#well. that and she was an idiot who lied on my medical paperwork about things I'd said in our meeting.

[neverendingford]

.

[zambie-trashart]

Caught in My Chest 2/2

Marinette looked around her classroom taking her seat in the back and no one even gave her a second glance except Adrien.

"Marinette, since you missed so much class I can help you after school today if you feel up for it," Lila said sweetly before fake wincing. "Or maybe not my port has been acting up lately," Lila said crocodile tears coming to her eyes.

"Port?" Marinette asked and Alya glared at her from the front of the classroom. "Wouldn't that mean you have..." Marinette started holding her right arm where her piccline was.

"Go on Marinette ask her!" Alya yelled holding Lila close.

"But that's, I just..." Marinette started. "I was just discharged from the hospital with Hodgkin's Lymphoma," Marinette finally said and all faces turned toward her.

Never before had Marinette seen the class so mad at her all because of a lie. How Lila had gotten a hold of this information was unexplainable but the fact that she would turn it around was unspeakable. "I can't believe you would say you have cancer just to try and show up Lila Marinette! You know she was recently diagnosed!" Marinette's breath was caught in her chest and she felt like she could never breathe again. Adrien stood up red faced and shaking.

"You're all idiots! Lila has been playing you since day one and the only reason why I haven't said anything is because I didn't have any proof," Adrien said and Marinette looked at her former crush in shock. "If any of you even bothered to do some research you'd know what a monster she is." Lila looked at Adrien angrily.

"What do you mean proof?" Lila asked trying to keep up her hurt persona.

"Medical records," Adrien said slapping them down on the table. "Also the fact that Marinette here has been in a healthy relationship with Damian Wayne for almost a year now and the fact that he is paying for her treatment and housing her after you turned her parents against her is another factor." Lila's face started to turn red.

"You have no right to go through my documents," Lila said picking up the files.

"I mean if there were any there, your bill of health has been clean for years Lila, Marinette's on the other hand not so much," Adrien said. "That's all I needed to say, we can wait and do more have later when Damian gets here but I can't say he'll be as nice about it. Marinette is the only family I have left and I'm not going to let you drag her through the grass anymore," Adrien added going to sit in the back of the classroom next to his friend.

"You didn't have to do that," Marinette said leaning on his shoulder. "But I appreciate it kitten," Marinette said winking and Adrien knew he was busted.

"I'll always be here for you M'lady," Adrien said and class started without delay.

Lunch rolled around and everyone was conflicted, Lila had lied to them about a deadly illness about so much, and Marinette, who they treated like garbage, was the one who was really sick. A large sigh could be heard from the door and two boys with black hair stood in the doorway one pushed sunglasses to the top of his head smiling and the other's face was stone cold.

"Alright, students of Francois Dupont, my name is Dick Grayson and today we're going to be talking about some certain behaviors of slander toward our name," Dick started and the whole lunchroom froze. "Recently we have heard from a patient of our program to help cancer patients around the world that there has been some issues, we are here to clear that up." Students suddenly noticed that he was reading from a screen on his wrist. "I sound like a robot," Dick whispered to Damian who rolled his eyes.

"Furthermore, patient 13078, Marinette Dupain-Cheng of the Wayne Foundation clinic was taken under our care at time 4:37 on March 30, 2021, she was diagnosed with Hodgkin's Lymphoma and moved to urgent care on April 2, 2021, after a biopsy on the first of April, 180 days of treatment are being provided and paid for in full. Lila Rossi who is not a patient of the Wayne foundation clinic has been seen harassing the patient which can cause stress levels to increase and therefore panic attacks which lead to trouble breathing and a shutting down of her lungs or windpipe in general if Miss. Rossi does not comply with our orders or removal from the school and distance from Miss. Dupain-Cheng, then we will be forced to take more forceful action..." Dick continued.

"Is this really necessary? Just stop messing with my girlfriend and apologize you assholes," Damian said and Dick sighed putting his arm down.

"Marinette, we know that things will never be the same but we're here to fight this with you," Alya said and Marinette felt tears well up in her eyes. Even if these people had been nothing but cruel to her she still wanted their support.

"We'll help you in any way we can dudette," Nino said wrapping an arm around her shoulder.

"That really means a lot guys but I need time to get over this with people who are truly going to be at my side, I'll appreciate everything you do though," Marinette said getting up and walking over to Damian with Adrien following close behind.

"You did what you thought was right beloved," Damian said and Marinette just smiled sadly. Damian looked over her head at Adrien who stared right back. "I think I know someone who might be able to make us all feel a little happier during this time, I'll see what I can do," Damian said leaving the superhero duo together to call a friend who could certainly bring the sunshine into Marinette's life again.

"A lot is about to change kitty," Marinette said holding the blond's hand watching Damian talk on the phone.

"180 days of fun M'lady," Adrien responded and suddenly a boy landed next to Damian and ran over to Marinette.

"Ready to kick some ass future Mrs. Wayne?" the boy asked and Marinette just chuckled blushing. She could already feel the weight being lifted off her shoulders.

The first few weeks were hard, she had to work to stay awake and study, keeping up with others was becoming a challenge.

The second month was painful but then again there was poison in her body constantly being flushed in and out.

The third month, radiation started, she was scared but she knew it had to be done.

Month four, she was almost done they said maybe even healed soon.

Once they had the caner isolated, she just had to have that laser there and then, hopefully, it would all be over.

Marinette had 180 days of meeting Damian's self-proclaimed best friend Jon by her side being whatever he needed her to be, she had the best partner she could ask for who was there to talk to her whenever she was scared, and she had Damian, her rock in the ocean.

When Marinette went into the doctors office and read off her paperwork, tears flooded her eyes as she bit her lip trying to contain her smile.

She was cured. Sixteen years old and she fought cancer and won.

She walked into school looking at the anxious faces of her peers.

"I've wanted to tell you something that I've known since the beginning of treatment, I'm moving to America after this was over, there's something about being here that makes me feel tied down. I did it, I fought and won a war far bigger than myself but somehow there's still something that I feel like I need to do or say, like there's something caught in my chest," Marinette said smiling sadly. "Lila never said anything, and that's what stings the most but I know I leave you guys as better people and you'll never make the same mistakes again, I want you to know I forgive you, every one of you." Marinette looked over her classmates one last time eyeing their expressions of tear-filled faces. "I have a flight to catch, bug out," Marinette said taking Damian's hand and walking past Jon and Adrien at the door and out of the school.

For the first time in a long time, Marinette felt her heart flutter as she took a deep breath and got on the plane.

a/n: This was such a hard story to write for me and I'm so happy to anyone who is reading and hope you enjoyed this experience. It has actual factual information in it and maybe you might have even learned something which would be cool huh? I hope to end up like Marinette in the next 163 days. thank you for reading

-Zambie

Taglist is closed due to story being complete: @hateswifi  @crystalangelluna @liquid-luck-00 @thatonecroc @ive-tumbled-down-a-rabbit-hole @professionalfangirl1738 @mochegato @wannajointhecrabcult @ranger-gothamite @moonspiritwolf1 @mochinek0 @toodaloo-kangaroo @ash-amg @enchanted-nerd @mewwitch @zorua-adorable @jumpingjoy82 @coolspidermanmusicflower @yazz-frost  @bugsy05 @rhetoric-question-mark  @myazael @rosep16 @elmokingkong @kking13 @heaven428 @vixen-uchiha @arcticfox487 @toodaloo-kangaroo @battybatbat 

[lunaastoir]

Heyhey! May I request a childe x reader where the reader simps for him but he doesn’t know? Like what if she was online best friends with the tsaritsa but the reader doesn’t know the tsaritsa is the tsaritsa so she constantly simps for childe to her. Like “OMG HE’S SO CUTE.” AND STUFF LIKE THAT. So since she’s like besties with the tsaritsa the cry archon decides to set her up? Thank you :>>>>

AAAAA NONNIE holds your hands gently this is so cute i love it :,) 

genshin doesn’t have internet/technology but for the sake of this ask shhhhhh we’re gonna pretend they do

i hope i interpreted your ask correctly, if i didn’t just lmk <3 

crack, fluFF- LOTS OF IT???

the tsaritsa’s meddling

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all you wanted were groceries. that was all you wanted. you were standing in line behind the stall as you counted the items you needed to get. salt, milk, sugar, fowl, what else? you were lost in thought as you prayed that you had enough mora to buy everything - god knows how hard eating is as an adventurer. which was why, when you dropped your precious mora, your mind immediately went into panic mode. not now, not now, please don’t let the line move, you begged internally. in hindsight maybe if your mora hadn’t dropped, maybe if you weren’t at your wits end as a broke adventurer, maybe if you had just bought those damn ingredients sooner, you wouldn’t be in this position. as you breathed a sigh of relief after collecting your money and returned your gaze back to the stall, the only thing you could do was stare. where...did everyone go? instead of simply turning around and fleeing which should’ve been your first instinct considering how deserted the place was, you stood there trying to process the information. that was, until you saw a head of auburn hair peak up out of the stall. startled, you almost dropped your mora again. as the tuft of hair gave way to a very tall, handsome, blue eyed man, your brain short circuited. 

oh god how you wished you had run when you had the chance. you imagined you must have looked quite comical; mouth hanging slightly open, the list of ingredients fisted in your hands while mora was hanging precariously from your fingers. after what seemed like an eternity, the man seemed to finally notice you. 

“oh hey, you must not have noticed but this stall is sold out for the fatui” 

the sentence accompanied with his signature smile practically brought you to your knees. that smile? aimed at you? you would be surprised if you weren’t drooling. 

determined to not look like an absolute idiot you flashed him a smile of your own before saying, “sorry my bad, i must not have been paying attention” while doing what little you can to get some semblance of balance. tuck the mora here, try to balance your list more gracefully, move that piece of hair from your face. 

his eyes surveyed your undoubtedly disheveled appearance, before making a quick decision. 

“what items do you want, i’m sure i can spare a few ingredients for someone as pretty as you” 

one blink. another blink. did he just call you pretty? oh my- 

“oh no, it’s really ok, i can just get these later - it’s not that important anyway” you lied through your teeth. you needed those ingredients or you were most likely going to starve on the road but he didn’t need to know that. 

“don’t worry about it, as a harbinger i’m sure my subordinates can overlook a few missing ingredients” he smoothly said before gesturing you towards him. 

“i’m childe by the way, if you didn’t know” his eyes flicked up to meet yours.

“y/n” you offered while handing him the list. 

as he looked over what you needed, you tried your best to keep your breathing steady while your mind raced. if you didn’t know? of course you knew who he was, who didn’t? you would know better than most considering how often you thirsted about him to your mutual. if anything, you should’ve been the one saying that line to him. as an adventurer, you tend to not spend much time in liyue harbor, chasing down ruin guards and running errands was how you would rather keep yourself busy. however, ever since you saw childe in liyue, sharing a pot of tea with zhongli of all people, you started swinging by the harbor more often. fascination was what kept you seeking him out wherever you went. you had heard about the infamous eleventh harbinger, supposedly the youngest of them, all while being quite easy on the eyes. you had brushed off all the talk you had heard to just that - talk. international affairs wasn’t something you cared for and if anything, seeing the fatui made you wary. however, your curiosity grew after seeing him whenever you were in town. you chalked up your eyes subconsciously seeking out his figure to the fact that he was just an interesting guy. nothing wrong with wondering about a peculiar fellow, right?  you went through excuses upon excuses until finally, you had concluded that perhaps, maybe, you had a little crush on him. tiny, you assured yourself. just a tiny crush on a very attractive man. 

that crush then trickled over to your time spent talking to your mutual. it started off with little hints of “oh there’s this guy i saw and i thought he was kinda cute” to full blown hysteria of “PLS SEND HELP HE LOOKED SO GOOD TODAY.” @cryogoddess definitely had a lot of patience putting up with your thirsts over a man she didn’t even have the name of. you felt horrible sometimes since more than half of your conversation was about the newest detail you had noticed about childe - however your protests on boring her were met with reassurances about how no, you weren’t boring her, and yes, this is the most lighthearted talk she’s had her entire day so please keep going. you weren’t exactly sure what this woman did, or even how old she was. all you knew was she was someone who was constantly stressed (maybe a fellow adventurer?) and she was quite honest (which you happened to appreciate). despite how busy she was, she seemed to always make time for your texts which made you feel like you could trust her with anything.

“is that all? do you need anything else?” childe’s voice interrupted your mental tirade as you owlishly looked at him. 

“oh! yes that’s fine thank you” you smiled before taking the bag from him. grabbing the mora, you rushed to hand out the correct amount before he stopped you. 

“don’t worry about it, it’s on the house” he laughed slightly before waving your mora away. 

it’s on the- excuse me? did he just give you all this for free? is this what fatui hospitality is like?  

rushing to close your mouth, you quickly recovered while slurring out a quick “thank you so much” before shouldering your bag. your brain was currently running on fumes and you were very sure that if you stayed there any longer you might just combust. 

“well, i’ll be off then, thank you again” you shot him another smile before quickly scurrying away. 

without turning back to look at his expression, you moved as fast as humanly possible while trying not to seem like you were about to jump out of your skin. you didn’t know what was more embarrassing, your thumping heart or the dopey smile on your face. there was no way you were ever going to get over this, not with the way he looked at you the entire time. sighing, you put your bag down near a bench and pulled out your phone. at least you had an update for your friend that consisted of something other than just mindless thirsts. 

your mind was still reeling over from what happened as you texted her with shaking hands. the reply was immediate: “wow, you finally got up the courage to talk to him huh.” you rolled your eyes playfully at her blunt message. “bY ACCIDENT- IT HAPPENED BY ACCIDENT,,, guess he couldn’t keep himself away from this sexiness 😩” another blunt reply: “right.” smiling softly, you responded: “thanks for hyping me up bestie i really appreciate it <3 ok but maybe childe and i belong together??? is this a sign from the archons???” you stared waiting for her reply, however you were met with a read 8:45 pm. you’re lucky i love you bestie, leaving me on read during my crisis you whispered to yourself as you shouldered your bag once again to head home. at least you won’t be starving tomorrow on your commissions. 

as soon as you entered your house, your phone lit up. “wait. as in childe, eleventh of the fatui harbingers, also known as tartaglia, feared by many on the battle field, currently stationed in liyue, major pain in the ass, and is currently ignoring some of his paperwork???” - @cryogoddess. your eyebrows furrowed as you read her message, “yes that’s him but why do you sound so freaked out and how do you know sm abt him?” another notification: “i can’t believe you’ve been thirsting to me abt CHILDE.” you: “KDJKSFJ YOU DIDNT ANSWER MY QUESTION - also??? i thought i told you his name did i not??? 😀” her: “no??? wow this definitely is...interesting” you: “BESTIE ANSWER MY QUESTION DO YOU KNOW HIM???” her: “i’ve gotta go, work is calling.” 

you sighed in frustration as you tossed your phone on your bed. why was she so freaked out? you weren’t dumb, you knew there was something she wasn’t telling you but you trusted her enough to know she’ll let you know if it was important. you wondered as you pulled the covers over your head, if you’ll meet childe in your dreams and if you do, hopefully, in a less embarrassing scenario. 

the next morning, you awoke to a barrage of texts from none other than @cryogoddess. they were all along the lines of you should go to bubu pharmacy and stock up on medication this evening (i heard they’re having a sale). you responded back with a maybe, if you had time today after your commissions and if xiangling didn’t stop by with some food. however, your mutual made you promise you would visit in the evening, even if it’s just for a few minutes. you gave in because a) you never could say no and b) she made it sound like it was urgent so maybe she was obsessed with medicine? hmmm you would have to figure out where she lived so you could send some to her. 

you walked toward bubu pharmacy while tiredly sheathing your weapon, loosely taking in your surroundings. kids playing near the pond, teenagers chatting at the steps, adults keeping a watchful eye over their kids while laughing about the day’s events. your eyes studied the sign outside of bubu pharmacy. sale? what sale? there doesn’t seem to be anything regarding a sale?

“y/n?” a mildly familiar voice called your name. you whipped around looking for whoever uttered those words before your eyes fell on none other than one blue eyed harbinger. he was holding a few silk flowers in his hand as he stared at you with a sheepish smile. 

“hi” you stuttered out. your mind was blank, what was happening? 

“oh sorry, these are for you. i don’t mean to make you uncomfortable but i heard that you might be interested in me? you caught my eye at the stall yesterday, so i was wondering if you would want to grab lunch from the third-round knockout and then go watch the sunset at mt. tianheng? there’s this really cool trick i can do with my hydro vision where i can make the sunlight dance across the waypoint.” 

you stared at him as you wordlessly took the silk flowers from his hands. the golden light of the setting sun cast his face in a beautiful sheen, softly showing off the gentle blush on his cheeks and the brilliant blue of his eyes. his auburn hair seemed to grow alive at the touch of the fiery light and all you could do was stare. 

childe’s confidence seemed to wane with every passing second that you gazed at him, open mouthed, so he decided to save himself the embarrassment before hesitantly opening his own mouth. 

“yes, i would love to” you quickly said. you smiled gently up at him. 

“i would love to watch the sunset with you” 

you felt your cheeks burning up as you looked at him with soft eyes. when he returned your expression with a dazzling smile of your own, you could feel yourself relax. yes, your heart rate was off the chart right now, but you were content. the sunset, childe, and the silk flowers was something you never knew you needed, but were glad you got. you had enough time later to worry about the oncoming mortification of how he found out you liked him. 

a single notification appeared in your phone as the two of you walked laughing towards the mountain. 

“you’re welcome <3″

BONUS: 

“i know i’m too sexy for you to not fall in love with me” childe sighed dramatically as he leaned against you for support as the two of you went up the stairs. 

you promptly rolled your eyes and pushed him down the steps as you walked ahead with his protests falling on deaf ears. 

[vagrantblvrd]

I would love anything Turnfreewood!

Lol, I was sorting my music collection when I had the perfect idea for your prompt, friend!

Vaguely noir-ish AU inspired by some songs from the game Contrast?

Private detective Ryan who used to be a cop before he left the police force.

Something, something, something shady business going on with corrupt cops and the like and idealistic idiot that he was he tried to expose it? But the baddies found out what he was doing and went after his partner, got them killed.

And Ryan, he’s not overly idealistic or anything, but he’s young, right. Got a real good look at how high the corrutption he was trying to expose went. How far-reaching, and in case he hadn’t realized that for himself he gets some visitors not long afterward.

Nice. Friendly. Letting him know if he kept pushing things his family might meet with some trouble of their own. (Ryan can’t be everywhere, you know? Can’t be on guard 24/7 to look out for the people closest to him - RIP his partner, btw - and so on.

The usual.

So Ryan.

He hates it, but they have a point, don’t they.

He’s just this little idiot in over his head and tells his family and friends some story about being forced to face his mortality while he was bleeding out in that alley with his partner. Waiting for backup that got there too late to do his partner any good, almost too late to save him and he lost the taste for being a cop.

