Caitlin Snow knew she would never amount to much, well on this Earth she spent her days killing people and stealing cash. Not exactly something to make her mother and father proud, well that was if they were even alive.

"I'm dumb, I must really have a fucking deathwish." She thought to herself, one moment she was devastated by the loss of Deathstorm, but that soon passed over with a new kind of feeling, anger. Not at just the powerful black speedster who menacingly towered over her but towards that man in red, the speedster called The Flash, not her world's one but the one who had caused all this to happen. She knew his name and where he was now, she had enough anger to fuel her actions but not the resources necessary to get over there.

"You dare defy me." A demonic and distorted voice disrupted her scheming thoughts, a clawed hand swiftly raced around her icy skinned neck, quickly tightening around her windpipe, in a flash she was now being held up in by her neck.

She could tell he was pissed, not just by his actions but by how his powerful frown beneath distorted the black leather that adorned his face, dark orbs narrowed down by his blacken lids so they were just pure black slits.

"If-f you goin' kill m-me.. do it." She choked out through her pursed blue lips, instead he denied her request, abruptly throwing her across his lair, the minion crashing into one of Zoom's glass boxes as he looked down at his clawed hand.

"No." He said as blue lightening occasionally sparked over his black costume, in a blur of blue he was stood in front of her collapse form, grinning smugly under his suit. "You are going to pay a visit to someone for me." If she could see through that evil mask of his then she would see him grinning under it as he knew just how to kill Barry Allen.

Earth-1

With the threat of Zoom looming over the occupants of Star Labs, the eerily quiet atmosphere seemed only appropriate. It had only been a few hours since they had witnessed Jay's death happened right in front of them, sounds of what happened were fresh in everyone's ears.

Despite being the fastest man alive, loss and pain, those were two things he could not outrun.

Barry was trying to do whatever he could to ensure his victory the next time he fought Zoom, currently running on the treadmill Cisco had repurposed for matching his high speeds. He was currently pushing at his highest recorded speed, it felt good to him, due to his speed everything was slowed down around him, however he kept his eyes ahead now, avoiding eye contact with anyone on the other side of the glass window which were monitoring his vitals.

He was also very glad that he was purely a blur at this point on the treadmill, his greatest gift masking his greatest weakness, his humanity. He felt terrible and he knew he should have moved Jay out of the way, he had the speed and he had the time yet despite being the fastest man alive he was so slow to realise what might have gone wrong, maybe he was so glad to have finally got back home from that wretched world that he was distracted and off guard when he saw his friends after what felt like a lifetime.

Another good thing about his speed, he was going so fast he could barely hear anyone over the whooshing and crackles his speed generated, also the speakers in the room which were booming out Harry's voice telling him it was enough for today were slowed down in and well he just couldn't hear them, too busy indulging in a world of his own, full of guilt and internal thoughts.

Well that was until Harry swiftly turned off the power to the machine, causing the treadmill to come to a standstill, also causing the clearly annoyed Barry Allen to a halt too.

"What?!" He turned swiftly, looking at the two rather surprised people sat behind the glass, eyes drawn to him after that sudden outburst.

"Barry, we said that's enough for today." A voice spoke softly into the speaker, it was Harry calmly and carefully trying to defuse his unsettled state.

"Enough?" He sounded hurt by the suggestion. "Look, Jay died today. Because I was not fast enough." He bluntly told them. "I need to keep training"

"Barry..." Another voice spoke, albeit with a softer tone, it was Cisco. "Dude. You cannot blame yourself, it wasn't your fault." He sighed gently as he remembered when he told them all that incident with the cold gun getting stole and how it had taken an innocent life and he took the blame for that life but Barry told him otherwise.

"I know.." he hesitated, clenching his teeth together as he gathered his displaced thoughts. "But. I could have got him, but I was too slow."

"Slow?" Harry was rattled by this as his tone showed it. "Barry, we had just escaped Zoom, we were just happy to get out alive, you of all people should know you that we can't save everyone."

Barry flinched, clearly about to say something instead bit his lip and opening the door to get out of the room and didn't pass a glance to them as he strolled out.

Harry sighed and his head twisted back to focus on his computer, Cisco looked at him with disbelief.

"Are you sure it was wise to let the angry speedster just walk off like that?"

"He needs time to vent, all he has been doing for the last five hours Is running, it time we let him do some thinking." He assured the young engineer.

Once out of both earshot and vision, Barry kept on walking, his destination was the cortex, his mind still fresh with the memories of what happened, the noises, the screams, the yells. One particular person's screams were present now. Caitlin's.

Oh god. He had been prefixed on ignoring everything that had happened he forgot that there was someone else who was worse off than him.

Caitlin was stood in the cortex, there was a glass case, inside held the fallen Earth-2 speedster's helmet. The doctor just stood there in silence, a hand resting on the edge of the glass box.

"Cait…" Barry nervously spoke out now, she answered with a swift turn of her body.

"Hi... Barry." She smiled softly at the speedster, eyes clearly sore from previous crying but her pale cheeks seemed void of tears.

"Are you okay…" Barry asked, smiling as his emerald eyes looked for any sign of discomfort.

She seemed surprisingly okay, flashing a small smile. "Surprisingly, yes." She admitted.

"Look Caitlin, it was my fau-" She stopped him with her words. "Barry, I don't blame you, it wasn't your fault and no one could have expected that."

"But-" He started again, she swiftly interrupted him again. "Barry, you can't carry the blame for this, sometimes things are just out of our control." She assured him, grabbing him and pulling him into a reassuring hug.

"T-Thanks Caitlin." He smiled at her and stepped out of the hug. "Do you want to go Jitters, for you know some coffee, I could use some time away from all this." He sighed.

"Sure." She beamed. "I just have to get something from the lab." She assured him before briskly walking off to where the Speed Cannon was.

Once down here she looked around where she had placed her phone last, finding it on one of the desks that was luckily far from where the remains of the speed cannon were positioned, turning her back to it as she pocketed her phone, not wanting to spend any more time down here with that damned machine that cost her a chance of her own well deserved happiness.

However, the loud warping sound and bright blue light caught her attention now, suddenly a brief ball sphere of semi-transparent liquid appeared in the centre of the speed cannon, unexpectedly a pale figure was spat out of it before the sphere abruptly imploded on itself.

Caitlin swiftly turned and rushed to the downed person's side, brushing away the person's dishevelled platinum hair and was planning to check their pale skin for any lacerations but moved back in shock. She was confused was this her Earth-2 Doppelganger?

"Barry!" She swiftly called out in shock.

Well that's the start of this story, I hope you guys enjoy and feel free, follow and favourite and comment on this story.

-ROB