Author's Note: LAST CHAPTER! For those of you who follow my instagram account ( writetoyou_fanaccount, in case you're interesting ;) you might have seen that I've already made a cover for Season 6 so I think you can guess what that means. More info at the end of this chapter as well as the beginning of SS6 :)
Also I'm really sorrrryyyy but I am still sticking with the plot of this episode so yes, spoiler! Nora dies. It really couldn't happen any other way. But there's a little happy note at the end, I promise :)
Also also- the whole plagiarism thing has been resolved, and the copycat stories are down :)
Everything was falling into place.
Cicada II was out of commission, the atomizer had been destroyed, and Barry had pressed the trigger, firing a vital blast from the mirror gun straight at the lightning shaped dagger.
Then Ralph came seemingly out of nowhere, stretching his body across the blast of energy so that, instead of the dagger, it hit him.
The dagger clattered to the floor and glowed. Barry lowered the mirror gun, staring at Ralph in shock. For a second, it seemed like nothing had happened. Then Ralph's body began to morph and disfigure into cubes, crumpling in on itself. Ralph went stiff and fell onto his back, his body a mottled mess.
"Cicada-" he managed as Cisco, Frost and Barry raced over. "Thawn. Dagger!"
There was the sound of clanging metal and the three standing heroes whipped around to see Grace on her feet, her dagger in her hand. She shot through the hole in the roof she'd created when she came, leaving the Team to deal with whatever pieces of their fight that still remained.
The next plan of action, it seemed, was to regroup at STAR Labs. Frost faded to Caitlin, who immediately got Ralph into a gurney to run tests. A half hour later, she came out into the Cortex to report her findings to a worried Team Flash.
"How's Ralph?" Barry demanded, reaching out and brushing her elbow with his hand as she came into the room.
"I've never seen anything like it; I can't quite figure it out," Caitlin admitted, swiping a finger across her tablet so all of her information came up on the larger screen. "His cells are kinetically inverted. It's like they're the reverse of themselves."
"Should've spent more time tryna figure out how this thing works," Cisco muttered dejectedly, tossing the mirror gun onto his desk with a clatter.
"I just don't understand why he would jump in front of that blast," Nora spoke up, practically buzzing with anxious energy. "I mean, why would he do that?"
Caitlin shook her head, out of ideas and, honestly, energy. It had been a long day. They should have won that afternoon, and now they had what felt like a hundred new problems to deal with.
"That's the question, isn't it?" Sherloque mused. He was standing in front of their white board, which was covered with pictures and the question WHO IS CICADA? He shook his head and walked out of the room, repeating, "That's the question."
"In other news, Cicada Deuce is still MIA," Cisco sighed.
"All right, we should get to CCPD," Barry decided. "See if we can find anything that could help us track her."
He pecked Caitlin on the lips and hurried out.
Flash!
Surprisingly, some use came out of hunting for clues at the CCPD. Grace had unknowingly left behind a shred of wood that couldn't have come from the precinct. Cisco thought that he'd be able to make some progress on using it to track her and hurried off to work
It wasn't long before conversation turned to Caitlin's patient. "Any progress on Ralph?" Barry asked hopefully as they walked from her lab to the Cortex.
"No." Caitlin let out a sigh, staring at the useless spread of information in front of her. "He's still unconscious, and I can't figure out a way to reverse his cells."
"So I guess that means we still don't know why he jumped in font of that Mirror Gun, do we?" Nora put in, coming up behind her parents.
"We do."
The trio turned to see Sherlock coming into the Cortex, holding what appeared to be a stack of paper. "We do. Because Dibny solved the greatest mystery of all." He looked down at the papers. "The Flash legacy, how to stop Cicada, repentance for his past sins… all the reasons Eobard Thawn was helping you."
"And stopping Dad from disappearing in the future," Nora added, eyes wide.
"Disappearing in the future is part of it, hmm?" Sherloque nodded sagely. "But this has nothing to do with your father. The real reason that Thawn wishes to defeat Cicada and destroy Cicada's dagger is because this dagger… is the only thing keeping the Reverse-Flash in prison."
There was a long silence. "So… destroying Cicada's dagger in the past will save Thawn from dying in the future?" Cisco confirmed. He'd come into the Cortex in time to hear Sherloque's theory and was just as shocked as the rest of them.
"That's right," Sherloque agreed. "Cicada's dagger has been dampening Thawn's powers all this time."
"So if we get rid of the dagger now…" Caitlin said slowly, "it disappears in the future."
"And Thawn gets out of Iron Heights," Barry muttered.
Cisco's eyes widened. "A reverse time hack."
There were tears swimming in Nora's eyes. "Everything you said about Thawn is true," she whispered, her voice cracking a little as she gazed up at her father. "The only person he ever helps is himself."
Caitlin bit her lip, eyeing Nora with an ache in her gut. "Nora… this isn't your fault."
"Yes, it is," Nora insisted before spinning and hurrying out of the room.
"Now…" Sherloque went on. "The question we have to ask is… do we stop Cicada? Or do we stop Thawn?"
"No," Barry said, his voice hard. "We're not gonna let thousands of meta-humans die, now or in the future. We find Cicada. We destroy the dagger once and for all."
Flash!
Barry found his daughter sitting in the Speed Lab, kneading her hands in her lap. "You know, you really are a lot like me," he said as he walked over to sit by her. "Trusting. And you always blame yourself when things go wrong."
