— 𝒮 —

𝐒𝐎𝐏𝐇𝐈𝐀 𝐆𝐈𝐆𝐆𝐋𝐄𝐃 𝐀𝐓 the movie that she and Cisco were watching in the middle of the Cortex, eliciting a grin from the boy next to her.

Cisco popped a piece of popcorn into his mouth, then letting out his own laugh for the scene. "Buster Keaton. Guy was a genius."

"Yup," she chuckled in agreement.

Cisco shook his head as he turned to her, a small scoff escaping his lips. "In the whole almost three years we've been best friends, I can't believe you've never seen this. I gotta make you a must-see movie list, pronto."

"Please do." She nodded. "And while I love spending time with you, Cisco, isn't your brother hosting a dinner you said you'd go to?"

"Yeah," he sighed, "so I was gonna ask you to come with me, but then I got a much better idea."

"Which was?"

A grin spread onto Cisco's face. "To not go at all."

She rolled her eyes in amusement. "I assume things aren't any better with your family?"

He only lifted his eyebrows as he pointed to the TV they had dragged into the middle of the room. "You're missing the movie."

She turned back to face the movie, mumbling, "Right, sorry."

Cisco sighed, and she moved her gaze back to him. "Okay, I'm gonna be honest with you. Things have actually been pretty fantastic . . . since I stopped seeing them so much."

She put a hand on his shoulder, her lips turning down into a frown. As humorous as he was trying to sound, she knew the topic of his family was no laughing matter. "Oh, Cisco . . ."

Their attention was then drawn away from their conversation as a beep sounded from the main desk, and Cisco immediately got up from his spot to see what was happening.

He glanced at the computer for a moment before telling her, "Silent alarm has been tripped at the Central City Morgue."

"Why would anyone wanna rob a morgue?" Sophia questioned as she got up and came to his side. "What's going on?" she said into the microphone as soon as she saw the GPS tracker on Barry's suit showing that he was there. "What do you see?"

"A dead body."

"Barry, you're in a morgue," Cisco chided. "You're gonna have to be more specific than that."

"The coroner. He's dead."

— 𝐵 —

It was the next morning that Barry walked into the morgue yet again, though this time for his CSI job. He could hear Sophia's footsteps close behind him.

She'd been helping him on a few meta-human-related cases in the last few weeks; they had told Captain Singh that she was a specialist that was needed, and with Joe backing it up, the captain agreed. Having a supergenius with them all the time had made things a hell of a lot easier—and besides, Barry would never say no to seeing her more often.

Barry sighed as he looked around at the many officers that were scanning the area, and tried his best to manoeuvre his way around the water that, for some reason, was puddled on the ground.

Too distracted by the matter at hand, Barry didn't notice Captain Singh until he bumped into him, and in consequence, the captain's cup of coffee spilled all over the both of them.

"Allen," Captain Singh chided as he tried to wipe the drink from his coat. "My fiancé just bought me this."

"I'm so sorry, captain," Barry apologized with a small groan. Not the best way to start off the morning.

"Just help Joe find out who did this," Captain Singh instructed with a sigh, before shaking his head and walking off.

"Oh, Straw-Barry," Sophia murmured, pulling up her sleeve to cover her hand and lightly patting the milky coffee that drenched his jacket. "You should be more careful."

He gave her a small grin as he wiped the coffee with his jacket sleeve. "I'll try my best."

Joe came up to the two of them, though his gaze was focused on the water that was pooled on the ground. "What's with all the water? Did the sprinkler system go off or something?"

Barry's eyes moved up to the sprinklers that hung from the ceiling as he shook his head. "No, I checked all the sprinklers. They're all intact. But look at this."

Exchanging a look of bafflement, Sophia and Joe followed Barry over to the deceased body, which was covered in a tarp.

Barry crouched down, grabbing a pair of tweezers before picking a small, clear cube from the ground.

Sophia's eyebrows furrowed as she peered at it. "What is that, ice?"

"Mhm," he hummed in confirmation. "The coroner has multiple impact bruises on his torso . . ." Barry stepped over the body and lifted the coroner's shirt to reveal the few multiple bruises that decorated his stomach. "All the size of a tennis ball. Judging by the amount of ice and water . . ." Barry stood up, putting his hands on his hips as he continued, "I'm guessing he was killed by hail."