Quits the force and leaves town (runs away) and kicks around for a little bit, gets all bitter and cynical and such and has these ~adventures that land him in, idk. Achievement City or Los Santos or somewhere.

(This feeling in the back of his head that things aren’t over, and he’ll have to face up to it sooner or later but that’s a future problem and why not try to forget about it for now?)

The kind of adventures where someone jokes he should become a private investigator because he’s more or less been solving crimes/cases in those adventures of his?

Supposed to be a joke, but it’s not like Ryan’s got anything else going on in his life at the moment, so private investigator it is!

Leases a little office somewhere and somehow manages to pull in enough business to pay the bills and tuck some away towards his savings. (Has to dip into said savings every so often for repairs/medical bills/whatever caused by cases and all that.)

And then one day someone walks into his office with a case. Something to do with a dead relative and a missing will. Or maybe it’s someone being blakmailed and someone mentioned Ryan as being both reliable and discreet and all that good stuff. (That, Ryan suspects, or no one would miss him/be all that bothered/surprised he got in over his head on one of his cases.)

Whichever it is, he’s in enough trouble financial-wise the money he’s being offered is too good to pass up, or worse? The client mentions the name of someone Ryan owes big-time who sent the client his direction with the expectation Ryan would know better than to say no.

SO.

Ryan takes the case and does all this Private Investigating.

Goes to his usual contacts and snitches around the city. Trustworthy and reliable ones and ones he can trust to look out for their own best interests and bribe/threaten them for what information he can get out of them. (And then figure out what’s true and bold-faced lies and working from there.)

Gets followed by Suspicious Sorts. Offered money to drop the case and send his client looking elsewhere for help and all that.

Gets into a back alley scuffle where he doesn’t quite come out on top but doesn’t leave with his tail between his legs either.

Goes to ground for a bit while he puzzles over what he knows, maybe goes to see his buddy in the police department here, and boy is Geoff ever not thrilled to see him.

“Seems like the only time I see you around is when you need something, Haywood,”

And Ryan being all scruffy and charming at him until Geoff sighs and tells him to go find Jack who will be able to give him what they’re allowed to without crossing any lines with ethics and the whatnot.

Jack is just as not-thrilled to see Ryan - goes all “What’s with the black eye?” the same way Geoff did and sighs as he hands over the files Ryan asks for. Tells him he’s an idiot and that Geoff and Jack didn’t see him, haven’t seen him in weeks. (And for fuck’s sake, don’t get killed idiot. the paperwork’s a bitch.)

Ryan all lol as he takes the files home with him and goes over them there. Just as confused about what the hell he’s gotten himself into this time, but!

There’s this one clue that has him sighing because he knows someone who knows someone who might - might - help.

Just has to do a little begging first.

SO.

He goes down to this little bar Meg runs with live singers and performers and all that? Trevor at the piano who flirts outrageously with Alfredo who’s one of the bouncers along with Jeremy.

Lindsay’s there doing whatever it is Lindsay feels like most days as far as Ryan can figure out? Michael’s a bartender/bouncer/whatever along with Fiona, and every once in a while one or both of them end up on stage because reasons?

All that.

Meg performs a few times a week, sings and dances or whatever else and sometimes Ryan heads there when he’s not working on a case because it’s one of the few places in town he’s actually welcome with open arms and all that.

Mariel handles most of the business side of things and Tyler is in charge of security and the like? (Something???)

Anyway.

Odds are good there are more things going on there than what the public sees - Meg and the others know way too much about what goes on in the city to explain otherwise - but Ryan’s never asked, (Learned better than that a long time ago.)

The first time he goes there during his current case Meg’s rehearsing on stage.

Middle of the afternoon and the place is closed to customers, but Ryan’s got a standing invitation to come by anytime he feels like it and everything. Good friends with Meg and the main players there and on good terms with everyone else.

Ryan walks in just as Meg starts singing this song, smiles when she looks over and catches his eye because they’ve got this Complicated relationship going on, you know?

On and off again and no hurt feelings (well, anymore, but all the grief she gives him is definitely deserved, okay.)

When she finishes the song she shoos everyone else working to deal with bar business and whatnot and takes Ryan over to a corner booth to talk business because he’s got the look he gets when he’s on a case.

When he fills her in on what he’s been up to the last few days she just. Gives him this look because fucking Christ, Ryan’s an idiot?

Getting all tangled up in Serious Business and such and oh, honey. That black eye looks awful.

Some flirting and concern and Meg despairing of Ryan and his life choices before she gives in and tells him what she can, promises to ask around for him, and oh, hey.

Maybe go see Gavin and what he can dig up for Ryan?

Which.

Yikes, because Gavin is part of this Complicated relationship Ryan has with Meg?

Part of this on again off again relationship the three of them ever quite manage to make work - timing’s always off and all that - but the times it does work are pretty great?

Just.

He’s good with Meg at the moment, but Gavin’s still kind ticked at him?

Something, something, something Ryan on a case and getting Gavin involved and the kind of shenanigans that almost got Gavin killed? Unpleasant reminder Ryan’s not infallible, that he got his old partner killed and oh, God, because he clearly didn’t learn his lesson if he’s putting Gavin - ad Meg - in the line of fire?

So he does what he thinks he has to to drive Gavin away and leaves things between them on a bad note. Meg saw what he was doing and stopped Ryan before he could try it with her too, but she warned him he was making a mistake and that he better apologize to Gavin make it up to Gavin or Ryan would regret it?

So of course he doesn’t, and Meg is just. Not angry, just disappointed and while Gavin figured out why Ryan did what he did, he’s not forgiven him for it. (Yet.)

ANYWAY.

Complicated because Ryan’s an idiot and Meg and Gavin are definitely aware of that fact, yes, Waiting for Ryan to get his shit together and figure out what he wants.

(In the meantime they’re..not-quite in a relationship? Like. Showing up as one another’s plus one at functions and seeing movies or going out to dinner together and such but aren’t Officially Dating, because waiting on their idiot and all.)

Ryan goes off to see Gavin who’s like. Freelance photographer or hacker or something, and they argue and bicker. Are about to move on to bantering, like maybe they’re ready to start dealing with their idiot issues when the guys who have been trying to intimidate Ryan into dropping his case make a move.

The whole fight in a dark alley/street and running from the baddies to end up back at Meg’s bar after closing time.

She’s just.

SIGH at these idiots and sits them down at that back corner booth to path themselves up/talk and goes to give them privacy as she deals with…other stuff? IDK.

Ryan and Gavin are patching one another up and don’t realize Meg’s finished up in her office and is playing a song over at the piano as tjhey talk and Ryan apologizes to Gavin.

But when they do, they look over and Meg’s got this little grin on her face because ridiculous and then like.

Smooches, probably?

More shenanigans that involve at least one (1) gunfight and a kidnapping or two (Gavin, of course and he’s super not thrilled at always being the damsel in distress, but Meg thinks it’s hilarious.)

A car chase and/or cat and mouse scene in an abandoned warehouse and Ryan solving his case to the relief/delight of his client and Ryan being like Jesus Christ, why does he keep doing this to himself? because he’s all bruised and battered and his car is probably a complete loss as far as the insurance company is concerned.

In the end he breaks even financially, but he’s made up with Gavin and has a date that Friday night with him and Meg and hey, things could have gone worse???

(That whole bit about his Tragic Backstory RE his former career as a cop definitely comes back to bite him in the ass in a future adventure, too. Wacky, zany adventures with many life-threatening moments and close calls with Meg and Gavin and good guys putting the bad guys in their places and more smooches before the credits roll. Or…something, yes.)

[lapisreviewsstuff]

Weekly prompt #3 | Ethan Ramsey x MC( Geli Melun)

Author’s note: Hey all. I just finished writing another prompt and hope you guys would love it. Further ado, let’s get into angsty fic

Warning: Angst, mentioning of death, bad writing as always

Words: 1600+

Sentence: The moment he realises that he lied to his love of life

Tags: @lilyofchoices @zyralovesethan @sibella-plays-choices @isabella-choices @buzz-bee-buzz @universallypizzataco who wants to be tagged or removed, let me know. I may have forgotten some people, but I will make a tag list in my notes.

Most of the elders say that painful truth is always better than sweet lie, but this saying doesn’t apply that much to infamous diagnostician Ethan Ramsey. He is known for honesty when it comes to reporting sad news to patient’s loved ones or family. He thought that he never lied to Naveen, but he lied about many things including his relationship with his Rookie Geli Melun. He was sitting in the office, drinking cup of coffee and reading a news article about how Stephen Hawking died and how the world reacts to those heart-breaking news. Edward Jenner wasn’t the only idol Ethan grew to respect, but he respected Stephen Hawking as well. One of quotes from Stephen Hawking had an effect on Ethan during his med school years: “ Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change”. Following this quote, he became a famous Diagnostician in the country and an idol to many medical students including to his love of his life- Geli Melun. He stopped reading an article for a minute, tears dropping from his eyes. He finished drinking his cup of coffee and rushed out of his office to supply closet to cry. Geli walked towards Dr. Ramsey’s office to consult with him about one patient, but once she knocked a door many times, no one responded. She opened a door and peaked her head in. Apparently no one was in the room, no presence of Dr. Ramsey. She closed the door and went to hunt Dr. Ramsey down. She checked every floor, every room in the hospital, but no sight of him. Suddenly a feeling of Deja vu overwhelmed her. Feeling threw her back to her first day of internship and how she almost killed a woman, and how she cried in the supply closet. Figuring his location out, she rushed to the supply closet to see him. Once she reached the supply closet’s doors, she heard sobs and sounds of agony. Geli calmly opened the door and slowly closed it and took slow, quiet steps towards broken Ethan. She kneeled besides him, looked at him. Ethan didn’t reacted to a person coming in.

“ Whoever is this, leave me alone.” His voice was quiet and he was shaking up. Geli putted her hand on his back, gently stroking it.

“ Why are you crying?” Her voice was a barely a whisper, full of worry. Ethan got up and pushed her hand away, glaring at her.

“ Dr. Melun, I said go away. Don’t you ever listen?” She stood up and crossed her arms.

“ Didn’t I came here to study and practice medicine? I came here to learn from legend itself Dr. Ethan Ramsey. But instead I see that legend crying for no reason and trying to act like he is powerful and all, so just spill it.” Ethan shook his head, pinching the area between his eyes.

“ I am grieving because of my failure of teaching you! You broke my goddamn walls. So stop looking at me like I am sort of God who can save everyone. Just, please, leave me alone.” He leaned into a wall and looked up in the dark sealing. Geli, feeling pushed away and hurt, rushed out of supply closet, trying to contain her tears. He was leaning into a wall for hours, realising that he lied to his love of his life. Naveen came into supply closet, finding broken and hurt attending. He gently closed the door and approached him, taking him into his arms. He pulled Naveen closer, sobbing into his lab coat.

“ What’s saddening you, Ethan boy?” Ethan sobbed at his shoulder for a while before responding.

“ My idol, Stephen Hawking, have died today and... I hurt my Geli.” Emphasis of ‘my’ made Naveen grin a bit, knowing that he was right all along that Ethan was in love with a resident. He softly patted his back.

“ No one is immortal, Ethan. We will die any day, but we have time to make beautiful moments on this world. About Geli... she came to my office, hurt, but I comforted her. She is okay, but not really okay so you own her an apology. Apologise to her, make sure you are apologising from your heart.” Ethan lifted his head up, looking at the old man.

“ I don’t think she will ever forgive me for hurting her. I’ve hurt her many times already. Now, I feel like a fool lying to her and pushing her away.” Naveen laughed a bit. Ethan was confused and raised an eyebrow at Naveen.

“ Sometimes I think you are an idiot, Ethan boy. Just apologise to her and move on. You two deserve happiness and what’s more, drop your professionalism aside when it comes to her. So go now and apologise or give her time to recover.” Naveen patted his back and left the supply closet. Ethan looked at the sealing, million things in his mind. After minutes of silence, he left the supply closet with a plan in his mind, wait and corner her when it's perfect time.

------------

Two weeks passed away since he talked to Geli about that incident. She was avoiding him at many costs, but failing due to he being her boss. When he tried to talk to her, most of talks were related to work, but when he tried to apologise, she brushed him away. Ethan was hiding behind corners, watching her from afar, still bewitched by her beauty and voice. She tried to hide her sadness by singing while everyone stopped at their tracks, adoring her. One day, Geli was at the Nurse’s station filling paperwork and talking to Bryce.

“ So how is your day, beautiful?” Geli grinned at him, not noticing Ethan standing at the entrance of Nurse’s station, earscopping. Seeing Bryce hitting on Geli made his veins boil out of jealousy. Instead watching two, he forced himself to look at charts of one patient. Hearing Geli giggling, broke his heart. The only reason she was laughing and giggling was because of Bryce not him which made Ethan upset with himself. He hoped that she would remember her time with him, having his heart in her hands, instead painful words and costant pushing her away.

“ Eh it was regular day for junior diagnostician. Diagnosing patients, singing until sadness goes away and avoiding Dr. Ramsey. How’s yours?”

“ I did a solo surgery and nailed it. Dr. Emery was proud of me so Win-Win. Scored another solo surgery and saved a patient. By the way, why are you avoiding Dr. Ramsey? Did he hurt you?” Geli tried to contain her tears from falling. She made a small smile and nodded.

“ Yes. That McAss hurt me badly. I tried to comfort him while he was crying, but instead he pushed me away. Later on I ran to Dr. Banerji’s office for a comfort. I don’t get his brains sometimes.” Bryce reached for Geli and hugged her.

“ Many surgical interns said that Dr. Ramsey became more grumpier and aggressive towards others. He has been like that for two weeks now. I once bumped into him and he threatened to take my career away. He doesn’t listen to everyone expect... you. You can make him less grumpy and aggressive. ” Geli sighed, shaking her head.

“ I don’t think I can do anything about it. Basically I am his resident and that’s it...” While she talked, Ethan passed by them, with elbow hitting Bryce’s back on purpose. Bryce and Geli leaned into reception’s stool as Ethan walked away.

“ Hey, watch it man!” This made Ethan stop at his tracks. He turned around to look at them. Geli looked confused at Ethan while Bryce looked annoyed at attending.

“ Dr. Ramsey, what was that?” Geli questioned him. Without single word he approached Geli and took her by her wrist. She whelped while Bryce looked more annoyed. Geli gave him an apologetic smile while she was following Ethan to his office. He closed the door, walked towards her as she took couple of steps back, cornering her. He put a hand on her face, gently stroking her cheek.

“ So now you are seeing that scalper jockey hmm?” Geli flushed a bit and turned her head away from his face. He gently lifted her face, looking at his eyes.“ Answer me, Rookie.” Geli looked at him, but not into his eyes.

“ You’ve inflicted pain into my heart. I am trying to find a cure, Dr. Ramsey, but so far I can predict that my scar will get bigger than now. I sing to hide my pain and sadness, Dr. Ramsey.” He gently removed strands from her face.

“ A cure huh? You’ve been avoiding me for two weeks and you think I don’t have a scar as well?” She slowly nodded at him while a bit of frustration appeared on his face.

“ I’ve been trying to apologise for my actions to you for weeks, but like I said, you’ve been avoiding me. You know how much I hate seeing you with other men. You bewitch everyone with your singing including me. Why do you have to make me suffer like this?” Tears flowed down his cheeks. A view of torn Ethan broke Geli into pieces. She reached for his eyes to whip his tears away. He leaned into her touch as her touch is gentle and calming. A moment of peaceful silence overcame them as they held each other for a while. She leaned into his ear, whispering.

“ I am sorry, Ethan. I have to check on my patient.” She nodded and tried to pass Ethan, but he wouldn’t allow it, blocking her path “ What is it?”. He took her face into his hands, stroking her cheeks.

“ Before you go, I want to ask you something. Do you forgive me?” She looked at him, quiet for many minutes before answering.

"Yes... I forgive you, but not completly." Ethan gave a questioning look at her. Geli took couple of steps further before pushing Ethan's blocking hand away "Because my scar isn’t healed completely and you lied to me about many things.” She passed by him and left his office while Ethan stood still, looking stunted at his office door. No wonder elders were right along about honesty and truth are always better than lie. Ethan took a seat on his couch and started to cry.

[robininthelabyrinth]

Fic: An Internal Affair - Chapter 11 (Ao3 link)

Fandom: The Flash Pairing: Leonard Snart/Barry Allen

Summary: Leonard Snart, the CCPD Captain of Internal Affairs, is known as Captain Cold for a very good reason: He hates corrupt cops with a merciless vengeance, and once you’re on his list, you’re in serious trouble.

His next target?

A CCPD lab tech named Barry Allen who’s developed a suspicious habit of disappearing at random intervals.

—————————————————————————————————

Len had been having such a good day before this, too.

Allen (Barry, you should call him Barry - but not yet) was knee deep in CSI work, so he hadn't had time for a proper date, but they'd been texting and had met briefly to go for coffee once or twice and then again a couple of days later for lunch. All in nice, well-lit places that appeased Danvers.

Thawne reported that he and Iris were making some progress in their investigation of the disappearances, mostly interviewing people who'd submitted complaints that appeared Flash-related. They’d exhausted the list of people who’d complained to the CCPD and had gone to the mayor’s office to dig into the complaint archive there in case there were others.

Danvers had shaken his tree of contacts on his behalf and continued to find no evidence of Allen's corruption in relation to any Family, although his involvement with STAR Labs in some capacity was at this point undeniable.

He still hadn't gotten a warrant for STAR Labs (oh, did he ever want a warrant!), but the pile of evidence he was going to use to apply for one was growing nicely.

And then he'd come here and his world had fallen apart.

"So what's that mean?" Len asks through lips that feel like they've gone numb. "Does that mean - are you saying we gotta -"

"No, no," Dr. Callahan assures him. She's a competent-looking Latina woman in her thirties, whose usually mildly distracted air could turn into razor-sharp focus at a moment's notice. Len had picked her to be Mick's primary physician because he'd been oddly comforted by her habit of always carrying a small, thick paperback in her coat pocket. "We're nowhere near the point of needing to make end-of-life decisions."

Len nods shakily. That's good. Because if they asked him to pull the plug on Mick, he's not sure what he'd do.

Shoot himself next, maybe.

"I just wanted to be clear with you about timeline," Callahan continues, gently but firmly. "He's still well within the boundaries of a plausible coma, but given how well his burns are progressing, we're starting to get to the end of where we feel comfortable assisting with medical induction. But the more we phase it out, the less positive the signs are."

"What's that mean?" Len asks again. "Does it mean there ain't no hope of him waking up?"

"There's always hope," she says. "But this next month or so is probably crucial: he either wakes up on his own, or we have to start seriously considering the possibility that he won't wake up at all and adjusting his care accordingly. And that means discussing what might be the best care going forward, which does include end-of-life options."

