An Introduction to Doctor Victor von Friez — The Kal-El Mythopoeia

The following is a small part of the story: THE FLASH: Test Run — Act I: Chapter 7

Things Fall Apart

Victor von Friez is a Romanian particle physicist who graduated top of his class at Oxford, and has a PhD in theoretical physics. From a very young age he’d been fascinated with interplanetary travel, and what it would take to make that happen. There was one evening, when Victor was fifteen he was looking through his father’s telescope and saw a shooting star. Inspiration struck.

For years Friez developed the idea for a completely theoretical science he calls “Flashpoint”. Where he imagined a propulsion system where it the vessel in question wasn’t moving, per se, but rather the universe was folding around it. As if God’s finger’s reached down from heaven and pulled you to where you needed to go. This was all in the name of interplanetary travel. You want to go to Mars? We’re there in half an hour! But what if our aspirations are greater? What if we desire to go further into the cosmos?

And he imagined a technology that would do the inverse, a way to sustain human life should the Flashpoint technology be able to take us across the universe. What he imagined was called Zeropoint, a way to “freeze” (yeah great irony in that right?) people for sustained space travel.

Despite receiving a PhD off of the Flashpoint Thesis, his work was heavily ridiculed and rejected by major institution after major institution. He couldn’t find work to care for himself financially.

“Your theories are insane Dr. Friez, your theories are impossible.”

Right out of college, Victor married Nora, a former classmate of his who was absolutely brilliant. She admired him and his work greatly, being one of the few who believed in the potential of FLASHPOINT. The only problem is, they started dating when she was fifteen, and he was a senior. He believes it turned out fine because they stayed together through thick and thin. They may have been high school sweet hearts, but this action further kept him stigmatized from the science community in all of Europe. Each time a lab heard of it, he was kicked out. And this happened everywhere over the course of two years.

And then Lex Luthor came knocking. Well, Merci Graves did.

LEXCORPS: CREATING A BETTER FUTURE FOR ALL MANKIND!

Alexander “Lex” Luthor, the richest man in the world, CEO of LexCorps, sent his assistant with an offer he just couldn’t refuse. He would work at LexCorps, his research funded. He took it practically instantly. And Nora had nothing to say to prevent them from leaving Europe for the States.

The next thing they knew they were on a plane to Metropolis where Lex Luthor had already set up a laboratory. Luthor had also set him and Nora up with a luxury apartment on the Upper East Side of Metropolis. Nora begins to suspect Luthor is going to try to use her husband, but he’s the richest man in the world, everything’s going to be okay.

Victor’s first day at LexCorps goes swimmingly. People are calling him a genius. Finally. It’s a place where his ideas aren’t being brushed over as “insane”, and that’s because of something Luthor shows him, Substance: 61-49.

Weapons of the Gods

Substance: 61-49 is this mineral, that can appear in a coral like form, or also metal sheets, both in a translucent green color. Oh and it’s not from Earth. Luthor won’t disclose where he got it, but it’s not of this world. But its properties fascinate Victor, who notices that this mineral is a power source of sorts, and it can alter the speed of particles. This is exactly what FLASHPOINT and ZEROPOINT needed!

The development of the FLASHPOINT technology can finally get off the ground, and the test thrusters are promising at harnessing the power of Substance: 61-49. And then Luthor call’s Victor up to his office.

Metropolis is still dealing with the aftermath of the first appearance of The Superman, who no one really knows all that much about at this point in time except that he appeared to stop this metal planet that called itself “Brainiac”, the world is changing and it’s changing fast. Luthor tells Victor that he wants him to shift his goal with FLASH/ZEROPOINT technology into weaponry. This irks Victor the wrong way. You want me to make FLASHPOINT a wearable suit? And Victor does this. The only way he could think of weaponizing ZEROPOINT is by making a “freeze-gun”. Victor doesn’t even know what he’s working on anymore.

Progress is going swimmingly on the two suits, and they’re just starting a third one called CRYSTALPOINT that harnesses the raw power of 61:49, also “suggested” by Luthor. And when a new intern starts working with Victor, a 19-year-old kid named Barry Allen, things look brighter. Victor sees a lot of himself in Barry, lurking underneath the solemn surface. Victor rarely sees the kid without earbuds in. But Barry is brilliant, he can tell. So Victor gives Barry the opportunity of a lifetime: to give a test run in Flashpoint.

What happens next changes the paths of these men drastically, but for the sake of spoilers, let’s summarize: Barry Allen, while wearing the suit, get’s struck by lightning and gets hurled 50 feet into concrete and a coma.

Dominos…

The lightning strike that hit Barry and sent him and the suit tumbling 50 feet into concrete and a coma ruined the suit. The mineral, Substance: 61–49, powering the suit was vaporized by the lightning bolt. The flashpoint suit is now a useless piece of metal that was immediately thrown out in the garbage by LexCorps staff. A third of Doctor von Friez’s life work is ruined, but he wasn’t that concerned about that, he still had the Zeropoint and Crystalpoint suits left, and Barry Allen was still alive, albeit in a coma. Despite his optimism, von Friez’s personal hell was just beginning.

Victor went to Lex and tried to explain what had happened with FLASHPOINT, and that they still had ZEROPOINT and CRYSTALPOINT, but Lex didn’t want to hear it, he wanted a rebuilt and operational FLASHPOINT suit pronto. Victor asked why, and Lex Luthor said nonchalantly: “I need all three to kill Superman”. Victor had an epiphany, that’s what it’s all been for? To kill the guy that saved us all from the alien threat and spends his time now stopping housefires and getting cats out of trees! My work was meant for the betterment of the species! FOR ALL MANKIND! But it wasn’t for all mankind it was for ONE GUY! It was all for LEX! WHY? WHY LEX? WHY!

Luthor was very displeased to hear about the Flashpoint Accident, as that suit was something he was very keen on being successful, rather than in the bottom of a dumpster and “destroyed by Superman”. (The reasoning for this is a story for another time). Lex didn’t take it well. At all. So naturally, as any sane person would do, Lex begins to slowly use harmful radiation in tandem with fumes from ACE Chemicals, a subsidiary of LexCorps, to poison Nora von Friez so she will be dead in two years. Like any sane person of course. But the thing about Lex’s act of vengeance is that it’s untraceable. Victor knows something is wrong with his wife, and that she is dying, but he has no way to prove that it’s Lex’s fault, but he knows it. And there’s nothing he can do about it except for pray.

To read what happens next for Victor von Friez, stay tuned for THE FLASH: TEST RUN!