CHAPTER 11: WONDER WHO'S CRYING NOW

***BARRY***

Olivia and Grayson lead Lisa into their hotel room, and Cisco and Caitlin are quick to follow them in. I, however, hang back for a short while.

Spending a huge chunk of my formative years and beyond living with a cop had its benefits. Among them - developing my character-judging skills. Seeing Olivia's metahuman ability in action, I was floored. I completely didn't expect someone so sweet and charming to have the same sort of easily-used-for-evil power as Roy G. Bivolo. I'm still convinced that there's no way she can be a bad guy...can she? But, after the display I just saw with her and Peter, I'm afraid I might just have to add her to my steadily growing list of Allies I Can't Completely Trust.

"You coming in, Barry?" Wells asks, poking his head out the door before he can close it completely.

"Just a minute," I say. "I'm gonna call Joe, give him an update."

"Joe?" Wells asks, scratching his head.

Oh yeah - this Wells doesn't know all our people just yet. "He's a cop," I say. "And my adopted dad. So he's one of us."

"As long as he's not secretly working for someone like General Eiling," Wells says.

"You know him?" I ask.

"He's always been a bit of a thorn in STAR Labs' metaphorical side," Wells says. "Well, I'll just leave you to it, then. I'll let you in when you're ready."

"Sure. Thanks."

Glancing down the corridor, I see a small chair perched in an alcove. I sit in that chair, facing a potted orchid on a table under a watercolor fruit-bowl still-life. Typical hotel decor, I guess. I've not been in too many of them. Hotels, that is. The number of times I've left Central City for more than a day (or a couple of minutes to run down to Coast City and pick up some of everyone's favorite pizza), I can count them on one hand.

I unlock my phone and dial Joe's number. For some reason, I still dial the whole number from memory, rather than just go into the contacts menu and tap the screen on his name and face. In the words of Bob Seger: "Call me a relic, call me what you will. Say I'm old-fashioned, say I'm over the hill."

One ring...two...then he answers. "Hi, Barry. It's been a long night for you, huh?"

"You're telling me." I stare up at the painted fruit bowl, feeling like its bright colors are mocking me. "It's not gonna be over for a while, so don't wait up for me."

"I was afraid of that."

Silence. Tense, awkward silence. "How's...uh, how's Iris holding up?"

"Not very well," Joe says. "I made dinner, and she wouldn't eat. Tomato soup, too."

I laugh lightly - tomato soup's a favorite in the West family, but with Iris having just sustained the loss of her boyfriend, it's totally understandable that she won't even go for that always-reliable comfort food.

"I wish I could be there," I say, "but-"

Joe interrupts me. "That goes without saying. But if you need to see this through, don't let us stop you." He clears his throat. "Everybody grieves differently, Barry. Metahumans included."

We both laugh at his weak joke. "Hey," I say, "if I end up somehow falling asleep on the job, there are other superheroes in town now. We can pick up each other's slack if we have to."

"'Superheroes?'" Joe repeats. "Plural?"

"Yeah," I say. "You already saw Spider-Man, right? Well, we've also got Nightwing."

"As in Gotham City's Nightwing?"

"That's the one. And it turns out his girlfriend's a metahuman too."

Joe whistles. "Will wonders never cease? Sounds like you guys have your hands full."

"We're managing," I say. "Right now we're trying to talk to one of our old friends."

"I take it you mean that in the sarcastic sense?"

I scoff. "Do you really have to ask?"

I can almost see Joe nodding along with me on his end. "Well," he says, "don't let me keep you. And don't stay up too late dealing with this 'old friend.'" Here, I can definitely see him holding the phone between his ear and his shoulder while doing air quotes to a (presumably empty) room. "If you find yourself downing quadruple espressos like they're water-"

"I already do that," I laugh.

"Hard to believe you're still single," Joe deadpans. "Well, good night. And I mean it, don't stay up too late. It's hard enough for me when I have to do that. You're only an amateur detective."

