(Yikes, that last chapter really had me wanting to rewrite, maybe make it thicker. Oh well. The show must go on. Try this one and tell me what you think. It's short, but it's also my bedtime, so I apologize. -Doverstar)
It was maddening to see Wally this way. Body spasming with pain, rewritten with burns. Stress clogged her lungs. At least on Earth-1, Caitlin would have had her friends around her to give her support as she did her job, as she tried to heal him, but here, she was alone. All she had was Savitar—and he wasn't much help. He stood on the opposite side of the examination table, suit's hood down, staring at nothing while she worked.
"I've given him a sedative," Caitlin murmured, "but it won't take affect for another ten minutes at least. He's barely conscious as it is."
Savitar, of course, did not answer her. That was fine. She didn't need someone to respond; she often spoke aloud during a procedure. It helped her focus, take stock of everything she was doing.
"The good news is, he isn't a speedster on this Earth, so any medicine I give him won't be burned through by his metabolism."
A very throaty groan from her patient echoed throughout the Cortex.
"Sorry," Caitlin told him, though she knew he wouldn't have heard. "Poor choice of words."
She heard Savitar shifting his weight to the balls of his feet. "I'm guessing this is going to take more than the usual ointment and lollipop treatment." He didn't sound sympathetic, as usual, but at least she wasn't the only one talking unnecessarily.
"I don't have the equipment for a skin graft," Caitlin fretted, moving to clean the blood from Wally's cheek. "And I don't know how much blood he's already lost—the scanner indicates that something pierced his lower back before you found him. But if I don't take care of these burns first, he won't be able to keep still, and I can't stabilize the back wound if he doesn't. Hang in there, Wally." She heard her own tone—it was loud, but calm. She didn't feel calm. She felt useless. She hadn't been expecting someone would need so many tools so quickly into her time here on Earth-66, let alone that it would be Wally who needed them.
Wally's breathing had become ragged, and Caitlin tried not to completely fall apart at the sound, wondering if he was short of breath from the sedatives, or if she was losing him already.
"The solution is simple." Savitar spoke as if she were much younger than she was, shrugging a shoulder.
Caitlin turned a desperate gaze his way. "Simple?"
He reached across Wally's shuddering form and held the snowflake pendant on the end of her necklace. Caitlin jerked backward, not allowing him to touch it even for a full second.
Savitar looked impatient. "You can heal those burns, heal all of him, if you use your—"
Caitlin gave him her coldest warning look yet. "I am not taking this off again."
Savitar raised his eyebrows. "You want him to die?"
"I know what you're doing," Caitlin informed him, voice low.
"You know I'm right," he countered, not backing down. "You want to save him, there's your answer. Easy. Too scared to try it, fine, let him die, but don't say I didn't warn you. You have a patient suffering from burns, you have cold powers, and you're telling me you're not gonna use them?"
"No!" Caitlin's worry took her voice and amplified it with every word; she was shouting soon enough. "No, I'm not. Stop it! Stop trying to turn me into Killer Frost!" She slammed a hand down on the tool cart beside her.
In the midst of the tension, the nerves making the Cortex emptier, Savitar's shoulders shook with mirth. "That's cold. You think I want you to be Killer Frost?"
Caitlin didn't answer, searching his eyes. Of course he wanted it. The light from her pendant seemed brighter, pulsing against the fist closed around it. H.R. and Cisco used to gather the team to play a game of Body Body in S.T.A.R. Labs at night every once in a while. They said it was for morale. She remembered losing every round, almost always the first to be sent to 'the graveyard', because her friends could see her necklace glowing in the dark. Iris had offered her scarf to fix the problem, and Caitlin had actually won once or twice as a result. She had refused to remove the necklace, of course, and even though the game was harder to play because of it, Caitlin had always been fond of the light it gave off. It was comforting, it reminded her that the trinket was a comfort, not a burden. The only thing keeping her in control.
And Barry Allen's sneering copy wanted her to abandon it. She could think of a thousand reasons why, none of them very flattering. And frankly, she didn't have time for his games.
"You want to be Killer Frost." Savitar let the words sink in, and Caitlin swallowed. "The only person who ever actually separated you from that thing," he went on, pointing to the pendant, "was you. Not me. You chose to take it off that night."
"Because you tricked me," Caitlin protested through gritted teeth. Another thrash from Wally and she reached for the anesthetic, forcing him to swallow it and trying to ignore Savitar's eyes on her.
Savitar scoffed. "It didn't take much, did it?"
If looks could kill.
"Bottom line is, whether you like it or not, Killer Frost is part of you. And you can either let it overpower you, or you can take control." Savitar raised his chin, pulling an arm out of its fold to point at her, a challenge in his green eye. "Good. Evil. It's up to you. Your powers are whatever you choose for them to be."
Caitlin knew she was staring. She shouldn't be staring. It wasn't polite. She couldn't help it. She suddenly could not tell who was standing across from her anymore. It wasn't the poison-tongued time remnant. It wasn't golden Barry Allen. But it sounded so much like him, her heart skipped a beat.
