Episode 5 The Flash Fanfic

Chapter 5

Astrid stared blankly at the picture frame on the desk. Relaying her last moments with her father in her head. Although in the last few moments that creature that had inhabited her father's body was in no way Robert Sutherland, it still felt wrong to have pulled the trigger. She was responsible for that bullet... and she would need to live with that for the rest of her life. Although her friends had seen what had happened, none of them could truly comprehend how it had felt having to do so.

She was still at work and the time was nearing 8pm. All the staff, except for she and the security guards had gone home for the night. Cisco was on a date with Jane. Caitlin was out of town working on the Firestorm project with a Dr Martin Stein... or Ronnie, Astrid still didn't understand the concept. All she knew is that they had taken an entire team of scientists with them.

Even Barry was MIA at the moment. She had just spoken to Ollie on the phone. She had cut it short for some silence. It gave her time to sit with her thoughts.

She flicked through the security screens on her computer. Everything seemed normal, until it didn't. She saw a flame a light in one of the bottom floors. She picked up her desk phone, but there was no dial tone. She picked up her mobile phone and saw that it was going flat. She tried to dial the security's number regardless. It rang through with no answer. Then her phone went flat.

Frustrated, she let out a sigh and stood up. She would need to find someone to put out the fire. She left her office, quickly and made her way to Cisco and Caitlin's work areas. She tried each of their phones. Neither of them were working either. A little panicked she raced towards the elevator but to her alarm, the lights and power suddenly went out. Aside from the moonlit sky shining through the windows, she was in total darkness.

She pressed the elevator button anyway, though as she had expected, it didn't work. She made her way towards Caitlin's med bay emergency cupboard and located a torch, switched it on and made her way towards the stairwell door. She wasn't sure what had tripped the power, maybe the fire was worse than she had previously thought. Whatever the reason, she needed to remain calm. She began her exhaustive journey down the long flight of stairs, making her way towards the bottom level, as quickly as she could.

As she gradually made her way down to the bottom of the stairwell, she became overwhelmed by the smell and the sight of the smoke that was coming from the bottom floor. She could hear the smoke alarms going off and touched the door to exit the stair well. It was not yet hot, which meant the fire wasn't too close. She felt weak from her trip down and she knew that her lungs were being filled with the strong stench of smoke.

She opened the door to see, not only fire, but a man that she was only slightly familiar with. "We need to find an exit!" she told him. 

He picked her up with one arm, threw her over his shoulder and gruffed, "You're coming with me, girlie. Snart has a bone to pick with you." The torch, that she had been carrying fell to the floor. At that moment she realized why this large man was so familiar to her. She remembered him as Leonard Snart's accomplice from the bank that day. He had set the fire to her building.

She began to kick and scream but she felt too weak to fight him off. All her strength had become lost to her as she was fighting to catch her breath through all the smoke. She could barely fight to keep her eyes open and felt herself slip into sleep.

Barry lounged on the couch alongside Joe and Iris at home watching television. Iris kept glancing at her phone waiting for Eddie to contact her, which he hadn't done since earlier that day. Barry had told her about his conversation with Eddie and was feeling guilty that he might have said something wrong.

Joe looked over at them and attempted to break the ice, until his phone beeped. He jumped up and got to action. "Sutherland Labs is on fire." He told them.

Iris and Barry both looked up in alarm. "Oh no! Is everyone okay?" Iris asked.
Before Joe could answer Barry quickly blurted out, "I need to go to my room to call Astrid..." He dialed Astrid's number on his phone, but when he was sure that he was out of Iris's sight he used his speed to make it to Sutherland Labs.

Fortunately, the top floors had not yet been touched, meaning that his suit and all of their equipment were absolutely fine. However, the first few floors were burning horribly. He was able to slip past the firefighters without being noticed and retrieved his suit, putting it on instantly.

Then he assisted the fire crew by attempting to putting out the fire, using a bucket and water from a nearby fountain along with his speed ability. The fire crew were working tirelessly, but to Barry they were doing so in very slow motion.

Barry realized that while the bucket of water that he was using was doing a very poor job in putting out the fire, the wind from his speed running was doing a better job.

This gave him an idea. He picked up his pace and ran faster and faster, letting the energy from his movement blow out the flames. It was working. He ran faster and faster encircling Sutherland Labs, watching as the flames reduced to a minor spark. He allowed the fire fighters to put out the last of the flames and looked for any trace of what had happened.

He got back to the 97th floor, his friend's floor. The power had been cut so he went to the emergency cupboard in Caitlin's medical bay. Someone had removed the torched. He found a pack of matches and lit one up. He scoured his friend's offices. He knew that Astrid had been there tonight. She had told him earlier that she had work to do. He went to her office and found her phone still sitting on her desk. It was flat. She never would have left it here. She must still be somewhere on the premises.

He put out the match and went over the entire facility, looking for her. She was not there, nor was she amongst the crowds of people gathered watching the fire or being treated by paramedics.

Barry went past her house. She wasn't there either. As he stood in the shadows outside her house he called Cisco's phone. It rang through. Finally he called Caitlin.

"Caitlin! Have you heard from Cisco or Astrid?" He asked. The interference was bad. He could barely hear her.

"Barry, I don't have good signal. You sound panicked. Is everything ok?" Caitlin called out.
"Sutherland Labs was on fire. Both Astrid and Cisco are not answering their phones." Barry replied, raising his voice.

"Barry... Cisco... date... Jane..." Barry could barely make out Caitlin's voice, he was more disappointed at the line going dead, though it sounded like she had said that Cisco was on a date. He would need to find Astrid by himself. But where the heck would he start?