Watchtower

Most took a seat at the round table in the meeting room, but there wasn't room for everyone. Tim, Dick, Barbara, and Jason stood just behind Selina, who was seated across from Barry, nimbly stretching her legs up in her hair. Barry held the meeting, with Doctor Fate jumping in when needed. Kara and J'onn sat next to one another, parallel to Zatanna and Starfire on the other side.

Barry stood at once, clearing his throat.

"I, uh... just wanna thank all of you for being here and-

"Yeah, yeah," Selina interrupted, checking her nails. "We all know this isn't your thing, Speedy. Just get on with it."

Barry gave her a slightly irritated look, sighing, then proceeded. "Anyways, we all know why we're here, but we haven't exactly elaborated the 'how' part."

"You mean how we're going to fix all of this?" Starfire asked.

"Right," Barry said. "And since I'm not that tech-savvy, with Tim's wonderful help, we put together a demonstration to show you guys." There was brief hesitation before his next sentence, though. "But... we called in the help of the only other person we could possibly think of in the moment."

Confused looks appeared on everyone's face but Barry, Nelson, and Zatanna's. Then the rest of them turned to the sound of footsteps entering the room.

"Ask..." the deep voice spoke as it approached closer. Once they stepped into the light, they stood front and center at the members in the room, garnering mixed reactions from them all. It was Lex Luthor, dressed in a business suit and slacks. "And you shall receive," he finished.

A flushed look of anger grew over Kara's expression, as she jerked her head to face Barry.

"What is he doing here?" she hissed.

"I know you're upset," Barry spoke under his breath, "but he's the only other one who could help us understand all of this right now."

"The only other one?"

"I know I'm not welcome here, and believe me, this is the last place I'd rather be. But like in old times, as the saying goes, the enemy of my enemy is my friend." He pauses, scanning everyone in the room, a smirk creeping over his face followed by a scoff. Luthor walks over towards the front center of the table. "Thanos. The most wanted man in the universe. Or, is he really a man? No, of course not. He's an extraterrestrial being. A Titanian Eternal, as his race is known to be. And what does that tell us?" Luthor stops next to Barry, standing before everyone, not expecting a response. "That he is intellectually superior to us, and therefore possess a higher level of knowledge and wisdom above the average man."

"So how are you supposed to help us?" Jason remarks.

Luthor looks to him. "Because I am no average man." Kara rolls her eyes. "Mr. Allen, would you care to start the presentation?"

With that, Barry takes remote controlling the hologram computer emitting from the table and pushes a button. Projected from the table's center is a holographic depiction of a rotating Earth, as well as the six Infinity Stones.

"From our understanding, there were six stones Thanos used to wipe out half of all life on Earth. Each of them possesses its own unique power and dominion over different covenants of existence. Time, space, power, mind, soul, and reality. All put in one, they have enough power to wipe out half of all life in the universe with just a snap of the fingers." Luthor insensitively snaps his own fingers as he says this.

The holographic Earth then zooms out, as countless other Earths line up in infinite rows and columns next to it.

"But haven't we learned that this Earth isn't the only one?" said Luthor. "No, there are infinite Earths. All living, breathing in their own plane of existence, occupying the same space, but at different points in time. Different frequencies. You see, time plus space can only equal one thing. Reality. Those are three of the six stones we just established. Theoretically, the universe began with a bang, much like a spark setting off the course of history, so it makes sense that the Power stone would take the first stance in the order of balancing the universe. And with the surge of power coursing life and energy into something, albeit a celestial or third-dimensional being, it then has to develop a soul or purpose to mark itself amongst others its newfound energy, and later a mind to understand its place in the creation of the universe, in whichever way it wants. However, that all means nothing without having a time or place to choose where it all occurs.

"Let's put it this way," Luthors goes on. "There are two separate points across a board. A and B. The only thing separating them is space, right? Well, to get from point A to B, to close their distances, you have to lose something in order to gain something."

"Time," said J'onn.

"Precisely," Luthor continued. "It's the only measurement possible to determine that you actually moved from one place to another. And together, these variables of both 'when' and 'where' determine our reality. Our very existence, for that matter. Proof of time validates our proof of space."

"Okay," Selina started to say, still not getting the point entirely. "Say I'm standing in the same spot for more than ten seconds, and someone just stares at me knowing I didn't move anywhere. Do they really need a watch to know that?"

