Jesse is having a great evening, stellar, in fact, kicking Wally's ass at virtually every game he throws at her, which means he's buying pancakes for breakfast, when a red streak whooshes into the cortex.
Staggering visibly, Barry takes a seat at the console. Takes a seat. Jesse pauses mid-"What do you mean Pluto isn't a planet?" rant, pitching a casual, "You okay?" his way. Wally takes advantage of her momentary distraction and steals a handful of chips from her bag of Lay's; she smacks his shoulder without looking at him. "Get your own stash."
"Yours are crunchier," Wally insists, chips crackling loudly.
Barry pinches the bridge of his nose and says in a low, warning tone, "Quiet."
Jesse's eyebrows arch. Oh, so it's a Grumpy Barry day, that's fun. She takes a chip and crunches down as loudly and leisurely as she can, snatching the bag from Wally's questing hand. He pouts and hip-checks her. "What's got you down, Bar?" she asks, ignoring her puppy-pleading boyfriend and the plight of her soon-to-be-catatonic mentor, if the way he's banging his head against the desk is any indication.
(Sweet, sweet revenge for that arctic training session last week. "The ice is thick," Barry said. "Fuck you," Jesse replied, or would have, if her teeth weren't chattering so hard from that unexpected arctic plunge. To Barry's credit, it did mean Wally hugged her for fully two hours after, and Wally cuddles were a serious perk.)
Barry stops banging his head and disappears, Flashing back a moment later with a thoroughly disheveled Caitlin in tow. She blinks, doe-eyed and surprised, settled down for the evening in pajamas. "Hey, Cait," Wally greets, smiling invitingly as he takes another chip and god dammit, Jesse misses the snatch back.
Caitlin frowns. "What am I –?" She turns to look at Barry, who, to be fair, looks like Voldemort, if Voldemort had a nose and freckles. "Wow," she says, reaching for his forehead reflexively. "What happened?"
Barry ducks, equally reflexively. "I don't know."
And then he vomits on the floor.
. o .
"Okay, so we've ruled out … most common poisons," Cisco says rather cheerfully as he taps away at a tablet. He's sporting Star Wars jammies and a pair of clear-framed glasses. Jesse's grateful that Speed course-corrected her vision for her, negating her previous need for contacts. Guess Vibing didn't come with the same perks. "Is it getting better or worse over time?"
Barry, now looking like Voldemort's sickly twin brother, rasps, "'Co."
Taking pity, Cisco dishes out another bottle of Tylenol. Jesse knows it doesn't help – at all, and believe her, she's tried to make painkillers work – but Barry seems to take some comfort in the act of popping a handful of pills, like they'll help this time.
Caitlin, undeterred, has him hooked up to two IVs, working to mitigate what she can't help. Wally is off helping with a round-up case for the police. "Sure you don't want me to come?" she asked, arms around his waist as he pressed a Speed-kiss to her forehead.
"Mm, I need someone to make sure he doesn't die. He still hasn't taught us how to throw lightning," he replied cheekily, and she pouted and obliged.
It's not that she didn't care, of course; Barry was a good guy. But Barry had also been kind of a jerk lately, caught up in his little stress bubble of you-could-have-been-killed that meant almost every conversation ended in shouting. Wally and she jokingly thought of it as his time of the month because, without fail, every three weeks or so Barry's stress-meter would overflow and he'd snap if a twig cracked too loudly.
It's probably a speedster-hormonal thing, Caitlin admitted when he was well out of earshot, further lending credence to their theory. Insofar, they'd found no ways to curb it, except employing Iris, who could, with a single very informative look, douse the rage.
Jesse had noticed that Wally tended to get sulky and quiet around the same time, too. She already had her own suffering to contend with every four weeks; whatever Speed Force threw at her was accepted without grief.
It also didn't help that unlike Wally and Jesse, who took turns on patrol, Barry went out every. Single. Night. He didn't trust that they wouldn't need him. Even if he said he would stay home, he'd Flash by periodically to make sure everything was good. Eventually whoever was out that night would sigh and let him tag along. They would take care of some minor projects and intercept some would-be crimes and chat with the nice Italian shop owner who always had a couple stacks of pizza waiting for his favorite speedsters, a tradition that was balanced by several other generous storeowners eager to entertain speedsters.
