A/N: I'm usually cautious in what stories I post featuring cannon characters as I don't want to display them out of character but this thought occurred to me and I just had to explore it a bit. Let me know when you first figure out who 'he' is in this because I'm curious. This might turn into a series of oneshots but for now this is complete.
He stared at the wall absently and tried hard not to think about what was bothering him. Which mean the only thing he could do was think about what was bothering him. It was inevitable today, really, but he'd hoped to try and bypass it for once. No such luck it seemed.
His eyes were unfocused as he vividly recalled a beautiful city with bright sun and mostly clean streets. It had well-maintained parks and only a few less than wonderful places for the citizens to fear going near. A large statue of a hero stood proudly in the street, evidence of how beloved he was. And that was what hurt the most really. That statue, along with the man it was of, was long gone. Not even rubble remained.
It was his own fault. That day it was his fault. He knew the hero wouldn't be able to let him go on his path of destruction. He was tearing up streets and endangering the whole city. Something like that couldn't be allowed to happen. But he hadn't even been in control of the situation and the hero wasn't either. It was just that nobody knew it until it was too late.
The explosion had rocked nearly the whole world it felt like. Heat and light filled every sense he had until he thought he'd never be rid of the burning sensation. But when it finally died down again an even worse feeling filled him. When he'd seen what he'd done. He hadn't meant to but he had. He'd murdered someone. And not just anyone. Someone who dedicated his life and safety to helping others. A hero in the truest sense of the word.
He closed his eyes tight and fought against the tears. He'd cried lots of times over the man he'd cut down too soon. Even as they pulled him into containment and fought to fix him so that they could punish him for the horrible thing he'd done. He had never been a callous man who wanted to destroy. But he had and he hated… no loathed himself for it. He was glad he was so dirty poor. He didn't have a mirror to ever have to see his own despicable face.
They'd finally cured him of his physical ailment but there was no way to cure his internal one. He had thought several times of finding some way to prostrate himself to someone for just punishment. He'd heard from one of the other heroes that his unintentional victim was friends with that there was a widow. A devastated widow. But he'd never know who the man really was. He had no way of finding her and even if he did he wasn't entirely sure he could face her. Not after what he'd done.
Destroyed a good man. Broke a family irreparably.
He really was the monster he'd been called all those years ago.
He heard his door open and turned his head slightly to see the teenager standing there. "Is it ready?" he asked, looking unbearably excited but also apprehensive. Something that only teens seemed able to do.
He nodded some. "Yeah, I'll take you there. Just give me a minute…" he muttered. The brunette teen nodded and left the small shack.
The self-appointed monster sighed and got to his feet. He had one last chance to fix things. No matter how fast a man was he couldn't outrun fate. That had been made abundantly clear in far too painful a way. His aged eyes turned to look at another wall where a lightning bolt inside of a circle had been carved into the wall with painstaking precision. Maybe you couldn't outrun fate. But they had one last chance to rewrite it. "He'll save you Flash…" he whispered to the carved symbol. "He just has to save you from me…"
With one last deep breath, he wiped his eyes and swallowed past the painful knot in his throat before leaving his shack. He had an impulsive teen to send into the past. A wrong to be made right. His last chance to make it right…
He prayed it worked.