Luthor scoffs. "If you ask me, Miss Kyle, I'd say the very answer lies within your own question." Selina cocks a brow. "I've been standing here for a little over two minutes now. I didn't just spontaneously appear before your very eyes like some sort of magic act." Selina smirks at Zatanna, to which the magician purses her lips in a comical consensus. "There's really no way to comprehend how that might work in a three-dimensional sense. The closest we could imagine would be the universe acting in a stop-motion manner, which would look quite disturbing if you ask me."

"Hmm, I'd say Speedy here does that all the time," Selina joked, looking to Barry, to which he sarcastically chortled back to her.

"Ah yes, but even the Flash has to take time in order to get from one space to another," Luthor adds. "For him, it just takes less time. Which brings me to the main point as to why we're here-

"Time travel!" Jason guesses. Everyone looks at him with blank expressions. He shrugs, "I mean, it's the only thing that would make sense after explaining all that to us. We're going back in time to stop Thanos from doing the Snap. I'm calling it."

Luthor quietly chuckles. "Oh no, Todd, not at all. Society's delusional perspective on quantum physics and the theory of relativity are all warped by the misguided ramblings that these Hollywood writers portray to us. They would have you believe that jumping in a time machine to go 'Back to the Future' or whatever might actually be possible. But no, that's ridiculous… though, not entirely ridiculous. Our goal isn't to go backward in time, but rather forward."

Barbara mutters under her breath next to Dick. "He had me up until that part."

Luthor continues. "Time is linear. It can only go forward. So theoretically, traveling to the past is impossible. But, we have a solution." Luthor then looks to Barry. "Mr. Allen, would you care to explain?"

Barry clears his throat. "You guys remember when I sort of broke the space-time continuum?"

"Which instance?" J'onn dryly humored.

Barry nodded. "Okay, that's a good point. But each time it happened was because I traveled so fast that it put us in a different vibrational frequency. Different from our Earth, and instead put us in another one."

Jason snapped at a new thought. "I got it. You wanna send us to a different Earth where none of this happened."

"Dude, can't you just let him finish?" Dick impatiently remarked. Jason raised his hands, backing off.

Barry tilted his head. "Eh, kind of. Not exactly, though."

Jason turned to Dick and gave him a smug look. J'onn then took over to explain the rest.

"Flash can reach the appropriate speed to break the Earth's vibrational frequency at 7.8 Hertz, according to the Schumann resonance. The problem arises in knowing the right frequency which determines which Earth you end up existing. Thankfully Batman created a way for us to know and choose at will."

"Wait, he made a way for us to jump into different alternate Earths at will?" Selina exclaims.

"You really didn't know that?" said Zatanna.

"Hell no!"

"Crazy, I know, but its Batman, so of course it worked," Barry said.

"Which Earth would fit for a most suitable plan of action?" Starfire asked.

"This one," Barry says as he clicks the remote yet again. On the hologram, this selects a globe from the many selections of Earths displayed. "We called it…" Barry tilts his head at the title. "Other Earth? Hmm, that's… creative, I guess."

Tim shrugged with embarrassment. "Look, I had to call it something, okay?"

Barry brushes it off, trying not to snicker. "Anyways, this is where we're shooting for."

"What's so special about it?" Zatanna asks.

Barry hesitates for a moment, and just then J'onn takes over once more.

"We recently discovered a large surge of energy erupt from the Other Earth not too long ago, similar to what we witnessed 5 years ago with the Snap. After closer inspection, we realized that it mirrored our world in many ways, except… the roles are reversed."

"Reversed?" Dick questioned.

"Everyone standing in this room, at this very moment, who all survived the Snap, had vanished in that world following the same event," J'onn answered. "The effects of the event seemed to be… flipped."

"So that means…" Barbara whispered, her eyes starting to water.

Barry had his head down, but slowly started nodding. "Yes," he said. "They're all still alive there. But we aren't."

A long but much-needed silence dragged on for some moments following the statement. Tears rolled down Barbara's cheeks, as Dick put a comforting arm around her. Selina fidgeted uncontrollably with her hands and feet, but didn't say anything. And many of them found it hard to even breathe at a normal pace, as they could hear their heartbeats pounding between their ears.

At last, Selina said something.

"Well, what are we waiting for? Are we gonna pay a visit or what?" she remarked.