"Pretty speech," she managed, still staring, unmoving.
Savitar's head shook, a little snort of a laugh escaping him. "Don't get used to it."
There was a moment of silence, Caitlin looking down at her necklace, unaware that the man who was not the Flash was taking a turn staring. Calculating. Measuring.
"Not like it wouldn't be easier to just let him die," Savitar added suddenly, voice wood once more. "But I'm not the doctor here, so."
Caitlin exhaled, the moment forgotten. "No. You're not."
Then she ripped off her necklace.
Savitar noticed her eyes flicker—brown, white, brown, white. She heard Frost's laugh in her ears, felt every negative emotion well up in her chest, all her worst qualities swarming her throat and her heart. She looked down at Wally and for a moment, there was no pity for him. All she felt was cold. Contempt, then indifference. Why should he live again? Why should she do anything to save him? He wasn't a speedster here. He was barely even an adult. His existence made no mark in the universe, and did nothing for her. Suddenly she just couldn't see the point.
She glanced up at the Flash's disposable copy, admiring his scars. But confusion still furrowed her brow. Everything was grayer, the edges of her vision were so sharp they were practically grainy. Wally lay in agony on the gurney. Her hands were overflowing with frigid air. What should happen next? Why couldn't she think properly?
Pulling out of the fog in her mind, she eventually whipped out, "I don't have to help him." Her voice was winter wind, designed to put a tingle in between fingers and raise the hairs on the back of necks.
"Well." Savitar's arms were back to being crossed. His eyebrows jumped. The right corner of his mouth turned up. "You're not wrong."
"I don't want to."
Savitar's head went on one side. He didn't say anything, didn't give her any orders. He didn't even look displeased. She needed direction, someone to tell her what to do now. Why was everything so sharp, it was like she was looking through a high-quality microscope. Somehow that it made it harder to see. She didn't like his silence. She didn't like the air in here. She didn't like the color of West's jacket. Everything was too loud.
Why was she here? Why shouldn't she just leave? Didn't she have better things to do than to look after Caitlin Snow's scarred pet reject and the stray they'd dragged in?
Savitar was eyeing the blood running from Wally's cheek onto his neck, the way his hand tried to grasp at the mattress as if the feeling of touching something would take away the feeling of his skin boiling off. The ends of the God of Speed's dark hair were hard with sweat from his little fight with Rory.
His one green eye caught her examining him, and Caitlin Snow shoved Killer Frost to the side, as hard as she could.
The sharpness around her vision died a little. Caitlin's hands shook; she felt Frost trying to regain control. There was an awful sense of fragility in her every breath. If she slipped, if she slipped just a little, she'd be gone forever and someone with white hair and icy intentions would take over.
Killer Frost was throwing everything at her. Trying to make her lose focus, look on the dark side. She stared, shaking, at Wally and saw lost causes. It was Wally one moment, Ronnie the next. It could've been Zoom in Savitar's place. Wally's breathing sounded like Caitlin's father, weak in that hospital bed her mother couldn't free him from. Caitlin swore she heard H.R.'s drumsticks tapping somewhere behind her.
H.R. H.R. and Cisco arguing. She could hear them. Iris and Jesse, in the chairs by the white desk, admiring Iris' engagement ring. The light coming off the jewel. Joe strolling through the entrance archway, mid-conversation on his cell phone, the smell of coffee coming in with him. Julian ordering Cisco to keep it down, glued to the glass demonstration board off to the left, she could hear the marker squeaking across its surface. Dr. Wells in his wheelchair on the dais, adjusting his glasses to see the latest readings from Barry's treadmill.
Barry, Barry grinning in the corner, Barry opening the glass case to retrieve his suit, Barry downing a Big Belly Burger, Barry pulling on his S.T.A.R. Labs sweatshirt, Barry laughing, Barry calling her name from the across the room...
They were all there with her, just for a second. The room was brighter, the colors were stronger.
She knew what she was doing. She was a physician, a bio-engineer. She wanted to make things better. She wanted to make Wally better, and she could do it, too. She had it in her. She'd proven it before. They'd shown her.
Before Frost had time to tug her hair, Caitlin laid her hands on Wally's burns, focusing all her energy on one repeated thought: Fix him, I want to help. I want to help.
The cold turned Wally's singed skin blue. Then it was silver, then it was pale brown. And the burns on his face were nothing but a yellowish stain. It crept to the wound making his cheek bleed, sewing it up in the patterns you could find on windowsills in a snowstorm. The blood froze and dried, red to burgundy.
She moved to his arms, his neck, his chest. Whenever the blue tried to stay, Caitlin inhaled, reigning it in, trying to ignore the way Wally shuddered underneath her arctic touch.
Caitlin turned him over with some difficulty, lifting up his jacket and shirt, steely at the sight of the deep gash down his lower back. We might be able to do something about that little cut. She couldn't tell if it was Snow or Frost snarking in her head. It didn't matter. She would give it her best shot.
