Chapter 4416: Prelude to Darkness (Part 8)

"Hello? It's me, what's wrong?... No way? Okay, I'll go back and check now. Sorry to trouble you, ma'am." Barry hung up the phone and scratched his head in confusion.

Hal looked at him and asked, "What's wrong?"

"The lady from the property management said my old house might have been broken into," Barry said. "I know that in some places, if a house is lived in by strangers for a period of time, the property rights might change. But Central City doesn't have that rule. And the security there has always been good; who would go to steal a house that belongs to someone else?"

"Do you want to go back and check?" Hal asked. "I'll go with you?"

"No need, didn't you just get off work? You should rest well," Barry said. "I estimate the property management people made a mistake; I'll go back and check and then come back."

After saying this, he turned into a bolt of lightning, left the Justice League base, and soon ran back to Central City, arriving at the old house.

The place Barry lived now was also a property of their family, but it wasn't the place where he grew up; it was a small apartment his parents had prepared for him in advance. The house in front of him now was his childhood home, the old house belonging to the Allen family.

This place was slightly remote, but very quiet and peaceful. The entire neighborhood hadn't had a violent crime in many years, and the neighbors' relationships were all very good; otherwise, they wouldn't have specifically come to remind him.

Barry took out his key, pushed the door, and walked in. He looked at the yard; it was also well-maintained. Every time the neighbors hired someone to mow the lawn, they would help take care of their yard along the way. This was actually because his parents were kind to others when they were still around, so the neighbors were all very happy to take care of him.

Crossing the yard, he opened the front door of the house. Just as he opened the door, he was stunned, because he saw his father sitting on the sofa reading a newspaper.

Just like a weekend afternoon many years ago, the sunlight spilled into the room through the window, their family had finished shopping for ingredients at the supermarket and filled the refrigerator by category. Before dinner, his father would sit on the sofa reading the newspaper, his mother would go to water the flowers in the backyard, and he would sit on the living room carpet playing with toys. Such days had passed for a long time, until one day, everything ended.

Barry thought this was his hallucination. He often had such hallucinations. Every time he returned to the old house, he would habitually pick up the newspaper and put it on the coffee table, as if his father would pick it up to read at any time; he would fill the watering can with water, just as his mother had asked him to do before. The departure of loved ones was just such a long, damp period. The marks they carved into you would appear and disappear at every moment in life.

Barry stepped inside, but soon he discovered that this didn't seem to be a hallucination. He wasn't a person with a very rich imagination, so every time a hallucination appeared, the image was very hazy and blurry. But the man in front of him was truly too clear.

Hearing his voice, the man turned his head, saw Barry, and smiled, saying, "You're back."

Barry didn't show a moved or happy expression. He bolted out in great terror, like a cat with its fur standing on end, and then roared toward the house: "Who are you?! Why are you turning into my father?!!"

The man was stunned for a moment, then said, "I'm not turning into your father; I am your father, little Barry. Don't you remember me?"

"But my parents are already dead!" Barry raised his tone and said, "Don't try to make me believe any ghost stories about resurrection from the dead; that's impossible. Even the Mother Box can't achieve complete resurrection; you tell me you can? Then why don't you go fight Darkseid?!"

Soon, a woman walked down from upstairs; it was his mother. She stood at the entrance of the stairs, waved her hand, and said, "Come in, Barry, we were just about to tell you. I don't know why, but we did wake up from the cemetery. Because we had nowhere to go, we returned to the original house."

"Impossible!" Barry's head shook like a rattle, "First of all, you couldn't have resurrected from the cemetery. Even with burial, the body would soon become part of the natural cycle and would have long since disappeared. Matter cannot be generated out of thin air. Then the body you possess now must not be the original one, but strange matter composed of some unknown force."

"And the soul, it's not that having the same memories makes it the same person. Your way of thinking is clearly completely different from my parents'. If it were them, they would only worry about whether they would scare the neighbors if they returned home immediately after resurrection from the dead, especially whether they would scare me."

"So, if you were really my parents resurrected from the dead, you might leave quietly, or find a place to settle down first, and then slowly contact me, letting me accept this matter, instead of returning directly to the original home and scaring me out of my wits."

Barry looked at his father and said, "Do you know? My dad knew I was afraid of the dark, so he installed lights in every corner of the house, wishing he could light it up like daytime. My mother knew I was most afraid of crustaceans; once when I was scared by a longhorn beetle, she threw away all the flowers that would attract longhorn beetles, even though there were some she liked very much. They were the most worried about me being scared, sometimes even making a fuss over nothing."

Speaking of this, Barry couldn't help but have red eyes, and he said, "I know them. If they really resurrected, no matter how difficult the survival was, they wouldn't appear in front of me suddenly. Because they were afraid I couldn't accept it, afraid of scaring me."

