Ending 3 part 1:
She felt the impact, her eyes flying open as the air rushed back into her lungs. Flaming debris still fell around her and Conner, giving the area an eerie feel as the flickering light cut through the fog of dust and smoke. She tested her body, standing and flexing her muscles. She felt fine. Great, even. "Thanks, that would have been a bad fall." He didn't respond, and his eyes didn't lift off the ground, a stricken expression on his face. "SB? What's…"
A shock of horror went through her chest when she followed his gaze. Her body, broken from the fight and twisted from the fall, lay bleeding among the rocks, her face gray and her chest still. She held her hands in front of her face, trying to understand how she could be dead, and still standing there staring at her body.
The Bioship landed and the team spilled out, Dick scrambling through the rubble and sliding to a stop at her side, starting chest compressions. "Come on!" he grunted, "come on!"
"I'm…here. Conner? Megan, listen!"
When telepathy wouldn't work, she moved to stand in front of Zatanna, willing the magician to see her. The girl looked right through her, tears filling her eyes. "It should have worked," she breathed, "it should have…"
Mallory backed up, her feet going right through her rocks in her path. She raked her hands through her hair, staring at her friends mourning her death, unable to do anything to comfort them.
"Heya!" She spun around, her body feeling light and airy, and clocked a bald man in a strange high necked bodysuit with a big D on the chest grinning down at her from three feet above. "Nice to know ya."
"You can…Who are you? What's going on?" she asked, glancing back to see if her friends could see him.
"The name's Boston Brand, but these days I mostly go by Deadman. Nice job, by the way, I saw you fight that ape guy in the city. You got guts. Sorry about your pops, though."
Mallory narrowed her eyes, looking around. "Why am I here? Why are you the only person that can see me?"
He made a face. "Oh, my bad, I thought you would just take the 'Deadman' thing and run with it. Let me explain, I'm Deadman, and I'm a ghost, and you're Inferno, and you're also a ghost."
"A…ghost?" He nodded like that settled everything. "Why?"
"I dunno, guess you have some unfinished business here. Judging by your death scene, I think it's safe to say you're not supposed to track down your killer. You can't do much to gravity."
She twisted her lips to the side, going over the prophecy a hundred times in her head. "I was supposed to die fighting Darkseid, and that's what I did."
Boston shrugged. "I dunno, that ain't how I heard it."
"What?"
"Think about the wording. Those things can be real sticklers for the details."
She shrugged. "It's not like I got a printed copy. I was told that Inferno had to die in order to end the invasion."
"Ohh, that makes more sense. The invasion ain't over."
"Yes, it is. I killed Darkseid, they don't have a–"
"Ah ah ah, wait for it."
Her eyebrows came together in confusion and irritation, but then she heard, "Thanks to Inferno." She looked up and saw the boomtube she'd come through close, saw the mixed relief on her friends' faces.
"Now it's over," Boston said. "The troops got pulled back."
Even as he said it, she felt herself being pulled upward, and in a blink she wasn't on Earth anymore. She took in the pink and purple space around her, stars twinkling as far as the eye could see. Boston appeared next to her a moment later, satisfaction on his face. "What'd I tell you?"
She didn't answer, just waited for something else to happen. When it didn't, she looked at her companion. "So…?"
"Oh, well, you're still in the middle place, so now you got a choice to make. Ya ready to move on, or you want to go back?"
"Go back, as in a ghost?"
He shrugged. "Well, usually yeah, but in this case, ya might be able to swing a full recovery."
Her eyes widened. "I can just go back?"
He shrugged again, crossing his arms over his chest. "Looks like you have someone looking out for ya on the other side."
She smiled. "Wally."
"Who?"
She shook her head. "My friend, we lost him during the Reach invasion, he disappeared while he and the other Flashes were absorbing the energy from the final crystal. He saved the world."
Boston scratched the back of his neck. "I dunno, sounds like to me he's just mostly dead."
