— 𝐵 —

"𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 𝐈𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐖𝐍𝐄?"

Barry closed the file that he had been sharing with Joe and looked to Captain Singh, who had just left his office and entered the bullpen.

Barry glanced at Joe. How were they supposed to say 'He was captured by the Reverse-Flash and taken to God-knows-where?'

"He took some personal time," Joe lied.

Barry placed the file on Joe's desk before tucking his hand into his pocket and turning to the captain. "Yeah, uh, Eddie's been going through some stuff, captain."

"Yeah, aren't we all?" Captain Singh scoffed. Luckily, he didn't push any further. He sighed before looking towards Joe and questioning, "You got anything on these gold-store robberies? Perps hit up two more in the last week, and we got nothing."

"We're working on it," Joe reassured him.

"Yeah," Barry added, "just waiting on final results from the lab."

"All right, well, pick up the pace," the captain chided. "And see if somebody can contact the Flash, maybe he can help speed things up."

Barry sighed. Oh, the irony.

"You know what I mean," the captain muttered. "Get going."

Barry turned back to face Joe as the captain walked away, and Joe gave him a pleading expression.

"Anything?"

"No," Barry sighed, a pained expression coming onto his face as he shrugged. "I mean, I've looked everywhere."

Joe groaned softly as he tilted his head up. "Keep looking."

Barry nodded. "Of course, yeah."

— 𝒮 —

Sophia sighed as she leaned back in her chair, glancing around at the empty Cortex before returning her gaze to the book she was reading: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë.

She was using the good ten minutes of Cisco being away to have some personal time—she hadn't had any of that in a long time.

Her attention was ripped away by the ringing of her phone, and a smile came onto her face when she saw that it was Barry.

"Hey, babe," she answered as she put her book down. "What's up?"

"Hey, Snowpea. You doing okay?"

"Yeah," she sighed, peering around the room. "Cisco left to do something, and Caitlin . . . also went to do something. I'm alone."

"Need company?"

"Aren't you at work?" she laughed.

"I'm coming to STAR Labs in a couple of minutes, anyway."

"Do what you're paid to do for the rest of your few minutes, Blue-Barry," she chided playfully, crossing one leg over the other. "No, it's fine, I'm just reading."

"Aw, but I love watching you read."

Her nose wrinkled. "That's creepy."

"You know what I mean," he laughed. "Anyway, the last couple of days have been . . . I'll go with stressful, and I was thinking, maybe we should just grab some dinner together? Little date?"

Her eyebrows furrowed. "Do we have time for that?"

"Just for half an hour."

She pressed her lips together. They had been spending every hour of the past couple of days on finding Wells, so a nice thirty-minute date sounded great to her. "Yeah, sounds good. Don't expect me to get all dolled up, though."

"I didn't think you could get any prettier than you are right now."

"You can't even see me." Her cheeks heated, though she chided once more, "Do your work."

She could hear the grin in his voice as he replied, "Got it."

She smiled, reaching out to grab her book. "Bye."

"Bye, sweetheart."

She smiled as she ended the call and tucked her phone back into her pocket. She quickly grabbed her book, relaxing back into her chair as she picked up where she left off.

Her reading, however, was interrupted a few minutes later by the sound of footsteps and clanging. Her eyebrows furrowed, she peered towards the entrance to see Cisco walking in, a cardboard box in hand.

She put her book back down and stood up, now intrigued. She squinted her eyes to see that inside the box were the cameras that Wells had used to watch their every move.

She rolled her eyes. She wasn't that surprised that Cisco had jumped at the chance to get more tech, but still. That was a box full of deception and lies.

"Cisco," she sighed, folding her arms as she walked around the side desk and towards him. "What. Is. That?"

He shrugged as he placed the box on the main desk. "All the cameras Wells used to watch us."

"You're keeping those?" she questioned incredulously. "I thought we were going to throw them out!"

