97

I sat at the dinner table with Iris and Joe West, at the West Household, placing with my septum piercing, staring into nothingness.

My foot tapped impatiently as Cecile was making coffee in the kitchen, Joe speaking up, looking at me, "Okay, so, ever since Julian moved back to London, they have been short-staffed in the crime lab at CCPD, and I know you and I have been stalling Singh with this whole story of Barry being on sabbatical in the Czech Republic-"

"And they wanna hire someone to replace him." Iris finishes for him, already knowing what he was going to say.

"Yeah, they should." I look up, "They need the help. We can't keep stalling for him anymore. Barry's not coming back."

"You don't know that." Iris looked at me.

"Yes, I do." I stared at her as if she had gone insane.

"Sweetheart," Joe clears his throat, talking to me as if I was his own daughter, "I'm very proud of you for taking the lead with Wally and Cisco at Star Labs, and we all let you have your space, so that you'd have time to deal with what happened."

"Joe, I'm fine, okay? There's no need to worry." I dismiss, taking a sip of my drink, the alcohol burning down my throat.

"You're fine?" Iris questions, reaching over, grabbing a strand of my long hair, looking at the ends of my hair that were dyed blue, "It looks like you've taken a trip down memory lane since we lost Barry, and you haven't stopped."

"I'm fine." I dismiss once more.

"Well we're not." Joe blurts out, "We lost him. My son, Iris' best friend, your everything."

"What do you expect, Joe? I did all the crying I could that night six months ago. I can't do that anymore. Barry told me to be strong. I'm being strong." I stare at them.

"When HR died, we had a funeral. We spoke about his life." Joe suggests, "Maybe we should do the same thing for Barry, give us all permission to grieve."

"And what are we gonna bury? An empty suit in the lab?" I snapped at him, "Because we don't exactly have him anymore."

He falls silent, causing slight guilt to pool in my chest, as I sigh, getting up, "Thank you for inviting me to dinner. But I'm fine. I'm gonna get going, alright?"

-

"There are other superheroes in this town." Wally spoke up, as we stood in Star Labs, after our encounter with this new Samurai, who wanted to fight Barry Allen.

"Yeah, and your boy, Kurosawa, over there blew us away like ragdolls performing his reverse Excalibur." Cisco spoke, "We haven't faced anything like this before."

"Why do you think he only wanted The Flash?" Iris asks.

"He said he wants to fight the best." Wally shrugs.

"He's threatening to destroy the city." I look at them, "Do we think he can do it?"

"I say yes." Cisco says, "Then he has to fight The Flash."

"Who isn't here?" The sentence slips out of Joe's mouth as if it was a question.

"What if he was?" Cisco looks at me, "Zee. you said it yourself. Just us trying to keep the city safe, we're barely getting it done. And this guy, he's no joke. If we don't offer up The Flash, there's gonna be serious damage. People are gonne die, and that's gonna be on us. We need to bring Barry back."

"And how the hell do you suppose we do that, Cisco?" I cross my arms, "If Barry comes out, the Speed Force Prison goes-"

Wally finishes for me, "It becomes unstable."

"It could destroy the city, the whole world." I cross my arms, "Which is exactly what we're trying to prevent."

"What if I can solve that?" Cisco looks at me.

"In the next 24 hours?" Wally questions.

"Yes! Guys, I've been working on this." Cisco admits.

"For how long?" The words seethed through my teeth.

"Since the night he left." Cisco moves towards his huge monitor screen, "I've had help. I've consulted with Harry and- Tina and Tracy and Felicity and Curtis, and I'm pretty sure I figured out a way to stabilize the Speed Force Prison and free Barry without unleashing another lightning storm on the city. I just need a couple more things."

"Maybe we should." Iris starts.

"No." I deny.

"Zee, this is a chance." Joe spoke, "A chance for us to get Barry back."

I shook my head at Joe, "You've been working on this for how long and you never told us?"

"I didn't wanna say anything until I was certain." Cisco stares at me.

"Are you certain that the Speed Force won't take Wally in his place?" I question, "Are you certain that you can even close it before it rips Central City in two? Are you certain that this will even work? Are you certain that it won't malfunction and destroy the city anyway? ?"

"He's gotta be." Cisco exhales, "Zee, you, of all people, how can you not be in on this?"

"Because I have finally come to grips that Barry is gone." I shot at him, my teeth gritting, "."

"Now, let's do what we can do to come up with a plan to take out this Samurai." I dismiss, leaving my cortex.

-

"You went and did this behind my back?" I snipped, following Cisco into his workshop as everyone followed after us.

"You would've tried to stop us." Cisco sighs.

"Because it was a waste of time." I rudely say, "I don't see Barry anywhere. He's gone, and you need to accept that Cisco."

The rest of the team had went behind my back, including Caitlin Snow, and tried to get Barry back, the attempt failing.

"I don't understand." Cisco sighs, typing away on his computer, "This should've worked."

"Or you could've killed us all." I snip.

"I don't know, Zee." Caitlin spoke, "I think we were pretty close."

"I'm sorry, "we"? Where have you been the last six months again?" I snapped at her, "We have barely been able to keep this city save, and now you've just decided to show up out of the blue- to help with something that isn't possible."

"She was only trying to help." Joe is shocked by my rudeness.

"Look, guys, we need to concentrate on stopping this Samurai who's trying to destroy the city, not on Barry." I instruct, being the Team Leader.

"Dude, what is your deal?" Cisco snaps at me, turning around, facing me, "It's like you don't even want him back."

I open my mouth to speak, Joe's phone ringing, as he answered it, Joe stopping me, "Hey, hey, hey! Cecile, can I call you back in a minute? We're in the middle of something here." Joe's eyes widen, "What?"

-

"State police picked him up on the 112- outside of Ivy City." Cecile told us, as we made our way through CCPD.