The call had come quite early in the morning, Barry thought as he made his way over to the crime scene. He'd been in the middle of waking up with Caitlin when his phone had gone off. He'd kissed her to show her how sorry he was, and then he'd gotten up and gotten changed, before flashing off to work. And here he was. Walking slowly, his bag in his hands, as he gets nearer he feels a slight rush of panic, why he does not know, but he shows his badge to the cops, and then walks onto the scene. Joe gets to him before he can see the body. "You're going to want to steel yourself for this first Barr." His foster father says. Barry nods, a sense of foreboding increasing within him. He takes a breath, and then walks to the body. He sees brown pants, a white shirt, and then, no…that can't be right. Barry staggers back, Joe there with a steadying hand. Patty Spivot lies before him, her eyes blank and unseeing. He looks at Joe and asks. "How?"

Joe sighs. "I do not know. A call came in from an off duty cop this morning. We got here as soon as we could. She was dead when we arrived on the scene."

Barry nods, taking a deep breath, he forces his heart to stop racing and says. "I'll take a few samples and see what I can find." Joe nods and claps him on the shoulder before heading off to talk to another cop. Barry knees down, gets his stuff out of his bag and starts taking samples from her clothes and her fingers.

Julian kneels at his side and says. "There's another husk." Barry sees his partner pointing off to the side. "I've bagged as much as I can from it, to run at the lab."

Barry nods, briefly noting the lack of bite in Julian's tone. Vaguely he remembers something Joe had said to him before. Julian and Patty had gotten close during the time he'd been away. Shaking his head to get rid of the grim thoughts, he takes the samples and puts them inside his bag. He sneaks a look to make sure that no one is looking and then he flashes off to the lab. Once there, he begins running the tests. He bangs his hands on the table in frustration when the tests come back negative, or showing no result. How the hell did she die? From what this is suggesting she might have known the killer, no sign of a struggle, no trace of a gun or weapon on her clothes, no sign of resistance on her fingers or her hands. How did it happen? This is all running through his mind when his phone buzzes. He picks it up and looks at it.

Joe called and has told us what happened. I'm so sorry about Patty, Barr. Meet me back home soon? X

Barry smiles briefly, his heart filled with love for Caitlin, even though she has a lot on her mind she's still worried about him. Briefly, he wonders what he did to deserve her. He shoots off a text in response: Sure, I'll see you in an hour. X

Julian arrives back at the lab, and soon enough an hour shoots by in no time as they work in silence, doing what they can to make sense of the mystery of Patty's murder. Julian is the one who breaks the silence. "The husk shows slight signs of being tampered with."

"What do you mean?" Barry asks, desperate to leave and meet Caitlin, but also desperate to know more.

"It seems as if its makeup was altered to ensure that we would think it was there naturally. But some of the particles show sign of disruption and the structure is not stable." Julian replies.

"You think it was moved?" Barry asks surprised.

"I do." Julian says. "I'll need to run a few more tests to see if I can pinpoint a location." Barry nods and silence falls over them once more, before Julian speaks again. "Oh, there was a Dr Snow downstairs looking for you Allen."

Barry nods his thanks and walks out of the lab. He makes his way downstairs, and smiles at the sight of Caitlin in a blue dress talking to Joe and Eddie, she smiles when she sees him and envelops him in a hug. "Thanks for coming." He whispers to her gratefully.

"Of course." Caitlin replies, she pulls back and allows Barry to take her hand in his. "Do you want to go?" she asks.

Barry looks at Joe who nods, and then back at his girlfriend and says. "Yeah, if we could." Hand in hand they walk out of the precinct, and as they do, Barry gathers his thoughts and then says. "I think Patty was killed by Alchemy."

Caitlin's heart stutters a moment, and then she asks. "What makes you say so?"

Barry sighs, a memory of his clash with Alchemy playing in his mind. "When I fought him, there was something odd about him. It was as if I'd seen him somewhere before, though of course I'd never met him before then. Then when he used the stone to summon Savitar, I remember seeing some sort of grey thing coming out of it and landing on the ground. I wasn't aware of it then, but the more I think about it, the more I think it was like the thing that we found near Patty. And the thing we found near a lot of the other victims."

"I see." Caitlin replies, her mind whirring. "But then, why is Alchemy killing these people? It doesn't seem to serve a purpose, does it?" For a moment, she is horrified by the calmness in her voice, and then she sees that Barry is also considering this.

"I don't know Cait. Nothing links any of the people we've found, and Patty hit hard because I know her. But I do not see how Alchemy could know that. I think we're going to have to do some more research into the stone he has, as well as into narrowing down who he or she could be." Barry responds.

Caitlin nods, then deciding her boyfriend needs a moment to take his thoughts off things. "Well, now we've got that sorted, why don't we go for a coffee somewhere? And just talk?"

Barry stops, turns and kisses Caitlin soundly on the lips. When he pulls back she has a surprised expression on her face, and so he merely smiles and replies. "Thank you."

Caitlin grins, leans up onto her toes and kisses him, then pulls back and says. "No worries Barry."

Together they walk to the Blue Beetle, and sit and talk about all sorts of things, eventually though, work comes calling. Caitlin walks with Barry back to the precinct, they make plans for a movie night that night, then it is to the lab for Barry and back to Star Labs for Caitlin. All the while, there is a shadow lurking over them, the sound and sign of the God of Speed himself.