- My name is Barry Allen,
and I am the fastest man alive.
When I was a child, I saw my mother killed
by something impossible. - Run, Barry, run!
- My father went to prison for her murder.
Then an accident made me the impossible.
To the outside world, I'm an ordinary forensic scientist,
but secretly, I use my speed to fight crime
and find others like me.
And one day, I'll find who killed my mother...
- Mom! - And get justice for my father.
I am The Flash.
Previously on The Flash...
- You opened your lab after Nora Allen's murder.
Do you mind telling me what you were doing
in Central City before that?
- Here I thought we were just two guys
having a friendly drink.
- What?
- I just noticed you don't smile too much.
- The explosion that put you in a coma
also killed my fiancée.
Ronnie!
- He was a hero.
- I didn't want him to be a hero.
I wanted him to be my husband.
- Don't look for me again.
- Everyone has a hero,
someone they look up to or admire,
someone they just wish they could be.
It's easy to believe in heroes.
What's hard is when our heroes stop believing in us.
- Oh, Barry, there's an intersection coming up. Hurry!
- This should slow 'em down.
- Guys, which way?
- Left. - Right.
- Left.
- Stop! You both hear you're
telling me two different things, right?
- Barry, listen up. Listen carefully.
Here is what you're going to do.
Now, the Queen is trying to make it to the bridge,
but I have a shortcut... wait for it...
And left... left...
right... - I see her!
- Make her go west before Fremont.
- Okay, how? - I'd recommend a detour.
Now, the King is headed for the entrance to the interstate.
- What entrance?
- Atta boy.
Check...
- Got the keys.
- Mate.
Give me some!
- Yeah!
- Efficiently done, Mr. Allen.
- We need a picture. - Pretty sure rule number one
of having a secret identity is not taking pictures of yourself
in your super suit without a mask on.
- Oh, come on, please!
This is just for us. This is to document all this.
- Who knows? Maybe people in the future
will want to know how all this happened.
- All right, well, if you want the future to have
the whole story, then, we all need to be in it.
- First, let me put on some makeup?
- The future does not care about your makeup.
- Mm-mmm.
Okay.
Big smiles.
Three... two... one.
Ha! - Does that count as a selfie?
- Absolutely.
- Sick. Came out good.
- Thanks for talking me through things out there.
- My pleasure.
Well done.
I have to say it was a bit of a rush feeling like a...
- A hero. - Yeah.
- You're pretty good at it.
Hey. - Hey.
- You do realize the whole point of moving out is
not being at home anymore, right?
- Ha-ha-ha.
I forgot a few things.
So... how is it living back at the house?
- Hey, Bar? - Yo.
- Babe... spaghetti a la me.
You sure you don't want to stay for dinner?
- Thanks, but Eddie is painting all day
and I swore that I would help.
Although, I'm really just going to do that thing
where I get a little paint
on my hair and on my nose.
- Oh, hey,
someone from Central City Picture News called you
the other day... I left the number on the fridge.
- What? Why didn't you tell me?
- Chill! Just did.
Hey, I heard that some members of the Royal Flush Gang
are headed to prison.
Is that a good scream or a bad scream?
- Good! So good!
I just got offered a job as a reporter
at Central City Picture News.
- That's awesome! - The editor's a fan of my blog!
- That is amazing. - Oh, my God!
- Oh, God.
- Harrison Wells.
Hello?
- We both know what you did.
It's time to pay the piper!
- Come in.
Look, Joe, I apologize for all of this.
It just... it really feels like a case of so much for so little.
The police should not have been called.
I got a prank call before all this happened.
- This feels like more than just a prank, Doctor.
- Well, there are those who feel I did not suffer enough
for the particle accelerator explosion of last year,
and some of them act on it.
- Dr. Wells. Dr. Wells, are you okay?
- Dr. Snow, I'm... I'm fine. A little chilly.
Otherwise, I'm fine. Hello, Cisco.
Make yourselves at home as best you can.
I'm gonna make a hotel reservation.