"Hail," Joe repeated dubiously as he looked around the room and the ceiling that shielded it. "In here?"

Barry nodded. "Yeah."

Joe's eyebrows knit together tightly as he looked back at Barry. "You think this was Snart?"

"No," Sophia interjected, shaking her head. "My cold gun couldn't have done something like this."

Barry gave her a sympathetic smile, though she only lowered her gaze to the floor, causing him to sigh.

Before they could discuss any further, Eddie came up to them, clutching a small black device in his hand.

"Joe, we got something," he informed them. "The coroner's office just installed an automated dictation system. Listen to this."

He began the recording, and a male voice spoke up, presumably the coroner's:

"Please. No more."

Then, another man's voice came up. "I'll stop when you tell me."

"Stop!" the coroner begged.

"Who killed him?"

"I know that voice," Joe realized with widened eyes. "That's Mardon."

"I want a name," Mardon continued.

Eddie's face contorted into one of confusion at the name. "Clyde Mardon's dead."

Joe shook his head quickly. "It's not Clyde. It's his brother, Mark."

"It was Detective West," the coroner admitted. "He shot him. Detective Joe West killed your brother."

Barry's heart stopped.

"And he will pay for what he did."

— 𝐵 —

The three were back in STAR Labs, the mugshots of Clyde and Mark Mardon being displayed on the monitor. They had just explained what they had found with the corpse in the morgue, along with the most important of all: the recording.

Caitlin stood in front of the monitor, her eyebrows furrowed. "So Clyde Mardon has a brother?"

Sophia nodded, a small frown tugging at her lips as she explained, "And both brothers survived the plane crash, and then the dark matter released from the particle accelerator explosion . . . affects them both in virtually the same way."

"Yeah, only Mark's powers seem to be a lot more precise." Barry, who was standing next to her in front of the main desk, shook his head. "To be able to control the weather like that indoors . . ."

"You'd have to be a Weather Wizard. Ooh." Cisco grinned, lifting his red slushie to his mouth. "Been waiting since week one to use that one." He suddenly closed his eyes, letting out a groan of pain, "Mm!"

"Trigeminal headache?" Caitlin asked with raised eyebrows as she sat down next to him at the desk.

Cisco's face scrunched up. "What?"

"Trigeminal headache," she repeated with a shrug. "Brain freeze."

"Then why didn't you just call it brain freeze?"

Joe walked over to them, letting out a sigh before pointing out, "Guess running around a twister in the opposite direction isn't gonna do the trick this time."

Cisco put a hand to his forehead, drawing their attention toward him. "I just remembered, during our run-in with Mardon—Clyde Mardon . . ." he began. "I was tinkering with something to help attract unbound atmospheric electrons."

Sophia raised her eyebrows as she turned to him. "Like a grounding mechanism?"

"Yeah," Cisco confirmed with a nod. "The only way Mardon can control the weather is if he can tap into the atmosphere's natural electrical circuit."

"And if we take away that circuit," she finished for him, "clear skies."

Joe's phone buzzed, and he grabbed it before telling them, "Singh's checking in. I gotta go."

Barry nodded towards him. "Yeah, we'll meet you at the station."

"Joe. We'll find Mardon," Dr. Wells reassured him as he rolled up. "Don't worry."

"I'm not worried at all." Joe shook his head, glancing at the man before heading out of the Cortex.

Dr. Wells watched him as he left, a twinkle of interest in his blue eyes. "Well, he's taking being targeted by a revenge-seeking meta-human rather well, I must say. Don't worry, Barry. Joe will be fine. I promise."

"Yeah." Barry nodded. "No, I know."

Everyone soon filtered out of the Cortex. When it was only him and Sophia left in the room, he remembered something he had wanted to bring up to her. So, he turned to her with a sigh.

"Soph, I actually wanted to talk to you about something else. Look, last night, on my way to the morgue . . . I saw something."

Her eyebrows furrowed in concern as she folded her arms. "What'd you see?"

