.
They were losing ground, the world was collapsing in on itself and even without the Crooked Man throwing things their way, it was becoming a tight space to occupy. Green Lantern saw the next danger first as the ground gave away under them and the ceiling above came down. With nowhere left to run to, the lantern created a platform to keep them up when the ground gave in and a roof to shield them from the falling debris.
He gave a pained shout as the weight fell on his construct, the effort of keeping them up and stopping the world from falling in on them was a touch more than he could easily bear. The inky substance that Barry and the other world Batman had realized was dangerous to look at was beginning to show through the broken parts of the world.
In a matter of seconds Batman realized the danger and covered Hal's eyes with his hand. The green construct shook slightly as his concentration wavered, Batman was speaking rapidly, explaining the danger but without their sight there was little the two could do to find an escape.
And in the glass case, Barry sat. Batman's words ringing through his head.
Barry's eyebrows knitted together after having heard Batman speak. That's right, the Batman he'd met here – the one that lost so much and gave up even more just for him…that man was still expecting things from him as well. But that Batman had died no doubt, like all the others he met in this game; he'd failed them as well.
But there was that phrase, running through his head over and over again.
"Do me a favour."
People were expecting things from him, relying on him. Barry had been left with their wishes and he was just sitting there. The friends he still had, needed him, they'd come to find him and he was just sitting there while they got hurt.
Enough was enough.
Very slowly Barry's fingers unlatched from the cooling body of his fake. The Crooked Man's gaze narrowed in on the sight and what little of his face Barry could see beyond the dirty bandages, contorted furiously. Abandoning the replica on the ground as gently as he could, Barry eased back up to his feet and turned to face the Crooked Man.
His expression scared the coward.
"You lost! You can't get back up." Crooked Man snarled, flinging his arm outward and uprooting another piece of the floor, this time on their side of the wall, and flung it at Barry. It was a shock to the man's system when the broken toy simply stepped aside and the slab of cement went flying past him harmlessly crashing into the far side of the glass box.
Terror began to trickle down the man's spine when the speedless man took a step towards him. The toy had been thoroughly broken, he had been so sure that he'd never get back up again. Perhaps he made the mistake of thinking everyone was as breakable as himself – yet he also currently stood here.
Will was a strong motivator, a reason to keep pushing forward even more so. But having people? People that relied on you and in return helped you back onto your own two feet – that was a whole different kind of motivation.
It was an irrational fear that overtook the Crooked Man as he stumbled away from the standing hero. Very quickly he was pressed against the corner of his own glass wall, and looking for more of a distance still.
"Kid, do me a favour." Barry recited something he'd heard in the game and a chill rushed down the Crooked Man's spine, he knew this request. "You do me a favour, Red. Kill this bastard before Alois ever sees him."
Beyond the glass wall, the Batman's gaze narrowed on those words. They were not Barry's, but they hit a cord with him. He understood where a request like that might have come from. Exactly how much had the Crooked Man shown Barry? Currently he couldn't think about it too much, while Hal was struggling to keep the construct together without being able to see what was happening. ***
That was alright, Bruce placed his trust in Barry. They could hold out long enough.
With his heart pounding frantically in his chest, the Crooked Man looked for some other type of escape. But the world was crumbling around him and beyond the glass there waited a different kind of horror. The one clad in black and wearing an ever-constant scowl. In his fumblings for some sort of escape, the Crooked Man's legs failed him and he sank down to the floor in the corner of the glass cage.
Still the Flash looked down at him and approached at the same steady pace. He had never quite seen the Flash move in this way, or wear this type of expression, in none of the memories he'd sifted through did this particular scene pop up. It was new, he had no game for it, and no plan in sight. The Crooked Man was left trembling.
"Mr. Allen, when a hero kills someone do you know what that does?" Barry echoed a different person's tone as he took the final steps up to the cowering man.
The Crooked Man had aimed to break a hero, make a man of him and then less of that. Had he not factored in what happened should he succeed? He made such a loud show and dance about killing and removing the title of hero – had he not thought far ahead enough to see what type of person he could make if he broke them? The fool.
Then the blonde was right in front of him, staring down at the shaken coward of a man.
"Guilt and regret can be a powerful thing. Even the Crooked Man feels them." Barry recited familiar words back to him and suddenly the man was crouched right in front of him, staring directly into his bandaged face. "Right?"
When the Crooked Man couldn't muster up the resolve to speak a single word in reply, Barry's flat expression twisted a bit. It could have been a smile but it looked entirely too grim for that.
"This world is not a game." Barry uttered, hardly raising his voice to match the Crooked Man's previous shouting. "Those people were not toys. These people aren't."
His control over the replicas had been haphazard at best. They'd retained too many memories, too much free will – ultimately they'd made poor dolls to occupy his dollhouse. He'd never expected them to become so sentient, to feel attachment to Barry Allen in the way they had. It had not been in his plan for them to feel so alive.