She tilted her head, hating that she sounded clueless every time she opened her mouth. "What?"
"No body, nothin'? Sounds more like he got sucked into the thing more than destroyed by it."
"But if he's not the one looking out for me, then why can I go back?"
"Maybe someone else paid the price for your life."
As soon as the words were out, Mallory understood why she was being given the choice, and a bittersweet smile came to her lips. She looked out at the distant stars. "Thanks, Dad," she murmured, knowing in that second that she couldn't throw this gift away. The price had been too great. "So, what do I do?"
"Well, just hold your arms out like this, and fall."
She looked at him skeptically, but she held her arms out as far as she could and tipped her weight backwards, a rush of wind hitting her before…
A steady, annoying beeping burrowed into her subconscious, cutting through her senses. She tried to ignore it, even yelled for someone to shut it off in her head, but eventually she couldn't take it anymore and pried her eyes open. The sound was coming from machines set up next to the hospital bed she was lying on. Or, the Medbay bed, to be more specific. She recognized the room almost immediately, which led her to the question of what had happened in the gap between fighting Darkseid and waking up in the Watchtower.
That question dropped to the back of her mind, though, when she saw Peter slumped in a chair next to her, his head nestled on his arm on the side of her bed. Clearly he hadn't meant to fall asleep. Seeing her brother brought conflicting emotions to the surface, both joy and regret. Well, maybe regret wasn't exactly the right word, because if she had to do it over again she would have made the same choice. Still, she hated what she'd done, how she had left him with potentially the last memory he would have of her. But now, she had a second chance, an opportunity to make it up to him. She shifted, pushing herself to a sitting position, and the motion stirred him a little. "Hey, Vig."
"Mallory!" He bolted up in the chair, partially embarrassed for having fallen asleep and partially surprised that she was talking, but mostly she saw relief written on his face.
"We won, right?" She wanted to tell him that she was sorry and she would never leave him like that again, but she had to get business out of the way first.
Her brother nodded. "Yeah, they pulled back their forces right after…"
"After what?"
He twisted his lips, the one habit he'd picked up from her. "Nothing. How are you feeling?"
She tilted her head at the guarded response, knowing there was something he wasn't telling her, but she let it go for the moment, assessing her injuries. She was sore, but not hurting, which she suspected had something to do with the IV drip she was hooked up to. More of her arms were bandaged than bare, and she wasn't ready to take the blanket off and see all of her injuries yet. "Fine, I guess. Stiff."
He snorted. "Yeah, not surprised. You've been out for fifteen days."
Her eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Two weeks? Is everyone ok? Where's mom? And Alex? And–"
"Everyone's ok, Mom's getting some sleep, Alex is getting some coffee, and you need to calm down before you make me sedate you." He looked down and added, "before you run away again."
She froze at the words, at the bitter undertone, and her eyes trailed down to his hands, wrapped in bandages. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have–" he started quietly, but she opened her arms and pulled him into a hug, holding him tight. He buried his face in her shoulder, squeezing her so hard her chest started to ache despite the pain meds, but she didn't say anything, just rested his chin on his shoulder and got everything out. "Don't," she told him. "Don't apologize. I'm so, so sorry I left you like that. That I hurt you. I promise, never again."
Slowly, he pulled away, and she reluctantly let go. He scrubbed a hand over his eyes, the tears making them bloodshot. The doors whooshed open and he turned away from it, not wanting to be seen crying. Alex wasn't paying attention to him, though. He paused mid-step when he saw her sitting up, and then he was at her other side in a second, pressing his lips to her forehead.
"Thank God," he muttered, his own eyes filling with tears. She put a hand on the back of his neck and rested her forehead on his, still too weak and stiff to move much.
"Glad I had the best care while I was out," she said, leaning back again.
A laugh bubbled out of him and he rubbed a hand over his face, shifting back into his professional role, though it was difficult. "Yeah, well, glad you think so. How are you feeling?"
