Disclaimer: I do not own The Flash or Arrow or their comic versions. I just have an overactive imagination and a fanfiction account.
A/N: I watched The Time Traveler's Wife years ago and the movie has stuck with me since. I've thought about doing my own version, but never had a story line I liked until this gem popped into my head and refused to go away until I wrote it. This story is complete and I will eventually get it all posted, but reviews will certainly help encourage me to post faster. ; ) Also, this story starts with Olicity, but Lauriver is end game and so is WestAllen. If these aren't your preferred ships, I'm sorry, but please don't flame me or leave rude reviews. Thanks for reading.
Chapter One
When Barry Met Oliver
Bartholomew Allen, who preferred to be called Barry, rushed to his lab at the Central City police station. He was late, again, and hoping desperately not to be caught. His direct supervisor rarely tutted when he dashed in, excuses rolling from his lips. Captain Singh, on the other hand, marked down each tardy and then liked to call Barry into his office to lecture him every couple of weeks. Never mind that Barry completed the labor of two men in half the time, produced solid evidence which helped lock up dozens of criminals, and offered a unique perspective that had cracked many cases wide open.
Most days, Barry squeaked in on-time; he just had the unfortunate tendency of clocking in late more often than the rest of his colleagues. Today, Barry's phone died the night before and with it his alarm. He'd overslept nearly half an hour until his arguing neighbors woke him. He'd skipped breakfast and his workout, coughed up the spare change for a taxi instead of the bus, and took the back entrance in the hopes of missing the captain. A touch of luck must have found him at the last second, because Singh was out when he arrived; a court appearance, he heard on his way down the hall. Provided Captain Singh hadn't tried to talk to him earlier in the morning, Barry might get through the day without a disapproving frown directed his way.
Slipping into his white coat, Barry walked into the lab and stopped dead. A man stood in the public area of the lab with his back to Barry. He wore a brown leather jacket and the back of his light brown head was entirely unfamiliar. Visitors popped into the open lab all the time, which was why all the sensitive material was stored in the secured room next door. Most of Barry's guests were cops or friends and they knew better than to touch his things. This stranger however had made himself comfortable in Barry's domain, sitting on one of his chairs as if he owned it. Worst of all, the stranger had found Barry's case board or more accurately, the personal case that was meant for his eyes only, which sat under the work-related ones. His mother's case, her murder, for which his father had been falsely convicted, and the one case Barry would never stop trying to solve.
"Excuse me, what do you think you're doing?" Barry marched across the lab space, ready to toss the stranger out, though he'd need help with that. The stranger turned around with a knowing grin.
"Hello, old friend. Sorry for intruding on your mom's case. I've heard you talk about it so often, I'm afraid I couldn't resist taking a peak."
"Who are you?" Barry sputtered, but then realized he did recognize the face; "Wait, you're Oliver Queen, the rich kid who got stranded on an island for like five years. We've never met."
"Actually, it was only two and a half years, and you're right, Barry, we haven't met, yet."
"How do you know my name? And how did you get up here?"
"I got up here with a visitor's pass," Oliver dangled the plastic card up for Barry to see; "As for the rest, you'd better sit down. It will require a lengthy explanation, that you won't want to believe at first, but eventually you'll have to accept it for the truth."
"I think I'd rather you leave and keep whatever crazy you're smoking to yourself," Barry gestured towards the door, frowning at the tabloid playboy.
"I'm from the future, Barry, and you sent me here to see if we could change the past. To save the future."
Oliver spoke seriously, then paused to let that information sink in. Barry stared at him for a couple heartbeats and then laughed: "That's a good one. Did Joe put you up to this?"
"I'm not joking, Barry."
"Oh really, you're from the future of what, a year from now? Or let me guess, you're from two hundred years in the future where we've unlocked the secrets to the fountain of youth."
"Physically, I am from the here and now. I only travel through time mentally, you like to call it body jumping with my younger selves. I come from 2049, Barry. And I can prove it."
"Okay, I'm listening," Barry pulled up another chair. He sat across from Oliver expectantly, amused, and wondering how long his affluent guest planned to maintain this farce.
"Most people believe you became a CSI to prove your father's innocence, but you had already decided you wanted to be an investigator when you were eight, years before your mother's murder. You wanted to help people, to help them find answers to tough questions, and you loved science; when Detective West told you about the important work crime-scene analysts provided for the police, you knew that was what you were going to do." Barry wanted to deny it but couldn't. That was a truth very few people knew about him and no one in that small circle would've ever dared share such information with the likes of Oliver Queen.
Before Barry could demand to know how Oliver found that out, the other man continued; "Majority of the time when you're late to work, it isn't because your phone died, or the bus was late, but that you got distracted chasing down a lead on one of your cases for your blog. Besides, you actually enjoy the lectures Captain Singh gives you about professionalism and responsibility, because its shows he cares. You look up to Singh, see him as a mentor, and knowing he see such immense potential in you fills you with hope and confidence." Now Barry slumped in his chair, shaking his head. There was no way Oliver could know these things about him, this was too personal. But Oliver wasn't done yet.
"More importantly, the night your mother was killed, you told the detectives you saw a monster outside the house just before she died. They thought you were just seeing things, grasping at denial because you couldn't face what your dad had done. They were only half right, you didn't see a monster that night but rather a man in a mask, and ever since you've been trying to recreate the mask to find the real monster who killed your mom. And if none of that has convinced you, there's also the fact that you're in love with Iris West, your childhood best friend who is, at this moment, completely oblivious to your true affections."
"How?" Barry croaked out.
"I told you, Barry, I'm from the future and in the future, we're old friends. Do you need a moment?" Oliver asked and mutely, Barry nodded.
His thoughts rattled about in his head. There was no one who knew all those secrets; not about the monster who was really a man or how he felt about Iris, because Barry had never told anyone. Except in the future, perhaps he had told a close friend, to help that friend convince a younger him. Barry was incredulous, afraid, and, a little close to geeking out at the idea that time travel might really be real. Oliver, meanwhile, covered back up Nora Allen's case and then inspected several shelves which held the chemicals Barry used when collecting fingerprints.
"So, you said you came back to change the past, to save the future. What happened in 2012 that could affect 2049 so much?" Barry asked at last. He'd decided he would accept Oliver's story for the time being, until he found a way to disprove it. Not that he wanted to disprove it all that badly.
Oliver smiled: "Nothing happened in 2012, which is what we're trying to change. Seven years from now, you're going to find a way to prove that monster you saw killed your mom, but by then it will be too late. Your dad will have died in prison. I'm here to change that, to give you back your father. And when you truly believe me, about the mental jumping through time, I want to find me again or rather the Oliver of 2012 and tell him how we met, because I'm going to need a friend like you, Barry Allen. Now, where do you keep the pens and paper in this joint?"