Author's Notes: I should mention that I haven't watched any of the SuperFlash crossover yet, so please no spoilers! This is one heck of an angsty fic. I'll make it up to you in fluff eventually. Have at it!
"Tenebris" is Latin for: darkness, turbidity, dark, obscurity, gloom, dark place.
Barry enters the Speed Force, but Barry does not come out.
Jay and Wally crash to the steel floor, the force of their arrival imploding the breach. Not wasting a second, Jay Flashes to his feet and lunges towards the empty space where the breach was. "Reopen it," he barks, looking at Cisco with disconcertingly bright, silver eyes. "Reopen the breach."
Cisco tries to, but the sinking feeling in his gut proves sound. Nothing materializes. "I can't," he says.
Joe asks slowly, "Where's Barry?"
Wally grimaces and stands. "He was right behind me," he says, looking around.
Jay barks, "Cisco."
In front of them, a breach blinks in and out of existence, Cisco's heart racing as he lowers his trembling palm. "I – I can't," he says, faint and disappointed. "I lost the tether, it – it's gone." He swallows hard. "Wherever he is, I can't reach him."
Jay presses a fist to his forehead and swears.
"Where is he?" Cisco asks. "What happened?"
"It was supposed to be me," Jay says, running a hand through his hair, and it is so Barry it makes a lump swell in Cisco's throat. "The Speed Force demands compensation. I was supposed to stay behind so Wally—" he nods towards the dazed, wide-eyed speedster, "—could escape."
"Barry stayed instead," Caitlin breathes.
The growing horror in the room culminates in Iris taking a step towards the space where the breach was. She doesn't ask Cisco to reopen it. She stands where Barry was, where Cisco made his to infinity and beyond remark, and her fists clench at her side, a silent expression of rage and regret.
In his mind, Cisco starts counting.
One minutes, eighteen seconds.
. o .
How long can a speedster hold their breath?
It's a question that haunts Cisco as he searches. He scans the waters relentlessly for a loose line in the ocean, aching to spot the shadow where Barry was, but there is a lot of water to look over, and he can only see so far. He knows he'll drown if he stays in the Speed storm for too long, but he searches anyway, until he is tired and sore and sick with it. Then he retreats, heaving for breath, and tries to stop counting.
Four minutes, fifty-eight seconds.
. o .
It takes three hours, eight minutes, and fourteen seconds to find Barry.
Delirious with exhaustion, Cisco fishes on his last legs and snags something on the line, unexpectedly strong. He lures his catch towards him, heart pounding, scarcely daring to hope that it's the speedster he's looking for. Telling himself to keep a lid on his enthusiasm, he reels it in slowly, accompanying hand motions almost identical to the proverbial effort he exerts. Stay with me, he tells the shark or swimmer caught on the other end. Easy now.
It goes beautifully for a full minute. Then the line catches suddenly, violently, yanking Cisco towards the breach. A dozing Wally jerks awake at the yell Cisco lets out, Flashing forward and catching him.
Anchoring him, Wally bellows, "Dad!"
Joe jerks out of his chair, doze interrupted, and lunges forward, reflexively grabbing a hold of the back of Wally's suit.
Wally keeps both arms around Cisco, gluing him to the floor. Cisco's arms shake with the effort of holding the line, but he doesn't let go. He can feel every muscle in Wally's body tense, taut and overheating, bulling his way towards safety. Wally strains backwards with the same force that the Speed Force yanks forward, Cisco caught like a lure in the middle, bobbing along with the storm of speedster versus Speed Force.
Versus speedster, Cisco thinks grimly, tightening his grip. He has his quarry; he'd recognize that bullheaded resistance anywhere. He reels, and insists, and persists until he is certain he is going to tear his own arms off, or Wally is going to lose his grip, and then he gasps as the line goes slack and a large object crashes out of the breach.
It's molten, glowing gold and vanishing in a flurry of yellow light. Without thinking Wally Flashes after it. A second later, a thunderous sound draws a shout from him.
Cisco drops the breach and sprints after Joe into the hallway. They find Wally pinned up against the wall, a glowing red shadow holding him aloft, vibrating too quickly for Cisco to see. It doesn't matter: he doesn't think, can't see straight, just puts up both hands and feels the energy build and release like a deep breath before a dive, instantaneous compliance surging from his palms.
Before Wally can make a move, a third streak of light crashes into the red blur, and they hit the wall hard, the red blur materializing as it drops, seemingly dead, to the floor.
Cisco can't breathe, but he finds himself moving forward on shaking legs, staring at the blue-black bruises forming around Wally's throat, I bleed quick, and directing his attention to the speedster on the floor.
With glowing red eyes, it looks right at him. He knows immediately that it isn't the speedster he is looking for, but it's already recovering. Jesse catches on and they disappear, a distant, hollow boom as the doors to the particle accelerator snap shut.
Flashing back into sight, Jesse puts a steadying hand Wally's arm. Panting, she demands, "What the hell did you catch?"
I have no idea.
. o .