"Fine, better than I did before, I'm sure."
He checked the IV drip and smiled a little. "Well, I hope so. Other than the physical injuries and concussion, you're good. No internal bleeding or irreversible damage. There's just one more test I want you to perform."
"What's that?"
"Here," he said, handing her an ice cold cup of coffee that he'd probably forgotten some time the day before. "Heat this up for me." She chuckled, but she took the cup and forced heat into it, stopping when the first bubble broke the surface. Alex nodded, smiling with relief. "We weren't sure how your powers would come back after being deprived of oxygen for so long."
"It couldn't have been that long, I was still conscious in space, and I must have opened the boomtube pretty quickly. I mean, I'm still here." Alex and Peter exchanged a glance. "What?"
"You didn't tell her?" Alex asked. Peter shook his head.
"Tell me what?" she pressed.
Alex sat on the side of the bed, taking her bandaged hand in both of his. "How much do you remember about the Invasion?"
She looked between them, thinking about the fight, and darkseid, and… "Enough, I guess."
"When you returned to Earth after whatever you did, Conner found you at the ruins of Mount Justice."
"Yeah, I think I remember that," she replied, though her memories were strange, patchy and distorted.
He gave her a strange look. "That's not possible," he told her. "You were dead when he found you."
An alarm shot through her chest, her eyebrows coming together in confusion as he continued, "you were dead for fifteen minutes."
She was under orders from Alex and the League that she should stay in bed for at least another two weeks before she could gradually return to normal activities. She was three days into her sentence when Zatanna finally took a turn sitting with her. They said they were rotating staying with her to keep her company, but she suspected they were just guarding her from breaking out.
"You know, you don't have to babysit me, I'm fine," she said after a long laps in conversation.
The magician flashed her a smile. "I don't mind. John's busy in London and everyone else is either helping with the cleanup or coming back from a shift, like me, and they're asleep by now. I don't have anything else to do."
"That last one is an option," Mallory pointed out.
Zatanna swatted the comment away. "Please, I'm not tired. I just got stuck on a shift with all the oldies."
"Got stuck with the 'Society reserves, huh?"
"No, just Ollie and Barry, and don't even get me started on Jefferson." They chuckled and Zatanna added, "the way they complain, they should be moved to a retirement home." She focused back on the pyrokinetic and added, "besides, after everything, there's nowhere I'd rather be right now."
Mallory looked away. "Thanks."
"That's what family does," her friend replied simply.
Mallory twisted her lips to the side, and after a beat of silence, she took a hesitant breath. "If I ask you something, can you not make it into a big deal?"
The magician arched an eyebrow curiously. "We'll see. What is it?"
Mallory took another breath, getting her thoughts together before she opened her mouth again. "When I came back to Earth, you were there, weren't you?"
Zatanna shrugged, waiting to see where she was going. "Conner's the one that found you, but I came with the others on the Bioship right after."
The redhead nodded. "Yeah, I know." She said it to herself, picturing her friends running towards her lifeless body.
"What?"
"Was I…how bad off was I when you got there?"
Zatanna bit her lip. "You know what happened."
"Yeah, I was dead, but I don't know that I believe that. Maybe I died for a minute when I got back to the Watchtower, but not at the cave, right?"
"Mal, Conner caught you midaire right after you fell out of the boomtube, and you didn't have a heartbeat. When we got there…" she trailed off, her eyes going glassy as she remembered finding her friend, the gray tinge to her skin, the clouded look in her empty eyes. She shook her head. "You were gone when we got there."
Mallory tilted her head, playing with a strand of her hair. "Yeah, I guess it was just my mind filling in the blanks while I was in the coma."
"What are you talking about?"
"I had a weird dream while I was out, that's all. I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I woke up, trying to remember all the pieces."
"Tell me about it."
