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Barry had just left school with his best friend Iris when three police cars sped past them, lights flashing and screeching up and down the street. As is always the case in these moments, Barry gave a stupid excuse so that he could sneak off into a side street and put on his Flash costume, drawing on the Speedforce to go and see what the problem was, transforming himself into a red and gold streak for the world.
Just under two years ago, in his first year, he was staying at school to clean up the physics and chemistry room after the club when a lightning flashed through one of the room's windows, hitting Barry and exploding the bottles of chemicals he was tidying up at the time. After this accident, when he woke up, the teenager had become fast. Very fast. Barry could run fast, think fast, live fast, a few minutes could be the equivalent of several months for him.
At first, he was just trying to figure out how his body now worked with his new powers, keeping the secret to himself. Then he started helping people when he came across the right moment, then he voluntarily walked around town to help, always running fast, the town press began to talk about him as a "gust of wind and lightning" who saved people and that's how, one thing led to another, a year or so ago, he ended up creating a red and gold hero costume to run around the city while hiding his secret identity and thanks to his parents' friend Daryl, who had taken him in as a child, he had easy access to the police radio, allowing him to be wherever he was needed in no time.
But something unexpected happened just over six months ago.
A flying unexpected, bright green, very very very talkative, proud and hot-headed.
Another young hero has arrived in town, calling himself Green Lantern - Barry couldn't help laughing the first time he heard it - and every time there's an intervention, he's there, twirling so easily in the air - and sometimes in buildings... - always responding with a smirk or a joke. It wasn't that Barry didn't appreciate help, you always need help, and it wasn't that he didn't like Green Lantern, on the contrary, but Green Lantern sometimes had a...strange attitude, as if he knew everything about Barry. And that was a bit worrying, because Barry did everything he could to keep his anonymity when he was wearing the Flash mask, he didn't want his little heroic activities to have repercussions on his civilian life and his friends. And until now, he thought that for a goofball like him, he'd succeeded very well on this mission, no criminal had come back to him, his friends had no suspicions - it was a miracle that Iris hadn't interrogated him or given him a conference with a slide show explaining point by point how the redhead had discovered his secret - and above all, it was incredible that his best friend Hal Jordan didn't yet know about this big secret.
Barry and Hal have known each other for a long time, one day together because of classes and they were already friends by the end of the day. Their friendship was the most precious thing in their eyes, they told each other absolutely everything, they didn't want a single secret to tarnish this precious friendship. Well...except that superhero secret, but it's far too big a secret, Barry adored, loved Hal and that's precisely why he can't tell him anything because he knows in advance that when his best friend finds out, he won't let him go for a moment and that, no matter whether he's in danger or not, and it was out of the question. Barry is no longer the boy to protect, he has powers now, he's faster than anyone, he can do so much more to help people, it's his turn now to protect the ones he loves, even if it means lying.
A few more strides and he was beside the police cars he had seen pass by a few moments earlier. They were parked in front of the city's central bank, also serving as protective barriers for the policemen, all armed.
"Nothing like a robbery to end this day of classes, right Flash ?"
Looking up, Barry found Green Lantern, as ever, floating nonchalantly in the air, his eternal smirk on display. The two were about the same age, so it wasn't hard for the other hero to guess that Barry was just leaving school, but that didn't mean he liked it. It was always like that with him, little jokes and remarks here and there as if Green Lantern knew Barry's timetable by heart.
"If you could avoid shouting from the rooftops that we're high school students, that would be nice." He replied, rolling his eyes as the other landed beside him.
"If you want, you can go and do your maths homework and leave this flight in the hands of a professional, Mr Grumpy."
Without waiting for an answer and with complete confidence, the fluorescent hero floated back past the police and cars, positioning himself a few metres from the bank's front door and using his ring to materialise a megaphone. Barry knew in advance that he was going to say something stupid.
"Hey awful ones, do you prefer the scenario where you surrender nicely without anyone getting hurt, or do you prefer the scenario where I kick your ass ?"
Now that's Green Lantern. And since he obviously received no reply, the flying hero took it as an invitation to go and fight the thieves. Barry, for his part, sighed at this lack of finesse, but after six months of working together, he'd learned to deal with the gruffness and as Green Lantern passed through the main door, Barry ran around to find a security door. There he was able to enter the building easily by vibrating -a new trick he'd learnt last month- and he ran around the bank, knocking out any robbers he came across on the way. At first look, they seemed to be a small group, not very organised and not very nasty -Barry found the bank's staff and customers all locked up in the boss's office and left there unguarded, really not very talented thieves-. The hero let the civilians out through the back door and then headed back towards the main room, the bank's reception area, where Green Lantern and the rest of the robbers were supposed to be. Barry was a little worried when he heard gunshots, but at least he was sure he could find the robbers and his teammate.
Once there, he saw several bags full of money and the thieves busy emptying their guns magazines towards Green Lantern, who had built a protective bubble around himself and still had that arrogant little smile to taunt the enemies.
After several seconds, realising that their strategy wasn't working, the robbers stopped shooting uselessly at the hero, wondering aloud why their colleagues hadn't returned with the last bags of money, and that's when Barry decided to intervene.
"If you're talking about the five guys in balaclavas who were hanging around at the back of the bank, I think you'll be waiting a long time for them, guys." He replied, puffing out his chest and crossing his arms to look more imposing.
