CHAPTER FIVE: SAFE WITH YOU
Maybe because sheer exhaustion and survivor mode went to just plain old exhaustion and adjustment mode in this time period, but it took four days for Ella to start having nightmares. Despite the fact she forced her eyes open till the weight of her eyelids were too much to bare and she tried to hold onto hearing even in her sleep. However she didn't dream. She fell into a black pit of nothingness.
Ella supposed when she started to feel safe again- safe with Barry, Caitlin, Cisco, and even Wells; safe that she wasn't going to lose control again and hurt the only people that genuinely cared for her, probably ever. For the first time in her entire life, she actually felt like she belonged. And on that third night, almost feeling the presence of Barry in the room next to her, she relaxed ever so slightly. Ella welcomed sleep that night, because though she knew Zoom was still out there, her life wasn't a nightmare. The gloves gave her control and even when the gloves threatened to not be enough, she noted the feeling of being about to lose it. And whether figuratively, in her mind, or physically, standing beside her with a hand on her arm, Barry was always there with counting and breathing techniques he did with her on the very first day.
But the third day was also the day Barry told them that when Ella killed the warlock, and since the seer got away, Decree had rallied a gang of warlocks and is preparing for round 2, and Ella had made the kill list. She actually stole the Flash's spot at number one, though he was a close second. Either way, they didn't know when, but Decree and a warlock army was also coming for them.
Truthfully, though she probably wouldn't be this honest with anyone, Ella didn't feel guilt for killing the sorcerer. That was justified. She had thought that was what made her a murderer, but then she realized she hadn't had murder in her heart yet. She was protecting an innocent life and then she was murdered in the process. It was when Ella lost control and attacked the men at the warehouse that she became a murderer. She had murder in her heart then. She wasn't protecting anyone but herself and she didn't care much more past that.
However Ella had been able to shut down those thoughts in her head. In the name of not losing control again, when a wave of guilt or regret appeared, she did something else. When she thought of the hatred that filled her body and she brought lightning from the ceiling, she turned to Cisco and became interested in his world of numbers and x's and things she couldn't ever begin to comprehend, but with a bright smile, he was happy to try to help. When Ella thought of the boy running towards her for shelter and a bolt of lightning shot from her fingers in self preservation, she turned to Caitlin and wondered what had happened to make her so rigid and distant. Gently pried the story of her husband dying twice and fell into her story and away from Ella's.
Her subconscious must be telling her her ways weren't working.
Ella was tied to a wooden chair. The seat curved up, causing her knees to ache, but that was the least of her worries. That was the least of her pain. There were so many tiny cuts marking her skin that it just felt like her whole body was a gaping, bloody wound. She couldn't pinpoint when one cut ended and the other began. There were tiger stripes of red trailing down her arms and legs.
Her head was swarming, sometimes her eyes rolled into her skull. Eventually she didn't even feel when the blade carved into her skin.
In the beginning, she could understand the questions and answer them.
"Who is the Flash?" he would ask her.
"I don't know," Ella would reply.
'Something's wrong,' she could barely think. Something just slightly… off.
If there wasn't already something about being tortured wrong or slightly off.
Ella thought in a suffocating panic and saw in pictures and words echoed to her from miles away, but she felt in full.
In the beginning, it was tiny cuts.
"Bull shit," he would tell her. "Who is the GOD DAMNED Flash?"
His voice was too high, it held no deep vibrato. She knew the voice though. He owned the words, but someone else owned the voice.
Each time she answered in denial of knowing, he sliced the tip of the blade over her face and arms, like tally marks.
When Ella stopped screaming in pain, he switched it up.
"I will give you the courtesy of telling you, I'm very skilled with a knife. This knife, actually. This knife has pulled apart many skins and has glinted with many types of blood. So one more time, tell me who the Flash is and I won't show you the extend of my talents," he threatened her.
"I have never met the Flash," Ella would say again and again. "I don't know who the Flash is."
One of the times she spoke those sentences, the thoughts that took an eternity to form a single word began thinking 'Wah'.
Sometime later 'mmm' was added.
