CHAPTER ONE

Present Day – 11TH Dec, 2013. (aka Day of the explosion of the Particle Accelerator.).

It was just another day at Central City Hospital for Sophia Lang. She was covering a night shift for a friend who was out of town. Usually she wouldn't mind- in fact she would welcome it because of her weird sleeping habits, but today was one of those days where she did mind. Tonight was the night the Particle Accelerator was being turned on.

Growing up as a bit of a science geek she couldn't help but anticipate the opening. Okay, who was she kidding, she was the biggest sci-fi fanatic there ever was. She used to watch Star Trek every night before bed with her dad instead of reading children's books, always fascinated by the amazing technology they had. And so she wanted to be there in person to witness what could be one of the greatest scientific advancements of her time, but she figured she'd just have to do it from the staff room window instead of in a front row seat filled with reporters and other huge scientific names. The success of the accelerator would mean new developments for all aspects of Science and technology. She wondered how it would affect the health system- would it hold the cure for cancer? She doubted it, but there was no telling what the accelerator would bring. Just imaging the sort of medical break throughs that would arise had her eagerly wanting to see it… too bad she would be working in the emergency room all through the night and into the early hours of the morning.

She grabbed her phone out of her pocket and sent a good luck text to her neighbour Caitlin, who worked at Star Labs. Caitlin had been excited for this moment for god knows how long, and she was sad she couldn't be there today to support her friend, guessing it'd have to be in spirit. She also set her phone to send a happy birthday message, on the stroke of midnight to her best friend Anna who was turning 24. They had big celebration plans for the next day, which would mostly consist of binge eating on Thai food, and watching re-runs of friends on her couch, but to them that was the perfect day. She smiled, at least having something to look forward to.

"Come on Lang, stop checking your phone and get to work," Laura- a not so nice colleague yelled out.

"Yeah, yeah I'll be there," she mumbled, placing her phone in her bag and shoving it in the staff locker before swapping her jeans and tee for scrubs, getting prepped for a long night at work. What she didn't know is that fate would intervene, and after tonight her life would never be the same.

Sophia had lost herself in her work, and had just come up to the staff room for a Coffee break. Most of the room was empty, spare a colleague or two taking nap in one of the seats across the long hallway that was the staff room. She smiled, and set her cup of coffee down, leaning against the table and looking out the window. In her direct line of sight stood the high structure that was Star labs. She took a sip of the soy mocha, relishing in the burn of coffee trickling down her throat when she saw it. It was a magnificent burnt orange light illuminating the sky. Like a pulse it started to spread further and further throughout the city, moving toward the hospital at a fast rate. Her eyes went wide, and there wasn't even enough time to move before the cloud of energy smashed the windows of the hospital and knocked her down.

Pain surged throughout her body, as she dropped down to the floor in agony, fading in an out of consciousness from the shock. She was struggling to keep her eyes open and a painful groan escaped her throat as she scooted away from all the broken glass, taking a few moments to compose herself, trying to push herself to stand up. All she could think about is that if she was hit then others would have been hurt too and she needed to help them. Come on Sophia, move she thought to herself. Powering through, she placed her hand on the white tiled floor beneath her and pushed herself up, trying to get into a sitting position at least. Getting up she brushed the glass off herself, and saw that the power had gone out. The lights flickered in the hall way, and it was eerily quiet.

It was in that moment her pager started beeping furiously, there was MET call to the emergency room. She grabbed her equipment, disinfecting her hands on the go and throwing on gloves as she ran down two floors of stairs. The power seemed to have went out in her section of the building where the pulse hit. The back-up generator barely powered the lights, and the elevators were out.

By the time she got into emergency it was a mess. There were people everywhere with various injuries. Most were lacerations that needed to be dressed, and stitched. She was focusing on the elderly patients and helping out with the stitching when an emergency paramedics unit ran in with a body on a stretcher.

"I need a nurse stat." one of the paramedics called, as the other paged for a doctor.

Sophia ran over, finished with her patient and immediately got to work, another nurse filling her place as all the staff rushed to get everyone medical attention in the chaos.

"What happened?" she shouted, not able to hear much over the bustling chaos of the ward as she tried to keep up with the moving stretcher, and assess the man's situation. His face was covered with small lacerations, probably from shattered glass and he had an oxygen mask on his face obviously his body not able to breath for him.

