I have a certain suspicion that next season, we're going to get a Leonard Snart who's been completely reset to the Captain Cold he was before he set foot on the Waverider. I hope I'm wrong, but this was an attempt to make myself a little more at ease with the idea.

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Mick tells her not to do it. In fact, she thinks he'd be happier if she hadn't learned about the presence of a Leonard Snart in 2016 Central City at all, but he can't bring himself to keep it from her.

"It's not the Snart who blew up the Oculus, Blondie. It's the son of a bitch who's just looking for the next score. We both were, once. This one hasn't changed."

Rip says that, given that Snart was at Ground Zero when the Oculus Wellspring blew up, the timeline seems to have ... snapped back on itself, reset one Leonard Snart to the man with whom the Time Masters had never tinkered. The man who'd walked away from a group of heroes on a rooftop without a backward glance.

It hurts, a little, to realize that he hadn't chosen to go of his own volition, not entirely ... although Mick swears the seeds were there.

He'd run into what had seemed an apparition after Rip had dropped them back in 2016 for a few days to make their decisions. Without family, he'd chosen to hit a few of their old haunts before steeling himself to tell Lisa ...

But there, in the bar, blue parka and all, was a ghost.

"He was pissed I'd just vanished. Didn't remember a goddamned thing."

Mick doesn't tell any of them until after Savage's defeat ... even if this Snart could help in the endeavor, he wouldn't, at least not without a lot of convincing they don't have time for. But then he lets the cat out of the bag, just in case.

Sara doesn't say much, but he warns her again later, anyway.

"Trust me. It'll just hurt. I know you two got ... close ... but this is not a Snart who lets people in. Mission changed him, like it changed all of us."

Gideon has told them all that the Time Masters could not affect feelings, that whatever friendships and loyalties they had developed were their own, whatever other strings were pulled. That was ... a relief, really. Something of her own, to remember when the nights were too long and she couldn't sleep.

"... me and you ..."

With this news coming hard on the heels of what had seemed to be his death and the news of Laurel's, she can't take it. She needs this tiny gram of hope.

She just wants to see him alive, snarky and clever and infuriating, just once, she tells herself. Just once.

So she pries from Gideon the knowledge of where Leonard Snart would be keeping himself these days, takes a deep breath, and heads out into Central City.

She knows he has ... or had, at least a few months ago, according to Mick ... safe houses scattered across the city and even in others, but the one she goes to is the one Gideon thinks is most likely.

Having gained entry through not entirely legal means, she prowls through the townhouse in the dark. It barely looks lived-in: minimal furniture, nothing remotely personal in the living room beyond a small stack of books ... a deck of cards on a desk ...

She's so distracted she actually jumps when the familiar sound of the cold gun powering up echoes behind her.

"Who the hell are you?"

That voice.

She closes her eyes a moment, then slowly turns.

Yes, it's him.

The same black leather jacket he'd been wearing when he died. He's not wearing the goggles, and his blue eyes are angrily ablaze.

There's not an ounce of recognition there.

She's been expecting it, but it's like a body blow. She actually flinches as if struck.

"Don't move," he orders sharply. She's not worried, even with this Leonard Snart. He might shoot if she makes an overly threatening move, but she knows enough of him to be positive he won't just shoot a seemingly unarmed woman for no reason.

She just studies him. Living. Breathing. Here.

The last time she saw him ...

His eyes narrow further at the look on her face.

"I said," he grits out, "who the hell are you?"

Not an ounce.

She lifts her hands to show her lack of (visible) weapons, annoyed to find they're shaking just a little, and draws a deep breath.

"No one you ... know. Just let me go. I'll walk away. You'll never see me again."

But her words only seem to anger him.

"No," he hisses back, eyes reflecting the light from the gun, making them bluer than ever. "I'm getting just a little tired of this crap. First Mick shows up after dropping out of sight a few months back, with some stupid story about going ..."

He stops suddenly, then steps just a little closer, lowering the gun just a little, studying her intently. She thinks of all the times she's felt his gaze, and closes her eyes.

"You were there," he says abruptly, in a voice that's somehow changed. "On the rooftop."

"Yes."

A long moment. Then, even from behind lowered lids, she sees the light from the cold gun fade.

She opens her eyes again, can see the wheels turning, the gears working inside that magnificent brain.

"Mick tried to tell me I went on that damn fool 'mission,' that we both did," he says, coolly. "You going to tell me the same thing?"

"I'm not going to tell you anything," she says wearily. "I shouldn't have come here."

He steps closer. She can't help taking a good long look.

She hadn't realized how much she'd gotten used to there being a certain light in his eyes when he looks ... looked ... at her until now, when it's replaced by only a chilly speculation.

