Summary: If there's one thing Iris used to be sure of, it's that she knows Barry Allen, inside and out. But the revelation of Savitar's true identity calls that fundamental cornerstone of her life into question. Frustrated and desperate, she decides to confront Savitar on her own terms.
Disclaimer: I don't own the Flash in any of its incarnations.
Notes: I was frustrated by the lack of interaction between Iris and Savitar, and this was the result. I'm not sure if I'm going to continue this, since it's kind of like meta in fic form. But I think it's interesting enough to share as-is.
The Thesis of the Cruel Speed God
"I'm going to jump off the roof of the Star Labs building tomorrow at 7 PM, and I don't want you to save me."
"Um, what?"
She sets her mouth in a hard line, crossing her arms over her chest. "I want to talk to Savitar, but I know he's not going to be keen. He'll remember this, so he'll know where I'm going to be, and that you won't save me."
Barry looks at her like she's lost her mind. And hey, maybe she has. "You don't know that he's not gonna send one of his minions to do it instead."
"I do, actually." She swallows past a sudden dryness in her mouth. "He's not going to rely on anyone else for this. If I die off-schedule, it could ruin everything for him. And his minions are much better at killing people than saving them." He has tons of experience saving people, she doesn't say.
Barry looks at her for a few silent moments, a desperate, hopeless sort of panic in his eyes. She feels her heart breaking just a little bit more. "I hate this idea," he says at last.
"I know," She forces her arms to loosen, to reach up and cup his face. She strokes her thumbs over his cheeks. "But I'm tired of waiting around for other people to save me, Barry. If some evil time remnant version of you is really going to kill me, then I have a right to hear his reasons first-hand. He owes me that much."
"I doubt that he'll see it that way, Iris."
"And what'll he do if he doesn't?" She raises her eyebrows. "Kill me?"
Barry doesn't look happy, of course, but she knows that he knows that she's making sense.
It doesn't feel like a victory.
She jumps off the roof at the appointed time, and, after only a few seconds of free-falling, feels the familiar whoosh of being swept into the arms of a speedster.
Before she can fully process it, they're in the woods outside the city. Savitar is in his grotesque suit, facing her.
She can tell that he's staring at her, debating whether or not he should say something or just run away. She uses that hesitation to spring the most important part of her trap.
"I know you want to leave," she says, stripping off her windbreaker to reveal what she'd placed underneath it. "But you should probably reconsider."
"You're wearing a bomb vest?" says Savitar, his vocal filter unable to keep the edge of surprise - and panic - from his tone. Iris feels a brief, manic thrill of triumph.
"I didn't tell Barry about this part," she says. "He wouldn't have agreed to this if I had. Plus, it would've tipped you off." She shrugs at him, trying to keep her tone casual. "If you try to remove it without disarming it first, it activates. If the timer runs out before it's disarmed, it activates. And I'm not going to tell you how to disarm it unless you get out of the suit and talk to me."
"You're bluffing."
"I could be," Iris concedes. "But can you really afford to take the risk? You've backed me into a corner, Barry, and you know how much I hate being manipulated."
"I am not Barry!" Savitar bellows, but makes no move to approach her.
Iris almost rolls her eyes. "You're entitled to your opinion. But if you really want to yell at me about it, at least be man enough to do it without the suit."
There's a long pause, where Iris can hear her own heartbeat. Then, the suit's hydraulics activate as it begins to open.
And it's undoubtedly Barry Allen who emerges from the shell of the monster. No glowing red eyes or horns or tail. Even the scars on the left side of his face fail to be menacing. If anything, he looks tired and underfed. Sickly.
"Have you been eating enough?" she asks, before she can stop herself. Do time remnants even need to eat?
"Don't start," says Barry. Not-Barry. Honestly, she doesn't even know anymore. "Don't play that game, Iris."
"What game?" she asks, a familiar anger bubbling up from her gut. "You look like hell. When was the last time you got a proper night's sleep?"
His jaw tightens visibly, fists clenching. "I was trapped in the Speed Force for centuries, Iris. I look like hell because I was in hell."
