Chapter 82: The Albatross

"You're good to go," Caitlin said as she started putting away her medical supplies.

"Really," Barry asked, in slight surprise. "No lingering maladies or anything like that?" He was a doctor as well, but he trusted Caitlin's judgment on this matter. She would be far more objective than him.

Caitlin shook her head, smiling. "You're fine, Barry. Your healing factor did its job. That being said, I recommend you take it easy for a day or two before you return to being the Flash."

Barry let out a sigh of relief. "Great. That's… that's great. Thank you, Caitlin."

His friend patted him on the knee and left. As soon as she was gone, Barry picked up his cell phone and called Kara on speed dial. The phone had barely rung once before his sister picked it up.

"Barry?"

"Caitlin gave me a full bill of health, though she recommended I wait a day before I get back to work. Can you handle that?"

"A day or two is fine, Barry," Kara said, laughing, "It's hardly any trouble at all."

"Great, great," Barry responded, though he still felt tense. "… Any luck on finding Zoom?"

The silence over the line was telling.

"Kara—"

"No luck, Bare. It's like he's vanished." Kara paused for a moment. "Are you okay?"

No. No, he wasn't okay. Barry wanted to say it was because of the fear of the danger the city was in, because the loss of faith in the Flash, of the threats Zoom made, but that wasn't the truth. No, it was the farthest thing from the truth. The truth was…

"He beat me, Kara," Barry said, voice dark and full of loathing. "He beat me bloody and he's threatening my city, and—!"

"He broke your pride," Kara finished for him.

"Yes," Barry admitted, angry. "He broke my pride, and the only way I'll ever be able to rest is if I break his pride in turn. If I break him, and make sure he never threatens my city again."

"That's a very dangerous slope to stand on, brother."

"I know, sister. But I can't help it. I'm a scientist, and an assassin and a medic — but I'm also a warrior like you."

Kara sighed. "As long as you don't let it consume you, Barry. You and I both know how that can end."

Yes, they did. More than one tale of all-consuming revenge had been passed down throughout the years of the League, and Barry had heard them all. That was why he was able to keep himself in check for so long when he realized that Harrison Wells was the man who murdered Nora Allen and framed Henry Allen. He was well aware of the danger, and more than that needed Harrison Wells intact to free his father. That overarching goal was more important than whatever brief but ultimately empty satisfaction he would've gotten from carving the bastard up.

But this was different. Zoom was different. Barry hadn't even known Zoom existed until the bastard was right on top of him, and was beaten halfway to hell for his troubles. In front of the entire city. It was humiliating. For the first time in a long time someone had completely shaken his self-confidence, and to say he didn't like it would be a vast understatement.

Kara was right, however. If he let this overwhelm him, then Zoom would simply win again the next time they faced off. Barry had to calm down and bade his time and act rationally. Otherwise he would get another beating for his troubles.

"I won't, Kara. I promise."

"Good. Let's move on to a lighter topic — what are you going to do for the rest of the day?"

Barry brightened immediately. "I'm going to hit up Big Belly Burger for some takeout before heading to Iris' place. She's got the day off too, so we're going to have a movie marathon."

"Really? I'm glad you two have reconciled. I was getting sick of watching you mope around."

"Yeah, well…"

Iris frowned as she sifted through her collection of movies, while waiting for her microwave to finish cooking the popcorn. Barry had admitted to her that he had been trying to catch up on pop culture but she was sure he would appreciate some classics as well. A mix would do great to break up the monotony of similar genres.

There was a squeak. She ignored it. What kind, though? Barry's favorite genre was sci-fi, but he had a soft spot for horror too, as seen with the many zombie movies he had dragged her to. Or maybe something new? Action was always a crowd-pleaser. Maybe some comedy.

Before Iris could contemplate on the matter further, a pair of large hands roughly grabbed her shoulders and tried to pull her forward. She began struggling immediately, using one of her hands to block the knife meant to slit her throat at the cost of bloodying it. Her self-defense training then kicked into play and she planted a firm elbow to the solar plexus of her assailant. Whoever had grabbed her was strong in body, but even a blow there had stunned him (judging by his grunt), allowing her to slip out of the hold.

She quickly ran out of the kitchen and into the living room, heading for the hidden compartment beneath one of her drawers where she kept her spare gun, only to let out a small scream when the man grabbed her by the hair. He pulled her away, landing her on his back, and she just barely managed to kick out his feet and crawl away. He reached for her leg, but she kicked again, then jumped to her feet.

Nearby was a nightstand, with a lamp sitting on it. Iris immediately took it into her hands and slammed it onto the assailant's back, shattering the lightbulb inside and bending the lampshade. It distracted him long enough for her to finally grab her gun and retreat to the other side of the room. The moment she turned back around, she froze, finally catching sight of her attacker. It was a tall, reedy man dressed in a weird outfit. His face was covered, and he had a sword at his side and a bow and arrows on his back. He looked like a weird Gothic pastiche of Green Arrow, if she was honest, and mentally reminded herself to apologize to Oliver for that thought.