"Pulse ox 80%, No heartbeat," the paramedic rushed out. Sophia nodded and they got to work quickly. The guy looked familiar, but she tried not to pay attention to that as they rushed him into a room, trying to get his heart beating again, and oxygen back into his body, but he had already slipped into a coma. Soon enough his heart was stable, and oxygen levels were rising, but his body couldn't cope. The doctor arrived shortly after and Sophia was sent to inform his next of kin on the situation. She spared one more glance at Barry's face before leaving the room. As she was left the room, she noticed two people sitting in the waiting chairs. It was at that moment she recognised the girl to be Iris West, sitting with her father Joe. She'd met Iris at Jitters, and had spoken to her quite a bit whenever she came to the coffee joint. That made this job so much harder, to explain to them that they weren't sure Barry would even survive, let alone wake up from the Coma if his body ever recovered… his heart was erratic, and there was no way of knowing… but they just had to have hope. She gulped before walking towards them as Joe stood up expectantly.

"How's he doing? Is he going to be alright?" Joe asked, and Sophia gave him a sad smile before responding.

"We've managed to get his heart beating as normally as possible, but his body has gone into shock due to the electrocution and so he's in a coma, for how long… we don't know yet," She said solemnly. This just caused Iris to panic even more.

"But he's going to survive right? He has too," Iris whispered the last part desperately, clutching at her father's hand for comfort.

"We've done everything in our power to help him, the rest is up to Barry. We've just got to have faith," Sophia said, placing a comforting hand on Iris's shoulder, giving her a small smile.

"Thank you Sophia," Iris said sincerely.

"The doctor will be out in a few minutes and then you can go inside and visit for as long as you'd like, if you need anything you know where to find me," Sophia said to the pair, receiving a grateful nod from Joe, who just held onto Iris's hand.

Sophia left, knowing there was nothing else she could do for Barry, and that only time could tell. She headed down the hall and moved onto the other countless patients that needed attention, but her mind strayed to her friend Anna, praying to god that she was alright in all this mess.

9 months later.

It had been a long 9 months since the night of the explosion of the particle accelerator. Countless lives were lost that day, others injured for life.

Barry had flat-lined multiple times, only to be nearly declared dead. His heart was beating so fast that it wasn't coming up on the monitor- not that anyone knew that at the time. It was like he had no heart beat… it would come and go in bursts and this went on for days before the hospital was paid a special visit by Doctor Harrison Wells. He offered Joe the option of taking Barry to Star Labs where Caitlin would take care of him, and where they had the technology to keep him alive.

But the drama didn't even end with that. Caitlin had lost her fiancé in the explosion and Sophia had found out the next morning that her childhood friend Anna was killed in a car accident when the accelerator exploded. That hit her hard. Detective West had delivered the news personally to her when he was at the hospital. She couldn't believe it. It was Anna's twenty fourth birthday and she had died. Sophia had never felt more helpless and empty in her entire life. She spent the next 6 months stuck in the same mournful phase, and she wasn't the only one. Caitlin was doing the same thing, working long hours, not taking care of herself, and pushing herself to the edge.

But during these tragic and mournful times, they somehow managed to get through it together. Sophia would cook dinner one night, and take a dish over to Caitlin's when she knew she was working a late shift at Star Labs taking care for Barry. Vice versa when Sophia was working late at the hospital, Caitlin would drop a care package filled with some groceries, chocolate and her favourite bubble bath scents. Even though she lost someone so precious to her, she also gained something beautiful. New friendships were formed, and she met some amazing people who started to slowly fill the hole in her heart.

It was now 9 months post-explosion and even though it was hard, they were making their way on the road to recovery. But there were always days that were hard, days when Sophia would give anything to see her friend again, even for a moment. Today was one of those days, but what Sophia didn't know was that someone was going to make it better.

Since it was Sophia's day off, she thought she'd grab Caitlin, Cisco and Doctor Wells some Coffee from Jitters to take along with her on her trip to Star Labs. Caitlin's car was getting serviced so she offered to pick her up from work, and Doctor Wells had invited her to spend the day at Star Labs, to which she gracefully accepted.