- Oh... This place is so sick.
- Yeah... hey, what took you guys so long?
- We got lost.
- We've never been here before.
- Really? Never?
- He tends to keep his private life private.
- A precipice in front, and wolves behind.
- In other words, you're between a rock and a hard place.
Check.
- The King is dead.
- Checkmate.
Dr. Wells?
- There he is.
Hartley, allow me to introduce you to Cisco Ramon.
Mr. Ramon here is one of the finest mechanical engineers
I have ever seen.
- Wow.
I can't believe Harrison Wells said that about me.
- I'm sure he'll prove to be an invaluable member of your team.
Trust me. - You I trust.
I don't foresee myself trusting someone
who showed up to his first day of work
at a billion dollar research facility
wearing a T-shirt that says
"Keep Calm and Han Shot First."
- Huh... would you give us a minute please, Cisco?
- Yes, sir.
- I realize you don't have to explain your hiring decisions
to me, but maybe for the sake of a fun exercise,
we could pretend you did.
- I have a good feeling about him.
Just as I did about you.
Oh...
- Hartley...
You're still my guy.
And nothing and no one is ever going to change that.
- I canvassed the street.
No other reports of vandalism.
No strange cars.
Get this... Wells says he's right there when it happened.
All that glass shattering down around him and he can't walk?
- And he didn't have a scratch on him.
- There's no point of impact.
No rock or bat or... any solid object
went through these windows.
It's as if they just shattered themselves.
This wasn't some teenage prank?
- No, it wasn't.
- But you don't want our help.
Why?
- Because I already know who did this.
Hartley Rathaway.
- Who is Hartley Rathaway?
- Hartley Rathaway is the prodigal son.
And he has returned.
- Hartley Rathaway possesses one of the finest scientific minds
I've ever encountered.
- Any ties to Rathaway Industries?
- His grandfather founded the company, his father expanded it,
and Hartley here was set to inherit the throne.
- What happened? - He came out to his parents.
Old money, old values.
- They were estranged when we met,
but, brilliant. I couldn't have built
the particle accelerator without him.
- You guys have never even mentioned his name.
- That's because Hartley had a challenging personality.
- What she means is he was mostly a jerk.
But, every once in a while,
he could be a dick.
- Let's just say that Hartley, like many outliers,
had trouble relating to his peers.
- Yes, but he was always your favorite.
- The chosen one.
He referred to himself like that.
- So if you two were so close, why would he target you?
- Hartley left S.T.A.R. Labs about a year ago
after we had a...
a disagreement.
- About what?
- Look, don't worry. We'll stop him.
I won't let him hurt you... any of you.
Let's get back to my lab, all right?
- I could've gone my whole life without seeing that jerk again.
- Yo. This place is so dope.
- What a coincidence. We were thinking of making
"Yo. This place is so dope" our new slogan.
- If you're so convinced Dr. Wells made a mistake
in hiring me, why don't you try proving it to him?
- Magnetic flux is measured by what?
- Hall effect pick up.
- The dual of a parallel R-C circuit?
- Series R-L circuit. I can go all day, pal.
- Hartley, it looks like you have met your match.
I am Dr. Caitlin Snow. It's very nice to meet you.
- Cisco Ramon. Nice to meet you.
- And just ignore Hartley. We all do.
- Tell your boyfriend I need his specs on the synchotron
by end of day.
- Actually, it is the end of Ronnie's day.
We are leaving early.
My boyfriend is taking me out of town
for our one-year anniversary.
- Aw. That's sweet. - Thanks.
I'll see you guys on Monday.
- See ya.
She seems nice.
You don't.
- I give you a week.
Max.
- Hi. I'm Iris West. It's my first day.
- I can see that.
- Really? Does it show?
- Uh, the fact that I've never seen you before shows.
- Mr. Bridge! Nice of you to make an appearance
at a staff meeting.
- I do love a good shmear.
- Everyone, welcome Iris West, our new cub.
