Within Seconds // Barry Allen

Power Outage

It was not often Parker was in dangerous situations, but when forced into it, Parker was decent, as her brain worked better in the street smarts way. It had to, when growing up with three other brothers. Protecting herself or appearing threatening was something not uncommon in the least. 

Parker crossed the Cortex. Underneath the medical bed, she patted feverishly until she found the taped key. She tried to steady her hands enough to open the cabinet beside Barry's suit. 

"Metal or wooden?" she asked.

"What?" asked Cisco. 

"Which one is not going to get me electrocuted and/or killed?"

"My best guess it wooden," said Cisco. 

Caitlin nodded. "But we can't promise you won't be dead."

Parker rolled her eyes. She snatched the wooden bat from the cabinet, then shut the doors and reclined in her computer seat once more. 

"A bat? That's what you keep in your secret cabinet?" Cisco asked.

Parker swung the bat around her hand, practicing her swing a couple times. 

"Park," said Barry, wiggling his phone in the air. "Have you heard from Iris today? I can't get a hold of her..."

"Did you try the Station?" asked Parker. 

Barry excused himself from the Cortex to make a call to the Chief. Minutes later, Barry walked with purpose back through the doors. 

"Uh-oh," mumbled Parker. 

"There's a hostage situation at the CCPD. Joe and Iris are in trouble. I need my powers back now," demanded Barry. 

"I have a theory, but it's untested," offered Dr. Wells. 

"I'm willing to roll the dice."

"Okay," sighed Dr. Wells, leaning his elbows on his knees. "You lost your speed, yes, but nothing has changed inside you on a subatomic level. In other words, your cells are still primed."

"Which means?" asked Parker. 

Cisco caught on to what Dr. Wells was suggesting. "We do a jump start."

"Okay, how do we do that? How do we jump start me?" asked Barry. 

"We need to replicate the initial jolt to your system."

"But that would mean a peak current of, at least, twenty thousand kiloamps," said Cisco in disbelief. 

"Are you insane? That's more than they give to people in the electric chair!" protested Caitlin.

"Caitlin, with Farooq in the building, we're all looking at a death sentence here," said Dr. Wells. 

"The spare generators are offline. If we reboot it, we could get a charge that big," said Cisco. 

"But what's supposed to transfer that energy?" asked Parker.

"We need something that can transmit the load from the generator to Barry's body without shorting out," agreed Dr. Wells.

Cisco's eyes widened. "The treadmill. My baby could take the charge."

"What if Barry can't?" breathed Caitlin. 

"That's up to Mr. Allen."

In the spotlight, Barry turned on his heel. 

"Where do you think you're going?" asked Parker. 

"I'm going to talk to him," admitted Barry. 

"Nope. Nope!" shouted Dr. Wells. 

"You didn't see him at the substation, okay? He needed to feed. I got super speed out of the Particle Accelerator blast, but his best friends died. He woke up with a disease," sighed Barry.

"Earlier today, you worked a crime scene where this meta-human killed an innocent man. He's a murderer. And you are powerless to defend yourself against him."

"He may just need help like I did. I don't need my powers to offer him that," said Barry. At a loss of further explanation, he muttered, "I have to try."