She parked her car and had been walking down the street towards the entrance of Star Labs with the coffee's to go when something-or more accurately someone came barrelling down the street so fast they collided with her, sending the steaming coffee all over her jacket. She screeched, the boiling coffee burning the skin on her hand as it came into contact, spilling all over her cardigan. She ripped off the beige cardigan immediately, relieving her of the pain, as she heard an "oh crap" most likely from the person who ran into her.

"Oh crap is one way of putting it, don't you ever watch where you're going?" she huffed, trying to wipe of the coffee before looking up, only to open her mouth in shock.

"I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to bump into you," Barry apologised profusely, feeling terrible that he had ran into someone, especially Iris's pretty nurse acquaintance, as Cisco phrased it this morning before he had left.

"Barry? How did you-" she trailed off in confusion, astounded that he was standing there in front of her when he had been in a coma for the last 9 months.

"I just woke up, Caitlin and Cisco said I could go, I had to go see Iris and Joe," Barry explained. He had just come back from visiting them both when he realised what he could do. It was impossible and he had to find out what was going on with him.

"Understandable but you shouldn't have left, did Caitlin even do a full Obs check, how's your heart rate, and your temperature?" She mumbled, grabbing his wrist with one hand and putting her other hand to his forehead. This just caused him to pause for a second before he realised that she was a nurse, and then he laughed lightly.

"I'm fine, Caitlin wouldn't let me go anywhere until she checked me out," Barry said, and then realised how weird that sounded.

"…"

"That sounded less weird in my head," and they both smiled, laughing on the inside- well at least Sophia was. Barry was just berating himself for saying something stupid, before looking down at the floor to see all the Coffee's destroyed.

"I'm really sorry about the Coffee I swear I'll make it up to you," he promised.

"Don't worry Barry. Its fine, you literally just woke up from a Coma, I can't blame you," She said with a sigh. "Though I could use some ice for my hand, it's starting to sting now." She pointed to the inflamed skin that was now as red as Barry's cheeks from embarrassment.

"Sure, let's go inside and get something on that," Barry said as they moved to walk to the Cortex.

"Again, I'm so sorry," He said feeling guilty.

"Again, its fine," she responded with a small smile, her brown eyes glinting in the light.

"So,"

"So…" she extended the 'o' probably making it more awkward than it already was.

"Cisco said you took care of me, I appreciate it," He said, grateful that he was taken care of by such caring people.

"It was no problem, I mean it is my job after all… You know we've never been formally introduced. Let's start over again?" She suggested sticking her hand out, "Hi I'm Sophia Lang, nice to meet you."

Barry smiled and grasped her hand shaking it, "Hi Sophia, I'm Barry, Barry Allen." They both laughed, feeling the tension diffused before they walked into the Cortex. Upon arrival Caitlin got busy with Barry and Doctor Wells, whereas Cisco helped Sophia out with that coffee burn that was starting to settle down.

After a lot of jaw dropping, and eyes popping out, it was revealed that Barry Allen had somehow gotten super speed from being struck by lightning. They had all gone down to an abandoned air strip, which was now being used as a training ground to actually see for themselves if what Barry claimed was actually humanly possible. They were just waiting for Barry to finish changing into what Cisco gave him.

Barry walked out, tugging at the red suit that was quite form fitting. "How does it fit? It's a little snug," he mentioned, twisting around slightly, inspecting how the outfit looked on him.

"At least you'll be moving so fast, no one will see you." Cisco pointed out, only causing Sophia to let out a little laugh and then when they both turned to her she shrugged.

"It's not that bad Barry, besides, I think the red suits you," she said biting her lip and eyeing the suit. Yes it was a bit snug but she did have to commend Cisco for choice of colour, the crimson really did suit him, and she noted that his cheeks were also tinted crimson after her comment. Before either boy could reply Caitlin cut in.

"See, you thought the world was slowing down, it wasn't. You were moving so fast, it only looked like everyone else was standing still."

"Doctor Wells will be monitoring your energy output while Caitlin and Sophia monitor your vitals." Cisco said, cutting into the conversation.

"What do you do?" Barry inquired.

"I make the toys, man. Check it," Cisco pronounced smugly before motioning to bits and bobs on the suit. "This is a two-way headset with a camera I modified, typically designed to combat battlefield impulse noise, or in your case, potential sonic booms."