"I assure you, I know my limits. Good night."

Hanging up, I gaze at the fruit bowl painting once again. As a kid, when I was in the midst of a serious Harry Potter phase, I would always try to tickle any pears in those paintings, hoping they would giggle and turn into doorknobs. Tonight, though, I feel no such urge. Childlike innocence doesn't really have a place at this moment.

I knock on the door, and Wells lets me in. He, Cisco, and Caitlin are all standing near the door, with Grayson perched on one of the two beds, one leg crossed in a figure-four. Olivia and Lisa, however, are nowhere to be seen. However, I do hear one of the two ladies (most likely Lisa) crying, the sound muffled through the wall separating the bathroom from the main room.

"She's really doing it, isn't she?" I ask, my stomach churning. "Giving her the whammy?"

"Honestly," Grayson says, "without actually seeing it in action, I can't tell. But from what these guys have said about Lisa, I doubt she's much of a crier, so..."

I look at the others in disbelief. "And you guys are just gonna stand here and listen to it happen?"

"Hey, this guy said her powers get results," Cisco says, gesturing to Grayson.

Crossing her arms, Caitlin says, "I don't like it either, but I don't know what else we can do."

The door opens, and Olivia emerges, her hands over her eyes for a second. She then uncovers them and looks down at Grayson. "You're good," he says.

"Tell that to Lisa," I say as she follows Olivia out, barely able to walk for weeping.

"Blue, right?" Grayson asks. Without waiting for an answer, he zips up his hoodie, connecting the two halves of the blue chevron, then steps up to Lisa and hugs her. He actually buries her head in his chest, undoubtedly covering it with her tears. But it does the trick - when she lets go of him, she says she's feeling much better.

When Roy was doing his thing and making people go psycho in public, it usually fell upon me to restore them back to normal with my speed, because the flash of red was the same color his eyes turned when he made people go crazy. Apparently, red's the color of love as well, because the same tactic was able to snap Peter out of his "I'm so hopelessly in love with Olivia" spell. And as for Lisa, it seems blue was able to fix her up - which makes sense given the color's connotations of sadness.

Wiping the tear stains from his hoodie as best he can, Grayson says, "I switched to a red outfit recently, but I still keep this blue hoodie on hand in case Olivia goes with her 'desolation' style of interrogation."

"Does that happen very often?" I ask.

"Not really," Olivia says. "Because sadness tends to not work on sociopaths."

"Should I take that as a compliment?" Lisa asks as she stands in the corner and blows her nose. "That I'm apparently not a sociopath?"

"I would," I say. "So, did all this torture get us anything to work with?"

"Not really." Olivia sits next to Grayson, her shoulders slumped. "Nothing she hadn't said before, anyway. I got this much, though - she and her 'Rogue' friends, Captain Cold and Heat Wave...they killed two sets of doppelgängers in the first twelve hours after the black hole."

"Which implies that there are multiple copies of each of them showing up," I say.

"And that," Wells says, "suggests that there are multiple parallel universes being linked to ours through the wormholes."

Yawning, Cisco says, "Maybe if I were a little more awake, I could probably do a better job of sensing them."

"Really?" Grayson asks.

"Trust me," Cisco says, brushing his hair behind his ears, "I've picked up on parallel universes a few more times than I'd care to admit. The things I saw, some of them weren't pretty."

"They're better left unsaid," I say, "unless they really have to be discussed." I turn to Wells. "But let's just say this - if we see any more of you, don't be surprised if we have to kill them."

"Why does it have to be mostly bad guys, though?" Caitlin asks. "Why can't we get more good guys? We've got Wells. What about Eddie?"

Thinking about Iris again, I say, "I know, I wish he was back too." I shrug, rubbing my neck. "But we gotta play the cards we're dealt."

