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Chapter Text

The Watchtower was quiet—too quiet. Which usually meant something was about to go wrong.

Barry Allen zipped into the main control room with a tray balanced precariously in one hand—two smoothies, a pile of nachos, and a bag of chips he definitely wasn’t supposed to eat near the consoles. Batman had already glared at him once that morning about crumbs.

But Barry was bored. Patrols had been uneventful, no crises on Earth, no rogue aliens knocking on their door. For the fastest man alive, slow days were torture.

So naturally, that was the moment every single screen in the Watchtower glitched at once.

Warning sirens blared for half a second before cutting into static. Panels flashed red. Security feeds dissolved into fuzz. Doors across the station clanged as if slamming open and shut, the metal echoing through the halls.

Barry winced. “Oof. That can’t be good.”

Batman was already at the console, his cape sweeping the floor as he typed. His jaw was tight, his eyes narrowed, every movement sharp and precise. Beside him, Wonder Woman was checking her communicator, frowning when the signal failed. Superman hovered behind them, his expression calm but his posture tense.

“It’s the main operating system,” Bruce muttered. “Something’s overriding the protocols.”

“Could it be sabotage?” Diana asked, scanning the darkened screens.

Clark shook his head. “No visible damage. Not from here.”

Barry shifted on his feet, watching them trade theories. He slurped from one of his smoothies, but even that didn’t drown out the sound of Batman’s furious keystrokes.

“You’re locked out of the command line?” Clark asked, peering over Bruce’s shoulder.

“Nothing’s responding.” Batman’s voice was tight, controlled—but Barry had been around him long enough to hear the irritation boiling underneath.

Barry hesitated. He wasn’t supposed to touch the fancy Bat-tech. Heck, half the time Bruce looked at him like he was just the guy who ran fast and told bad jokes. But… the pattern of error codes scrolling across the corner screen was familiar.

He took a few steps closer. “Uh… have you tried rebooting the mainframe?”

There was a pause.

Bruce didn’t turn, but Barry could *feel* the weight of the Bat-glare. “What?”

Barry set his smoothie down and shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal. “Y’know. Shut it down, force restart, clear the cache. Sometimes systems like this just choke themselves. Happens to my lab computers all the time.”

Superman gave him a curious look. “Would that actually work?”

Barry didn’t bother answering. His fingers blurred across a side console, the keys clicking too fast for the others to follow. To anyone else it looked like gibberish, but Barry’s mind tracked every line of code. Within seconds, he bypassed the frozen interface, jumped into the kernel, and triggered a clean reboot.

The lights flickered—once, twice—before stabilizing. The sirens cut off. Every screen snapped back to normal, feeds steady, systems humming like nothing had happened.

Barry leaned back in the chair, grinning. “There we go.”

The room was silent. Wonder Woman finally spoke. “Barry… how did you—”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “Oh, uh, just a hobby. I mess around with gadgets sometimes. Nothing special.”

Clark tilted his head, still studying him. Bruce’s hands stilled on the console. For a moment it looked like he might actually *ask*. But then, without a word, Batman turned back to the screen, acting as if it hadn’t happened at all.

Barry sighed, grabbed his smoothie, and took another slurp. If they didn’t want to know, he wasn’t about to explain.

Besides, it was kind of fun, letting them think the Flash was just the goofy speedster.

Chapter Text

The Watchtower’s briefing room was filled with the low hum of voices and the flicker of holograms projected across the long table. Batman stood at the head, arms folded, the holographic blueprint of a high-security facility rotating in front of him.

“Our target is here,” Bruce said, pointing to a chamber buried beneath steel, concrete, and a maze of traps. “A weapons cache too dangerous to remain in enemy hands.”

The rest of the League leaned in. Wonder Woman crossed her arms, her expression determined. Superman studied the map, jaw set. Green Lantern lounged in his chair but kept an eye on the schematic, while Martian Manhunter watched in silence.

Barry Allen sat at the far end, chin in hand, doodling spirals on his notepad at supersonic speed. To anyone else, it looked like he wasn’t paying attention—but Barry’s mind was cataloging every detail.

Batman tapped a sequence on the map. A series of crisscrossing red beams lit up the projection. “The problem is here. Laser tripwires. Randomized intervals. Heat and motion sensitive. One mistake, and the entire place detonates.”