Anyone want to volunteer to be her mama bear?
Mason, you picked a bad day to actually show up.
- I don't nanny. - I lost the ability
to make a joke back in '05. Today, you do.
Deadlines. All new stories are due on my desk
at the end of the day.
- Oh, actually, I had an idea for a piece.
There's this program in Keystone
that helps battered women get back on their feet.
- Ah, that sounds really great, West.
Actually, any thoughts on a piece about The Flash,
something you haven't written about yet, something new?
- Um, no.
Not currently.
- All right. Sally forth, everyone.
Sally forth.
- Everything has a natural frequency.
And since sound is expressed
as a vibration, if the pitch of the sound
matches the natural vibration frequency of an object, then...
- So, you're saying that can happen to anything,
Not just glass? - Oh, yeah.
I think that's absolutely what happened to the windows
at Wells' house.
He's using some kind of sonic technology.
- I'm getting this feeling that Wells is hiding something...
about what's going on with this Rathaway character...
- Don't touch that!
I mean, it sounds like this Hartley guy was a pill
before he went all super villain, so I...
I get why he never mentioned him.
- Like he never mentions his girlfriend that got killed.
- No.
How do you know about her?
- He's taking up a big part of our lives.
I wanted to know more about him.
- I mean, if you want to know more about him,
you could just ask me.
- Sounds like you don't know him as well as you think.
- Joe. Multiple 911 calls.
Rathaway Industries is under attack.
Sector cars are en route.
- Hey. - Barry, it's Caitlin.
- I think I know why you're calling.
- Get down on the ground!
- It's over, Rathaway.
- You know my name.
I know some names too.
Caitlin Snow.
Cisco Ramon.
Harrison Wells.
I can hear the radio waves emanating from your suit.
About 1900 megahertz.
Is that them on the other end, listening?
Are they gonna hear you die?
- No. They're going to hear you get your ass kicked.
- Okay.
- Looks like you're not as smart as everyone says.
- Smart enough to have figured out
who Harrison Wells really is.
You see, I know his secret.
- Being scooped up by a guy clad in head-to-toe leather
is a long-time fantasy of mine, so thanks.
Well, well, well, the gang's all here.
You've lasted a lot longer than I would've thought, Cisco.
- And you didn't last ten seconds against The Flash.
- I was thinking of calling myself Pied Piper.
- Hey! I assign the nicknames around here.
Although that one's not bad.
- Caitlin...
Never did get that wedding invite.
- Shut the hell up!
- Stay in front of me.
The scanner is detecting foreign metallic objects in your ears.
Take 'em out. - I can't.
I suffered head trauma when S.T.A.R. Labs exploded.
My hearing was severely damaged.
Without these, I'm in pain you can't imagine.
We all lost something that night.
Ha. Very clever re-purposing the anti-proton cavities
into confinement cells.
Wells' idea, I'm sure.
- It was mine, actually.
- Hartley, don't make this more difficult than it has to be.
- Enough, Hartley.
Give us a minute.
- See you soon, Cisco.
- Doubt it!
- God, I wish I'd taken a language in high school.
- How did you know we were working with The Flash?
- I wrote a hexagonal algorithm
tracking all of his sightings,
extrapolating a theoretical exit trajectory.
In other words, every time he ran from the scene of a crime,
he ran in this general direction.
- You are brilliant.
And... any anguish you have been through because of me
was never my intent.
- Not bad...
as far as heartfelt apologies go.
Except that wasn't for my benefit.
That was for you, Flash.
Feels good to have the great Harrison Wells behind you,
doesn't it? But one day,
this man will turn on you...
in a flash...
and even you won't see it coming.
I only hope that he leaves you in better shape than he left me.
If you're lucky, you'll only be dead.
Because every day I have to live with the agonizing,
piercing screaming in my ears.
I almost forgot... I told your pet
I know your deep, dark secret, Harrison.
Have fun letting him in on that one.
- I assume you were all listening.
Well, Hartley was telling the truth.
I have not been honest with you.
