Short on Time

Chapter 40

"Yo. Can we please get rid of Jay's helmet?" Cisco asked as I helped Barry on a noard.

"No, sorry. It keeps me motivated," Barry said.

"Well, it's giving me daymares," Cisco said as he pulled out some books. "This is everything I could find even remotely related to increasing speed. How are these supposed to help apply the speed equation to you?"

"The answer's got to be here somewhere," Barry said grabbing a book.

"I think I found something interesting," Caitlin said walking out.

"Good interesting or bad interesting?" I asked.

"'Cause that word could go either way," Cisco added.

"After running some comparative data, it appears that you, Reverse Flash, and Zoom are moving your legs at essentially the same speed," Caitlin said.

"Then why are they so much faster than him?" I asked.

"Best I can tell, with each stride their feet spend less time on the ground, thus propelling them forward much faster," Caitlin said.

"By almost 30%," I told Barry.

"Great. All right, well, I got to make up that difference somehow," Barry said.

"Barry? Look, after what that monster did, I want to stop Jay just as badly as you do," Cisco said. "But what if the reason you haven't been able to run as fast as him yet is because you just can't?"

"Barry, you know what happened to Jay is not your fault, right?" I asked.

"Well, I should've known better," Barry said.

"You? With Wells last year, I should've learned my lesson and dug deeper into Jay, but I didn't, Joe said walking in.

"Come on, Joe," Barry said.

"Point being is nobody saw this coming. Nobody," Joe said.

I took Barry's hand and pulled him out of the Cortex, "seriously Barry, don't blame yourself. Please."

Barry sighed, "you know I can't."

I shook my head sadly as I went to walk out."

"Wait, are you still coming to dinner tonight?" Barry asked quickly as he grabbed my hand.

I smiled at him, "wouldn't miss it. Besides, I think Iris will kill me if I don't bring that red sauce."

Barry laughed, "it is the best sauce I have ever tasted."

~*~

I hummed a song in the kitchen as I finished making the pasta and reheating the sauce. Joe came in behind me and dipped his finger in the sauce, "this is the best thing I've ever tasted."

I laughed, "it's a recipe from an old friend. He went to school and experimented before he gave the recipe to me to try out."

Joe pulled out the garlic bread from the oven, "you have to share."

"I promise," I told Joe as I spooned everything into a casserole dish and put the sauce on. "Now, let's eat."

"Hey, sorry I'm late," Wally said as I walked in with the dish.

"No, no, you're just in time," I told him.

We all sat down as I started to spoon out the food, "so my advisor loved my engine designs and even asked me to help her out with one of her engineering projects," Wally told us.