Author's Note: What happens when you prompt your fanfiction bestie Chocolate X My Mouth and then like the prompt so much you want to do it yourself XD
The prompt: Somehow something happens which means only the two of them (Barry and Frost) are conscious/moving and they have to figure out how to stop it. Kind of inspired off of Flashtime but maybe instead of her visiting his super-speed world he visits her cold world.
My prompts are just AMAZING amiright? XD
It was 2 o'clock in the afternoon when Frost was shoved forcibly into consciousness. She started and looked around, trying to reach out for Caitlin's consciousness and finding nothing. The last time that had happened, Caitlin had been hit in the back of the head with a wrench by a car-mechanic-turned-meta-turned-criminal.
Tentatively, Frost felt at the back of her head for any signs of injury. Feeling none, she finally realized what felt so off about the room.
It was freezing, and utterly still. It seemed that the air molecules themselves had even turned motionless. Frost wasn't bothered by the cold, but it seemed that Caitlin hadn't been able to handle it. And if Caitlin, who still had a solid amount of cold-resistance even when Frost wasn't in charge, couldn't handle it, then Frost doubted anyone else could.
There was the startling sound of speed lightning behind her. Shocked, Frost turned around. Barry was standing in front of her, wearing his flash suit. His nose and cheeks were snow-day (or sick-day) red, but he was moving.
"Well hello there, handsome," Frost greeted cheekily. "Here I thought you might be giving me the cold shoulder."
On any other day, Barry might have smiled at the pun. Instead he just looked grave. "Did you do this?"
"Nope," Frost shrugged. "I was thrown into this same as you. Caitlin's out. I'm guessing everyone else is, too."
"Then how am I still awake?" Barry asked, parts of the mask where his eyebrows would be scrunching together.
Frost squinted thoughtfully. "Mmm, must be that automatic heat setting Cisco put into your suit," she theorized. "After Caitlin's da- I mean, Icicle- did that whole freeze-y room thing, he put in a new feature. Anytime the temperature drops below a certain point, the suit's heating kicks on. That way, you won't be debilitated by the cold."
Barry nodded slowly. "Okay," he muttered. "Okay, makes sense."
"Your face, however..." Frost trailed off, and reached up and touched Barry's nose.
He automatically flinched back before realizing what she was doing. "I can't feel my nose," he sighed, wrinkling it. "Or any other part of my face."
She tapped him once more on the tip of his nose before taking her hand back. "C'mon, cutie," she said, heading towards the door. "Let's go see how it looks outside."
Barry followed like an obedient puppy and the two of them walked outside. Frost stared around her in awe. Everything was completely dry. The sun still shone. It wasn't as if an ice age had completely taken over Central City in a minute.
But it was silent. There were no sounds of cars, honking horns, people talking, music playing, planes, busses, anything. The world had gone completely and utterly still.
"It's beautiful.." Frost breathed. "In like a weird, unnatural, let's-hope-this-never-happens-again kind of way."
Barry reached up to rub the back of his head before realizing there wasn't any hair to mess up. "So what do we do?"
Frost smirked. "Whole frozen world out there," she snickered. "I bet there's a couple of people we could mess with. You know, I have been wanting a new jacket..."
Barry frowned. "Frost-" he started sternly.
"Kidding," Frost groaned, rolling her eyes. "Chill out, boy scout. Rhyme not intended."
Barry's lips pinched for a moment before he let out a long breath. "I'm sorry," he apologized finally. "I'm... a little on edge at the moment. You might be thriving in this weather but... well, who knows how long the suit can last. Or me."
Frost blinked and looked away. She didn't particularly like the thought of being trapped, alone, in a completely frozen world, for who knew how long. She was alone enough in Caitlin's head, but even then she still had the doctor to keep her company. Here, she would be completely solitary.
"Yeah, I get it," she shrugged, putting back up her wall and shutting out her fear. "So let's head back inside and see what's going on."
They headed back in together and Frost tapped a couple keys on the computer. The device was slow, most likely half frozen. Frost was surprised that it still worked. "So what's the plan?" she asked, opening up the satellite connection and preparing to put in a search.
"Well..." Barry started thoughtfully. "For the cold to have spread this far, it's got to have a pretty strong center, right? So unless it just doesn't have one source, there's going to be one part of the city that's the coldest."
Frost's lips twitched in acknowledgement of his point. She had forgotten how good Barry was a problem solving. It had been awhile since he needed to.
Frost quickly plugged in an algorithm to scan for the different cold frequency levels. With any luck, she had watched Cisco doing this enough that it would actually work, and the idea of a cold center wouldn't be a total bust.
Barry sat down heavily beside her. She glanced over. "Doing alright, Flash?"