"Which would be awesome," Sophia muttered under her breath, Cisco agreeing with an "Mmm hmmm". Barry then moved onto talking with Caitlin, mostly about her not smiling all too often. When Caitlin mentioned loosing Ronnie in the explosion, a pang of sadness hit Sophia. She sort of felt guilty now, being happy and moving on when her friend died in the explosion. She gulped, a turned away from them, looking at her phone screensaver which was a photo of said friend that they took on a holiday they had in Australia a few years ago. She was so caught up thinking about Anna, that she barely noticed Cisco placing his hand on her shoulder.

"You miss her don't you," he asked, a sympathetic expression on his face.

"All the time," she said, before sniffing slightly and straightening up. She gave cisco a small smile before moving to grab her tablet out and sync it up with Barry's vitals. As Barry got ready to run, Wells spoke some final words of wisdom.

"Mister Allen, while I am extremely eager to determine your full range of abilities, I do caution restraint." And with that Barry sped off like a bullet, a rush of wind blowing Sophia and Caitlin's hair back.

"Yeah! He just passed 200 knots per hour," Cisco exclaimed, clearly enjoying himself.

"That's not possible," Sophia breathed out, staring out at Barry's blurry form in awe. It was only a few seconds later when Caitlin yelled for Barry to watch out, when he went crashing into a bunch of water containers.

"Ouch, that's got to hurt," She muttered with a frown. She told Caitlin she had this one, and grabbed her Nursing kit. She ran down the runway, Barry meeting her halfway, gripping his right arm awkwardly, a painful expression on his face.

"You alright Allen?" She asked as he moved forward.

"Yeah, just my wrist is killing me," He mentioned. She observed his injury and by the look of it he had fractured his wrist.

"Most likely a distal radius fracture, but we'd need to get back to Star Labs to be certain for sure," she said delicately touching his wrist with her gloved hands. He didn't know how but her soft touch eased the pain slightly. He stared at her for a moment, not having a good chance to do so before hand. Her short dark hair consisted of messy curls that the wind kept blowing in her face. Before he knew it he had his other hand tucking a curl behind her ear, only to receive a hint of pink on her cheeks as a response.

"Thanks," she said softly before continuing. "We better get back to Star Labs, Caitlin will probably want to do some x-rays on that wrist, and I'm sure she's dying to do some more blood work."

"Sure thing, let's get moving Lang."

"Lang?" she rose an eyebrow, her brown eyes glinting in the sunlight, something that he found he kept noticing.

"Well you called me Allen, I was just trying it out," he mumbled in embarrassment.

"Its fine, I like it," She admitted, giving him a small grin.

"It looks like you had a distal radius fracture," Caitlin explained, showing Barry the results from her tablet, causing Sophia to smile to herself as she had predicted it.

"Had?" Barry asked in confusion inspecting his wrist as he twisted it back and forth, feeling no pain at all.

"It's healed in three hours," Caitlin said, and now it was her time to be excited.

"How is that even possible?"

"We don't know."

"Yet," Cisco shoved in.

"Well if his body is able to move at such a fast speed, then surely all his other bodily functions both anatomically and physiologically would have followed right? It's a change on a cellular level, so that must be why the healing process was accelerated and faster than any normal human's," Sophia mused, only to receive an impressed look from everyone in the room.

"What," she said shrugging at their dumbfounded expressions, "Just because I don't have a PHD like half the people in this room doesn't mean I'm dumb, I did graduate with Masters at 19." She frowned, crossing her arms. What did they all think she was dumb or something just because she didn't have a degree in astrophysics or something insane like that?

"Good theory, I like it," Cisco commented, spinning her chair around in the cortex. "But you really need to learn how to stop you know, hit the brakes before you break more bones," Cisco directed at Barry who grimaced. It was not a pleasant experience, and he'd rather not repeat it again.

"What happened out there today? You were moving pretty well, and then something caused you to lose focus," Wells probed, and Barry to take a deep breath before beginning his story.