Len nods dully. Mick hadn't had a DNR order on file, the idiot, but Len knew he didn't want to be one of those unfortunate creatures kept alive by machines years after all hope was extinguished.

He'd made that clear to Callahan, and that's what she was referring to: if Mick didn't wake up, they were going to talk about - to talk about -

Len's killed men before. Some women, too, if they were rotten - never children, despite a few jokes about wanting to strangle particularly loud ones.

He's never killed a friend before.

"I wanted to discuss this with you now so that you had time to get yourself ready, should the worst come to pass," Callahan says. She's sympathetic, he can tell, but she knows him well enough by now to know that he wouldn't appreciate any expressions of that sympathy. "We're going to do everything we can this month - pull out all the stops, so to speak - but in the end, it's going to be up to him."

Len nods mutely. His hand has somehow found Mick's on the bed, through no intention of his own, and he's squeezing it hard enough that his knuckles have gone white.

Callahan says some other things, more reassurance that there are still things they have to try, but he mostly tunes her out and eventually she goes away and leaves him there.

"Mick," he whispers, and his voice is scratchy. "Mick."

He hasn't really faced up to the idea of Mick not waking up. Oh, he's thrown in an "if" in his thoughts and words, but he's never really believed it.

His whole life is still centered around the belief that Mick will wake up one day: Danvers' increasingly long group chat of updates on Len's life, meant for Mick to one day read; his ridiculous crush and now possible-relationship with Allen, meant for Mick to learn of and hopefully approve...

His revenge, meant as a gift to help convince Mick to forgive him all his lies.

All dreams. All hopes.

All dust in his mouth.

He's never going to talk to Mick again. Never get the benefit of his kindness, his crass humor, his understated wisdom and insight into the human soul. Into Len's soul. He's never going to hear Mick lecture him on his health, on eating his vegetables, on not hanging out with Charlie too much. He's never -

There's still hope, Callahan said. Still hope.

He just can't see it right now.

It's a bad night.

Allen tries to text, but Len turns off his text notifications. Danvers calls, but he hangs up on her - not that that stops her from actually coming and banging on his window, but he snarls at her to go away and she does. Even Lisa calls - at Danvers' encouragement, no doubt - and Len's sense of duty as an older brother makes him pick up, but he doesn't actually say anything more than "This ain't a good time, Lise," and remaining otherwise mute.

Hearing her voice does help a little, though.

It helps enough that when Danvers shows up to escort him to work the next morning, jaw set in a manner that suggests refusal isn't an option, he agrees to go.

Work will be good, he thinks. Thinking certainly isn't doing any favors.

It doesn't work.

Len spends the morning staring down at the paperwork he's supposed to be filling out with an overwhelming feeling of despair. He knows he's doing good work, necessary work, vital work cleaning up the city police into something worthy of the name, but what good is it, really, if Mick's not going to be around to see that Len being a cop isn't actually all that bad?

When you have nothing, you still have your duty, he reminds himself, and forces himself to pick up the pen. You still have your city, which you love.

Paperwork isn't really doing it for him today, though. Necessary, yes, but he's already gone as far as he can right now - the DAs won't take any new cases out of his backlog unless he can prove something truly egregious, and there's only so many subpoenas and wiretapping warrants he can fill out.

He needs action.

That's why it's a relief when Iris sweeps into his office in the early afternoon, taking one look at him and announcing, "You look like reheated crap."

"Reheat crap often, do you?" Danvers asks grumpily from her desk. She's been stressing about him since last night; she's entitled to a bad mood. "We usually just flush it away, here."

Iris is surprised into a snort, which interrupts the entrance line she'd no doubt had lined up. "Okay," she says. "That was a good one. That was really good. A+ for both timing and delivery."

Danvers smiles a bit at that. "Captain Snart's not exactly feeling up to company right now," she adds.

"Captain Snart is right fucking here," Len says through gritted teeth.

"See?" Danvers tells Iris, who nods.

"I just need something really quick, I promise," Iris says, shifting over to speak to Len directly. "Eddie got pulled away on a precinct-wide thing going on today - something about a gorilla? I'm not sure - and I wanted to follow up on a lead that I got, but he insisted I clear it with you first. We all good?"

Len, not being an idiot, blinks slowly at her. "Funny," he says. "Nowhere in that sentence did you actually inform me of what lead you're intending on following up, where, and what you're planning on doing that Detective Thawne sent you here first."

"Damn," she says mildly. "You're sharp as a tack, aren’t you? Okay, fine. I want to go question a guy who supposedly got fired from STAR Labs right before the Particle Accelerator went live. I found his name in Mason's notes."

Mason Bridge - that was the newspaper editor from Iris' internship, the one that had been her supervisor. He'd been one of the more recent disappearances.

"I thought all his notes had disappeared along with him," Len says. "What with him being paranoid over anyone getting a glimpse at them."

"Says the hypocrite," Danvers coughs.

"So did I," Iris says, smirking at Danvers. "But then it occurred to me - after talking with Kara here, actually! - that he might've asked one of the CCPN secretaries for some help with them at some point during his career, and one of them was actually able to show me a secret nook in his office where he kept some files in the event of a fire. Sadly not all of them, but it did have this one guy's name. That's something, right?"

"That sounds like a very promising lead," Len says.

"That's what I thought!"

"What's the guy's name?"

"No way," Iris says. "I'm not telling you that; you might try to assign the follow-up to someone else. I’m tired of sitting around in the mayor’s office’s archives digging through papers; this is my only leverage to make sure that I get to go."

She's not wrong. Len appreciates that, even if it’s annoying.

"Makes sense," he says.

"So you approve?" she asks hopefully.

"Why don't you tell me why Detective Thawne wanted you to ask my permission before following up on it, first," Len says wryly, "and then we'll see?"

Iris is a positive sneak; he likes that in a person.

She makes a face at him. "Well, this individual - er - may or may not be - uh - living in the Keystone slums."

Len arches his eyebrows. "Where in the slums?"

"...near Leopold Ave."

"Ah, yes," Len says. "Now it all makes sense. I have no idea why Detective Thawne might have any hesitation about letting you go down to Murderers' Row all by your lonesome."

"...so that's a no, then," Iris concludes.

"Oh, no, I think it's a great idea," Len says. "In fact, I'll go along with you."

"What? No!" Danvers exclaims. "Are you crazy?"

"Danvers -"

"Don't you 'Danvers' me! Do you have a memory problem or something, where you can't remember that the Families are trying to kill you? Murderers' Row is prime Family territory!"

"Technically not -"

"Only because no one wants to deal with disciplining it! Just because it's too unorganized to be properly called organized crime does meant that -"

"I need to do something," Len says flatly. Something about his voice makes Danvers pause and look at him warily. "This will do just fine."

"...fine," she says. "Will you at least wear the -"

"I ain't wearing the mask to Murderers' Row," Len says, rolling his eyes. "Keystone ain't Central like that; they'd shoot me just for hiding my face."

"But -"

"No. And that's final."

"Fine!" she exclaims, crossing her arms and glaring hard enough that Len fancies that he can feel the hair on the back of his arms crisping up again. Danvers has a good glare. "But I'm coming with you."

"I don't think taking either of you is a good idea," Iris says. "Snart, you're wanted by the Families, and Danvers, listen, it's dangerous -"

"What, and it's not dangerous for you? You're literally a civilian!"

Technically, as admin staff, so is Danvers, but Len's not dumb enough to say as much.

"One person can more easily escape notice than two -"

"If by 'escape notice' you mean 'get kidnapped and sold into human trafficking,' which I suppose is one way to interpret that phrase, albeit an uncommon one," Len says dryly. "No. We all go, or I go, and those are our only options. And Danvers, if you really want to do this - which you don't have to -"

"I know that, and I'm doing it anyway," she says stubbornly.

"- then at the very least I insist you take a service weapon with you," Len continues. "I don't care if you don't like guns."

"Fine. But I get hazard pay for this!"

"Of course you get hazard pay for this," Len says.

Danvers blinks at him. "I - wasn't expecting that to actually work. I really get hazard pay?"

"Why not? This is what hazard pay was meant for."

"Can I get -" Iris starts.

"You're a consultant, it was your idea in the first place, and you're basically blackmailing us into taking you along with us by threatening to withhold the witness' name," Len points out. He likes people with spirit, but even he has reasonable limits. "No hazard pay, you take a stun gun, and if we all survive, I'll consider giving you a bonus in retrospect. And if you ever try to blackmail anyone over anything bigger than a ridealong, I’ll crush you like a gnat."

"...understood,” Iris says. “Also, a stun gun, seriously? I’m a cop’s kid; I can handle a real gun -"

"And until you can handle it to my satisfaction on a police shooting range, you take the stun gun," Len says firmly. He was a cop’s kid, too, and while he’ll allow that it typically provides some knowledge of how to use a gun, it doesn’t instill significant confidence in a person’s ability to know when not to use a gun, which is more his area of concern. "Now, we're wasting daylight. Shall we catch a ride into Keystone?"

The original taxi they catch takes them into the center of downtown, which is as close as the driver is willing to go to Murderers' Row. Len can't blame him; the area's awful at the best of times, and the times following the devastation wrought by the Particle Accelerator could hardly be considered the best of times.

"We can't walk there from here," Iris objects. "It'd take us over an hour even without factoring in Snart's crutches, and - all jokes about stupid bravery aside - I don't want to be stuck here past sundown."

"No problem," Len says. "Why'd you think I asked him to take us to the corner of Rundown Street?"

Iris glances at the street sign with a frown. "It's called Sundown Street -"

A car zooms them by at illegally high speeds, coming out of nowhere on a sharp turn, passing close enough for the wind to buffet them. It's followed a second later by another one.

If they'd been even a single step off the curve, they'd be dead.

"Like I said," Len says wryly. "Rundown Street. Otherwise known as the most popular drag racing strip inside Keystone City proper. C'mon, we're not far from the finish line - we'll be able to get one of the losers to give us a ride if we pay his loser's fee."

"Loser's fee?" Danvers asks.

"The buy-in amount," Len says. "Not too expensive, but more than most drivers can afford - but it can be waived if you're willing to bet your car as collateral."

"I get it," Iris says. "We save someone's car - and their livelihood - and they drive us wherever we want. That's...kind of cold-blooded."

"Well," Len drawls. "They do call me Captain Cold, you know."

"I bet they wouldn't if they knew how much you enjoyed it," Iris says, but she's grinning.

Their selected driver turns out to be a young African-American man on the verge of college age, who goes by the street name "Wally Wheeler", and he's incredibly grateful about them saving his car.

"I'm trying to save up money for my mom's medical treatments," he explains to a sympathetic Iris and Danvers. "I got a part-time job at first, but it didn't make enough. And I was good at this, so..."

"As long as you stick to racing," Len says. "Those sort of problems are what lead people to the Families, but if you go there, you'll get trouble you won't get out of."

"Isn't racing also illegal?" Iris asks, giving Len a look.

Len shrugs. As vices go, racing's far from the worst one to have.

"The boss is a big believer in victimless crime," Danvers tells Iris, sounding long-suffering. "He thinks it's a panacea against crimes that do have victims, like the corruption involved with and caused by Family work. Also, don't ask what he considers to be 'victimless', it'll just turn into a rant about the modern state of property insurance."

"Chattel insurance," Len mutters under his breath.

"That's not necessarily wrong, though," Wally - Len refuses to call any human being 'Wheeler' - says. "About the difference between petty law-breaking like drag-racing and, well, worse stuff than that. I know lots of guys that do stupid stuff and justify it on the basis that at least it's not the Family biz."

"Hmm," Iris says. "That's interesting. Tell me, would you consider letting me interview you..?"

"Yeah, sure, if you'd be willing to get tested for bone marrow compatibility for my mom," Wally says. "One interview if you get tested, and if you’re a match, well, I'll do all the interviews you want."

"Deal," Iris says. "Danvers, what about you? Want to get tested together?"

"I can't," Danvers says apologetically. "Medical issue. But I have a really, really rare blood type, so I wouldn't be a match anyway."

"Snart?"

"My doc says she's the only one allowed to stick me with needles for the foreseeable future," Len says, waggling his crutch pointedly. Giving blood after getting shot in a dirty warehouse is just asking to potentially spread some sort of blood-borne disease, even if the tests have come up negative so far. "Anyway, Wally, about that ride – we need to go to Murderers' Row."

Wally's eyebrows go straight up. "You gotta death wish or something?"

"We need to talk to someone there," Iris says. "You don't have to stay -"

"Are you joking? Of course he has to stay," Len says. "How do you expect us to get out again?"

"But -"

"No, it's cool," Wally says. "Your man here looks like he can handle himself - you're packing, right?"

"Of course."

Wally nods. "Then I'll stick around. I've never been in Murderers' Row long enough to see what it looks like."

"Me either," Iris says, sounding excited.

Len blinks at them. "It's a slum," he says blankly. "It doesn't look like anything."

Danvers pats him on the back. "The guy with a ranking system for different prisons doesn't get to throw stones here, boss."

...it's not his fault Iron Heights sucks balls. Or that Len has a multipage spreadsheet to prove it.

Murderers' Row, on the other hand, is just your average old slum: ratty dirty buildings halfway or more to falling apart, shoddy half-hearted repairs, people hanging around looking at each other suspiciously, everyone packing more heat than a summer's day - lead in the walls, dirt in the water, and violence in the air.

Len feels at home already.

"You're humming, boss."

"Nice to be back in the old parts of town," Len says. "Though of course this don't have anything on Central's slums - now there's a prime bit of slum territory -"

A member of the local gangs - not Family, just a local - who was oh-so-casually loitering ever closer to them, hand on the gun in his pocket in the event of their being either a threat or unwary prey, gives out a snort at that, his shoulders dropping.

"Shoulda known a Middleman'd be the only one dumb enough to bring two bits into Murderers' Row," he says, friendly enough.

"What, and after all the effort I went getting one of each color, too?" Len replies, smirking back even as his voice drops back into the comfortable nasal drawl he grew up with. "Archboys got no taste - and no discernment, neither, if you think these here are bits. You really think I'd come here with one leg and no protection?"

The gang member nods amiably. Like most low-level thugs, he's willing to give the benefit of the doubt to just about anything he doesn't understand - and the idea of a slum kid like Len showing up with crutches and two pretty ladies ripe for kidnapping is just ludicrous enough that he's willing to believe that Danvers and Iris are both enforcers hidden in sheep's clothing.

"Don't start nothing," the guy still says in warning, clearly more reflexively than anything else, and heads back to rejoin his gang.

Iris does Len the tremendous favor of waiting until he's gone to ask, in an undertone, "Middleman? Archboys?"

"Middlemen are Central City slum kids, born and raised," Len tells her. "Archboys are the same but for Keystone. There isn't an official divide, of course, but everyone's got their loyalty, what with the two cities being so close."

"And bits?" Danvers asks. "What's that mean?"

"Uh," Len says.

"Whores," Wally says, amused. "Except your guy here somehow convinced him that we must all actually be really dangerous because it'd be too stupid to come here otherwise."

Len shrugs modestly. He's always had a gift for bullshit. "Now's your turn," he says to Iris. "The name?"

"Hartley Rathaway," Iris says.

Len's eyebrows shoot up. He's not the only one.

"I know, I know, a Rathaway here of all places; it sounds dumb," Iris says, seeing his expression. "But he was disowned by his family after he came out and then blackballed from the scientific research industry after getting fired from STAR Labs, and Mason'd traced him here."

"Well," Len says. "At least he'll be easy to find."

"Not without street numbers," Iris says, scowling at the rundown buildings.

"Who needs street numbers when you've got cardboard?" Len asks. "Wait here."

He hobbles over to the nearest outpost of the cardboard brigade - not far, there's a nice alleyway where a handful of homeless people are congregating.

Len likes the cardboard brigade. His usual contact – a crazy ageless woman called the Mad Magpie that likes to hang around the police precinct, thus the ‘crazy’ moniker – likes him back, and that usually means he can ask for favors other people wouldn’t get. In this case, he gives them the usual set of passwords and asks for the courtesy of an hour's head start before they start spreading his name and face around.

They agree cheerfully and direct him to one of the buildings on the street, the one with a green door and boarded-up windows.

Their target supposedly resides on the third floor.

"This is wild," Wally murmurs, staring at the entranceway to the building with some trepidation. "I can't believe you're going to go interview a guy in Murderers' Row, ex-millionaire's kid or not. You journalists have got some serious balls."

Len decides not to correct Wally's misapprehension as to their profession, as cops are as little liked here as anywhere in the slums. Besides, that comment was mostly aimed at Iris, who is, in fact, a journalist.

...technically.

Being a blogger counts, right?

Len struggles up the steps. The slums are not exactly handicap-friendly, to say the least, but at least he has Danvers' strong arm and excellent sense of discretion to help get him there.

By the time they're on the third floor landing, he's breathing hard and both Iris and Wally have identical worried expressions.

Literally identical, actually; Len wonders if they're related. Sadly, there's probably no polite way to ask Iris if her dad happens to have any illegitimate kids out there.

"You sure you're -" Iris starts.

"I'm fine," Len says, catching his breath. "What's all that PT for if not for climbing stairs and interrogating witnesses?"

"Assuming this guy's there at all," Wally says.

"That's a good point," Iris says. "He could've been disappeared, too."

Wally looks intrigued. "People have been disappearing? That sounds bad. Can I help?"

"You're already helping," Iris assures him.

"Danvers, how much of a budget do we have for interns?" Len murmurs as quietly as he can, knowing that Danvers' ridiculous bat-ears will hear anything he says as long as there's even the slightest exhalation giving sound to the words.

"You could use having a more reliable driver than Charlie, of all people," she whispers back. "I'll check when we get back to the office, but we can probably make it work."

"S'long as he never intends on being a real cop later in life, it could get him outta some of his current trouble..."

With that settled, Len decides to ignore Iris' attempt to brief Wally on what they know (nothing, but told from a fairly pro-Flash perspective) and knock firmly on the door.

Nothing.

"Danvers?" Len asks.

"There's someone inside," she confirms. "Only one person, as far as I can tell."

"How can you tell?" Wally asks.

"Danvers has ridiculously good hearing," Len says proudly. "The only way she could be more accurate about this sorta thing is if she had X-ray vision."

Danvers flushes.

It’s simultaneously hilarious and rage-inducing (mostly at her family) how shy she is about how awesome she is.

Len knocks again, this time harder. "C'mon," he calls. "We know you're in there, we mean no harm, and anyway, I hear that the price of door replacements on Murderers' Row is killer."

Danvers groans, Iris smirks, and Wally stares up at the ceiling like it can give him answers to how he ended up here.

A second later, the door swings open.

"That was fucking awful," the man inside informs them, smirking.

Len frowns at the man - about the same height as Len, Caucasian, brunet, and scruffy like he thinks Indiana Jones is a role model, wearing a dark green hoodie and cheap jeans - and says, "I'm gonna assume you ain't Hartley Rathaway."

