Justice League of America - Batman: The Stone King by Alan Grant (best english novels to read .txt) 📗

back of his hand. He knew the times, stops, and destinations of every train in the timetable.

The doors hissed shut with a low whoosh of pressurized air, and Kurt pushed the button that would electronically secure them until the next station. He heard the whistle from his rear-positioned guard, and engaged the engine. Slowly, the train pulled away from the platform and its garish lights.

Kurt sipped a soda and smiled softly to himself. The train reentered the tunnel, the cab's headlamps illuminating the gleaming rails ahead as they rolled into the darkness. This is where he was happiest, in the air-conditioned car as it sped underground, tunnel walls only a foot away on either side of the rushing engine. Kurt wasn't a big people person.

He didn't need the monitor map, with its pulsing lights, to tell him to slow for the signal ahead. After so much time, Kurt liked to think he could have driven any route blindfolded.

Behind the engine, the cars carried only a fraction of their rush-hour load: late workers heading back to the welcome of their families, a few homeless people coming in to the big shelter on Main Street.

The train slowed. Through the toughened glass window, Kurt saw the signal ahead blink from red to green. He eased up on the brakes, and the train effortlessly regained its speed.

As the train neared the signal, Kurt frowned and lowered the soda bottle from his lips. There was a bluish glow around it, casting a few sparks out into the surrounding darkness.

Looks like the signal's about to short out. Kurt reached out to the radio mike that kept all drivers in constant touch with the centralized control system. Better call it in–

The thought died in midstream as Kurt's eyes opened wide in amazement. The mysterious blue light had detached itself from the signal and was hovering and pulsating six feet above the tracks.

"Kurt?" Section Controller Jack Icke's voice crackled from the cab speaker. "You have something to say, buddy?"

"Yeah, you bet," Kurt began. But scarcely had he got the words out when he broke off again.

The blue globe of light flew toward him at incredible speed and hurled itself at the cab window. Instinctively Kurt threw up one hand to protect himself. But the Plexiglas remained intact as the light passed right through it.

There was a tingle like static electricity as the ball touched his skin. Then Kurt's mind went blank, and his entire body spasmed with bone-deep pain as the globe of light sank into his flesh.

"Kurt? Kurt, you still there?" Jack Icke asked.

But Kurt Glaser wasn't there. His consciousness was stilled, his identity usurped. Whoever–or whatever–was controlling him reached out to crush the crackling intercom, splintering it into pieces. Warning lights flashed red on the monitor panel as the train's speed began to increase dramatically.

Wally West stood on the platform of the Blane Street subway station, the taste of Paloma's Pizza still tangy in his mouth. "Best in Town," Paloma's advertising claimed, and Wally couldn't disagree with that. He'd been to the football game, a dreary defensive ordeal mat could have been a classic if only both sides had opened up. At least the pizza was good.

As his alter ego, the Flash–the Fastest Man Alive–Wally could have run home in less than a second. But that would be defeating the purpose of his evening–to relax, for once, and forget all about superspeed. He'd seen the game, he'd eaten the pizza. It was only a fifteen-minute subway ride.

Pleasantly full, Wally leaned against a pillar, only half paying attention to the evening newspaper he held. The warning bell rang out to announce the imminent arrival of a train, and Wally tossed his newspaper in a trash can as the lights approached from the darkness of the tunnel.

"Train approaching," a disembodied voice blared from the station speakers. "Stand clear of the platform edge."

As if on cue, several commuters moved disobediently toward the platform's edge. Long use of the subway system had made them jaded about its safety rules and regulations. This was the one time they should have heeded the announcer's warning.

Instead of slowing to a halt, the train accelerated.

Wally West caught a fleeting glimpse of the driver's face as the train flashed toward him.

It's not going to stop! he thought, seeing the blank, almost zombielike cast to the conductor's features.

The deafening roar of the train echoed through the station, and Wally saw sudden panic on the faces of those commuters standing close to the edge. Traveling at this speed, the train's slipstream would suck them down onto the tracks as it sped by.

Wally moved at the speed of thought itself. His costume, a manifestation of the speed force, appeared around him, his mind willing it into being.

A microsecond later, Wally West was transformed into his super hero identity–the Flash, the Scarlet Speedster, the Fastest Man Alive.

Once, Wally was a boy, a kid like any other. Until the accident. While visiting his uncle, police scientist Barry Allen, an unlikely combination of chemicals had exploded in the lab. Wally was drenched and knocked unconscious. When he came to, he found that he had mysteriously acquired the ability to control every single molecule in his body–to make them speed up so much that he became effectively invisible.

Since that day Wally had dedicated himself to mastering his newfound powers and putting them to work on behalf of humankind. He was honored to be asked to join the Justice League of America. When not battling against threats to the planet, shoulder to shoulder with his fellow super heroes, the Flash worked for the benefit of the citizens of Keystone City.

The train was shooting through the station in a nightmare of noise, moving so fast it swayed dangerously from side to side on the rails beneath its wheels. Wally saw distressed faces at the carriage windows, people screaming as they clung to the straps, rocking against the train's motion.

Suddenly, the last carriage was streaming past. Even as the vacuum created by the train's speed