"I was running and I turned and I saw myself. Or, I don't know, another Flash." He let out another sigh. "Running beside me."

"That's . . . weird."

"Yeah," he agreed with a frown. "What do you think it was?"

She thought for a moment before shrugging. "It could have been an illusion, a mirroring effect caused by wind shear and light. A speed mirage, you could say."

Barry thought back to the memory. He knew for sure it wasn't anything like that . . .

"It didn't seem like that," Barry replied with a shake of the head. "It was . . . He seemed real."

Sophia sighed. "You know Barry . . . we should focus on Mardon first. Then, we can talk to everyone and figure this out. Okay?"

He nodded.

"We should probably get to CCPD," she pointed out.

Barry gave another nod and gestured for her to follow him out to the parking lot.

As he slid into the driver's seat, he shook his head. Sophia was right—he had to put all his attention on Mardon. Joe was counting on him, after all. This reflection, speed mirage, whatever it was—it wasn't anything threatening, as far as he could tell. It could wait.

He started the ignition, and then changed the radio from the news to the top forty. He was in dire need of positive thoughts. And luckily, he had a good topic change: "On a lighter note, I've been thinking."

"That's never a good thing."

"Hey!" He laughed as he turned out of the parking lot, eliciting a grin from her. "Anyway, I've come up with a few different name ideas."

Since Sophia had come up with quite a few different berry-related nicknames for Barry, he had made it his personal mission to find a nickname just as bad for her over the last couple of days. However, his last few attempts were . . . not great, admittedly (he had even received boos and popcorn thrown at him when Cisco was around to hear). So far, there have been Phie, So-So, Soap . . . Not his finest work.

"I don't like it."

Barry scoffed. "I didn't even say them yet!"

"I just know." Sophia tapped the side of her temple. "Okay, okay, what are they?"

Barry grinned before beginning, "First: Phi-Phi."

"Absolutely not."

"Dammit. Soapie."

"If I didn't like 'Soap,' what made you think that I would like that?"

"So."

"That's gonna get confusing, real fast."

"Phia, Sophi-phi, Soph-Soph."

"No. No. No."

"Seriously?"

"Barry," she laughed. "Please do not tell me you seriously wanna call me Soph-Soph."

"Okay, fine. Snowpea."

She immediately shuddered, crinkling her nose in disgust as she muttered, "Ugh, I hate snowpeas, they're gross."

Bingo.

"Snowpea it is." Barry grinned in satisfaction, leaning back in his seat as he continued to drive.

"Ba—no! I just—no!" she complained in outrage, folding her arms.

"What's that, Snowpea?" he asked innocently, shooting her a wink.

"Hmph," she huffed, leaning back in her seat, though the corners of her lips tugged upwards.

About eight minutes later, they arrived at CCPD and headed straight to Captain Singh's office.

Eddie, Joe, and the captain were already occupying the room by the time they entered, all of them seeming to be waiting for Barry and her arrival.

"Where we at?" Eddie questioned as soon as they had settled in.

Singh sat down at his desk, opening the folder to see as he informed them, "No one saw anything. We're canvassing known associates, seeing if he reached out to anybody."

"Maybe we can get a lead on where he is," Joe suggested with a nod.

Singh looked up at him, his eyebrows furrowing. "Why don't we let Thawne do that?"

Joe's eyebrows knit together tightly as he pointed out, "Nobody knows the Mardon brothers better than I do; Chyre and I tracked them for years. I know how they think."

"Which is why you should coordinate the investigation from here," Singh added as he gave him a tight smile before gesturing for them to go.

The four of them left the office, though they stopped in their tracks only a couple of moments later as they saw Iris approach.

Joe huddled the group closer together, keeping an eye on her as he murmured, "If you guys wanna keep that smile on that pretty face . . . she doesn't hear about any of this."

They gave a nod of understanding just as she came up to them. She had a wide smile on her face as she leaned over and gave Joe a hug.

"Hey, Dad."

"Hey, sweetheart," he murmured as he patted her on the back before pulling away.

She turned to her boyfriend, giving him a sweet smile as she greeted, "Hi."

"Hey," Eddie muttered before he quickly brushed past her and headed straight to his desk.