Jesse's stomach growls and she thinks longingly of pizza, but Cisco and Caitlin and yes, Barry, expect her to stay and not abandon them, so she puts up with the occasional stomach growl to offer Moral Support.
It's not unneeded; Barry looks like he's on his deathbed, pale and shaking and breathing shallow. If he wasn't a speedster, Jesse knows they'd already be calling next-of-kin. As it stands, she kind of wonders if she shouldn't call Iris, or Joe. Then she thinks, Wally will tell them as Wonder Boy himself reappears.
"How's he doing?" he asks, flushed with victory.
In response, Barry coughs, a long, deep, bronchial hack that says, "I'm dying, Wally, how are you?"
"Great!" Wally replies, and claps him on the shoulder, and retrospectively, Jesse thinks thunder should have crackled ominously in warning in that moment. Instead, Barry falls off the table and Wally Flashes to catch him, depositing him back on the gurney with an apologetic smile. "Sorry. I still don't – the whole Speed-strength thing is a bit of a surprise," he explains sheepishly.
Barry rests a hand on Wally's arm for a moment, and his eyes flicker, still that disconcertingly deep red, and then they go dark and human, all at once, like a light being turned off.
"That's a new one," Cisco observes astutely as Caitlin, penlight in hand, orders him to follow the light.
He stares blankly ahead, asks, "What light?" and Jesse's blood runs cold.
"What do you mean?" Wally asks, his hand resting on top of Barry's, even though Barry's hand is sliding off his arm. "Hey, no passing out on us. You still haven't yelled at us for breaking the windshield with our fall."
Barry groans, like he remembers and wants to scold, but he sinks back instead.
Then his breathing starts to wheeze and suddenly none of it is even remotely funny.
. o .
They're lucky that he plateaus.
The asthmatic gasping is painful to listen to and the heartrate monitor tells them how stressed Barry is, but the alternative is intubation, and they're collectively so appalled by the idea that they opt to try and talk him through it instead. All the while frantically ruling out lesser common poisons. Cisco champions the cause via tablet.
"Radioactive spider bite?" Wally tries, pacing in agitation. He radiates sympathetic pain in his Speed aura visible only to Jesse, like a cloud of red dust, hurting on Barry's behalf.
"Or snake," Cisco says, cottoning on, and he's tapping at his tablet at a speed Jesse finds impressive. "Only problem: we don't have any antivenom."
"A name and a place," Wally says, and Cisco rattles off both and he takes off.
Jesse takes over the watch, sitting at Barry's side and feeling his back heave as he tries to get in enough air. "I take back all of those 'you're acting like a dick' comments, if it helps," she says, rubbing his back. There's a break in the shivers that, under better circumstances, might be a laugh.
Wally skids into view a second later, holding a truly astounding assortment of vials, and says in a burst, "I-didn't-know-which-ones-to-grab-so-I-got-as-many-as-I-could—"
Caitlin instructs him where to put the box and Cisco rattles off at a brisk clip, "Okay, let's try coral snake, those are pretty common—" Wally fishes it out, Caitlin gets a syringe, and Jesse holds Barry's arm out for her.
Her teeth ache with how tightly she clenches them, aching for it to work. They empty twenty vials into Barry and nothing changes. Jesse is freaking out and Wally is on the phone with Joe, heyyy, Dad. Jesse winces at the time; a phone call at two in the morning to say one of his speedsters is in deep trouble? Joe is going to kill them for not saying anything sooner.
To add to the fun, her not-Dad shows up as soon as Wally hangs up with his dad. Brandishing a cup of coffee, HR says cheerfully, "I heard we were having a sleepover! You rapscallions. What's—?" He deflates when he sees Barry, lifting both eyebrows and barking with sudden urgency, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, speedsters get out, speedsters out out out out, you're—"
Wally coughs. Jesse freezes, looking over at him and realizing for the first time that his agitation isn't confined to sympathy. He looks sickly, sweating and unfocused, hand near the collar of his suit. "Aw, fuck," HR says. "I mean shoot," he adds, looking at them with big "I swore in front of the children" eyes. When no one reacts, he relaxes and sets his coffee down. "Oh, you're in for a treat. Speed-sicknesses are legendary. And highly contagious," he adds, prompting everyone to retreat to a corner. "They say no two sicknesses strike the same way," he rambles, stepping closer fearlessly, "something to do with the volatility of the – well, anyway, how're you holding up, BA?"
