[ barry's pov ]

"Owe you for the java, rookie." Ralph told me as we were stood by Jitters, "Can't believe I left my wallet at home."

"Don't worry about it." I mutter, putting sugars into zee's iced coffee, stirring it well before placing the top back on, picking up both hers and mine, "It could happen to anyone five times in a row. And could you please stop calling me rookie?"

"Sorry, uh old habit from when I was your superior officer." Ralph said, as we walked out of Jitters, "You know, before you got me fired, ruined my career destroyed my life. Crushed my spirit, left me alone - without a friend in the world."

"Don't forget how I turned you into an amorphous, stretchy blob." I sip my coffee, the warm liquid slipping down my throat as we turned the corner.

"Actually, that's the one good thing you've done for me." Ralph admits, "Course, you didn't do it on purpose, so you don't get credit."

"Both of you, hand over your cash, now!" A man shouts from behind us, causing us both to halt and then, a smile and laugh coming from me as I pointed at him, this being the same man that tried to rob me when I first got my speed, "Hey."

"Uh, pardon us, okay? One second." Ralph told him, as we turn back around.

"Okay, this is perfect." I told him, "I've been teaching you, right? Muggers are like Superhero 101."

"Ooh, Ralphy like-y." Ralph says.

"All right, what's your plan?" I question.

"Okay, I was thinking about this in the shower this morning: how sweet would it be to turn into a giant slingshot?" Ralph looks at me.

"That's a weird plan, but okay." I shrug.

"Oh, I got an even cooler idea-" Ralph began.

"Hey! I'm still robbing you guys!" The man from behind us cuts him off.

"We will be right with you, sir! Please!" Ralph says to him, before turning back to me, "Okay, what if I did, like, a human Slinky thing? Maybe wrap him up, throw in a few on-theme puns?"

"Whatever, Ralph." I roll my eyes, "We just gotta- hurry up a little bit."

"Relax, rookie." Ralph exclaims, "I've seen a lot of thugs. This guy is no shooter."

As if on cue, the man shoots Ralph, Ralph's skin creaking and stretching, shooting the bullet right back at the man, as he lets out a wail in pain, falling onto the ground, "My leg!"

"Well. Our work here is done." Ralph turns to walk away.

"Hey, hey, what are you doing? We can't just leave." I stop him, "You just shot him."

"I didn't shoot him. He shot him." Ralph defends himself, "Do you feel like I shot you?"

The man shot him again after the question, the bullet coming right back at him, shooting into him again, as he wails again, shouting.

"Stop shooting him!" I shout at Ralph.

"I am not shooting him!" He shouts right back.

"Oh, they shot my ass!" The man wailed.

"Okay, so he's a little banged up, but we caught the bad guy. Isn't that what superheroes do?" Ralph questions.

"No, a superhero's first job is to protect people." I told him.

"Oh, God." Ralph scoffs, "What's the second job? Long-winded lectures before noon?"

"I barely- take this." I hand him both coffees I was holding, scoffing, walking over to the man, "One day, I'm gonna throw a lightning bolt so far up- I'm taking him to the hospital!" I look at him, looking my palm up, "And you owe me five coffees."

"It's fine. I know. Come on, get up." I told the man, pulling him up, "I'm not gonna hurt you. This way, come on."

-

[ zee's pov ]

"Ouch." Barry spoke as he walked into the cortex, with me on his back, wearing his jacket I had stolen right when he walked in and took it off over the olive green t shirt I had tucked into a pair of blue ripped jeans. Barry held onto my legs so I didn't fall, as I had my arms loosely wrapped around his neck, sipping the coffee he had brought me, "All-nighter, huh?"

"I haven't been this tired since Killer Frost decided to go to Burning Man." Caitlin sipped her coffee.

"Yeah? Well, how is our search for the mysterious Devoe coming?" Barry asks.

"Allen, we're searching for an evil mastermind. The only clue we have to go on is his name, of which there's literally thousands, so how's the search going? It's-" Harry throws something at the wall, the tool clattering against it, "Fantastic."

Cisco giggles, "I missed that."

"Maybe he's old." I suggest dumbfounded, my mind not fully awake, as I sip more of my coffee.

"Drink your coffee." Barry told me, "You'll sound smarter after you're done with it."

"Hey-" I hit his shoulder lightly, "Mean."

"I love you-" Barry kisses my cheek, then turns his head, looking back at Harry.

"If we're gonna find Devoe, we need more brain power." Harry sighs.

"Well, why didn't you say so? One master detective, ready to detect." Ralph walks in.

