Leonard sped away from the warehouse in the direction of S.T.A.R. Labs.

Avery had to fight hard the urge to turn around in her seat and look at her mother again. She could still picture her too-pale skin and pained expression, not to mention the dark red blood that stained the front of her shirt. She'd her hand pressed over where the bullet had entered her skin, but the pressure didn't keep blood from seeping between her fingers.

She didn't like that her mom — who was usually so tough and brave — looked so weak and scared.

So she didn't look back. She didn't need to. She already knew what she would see and she would remember for a very long time.

Leonard kept nervously glancing back at Sara through the rearview mirror. Lenny never looked nervous, Avery thought, so something must be really wrong.

In fact, Leonard's heart was pounding so hard he was sure Avery could hear it.

He wanted to floor it all the way to S.T.A.R. Labs, but he knew that was a bad idea for a number of reasons. For one, if he got pulled over, he'd have to explain to the officer why he had a person bleeding out in the back of his car. Worse, with the teeny Avery sitting in the front passenger seat, getting in a car accident could be deadly.

So he was sticking as close to the speed limit as he could.

As he neared the lab, he pulled his phone out of his coat pocket and dialed Barry's number.

"What do you want, Snart?" he asked, taking far too long to answer the phone than Leonard thought a speedster should.

"Are you at the lab?"

"Yes," Barry replied suspiciously.

"I need you to be ready outside when I get here."

"What? Why?"

"We had an incident with Merlyn. He shot Sara in the stomach. It's bad."

"Got it," Barry replied and the line went dead.

Leonard continued to S.T.A.R. Labs and the second he pulled into the driveway, there was a blur of red light and Sara was gone.

Trying to keep his hands steady on the wheel, he parked the car next to a side entrance. He got out and opened the back door to help Avery out of the car. She held very tightly onto his hand as he led her to the Cortex. Nobody was there when they arrived, but the door to the med room was closed and tall blue curtains were around the bed, blocking it from their view.

He tried not to think about what was happening behind the curtains. Instead, he focused on Avery, who still hadn't let go of his hand.

"Are you okay?" he asked, crouching down at her level, "Did Malcolm hurt you at all?"

She shook her head.

"What happened to Mommy?" she asked, "How come Uncle Malcolm took me away from school?"

Leonard was afraid she'd ask that question. He knew it was Sara's choice to decide how much and how little to tell Avery about what happened in the warehouse, but Sara was in surgery right now. She was fighting for her life and Avery knew it, and it wasn't fair to let her remain afraid and confused.

He sat down in one of the chairs along the side of the room and let Avery climb into his lap.

"Your Uncle Malcolm," he started, speaking slower than normal so he could choose his words carefully, "is not a good person. He has a lot of money and he used it to build a machine that would hurt a lot of people."

"Why?" Avery interrupted, following his every word with wide eyes.

"Why? Because he thought if people were afraid of him, he'd have more power," he answered, "Your mom and I were working together to stop Malcolm and take the machine from him, and we did, the night you stayed with your grandma."

"Is that how she hurt her arm?" she asked.

"Yes," he nodded, "Malcolm was mad when he found out we took his machine because it's very important to him. To get it back, he took something that's very important to us."

"Me?"

"Yes, you. He said that he would give you back to us if we gave his machine back to him, but he lied. He let you go, but he didn't want your mom or me trying to stop him anymore. That's why she got hurt."

"Uncle Malcolm tried to kill Mommy?"

"Yes," he nodded, "But he didn't, and Barry, Caitlin, and Harry are taking care of her and making sure she gets better.

"Okay," Avery nodded.

"Do you understand now?" he asked. She nodded again, but didn't move to get off his lap.

He figured she was processing everything that he'd told her, so he sat and waited. After a while, Cisco came out of the med room. He opened the door just enough for him to fit through and closed it just as quickly.

"We think she'll be okay," he said and Leonard felt his heart finally returning to a normal pace, "They stabilized her and stopped the bleeding. Now they're just getting the bullet out and then they'll be done."

Leonard nodded. He lifted Avery up to place her on the next chair and then got to his feet.

"Cisco, do you mind watching her for a little while," he gestured to Avery.