With any of you.
The accelerator...
Hartley warned me that there was indeed a chance
that the accelerator could explode.
His data did not show 100% certainty,
just that there was a risk, but it was a real risk.
And yet I made the decision
that the reward... that...
everything we could learn and everything we could achieve,
that all of that...
simply outweighed that risk.
I'm sorry.
- Then the next time you choose to put our lives,
and the lives of the people that we love,
at risk,
I'll expect a heads up.
- After the explosion, when everyone else left you...
Caitlin and Cisco stood by you.
You owe them more than an apology.
- They might soon get more than that what with Hartley
so intent on sending me to the next world.
- What are...
that wouldn't make it right with them.
You broke their trust. Our trust.
- Oh! Hi, chief.
Is that what people call you? - Uh, no. Not really.
Listen, eyewitnesses say that The Flash thwarted an attack
downtown today. Look into it.
- Uh, yeah, sure. - Great.
Mason, you're looking particularly rumpled today.
- Mm-hmm.
- So, what are we working on?
- I am following up on a lead on corruption at the DWP.
You... well, I think you just got your assignment from Larkin,
didn't you?
- Look, I'm not stupid, okay?
I know that Larkin hired me because he thinks
that I have some sort of in with The Flash.
But I am serious about being a journalist.
- Why? Because you write a blog?
My mother writes a blog.
- I may not have a lot of experience, but I do have...
- Spunk? Grit?
Gumption?
What is this, a Chick-Lit novel?
- No, no, no, I am having the worst day ever.
We both can't be having the worst day ever. Okay?
And I was really looking forward to getting
some good complaining in.
- Well, fire away.
- Okay, well, turns out that the real reason they hired me
is because they think I have some sort of connection
to The Flash, which I don't.
Not anymore.
And I've been teamed up with Mason Bridge,
who is a legend, who I admired, before he told me
I was a worthless, talentless millennial.
- Well, the people we admire aren't always
who we'd like them to be.
- Well said.
So, I'm screwed.
- No, look...
if this Mason guy doesn't see what a talented journalist
you are, then he's probably a lousy writer.
- He won the Pulitzer.
Twice, I think.
- Oh. Good for him.
Thanks, Barry.
Having someone believe in me, it's, um...
a small... really, really big thing.
- Yeah. - Yeah.
- Where's Dr. Wells?
- I'm not sure. Barry was right.
Hartley was using sonic resonance.
The intensity regulator's measuring decibels.
But you know what's weird?
He had it set to the lowest setting.
- What do you mean? - Well...
He could've completely destroyed his father's building
if he wanted to in one blast.
- So, why not just do it and leave?
I mean, why stick around and run the risk of getting caught?
- Unless he wanted to be caught.
Dr. Wells!
There's been a pipeline breach.
- Hartley.
- Stay here.
- Ah! Not now.
Aah!
Cisco, can you hear me?
Ugh!
- Hey, what's up? - Listen to me... Hartley escaped.
He's loose in the facility. - Okay.
- Okay, your turn... why are you having the worst day...
- Tell me, Harrison.
Am I still your guy?
- Hey! Are you okay?
- Yeah, uh, Cisco and Dr. Wells.
- He's gone.
- Hey.
Welcome back, Mr. Ramon.
- Ooh.
Oh, man.
Caitlin? - Hey.
She's fine.
- You need to rest. You have a concussion.
You're lucky.
- Please tell me you got him.
- I guess the attack on his family's company was a fake out
so we'd catch him. - And give him
direct access to S.T.A.R. Labs. - Why?
- I should've known he was up to something.
This is my fault.
- Hey, man. This is on me, too.
I shouldn't have left before...
- This is no one's fault but mine.
I earned the blame... I'm not interested in sharing it.
Hartley doesn't think I've paid for my crimes.
And he's right.
He won't stop until I do.
- Where are you going?
- To earn back your trust.
Hmm... now what were you doing in my accelerator?
- Thought it was our accelerator.