"No shit," the guy says. He looks vaguely familiar, now that Len thinks about it. "What gave it away, the extra foot of height or the fact that I don't talk rich?"

"The latter," Len says. "Given that I ain't never met the guy in person to know about the rest. He live here?"

“Who wants to know?”

“A nosy asshole,” Len says. “Don’t make me go ask the cardboard brigade to tell me the same thing, okay?”

The guy snorts, acknowledging the point.

“So does Rathaway Jr. live here?” Len prods.

"Usually, yeah," the guy says, giving in. "He’s my roomie. Ain’t been back in a couple weeks, though."

"He's been disappeared?" Wally exclaims.

The guy gives Wally a weird look. "Or he's just not been here for a couple weeks. It happens sometimes – jobs, laying low, that sorta deal."

"Oh."

"What’s that about people getting disappeared..?"

"Can we come in anyway?" Len interjects, not answering the question. "I could use a chair to crash in before attempting those stairs again."

"Yeah, sure, come in. Do I know you from somewhere?"

"I was just thinking that," Len says. Danvers is shaking her head at him pointedly like she's trying to tell him something, but he's not sure what; he's too busy trying to place the guy. "What's your deal?"

"Usual cut crew work, largely freelance - used to work with my brother -"

"Do you have a name, maybe?" Iris asks, following them inside, even as Len's nodding. “That might help more than your profession.”

The guy flushes, remembering his manners. "Uh, Mark. Mark Mardon. Nice to meet you."

Len snaps his fingers as it comes to him. "The Dollarhyde Street diamond job! The getaway drivers!"

"Holy crap," Mardon says, recognition lighting up his own eyes. "Leonard Snart?! I heard you went straight!"

Danvers puts her head in her hands.

Oh, right. That's what she'd been hinting at him about: Len's a wanted man in criminal circles.

Damnit, Danvers, thirty years a thief and four months a proper cop - he's going to mess up sometimes!

"Uh," Len says, wondering if this is about to escalate into a firefight.

"You were badass, man," Mardon says admiringly. "We got away clean with the cut from your job with no sweat, and it lasted us nearly a year of good living. One of the best jobs we ever did. You're good people, man; the criminal underworld lost a genius when you turned."

Aw, Len's touched.

Also rather relieved.

(Danvers' shoulders are now shaking with laughter, while Iris and Wally both gape.)

“Always a pleasure to meet a fan,” he says, ignoring his audience. Hopefully they’ll know well enough to stay out of this conversation and leave it entirely to him.

He knows how to talk to criminals.

"Is it true that you sent fifty pigs to jail in one month alone?" Mardon asks eagerly.

Len grins. Being admired for his cop work by criminals is somehow even sweeter than being admired for his top-notch criminal skills. "Almost. Some of 'em refused to plea bargain out and are going to trial - or are supposed to go to trial. They're begging for a plea bargain now."

"Fuckers deserve it," Mardon says fervently. "Every one of 'em. I hate cops."

"Corrupt cops," Len corrects.

"Aren't they all?" Mardon asks.

"Leave me some hope here, please," Len says dryly. "I don't wanna have to start the whole thing from scratch."

"Hey, they're not all bad," Iris protests. "My dad's a cop! So is my boyfriend!"

"Can we keep it down with all this cop talk?" Wally hisses. "My old man was a cop before he ditched my mom, but I don't go around boasting about it! Especially not here of all places!"

Mardon's frowning at Iris. "You’re from Central," he says slowly. "Your dad wouldn't happen to be Joe West, would he?"

"Uh," Iris says instead of confirming it, proving that she's not a total idiot. "Why do you ask?"

"Because Joe West murdered my brother," Mardon says, still frowning suspiciously at Iris. "My baby brother, Clyde - West shot him right in the fucking back. And one day, I'm going to get back at West by murdering someone he loves, too."

"Lucky for us that she’s a Lloyd, not a West, then, ain’t it?" Len interjects, lying his ass off with the name of the first black cop he can think of that isn’t West and extremely uncertain as to whether it's going to work. He wishes he were less surprised that even when he's not part of the investigation, Joe West still manages to fuck everything up. "You know I'm not going to let you do that, right?"

Mardon glances at him, scowling, and then just as Len's considering going for his gun, suddenly relaxes. "Should've figured," he says with a grin. "I know your code against killing civilians; if you had that as a thief, I can't see you changing it as a pig."

Len shrugs. "What can I say? I never much liked the idea of some civilian getting iced just 'cause they happened to have the wrong blood. If the whole world acted like that, I'd've never made it out of the crib before someone would've put me out of my misery to make a point to my old man."

Mardon grunts. "Yeah, I guess," he says reluctantly. "Sure wouldn't've have wanted someone going after Clyde because of some damn stupid thing I did, I guess."

"Exactly," Len says, then hesitates. "You want me to look into hammering West for that shooting?"

Sadly, he knows it's probably a lost cause if the officer-related shooting's already been resolved by the bureau. They don't reopen stuff like that without evidence of some sort of cover-up or something, and it sounds like Clyde Mardon being shot in the back was pretty public already.

Still…

"Might not go anywhere,” Len continues, ignoring how Iris is trying to death-glare a hole into his back. She’s got nothing on Danvers. “But at least it's better than you getting sent down for life 'cause you murdered an innocent, yeah? What do you say?"

"No," Mardon says. "Thanks, and I appreciate the offer, but no. I've got a back-up plan in place that ought to show West what for without getting in your crosshairs. Property, not people."

"It'd better stay property not people," Len warns him. "I'm gonna have to tip off the CCPD about this little convo; you'll get pre-med for sure if anyone goes down, and that means the death penalty gets put on the table."

"Yeah, whatever," Mardon says. "The pigs won't be able to stop me even if they tried."

"That's what they all say," Len says wearily. "Now listen, can you help us or not?"

Mardon blinks at him. "Help you? With what?"

"We're looking into some disappearances, most of which seem to happen right around the same time as a Flash sighting," Len says. "We think Rathaway might have some insight. Can you tell him to call when he gets back? And let us know if he doesn't get back?"

"Sure," Mardon says, accepting Len's card. "But only 'cause you go exclusively against cops in your new job. D'Angelo said you were still cool with the trade for the most part."

"D'Angelo also promised to keep his mouth shut," Len says with a sigh. He really hopes Iris doesn’t remember to pay attention to this part of the conversation, but she’s a would-be journalist; he’s sure she will. Well, he always did believe in the philosophy of not doing anything you wouldn’t want to go down for doing later on, and he’s perfectly willing to face the music on this one. After all, working with D'Angelo got him the best lead they’ve had yet on the Flash. "Amateurs. Anyway, I didn't say it before, but I'm real sorry to hear about Clyde; he had a beautiful way with just about anything on four wheels."

Mardon smiles. "That he did. That he did."

Len nods and gets painfully back up to his feet. "Don't suppose you've got anything to add about these disappearances yourself? Or the Flash?"

Mardon snorts. "No. Or, well, yeah: if you don't see anything really big go down by the waterfront in the next few days or so, assume that I've been disappeared, too."

"So noted," Len says, then turns his attention to his small crew, mute and watching. "C'mon, all, we're wasting daylight. We'll hear from Rathaway when or if he comes back."

They follow Len down those horrific stairs – he needs so much more PT than he thought he did before he tried those stairs, but his leg is considering secession in self-defense while his side and spine are basically giant screaming pits of agony – and back out into the street.

"So, that went - uh - interestingly," Danvers says, her voice somehow still cheerful even though she’s looking at Len a little worriedly. "At least we got a heads up about possible violence, right?"

"Honor among thieves," Len says, nodding. "Mardon's a bit old school at heart; he didn't have to give us that much."

"Probably not. And, uh, weird question," Danvers says. "Did anyone else notice how right in the middle of the conversation the weather right outside the window got all -"

"He's going to do something terrible!" Iris explodes. "We have to stop him!"

"We'll tell everyone," Len says soothingly. "Including Detective West; we’ll just get him to avoid the waterfront for a bit. It'll be fine."

"You sure?" Wally asks anxiously. "I mean, I've never met this West guy, and I'm sure he's a total dickbag, but that doesn't mean I want him to get hurt."

"He's not a -" Iris starts, then pauses. "Listen, he's not a total dickbag, okay? Not all the time."

Len would disagree, but whatever.

"And what do you know about him, anyway?" she continues accusingly. Clearly a believer in the ‘I can criticize him but you can’t’ school of thought, Iris West. "You're not even from Central; you’re from Keystone! He’s never even policed your area – you don’t know anything about him! You don’t have any reason to say anything about him!"

"Yeah, well," Wally says, rolling his eyes and crossing his arms. "According to my mom, he's my old man."

"He's what?!" Iris shrieks.

Oh, boy. Len'd thought they looked similar, but he hadn't really thought that whole 'illegitimate child' theory had water in it.

This is going to get unnecessarily emotional fast, he just knows it.

"What do you care?" Wally snaps. "Your old man's Lloyd or whatever; mine's the one at risk!"

"I'm not a Lloyd, I'm a West!" Iris exclaims. "Snart was just lying so I wouldn't get shot!"

"Uh, guys?" Danvers says. "Maybe we should be having this out in Murderers' Row?"

"But," Wally says, then falters. "If you're a West – and if he really is my old man –"

"- then I'm your sister," Iris finishes. "Holy crap. You're my brother!"

“Holy crap!”

“Holy crap!”

Yeah, Len's done with this.

He gives his best ear-piercing whistle.

All three of them look accusingly at him, clutching their ears. Danvers in particular looks like a sad miserable puppy that’s been betrayed by a surprise visit to the vet or something.

Too bad, so sad.

"Everyone get back in the car," he orders. "You can talk about all this family stuff on the drive back to Central. And maybe let’s do this before we all get shot? The cardboard brigade only promised me an hour before they sold my presence here to the Families."

That, at least, gets everyone moving.

Len resigns himself to the worst car ride ever.

[thefastlanefanfic]

The Neighbors - TWO

Wattpad // Chapters 1-2

Sidenote: I’m so sorry if you’re on mobile lol this is gonna be long as shit (why does the “read more” thing not work on mobile)

5:00 AM on Monday morning came entirely too soon.  With the ability to select college courses all in the afternoon for my last semester, I'd been sleeping in until 11 o'clock in the morning.  It certainly didn't help that I'd been sleeping past noon the last few days I was at home on my "summer break."  There was something about finishing college that made me exhausted.  I would have thought I'd be energetic and stoked to greet the days void of research papers and group presentations, but instead, it was like every single all-nighter I ever pulled was catching up to me.

I threw on the new lavender scrubs my father bought for me and proceeded with my morning routine.  I made sure I had a lunch packed.  Since I was trying to be healthy, I packed a salad with some chicken I'd prepared the night before and some popcorn.  I loved popcorn.  I printed and filled out all of the grown-up paperwork I had to turn in to the company to make sure I got medical insurance coverage and direct deposit to my bank account every two weeks.  I felt like such an adult, having to do all of the background checks, I-9s, W-4s, and whatever other legal paperwork the company had to do before I could officially start work.  Then again, I had to call my dad about forty times in the process of filling out the forms because I had no idea what they were asking me.  Maybe I wasn't actually an adult just yet.

As I was walking to the front door, I noticed a group of crickets scatter away from the door inside the apartment.  I squealed and jumped backwards before I knew what they were.  Why were there so many of them in my apartment? I noticed the early morning sun streaming in through a sliver of a crack under the door.  I swore to myself.  The reason the crickets sounded so close to me last night was because they had come under the door into the apartment.  I figured they were just sitting outside my bedroom window as I was trying to sleep.  

I used my dustpan to chase a few of the crickets back toward the front door.  Some of them had disappeared under my couch.  Others were chirping from hidden crevasses in the apartment I had yet to discover.  I growled as I heard one chirp that sounded like it was in my ear, but I couldn't find it anywhere around me.  I checked my watch.  I was going to be late for work.  I opened the front door to shoo out the few crickets I could direct out of the apartment.  On my front stoop was a small bag.  The smell of warm shit filled my nostrils and began to crawl into my apartment, mixed from the humidity already clouding up the atmosphere outside.

"What the-"

I didn't have time or patience to decipher whether the dog crap was an insult directed toward me or just a rude, lazy neighbor who couldn't make it to his own trashcan.  I glanced out into the quad to see if anyone was out with their dog.  The quad was quiet.  Still asleep.  I slung my purse over my shoulder and switched my lunchbox to my left hand.  In my right hand, I pinched the very tip of the bag between my pointer finger and my thumb and quickly made my way to the trashcan along the sidewalk.  I threw the bag into the can and shivered, the smell of warm shit still lingering in the dense air.

"Early shift this morning?"

I nearly leapt out of my skin as someone approached from behind me.  I whipped around, my purse swinging with my body and slapping against my butt as I did.  It was Wilson.  He was in uniform and looked like he was returning from a night shift.

"Or are you just returning home?" He asked.

It was too early for me to be dealing with him.

"Heading out," I said.  "First day."

"Yippie-ki-yay!  Good luck, even though I'm sure you'll be outstand-erific," he said, winking at me. "Maybe later tonight we can do that dinner date.  Early birthday dinner?  I know your birthday isn't until tomorrow but I just found out I've got a 16-hour shift tomorrow and I'm not sure I'll be able to take you out on that day.  I'm covering for a buddy."

"You know, Wilson, I really just need to stay home and do some more getting settle-" I started, trying to weasel my way out of this "date."

"Oh come on, Leah.  One dinner date.  Maybe more after that, but only if you fall in love with me first."  He snatched my free hand that previously held the poop-bag and kissed it.

I pulled my hand away and fake smiled.  "One meal," I agreed, eager to get going.  I refused to call it a "date."

"Magnificent," Wilson said, raising his arms to the heavens as if God himself had granted Wilson the permission to take me out. "I will pick you up around 7.  Does that work?"

Just then, Harry sauntered into the quad wearing nothing but shorts and tennis shoes.  He had a t-shirt draped around his neck and was using it to wipe the sweat from his forehead.  His hair was sticking straight up into the air.  His chest glistened with more sweat.  I caught myself before my jaw dropped too noticeably.  Harry's eyes met mine and he winked at me, smiling.

"Leah? Dinner tonight at 7?" Wilson asked again.

"What?" I asked, snapping back to reality. Harry was walking past us.  I wished Wilson would shut up and leave. "Yeah, that's great.  See you later-" I said, turning and following Harry.  I called his name before he entered his apartment.  He turned and smiled at me again.  

"Lee." He wiped his forehead with his t-shirt.  The full-frontal view of his bare torso finally gave me a look at the ink that covered every inch of his skin.  Each piece of art came to life as his lungs expanded with each deep breath he took.

"Leah," I corrected him, laughing as though it didn't really hurt me that he couldn't seem to remember my name.  ""Like, Lee-uh. Lee-uh," I repeated.  I sounded like an idiot. "How are you?"

"Great," Harry said.  "Nothing like an early morning run."

I faked a laugh. "Yeah."

"Do you run?" Harry asked.

"Not if I can help it," I answered honestly, chuckling to myself.  Harry raised his eyebrows and nodded, the look on his face indifferent to whether I really ran or not.  There was a glimmer in his eye that made it look like he was almost laughing at me internally or just really enjoying the conversation.  One of those, or he just was being overly polite and wanted to go shower off the sweat that was flowing gently over his toned torso. "I mean," I said.  "I should probably start..."

"Not a bad habit to pick up," he said, wiping just below his messy hair with his t-shirt one more time. "I can see how it's not for everyone though.  You headed to work?" He looked me up and down in my lavender scrubs and smiled as though I was a four-year-old child dressed up for the job I wanted in the future.  To be fair, that's about how I felt.  I couldn't believe I was about to have my own adult job.

I nodded slowly, enjoying the way the words rolled off his tongue and dripped off of his lips before I snapped out of my trance and shot a look at my watch.  "Oh shit- I'm actually going to be late."

"Good luck-"  Harry said, turning and using a key to open his front door as I sprinted across the quad, holding my purse tightly to my hip.  I slid to a halt with a sudden courage to ask:

"Harry, are you doing anything later tonight?"

He had disappeared into his doorway but the door was not yet closed.  He reemerged and shrugged.  "I'm not," he called to me. "Sounded like you made plans with Wilson, though."

The hopeful smile that had spread across my face disappeared as quickly as it came.  "Oh, yes.  I forgot."

Harry smiled and shook his head. "Maybe another time, Lee.  Get to work."

"Leah," I corrected him once more.  

He merely laughed and closed his front door.

I was tense arriving to work because I was a few minutes late.  I rushed into the main foyer of Sunshine Days Nursing Home and nearly slammed into the front desk.

"Leah Fitzpatrick here for work.  It's my first day."

The middle-aged, overweight receptionist was wearing some Winnie-the-Pooh scrubs, though the way she had snacks and drinks and cheap romance novels scattered all over the desk made it seem that she didn't actually work with any of the patients personally.  The only spills her scrubs were catching were from her 64oz mega-drink soft drink cup she'd picked up from a truck stop and the ketchup swirled onto a half-eaten pizza that was laying in the empty receptionist chair beside her.  She peered over her glasses at me.  I found it hard to meet her eyes since so much dead skin and eye goop had congealed in the corners of her glasses where the bargain-brand frames met the bridge of her pale nose.  Her red, short, curly hair matched the cheap red lipstick that had found its way to her front teeth.

"You're late," she said.

"I just got a little held up at home.  My new apartment... the bolt lock was giving me problems," I lied.

I could tell the receptionist wasn't buying it.  She cocked her head at me and looked at me.  I was almost waiting for her to say, "Mhmm.  Really?" I was relieved when she didn't.

"There are people here who work a night shift and it's really fucking tiring.  Have you ever worked a night shift?" She snapped.

I shook my head.

"It's really fucking tiring.  People are going to be mad if you refuse to get here on time.  They want to sleep.  Don't you like your sleep?"

I nodded.

"Then get here on time. It's really fucking tiring to work a night shift."

"Okay..." I said.  "I got it."

The receptionist sat back in her comfortable swivel-chair and placed a fat hand on her chest like she'd been personally attacked. "If you're going to have a problem with coming to work on time you may as well quit now.  Do you need to turn around and walk out those doors or are we going to agree that you come in at five o'clock?"

"Six," I corrected her.

She gasped at me, again offended that I would even open my mouth.

"Six is what the email said.  I can show you," I said, pulling out my phone.

Clearly not wanting to be proven wrong, the receptionist held up a hand to me and shook her head.  "Just be on time next time, okay?  We don't have patience for people who don't take this job seriously."

"Jesus, Martha, cool it," a cool voice said from a hallway behind me.  A woman in her 30's approached me and the receptionist slyly.  She looked too clean to have worked a night shift.  I wondered if she was working the day shift with me.  Still addressing the receptionist, she said, "You were late on your first day because you spilled a Chick-fil-a milkshake down your front and had to go back home and change."  

Martha's face flushed red.