She almost flinches at the raw pain in his voice, but manages not to. The only reason that future Barry trapped Savitar in the Speed Force was because he'd chosen to become Savitar in the first place. "Didn't you already know that would happen when you put on the suit?" she asks, the strange vertigo of time loops and causality hitting her all at once. "Your future self had already killed me, so your past self knew going in what wearing the suit would mean. You still had all your memories." Her eyes start to burn. "Which means you were planning to kill me before you ever got trapped in the Speed Force. That-" she takes a breath, her chest impossibly tight, "-that you were willing to suffer for centuries in order to make sure it happened. So spare me the victim act, Bear. You made your choices knowing exactly what they meant."
She can see that she's struck a nerve. "It was either that, or a complete cessation of existence." His voice is low. Dangerous.
"I'm not saying it was an easy choice," she says softly. "But it was still a choice."
"One that Barry Allen forced me to make."
He's not wrong, she knows. Ultimately, it had been the choice of some future, broken version of Barry that had led to all of this. "Okay, fine. I get that part," she says. Because she does get it, however much it hurts her. "But what I don't get is the whole 'ascending to godhood' part. You've never wanted power for its own sake."
She sees his Adam's apple bob as he swallows. "I just want the pain to end."
"You don't need to become a god for that," she points out, dryly. "Apparently, my mother swore by heroin." Her lips twist into a sardonic smile. "Though I'm guessing godhood comes with less nausea and constipation."
"One can only hope," quips Savitar, in a way that's all Barry.
She lets out a soft, sad laugh. "You don't even know for sure that becoming a god will make your suffering end, Barry."
Flatly, he says, "It has to."
"Okay, so...you become a god. Then what?"
"Then, I do whatever I want," he says, in the tone of voice that always tips her off when Barry is being evasive.
"And...doing what you want: would that include helping people again?"
He cocks his head. "Why should I bother?"
"Why shouldn't you?"
A shrug, noncommittal. "I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it."
Iris is struck by a sudden, aching sadness, so strong that it's physically painful. Barry has always been a shining beacon of goodness in her life - someone she could look to when the world seemed too dark to bear. Yet here he is: broken, entirely without any light. Just an empty shell.
"Can I tell you something I've never told anyone before?" she asks, very softly.
"Not even him?" asks Savitar, and there's definitely bitterness in his voice.
"Especially not him," she says.
A pause. "I'm a captive audience, Iris."
She nods, swallows past the painful lump in her throat. "Do you remember that vacation I took in college?"
To his credit, he doesn't bother pretending he doesn't. "To Costa Rica? Yeah."
"Well, it wasn't really a vacation." She swallows again. "It was rehab."
"What do you mean?" He sounds genuinely shocked.
Iris presses on. "I mean that I got addicted to my anxiety medication in Junior Year and had to go to rehab for it."
"You were on anxiety meds?"
"Valium," she confirms, knowing that he possesses Barry's own extensive knowledge of medical substances. "I could never bring myself to tell you or dad. You both had so much of your own crap to deal with." She shakes her head. "Actually, that's only partly true. I think I was mostly just terrified that you'd both think I was weak." A shaky sound comes out of her mouth, halfway between a laugh and a sob. "So when I found out my mom had actually been a junkie, everything just sort of...fit into place. Dad always said I took after her."
"...Why are you telling me this?"
"Because I want to get it off my chest before I die." She manages to give him a weak smile. "You're going to kill me anyway, Bear. It actually kind of lowers the stakes for everything else."
His voice is somewhat shaky when he says, "So I was too weak to help you then, and now I'm too weak to let myself be erased. Is that what you want to hear, Iris?" It should've given her some satisfaction, to know that she'd managed to get to him. But instead, it feels like she can barely breathe. "What, do you think I've been counting down the days until I can kill you, twirling my mustache and cackling?"
"The way you've made a spectacle of it, you don't exactly seem reluctant," she finally manages.
"Barry Allen deserves to suffer," he snaps. "Besides: I'm only doing things the way I remember them happening. Deviating too much could undermine everything."
"Then you remember how much it made me suffer."
"I remember kissing you, too," he says, hoarsely. "I remember holding you, comforting you, being inside of you. I remember watching you die."