"I'm already here." I looked at him, sipping my coffee.

Ralph shot me a look, as Harry spoke up, "I said more brain power."

Ralph sighs, his hand resting on the keyboard, "Initiating emergency oxygen purge."

The alarm starts to blare loudly, Ralph stammering as he tries to stop it, a countdown from ten happening, Harry pressing a button, silencing it, "Like I said, we need more help. Maybe I should call my friends."

"Your what?" Barry blurts out, staring at Harry, the words that came out of Barry's mouth catching all of our attention.

Harry repeats, "My friends."

"I know I haven't had all my coffee yet but-" I slip off Barry's back, clearing my throat, looking between Harry and Barry, my eyes lightly squinted with confusion, "I think he's saying friends."

"Is he saying friends?" Barry asks, looking at Caitlin.

"I think he's being sarcastic." Caitlin admits.

"No, no, no." Cisco points at Harry, "This is delirium. He's cracked from being awake all night."

"Hey, Harry, all of your friends- are in this room." Cisco snaps his fingers.

"I have other friends. You asked me to make new friends. I made new friends. It was a task." Harry sets his coffee down, "I complete tasks."

"That's so great." I let out a weak, tired laugh in happiness, "Harry Wells has friends."

"I can't wait to meet them." Caitlin smiles at him.

"Harry, you listened to me." Cisco smiles tiredly, "I'm so proud of you."

"Look, my friends are smart. They'll help us.

I'll call them." Harry says, leaving the room.

"All right, well, um, in the meantime, we gotta find the rest of these bus metas." Barry crosses his arms, "Somehow they're connected to Devoe's plan."

"You were on the bus." I point at Ralph, "Can you remember anybody else who was?"

"Well, I was in between drunk and hungover at the time." Ralph shrugs, looking at the photos on the board, his eyes falling on Becky Sharpe, "She is cute. What's her deal?"

"She's in jail." Caitlin shot him a look.

"When are visiting hours?" Ralph asks, making me roll my eyes.

"What about vibing the rest of the bus passengers?" Barry asks Cisco.

"I mean, I-I tried, but, you know, the the dark matter we released was such a massive space-time event that my energy just reflected back and I ended up vibing myself." Cisco sat up, "I'm pretty sure I relived my own birth. Or was that my death?"

"You know, there are other non-traumatizing ways of bringing Ralph's memory back, like hypnosis." Caitlin suggests.

"Is that really a thing?" I look at her.

"I mean, not the whole cartoon, pocket watch version, but yeah, real hypnosis can be used to recover memories." Caitlin confirms.

"All right." Barry nods, "Do you know any hypnotists?"

Caitlin and I shook our heads, Cisco speaking up, "Not me."

"You lost me at cartoon." Ralph admits.

"All right." Cisco spoke, "So who's gonna hypnotize Ralph?"

-

"I'm Dr. Sharon Finkel." The couples therapist introduced herself, as I was seated in between Barry and Ralph on the couch.

"Who suggested this again?" Barry mutters to me.

"Iris did-" I mutter back, "But- it was our only option. And apparently- she can do what we need so- let's give it a shot."

I look up at her, folding my hands, "Dr. Finkel, thank you so much for squeezing us in- with your very crowded schedule- uhm. Our friend Ralph here is having trouble remembering information for a very- important detective case. Which is why- this is so urgent."

"So I see you didn't go to Harvard." Ralph spoke up.

"No." Dr. Finkel shook her head, "Did you?"

"I see what you did there." Ralph nods at her.

I roll my eyes, shaking my head, slouching in my seat, Barry had already done the same thing, Barry speaking up, "If you could fix his personality too, that'd be great."

I lightly laugh, as Ralph spoke up, "Give it up, rookie. This psycho hooey's never gonna work on me."

But it had worked, and now Barry and I were sitting with Dr. Finkel, as she spoke, "Now, remember with me, Ralph. It's a month ago. You're on a bus. What do you see?"

"I see someone crying." Ralph spoke, his eyes closed,

"Dude's really bumming me out."

"What else do you see?" Dr. Finkel questions.

"I see some women. I can't see their faces." Ralph spoke, "34-32-36, 38-34-32."

"Are those bus routes?" Barry asks.

I place my forehead in my hands,'"I think they are measurements. I am officially disgusted."

"I see something else." Ralph blurts out, "It's a bison."

"Does a bison mean anything to either of you?" Dr. Finkel asks, as Barry and I shake our heads in unison.

