agoodyarn | somewhere in central city...

"Um." Good, Barry, very eloquent. "The insurance isn't really the point. You're still stealing, and I can't let you do that." This might have been the first time he'd showed up to a robbery and the robber had just tried to reassure him that everything was fine, and apologized, while literally still stealing right in front of him. Who was this guy?

Either way, he could at least get back the things he'd taken already right? He took off, racing around the man and reaching for his pockets.

Pockets that had a hand clamped tight over them. He wasn't quite as fast as Barry, but he didn't have to move nearly so far.

"Sorry." Still utterly calm. Slow, like a snake. "Like I said. I need this. If it makes you feel any better, once I've handled my monetary issues, I'll come back and buy the place. I give it two or three months, given the strength of the market. You won't even see me after tonight."

"It really doesn't. Make me feel better." Barry tugged at the hand, for some reason, totally ineffectually, but this was surreal. "You still can't just take things?? How do you not know this?"

"If I was in my own world," he started with a sigh, "or rather, if it hadn't been destroyed by someone meddling across the multiverse, I wouldn't have to do this."

And oh yes, he looked at Barry.

"Then again, given the state of things there, I suppose I can forgive you."

He reached over and flicked his finger at the middle of Barry's chest... with enough force to send him flying across the room.

Sigh.

"As much blessing as curse. But the fact of the matter is, I need to be able to buy myself an identity and get myself somewhere to live. So. Theft."

He glanced over at Barry.

"I don't like it any more than you do. But it's really better this way."

Edited 2016-11-28 19:03 (UTC)

Barry hit the wall hard almost before he'd realized he was moving, which was extra weird for a speedster. He groaned a little and pushed himself to his hands and knees, and sat up, ignoring the concerned voices of Caitlin and Cisco in his ear.

"Okay, I have no idea what you're talking about but pretty much none of that is going to make me just let you go," he said after a moment, and got back to his feet, because it was what he did, Barry Allen didn't stay down, the Flash didn't stay down.

...except he had no idea how to win this. "Uh, guys, any ideas?" he said under his breath.

"What's he doing?" came in from Cisco almost immediately just as Caitlin, clearly distressed, asked "What's going on? Are you okay?"

The 'robber' just sighed and tilted his head over towards Barry.

"Please inform Big Brother and Big Sister that I'm not going to hurt you. I'm just here to get what I need and be on my way." A pause before. "Yes, I can hear them." Then a tilt of his head. "And I can hear where they actually are if I really put the effort in."

Another pause there.

"Which I realize sounds like a threat, but it's not, really. I'm just trying to convince you to give this up. I'd rather not hit you again." He glanced over at Barry and there was definitely a thoughtful expression there. Actually, no. Not so much thoughtful as...

Yeah, the guy was checking him out.

"No agreeing to disagree?"

"...diiid you guys hear that?" he asked slowly.

"Yeah, but it still doesn't answer the questions, B—Flash!"

Nice save, Barry thought with a little sigh. "I'm, yeah, I'm okay, he's just. Rationalizing stuff and trying to be a real stand-up guy or something." Also he might have just checked me out, he didn't add aloud, because they didn't need that right now and besides, what was that about? Weird.

"I'd rather you quit stealing things but I don't really want to get hit again either." Which meant moving faster, making a fast circuit of the room to build up momentum before slamming into the guy in an attempt to at least get him back out the door, where Barry could get at him properly.

The problem with wind ups is that they're visible. And while Clark wasn't as fast as Barry, he's certainly not slow either. Which is why he turned to let Barry's fist skid against him (wouldn't do to let him break his hand, after all) and caught him behind the head like a scruffed kitten, lifting him off his feet to limit his mobility. It could be an adorable image if it wasn't for the fact that a hand that felt like it could bend steel was in a prime position to snap his neck.

"Careful," and there was something just this side of dangerous in that voice. "I really don't want to hurt you. And you might have done a number on the bones in your hand with that."

He leaned in, smiling, but it was a cat's smile. The kind of cat who was holding a canary. Yet as he spoke again, the dangerous edge was gone.

"For the moment, however, you're not picking up the clue. So say good night, Flash."

Which was when that flick was aimed at the front of his head and the lights went out.

...by the time Barry came to, his new friend would be long gone, every one of the security cameras fried and melted, and his feet would be cold... because they were literally stuck in a block of ice against the ground.