"When I was 11, my mother was murdered," Barry started off, and Sophia's breath hitched, tears slowly forming in her eyes as he continued with his heart-breaking story. "It was late, a sound woke me up. I came downstairs and I saw what looked like a ball of lightning." Barry explained, and she thought of the cloud of light she saw the night of the explosion, wondering if it was in anyway similar. "Inside the lightning, there was a man. He killed my mom. They arrested my dad. He's still sitting in Iron Heights for her murder. Everyone, the cops, the shrink, they all told me what I saw was impossible," he stopped for a moment, breathing out the next words with a shaky breath. "But what if the man who killed my mom was like me?" That caused everyone in the room to look up with wide eyes.

Sophia just stared at Barry. Today she learnt that not everything you believe is true, and that sometimes the impossible isn't that impossible. Barry's logic seemed to make sense, and even though the prospect of the man who killed his mother being a meta-human was terrifying, it could be true. But then again, the particle accelerator explosion is what gave Barry his powers, so it was highly unlikely the killer was the same, since this had happened over 10 years ago. But before she could voice this point Doctor Wells came to the rescue.

"Well I think I can say unequivocally you are one of a kind Barry."

Shortly after the conversation in the room dissipated, and Barry said he was heading out to meet up with Joe and Iris. Caitlin and Sophia agreed they would work analysing the results from Barry's recent training session and Cisco mumbled something about making a suit.

Sophia was working on some of Barry's vitals, comparing them from his pre-meta days to work out what would be a normal range for him now. It was difficult to piece everything together but she figured over time, and further examination they would be able to figure out what was normal and abnormal for Barry. She had nearly finished entering the data into the computer when Cisco called her on the Com system to come down and check something out quote "you're going to want to see this" and "man this is so sweet," so obviously she left the work she was doing and went to see what the fuss was all about.

When she got there, she saw the finished piece and she nearly died (figuratively). It was a full suit, this time with proper pants and sleeves. It was made of some sort of tri-polymer that looked like it could hold up with Barry moving at high-velocity speed so that he wouldn't spontaneously combust or something.

"I see you decided to go with red," Sophia mentioned to Cisco as she checked out the suit, still in awe of how 'cool' it looked. She moved forward, touching it with her hand, and it the material felt like smooth leather, which made her suddenly jealous that Allen would get to wear this and not herself.

"You can thank me later," Cisco teased, winking at Sophia who caught this motion and laughed, looking down in embarrassment.

"Don't even start Cisco," she responded biting her lip. She had a feeling Barry would like the suit.

"Wanna help me move it into the cortex?" Cisco said, to which she nodded. They placed it on a trolley, and rolled it into the cortex, placing it behind a glass frame.

Just as they had done this, a rush of air had blown into the room, and the two turned around to see Barry walking in.

He looked angry… this was not good.

"I wasn't the only one affected by the particle accelerator explosion, was I?"

"We don't know for sure," Caitlin said.

"You said the city was safe, that there was no residual danger," Barry exclaimed, running a hand through his hair in frustration. "But that's not true, so what really happened that night?"

"Well, the accelerator went active, we all felt like heroes, and then it all went wrong,"

"A dimensional barrier ruptured, unleashing unknown energies into our world, ant-matter, dark energy, X-elements," Wells explained, wheeling around the room.

"Those are all theoretical," Barry countered.

"And how theoretical are you? We've mapped dispersion throughout and around Central City but we have no way of knowing exactly what or who was exposed. We've been searching for other meta-humans, like yourself."

"Meta-humans?" Barry frowned in confusion.

"That's what we're calling them," Sophia cleared up, giving him a sympathetic look. She could understand that it was a lot to get around, because all the superheroes she had looked up to in her comic books as a kid were now suddenly real, and right now they were not lacking in villains. Clyde Martin had been hit by the storm cloud as well, and he was now raining down terror on Central City. Literally. He had the ability to control the weather, and if that wasn't crazy Sophia didn't know what was.

"Mardon must have gotten his powers the same way I did," Barry thought out loud before continuing, "He's still out there. We have to stop him before he hurts anyone else."

"Barry! That's a job for the police," Wells yelled.

"Yeah, I work for the police."

"As a forensic assistant," Wells said, which clearly didn't sit well with Barry as he yelled back "You're responsible for this, for him!"

"What's important is you, not me."

"I lost everything. I lost my company, I lost my reputation, I lost my freedom," he confessed, "And then you broke your arm, and it healed in three hours. Inside your body, could be a map to a whole new world genetic therapy, vaccines, medicines, treasures Barry. Deep within your cells, and we cannot risk losing everything because you wanna go out and play hero. You're not a hero," Wells concluded.