"Where are you going?" Cisco and Avery asked at the same time.

"I just have something to take care of," he said, addressing Avery, "I'll be back soon."


Leonard wasn't exactly sure where he was going. The person he was looking for never stayed in one place for too long, but he had his guesses.

As it turns out, his third guess — a bar in central City called Saints and Sinners — was right. He was grateful for that; his next guess would have taken him to Star City.

The man he was looking for was leaning against the wall next to an old-fashioned jukebox. He was chatting up a girl with messy hair, a leather jacket, and an age at least half of his.

Leonard strode across the bar and grabbed him by the arm, pulling him out the back entrance into a musty alleyway.

"Mick," Leonard said.

"What the hell was that?" Mick exclaimed, looking around him in confusion.

"Did you tell Merlyn I was working with Sara?" Leonard growled, his fists balled together in anger.

"What?"

"I know you're still in contact with him. Are you the one who told him Sara's working with me?"

"What, no," Mick answered, shaking his head, "Why would I do that?"

"Somebody told him because he's been calling her and today he kidnapped Avery."

"Who's Avery?" Mick asked before his eyes lit up with recognition, "Oh, your daughter."

"She's not my—" he started, but then decided it wasn't the point, "Fine, yes. He found her at school and kidnapped her and wouldn't let her go until we gave him the Markov device. He shot Sara!"

"Shit, man," he said, "I'm sorry about all that, I really am, but I'm not the one that told him."

"Then who did?"

"Look, Snart, Merlyn's got eyes all over this city. It was prob'ly one 'a them," Mick said.

"Sara's in the hospital right now with a bullet in her stomach. She's fighting for her life. She might die. Avery might lose her mother. It's Merlyn's fault and I want to know who told him."

"And do what?" Mick asked, "I can tell how much you love Sara—"

"What?" Leonard interrupted, but Mick ignored him,

"— but when you find this guy, what are you gonna do? Kill him? What good is that gonna do? It's not gonna save your girl."

Leonard's shoulders slumped.

"I hope you figure this all out," Mick said, clapping him on the shoulder before heading back into the bar.

Leonard took the long way back to the parking lot, walking out of the alley and around Saints and Sinners instead of cutting through the bar. As he was approaching the car, his phone rang. He waited until he was sitting in the drivers seat before answering it.

"Cold," Cisco said, "We've got a situation down at S.T.A.R. Labs."

"What kind of situation?" Leonard asked, starting the car, "Sara?"

"No," Cisco said quickly, "She's still in surgery. She's fine. No, it's actually Avery."

"What happened? Is she okay?" he asked. With the phone sandwiched between his shoulder and his cheek, he started backing out of the parking lot.

"I dunno, man. She, like, freaked out or something like a half hour after you left, I guess because she doesn't really know where she is, or who any of us are. All I know is that she's been crying for like forty five minutes and we dunno how to get her to stop and she's asking for you."

"Tell her I'll be there in fifteen minutes," he said before hanging up the phone.


It was dark by the time he returned to the lab and pulled up to the same side entrance as earlier that day, late enough to be past Avery's bedtime.

Indeed, Avery looked dead on her feet when he arrived at the Cortex. Wally and Cisco were kneeling gingerly by her side, and Avery herself was sitting on the floor with disheveled hair and tears leaving shining tracks down her cheeks. Her clothes were rumpled and dirty from being worn all day, not to mention being in the dusty warehouse. She'd lost her shoes at some point during her tantrum and now even her socks were slipping off of her feet.

She looked up when Leonard walked in and got to her feet, stumbling in his direction before collapsing into his arms. Leonard lifted her up so her legs locked around his middle and her arms looped around his neck. She buried her face in the collar of his jacket, sobbing into the worn leather.

"Thank God," Cisco said, too grateful for not being in charge of Avery's emotional wellbeing anymore to notice how Captain Cold's demeanor was unusually warm. Wally and Cisco went into the med room, saying as they did that they'd be back out in a little while to give an update him on Sara.

Leonard left the Cortex and started walking around the winding hallways of S.T.A.R. Labs.