"It's good tech, Soph!" he exclaimed as he sat down and grabbed a screwdriver.

"Yeah, but . . ." Sophia crinkled her nose as she sat on the edge of the main desk, watching as Cisco unscrewed one of the screws. "It's creepy."

He shrugged, glancing up at her as he moved his screwdriver to the next screw. "I'll take whatever I can get, creepy or not."

"And you're gonna use all those cameras?" she questioned dubiously as she looked at the pile on the desk. She took a moment to count, though she stopped after ten. "That's a lot."

"Yeah, well, it'd be helpful if a literal genius could help me!"

She laughed, though before she could respond, another voice chimed in:

"Hey," Barry greeted as he entered. His eyebrows furrowed as he seemed to take notice of what Cisco was doing. "You planning on keeping all those cameras Wells used to spy on us?" He walked around the desk, kissing Sophia's cheek before raising his eyebrows at Cisco. "Kind of creepy, don't you think?"

"That's what I said!" Sophia exclaimed, only receiving a hard glare from Cisco in return.

"First rule of mechanical engineering, dudes," Cisco replied, continuing his work. "Never waste good tech."

Their attention quickly drew to the monitor as it began to beep, and all three of them exchanged worried looks before peering into the screen. The map quickly moved to Central City Gold Reserve, and a red circle focused on it.

Sophia narrowed her eyes. "Central City Gold Reserve's under attack."

"Gold?" Barry repeated, his eyebrows furrowing. "That's the case Singh wants us on." He tilted his head, the corner of his lip tugging upward. "I'll be right back."

Sophia winced as a gust of wind and a pile of papers flew at them, and she quickly fixed her hair before taking the seat next to Cisco. She typed into the computer and quickly got the security footage pulled up, Cisco leaning over her shoulder.

It was in a parking lot, with military-grade vehicles all lined up behind the building. Hiding behind them were officers, who were both shooting at the attacker and being shot at.

The attacker was walking towards them as he shot mercilessly, next to a vehicle that had blown up from the inside and now had a fire raging along the seats. He wore full-body armour, along with a helmet that covered his entire face.

Sophia let out a small gasp as she watched one of the officers fall to the ground—he had been hit—though the other one only shifted back and continued to shoot.

The attacker stopped shooting as soon as Barry appeared in front of him.

"You picked a bad day for this, pal."

Barry began to advance toward the attacker, though he suddenly stopped and grabbed at his head.

Sophia's eyebrows furrowed in concern as she leaned forward, hearing his groans coming over the comms as he watched him stumble around and clutch at his head. He fell to the ground, trembling and squirming.

"What the hell is happening?" she murmured to Cisco, who seemed just as concerned as her as he shifted forward.

"Look at that guy." He pointed towards the attacker, who had doubled over.

The attacker suddenly straightened up and stared at Barry for a moment before turning and running away.

"Hey, guys. What's—is everything okay?"

"Something happened to Barry," answered Sophia to Caitlin, who was now peering over at the footage with widened eyes. "He got close to the thief, and then . . ."

They watched as Barry struggled to get to his feet, rubbing his head, before he suddenly disappeared from the footage. The whoosh of wind and the blowing of their hair told them that he had arrived.

"Barry!" Sophia got to her feet and hurried over to where he was standing in the middle of the Cortex. She used her index finger to tilt his chin up as she examined his face, watching as he rubbed his head again. "What happened? Are you okay?"

While the other two clustered behind her, Barry sighed and answered, "I don't know, when I—when I got close to him, I saw this . . . vision."

"Vision?" Cisco echoed with furrowed eyebrows. "What do you mean?"

"Like someone else's memories," he clarified.

"Come on," Caitlin muttered as she grabbed his arm and pulled him towards the Med Lab. "I need to check you."

Sophia and Cisco stood at the back of the Med Lab while Barry sat in one of the chairs, and Caitlin rifled through her equipment on the metal table beside him.

