Young Rogues #1: A Rhapsody of Rogues

Time goes on. Heroes never die. Legends are remembered forever. This is how the reality of comics and super heroics work. The modern myth. There are no endings… Yet there are if you know where to look. Legacy. Crisis. Change. Endings AND Beginnings. But enough of that.

In one world – a young world – of heroes, a storm brews at the point where the Equator crosses the Prime Meridian. It does this for no particular reason. Perhaps the storm has a flair for the dramatic? Oh, one could say “but that’s the point where the four hemispheres are joined as one!” but does that really matter? Maybe. The storm is like no other. It is a storm that spans the far reaches of history. It is storm that is history. It is the now and then, the maybe and the never were. It is a storm of red and yellow lightning.

Red and yellow lightning…

Stop for a moment… Picture it. Let your imagination run wild.

Maybe you’re right.

But I think it’s more my job to write.

There, in the middle of the Atlantic, the storm rages. There is no calm between the bolts of history. The blood of an era passes in an instant. The sun’s rays flares across eons. The storm moves. It must move.

The Weather Channel has no idea what’s happening.

It crosses the Atlantic, heading east with a wind speed like no other hurricane that had ever came before. Or rather like no other hurricane than itself. Over crashes of waves and the terror of dolphins it moves. The Bermuda Triangle is almost a comical retreat for it before it reaches the beaches of Florida. So many lost over the centuries find themselves home. Or in places that used to be their homes. The point is, they’re no longer there. Trapped for eternity.

Lost.

The storm rolls over orange groves. The winter is upon them. The red and yellow lightning bolts strike. Copses of trees die. Others ripen. One fine farm inexplicably turns into thousands of cartons of freshly squeezed Florida Orange Juice.

More bolts. It’s now in the Gulf of Mexico, sweeping up the southern coast of North America. Texas. For one brief instant over San Antonio the Alamo is remembered in a truly real way then immediately forgotten because in a world such as this that can’t happen… right?. It turns north and a bit west, in its wake it leaves lakes dried up with a single bolt. Other bolts give birth to a line of condominiums and other housing projects that will take years to conclude in a heavily wooded area. Oh, and three separate shopping malls. Unfortunately the malls were never meant to exist side by side with one another and would quickly go out of business if anyone decided to buy the properties.

Thankfully all that highway construction finally finishes by the time the storm reaches its destination (except for one stretch that shows that some day a twister will tear through it… probably).

Kansas. Missouri.

Central and Keystone Cities.

Gems.

There is a calm now.

A single red bolt crashes down from the heavens striking a rather striking if not fetching statue outside a relatively new museum in the grand scheme of history.

Nothing happens. If a storm could laugh, the yellow lightning would be chuckling. It is chuckling. A smile letting in the moonlight opens from cloud to cloud.

Then the unnatural storm moves on because it is a fickle and nubile nimbus. Heads up east. Messes around with the big cities on the east coast because it can before turning around and dispersing somewhere over Michigan out of remembrance or some such drivel.

The entire journey lasted two hours. Three tops.

It ends before it ever begins.

All in all… a rather unusual phenomenon.


Central City
10:03 a.m.

Breath fogged in the mid-morning air before Owen’s bluish lips. At least, his lips felt blue. One would think that on a day of a record breaking low temperatures that the city might have rescheduled or moved the ceremony to warmer conditions but no. That would damper the pioneering spirit Central City citizens. Especially not when they remembered that Keystone held their own occasion of honor at the height of summer only a few months ago. The rivalry between the two sister cities was very nearly obscenely pathetic in that sense. Their sole defining purpose nowadays was to be in an existential state of one-upmanship.

To make things worse, the Mayor was late. There’d been some rumors of a freak storm that had crossed the country the night before. People swore it passed over Central City yet unlike all the other cities in its path they had been left alone. Or perhaps it simply seemed that way. Perhaps things had changed and they just didn’t know it.

Owen pulled his beanie lower over his ears to protect them from the chill and shivered within his hoodie. A fellow in the crowd bumped into him. A simple look silenced the murmured apology. It wasn’t that Owen appeared particularly tough. He wasn’t. He was at best described as a mutt left out in the rain without his doggie dish. The reaction of this stranger was better caused because sometimes, sometimes, you know when it’s not a good day for a person.

It was a day to remember loss as much as this one in honor to a fallen hero.