He had never seen Avery cry before. It was such a change from the cheerful and bubbly girl he was used to. Lisa, on the other hand, had been very fussy at this age, so he wasn't exactly unprepared to deal with an upset toddler. He remembered from years ago that one of the only things that calmed Lisa down was walks. He would take to the park or around the neighborhood, at night even a car ride would help soothe her. He figured he might as well give it a try with Avery.

He didn't say anything to her. He wasn't sure if he should; all of this was so new to him. He decided that if Avery wanted him say something, she'd ask him, and until then he resigned to a calming silence as he walked around S.T.A.R. Labs.

What was going to happen when Sara recovered? Leonard would understand if she was furious with him for endangering her daughter and causing the incredible amount of pain she was in.

He would understand if she never wanted to speak to him again. He wouldn't be happy about it, and he knew he'd miss her and Avery, but he would understand.

But what if Sara didn't recover? He knew Caitlin, Wells, and Barry were doing everything they could to save her, but what if they couldn't? Maybe he had taken too long to get to S.T.A.R. Labs. Maybe it was too late to save her.

What if she died?

Would he want to continued the mission to stop Merlyn from destroying the city? He knew he should, but maybe he just couldn't, not without Sara.

And what about Avery? What would happen to her if her mother died? She would probably go to Dinah, but there was a chance she'd go to Star City to live with Laurel or Quentin.

Leonard felt his arms protectively tighten around Avery's shoulders at the thought of losing the little girl who had undeniably stolen his heart.

It took two full laps around the lab's main hallways before Avery's sobs had subsided to just a trickle.

Just outside the Cortex doors, Leonard set Avery down and crouched down at her level.

"You okay kid?" he asked, wiping a stray tear off her cheek with his thumb. She nodded, her lower lip trembling. Before she could start crying again, he wrapped his arms around her and let her fall against his chest. He rubbed a hand up and down her back and waited for her to pull away.

When she did, she lifted her head and said,

"I'm hungry."

Leonard hadn't thought of that. He supposed he probably should have. It had been a few hours since the incident at the warehouse and even longer since Avery had gone to school. All this meant that, unless Cisco had fed Avery, which Leonard suspected he hadn't, it had been a very long time since Avery had eaten.

"And I wanna change outta these clothes," she added, "And get my blanky."

"So you want to go home," he clarified. She nodded.

At first, he wasn't sure if he wanted to leave S.T.A.R. Labs, he didn't want to leave Sara, but the more he thought about it, the more he realized it was a good idea. They did need to eat something, and Avery needed a change of clothes. Plus, they could both use even just an hour away from the lab. Leonard's head had been swimming in possibilities of what was happening in the med room since they arrived. He could use the distraction.

So he and Avery walked back to the Cortex.

After bringing Sara to the med room, Barry had run to get her car from the warehouse so they could have Avery's carseat if they needed it.

It had paid off, because, all Leonard had to do was let Cisco know where they were going and ignore the dark bloodstains on Sara's jacket as he fished through her pockets for the keys and then they were off.


Avery was unusually quiet during the ride home, but once she was back in her apartment she seemed to be back to her bubbly self.

She immediately went to her room to change out of her old clothes, and Leonard set to making the easiest meal he could think of: grilled cheese.

"Does your mom have cookie cutter anywhere?" he asked when Avery emerged from her bedroom in a pair of pink henley pajamas.

"Are we making cookies?" she asked after pointing him towards the cupboard of baking supplies where he found a plastic bag filled with cookie cutters of all shapes and sizes. She climbed up onto a barstool to better regard Leonard's cooking.

"Nope." He fished through the bag until he found a metal butterfly. Avery leaned over the counter to watch Leonard press the cookie cutter into the middle of the grilled cheese.

"Ooh, it's a grilled cheese butterfly!" Avery exclaimed when the cutout was on her plate, "Are you gonna make yours into a shape?"

"How about you pick?" he suggested, handing her the bag. She sifted through the bag for a moment before handing him a heart shaped cookie cutter.

"Good choice," Leonard said.

"Are we gonna go back to the star building?" Avery asked as she started eating her dinner. Leonard figured she was referring to S.T.A.R. Labs.

"That depends," he answered, "You could come back with me, or I could call Lisa over to she could stay here with you for the night and I'll pick you up tomorrow morning."

