⚡ ɪɴ ᴛʜᴇ ᴍɪᴅᴅʟᴇ ᴏғ ᴛʜɪs sᴛʀᴇᴇᴛ ( ᴏᴘᴇɴ )

[accelero]

Who: barry allen / the flash & you, yes you
Where: all over wonderland and in the mansion
When: throughout february
Rating: pg-13 for safety
Summary: catch all for meeting barry & the flash
The Story:



( BARRY ▍when you feel like giving in, I'll believe )

[ february finds barry trying to figure out the details of the multiverse. wonderland is so far from whatever end central city might be at. it's not even earth and trying to calculate how it draws people from various multiverses is a mathematical equation that becomes so complicated he wishes he could ask cisco or professor stein.

he doesn't think of eboard thawne.

you might find barry in the library, surrounded by books of math and physics, hunching over endless calculations. it doesn't help that there aren't laptops.

other times, he'll be in the kitchen or in the diner, this time surrounded by various junk food boxes, be it burgers, pies or tacos.

remember the whole need-to-eat-about-850-tacos-to-get-through-a-day-as-the-flash? no? well it's definitely happening. he thinks the closet is pretty cruel for giving him normal granola bars instead if the Cisco'ed ones it gave him up until this week. one, because they're pretty useless two because granola bars suck.

you're welcome to join him and...grab a burger out of the five already on the table. ]

( THE FLASH ▍so lift your head high and don't give in)

[ it doesn't matter where you are, really. you could be on the roof or outside, you could be looking out the window of your room when you see it. it might look like a lightening or perhaps a flash of red but it'll be gone in less than a blink.

surely you imagined it, right? but you might come to see this red streak of lightening more and more the following days, there one moment and gone before you have the chance to squint your eyes. try to take pictures of it and catch a blur, try using any sort of binoculars and get the same result, a red blur.

those who wish to try and see it with their own eyes might have to try and guess which direction it was headed. usually it would be the beach or the forest. you might have tried walking in the same direction, got to the outskirts of the forest or to the edges of the beach when suddenly, it'll be just behind you.

and it'll be standing still. it'll appear to be a man in red but look upon it and he'll look like a blur, vibrating much too fast for a clear image.

but it is certainly a man and his voice sounds blurry too, deep and unfamiliar, masked by the quick vibrations of vocal chords. ]

You shouldn't be following me.

Comments

barry

[assembles]

[ It's not like Steve has staked a claim, exactly, but he's definitely known around the diner as the guy who comes in and orders more food than anyone should physically be able to eat. The serum has done a world of good for him, but there are some unfortunate side effects, and that rapid metabolism is one of them.

So when Steve shows up in the diner on a particular February day and finds a teenage kid sitting at one of the booths with a veritable pile of cheeseburgers in front of him, color him a little surprised.

To be fair, teenage boys do have a tendency to go through food at an alarming rate. Even so, Steve has to imagine there's something more going on here, and so he steps over to chat mainly out of curiosity. ]

Are you sure your eyes weren't bigger than your stomach there?

[ He won't outright ask if the stranger is different just yet, but it's a strong suspicion. ]

[accelero]

Wha - oh. uh. not really. busy day, tons of exercising.

[ there's only so far one can run in wonderland but barry's got to get faster. when he'll find his way back to Earth-1, there will be zoom to deal with and even now, zoom might find his way across the multiverse and into wonderland and barry has to be able to win against him.

with the lack of the treadmill, he'll been running all across wonderland and when all of that is done, well.

there'll have to be about forty burgers if he wants not to pass out.

he'll wipe his hands on a napkin and offer him one. ]

Barry Allen, hi.

[assembles]

[ Tons of exercising, huh? That still doesn't explain the sheer amount of burgers that he has there. Someone probably prepared all of those, too. The closet helps, of course, but it seems like a lot of effort to put someone through if he doesn't actually plan to eat them all.

Steve raises an eyebrow, but takes the offered burger and then also takes the seat across from Barry. ]

Steve Rogers, nice to meet you.

[ He takes a bite of the cheeseburger and chews it over as he gives Barry a closer look. There's no obvious sign of there being anything special or miraculous about him, but that doesn't mean anything.

After a few moments of contemplation, Steve decides to play it casual. ] Fast metabolisms can be a real pain, can't they?

[accelero]

you can definitely say that.

[ especially since the closest have been a pain about the cisco'ed granola bars that could have prevented the whole pile of burgers mess. still, if that's how it has to be then there's no way around it. barry finishes one burger, unwraps another before stopping to think.

could he be speaking to someone with a similar problem? another metahuman?

he is kinda....big. it's sort of a bummer barry got abs but never got taller. oh well. ]

but these are pretty good.

[assembles]

[ To be fair, Barry's build probably also means that he isn't noticed nearly as often as Steve is these days. The sunglasses and baseball cap can only do so much to hide who he is, although he thankfully doesn't have to concern himself with that here in Wonderland.

Instead of getting a blank stare at his remark about metabolisms, Barry gives him an enthusiastic response. That probably means that he knows exactly what Steve is getting at. ]

It's the closest we can get to homemade here. [ He grants himself a bite of the burger, chewing and swallowing it down before he speaks up again. ]

So, what kind of abilities do you have? Super-strength, super-speed? Extra-fast healing? [ At this point, the possibilities are endless. Steve's pretty sure he's heard it all and experienced a fair amount of it firsthand. ]

[accelero]

[ he sighs a little. caught, huh? he rubs the back of his head, thinking of how to reply to this. he could go into the description of what super-speed means and the rapid cellular regeneration but since he's already guessing and the place is nearly empty, what's better than just showing?

a moment later there is a nothing but a red streak zooming in and out in two blinks of an eye. when he stills again, there is a pile of cakes from the tea room on the table. ]

for the sugar, I guess.

[assembles]

[ Even for someone like Steve, if a person moves that fast there's nothing he can do to track them. He's still registering the red blur that Barry leaves behind by the time that he makes it back, carrying even more food.

He's like Pietro and Tommy. The streak he leaves behind is red instead of blue, but other than that it looks to be the same kind of ability. Steve doesn't recall Pietro needing to keep up with his metabolism by eating, but then again, they hadn't had much time together. ]

I've met a few other people like you. Same skillset, I mean. They're not here anymore, or I'd introduce you. [ Since Barry showed him, it stands to reason Steve should do the same, although he doesn't want to make a mess of the diner. ] I've got super-strength, enhanced agility, resilience, speed... I definitely can't move as fast as that, though. [ With a nod, Steve finishes off his burger and then reaches for one of the cakes. ]

[accelero]

I heard. I've met other speedsters too, where I come from.

[ it hasn't been a delight in either case, not with zoom and definitely not with reverse flash. if jay ever gets his speed back, at least barry could say that he knows another speedster who is not a raging psycho. ]

You're a meta.

[ he chews into a case. ]

It's the name they gave us where I come from, meta-humans.

[assembles]

[ That many speedsters in one place? Steve has to wonder if there's someone specific who's creating them in that case, if it's another example of too much power being put into the wrong hands. Not that Barry seems bothered by his abilities.

At the term, Steve shrugs. It's not the word they use, but it doesn't really matter. ] For us, it's 'enhanced.' Probably means more or less the same thing.

[ Steve leans back in the booth, an attempt to be casual, but his eyes don't leave Barry. ]

Where did you get your powers from? Were you born with them, or were they given to you?