The new woman leaned on the counter and looked at me. "Leah?"

"Yes," I said, extending a hand, relieved that someone spared me from the unwarranted wrath of the receptionist.

She shook it.  She was a plain looking woman with brown eyes and brown hair pulled back into a low ponytail.  She was wearing no jewelry or makeup, but still had a subtle beauty about herself. "Nicolle.  I'll be showing you around these next few weeks.  Or until you pick it up on your own."

She put her hands into the front pockets on the shirt of her green scrubs and walked back down the hallway she'd originally emerged from.  I followed, finding nothing but administrative offices and break rooms.  "You can put your stuff here," Nicolle said, motioning toward a single wall of tan lockers once we'd reached the room the furthest down the hallway.  There was a table in the middle of the room with a few coffee cups, food wrappers, and magazines spread across it.  A cell phone was plugged into the wall, charging.  An old, square computer monitor was in the corner of the room I figured no one ever visited - the top of the computer was coated in a thick layer of dust.  As the outdated "Windows" icon bounced from side to side of the monitor screen, it seemed to shake dust particles onto the rickety-looking desk it was sitting on.  "Don't let Martha scare you," Nicolle said as I shoved my purse and lunch into a locker that reeked of old perfume.  "Martha was engaged and basically got dumped for a skinny girl.  It sucks.  I'd be pissed if that happened too.  But Martha then proceeded to gain another 200lbs after her fiancé left her.  Whole thing was a mess.  She just hates anyone she thinks is prettier than her." Nicolle stretched her arms over her head and yawned.

I wanted to feel bad for Martha, but because of the first and only encounter we'd had so far, I couldn't make myself feel for her.

Nicolle crossed her arms over her small chest.  "We don't do a whole lot of training here for newbies unless you feel like you need it.  You're fresh out of school though, right?  You should have a better grip on physical therapy and art therapy and meds than any of us."

I laughed.  "It's been a month since I've had to crack a textbook so I wouldn't mind a refresher of the meds.  The rest I think will come naturally."

"Don't worry about the medicine so much.  We have a registered nurse who sorts out dosages and brings the meds to you for whichever client you're with at the time.  You just hand it to the client and make sure they don't spit it out or choke."

"Sounds easy," I said.

Nicolle laughed.  "Easy unless you're working with Mr. Lewis.  He'll spit until he has no more saliva if it means he doesn't have to take his meds."

For the day, I basically shadowed Nicolle.  She was 35.  Married to a guy she'd dated since high school.  She kept assuring me that she loved the guy but proceeded to talk about all of the problems they were having and how tired of him she was.  She droned on about how she went out with some of her single friends a week ago and was hit on by a tall, handsome cowboy.  "I should have gone home with him.  Spiced up my life a little bit.  There is never any excitement anymore," she said to me as we carried lunch trays down the hallways from room to room.  Before I could give her my opinion, she spoke to the old man in the room we'd entered. "Mr. Davenport, salmon today."

The old man she addressed merely turned his back to us and continued to watch The Price Is Right on his television.  He curled his lip like he was disgusted as Nicolle placed the tray of food on a table beside him.

She rolled her eyes at me and motioned toward the door.  In the hallway, she said, "He's a chef.  Has a daughter who's a chef too.  He says her name is Kennedy, I think.  She lives in NYC.  Dating some famous boxer.  Mr. Davenport talks about her all the time, but she never calls or visits.  I can't tell if she's actually real or if he's just crazy.  He claims he won't call her because he put her up for adoption when her mother died during child birth.  I just think Kennedy's a figment of his imagination.  Anyway, the food is never good enough for him but he'll eat it if you just leave it for him."

By the time I got to take a lunch break, I was exhausted.  There was something about the slow day that made me more tired.  I felt like I wasn't really doing a whole lot, but making small talk with some old people who were mentally aware enough to recognize I was a new staff member, and other old people who weren't mentally aware enough to recognize that I was NOT, in fact, their grandchild.  One woman in particular kept calling me "Elizabeth," who Nicolle later informed me was the baby girl the old woman miscarried in the 1930's.  Really, it all made me sad.  It just made me think of my father.

During group art therapy time, I sat with a table of four elderly women and watched as they painted aimlessly on their own canvases.  Really, three of them were painting.  The fourth was tugging at the uncomfortable smock that we'd distributed to everyone to keep their clothes from getting paint on them.  

"Shelley, I don't like this fabric," the old woman croaked, addressing my new coworker across the room.  

Shelley sighed and crossed her legs as she helped one of the elderly at her own table.  She scratched under the heap of blonde hair on the top of her head, which I guess was supposed to be a messy bun.  "Lydia, we've told you, we are keeping your other clothes from getting dirty."

The old woman looked at me as if I was supposed to contradict Shelley and give her permission to take the smock off.  I smiled at her as politely and sympathetically as I could, but didn't say anything.  In the 8 hours I'd been there, I didn't feel I knew any of the clients well enough to ask anything of them or order them around.  

"This damn place..." Lydia muttered under her breath, turning to face the muted TV that had some low-budget soap opera playing.  Her stiff, grey hair stayed perfectly in place as she huffed and puffed in her chair.  Her overly-exaggerated actions almost made her look like an annoyed teenager who had just been told "no."

I got lost in the soap opera for a moment. There was something about watching those shitty actors on mute that made it seem like they might almost be good at acting for a second.  I felt something wet land on my arm and drew my attention back to the table where Mrs. White had accidentally flicked green paint onto my new lavender scrubs.  I pursed my lips and sighed.  It was only a small blot of paint, but they were my brand new scrubs.  I tried not to be mad.  I knew my face probably showed nothing more than indifference.  I was good at hiding emotion when I wanted to.

"I'm sorry, Elizabeth," she said to me, glancing down at the table where she'd also dripped paint.  "I'm so clumsy these days..."

I stood up. "It's okay, Mrs. White." Almost immediately after rising to my feet, behind me, I heard some kind of liquid splattering on the wood floor, like someone had poured their water straight onto the ground.  I turned to see another woman, Miss Jane, with her elastic-waisted pants around her ankles, her Depends diaper around her knees, and her bare butt hovering just over the side of an empty vase beside the doorway to the community room.  I gasped as I realized that she was mistaking the vase for a toilet.  Though she was aiming for the vase, she was really getting half of her pee into the vase and the other half of it on her shoes and the floor.

"No, don't!" I blurted, a natural reaction to Miss Jane's mistake.  The old woman jumped, my outburst having scared her.  She stumbled backward and tipped over the vase.  I could hear the urine in the vase slosh before the vase hit the floor.  It was like it was happening in slow motion.  It was another natural reaction for me to stoop down and try to stop the vase from tipping completely over, but I was too late, and the vase bounced onto the floor, showering me in warm old lady piss.  I stood slowly, held back a gag, and shuddered.  In the corner of the room, my coworker Shelley merely cackled, still scratching under the heap of hair tied up on her head.

"Not the first time that's happened.  Next time, let her finish peeing.  Easier to clean up if you don't knock over the vase," Shelley said, looking nonchalantly at the old man painting beside her.

By the end of the day, I was defeated.  Done.  Grossed out.  A little depressed.  How could I do this job?  How could I last more than a week?  How did Nicolle and Shelley work so long in a place with people who couldn't go to the bathroom on their own or even remember who their own kids were?  I knew what I was getting into by taking this nursing home job... but then again, I didn't.

I wheeled into the parking lot at my apartment complex and dragged my body from the front seat of my car.  No sooner had I set my feet on the pavement did Wilson come bouncing jovially around the corner of the quad.  He was decked out in his cop uniform.

"I've been waiting for you!" He said.  He had to have been staring out the window of his apartment until I drove up.  Unless maybe he was standing outside the quad waiting for me too.  I wondered how long he'd been waiting. His blonde hair was slicked back so tightly that it didn't move as he bounded toward me.  

I had forgotten about our dinner.  I wanted to groan.  It was times like these I wished I had the power to make myself vomit on command.  If I could have one super power, it would be to vomit whenever I wanted just so I could weasel my way out of hanging out with people.

"Can I take a rain check on dinner?  I've had a hard day... my stomach is hurtin-" I started.

"No escaping your birthday! Your dad told me you're not much of a birthday person but I'm going to force you to dinner!" Wilson said, locking my small wrist in a tight clasp of his fingers and pulling me toward his cop car.

I silently cursed my dad for telling Wilson about my birthday at all.  "Wilson, I just really am so tired- I mean, I'm covered in pee and-"

"No excuse is going to get you out of this.  Your daddio said you would try every excuse in the book so I'm not buying it."

I was trying to find a way to free my wrist from his grip without making it seem like I was whipping my hand away from him, but he was not letting loose.

"I made reservations for 7:00 and it's 6:45! We have to get there," he said hurriedly, opening the back door to his cop car. "Let's get to bangin' on all cylinders."

I hesitated, suddenly the only thought occupying my mind: "Wait... you want me to ride in the back?"

"Awkward, I know," Wilson said, uneasily sighing and laughing at the same time.  "You can't ride in the front unless you're a cop."

"I didn't know that was a thing..." I said slowly.

"It's a thing.  Big thing.  Big thing," Wilson said.  He looked impatiently at the watch on his wrist and bounced his knees.  "We gotta get going though so jump in! The back is not that bad, I promise.  It'll be fun.  A good party story later in life.  Tell your friends like 'hey, I rode in the back of a cop car once.'"

I stared into the black back seat where a gate was going to keep me from properly communicating with Wilson.  The window was also barred.  I looked over my shoulder at the blue low-rider I'd first seen him in the day that my father helped me move in.  "We can't take that car?" I asked, pointing at it.

Wilson bounced on his toes.  I could tell he was getting more and more annoyed with me as each second passed.  Maybe I could piss him off enough to make him ditch his own date.  He inhaled sharply.  "I'm on call so we have to take the duty car.  It's fun in the back!  Don't worry."

I sighed heavily.  There was no way this guy was letting up.  "Can I change first? I'm covered in pee-"

"Good golly-wolly," Wilson laughed harshly.  "Your dad was right.  You really don't like your birthday-" He nearly pulled me into the back seat like I was a criminal.  He slammed the door in my face, nearly crunching my foot in the process.  I gawked at him, though he couldn't see me inside the tinted, barred window.  He jogged around to the drivers' seat, and before I could protest dinner any more, flew backward out of the parking lot and onto the main street.  He was speeding like crazy.

We came to a red light and he hummed angrily.  I watched in disbelief as he flicked on his police siren and forced the cars to part like the Red Sea.  He drove recklessly through another red light at an intersection, but all cars halted for him to speed through since he had his lights on.  Meanwhile, he didn't seem to notice me sliding around all over the back seat.

We arrived at an Olive Garden.  Wilson had to come let me out since my door wouldn't open from the inside.  A family of four eyed me suspiciously in my nasty scrubs as I crawled ashamedly out of the grimy back seat of the cop car.  Wilson didn't address me as he aggressively took my arm and pulled me into the restaurant.  He shoved through the waiting crowd by the front door and tapped the bell at the hostess' desk obnoxiously.  The hostess, who saw him approach and was going to speak to him even before he dinged her bell, froze with her mouth open.  I tried not to laugh as I watched her face, a fake smile spreading from cheek to cheek as she kept her cool with this rude customer.

"Table for two? The wait will be about 45 minutes," she said.

"Reservation for Kilmer at 7:00.  Sorry we are late.  This one wouldn't stop bitching-" Wilson said, pointing his thumb over his shoulder at me.  

The hostess peeked over Wilson's shoulder at me.  I made the classic "what-the-hell-is-this-dickhead-talking-about" face at her and she seemed to immediately read me.  I was too tired to fight this.  And by this, I meant Wilson as a whole.  I had already accepted that this was going to be a disaster date I would talk about four years from now.

We sat at the table and ordered food.  I watched Wilson's face as he handed his menu to the busty, blonde waitress who wrote down our order.  His eyebrows were tightly drawn together and his jaw was clenched.  Almost like a flip had switched, his face relaxed with a single blink and he smiled at me.  "Happy birthday."

"My birthday is tomorrow," I said rudely, crossing my arms across my chest.

Wilson sighed heavily and relaxed in the booth seat we were in.  "My, my, my.  You are a little jokester, aren't you?"

I felt like he was trying to play off the fact that I was NOT, by any means, having a good time.

The waitress plopped down a basket of bread between the two of us.  Wilson grabbed a stick and shoved half of it in his mouth.  I watched as crumbs scattered down the front of his officer uniform, all blue this time instead of tan.  He chewed with his mouth open, flecks of spit flying my direction and landing on my arms and hands.  I crossed my arms across my chest as if it might actually help protect me from the flying spit.  It didn't.

"Let me get a Miller Lite.  Bud Lite.   Whatever beer you have that's light," he said to the waitress, half of the bread still in his mouth.

"Aren't you on call?" I asked. "You shouldn't be drinking."

He winked at me.  "I won't tell if you won't."

I sunk my head into my hands.  "Good god..." I sighed, mainly to myself.  Wilson ignored me.

We sat in silence after that.  Wilson tapped his short, stubby fingers along the table and clicked his tongue as he looked around at the other dinner guests enjoying their carb-loaded meals in the yellow lighting of the restaurant.  I didn't ever know it was possible to go from hero to zero so fast.  Not that Wilson was ever a hero in my book, but he seemed like more of an asshat than ever.  I was praying to God Wilson wouldn't get called into work for some kind of backup.  I was dying to escape this dinner, but after three beers, light or not, I was terrified thinking about what kind of damage this careless cop could do when he wasn't in the right state of mind.  Each time he ordered another beer, I would give him a death stare and tell him, "I don't think that's a good idea."

Each time, he ignored me and drank his next beer faster.

He motioned for the waitress to come to the table once more.  Without him asking, she brought him another mug of beer and placed it in his outstretched hand.

“I really wish you wouldn’t drink another,” I said to Wilson, unable to look this asshole in the eyes anymore as he cupped his fourth mug of beer in his hands.

“Listen, if you’re going to be my girlfriend, you need to be less controlling. I can’t believe this is our first date and you’re already trying to control me,” he said, lifting the rim of the glass cup to his lips and sipping the beer.

There was such a drastic difference between how Wilson was talking to me and treating me now as opposed to how he had been with me in front of my father. I wanted to believe that he was just playing a role to appease my father and give me a good first impression that day, but even earlier this morning, when he asked me to dinner, he seemed to be a totally different person.

“What did you do today?” I asked him.

He sighed in annoyance. “I’ve been on call all day,” he told me, putting to rest any thought that I had about him maybe just having a rough day. Whether he had a good day or not didn’t give him the right to treat me like he was.

He polished off his fourth beer and signaled the waitress for another.

I leapt to my feet. “I’ve got to go to the bathroom.”

Wilson just stared up at me.

I turned and made my way through the tables, the murmur of private conversations surrounding me as I turned my hips to squeeze through chairs and people. I walked back to where the kitchen was and met our waitress as she was rounding the corner of the kitchen with another beer in her hand.

“Don’t you have an alcohol serving limit?” I asked.

She blinked at me and began to stutter.

“He’s on call for work. For police work,” I explained, trying to make her feel bad.

“I mean, he’s the customer though… I didn’t know he was working. Anyway, what he chooses to drink is up to him.” She tried to push past me with the beer, but I put my hand on her shoulder and pushed her back.

“He’s not going to arrest you if you cut him off, you know,” I said.

She gasped at me. “That’s not what I thought would happen anyway-“

“So you’re just going to over-serve him alcohol to boost your tip?” I asked.  I knew my tone was rude but I didn’t care. This was important.  A few other waitresses had protectively gathered around the one who had been serving us.

“What’s the problem?”

The waitress inhaled sharply. “She just couldn’t find the bathroom. It’s this way to the left,” she told me, pointing a finger past me and waiting for me to try and bring up the alcohol issue again.

I glared at her, turned on my heel, and nearly ran to the bathroom. I pulled out my phone and googled the number of the Easton Police Department. I locked myself into a bathroom stall as the phone began to ring.

“Easton P. D., how can we help you?”

“Listen, I have a problem-" I said, running my finger over the latch on the bathroom door.

“Ma’am, let me transfer you to emergencies-"

“No! No,” I blurted. “This is about one of your employees. He’s on call right now. Officer Wilson Kilmer. He’s-"

“Oh… Hold on, sweetheart. I’m going to have to transfer you anyway.”

“What?” I asked. “To who??”

“Please hold.”

The phone began to ring again before I could speak to the receptionist anymore.

“Chief Moore speaking, who is this?” A voice sounded as quickly as the ringing had begun.

“Um, my name is Leah and I’ve got a problem with one of your officers. Officer Wilson Kilmer?”

The other end of the line was silent for a moment. “What has he done?”

“Nothing yet, I suppose. We’re at dinner and he said he’s on call and he’s just been drinking a lot.  He’s intoxicated I think and I just want to make sure he doesn’t get called in. I don’t want him hurting someone because of a lapse in judgment caused by the beer,” I explained hurriedly.

“What?”

“I asked him to stop and even told the waitress to stop serving him but-"

“Is he wearing the uniform?”

I nodded and said, “Yes.”

“Where are you?” He asked.

“The Olive Garden on… uh…. I don’t know… I just moved to Easton like, three days ago. I’m so so sorry-”

“Miss, please. It’s okay. Thank you for the call. We’ll take care of it.” The line went dead.

I walked out of the stall and saw an older woman watching me in the reflection of the mirror as she wiped the water off of her hands. I knew she’d heard it all. She merely nodded at me once and smiled before throwing away her hand towel and exiting the bathroom.  I walked to the sink and threw water on my face before peering at my own tired reflection in the mirror.  God, this had been a long and eventful day.

When I walked back to the table, I was surprised to see Wilson throwing our food into to-go boxes. The food must have just arrived. He looked rushed.

“C’mere, Leah, come on. We’ve got to go. I called you a cab. I’ve got to go to work. They just called me in-“

“What??” I asked, shocked for a moment before I had the idea that maybe he was being called into work by the chief to get his ass chewed.

He grabbed his uniform jacket and threw some money down onto the table. He grabbed both of the boxes of food and pulled me by my wrist through the restaurant and out the door. As we walked out, another cop car turned slowly into the parking lot.

“James,” Wilson said seriously, coming to a halt as James pulled up in front of us and stepped out of the car.  James had a cautious, and yet seemingly unnecessary, hand hovering close to the gun on his hip.  James was also young, with short brown hair covered by his police hat and dimples so deep that you could fall into them if you got too close. He smiled faintly at me.

“Wilson-“

“James.   What’s the problem??  Robbery??  Murder-“

“Hey, man.  Why don’t you jump in the car and I’ll tell you on the way to the station?” James said, almost like he was talking to a confused child.  He looked at me and blinked slowly.

Wilson didn’t even seem to remember that I was standing there as he sprinted around the front of the cop car and dove into the front passenger seat with both my dinner and his.

James instantly turned to me and lowered his voice.  “Miss, we want to thank you for the call.  I’d just be careful around him from now on.”