"Yeah," he muttered, covering his face with his hand. "Just... getting a little tired."
"Can't handle the heat?" Frost teased. "Or... the cold, I guess."
"Guess not," Barry agreed halfheartedly, and shivered.
Frost pulled a face. Caitlin was so much better in situations like this, where people needed some sort of comforting or... warmth. Warmth wasn't Frost's thing. She didn't do warmth.
Standing up slowly, Frost made her way over to Caitlin's lab, where she tugged a fleece blanket from a box underneath one of the med beds. ( choco ;) Barry followed her with his eyes as she walked back over to him and put the fleece blanket around his shoulders. Her hand lingered for a second, before patting his bicep twice and awkwardly moving away.
"Thanks," Barry murmured, still watching her. He had an odd look on his face, his eyes soft and his mouth a little upturned at the corner. Frost swallowed, looking away. She wasn't used to being looked at like that, not by anyone. Especially not by Barry.
They sat in silence and Frost watched the computer screen as the satellite slowly scanned a zoomed out map of Central City. She was interested to see how far the cold reached. Was it just affecting the city? Or... was it the entire world? There was no way to know until the scan stopped.
Barry drifted off, his hands holding the fleece blanket tight around his shoulders. Frost watched him, her head tightly slightly to the side. His nose was starting to turn blue, cheeks blotched in purple and lips chapped. Unsure of exactly what she was doing, she reached out and touched his face.
Frost had only ever tried stealing heat from someone before. At some points in time, she craved heat. In moments like that, Caitlin would force her to make a boiling cup of tea or take a hot bath, instead of heading out to suck the life force out of some innocent person's body. Caitlin wouldn't even let her down to the Pipeline, where there were dozens of criminals that probably deserved to have the heat sucked out of them.
That was where Caitlin and Frost where different. Caitlin was so kind and understanding; she forgave and she thought that everyone deserved warmth. Frost supposed that it was that very thought that made Caitlin keep her around. Frost, on the other hand, was so cold. When she brushed her fingers against Barry's cheek, she was expecting to feel a flutter of need deep inside her, aching for his warmth.
Instead, she felt a a strange tug in her gut. His cheek was icy, colder then her hand if that was possible. And in moments, she was absorbing his cold. It felt strange. Usually absorbing heat brought her a sense of pleasure. Absorbing cold made her hand ache. But just a couple seconds after she began drawing Barry's cold away from him, his purple cheeks reddened. His skin looked healthy again. His eyes fluttered open.
"Frost?" he murmured, blinking at her. "What are you doing?"
"I'm not entire sure," Frost admitted, quickly dropping her hand from his face. Almost immediately, the glow disappeared and Barry started to shiver again. "Sorry."
"I thought you could only take people's warmth," Barry said.
"I guess that's hard when they don't have any warmth to give," Frost shrugged.
The scanner pinged and Frost looked over, glad for the distraction. The cold front seemed to be contained around Central City only, which a relief. "Looks like your theory was right," she said to Barry, peering at the screen. "There's a spot in Central Hospital that is at negative five-hundred and twenty-three degrees. Dang. That's cold."
Barry looked uncertain. "Do you think I can handle it?"
"Hmm..." Frost looked over at him, thoughtful. "You might. If you start vibrating before we get to the cold center and make the vibrating stem from your body (which should remain relatively the same temperature because of your suit) you should be able to keep your face warm enough to cope."
Barry nodded, accepting her word at face value. It amazed Frost that, even after everything she had done, he trusted her that much. She decided not to mention that, and simply stood up. "Come on, Flash," she said, offering him her arm with a smirk. "It's time to go melt the world."
Shaking his head in fond amusement, Barry got out of his chair and draped the fleece blanket over the back. Then he wrapped his arm around Frost's waist, and in a second the two of them were flashing towards the hospital.
Frost had forgotten how much she hated running at super speed. The friction from the air was like any other friction- warm. Besides that, the lightning charging Barry's body as he ran had a tendency to flow into whoever he was holding. Her hair was staticky and her skin overheated by the time Barry set her down, and she was glad of the intense cold.
Barry had regained some color from the run, and before he could lose his warmth he began to vibrate. Together, they walked slowly inside of the building.
In the eighty-some minutes she had spend in their new, frozen world, Frost had yet to see any people. She had expected it to be a bit like Flashtime, how everyone was completely still in the positions they had been in when time slowed down.
But time was still running. People had simply been overcome by cold. There was a receptionist, hunched over her keyboard, a chunk of hair in her coffee. Multiple people in the main lobby were sprawled over chairs, unconscious. An old man in a wheel chair was slumped to the side, looking like he might fall. Frost walked absentmindedly over and righted him.
