Find Your Light in The Darkness

Feel The Lightning

Dedicated to NoraXSWest-AllenFam, @CamrynKissel, @joshuasmith943, @bloodypunkkk, damianflashpoint, @amorheartz, ThatSpiderKnight, and luciferandchloe2021 for all of the amazing support they've shown all of my Flash-themed stories! Love you all so much!

Without a second's thought, Barry instinctively threw his long arms around Iris' shoulders, shielding her upper body as if there was about to be an explosion. An action which the strong reporter would typically have protested against if not for both the suddenness of the noise and the comfort which his beating heart brought to her ringing ears as she momentarily pressed her head closer to his chest, the sound of its uneven beat almost shaking her form just as much as the speedster's was. Screams of various volumes echoed vaguely throughout Barry's head as the surrounding citizens ran in multiple different directions, pleading they'd escaped the criminals' grips, though the men didn't seem in the slightest to actually care about any of the people in the square, but rather, what they were standing next to.

"You all have thirty seconds to leave if you don't want to be filled with lead," one of the two armed men declared as he dangerously waved his gun's front sight in the air above his scruffy, black-haired head, his thick gray trenchcoat's sleeves brushing vaguely against his partially bruised wrists with nearly every movement.

A sign which almost instantly alerted the scene's resident CSI as to who their attacker was.

Marcus Spitz! That's why he looked so familiar! I remember Patty briefing me on a case she was following a few weeks ago about him vandalizing parts of the city and then just disappearing for months. But he always left a single body with no fingerprints at every crime scene as a sort of means of making a point to the police.

"And that includes you too, lovebirds," the second man commanded as he pressed the head of his pistol harshly against the back of Barry's head, the feeling of the cold metal touching his skin immediately jolting the speedster out of his racing thoughts.

He hadn't even realized that Iris' upper body was pressed against his navy blue-shirted chest until she was forced to stand back up beside him, leaving an oddly lonely feeling to linger behind in her minimal warmth's absence. Not that the man's comfort was even in the least bit a present focal point for anyone in the vicinity to be paying attention to at the moment.

Especially Barry, most of anyone.

"You don't have to do this, Marcus. There's still time for you to change," Barry reasoned, his eyes cautiously searching the crowd of kids dispersing from the area, his mind trying its very hardest to ignore their cries of fear in favor of focusing his attention on the criminal.

Though, that task was so, so much easier said than done.

"Ah, so you've heard of me, kid. Huh, not really surprised considering how famous I am in these parts, after all," the long-haired man boasted, scoffing proudly at the young man's remembrance of his name.

"But how 'bout' you just stick to leaving. Unless, you wanna be the next guy to join my resume?" Marcus sneered, his sarcastic remark prompting a loud laugh out of his partner as the latter easily leaned back against the golden statue's base.

An object that only finalized the quickly building case forming inside the CSI's mind.

That's why they're here. To destroy the statue. But the actual question is why would they go out of their way to do it now? Did they think it would be less crowded than it was or did they want more witnesses for what they're going to do?