She grabbed a flashlight and checked both of his eyes before sighing as she shut it off. "Your eye movement is normal. No signs of neurological damage."

Cisco folded his arms. "Do you think the thief might have been a meta-human who put the whammy on you or something?

"I don't know. When Rainbow Raider got in my head" —Barry shrugged— "all I felt was anger. But this was not that. This was . . . just overwhelming fear."

Cisco, who had stepped out of the lab and sat at the nearest desk, gave a small hum. They looked over to see that he had pulled up a replay of the footage, which showed Barry on the ground and the attacker squirming.

"Huh. Looks like when you went down, the thief got disoriented, too."

"Maybe . . ." Barry shook his head and shrugged. "We both got whammied."

"Then you know how it feels."

Sophia's head whipped around to see that Iris had entered the Cortex, and her eyes widened; Barry still had the suit on.

Though, Iris didn't seem all that surprised about it as she stared at Barry, who wore the same expression of shock as Sophia.

"Hi, Barry . . ." she began as she continued forward, her eyes set on his, "or should I say, the Flash?"

"Iris . . . I . . ." Barry swallowed, clearly trying to think of something to reply with, though it was also obvious that his mind was drawing a blank. "Can we . . . Let me explain . . ."

Sophia exchanged a nervous look with Cisco as Barry got up, running a gloved hand through his hair as he gestured for Iris to follow. The pair, silently, headed into the training room.

Sophia and Caitlin followed Cisco as he headed towards the main desk. He clicked on the security footage of the training room and wrinkled his nose. "This is one of the few times I would not wanna be Barry Allen."

"I wonder what he's gonna say," Caitlin murmured with a raised eyebrow.

Squinting his eyes, Cisco slowly said, "We should absolutely not listen in."

"It's none of our business," Sophia agreed with a nod. Though, as she glanced over her shoulder toward the training room, she couldn't help but feel a bit of curiosity. "But . . . the Flash is our business."

"And Iris did just find out Barry's the Flash," Cisco continued.

"So by transitive property, Barry and Iris are our business," Caitlin concluded.

After exchanging awkward smiles, Caitlin reached forward and clicked the mic button on the screen.

Barry had been pacing around, his face scrunched up as he stammered, "I . . . How did you find out?"

Iris, who was sitting on the edge of the treadmill, clasped her hands together. "When I touched . . . the Flash . . . the other night, I felt a jolt of electricity. The only other time I've felt anything like that was when you were in a coma—after the accident."

Clearly frustrated, Barry shut his eyes and rubbed his face.

Iris let out a humourless chuckle. "I can't believe I didn't figure it out sooner."

"I can only imagine how angry you are," Barry sighed.

"I'm not angry, Barry. I'm just disappointed."

Barry nodded, shutting his eyes once more as he whispered, "Okay."

"Does Eddie know?"

Barry walked around the treadmill before pausing, and he sighed before admitting, "Yes. He does."

Iris kept her eyes on the floor as she raised her brows. "Is that why he got kidnapped?"

"No," Barry answered, scrunching his face as he rubbed his head. "I don't know why Wells took Eddie. I—"

"Dr. Wells is the Man in Yellow?"

"Everything he's been doing . . . helping me . . . it was all a lie. Wells killed my mom."

Iris pressed her lips together, and though it was hard to see through the small monitor, it seemed as though her eyes were growing teary. "Is he gonna kill Eddie?"

"No, he's not," Barry instantly reassured her. "I'm gonna get Eddie back. I swear."

"Yeah, the Flash said the same thing."

"Look, Iris, you have to believe me! There were so many times I wanted to tell you! You were the first person I wanted to tell, but then everything started getting crazy. And I thought maybe Joe was right—"

"Wait, wait, wait," Iris interrupted, her eyebrows furrowing. "You're telling me that my dad knew . . . and he told you not to tell me?"

"He was trying to protect you. We both were."

