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Once upon a time, Central City had a sister city.
Keystone was the other side of the Missouri, in Kanas but the two cities were built together, founded together, were close enough had they not been in separate states with the river between them, they probably would have merged into one.
They called them the Gem Cities.
And once, they had had a superhero.
The Flash had first appeared in 1940. They said he could run so fast no one could see him moving. That he fought criminals and protected people.
And then they said nothing.
Then one day Central City was alone.
It was a tall tale, they said, stories children told each other to scare each other. Keystone City had fallen down a mine shaft, children should stay away from them, and Central had plenty from the old days. Keystone City was demolished after a failure at a new nuclear power plant in the 50s. Keystone City was stolen by an alien who collected them. Keystone City had never existed at all.
A lot of the theories Iris had read seemed like things her dad would scoff at and tell her not to believe that nonsense. And maybe her dad wouldn’t approve of some of the people Iris had asked about it either, but it wasn’t like she told them her name, Daphne’s older brother had just let them see his computer when Iris had been over there while her dad took Barry to one of his appointments, and he had shown them some things and let Iris send an e-mail.
Barry just said his mother was killed by a man made of lightning, a man who ran Barry twenty blocks away in the blink of an eye. And no one believed Barry, not even Dad, not after the jury had found Henry guilty in only minutes.
Barry’s story sounded like the Flash.
Barry liked stories about the Flash. Iris knew that. Everyone knew that. The Flash had fought a bad guy named the Rival in some of the comics Barry had, clearly he was using that to make up his story.
None of the Flash stories Iris knew- and Iris knew all of them thanks to Barry- had anything in them about lightning.
Barry would not lie to her. He was Iris’ best friend; he wouldn’t lie to her. He wouldn’t lie to anyone, and Nora was his mother, Barry would never ever try and help someone who hurt his mother, not even if he was confused.
If the man who killed Nora was like the Flash, then if Iris proved the Flash was real, maybe someone would listen to Barry.
Iris liked the library. It wasn’t far from Dad’s work so he didn’t mind them waiting there after school while he finished his shift. He hadn’t had a night shift since the one he brought Barry home and Iris had worked out that was because of Mrs Johnson who was in charge of making sure Barry was allowed to stay living with them. She didn’t know if Barry knew that or not yet, but she also knew that Barry was always glad her dad was there after his nightmares, even if Barry did keep yelling at him and being angry with everyone and shutting himself in the guest room that was his room now and not talking to anyone, not even Iris.
Barry liked the library too though. He kept hiding himself in corners with science books and notebooks and pencils and Iris knew he was trying to find out how to start looking for the Man in Yellow, but at least he never tried running away from the library.
Maybe he had realised the same as Iris and knew Ms Rose the Librarian knew how to call Dad’s work and if he tried leaving by himself, she would do that before Barry could make it to the nearest bus stop with a bus that went anywhere near Iron Heights.
Barry was curled up with a book again though, being quiet again, and he didn’t seem to notice Iris leaving the main bit of the library and heading to the back instead.
Because what the library had that Iris needed was newspapers.
Hundreds of newspapers.
If Keystone and the Flash were real, it would be in one of the newspapers.
The Flash had first appeared in 1940, everyone knew that. But Iris didn’t know when in 1940 and there was lots of other news too.
This might be harder than she thought.
The last three visits to the library she had been reading old newspapers but there was a lot of news and most of it wasn’t what she was looking for. She had started in January, at the beginning of the year, maybe the Flash just hadn’t got his powers yet. She could ask Barry when he was supposed to get those, he would know, but then Barry would know what she was doing and she didn’t want him to know yet, she wanted it to be a surprise when she could find something that would actually help him.
She also didn’t want Barry letting it slip next time he was angry and arguing with her dad. And if she asked Ms Rose for help Dad might find out what Iris was looking for and he didn’t believe Barry, he’d already told Iris not to encourage Barry in this.
