A/N: Here's the second trial!

Cisco drew a long line across the dry-erase board, dividing it in half. On one side he wrote Barry's name, on the other Caitlin's. Under Caitlin's name he drew a short vertical line. "The results of the first trial: one point for Caitlin."

"What's next?" Barry asked.

"The first trial tested you physically. The second will test you mentally. A game of chess, to see who's a better strategist."

Barry grinned. Chess was familiar. He knew it well, from when Dr. Wells… Thawne… had played it with him early in his training. It had been some time since he'd played, actually.

"Barry vs. Frost," Cisco said.

"Why can't I play?" Caitlin asked.

"It's not that you can't, but Frost was supposed to do the skating trial, so I had to switch things around."

Caitlin seemed to be staring into space for a few seconds. "She doesn't think that's it," she said.

It took Barry a few seconds, and then he drew in a startled breath. He knew Cisco was trying to make this as funny as possible, but if he was implying what Barry thought he was…

Cisco blinked and shook his head. "No, that's it."

Caitlin shot him a dirty look before Frost took over. Frost took a step toward Cisco. "Is there something you want to say, Cisco?" Her voice was low. "Maybe something about my intelligence?"

"No, nothing comes to mind," Cisco said nervously.

Frost studied him through narrowed eyes. "Good. Cause I'm just as smart as Caity, Vibe-boy."

"I never said you weren't. You might be smarter."

Barry closed his eyes. Cisco didn't even realize he was digging himself deeper into a hole.

"We should play," Barry said, clapping his hands together. The action made the others stop looking at each other. "I should warn you, I'm pretty good at chess."

"Are you, though?" Cisco asked. He moved around the lab, fully confident again. "I ordered this a while ago, but haven't tried it yet."

Barry watched warily as Cisco brought in a large box. He took out a structure that had what looked like seven chess boards on it, each on a slightly different level. They weren't all the same size, though. "What the hell is that?"

"3-D chess. Sheldon made it."

Sheldon? The name wasn't familiar. Barry looked at Frost to see if she knew who that was. "He's a character from The Big Bang Theory." She looked at Cisco and rolled her eyes. "Nerd."

Barry had forgotten Cisco liked that show so much. "I have no idea how to play this," Barry said.

Cisco tossed a rule book at him without breaking stride, still placing the chess structure in its spot. Apparently he was going to have to learn.

Barry had to speed-read the instructions twice before they made sense, and then spent the next twenty minutes explaining it to Caitlin and Cisco. The fact that even Cisco hadn't known how to play hadn't deterred him, and Barry had brought two chairs out for himself and Frost once they were ready to start.

Cisco also made them do rock-paper-scissors-lizard-Spock to determine who played as the white chess pieces, and therefore got to go first. At least, Cisco tried to make them play that version of rock-paper-scissors. He went through all the options with Barry ("when I play Spock, you want to play theory, because theory disproves Spock"), and then started to do the same with Frost. That ended when Cisco told her she was wrong about using the lizard, and in the next turn she fashioned an icicle. "Yep, that's a winner," Cisco said in a higher-than-normal voice.

Barry won the rock-paper-scissors (the original one), so he had the first move. He didn't know if Frost knew chess or if Caitlin was helping her out (not that she was incapable or anything… man, he would be wary for the next week because of Cisco…). Whatever was going on in her head, she did surprise Barry a few times.

Ultimately, though…

"The winner of the second trial is Ba-rry Allen!" Cisco announced.

"You do realize we're the only ones here, right?" Frost asked.

Cisco drew a line on Barry's side of the board. "The Meta Games may not have the best turnout, but we're gonna treat them like any other official game." He turned to face them. "Trial three! Soccer!"

Almost all of Barry's amusement at having won the second trial vanished in an instant. "Cisco, you know what happens when I play baseball." Soccer would only be worse.

Cisco grinned evilly. "This trial was made exactly for that reason."

A/N: Leave me a review! I keep going back and forth: should Barry win, or Caitlin?