A/N: Hey all! I'm back at it with another chapter! I'm so very sorry for the wait, I just started my new job and I've been juggling that, school work, my language studies, and trying to get some sleep, so please forgive me! Luckily, the semester's almost over, so I should be updating more often. I hope everyone had a kickass Halloween and that my American readers had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I'm still stuffed full of turkey :)

To my French readers: Je vous appuie tout et je prie pour la paix dans votre pays. Mes bénédictions à vous. (veuillez excuser mon terrible de la grammaire, mon français n'est pas très bon)

Disclaimer: I don't own The Flash, The CW Network, or DC Comics. That's too bad, cause I'd make a Justice League movie come out this year.

Ch 4

"Can…I…get… off… of…this…" I wheezed as I ran as fast as I could. "...DEATH TRAP." Cisco and Caitlin were observing me on their newly patented treadmill. Thing was, it was "Cisco-ed" to handle Barry's speed—which I obviously can't handle— so it was a nightmare for me.

"Just a little longer." Cisco's voice crackled through the speaker in the room. I peeked at the watch on my wrist and my eyes widened.

"It's been fifty minutes? That's it!" I took one step in the direction to get off of the super treadmill and promptly slipped and fell. As I fell, the track of the treadmill skidded against my arms and legs, making me screech in pain. I ended up in a pile at the end of the treadmill, moaning in discomfort. There was a sound of the doors whooshing open as I felt people crowd around me.

"Hey, are you okay?" Someone asked me. I rolled over onto my back, looking into the guilt painted faces of Cisco and Caitlin and I held my arms up.

"I'm probably gonna puke, but who cares, right? Just help me up." Each of them grabbed a hand and hauled me up. As soon as I was on my two feet, my legs started to wobble as they felt like jello. "Why did you let me run for fifty minutes?"

"We were just testing your endurance. Obviously you've been training like I asked you too, but it's not just that." Caitlin explained as she set me on a bed and started probing my legs. "The combined physicality of the athletes that you've studied seemed to have had a positive effect on your lung capacity and muscle atrophy—or should I say lack of it."

"Any normal person would've collapsed after at least 15 minutes of running at the speed you were running. It's not Barry's level of speed, but it's still pretty impressive. Up top!" Cisco added in as he held up a hand to high five me. I gave him a deadpanned expression as Caitlin checked the burns on my arms and legs. Cisco's other hand went up to meet his as he acted as if I had returned the high five. "Go team…" He slinked away to the other side of the room.

I winced as she poked one of the areas by the outside of my right elbow, and she gave a diagnosis right away. "Just some minor track burns. They'll feel painful, but in reality, there's not much damage. They should go away in about a week." She smiled and walked back over to her desk.

"Also, the treadmill is a surprise, so don't tell Barry yet." Cisco called over at me from his desk.

"Great! I think I'm gonna shower and take a nap here, cause my legs feel nonexistent." I carefully slid off the table and to the direction of the shower room. Turning the shower up to almost scalding, I peeled the sweaty clothes off and waddled into the shower.

About 30 minutes later, I stepped out and dried myself off. Putting on the extra clothes that I had brought with me, I dried my fiery locks with a towel. Walking into the main lab with damp curls and a towel around my neck, I heard Caitlin and Barry arguing.

"—metahumans. And aside from Clyde Mardon, we haven't found any."

"And me!" I chirped as my bare feet padded over to the group. "Barry's in his suit." I reached closer and sniffed him lightly. "You smell slightly of ash. Did you go save people from a burning building? Was I really in the shower for that long?" Barry and Cisco smiled at me sheepishly.

Barry focused back on the task at hand, "People in this city need help, and I can help them!"

"We can help them." Cisco added in. Caitlin looked to me to back her up, but I just shrugged. She huffed and looked at a point behind Barry, then she spoke up again.

"Will you please say something?" Barry rolled his eyes and turned around to see Dr. Wells right behind him.