At this point, we all decide to go our separate ways for the night. Lisa goes out of town to return to wherever she and her comrades are holed up - but before she leaves, Cisco surreptitiously plants a chip in her jacket pocket, allowing him to track her. Until she inevitably discovers the chip, that is, and presumably crushes it, cutting off the signal after less than ten minutes. By this time, I'm finally home, Cisco and Caitlin are off to their places, and Wells has agreed to stay the night with the former.

When I get home, Iris has crashed on the couch, and Joe's draping a blanket over her. "She just stared into space for hours," he whispers, "until just now."

Poor girl. I resolve to ask her if she'd like to help us out in the morning. Maybe if she's got something to occupy her time - especially since the younger ones are supposed to be at CCU for the second and final day of their weekend tour tomorrow - she can feel better.

Until then, I kiss my fingertips, then touch the side of her sleepy head. I'm almost afraid I'll wake her up, but no, she's sound asleep, having clearly cried herself into that state.

As it turns out, though, I don't even need to ask for her help. I barely open my mouth to say "Good morning" when she says, "Please tell me there's something I can do for you guys."

I crane my neck and see Joe rooting around in the fridge for orange juice. "You brought her up to speed?"

"With what I knew, at least," he says, pouring himself a glass. "I'm sure you can fill her in on the rest."

I check my watch - it's eight o'clock. We barely got six hours of sleep each. But by now, I'm sure Peter, Gwen, Grayson, and Olivia are on their way to CCU. So, with that, I lead Iris out the door, and we make our way downtown. Unbelievably, she agrees to let me speed her to CC Jitters along with me.

"Let me guess," says the barista, a favorite of ours named Ginny McCall, as she sees us. "Quadruple espresso for you?"

"Nah," I laugh. "That's a little too much for me."

"Really?" Ginny laughs back, a smile forming on her face. "You looked in a mirror lately? That was what my friend looked like after we went to Spain. Days of jet lag..." She shudders, wringing her hands. Then she perks up as the bell over the door rings. "Holy crap, speak of the devil!"

"What?" Iris and I turn around, seeing two people come in. One, like me, is a very tall guy. The other is a pale blonde girl with dark rings around her eyes, visible even at a distance.

"Nah, false alarm," Ginny says. "That girl just looks exactly the way my friend did."

Iris and I place our orders, then we sit at a table and wait. We don't talk, though. Instead, we silently overhear the conversation between these two new customers. The guy, who looks like he could be Indian (not unlike Ginny, whom I believe is half-Indian), says in an English accent, "Right, Liv, you tell me - how would you go about looking for wormholes in a crowded, half-destroyed city?"

"Gee, I dunno," Liv snarks. "I'm just the office zombie, Ravi. In more ways than one."

"Your fake-ditzy attitude infuriates me sometimes," Ravi says. "Did you know that? If not, you should." Ginny gets his attention, and he turns to her and says, "Ah, yeah - Chocolate Dalmatian for me, and a Cinna-Mocha for the lady. Large, both."

"And extra cinnamon, please," Liv says. "Lots of it. Maybe even add some cinnamon jelly beans if you got 'em?"

Ginny grins at her. "I like you," she says.

"I only take it hot 'cause I'm a zombie," Liv laughs. "Trust me - I may not look like much, but I'm an undead alabaster badass!"

"Badasses are always welcome here," Ginny says, ringing up their orders and taking their money.

I can't hold back any longer - these two have really piqued my interest. While they wait for their unusual drinks (one extra-sweet, the other extra-spicy), I stand up, approach their table, and ask, "Did I hear you guys talking about wormholes just now?"

Liv looks at her traveling companion with a dangerous grin. "Ravi, did you go and tell your online gaming group about our secret mission?"

"Of course not," Ravi says shortly. "Come on, Liv, how long have you known me? Have I not earned your confidence yet?"

"It's a shame you don't believe me," she says, looking from him to me, "'cause it seems like this guy knows what we're here for. Don't you, Slim?"

"They call me 'Barry' around these parts, actually," I laugh. "And yeah, I know a thing or two about the wormholes of Central City. Where would you like to start?"