"You're just a young man who was struck by lightning," With that Sophia had enough, Yes Doctor Wells had some good points, but Barry was his own person and could decide what he wanted to do. If he wanted to use his powers to help others then she would support him. But before she could even move forward to talk to Barry he zoomed out of there in a flash.

A frown settled on her forehead, and she couldn't help but feel disappointed in Wells.

"If Barry Allen wants to be a hero, then he can be, and he can help us at the same time. What you did was wrong, and you know it," Sophia told Wells before giving Caitlin and Cisco a glance as she left the cortex.

After leaving Star Labs, Sophia figured she would go to Jitters and get that coffee she missed out on that morning. Day dreaming in her own little world as she walked towards the store, she gasped when she felt a hand on her wrist. She looked up to see that it was only Barry and sighed in relief.

"Sorry," he murmured, it was the second time that day he had caught her off guard.

"It's alright, just didn't expect to see anyone. How you holding up Allen?" she asked.

"That's the thing… I'm not holding up. I feel absolutely helpless right now… I don't know what to do," he said sighing, placing his hands in the pockets of his jeans. She pulled him into an alleyway outside the coffee house so that no one would over hear their conversation.

"Hey, listen, it's not your fault. The accelerator just happened to give people super powers, and you happened to be one of them. It doesn't mean you are responsible for Marden," she whispered, trying to keep her voice low, and she could tell by his facial expression that he wanted to interrupt but she just held her hand up and he stopped. "That being said, you have a responsibility to yourself. If you believe that you can help others with your speed, then that's your duty, first and fore mostly a duty to yourself. Not anyone else."

"You sure are wise for someone so young," Barry joked, but deep down he truly appreciated her honesty and advice. Her belief in him after knowing him personally for a day was truly astounding. He felt the same about Cisco and Caitlin… he just wasn't sure about Doctor Wells at this present moment.

"I'm the same age as you doofus," she answered, playfully shoving his shoulder and he gave her one of his heart-melting grins that she tried to ignore. She noticed that he had a great smile, and she was scared at the hold it had over her emotions at this point.

"So what do I do? You heard Wells." And with that his face dropped again. Wells was right. He was just a forensic assistant, he was just a regular person, and he wasn't anything special… at least that's what he told himself.

"What do you do? Stop Marden, that's what you do," She replied, a smile on her face. She moved forward, pushing him towards the exit of the alleyway. "Well go on then," she motioned, "Go be a hero." With a final nod, he was gone in a flash, and she was staring at the empty space in awe.

Figuring he was going to go to Star Labs to stop Marden, she grabbed her coffee to go, and headed back there. As she walked in Cisco and Caitlin were both manning the desks, speaking to Barry through a microphone. Sophia's eyes immediately went to the manikin that held the crimson suit, only to see it missing. She was happy he was using it, but slightly disappointed that she didn't get to see him in it yet, especially since she found that other red suit to fit him very well. She shook her head, trying to get those thoughts out of her head and start helping out in any way she could.

"Barry, this thing is getting closer."

"Wind speeds are 200 miles per hour and increasing," Cisco said, flicking things on the screen. Sophia stood next to him and looked at the readings… things were not looking well for them right now.

"Barry can you hear me?" Sophia spoke through the mic.

"Yeah, loud and clear," he responded.

"If it keeps up it could become an F5 tornado..." her voice rang through the mic, Cisco continuing "and it's headed towards the city."

"How do I stop it guys? What if I unravel it?"

"How the hell are you gonna do that?" Cisco exclaimed.

"I'll run around it in the opposite direction, cut off its legs." Sophia nodded at his logic, it might work but it'd probably kill him in the process.

"He'd have to clock 700 miles per hour to do that," Cisco calculated.

"Your body may not be able to handle those speeds," Caitlin said, giving the two a worried look as they all looked back to the screens.

"You'll die Barry," Sophia whispered, the worry seeping into her voice, and she felt guilty now because she was the one to encourage him in the first place, to go and stop Marden.

"I have to try," god dammit she thought. And with that he ran, his body moving at inhumane speeds. As they monitored from the computer screen, they could see that it was working, he was destabilising the tornado, and it was starting to unravel the faster he moved.