Barry flips the bird. HR mirrors the gesture. "That's a new one." Then he makes the OK sign and adds, "This is how we say it on my Earth."
Jesse facepalms. "He can't see you," she says. She shoves down the fear beginning to claw at the back of your throat. Get a grip, you're fine.
"Oh, that's cool." A beat. "I mean – that's terrible. Well, you're in luck, because they say friendship is the best medicine."
"Is that a weird saying or a weird truth?" Cisco dares to ask, pressed as far back against the wall as he can be. Wally looks terrified, ready to bolt. Caitlin alone seems resigned.
Jesse doesn't have a corner to run to and, besides, she's pretty sure she'll pay for it in the afterlife if she abandons a dying friend because she doesn't want the Speed-sniffles. These are hardly sniffles, her anxiety rightfully points out.
HR waves a hand. "Oh, you're fine – non-speedsters can't catch Speed-sicknesses."
A ninety-pound weight is lifted from Cisco's shoulders. Even Caitlin exhales. Jesse tenses, and Wally vomits.
"Wow, you guys sure are a bucket full of seahorses," HR exclaims, clapping his hands together. "You're also out of luck because, well, Speed Force is one tough sonuvagun. I've never heard of a cure."
"They're terminal?" Caitlin asks with surprising coolness.
Not cool, the little shrieking anxiety monster in Jesse's brain is screaming. We're gonna die! We're gonna die!
HR snorts like it's the stupidest thing he's ever heard. "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard," he reinforces. "No, they're like …" He grasps at straws, loses his train of thought, and picks up his coffee instead. "Well, anyway, you won't die," he finishes.
Wally groans and sinks to the floor. Jesse gets off the gurney, sluggish but still standing, and joins him. "Hey, you're okay – you're okay – if he's right you'll be fine –"
"Of course I'm right," HR scoffs. He looks at the box of vials and raises an eyebrow. "How many of those did you give him?" he asks, whistling at Barry to get his attention. "Yeah, wowie, you got whammied." Barry scowls at him. HR reaches out curiously, holding a hand just in front of his face, and asks, "You can't see this?"
"How do you know all of this?" Cisco interjects.
HR blinks and drops his hand. "What, you – it's not common knowledge here?" Then, looking back at the vials, he adds, "Well. I told you. I get around. I meet interesting people. Several of whom are speedsters. You know, the Accelerated Man, he really is quite the fellow—"
"Fast forward to the point that's relevant," Cisco prompts, as Wally groans.
Jesse wraps an arm around Wally's waist and shoves the screaming anxiety monster into a box. For good measure, she stuffs that box inside another box. Then she smashes both with a hammer.
"I meet interesting people," HR repeats with a shrug. Addressing Barry once more, he instructs, "Drink lots of fluids. And stop shooting up snake venom, you animals."
"Antivenom," Cisco corrects.
"That too." HR can't resist flicking Barry's nose, evidently too curious to see if he's faking it.
Barry knocks him out in one perfectly aimed punch.
"Nice shot," Cisco says, holding out a fist for a bump and instructing, "up high."
Caitlin leans over HR, sighing as Barry and Cisco fist-bump.
Wally twists in Jesse's grip, panting, feverishly hot. "Jesse," he groans, pressing his forehead against her shoulder. "Jesse."
She can hear the Golden Trio arguing, Cisco defending Barry. Caitlin argues back and drags HR into a chair, fetching smelling salts. Even breathing like a racehorse Barry seems almost calm, perhaps convinced that if he can survive being shot up with enough snake antivenom to kill a moose, he can survive this, too.
She wishes she had his resolve as her own throat begins to tighten.
Oh, this is gonna be fun.
. o .
It goes sideways after an hour, but certain things stand out.
The vertigo is so intense she has to keep her eyes shut, but she can clearly pick out conversations. After an indeterminate time Joe arrives and hauls Wally off the floor, and Wally is shaking, has been shaking against her for a while now, and she wonders if he's burning up or freezing, or maybe both.
Iris is there, too, speaking in an indescribably calming tone in a corner, too quiet to hear. When Jesse dares to open her eyes, she sees Barry crowded close to her, head ducked over her shoulder.
Then she hears movement, step-step-step, gingerly moving towards her. A warm, firm hand clasps her own. She'd recognize Barry's Speed signature anywhere. He says, "You're coming home with us," and she doesn't argue. Sleeping on the floor of the cortex isn't fun, but she doesn't exactly have a designated arrangement, either; the hospitality erases the problem.