"I think what Caitlin is saying, in her own spectacularly angry way, is that we are just beginning to understand what your body is capable of. Not to sound like a broken record, Mr Allen, because I've told both you and Miss Steele this many times, but I do caution restraint."

"Dr. Wells, I doubt restraint is how you got to be the man you are today." I groaned at Barry's words as that was the exact opposite of the right thing to say at the moment.

"In a wheelchair, a pariah, lack of restraint is what made me these things." He started to turn away. "Know your limits." The mechanical buzzing sound that followed signaled his parting from the room.

Caitlin whipped around and snapped at Barry before following her boss "Don't expect me to patch you up every time you break something." Barry looked confused as Cisco reached around his body and started huddling him over to the computers.

"Hey, anything happen out there today? The sensors in your suit were kicking back some weird telemetry, like your vitals spiked for a few seconds." I eyed the speedster as a flash of uncertainty crossed his face before he plastered a fake smile on his face.

"Never felt better…" Cisco pulled a vibrating phone out of his pocket, then handed it to Barry. He exhaled before answering the phone.

"Hey Joe, everything alright?" I heard a low mumbling over the speaker as Barry looked up at the ceiling then around the room. I took slow, silent steps towards him as he continued to listen to whatever Joe has to say. "I'll be right there." He made another frustrated exhale before hanging up.

"Liar." The one word that came out of my mouth seemed to frighten Barry, as he didn't notice that I was there. His mouth was open as he gaped at me.

"I'm not lying, I'm going to work right now."

I leaned in closer and lowered my voice so that the others wouldn't listen in, "That's not what I'm talking about, Mr. 'Never Felt Better'." His eyes widened as he realized what I was referring to, I nodded before stepping back and motioning for him to go. He sighed before speeding out of the lab, sending papers flying.

"When do you think he'll realize that he forgot his clothes?" Dr. Wells inquired smartly. I chuckled before giving a hypothesis.

"Oh, he'll find out when he gets there, he may just make a pit stop or two." Cisco chuckled before turning to me.

"Why does Barry have to go to work now, but you don't?" I folded my towel as I cut my explanation down to a minimum time of half a minute.

"I've got another officer taking the photos, I'm not due to the office for another 4 hours so I'm gonna use 3 of those hours to take a nap." Plopping the slightly damp towel onto a chair, I slipped on my shoes and grabbed my bag before walking out of the lab. "See you guys!"

As Kate was taking her nap, an unexpected change was about to finish taking place. Ironically, this specific change was taking it's time emulating itself into her code.

The feeling of the last two unchanged cells in her body morphing and buzzing with an unknown force woke her up.

My eyes snapped open as I felt a pinch in my gut. Looking at the clock, I gasped as I only had 15 minutes to get dressed and ready for work. Jumping out of bed, I jogged to my closet and rushed to put on some appropriate attire. My keys were snatched off of the counter, red waves flying wildly around me as I rushed out of the door, purse in hand.

Once I left my apartment complex, I started to jog in the direction of the station. Suddenly, I felt a buzzing in my legs and I looked up to see the front of the police station. My eyes widened as I know that I wouldn't have been able to make it on time without— "Super speed." I whispered as I looked at my hand which was twitching and vibrating at an abnormal speed.

Holding my hand down with the other, I walked as fast as I could to my office and closed the door behind me. My mind started racing as I sat at my desk. How did this happen? I thought I couldn't mimic superhuman powers… Does this mean more tests?

There was only one person who I knew would understand. Barry.

Walking into his lab, I saw him sitting at a table, trying to turn on our outdated centrifuge. I announced my entrance just as he smacked the side of the machine.

"I don't really know if hitting it is gonna make that dinosaur purr. Wait, wrong analogy…" Barry smiled at me before grabbing the vial out of it's casing.

"Watch this." He smiled before shaking the vial at super speed, acting as a human centrifuge. When he stopped, the particles were all separated into three layers and I smiled. "Cool, right?"