"Do you think people will be able to recover from this?" Barry asked, his eyebrows furrowed in concern. "Or is every person in the city except the two of us going to be suffering from intense hypothermia when we manage to lift the cold?"
"Well..." Frost replied thoughtfully, glancing around the lobby. "My hope is that the sudden cold has put everyone into sort of a stasis. Like when Steve Rodgers crashed into the ice. He had to be melted, of course, but otherwise there were no lingering effects. Maybe everyone will be left with a slight sniffle." She shrugged. "Granted, there is always the possibility that re-heating the atmosphere too quickly could put everyone into shock and all their hearts could stop."
Barry's eyes went wide. "Oh," he said softly.
"But..." Frost continued. "If we don't warm them up then the cold will probably keep spreading and everyone might as well be dead."
He nodded. "Alright," he said after a moment. "I can't keep up vibrating forever so we should probably figure out where this cold is coming from."
Frost pulled her phone out of her pocket and quickly synced it to the STAR Labs computer. Things were certainly more difficult without someone running tech back in the Cortex.
"This way," she instructed, leading Barry towards the stairs. "The readings seem to be coldest on the third floor."
"Be careful," Barry warned. "We have no idea what's up there."
They hurried up two flights of stairs and Frost followed the satellite images on her phone to a closed door halfway down the hallway. She reached for the handle before her hand leaped back. The metal burned it was so cold.
Gritting her teeth but knowing she was fully capable to handle it, Frost gripped the handle and shoved open the door. The metal had frozen and stuck but with a strong push she was able to get it open.
The wave of cold hair the greeted them took Frost's breath away. Behind her, Barry stopped vibrating and collapsed to the ground.
"Barry," Frost gasped, landing on her knees next to him. His body was struggling, trying to stay moving. Desperate, Frost placed her hand on his cheek. "Barry, stay with me."
Her hand began to ache again. His cold was rushing into her in waves, without her even bidding it to. Her head began to ache, and the water in her eyes started to crystalize. She felt like she was turning herself to ice.
Barry groaned. "Frost..." he mumbled. "Stop. You're killing yourself."
Frost inhaled sharply. Her fingertips were blue, laced with white. She couldn't move them. "And- and w-what if I l-let go?" she stuttered, teeth chattering. "I let go and- and- I stop the c-cold and ev-everybody g-goes into shock and y-your heart st-stops?"
Trembling, Barry lifted his hand to Frost's wrist. "It'll be okay," he murmured, thumb stroking at her rapidly freezing wrist. "I know that you will figure this out. You can do this, Frost, okay? I believe in you. I've always believed in you."
He gently shoved Frost's hand from his cheek. Immediately, feeling rushed back into her fingers. The tear ducts in her eyes started to melt, but Frost wasn't sure that that was the reason that tears began to roll down her cheeks.
Desperate, she leaned down and pressed her lips to his.
He was already cold.
Trembling, Frost got slowly to her feet. An icicle formed in each hand, glistening white and sharp enough to slice through metal. She walked into the room, footsteps crunching on the light layer of frost that had accumulated in the bitter cold of the room, and froze.
There was a man standing in front of a large machine. He was tall and thin, with neatly trimmed, icy-grey hair. The ice clattered out of Frost's hands, smashing on the floor, and the man turned around.
"Icicle," Frost breathed, eyes wide.
Icicle, the evil side of Caitlin's father, Thomas, smirked. "Hello, Frost," he greeted. "I knew that you'd turn up here."
So. All of it was a trap. A whole elaborate set up to lure her in.
"You could have just sent an email," Frost sighed, rolling her eyes. "Instead of freezing the entirety of Central City."
"Yes, but I wanted you to be alone," Icicle shrugged. His eyes moved passed her, to Barry's body lying prone on the floor. "It seems that I didn't quite succeed. But no matter. The Flash won't be a problem now."
Suddenly broiling with anger, Frost formed another ice-dagger and chucked it at Icicle's head. He met it with an ice-shield and the weapon shattered. Frost had been anticipating that move, and she was already across the room and at Icicle's throat. Her fingers made blue hypothermic marks on the skin of Icicle's neck as she shoved him into the machine he was working on.
"Tell me how to turn it off," Frost growled.
Icicle smirked. "Well that'd be boring," he sighed.
"Tell me how to turn it off!" Frost yelled, another dagger building in her free hand. She laid it on Icicle's throat, making sure to press a sharp edge into his skin.
He cringed. "Now Frost," he started. "I'm sure that Caitlin wouldn't-"
"Caitlin isn't here right now," Frost interrupted through gritted teeth. "It's just me and you. No backup. No Team Flash telling me to check my morals. I could kill you right now and no one would even know you were here."