She screws her eyes shut, hugging herself. "So then how can you stand to do this to me? The least you could do is make it quick. If you ever loved me, then you'd give me that tiny scrap of mercy." Hot tears roll down her cheeks. She remembers how she'd told him once that, if she could choose how she'd die, it would be with a fatal aneurysm: quick, and completely unexpected.
"I'm sorry that I have to draw this out, Iris," he says, completely sincere, as if he's reading her mind. She feels his trembling hands cupping her face, and he wipes away her tears with unsteady thumbs. A mockery of what she'd done to her Barry just the day before. "But it will be over soon, and then..."
"What?" She snaps, jerking away from his touch. "I'll be too dead to care?"
He grabs her by the shoulders, then, his grip just shy of being painful. "And then I'll be a god, and death will mean nothing."
Her eyes snap open at the words, everything suddenly slotting into place.
No, Barry Allen never would seek power for its own sake, would he? And Barry Allen would never give up on her, either. First and foremost, Barry cares about people; it had been hard to believe that any version of him would resign himself to endless solitude for the sake of becoming a god.
But she'd been too caught up in her own dread to see the obvious answer: he sought the power of a god in order to escape his solitude. Because obviously that's what Barry Allen would do if he went crazy and evil. It had been the root of every mistake he'd ever made.
She feels vaguely nauseous. "I have my answers," she says, trying not to let on that she's figured out his long-term goals. "If you let go of me, Savitar, I won't bother you again."
He stares down at her, gaze so filled with longing that it almost takes her breath away. It's with visible reluctance that he finally lets his hands drop away.
Iris strips off the bomb vest, letting it fall to the floor. "You were right, by the way: I was bluffing."
But he's already getting back into the suit, ignoring her. He needs to, she knows, or else he'll do something that'll ruin his plans. If it had been up to him, he wouldn't have gone anywhere near her until just before he was planning to kill her.
It's almost comforting, that he's evil in such a Barry Allen kind of way.
But only almost.
She calls Cisco to come pick her up, and his face is all frowns when he arrives twenty minutes later.
"You're mad at me," she notes as she opens the door of his van, impressed by how steady her voice is.
"This was so dumb," he says, by way of confirmation.
"Yeah, it was. But it was also worth it." She buckles herself in. "I think I know what Savitar's really up to now." She debates turning on the radio, but decides against it. A headache's already coming on. "But I can't tell you unless you promise to keep it from Barry."
"Let me guess: Savitar doesn't know that you know, and you want to keep it that way."
She nods. "I'd gotten him pretty riled up towards the end. I'm hoping that he didn't notice the slip."
"Got it," he says, some of his anger fading away. "I won't tell Barry, so dish."
She takes in a deep breath, steeling herself. At last, she says, "I think he's planning to resurrect me."
Cisco actually pulls over, then, his face lit up in revelation. "It all makes sense," he breathes, his hands compulsively clenching and unclenching on the steering wheel. "He needs to kill you in order to exist, and then he needs to become a god if he wants to bring you back. He wants to have his cake and eat it too!"
Iris isn't sure she likes being the 'cake' in this metaphor. "...Do you think that what he's trying to do is possible?"
"Honestly? Yeah - it probably is." He blows out his lips. "And he probably plans to mess with your memories when he does it. You know - to keep you compliant. If resurrection is on the table, then that kind of mental tampering would be a cakewalk."
"And he'll let the rest of you go on thinking I'm dead, so that Barry will still be angry enough to create the time remnants." It makes so much sense that she's angry she couldn't see it before. That she had to cause Barry so much anxiety in order to figure it out.
"That magnificent bastard," says Cisco. "He's totally stealing from the League of Assassins' playbook."
A chill runs down her spine. "How much do you know about them?"
"Not enough," Cisco admits. "Team Arrow's never eager to talk about them in too much detail. But maybe I can change that if I explain what's going on."
"Assuming they don't have their own impending doom to deal with," Iris points out.
"It's still a lead. I mean, how many ways can there be to bring somebody back from the dead?"
"...We can't tell Barry about any of this, can we?"
"Oh, absolutely not."
Still, Cisco's right: it is something. She can think of it as the biggest scoop of her life.
For now, that will have to be enough keep her going.