This work can be read as a stand-alone fic but reading the parent fic Finally is strongly suggested to experience this work more thoroughly and completely.

This is my first time writing a crime/mystery fic, so please bear with me. I hope you do enjoy this! This work is unbeta'd and all mistakes are mine. Also, no copyright infringement is intended. And, finally, all faves/favorites/reviews/comments are always welcome! With that, I leave you folks to it! XOXO!

Dr. Caitlin Snow suddenly felt her blood running cold, her vision dimming. She felt weightless, breathless. Sit! Her brain commanded. She followed on instinct and felt herself leaning into the glass window and sliding down on the floor. Breathe!

She had been trained to be cool, calm, collected in the face of emergencies; ready to act; her wits about her. She didn't bat an eyelash when she had needed to punch a hole through Barry's lung to save him from poison mist. She didn't even blink when she had prevented Lyla from bleeding to death after a nearly fatal encounter with a boomerang. Heck, she had not faltered when she had faced being blown up to bits by a crazy pyromaniac alone in an abandoned warehouse.

But it was different now. Cool, calm and collected had gone out the window after having Barry Allen almost die on her for the fifth time that day.

Central City, seven hours earlier...

It had been another bright summer morning in Central City. Caitlin had texted Barry the night before that she would be dropping by the CCPD crime lab in the morning to get updates on the case they were following. In truth, she just wanted to see him. They hadn't really seen each other since they got back from Starling City the weekend before last. He hadn't dropped by S.T.A.R. Labs that often in the past two weeks – which brought her to another reason she was detouring his office instead of starting her day early in her own laboratory. There was something off between the guys and Dr. Wells. What it was, she didn't really know but something had changed. And since Dr. Wells hadn't shown up in the lab for the past week, she didn't really have much to do – hence the trip to Barry's CCPD hangout.

He had texted her back immediately and told her to drop by early. He could only meet her for a short while, though. Apparently, even he had to catch up with his back logs. Hoping to make up for the hassle, she decided to surprise him with breakfast – hence the coffee and muffins from Jitters.

She had just entered his lab when she saw him on the floor, choking up, with his lips swelling up and a very peculiar rash breaking out all over his body. It was a quick diagnosis: anaphylactic shock and she knew that she only had seconds to act. And act she did.

By the time the coffee and muffins hit the floor, she had already shouted for help, and was scrambling to him and retrieving an epinephrine autoinjector from her bag. She quickly plunged the Epipen in front of his right thigh and opened the collar of his shirt. The effect was instantaneous – his breathing had improved by the time she heard the first onrush of footsteps by the door. It was probably the only time she thanked the universe for her shellfish allergy!

It wasn't even ten minutes before she and Barry were in the ER. It was unusually busy for a Friday morning so it was a good thing that she was one of Barry's emergency contacts and was ready to give the doctors a quick medical history. By the time Barry's surrogate father, Detective Joe West and the senior detective's partner, Detective Eddie Thawne, had made it to the ER, Barry was already pumped full of potent antihistamines. They couldn't really speak with him because he was groggy from his medications. It's not like he could talk, too, Caitlin thought. He had a really swollen tongue.

After giving a quick hello to her, Eddie took his leave and went to go find the doctor. Joe, who had heretofore maintained his professional decorum, broke formality and gave a very relieved sigh before he swept her in a bear hug and thanked her for being there for his son.

"Thank you," Joe said as he tightened his embrace around her.

Caitlin returned the hug and felt a little teary-eyed with the same relief. She didn't want to think about what would've happened if she hadn't been there. After all, in the context of an allergic reaction, a supercharged immune system, which was another quirk of Barry's hypermetabolism, was not something to be thankful for.

"What happened?" Joe asked as the both of them recovered and stepped back from each other.

"I don't really know. I just found him on the floor. And then I was stabbing him with an Epipen," she said, almost robotically, before being plagued by a sense of guilt because she felt like she was missing something. "He doesn't have allergies, right? Because I've read his medical history so many times, I've practically have it memorized… and there was never any mention of allergic reactions."

"He didn't," Joe said. The fact that all of that had changed now went without saying.