"The coolest." I breathed out as Barry looked at me concerned seeing the slightly frightened look that came up on my face. "There's something that I have to show you." Curiosity lit up his face as I reached across him and grabbed another vial from the rows that he had to separate. Holding it in my hand, I started to shake it slowly at a human speed, before my hand sped up to where it matched Barry's speed not even a minute ago. His eyes grew as I stopped my hand, showing almost the same results as the vial he shook.

"When…?" He started stuttering.

"Today. It just happened on the way here, my hand was vibrating and I don't know how, Barry. I'm scared." He got up and hugged me. "I thought I was supposed to have a lid on this thing. I thought we knew everything about my," I lowered my voice down to a whisper, "ability."

Pulling out of the hug and looking me in the eye, he comforted me and was firm in dissipating my worries. "Everything will be okay, you saw how fast I got a handle on my speed, you'll probably do it even faster. They know what they're doing at STAR Labs. It's all good." He grabbed the vial that I partially separated and finished the job, getting up and going over to the board. As I watched him take off his gloves, I saw him slump a little and run into the table.

I ran over in alarm and took his face in my hands. "Barry?" I patted his cheek a couple of times, "Are you okay?" He blinked heavily a couple of times before looking into my eyes for a moment. Putting his hands on my wrists, he moved my hands away from his face.

"Perfectly fine. Nothing's wrong." He smiled exactly like he did to Cisco earlier.

"You're doing it again."

His head tilted in confusion "Doing what?"

"That thing where you act like you're okay, but no one's gonna find out about what's really wrong until it's absolutely necessary. What's going on, Barry?"

He sighed and turned his head to the side quickly before looking back at me, "Nothing. I'm fine. I promise." I rolled my eyes and scoffed.

"Okay, whatever."

"This is all of your fault." Iris walked in to the lab in a gorgeous purple dress. "I could've taken European Folklore to cover my sociology requirement, but no! You said to 'Take journalism, Iris. Reporters have all of the fun.'" Iris narrowed her eyes as she leaned in Barry's direction. "Guess what, Barry? Reporters have none of the fun. Journalism is boring. I'm bored. I'm blaming you." She deadpanned.

I snickered. "And that is why you don't take advice on class credits for communications from a guy who has a degree in forensic science." Iris narrowed her eyes even more and glared at me. I smiled innocently and she turned to look back at Barry, who seemed to be in a daze.

"What? Why are you staring at me like that?" Iris' words seemed to snap Barry out of whatever stupor he was in.

"You look really nice." He walked over to another table to shuffle through some papers. Iris looked confused as she turned around and accepted his compliment.

"Thanks. Why don't you look nice?" Barry's head popped up from his paperwork with a quizzical expression on his face. "This afternoon? Suit and tie? The university is giving Simon Stagg—"

"Simon Stagg…" Barry's face took on an expression of recollection as he uttered the name.

"…Some big award and you agreed…"

"To explain the science stuff for your article, it's all coming back to me now." He had a guilty look planted on his face as he finished Iris' sentence.

"How fast can you get home and change?" Iris had a forgiving smile on as she looked up at her best friend.

"Pretty fast, I reckon, right Bear?" His head snapped towards me as I smirked, back to my normal mood. I leaned back in Barry's chair and put my feet up on his desk, making myself comfortable.

Eddie walked into the lab, "Hey Allen, Steele, Joe asked me to see where you guys are at on the evidence from the gun store shooting." He gave Iris a fleeting glance. "Oh, hey Iris."

Iris now resembled a school girl as she played with her dress a little before answering, "Detective." She gave him the old up-and-down look before I couldn't take it anymore.

"Oh for the love of God, just kiss already. There's enough sexual tension here that you could pass it on through the air. I could plant a wet one on Barry right now." I heard a choking sound coming from Barry's direction as he started coughing frantically, a blush rising on the speedster's neck. I snickered at Barry's reaction, then suddenly he seemed to compose himself as he backed up the first half of my statement.

