The Flash appeared inside S.T.A.R. Labs in a streak of orange lightning before stopping near the platform.
Cisco Ramon was rotating slowly in his chair while replaying footage from Central City across several monitors. A week ago Barry Allen had still been the guy who woke up from a nine-month coma. Now he could run faster than sound.
According to Dr. Harrison Wells, the lightning strike during the particle accelerator explosion had altered Barry's body completely, giving him impossible speed.
Since then Barry had secretly started stopping crimes around Central City while trying to understand what he had become. Meanwhile Cisco had immediately decided someone this fast obviously needed a superhero name.
Caitlin Snow and Harrison Wells still didn't know Barry and Cisco had started doing the whole "hero" thing around the city. Unlike those two, they still had enough common sense to realize running around fighting criminals at super speed sounded incredibly reckless.
Cisco spun the chair toward Barry dramatically.
"Well," he said proudly, "look who the Flash dragged in."
Barry pulled the mask down from his face and exhaled slowly while the orange lightning around him faded into nothing.
Cisco Ramon rotated his chair toward him from the computer station. "Another robbery?" he asked.
"Yeah," Barry replied while removing the gloves. "Three armed men near Fourth Street. CCPD should already be arriving."
Since waking up from the coma, Barry's life had stopped feeling normal.
At first he thought it was impossible. Then he started breaking the sound barrier.
Barry walked toward the monitors before slowing slightly.
Something still felt off.
While running through the city earlier, someone had looked directly at him. Actually followed him with their eyes while he was moving through the Speed Force.
That shouldn't have been possible.
"You okay?" Cisco asked, noticing the shift in his expression.
Barry stayed quiet for a second before answering. "I think someone saw me today."
Cisco frowned immediately. "Saw you how?"
"While I was running."
The room became quieter after that.
Because if Barry was right—
Then someone in Central City had just done something that completely ignored the rules they thought his powers followed.
"Let's pull up the traffic footage," Cisco Ramon said as he turned toward the monitors and started searching through the city cameras.
Barry moved closer and pointed at the screen the moment Daniel appeared near the sidewalk beside Harleen Quinzel. "That's him."
Cisco zoomed in.
The image distorted instantly.
Every part of the footage remained clear except Daniel's face, which dissolved into broken pixels and static like the camera itself refused to process it properly.
"What the hell?" Cisco muttered.
He tried adjusting the frame manually, cleaning the image and running enhancement filters, but the distortion only spread further across the monitor before the entire screen suddenly sparked and went black with a loud pop.
Smoke rose from the system.
At the exact same moment, Caitlin Snow walked in after hearing the noise.
She stopped immediately.
One monitor was smoking. Cisco looked guilty. Barry was standing there in a red leather suit with lightning symbols on it.
Caitlin blinked once.
"Barry," she asked slowly, "what exactly are you wearing?"
Barry immediately lost the ability to form sentences.
He looked at Cisco for help.
Cisco pointed right back at him.
Absolutely not.
Caitlin looked between both of them with the expression of a teacher catching students mid-crime while they silently tried blaming each other.
Before either of them could explain, the doors opened again and Harrison Wells rolled inside in his wheelchair with a tablet in hand.
"It would appear," Wells said calmly while placing the footage onto the main screen, "that Mr. Allen has been spending his free time playing hero."
The footage showed orange lightning tearing through the streets of Central City at impossible speed.
Caitlin Snow stared at the screen for a moment before slowly turning toward Barry.
"Wait… that was you?" she asked.
Barry gave an awkward smile that immediately answered the question.
Caitlin looked genuinely shocked. "Barry, I specifically told you not to push your abilities without supervision."
Her voice carried more frustration than anger, the kind that came from worry. Ever since Barry woke up from the coma, she had been monitoring his condition constantly because nobody actually understood what the particle accelerator explosion had done to his body.
"You're generating impossible amounts of energy every time you run," she continued while walking closer. "We still don't know the long-term effects on your metabolism, your cells, your nervous system—"
"I was careful," Barry interrupted weakly.
Caitlin gave him a look that clearly said she did not believe that for even a second.
"Barry," she said, "you were running through the city fighting armed criminals in a red leather suit."
Cisco quietly raised one finger from beside the monitors. "To be fair, the suit does look good."
Caitlin didn't even look at him. "Cisco."
Cisco immediately lowered his hand. "Right. Serious medical concern. My bad."
*****
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