Mallory thought for a second, swimming through the haze of the memory of the dream, everything foggy and choppy in her mind. "Well, I was there, at Mount Justice, and Conner was there, but I wasn't really me, I wasn't in my body, and I knew I was dead, and so did he. And then I saw all of you come, you thought that I was gone, but I was standing right there, and I couldn't get you to see me, or hear me. And then this guy showed up."
"What guy?" Zatanna's voice had a different ring to it, and she leaned forward, waiting for Mallory's answer.
The pyrokinetic shrugged, not taking much note of her friend's change. "Just some guy, he could see me though, and talk to me. He was kind of funny. He was bald, and he was wearing something Dick would wear for an act." She laughed, her hands helping to describe the costume. "It had a high vampire collar, and a deeper V than Raquel would wear. And there was a 'D' on the stomach, probably because there wasn't room on his chest. He had a name too, it was–"
"Boston," Zatanna whispered.
Mallory froze, turning to her friend, a chill starting to go down her spine. "How did you know that?"
Zatanna looked like she'd been caught, like she hadn't meant to say the name out loud. "Um…"
She didn't offer anything else, and Mallory narrowed her eyes. "How did you know that name?" she asked again.
Zatanna bit her lip, conflicted, but finally she sighed. "He's a friend of John's, he was murdered with an unbalanced soul, so he has to roam the earth until his account is made right."
"So it was real," Mallory breathed, the chill turning to a wave of comfort as she realized that her dad really had given her a second chance. The comfort turned to something more urgent when she suddenly remembered something else that had been said, and she was up, pulling the monitors off her arm.
"What are you doing?!" Zatanna asked, springing to her feet.
"I'm going to get the Javelin and get to Earth," Mallory said, looking around for something besides the hospital pajamas she was wearing, and coming across her training clothes and Conner's jacket that he must have left after his shift with her. She pulled them on and twisted her hair into a bun on top of her head.
"Mal, wait, you can't go anywhere! You're supposed to stay in bed for another two weeks."
"I'm fine, that's just being overly cautious."
"I can't let you leave by yourself," the magician said firmly, sidestepping so she was blocking the door.
Mallory fixed her with a determined look. "That's why you're coming with me."
She didn't tell her until they landed in the middle of a frozen wasteland what they were doing. Even after she opened the plane doors and climbed out, frantically searching for the exact spot, Zatanna was left following her in confusion, magicing warmer clothes on after the first unexpected gust of arctic wind.
"Mallory?" The name left a cloud in the air, and the pyrokinetic didn't slow down her search. "Mal!" The name came out sharper, more worried, and Mallory looked up, the circle of stones she's been searching for at her feet. Recognition flickered across Zatanna's face when she saw the rocks, and her gaze rose back to her friend's face. "What are we doing her?"
"He disappeared," Mallory said, her words coming quick, her hands shaking from something other than cold. Zatanna's face grew more worried, and she wondered briefly if Alex had given her something stronger than her normal pain meds today. "What if Boston was right? Mostly dead isn't impossible, right? If it isn't permanent, if he just needs a push, then–"
"Mallory!" Zatanna grabbed the redhead by the shoulders, forcing her to hold her gaze. "Talk to me. What are you talking about?"
Mallory took a breath and nodded, looking back down at the circle of stones they had built five years before, when Wally disappeared on that very spot. "What if he's not really gone?" Zatannna shook her head, but it was Mallory's turn to grab her shoulders, holding her in place. "Boston said it sounded like he was just mostly dead. There wasn't a body, Z, what if he just got sucked into that thing, whatever it was, and he just needs a boost to get out?"
The magician was still shaking her head, but her eyes were looking around, her mind working on the possibility. "It's crazy," she said. "It's such a long shot, there's no way."
"But what if?" Mallory pressed.
"Even if he was, how would you get him out?"
"Kinetic energy got him in there, maybe he just needs a different kind of energy to get him out."
Zatanna tok a step back, gulping in breaths as she considered the idea. "Ok," she said slowly, the same determination coming to her face, "what do you need me to do?"