And finally, 'man' finished her thought.
Woman.
Decree's words. Woman's voice, she realized.
But Decree seemed to have no idea. He took the long side of his blade and sliced her stomach.
Cries filled the room again.
Finally, she flung her head back and forced her eyes into the unblinking ones of her captor.
A wicked grin crossed her face.
Her dark eyes twinkled in excitement.
Her finger stabbed her in her stomach wound.
Blood was splattered across her face, her arms, her clothes.
Ella was looking into a mirror.
But no… she wasn't.
It wasn't Decree doing those things to her, it was herself.
Ella pushed her hand deeper into the gash on her stomach, farther and farther till it was pushing her spine, and her back pushed against the back of the chair.
The chair toppled over and she landed with a grunt.
Xxxxxxxxxxxxx
When Ella opened her eyes again, she wasn't tied to a chair.
"What the hell, Ella..." a voice mumbled from behind her. Slowly she rolled on her back and moved her head to the direction of the voice. Barry -relief filled before her mind even recognized him- pushed him self up from his stomach to his knees, like he'd fallen. "What are you doing in my room? In the floor of my room," he corrected himself. He scooted around to face her.
She went to wipe the blood off her face, but when she brought her hand back, it was clean. Ella swallowed, her throat dry. Slowly, she sat up and looked around the room. She was indeed in Barry's room and she wasn't exactly sure how she got there.
"Are you okay, El?" Barry asked, much more gently this time. Worry shone in his eyes as he leaned closer to her. He didn't see any visible damage, other than wide eyes and a sweaty face.
Ella opened her mouth a couple times, trying to speak before she actually found her voice. "I don't know what happened. I was..." She paused, trying to think very hard, but her thoughts were forming so slow. "I was in my bed, but I was having a nightmare. Oh my God, Barry." Her head fell in her hands as the dream came flooded back.
Without another word, Barry pulled Ella closer and wrapped his arms around her. "You're okay now, El. It wasn't real, it was only a dream."
"But it wasn't," She replied in a broken voice. "Decree was torturing me again. I remember… I remember everything. I can't- I can't act like I don't. But-but then I realized something felt off, his voice wasn't the same. I knew the voice. At some point, with all the strength I could muster, I looked up at him, and I found… it was me." Ella spoke to his chest, unable to look him in the eyes. She couldn't bare looking into his eyes and see the burden she was causing him by telling him the honest to God truth.
Ella was tortured. For him, and she knew Barry would feel responsible for it.
"I was so scared," she said, barely a whisper. "But I feel safest when I'm with you. Maybe I… teleported to you in my sleep. Because I knew. I was safe with you."
She could feel him clenching and unclenching his jaw. He was about to reply when his bedroom door bursted open and Joe came bounding through, startling both Ella and Barry, who were both still on the floor. This time though, they didn't flinch away from each other. Ella wasn't ready to move yet.
"Barry, there was a murder- why do I always seem to find the two of you like this?" Joe began before cutting himself off with a question. Then his face fell into concern. "What happened? Did Zoom come again?"
Ella took a deep breath and then another, trying to come her pounding heart. It wasn't really working so she started to speak with a shaky voice, "I had a nightmare about Decree. From when he had me. I just woke up in here. I don't really know why."
"Joe, I had just gotten the call that I was needed at the station. I tripped over her, getting up to get dressed," Barry put in his side of the story.
Joe squatted next to the two of them. Rubbing Ella's arm, he said, "Are you going to be okay, Ella?"
Knowing she'd been enough of a burden already, Ella nodded, though she yet again felt like she was anything but. "I'm fine. You should get to the station. I'll be okay." She pushed herself away from Barry and shakily stood up. "Murders are a bit more important than me."
Within ten minutes, Barry and Joe were out the door, and Ella was standing in the living room by herself.
"Meet you there," Barry said, but Joe stopped him before he took off.
"Is Ella going to be okay? Should we be leaving her alone?" he asked, his eyebrow raised for even more punctuation.
"I don't know, Joe," Barry answered honestly, hanging his head. "When I got to her, she was covered in blood. There were hundreds of little cuts all over her body and a major wound in her stomach. Everything healed by the time I brought her back, like it never happened. And I guess I kind of... forgot."
