She realizes presently that she's never actually set foot inside the Time Vault, though she is familiar with what it looks like thanks to the surveillance camera they used to watch over Wally and Jesse after sheltering them there during the induced Particle Accelerator explosion. Had that really only been months ago? It felt like years, though she suspects maybe that's the effect standing in a room designated as a Time Vault can have.

Truth be told, she had forgotten all about Barry's promise to disclose why he was tossing and turning each night. Coverage of the STAR Labs Museum opening accounted for the bustling activity in today's newsroom, most of which she and another co-worker were put in charge of. She was supervising more and more major CCPN projects lately, a challenge she was proud to take on, but a responsibility that stressed her nonetheless. She was aware it was paving the road for an inevitable promotion that Scott had hinted was likely coming her way, which motivated and excited her, minus the added pressure to execute flawlessly in both reporting and in management.

In fact, Iris was so preoccupied at work that she had even overlooked that today was meant to be Wally's first time accompanying Barry for field observation. At this reminder, and once her associate promised her everything was under control, she hurriedly headed home to change and catch an Uber to STAR Labs.

Even though Barry was on-edge more than typical, to the extent that he lashed out at Wally for overstepping his bounds, Iris still didn't remember her scheduled talk with Barry until he had gently nudged her later that evening, gesturing for them to slip away from the jovial chatter of museum guests, the waiters parading trays of hors d'oeuvres, and the photographers flashing their cameras,leading her downstairs past the cortex, Speed Lab, and into the Time Vault.

"What are we doing here?" she asks, feeling that sense of discomfort that had been quelled all day tiptoe down her spine once again.

Barry affords her a perturbed glance before turning to the control panel and clearing his throat.

"Scan the archives for April 25, 2024," he orders.

"Scanning archives," a feminine robotic voice echoes.

As she watches the stream of holographic images shuffle to locate the date Barry had named, Iris begins to predict the direction this encounter might take. She's heard of the infamous time encyclopedia hidden away by Thawne. She owes the discovery that she would become Barry's wife to these archives after all. It wouldn't be unlike Barry to be bothered by something he might have seen from the future and to project that fear onto the present.

"Barry," Iris interjects, fascinated by the figures passing before her eyes, but also somewhat dubious. She's always believed in the impossible because of Barry, even before speedsters and metas. She believes in his ability to travel to the past, to glimpse into the future. But what all of Barry's journeys through time had ultimately confirmed to her was its malleability. More than anything, they had enforced the value and weight of the present. Destiny was a potent force it was true, but so were the choices today offered, and the free will to decide.

She endures: "Barry, whatever you saw-"

"Iris."

He's facing her now, and this time, the creeping apprehension engulfs her in full force, just from the way he's looking at her. She's so lost in his desolate gaze that she doesn't notice that the hologram of archives has stopped shifting. When she manages to tear her eyes from his, they meet the image of a newspaper front page.

"Flash Missing. Vanishes in Crisis," she reads, skimming the article's introductory paragraph. "After an epic street battle with the Reverse Flash…" She feels understanding flood over her. "Oh Bear, is this what you've been having nightmares about?" she asks sympathetically, moving to hug him-

Except he doesn't meet her where her arms reach out, instead leaning his head back against the wall dejectedly.

"Iris," he repeats, and there is too much tenderness in his voice for Iris's liking. More startling than that is how he didn't move to embrace her. All she wants is to hold him close, squeeze him tightly, kiss his fears and worries away, but he isn't letting her.

She opts for a different approach. After all, she isn't going to judge his reaction to learning of his disappearance…or potential death. She doesn't even know how she would take to the news of her own, if she were in his place.

"This doesn't mean anything, Barry," she begins calmly, though she can't deny the dread that his possible vanishing fills her with. Nonetheless, she stands by her conviction that time is flexible. Hadn't Flashpoint proven to her exactly that?

"I don't know what's going to happen in the future…" she tries again, inspired by his own words to her on Christmas Eve.

"Iris," he utters for a third time, and she finally realizes that she hasn't once allowed him to speak properly since they entered the vault.

"I've seen this headline before," he explains, sounding just as crestfallen as he looks. "Two years ago, when I first stumbled upon the Time Vault. This newspaper is how I learned that you and I are married in the future."

She frowns. "How?"

"Because it used to be written by Iris West-Allen."

Iris glances up at the newspaper once more, locating the author byline: Julie Greer. It's a name she doesn't recognize.

"I don't understand…"

She looks to Barry for clarification, feeling more confused than troubled at the moment, but he won't stop watching her with forsaken eyes, though the usual compassion that he views her with starts to tint his green irises. Mild reassurance catches up to her, Barry's gaze will do that to her, except that doesn't put a cap on her bewildered curiosity.

He takes a deep breath. "The future's changed, Iris."

Hasn't it always? she wants to challenge, but she waits for him to continue.

"When Jay and I tapped into the Speed Force to get rid of the Philosopher's Stone, I did something I've never done before, without knowing it at the time." Barry scrutinizes her carefully: "I traveled to the future."

Iris senses her heart palpitate against her sternum. Heat courses through her with every pulse.

"The future's changed," he restates. "I saw Savitar murder you."

The subsequent stillness is so palpable that Iris swears Barry can hear her heartbeat from where he stands across from her. If he doesn't hear that, he has to sense the infinite questions racing through her mind.

He doesn't move or say anything, instead surveying her with a kind of vigilance she's never seen from him before.

She supposes he's waiting for her to respond, of course he would, only…she has no idea how to. It's not the first time someone seems to have more knowledge and control of her own life over her. But being informed that she's going to wed Barry versus learning that she's going to die are two very different events.

"What do you mean you saw?" she finds herself asking, still trying to make sense of his revelation before she allows herself to react. "What exactly did you see?"