"Who are you!" Iris demanded, her gun trained on the man. When he refused to answer and instead stepped forward, she shot at him. The man dodged the bullet easily, and drew his sword, making Iris apprehensive. She shot again, only for him to dodge one more. She kept shooting and shooting, but she couldn't catch him, and he moved ever so closer to her position. Iris aimed for one more shot, only to gasp when the gun only made a clicking noise instead. She had run out of bullets.

That's weird, Barry thought, as he exited the elevator, a bag of Big Belly Burger clutched in his hand. Where is everybody? There was no receptionist at the front of the apartment's lobby, and he hadn't seen anyone around this block. While this apartment complex wasn't exactly on the bad side of town, there still should have been some loiterers around. There usually were whenever Barry had visited, at least.

Before Barry could think on the matter further, the telltale sound of gunshots caught his attention, coming from the direction of Iris' apartment. He dropped the bag of fast food immediately, and sprinted forward, only barely noticing that his speed wasn't activating. Meta-dampener. Fuck. "Iris!"

He barged into the apartment, kicking down the door, and observed the scene. Iris had her gun trained on an assassin, a League assassin, a little ways from Barry. Upon spotting her opponent, Barry's heart stopped and he had to control his expression so he wouldn't show the fury he was feeling.

"Why are you here? We have no quarrel with the Demon's Head," he asked in Arabic, ignoring the surprised look his best friend shot him.

The assassin tilted his head. "Do not be so sure, Al Sa'iqa. She knows your secret—"

"She knows nothing!" Barry instantly denied.

"She will, and thus, she must die. And if you stand in our way, then your life is forfeit as well."

Upon those words, Barry looked down — and then threw the knives he had drawn from the hidden holsters in his arms. "Get out of the way, Iris!" He screamed as he jumped up, using the side of her couch as a springboard, not bothering to see if she had listened. The assassin had moved to dodge his knives, but had been too surprised to block his pounce, dropping his sword as he dropped to the ground with Barry on top of him.

Barry flicked out another knife and went to stab the assassin, but his opponent blacked away, forcing him to roll over and stand. The assassin followed his lead, and soon they were at it. Barry drew out another knife and wielded it with the one he already had, using it to match his opponent's fists. It soon became obvious that he was far more skilled, and the assassin gradually lost ground. Realizing that he wouldn't be able to win in close combat, the man tried to create some distance with a kick to the chest so he could draw his bow.

Before he could even finger an arrow, however, Barry stopped him by aiming his next throwing knife at his hand, causing him to scream in pain as the blade pierced his flesh. He dropped the bow, holding his aching hand, and only to flinch as another knife buried itself into his shoulder. Before he could even react, Barry finished the trifecta by pushing his back to the wall and using his knives to pin his clothes to the plaster.

"Do you take me for a fool?" Barry hissed, once again speaking in Arabic. "Your movements are reminiscent of the League, yes, but immature. Weak. If Ra's al Ghul wanted me or someone under my protection dead, he would've sent someone far more skilled than you!"

The man said nothing in response to that, still wincing in pain.

"Tell me the name of your true patron, or this will be far from the only pain you feel today!"

Realizing that he had finally failed in his mission, the man gritted his teeth, allowing the false tooth implanted in his mouth to break and release the poison inside. From behind him, Barry could hear Iris gasp in horror as the man slowly died in front of them from a cyanide tooth. Barry, for his part, simply glared. He should've known it wouldn't be that easy.

As the man went limp, Barry turned around, adopting a far softer expression. "Are you alright, Iris?"

Iris trembled in front of them, and before Barry knew it, she was in his arms, crying. Barry sighed and began rubbing comforting circles into her back.

About an hour or so later, the entire building was swimming in A.R.G.U.S. agents. They had inspected every inch of the complex, discovering the dampener and trying to figure out how, exactly, this had happened. An hour after that, an agent made her report to Barry, explaining their findings.

"From what we've determined so far, all the occupants of the building besides Miss West were beset by different, random emergencies within the first few hours of the morning. This ensured that she would be alone for the rest of the day, allowing the assassin to stage his attack uninterrupted," the agent finished.

Barry rubbed his thumb across his chin. "Then that means this was not just some run-of-the-mill hit. This was too thoroughly planned for something like that. They've had their sights on Iris for a while, and something prompted them to finally stage an attack."

"That's what it looks like so far, sir."

"Continue the investigation," Barry ordered, "Send a full report to me when you're done."