I remember everything. I can't-I can't act like I don't.
Guilt filled Barry's entire body, remembering her words. He knew she put others before herself, but he didn't know to what extent. Had she really been holding back to not be a burden?
"Mmm," Joe replied, mulling over his words.
"I told her to go to the lab, so she's not alone. She said she was."
Joe nodded. "We need to get to the station. The vic… was Thomas Johnson and his wife."
"The station's receptionist?" Barry exclaimed in shock. Affectionately known as TJ, Thomas Johnson was a retired navy seal, an older gentlemen. He'd known TJ since Joe took him in.
His adoptive father nodded again. "Shot through the head in his house. Both of them."
"We need to get there. See you in ten," and with that Barry took off.
Barry tried to get into the groove once at the crime scene, but his mind was distracted. How could he… how could they all have failed Ella so bad? None of them stopped and asked what truly happened while they were waiting for the Flash to arrive. How long had she been there? What did they do to her?
"Barry." Joe said his name, trying to catch his attention. He placed a hand on Barry's shoulder and spoke in a quiet voice, "Let's focus at the task at hand. Ella has a chance to be helped, but TJ does not anymore and we have to figure out why. We have to figure out what happened, and that's you, Barry. I need you to focus."
With a nod, Barry surveyed the kitchen of the Thomas household again, making notes of the way the blood on the wall was splattered and where it pooled on the floor, and took samples of things to take back to the lab. He stood over the bodies of TJ and Mrs Thomas and then made his way to the broken back door. Lastly, he listened to the reports given by the police officers first on the scene.
He took all these puzzle pieces and tried to fit them together and then he explained what he thought happened.
"I think it happened very fast. The Thomas' were enjoying a normal night at home when the back door suddenly broke open. TJ's… was quick on his feet. You have to be to main the front desk at a police station. He was a navy seal. If he had more than a couple seconds to prepare, Mrs Thomas would probably not be dead. So this guy bursts through the door. TJ was shot at a farther range than Mrs T, so he was probably shot first. Mrs Thomas is standing at the sink doing dishes and the shooter tries to shoot her straight off, and all TJ has time to do block the first shot with himself. I think she was meant to be the first shot though, since TJ seemingly sitting at the table, reading the newspaper and Mrs T was doing the dishes on opposite sides of the room. He was meant to see the death of his wife."
The surrounding officers were quiet as they took in what Barry said. Joe spoke up first. "All right, starting off with the basics. We need his file, phone records, and try to get a list of his military contacts to see if there was a particular event while he was on duty that could have triggered this."
Barry nodded his agreement to this idea and decided he was going to throw himself into this case. TJ was like Ella in a way, no one thought they needed to ask him to make sure he was okay. Nothing ever portrayed otherwise. Did he know the person who did this to him and his wife? Were they now after their kids? And it didn't matter they were grown adults, you're never too old for your parents.
Barry wished he was more aware of the people around him. Ella always was, TJ always was. But Barry's been so caught up in himself to realize just how much people around him were hurting. And that needed to change.
When Joe and Barry left, Ella didn't go to STAR Labs like she promised. She had every thought of doing so when she promised, but then she began thinking, and when that happened, it was hard to get her to stop.
She thought of Decree torturing her. She thought of waking up in the lab eight months later, and she thought of when she lost control and stroke that little boy down with lightning. All of the pain she felt with Decree was probably nothing that sweet little boy felt when he came to her looking for comfort and instead got his skin burned off.
It was still dark outside when Ella was left alone. Barry and Joe had been called in before their shift officially started. She still felt shaken and she didn't want to be alone, but she didn't want to be with people that would only try to make her feel better. Because in reality, she did a horrible thing. Whether or not she was in control, she did a horrible thing to a child.
Ella never got the boy's name and he was haunting her thoughts right now. All the while she showered and got dressed, he planted himself in her mind. As she was brushing her hair, her eyes followed the lightning that ran over her fingers, that she couldn't feel, but apparently made other people feel good. Maybe if he was in pain while he was healing, Ella could comfort him? Could she maybe take away the pain during the time she touched him?