Because it will be our fault if we turn this thing on
and blow a hole in Central City.
- You are wagering the lives of everyone in this building.
Everyone in this city.
If you don't have the courage to admit you could be wrong,
I will do it for you.
- Hartley Rathaway...
your position at S.T.A.R. Labs is terminated.
- If you think you can shut me up...
- Oh, I know I can, Hartley.
Because if you breathe one word of any kind of
unsubstantiated accusation,
I will make sure the only job you ever get in physics
is teaching it to high school juniors.
- What is going on here?
Press conference.
- Thank you for coming on such short notice.
And for those of you that read the ten-volume report
issued by the Norris Commission,
well, I commend you on your tenacity.
You already know, then, the circumstances that led to
the explosion of the S.T.A.R. Labs particle accelerator.
Or rather, you think you do.
Now, the Commission's finding was that the catastrophe was
caused by a chain of events that nobody could have predicted,
including myself.
The truth is...
I was warned there was a chance
the particle accelerator might fail.
I was warned by a former colleague...
a friend.
I chose to ignore the warning and in so doing,
I let down all of you.
As a new friend pointed out...
I failed this city.
I failed this city and I failed those who trusted me the most.
By coming forward today...
it's my hope I'm taking the first step toward
regaining that trust.
And your trust as well.
Are there any questions?
- Do you have any intention of rebuilding
the particle accelerator?
- Miss West, do you have a question for me?
- I don't believe you answered my colleague's question,
Dr. Wells, so I'll ask it again.
Do you have any intention of rebuilding
the particle accelerator, either now or in the future?
- Of course not.
- Thank you for your answer, Doctor.
- It's my pleasure.
No further questions.
- Hey.
What was that?
- Gumption.
- Has Hartley made contact yet?
- What makes you so sure he will?
- Because he's Hartley,
and he'll want to have the last word.
- Cisco, you should be resting.
- The answer to why Hartley fooled us into catching him
is in here, and I'm gonna find it.
- You have nothing to prove. - Not true.
Do you know why I hired you, Cisco?
- You said you saw something in me... I know.
- What I saw was humanity.
You and Hartley, Cisco, you're both brilliant.
You both have mental...
sparks. But his brilliance
subtracted from the experience of working here,
whereas your brilliance,
your heart,
your warmth, your humor,
it just adds to it.
There is no chosen one, Cisco.
No second or third favorite. Never was.
It's just us.
- What's that?
- Nice gambit, Harrison. But this isn't over.
- Hartley, what do you want? What do you want, Hartley?
I already gave my mea culpa today.
- The city already hated you.
You don't think I noticed that press conference
was a pathetic bishop sacrifice?
No, no, no. I've played with you too many times
to let you get away with that.
This is between you, me, and The Flash.
- You don't want to play for those kind
of stakes with me, Hartley.
- Actually, I really do.
What do you say? One last game of chess?
- You and I both know that the winner of the game
is the one who makes the next-to-last mistake,
and you clearly have a move in mind.
- You're right.
And I'm already at the board.
So why don't you move your precious scarlet knight...
While I take out a few pawns.
- All right. All right, Cisco, where do I go?
- I can't trace the signal. He could be sending his messages
from anywhere. - Cisco,
scan for seismic activity.
If Hartley's using sonic blast,
the vibrations could cause tremors.
- Look. Over here. Quake activity but no fault line.
- The Keystone Cleveland Dam.
- Barry! Don't underestimate him. He's brilliant.
- Well, good thing I'll have you in here.
- Rook to knight four.
- Aah!
- Barry, you need to disarm Hartley immediately.
Immediately! Do you hear me?
He is a master of distraction.
He is a master of hiding his true endgame.
- A-ha!
Uh-oh. - A-ha what?
- I figured out what Hartley
stole from S.T.A.R. Labs, why he let himself get caught.
- Which brings us to the "uh-oh."
- He has all the data on Barry's molecular scans.
- Why would he want that?
- He can get Barry's frequency.
