I'll Be There in a Flash

46

I was waiting for Jake in Jitters so I could tell him what's been on my mind for weeks now. I see him walk in and he sits across from me. "You wanted to talk?" Jake asks and I nod. "The reason that I wanted to talk to you was because I think that us dating feels way too weird. I mean, I had slight feelings for you, but I didn't love you." I say and Jake looks down. "I get it, Tori. You love Barry more than me. I understand." he says and I look into his blue eyes. "No. It's not that." I start to say but Jake interrupts me. "Admit it, Tori. You still love him." Jake says and I look down and sigh. "It's not like I can date him again though. He's dating another girl." I say and Jake puts his hand on mine and I look at him.

"I'm sure he still loves you too, Tori. He probably just doesn't know it yet." he says and I smile.

"Can we just be friends?" I ask and he nods.

I smile at him and then get a text from Barry to head back to S.T.A.R. Labs. "I gotta go. I'll see you at work tomorrow." I say with a smile and he nods. I walk out of Jitters and head over to S.T.A.R. Labs and when I get there, I see Caitlin in the examination room with Ronnie/Martin Stein. "What's happening?" I ask Barry and he shrugs. Suddenly, Dr. Wells calls Caitlin over and she walks over to us. "You ok?" Barry asks her as she walks out of the room. "Yeah, it's just confusing." she says and I look at her sincerely. "What isn't confusing is what's happening to him now." Dr. Wells says and we look at him confusingly. "Ronnie's body is rejecting Stein's atoms like a host rejecting a parasite. The resulting instability is causing an exothermic reaction. I worry, if his temperature continues to rise it'll set off a chain reaction." Dr. Wells says. "And then what happens?" Barry asks and Caitlin walks up to Dr. Wells. "He could go nuclear." Dr. Wells says and I look at Barry wide eyed and then I look at Caitlin.

Then Cisco walks in looking angry and then he sees Ronnie. He walks in and looks at all of us, "That's not weird at all." Cisco says. "It seems Ronnie's fight with the Flash and Hummingbird has exacerbated the Firestorm matrix. It's unstable. It's exponentially increasing the rate of fission inside his body." Dr. Wells says rolling out of the room and we all follow. "How long does he have?" Caitlin asks and he turns to face Caitlin. "If his temperatures keeps rising at the current pace, no more than a couple of hours." he says and I lean on the table with my arms crossed. "But you can fix it right? I mean you can separate them before it's too late?" I ask.

"Any attempt we make to separate the two of them could be catastrophic. A nuclear explosion. And a nuclear explosion of this magnitude would level this entire city. Unless..." Dr. Wells says and we all look at him with hope clear in our eyes.

"Unless what?" Barry asks and I wonder the same thing.

"Unless the host of the body were no longer functional." Dr. Wells says and I look at him with wide eyes.

"You wanna kill Ronnie?" Caitlin asks angrily.

"No, I don't want to kill Ronnie. But in this scenario, Ronnie is the host body." Dr. Wells says and I stand up straighter.

"If you kill Ronnie, you kill Stein. That's two people." Cisco says and I nod in agreement.

"I don't know how else to stop it. And my guess is that if Ronnie and Professor Stein knew the consequences that we were all facing they would make the same decision." Dr. Wells says.

Barry rubs his eyes and I look down as Dr. Wells says that it was two lives for millions. "Can you give us a minute?" Caitlin asks me, Cisco, and Barry and we all walk out of the room. I walk with Barry to Ronnie's room and I stare at Ronnie's features. He has black hair that was gelled up like Barry's, blue eyes, and buff almost like Oliver, but Oliver was way more buff. "Hey." Barry says and Ronnie jumps and looks at us. "Sorry." he says again and we walk in. "Can we get you anything or...?" I ask him as he stands up grabbing his jacket. "A glass of Chateau Haut-Brion Pessac-Leognan 1982 might be nice. Or maybe it wouldn't" he says and me and Barry look at him. "This body's taste buds would obviously be different from my own. Perhaps I'm now a light beer man." he says and I shove my hands in my back pockets. "There are worse things to be." Barry says and I nod with a small smile. "You mean like a living nuclear bomb?" Ronnie says and my smile and Barry's smile disappears.

"You know." Barry says and I look down.

"Unstable nuclear fission was always a danger in the transmutation process. Plus, you all argue very loud." Ronnie says and he starts to walk out.

Me and Barry follow him, "I'm sorry. But our friends are gonna figure out how to fix this, I promise." I say to him. "I remember meeting you both on the train. You both were headed to S.T.A.R. Labs with your friend. You both seemed to be in love with each other. Are you both, as you young people call it, a thing?" he asks and we stop walking and I look at Barry and he looks at me, then we look back at Ronnie. "No, we're not. I mean, we used to, but not anymore." Barry says and I nod. "Yeah. Barry has a new girlfriend now and I recently broke up with my boyfriend." I say and I feel Barry look at me. "You never told me that you broke up with him, Tori." Barry says and I look at him. "I told you before you left to see Linda earlier." I say to him. "I thought you weren't gonna break up with him until tomorrow." he says and I roll my eyes. "If I may interrupt all this bickering." Ronnie starts to say and we turn to him and I feel embarrassed. "You both still seem very in love with each other. I can see it in your eyes." he says and I look down and blush.

"You know, Einstein was not only brilliant, he had a great sense of humor." he starts to say then mutters something under his breath that we couldn't hear. "Any man who drives safely while kissing a pretty girl is not giving the pretty girl the attention she deserves." he says quoting Einstein and I look at Barry and he looks at me.

"If I learned anything this past year, life's too short not to live." he says and Barry keeps looking at me.

"Do whatever it is you like. But it is clear that you both love each other strongly." he says and we look over to Ronnie and he leaves.

I keep looking down, but I know I can't ignore Barry forever. "What do you think, Tori?" Barry asks and I look up at him. "About you and me?" I ask and he nods. "I think..." I drift off trying to think if I should tell him that I still love him or lie. "I think you should do whatever makes you happy." I say and I wasn't lying. I really want Barry to be happy with either me or Linda. I just don't want to see him depressed. He smiles at me and he starts to lean in and my heart pounds in my chest having hope that he was gonna kiss me. I was wrong. Barry pecked my cheek and my heart settled down. "Thanks for the support, Tori. I can always count on you." he says and he walks away and I look in the direction he walked in. "I just wish you knew how much I still love you." I say under my breath and I walk out of the lab. I head to the only person I can actually talk to at the moment. Iris. She's always there for me, and right now I need her more than ever.