No, she should not have come here.

"But you did," he drawls, interrupting her thoughts with startling perception. "Why?"

Give a part of the truth. "Yes, you did go along on the mission. But ... there were changes made to the timeline and apparently you ... didn't. Now. I was just checking on that."

It's so uncanny, how the mannerisms are the same. Of course they are, but they seem like they shouldn't be. That little head tilt, for instance.

"And who are you, to be ... checking up on me?"

Is there the tiniest thread of their habitual flirting in that low drawl?

She eyes him, realizes that his gaze has turned somewhat ... speculative. Not so different from how it was during that first conversation , strolling on the Waverider.

"... just trying to make conversation ... "

Oh, this is dangerous. This is so dangerous. She needs to walk away. She needs to let him go.

"Sara." It's not what he's really asking and they both know it. She gives him a thin smile. He actually returns it.

Dangerous.

"So ... Sara ..." (A frisson of something up her spine at the way he drawls her name.) "... you've established that I'm here and that I'm uninterested in idealistic crusades. Now what?"

You let me walk out of here and we never see each other again.

She can't make herself say it.

He does, though.

"You can walk out of here and go back to your friends, make it clear I'm not interested in them and they need to stop bothering me ..."

That's it, then.

"... or you can let me buy you a drink."

He looks almost as surprised as she is by his words. They stare at each other for a long moment.

She should say no, she should get back, she shouldn't ...

"OK."


The bar he takes her to is a bit of a dive, really. But she likes dives.

He prowls inside with the air of a regular, eyeing her reaction with curiosity. She merely smiles at him.

There's a jukebox. Probably no Captain and Tennille, though. Her heart clenches, just a little.

She feels his eyes on her and realizes he'd marked that reaction. He doesn't comment, though, just orders them both a beer and leads her to a booth.

There, they contemplate each other.

"The Flash put you up to this?" he asks, finally.

It actually startles a laugh out of her. "I don't even know the Flash."

"Hmm. But you were surprised that I said it, not at the idea that you might." His smile curls at the edges. "Are you one of these heroes ... Sara?"

He doesn't know you, he doesn't have any idea ... even if he does say your name like he's tasting it ...

"I'm trying to be," she tells him with a quiet dignity. "There are worse things."

"Mmm." The noise is noncommittal. "I have a problem with the paycheck."

She smiles a little. "So you've said, Crook."

More than she'd meant to say; it's becoming too easy to try to forget, to buy that this Leonard is the one she knew. She sees him register that they've apparently been close enough to talk, that her delivery of the noun is perilously close to a pet name.

But he doesn't retreat. He takes a swig of his beer, his eyes on hers. "Tell me why Mick looked like he'd seen a ghost when he saw me. Tell me why you felt the need to ... check up on me."

Deep waters. "I told you. You were on the ship. You were ... part of the team. And then a few things happened and part of the timeline apparently reset itself. Now, you never left Central City."

"But Mick did. Now, how," he muses, "would that happen? Mick's always been a follower."

"People change."

Something in her voice draws his eyes back to hers.

Same eyes. Same piercing stare. So easy to try to forget.

"But you ... no one ... expected it to happen. This 'timeline resetting itself' garbage." His voice drops with disgust. "Mick didn't expect to see me. And you ... what, came to verify? That I existed?"

"Yes." It's true enough.

His mouth twists a little. "There's not some sort of copy of me back on that ship, is there?"

"... get him out of here ..."

"... a hero ..."

"... that's what he was ..."

"No," she says. "There's not."

She doesn't manage to keep the emotion out of her voice. His brow furrows, and he leans forward.

But before he can say anything, he catches sight of the pinkie ring on her right hand.

"Where the hell did you get that?!" He grabs for her hand, only to find his sleeve pinned to the table by one of her knives as reflex kicks in. His eyes fly back to hers, anger warring with respect.

The bartender looks their way, but only that. (She's pretty sure this isn't the first knife to have been driven into this table.) They both respond with quick shakes of their head. Nothing to see here. Move along.

He looks backs to find her glaring at him, gives her a rueful look she's also seen before.

"OK. That was ... uncalled for. But impressive," he adds, looking at the knife. "Unpin me?"

"I don't know if I want to do that."

"Come on, you have to admit it was a shock for me, seeing that thing ... there ..." That sidelong look again. "... when I know for a fact it's somewhere else entirely."

She twists the ring around on her finger. She'd used the ship's technology to resize it after Mick had given it to her with the comment that Snart would want her to have it.

She's not sure how to respond without giving things away. But he takes it out of her hands when he searches her face, nods to himself, and then leans back as far as he can with a knife through his sleeve and takes a drink of his beer.