Dr. Finkel snaps her fingers, snapping Ralph out of the hypnosis, Ralph speaking, "It's hocus-pocus. It's never gonna work on a guy like me, but we can try it if you want." His eyes trail towards us, "How'd you guys get over there?"

-

"Security guard found him here this morning. We haven't ID'd him yet. His personal effects are scattered everywhere, so we didn't find his wallet. But we may find it when we find the rest of his briefcase and- his missing hand." I told Barry, as Joe, him and I stood by our new crime scene.

Barry sighs, "Well, judging by that avulsion and the claw marks, I'd say a large predatory animal did this. But whatever it was would have to have four-inch canines, a bite force of 5,000 P.S.I. and weigh over a ton. That animal doesn't exist."

"What the hell did this?" Joe asks, Barry's eyes traveling to a animal statue, "You don't think-"

"Do you remember back in the day when we wouldn't calmly consider a stone statue our prime suspect?" Barry walks over to it.

"No, I actually don't." Joe shook his head.

"Blood." Barry said, after swabbing the inside of the statues mouth.

"Oh come on-" I facepalm, "Every day just keeps getting weirder- and weirder."

Joe backs away from the statue, as do Barry and I, as if it would come back to life and eat us alive.

-

"Okay, Council of Wells! How we doing?" I caught their attention as Cisco and I walked into the Speed Lab.

"Have we found our mystery foe yet?" Cisco sips his coffee.

"No, we can't even agree on what methodology to use." Harry sighs.

"What?" Cisco asks, "You've had an entire day."

"I know." Harry nods.

"Wait." I look at Harry, "Weren't there three of you?"

As if on cue, the third Harrison Wells shows up, the one that went by H. Lothario Wells, "Whoo! Thanks for the merry-go-round, sweetheart. You know what I mean."

His eyes land on us, chuckling, "Oh, sorry. I had to take care of some off-camera business."

I let out a loud shriek, my eyes wide at the sight, Cisco reaching up and covering my eyes, closing his own, "Oh, my God!"

"What?" Lothario Wells asked.

"I can see your frank and beans." Herr Harrison Wolfgang Wells told him.

"Come on, now. I do my best thinking commando." Lothario held up his glass, "Plus, it ain't like we all haven't seen it before."

"We haven't seen it!" Cisco shrieks, "And she's getting engaged-"

"Ah, you Earth folk." Lothario sighs, pulling up his pants, "You guys are so uptight."

"Can we just get back to the task at hand? We need answers." Harry sighs.

"The best answer is always the simplest." Wells 2.0 spoke, "Why don't we go to every Devoe we can find and interrogate 'em?"

"What, even the baby Devoe?" Lothario Wells questions.

"Especially the baby Devoe." Wells 2.0's accent was thick.

"Baby violence solves nothing." Herr Harrison Wolfgang Wells remarks.

"Guys- guys, all right gentlemen! Clearly, this isn't working. And by the way, it's not me. It's you." Harry presses a few buttons, and then the holograms disappear, "This was a bad idea."

"It's like your junk has been burned into my brain." Cisco whimpers.

"Same here." I mutter, slowly opening my eyes.

"You're welcome." Harry puts his hands on his hips.

"You know what- I need to go- find Ralph and Barry." I step away, trying to get the image out of my mind, blinking repeatedly, meeting up with Ralph and Barry in the hallway, walking into the cortex, "We've got the third piece of the necklace. Joe found out that it was on display at Central City Museum, but when they figured out- that it was a target-"

"It's on the move." Barry stares at the monitor.

"Yeah, it's being transferred via armored car to a secure storage facility in Brookfield Heights." I rub my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose, blinking repeatedly, then squeezing my eyes shut, "I pinged the truck's GPS."

"Are you- okay?" Barry places a hand on my back, looking at me, concern laced in his tone.

"I saw Harry's junk." I blurt out.

"What?" Barry's voice lightly raises, his eyes widened with shock, as I look at him.

"I will explain later- just- go." I close my eyes again, rubbing my temples.

"All right." Barry says, "Ralph? Let's go."

"I'll get my ugly suit." Ralph mutters.

-

"I'm getting the same traces of dark matter from this that I was from the tiger statue." Caitlin sets down the helmet from the armor that attacked our victim.

"Looks like our meta isn't restricted- to animating just stone." Iris spoke.

"No, but she does have some limitations." Barry crosses his arms, "Out of all the artifacts in the office, she could only control the knight."