"Yeah, well, maybe it's time you both stopped."

And with that, Iris got up and headed towards the door.

Immediately, the three of them rushed to look like they were busied by something; Cisco grabbed the phone receiver and brought it up to his ear while Caitlin and Sophia leaned against the desk and immersed themself in a conversation about seals.

"Yeah, uh-huh," Cisco murmured to the non-existent person on the other line, a grin plastered onto his face. "Yeah, if we could get another shipment of the, uh, of the computers in here."

As soon as Iris stormed out of the Cortex, Cisco lowered the phone and Sophia and Caitlin ended their fake conversation.

"Yeah," Cisco muttered to them, "I don't think that had anything to do with us."

Caitlin shook her head. "Nope."

Sophia sighed as she peered into the training room, where Barry was sitting down on the edge of the treadmill, his head in his hands.

She muttered for the other two to excuse her before heading towards him, though she remained quiet as she sat down next to him.

After a few moments of stillness, Barry lifted his head, his face pink and his eyes moist. "I can't believe this is happening."

Sophia frowned as she placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. "I think it's . . . good that she knows."

"She's in as much danger as the rest of you guys now," he pointed out with a scoff. "It's not good."

"Yeah, but the stress that you, Joe, and Eddie have been getting from not telling her was so overwhelming . . . Besides, I'm sure she would've found out eventually," she reasoned, shrugging. "There was a ninety-eight-point-six percent chance she would've, actually."

He gave her an incredulous look. "Is now really the time for statistics?"

She shrugged again. "I'm just saying."

Barry sighed before shoving his face into his hands once more. "Now, Eddie's gone, and she doesn't even believe that I can get him back. What do I do, Soph?"

Sophia smiled, patting his shoulder as she whispered, "Show her that she's wrong."

— 𝐵 —

"I just got a call from Joe," announced Barry to the three others as they headed down the hall towards the Cortex. "The Central City Gold Reserve is about to transport three hundred million dollars in gold bars to their Coast City vault." He sighed, turning to face them as they entered. "Singh told Joe they think the Man in the Mask is gonna make a play for it."

"Okay, but we still don't know if he's responsible for those weird images you saw," Caitlin pointed out.

As Barry sighed and put his hands on his hips, Cisco questioned, "How are they transporting the gold?"

Barry's upper lip curled in an ill sort of amusement. "They're using an ice-cream truck."

"Sweet," Cisco remarked before grinning. "Literally."

— 𝐵 —

"Whoa! The truck just got hit by a landmine!"

Barry felt his heart rate immediately spike at Cisco's words, and he immediately began to speed down the side of the road, feeling the wind burn his cheeks. Light rain whipped against him, though he ignored it as he let his determination drive him.

"Is Joe okay?" he asked frantically.

Sophia's sigh was loud in his ears, causing his heart to sink. "We don't know yet."

By the time he had reached the street the truck had stopped on, a few officers were already down, and the Man in the Mask was facing off with Joe, who was pointing his gun straight at him.

Barry barrelled into the Man in the Mask, causing him to fly into the side of the ice-cream truck while Joe doubled over to protect himself.

Barry glanced at the Man in the Mask, who, for now, remained unmoving on the damp pavement. As Joe walked up to him, breathing heavily, Barry asked, "You okay?"

"Yeah," Joe confirmed, fixing his gear. "You?"

"I didn't want you to have to shoot him again," Barry murmured, peering over at the Man in the Mask as he walked up to his side, Joe going to the other. "And I'm having a pretty bad day."

"So is this guy," Joe remarked. "Let's see what Goldfinger has to say for himself."

Barry watched as Joe knelt down next to the man and pulled the mask up. He only grew baffled, however, as he quickly recognized the bright blue eyes and square face.

"General Eiling?"

— 𝒮 —

Sophia folded her arms as she squinted her eyes, watching General Eiling, who was now in one of their cells in the Pipeline.

