Any comic fan will have heard of DC’s Crisis on Infinite Earths. Super-villain Anti-Monitor threatened all the other infinite universes, except for his own Antimatter universe. Barry Allen heroically sacrificed his life by running faster than he’d ever run before, circling the villain’s anti-matter cannon. While this destroyed the weapon, it also took Barry with it, merging him with the Speed Force forever. Now with Barry out of the picture for DC, whether laughing with or at the comic company, Marvel stepped in with their own take.

New Origins

At roughly the same time that Barry dissipated into the Speed Force, a new character arrived on the Marvel scene. An alien being known as the Runner — not Barry, we’ll get to that — arrived on Earth-616. Coming from a race of Elders — immortals who had dedicated their lives to only one purpose — the Runner wanted to know “the thrill of the body in motion.” The Runner sought the fastest being in existence and heard Earth had several speedsters. Each was contacted to participate in his race. The winner would go on to join in the greater race he was planning.

The Runners

The race would include Quicksilver (Marvel’s, not DC’s Max Mercury), The Whizzer, Captain Marvel, Speed Demon, Black Racer (not the DC personification of Death), Super Sabre and Quasar’s friend Makkari. The course would be to the moon with a normal environment simulated to let them run and with a slight space warping to account for the motion of the moon.

Once the racers passed the first warp junction, an energy blast hit the track. A confused man emerged from the lightning bolt: blonde, previously without form, and wearing yellow boots and a tattered red outfit.

The blonde newcomer went on to win the race with ease and took the title of “Fastest Man Alive.” This apparently feels right to the winner, but the mysterious man has no memory of who he is. The closest thing to his name that he could recall was “Buried Alien”.

His super-speed ability originated from something called “Hyperspeed.” Mr. Alien went on to take the name of “FastForward” and continue running around the Marvel universe for a while.

One Last Run

FastForward would later run in the galactic race, but he turns away from the lead to stop another racer from cheating. Following his defeat in the first race, Makkari went into training so he could reenter at the higher tier.

Although Makkari ends up victorious due to Buried turning back, Makkari was going so fast he was unable to slow back down. So, Makkari and Buried arrange a deal — in exchange for FastForward helping Makkari to slow down, Makkari will help Buried get back to his universe. Buried Alien left the Marvel Universe back in 1994.

There is, of course, the small trouble of licensing. Because Barry Allen is owned by DC, he cannot simply jump to Marvel without a lot of careful legal talk. So this is technically not Barry Allen. Like Clark Kent is not technically Superman and Steve Rogers is not technically Captain America. So, other than works like the fantastic JLA/Avengers crossover or Amalgam Universe, Barry Allen has never been involved with Marvel. Technically.