The robbers were speechless at this information while behind them, Green Lantern laughed, it really was an amateur robbery that had gone completely wrong. One of the robbers tried his luck by pointing his gun at Barry, but was immediately crushed by a green tennis racket.
"Don't even think about attacking my partner, he might send you to jail before you even figure it out."
The last three robbers listened attentively to Green Lantern before looking at their comrade on the ground, who was already seeing the stars in broad daylight, and then made the wise decision to drop their weapons and put their hands in the air. In a few moments, the robbers had been put out of action and were now on their way to the police station, the hostages were free and not a single dollar had left the bank. All's well that ends well for this day.
After a heartfelt thank-you, the two young heroes left together, Barry running alongside Green Lantern as he flew, trying for the umpteenth time to explain to him that rushing in head first is not a good plan and that it will all go wrong one day if he continues to be so reckless. And as always, Lantern didn't seem to listen, he gave him a big smile, reminded him that Barry had a literature homework due tomorrow and flew off to who-knows-where. This guy... he clearly knows Barry, he knows everything and it's very frightening ! It's going to drive him mad !
Arriving at school the next day, Barry was determined to investigate Green Lantern. The other hero was clearly in his school, or even his class, to have so much information on him. He spent the whole morning scrutinising his classmates, trying to spot a clue, but his investigation was going nowhere. For a moment, he thought it was Snart, the guy was totally the type to taunt him but he was shorter and with lighter hair than Green Lantern -then he thought before running off somewhere HIM-. A lot of hypotheses came into his head this morning, but each time, there was a detail that didn't fit: the height, the body, the hair, the character. He couldn't find out who Green Lantern was. And that frustrated him. Iris and Hal had spent the morning saying he was weird - which wasn't much of a change from the usual-. If only he could at least explain to his two friends, but there was too much risk of them finding out later that he was Flash.
Barry sighed as he let his head bang against the door of his locker, this is going to ruin his day and certainly the rest of his week if he doesn't find out who's behind that stupid green mask !
"It's not nice to hit his locker, you're going to hurt him."
With his textbooks under his arm, Hal also put away his morning's lessons in his locker, not far from Barry's locker.
“Between this iron door and my head, I’m the one who’ll hurt the most.” He said as he opened the said iron door.
"Oh my poor carebear, do you want a magic kiss ?"
Like every time they were at the lockers, Hal put a hand over Barry's locker door, pretending he had a cool pose doing that but it was mostly to hold back this damn door that closed by itself and that had been annoying Barry since he inherited this damn locker.
Then he saw it.
This brilliant green ring with a foreign lantern symbol, like the one on the hero's costume, stands proudly on the middle finger of Hal's right hand. All the connections were made in Barry's mind. Same height, same physique, same hair colour with that indomitable lock of hair, the same fiery and doubtless character. Everything also explained how and why Green Lantern knew Barry and his life so well, because Green Lantern is his best friend !
Barry stood staring wide-eyed at the ring for a long moment, and when it was Hal's turn to realise that Barry had discovered his secret, all he could think to say was "oops, I've been found out."
"It was you...All this time it was you and you didn't tell me anything Harold !" He exclaimed, almost screaming. Emotions mixed inside him because he was relieved that it wasn't a stranger who knew his secret identity but he was also enormously disappointed that Hal hadn't told him and that he'd find out like this.
"Shh, you don't have to tell the whole town !"
"You didn't even bother to tell your best friend !"
"Yes, I know. But in my defence, I only realised it was you a few weeks ago and I didn't know how to tell you."
"I don't know, maybe "By the way Barry, it's me, Hal." might have been a better idea than leaving me in the lie then you, you knew my identity !"
"Oh, you've managed sarcasm..."
"Don't change the subject, Harold Jordan !"
The brunet fell silent immediately, and even though he was taller, Barry felt like he was scolding a child, not taking his eyes off him, his eyebrows furrowed and his gaze hard. After a few moments' silence, Hal ventured to say a sincere "sorry", and it was apparently the right thing to do, because that simple word was enough to change the expression on Barry's face from anger to annoyance, and after a long sigh from the blond, he now looked blase about his best friend's mistake. It was already much better for Hal.
"You know you get really arrogant when you have that damn green mask on ?"
"Own a ring that can create anything you imagine and you too will become overconfident in your abilities. Then, I have the best partner to have my back !"
Hal gave a big smile - so radiant that Barry thought he'd been blinded for a moment - but he still had a sorry look on his face because he sincerely didn't like not being able to interact normally with his best friend, but as he'd said before, he just didn't know how to broach the subject, Hal had only started to think about it very seriously this morning when he realised it was bothering Barry. At least now everyone knew everyone else's secret identity, Hal simply hadn't imagined the revelation like this. In the end, as always, Barry was right, he didn't need to try too hard to explain the situation, a simple "Hey, it's me" would have sufficed.
"In the end, I'm glad it's you behind the mask, it's more reassuring."
"Oh, does that mean you still want me as your partner in crime ?"
"We're fighting crime Hal. But yes, I'll still have you as a partner. Just before..." Barry checked his watch before smirking and giving Hal a mischievous look, who sensed a well-deserved revenge in the making.
Everything around Hal suddenly blurred for several seconds and when his vision came back into focus, he was no longer in front of the lockers but in a small street adjacent to the town's central park...five kilometres from the school, Barry giggling at his incomprehension.
"Today, I'm not the one who'll be late for class. See you later !"
And as quickly as he had arrived, he left again, leaving Hal alone in the street as their class was about to begin.
"Hm...that's fair."