He was standing still, his feet shoulder-width apart, and was staring straight forward with a blank expression. His face was awfully bruised, and he had a bandage over the front of his left shoulder, where Joe had shot him.

"What's wrong with him?" questioned Barry, one arm up to lean against the entrance.

Caitlin nodded. "I pulled a bullet out of his shoulder—"

"Which should hurt like hell," Joe chimed in.

"—and it didn't even seem like he felt it." Caitlin sighed. "I did a complete body scan, and, otherwise, General Eiling is perfectly healthy."

"So why is he just standing there like a robot?" asked Joe.

"I just got off the phone with ARGUS," interrupted Cisco as he walked in. "Officially, Eiling is on administrative leave."

Sophia raised her eyebrows. "Unofficially . . . ?"

"I spoke with Diggle's wife, Lyla, and she said Eiling's been missing for the past three months, and ARGUS is covering up for it."

"Makes sense," Barry said, his hands now tucked into his pockets. "Last time I saw the general was when Ronnie and I broke Professor Stein out of that military facility. I'm sure they're covering that up, too."

"So where has he been since then?" mused Joe, taking a few steps towards the middle. He loudened his voice as he called, "General Eiling, why were you trying to rob the gold reserve?"

When he didn't even blink, Sophia slowly suggested, "Maybe he's in some kind of a trance?"

Barry looked from her and back to the general, and he furrowed his eyebrows. "General? Do you remember me?"

General Eiling's eyes slowly flicked up to meet Barry's, and in a low, gruff voice that Sophia didn't recognize, he growled, "Flash."

Sophia's eyebrows knit together tightly as she looked at Barry in alarm, and he quickly returned the same expression. How did the general know that Barry was the Flash?

"Ooh," Joe murmured, clearly just as worried. "How does he know you're the Flash?"

"I don't know," Barry replied hurriedly, glancing around at them before looking back at General Eiling. "General—"

"Eiling . . . not here," the general interrupted with the same growl. "Eiling . . . bad."

"Maybe it's some kind of psychotic break presenting itself as dissociative identity disorder?" Caitlin suggested quietly.

"Caitlin," General Eiling grunted, causing everyone to straighten up in surprise. "Caitlin . . . good."

The team turned to look at her, and she gave a slight shrug. "Oh, uh . . . thank you?"

"Mm. Forget multiple personalities," said Cisco, his arms folded and nose wrinkled. "You guys have seen The Exorcist, right?"

"You and your movies," Joe grumbled before nudging Barry with his finger. "Keep talking to him. He seems to respond to you."

"Uh . . ." Barry shifted his weight from one foot to the other as he slightly shook his head. "Why is Eiling bad?"

"Eiling . . . hurt me. I hurt . . . Eiling."

"Okay," Barry said softly, glancing at Joe before looking back at the general. "Uh, so, if you're not Eiling, then who are you?"

"I . . . am . . . Grodd. Fear me."

Cisco's eyebrows furrowed. "What is a Grodd?"

— 𝐵 —

"Oh," Barry said lightly, watching the video footage of Caitlin tending to a gorilla in a cage. "Grodd is a gorilla."

"Five years ago," Cisco began, sitting at the side desk, "Eiling and Wells were working on a project to expand soldiers' cognitive abilities during battle."

"What we didn't realize is that Eiling was trying to create soldiers with psychic abilities," Caitlin continued, a hand on her hip while the other leaned on the main desk.

"What do you mean, 'psychic'?" asked Joe nervously, his arms folded.

"Eiling was trying to create these super-soldiers with telepathic and telekinetic capabilities," Sophia sighed, taking a seat next to where Caitlin was standing.

"When Wells found out about the terrible experiments that Eiling was doing," continued Caitlin, "he shut down the project."

"So our psycho-killer has a soft spot for animals," Joe commented with a shrug. "That's sweet."