The crowd grew restless as most are wont to do when things run late whether it be a football game, a speech, or their favorite show because Idols Dance is still on the goddamn air and pre-empting it. The indescribable murmur increased as time passed. Reporters and journalists hovered around the edges and on their stands. Cameras waited to roll. They were from all over, not just this happy patch of the Mid-West. Even two years later, they still remember what happened when the sky stopped being blue for one day that felt like forever.

Before them, behind the stage and its empty podium, loomed the hero of that day.

The Flash.

The Fastest Man – no longer – Alive.

There he was in all his glory as a larger than life statue situated on the steps of the museum dedicated to his arrogance. Looked like he was ready to dash off to save the day one more time. Except he couldn’t, not any more… People would have to learn to save themselves now.

His fist clenched tightly around the object hidden within the pocket of his hoodie, knuckles no doubt whitening.

Black eyes from across the crowd stopped him.

52 Miles Out from Keystone City
10:07 a.m.

They weren’t normal black eyes. Normal black eyes come from being slugged in the face. No. These were something else. The eyeballs themselves were blacker than the deepest depths of an infinite nothingness. No hint of an iris remained within them… only pupils. Inhuman, red pupils. Not that black eyeballs were particularly human to begin with but at least they didn’t glow. Except, come to think about it, the glow didn’t necessarily remove any trace of humanity.

It was whatever lay behind those eyes.

The boy didn’t sit up from his cot. He remained laying, arms crossed behind his head. His lips hummed a tuneless tune. To the cameras monitoring his cell, it’d look perfectly natural in review if they decided to slow down the frame rate. They always kept it slow on him.

“Professor,” he hummed in a sing-song voice.

“Son,” the voice was as deep as those dark eyes. Remarkable vibrato.

“Makes me feel tingly when you call me that,” he sang, “but are you sure you have the right one?”

“If not, I’m speaking to him right now.”

“Bet you arrrrre.” Rolled his ‘r’ a bit too long on that one. It didn’t want to stop. “Time to move?”

The man behind the black eyes nodded. Then the Professor was gone and he was all alone in his cell.

It didn’t take long for him to escape. It really didn’t. A.R.G.U.S. prided themselves on the ability to contain, control, or employ metahumans but he was no normal meta. Their ability collars failed. Their security might as well not exist. If he didn’t want to be there, he wasn’t. The only reason he stayed was because they fed him enough. The tiny cell remained his home for as long as he wished it to be. Wasn’t like they didn’t let him out.

Every now and then, he acted as their personal hamster inside his own wheel and powered some of their more power-draining experiments.

He stretched lithely like a cat. A very slow – to him at least – wink was directed towards the camera. It would be a few heartbeats before they realized he was gone. A yellow streak blew his cell-door off its hinges (if it had hinges but given that A.R.G.U.S. was all about the future, it was a fancy sliding door). The sound would be heard later. They were way behind the times he laughed aloud.

His blur dashed down white halls so sanitary you’d think machines kept them clean. Which now that he thought about it, they probably did. Turn. Turn. Turn. Turn. Right. Right. Left. Door (bang). Stairs. Up. Left. Right.Pause for a heartbeat – his heartbeat – at an elevator, jogging in step, then he exploded out the top before he heard the ding of its arrival, bouncing from wall to wall as he fled the underground facility. He vibrated his way through a door at the highest floor.

Two luckless guards found themselves in the path of lightning. The golden bolt hit them somewhere around the legs and because he knew the proper way things were done when fleeing from custody, he kicked them while they were down. Repeatedly. No one could kick repeatedly quite like he could.

Window.

No ground beneath his feet.

How bout that… It wasn’t a completely underground complex. He had an infinite amount of time to consider the repercussions of this as he continued running in midair like some cartoon figure. A red bolt struck him before he could start to fall. Not that it was needed, mind you, but he still appreciated it. Stopping was always a hassle . . . especially when he started really going.

Red and yellow lightning twisted in the air before crashing to the ground with all the fury of an angry thunder god.

“About time you showed up, Thawne.” The red bolt remarked idly.

“Oh Allen, I’m sure Professor gave you a handicap.” Shot back the yellow.

Inside their crater about a mile out from the compound’s gate, the two young men – boys really – looked at one another for the first time in what seemed like ages. It was as if they saw twisted reflections of each other. Twins. Identical in every way except for two very distinctive attributes. Clad there in the same two piece set of white clothing A.R.G.U.S. gave to subjects that weren’t quite prisoners but not quite free, they were the same. Carried themselves with inbred cockiness that allowed them to slouch yet still seem they were ready to pounce at any given moment. Their eyes never stayed still to each other. Both their toes curled in dirt as snow slowly drifted down around them. It was the farthest feature away from the tip of their toes that made them different.