But the Crooked Man had been given the ability to use them, a gift offered by a monster that made him from stitches and promises. He'd be just as foolish not to use them. He was more foolish to have listened to the monster at all; death should have taken him the first time.
Then much to the Crooked Man's horror, the Flash looked away from him, towards the glass wall that was sporting many cracks across its surface. If he knew how the wall worked, if he understood how the Crooked Man maintained it or not he couldn't say. But when the Flash reached out to place a single hand against its cracking surface and with a small shove, shatter it to pieces, it didn't matter if he understood anymore.
Shards of the glass wall he'd made scattered and crashed to the ground, creating pockets in the Crooked Man's crumbling world where the real world could be seen under it. Barry's house appeared wherever the glass landed and the moment the shinning splinters hit the murky outsides of the dollhouse, it began to dissolve.
Batman saw the opportunity immediately, and quickly clapped a hand on Lantern's back. They still had to hold out till the void was properly gone but they were safe now. That in itself a relief. Before long the weight that had threatened to crush them and the abyss below all vanished away. Hal was free to collapse in exhaustion and Batman could finally uncover both his companion's eyes.
The Crooked Man could only sit there; mute as his world faded and melted away back into the world he'd left behind. The moon's light flooded in and he cringed away from it, trying to cover his face desperately even though there was no possible way to keep the light out with his new sight.
"Its over. You've won. Finish me now – before I kill someone."
As he sank to the floor, clutching desperately as his eyes, clawing at the bandages on his face. Barry remained over him, looking at the man that had tossed him through hell, and for what? His misguided sense of justice? His friends were safe now and the Crooked Man's world was breaking apart at the seams, there was no danger here anymore.
"What's wrong? Go on!" Crooked Man whispered as he curled in tighter on himself, waiting for death. Wishing for it. "Do it."
He did not strike the Crooked Man.
Even when the lightening filled his veins, thriving and relieved to be alive in its host again. The speedforce pooled in his chest, a smug cat pleased to be at home once again. Even then the Flash did not raise a hand to the shaking man. Perhaps he should have, there were so many people he'd met along the way that would have done it, would have asked he do the same. But he was not yet that person. He was still Barry, the Flash – the person that all those people had put faith in. He couldn't very well change that now.
Instead he opened his mouth and began a riddle of his own.
When he spoke the riddle, the Crooked Man heard him and behind his clawing fingers, the Crooked Man's eyes widened and began to spill painful tears. It was like a small secret being passed between them. The riddle came to an end with the final comment of "What am I?" And despite how his eyes burnt, Crooked Man looked up at the Flash and Barry smiled.
"Think you can solve it?"
That was it. The Flash was still very much alive and the broken toy that he thought he'd made no longer existed. If it had ever existed he couldn't be certain. The bright smile on the hero's face forced more tears into the Crooked Man's eyes.
He couldn't understand.
"Why are you sparing me? Can't you see this is how the game is supposed to end? One of us has to die!" He shouted, anger and desperation forcing the words from his throat. But the Flash still did not strike him, instead he smiled stood and smiled that gut-wrenching smile of his.
"I don't understand, I can't understand. Why are you being so kind to me?" With tears still streaming down his face as he stared up at the hero in horror.
Because he'd only just realized it properly, this man was a hero.
Gritting his teeth, the Crooked Man bowed his head and screamed. The tears choking him as his fingers dug into the flawless ground, unable to find purchase in the final patches of his own world. All the while, the hero simply sat there and watched him with that same gentle expression. He hated that face, couldn't stand to look at it as the sight left an aching feeling in his chest.
The memory of a far away smile pulling at the broken strands of his heart, suffocating what was left of him.
"You can't save everyone. But don't give up just yet. You'll still save someone." Barry murmured and the sobbing man's went wide again. "Those words…were they his or yours?" The hero asked kindly and more tears began to flow freely down the broken man's face as he sobbed the same word over and over again.
"Why, why, why, why, why…"
The last of his dollhouse was fading and all that was left behind was the small suburban house he'd found all those months ago. Through the windows the moon shone brightly, stars happily surrounding it as they gave light to the night. But it wasn't the moon he'd known or the world he'd left behind the first time. Instead the Crooked Man woke up into an entirely different world.
One that felt warm and hopeful even at night. One he didn't recognize.
"Barry!" The Flash turned when his name was shouted and before he could get so much as a word out, he was assaulted by Hal Jordan as the man practically tackled the alarmed speedster. "You sorry son of a-! Don't you ever pull something like that again, you hear me, Allen? Never again."
And Barry laughed, hugging his friend in earnest.
"You look so bad in yellow." Was the first thing he said and Hal laughed as well. There would be time to tell his story later, but for now this was enough.
Behind the pair, Batman sighed tiredly and pressed the call button on his com. He believed that Clark would be more than happy to give them a hand transporting a villain into custody. He just hoped the blue Boy Scout kept his mouth shut about Bruce worrying over the kids.
It was unlikely.