I was seated on the desk, Iris standing next to me, the platter that Cisco had set up for the Council of Wells not being touched, so here I was, eating it, speaking up, propping a chip in my mouth, "So then maybe her psychic imprint abilities are just restricted to effigies."

Ralph snorts, Barry turning and looking at him, "It just means statues."

"Yeah, I don't know." Ralph shrugs, "Sounds kinda dirty to me."

I point a chip that was slightly covered in guacamole, "Im so close to shoving my foot so far up your ass-"

"Where did you get all that food anyway?" Ralph asks me, changing the subject.

"Cisco." I shrug, "Harry's friends- turned out to be just other versions of himself from different earths. And- you know- I was hungry because I haven't eaten all day and- Cisco gave me this huge- thing he prepared for it."

Iris swipes a chip from the huge platter, eating it, as I look back at the screen.

"So if the statues look like people or animals, she can bring them to life." Joe spoke, sarcasm threaded through his next sentence, "Good thing there's only thousands of those in the city."

"Oh, I got a hit on facial recognition." I press the screen.

"Mina Chaytan, professor of cultural anthropology?" Barry read, "She's a teacher?"

"Correction- she was." I held a chip up, "She became an activist, but she lost her job six months ago after being arrested."

"Breaking and entering, trespassing, burglary quite an activist. The charges were dropped, but the university still let her go." Caitlin read.

"She was trying to reclaim several Sioux art pieces from the museum." Joe read off the screen, "Chaytan was at this even before she was a meta."

"Yeah, except now she's upped her game to homicide. She wants the third piece of that necklace?" Barry looks back at us, "Let's find it before she does."

"Okay." Joe nods, "Zee, let's go."

"But- my chips." I held the platter.

"Zee." Joe shot me a look.

"Okay-" I place the platter down after getting up, as he reaches for a handshake, which I give in to the handshake, "West and Young are on the case."

-

"Guys-" I ran into the cortex, "Chaytan escaped from CCPD. Apparently, she made a tactical dummy go full terminator at the station."

"Well, we know where she's going." Caitlin looks at us.

"The necklace." Iris answers.

"The two pieces she stole have been reunited with the third piece at the museum." I tap away on the monitor, breathing heavily from running.

"She has killed for these before." Barry crosses his arms, "She will kill anyone that gets in her way to reclaim them. It's up to us. Are you ready?"

"Well I was until you said that." Ralph admits, "Jeez Louise, man. What kind of rousing braveheart speech was that?"

"Just put your thing on." Barry sighs, heading towards his suit.

"Wanna help me?" Ralph asks.

"No." Barry grabs his suit.

"It's really tight." Ralph turns, heading to where his suit was.

-

"Hey." Barry walks into Star Labs with Joe, "What's going on?"

We were all stood in the cortex the next day, after defeating the Black Bison, we believed we had figured out who Devoe was.

"We think we know who he is." I cross my arms, leaning back against the desk.

"According to Harry's friends, the name we're looking for is Clifford-" Cisco pulls up the profile, "Clifford Devoe."

"92% match to our psychological profile." Harry sips his coffee, "No other Devoe comes close."

"Guy keeps a low profile." Iris spoke, "No social media, no criminal record-"

"And we know where he's hiding." Harry grins lightly, "43 Hibbard Lane."

"Well, if he's as dangerous as you said I can call Singh." Joe offers, "We can get a squad over there."

"No." Barry shook his head, "Let's go get him."

"You want to go get him?" I repeat, not quiet sure where he was getting at.

"Guys, Thawne, Zoom, Savitar for once, we actually have a chance here to get ahead of our enemy." Barry told us, "Let's go get Devoe."

And that was where we took action. Barry and I had went to Clifford Devoe's house, while everyone else was on stand by, ready to attack at our mark.

"For a evil mastermind- he sure does have a nice house." I mutter, as I walked up the path with Barry.

"Is everyone set?" Barry mumbles into the comm.

"Eye in the Sky is a go." Iris' voice filled the line.

"I have eyes on the front door." Harry follows up.

"Snow and Frost standing by." Caitlin's voice fills the line right after.

"Just give us the word and we'll breach in." Cisco told us.

"What kind of criminal mastermind has a welcome mat?" I mutter, looking down at the mat Barry and I stood on once when reached the front door.

Barry sighs, ringing the door bell, a pretty woman answering the door, looking at us, "Hi. Can I help you?"

"Uh, yeah- actually-" I pull out my badge, showing it to her, "I'm Detective Zee Young, CCPD. This is Barry Allen, my associate. Uhm-"

"Is everything all right?" She questions.