Maybe she could ask Henry but probably not. Barry wasn’t supposed to be going to see Henry, he just kept running away and taking himself there. Iris definitely wouldn’t be allowed to go see Henry. And it was Nora who used to tell Barry the stories, Iris knew that.
The Flash had to be in one of the newspapers eventually.
If he was real.
There was someone else reading the newspapers when Iris next went to the library. Another girl.
Iris didn’t know her but she looked about the same age as her and Barry.
And she had an old newspaper book too.
Iris picked up the next newspaper she had to read and sat at the big table, across from the other girl, and started reading.
Still nothing about the Flash, but eventually there had to be something. She was almost at February now. Maybe she should have started at December and gone backwards.
The other girl was going backwards through her newspaper book. And reading way quicker than Iris could, and she had a proper notebook with a glittery pencil collection next to it.
“I like your pencils,” Iris whispered.
“Thanks,” the other girl whispered back. “You don’t go to my school.”
“I don’t think so,” Iris said. “I’m Iris.”
“I’m Linda. Is your history homework writing about an old news story too?”
“Oh, no, I’m not doing homework,” Iris said. “I’m looking for the Flash. My best friend likes Flash stories, I’m going to prove he really was real for him.”
“That’s just a story,” Linda scoffed.
“Well, what news are you looking for?”
“I’m going to find out why Keystone really disappeared,” Linda boasted. “I think it was the army.”
“Keystone’s just a story too,” Iris said. “No one knows why it vanished, it can’t just be in a newspaper.”
“No, but the news will have clues,” Linda said. “And then you take the clues and you go find more clues.”
“I know that. My dad’s a policeman, he finds clues for his job. I’m going to be one too when I grow up.”
“I’m going to be an investigation journalist,” Linda said. “They find clues too. If I get an A on this homework it will prove I’m going to be a really good journalist.”
“Like Nellie Bly,” Iris said. “She’s in a book my best friend gave me for my birthday, she’s really interesting.”
“There’s loads of women journalists,” Linda said. “The library has a book, I need to return it next week, but maybe we can ask the librarian if you can get it out after?”
“Yes please,” Iris said. “Mrs Rose knows my dad, she won’t mind.”
Linda was waiting by the desk when Iris and Barry walked into the library the following Tuesday.
Iris waved, and Linda looked excited about something.
“Who’s that?” Barry asked.
“My new friend Linda,” Iris said. “Are you going to the science books?”
“I thought we were going to do that algebra homework you were stuck on,” Barry said.
“We will,” Iris said. “Linda promised to give me an interesting book, and then I’m going to work on my French project a bit, okay?”
“Oh.” Barry looked disappointed. “Yeah. Okay.”
“I’ll catch up with you,” Iris said. She hugged him. “See you later!”
Iris rushed towards Linda and Mrs Rose.
“Hello Iris,” Mrs Rose said. “Linda says you’d like to take the book she’s returning out.”
“Yes please,” Iris said.
“I’ve found something else to show you,” Linda whispered.
Iris caught sight of Barry with his nose buried in a book on their way back to the reference section.
He looked up and waved and seemed pleased when Iris waved back enthusiastically.
“Who’s that?” Linda asked.
“Barry,” Iris said. “He’s my best friend, the one who knows all about the Flash.”
“He might be useful,” Linda said. “If he really knows a lot.”
“Not until I can give him some proof,” Iris said firmly. “What did you find?”
“This,” Linda said.
She pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to Iris.
It was a photocopy of an old newspaper article from a newspaper called The Keystone Times, written by someone called Joan Garrick.
It was about the Flash.
“It’s the first article about Keystone I could find,” Linda said. “Which means it’s the last article published. I think it means the Flash was real and involved in why Keystone disappeared.”
“We’re working on the same story,” Iris said.
“My homework is due tomorrow,” Linda said. “I had to do a different story for that, but I still want to find out what happened. And you want to find out what happened to the Flash so I think we can help each other. Partners?”
Linda stuck her hand out and Iris nodded and shook it firmly.
“Partners,” she said.