His confirmation had brought something to the fore of Caitlin's mind. Barry's lack of known allergies and his symptom profile, especially that almost pathognomonic rash and its dense concentration around his lips, was eerily similar to the latest victims in their case. "Is it just me or does this look familiar? Remember the case you brought to us three weeks ago?" It wasn't an official case then. It looked like it was going to be one now.

Joe nodded his head.

"I don't think I would forget a rash like that. And here," she said as she took Joe closer to Barry and lifted his oxygen mask to reveal his horribly swollen, blotchy and unusually red lips. "Look at the rash around his lips."

The detective nodded his head again. "So this isn't just some reaction to something he ate."

"I'm not saying that it isn't but it wouldn't hurt to make sure. I don't have privileges in this hospital so I don't really have the authority to order the tests we need to figure this out," she said as she took something out of her bag. It looked like a really long Q-tip with a plastic cap on top. A swab, Joe had thought as Caitlin proceeded to do what he'd guessed.

"So, I'm swabbing his lips now so that we can have something to work on. Cisco is already on his way here to see him. I'll tell him to run this," she said as she capped the specimen and hid it in her bag. She was just about to tell Joe that they also needed a full toxicology screen but was interrupted by Eddie, who had Barry's attending physician in tow. She had whispered it to Joe instead.

Joe immediately agreed with her idea and after getting an update from the ER doctor, he informed the physician of a possible connection to an ongoing 'poisoning' case. The doctor then ordered a full tox screen and a bevy of other tests, which had Caitlin biting her lip because she knew that it would take forever in labs that were less advanced than her own. But since it was infinitely harder to covertly extract blood than it was to obtain a swab (Yes, even if she had an extraction kit ready in her bag! ), she had forced herself to let it be. However, the detective, who had wanted to get a jump on the investigation ( Bless his soul!), requested that a sample of Barry's blood be released to the CCPD for further forensic analysis.

Once the doctor left, Joe told her to ask Cisco to wait for the sample to save them all another trip. That earned him another very grateful hug from her.

Eddie's urgently ringing phone cut short their interaction. Eddie picked up and told Joe that their boss wanted an update and a preliminary assessment. It was obvious that the senior detective was torn between wanting to remain with Barry and reporting back to the station to start the investigation, so she volunteered to stay with the currently knocked out patient.

"Don't worry, Joe," she assured, "I won't let anything happen to him."

"I know. But just the same, I'll leave a couple of officers on stand-by. Call me when anything changes," he answered as he laid a hand on her shoulder with one last look at his son and left.

They ended up spending four hours in the ER before the doctor released Barry. With strict instructions for monitoring, a greatly improved yet still loopy Barry (She couldn't help but smile when he had sleepily greeted her with 'Hello, my cutie Caitie-Cats! I'm glad there are two of you!' as soon as he was able to speak) was discharged into her care. By the time all the papers were taken care off, Joe, who had been taken off the case by his Captain, was already back to give them a ride to S.T.A.R. Labs. They had both decided that it was the best place for Barry's continued care, as well as his protection, against what was largely an unknown threat.

Beep… Beep… Beep…

The faint but reassuringly steady rhythm of Barry's pulse monitor brought Caitlin back to the present.

All of that, to her, felt like a lifetime ago. Since then, Barry had only gotten worse. In the three hours after she had brought him back to S.T.A.R. Labs, he had turned blue, collapsed and hadn't regained consciousness since. She was lucky that she was able to intubate him just before his airway had closed all the way up. Then, just when the swelling around his throat had seemed to resolve, he started choking on his own vomit. Now, his vital signs were plummeting every so often. It wouldn't have been a problem if she had a full medical staff at her disposal. But with Dr. Wells being MIA, Detective West being on the hunt for a suspect and Cisco splitting his time between helping her and the detective, they were all stretched too thin.

She had been alone when Barry's vital signs crashed for the fourth time since his release from the hospital, and it had been that close a call to have her fighting a full blown panic attack just inside his treatment room in the cortex. She knew she needed help. And there was really only one person she could call.

"Felicity," she exhaled unsteadily into her phone, "It's Barry."

Ha, finally a chapter! Don't be scared to let me know what you think by leaving comments/reviews below! Kisses! To those who want to check out Finally, just look under my stories and go from there.