"Please, guys, go ahead. We already know, remember?" Barry walked over to his computer and looked at a few files on it. He seemed a little tense, so I put a hand on his shoulder. He relaxed a bit, and we both cringed at the awkward sound of the lovely couple kissing. Initially I was pissed—to say the least— at Iris for not telling me about her relationship with Eddie, but I eventually got over my anger and I became genuinely happy that she found someone who seems to really love her.

"Ah, thanks for being so cool about this Barry, Kate. I know it's not easy keeping a big secret." Eddie thanked us with a giddy smile.

I turned and rolled my eyes and muttered, "If only…" I thought I heard Barry mutter something too, but I didn't catch it.

"I'm going to STAR Labs." I told Barry, before going to grab my things from my office. "See you guys later, have fun!" All three of them waved at me as I left swiftly. As soon as I left the station, I walked into a nearby alley and used my speed to run all the way to my destination.

As I zoomed into the main lab of STAR Labs, I skidded to a stop to see papers flying everywhere.

"Ah, come on, Barry! We just reorganized these papers to—" Cisco's rant was cut short as he looked up to see that it wasn't Barry who caused the mess. "You're not Barry. Where is he?"

"At Stagg Industries. Heh." I shrugged nonchalantly.

"Well, if he's all the way over there, and you're here and the papers…." Cisco's eyes widened as he put the pieces together. "No way!"

"Surprise?" I cringed slowly and put my hands out as if I were showcasing something. Cisco put his hands over his mouth in shock, before slowly letting them down and giggling like a schoolgirl.

"This. Is. Awesome. We have two speedsters now! Imagine, you guys could become a crime fighting duo." Cisco was practically vibrating with joy by this point. Then his eyes grew wide and he gasped, as if he had a sudden epiphany. "I already have your names together. You ready for this?"

I blinked at the engineer, who took my silence as a yes and continued. He put his hands up as if he were describing a marquee.

"Flash and Lady Flash. Pretty great, huh?" He smirked at his creative idea.

"I don't know Cisco. We don't even know if this is a permanent thing. I can probably just copy super abilities for a little while. I could lose these powers after 24 hours." I shrugged and sat down in a chair.

"Maybe, maybe not. We'll just have to find out. Once we come across another metahuman, we'll know for sure." Cisco smiled at me as Caitlin walked in with a hand around Barry's arm.

"Hey, what's up?" I perked up as Caitlin sat Barry down on a bed and started hooking him up to an EKG and started checking his vitals.

"You tell her, Barry." Caitlin bit out as she continued to rush around, tapping on monitors. "Go on!" I turned to Barry, eyebrow raised in expectation.

"I passed out at Stagg's award ceremony. Those guys who robbed the gun store were there and they took everyone's jewelry. I saved a security guard, but when I tried to go after the crew… I passed out." My eyes widened as I stalked closer to Barry.

"You what?" My voice screeched as Barry and Cisco both leaned away from me. But before I could continue, Caitlin interrupted.

"You lied to us. How could you not tell us you're experiencing dizzy spells? We're your doctors. God knows what's going on inside your body, your cells are in a constant state of flux." The doctor had a fire in her eyes as she chastised Barry. "You could be experiencing cardiopulmonary failure or a transient ischemic attack." Barry turned to Dr. Wells to translate the complicated medical term.

"Mini heart attack." He passed off nonchalantly. "Probably not."

"You of all people should know that in science we share, we do not keep secrets." Caitlin stormed off and Cisco walked around to Barry's front side.

"Wow, I haven't seen anyone make her that angry since Ronnie." My eyebrows went up in recognition at the name. Cisco handed Dr. Wells a tablet and went over to his computer.

"Ronnie was Caitlin's fiancé, the one that died the night of the accelerator explosion?" Barry looked from Cisco to Wells for an answer, and the latter was the first to respond.

