I shook the umbrella off, stepping into the warehouse and smiling at the group there. Despite the reason for being there, I was happy to be in Starling, and see my friends. "No sign of any explosives. Maybe a crane, maybe a forklift," I heard someone say. "I'm guessing there at least three of the, maybe four," I knew it was Detective Lance by then. He was circling the area with Felicity a couple feet behind him. I smirked, crossing my arms as I watched them. "And given how quick they got out of here…"

"You'd say they are fast?" I asked, seeing everyone whip their head around. As I saw their eyes widen, my phone rang the special tone I had set up for my favorite forensic scientist. I started singing the song as I answered Barry's call.

"You're already there?" He asked, well more like whined into the phone. "Why didn't you wait for me?"

I laughed, "Bare, has it ever occurred to you to get up earlier so you wouldn't be late more than half the time." I sighed, seeing everyone waiting for me now. "I got an earlier train; just get here quick, kay? I gotta go," I whispered the last part into the phone, quickly hanging up and looking at the group.

There were some stares as I put my phone away, but I didn't really care, seeing Oliver open his arms. I smiled at him, taking a couple strides to be in his arms. "Leslie, long time no see." Oliver's hugs felt like home, making me sigh and close my eyes. "You didn't need to go Les," he whispered into my ear. "Things would have eventually worked out." I shook my head, pulling away from him.

I gave him a sad smile, shaking my head again. "Ollie, it had to happen."

He grit his teeth, him doing the shaking of the head this time. "I would have done something. I could have done something. I-"

"Oliver," I said sternly. "Give yourself a break."

There was a cough, and I pulled away from Oliver, seeing Barry walk in. He was soaked from the rain, and I had to hide a snicker into my arm. "Sorry I'm late," he said quietly, but we still heard. "Care to show me the uh…" I nodded, scratching the back of my neck and then adjusted my bag on my shoulder.

"C'mon Allen." I brought him over to the missing centrifuge spot. Once we were there I didn't stop though, I roughly grabbed his jacket, dragging his body down to a crouch so that we could have some privacy. "Barry Allen, this is a favor for you, do not," I looked up from his jacket into his scared eyes, taking a deep breath to calm myself down. "Look Barry, I'm the only one to believe in your freak stories, I know, but there was a reason I left, and I don't want to have to force my reason on you too." He nodded, blushing as he looked behind us.

"It was only one guy," he whispered to me, sending a glance to the crime scene.

I furrowed my eyebrows, "But, I mean… That's a lot… Barry… Are you insane?!" I knew my voice shot up a couple of octaves, but this was crazy. "This is crazy, Barry!"

"Uh, is everything okay with you two?" I heard John ask us. I smiled tensely, looking down at the tugging on my hand. I was still clenching Barry's jacket very tightly, and he wanted me to let go. I let go, sending an apologetic smile to Barry as I stood up, wiping the probably nonexistent dirt off of my pants.

"Yeah, sorry about that John. Barry here, just has some, you know, not very probable theories zooming around his head."

"What are they?" Felicity asked. Barry's hand fell on my back, and I sent him a small smile.

"Reasons why he was late," I muttered, jumping a little when there was a slightly hard pat on my back.

"Okay, but who the hell are you?" Lance asked, and I finally looked at him closely. He was wearing the officer uniform, and I was a little confused.

"Do your parents know that you're here?" Oliver added, sending me a pointed look. I bit my lip at the question, looking at Barry as he just stared at my friends.

"Oliver-" I started, wanting to scold him when Barry stopped me.

"It's okay Leslie. I'm Barry Allen, from the Central City Police Department. Not the kinda stuff that Leslie does, more science stuff." I rolled my eyes, hitting his chest and drawing the attention back to me.

"We're working on a case with similar unexplained elements in Central City," Barry stated, and I nodded with a grimace. I did not expect to have this lie be so hard to commit too. "So when the report of your robbery came over the wire, our captain sent us up here." I avoided looking at the group, but continue to nod while I looked at Barry.

"And you two think one guy ripped through the door like it was tin foil?" Lance asked us.

"One very strong guy, yeah." He nodded excitedly to everyone, looking at me to back him up. I sighed, nodding along with him. "Uh, it takes about 1250 pounds of torque to break someone's neck." He tapped on the tablet, pulling up a picture of the dead guard. "You see the marks on the guard's neck? The bruising pattern suggests the killer used only one hand. I'm guessing you don't know how hard it is to break someone's neck?"

I snorted, looking away from them into my shoulder. "Hmm?" Oliver asked. "No, no idea." I didn't notice the look from Lance, Barry, and John; two questioning and another that was warning respectively.

"Uh, we're going to need a list of the inventory to figure out exactly what was stolen," the guy behind Oliver said. That drew away enough attention from Barry and so that I could give him an encouraging smile.

"Actually, I think I know what was stolen," Barry interjected, and once again, everything was back to us. "A centrifuge, an industrial centrifuge." He led us over to the empty spot, still talking, "Probably the cord enterprises 2BX 900, maybe the six series. Both have a three column base. You can see the three sets of broken bolts, where the thief just… ripped it out of the ground."

"And what-" Lance started, but Oliver cut him off, staring scrutinizing at Barry.

"How the hell did you get all of that so fast?" Oliver asked, not chancing a glance at me, his eyes still very focused on Barry.