"That is part of the plan, yes, but we can't stay," Barry answered.

Selina rolls her eyes. "I'm starting to think you guys aren't opportunists by any means."

"As much as I, too, like to take a dive at a great opportunity, it's not that simple," Luthor chimes in. "Playing with alternate dimensions in intertwining them is never a good idea, in the long run. Their world is very much like ours, as we've indicated. But it's not our world. Though, perhaps at one point, it was."

"This poor kitty's lost. Care to explain some more?"

"I have some theories. Either both of our worlds coexisted equally as one, and the Snap resulted in two different splits in reality, making our current Earth where we've survived, and another where, vice-versa, what we've lost still lives on."

"And the other theory?" Starfire asks.

"That I'm wrong," Luthor boldly states. From the looks on everyone's faces, they didn't quite like the sound of that. "But I'm almost certain that's not the case.

"Our frequencies are vibrating almost the same, but at a different space and time. Even the ionospheres are vibrating at a similar resonance. Think about it, Thanos had intended to eradicate half of the entire universe with the stones. He spoke of that himself with full conviction and ran through with it. But, how could he say that, without also realizing that there is no 'universe'? There's multiple universes. So this tells me that both Thanos was not aware of such knowledge, and that as a result of his cataclysm, he split this Earth into two realities in which only he can occupy."

"Amazing…" Starfire quietly said to herself.

"Basically, Thanos only exists in these two dimensions," Barry said. "Ours and Other Earth's. Every other one, Thanos and his army never even came into the picture."

"And somehow him snapping his fingers created a divide between these realities," Luthor finished.

"But the energy signature was recorded just recently, right?" Tim spoke. "Ours was five years ago. How's that possible?"

"Someone's been paying attention," Luthor replied. "We've also come to the realization when looking at Other Earth's data that our times don't exactly match, which is normal when dealing with pocket dimensions. Our present time right now is their past. As I said before, time is linear. We can only move forward to catch up."

"But the snap will already have happened either way," Starfire said.

"Yes, but… the stones may not be gone."

Doctor Fate stepped in. "When Zatanna and I searched for any last remnants of the stones when Thanos last used them, we came up with nothing. He'd used them twice. Once to purge half the universe, and twice to destroy the stones themselves. To him, they served no further purpose."

"But not to us," Zatanna muttered.

"If we can get there to the Other Earth at the right time, we could locate and get the stones from Thanos before he destroys them again."

"How do we know from that energy expenditure that he didn't just destroy them again?" Barbara asked. "I mean how can we tell if this was the first time or not?"

"Planet 0259-S, or the Garden, in which Thanos resided was where he last used the stones to destroy them in our dimension. No large expenditure of energy has yet to be recorded in the same location."

"So he only used them once…"

"What makes us think he plans on doing the same thing in the other reality?" Selina.

"We'd be risking it by doing nothing," Barry retorted.

"Technically, he might," Luthor spoke. "Unless your super friends on the other side find a way to stop him before he does, which I doubt, things just might play out the same way. Two timelines have to meet at some point. Same melody, different tune."

"He's right," Barbara said. "We can't risk it."

"I don't like how doubtful you are that they won't stop him," Grayson fires back at Luthor.

"I can't decide for them, Grayson. But neither can you, quite frankly." Dick says nothing. He knew in a way that Luthor was right. "It's up to you all to take the risk or not."

"Why are you helping us?" Kara asked skeptically.

Luthor turns and walks over to the window, facing out over the Earth. Even after the fact, it was such a large and beautiful sphere. With the light reflecting off the glass, Lex could see his reflection looking back at him, standing over the vast planet.

"At first, I agreed with Thanos," said Luthor. "Hell, he had a point. A mass expenditure of resources was starting to get out of hand. Not just here on our world, but other worlds. There wasn't enough for everyone. Doing this would fix that problem, of course. And so far, it's worked." Kara began fuming with anger, clenching her fist. "But then I realized… with Superman gone, and my many other rivals and adversaries, I no longer had anyone or anything to compete with. I had no purpose. I have a wide array of knowledge at my disposal and nothing to use it for… until now."

"You do realize that by helping us you're bringing Superman back, right?" Jason pointed out.

"I'm well aware. As much as I despise him, in a way, his very existence keeps me at bay."

Kara shakes her head. "You're unbelievable, you know that?" she scorned.

But Luthor says nothing.