It was then Ella decided to try to make a difference with her morning. She teleported to the lab, hoping to find empty rooms. She knew Harry stayed somewhere on the premise, and at any given time Caitlin or Cisco sometimes came in early due to sleepless nights, so she was relieved to a quiet lab, deprived of Cisco's fun chatter, Caitlin's heels clacking against the floor, and Harry's know all stare- things she had come to look forward to seeing.
Ella booted up one of the computers in the main room and typed in 'ellapeterson' and the crazy number/letter password combination she came up with for her account within STAR Labs. It didn't much prying on her end, thanks to the rigged up software, to get into the hospitals databases and found information on Mason Harris, the barely 7 year old boy with severe burns in ICU.
After gathering the information she needed, Ella found her way to the case that displayed her suit and pulled it down. Wishing she had superspeed like Barry to put this on in a blink of an eye, she quickly stripped to bra and underwear and pulled the suit over her body.
As Ella zipped up the front, she had to admit, she felt pretty invincible in her costume. She had never fit anywhere like she fit in the purple and silver get up. She slid the mask over her face and pulled her gloves on.
She really felt like 'Bolt' in that moment.
Even though Ella had looked over the floor plans, she was scared to try to teleport into Mason's room without actually having been there before, so she found herself in single bathroom outside of the nurses station instead.
She pushed the door open slightly to peer out, seeing a nurse typing something into a computer and another walking past the door, pushing a medical cart. When the nurse passed, she opened the door ever so slightly more, trying to catch room numbers to locate Mason's room.
Ella crept out of the bathroom and quickly ran to take cover in front of the desk, out of few of the nurse in the station. After finding Mason's room number, she bent low and quietly walked around the desk. Now she was only ten feet and a door away from the boy, but now the nurse was facing her, though Ella was still squatted. However her head was bent over the computer.
The door to Mason's room was slightly ajar. She figured his mother was in the room. Would she be awake? It wasn't even 7am. Exhaustion had to have taken over her sometime when PM crossed over to AM. If the mother was still awake, Ella decided she'd take it as a sign she wasn't suppose to be there.
Though somehow she had to get there without the nurse noticing her, and before the nurse making rounds came out from a room again. Ella turned another corner, still hidden, and peered over the top of the counter. She took a deep breath and made a small bolt of lightning fall from the ceiling, from behind the nurse at the desk.
The women jumped and turned around to figure out the noise, and Ella took that as her moment to run.
Once in the room, Ella was met with darkness, slightly lit up with the glow of an IV machine. She let out a quiet breath of relief when she saw the lady presumably the mother, sleeping straight up in a chair by Mason's bed. Her neck was going to ache when she woke up…
Ella took a deep breath to calm herself and brought herself to the edge of Mason's bed. His eyes suddenly popped open and a sound of surprise escaped his lips. Mrs Harris stirred in her chair.
"Shhh, Mason. I'm a friend of the Flash. You know who the Flash is?" Ella spoke in barely a whisper, leaning in so Mason could hear her. His mouth had opened to alert his mom, but those words got stuck in his throat. He nodded, though his eyes shone with suspicion. And unmaskable pain.
"I'm Flash's friend. He calls me Bolt and I'm trying to be a superhero like him. I can try to make your pain go away, if you'll let me, Mason. He was there when you were hurt. He told me," Ella said, feeling slightly guilty that she didn't mention she was there too. "Can I try?" Though Ella spoke quietly, she was worried she'd wake up Mrs Harris and when Mason nodded his consent, she didn't speak another word.
There was a small patch of bare skin on his arm. Ella took a deep breath and pulled her gloves off her hands. The way Mason's eyes widened at the lightning running around her hands heightened her anxiety and caused the room to thicken with static.
"It's okay," Ella barely breathed. She could tell Mason was barely breathing too.
With another deep breath, and Barry's voice in her head telling her breathing techniques, she gently placed her hands on unblemished skin. Please work, Ella thought, closing her eyes, please make the pain go away.