Barry turned back to the footage that was playing on the TV, and he gestured toward it. "What happened to . . . Grodd?"

"We don't know." Caitlin shook her head. "After the particle accelerator exploded, I went down to check on him, and . . . his cage was empty."

"So, he could've been affected by the same energy that hit Barry and Sophia," Joe realized.

"When the dark matter hit Grodd, all the drugs and serums that Eiling injected him with could've activated," Sophia confirmed grimly with a nod.

"Maybe the accelerator explosion created a meta-gorilla," Cisco chimed in, clearly struggling to hold back a smile. "I think we know what happens when a super-intelligent ape who's pissed off at humans escapes captivity."

"Cisco's right," interjected Caitlin as she sat down before scrunching her nose. "About the first part." She typed into the computer for a moment before looking up at them. "This is the first brain scan that I did on Grodd."

Barry turned to the TV to see a brain scan, and his eyebrows furrowed at the middle of it, which was lit pink against the rest of the blue.

"Whoa," he murmured. "His primary motor cortex and Broca's area are lit up like a Christmas tree."

"From Eiling's experiments," Caitlin confirmed. "And this is the brain scan that I just did on Eiling."

Grodd's brain scan moved to the side as Eiling's brain scan came next to it, and Barry's eyebrows furrowed; the general's brain scan looked identical to the gorilla's.

"His brain is lit up in the exact same way," Caitlin continued.

"So Grodd and Eiling are connected somehow," Joe murmured.

"I think that, somehow, Grodd is transmitting neural signals to Eiling's primary motor cortex," Sophia interjected, the crease between her eyebrows deepening. "Mind control. Telepathy. Who knows what Grodd is capable of now?"

"What do we think Grodd wants?" Barry asked as he folded his arms and turned to the two women. "Revenge?"

"I do not like the fact that Wells rescued Grodd," Joe said, putting his hands in his pockets. "I don't think it's a coincidence that this gorilla shows up at the very same time we're looking for Wells."

"Grodd and Wells always did have a special bond," Caitlin reasoned with a nod.

"It wouldn't surprise me if Wells was using Grodd to distract us," Joe sighed. "If we find Grodd, we find Wells. If we find Wells—"

"We find Eddie."

Barry's eyes widened as Iris stepped into the Cortex. Did this mean she'd forgiven him? Or, at least, wasn't angry?

"And I'm gonna help."

Caitlin grinned. "Know anything about gorillas?"

A smile grew on Iris' face as she nodded. "I just might."

Iris took a seat between Caitlin and Sophia, and she began to work on the computer. The other three quickly grouped around the main desk as she started:

"There have been reports of some sort of animal down in the sewers."

"Mm," Cisco hummed, holding onto the back of Sophia's chair. "Alligators . . . CHUDs . . . ROUS'." He scrunched his face in frustration when no one replied. "Am I the only one who watches movies around here?"

Iris wrinkled her nose before looking back to the computer. "Uh, a few months ago, two sewer workers went missing. The search party reported hearing strange, animal-like noises down in the tunnels."

Barry leaned against the desk, his eyebrows furrowed as he asked, "Where exactly did they go missing?"

"Uh . . . Fifth Avenue and Tenth Street."

"There's an access point to the sewers about two blocks east of that intersection," Sophia chimed in.

Barry nodded. "I'll start there."

Joe quickly straightened up. "Not alone. I'm coming, too."

"Huh." Cisco nodded his head, quipping, "Wading through miles of rats, roaches, and human excrement? Count me out."

When everyone gave him a hard glare, Cisco rolled his eyes.

"Count me in."

Joe scoffed. "It's your monkey."

— 𝒮 —

The sewer smelled of rotten eggs and Sophia tried her best to ignore it as she, Barry, Cisco, and Joe walked through.

Cisco was wearing a head flashlight (in his hands, a banana—for the gorilla, of course), which also had a camera installed so that Caitlin and Iris could watch from the lab.