The one called Thawne had strawberry blond hair. His red lightning counterpart possessed auburn. They had allowed it to grow to shaggy lengths while in captivity.

“How long until they realize we escaped?”

Allen tilted his head and for a heartbeat, he wasn’t there. “Eleven point oh three seconds.”

The second thing that made them different had been that. Their powers.

They waited the exact amount of time. At eleven point oh two seconds, Thawne thought he detected two of his twin. Another point zero one second later, the warning claxons began. They had impeccable internal clocks.

“Race you?” asked Allen as the sound grew louder.

The yellow bolt didn’t bother to answer.

He ran.

10:08 a.m.

The Flash Museum, Central City
10:10 a.m.

It was a place dedicated to the memories and achievements of the dead. In all fairness, most museums could be described as such but this museum had been built back when the displays belonged among the living. It was empty now, a remote and uninviting place for one such as Elle. A majority of the coming visitors were still outside waiting in the freezing cold for the Mayor to give his speech.

Elle dressed liked like she should have been with them. An oversized jacket – dark blue in color – hid her slender body with its prominent hips and slim stomach. Warm gloves covered nails treated with the polish and care of a girl that was expected to keep up appearances but in fact did not give a crap. Her ugg boots continued such disregard for expectations. Maybe they could be perceived as fashionable if you squinted your eyes just right. However, if one did not squint, they saw that they were the pragmatic boots of one willing to trek thirty miles through snow up a hill and return with a Christmas tree.

Not that Elle could carry said tree on her own. She was by far too small for such a feat of strength.

She wandered about aimlessly, aware that the rare guard had their eyes on her. Must have been the coat. She hadn’t added that into the equation when she dressed in the morning. It could hide any number of things inside besides her figure. She tried on the metal helmet of Mercury like she remembered doing a few years ago and smiled sadly at her reflection next to the figure who once wore it or helmet just like it. She got turned around in the Lair of the Mirror Master in one of the side rooms for a good five minutes. Eventually, she found her way through the souvenir shop with its far too cheerful cashier watching the Mayor give his speech on the flatscreen against the wall and back to the main lobby with the full figured displays of the Flash, his partner, and the Rogues.

Everyone swore it to be an amazing gallery and for once Elle shared the opinion of everyone. Here in this circular lobby, the doors arrayed themselves like the hours on clock, each one leading down to a different era of the Flash’s history or a key exhibit for that moment in time. There was the treadmill he once used to power the entire city when a freak storm caused by the Weather Wizard killed all electricity including a fair amount of backup generations. Countless people would have died in accidents or hospitals had he stopped running. It had been quite the strange week she remembered. Her father had come home from work to tell her all crime had stopped in the city. All… Crime. No burglaries, no petty thefts, no murders… For whatever reason, the criminals of Central City knew better than to take advantage of the Flash’s situation.

Her eyes flickered back to the center display. Well, there was probably a reason.

Her hand swept along the rails of the treadmill as she looked out the doors where twelve o’clock would be and the massive crowd outside. There really were a lot of people just listening to a drool man recite a speech he hadn’t successfully memorized. It seemed pointless. They all knew, or had their own strange memories, of what happened back then yet every year some of the truly important figures were never mentioned. Never. Always about the damn Flash and his sacrifice.

“Always found Captain Cold to be the best of the Rogues myself,” a voice said from behind her. “Had his own code, honor, one he imposed by any means he thought necessary on the other criminals in the Gem Cities.”

Elle hadn’t been aware her mild adventure had come to a full stop before the Captain Cold main display. It was so life like with a parka the same shade as her coat, its fur lined hood framing a handsome face. The features on the sculpture were his features down to the chin dimple. In an outstretched hand it held one of his signature cold guns. She could almost feel the chill radiating off of it.

“Son of a cop, not a good cop it has to be said, but a cop. Still one I believe,” the voice added absentmindedly, “He knew right from wrong. He knew how wrong was too wrong.. And he was there when the city and the Flash needed him the most.”

The voice stepped into her line of sight. She recognized him as one of the curators by his dress – either that or a highly obsessed fanboy with no fashion sense. A silver bowtie did not go with a crimson waistcoat glistening with yellow lightning bolts. He was slightly above average height (and in the looks department she thought to herself) with light black skin and a beard that gave hint that maybe he was of mixed ethnicity because it wasn’t the proper shade. Elle couldn’t be sure given that his beard, a little more than scruff, was the only hair on his head. He looked down on her with shining green eyes. He was surprisingly young to be a curator in her opinion.

