Chapter Ten
Review Responses:
Gwenneth- Here you go! Enjoy!
FastestManAlive- Was Barry the one to reveal his location to the team on Earth-1, though? Think about it.
Legendoffun- Thanks! Hopefully there will be more that you didn't expect coming up soon in the story.
Crimson Comet- Yeah, I'm making up my own identities for all of the unknown characters in the show. It's more fun that way. And toward the new location of Barry's cage, let's just say that Zoom is making things personal for both of them. You'll be getting Zoom's full backstory soon.
The machine glows brightly in the dimly light room lighting a path to Caitlin, Cisco, Joe, Wells, and Jay who are standing right outside the doorway.
"Is it just me or is Frost really, really crazy? Like crazier than before." Cisco whispers over his shoulder, trying to catch a glance at the icy metahuman just staring at the breech portal opener.
"I wouldn't say she's acting crazy." Caitlin tries to keep the bit of amusement from her voice. "She's determined. She just wants to do this quickly."
"You're just saying that because she's you." Cisco points a finger to Caitlin and she shrugs her shoulders.
"I obviously don't compare myself to a criminal metahuman from another universe who just happens to look like me. Even if she does a very nice job of looking like me with those boots." Caitlin adds as an afterthought.
Cisco throws up his hands.
"While I doubt she is the most stable companion to bring along with us, she will surely be quite helpful with those freezing powers of her." Wells adds the conversation.
"Fine, whatever. I guess she was fine before. Kind of." Cisco decides to give. "I just wish she would actually talk to us instead of glaring at us or at some poor, innocent wall."
"Zoom did just killed her-" Wells is interrupted by Cisco.
"Yeah, I know." The engineer stops him, giving a pointed look toward Caitlin and a small shake of his head.
Caitlin narrows her eyes, but leaves the subject unattended to while she reaches over to the rolling table they had brought closer to the portal opener.
"Okay, this should be what you're going to need while you're over there." She rolls her hand over the multitude of technology. "The cold gun, tranq darts, some super special glass shatterers compliments of Cisco, and are you sure I shouldn't come with you guys?"
"Yes." Wells answers immediately and looks up as if realizing that he had answered much too quickly. "We can't take chances with the breach malfunctioning and having no one here to fix it. Besides," He glances around to sizeable amount of people who were already going. "I believe we should be good with the thousand of us who volunteered."
"Great." Caitlin gives him a dubious eye roll. "Anyway, I put medical supplies into Joe's bag for Barry if need be. I'm hoping that between the four of you, considering that two of you are geniuses, you could at least hold something together until you can get back here with him. Not that Barry's going to be hurt or anything anyway, but just so that if-"
"I get it, Caitlin. We got this. This time." Cisco tells her the promise she is fully prepared to complete this time.
"So," Joe speaks up. "What should I expect over there?"
Cisco could tell he was attempting to change the subject. He let him.
"Lions, tigers, bears, and a pretty much everything that's over here, but on a weird, sepia color scale. Except you're technically dead, so don't like go around waving a badge or something."
Joe blinks.
"Okay, I can work with that."
"This time you'll also have me too to help." Jay affirms, nodding his head. "I can handle any especially Earth-2 problems that may come up and with Velocity-9, I might be able to at least help with Zoom."
"Yep." Caitlin says in a high voice. Her hand fumbles on the plastic packaged syringe before she hands it over to the once speedster. The others seem to stare anywhere, but at Jay pocketing the Velocity-9 in one of his pockets.
Joe finally picks up the small cylindrical device from the table and peeks at the small legs attached around the end.
"Are you sure this will definitely open up the cage?"
"Oh, yeah." Cisco assures him. "That would shatter a rocket ship's front window from five feet away if you set it to it's highest setting. Trust me, that cage doesn't stand a chance anymore." He wasn't going to let some carbon glass make him useless again.
"Okay, now I'll just have to make sure nothing goes wrong on this end." Caitlin nods her head with a flutter of nervousness in her eyes. "Hopefully, there won't be anymore earthquake causing metahumans ravaging the town this time around."
"I actually acquired some help for you in case of an emergency." Wells says. He shifts from one leg to another leg. "She should be arriving soon, not too long after we leave."
"She?" Joe raises his eyebrows. "I suppose you're talking about your daughter considering you know no one else on this Earth."
"Yes, I've decided that keeping her away may not be the best option."
"Really? Trying to lock up your kid for their safety didn't work out for you." Joe raises his eyebrows, trying to keep a straight face.
"No," Harrison does not seem amused. "I'm half think the constant writing Jesse's doing in the house is a plan to runaway. I'm not sure what else to do at this point."
"Woah, Dr. Wells admitting to not knowing something. That's a first." Cisco snorts.
Frost looks over to them and snaps out of whatever had been circling around her mind before. Her shoes clack against the ground as she walks toward the group standing away from her. Her shoes were much louder than the conversation they were having without her.
"Problems?" She asks still five feet away, her hands landing on her hips.
"Nope, not at all." Cisco says a little too quickly and Frost raises her eyebrows. "Well, okay, besides the problems that already existed, there aren't any other problems."
"Good." The Earth-2 Meta takes the last few steps toward the swiveling table and rummages through the various devices. "You expect to win with these?" She sneers. "Did you raid some toy store across the street?"
Silence beats between the people.
"Thank you for your input Miss...Frost I suppose." Wells answers before Cisco can explode. "We're as prepared as we can be at this point."
"Despite how little time your insistence to leave left us." Cisco mutters to himself earning a cutting glare from Caitlin-2.