In Joe's hands was one of Cisco's guns, though it also had a flashlight connected, so the pair led the way as the group stepped through the sewer water that reached just below their ankles.

As they rounded the corner, Joe grabbed a flare from his bag and ignited it, causing a red glow to cloak his hands. He placed the flare on top of one of the pipes that lined the walls and turned to them.

"Cisco, take the rest of these flares, light them, drop them as we go; it's our path back," Joe instructed, handing Cisco the bag. "Give me that banana."

Cisco handed him the banana as he adjusted the bag on, and Joe nodded.

"Okay," he sighed. "Stay close."

"Definitely," Barry agreed as he drew out his gun.

"I'm not going anywhere," Cisco mumbled.

"Here." Joe turned to Sophia, and he drew his usual gun from his holster before handing it to her. "Just in case."

Sophia stared at the gun in her hands with widened eyes, and she shook her head. "Joe, I don't know how to use a gun."

"It's easy," he muttered with a shrug. "Just disengage the safety and pull the trigger."

She sighed as she looked down at the gun. "If I kill one of you, I'm sorry."

They followed Joe towards the right, hearing drips of water splashing and their feet dragging against the ground.

Cisco grabbed a flare out of the bag and dropped it into the water, and they saw the faint red glow before they continued on.

"I can't believe I'm looking for a supernatural gorilla," Joe muttered as Cisco placed another flare on the pipe; "I'm terrified of regular gorillas."

They suddenly froze as they heard a heavy clank of metal, and Joe immediately raised his gun. They continued slowly, their breathing a little heavier, as they looked around.

"What was that?" asked Cisco worriedly.

The flashlight on Cisco's head then shone onto the wall, where they then spotted a rat scurrying along one of the pipes.

Deeming that to be the source of the sound, they continued forward, Cisco placing another flare on top of the pipe on the wall opposite to the rat.

"Whoa," Cisco murmured suddenly. "Hey, hey, guys—look at this."

Joe lifted his gun so the flashlight shone over the wall that Cisco was pointing at to reveal that there were numbers and letters scratched onto the wall. Most of them seemed to be Grodd's name, some misspelt.

"Incredible," Cisco breathed out, stepping forward to place a flare on the pipe.

"Looks like we're in the right place," Barry murmured.

"Somebody wanna tell me what we're looking at here?" Joe questioned as they furthered down the sewers.

"Grodd," Sophia answered, examining the drawings as they passed. "He's evolving—he's getting smarter."

The light shone over a stick figure with the words 'bad Eiling' next to it.

"Getting smarter," Joe repeated. "Great."

A sudden low growl caused them to whip around to the next entrance and raise their guns.

"If I hadn't seen Jurassic Park, I wouldn't be nearly as frightened right now," Cisco breathed out.

The growling continued, and heavy footsteps began to sound. He was coming.

"So . . . if he's getting smarter," Joe said slowly, "you think he might be getting bigger, too?"

Sophia turned her head as the growl moved towards the opposite side.

"That must have been a truck passing over, right?" Joe said, though only a second later did another growl come, causing Cisco to gasp and stumble back.

They all turned towards the sound, guns raised. Barry suddenly let out a yell and they whipped around to watch as he grabbed his head.

"Barry!" exclaimed Sophia as he fell back before he was suddenly thrown towards the wall by an invisible force.

Sophia immediately rushed over to Barry, who was lying unconscious, and tucked the gun in her pocket as she knelt down beside him. As she cupped his cheek, she heard Joe fire a few shots down to where the sound had come from.

"We gotta get out of here!" Joe shouted.

Sophia shook her head, her lips turned into a frown. "Barry's out cold."

Before she could say anything else, however, she felt something grab the back of her shirt and pull her upwards. She hardly had any time to scream before her vision began to fade to black, and the last thing she heard was the shouts of her name while a low growl rumbled.