Description: Following the 'disastrous consequences' the producer of the show mentioned in an interview regarding Harry and his thinking cap.
AN: This is for all of you who were freaking out together with me after we read that article!
Frustration with the show always gives me inspiration, so here you go. The frustration, yet, is not because of the episode itself, but because of another big break we're going to have to face. I still expect snowells to happen, this is one of the ideas how. To me Caitlin is already in love with Harry, because seriously, did you see the way she's looking at him?! The way she looked at him at the beginning of 4x16 was EPIC.
Way Home update is all ready, but needs a spell check. That definitely comes next.
The team gathered up in the cortex to celebrate, surrounding a smiling Harry who was just putting his thinking cap aside.
"I told you I could do it! I told you I could outthink the Thinker and beat him at his own game!" he said in pride and Cisco just rolled his eyes at that.
"Yeah, but I think we gotta get rid of this, Harry," the younger man quickly said and snatched the cap from the desk. "Not that I don't believe you can use it wisely now, but the risk is still there. If we don't need this thing, we're not gonna use it, ok?"
"Fine," Harry agreed, waving his hand at that. "I don't expect anyone like DeVoe to show up anyway. There's just one last thing I need to do," he then said, looking for someone among his friends and finally, his eyes set on her just standing in the far corner of the room, watching him. The moment she realized he was looking back at her, she quickly escaped his gaze, but it was too late. It always was with her and her famous looks these days. In fact, Harry couldn't believe he hadn't caught up on it sooner and that it'd taken an actual thinking cap for him to realize that he was more to her than just a friend. And it was a good thing because he felt the same way, the conversation – or rather listening session – with Jesse he'd had those few weeks ago made it possible for him to make this step.
"And what's that, Harry?" Caitlin just asked, shifting from one foot to another as he couldn't seem to stop staring at her. In fact, it started to become unnerving and she felt all jittery out of the sudden because the way those radiant blue eyes…
"Move on," he answered her question before starting in her direction.
He didn't stop. Not even when he finally reached her. Instead, he just proceeded to cupping her face and pressing his lips gently against her own in their first of, he was sure, many kisses.
At first she froze, not quite able to believe he was finally doing it. That he was finally making this step. She'd had half a mind to actually come clean with her feelings for him, but what always stopped her was either another crisis or someone interrupting their talk like Amunet or that girl from Jitters who'd spilled her coffee all over the table.
Now it was finally happening and it was everything she could ever dream of. And more.
When his lips finally left hers and she could catch a breath, she gasped, "Took you long enough."
The sudden silence in the room just now registered in her brain and she looked away from Harry's mesmerizing eyes and towards the people still present in the cortex. Wells's hands left her face as he turned as well.
"Don't worry, Snow," he then said, taking in a few stunned looks and equally few people that were just smiling, including Cecile – who knew about Harry's feelings as it was hard to keep them away from his head recently – and Cisco who'd seen this coming long ago. "I estimated that they'd be fine with it by 95 %."
"Stop that!" Cisco protested then. "Seriously, Harry, this is getting ridiculous! Can you just, please, come back to throwing things at people?"
"With pleasure," Harry just said when turning back to Snow. "So what do you say? Maybe we should finally have a proper date."
"Say no more," she agreed with a huge smile on her face and then she couldn't help it but cup his face and bring him closer because she wanted to kiss him again so badly.
Just then it happened.
He suddenly stilled and his lips stopped moving along with hers before he simply collapsed.
She managed to catch him and as a result, she tumbled down to the floor with him, bruising her butt, but feeling lucky that she made sure he didn't hit his head.
"Harry?" she asked, stunned. She was holding his head in her hands, but he wasn't moving. He wasn't opening his eyes. "Oh, my God, Harry! Harrison! Open your eyes! Come back! Harry! Guys, help!"
He could actually hear her. Her voice was just about the one thing that could reach him now and he desperately struggled to find his way back to the surface, but he couldn't move. He just couldn't. He seemed to be paralyzed, not able to feel anything, just hear her, but then even that was gone and all that remained was darkness.
