by Sean McMahon
Malcom’s eyes widened, knowing that the arrival of the unwanted stimulant would have a potentially disastrous impact on his plans, and he quickly pulled back the blade, aiming for Hal’s heart once more, eager to finish this before further complications had the opportunity to bleed into his present, but it was too late.
The killer froze, the music meaning far more to him that it did to Hal.
‘It can’t be,’ The Dark Restarter muttered, and for a moment Hal thought the killer was referring just to the phone.
But it was more than that; Malcolm wasn’t just displaying frustration…he was visibly haunted. As if his mind had been transported back to somewhere else entirely.
Hal took advantage of the brief respite, as a band Hal knew to be called “Freak” filled the dead space between them like an air horn, the song “No Money” levelling the playing field.
Malcolm remained in a state of seemingly perpetual hesitation, his eyes now fully-glazed by a painful memory.
‘But that would mean,’ The Dark Restarter whispered, his words utterly lost under the chaotic onslaught to both their senses. All this time, he thought it had been a stranger. But now he knew the truth. ‘It was…you?’
Hal didn’t know what that meant.
Actually, he simply didn’t care at all, as he closed his eyes and inhaled deeply.
As The Dark Restarter pulled himself together and applied pressure to the blade once more, Hal grabbed Malcolm’s wrist in one swift, effortless movement, preventing the tempered steel from entering his body and ending his life.
As each note connected with the next, the fog clouding Hal’s mind lifted, his memories returning in full force as the floodgates of time itself were ripped open, his focus no longer revoked, but returned to him with a boundless tenacity.
‘I remember…’ whispered Hal. ‘I remember everything.’
“It’s never too late,” Hal thought, recalling the advice of a stranger from his past. ‘To restart from scratch,’ he muttered, releasing the end of his thoughts into an existence beyond that of his own mind.
A sense of disbelief washed over him, as the faint echo of a forgotten memory drifted onto the shore of his conscious mind; a message in a bottle, that had traversed the infinite ocean of time with a singular purpose; to make him remember something important. A memory from his childhood that, thanks to the music, was so vivid, he knew without a shadow of a doubt that he could win this.
He chuckled at his own ingenuity, feeling as if he were cheating on a test by receiving answers he had no right possessing. Hal thanked his future-self for the gift…not yet realising the implications that having such a recollection would mean for him in the long run.
Using his legs to slowly lift himself up from the ground, Hal found his footing and pushed back against the force Malcolm was exerting onto him.
Malcolm snarled as a mixture of blue and red energy ignited between them, violent arcs of electricity spitting viciously and landing on the floor in a pile of temporally-charged embers, lining the ground like the epicentre of a blacksmith’s forge.
Malcolm stared in disbelief, as his strength was inexplicably matched by Hal – who was somehow keeping the knife at bay – and concentrated fully on attempting to drain his opponent.
But something was different.
It wasn’t…working like he knew it should.
With his eyes still closed, Hal’s mind was filled with thoughts that were fuelled by positive reinforcement; he found what he was looking for quickly, as he relived the day he rescued Shelby from the shelter.
“More than enough,” thought Hal.
His eyes sprang open, glowing an ethereal blue, the connection between his hand and Malcolm’s wrist spewing another wave of freshly-baked sparks, generating an enormous feedback of power that sent Malcolm flying across the room.
Malcolm collided savagely with the wall alongside the metal cage that imprisoned Fearne, as Hal dusted himself down for no other reason than to show his attacker he was rallying.
For the first time in a long while, The Dark Restarter was utterly lost for words, but collected himself all the same, pulling himself up from the floor, managing to utter a curse as his eyes darted around the room demanding answers on where the phone had originated from.
Hal spat out a mouthful of blood, wiping a stray trickle from his chin, before releasing a humble laugh into the room at the killer’s expense.
‘You see, that’s the difference between you and me Malc’, I have one thing that you’ll never have…’ said Hal goadingly, his mind once again firing on all of its restarted cylinders.