"But you won't," Icicle spat. "Because you're soft. I saw how you acted when I first escaped. You were willing to let me go, just because you thought that Thomas might still be alive. You might say that was Caitlin, but she's rubbed off on you. You're different then you used to be. And you won't kill me because that's not who you are anymore."
"Don't. Tempt me," Frost hissed, digging the icicle deeper. "I've gotten enough pep talks about morals and not killing to last me a lifetime. You think that I care?! There are days that I want to walk down to the Pipeline and drain every last metahuman there of their heat. This is one of those days. So you had better shut up and tell me how to turn off this machine before I drive this ice through your body a hundred times."
Abruptly, Icicle drove his knee into Frost's stomach. She let go of him and doubled over, coughing. He took the advantage and shoved her over, sending her sprawling into the machine. Through tearing eyes, Frost scanned the tech. It looked to be much like a nuclear core, except instead of heat it was radiating an intense cold. It was like nothing Frost had ever seen, and part of her was sad to have to destroy it.
Not a very large part, though.
As Icicle advanced on her, Frost took a deep breath and planted her hands on the machine. She could feel the intense cold radiating from the machine, and she did exactly what she had to Barry twice now this afternoon:
She absorbed the cold.
In moments, her hands were locked onto the machine, turning to solid ice. Icicle stopped moving and watched her, eyes wide. "No," he muttered, running forward. "No- no- what are you doing?!"
He tried to wrench her away but Frost clung on. She could feel her arms turning cold. A tear ran down her cheek and froze on the end of her chin.
So this was how she was going to die. She had never seen herself as someone who would save the world. But as she glanced over at Barry's body, his face white from cold and all of him completely still, she knew that this was the only end for her that made sense.
He had saved her so many times, from herself, especially. He had forgiven her and loved her unconditionally. And now it was time to repay all those favors that he had done her over the years.
Icicle was acting like a maniac. He had his hands wrapped around her shoulders, trying to tug her away. "STOP!" he screamed. "STOP!"
"Look," Frost managed, her voice raspy. "Eventually, this thing's gonna stop working. And when that happens, everyone is going to wake up again, including the Flash. So unless you want to get your butt handed to you I suggest you get the heck out of here and never. Come. Back."
Icicle let out a scream of rage and ripped himself off of her. Then he used his ice to blast himself out through the window and into the sky.
Frost's head dropped. She could no longer move her arms and she felt her upper chest starting to solidify, too. The machine was starting to steam, unable to function in the warming air temperature of the room. She didn't think that it would heat fast enough for her to get out of this alive, however, so she set her teeth and kept draining the cold.
Ice was beginning to creep across her vision like cataracts when two gloved hands were placed on top of her own. Unable to move or even shift her eyes, Frost felt a surge of panic rush up from her gut. Who was it? Had Icicle returned, about to kill her?
But then the hands began to vibrate. Barry was awake, on his feet, and ready to help her. He didn't ask questions, just stood with his hands vibrating, keeping her warm while she sucked in the cold.
Finally, the machine's metal began to make. It was steaming in the cold air and Frost was able to pry her fingers away.
"Come on," Barry urged, picking up her stiff body. "We have to get out of here."
They made it out of the room and about four feet down the hall before the machine overheated completely exploded. Heat bloomed like a mushroom cloud from the room, slamming into Barry's back and sending him and Frost tumbling to the ground. Still too stiff with cold to move, Frost was unable to brace herself as she bounced across the ground and finally landed with a thunk against the wall. She was surprised that she hadn't shattered on impact with a floor like a very realistic ice sculpture.
"Frost," Barry groaned, throwing himself to his feet and rushing over to her. He rested his hands on her arms and began to vibrate again, this time taking her body with him. Steam rose in plumes from both of them. Frost's eyes melted and began to stream. Her insides warmed. Her joints loosened and she could take a full, deep breath.
Barry stopped vibrating and pulled off his cowl. His hair was a mess, forehead red where the suit had pressed into his skin. He cupped her face in his hands, wiping her cheeks dry. "Hey," he whispered. "It's okay."
Vision clear now, Frost saw his face form into that same look he had given her back in the Cortex, his gaze soft. She saw him start to lean closer, his eyes flutter closed. Then the back of her eyelids filled her vision as he closed the distance and kissed her.
And for the first time in Frost's life, she was glad to be warm.
Author's Note: HOLY CRAP when I started this I had NO IDEA it was going to turn out like this! Like I am actually REALLY proud of this :O :O Wutttttt omg this thing totally wrote itself I'M SHOOK XD