#also you cannot tell me patty wouldn't have made an EXCELLENT elongated lady alright?

[areyouscarletcold]

KF Barry Au with Iris and any of the other ladies + .Are you kidding me? We are not fine!

This one may or may not be based off of a couple of self-indulgent additions we’ve been chatting about involving two lovely ladies whom we both adore and deserved better. Because fuck canon, that’s why.  So enjoy :)

104. Are you kidding me? We are not fine!

Iris stopped cold in the middle of the hallway, gaping at the limb on the floor.

The impossibly long, winding, flailing arm that kept flopping around at her heels, struggling to gain purchase on the slippery floor.

Somehow, after gaining superpowers and fighting metahumans and returning from the Speed Force, the sight of a slender hand inching closer to her foot was the thing that sent her running. As much as she longed to bolt away from the arm, though, she found herself following the arm to its source, shuddering amongst the crackling purple energy embracing her like an old friend. She caught the sound of muffled voices as she drew nearer to the Cortex and realized everyone was crowding in the medical wing.

“Just - hold still!”

“Maybe a sedative would be easier. It won’t do any good if you keep - ”

“What the hell - ”

Iris blew past Wally, who didn’t so much as flinch at her presence, likely having felt her arrival, and couldn’t help but gape again, not at the arms jerking on the bed but who they belonged to.

“Please,” Caitlin was saying, a syringe in hand and a tight smile on her face, “you need to calm down. Everything is going to be fine - ”

“Are you kidding me? We are not fine!”

“Would someone like to explain what is going on?” Iris spoke up, unable to take her eyes off of the arms - and legs, oh god, they were everywhere - twitching beside her feet, off the gritted teeth and pure terror in their guest’s eyes, blonde hair haloed around her head as she kept glancing down at her growing limbs.

Cisco, who’d been slowly making his way toward where Wally stood at the doorway, flashed her a chagrined grin of his own. “Uh, well, see - ”

“Wait,” the blonde shifted on the bed, her eyes widening as she spotted Iris, and the lightbulb of recognition definitely went off if her shock was anything to go by. She struggled to sit up but being unable to control her puddy-like limbs only allowed her to flop back onto the bed. “Iris? Iris West? Is that you?”

Iris glanced between the others, at Wally’s shrug and Cisco and Caitlin’s uncertain expressions, and stepped closer, making sure not to trip over the various growing limbs. “Yeah. Yeah, it’s me. Patty, right?”

It was a weak question and they all had to know it; there was no way Iris could’ve forgotten Patty Spivot, certainly not after the woman had come to her for dating help with Barry years ago - and wow, those were simpler times even before she got her speed. Not after Barry had confided quietly to her about how he’d broken up with her, had been unable to confirm he was Frost when Patty pleaded with him to tell her the truth, even when she knew he was lying. Not after she’d quit the force after Singh asked her to take a break, after her increasingly reckless conduct, and how guilty Barry had looked when Patty seemed to vanish from Central City.

Until now, that is, when she turned into human silly putty.

Oh, god. Barry. Did he know? Had he seen Patty yet?

“Yeah, Patty Spivot. I used to, uh - ” Patty’s eyes narrowed. “Wait, if we’re at S.T.A.R. Labs, then - ”

“We think her cells have been polymerized by dark matter,” Caitlin cut her off, running a hand through her curls. She looked thoroughly exhausted. Iris wondered if she’d gotten any sleep the night before.

“What does that mean, exactly?” Iris asked.

“The walls of every cell in her body have elasticized,” Cisco explained, gesturing toward Patty’s tangled legs by his feet. “Meaning this girl can stretch and stretch until - ”

“Oh, god,” Patty muttered, closing her eyes, her head hitting the pillow with a soft thump. “Is this what Rapunzel felt like, just with…hair, I guess?”

“Not helping, Cisco,” Caitlin whispered. She set down the syringe and laid a hand on Patty’s shoulder. If she was deterred at all by Patty’s new state, she didn’t show it. “Look, it’s going to be alright. I just need to get a blood sample so we can find a way to return you to your normal state and figure out how this works.”

Patty hesitated, but something in Caitlin’s earnest expression must’ve broken down her defenses because she sighed and shoved one of her endless arms toward Caitlin. “Please. They’re a lot heavier than they look.”

Iris turned to Cisco and Wally. She made sure to lower her voice, keeping an eye on Caitlin and Patty. “What do you mean by ‘dark matter’? If she were hit by the Accelerator, we would’ve known.”

“Not the Accelerator,” Wally said with a shake of his head, crossing his arms over his chest. “The bus metas.”

Iris’s heart sank. The guilt over creating those metahumans after she’d been freed from the Speed Force had never quite gone away, despite the fact that she knew it wasn’t her fault. She couldn’t have known what would’ve happened.

Her brother’s expression started to soften, likely sensing where her thoughts were going, and Iris forced herself to stand a little straighter, clearing her throat. “She was on that bus, then?”

“She admitted it when Dad and I went to see her.”

“Went to see her?”

“Apparently she never left Central City,” Cisco said, raising an eyebrow meaningfully. “Works as a P.I. downtown now, I guess.”

At least Patty was still working toward what she loved. “And she didn’t know about her powers until now?”

“Some guys were trying to attack her while we were leaving.” Wally grimaced at the memory. “She, uh, stretched her way down the side of a building to safety. Which - impressive. But also a little disturbing at the time.”

“Tell me about it. A little head’s up next time I wander down the hall would be nice.” Iris bit her lip and leaned closer. “Speaking of head’s up, did… Wally, did you guys tell Barry about Patty?”

Wally frowned. “No. Why?”

Cisco winced and muttered something in Spanish under his breath. “Shit, didn’t even think of that. Should I - ?”