On, I was planning on it.  I was planning on staying far, far away.  I meant, as far away as I could while still living next door to him.  James stepped back into the police car, closed the door, and sent one more sympathetic look my way as he drove away with Wilson.

At that moment, the taxi arrived.   I hadn’t even thought about the fact that Wilson literally called me a taxi to drive me home.  Not even something more clean and modern, like an uber or a lift.   There was something about just looking at the rusty, yellow taxi that made me feel dirty - well, dirtier than I already was.  I climbed into the cab slowly, avoiding a splash of grey mystery goop on the faux-leather seat and trying not to lean too far back.  There was a rip in the seat behind my back, and I was nervous that if I relaxed too much, I'd be sucked into the trunk by some taxi-demon.  I was hesitant to even pull the slick, greasy seatbelt across my still pee-stained scrubs.

The driver coughed so hard that I was worried a lung was going to hit the windshield.  It was obvious he'd just polished off a cigarette, the smell lingering despite the car's open windows.

"Where to?" He croaked.

I almost couldn't remember my new address.  "Marble Park apartments," I finally told him after racking my brain. He tried to make small talk, but I was too busy running over the events of the day to have a conversation with him.

When we got to the apartments, I paid the cigarette smoke-ridden cab driver and dragged myself out of the torn-up back seat, accidentally dragging my hand through the mystery goop I'd tried so hard to avoid the whole 20 minutes home.  I groaned and wiped whatever the sticky residue was onto my pee-stained scrubs and sighed heavily and almost sing-song-y as I rounded the corner of the quad.  It was dark outside, all except for the three, dim porch lights that were bright enough only to illuminate the three feet of porch there was for the first-floor apartments.  The lamp post in the middle of the quad was also dimly lit.

I used the entirety of my body weight to open the front door to my apartment.  I immediately dropped my purse, pulled my shirt over my head and pulled my pants down to my knees, using my feet to push them the rest of the way off of my legs.  I walked straight back to my bathroom and didn't even wait for the water to turn hot before I had slumped against the shower wall, letting the water flow over my skin which felt like it had a thick layer of grime on it.  Grime from being coughed and sneezed on.  Grime from being peed on.  Grime from Wilson's spit.  Grime from the cab.  It was like I could feel it coming off in layers as I dragged a bar of soap slowly over my skin.

I hadn't washed my hair because I liked to wash it in the mornings.  I threw it up in a messy bun on top of my head. The bun looked way better than whatever mess Shelley had created with her own hair, if I did say so myself.  I wiped the mascara off of where the steam from the shower had made it bleed down my cheeks.  Took my contacts out.  Threw on my glasses.  Put on some old, purple sweats I had.  Pulled on an old bralette.  I walked into the kitchen of my apartment and opened the cupboard.  Without giving it much thought, I snagged a bag of popcorn kernels, threw it into the microwave, and pressed the "six" button.  I knew it wouldn't take that long, but I would stop it when the popcorn had popped.  I stood, leaning my bare stomach against the cold, fake granite of the counter and stared blankly into the microwave.  A ring from my phone snapped me out of my trance.

"Hello?" I answered.

There was no reply.  

"Dad, are you there?"

I began to walk around my apartment, searching for a clear signal.  I could hear bits and pieces of something my father was trying to say - probably just checking in on me - but I couldn't get a full sentence from him.

The call ended.  I was standing by the window at the front of my apartment.  I typed out a quick text to my father:

Couldn't hear you.  We can try again tomorrow.  I've had a long first day.  Love you - L.

As I sent that text, I scrolled through some of the other text messages I'd been receiving from old friends for my birthday - Impersonal and brief "Happy Birthday!" messages that didn't bring me as much joy as they did in the past.  Getting caught up in the messages, I didn't realize that my popcorn had begun to burn. The smell filled the apartment, and I scurried to tear the smoking bag out of the microwave.  Smoke began to cloud the ceiling.  I burned my finger on the top of the bag where the smoke was coming out and dropped the bag to the floor.  Swearing, I hurried to the window and threw it open to prevent the single smoke detector in my apartment from releasing a shrill alarm and disrupting the peace of my new neighbors.

As I stood at the window, I rubbed my eyes with my uninjured fingers.  I examined the part of my finger that stung from the burned bag of kernels.

"Alright?"

I nearly leapt out of my skin.  I thought for a moment someone was standing in my apartment, but I finally realized that Harry was standing just outside the window.  I hardly noticed him since it was so dark outside and he was still dressed in all sorts of dark colors.  

"Fucks sake-" I exclaimed.  "I- I- I'm okay.  I'm fine.  You scared the hell out of me-"

"I'm sorry," Harry laughed, coming a little bit closer to the window.  The light from my kitchen illuminated his handsome face.  It also allowed me to see that he was holding some sort of green gardening can.  "I was just putting a little bit of plant food in Miss Jones' plants.  I do it every week or so.  Helps 'em stay alive," he explained.  

"At night?" I asked.

"What?"

"At night?  You feed the plants at this time of night?" I repeated, raising my wrist to look at a watch I realized wasn't there only after I'd checked the imaginary time.  

Harry laughed awkwardly.  "Eh, well, yes.  She doesn't know I do it.  At least, I don't think she does."

I stood and stared at him, becoming more consciously aware of my appearance and clothing (or lack thereof) and the fact that he'd probably been peeking in the window the whole time I'd burned my snack and been chasing some kind of cellular service.  For as much as I wanted to be creeped out, my stomach was fluttering.  He wasn't creeping in my window.  He was feeding Miss Jones' plants.  Her goddamn plants.

I walked out the front door and stood to the right side of my porch, leaning over the banister toward Harry's silhouette.  He watched me only for a short moment before he returned to shaking some of the small pellets of plant food into the vases on the ground and the plants hanging from Miss Jones' porch.  I wanted to ask him something.  Tell him something.  Have him ask me a question or anything to get us involved.  However, I stood for a few minutes in silence, in the dim lighting from my kitchen and the small light in the middle of the quad, and listened to the plant food pellets tap against the sides of the plants' bowls and vases.

When he'd run out of plant food, Harry sighed softly.  "Good night, then."

His feet brushed weightlessly against the grass as he began to walk away.

"Harry," I called quietly, almost as if I was whispering it to myself.

He stopped.  I saw the black shape of his body turn toward me, his figure becoming more visual as he stepped closer into the small amount of light from the kitchen again.  He stood and waited without saying anything.

I had a sudden wave of confidence wash over my body.  I stood up straight, sticking out my chest even though I know he couldn't really see my perky breasts in my bralette.  I took a deep breath, but just as quickly as the confidence had come, it went away. "Um-" I started.  My inner self was begging me to say something.  Anything.  

"Come inside?" I said.  I asked.  I whispered.  I basically breathed it.  I wondered if he even heard me.  I felt like an absolute dumbass.  Should I repeat myself?  What if he said no?  It was late.  Surely he would say no.  What was I inviting him in for?  Burnt popcorn?  I didn't know what part of me was asking him into my apartment, but could only imagine it wasn't for a cup of tea and small talk.  What did I think was going to happen?  He was going to just lean in and kiss me and-

"Sure."

"What?" I asked.

"I'll come in.  Let me take a look at your finger," he said.

Like that morning, I had to keep my mouth from falling open.  I turned around abruptly and opened my front door for him.  He followed me inside.  He moved so quickly and so silently that I just about jumped out of my skin again when I turned around and he was standing only eight inches from me.  He gripped my hand and extended my fingers, like he had the day I was moving in.  This time, however, I let him look, even though there was nothing there anymore.  No evidence of any serious damage.

"I think you'll survive," he told me after evaluating the non-existent injury.  "Your heart line here is showing some pretty interesting stuff, though," he said, dragging a long finger along one of the creases in the palm of my hand.  

"What?" I asked, kind of laughing to myself.  I'd never much believed in palm-reading or horoscopes or anything like that, but it was always interesting to read about and learn about. "What does it say?" I asked him, looking down at my own palm.

"It's about your love life," he said.  "Did you have a good date tonight?"

"No," I gushed, looking up into Harry's eyes.  I laughed just thinking about it.  "It was a disaster.  Does the palm say I'm destined for a long, devoted, and romantic relationship with Wilson?  After tonight, I'd rather die before having to spend more time with him."

Harry's mouth curled into a small, almost triumphant smile, but he shook his head.  "It says something about a tall brunette kissing you.  Unless you object."

My heart pounded in my chest.  "Oh?" I squeaked, nearly losing the ability to speak.  "My palm is that specific?" I asked.

Harry took a step toward me and began to lean in.  "I don't know," Harry chuckled.  "I can't read palms."

I lifted my mouth to meet his.  I began to instantly feel drowsy, like the room was spinning and I was going weak.  Harry wrapped an arm around my lower back and pulled my body more into his.  I felt like fireworks were exploding in my stomach.  His lips were warm and full.  I wanted to sink my teeth into them.  Without separating our lips, I began to pull him toward my bedroom, tugging at the hem of his black shirt as we went.  Clothes began to litter the living room.  I flicked off the lights as we neared the bedroom.  For as much as I wanted to look at Harry's handsome face, just the feeling of his mouth, which was making its way up and down my neck, was creating an overwhelming sense of euphoria in me.  

He was like a drug, his touch giving me an immediate high.  As he pulled his fingernails over my skin, a line of goosebumps followed.  His moans as he felt my body were giving me a confidence I didn't know I had.  I remember that he was on top of me, kissing down my stomach.  I was on top of him, sucking on the soft skin of his neck.  His hands were twisting into my hair and I was tugging on his.  We were twisting and turning around each other, around the sheets... tangling our lips, our legs, our arms... and before I knew it, the sun was coming up.  

I blinked my eyes open.  I stretched and turned my neck to look at Harry beside me... only he wasn't there.  The sheets were tousled like someone had been there, but any other evidence of Harry was gone.

[ponticle]

8pm [12 Hours to Solve This Anderstair Challenge]

Alistair x Anders, Modern AU, Coffee Shop Universe

[challenge masterpost]

[Read it on Ao3]

Chapter Summary: Anders get curious. Alistair hesitantly tells the story of how he and Icis got together. Rated T: just some bittersweet things.

“So can you speak to Icis now?” I ask. “I mean… if you wanted to…”

“Not really,” he answers. “I pretty much ruined everything. Who calls off a wedding that close to the date?”

“Assholes,” I tease.

He snorts. “Yup… that's me—just a walking asshole… thank god you've found a use for those…”

“What is she doing now?” I ask.

“She took a job at Beth Israel, actually… you're practically neighbors,” he laughs, but it's humorless.

I shudder. “I really hope we don't run into her…”

He looks at me. “We?”

I blush. “Yeah… Please come home with me.”

He shrugs. He’s not ready to agree to my terms, yet, but I think he’s close. Since we’re in a sharing mood, I decide to let myself be curious.

“What happened with Icis?”

“You mean the break up?” he asks. “I told her I couldn’t marry her… it was horrible. She actually cried—I’d never seen her cry before that.”

We stare at each other for a long time. I’m trying to read his expression.

“I actually meant in the beginning…” I explain. “You guys got together so fast.”

“Oh,” he raises an eyebrow and smiles at a spot in the distance, “that’s a really good story, actually… are you sure you want to hear it?”

I know it will make me feel jealous, but I think I do. I nod.

 Alistair is having a shitty morning. His scrubs came out of the dryer slightly damp, his upstairs neighbor used up all the hot water, and he spilled coffee on his jacket. All of this misfortune is made worse by the fact that he still doesn’t know what he’s doing at work. He’s been at it over two months, but the procedures at this hospital are significantly different than they were at Tufts. He’s still learning.

Inside the double doors of the hospital, he’s immediately greeted with a stack of paperwork. A records admin, who is a grouchy older man—hell-bent on ruining Alistair’s life, it seems—throws the papers into Alistair’s arms and harrumphs. Everyone acts like Alistair should already been proficient at everything. He isn’t sure why that’s an expectation.

He rounds the corner toward his office, just trying to keep his head down, when a short, blonde woman runs around the corner, directly into him. Predictably, all his papers flutter to the floor. Unfortunately, the woman was also carrying a thermos filled with tea. Now, the tea is mixing with the papers on the floor.

He immediately squats down to assess the damage. He tries to pick up as many of the papers as he can, but he can tell already that it’s a losing battle.

“I’m so sorry,” says the woman. She kneels down next to him and tries to sop up some of the tea with her coat—it’s white, but short. She must be a resident.

He looks up at her for the first time.  “Oh my god, Icis?”

Her eyes widen, “Dr. Theirin!” she shrieks. “Oh my god—I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” he lies. None of this is okay—that grouchy records guy is going to murder him.

“Can I help you in some way?” Icis asks.

“I doubt it,” he smirks. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m a radiology resident,” she explains. “Interventional.”

“Oh…” he cocks his head to the side, “Taking after Dr. Pavus, huh?”

She blushes, “He was always my favorite professor—next to you, of course.”

He laughs. He’s managed to pick up all the papers, although they’re not salvageable—he can tell already.

“I need to get a new set of scrubs,” she looks down at herself miserably.

“I’ll go with you.” His own shirt is totally stained.

They walk side by side to the laundry to get new clothes. When they arrive, they’re given two new sets—his are blue, hers are green.

“So, how long have you been here?” she asks.

“Just about two months,” he explains. He doesn’t want to get into why with a former student. It doesn’t seem appropriate, even though she met Anders on that fated camping trip.

“Nice—I just arrived two weeks ago,” she explains.

Right. He missed the last couple months of her internship. He thinks about his students a lot, actually. He’s been wondering how they all made out.

“Do you keep in touch with any of the other interns?” he asks.

“Krem and I text a lot,” she answers. “He sends me funny memes.”

“That’s nice,” smiles Alistair. “Where is he now?”

“He’s in Chicago,” she answers, “—cardiology.”

“Yikes—I had a feeling, though,” laughs Alistair.

Alistair has never wanted to do anything surgical or high-risk. He loves the idea of using the most conservative option first.

She looks down at her watch, “Ooh, I’m late—can we catch up later, though?”

“Sure, let me give you my cell number,” he writes on a scrap of coffee-stained paper and hands it over.

She laughs and nods before running down the hallway.

 They hang out for the first time as friends a week later.

Alistair meets her outside her apartment. She lives with three roommates.

“They’re loud, but nice,” she explains. “I didn’t know anything about Brooklyn, so they’re helping me.”

“Well, let me show you some things you might not know about yet, then,” Alistair offers. “Do you know the Gold Star Beer Counter?”

She shakes her head.

“You’re going to love it,” he concludes.

As they walk there, he gets curious. “So… I take it you never worked it out with Sera?”

She bites her bottom lip and shakes her head. “We were becoming too different—she was perfect for me when I was in undergrad… but…”

He nods, “Yeah… I know how that feels. No one can understand what this life is like from the outside.”

“Exactly,” she smiles. “What about you? Have you met any handsome boys out here?”

He laughs. She's assuming. “No… and no girls either,” he coughs pointedly.

“Shit. I'm the worst,” she rolls her eyes. “I'm bi too… but it doesn't stop me from making assumptions, just like everyone else…”

“That sort of thing is very deeply ingrained,” agrees Alistair.

They walk silently for the next twenty steps. It occurs to him that this suddenly feels like a date—now that they know their genders aren't an impediment. He doesn't want that. She was his student. It's creepy and makes him feel like a predator.

He spends the rest of the night making it clear that they're friends—colleagues, even. Luckily, they don't hit any snags and he's walked her back to her apartment before he knows it. Everything is as it should be.

“Thanks for showing me around, Dr. Theirin,” she says happily.

“You can just call me Alistair now,” he offers. They’re both doctors now; that’s the usual convention.

“Sure thing, Al,” she jokes.

He shrugs. That will work.

“Let’s hang out again sometime soon, okay?” she says.

“Okay, Icis—just text me.”

 They see each other several times over the next few weeks. Their schedules don’t line up often, though. As a resident, she has to work lots of 24 and 36 hour shifts, so she’s not very available. Alistair is lonely in the city. He calls Dorian a lot, but every time he’s not actively doing something—teaching or working out or reading—he starts to think about Anders. It’s starting to feel pathological—and he doesn’t know of any interventions for a broken heart.

One morning, there’s a knock on his door. It’s only 6am.

He staggers to open it. On the other side, Icis almost collapses.

“Icis?” he gasps, ushering her inside.

“I think I’m sick,” she mumbles.

He can tell she’s sick just looking at her—her face is pale, but sweaty; her eyes are threatening to close. Most alarmingly, she’s slurring her words.

“Icis, we need to take your temperature,” he says seriously.

She nods and lets her weight drop into his arms.

Her feet are almost dragging on the floor as he brings her into his bedroom. As he does it, he realizes that this is a stupid place to put her, but based on the layout of his apartment, it was closer than his living room. A lot of Brooklyn apartments are strangely constructed—his is no exception.

While he’s looking for his medical kit, he hears her mumble something that he can’t understand.

“What, Icis?” he calls.

She says something equally unintelligible.

He whirls around the corner and shoves the thermometer in her mouth before she can argue. It’s not the good one he uses at work—he keeps that one in his office—it’s an old one, filled with mercury. Transiently, he hopes she doesn’t bite down on it and die.

While they’re waiting, he sits next to her on the side of the bed and pushes the hair off of her face. Her bangs are stuck against her forehead—sweaty and tangled. He notices she’s wearing scrubs.

“How many hours were you at the hospital this time?” he asks.

She shrugs. She can’t answer because she still has the thermometer in her mouth. She holds up her hands—ten fingers, four times, and then three more.

“Forty-three hours?” he raises his eyebrows, “Dear god, woman…” he smiles.

She smiles around the thermometer, despite how terrible she probably feels.

Eventually, he pulls the thermometer out of her mouth and holds it up to the light.

“102.3,” he says.

She rolls her eyes and starts to sit up.

“Are you insane?” he laughs, pushing her back, “You’re not in any condition to get home right now. If I had a car, I’d drive you, but this is probably better anyway—you need someone to look after you… and I’ve met your roommates—they seem like idiots.”

She laughs, despite herself. “Can I at least get out of these scrubs? I feel so disgusting.”

Alistair stands to leave the room, but when Icis stands up, she starts to fall toward his dresser almost immediately. He has to grab her around the waist just to keep her upright.

“I think you need help,” he offers.

She nods. All her normal decorum is gone—she looks like she just went through a washing machine’s spin cycle.

Alistair realizes it could be weird to help her undress—in his room—but he straightens his spine and assumes his most clinical facade. He’s seen humans naked—it’s just anatomy.

When she’s down to her underwear, Alistair hands her one of his softest T-shirts and helps her pull it down over her head. She slips into his bed, beneath the covers, and almost instantly falls asleep. She’s shaking a little, so he puts an extra blanket over her and makes his way back out to the kitchen. He would have slept another hour, but he can hardly see the point now. He doesn’t have to work today, so he sets himself timers to go check on her every hour.

