Crisis On Earth-1

All The King's Horses, All The King's Men

[Authors Note: Welcome back for another round of sunshine, rainbows, ice cream, and puppies! This was one of the more difficult chapters to write, as I'm sure you'll understand soon. But I remember writing this so fondly, and I'm very proud of it. Ain't much else to say this time, so I'll let you get going! Enjoy, my readers!]

Central City's criminals had suddenly decided it was time to come out of the shadows, and rear their ugly heads. Their had been multiple armed bank robberies, assaults, hostage situations, and an ARGUS truck being raided. Of course it would take a toll on anyone to have to clean all that up in under twelve hours, but Barry still couldn't find it within himself to feel anything but pure joy. Every time he saw Kara, she held a beautiful grin plastered across her face, as if the wind had changed and her face had become a permanent smile. She always fiddled with her ring when she thought no one else was looking, but Caitlin had been kind enough to point it out to Barry early on during the day.

Nearly about to call it a night, Barry walked into the Cortex and clapped Cisco on the back happily before sauntering into the centre. Of course being a Speedster meant you did everything fast but even so, Cisco was shocked to see Barry so energetic and upbeat. After Iris' disappearance, Barry had become rather cold, and distant. But once Kara showed up, and saved Iris, Barry was happier than ever. Even with the threat of the Reverse Flash and Reign looming over their heads, Barry was immensely happy, as was Kara. That was something, everyone else agreed, was contagious; and just a little intoxicating.

"Good work out there today, man. Really showed 'em who's boss!" Cisco smiled, and Barry laughed, pulling down his cowl. His hair was a mess but that was to be expected after having leather crushing it down for twelve hours straight. Not many people could complain about that and not get weird looks from their grandmothers.

"Come on, let's go drink, I'm buying." Cisco moving to grab his jacket off the swivel chair, stopping when an alarm rang out, signify that they weren't going out for drinks. They had something else to attend to, and Cisco couldn't help but curse near silently under his breath.

"Heard that, Cisco!" Kara chirped from the corridor before happily skipping into the Cortex, standing next to Barry as Cisco looked at the monitors in front of him; pulling up the relevant information as to why the alarm decided to go off. She put her hands on her hips and turned her head to smile at Alex who walked in shortly after her, standing opposite the desk with her arms crossed.

"What've we got? Another bank robbery?" Kara asked, tilting her head. Cisco continued to type away at the keyboard in silence until he pulled up CCTV.

"No... I think it's... someone just broke into Dayton Opticals," Cisco scratched his head quizzically before looking at Barry and Kara. "Go get 'em. I doubt this'll take long." He smiled, and Barry nodded before pulling his cowl back up. He examined the CCTV and saw a shadowy figure examining crates that looked rather important. Dayton Optics were working on some seriously state of the art tech. Whatever they were working on could easily be mishandled in the wrong hands.

"Let's go." Kara smiled and put her hand on Barry's shoulder. He nodded and zipped out of the Cortex and into the streets, Kara followed shortly after in a streak of blue, and red. Dayton Opticals wasn't too far away, and the SuperFlash couple were eager to curl up in bed for the night, watch some Netflix and cuddle up to each other. They had many seasons of the Office to binge together, and Kara was eager to get started. She'd watched them all with Alex once before but Barry had never seen them.

~~~

Upon arriving at Dayton Opticals, both the Scarlet Speedster and Girl of Steel noticed how eerily quiet it was. No alarms had been tripped, no signs of breaking and entering, even their glowing sign was a beacon of light amongst the darkness of the night sky. They slowly walked forward, keeping an eye out for any signs that might lead to the criminals that'd broken in. A place like Dayton Opticals didn't sound their alarms for no reason.