The room temperature seems to shift a few degrees lower in the hallway, but the most the meta does is roll her eyes at him. Caitlin-1's eyes widen as she realizes it was her double doing it.
"So, you're ready to go then? I'm not sticking around this dump of a world any longer."
"You haven't even left the building."
"I've seen everything I need to see." She glances over to her Earth-1 counterpart. "It's a little too cushy for me here. I'm not one to get comfortable anywhere."
Cisco sighs and shakes his head.
"Yep. We're all ready then."
They take it in for a moment, just a little unready to start this journey all over again. They know this will be nothing like their last rescue mission.
"Iris will be coming over soon too," Joe suddenly speaks up. "So you should have plenty of help here between all three of you if there are any problems. She wanted to be here now, but her new editor will probably fire her if she missed much more work. It took me quite a while to convince her that Barry wouldn't want her to get fired just to see us off."
Caitlin nods and bites her lip.
"Got it." She waves her hand up. "Don't worry about us at all. Just do whatever you need to do on your side."
It's everyone else's turn to nod.
"So…" Cisco starts, putting the last tweak to his backpack straps. "We go now?"
Minutes later, minutes that went far too quickly compared to the minutes of the last week, the group stood in front of the machine. It's glow not yet started up yet.
"There's a pretty good chance Zoom will be waiting on the other side for us as some as we step through." Wells is the one to say. "We're going to want to get out of STAR labs immediately."
"Got it." Joe takes note.
Cisco moves off to the side and flips switches to start up the process. He looks over to Jay and gestures for him to get ready also. Jay in turn glances to Caitlin who is looking away to the empty space above the machine.
Jay coughs.
"Oops." Caitlin breaks her concentration from whatever was floating in her mind. "Got it." She holds up the syringe in her right hand and brings it up to Jay's arm. "Here you go. Be careful with your other dose for the jump back. You only have one, so Zoom can't get his hands on too much if something happens."
The syringe empties into his arm and a faint red streak flashes across his eyes.
"Okay, let's do this." His voice has an edge of vibration to it and his gaze switches quickly from one person to another.
"Good luck." Caitlin says as the middle of the room suddenly lights up with a blue, white glow that feels like it could swallow the universe.
Jay flashes her one last smile and the occupants disappear and the last words of "See you soon" echo from Cisco who is the last to suddenly be whisked off by Jay to the other universe.
Caitlin-1 sighs.
Joe doesn't dare take a full breath until he is on the other side of the portal. Or at least until he believes he is on the other side of the breach.
The walls and floors all reflect the same bash colors as before and just the thrum of a building with real, current activity assures him that this is not the STAR labs he had left behind. This is the world his son is in.
A moment later and four others appeared behind him.
"Woah," Cisco pants. "That still stinks. A lot."
"Yeah, yeah." Wells grabs Cisco's hoodie sleeve and starts to drag him toward the nearest door. "We're getting out of here now. I don't want to put this building under attack again."
Joe wraps his hand around his holster and follows behind them closely, keeping an eye on Frost behind him and Jay to his side. Jay's eyes fidget back and forth from the somewhat familiar surroundings.
"So, we're not actually going to the basement first are we?" Caitlin shoots off.
"What do you mean?" Wells barely looks back to her, but she catches Joe's attention.
"He's gonna know we're here any minute now and where do you think he's going to head first? Exactly where he thinks we're going to go, the basement."
"He doesn't know we know about the basement." Cisco tells her, slightly out of breath. They turn around another corner where the hallway turns to windows on their left. The afternoon sun filters in, hurting the tense mood of the running group.
Caitlin-2 snorts.
"Zoom knows everything. Let's go get mask guy first. Zoom probably isn't going to expect us to go there first and it's not like your Flash will just let you leave someone a prisoner here. Besides himself." She adds.
Wells and Cisco share a glance that seems to communicate something between themselves. Joe doesn't like it.
"We need to get Barry first." Joe argues, trying to cut off the idea before it really begins to form.
"I agree." Jay says quickly. "Who says Zoom won't be waiting at the cave? He doesn't know that we know where he's keeping Barry. He can't. He would have never sent us that video if he knew about the message Barry was sending us."
The group finally reaches a back exit, but Harrison stops the group a foot from the door.
"I believe we should retrieve the masked man first." Wells tells the group after a beat of pause. "He's been a prisoner of Zoom for who knows how long and probably knows much more than we do. His information could come in handy."
"Zoom is going to be waiting there." Jay says, shaking his head strongly.
"No, something tells me Zoom already knows that we're going to make our way to Barry's childhood home sooner or later."
"What?" Jay insists on knowing and Wells rubs his forehead in frustration.
"A nice little video all packaged up with the exact information we need to know? Zoom probably let that location pass onto us just so he would know our first move. He's probably waiting in that basement for us now."
"Why didn't you bring this up before?" Cisco practically screams a the scientist, but knows better considering their situation.
"What difference would it have made?"
"Um, all." He squeaks. "All the difference, pretty much."
Wells rolls his eyes.
"The only thing it's changing is the order in which we go about saving whomever needs to be saved. Okay. Will everyone agree to go to the cave first?"
"You know I don't care." Frost outs her hands on her hips.
Jay realizes his defeat and nods to prevent the argument from continuing.
Cisco looks over to Joe. "I'm only agreeing if it's what Joe wants to do too."
Joe hesitates and Wells is almost sure he will disagree.
"Do you truly believe this is the right thing to do?"
Harrison nods.
"Fine. We go to the cave first. And very quickly."
They leave the building not a moment later. Jay exits last. A dark look adjourns his face while no one is looking.
Next time on Prisoner of Earth-2, the identity of the masked man is finally revealed while the motives of another come to light.