“Brute force?” Diana suggested, eyes narrowing.

“Too dangerous,” Bruce shot down.

“Phasing through them?” J’onn offered.

“Risky,” Bruce replied, shaking his head. “The sensors don’t just respond to physical breaches. They detect spatial distortion too.”

Clark leaned closer. “So what do we do? Stand here debating until they move the cache?”

The team fell into a tense silence. Barry sighed, leaning back in his chair. He could see the answer so clearly it almost hurt. Finally, he piped up—casual, like it wasn’t a big deal:

“Why don’t we just build a detector? Something that can pick up the laser frequencies before we step into the room.”

Five heads turned toward him.

Hal raised a brow. “And how exactly do we do that? You got a magic laser-finder in your back pocket?”

Barry twirled his pen between his fingers. “Not magic. Just science. With the right sensors, you can sweep for the beams, map their placement, and time your movements. Easy.”

The room went quiet again. Batman’s gaze lingered on Barry for a beat too long—sharp, calculating. Then, without acknowledgment, he turned back to the hologram. “We’ll add the device to the plan.”

Barry smirked faintly. Typical.

Later, during the mission, the prototype detector worked flawlessly. The League slipped through the laser grid like ghosts, not a single alarm triggered. The cache was secured, the mission a complete success.

But when the debrief rolled around, no one asked where the idea had come from. They chalked it up as another clever tool in Batman’s arsenal.

Barry didn’t correct them. He just grabbed a donut, spun his chair lazily, and let the others bask in the victory.

Sometimes, it was easier being underestimated.

Chapter Text

The battlefield was burning. Alien craft hovered overhead, firing bursts of plasma into the city below. The League had fought their way through wave after wave of soldiers, only to be caught off guard when a dome of shimmering light dropped around them like a guillotine.

Barry skidded to a halt against the glowing wall. “Okay… that’s new.”

Superman slammed his fist into it, the impact shaking the ground. The dome rippled, then steadied again, unbroken. Clark frowned. “Stronger than it looks.”

Diana drew her sword and struck with a flash of divine steel. Sparks hissed, energy recoiling against the blade, but the barrier remained. “It resists both force and magic,” she said grimly.

Green Lantern hovered a few feet off the ground, his ring forming a giant drill that spun furiously into the dome. Nothing. Hal grit his teeth. “Great. Alien hamster ball. Love it.”

Batman was already at work, scanning the barrier with a handheld device. His face remained a mask, but his clipped words revealed the tension beneath. “Energy lattice, reinforced by alternating frequencies. Physical or brute energy attacks won’t work.”

“Then what will?” Oliver demanded, notching an arrow but clearly aware it wouldn’t do much.

The group fell into silence, each mind spinning, but none finding a solution.

Barry crouched near the edge of the dome, running his fingers along the seam where energy met ground. His ears picked up a faint hum beneath the chaos outside—a rhythm, a pulse. His brain lit up.

“If we disrupt it with the right counter-frequency…” he muttered.

“What was that?” Diana turned toward him, her brow arched.

Barry glanced up, scratching the back of his neck. “Uh—what if we use a mix of sonic vibrations and electromagnetic pulses? You know, destabilize the lattice from inside. Like breaking a glass with the right pitch.”

The others stared.

“And how exactly do you know that?” Diana asked, suspicion in her tone.

Barry gave his trademark shrug, lips quirking into a grin. “I read. A lot. It’s not rocket science.”

Batman’s gaze lingered on him for a fraction too long, but instead of questioning, he snapped, “Clark, you can generate controlled sonic shockwaves with your hands at super-speed. Lantern, match it with a modulated EM construct. Synchronize.”

Hal raised a brow. “What, just… wing it?”

“No,” Barry interrupted quickly, words tumbling out fast. “Not wing it—match the pulse intervals here, here, and here.” He zipped to the console on Batman’s gauntlet, typing calculations before Bruce could stop him. “Sync them exactly. Otherwise, the lattice will double down and fry us instead.”

The League exchanged looks.

Superman finally nodded. “Let’s try it.”

They moved into position. Clark clapped his hands together at supersonic speed, generating a concussive sonic boom timed to Barry’s numbers. Lantern’s ring flared, releasing a sharp electromagnetic surge in perfect sync.