The woman saluted him and left. Barry sighed and rubbed his forehead, warding off the oncoming headache. This was not how he wanted today to go at all. Or any day for that matter, but especially not today. If he hadn't been here, who knows what would've happened to Iris then?

"Sir?"

"Yes?" Barry asked, a little more harshly than he needed to, turning around. Another agent, this one a man, held up his hand to reveal he was holding the bag of Big Belly Burger that Barry had brought with him earlier. The food had been forgotten in the midst of the chaos, and Barry hadn't bothered to collect it, too busy trying to calm down Iris.

It was all cold and soggy now, this Barry was certain of, but he took it from the man regardless, muttering a quiet thanks. With that, he went to find his friend.

He found Iris at her couch. The cut on her hand had been treated, the blood flow staunched and the appendage itself disinfected and wrapped. She was being interviewed by another agent and being briefed on the cover story she was to give to her friends and family. Iris hadn't protested this, perhaps quickly cottoning on that there was more to the situation than she realized and still more than a little shaken after such a harrowing near-death experience. She had been in danger before, but this was different. She had been alone in her home, the one place she should've been safe, and had never felt such malice directed at her before. It had been… enlightening, to say the least.

After the agent was done, Barry dismissed him and sat down next to his friend, setting down the bag of food onto the coffee table in front of them. "I'm sorry I forgot about the food. It's all cold now."

Iris burst into hysterical laughter at that. "Barry, I nearly died, murdered inside my own home," she pointed out, voice mirthless, "Compared to that, a bit of cold food is nothing. Besides," and here, she quirked a smile, though it wasn't as lighthearted as it usually was, "that's what the microwave is for."

Barry couldn't help it — he chuckled. "I'm glad."

Her smile softened, her carriage visibly comforted, before her eyes dropped slightly. Barry's chuckle tapered off, and he took her uninjured hand. "What's wrong?"

"Barry… who was that?"

Barry sighed. "I don't know, at least not exactly. But he's an assassin, I can tell you that much."

Iris blinked. "An assassin? But—I'm a beat cop! I'm not even a detective yet! Even with that case with Amunet had Ralph take most of the public credit. There's no reason for anyone to send an assassin after me."

"There is, Iris." And here, Barry looked at her meaningfully.

His best friend was not a fool. She caught on to his train of thought immediately. "You mean someone sent that guy after me to get back at you?"

"More like to send a message to me," Barry corrected her lightly. "If they had wanted to actually kill you, they would've sent someone better than an amateur like him." After all, if he had been competent, he would've shot Iris with his bow when her back was turned and she hadn't realized he was there. It's not like it would've been a particularly hard shot either — you didn't need to be Oliver to shoot an arrow a couple of feet to hit a stationary target. Any half-decent archer could've done it. Barry could've done it.

Instead, he stupidly tried to grab her from behind and slit her throat, giving her the chance to fight back. And while Iris wasn't an assassin, she was a trained cop with some extensive self-defense training. While Barry doubted Iris could've held him off much longer, especially after she ran out of bullets, she certainly held him back long enough for Barry to get involved, which the assassin obviously knew was a risk judging by the pre-installed meta-dampener.

A well-planned assassination, but with extremely poor execution. That's why Barry knew this couldn't have been Ra's. No recruit of such ineptitude would've been allowed to live longer than a couple of months, let alone become a full-fledged member of the League. Ra's would've killed himself before he allowed his standards to fall so far, because such a thing was proof he was no longer worthy enough to be the Demon's Head. No, this attack had to have been the work of someone else.

Amateur? Iris did not like the sound of that, nor the implications of Barry knowing this man was an amateur to begin with. She put her thoughts aside and pressed on. "But if that's the case, then why?"

"I don't think it was a direct message," Barry told her, "I think it was supposed to be a misleading kind."

Realization soon dawned on Iris. "They wanted you to blame someone else for this. Someone they wanted out of the way."

"Yes. And the person they wanted me to blame, that they wanted the Justice League to blame, is someone we can never afford to cross — ever."

Considering Barry was a speedster with skills able to completely dominate the assassin sent after her, Iris did not like the sound of that either. What is going on? she couldn't help but think. She thought things with Zoom were bad enough, but now this?

"Until this situation is resolved," Barry cut through her thoughts, "I'd like for you to stay in the Hall of Justice for now. If that's alright with you."

"It's fine, Barry," Iris replied, a little dazed. "I know this is something beyond my payroll. I won't fight you on it."

"Good," Barry stood up, "Collect everything you need for a week's stay and I'll drive you over to the base. A.R.G.U.S. will take care of any loose ends, so don't worry about work. Hopefully this will blow over soon and you won't miss too much, but better safe than sorry."

"Right," Iris inhaled, "Right."

My chapters for this story are so much shorter. Sometimes I wonder if it's better if I merge them. Oh well.

We're getting into things, everyone. Next chapter is one you won't want to miss!

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