"Yeah. He is… missed." Barry looked down in shame. "Now, let's figure out why this is happening to you."

"C'mon." Barry's head snapped in my direction as I nodded towards the training room doors. "I'll bet Cisco has something really cool to show you."

"Wait, you're not mad at me?" He questioned as he got off of the table and took a couple of steps towards me. I crossed my arms.

"Oh, I was, but I think Caitlin's tongue lashing was more than enough penance for not telling either of us." One of his eyebrows rose and he knocked his hip into my side making me stumble.

"Tongue lashing? Wow, that's old school. Like, old old school." I scrunched my nose and Barry laughed as I pushed him playfully into the training room.

As Barry and Cisco talked through the glass, I turned to Dr. Wells and started breaking the news.

"Dr. Wells? You told me to come to you with any changes concerning my powers and I don't know how exactly to say this, but I've sort of… contracted… Barry's ability." Although he didn't seem very surprised, his head turned towards me and his eyebrows rose slightly. "I found out just this morning, I literally ran to work and acted as a human centrifuge. You can ask Barry." Dr. Wells seemed to contemplate my words for a second, before turning to Caitlin and stating calmly.

"Dr. Snow, check his glucose levels." Caitlin's eyes traveled over to a certain point of the screen and I could see her practically restraining herself from physically facepalming. As she started to speak into the mic, Wells turned his head back to me. "We'll discuss your advancements after we get Barry on track with his—" but his words were interrupted as a thump sounded out from the training room.

Our heads swiveled to see Barry's unconscious body atop a pile of broken boxes and styrofoam packing peanuts. I gasped and zoomed into the training room and quickly checked his body for any immediate injuries. Seeing none, I breathed out a sigh of relief and turned to a gaping Caitlin, a grinning Cisco, and a pensive Dr. Wells to shout, "He's okay! I don't think he's broken anything."

I started to pick up Barry by his shoulders, but seeing as I was still alone, I looked through the window and whined. "Oh come on, is nobody gonna help me with this?"

I had left the lab shortly after Barry woke up. I thought I saw Joe on my way out, but I was moving too fast to think twice about it. Once I reached my apartment, I pulled out my laptop and searched up every video I could on martial arts, parkour, weapon use, anything resourceful in a fight.

Before this morning, I was honestly feeling like a huge let down. Yes, I have this "extraordinary" gift, but what could I do with it? Become an olympic athlete? Compete in a dance competition? I didn't see how I could use my ability for good, how I could contribute to society. I hadn't fought any crime, only Barry has. I figured that Barry shouldn't be out there alone, no matter how fast he is or how much he thinks he can take it. Having this super speed evened the field a little.

Plus you know what they say: four fists are better than two.

Okay, maybe not.

But I spent the rest of the night, eyes tingling with new information and movements being imbedded into my brain. I soon fell asleep to the sounds of an MMA KO compilation from 2009.

The next day at work, I was sitting in Barry's office, wasting time while waiting for my photos to develop. Barry was roaming around with his gloves on, processing different pieces of evidence. Munching on a donut, I saw Joe walk in and I waved. He gave me a stern smile and looked towards Barry, who rolled his eyes as he walked to the pile of donut boxes.

"Come to yell at me again?" Barry mumbled while looking down. Joe flinched, but just barely, before carrying on.

"Simon Stagg's head of security was murdered last night." I saw confusion and curiosity run across his face before Joe continued. "The coroner took some skin samples, hopefully they belong to the killer. See if you can find a match."

"Can't be a coincidence, Stagg's benefit was attacked last night." Barry's statement stopped Joe on his way to the door.

"I'm going to interview Stagg now."

Barry stepped forward. "I'll come with you."

Joe's eyes hardened, "You're job is in here, stay in here and do it." My head turned back and forth between the two men. I could sense the hostility. As Joe left, I rose from my seat, wiped the crumbs from my hands and started towards Barry.

