Another apology from the author:

I don't want to beat a dead horse here, but with more negative comments appearing on this story, I felt this was necessary. I'm truly sorry for referring to the Holocaust with this story. I know that a fictional story doesn't even remotely compare to those horrible real-life events. I'm not going to pretend like this story doesn't contain some similar elements, though. The truth is, I feel like so many people act like the Holocaust happened a long time ago and that it can't happen again today, but the reality is that it really wasn't that long ago. It was less than a hundred years ago, and it could very well still happen today. It does still happen today in some countries.

Violence and human genocide are common recurring themes in human history, and I wanted to show how it would happen in modern times. Obviously, we don't have metahumans in real life like we do in this story, but we do have people of different races, religions, ethnicities, and sexualities, and any one group could be subjectable to having this happen to them. It's foolish to think that history can't repeat itself. We should learn from history, not ignore it and forget about it.

A good movie that shows this, actually, is the movie V for Vendetta. Set in modern day Britain, the movie shows how in a modern society, a variety of people are oppressed and mass exterminated for their differences, particularly homosexuals and people of "unsavory" religions—pretty much anything that isn't Christianity. It's a great movie, and I highly recommend it to anyone who might find it interesting. It shows how all of this can actually still happen, even today. It's not impossible or even improbable. It will happen again at some point.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that, although I originally compared this story to the Holocaust—because it is perhaps history's most famous and well-known human genocide—really it's comparable to any of the many genocides that have taken place over the course of history. I'm really sorry about this rambling author's note. I just wanted to get this all out there because although I wanted people to be entertained by this story, I also wanted it to make people think.

Warning: Self Harm


An Act of Desperation


It was on every news channel.

Clinton Price Announces Plans for Separate Metahuman Communities

"In regards for public safety," Clinton Price announced, "MRA officials and I have decided it would be in everyone's best interest if metas were kept separate from the general human population that still occupies Central City. We have managed to contain the problem by not allowing metas to spread beyond Central City limits, but in doing so we now have a city overrun with contaminated metas. Many have pushed for all meta individuals to simply be exterminated. However, I find this to be a far more humane way to deal with the problem, and I think this will make everyone happier on both sides of the spectrum.

"The new designated meta residence zone will be surrounded by a sixty-foot-high wall, which will be carefully guarded and maintained by MRA personnel in order to ensure that no meta breaches the human zones of our city. I assure everyone, the living conditions of this zone will be very agreeable in order to ensure quality of life for both humans and metas. Our zoning project is currently underway as we speak and should be complete by the end of the month."

"We have to get this chip out of me," Barry said seriously, looking past everyone and staring a hole through Caitlin.

"Barry," Caitlin said painfully, turning off the TV in the cortex, "I can't."

"Then I'll remove it myself," he said seriously, his voice laced with a hint of panic, "I swear to God, Caitlin. If you don't get this thing out of me, I'll do it myself."

"Barry," Iris said, putting a hand on his shoulder, "It could kill you."

"I don't care," he said angrily, "I'm willing to take that chance."

"Well, I'm not, Bar," Joe said, "We have to find another way."

"How?" Barry demanded, "There's nothing else we can do. This chip won't allow me to leave. I can't hide from the MRA. I can't escape this or fix it until we find a way to get this chip out."

"Barry, we're not going to let this happen," Joe said firmly, "I won't let them separate you from us."

"How?" Barry asked again, quieter this time.

That was the real question. None of them really knew what to do, and they understood Barry's panic, felt it themselves. No one knew how they were going to stop this from happening. The situation was completely out of their hands.


Barry stood there for the longest time staring into the bathroom mirror, his shirt long since removed. He had made sure nobody else was home, and he had locked the door just in case. His reflection looked pale, no doubt from the fear and tension of what he was about to do. He had been standing there for a while now, trying to work up the nerve.

Barry took a deep breath and pulled out his supplies. He pulled on a pair of his CSI gloves, thankful that he always kept a box at home. He tore open an alcohol swab packet, and raised the wipe up to the back of his neck, the smell of rubbing alcohol making his stomach churn.

If Caitlin wasn't going to do this, then he would do it himself.

He wasn't going to let the MRA win. He wasn't going to let them control him. If he got this damn thing out, then the MRA wouldn't be able to track him. He wasn't planning on running. No, he was still going to stay and fix this. All he needed was his speed back, and there was only one way to do that.

After sterilizing the back of his neck the best he could, Barry picked up the razor blade he had set on the counter and wiped that off with another alcohol swab before grabbing a lighter and holding the blade under the flame for a moment. Caitlin was going to be furious with him, but at least he was being somewhat aseptic about it. She had to give him points for that.