It's one in the morning, but everyone is up now, Jay in full Flash regalia, Iris in pajamas, Julian nursing a cold cup of coffee, HR holding a hand to his mouth in an attempt not to speak. Caitlin, Jesse, Wally, and Joe are in the cortex, doubtless confirming that nothing is broken. Down here, the air is so thick Cisco could strum it, tension riding his back with spurs.
Staring at the speedster in the cell, he feels something approaching fascinated horror. Jay has a hand on the glass, standing dangerously close to it, and the creature with Barry's face and Not Barry's eyes stares at him. Unblinking. Unmoved. Its teeth bare in a slow snarl, a shiver coursing through it, and it puts its back to Jay without a word.
Cisco swallows hard and takes a step forward. "Barry?" he tries. The creature tenses, shoulders folding inward. "Barry?" he repeats, stupidly hopeful, stepping closer.
The speedster ignores him, staring blankly at the opposite wall, back to them.
Julian says in a defeated, raspy tone, "What a bloody nightmare."
The creature in the cell doesn't move.
Iris walks away, can't stay, and Cisco wishes he could join her, but he can't leave. Not even when HR finally walks, or when Jay puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes it, warning him not to stay too long. The cell will hold, he reminds Cisco in a dull voice.
Cisco puts a hand on the glass, cool to the touch. The cell will hold, he tells himself.
He taps it and the creature flinches, wrapping its arms around itself, oddly human, and the tension is back in Cisco's throat.
. o .
"Flash," he says, and the speedster turns and looks at him with striking golden eyes. There's no animosity there, not anymore, just a burning, world-ending curiosity. Like it could snap his neck simply because it didn't know what mortality was. Or, rather, didn't care.
Cisco inhales slowly and repeats, "Flash."
The speedster steps right up to the glass, staring at him with unblinking intention, and presses its palm flat against it. It doesn't have to say a word for Cisco to know what it means.
Flash.
His heart swells when the creature dips its head – Barry's head – in acknowledgement. However slight, it's a breakthrough. Proof that maybe, just maybe, Barry is in there.
"Flash," he says again, like it is the only word he knows. He repeats it until the creature is staring at him with something approaching wonder.
"Flash," it echoes unexpectedly, and it is not a sound but a feeling, like a color, something he cannot describe without showing it.
Riding the high of revelation, Cisco says, "Barry."
The light goes out, Flash's shoulders tensing, and it prowls away from him, to the farthest corner of the cell it can, hunched and reserved once more.
"Barry," Cisco insists, because he needs this to work. "Barry."
It casts a bolt of lightning at him, a blue, sharp, electric thing that crackles menacingly across the impenetrable glass wall between them.
Cisco takes a step back, descending into darkness, bones aching with fatigue. Stay, Flash's posture says, even as its eyes glower reproachfully. Cisco backs up, backs until he's in the shadows, but he doesn't shut the outer door. He takes a seat instead, assuming the first watch.
. o .
A low, thin whining like a dying animal intercuts Cisco's sleep.
His eyes open before his brain catches up. He wanders with dreamlike thoughtlessness towards the source of the sound, staring at the speedster curled up in the corner, whimpering and whining again. There's a breathlessness to it, a cold fear, like it's not just hurt but being hurt. Cisco taps the glass and it thumps him hard in the chest with a single, stabbing emotion: please.
He shudders, hairs on the back of his neck standing.
This is insane, he thinks, opening the door, still locked in an almost trance. The Flash, carrying enough energy to annihilate him, doesn't move, just lies like it's dying on the floor, whining.
"Barry?" he dares to try again, and the same thump of emotion hits him again, hard enough to stagger without the barrier between them.
Help me, it pleads, over and over, like a heartbeat. Help me.Help me.
Cisco draws in a deep, centering breath, aware that he is violating every rule about safety, and crouches next to it. He presses a hand on its shoulder. Before he can even gasp at the heat, the undertow drags him down.
. o .
Everything is fine that night until the doorbell rings.
The cop tells him in person because it can't be said over the phone. I'm afraid I have some bad news, she begins, like every movie cliché, and Cisco's throat closes up, and he wants to tell her to leave, to get out, but she insists on telling him the unutterable truth. There was a car accident.Dante Ramon is dead.
He tries to turn away and she's back, looking him in the eye with that painful mix of sympathy and apathy, care but don't get too close, and says, "I'm afraid I have some bad news. There was a car accident. Dante Ramon is dead."
And again: "I'm afraid I have some bad news. There was a car accident. Dante Ramon is dead."
And again: "I'm afraid I have some bad news. There was –"
. o .
Something drags him backwards, away from the burning warmth, and he knows other people are talking, but all he can hear, over and over, is that same monotonous voice. I'm afraid I have some bad news.There was a car accident—
Then there's a warmth spreading across his chest, strength that ushers the woman away and quietly shuts the door.
He can't speak, can't react, and so mercifully, he blacks out.
. o .
Cisco's head hurts, a lot, but the first thing he truly notices is the hospital sheets underneath his hand.
And then it hits him like a sledgehammer. Dante, he thinks, tears tightening his throat, hands clenching around the sheets. Dante…
A gentle hand on his shoulder gives a little shake. "Cisco," Wally says, sounding tired. "You're not there."