She watched him walk for a couple of moments with a frown before turning back towards them, plastering her smile back on. "So, what are you guys working on? You got any good leads for an honest reporter?"

Barry shook his head quickly, giving Joe a side glance before telling her, "Uh, things are actually pretty quiet around here right now."

"Ah." She nodded before looking back over to Eddie, who was silently working at his desk. "Can you guys give me a minute?"

Joe nodded. "Yeah, we were gonna go grab lunch."

Barry's eyebrows furrowed as he turned to him. "We were?"

Sophia elbowed him lightly, causing a look of realization to dawn on his face as he nodded. "Right. Yeah. Yeah."

"Duh." Joe waved goodbye to his daughter as they left.

The three of them got into Joe's car, Barry being in the passenger's seat while Sophia sat in the middle of the back.

Barry spoke up as Joe began to drive, "So you want to talk about what's been going on with you?"

Joe's eyebrows furrowed, but he kept his gaze on the road. "What do you think is going on with me?"

"You seem a bit cavalier . . ." Barry answered slowly, "considering what we're up against."

"We aren't up against anything."

Barry sighed. "Joe, come on."

Joe shook his head as he reassured them, "Look, I'm fine. Can we just change the subject, please?"

"Yeah," Sophia answered, awkwardly nodding. "What's . . . up?"

Barry looked back at her, his eyebrows raised as he sent her an amused smile, causing her to swat his arm, and his smile only broadened.

Suddenly interrupting their smooth drive, the darkening clouds gathered atop and rain began to pound on the windshield, only growing stronger with each drop. Thunder began to roar, and lightning flashed throughout the grey clouds.

Barry and Joe continued to talk, though Sophia remained silent for a few minutes.

"Hey, guys?" Sophia interjected with a frown.

Barry turned to her, his eyebrows furrowing. "Hm?"

"I think—" She swallowed hard, glancing around her. "I think Mardon might be here."

Joe let out a small chuckle. "No . . . there's no way."

"It's not supposed to be raining this much," Sophia pointed out as she leaned forward and turned the radio dial, changing it to one that was talking about the weather.

"It's another beautiful day here in Central City. Not a cloud . . ."

Sophia turned it off. "Mardon."

The car slowed down to a stop as Joe realized that she was right, and they looked through the back window to see another car pulling up behind them.

Mark Mardon closed his fist, staring at them dead-on.

Barry quickly sped the three of them out of the car and threw them onto the wet grass next to the sidewalk.

A split second later, they watched as Joe's car went up in flames, the lightning having struck it the moment they had escaped.

— 𝐵 —

Once they arrived back at CCPD, the three informed Captain Singh of the event, and he most definitely did not take that well (but who would?).

"You're confined to the precinct until Mardon's caught."

"David, you said it," Joe protested as they walked to the office, "that son of a bitch killed my partner."

"And I'm not gonna lose you the way I lost Fred Chyre," Singh sighed as he paused in his step and turned to them. "Look, I can't stop you from being pissed, Joe. But I can keep you safe. Maybe your daughter can contact the Flash."

"I'm not getting her involved in this."

Singh let out another sigh before leaning towards Barry. "Allen, make sure he doesn't go anywhere." He raised his eyebrows before turning around, allowing Joe no chance to argue as he headed back to his office.

"I need to be out there," Joe complained as the three walked towards his desk.

Barry exchanged a short glance with Sophia before folding his arms. "Joe, you're always the first one to tell me when I'm not thinking clearly."

"I took down Clyde," Joe said firmly as he sat down in his chair. "I can take down his dirtbag brother too."

"You didn't do that alone, remember?" Barry reminded him with lifted eyebrows.

"You're right." Joe sighed. He looked around at the busy room of officers before questioning, "How are any of these guys gonna protect me? They don't know—they don't know what Mardon's capable of."

Sophia grinned. "All right, well, lucky for you, your friends at STAR Labs do." 

— 𝒮 —

Cisco lifted his creation from its holder, it being a metal device that was about the length of his forearm. He put it in front of him for Sophia, Dr. Wells, Caitlin, and Barry to see.