Barry held up a hand mirror so that he could see his back's reflection in the larger bathroom mirror. Using his other hand, he reached up over his shoulder with the razor blade held tightly between his fingers. It was an awkward angle, but he made it work. His hand paused behind his head for a moment, the blade hovering inches away from his neck. Barry took a deep breath and gritted his teeth before sliding the blade across his skin.

His neck exploded with pain almost instantly. The area had healed over, but it was still tender from his original surgery and from all the times they had shocked him using the chip. His stomach churning, Barry continued to cut into the wound, opening it up while also being cautious not to cut too deep. He didn't want to hit a major blood vessel or a nerve. With a gasp of pain, Barry set the razor blade down once the wound was fully open.

He shakily lowered the mirror in his hand and took a moment to breathe through the pain before raising it up again. His entire body was trembling, and it instantly felt like he was back in that facility, just after he had gotten the damn thing put in. He could see the device now, and he felt a twisting in his gut as he thought of the best way to remove it. He had looked over the diagrams Caitlin had found, studied them meticulously, but he had to say, looking at the real thing was nothing like the picture. He couldn't visualize how the device was actually inserted. He was no surgeon, after all.

This was why he had begged Caitlin to do this for him. Even if he was a surgeon, it was impossible to do it on himself. That wasn't going to stop him from trying, though. He could stop now. He could stitch himself back up and give up, but to do so would be leaving himself at the MRA's mercy. He couldn't do that.

He couldn't stop now.

Taking a deep breath, Barry reached a shaky hand up to the incision, pressing a gloved finger into the wound. He gritted his teeth as he dug into the open incision, trying to get a feel for the device, but his damn glove kept getting in the way. Frustrated, Barry lowered his hand again and tore the glove off. Screw being sterile. His body would take care of any infection once he got his powers back anyways.

Blood was running down his back now, mingling with the sweat that now covered his body. Barry leaned against the counter. His knees were shaking now along with his hands as his now ungloved fingers returned to the incision.

Based on what he had seen in the diagram, the device wrapped around his spinal cord and extended up into his brainstem. He first had to worry about unclasping it. He would worry about the brainstem thing later when it came time to actually pull it out. Barry worked on unscrewing the clasp on one side of the device. If he did it wrong, the device would end up clamping down on his spinal cord, effectively killing him or paralyzing him.

Barry felt dizzy as he looked at the large, white nerve in his neck that the device was wrapped around. He had seen similar things in his work and with cadavars in CSI school, but it was entirely different than seeing and touching your own spinal cord. Barry felt like he was going to be sick and tried not to think about it too much, focusing more on the device itself rather than the internal anatomy of his spine.

His shaking grew worse as he struggled to detach the device. His fingers kept slipping on it, slick with blood. Barry started to get scared when he felt a tingling sensation in his fingers and toes. He was doing nerve damage. He could tell.

Still, he pressed on, desperate to get the chip out his body. Tears filled his eyes as he thought about how he had been driven to this, to this act of desperation. He felt like an animal with its foot caught in a trap, willing to do whatever it took to escape.

The numb tingling feeling quickly spread, and Barry felt like his legs were going to collapse from under him. He was terrified that he was going to end up paralyzing himself. Maybe if he just got the device out, though, it wouldn't matter. He had recovered from a broken spine before. If he got his powers back, maybe he wouldn't end up quadriplegic. Even if he did, it was probably better than whatever the MRA had in store for him.

Black spots started to fill his vision. The sweat covering his body felt cold now, and it was then that Barry knew. He was in way over his head. He managed to get the clasp on the device unscrewed, but he was nowhere near removing it. A sob escaped his lips as he clawed desperately at the device, no longer worrying about being careful. He needed it out of him. He couldn't stand another second of having it in his body. He would get it out even if it killed him.

He could feel his consciousness slipping away from him, and tears started falling down his face. He needed to get it out now before he passed out. This was his one chance for freedom. If he failed, he probably wouldn't get another one. Another broken sob escaped his lips before the darkness suddenly overtook him and he felt himself hit the floor.


Wally set his school bag down by the door as he walked into the house. He didn't even want to think about his homework. He hadn't been focusing too great in school lately, mostly because of everything that was going on. He wasn't particularly close with Barry, but it definitely still pained him to see what Barry was going through. He didn't know him very well, but Wally knew that Barry didn't deserve any of the things that were happening to him, and he was just as worried as the rest of them that Barry was going to be taken away soon.

He couldn't even imagine what Barry must be feeling right now, especially now since he didn't have work or anything else to distract him from it all. While the rest of them left in the morning to go to school or work, Barry spent his entire day at home, probably going crazy wondering what was going to happen to him.