The little bolts escaped the confines of her fingers and wrapped around Mason's body instead. Ella let out a gasp and tried to pull away, but she couldn't break the lightning streak. Mason whimpered and that was when Mrs Harris jerked up in her chair.
"What the… get away, get away from him!" She suddenly screamed, flinging herself at Ella. With a pop, the connection broke and Ella fell to the ground. "Help! Help me!" Mason's mother called to outside the room.
"Stop, Momma!" Mason suddenly cried, and his mother's eyes jerked over to him. He was unraveling the wrap on his arm. "Momma, the burns are gone."
Ella pushed herself up and bolted up and out of the room.
Cisco was rubbing his tired eyes when an alert dinged on his computer. He sat at his desk, looking at the ready, but truthfully his mind was back at his apartment with Faye, a couple nights before, standing in his kitchen, looking like one of his fantasies come to life. She only stayed long enough to feed him a line of promises and to get a promise out of him, before sauntering out his door.
The promise from Cisco being he wouldn't tell his friends about her. When he pointed out how shady she sounded, she smiled a million watt smile, and continued on with her promises. She promised he could tell them soon, just not right now.
Faye also promised heightened Vibe's abilities (he couldn't deny the excitement when words like 'mind control' and 'mind melting' came out of her lips) and help against a warlock gang that was coming in a couple weeks. Soon enough he'd be getting more visions of the future and will learn a shocking discovery about Zoom. And that if Cisco asked out Ella, she'd say yes.
But he didn't. It was against guy code… right? The girl your best friend's been prophesied to be with, though that said friend is fighting it with all he's got, she's off limits.
So when his computer dinged a notification, it startled Cisco a bit more than it should have.
'Friend of the Flash' Heals 7 Year Old Boy
Cisco was met with the headline. He clicked the link and the full article popped up.
The 7 year old boy that was kidnapped four days ago and struck by lightning was resting in his hospital room, unable to sleep due to pain when a women dressed in a purple and silver costume and a masked bursted into the room.
"I was really scared at first, but she promised she was a friend of the Flash's and he's my favorite superhero. He saved me when I was kidnapped," Mason Harris told officials in a statement. "She told me her name was Bolt and she could make the pain go away."
But he wasn't told HOW Bolt could take away the pain.
"It looked really scary at first, I was covered in lightning! But it didn't hurt. Momma woke up though and made her stop, but I felt so much better that I didn't think I needed the bandages, and I took them off. And I was! I was all better!" Mason finished his account of the story, to everyone's amazement.
'All Better' wasn't an understatement. As well as severe burns, Mason Harris suffered from a ruptured ear drum, the loss of feeling in his legs, and signs of Parkinson Disease, all possible side effects of being struck by lightning. It was seeming unlikely he'd make a full recovery.
However the authorities are uncertain in the fact Bolt was the one that inflicted the lightning that struck Mason in the first place and was trying to right a wrong. Investigations are pending, but keep connected with us to stay updated!
Cisco leaned back in his chair, staring at the smiling face of Mason. The same hands she had touched his shoulder with, calming his internal meltdown, were the same hands that healed this boy of the side effects of being struck by lightning? Amazing.
He stood up then, to go find Caitlin in the lab, and show her the article, and managed to walk in the moment Ella touched down- in front of the desk this time, but alas still landing on her butt.
"I did a pretty damn good job on your suit, El. Or should I say Bolt?" Cisco put in as he admired the way the costume perfectly fit her body.
"That was remarkable," Caitlin stated, having just walked in the room to run something by Cisco. She walked over to Ella and offered a hand.
Ella accepted it, and stood up with a grin. "I think I had a good morning."
"Yeah, I read about it," Cisco replied, mirroring her grin. She locked eyes with him and pulled him into a hug.
"Wait, what'd you read, Cisco? And why are you wearing the suit, Ella?" Caitlin asked, her head moving up and down as she took in the suit Ella was wearing. Cisco thought maybe she had been affected by the explosion and her power was the ability to go from normal to rigid mother in zero point two seconds flat.