"So. I'm dead, am I? Or," he allows, "other me is."

She holds very still. "What makes you say that?"

"Couple of things. Mick's reaction. The look on your face a few times. That ring. This timeline mumbo-jumbo. You thought I was dead, Mick saw me, Mick flipped out, and then you had to come see for yourself. Does that pretty much sum it up?"

It angers her, to hear him recount it up so flippantly. "Pretty much."

He can hear it in her voice and levels a look at her. "What'd I do, play the hero?"

"You were a hero," she says, despising the little shake in her voice. "You saved us all. You saved the world, really."

This gives him pause, a little; she can see it. But he shakes it off.

"And look how that worked out for me. Other me."

Cold-hearted bastard. It's too much; she slam the nearly empty beer to the table, surges to her feet, retrieves her knife and walks out without a backward glance

It's only a few moments, though, before he's keeping pace with her as she walks through the night.

Finally, he says, "Do you know where you're going?"

"Not particularly."

A "huff" of amusement. "Can I at least help with that?"

She ignores him.

They continue to walk.

"I'm sorry."

Ignore, ignore.

"Sara? If you knew me, any version of me, you know I don't do this much. Please."

"Why? It was the truth. I guess the truth just hurts."

She wraps her arms around herself. It's starting to get truly cold out.

And that's when she feels him settle his jacket around her shoulders.

The goddamned black leather jacket, the one he'd insisted she take during the hull incident, the one he'd been wearing when he died ...

He doesn't know, he can't know. But the gesture undoes her. Tears start to trickle down her cheeks. She thought she'd done enough crying for a lifetime over the past week or so. She was wrong.

She keeps walking, the tears pouring down in silence. He can't have missed that his gallant gesture has elicited an unexpected reaction, but he doesn't say anything.

Eventually, however, she looks up and realizes he's managed to guide her right back to the townhouse. She glares at him. He sighs.

"Look. Come in and have a cup of coffee before you head back out to do whatever heroes do, OK? It's late, you look beat, you can kick my ass if I pull anything."

"You don't drink coffee."

It gives him pauses. "True. But that doesn't mean I don't have it around."

Yet again going against her better judgement, she accedes.

She drinks her coffee in silence while he watches her across a battered table. She does her best to ignore him.

"Sara? Are you going to hurt me if I ask you one more question?"

Despite herself, it makes her smirk. "No promises, but go ahead."

He hesitates for a very long moment. "Were we ... something?"

Something. She gives him a sad smile. "Friends. We were friends."

"Mmm. Friends?" His eyes are fixed on hers. "Not more?"

She shouldn't answer.

"Almost."

"Ah."

His next words are so soft she doesn't hear them at first. "Pardon me?"

"He was an idiot." The piercing look is just as she remembers it, then he looks aside. "I was. Other me. Whatever."

Her lips curve despite herself. "Not that I'm arguing, but what makes you say that?"

"He waited too long, apparently. Lost a chance. You have to take chances sometimes in this business. He should have known better than that. But let's admit it, we're not the best people with ..." A wave of a hand. "All this. Feelings."

She knew ... knows ... him well enough to recognize the more staccato pattern of speech he adopts when he's just trying to get the words out.

"Well, cut yourself a break. I'm not the greatest with them either."

"But you must have cared." That little smile is hovering around his mouth again. "Or you wouldn't have come here."

"Guilty."

They smirk at each other.

Maybe, somewhere, buried deep in his brain, in his DNA, there's an iota of the Leonard Snart who went on the Waverider, who watched her dance in a bar in the '70s, who stopped her from killing Stein, who played cards with her when she needed a distraction from her demons, who gave her his jacket when they were freezing to death, who brought up "me and you."

Whatever it is, it somehow surprises neither of them when he leans over and kisses her.

And it's worth it, to have a new memory of kissing him, one untainted by grief and panic. It is him and it isn't, but she knows what he can be, what's at his core, and that's enough for now.

The kiss gets just heated enough that they're both sorely tempted to let matters progress, but eventually, they draw apart.

There's a look of wonder in his eyes.

"An idiot," he says, finally, and it makes her laugh.

He walks her back outside, makes sure she's oriented enough to figure out where she'd going. He doesn't express any further interest in the team he once gave up his life for, and she's a little disappointed.

But time will tell.

They may actually have it, now.

"Thank you," she tells him. He gives her an odd look, but doesn't ask why.

He just regards her.

"So. You'll be leaving again? But coming back this way? Once in a while?"

"We should be." She twists the ring around on her finger.

"Buy you another drink? Maybe dinner?" He pauses. "You like to play cards?"

Perhaps there are things that are meant to be, after all.