All of them were worried about what Barry might do. He wasn't the type to just stand by and do nothing when things were going to hell, and they all were terrified he was going to go out there and join the metahumans who were fighting back, even if doing so would essentially be committing suicide. Barry had promised them he would stay home, though. He promised he wasn't going to do that. Still, they all were worried he was going to do something reckless. He was scared, and with good reason. There was no telling what Barry might do out of fear.

"Barry?" Wally called, walking through the living room and into the kitchen, both of which were empty.

He made his way upstairs then. Barry was probably in his room. Wally had decided that the least he could do was spend time with the guy, try to get his mind off things for a while and maybe get to know him a little more in the process. He was confused when he found Barry's room to also be empty, though.

That was when he noticed that the bathroom door was closed.


Henry didn't have access to much TV from the cabin he was staying in, but when he went into the nearby town and stopped in a small diner for a cup of coffee on a Tuesday afternoon, the TV caught his eye and he paled when he saw the news report.

Push for Metahuman Segregation Laws Intensifies with MRA Bombing in Central City

Segregation laws? Bombings in Central City? What the hell was happening? And what was the MRA?

"Can you turn it up, please?" he asked the waitress behind the counter.

She nodded and grabbed the remote.

"If you want," she said with a shrug, "Most people are sick of hearing about this by now, though."

"What is it exactly?" Henry asked, "What's going on?"

"Central City's become a warzone," she said, giving him a strange look, wondering how he was only first hearing about this now, "Where have you been?"

"I don't watch a lot of TV," Henry said dismissively, "What do you mean, a warzone?"

"Well, everyone knows by now that Central City has all those mutant people running around," she said, "Metas. Or metahumans. I don't care really what they call them."

Henry nodded, impatiently waiting for her to continue.

"The government's been regulating the metas in the city, not allowing them to leave and pretty much controlling every aspect of their lives. I guess the metahumans have had enough of it, though. They're starting to fight back. Now, they're pushing for segregation to keep the metas separate from the humans, which if you ask me, sounds like a pretty good idea at this point. With all this violence going on, separation would probably be better for everybody. Really, I don't know why the humans don't just leave, though. You'd have to pay me to live in a city filled with mutated freaks."

"What about the Flash?" Henry asked intensely, "What has he been doing with all this?"

She shrugged.

"No one knows what happened to the Central City vigilante. He just disappeared. He was probably one of the metas that fought back in the beginning of it all. They've killed hundreds of metas already, and most people just assume the Flash was one of them."

Henry felt all the blood drain from his face.

"I have to go," he said quickly, slapping some cash on the counter and abandoning his coffee as he rushed out the door.

Henry was pissed. No, he was beyond pissed. He was livid. With everything that was going on in Central City, no one thought to call him?! His son was dealing with all of this or worse, he could be dead, and no one bothered to even call him?!

Henry slammed the door of his car angrily, whipping out his phone as he started to drive.


Joe glanced briefly down at his phone and saw that Henry was calling. He knew it was only a matter of time before news of what was happening reached Barry's father. He didn't have time to face Henry's wrath right now, though, and he let the call go to voicemail. He had more pressing concerns at the moment as he rushed into the house and up the stairs.

"What's going on?" he asked Wally immediately when he found him standing outside the bathroom door.

"I don't know," Wally said, "I've been knocking and shouting for almost fifteen minutes. He's not answering me."

"Are we sure he's in there?" Joe asked.

Wally sighed and held up his phone. He had the new MetaTracker app open and sure enough, the map indicated that Barry was there. At least the chip in Barry's neck was useful for once.

"Barry!" Joe called through the door, pounding on it with his fist, "Are you okay? Can you hear me?"

There was no reply.

"Dad, I've been trying for fifteen minutes," Wally said seriously.

"Move away from the door," Joe said firmly, and Wally quickly obeyed while Joe took a step back before kicking the door in.

Both of them rushed into the room, and Joe's heart leapt into his throat when he saw Barry lying on the floor. He was shirtless, lying on his stomach, a line of dark red dried blood flowing from his neck and down his back. Joe wanted to be sick when he saw the open wound on Barry's neck, and he knew instantly what had happened.

Barry had tried to remove his microchip.

"Oh my God, Bar," Joe said quietly to himself, "What did you do?"

"Barry," Wally said loudly, kneeling down next to him to try to wake him.

"Don't touch him," Joe said quickly and Wally drew back a bit, "We don't know what damage he's done to his spine. We shouldn't try to move him or anything, or we could make it worse."

Joe quickly pulled out his phone and dialed Caitlin's number.