"And you two monsters, not only didn't consider me at all, but also occupied my house, shamelessly calling yourselves my parents. Now, leave immediately, right now, or I'm going to call the police!"

"Don't be like this, Barry. You have to listen to our explanation. Your mother and I really are..."

Before he could even finish speaking, the light of blue lightning shone. Immediately following a "swish" sound, Barry, with red eyes, pulled a bewildered Hal and appeared in front of the house. Barry pointed at the front door of the house and said, "It's them, they turned into the appearance of my parents. Hal, hurry and drive these two monsters away!!!"

Hal was also startled. He walked in, took a look, sized those two people up from head to toe, and said, "Can't tell they are monsters; they seem to be ordinary humans..."

"Impossible!" Barry kept shaking his head, "They absolutely couldn't be my parents. This isn't their house. Drive them out!"

"Alright." Hal chose to respect Barry's wishes and said, "Are you two leaving on your own, or should I invite you out?"

"We..."

Before he could even finish speaking, two police cars arrived at Barry's door. Barry looked back in shock. The officers walked forward and said, "Someone reported illegal trespassing. What's going on here?"

Barry was just about to open his mouth to explain, but Hal gave him a look. Since it wasn't the two of them who called the police, it must be those two fake people in the room. Even he couldn't see the flaws in these two people, so as ordinary people, the police couldn't possibly distinguish them.

If they overreacted and argued unreasonably, it would be very easy for those two people to find flaws. Although Hal hadn't been in a good state recently, he had learned the meditation method mentioned by Sinestro, which was slightly better. Moreover, his brain had always been sharp, so he said directly, "Officers, don't approach the house first; there might be Martians inside!"

"What?!" The two officers nervously drew their guns.

"It's like this," Hal gave Barry another look and said, "You should know this is the Allen family's old house, right? The Allen couple has been dead for many years, and he is the only son of the Allen family. Just a moment ago, he received a call from someone claiming to be his parents. He thought it was someone playing a prank, but the neighbors also said there seemed to be shadows in the house."

"He was worried that someone was trespassing illegally, so he rushed over to check and also called the police. Unexpectedly, the Allen couple who had been dead for many years resurrected. Of course, they claimed to be resurrected, but I think they are Martians disguised as the Allen couple!"

"Still remember the declaration published by the Martians before? They want to fully invade Earth, stop Earthlings from pulling out the nails, so they must have sent more people to carry out infiltration warfare on Earth. Not having time to prepare from scratch, they wanted to replace the identities of dead people. Fortunately, Mr. Allen was alert and didn't let them succeed. You must help us!"

One of the young police officers was still a bit bewildered. But the older police officer sized up Barry and said, "I know you. When I was transferred here, you seemed to have just started elementary school, right?"

Barry recalled a bit and also felt this police officer looked a bit familiar; he said, "Seems so, you even bought snacks at our school gate. Mexican fruit cups?"

That old police officer was completely convinced this time. Hal moved aside a bit, he leaned in to look inside, and was so shocked he almost dropped his gun.

"Head... head... headquarters! I... I am... I need support... I need support!! There might be Martians here!!!!" The old police officer screamed into the communicator.

If he only had an impression of Barry, he had a deep impression of the Allen couple. This couple was very kind; every time they picked up their child for school, if they met the police, they would buy them coffee. This old police officer had also met them a few times. He was very clear that even if the Allen couple hadn't died, it was absolutely impossible for them to be this young. These two things in the room were definitely fake people!

When Hal went to look at the expressions of that couple again, he found that they didn't have the anger of being exposed, but were genuinely somewhat helpless. He realized that even if the other party was sent by someone, they might not know the truth either, but really felt they had resurrected.

But even so, they absolutely couldn't let them go. This kind of thing was too eerie; no matter what, they had to investigate clearly first before talking.

Soon, the police station sent a large number of reinforcements. Not just police cars, but armed helicopters also came. Soon, those two people in the house were taken away; they had thought the two would resist fiercely, but in reality, they didn't, following the police obediently. Of course, Barry and Hal were also taken back for questioning.

Learning that the two were members of the Justice League, everyone's attitude was much better. Don't look at the Justice League now also being responsible for collecting taxes, but they mainly strike at those individual targets who resist stubbornly and don't take action against ordinary people.

And those who dared to commit crimes against the wind at this juncture were even more evil in ordinary times. It was always possible to pull up the radish and bring out the mud with one investigation. They had broken many such major cases recently, allowing many people to have their grievances redressed, so their prestige among the public was very high.

And if they were members of the Justice League, then encountering such a thing was very normal. Now, it was the critical moment for implementing the new policy. And the implementation of the new policy concerned whether humans could successfully pull out the nails. Since they couldn't move the new president, they would first strike at the new president's personal guard. It was too normal for Martians to have such a plan. ===== CHAPTER 4417 =====