"Okay, what the hell was that?"

Barry's jaw clenched before he bit out an answer. "He doesn't think I should be doing what I want to do. Saving people, stopping crime. He doesn't get it, the police can't handle metahumans, I can. We can." I raised an eyebrow at the chill to Barry's words.

"Did you ever think that maybe Joe's just scared that you'll get hurt?" Barry's eyes flashed with betrayal at my answer.

"You're taking his side? I can't believe this." I shook my head at Barry's frustrated tone.

"I'm not taking sides here. Just, look at it from his perspective. If someone you loved said that they wanted to go throw themselves into a burning buildings and in front of bullets, would you be happy about it?" Barry's eyes blazed before softening slightly, "I'm just saying—"

I was cut off by Iris entering the lab. "Why is my dad mad at you?" Barry turned away from me, it was then that I realized that we ended up in very close approximation to each other. He started working on the skin samples while answering Iris' question.

"Work stuff." I slumped onto a stool, catching Iris glimpse between us for a second before steeling her eyes on Barry. He turned around, as if sensing her glare on him before asking, "Why are you mad at me?"

"You were supposed to meet me at Jitters to give me some scientific background for my article." Barry sighed and pulled his gloves off in a upset manner.

"And I didn't show up."

Iris continued to lay the guilt on, "Now I have to come up with a new article topic in 24 hours or I fail the assignment."

Barry took a few steps forward, "Iris, I'm—"

But Iris wasn't having any of it, "Don't say that you're sorry, okay? I know that you are. What I don't know is what is going on with you. With both of you." I jumped in surprise as her glare turned onto me. "We grew up pretty close to each other in the past few years, the three of us. You don't think that I can't tell when you're happy? Or depressed, or sad, or lost?" Her brown hair formed a curtain around her face as she briskly poured her sugar into her cup of coffee.

"Now, I'm gonna ask you both one more time, Barry Allen and Katherine Steele and you better be honest with me. What the hell is going on?" I saw a blur around Barry for a split second before his computer beeped. "We are not done talking about this." Iris stated firmly. Barry and I made eye contact, I'm sure we were both silently hoping to avoid that future conversation.

The three of us soon crowded around the monitor, with two sets of eyebrows creasing together in confusion. "That's impossible." Barry murmured. Iris leaned in to see what the damage was. "There was a murder last night, these skin cells belong to the murderer." His head shook in disbelief as he furthered in his explanation. "But these cells are naive. Stem cells."

"They can copy any cell that the body needs, but they're only found in babies. This is beyond weird." I finished Barry's elaboration and scratched my head questioningly.

"So, what, this killer is newborn?" Iris looked to Barry and I for an answer.

"Not quite." I whispered as a thousand questions started to pop up in my mind.

"Well, that's enough weird science for the day for me. I'm gonna go. You two have fun." Iris sauntered out of the lab.

"I'm gonna run these files down to Singh, you stay here." Barry started gathering a stack of papers together.

I sat in his twisty chair and swerved in his direction, narrowing my eyes. "It's not like I'm doing anything else at the moment, Mr. Bossy Pants." The corners of my lips turned up, showing the playfulness in my statement. Barry rolled his eyes and smiled before exiting the lab.

After a couple of minutes of whistling and playing Tetrus on my phone, I jumped when Barry zoomed back into the lab, a grave look on his face. Walking over to the distraught man, I saw him open his locker which contained his red suit.

"What's going on?"

Barry's face stayed stone serious,a complete 180 to his mood earlier. "Stagg is being attacked at his factory. Joe is there." As soon as I realized what Barry was up to, I immediately tried to object.

"Barry, don't you dar—" but before I could finish my sentence, he was out in a flash. I now stood alone in an empty lab, papers fluttering around the room. My fiery red curls were now distributed sloppily and tangled around my head and shoulders. I blew a curl out from in front of my eyes in a huff.

"Damn it."

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