"Caitlin," Joe said urgently as soon as she picked up, "We need you at the house right away. Barry did something stupid."

Wally looked sadly at Barry lying on the floor, his outstretched fingers bloody from trying to dig the device out of his own neck.

"Yeah, he tried to remove it," he heard his dad say shakily into the phone, "He's unresponsive. We haven't touched him. We didn't want to cause more damage."

After being assured that the young doctor was on her way, Joe put his phone away and let out a shaky breath before kneeling down next to Wally by Barry.

"Oh, Bar," he said sadly when he noticed the dried tears on his son's face.

Joe felt his heart shattering into pieces. As stupid as it was, he knew exactly why Barry did this. He was scared. He was desperate and terrified. Tears filled his eyes, as he lightly touched Barry's face.

"It's going to be okay, Barry," he choked, "I got you, son."

When Caitlin got there, she didn't seem angry like Joe had expected her to be. Instead, she reacted the same way that he had. She took one look at Barry, lying on the floor with a razor blade lying next to him, and she felt herself become consumed with intense sorrow for him. She couldn't even bring herself to be angry. She was just sad as she started to assess the damage.

"He's reacting to painful stimuli," she said quietly when Barry reflexively tensed as she squeezed the trapezius muscle in his shoulder, "That's good. It means he didn't paralyze himself."

She looked at the wound then, her stomach doing summersaults when she saw Barry's spinal cord and the device that had been partially unclasped. She couldn't believe Barry had been driven to the point of actually doing this to himself.

He had told her.

He had sworn to her that if she didn't remove it for him, he was going to do it himself. She didn't think that he'd actually do it, though, and now she felt like she had no one to blame but herself for not taking his threat seriously. She shouldn't have underestimated Barry's desperation to regain his freedom again, his desperation to not be taken away from his family.

Caitlin tried to ignore the prickling of tears in her eyes as she assessed the damage. She needed to keep a cool head so she could help Barry. Her attention was pulled away from Barry momentarily, though, when she heard a sharp gasp from the doorway.

"Oh, my God!" Iris said in a shrill voice, "Oh, my God! What happened?!"

"Barry tried to remove his microchip," Joe told her sadly, "Caitlin's just assessing the damage now."

Iris put a hand over her mouth as she looked down at Barry, unconscious on the bathroom floor.

"Oh, my God, Barry," she said through her fingers, tears filling her eyes, "Why would you do this?"

She looked at Caitlin then.

"Is he going to be okay?" she asked her tearfully.

"He caused some nerve damage," Caitlin said softly, looking at his cervical spine, "But it might be fixable. The device clamped down slightly on his spinal cord. It's probably why he passed out. It looks like he yanked on it, no doubt desperate to just get it out any way that he could. He must have panicked."

Iris knelt down in the small bathroom to place a gentle hand on Barry's arm. That was when she noticed that his fingers were twitching, no doubt from the nerve damage he had caused.

"Caitlin," Joe said quietly, "Is there any way that you could…get it out of him? Could you maybe just try?"

They all looked at the doctor who had an uneasy look on her face.

"It's too risky," she said painfully, "There are so many different ways that I could try to remove it, and if I don't choose the right way, I'm only going to cause more damage. It looks like Barry chose the removal method that I would have tried, and he ended up just hurting himself. He's already caused damage to his spine. I can't risk causing more."

"He's desperate, Caitlin," Iris said tearfully, "He was desperate enough to risk doing it himself. Maybe you should try it."

"I could kill him," Caitlin whispered painfully.

"Can we deactivate it?" Wally asked, "Maybe we don't have to remove it. We can just break it somehow so it doesn't work anymore."

They all looked to Caitlin, but she just shook her head.

"So many people have tried doing that, and most of them either crushed their spinal cord or ended up electrocuting themselves to death. No one has successfully disabled one. The only people who truly know how to get them out are the people who put them in."

They all looked sadly at each other for a moment of silence, only for it to be broken by Caitlin a minute later.

"I'm going to fix the device," she said quietly, "I have to get it realigned back in place or it's just going to hurt him."

She set about realigning the device then, feeling sick to her stomach as she reclasped the part of it that Barry had managed to take apart. Once it was back in place, the pressure on Barry's spinal cord was resolved. She could only hope now that he wouldn't have any permanent damage from his desperate attempt to remove the device.

Caitlin wanted to cry as she stitched Barry back up with the microchip still inside him. He was going to be so devastated when he woke up later to find that the device was still in his body. Caitlin hated herself when she finished up the last stitch on Barry's neck. She felt like she was failing him, sentencing him to suffer at the MRA's hands for the rest of his life.

The last stitch felt like the final nail on his coffin.