"I call it the Wizard's Wand," Cisco introduced, winking over to Sophia, who let out a small giggle at the name.

"Subtle," Dr. Wells chuckled. "How does it work?"

Cisco flipped it so that he was holding it vertically. "Just think of it like an active lightning rod. Point it at the sky and it'll suck up whatever energy's floating around it like a sponge."

He handed it to Barry, who then examined it as he asked, "And it'll stop Mardon?"

"It'll slow him down," Cisco confirmed as Barry pretended to use it as if it were a baseball bat, a grin on his face as he did so. He continued as Barry handed it back to him, "If there's no atmospheric electrons available to him . . . there's no way to control the weather."

"Good work, Cisco. As always." Dr. Wells gave him a smile before beginning to roll away. "Excuse me. I'm gonna go stretch my legs."

Sophia's smile faded as she turned to Barry and inspected his bothered face. She folded her arms, her eyebrows furrowing. "You okay? You seem a little off."

He gave a small chuckle as he looked at her. "Yeah, uh, somebody at Picture News got it into Iris' head that something suspicious is going on with Dr. Wells."

"Like what?" Sophia questioned, her expression only growing more baffled while Cisco came up beside her.

Barry sighed. "That he knows what happened to Simon Stagg. Nobody has heard from him or seen him since the night I stopped Danton Black."

Sophia exchanged a look with Cisco. Could Joe have been right? "What did you tell her?"

"That she's wrong," Barry answered with a shrug. "And she is."

Cisco's face grew troubled, and Sophia turned to him as he began to walk towards the exit.

"Cisco?" she called, causing him to stop and turn towards her. "Where are you going?"

"I . . ." Cisco glanced over to Barry before clearing his throat. "I'm going to go talk to Joe."

"Okay, could you bring this to him?" Sophia grabbed the Wizard's Wand and tossed it to him. "He might need it."

— 𝒮 —

Sophia was at her apartment (for once), lounged on her couch as she scrolled through Instagram, giggling at the videos of cute dogs that came up on her feed.

She sighed as she nodded her head back and smiled. She should get a dog. . . . Wait, no, she suddenly realized, she wouldn't be able to take care of it, she was never home. . . .

She jerked slightly out of surprise as her phone began to ring, though she relaxed when she saw that it was Barry's contact that popped up.

She smiled as her eyes gazed over the photo for a moment, which was one of when he had stolen her phone and spammed it with photos of him pulling silly faces. This one consisted of only the upper half of his face as it hovered over the camera, his nose and eyes being very prominent.

Sophia accepted the call and brought her phone up to her ear as she greeted, "Hey, what's up?"

"Where were you?"

"Huh?" Her eyebrows furrowed as she straightened up. "What do you mean?"

"Mardon just attacked CCPD."

The confusion was replaced by panic. "What? When?"

"Twenty minutes ago."

"Are you—no one told—I'm at home!" she quickly excused as she got up. "Is everyone okay? Is Joe okay?"

"No . . . Captain Singh got hurt," Barry sighed. "Joe, his fiancé, and I are waiting at the hospital."

Sophia nodded, turning on her heel to look for where she had placed her car keys. "I'll be there in fifteen minutes."

Before she could spot her keys, however, she found herself suddenly in front of the hospital, with her hair a little messier and her stomach a little nauseous.

"Hey," Barry greeted grimly as she fixed her hair.

"Hi," she sighed, a frown tugging on her lips as they began to walk in.

They stepped into the waiting room, where Joe and a man, who she assumed to be Captain Singh's soon-to-be husband, were anxiously waiting.

Sophia shifted closer to Barry, their shoulders brushing as she murmured, "What happened?"

"Well, Mardon came to kill Joe, but the cops were all firing at him. He used some kind of wind to redirect it back at them, and the glass shattered, which . . . hit Captain Singh," Barry sighed. "But then I used Cisco's Wizard's Wand, and it worked, so Mardon left."

All of a sudden, the doctor came out of Captain Singh's room, a clipboard pressed against her chest.

Exchanging nervous glances, the four of them came up to her, and Barry spoke, "How is he, doctor?"