He didn't want to, but he pulled away from Ella's unexpected hug then. Ella hadn't faced the wrath of Caitlin quite yet, he had on numerous occasions. He hoped to defuse her before she exploded.
"Thanks for the suit, Cisco. I think I can do this now," she said, her hand still on his arm. Who created the guy code anyway…
"I'm waiting," Caitlin reminded with a severe expression and a look crossed Ella's face. She was catching on.
"Well, I, uh, I went to go see the boy I hurt the other day. I just-I just thought I'd relieve his pain for a little bit..." Ella began explaining as Caitlin eyes widened, possibly threatening to fall out. Oh, Caitlin was going to lay it on her…
"Even though you don't know the extent of your powers and all your testing hasn't fully come back yet?" Caitlin asked in full on mother mode.
"Yeah, yeah, even though that," Ella winced before quickly going on, "But! But instead of just taking away the pain, it healed him. I don't- I don't even know how!" She ended excitedly, and though Cisco knew Caitlin wasn't really mad about that, and she was probably happy he had been healed, Caitlin didn't look like it.
"You still didn't know, Ella, what would happen..."
"Well, you don't know till you do," Ella replied, causing Caitlin to give her another look. "All right, if it'll make you feel better, let's go take some blood or check my, I don't know, liver or something."
Caitlin pursed her lips, not wanting to indulge Ella, with 'why can't a normal person walk through this door' thought written in her eyes. "Fine," she said, before sighing, "And it's actually super cool you healed him, you don't even know, Ella..."
After Barry finished his reports for the day, he headed over to STAR Labs to begin his night job. Ella had finally subjected to a day of complete testing and she looked exhausted by the time he arrived.
"Barry!" Ella said excitedly, a smile lighting up her tired eyes, at his arrival.
"Hey, El," He greeted back, and suddenly the light in her eyes dimmed. What did he do? "Saw you took Bolt for a spin and nobody caught fire, so good job."
"Aren't you going to tell her she should be more careful and not go out till she has more control over her powers?" Caitlin immediately put in as she typed something on the computer. She didn't even look up at him.
"I was gonna get there, Caitlin. I was more excited over the fact she can freaking heal people, but you know… I better ream her out first," Barry replied sarcastically, though smiled when Caitlin looked up at him, causing her to roll her eyes.
"I just think she should know more before going out into the world like that," Caitlin defended herself.
"I know, I know," Ella finally put in, "I'd just done… so much bad. I could just feel I could do this one good thing. But I should have waited and brought someone with me. Because you're right, I'm nowhere near in control." She looked down and played with her glove covered hands, a pained expression on her face.
"You still did good today, Ella. Just something to do in the future," Harry said, walking in the room.
Barry looked over at his entrance and found Iris trailing in behind him. "It's so sad about TJ, Barry," Iris came over to him and briefly hugged him.
"I know," He replied, sounding a bit deflated.
"Any leads?" Iris asked, and Barry shook his head. "I just don't understand how anyone could have something against the Thomas'."
"Who's TJ?" Ella asked, concern etched in her face, walking over to them.
"He was our receptionist at the station. Him and his wife were murdered last night," Barry explained flatly. "He was like… a grandfather, I guess. He's worked at the station for over ten years."
"Sorry, Barry," Ella replied quietly, a look of grief passing through her eyes. She rubbed his arm before walking back over to Caitlin. Barry wished she wasn't still wearing the gloves. He could use some calm right now, or possibility healing.
Iris opened her mouth to say something, but Barry's phone went off, and he didn't hear it. He pulled it out of his pocket and found it was Joe calling him. He quickly answered the phone.
"Bear, there's another hit in progress." Joe didn't say anything more and hung up the phone.
"Suit up, Ella. We're going," There was barely even a pause and Barry was in his Flash outfit, "out."
Kinda intended a bit more to happen in this chapter but somehow I got to 5,000 words and only got to three of the five things I had planned for this chapter :/ so I'm breaking it off here. Oh well. I was going to surprise y'all but I'll just tell you now… Flarrow next chapter I'm so excited! Please let me know how I'm doing? xx Anna :)