Mallory shook her head. "Nothing. Just stand back."
"Then why am I here?"
Mallory looked at her, and Zatanna saw for the first time how much she was banking on this working. "In case this doesn't work," she admitted quietly.
Zatanna took a breath and nodded, walking away from the site. She was the supporting role this time, cashing in the favors of every time the girls had gone with her to see her father for an hour.
Mallory stood, balanced her weight, took a breath, and…froze. Her eyes flicked to the stones, her chest tightening with panic. What would she do if this didn't work? If Zatanna was right and this was just some crazy speculation from a ghost she'd only met once. It would be like losing him all over again, and she didn't know if she was strong enough for that.
Zatanna watched her, waiting a full minute, reading the doubt on her face, and walked over, pulling her into a hug. "It's ok, Mal," the magician murmured, her voice heavy, knowing. "You don't have to carry this weight. We can't change other's fates, not when they're already written."
Mallory sniffled, fighting the tears that were threatening to come. She remembered the time right after she died, when she was trying to get them to hear her. "What did you mean, it didn't work?" she asked quietly.
Zatanna stepped back, releasing her and hugging herself. She knew exactly what Mallory was talking about. "The spell we put on you, to change your prophecy and keep you alive."
Mallory's eyes widened. "How did you…"
"When we went to New Orleans, back when the Legion was still at the cave, and that fortune teller read your palm. I went back, because I knew she was real. She told me everything, and she warned me not to try to intervene. I bought the dreamstone so you wouldn't worry, but I've been working with the others in the magic community ever since, trying to create a spell that would rewrite your fate. I put it on you before you went to fight, rubbed it into your heart, but it didn't work." She shrugged. "Or, that's what I thought. Maybe it did help, though. Here you are, and the world is still free and alive."
Mallory looked down at her hands, her knuckles shredded beyond repair, and turned her palm up, studying her lifeline. "Maybe there's a reason I came back," she said quietly. "Maybe I wasn't done here."
She backed up, and Zatanna did too, giving the pyrokinetic room. The redhead rose into the air, her fire leaping from her skin, her clothes burning to ash, leaving her in only her training clothes, and she built her fire, making an X with her arms, containing the flames to her body, raising the temperature, fueling it with everything she had to lose, and gain. She pushed herself until she could no longer see through the waves of heat, until her nerves began to tingle and then scream, and still she pushed. Thermal energy was all she had to give, it had to be enough. She would make it be enough, she wouldn't let herself think about failure.
She threw her channels open, building her fire until her body threatened to explode, and when she couldn't take the pain any longer, she threw her arms out with a scream, evaporating the snow all around her into steam that clouded so thick it blocked her vision. She fell to the ground, hugging her knees to her chest and breathing shakily through the feeling of every nerve in her body burning her alive. Tears streaked down her cheeks involuntarily, her senses dulled to focus on her breaths. She looked through the mist, seeing a shadow. One.
The tears already streaming down her face came harder, anguish filling her already agonized chest. She'd failed. She stared dully at the one shadow as it started to come towards her, Zatanna coming to check on her after she didn't get up.
But as it approached her, it began to morph, widening until it split in the middle, and she didn't have time to process what that meant before the figures broke through the steam to stand in front of her, one dark haired magician, and one red-headed man that was different than she remembered, but with eyes that were exactly the same.
"Wally!" she choked, and then tensed at the wave of agony the movement had brought on.
He knelt in front of her, Zatanna just behind him, covering her mouth with a hand as tears of disbelief filled her eyes. "What hurts?"
The lump in her throat wouldn't let everything in her head come out, that her heart was throbbing, her mind aching, her body agonized. No, she couldn't possibly have told him everything that hurt in that moment, so she just whispered, "everything."
He didn't miss a beat. He scooped her up into his arms, his solid presence soothing everything in her heart, if not her body. "Thank you," he murmured, the sincerity in his voice hardening the lump in her throat. "Now, let's go home."