She gave a sympathetic smile. "We're stabilizing him. He's experiencing some paralysis in his lower extremities. The hardest thing to gauge is the extent of his neurocognitive deficits. So he may not be the same person you remember."

Sophia placed a hand over her mouth, her eyes wide.

Captain Singh's fiancé had tears welling in his eyes as he asked, "Can I see him?"

She shook her head. "I'm sorry. Visitation's for family only."

"Being his fiancé makes him family, doctor," Joe interjected.

"Ah." She gave a nod of understanding as she gestured to the door. "Sure."

"Will he be able to return to the force?" Barry asked tentatively, his eyes glancing over to the door with worry.

"I'm actually not sure he'll be able to walk again," she sighed before walking away, leaving the three of them in a stunned silence.

Sophia sighed, rubbing her eyes. If only she had been at STAR Labs, maybe she could've helped . . . .

Unable to speak, she walked away, wanting to head back to the Cortex and figure out what to do. Should she yell at Cisco for not telling her? Find Mardon? Ah, what the hell, she'll do both.

"Soph!" Barry called as he jogged up to her. "Where are you going?"

"STAR—"

Sophia felt a pair of hands wrap around her arms, and then a gust of wind on her face.

"—Labs. Dammit, Barry, tell me that you're doing that before you do it, will you?" Sophia fixed her hair once again as they stopped at the destination she was heading for herself.

"Next time, Snowpea," he promised with a smile. "Anyway, why'd you wanna come here?"

She stared at him for a second before pointing out, "We need to find Mardon."

"Well yeah, obviously." Barry nodded. "But why all of a sudden?"

"I feel bad. I shouldn't have gone home, maybe I could've helped you and Singh wouldn't be like this." Sophia walked over to the side desk as she shook her head.

"Wha—this isn't your fault. You know that, right?" Barry furrowed his eyebrows as he followed her.

"I'm the one with the genius brain, I could've figured something out," she muttered while picking up a pen and twirling it through her fingers as Barry sat to her right. "Then no one would've gotten hurt, and Mardon would be in the Pipeline right now."

"Snowpea, you can't blame yourself for something you couldn't control." Barry put his hand on her shoulder, the touch bringing butterflies to her stomach. Dammit, not right now, heart. "You didn't know."

"I should've."

Then, the thud of footsteps alerted them of a new presence. Sophia looked up to see Cisco walk into the Cortex, his eyes glued to his phone.

"Soph," Cisco spoke, "I want—" He suddenly paused as he saw that Barry was there and he pressed his lips together.

"What's wrong?" Sophia questioned, her eyebrows furrowing.

"Oh, nothing." Cisco cleared his throat. "So what happened with Mardon?"

"He got away." Barry shook his head, a sigh escaping his lips as he leaned back in his chair. "And Captain Singh . . . He got hurt in the process."

"Aw, man," Cisco exhaled, running a hand through his hair. "That sucks."

There was a brief moment of silence before both Cisco and Barry spoke simultaneously:

"Anyway, Soph, I wanted to show—"

"Sophia, could I talk to you for—"

Sophia between the two men, her eyebrows furrowing. "Uh . . ."

"Go to him, I'll do my thing by myself." Cisco nodded before quickly leaving to do whatever it was he wanted to do.

Sophia turned to face Barry, leaning back in her seat as she raised her eyebrows. "What's up?"

His eyes studied her face carefully. "Are you okay?"

"I mean . . . Captain Singh's still paralyzed, Joe's still in danger, Mardon's still out there . . . Not a lot to be okay about," she gave a small chuckle. "But I'm fine."

Barry was silent for a moment before he asked, "Snowpea, do you remember how I was going to ask you something some time ago?"

"You have to be more specific than that," she pointed out with a laugh. "You ask me many things."

He smiled. "Right before you went to Jitters and got . . . kidnapped."

"Oh . . ." She narrowed her eyes before nodding. "Yeah. I remember. Why?"

"I was just going to ask . . ." Barry hesitated for a moment, licking his lips as his eyes grew nervous. "Well . . . I guess I should tell you first . . . Okay. I'll just go for it. Soph, I like you. A lot. As in . . . I have feelings for you. And I know this is probably, like, the most terrible time to tell you, but if I don't now, then I never will."