When he opened his eyes, he was lying down and a quick assessment of his surroundings told him that he was in med bay. That wasn't even the worst, nor the weakness he still felt in his entire body as though it was made out of lead and moving it would be a tremendous effort. What was the worst was the look on her face when he finally spotted her standing right next to the bed.
"Snow," he said her name, his throat terribly hoarse. She immediately placed a glass full of water to his lips so he could drink. Whatever happened, had it already progressed so far? Now he started to understand why DeVoe had ended up in a wheelchair. It wasn't sickness. It was this. Thinking put too much stress on the whole body, all the energy being sucked by the brain, taking a strain on the remaining organs. "How bad is it?" he asked, although he already ran the numbers in his head.
Caitlin put the glass back to the table near the bed, but before she managed to answer, Cisco spoke, "The thinking didn't stop with the cap, did it? You used the dark matter after I specifically told you not to."
Harrison closed his eyes, a guilty expression on his face and a heavy sigh being released from his lips. He heard a very familiar clicking of heels and then the door shutting. When he looked again, Caitlin was gone, but he could still hear her sobbing outside.
"I'm sorry," he eventually apologized, choosing to stare at the ceiling so he wouldn't have to face Allen and West-Allen who were also in the room.
"Oh, you're sorry," Cisco mocked him, placing his hands on his hips. "Did it even occur to you what this would do to us?! The people who love you?! Oh, wait, forget about that! Just think about Caitlin for a moment! The woman you actually kissed before losing it! Do you have any idea what this would do to her?! She can't go through this again!"
"Cisco," it was Caitlin. She came back, tears still flooding her eyes, but she held on for now. "Don't. I was the one who told you to help him."
"Because you were worried about him, Caitlin!" Cisco exclaimed, placing his hands on his head. "God! Damn it! You told me he would do it anyway, so I helped, but I thought you promised you wouldn't use dark matter!" He turned back to the man in bed.
"I'm sorry. It was the only way to stop the Thinker. To become smarter than him!" Harry screamed and then his whole world spun. He closed his eyes for a second to steady himself.
"Are you ok? What's wrong?" Caitlin was already there by his side, concerned, her hand on his shoulder and that touch was truly killing him. Because just now he realized how stupid he'd been when trying to outsmart DeVoe for all cost, how delusional that he could do it without consequences. And the consequences were disastrous, apparently.
"I'm sorry. I truly am," he repeated in a voice much calmer and quiet as he looked at Snow and only at her. "I should have seen it, Caitlin. I thought I could do it, but I was wrong. For a genius, I was so… stupid," he sighed in frustration. "I was also too thick to notice things changing between us… I'm pretty sure even my daughter noticed that from that just one visit whereas I… Ah," he shook his head, sighing heavily and raising his hands to ruffle his already messed up hair. "I'm sorry I've waited for so long. I'm sorry you're going to have to lose me."
"No," she denied fiercely, tears shining in her eyes as she shook her head. "You won't die. I won't lose you. None of us will. I will fix this. I will find a way."
"You won't. I'm sorry, but you won't. Maybe I could, if… Ah, if I wasn't so damn tired… it makes so hard to think…"
"Then don't," Cisco suddenly advised in a surprisingly soft voice. "Don't think. You're only stressing your body with thinking. Just rest, ok? We'll try and figure this out."
"Thanks, Cisco," Harry just said with a smile before he drifted off again.
"Dude's really sick if he thanks me and calls me Cisco," the guy stated and then he shifted his eyes to Caitlin. Barry was there by her side and hugging her now, giving her some comfort.
"We will figure this out. We won't give up," he assured his friend.
"Yes," Iris backed him up. "Harry is our friend and we do anything in our power to help our friends. Besides, you love him, so we have the extra motivation."
Love, Caitlin thought morosely, it'd only ever brought her pain…
The problem was that Caitlin started to think that Harry was right - she couldn't come up with a solution to help him. And it was killing her. She didn't sleep. Didn't eat. Spending all her days and nights in the lab whereas he was all alone in med bay and it made her sick that she couldn't be there with him, but she wanted to save him so badly…
Eventually, she ended up frustrated and on the verge of a nervous breakdown since she could finally see her future. Just for a moment, when he'd kissed her, she could see it all. Them together, happy, working in the Labs, saving the day and spending free weekends and nights just by being, by having a life. Maybe having kids. Maybe getting married. And all of that was taken away from her a moment later when he collapsed in front of her.
