Short on Time

Chapter 38

Tapping was the first thing I heard when I woke up again. I groaned as I sat up, Barry was by my side as soon as I opened my eyes, "where are we?"

"Zoom's hideout," Barry said as he looked around trying to figure out a way to get us out.

"You're wasting your time. I used to think I could escape too when I first got here. There's no way out," Jesse said. 

My head snapped to the direction where I heard the tapping and saw the man with a mask over his head, "who is that?" 

"I don't know. He's been here since Zoom brought me to this place," Jesse said as the tapping continued. She snapped at him, "Stop, okay? Just,  just please stop."

"Jesse, I think he might be trying to help us," Barry said.

"Nothing is gonna help us," Jesse bit back.

"That's not true. We're gonna get out of here," I said standing up to face her. "Your dad's gonna find us, I promise."

"You sure have a lot of faith in a man who only cares about himself," Jesse said. 

"You know, I actually thought that at first too. It's not true. Every decision that he's made every action he's taken since we've met has been to save you. Your dad hasn't given up on you, Jesse. Don't give up on him, he already lost one daughter," Barry said gently.

A gust of wind blew in as Zoom arrived in front of us. Jesse whimpered as she backed as far away from Zoom as she could. "Believe what you want, but the only reason that you're still alive is so I can kill you in front of your father. And the only reason your father's still alive," Zoom said as he turned to look at Barry. "Is to get me your speed. Once he does that, he will die too." 

Zoom left us then and Jesse shakily looked at me, "see? There is no way out of this."

I gave her a look, "there is. Just wait."

~*~

"That's not Morse code," I told Barry as he tapped at us.

"I know he's trying to tell us something. We just have to find the pattern," Barry said.

"There's no pattern, Barry," Jesse said blankly.

"You know, your dad, who I'm pretty sure is one of the smartest people to live on either of our Earths, told me the only person smarter than him was you," I told her gently.

"He said that?" Jesse asked.

"If that's true, we work together I know we can figure this out. Worth a shot?" Barry suggested.

"Okay," Jesse said as we carefully listened to the tapping. "Well, he never goes past five."

"What?" Barry asked.

"He never goes past five knocks without pausing," Jesse said again. 

"Right?" Barry asked in question.  

"Listen," I told him. 

"Hey, you're right," Barry said. "I think, I think I know what that is. It's a five-by-five tap code used by POWs." 

"That would only get us to 25 letters, and there's 26 in the alphabet," Jesse said.

"Not if you combine C and K. They sound the same," I told Jesse smiling.

"Let's try it out," Barry said.

"Worth a shot," Jesse said with a shrug and then we got to work. I carefully listened to the man as we began writing down the order of the tapping and assigning them to letters.