2021 WHUMPTOBER

8. Definitely Just a Cold - Flash

"What happened here?" Barry asked, slapping on some gloves.

"Not sure," Joe said, "that's why you're here."

"Har har," Barry said, crouching next to the deceased cattle.

Joe looked down at him, "Two dead farmer and a dozen dead cows."

"Bakers dozen actually." Barry corrected. (A baker's dozen is 13 rather than 12 if anyone was wondering)

Joe gave him a deadpan stare. Barry grinned and turned back to his work.

"It looks like a disease maybe. Not sure about the farmers though. I'll take a couple samples back to the lab and run some tests," Barry said, gathering said samples he needed.

"Make it quick," Joe said, "I don't like not knowing what happened."

"I'm always quick," Barry gestured in a 'what can I say' motion.

Joe rolled his eyes fondly and walked away.

Barry chuckled quietly to himself and looked over the field of dead cows. He shook his head and meandered over to the tarp covered bodies.

"There's got to be an answer here," Barry mumbled. He looked over the body, but couldn't find any visual signs of... anything. So he grabbed a few samples and decided to look at a couple more of the cattle before returning to his lab to run tests.

He crouched next to a dirty white cow, inspecting it in numerous places. The dirt that had settled and all the farm smells tickled Barry's nose and he let out a great sneeze, disturbing all the particles around him.

"Damn," he mutterd, itching his nose and standing up, "I hate farms. Let's get these back to the lab."

***** LINE BREAK *****

"Mystery solved," Barry said, scooting away from his desk after printing the results.

He walkeddown to the Captain's office, but he wasn't there at the moment, so Barry shrugged at set the papers on his desk, ready to go home. Putting a sticky note on the papers to make sure Singh didn't overlook them, he grabbed his bag and headed home.

----- THE NEXT DAY -----

Barry woke up feeling a little under the weather. His muscles were achy and his throat hurt and he just felt crummy.

"Damn, I don't have time to be sick," Barry mumbled, dragging himself out of bed. He didn't look horrible, so he decided that it must've just been a small head cold. As long as he kept his distance from people, he could still go to work.

Flash forward to work:

"You alright Barry?" Joe asked.

Barry ducked out of reach, "I'm fine Joe. I have a small head cold so keep your distance. I don't want you to get sick."

"Barry," Joe put a hand to the bridge of his nose, "how many times must we go over this? When you are sick, stay home."

"It's fine," Barry croaked, "I'll just keep my distance and be super extra sanitary."

Joe huffed, "Fine. Oh, did you figure out what happened at the farm?"

"Yeah, I put the results on Singh's desk last night before I went home."

Joe nodded and they went their seperate ways.

Barry felt progressively worse as the day wore on. He was pretty sure he had a small fever and he was very uncomfortable. Focusing was hard and Barry decided he would turn in early and if he didn't feel better by morning he'd stay home.