It stops being relative which of her boys she stays close to, taking advantage of their Speed-warmth as they doubtless feed off of hers. She ends up puppy-piling with Barry on Wally's bed and Wally just says, Move and Barry makes room.
Somehow, trapped in the middle, it stops aching as intensely, and she can't shake the image of penguins huddling for warmth as Wally accommodates rather than exiles Barry. He needs them as much as they need him, she realizes, as Wally grunts and deliberately snags Barry's wrist, maintaining direct contact.
Somewhere in the middle of the night, she hears Barry mumble under her, "Reel, run, release."
Wally grunts, "What?"
"Reel, run, release," Barry repeats. "Reel like a pitcher, run like you're swinging the ball, release. Crack. Home run."
It takes Jesse a moment, and then she snorts a laugh against his shirt, because he would treat the lightning toss like a baseball pitch.
"Reel, run, release," he says again, like a mantra.
"You know we don't have a solid reason to keep you around now, right?" Wally points out with mock gravity. He fishes around, snags the back of her shirt, and hauls her closer. "They kill off the mentor once his last trick is revealed."
Barry actually laughs. Jesse is relieved to hear it isn't heavy, or stressed, or strangling in the slightest. All he says is, "Dimension hopping."
Wally mutters, "Fuck" without heat and Jesse kisses his cheek and cuddles into his chest.
She dozes off, exhaustion warring with a headache pressing at the back of her eyes. Someone is purring, she is absolutely, one-hundred percent sure of it, but she can't figure out who and doesn't care to ask.
It's healing, and she relaxes into it. When she opens her eyes again it's midmorning, and Wally is hanging catatonically off the bed. Barry is nowhere to be found, his side of the bed still Speed-warm.
She rolls into it and drapes an arm over the side of the bed, finding Wally's shirt and pulling him back onto the bed. Speed makes everything easier, she thinks with a slight smile, cuddling into him as he snuffles in his sleep and lets her.
Her jaw hurts, and fatigue presses down on her like a physical weight, and she joins him. Her sense of time dissolves when she wakes up to darkness. Wally's gone, and she finds the boys downstairs on the couch, shoulder-to-shoulder, feigning interest in a laptop but mostly just sharing Speed-heat.
Jesse sidles up behind them and climbs over the back of the couch, settling beside Wally and casually dragging his arm towards her so she can hug it.
"Reel, run, release," Barry repeats, nodding at the baseball website. He's yawning virtually continuously, but his eyes are red again, glowing like embers, Voldemort's less demonic cousin.
Wally says, "I'm fucking roasting," and gets up. Jesse pouts and misses him and takes his seat by Barry instead. She hears the ice-maker running as ice cubes click into a glass, and Barry says, "Don't get brain-freeze" half a second before Wally swears again, loudly, and Joe grunts and barks from the top of the stairs, "Language."
"How do you feel about parrots?" Barry asks her, already calling up YouTube and typing dancing cockatoo into the search bar.
Her neutral-leaning-positive feelings amplify to thoroughly positive by the end of their thirty-minute foray before Wally cools off enough to say, "Scoot," and Barry gets up to make room. Barry disappears up the stairs, doubtless looking for his girlfriend. Jesse blinks too long, because when she opens her eyes again there's breakfast, and mmm.
"Joe, you're a hero," Barry says sincerely, sitting at table with Wally beside him, wolfing down what's left of what she suspects isn't the first or even second batch of pancakes. She staggers towards them, weak and tired and starving.
"And you eat like a pack of fifteen-year-olds," Joe says, pointing a spatula in mock accusation at him. "Stop hogging all my blueberries."
Barry sheepishly drops his hand, leaving the sole blueberry left in the basket intact. Jesse takes it and hums, saying, "Those really are good blueberries."
Joe sighs as she ditches the plastic container and kisses Wally. "You smell delicious," she tells him, happy and hungry, curling into his lap like they're alone, and Wally lets her. She steals his fork and pancakes and he lets her take those, too.
Iris wanders in and tries to take Barry's, but he's too fast for her, growling playfully as he slides his plate out of reach. She flicks his nose in retaliation.
Jesse laughs, and Joe says, "You better not be having too much fun in there," and she smiles.
"Never," she replies, even as Wally and she share a look that says always.