He'd wake to "Flash!" being shouted into his comm, someone, Caitlin, trying over and over again to wake him up before anyone else showed or to hopefully, have him awake for when Cisco and Joe got there.

"Ow," he muttered as the yelling made his aching head vibrate a little, and not in the good way. "He's gone, guys," Barry groaned, pushing himself up a little, and realizing he couldn't move his feet, and then realizing why. "For real? Man, I don't like this guy." Not that he had trouble getting out of it, vibrating fast enough would make the ice crack, and get his feet warm again.

"Caitlin, he got away, all the cameras are toast, and he froze my feet in a block of ice," he said, just as the ice broke and he was able to roll over onto his back. "I'm guessing he got away with what he took, but he...huh, I don't think he grabbed anything else after he knocked me out..."

"Jerk!" came across the comms as Joe and Cisco came walking in through the broken front door. Cisco rushed over with wide eyes while Joe went a little slower; after all, Barry was all right.

"You all right, Bar?" was the first thing out of Joe's mouth. Cisco, on the other hand, was staring at the remains of the ice, then spinning around to take in the room. For a moment, he almost looked dizzy before he got himself back in line.

"Whoah..."

"Yeah, I'm fine." He coughed, rubbed at the little bruise on his chest. It had mostly healed, but still. "I mean, mostly fine. He flicked me across the room with one finger, that wasn't. Great."

Barry pushed to his feet with Cisco's help. "He said he needed the money to buy a new identity and he'd, he'd pay the store back, or. Buy it. Something." He sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. "Forget it. He's gone. We should clear out so I can, y'know, come back and try to figure out what happened here."

Sometimes being a CSI for the same city where he was a superhero was a strange occurrence.

"We definitely need to get you out of here," Joe said as he reached over to tuck his arm under Barry's. The man would practically carry him if he had to. He'd done it before.

"You can play CSI when you're actually the CSI. But for now-"

Then there was piling into the car that Cisco somewhat missed, looking back and forth at the destruction. Frowning and pressing his lips together, he turned back to the others and held up a finger before closing his eyes. He just... he had a feeling, okay? And given his powers, it didn't make sense not to trust his feelings.

He pulled out the glasses and focused on the strange energy here...

Joe watched as he put Barry in the car, clearly hoping it ended soon and they could get the hell out of here. He'd already delayed the officers heading to the scene enough.

Cisco didn't take long, though, rocking faintly in place before he pulled the glasses off with shaking hands and tucking them away as he scrambled into the car.

"You okay?" was the first question Joe had but Cisco just shook his head and gestured for the older man to drive, so he did.

Barry never missed it when Cisco pulled out his glasses. He let Joe walk him to the car, although he was feeling pretty steady by now, and once they were driving away, he leaned forward to set a hand on Cisco's shoulder in the front seat. "Cisco, you vibed something, what did you see? Can you tell who that was?"

Cisco swallowed hard and nodded before holding up a hand. Kind of. He'd gotten a pretty good glimpse though.

"He's from... another world. Like Earth-2 only... darker. Way darker. Like... in my vision, it looked like everything was out of a Frank Miller comic, you know?"

He breathed in deep.

"Only, the world... disintegrated. He was up in some kind of ice palace and there was a talking rock like..." he glanced back at Barry, "Dude, I know this sounds weird but this is what I saw. Anyway, the rock called him his son, weird, I know, and then said something about him not being finished."

Cisco swallowed.

"Do you... do you think he was talking about- I mean, do you think this guy could destroy the whole world?"

"Whoa." Barry sat back heavily, thinking back. He had no idea who this guy was, but he hadn't really seemed all that worried about the Flash. Kinda the opposite. He'd thought Barry's attempts to get him to stop stealing things had been cute.

"I don't know," he said after a few moments. "I mean...I don't know about the whole world, but I didn't even make him flinch. I didn't make a dent."

Joe looked over from his seat driving.

"And you're sure you're okay, Barry? I don't need to put my lights on?"

"Nah, Joe, I'm fine, really. I'll have Caitlin look me over when we get back to STAR Labs, but I think he was actually...kinda careful about not hitting me too hard."