Avery seemed to think it over.

"No," she said after chewing and swallowing another bite of her grilled cheese, "I wanna stay with you."

"Are you sure?" he asked, "We might be there for a long time and it might be hard for you to sleep."

"If something happens to Mommy I want to be there," she said seriously.

He couldn't argue with that.

"Okay."

Leonard and Avery hung around the apartment for another few hours, letting the little girl release some of her pent-up energy from the long day she'd had. She finished eating, and then they played a couple games of go-fish (where she repeatedly asked him to prove he didn't have the card she wanted by showing her his whole hand). She showed him a ballet routine, and he read her a few stories and by then, she finally seemed tired, her movements subdued and her eyelids drooping.

Leonard decided it was time to go back to S.T.A.R. Labs.

Avery ran into her room to get her blanket - a soft square of pink fabric with satin edges and a stuffed bunny sewn into the center — and then they were off.

Unbeknownst to Leonard, Avery had fallen asleep on the ride from her apartment to the lab, something he only realized when they pulled up to the building. He opened the back door to see Avery with her thumb in her mouth and her blanket in her closed fist. Her cheek was pressed up against the side of the carseat and her eyes were closed.

He knew he had to somehow get her into the lab — after all, he certainly couldn't leave her in the car by herself, but he also knew that waking her up probably wasn't the solution either — a grumpy four-year-old was the last thing he needed right now.

He settled on unbuckling her from her carseat and gingerly lifting her up into his arms. Her legs dangled towards the ground and her arms were draped haphazardly on either side of his neck. Her chin was over his shoulder and her wild curls brushed against his face, tickling his nose.

He made his way back to the Cortex, where Cisco was sitting at the wide desk.

"How's Sara?" he asked, ignoring the perplexed look on Cisco's face when he turned in his swivel chair to see Captain Cold carrying the sleeping girl.

"Good I think," he said, "They're still in surgery. It might be a while."

Leonard sat in one of the chairs against the wall. He let his legs stretch out, bracing Avery from sliding off of him. She was splayed out on his chest, her breaths long and even.

Leonard didn't sleep, fearful of what could await him when he woke up.

Hours later, a few minutes before midnight, Barry, Caitlin, and Harrison emerged from the med room.

They looked exhausted.

Caitlin wiped sweaty hair out of her face, Harrison had spots of blood across his shirt, Barry collapsed in the rolling office chair with a deep sigh.

"We got the bullet out," Caitlin told him reassuringly, "She'll be fine."

Leonard nodded. He almost let himself drift off, his chin resting on top of Avery's head, but not even fifteen minutes later, he was jolted into consciousness by a cacophony of beeping coming from the med room. Caitlin and Wells jumped to their feet and roused Barry, who'd fallen asleep in his chair, as they went to Sara.

If Leonard had been in there with them, he would have known that when they'd removed the bullet from Sara's abdomen, they'd ruptured a blood vessel, causing profuse internal bleeding.

But he wasn't there. He could only catch a few words through the closed door of the med room, and those words didn't reassure him that Sara would be okay.

"Hemorrhage."

"Blood loss."

"No pulse."

"Flatlining."

He heard the sounds of them starting up the defibrillator. He heard them administering waves of shocks to restart her heart. All he did was sit very still, trying to block out the sounds from the med room but knowing he would never be able to.

Leonard didn't know how he'd be reacting to all this if Avery hadn't been with him.

Perhaps he'd be angry, pacing the Cortex and demanding miraculous solutions that didn't yet exist.

More likely, he would have succumbed to the empty darkness he was feeling. He might have ignored Mick's advice to let go of what Malcolm did and instead focus on Sara. He might have tracked the man down and made him regret ever going near Sara and Avery.

But he didn't do either of those things.

As much as it hurt every part of Leonard's being to hear Sara suffering, he'd rather listen for the rest of his life than let Avery wake up and know the amount of pain her mother was in.

He held Avery closer to him, finding an unlikely anchor in the little girl. He rested his forehead on top of her head, his face hidden in her hair.

He squeezed his eyes shut, trying his hardest to not see behind his eyes what must be happening in the med room.