“Sooner rather than later, yeah,” Iris agreed. “Is he on his way?”

“I called him a few minutes ago, he said he was already driving here so…”

“Right. You and Wally go, Cait and I can handle Patty.”

“You sure?” Cisco asked. “Because she’s a little more…cranky. Than she used to be.”

“I’ll be fine,” Iris assured him. “We got along well enough years ago, and we have a lot in common. Besides, don’t you have your girlfriend’s dad to see to?”

Cisco groaned and Wally ducked his head to hide a small laugh. “Why did you have to remind me of that? Why?”

“I’ll drop him off and warn Barry,” her brother promised, his mouth quirking up at the corners before he disappeared in a whirl of yellow lightning along with a grumpy Cisco.

A gasp behind her drew Iris’s attention back to Patty, whose mouth was slightly agape, staring after where half of their team had once stood. Caitlin shot her an unreadable look, the syringe of blood in hand as she moved to deposit it on her work table.

“Uh, hey, Patty, about - ”

“He’s the Flash,” Patty said, something close to but not quite awe coloring her voice. Her brow furrowed the longer she stared at the empty space. “That was your brother, right? We met at the Christmas party - he’s the Flash?”

Well. No wonder they had problems with keeping secret identities secret. “Yeah. Wally’s the Flash.”

“Then you’re…” The former cop tried to move onto her elbows, forgetting herself for a moment, but her elbows were halfway out the door. “No wonder Momentum looked so similar to him, you’re siblings!”

Iris couldn’t help but laugh. “I got my powers after Wally did. Like, years after, actually. Is it that obvious that we’re…?”

“Pretty obvious. I mean, your suits are similar and you don’t see many speedsters running around these days. Those masks are kind of flimsy.”

Caitlin made a quiet noise, her lips pursed as she fought back a laugh of her own. Iris couldn’t bring herself to glare at her friend, even jokingly, because…well, she had a point. Maybe they ought to talk to Cisco about that. Even Barry’s only defense against the public was a thin blue mask over his eyes.

“So much for hiding, then.” Iris walked over and sat in the chair next to Patty’s bed. “You don’t look too surprised, though.”

Patty rolled her eyes, any humor dissipating from her face, and Iris thought she understood what Cisco meant by cranky when her green eyes met Iris’s, steely and hard. “Please. I didn’t expect it, no, but I did date a superhero for a while. Would have to be pretty stupid not to guess that his team-ups with Flash and Momentum had to come from friends rather than acquaintances.”

Right. That answered Iris’s next question about Barry, she supposed.

“Well, you’re a lot smarter than most of the city,” Caitlin teased weakly.

“It’s not that. Just…” Patty exhaled deep through her nose. “You see what you want to see sometimes. If most people don’t know, it’s not that they’re stupid but that they don’t want to believe that a CSI could be one of Central City’s heroes.”

“They want to remain blind,” Iris said, sympathy churning in her gut. “Seems better to romanticize them, right?”

Patty’s mouth twitched. “Something like that.”

Caitlin’s phone buzzed on the table, inciting her to pull off her gloves to answer it. Patty turned her head away from Iris, her expression shuttering, and Iris thought back to having coffee with the woman in Jitters, laughing over Barry and explaining carefully how he’d always been bad on letting people in - he can be cold, she’d said, a half-joke that Patty wouldn’t have recognized at the time, she’d thought she was so clever. A guilty part of her wondered if it’d been Barry or something else that drove Patty to leave the CCPD, venture out on her own.

“Linda’s on her way up,” Caitlin announced, typing a quick reply. “Apparently she ran into Barry, Wally and Joe in the hall.”

“Great.” Iris watched Patty tense, though whether it was the mention of her ex or her old partner that did it was beyond her. She squeezed the higher portion of Patty’s arm, grabbing her attention. “Do you want me to stall them? Or have Linda - ?”

“No!” Patty seemed startled by her own outburst, the surprise fading quickly into exasperation. “No, that’s… It’s been years, it’s fine. I just… It’s been a while. This isn’t exactly how I ever pictured, not that I did…well, seeing him again.”

“We’re going to help you with the elasticity,” Caitlin affirmed. The smile she gave Patty was genuine this time. “Powers just take a bit of getting used to.”

“Are you…?”

Caitlin shook her head and laughed. “No, I’m normal. Not a metahuman, I mean. Me and Joe are the only ones who are. And Cecile.”

“We’re one big dysfunctional family,” Iris joked to see Patty’s features lighten, even a smidge. “You’ll fit right in, don’t worry.”

For the first time, Patty let out a snort, loud and unabashedly amused. “A family, huh?”

“We’ve been through…a lot,” Iris admitted. “Started with Barry, then the rest of us got powers one-by-one through various means, and then we gained Linda. We know what we’re doing.”

Patty studied her for a moment, and Iris could hear footsteps approaching the Cortex, quick and light, probably Linda hurrying to arrive before Barry and the boys. She always was better at mediating conflict than Iris. The bags under Patty’s eyes seemed softer the more Iris stared back, somehow fading as the P.I. relaxed with a shake of her head.

“If I’m getting a superhero name, it better not be anything like Play-Doh Girl or Silly Putty. Ooh, wait! Can I come up with my own name?”

Iris patted Patty’s arm and exchanged a look with Caitlin, who moved to the door, ready to intercept Linda. “Cisco usually comes up with the names around here, but something tells me he’ll make an exception. Anything would be better than Silly Putty.”

“Silly Patty, more like it,” Patty grumbled through another laugh, but Iris could already see that familiar excitement lighting up her eyes, that determined spark she remembered returning in tenfold, and she didn’t need to be able to time travel to guess that the newest addition to their team was going to be just fine.

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