Being able to eliminate the disaster should be good, right? Barry thought to himself. But unless it involved Iris, his intelligence generally stayed online. Since Thea had charged over here so aggressively to stop him, there had to be more to the story. He immediately settled down, waiting for her to continue.
"But what's the price, Barry? Can you bear the consequences this will trigger?"
"As long as I can save people, I won't regret it." Barry's response was decisive. He assumed the price involved personal harm to himself.
Thea didn't know whether to laugh or cry. He didn't know anything and already claimed no regrets? I haven't even finished talking yet!
Might as well change your name to Barry No-Regrets, Thea thought. She raised one finger, pointing at the nearly frozen external world. "You'll change everything you see here, plus everything you don't see—even everyone and everything in the entire universe. Can you bear that price?"
Seeing Barry's confused expression made it clear he didn't understand. Thea continued with examples. "Each and every one of us—actually, forget universal intelligent life for now, let's just talk about Earth. Mr. Barry, billions of people make choices every single moment. If you reset the timeline—whether it's one day, one year, or even just one minute—they'll have countless new choices to make again."
"When they stand at life's crossroads again, those choices might be better, or they might be worse than today's outcome. Can you bear that price?"
Barry desperately wanted to say he could, but he genuinely couldn't. He had no right to make choices for others.
To deepen his understanding of the situation's severity, Thea waved her hand, producing another image. In it, a Black woman was locked in a passionate kiss with Barry.
Thea put on an expression of sudden realization. "Oh my, you finally won over Iris just ten seconds ago? Looks like you two finally saw your true feelings in a life-or-death moment. Congratulations. Have you considered that if you reset the timeline, Iris will go back to Officer Eddie Thawne? Can you bear that price too?"
"Iris loves me. I'm absolutely certain of that," Barry said, unable to interfere with others' lives but feeling quite confident about his own situation.
"People have subconscious minds. I acknowledge that Miss Iris deeply loves you, and you certainly love her. But your romance ten seconds ago erupted during a crisis moment. If this crisis never happened, a mountain of moral concepts, human factors, environmental pressures, and workplace dynamics will influence her final judgment. Based on my assessment of Iris, she'll continue maintaining her cohabitation with Officer Thawne while ignoring her subconscious warnings."
"Mr. Barry, this is just one small example. You might have a spirit of self-sacrifice, but what about others? What about Earth's billions of humans? If they make countless choices again, will the outcomes be better or worse than today? Have you thought about that?"
Thea felt this was a rare opportunity—she had to make this absolutely clear. Otherwise, if he created another Flashpoint event, that would be too depressing.
Things like Doctor Manhattan using Flashpoint to steal ten years—she'd heard about that but never witnessed it. In Thea's view, those higher beings' affairs were beyond her jurisdiction. But the immediate situation definitely needed to be nipped in the bud. She couldn't let the timeline get riddled with holes like Swiss cheese. How would anyone live like that?
To strengthen Barry's resolve, she made another promise. "I'll handle this tsunami. You grab the culprit. Deal?"
Now Barry felt reassured. Thea directly dismissed the time field, and he shot toward the Weather Wizard like lightning.
Facing the dozens-of-meters-high tsunami, Thea showed no fear. The thing looked terrifying but didn't actually contain that much energy.
The Superman vs. Zod battle, the fight between the three women and Doomsday—any random punch or kick in those conflicts caused more destruction than this surging tsunami.
This weather-induced tsunami's impact on the ground wasn't particularly strong. Thea drew out the Trident of the Dead King. This artifact forged by Atlantis's first king possessed water-control abilities just like Aquaman's trident.
She also called the Aquaman couple, and together they applied force. The originally sky-obscuring tsunami was completely suppressed, the water's surface smooth as a mirror.
As for the Weather Wizard's tornado, in the eyes of a true mage, it was a cheap imitation versus the real deal. Thea casually extinguished it.
After resolving the disaster, she finally had leisure to look toward Barry's side. She hadn't paid much attention earlier, but now she noticed Barry's speed had increased again.
After having all his Speed Force drained by the Rival and forced to restart from scratch, then losing control once more, current Barry seemed to have grown stronger twice in succession. His top speed had now reached five thousand kilometers per hour, surpassing both Thea and Diana. In her assessment, he was roughly equal to Supergirl and still slightly behind Superman and Martian Manhunter.
She'd spent seven or eight years struggling to reach her current level, only to have someone else surpass her in speed in two months. Thea felt somewhat deflated, though fortunately speed had never been her strong suit. The uncomfortable feeling quickly faded.
Barry's movements grew increasingly swift. The Weather Wizard, who'd been standing at the pier's center trying to look imposing, hadn't even registered what was happening before being hog-tied.
Seeing Thea had also stopped the disaster weather, Barry excitedly rescued both his adoptive father and future father-in-law, Joe West. Thinking that Iris could finally be with him, he felt filled with energy. As for Officer Eddie Thawne—he could only say sorry.
Just as Barry thought he was on top of the world, the communication in his earpiece plunged him into an abyss.
The truth came out. Dr. Wells was the Reverse-Flash. He'd tried to kill Cisco after his investigation uncovered the truth, but his actions had been exposed and Caitlin had intervened just in time.
The Reverse-Flash had no idea Caitlin was this formidable. Going full power—or rather, full ice power—Killer Frost had saved Cisco at the critical moment.
Caitlin couldn't match Reverse-Flash's speed, but she specialized in pure defense, waiting for reinforcements. Using her massive area-of-effect abilities with herself as the epicenter, she continuously absorbed surrounding heat. No matter which angle Reverse-Flash attacked from, he couldn't bypass this 360-degree defense.
As long as he entered Caitlin's effective range, his body heat began draining rapidly. It was like trying to bite through a turtle shell—no way to get a bite in.
After two attempts at throwing lightning bolts failed, Caitlin—who'd become Thea's subordinate—occasionally received combat training from Deathstroke and Fiora.
She couldn't compare to battle-hardened mercenaries, but she was definitely no rookie who'd collapse at the sight of violence.
Thrown lightning bolts had high initial velocity, but lightning also generated heat and was affected by Caitlin's heat absorption, leading to velocity reduction.
With proper preparation, dodging wasn't particularly difficult.
"Caitlin, I underestimated you," Reverse-Flash said, removing his mask to reveal Dr. Wells's scholarly, intelligent face.
Having spent so much time around Thea, Caitlin's acting skills had reached an exceptional level.
"Doctor, why did you want to kill Cisco? And that outfit? Was it you who killed Barry's mother? Why?! Why would you do this?!"