But it didn't matter that no one was looking towards me for the answer, I had gotten enough of slack for Barry's intuitiveness, and I wasn't getting it from these guys. "Barry here," I looked over at him, seeing the wide eyes and open mouth, he probably wasn't expecting to answer these types of questions. I started again, "Barry is kinda like Sherlock in the manner of seeing a lot of clues that give you the only logical explanation, but not like Sherlock in the manner of being a sociopath. He's normal." I looked around at everyone. "Sorta," I added as an afterthought. "You had a question, Detective Lance," I said, giving him a look that basically said, you have the floor.

"Oh, I'm not uh..." He shook his head. "What is a centrifuge exactly?"

"It separates liquids," Felicity explained. "The centripetal acceleration causes denser substances to separate out along the radial direction."

"And the lighter objects move to the top," Barry said. Felicity smiled at him, and I smirked, holding back a nudge into Barry's side.

"I'm Felicity Smoak," she introduced.

"I do believe that not everyone has been introduced here," I said, looking between my friends and Barry. "You know her," I said, pointing at Felicity with my hand. "That's Quentin Lance, I used to be a Detective with him. Oliver Queen is next to him, and John Diggle beside him." Oliver sent me a sideways glance like he wanted us to get on with the investigation. "Right, there's cracks on the floor heading towards the door, footsteps. It's one guy." Barry nodded alongside me. Oliver ignored us, walking to the platform with the missing centrifuge, kneeling down to get a good look.

"I mean, it's just one of my theories, backed by a lot of evidence."

"There has to be another explanation," Lance interjected.

"Lance," I whined, shaking my head, but Barry's hand gripped my own, telling me it was okay. "Come on Barry, let's uh…" I looked around at the group. "I'll take you to the uh… coffee shop I used to go to all of the time. It's nothing like Jitter's, but you know…" No one was paying any attention to us, so I just pulled Barry out.

Once we were outside I pulled open my umbrella, and led him down the street. "Can you talk to me about the Arrow?" Barry asked. I stopped in my tracks, causing Barry to go a couple a feet out into the rain before he realized that I wasn't following him. "Is something wrong Les?" I bit my lip, watching as he hurriedly got back under the umbrella and grabbed my face. "Leslie? You don't have to tell me about the Arrow," he muttered. His eyes were fully focused on me and I felt my mouth quirk up a little into a small smile.

"Barry Allen," I started, seeing his eyes light up, "you are one very curious kid." I continued walking, this time Barry keeping up with me.

"Oh come on Les, that's not even fair. I'm older than you!"

I snorted. "By a couple of months Bare, besides you still look like a kid, I'm much more mature looking than you!" He bumped my hip a little, causing me to roll my eyes, but we were already there, and together we walked into Starling City's Finest Coffee Shop.

-:-

"Go ahead Barry, I gotta answer my phone. It'll only be a couple of minutes." I shooed him away, pulling out my phone and grimacing as I read the name. Iris West. "Hey Iris, what's up?" I asked running a hand through my hair. "What can I do for you?"

"Both you and Barry are not here in Central, and I've been pushing both of you to go on one stupid date with each other, so I've assumed that you're on a romantic getaway and won't be back for a while." I groaned, shaking my head even though I knew she couldn't see.

"We're just in Starling visiting my friends," I lied, hoping she would take it.

"You took Barry to meet your old friends? Barry? Like the Barry Allen that I grew up with and you have a crush on Barry Allen?"

I scoffed. "Iris, I don't have a crush on him!" I ran a hand through my hair, trying to stop the blush that came up on my cheeks.

"Okay, try telling me that." I rolled my eyes then, letting my hand fall to my side. I felt the string I pulled when I was nervous, and pulled on that, trying to let my heart calm down as Iris stopped talking about Barry and I being missing.

"I just did, Iris!"

"Oh!" She sighed. "You know what I meant Les, just uh… Dad's looking for you and I don't really know what to say to him."

"Just tell him the truth Iris, we'll be back in a couple of days. I gotta go. Love ya!" I hung up after that and took a deep breath. I heard Barry explaining the situation to Oliver, and gulped, I had been horrible at lying to him months ago, and I knew I didn't get better at it while staying in Central, so this wouldn't exactly go as planned.

"Is Leslie with you?" I heard Oliver ask.

"Yeah, she was just answering a phone call," Barry answered as I walked into the room.

"Good," Oliver said, walking towards me and grabbing my arm roughly. He pulled me to the long table and forced me to sit down as Felicity showed Barry around. "What are you doing here Leslie?" he asked, no humor in his voice. I bit my lip and tapped my finger on my leg, wishing that Barry was still here and could help me. But he wasn't, and he couldn't, so I was on my own.

"Oliver," I gave him a horrible fake grin, "why don't you take me back to the mansion so that I can say hello to your mom and Thea. I haven't seen them in a while. And I'm so sorry for not being here during the whole, you know…" I let my hands flail around for a few seconds before bringing them back in and settling them in my lap.

"Are you going to tell us why you are here?" John asked, fixing his posture as he went to stand behind Oliver.

I deflated, but shook my head. "Not now, and not here with Barry in the other room," I whispered. "It's nothing bad, I swear, but I just don't…" Oliver nodded, and I saw a tiny smile form on his face. "I will eventually, guys…"

"Well," Oliver stood up, "in the meantime, why don't you and I take a swing around the Queen Mansion, I know some people there that would love to see you."