It took another two hours for Caitlin, Barry, and Wells to stabilize Sara, but one blood transfusion and a hell of a lot of stitches later, they finally traipsed out of the room.

They all looked dead on their feet. Barry immediately collapsed in a chair and closed his eyes, his elbow balanced on the armrest and his chin in his hand. Cisco, although not involved in the surgery, had been assisting, doing supply runs whenever Caitlin need them, and around fifteen minutes ago had fallen asleep at the desk, his head in his hands. Even Caitlin, who was usually able to maintain her composure during even the toughest of situations, was showing signs of the strain caused by what had been nearly twelve hours of surgery.

"She's going to be okay," she told Leonard, managing a reassuring smile, "This time for real."

"She's pretty loaded with sedatives," Wells said, "She probably won't wake up until tomorrow morning." He turned to Caitlin, "I'm gonna head out. Give me a call if something happens."

Harrison pulled on his coat, nodded in their direction, and left the Cortex.

"Glad to see Avery's sleeping," Caitlin said, "She's had a long and eventful day for a four-year-old."

Leonard nodded vaguely, staring into space. Caitlin followed his eyes to the med room door, as if he was waiting for Sara to walk through it and tell him she was okay.

"Go see her," she said gently, tipping her head towards where Sara was sleeping, "I can watch Avery for a little while. Don't worry, I won't pass out like the boys."

Leonard nodded and then stood, still holding Avery. He set her down on a black leather couch, where she curled into her side, her blanky still in her hand.

He quietly opened the door into the med room and stepped inside.

The curtains had been moved away from the bed, along with most of the surgical equipment. The only things left by the bed were an IV drip and a heart monitor, both with lines leading to Sara.

Sara was lying asleep in the hospital bed. Her head was tipped to the side, and her long hair was strewn across the pillow. The heart monitor by her side was beeping rhythmically.

There was a chair in the corner of the room and Leonard pulled it closer to the hospital bed. He sat in the chair, not really sure what to do.

Just being near Sara, seeing her breathing, hearing the heart monitor prove to him that Sara was truly alive, lifted a tension that Leonard didn't know he'd had.

He wasn't sure if he of all people should be the one by her bedside. He was, after all, the reason she was here. He was the reason she had nearly died, orphaning her daughter and leaving behind so many people who cared about her.

But here he was.

Acting on impulse, he took her hand that was lying limply by her side, engulfing it in his own. He pressed his lips to her knuckles, not releasing her hand when he pulled away.

He only let go when he felt someone touch his shoulder. He looked up to see Caitlin standing behind him.

"You should sleep," she said, "It's been a long day."

"What time is it?" he asked, only realizing now how tired he truly was. His eyes stung with exhaustion, his eyelids getting heavier with every blink.

"2:30 in the morning," Caitlin answered. He nodded and stood up, following her out of the med room. He paused at the doorway, glancing back one last time at Sara before he let the door close.

The Cortex floor was now home to several cots. While Leonard was in the med room with Sara, Caitlin had transferred Avery, Cisco, and Barry to three of the cots. The remaining two were clearly for herself and Leonard.

"Not the first time you've had late night emergencies?" Leonard asked.

"Nope," Caitlin replied, shaking her head, "And definitely won't be the last. Believe me when I say that in this business of metahumans and super-villains, Sara's injuries aren't a special case."

Her words were meant to be encouraging, and strangely, Leonard understood. Sure, a bullet to the stomach was a rarity and most likely a tragedy for most people, but they weren't most people. They had an entirely different set of standards, and within those, Sara's case was relatively normal.

"Go to sleep," Caitlin said a second time, "I'll wake you up if something happens."

He nodded again. As he made his way towards the cot, he saw that Avery's blanky had fallen to the floor. He bent down to pick it up and placed it under her arm so it would be right by her when she woke up.

He smoothed a hand over her light brown curls as he passed her bed, and he climbed into his own.

He was asleep the second his head hit the pillow, eager for the Hell of that day to be over.


Get ready for a wild ride of sporadic updates because I'm descending on a month or so of AP tests, the SAT/ACT, and finals. I have my AP Lang final this week (yes, spread over the entire week, yay), so I'm not sure if I'll get to writing. We'll see :)