She walked into med bay where he was still lying in bed, tired despite numerous hours of sleep, tired no matter what the time. He was always exhausted those days and it would only get worse. Unless they did something about it. She just didn't know what.
She sat by his side, holding his hand, waiting for him to register her presence and open his eyes before she would gather up enough strength and motivation to come back to her lab and work some more.
"Stay," he asked her in a quiet voice when she was just about to leave, his hand tightening on her own. Yet, that hold was far from strong and it was killing her. "I don't want you to spend the last moments we have together in your lab, working on a cure that is pointless."
"No, don't say that. It's not pointless. I can do this."
"I believe maybe you can, but not in such a short period of time and we both know that I do not have that time, Snow. There's just not enough. You can't save me. I can't save me. I'm sorry."
"Stop apologizing," she told him right then with fresh tears glistening in her eyes. She just couldn't believe that he would be taken from her like this without her even getting to know how it was to be with him for real, how it was to be a couple, to laugh together and kiss and spend the time together and make love and do all those things couples usually did.
"Come here," he suddenly offered, opening his arm and she sent him a questioning look before understanding what he meant by that.
Eventually, she did get into the bed and snuggled up to his side, placing her head just above his heart, listening to it beating. They'd never been so close before, never lying in bed together, but it came to them so naturally that it hurt. She clang to him, breathing him in, feeling his hand in her hair, stroking gently; feeling his breath on her forehead. She didn't want to lose that. And she wanted so, so much more.
"I love you, Caitlin," he suddenly confessed and she couldn't help but start crying all over again.
After a few minutes of silence during which she was savoring those words, she finally answered, "I love you, too, Harry."
She stayed with him until he drifted off to sleep again and the terrible yearning that appeared in her body overcame her completely. She wanted to scream. She wanted to curse the whole world because this wasn't fair. Because she needed more. Because she deserved it, damn it! She wanted him. All of him. His body and soul. To the rest of her life. Was it really that much to ask?!
And then she just got up. It took everything from her to make that decision and leave this body she was clinging to like to a lifeline, but she did it. She still had time. She had to save him.
She called for Barry, hitting the panic button on her phone and he was right there immediately, terrified. "Is he…?"
She just then realized he was asking whether Harry was still alive, so she confirmed.
"Barry, I need you to take me to see Marlize DeVoe," she then voiced her wish.
While DeVoe was gone, his last body giving up when he'd been outplayed; his wife was currently held in women's penitentiary.
Surprisingly, she listened to what Caitlin had to say and she looked at the younger woman with compassion on her face. "I'm sorry this happened to you. You see… I… I just wanted to keep my love by my side no matter what the cost and look where it got me… I, too, loved fiercely. I, too, couldn't let go. I would do anything for Clifford and I did. Only in the end it wasn't Clifford anymore and for me it was just too late…"
"With all due respect," Caitlin cut in just then, "the man I love is still the same. He's made a mistake, trying to take your husband down and even you can see now that Clifford DeVoe was wrong."
Marlize nodded, but still continued with, "Maybe you're right. The thinking cap itself didn't do this to my husband, but trying to survive did. You're gonna lose the man you love either way, miss Snow. You can't save him. All you can do is be with him till the end. His body is already failing. His human DNA wasn't meant to sustain dark matter."
"No." Caitlin shook her head vehemently. "No, I can do this. I know I can. I am not going to lose anyone ever again."
"I said the very same thing," Marlize told her when standing up, ready to be taken back to her cell, "and look where I am now. No matter what you do, the case is already lost. And I am sorry. I truly am. I know first-handedly what kind of a pain it can bring."
Caitlin was very shaken up after meeting with Mrs. DeVoe, but she was still not giving up. She refused to. Maybe she was in denial. Maybe it was hopeless, but she couldn't give up because that was the only thing she had left. Hope. She refused to accept anything else.