 The next morning, her fever has finally broken. When he comes in to check on her at 8am, she’s sitting up in bed, sipping water.

“Hi,” she says sleepily. “I’m so sorry to barge in on you like this.”

He shakes his head and sits next to her legs on the side of the bed. “It’s okay—I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

“Thanks,” she says. “I just didn’t know where else to go…” she mumbles.

He’s not sure what that means. “Why didn’t you go home?”

She laughs. “Well… I knew I needed help… and yours was the only face I could picture.”

He blushes. “I’m glad I was available.”

She smiles, “Me too…”

They’re silent for a minute. He isn’t sure what he should do now that she’s awake. He knows her really well, but not as a friend—especially not as a half-dressed friend in his bed.

“Alistair?” she whispers.

He refocuses on her eyes and leans in.

“Thank you.” She leans in as if she’s about to kiss him, but instead nuzzles her head into the crook of his neck.

It feels like she’s communing with some small forgotten fragment of his soul that no one has touched since… since Anders. In that one moment, everything changes. She’s suddenly not the sick person taking refuge in his apartment, but someone who sees him for who he really is.

“Icis?” he croaks. “Will you stay with me for a while?” He turns his head to make shaky eye contact.

“As long as you’ll let me.”

 Presently

“And after that, we were pretty much together,” explains Alistair.

I’m trying not to let it show on my face, but I’m really jealous—more than I thought I would be.

“What?” he asks, looking at me.

“I just didn’t know how romantic that was going to be…” I grumble.

He laughs and kisses me. “The most romantic part is that she reminded me of you.”

[sku1lrose-blog]

First kill

It was in the aftermath of what had happened with my brother. I had to go through a lot of therapy, a lot of suppressed memories. I didn't think I needed that mandatory therapy, I still think the same. I think it was all just a time spent talking about things that are where they supposed to be, in the past. I had to take a lot of medication too. Annoying. I was fine, and still am. I don't need some pills to do my job, nor live my life. I am fine.

I came back to my outpost, and back on duty 6 months after killing my own brother in the abandoned hospital. I had a lot of paperwork to do, and, quite honestly, a lot of time to do so. After all, I lived in the most boring town of the most boring state in the world.

It was all easy money. No work, but get paid, really nice.

Anyway, to get back to the story.

I was bored. But not like checking the fridge every five minutes bored. No. I was out of my skin bored. Nothing felt comfortable, nothing felt quite right. So I decided to change it.

That's when I found her.

A cute little red haired woman. Social study proffessor at our local community college.Almost as damaged as me. I ran a background check on her the same day I met her. Don't judge me, in my line of work, we are taught to doubt everyone.

Anyhow, it was like in the movies. We met by bumping onto each other on the street. I knocked some papers out of her hands. Must have been an exam or something like that, since she was carrying a lot of those.

Stress... That was all I saw in her eyes. It was like she was ashamed of looking me in the eyes. Either that, or she was afraid of me.

I mean I wouldn't blame her. Even my coworkers looked at me with a certain dose of fear. I guess that was because I shot and killed my own brother. My own flesh and blood. But that didn't change me.not one bit.

All I know is that I started writting again. I used to do that a lot when I was a child. All of my proffessors told me I had a gift for imagining, and writting things only I could see. But alas, it was not in my plan. To live of of my imagination. It's too unstable of a job for theese times. And I liked catching idiots in crime more. Seemed a lot more fun than it really is. I mean the worst was when some granny called me to report her senior neighbour for "killing" her dog. It would be all good, if that was my job, and if that same granny DID have a dog. Her dog died of old age five years prior to her calling me to investigate.

Anyway, that night I got back to writting, I didn't even realise I was writting. I was just sitting home, at my lap top (kind of the same as I am now) and I was doing my research on the proffessor I mentioned a little bit earlier. I was listening to Beethovens' Moonlinght sonata third movement, when my fingers started following the music on the keyboard. Funny enough, I don't even remember opening Word when I started typing.

When I finished, I was stunned by what my subconcience, along with my brain, produced. I never knew I could write something like that.

"It was at the corner of the main street, and 52nd. There was a nice warm breeze, with a really nice, and sweet smell in the air. The sun was shining, so I needded my sunglasses to see better. It was really nice, and pleasant to be outside in this conditions. I felt warmth surrounding me, and soft breeze going through my hair and beard. How long since I shaved last time? I don't even remember. Or maybe I do, but I just don't care. Something hit me!!! Panic! Wow! That smell is hers. Did she bump into me, or did I bump into her while being lost in translation of this fine fine pre-summer weather? I menaged to collect myself to muster a simple and quiet "sorry". Then she looked up, while we were both collecting some papers of fromthe pavement. Those eyes. Wow! I was simply stunned. Like someone had just hit me over the head with a montauin, on top of a plane on top of a tractor. I was cemented in place. That sorrow. Fear. Shiverring. So much potential for those eyes. I hope to see them lighten up next time I meet this mysterious woman."

Amazing what my subconcience caught, and remembered. I couldn't put it like that even if I tried my best to do so.

I did my "research", and I found her.

She was broken, almost as I was. Her ex, who she lived with abused her. Beatings on a daily basis, and sometimes even rape. And she tolerated his behavior. Idiot. He is not changing for anyne honey. Get that through to that smart brain of yours.

I waited for her outside her classroom the next day. As she walked through that door, I suddenly smelt that same beautiful candy flavored scent all around me.

"Hi. Can I help you with something?" were the first words she said, after which she froze for a second. I guess she remembered who I was.

"Actually, you can. I would like to talk to you, if that is okay with you." I said after a moment of hesitation.

"This way, please" she said as she lifted her right arm, showing me the way.

"Please, hae a seat. Would you like something to drink."

"Just a glass of water, if you don't mind, it's very hot outside." I lied. I was feeling hot, and I was sweating like a pig because of her.

"Okay, so please tell me, detective, what can I do for you?"

(I could think of a couple of things) "Well, this may sound a bit wierd, but I can't get you out of my head since yesterday, so I snooped around for a bit, and I came here with intention to just have a conversation with you. I hope that is okay with you miss."

"Wh... Why would you like to have a conversation with me? Did I do something?"

"No, no" I assured her "I am not here onofficial police bussiness today. I just wanted to get to know you. You intrigue me."

"Intrigue?"

"Yes! I could see fear of men in general in your eyes, not the usual kind of fear I am used to, after... Well, you know."

"Yes, I do. So what would you like to know?"

"Tell me everything."

And she did. Don't worry, thi isn't a play, so I will not write the entire conversation. Even if I wanted to, I don't remember like 70% of that.

Anyhow, we started dating. Me, a loner, who didn't like to be touched, and just sat in silence, or listened to classical music for hours at a time, and her, a social study proffessor, beaten and raped by her ex boyfriend.

We heard he was in jail for possessing, and using drugs, and a gun. I was so 'surprised' when I heard the news. Scum of the earth. Parasite. What do you think, who tipped him of?

To this day, he swears he was framed. I only partially agree with him. He was stupid enough to not notice what 'someone' left in his apartment.

Anyhow, her eyes were glowing that day. It was like looking into two big-ass hazelnut colored stars on top of a body sitting across me during dinner.

That night she went wild. We ended up in my house. It was like magic. She was out of control.

Like she knew what I had done, and rewarded me for my 'mision'. I felt her. Everywhere. That scent I felt, it wasn't perfume, my friends, no. Her skin was what gave that scent away. And now, that scent was smeared all over my body. So much sweat, those moans, right volume, right place. Right into my ear, as she bit that same ear. That drew out some unknown flame out of me. Even I didn't know I had that inside me.

I was like wild animal. I kept going faster, harder, deeper.

"Choke me" she whispered.

Her pulse. So strong. So disturbed. So unequal. Her blood flow. As I squeezed, I felt more and more things under my palm. I felt her breath wearing thin, her voice chords stretching, like she was trying to say something. But I couldn't hear anything lost in that sudden impact of power, passion, and bloodlust. I kept squeezing life out of her.

That fear in her eyes. That look as she realized she is not going home anytime soon. That look as she realized she said wrong words to the wrong person. That fear as she realized she was, indeed, going to die.

That somehow made me want more of it, and made me even wilder.

When I came to, she wasn't moving.

As I looked down, I realized that she wasn't even breathing.

Ode to death. That was playing in the background, on my gramophone, silently, inpatiently.

A fitting part, don't you think?

I have to make her disappear. So, i went into the woods, and lit a fire. I was very careful, and I waited for quite some time.

I didn't know that human flesh smells so bad when set on fire.

After the fire died out, I checked to be sure there was nothing left as evidence. After all, I am a homicide detective. It would be a very cruel joke if I had to chase, and try to catch myself.

After that, I called Rangers'department, and reported a smoke coming out from the forest.

As I sat down in a chair in my living room, I sipped some bourbon, and I was looking at the almost empty bottle, when I realized one little fact. Now, I am a killer. I am not terrified, nor am I sorry for what I did. I liked it, very much, for that matter. And I was sure of only to things.

One, I am not stopping anytime soon.

And two, that was my first kill.

[robininthelabyrinth]

Fic: An Internal Affair - Chapter 9 (Ao3 link)

Fandom: The Flash Pairing: Leonard Snart/Barry Allen

Summary: Leonard Snart, the CCPD Captain of Internal Affairs, is known as Captain Cold for a very good reason: He hates corrupt cops with a merciless vengeance, and once you’re on his list, you’re in serious trouble.

His next target?

A CCPD lab tech named Barry Allen who’s developed a suspicious habit of disappearing at random intervals.

—————————————————————————————————

"You're doing it again," Danvers says gleefully.

Len puts his phone down. "No idea what you're talking about," he lies.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about."

"Nope."

"You're smiling. You never smile."

"I smile."

"You really don't, boss," Danvers chides. "You should. It's a good look on you."

Len arches his eyebrows at her.

"It is!" she insists. "I mean, sure, okay, you've managed to convince at least six people here that you're about to purge the department, but that's just because you look kinda smug and demonic when you smile -"

Len grins, with teeth.

"Stop that, it's not a good thing."

Len's not so sure about that.

His phone buzzes.

Len can feel his vicious grin melting into a softer, fonder smile.

"Go on," Danvers says, her own smile turning positively wicked. Len's proud: that's entirely his influence. "Don't leave your boyfriend hanging."

"We went on one date, Danvers."

"Oh, it was a date, now; I thought it was just an information-gathering dinner..."

"It can be both," Len says with great dignity. "Please ignore all previous statements to the contrary."

"Boss..."

"I know, I know," Len says, holding his hands up in concession. "Don't worry, I'm not crossing any lines with it. It'll stay platonic - at least until I clear him, anyway. Then we can be boyfriends."

“Woo hoo!” Danvers cheers. “One very cute guy, in the bag –”

“And how would you know that?”

“I went to sneak a peek at him, obviously,” Danvers says, absolutely shameless. “Have to know what’s good enough to catch my boss’ eyes, don’t I?”

"Oh, shut up," Len tells her, but his attention is back on his phone, reading Allen's latest ridiculous story about his (highly implausible) workday. The most recent twist involves several long paragraphs regarding his newly discovered dreams of retiring to a goat farm.

Allen texts remarkably fast.

Must be a millennial thing.

It's nice, though; Len's used to being the talker, the chatty one, but Allen (should he call him Barry?) has a motor mouth that puts Len's to shame.

(Mick would find it hilarious and say it’s exactly what Len deserves.)

At least Len's still winning their pun-off hands down.

Not literally hands down, of course, since it's happening largely through text.

Heh, he'll have to mention that one to Allen...

"When are you going to see him again?" Danvers asks, interrupting Len's pun-related reverie. "For a date, I mean; not for an investigation."

"I'm still investigating him," Len reminds her. And himself.

"Yeah, yeah, I know, I know, you’re still investigating, of course you are," Danvers replies, flapping her hands at him. "You're way too paranoid - what you told me about Allen investigating the Flash makes perfect sense to me. Especially since we've managed to correlate a lot of Allen's mysterious disappearances and out-of-field conversations with all the stuff the Flash is up to. We just need to prove it and bam! Dating free and clear."

"Bam? Really?"

"I watch a lot of Food Network," Danvers says. "Shut up. Seriously, though, you're not going to wait until the investigation is done to go out with him again, are you? Tell me you're not!"

"I'm seeing him again tonight," Len admits.

Danvers literally punches the air.

"You're overly invested in this," Len tells her. "Seriously over-invested."

She rolls her eyes at him. "You tell me all about it! All the time!"

"You're my secretary! I need you to make sure that I don't double book over any MR days or anything."

"A, it’s admin assistant, not secretary. B, you went to see Mick yesterday," Danvers says. "Because Allen was working late to make up for taking the day off after being at court in the morning the day before. You know perfectly well that you're not missing anything; you just want to gloat."

Well.

She's not entirely wrong.

Though Len still feels obscurely guilty about how much time he's spending on Allen instead of his usual work, even though the DAs have suggested that they’re appreciating the break.

Or maybe the guilt comes from the fact that he still hasn't figured out exactly how, or why, Allen faked the coma business, and how that ties in with whatever STAR Labs is up to with the Flash - a question that will only be answered either by Allen himself, or with the arrest of the Flash.

Both, ideally.

(No, Len does not have daydreams of presenting the Flash handcuffed to Allen on a silver platter. Really. At all. That would be unprofessional and unproductive, and anyway he probably won't be the one making the arrest if everything goes well; that honor would be going to Detective Thawne, him being an actual detective and all.)

He really hopes Allen is clean – well, clean of everything but a bit of insurance fraud, but insurance fraud in the pursuit of his mother’s murderer; surely that’s somewhat more understandable, right?

Mick would understand that.

Len thinks Mick would like Allen.

He confessed the whole thing to Mick during his visit the day before: how wonderfully their dinner (date) had gone, how they'd connected and talked and kept talking, how Len's infatuation was moving from a mostly physical attraction and a slight appreciation for Allen's niceness towards something far more dangerous...how he was worried that he would let his feelings interfere with his investigation.

How he knows they already have.

They have been from the start, when he began investigating Allen as much because of Mick as anything else, and they are now, with his fondness for Allen leading him to want to find a result that will exonerate him.

Yes, the Flash theory makes sense, but it isn’t the only possibility. After all, Allen could still be an accomplice.

He could still be corrupt.

God, Len wishes he knew what STAR Labs was up to.

He just can’t figure out what the Flash's deal is.

The guy claimed that he isn't seeking glory, and despite himself Len thinks he believes him, so it’s not about that. Nor does the Flash seem motivated by revenge, the way the Hood/Arrow's vendetta against crime had obviously been at the start. And it certainly isn't some idiot joyriding around on some new technology, either.

Len would be willing to give the Flash the benefit of the doubt and say that the whole thing really is stemming from an overdeveloped sense of public duty, but every time he considers it, he thinks about Allen, and more than Allen, he thinks about all those damn disappearances.

Far too many people seem to disappear without a trace after an encounter with the Flash, or at the very least streaks of lightning that suggest his presence.

The latest disappearance: LaShawna Baez, an ex-medical student that'd gotten tangled up with a bad boyfriend with Family ties.

Of course, they all suspected the boyfriend was responsible when he'd gotten caught, but when questioned, he swore that he'd left her behind to be captured by the cops or the Flash when their little Bonny-and-Clyde streak of robberies went off the rails.

Heh.

Streak of robberies...

Either way, another disappearance like that, right around yet another Flash sighting? Not good. After all, at most, Baez would have been guilty of grand robbery without any aggravating factors, like use of arms or felony manslaughter, and that sort of crime doesn't come with a death sentence. If the Flash killed her, then there can be no doubt that he is perverting the legal system in the worst of ways.

And if he isn't killing them, then where are they?

A mystery.

Unlike many people, Len didn't become a cop because he likes solving mysteries. He became a cop because he wants to see justice done. Mysteries are nothing but an impediment to that goal.

Len's phone buzzes again.

Not Allen, though; it's a text from...Danvers?

It reads: "Where are you taking him?"

"Very funny," Len tells her, looking up and rolling his eyes at her.

"Hey, since it seems like you're only accepting messages by phone today, I figured I'd follow protocol," Danvers says, laughing and putting down her own phone. "But seriously, where are you going? Not somewhere outside, I hope; the forecast is for intermittent bursts of rain."

"No, not outside. He's picked a restaurant downtown," Len says. "Hole-in-the-wall in an iffy area, but supposedly the best pasta you can find in the city."

"Better than Antonio's?"

"Doubtful -" No one's pasta is better than what the seemingly immortal Antonio served up in his eponymous restaurant, and Len's not just saying that because he more or less survived his pre-teen years on Antonio's willingness to trade extra bowls of pasta for help washing up the tables that Len suspects he didn't really need. "- but it's always worth a try."

"Have fun," Danvers says. "Though - if it's an iffy part of the city -"

"I'm not wearing the mask on a date, Danvers," Len says sternly. "No. Just - no."

"Fine," she says, pouting. "But you take two phones and an emergency alert, got it?"

"Danvers -"

"No, boss. This is non-negotiable. You're still basically number one on the Family hit list. Just because they've left off a bit now that you're doing internal affairs in the middle of a police station most of the time doesn't mean that they'll hesitate to shoot you if they see you on their turf."

"I'll be careful," Len promises.

Danvers doesn't look entirely appeased, but it's the best she's going to get, so she takes it.

Len kills the next few hours with a combination of texting with Allen and finishing up the paperwork to get warrants on the next batch of cops under suspicion.

He's a little worried that all that texting means that they won't have anything to talk about during dinner, but that fear turns out to be totally misplaced: the conversation flows as easily as the endless refills of soda that Allen keeps draining in his infectious excitement.

(The pasta's no Antonio's, but the breadsticks are definitely out of this world. He'll have to tell Danvers.)

Len's not even sure what they talked about: everything and anything, from the deplorable state of politics in Central to the perils of paperwork, the need to improve infrastructure in the slums without it resulting in gentrification and the eviction of the current residents, to the trials and tribulations inherent in finding just the right present for their respective siblings/best friends.

They're both laughing over some dumb joke Len made - some unnecessarily complicated and definitely not-actually-that-funny thing about the Central City Combines and the Transformers cartoon/toy series - when they leave to go home, with Allen laughing so hard that he needs to lean a hand against Len's shoulder to steady himself and Len wiping tears of amusement out of his eyes.

That's probably why he doesn't see the guy sliding out of the darkness to cut off the exit to the alleyway that's the only way in or out of the restaurant.

He definitely hears it when the guy snarls, "Put your hands up and no one'll get hurt," though.

They both stop laughing at once and turn to look at the mugger.

He's of average height and build, dressed in baggy clothing of assorted colors that have faded through over-use. He seems moderately well-put together, though, despite the stringy brown hair that seems to be trying to form white-man's-dreadlocks - which is to say, knots.

He's holding a switchblade on them.

It's not even a gun.