Barry shakes his head, pupils glistening momentarily before wiping fiercely at his eyes, refusing to let himself cry in front of her, undoubtedly in an attempt to remain strong and composed.

"I saw him murder you," he surfaces, reiterating what he had before. She's not obtuse enough to conclude from this that her death is gruesome. It would be like Barry to spare her details to not terrify her.

Except she's conscious of terror provoking her nonetheless.

"How?" she presses, oddly calm despite budding fear and uncertainty that she isn't sure is rational or not.

Barry blinks at her.

"How does he murder me?"

"Iris," Barry cautions.

"HOW?" Her relentless outburst startles Barry and herself.

All he does is stare blankly.

She turns away hurriedly, pacing to the other side of the room, suddenly too conscious of how he's treading around her, probably anticipating her detonation at the news of her murder at the hands of a Speed God, probably waiting for her to express at least some sort of emotion. How can she though when all that's coursing through her is numb disbelief?

Normally she wouldn't take a foretelling like this seriously, normally she wouldn't resolve herself to knowledge of the future, normally she would insist on the impact of the present. She had been forewarned that she and Barry would get together, but that had been destiny because she wanted it to be. Surely, by that logic, anything could be willed or willed away, even if it was her own death.

Unless…she was kidding herself and she was actually more helpless over her own fate than she previously believed herself to be. Perhaps she and Barry are together in every timeline and on every earth because the will of the universe had written them as such.

No, she refutes vehemently. I love Barry. Destiny put him in front of her, that much was true, but it was her heart that chose to love him.

Still, she can't shrug off the fear stirring within her. Was it because Barry had actually traveled to the future and witnessed this event this time? Was it because of the newspaper byline change, that just now did she start to piece together as further evidence that she indeed dies?

Savitar's ominous prophecy rings through her ears: I know your destinies. One shall betray you. One shall fall. One shall suffer a fate far worse than death…

She's not sure when she starts shaking.

"Iris, it's okay to not know what to feel," she hears Barry's wary voice from behind her, which is still soft, despite his tension, and it takes that for her to realize that she's been quiet for a while now. She knows his words are genuine, and not part of some speech he had prepared beforehand.

"Whatever it is," he goes on, more empathetic now, "I just want you to know that I'm right here with you."

It is this earnest statement that finally breaks her. Besides the insight that Barry would not be acting this way if he were not subject to something that truly convinced him of her impending death, it is this grasp of what death really entails: separation, from not only livelihood, ambitions, hopes and dreams, but from the people she loves most.

Her friends. Wally. Her father. Barry.

I just want you to know that I'm right here with you.

But he wasn't always going to be right here. No matter what he vowed, if she were dead, Barry wouldn't be with her. He could promise his presence and his love, but if she were to take this vision of her supposed death seriously, she was going to die alone. Even worse, she was meant to be brutally killed, fated to be ripped from those who were closest to her.

She turns back to him, unexpected tears gathering, still unable to help the questions that escape her, even if they come out more desperately. Each answer he gives pushes her further from skepticism and closer to alarm, until she asks the question she's been putting off, though perhaps the most important one.

"How long until it happens?"

By now she's unabashedly crying, all panic and trepidation let loose.

At the sight of her weeping, Barry strides over to her, pulling her close to him. This might have been what he was awaiting, for her to shatter so that he could offer himself, but that awareness doesn't make his arms any less comforting. She welcomes his embrace, buries her head in the shirt of his suit, soaking it with her tears while she sobs against his chest. For a moment, she ignores the future to be grateful for his company in the present, even somewhat more grateful that he is the one who shared this with her, truth be told. Had her dad been the one to do it, she knows she would have ended up consoling him, and she's too protective of Wally to imagine him having to break the news of her death to her. Only Barry could provide her the space to process that she needed.

It's difficult to tell how long they stand in the Time Vault, wrapped in each other. Briefly, she wonders if there are still guests upstairs, contemplates whether or not her CCPN coworkers are looking for her. How to explain her disappearance from the party to them at work tomorrow? How to continue living her life normally as though she didn't just learn of her imminent demise?

She stirs beneath Barry's grip on her to look up at him, and he shifts to accommodate her, though neither one of them lets go.

"How long until it happens?" she poses again, her eyes boring into his.

Something in Barry's demeanor had changed, perhaps prompted by her tears. No longer does he appear as disheartened as he was before he held her.

"It's not going to happen." As staunch as he is in his tone and his expression, for the first time Iris can remember, her unwavering faith in Barry is challenged. She can't articulate anything, can only interpret this answer to mean that she is dying sooner than she thought. More tears blur her view of his face.

"Hey."

He tucks his fingers beneath her chin, gently propelling her head upward so that they're nose-to-nose. His thumb meets her cheek, caressing her skin before promptly smoothing her tears away until she can see him clearly again, until she can read the determination that glints in his pupils.

"I swear I will protect you."

She sniffs, and sinks into him once more, this pledge more uplifting than its predecessor, even if it didn't promise that she would live. It amazes her how Barry's judgement could be assertively bleak or idealistic. Sometimes he was right when he branded a situation as either or, but he was never wrong when he promised he would do everything in his capacity to ensure her safety. That she would trust. That she couldn't doubt for as long as she lived, however long that was.

Suddenly, Iris doesn't think she can stand another second in the vault. She's struck with an urgent desire to be as far away from STAR Labs as possible, to be alone with him, away from any reminders of the future. She glances up from beneath his arm once more.

"Let's go home," she proposes, soft in her entreaty.

He nods as though understanding, moves to steady her against him, ready to pick her up and speed them out of there, only she stops him.

"Barry," she pleas. "Can we walk instead?"