That was how Cisco found her in the middle of the night.
"What are you still doing here?" he asked when walking into her lab. "Caitlin," he tried again when she didn't answer, "spend some time with Harry, ok? You know how depressed he is right now? He misses you. He needs you."
"No," she just said, her voice adamant, tears at bay. "No. Not until I figure out a way to save him."
"You know you're gonna regret this later, don't you?" Cisco asked with a sigh when making his way to his friend. "He loves you. You gotta spend all the time you have left with him."
"Don't tell me what to do, ok?!" Caitlin suddenly screamed and Cisco seemed taken aback. "There has to be a way! There has to be!" She got up from her chair, looking around in terror. "I just… I can't…"
"I know," Cisco assured her when making his way to her again and gently placing his hands on her shoulders.
"He can't be just another man who loved me and then died! I can figure this out! I have to! I just need time!"
"Which you don't have. Caitlin…" Cisco sighed, trying one more time, "even if we reverse the influence of the thinking cap on Harry's brain, which is totally doable, that's not really the problem, is it? The problem is…"
"…the dark mater coursing through his veins," Caitlin finished after him with a gasp. "Cisco!"
The sparks in her eyes could only mean one thing and for a change, they actually gave Cisco hope.
"What?" he asked.
"We could potentially save him with blood transfusion and we already know Jesse has the same type… The problem is that it will only be a temporary fix… We need to remove the dark matter."
"And that's the problem. We can't."
"Oh, no, I think we can. And I know someone who can take someone else's powers," Caitlin said and Cisco finally understood. Of course they did. It'd happened to Iris and Barry already, so it might just work. "Harry's body can't handle the dark matter because he doesn't have the metahuman gene, but this guy can totally fix this!"
"We gotta call the Melting Point!"
Cisco breached Melting Pod to the Labs in the last possible moment, previously making a trip to Earth Two to get Jesse. Now the girl was by her father's side, giving him her blood and the meta tried his thing with taking the dark matter away.
Caitlin prayed it would work, because if it didn't… then she would truly lose Harry and she wasn't ready for that. She would never be. If the worst happened, she suspected she would go full-on crazy Killer Frost and never come back.
Only then Harry suddenly opened his eyes, seeing Jesse there and feeling slightly confused. Then he spotted Caitlin and her heart sung. Because what she saw in those crystal blue eyes was not weakness anymore. It was strength.
They just finished making love and Harry lifted his head from where it'd been buried in Caitlin's hair to look at her face; his curls plastered to his damp forehead, complete devotion and love reflected in his darkened blue eyes.
"I love you so much," he whispered right then, his voice hoarse and thick from all the groaning and calling her name he'd just done as well as she had in throes of passion.
"I love you, too. So much," she responded, bringing her hands to his face and stroking it gently, tightening her legs around his waist and then her arms around his neck as she pulled him closer, never wanting to let go of him and completely happy she'd saved him, that they'd managed to get here. It didn't matter that the act of love was over, they still felt the need to be connected, to be together and soon enough they would be up for a second round.
"I'm sorry I was so stupid," he apologized to her one more time and then found her lips to kiss her.
"Honestly," she responded with her lips still against his, "I never thought you could actually be this stupid. I trusted you knew what you were doing. I always trust you."
"I'm just glad you brought me back. You… God, Snow, you have no idea what this means to me."
"Oh, I think I do, but you have to promise me one thing."
"Anything," he assured her, looking her in the eye from up close.
"Never ever do something like this again without consulting me and the team."
"You got it. Can you promise me something now?"
"What is it?"
"Marry me."
AN:
Did I just stumble upon something?
What if Melting Point is the key?
And what if DeVoe somehow got Ralph and he's impersonating him already?!
Just a few loose thoughts.
I also know this story isn't all that good, but I had to get this 'disastrous consequences' out of my system. I believe that the team will save Harry because they care about him and that Caitlin will be the one to do it because she's a brilliant doctor.
Also, I think this is the most plausible outcome: .