The dome screamed. Light fractured across its surface like cracks in glass. For a heartbeat, it seemed to hold—then shattered, dissolving into nothing.

Fresh air rushed in. The world outside was waiting, still under siege.

The League surged back into battle.

Later, when the fight was won and the city safe, Oliver clapped Barry on the shoulder. “Nice save back there, Quickshot.”

Barry grinned. “What, me? Nah. Just lucky guess.”

But as he zipped off toward the snack table, Batman’s eyes followed him. Not suspicion, not quite. More like… calculation.

Bruce Wayne was not a man who believed in lucky guesses.

Chapter Text

Barry drew quick sketches on the whiteboard in the Watchtower, his hands moving in a blur. Circles, arrows, and wave patterns filled the space until the chaotic mess resolved into something surprisingly elegant.

Clark leaned forward, brow furrowed. “So… the Speed Force is like a river, but one that flows outside of time?”

“Exactly!” Barry said, his eyes lighting up. “And when I run, I’m not just moving fast—I’m tapping into that river’s current. The problem is, when it gets turbulent, it spills into our reality. That’s why we’re seeing these energy surges.”

Hal crossed his arms. “Okay, but how do we stop a cosmic river from overflowing?”

Barry tapped the marker against his chin, then started scribbling equations alongside the diagrams. “If we can stabilize the frequency of my vibrations, I can create a kind of dam—more like a resonance lock—that prevents the surges from breaching.”

The room fell silent. The others exchanged looks, half impressed, half bewildered.

Oliver finally broke the silence with a smirk. “You lost me at ‘frequency.’”

Barry chuckled. “Think of it like tuning a guitar. The strings—me—just need to be in harmony with the Speed Force. If I’m out of tune, everything around me shakes apart.”

Understanding dawned across the team’s faces. Even Batman’s eyes narrowed slightly, taking in every detail.

“Do it,” Bruce said. “We’ll provide cover.”

Barry nodded, hiding his grin. For once, it felt good to let his brain run just as fast as his legs.

Chapter Text

The Watchtower’s alarms had barely died down from the last skirmish when a new threat emerged—one that left the entire Justice League scratching their heads.

Reports came in of a villain who appeared to vanish mid-battle. Witnesses described shadows flickering, then nothing—buildings left untouched, civilians unharmed, but the villain always gone before anyone could get close.

The team assembled in the Watchtower’s main observation deck, watching footage of the latest encounter. The villain had stepped into view, waved a hand, and then disappeared like a wisp of smoke.

Clark’s jaw tightened. “Every time we think we’ve got him, he’s gone. No trace, no energy signature, nothing.”

Oliver paced along the edge of the room, quiver slung across his back. “It’s like he’s teleporting. But there’s no tech, no portals, no Speed Force powers I can see.”

Hal hovered a foot above the floor, ring poised. “Cloaking device? Could be some sort of optical camouflage.”

“Maybe,” Diana said, stepping closer to the projection. “But he leaves no physical disturbance. No air displacement, no thermal trail.”

Batman didn’t respond immediately. He was silent, scanning the data streams like he could think the answer into existence. J’onn folded his arms, tilting his head, feeling for psychic echoes, but even his Martian senses returned empty.

Barry, as usual, was quiet. He leaned against the railing, eyes darting over the patterns on the screen. His mind was moving a thousand times faster than the video could play. The hum in the recordings, the subtle flicker of shadows, the way light bent around the villain—it all clicked into place.

Finally, Barry spoke, calm and measured. “It’s not invisibility. Not a cloaking device either.”

All eyes turned toward him.

Superman raised a brow. “Then what is it?”

Barry stepped forward, pointing at the footage. “Look here—the way the light bends around him, the shimmer in the air. Combine that with the faint hum in the audio spectrum, and it’s clear. He’s using high-frequency sound waves to distort light. Essentially, a sound-based optical illusion. The waves bend photons so our eyes can’t track him.”

The room went silent.

Hal whistled softly. “Wait… so it’s all sound? That’s… genius. And terrifying.”

Oliver tilted his head. “Okay… then how do we counter it?”

Barry grinned faintly. “If we can generate a counter-frequency that interferes with his sound waves, we can collapse the illusion long enough to grab him. You guys just need to coordinate with me on timing.”