"Seriously?" Allen says. "Seriously? You just – to – right in the middle of – jeez, some people just have no luck."

Len couldn't agree more. What sort of unfortunate luck must a mugger have to pick not one but two CCPD employees, a cop and a CSI, to try to rob?

Of course, Allen doesn't know what Len does, and Len doesn't want it to come out this way - then he'd have to confess to the yet-unfinished investigation, because there's no way that he works at the same precinct and doesn't know about Allen.

If anything, that restriction cripples him more than his current need to use a crutch.

"I mean it!" the mugger insists. "Now!"

"If you need money, there's a cardboard brigade outpost not far from here," Len tells him. "I can point it out to you if you're not familiar. But robbery's only going to get you thrown in jail."

"Seriously," Allen says again, this time in emphatic agreement. He's shifting from foot to foot, looking as though he's torn between options of what to do - Len can't blame him; a middle-class kid like Allen's probably only been mugged once or twice in his life. He's probably debating whether fight, flight, or concession makes the most sense.

Not unlike Len, who, despite many years of experience on the wrong side of muggings, needs to decide if it's worth discarding his disguise and revealing his secret to get them both out of this.

The mugger's eyes fix on Len and abruptly narrow. "Hey," he says. "Don't I..."

And then he grins.

Len doesn't like that grin, nasty and cruel and planning nothing good for anyone.

"Oh hell no," Allen yelps as the mugger, without any other warning, suddenly lunges forward, knife extended, straight at the two of them.

A second later, the knife clatters to the ground - Allen must have swatted it out of the mugger's hand at remarkable speed - followed very quickly by the mugger himself, because Len balanced on his good foot and used the crutch in his other hand to bash the mugger right over the head, knocking him out.

They both look at each other.

And burst out laughing.

"My hero," Allen chokes out.

"You're the one who went for the knife," Len reminds him, sniggering. "Right back at you."

"Oh, sure, I went for the knife, yeah, but you broke out the crutch-foo -"

"Hey, a man's gotta know to defend himself! It's a hard world out there!"

"What the hell's going on here?" a voice bellows from behind them.

They turn, still laughing; it's the maître d' from the restaurant.

"Sorry," Allen manages to get out between hoots of laughter. "This guy tried to mug us -"

The maître d' glances down at the unconscious mugger. "Oh, great, him again," he says with annoyance. "All right, get out of here, both of you; I'll call it in to the cops."

He probably won't, if he knows the mugger personally, or at least he'll give the mugger a chance to wake up and flee the scene first, but whatever; Len's on a date he doesn't want to disrupt, and he never much liked arresting poor people even when they clearly deserved it.

He glances at Allen, who nods and thanks the maître d', and with that they both leave the alleyway behind.

"Well, that was a terrible ending to a pretty good dinner,” Allen remarks.

"It wasn't that bad," Len says. A bit of unexpected excitement goes a long way to making even the dullest dinner interesting, in his view, and this was far from the dullest of dinners.

"I don't know," Allen says ruefully. "I take you to a restaurant I like in a sketchy part of town and then, for the first time ever in my experience coming to this place, someone tries to mug and then kill us? I don't see how it could possibly be worse."

The second he says that, there's a roll of thunder.

No. It can't be. The world does not love anyone enough to give them such perfect timing.

It is.

The skies open up above them, rain sheeting down in one of Central City's infamously abrupt downpours.

Len's heart is going to explode out of sheer what-wonderful-timing glee.

"You had to say it," he tells Allen, beaming.

"I had to say it," Allen agrees, starting to laugh again.

Allen - Barry - looks so happy, standing there with the rain sheeting down on him, soaking his clothing and plastering his hair to his skull in what really ought to be an unattractive wet-dog look but really isn't, that Len finds himself taking that extra step forward and pressing their lips together.

A second later, he abruptly remembers himself - and his investigation! - and pulls away. "I'm sorry," he says. "I should have asked - we said this was just about getting to know each other -"

Allen reaches out and pulls Len back into the kiss by his jacket lapels.

Oh, Len really shouldn't. He really, really shouldn't.

But he's happy, damnit, and it's been so long since he's been happy, really truly unabashedly happy - not just with a possible romantic partner, that's been forever and a half, but with anyone at all, months and months -

God, Len is so screwed.

He leans into the kiss, reaching up to grab Allen by the shoulders to pull him in -

His side gives a sharp, sudden stab of agony as his crutch falls to the ground.

"Oh, man, I'm so sorry!" Allen exclaims, breaking away, taking care to steady Len on his feet before squatting down to pick up the crutch again. "Man, I should've been thinking -"

"If you were thinking, we were both doing something wrong," Len says dryly, trying to recover himself while also clutching at his side a bit. He's familiar with pain, has a great pain tolerance, but even he gets tripped up by it sometimes.

Allen smiles at him as he hands over the crutch. "Yeah," he says. "I - don't think we were. I mean. If you don't."

Len's still hurting - joy and love making pain go away is the stuff of fairytales and romance novels - but he does end up smiling helplessly back. "No," he says. "Though maybe -"

"We go slow?" Allen suggests.

Len nods.

"That works for me," Allen says. "Like, really. I've got some stuff I need to work through - stuff I want to work through. I - I like you. A lot. And I'd like this to work out. But for that to happen, I need to get over some stuff. So, uh, yeah. If slow works for you, slow works for me."

"Slow works," Len agrees, smiling. "I've got some stuff on my plate, too -" That stupid investigation, for one. God, he wishes he could just get over himself and decide that Allen is innocent, but that's just not his way. Not until he's proved what happened. "- so, yeah. Slow works great."

Allen laughs. "This is kind of ironic in ways you don't even know about yet, but you will," he says, a promise dancing in his eyes. "And, uh, yeah. Good. I'm glad we're on the same page. Want me to catch you a cab?"

Len manages, through valiant effort, to keep them to a single kiss good-night before he gets into the cab and goes home in an utterly fantastic mood.

He'd say that it's the sort of mood that can't be brought down, but that would be a lie, because limping into his supposedly secure apartment and finding Charlie standing there browsing the cookbook section of his bookcase does the trick pretty well.

"What the hell do you want," Len says flatly.

"That's not nice," Charlie says peaceably, continuing to browse. "You should be nicer."

Len rolls his eyes. Charlie is an old - is friend the right word when you can't stand someone but put up with them anyway out of long-standing habit? Probably not.

An old contact? That works.

Len has known Charlie since they were both in juvie together. He was mildly unsettling back then; he's positively creepy now.

It's the way you're distinctly aware of those priors for cannibalism (technically, disgracing a corpse) and possible kidnapping the entire time you're around him, even if you don't actually know about them.

Still, while, despite that fact, Len generally considers Charlie to be harmless - he's usually willing to accept a firm 'no', bizarrely enough - that doesn't mean he wants Charlie appearing in his apartment.

Len sleeps here.

"Who let you in?" Len asks.

"Your house-cleaner," Charlie says promptly. "She remembered me from last time."

Len's going to have to have a word with her.

"And why are you here?" Len prompts, since Charlie seems to be getting distracted with a book on large-scale barbecuing that Len'd gotten for Mick as a present one year.

"I was wondering if anyone had tried to kill you yet," Charlie replies.

Len stares at him.

Charlie blinks back. "Hasn't anyone told you about the new bounty on your head?"

"No, Charlie," Len says, keep his voice mild and controlled. "You're one of my contacts, remember? You're supposed to tell me about these things - I don't know them if you don't tell me them."

"Oh. Right. Well, they only put it up a day or two ago. Hasn't anyone tried to kill you yet?"

"No, I don't keep a regular schedule, which makes it harder to -" Len pauses.

That's his usual answer, but it's not true, is it? Someone did try to kill him.

Sure, a random probably-high mugger acting on impulse, not a Family assassin, but now that Len considers it, the guy had stared at Len, recognizing him, before escalating from a mugging to attempted murder.

If there's a bounty on his head, with a picture attached, that would explain the recognition.

"A Family bounty?" Len asks.

"Of course," Charlie says. "They really do hate you, you know."

"I do know," Len says. That doesn't mean he's not puzzled, though. "Still, recognizing my face...I thought they'd put the bounty on the backburner for a while? On account of them not wanting to start an outright war with law enforcement?"

Charlie shrugs. "It's back on. Or, well, it was never off, but notice of it was redistributed. I heard a rumor that you crossed one of their assassins and they made a request."

Assassins? Len hasn't been allowed anywhere near anything Family related, much less one of their trained killers.

Maybe one of the corrupt cops he'd taken down?

But the only one in the last week or two was Cichowski. That seems highly unlikely.

Besides -

"Why wouldn't an assassin just take me down themselves?" Len asks, a little skeptical. "Seems the most straightforward approach."

Charlie shrugs again. "Laziness, vanity, doesn't want his name associated with it - who knows? Could be plenty of reasons."

Point well taken.

“How good a rumor is it, that it's one of the Family assassins' behind it?” Len asks. "Rather than one or another of the Family's brass getting a bee in their bonnet for some reason or another?"

“Just a rumor.”

That’s not worth much.

“Let me know if there’s anything more in that?” Len asks.

“Of course,” Charlie says. “I’ll ask around. But you should be careful.”

Len's lips twitch. "No one gets to kill and eat me but you?"

"If I kill you, I'm going to eat you, yes," Charlie says, as mildly and peaceably as ever. "Same thing if I find your body in a well-preserved state. But you're my friend: there's no reason for me to want you to go before your time."

That's almost heartwarming, if you ignore the kill-and-eat part. And possibly the "before your time" part; Len's going to have to check that Charlie hasn't hatched another plan to kidnap, murder, and devour him again, especially now that he doesn’t have Mick to keep an eye out about it for him.

It's a good thing Charlie's plans are invariably crap.

"Well?" Charlie says expectantly.

"I'll be careful," Len promises. "Now get the hell out of my apartment."

Charlie does, taking with him one of the cookbooks - not the barbeque one, which he knows is off limits, but one of the how-to-make-macrons ones, which, uh, what?

"That's not nearly as funny as you think it is, boss," Danvers informs him the next morning, when he tells her the story. "Can we get back to the part where your life is in danger?"

"It's just a bounty," Len objects. "There's technically been one on my head this entire time."

"Yes, but you haven't had random muggers escalating to attempted murder the second they recognize your face!"

Oh, boy. Danvers is breaking out the increased emphasis.

"It wasn't a serious attempt -"

"Boss!"

"I'll keep wearing the mask when I go out on Flash business, okay?" Len says. "I promise."

Danvers crosses her arms and glares.

Len swears he can feel the hair on his arms start scorching.

Time to use his trump card.

"I also promise that I'll stick to Jitters and other well-lit areas for any more dates with Allen," he offers.

Danvers keeps glaring for an extra second to make sure he knows that she's only going to fall for his bait because she wants to, not because he tricked her, and then she grins. "You're going to have more dates?"

"We are," Len confirms, unable to keep himself from smiling back. "Going slow, though - he's getting over somebody, and I need to finish the Flash investigation first."

"If you get the Flash, then Allen can stop doing all the suspicious things he's doing," Danvers agrees. "And you can scratch the whole thing off as well-meant but misguided over-enthusiasm."

"Well, not the whole thing," Len demurs. "I'm still going to make him deal with the insurance fraud aspect of it all. But yes, if he's not corrupt, that makes things much easier. But remember -"

"Yes, yes, I know, people on your list are guilty until proven innocent."

"No," Len says, rolling his eyes. "Just Occam's razor: corruption is unfortunately still the more reasonable explanation. Do you really want me getting in deep with someone with an asterisk by his name?"

Danvers softens. "Yeah, okay," she says. "You sure it isn't too late for that?"

"I'm infatuated, not in love," Len says. "If we find out that he's no good, I'll live."

He'll be disappointed, sure, even maybe a little heartbroken, but whatever.

"What's on the agenda today?" he asks, changing the subject. His resolution to practice talking about his feelings with Danvers so that he doesn't choke up when apologizing to Mick after he wakes up (if he wakes up) aside, he still doesn't enjoy it. Give him work to do instead any day.

That pesky work ethic is probably why he was Central City's most successful freelance thief for over a dozen years running, possibly more, depending on how you count these things.

"Let me check," Danvers says, sliding back over to her computer. "Looks like a pretty light day - you've got some meetings in the afternoon with the DAs to walk them through some of your evidence again so that they don't get cold feet about bagging a cop, again -"

"In an election year, with only a short while to go before the primary? They ought to be happy that I'm giving them so much law-and-order cleaning-up-the-system cred."

"I'm not the one you need to convince of that," Danvers says dryly. "Anyway, that left this morning pretty open, so I took the liberty of arranging an informal powwow on behalf of the Anti-Flash Task Group -"

"It's not actually called that, you know."

Danvers rolls her eyes at him.

"That sounds great," Len adds. Some solid investigative work sounds right up his alley right now. "They're coming here?"

"Detective Thawne and Miss West, yes," Danvers confirms. "I figured you didn't want every street cop who's potentially on the task force personnel list."

"Definitely not." Len pushes himself back from his chair and up to a standing (well, leaning) position. "I'm going to practice some PT in my office; let me know when they get here."

The joys of healing.

Thawne and Iris - she'd insisted, by virtue of refusing to answer to anything else, and anyway he needs to distinguish her from the other, less amiable West that stalks the precinct with a grim scowl like he thinks that alone would drive Len away - arrive an hour later, when Len's finished and already put his leg up to rest while he grimly drains a green smoothie designed to feed him nutrients he needs.

He hates green smoothies.

All those vegetables –

(They don’t taste like the ones Mick made him eat at all. He wonders if Allen likes veggies...)

"Hey, sorry, are we late?" Iris asks, looking around the mostly deserted conference room that doubles as Len's part of the precinct. "Or, uh, early?"

"Right on time," Danvers chirps. "Please, have a seat anywhere you like; as you can see, we've got the space but not the personnel. Captain Snart will be out of his office momentarily."

Len's mostly glad about the excuse to toss the smoothie.

Danvers glares at him when he comes out to the main room - she always knows when he's thrown away his smoothie, it's uncanny; he swears she can see through walls - but he ignores her and hobbles over to greet his guests.

Teammates?

Whatever.

"I look forward to working with you, Detective Thawne," Len says, sticking his hand out. "I've heard good things."

Thawne looks surprised.

"Eddie!" Iris hisses, elbowing him in the side.

He abruptly remembers himself and belated reaches out to shake Len's hand.

"Don't worry, I get it," Len says dryly. "The fire-breathing gorgon with snake for hair's a lot less intimidating in person, yeah?"

Thawne flushes a bit, but smiles ruefully. "I think ice breath is the more common story."

"Ice? How would that even work - am I breathing it out in solid form?" Len asks, amused. "Or is it more like sneezing snowflakes?"

"Probably more like an artic wind gust, using the Joule-Thompson effect," Danvers volunteers. "Compressed air through a small opening drops the temperature significantly; that, in combination with saliva acting as a freezing agent, would lower the temperature of the exhale to such a negative degree that anything that's hit by it gets iced over."

They look at her.

She blushes. "I mean," she says. "If he had freeze breath."

"No, I like that," Len says. "That would actually be really cool."

Danvers, far too used to him, groans.

"Was that a pun?" Iris says, starting to grin. "Captain Cold makes cold puns?"

"Captain Cold makes all puns," Danvers says.

"This is a non-discriminatory office," Len agrees.

Thawne snorts, and Len can see him finally starting to relax. "Glad to hear that," Thawne says. "Sorry about my reaction. I'm actually really looking forward to working on this task force; it's my first time leading an investigation without a senior partner."

"Isn't Captain Snart your senior partner?" Iris asks.

"No, I'm his boss," Len says. "That's different. Still, glad you’re thinking that way, Thawne; I'm hoping that you'll be able to take a lot of solo lead on this investigation." He nods at his crutch. "I'm ain't exactly my old mobile self these days."

"Not to mention on a Family hit list," Danvers pointedly mutters to no one in particular.

"A Family hit list?" Iris asks, sounding interested. "Really?"

"I used to do undercover work," Len tells her, a little charmed by how impressed she looks by it. Undercover work didn't allow for much bragging, for obvious reasons. Besides, even if he’d had someone to brag about it to, he'd been too angry to really get any joy out of it before now. "The Families don't appreciate that much."

"That's pretty awesome," Iris says. "What did you do when you were undercover, if I'm allowed to ask?"

"Oh, don't ask him that," Danvers says before Len can reply. "He'll be showing off his pickpocketing skills for days; it's unbearable."

She's grinning, though, and Iris grins back. "I don't know," she says. "That sounds like it could be interesting."

"Could be," Len says, and hands her back her wristwatch to an exclamation of delight. "But we should probably focus on the Flash."

Iris straps her watch back on, grinning even more now. "Yeah, probably. We're still agreed on not treating him like a criminal, right?"

"No, we're agreed that we're withholding judgment pending further investigation," Len corrects. "But yes, innocent until proven guilty's still a thing, if that's what you're asking. I won't hold anything wrong he's done against him until I prove he's done it."

"What's he done to make you think he's done something wrong at all?" Iris challenges.

"Other than being an unauthorized vigilante and however many counts of assault on purported 'criminals' - yes, purported, they're innocent till proven guilty, too - you mean? The disappearances."

Iris blinks. "Disappearances? What disappearances?"

"Serial disappearances," Danvers clarifies. "I've been logging strange events in Central City, and a number of them can be correlated with your map of Flash activity."

"That doesn't mean the Flash is behind them," Iris objects.

"He could be trying to solve them," Thawne suggests, though he looks more dubious than Iris.

"Not exactly his job," Len reminds them. "But that's what we're here to figure out. If the Flash really is a do-gooder, and not involved in these disappearances, then we can see about getting him some legal backing - a badge, and the ethics course that accompanies wearing that badge."

"Ethics?" Iris asks dryly, arching her eyebrows in mock surprise. "In Central?"

"Yes," Thawne says, and unlike Iris he's utterly serious. "Just because lots of people don't have any doesn't mean we shouldn't be aiming to do better."

"You sound like a politico before their first reelection campaign," Len says. "But as it happens, I agree. I love this city, dirt and all, but just because it's always been dirty before ain't no reason to tolerate it. Corruption's the root of all the problems we've got, and it starts with people thinking ethics are optional because this is Central. It might be Central, but you gotta put your money where your mouth is when it comes to ethics or else what’s the point?"

Iris nods, while Thawne looks thoughtful. "You really mean what you say, don’t you?" he says. "It’s not a grudge or anything – you're really trying to clean up the city."

"One traitorous cop at a time," Len agrees, even though it’s not entirely correct: he’s one hundred percent fulfilling a grudge, but there’s no reason he can’t clean up the city at the same time. "Well, assuming the Families - or the cops - don't shoot me first."

“Oh, no,” Iris says. “You’re not allowed to get shot before I get to the bottom of these disappearances and prove you wrong about the Flash.”

Len smirks.

Sounds good to him.