Barry, you need to get out of there!
You need to get out of there immediately!
- It's over! You lose!
- Amazing. He replaced me with you?
Total moron.
I got you with the same trick twice.
- Ah!
Uhh!
- I got the idea watching you and Harrison chit-chat...
to use your suit's own speakers to kill you.
- Gah!
- That feeling? That's your organs shearing apart.
And you activated the frequency when you disarmed me.
In chess, we call that a discovered attack.
You don't see it until it's too late.
Right, Harrison? - Aah!
- Barry's vitals are bottoming out.
We need to do something.
- What are you doing?
- Barry's on the travel road of the dam, at rush hour,
surrounded by cars.
Many of those cars are going to have satellite radio.
Satellite sends a signal to the car,
song comes out the speaker... - Yes! I know
how satellite radio works! How does that help?
- Well, I'm gonna have the satellite send something
other than a song.
Hartley is about to hear something
he was not expecting...
a sound wave that will meet the frequency of
and destroy his weapons.
- You don't seem so special anymore.
Given how easy it was to bring you down,
I wonder if Harrison will even miss you.
- No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no!
No!
Aah!
- Checkmate.
Barry, can you hear me?
- Sort of!
- Okay! - How do you feel?
- Fine! I mean there is a little ringing in my ears,
but other than that I'm good, so...
- You're speaking very loudly.
- Sorry. - It's okay, it'll pass.
- Nice moves. - Thank you.
- Anytime.
I think I'm gonna take my doctor's advice
and go lie down.
- What a great idea!
Man, I feel like I'm hung over times ten.
- I'm not surprised.
- It's difficult for me...
to admit when I'm wrong.
Certainly, in front of an entire city but also...
Also to my closest friends.
So I hope one day
to restore your trust and faith in me.
- That day was today.
Not every hero wears a mask.
Some heroes save the day in the simplest of ways.
By just being there for us...
or letting us know we're believed in.
If I'm any sort of hero today, it's not because of my speed.
It's because I learned how from the people in my life...
all of them.
Hey.
- Hey.
Man, that press conference today was something else.
Dr. Wells... took a lot of guts to do that.
I have to give him that.
- He has his moments.
- What's up?
- Must have been hard for you.
What? To be this handsome?
Raising me.
- Oh. No.
- Well, a kid who loved math and chemistry,
whose idea of a fun afternoon was
doing experiments in the garage.
Couldn't have been easy.
As soon as I started AP classes, you had
no clue how to help me with my homework.
- No. - You must have always felt like
you were competing with Richard Dawkins and Neil Tyson and...
Henry Allen too.
But, look, none of them... no one...
could ever replace you.
Not even Wells.
- Aw.
- All right, I'll see you at home.
- All right.
- Hey, Eddie. - Hey, Barry.
- Hey, what'd you find out?
- I searched Wells' entire house like you said.
There was nothing.
Are you sure you want to do this...
Investigate Wells?
- 100%
- Your evil hearing aids won't help you escape this time.
So I'd get comfy.
- You must be enjoying this, Cisco.
- I am. - Ah, well,
if that scares you, I can't imagine
how you're gonna feel when you open up these doors
and let me out of here. - Hmm...
maybe I'm going deaf, 'cause I could've sworn
you just said I'm gonna let you out.
- And very soon too.
- Why would I ever do that?
- Because I know where Ronnie Raymond is.
I know what really happened to him that night.
And I know how to save him.
- Warning! Tachyon output has passed acceptable
tolerance range.
Continued exposure is not recommended.
- Increase to maximum, Gideon.
- Increasing to maximum, Doctor.
Speed Force absorption at 35% and rising.
- I'm not stabilizing. I can't hang on to my speed.
It comes and goes, and I can not control it.
Gideon, for how much longer is the Tachyonic device viable?
- Calculations inconclusive.
I'm sorry, Doctor. - Oh, that's okay, Gideon.
This was only meant to be a temporary fix.
The real endgame is almost here.
- Greg, move your head!