Malcolm bristled at his adversary’s insolence.
‘Do tell,’ his eyes filling with the fire of red energy that only a true Dark Restarter could generate.
The refuelled time-traveller shrugged, and walked slowly towards Malcolm, stopping a few metres in front of him as he looked down at his hands, stretching out his fingers in relief as blue energy danced between his fingertips.
Hal smiled darkly, his blindingly-blue eye sockets casting a fluctuating glow on his cheeks. And then, he uttered two simple words; a truth that, for all his intelligence, Malcolm couldn’t possibly fathom.
‘A team.’
Malcolm used his shoulder-blades to push off from the brickwork, and they began circling each other, both men waiting for the other to react first.
No longer an underdog and an undefeatable giant.
But as something worlds apart; as equals.
Shaking away the nonsensical doubt, Malcolm struck first, running towards Hal, the blade in his hand singing through the air as he did so. But Hal didn’t step away.
Officially done with running, the Restarter instead strode towards his attacker.
Malcolm dropped his arm downwards, the blade slicing the air, on a collision course with Hal’s shoulder, who merely leaned back on his heels, effortlessly dodging the incoming attack, sending Malcolm off balance as the momentum of his actions carried him onwards.
Hal knew in that moment that all was not lost.
After all the training Future Malcom had insisted on…Hal knew something the younger Malcolm before him couldn’t; he hadn't been preparing Hal for multiple outcomes, he had been training him entirely for this exact fight.
For every blow that the killer threw at him, for every attempt Malcolm made to connect with Hal, a response was now ingrained so deep within his muscle memory that Hal knew what was coming next before Malcolm had even made the decision on what move to make.
‘I know Kung Fu,’ muttered Hal gleefully, his eyes lighting up with joy as the true majesty of that dawned on him.
Regaining his balance, Malcolm swung again, as Hal ducked heavily to his right.
Ever the chameleon, Malcolm changed his approach, bringing the knife back around in a horizontal motion towards Hal’s head, but Hal did what no one ever did when such a threat to life occurred; he moved closer to his attacker, bringing up his left forearm, blocking the blow, the electricity sparking between them physically repelling Malcolm’s knife-wielding arm like a steel bar connecting with adamantium, the force of the connection sending an earth-shattering reverberation through their bodies, causing Malcolm to lose purchase on the weapon.
The blade flew from his hand and slid across the floor behind him, Malcolm not bothering to follow its path, instead reaching out to grab Hal by the throat.
Hal ducked underneath him like a professional boxer, landing a lightning-fuelled uppercut to Malcolm’s jaw, causing him to stagger back.
The music hilariously hit the end of a chorus at that precise moment, as if lamenting the impossibility of what had just happened.
Harold Callaghan.
A complete novice in combat, who would sooner take a punch to the face than embrace even the mildest form of confrontation, had just caused a legitimate serial killer…one proficient in multiple fighting styles and a behemoth by comparison in terms of strength…to stop.
To hesitate.
‘That’s…impossible…’ mumbled Malcolm, spitting an irksome mouthful of blood that had filled his mouth, legitimately dazed. ‘Who taught you to fight?’
As Hal picked up the phone from the ground, he marvelled as the power levels of the phone shot from nineteen-percent back up to one-hundred.
‘Oliver Queen,’ replied Hal, putting on his best rasp before muttering ‘and Malcolm…you have failed this city…’
Malcolm growled, and sped towards him, collecting the blade now resting by his foot and thrusting it outwards towards Hal’s throat.
Hal lowered his body in an almost-kneel, crossing his wrists to form an “X” with his arms, and pushing upwards, guiding the un-glinting metal to the left of his own head, where it narrowly missed cutting off his ear lobe.
Moving his wrist and taking the notable heft of Malcolm’s right arm, his knees buckling slightly under the load, Hal fluidly turned his whole body, using Malcolm’s own weight against him and causing the monster to stagger forwards, before unleashing several jabs to his assailant’s torso in quick succession.