"The suit's holding up." At least there was that positive.

"But he's not," Caitlin ruined the positive.

"He can do it," Sophia reassured them all. He had to. "You can do it."

"He's too strong," Barry groaned as they heard him fall to the ground.

"You can do this Barry," Doctor Wells said, which caused all three youngsters to turn to their right in shock that Wells was there, and especially at what was coming out of his mouth. "You're right, I am responsible for all this. So many people have been hurt, because of me, and when I looked at you, all I saw was a potential victim of my hubris, and yes, I created this madness, but you, Barry, you can stop it." Wells motivational speech seemed to kick start something in Barry and he started moving faster than before, hitting past 700 miles per hour and stopping Marden. His mic went a bit fuzzy towards the end but he had stopped the tornado.

"Barry?" Sophia carefully said his name through the mic, hoping he was alright.

"It's over, I'm ok," He responded and everyone let out a huge sigh of relief. Cisco let out a laugh, and soon enough they all joined in.

"Well, it's been a long day hasn't it," Sophia mused, "I think it's past my bedtime," she joked, but she was sure that if she didn't head home soon she wouldn't be able to wake up for her morning shift at the hospital.

"Indeed Miss Lang. I believe I owe you an apology. It was wrong of me to say that to Barry, and you were right. He can help the city, and he can help us, it's just a matter of balance," Wells said as wheeled over to her.

"All is forgiven, and likewise I'm sorry for my little outburst back there," She said, extending a hand out to Doctor Wells who shook it, giving him a nod before herself and Caitlin left, for home. The two boys stayed behind to welcome Barry back. Sophia was just happy to be back home after the insane day she had. She still couldn't believe that this was even possible, and she had a feeling that her life was only going to get more crazy from here on out.

After saying goodbye to Caitlin on the third floor, she trudged up the stairs once more til she reached her own floor and fished for her keys in the mess of her black handbag. She honestly needed to keep it more organised but she was never good at that. She unlocked her apartment door, kicking off her shoes and leaving them in the hallway, her feet relaxing from the release of the pressure. Slowly she changed into a comfortable pair of shorts and a white tee before slipping into her bed, cuddling up to the softness it offered. As she lay in her bed, her navy blue blankets all the way up to her chin, she grabbed her phone on her night stand and sent a text to Barry whose number she had gotten off Cisco that afternoon. The message was short and sweet.

"Proud of you. – Lang."

And with that Sophia's eyes fluttered closed, taking her into a land of peaceful dreams, because for the first time, in a long time, she felt safe.

Disclaimer: All characters and lines that have been taken from the hit TV series The Flash belong to the CW writers of 'The Flash' and Warner Brothers, except of course my own original creative genius and characters. This disclaimer applies to all chapters within this story.

Updated/Re-vamped on the 18/06/16 / Only minor changes to layout & presentation.

Authors Note –

So, there was chapter one. I sincerely hope that you all enjoyed reading it, and are looking forward to more. I know this chapter was quite fast paced, but I just wanted to get that quick background in regards to Sophia as a character, her workplace, and the type of supportive and compassionate person she is, the following chapters flow much better, I promise.

This fic is Barry/OC but I assure you that there will be NO bashing of canon love interests whatsoever. I hate reading a fic where they basically tear the canon love interest to shreds because it doesn't suit their agenda… seriously not cool.

This is mean to be a light fic with romance, adventure and comedy, with a hint of drama. The story is told mostly from Sophia's point of view, and goes by the episodes of the series, starting with season one. Not all episodes will be covered, as I do have chapters that are original, and things will be changed around, not all aspects will be 100% correct or matching that of the show, and that's because I've either decided I wanted to take creative licence over bits and pieces, or I've just forgotten about things etc. But please do not expect it to be exactly like the show at times, because it is fanfiction after all.

I am aiming at posting one chapter a week, or one every few days depending on demand. Reviews are welcomed, I would love to read what you think about this story so far.

I've posted one-shots on here before, but I hope that this is my first successful posting of a complete fanfiction with multiple chapters. If everything turns out well, I want to take it into season two as well, and who knows where it'll go from there.

Much appreciation and love to you all.

Heroherondaletotherescue.