He'd been a really considerate robber. Apart from the robbing-a-store part. And, well, he had left a mess. "It's mostly just my pride, that's what got dented. Guy scruffed me like a kitten." The memory of that made him scowl a little.

...Cisco was definitely spooked, but there is no power on earth that could make him not make a noise and have to hold back a snort at that mental image.

"Sorry! Sorry, sorry, no, not funny, totally not funny-" he breathes in deep, "deeply terrifying. World-endingly terrifying. Annnnd I think I want to go back to funny again."

He glanced back at Barry.

"Big guy? Like the, uh, like the one who got turned into a zombie and chased us around the lab?"

"Tony? Yeah, kinda Tony's size, but ho—" oh god he'd already started saying it, he couldn't look at Joe, focus entirely on Cisco as he said, "hotter-looking, like he dressed better. In a suit. And he said he'd made sure everything he took was insured, we should check on that."

"On it," since it wasn't like Cisco hadn't brought a tablet to work on while they drove.

...but you bet both Joe and Cisco were kind of giving him a look. Just a little one.

They were almost to the lab when Cisco frowned and tapped the tablet a few times, turning it to show Barry.

"He's right. They actually just upped their insurance citing... falling property values, apparently. Which yeah, they're not wrong. That section of the city isn't doing great since some of the industry shipped out of town. Huh."

Then he turned to Barry.

"So are we talking a sweet suit like the kind I wipped up for you or-"

"No, like a suit-suit, a business suit. Pretty nice one. He looked like, I don't know, a banker or something. If the place hadn't been smashed up when I got there, he would've just looked like he was browsing."

Just gonna ignore those looks. If they'd seen him they'd know that 'hot' was a totally objective descriptor, okay.

"He just looked like a guy," he said more quietly. "But I watched him punch through glass, and he kept me out of his pockets, and just plucked me out of the air."

Cisco nodded along to every power before adding a couple of his own.

"Plus froze your feet somehow. Plus melted the cameras. So either he's gotten a hand on our Gruesome Twosome's armory," Cold and Heatwaves "or he's got a few more tricks up his sleeve than most."

Joe pulled into the spot, shaking his head.

"I don't like it. I don't like this at all. Who IS this guy? Like we don't have enough problems as it is. First Alchemy now... Ultraman?"

Cisco's nose scrunched up in distaste at the name.

"Oh, Joe. Joe, don't do that to me. Don't- no. Terrible. We are not calling him that. We're just... not. No."

Joe gave a flat look.

"I don't care what we call him. I just want to know what we plan on doing if he decides that this isn't going to be his 'one time' theft. Or if he escalates."

Cisco looked from Joe to Barry and finally at the door of the car.

"Let's talk about it inside, okay? Maybe I can see if that video camera footage was saved on a centralized harddrive. That'll give us access to the footage even though the cameras were destroyed."

He grins at Barry.

"They're so worried about security, it'd make sense if they moved to cloud storage. Next generation security is all about data protection."

Then he was heading in.

Barry didn't speed into the Cortex like usual, he walked in with Joe as they discussed the crime scene from a CSI perspective, and how much inference Barry would be able to sneak into his report to help them point in the right direction without it being obvious he was an eye witness, since there weren't any eye witnesses except the Flash. "...except Julian will probably end up with the case," he added with a frustrated huff. "I hate that guy."

Then he did race ahead so he could get changed and meet Joe at the door to the Cortex instead of hanging out in the costume. He'd get a call soon to head to the crime scene, if he was going to get to go to the crime scene.

Caitlin was waiting at the door for them all, though.

"Is everyone okay? Barry, are you-"

And she took a long moment to watch how he's walking to make sure that she was satisfied with how he was. All the same, she let out a grumble.

"What're we doing?"

Joe pointed over to the reclothed Barry and then at himself.

"Me and Barry are heading to that crime scene, more than likely. You two, I think, are going to start working on getting a reading on this guy." He looked over at Cisco. "We're callin' him Ultraman."

"We are not calling him that!"

"C'mon, Cisco, it's not that bad, I mean, look at all the stuff he can do." Barry was not unaware that he was getting a Caitlin Snow Look, and obediently headed toward the medical bay for her to look him over. "I might get called in soon, but he did hit me pretty hard in the head, and flicked me across the room. My chest still hurts a little from that one. And my head. And my pride."

She didn't need to know about the scruffed-like-a-kitten thing.

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