“There’s a reason he’s at the front next to the Scarlet and Silver Speedsters.”

“I know,” Elle agreed in a very quiet tone.

“He deserves m—“

Whatever he was about to say was lost in the absence of sound followed by the wahwumph of an explosion and the echoing sound of shattering glass. It happened in a blink and in that blink, Elle felt the curator shield her with his own body. Then it was over, leaving only a mess behind. The statues of the Rogues and Flashes had been tipped over in the blast. Masonry had reached as far inside as the treadmill.

The man stood up, a piece of glass that once belonged in the gallery’s doors lodged in his shoulder. He gave her a single look and said what no adult in the same situation would say. Told her to get somewhere safe before leaving her all alone.

Elle looked down at the fallen displays. Cold’s gun was gone. She took one frightened step only to stop when she heard the skittering across tile. There it was… At her feet as if it was meant to be there. She reached inside her own parka for that’s what her coat truly was and pulled out a glowing canister.

Front of Flash Museum
10:27 a.m.

“… on those days of Red Skies stretching across the heavens, covering all of Central and Keystone Cities, expanding ever more until it might have reached all of America, the heroic Flash sacrificed himself to save us all and grant us a continued future not fraught with a past that refused to stay in our memories…” Mayor Myles droned on.

It had been two years ago to the day since the Flash had vanished. No single authority figure let alone the average citizen residing within the Gem Cities at the time could remember exactly how long the Red Sky had lasted. They agreed it must have been more than one day because the terrors they experienced could not fit into a mere twenty four hours except when the skies were blue once more… it had been the same day as the one people last reported sighting the Flash from across the country.

The Flash, the Scarlet Speedster, the Fastest Man alive… It had been just under ten years ago when he first showed up the scene as a red and yellow streak. The Rogues followed in his wake and in time he gained a partner – and lost the partner – clad in silver. The Gem Cities weren’t like the other major cities that could boast about having a sworn protector of the innocent. They could also brag about villains that when pushed come to shove weren’t quite villains in the end.

Too bad a majority of the time the cities forgot that. Too bad the Mayor didn’t once mention Weather Wizard’s death as he held back the returning Ice Age. Too Bad the loss of Captain Cold alongside the Flash when both men went into the Breach was more a footnote than praise… Too bad they all ignored Captain Boomerang’s sacrifice.

Owen fingered the toy boomerang in his hoodie’s pocket. He’d purchased it from the museum earlier before he had started waiting with everyone else. There was nothing special about it. It was a replica of one of Captain Boomerang’s collapsible frames made of plastic. It was a toy.

Just a toy.

The inhuman black eyes could no longer hold him frozen in place. Now was the time. He felt the power in his hand, felt the power flow through him and into the boomerang. In any other hands it wouldn’t be capable of flying true. In any other hands it wouldn’t do what it needed to do.

The boomerang flew faster than sound, faster than the eye could see, and like the inexplicable object that couldn’t possibly pierce a street sign after a tornado, the plastic toy buried itself in head of the Flash statue. A hush fell over the crowd at the sight of it. Owen kept his hands in his pockets.

The world exploded, rubble flying everywhere, the blast strong enough to knock Owen off his feet and into the people behind him. He struggled to stand, ears ringing, dimly aware that slowly and surely at high-octane speeds the crowd vanished around him.

Red and yellow streaks tore through the audience, removing everyone and everything. Families disappeared. Men, women, and children were gone in an instant. Owen’s pillow was taken out from under him just as he got to his feet. They were like bolts of lightning, beings that had not been seen since before… since before the Flash had vanished himself.

The blurs left the cameras and their crews for second to last then seemed to get into an argument over who would carry Mayor Myles off judging by the twister swirling about the terrified man. The yellow streak won in the end. Or maybe it was the red. This disturbed Owen greatly. He should have been able to tell.

Owen brushed the bits of the statue from off his jacket and pulled his knitted cap down tighter over his ears. He was alone now and not all too sure what came next.

A figure, a man, stood alone at the museum entrance amidst all the rubble as if in a trance. Alone in his own world too. He held something glowing in his hand. Owen could just barely make out that it looked to be some sort of hologram.

He caught a single word before a freezing beam of light blinded him.

"Run..."