Dante's dead, he thinks, and he's sobbing, curling onto his side and weeping into the pillow, because it doesn't matter whether it's that night or ten years from now.
The result will always be the same: I'm afraid I have some bad news.
There was a car accident.
Dante Ramon is dead.
. o .
When he is too tired to cry, too anguished to mourn, he sits with blank-faced apathy in front of the cell.
He can't even lift a hand towards the twisting figure on the floor, fingers trembling as they rest on his knees instead. They're afraid to touch him, to try to help. Consequently, they prolong his suffering, because it's easier to sit and pretend than it is to approach and address.
He can still hear the woman's voice. Cisco closes his eyes, deeply, irreparably tired.
He says in a low voice he doesn't believe, "You're not there."
To both of them, to himself only, he repeats it. "You're not there."
. o .
He's snoring when he feels the thunder in his chest.
It's a muted feeling, an inarticulate thing that implores and accepts, begging on its knees without voicing any supplication. It reaches towards him without holding out its hand. It aches.
Responding, he sits up blearily, neck aching abominably, and sees Flash watching him with aching clarity.
Please, it says again, louder and softer at once.
He opens the door.
Together, side-by-side, they walk towards the breach room. Across the threshold Flash limps forward, leading the way. Pausing in the center of the room, it turns back to look at him, and there is such aching, pleading heartbreak – let me go – that Cisco swallows hard and approaches.
It's easy to open the breach, hand on Flash's shoulder, and they emerge in the Speed storm he knows, the waves churning with it, but he doesn't fear them.
He can see Barry, Barry, insubstantial as a ghost, black-and-white, drained of all color, swaying in place. He's kneeling and cradling an invisible mass in his arms, groaning softly in pain as he tenses and flinches alternately. Cisco feels The Flash tug at his hold and cannot bring himself to let go, afraid he will lose Barry forever if he does. Flash gives another, more immediate pull, and Cisco almost lets go.
Come home, he tells Barry instead, holding onto the shadow. Come home.
Barry shudders, slumping farther, like he's losing life, and Flash strains more urgently against him. Come home, Cisco insists, louder. "Barry. Come home."
The figure on the floor looks up, surprised and slow. "Cisco?" Barry rasps, and there's such anguish in his voice that it aches. "Cisco." His gaze slides to the creature next to Cisco, but there is no more shadow. Rising on slow, unsteady legs, Barry walks towards him. There's wonder and fear in his tone, his hand hesitating near Cisco's sleeve.
Closing the gap, Cisco takes his hand.
Blink-and-they're-gone.
. o .
Cisco's apartment is warm, warmer than Barry likes it, but he doesn't complain as Cisco shuts the door behind them.
Cisco's bed is small, too small for two adults, but they make it work. Barry fists a hand in his shirt and holds on, and apologizes, and apologizes, and apologizes.
Cisco drags him closer after a point, a firm hand on the back of his head.
Message received, Barry quiets, breathing against his collar, he's so close, and for the first time Cisco thinks, I need you, and he is right there.
. o .
Barry doesn't let him go, and somehow they don't drown.
. o .
It hurts.
The grief aches like an open wound. He buries his face against the nearest warm surface and sobs. Barry's arms come around his back and hug tightly, crushing the grief against him, and it isn't enough and never will be, but it is what keeps Cisco alive.
. o .
They don't ask because they don't need to. Cisco knows what Barry saw, and Barry, he is sure, knows what Cisco saw.
The aching, undying gratitude pouring from Barry is so intense it's almost too much, but Cisco lets it wash over him with tidal insistence. He lets it into his life, into his kitchen cabinets and his couch cushions. He leans on it when he needs to hug, to be held and to know that he won't drift away, either.
Barry is just tall enough that when he hugs Cisco, it feels like there is no inch of him unguarded, the insistence and warmth pouring off him affirmations of what they both already know.
I'm here.
Cisco is Barry's anchor, and Barry is Cisco's rock.
They cling to each other as the storm passes over them.
. o .
When Barry sleeps, his chest rumbles like he's purring. Cisco notices because he is lying with his head on Barry's stomach even though he isn't tired, or maybe is just too tired to be tired anymore, listening to him sleep. Absorbing it like it'll heal him.
I missed you, he thinks suddenly, overwhelmingly, aching heart wide open. I missed you.
And he knows it goes beyond the Speed Force.
. o .
It takes a month for the nightmares to stop, for life to start resembling its new normal, but even Savitar seems small next to the Speed Force, to Barry embodying it, wrestling with it, at its mercy.
Why did it let you come back? Cisco asks him one night.
Barry, all but asleep, replies, Because you needed me more than it needed me.
He thinks about bullying the Speed Force into submission, about taking what belongs to him, and slides under one of Barry's arms. Barry squeezes his shoulders, in a happy-to-have-him way, and Cisco relaxes against him.
. o .
He's right: it still hurts, in ten years.
But in ten years, he still has his scarlet speedster, his Flash, his Barry.
And while the two do not cancel out, he knows he can live with the former while the latter remains intact.