Malcolm regained his balance and brought up a hand, savagely lashing out at Hal’s head, which Hal deftly ducked under, allowing him a free moment to casually punch Malcolm square in the face.
The Dark Restarter recoiled in pain, dropping his advantage, the knife landing once more with a muted clatter that only a Restarter could hear.
They both stood there for a moment, breathing heavily, the severity of what Hal had just done truly dawning on both of them.
Malcolm lifted his hand up to his nose, pulled it back into view and saw the staining of blood on his fingertips.
Hal kicked the knife away from them both and into the corner of the room, remembering Future Malcolm’s advice that if there was a weapon in play, it was best to keep it as far away from an opponent as possible.
“You’ll be tempted to use it,” Future Malcolm had said. “You will think it will change the tide. But all you will be doing is bringing him a weapon he can use against you.”
For a brief second, Hal felt like he had taken this too far, and had pushed his luck to the point where if Malcolm were to show any mercy at all, that option had just officially been taken off the table. Hal was also privy to the fact that there wasn’t much of his tutor’s training left to run through. A few moves at the most.
The Restarter suddenly found himself resisting the potent desire to apologise, as if doing so would result in Malcolm laughing it off. That perhaps he would decide to go easy on him. Maybe even grab a cup of tea and a biscuit. Allowing them to discuss how silly this all was.
Hal could almost hear the belly laughter they were both indulging in over this entirely imaginary coffee shop meet-up, over the clinking of dishwasher-safe crockery and the whirr of milk-frothing apparatus. Perhaps they even split the bill before going their separate ways.
He was pulled back to reality, thanks to Malcolm’s eyes which seemed to suggest such a fantasy was a no go.
‘Malcolm,’ said Hal, regaining control over his shortness of breath, the exertion having really done a number on him thanks to his charged state of self. ‘It doesn’t have to be this way. We can work together, find a way to–’
But Hal’s plea was evidently falling on deaf ears. He had damaged more than Malcolm’s temporally-displaced body…he had damaged his pride.
There was no coming back from that.
As if to cement that truth, the door above them blew apart, shards of wood exploding inwards and trickling down the staircase, causing both Hal and Malcolm to instinctively divert their attention to it.
Two hovering orbs of blue light stared out at them down into the darkness, a familiar silhouette filling the doorway.
Hal chuckled, but the relief in his voice betrayed the levity.
‘Cutting it a little fine, aren’t we?’ he said to the powerful being, which to Malcolm seemed to glide down the stairs, rather than walk.
‘It’s not my fault your plans are terrible.’
‘You found Felicia then?’
‘If you’re referring to that poxy plastic flamingo,’ said Kara, in a playfully irritated tone, the relief that her friend was still alive lining her words. ‘Yeah.’
They shared a smile.
‘Wanna tag in? I’m sort of doing all the heavy lifting here,’ said Hal.
Kara was about to mention how she’d just disintegrated a door when Malcolm growled, running towards them and causing the Restarters to end their ill-timed banter.
As the music continued, they began exchanging blows with the man from two fronts instead of just the one.
This felt odd to them both. They had practiced the moves that followed, sure, but never in tandem. Never as one.
Hal knew it wouldn’t be long before he himself came unstuck and evolved into a liability, having always lost interest at this point in his tutelage. Kara clearly didn’t have that problem, as she weaved around Malcolm, jabbing him in the spot above his kidneys, continuing to dodge him expertly.
Merely getting by, Hal’s luck eventually ran out as Malcolm’s fists collided with his face, throwing him hard into the open cage door where Fearne – a few pints of blood shy of truly living – continued to swim in and out of whatever dregs of consciousness she was somehow clutching onto.
‘Close it,’ The Dark Restarter shouted to his alive- self, who traversed the room, passing through both Kara and Malcolm himself, shutting the gate, and sealing Hal inside with a simple click of a padlock.