"Huh?" was all she could manage to say. Her heart both felt like it was beating at a hundred miles per hour and not at all, simultaneously. The butterflies she was so used to increased tenfold, and she was almost afraid that there were so many that one might somehow come out of her mouth.

"It's . . . it's okay if you don't . . ." Barry's expression had become crestfallen, though he seemed to muster up a small smile.

She quickly shook her head. "No, I'm . . . I do. Like you."

His eyes widened. "You do?"

"I do."

Suddenly, Barry's phone rang, drawing both of their attention to that.

His eyebrows furrowed as he accepted the call and brought the phone to his ear. "Hey, what's—whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down!" His eyebrows furrowed as the caller spoke. "Holy—okay, I'll be there in a second."

"What's happening?" Sophia asked worriedly as he hung up and got to his feet.

"Mardon has Joe, and now he's creating some kind of tidal wave along the coastline," Barry informed her quickly as she followed him towards the mannequins.

"Oh my God," she breathed out. "Do you think you can manage to—"

"As long as I have you on the comms," Barry said as he placed his hands on her shoulders, "everything will be fine."

Sophia swallowed. Way to put pressure on her. "Barry, please don't die."

"I'll try my best." He gazed down at her for a moment, his eyes fixated on her own.

And after what felt like both a second and a million years, he leaned in and pressed his lips on hers.

His hands slid from her shoulders to her cheeks, the warmth of his hands seeping into her skin as he tilted his head. She felt as if a thousand volts of lightning were going through her body as they kissed, and it wasn't from the fact that he was the Flash.

They broke apart after a moment and the reality of what was happening returned to their minds.

"Be careful," she whispered.

He gave her a reassuring smile as he nodded, and gave another quick kiss to her lips. A flash of red and a gust of wind later, he and his suit were gone.

Sophia rushed over to the comms, turning the mic on. She thought for a moment, biting on her lower lip.

How could they prevent a tidal wave from hitting the city?

— 𝐵 —

Barry arrived at the coastline of Central City, his heart dropping as he saw the tidal wave that was making its way over, it being more than twenty feet tall.

He spoke through his microphone, "Snowpea, you got anything?"

"One second, one second . . ." Her voice came through his earpiece, the sound of it automatically causing his nerves to die down and his shoulders to relax. "All right, theoretically, if you can create a vortex barrier along the coastline, a wall of wind . . . that would sap the tidal wave of its energy before it hits the city. By running back and forth."

"How fast?" Barry furrowed his eyebrows, an uneasy feeling seeping onto him as he watched the tidal wave grow closer.

"I don't know if you can run that fast. Barry, be—"

"Careful," he finished for her with a smile. "Got it."

Determined, he began to run along the coastline, all of his surroundings becoming a blur of blue, green and white.

Wind began to fly in the opposite direction of the tidal wave as he ran back and forth, doing exactly as Sophia said it would. Despite the wind, the tidal wave was still edging closer to the city.

He needed to go faster.

With a yell, he willed for all his energy and ran faster than he ever has before, the strong wind pushing on his face feeling like a heavy block of metal.

He needed to save Joe. Faster.

Suddenly, he emerged into darkness, the bay having turned into city. He passed the bright building lights and street signs as he continued to run, confusion taking over him. Where was he? What happened?

Then he looked to his right, seeing a reflection—no, seeing another him running along his side, a look of pure bafflement taking the other's face before he went a different way.

Wait a second . . .

Barry continued to run, before slowing down to a stop on the side of a street and looking around to analyze his surroundings.

A digital clock that was hanging from a building showed that it was ten in the evening with its glowing red numbers. Two dogs, being pulled by their owners, were barking at each other right under the clock, obviously not very happy with each other. A man was spinning a bright green sign, promoting some kind of special for a club.

Barry shook his head with fear as he realized what was going on. This was the same exact thing he saw last night when he was going to the morgue.

"Taxi! Taxi! Oh, come on, I'm gonna be late!" a woman shouted from nearby, infuriated as a taxi passed by her. That was the same woman.

Barry exhaled. "Oh, boy."