Dr. Stein squints his eyes as he looks at the face of the man standing over him. He feels he has seen the face somewhere, but he can't remember.
Especially after almost getting choked to death.
"Here, take my hand," Barry says, giving Dr. Stein his hand. Stein grabs Barry's hand as he gets back to his feet and looks around.
There is smoke and dust everywhere. Stein feels overwhelmed as he can feel the dusty air entering his lungs.
Trapped inside a body he had no control over for over a year, and now he finds himself right in the middle of an explosion site, breathing in nasty air.
"I am free...." He says. Even though his surroundings are filled with dust and smoke, which makes it hard to breathe, he doesn't care. The elation he is feeling right now after finally being freed from the prison he was trapped in is way beyond any discomfort he can experience.
After taking it all in, Stein turns to look at Barry. His old eyes squint as he tries to remember the face that's before him.
He is sure that he has seen Barry somewhere.
"Have we met before?" Stein asks.
"Yes, the day of the particle accelerator explosion. We met on a train," Barry answers.
"Ah, yes, I remember. You were that young man. I remember you saying you were taking a girl, who's not your girlfriend, she's just a female friend," Stein says.
As Martin says those words, Barry gets a flashback of that memory, a memory of the previous Barry when he was just an awkward nerd and a geek.
He even visibly cringes.
"Yes... That's one way to remember me," Barry says, holding back the embarrassment he is feeling.
Martin then turns to look at the unconscious Ronnie before looking back at Barry.
"How did you manage to do this?" He asks.
"Not me. It was Dr. Wells. He made a Quantum Splicer to-" Before Barry to finish his sentence. Martin finishes it for him. "To bombard are fused atoms with enough energy to splice them, hence separating us," Martin concludes.
"Now, how do we get back?" Martin asks, looking around as he sees nothing but dried, dead land everywhere he looks.
"Leave that to me," Barry says as he walks up to Ronnie and puts him on his shoulder before walking up to Professor Stein and holding him firmly.
"You might feel a little dizzy," Barry says.
"What are you doing?" Martin asks.
"Take a deep breath and hold it in," Barry instructs. Though Martin has a lot of questions, he does as he is told. As soon as he holds his breath in, Barry moves.
Lightning flashes all around them as he takes a step forward at Super Speed. The Speed Force distributes itself perfectly to encompass all of Martin so that he doesn't get incinerated into dust as Barry takes him along.
Martin, for a moment, felt as if the view before him was turning blue, but the very next moment, he found himself standing before S.T.A.R. Labs.
"Wha-" Martin feels overwhelmed, noticing the instant change in scenery. A moment before, he was in the middle of nowhere, and now he is standing right before S.T.A.R. Labs.
"What that explosion did to you and Ronnie here, it did the same thing to me. I got the ability to run very fast," Barry explains to Martin before he asks him about it.
Martin is fascinated by the idea that Barry can run very fast. His mind is immediately flooded with so many questions about Barry's power and its implications for the world around him.
As a scientist, he is clearly very curious about how Barry's power works, especially after seeing that there isn't a scratch on him.
If what Barry's said is true, then his old body should have experienced 1000s of Gs of force, which would have incinerated him into nothingness, but he stands here completely unscathed. The same could be said for the unconscious Ronnie on Barry's shoulder.
"Let's head in, Dr. Wells and the team are waiting for us," Barry says to Martin and takes him into S.T.A.R. Labs.
___________________
Inside the Lab's cortex, the team looks to be on edge as they haven't heard from Barry yet, when suddenly they hear footsteps.
They turn and see Barry walk in with a man on his shoulder and another old man walking right behind him.
"Barry!" Caitlin aproaches him, worried, and starts checking on him.
"Don't worry, I am fine," Barry says.
"Is that?" Caitlin asks as she sees Ronnie on Barry's shoulder.
"Yes, and here's Dr. Martin Stein," Barry says, moving aside as the team looks at Stein, who looks back at them.
"Professor Stein, it's good to see you finally in person," Dr. Wells says.
"Harrison Wells... Thank you for helping me," Dr. Stein says.
"I did what I needed to do... Help the people who had to suffer because of me," Dr. Wells says.
"Uh... do you have somewhere I can freshen up and get a change of clothes?" Dr. Stein asks as he does look very ragged with torn clothes and dirt all over him.
"Of course," Dr. Wells says as Cisco escorts Dr. Stein away.
Barry uses this moment to put Ronnie down and asks. "What about him?"
"Now that Professor Stein and Mr. Raymond have separated, we need to run some tests on them. See if there are any side effects to their separation," Dr. Wells suggests.
"Dr. Snow, please begin with the preparation." Dr. Wells says, looking at Caitlin.
Barry turns his head to look at Caitlin and sees her staring at the unconscious Ronnie. He takes a step closer to her and feels the air around her getting cold.
He then notices her eyes. They are glowing white. Her eyebrows are scrunched, her jaw tightened, and her fist clenched.
She is angry.
Barry immediately grabs her hand gently and snaps her out of it.
Jolted awake, she looks at Barry. She seems confused.
"Huh?" she questions as if she didn't hear what Dr. Wells says.
Barry looks at Dr. Wells, and they both immediately come to the same conclusion.
Caitlin is losing herself faster than they expected.