Batman gave a curt nod. “We’ll execute. Quick, precise, no mistakes.”

Within the hour, the League put Barry’s plan into motion. The villain’s shimmering form faltered, stuttered, then collapsed as Clark restrained him. Oliver’s arrow was already nocked in case of a last-second escape, Hal’s ring immobilized the energy field, and Diana’s sword hovered in case he tried to fight.

The villain was captured, leaving the League victorious—but none of them paused to ask how Barry had figured it out so quickly. They simply accepted his instructions and followed them.

Barry, leaning casually against the wall afterward, allowed himself a small smile. Sometimes, being underestimated had its perks

Chapter Text

The Watchtower trembled as the rift in the sky above the planet grew wider, a jagged tear in reality that stretched from the stratosphere down to the city below. Streams of unstable energy twisted through the atmosphere, tearing at satellites and bending light in impossible ways. The Justice League had tried everything—magical seals, brute force, even combined attacks—but nothing could stabilize the anomaly.

“Clark, hold it!” Diana shouted as Superman attempted to brace the rift with a focused punch. The energy rebounded, slamming him back across the floor.

Hal’s ring flared as he tried to construct a stabilizing lattice, only for it to collapse under the rift’s chaotic vibrations. Oliver fired arrows laced with experimental tech, but they dissolved in the energy before reaching the anomaly.

“Nothing works!” Batman’s voice was sharp, slicing through the chaos. “We’re running out of options.”

J’onn floated in midair, scanning the rift psychically. “Even my senses cannot penetrate the distortions. This is beyond conventional physics… and alien tech.”

Barry Allen leaned against the wall, quietly observing the team. His fingers drummed against his thigh. His mind was racing, analyzing the rift’s oscillations, the subatomic fluctuations, the harmonic frequencies embedded in the tears. He’d seen patterns others had missed. He’d been waiting for the right moment.

Finally, he stepped forward, voice calm but resolute. “I think I might have a solution.”

All eyes snapped to him. Skepticism and hope collided on their faces. Batman’s gaze sharpened. “Explain.”

Barry moved to the central console, pulling up a holographic projection of the rift. “The instability is caused by quantum harmonics resonating out of sync with the natural structure of spacetime. If we can generate an inverse harmonic wave and synchronize it precisely with the Speed Force, we can lock the rift’s energy in place long enough to stabilize it.”

Hal blinked. “Uh… what does that actually mean?”

Barry grinned, unfazed. “Think of it like tuning a massive, multidimensional instrument. If I run through the rift at exactly the right speed and emit a counter-frequency aligned with its harmonic signature, it’s like hitting the perfect note to calm a screaming string.”

Bruce’s eyes widened, scanning the calculations Barry had already input. “You’ve calculated the exact harmonic phase shifts, the temporal velocities, and the energy resonance points… by yourself?”

Barry shrugged modestly. “Let’s just say I’ve been studying quantum physics and engineering in my spare time. And maybe I like a challenge.”

The team quickly mobilized, following his precise instructions. Clark braced himself, ready to absorb the shockwaves; Hal constructed a feedback lattice to amplify the counter-frequency; Diana and Oliver focused on protective measures in case anything went wrong.

Barry streaked forward, moving faster than the eye could follow, threading his way through the rift, his body glowing with Speed Force energy. His calculations, executed in real time, aligned perfectly with the rift’s chaotic oscillations. Slowly, imperceptibly at first, the jagged edges of the anomaly began to smooth, the energy calming into a steady, contained flow.

With a final surge, the rift stabilized, collapsing inward like a slinky snapping back into place. The Watchtower shook, then settled into silence.

Clark clapped Barry on the back, a wide grin on his face. “You’ve been hiding your talents for too long, Flash.”

Barry laughed, brushing imaginary dust off his suit. “Sometimes it’s more fun to let you all figure things out on your own.”

Batman, still studying the now-dormant rift, gave him a rare nod of approval. J’onn’s expression softened, respect evident in his eyes. Even Oliver and Hal looked impressed, muttering their congratulations.

For the first time, the Justice League truly understood: Barry Allen wasn’t just the fastest man alive. He was a brilliant mind, capable of feats that rivaled even the greatest minds on the planet. And in that moment of revelation, the team’s respect for their speedster solidified forever.