At first, Wally's body arched, trying to pull away from her. He let out a cry that made her eyes sting, but she kept working. The blue lingered a little too long this time, and Wally's breath began to cloud in the air. Caitlin counted to ten, not daring to close her eyes; she needed them for this procedure. The cold was in her toes, her fingernails, her spine. She couldn't let it infect her friend, but she had to allow it to take up residence with him, just for now. Just a trickle, to save him. To mend the wound, stitch it up, and it really started to, just the way she envisioned it doing as she pushed more and more of the frost out.
Ice didn't have healing abilities. It could delay the inevitable for a while, if it was actually cold enough, if there was the right amount of it. But Caitlin's abilities were more than just snowy superpowers. Savitar had been right, they were part of her. They were in her DNA, her bloodstream, her genetic makeup was tainted. They would do as she bade them, if she was in control. If she kept the bite of winter from turning her into someone she wasn't.
Caitlin Snow was a healer. So the ice went in to heal.
After a few more minutes, Wally stopped writhing. He stopped screaming, he stopped doing just about everything except breathing. He seemed exhausted, but no longer in pain. As Caitlin turned him over one last time, trying to put him in the healthiest position to rest. He was shivering, and she pulled the sole blanket up to his chin, reaching for her necklace.
After she tightened the clasp, Caitlin remembered she wasn't the only person standing in the room. Savitar couldn't hold a candle to her warm Team Flash vision, but she found he wasn't an entirely unwelcome sight, either. This time.
He was watching Wally's chest, the rise and fall of it, not looking back at her at all.
But when he spoke, it wasn't to their guest. "Hi there, Doctor Snow."
He said her name, her real name, slowly, very intentionally. His voice was hoarse and neutral as usual, but something was missing in it. His head came up, eyes glittering. Barry's mouth twitching, Barry's right eyebrow raised just so.
It was because she was relieved to be in her own mind. It was because Wally was going to be okay. It was because she was suddenly struck with the fact that the man standing on the other side of Wally's bed—the man with so much weight in his memories and the same smell as her best friend—had surprised her. He'd been doing that a lot in the past few days. Why hadn't she noticed until now? She hadn't been prepared. Ironic as it was, the unexpected was suddenly very familiar to her.
That was why she smiled at him. She just beamed right at him.
Of course, he had the clarity of mind to look as if she had just slugged him across the good half of his face, which made it very worth it to let loose like that for a second.
Then there was a gasp in between them, and Caitlin started, hands gripping the metal frame of the examination table. Savitar pulled the hood of his suit back on.
"He's up," she blurted instinctually, turning to grab her stethoscope. The last traces of contrasting cold must've shocked his brain into red flag mode at last.
Wally's eyes were open, his shoulders tense. He was heaving for breath. His eyelids fluttered; Caitlin's sedative was finally taking hold. He rasped out, focusing wearily on her, "Where'm I?"
"You're—" Her first notion was to say back at S.T.A.R. Labs, but she got the feeling that would be too confusing right before he fell asleep. "You're safe, don't worry."
"This guy—" Wally coughed, eyes watering. "Guy blew up...he came to my booth, he, he..."
"It's all over now," Caitlin promised, shushing him gently. "He can't hurt you."
Wally let her push him back down as he struggled to sit up. His hand found her wrist. "You pull me out?" he managed, clearly trying very hard to stay awake and speak coherently. But his body had just been through too much too quickly.
"No—no, I—it wasn't me," Caitlin cleared her throat. "Sorry. It was...someone else."
"Someone else?" Wally's head swiveled aimlessly around. His voice cracked. His eyes were bloodshot.
"He's right here." Caitlin went around the table, taking Savitar's hand, tugging him into the frantic college student's eyeline. Savitar's hand was colder than hers ever had been; she could actually feel it through his suit's gloves. He pulled it away as if he were holding the wrong end of a match, but at least he didn't move after she'd led him over.
Wally did not seem disturbed by the scars just visible beneath Savitar's strange mask. Probably the sedative. Instead of asking any more questions, he looked the speedster in the eyes, coughed one more time, and choked out, "Thank you," before dropping off. His hold on Caitlin's wrist went limp as he fell into an artificial sleep.
Caitlin risked a glance at the meta in the black and blue costume. Savitar seemed to be made of dry clay; if you so much as poked him, he could've cracked and crumbled into dust. She saw his eyes, even the milky one, go so soft he was almost Barry again, right there in that second. His palms closed and opened again. It was as if Wally had knocked the wind out of him.
Allen's words from Jitters came back to Caitlin. You have to remind him what that feels like. Helping people.
He was feeling it now. When was the last time someone had thanked him? When was the last time he'd saved a life, instead of being so focused on his own?
Savitar turned to look at her very suddenly, as if just remembering she was there. When he did see her, the softness got strained. If she pretended for the moment that they were still eyes she knew, she might've thought he was trying to convince himself she was actually standing there.
"Hi, Flash," Caitlin murmured, finally answering him. The smile hadn't gone anywhere.
(Well? Give me the goods. Next chapter coming soon! Don't kill me for just 3,212 words, okay? I tried. Good night, Jell-O Squares! You guys fuel my fire. -Doverstar)