‘Hal!’
It was just her and Malcolm now.
‘Ready to die again, little girl?’
‘Ready to have your arse handed to you by a woman?’ she retorted, pleased that her voice didn’t contain a single iota of the self-doubt she was feeling, or the shakiness being brought on by her surging adrenaline.
Malcolm found himself momentarily distracted, noticing a large frame in the doorway above them, which nodded slowly, all deliberation nullified.
The Dark Restarter smiled, nodding back, as the silhouette retreated. To where, he would only know when he became him.
Kara seized the opportunity to land the first blow of the next wave, forcing the palm of her hand upwards into Malcolm’s nose.
Hal’s eyes fluttered open, and he began to pull himself up from the ground, knowing that Kara would need his help. However, the display before him seemed to indicate anything but.
Kara and Malcolm’s parries were being exchanged at such speed, that they seemed to be juddering in and out of time itself, becoming little more than a flurry of red and blue sparks, as their respective blows and counters connected.
Kara, fuelled by what Hal knew to be hope and the sheer will of needing to succeed…and Malcolm, channelling the entirety of his hatred and resentment, until finally, Kara’s luck ran out too.
She staggered backwards, no longer a blur, her body realigning with the present moment, her slender frame coming back into focus, her hands pressed against her nose, blood pouring from between the gaps in her fingers.
‘It’s over,’ The Dark Restarter barked, trying to catch his breath far more than he should have been.
But Kara merely closed her eyes, and concentrated.
Her short auburn hair began to rise, defying gravity, held in place by a static charge of some kind. She lowered her fists to her side and clenched them.
Eyelids flashing open, blue energy coursed through her eye sockets, arcing down her arms and all the way to her hands, causing her entire face to glow blue, her features no longer visible.
Hal and Malcolm covered their eyes, shielding themselves from the intensity Kara was emitting until, eventually, the light retreated.
Malcolm took a step
backwards. The tiniest of steps. But definitely definable as a step all the same.
Hal had pulled himself upright and ran to the grill of the cage, peering out to witness Kara being lit up like Christmas and tearing his gaze away from her towards her attacker.
Was that fear Hal could see in his eyes?
Hal attempted to force the cage door open, eager to rejoin the battle, with zero success.
Kara shot Hal a look of surprise, as she looked down at her own hands in fascination.
Her broken nose had been fully-healed as the rest of her injuries diligently repaired themselves, leaving her with a feeling of aching invigoration.
‘How?’ said Malcolm, looking to the doorway behind her and clearly debating with himself as to whether he should just make a run for it.
None of this was going to plan.
Malcolm faltered, then shook away the notion of running. Regaining his resolve, he flexed his muscles and clicked his neck menacingly.
“That seems to be his thing,” thought Hal, as he scrambled to the other side of the cage, and reached out beneath the gap, trying to gain purchase on the blade that resided on the other side.
He flexed his fingers, but it was just out of reach.
Remembering he couldn’t be harmed by objects in the real world, he forced his wrist through the gap, the metal unable to break his skin or cut him like it would have done had he been in-phase with it. “Come on, come on,” he thought, as his fingertips kissed the hilt of the time-travellers knife.
‘No matter,’ said Malcolm, an uncharacteristic inflection of self-doubt in his voice.
‘Malcolm, enough,’ said Kara like a teacher telling off a child under her charge. ‘I have an offer for you.’
‘Unless it’s these walls painted with your blood, I suggest you cease stalling me so that we can end this.’
‘That’s exactly what I’m offering.’
‘What?’ her words not computing, as if the telephone line was bad and clarification was required.
‘Let them go,’ she said, pointing to the Restarter Zoo that housed Hal and Fearne. ‘Spare my friends at Fir Lodge. And I’ll give you what you’ve been after since this nightmare began. No resistance, no retaliation. You can have me.’
