Eddie collapsed, slowly bleeding out from the hole in his chest. Eobard staggered away from Barry, no longer vibrating.

"What did you do?" Joe screamed, grabbing Eddie, trying to stem the flow of blood. "What did you do?"

"No such thing as a coincidence." Eddie whispered.

Eobard looked frozen. His features began to morph, his face stretching and his hair changing from it's dark brown to blond and back again. His entire body began to shake and he started screaming.

"What is happening?" Barry demanded

Cisco gasped, "Eddie is his ancestor. If Eddie dies he'll never be born. He's being erased from existence."

Iris was pleading with Eddie to stay with her, Joe watching his partner slip away in shock.

Barry and Cisco watched in horror as the man's body began stretching and splitting, until two men were standing before them, Harrison Wells and a tall blond man. Harrison collapsed while the blond man, the real Eobard turned to Barry with a slight smirk.

"I've controlled your life for so long Barry. How will you get along without me?"

Lights began racing up Eobard's arm, like cracks on paint and then his arms began disappearing, his entire body disintegrating in glowing particles. With a final scream, he was gone. Barry staggered upright, staring at the unmoving body of Harrison Wells, the real Harrison Wells?

"Barry!" Joe called out. "Barry, get him to a hospital."

Barry looked at Eddie,it was too late. He knew it was too late, and he knew Joe was well aware of it too, but with Iris screaming he couldn't not try. He scooped the other man up into his arms and zoomed off.

—

Three hours later Joe sat down next to Barry on a bench outside of the hospital.

"How is Iris?"

Joe shook his head. "Caitlin had to sedate her. I took her home, and Caitlin is staying with her right now."

"Joe I-"

Joe held up his hand and shook his head "Eddie died a hero today. He took control of his own fate and made his own decisions. I'm proud of him."

Barry nodded. "What about Harrison?"

"Dunno. I was so focused on Iris. Cisco and Ronnie were bringing him up to the medical bay when I was coming here."

"What are we going to do with him?"

"I have no idea. It depends on who he is when he wakes up."

—

Harrison Wells opened his own eyes for the first time in fifteen years. For the first time in fifteen years he was alone in his own head. He was alive.

He wished he wasn't.

He looked around slowly, he was in the medical bay of S.T.A.R labs. He tried to push himself up into a seated position, but found he couldn't move his arms. Glancing down he saw he was in restraints. He didn't bother trying to move his feet. Eobard never bothered to fix the spinal cord injury that had restricted him to a wheelchair, it was easier to maintain the facade when there was actual damage and the speedster had been able to use his speed force to generate a small electrical field inside himself that would bypass the area of injury and allow him to move normally. After his discovery Eobard could have healed himself, but he was so annoyed with Harrison and he'd gotten so used to generating the field that he decided not to out of spite. Without the speed force Harrison's legs were useless.

He had screamed inside the mental cage that trapped him for 15 years, hoping someone would kill the man who wore his face, would free him from all of this. Oh god, he'd been forced to watch so many people die at his hand. And Tess… beautiful Tess was dead and he'd been unable to do anything to help her. Tears streamed freely down his face.

Harrison Wells closed his own eyes for the first time in fifteen years.

—

Everyone was gathered in the main room except for Joe who had stayed home to take care of Iris.

"How is this possible?" Barry asked "If we found Harrison Wells's corpse how is he here now?"

"I have a theory. When Eddie took his own life to prevent Eobard from ever being born a massive paradox was created, without Eobard many things would not have happened including the death of your mother Barry. This should have caused the singularity to happen despite the fact that Caitlin and Ronnie were able to close the wormhole." Dr. Stein explained.

Barry frowned. "Then why didn't it?"

"In order to take Dr. Wells's identity Eobard stole everything that made up the essence of what Dr. Wells was, his appearance, his memories, his-"

"His soul?" Cisco offered.

"In a way yes. He stole all of it leaving behind the husk of a man that you found and was essentially wearing Dr. Wells as a mask. The first thing paradoxes try do is correct themselves, and because Eobard was so close to the wormhole when he started to cease to exist the energy from the paradox was able to latch onto the essence of Dr. Wells."

"Without the Reverse Flash the real Dr. Wells would still be alive. So the paradox was able to correct that using the essence of Dr. Wells to recreate him." Cisco jumped in.

"Exactly. Recreating Dr. Wells released enough energy, like a steam valve, that the singularity happened in much smaller more manageable events. We still don't know what the repercussions of those will be, but at least the earth is in one piece."

"So what will that mean for him?" Barry nodded back at the medical bay.

"Well if I'm correct in all of this, that is for all intents and purposes Dr. Harrison Wells. The real one."

"Do you think he's dangerous?"

Dr. Stein shook his head. "Harrison Wells would have been a passenger in his own body for the past 15 years. I do not know if Eobard was aware of him, but he would've been most certainly aware of Eobard, and everything that man did. I do not believe that he is dangerous, but I believe that no one can come out of that sort of experience without a fair bit of psychological trauma."

"I did a through physical while he was unconscious." Caitlin handed Barry a file. "He looks exactly the same. But there is no trace of the speed force in him and… his spinal injury is still there."

"What?"

"He's still paralyzed."

Cisco nodded. "It makes sense. If Reverse Flash healed himself and anyone did a physical afterwards his cover would've been blown."

Barry frowned. "Well then why didn't he heal himself after we found out who he was? And how was he able to walk? Reverse Flash was after than me."

"Electricity." A voice called out from the med bay. Everyone jumped in surprise. "You speedsters have a lot of it."

Barry quickly moved into the other room, followed by the others. "Dr. Wells?"

"Barry Allen." The restrained man replied evenly, his face impassive. "Everything that happens in our bodies are just chemical reactions and electrical currents. SCIs interrupt those currents but if you have sufficient voltage that's easily bypassed. As for the healing thing, well Dr. Stein he was very aware of me and found me to be quite annoying, so when he had the opportunity to heal everything he decided not to."

"Should we trust you?" Cisco asked.

Harrison laughed bitterly. "Why would you? I killed you. I tried to kill all of you."

"But it wasn't you." Ronnie pointed out. He glanced at Dr. Stein remembering his own experience of being out of control of his body. "You didn't have a choice."

"I still felt and saw all of it. I still-" He broke off with a sob, tears once again flowing freely down his face.

Wordlessly Caitlin started to undo the restraints on his arms.

"What are you doing?" Barry demanded.

"I'm going to take him home. He doesn't need to stay here."

"Shouldn't we lock him up until we're positive he's not evil?" Cisco asked.

Ronnie went to move Wells's wheelchair closer to the bed. "I think he's been locked up enough, don't you?" He and Caitlin shard eye contact. She nodded, grateful to have her husband's support.

Barry hung back doubtful, but he didn't make a move to stop them.

He sure hoped that this wouldn't come back to bite them.