"How do I fix this?" Nora asked, a note of pleading in her voice.
"I don't know if you can, Nora," Barry admitted. He sat down and ran his hands down his thighs. "You made a mistake, you know? A big mistake. Sometimes in life, all we can do is just live with the consequences. So what you have to ask yourself is… what kind of hero are you gonna be? One who takes a do-over after every mistake, or one who lives with it and moves forward?"
Nora nodded, her eyes falling from his face. "This must be so hard for you," she muttered. "Having to actually help him escape after everything he's done."
Barry shrugged. "I'll admit that it isn't my first choice. But I'm not going to let my personal feelings get in the way of helping all of the metas that are hurting out there. And it's not entirely unselfish- half the people I know are metas. Cisco, Cecile, Ralph… Caitlin's not a meta but I'm sure Cicada has more than enough beef with Frost by now that she wouldn't be long for this world if Grace had her way. And…" He nudged Nora's knee with his own. "Something tells me our daughter is going to be born a meta, too. So, no, not a completely selfless choice."
"But still a hard one."
Barry let out a light sigh and nodded. "But still a hard one."
Flash!
It had been a few hours, and Caitlin was frustrated and had a headache.
Sherloque walked into her lab, gaze sliding over Ralph's cubed form for a moment before he sipped his coffee and looked back to her. "Nothing?"
"Nope." Caitlin resisted a groan. "I still cannot figure out how to reset his cells back to normal."
"He's still Humpty Dumpty'd, huh?" Cisco asked as he came in and leaned against the doorframe.
"Yep."
"He hasn't been this much of a mess since he first got his powers," Cisco mused, walking further into the room to join Caitlin and Sherloque in staring at the immobile Ralph.
Sherloque took pause. "Since…" He frowned and looked between Caitlin and Cisco. "And what did you do to help him then?"
"We introduced a stabilizing enzyme that reset his body back to its original form using vulcanization and… muscle memory…" Caitlin explained, her words slowing slightly as an idea hit her.
"Muscle memory," Sherloque repeated. "Well then, it appeared all that we need to do is wake him up."
"And how would you suggest we do that?" Caitlin asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Simple." Sherloque turned, put his coffee cup squarely down on the table, and looked towards Cisco. "We blast him."
"We blast him?" Cisco echoed, raising an incredulous eyebrows.
Sherloque nodded. "If you blast him, the vibrational jolt… it will be more than enough to kick-start his consciousness. I'm sure of it."
"Can't we just play some Gaga and hope he wakes up?" Cisco asked.
Caitlin grinned, picking up on the reference to the way they'd woken up Barry two times in the past.
"Gaga is not the solution to everything," Sherloque snipped. "You have to blast him! Allez, young Ralph Macho, please." He paused and tugged Caitlin backwards by the elbow. "Be careful; this could get a little ugly. We would not want to unnecessarily scar the baby."
Caitlin frowned. "She isn't born yet, Sherloque."
He shrugged, not seeming to think that was an important factor, and Cisco stepped up to the metaphorical bat. "All right," he muttered, raising a hand. "Sorry, deuce."
He shot a quick vibe blast at the man on the bed. Ralph's body began to jiggle, before it expanded like a balloon and then shrunk abruptly back to normal size. Ralph sat up with a gasp. "WrestleMania!" he shouted, then sniffed.
"Voila!" Sherloque beamed. "Good as new."
"Blasted why you happened what?" Ralph demanded.
Cisco and Caitlin exchanged glances, then frowned. "Hmm?"
"B-b-blasted why you happened- what?"
"Except for the language skills," Sherloque admitted. "Those will return. Probably."
An alarm started blaring and Caitlin let out a sigh as she turned to follow Sherloque and Cisco out of her lab. One problem resolved, a new one to deal with.
Flash!
The alarm turned out to be a result from Cisco's wood-scrap-investigation. The splinter was from an ash tree, commonly found in Kollins Woods not 12 miles from Central City; the woods where, not coincidentally, Cicada had tried to kill Cisco.
It was also one of the largest wooded parks in the country, which got them almost nowhere.
Thankfully, Nora came in at that moment. "I have a plan," she declared. "One that can stop both Cicada and Thawn."
The plan turned out to use Cecile, who was a highly talented empath. Grace emanated hate, which would make her quite easy for Cecile to detect. Hopefully, they could find Grace without her even knowing they were there.
"Then," Nora briefed as she, Frost, Cecile, Joe and Barry tramped through Kollins Woods, "once we find Cicada II and trap her, we can give young Grace the choice to take the cure. Hopefully once she's no longer a meta-"
"That jerk will cease to exist," Frost finished, nodding her approval. She always liked a good erase-from-the-timeline, having seen it work quite neatly with Savitar a few years before.
"That way, we can stop her without destroying the dagger and Thawn never goes free," Nora finished.
"Now all you have to do is convince Grace to make the right choice," Barry added.
Nora bit her lip. "What do I say?" she asked anxiously.
"Whatever's in your heart," Barry advised, speaking from experience. "She'll listen."
Cecile spun abruptly around. "What a bunch of sentimental crap," she scoffed. "You two sound like a friggin' Hallmark movie."
Barry and Nora both blinked and tilted their heads in an adorably identical way. Frost smirked. "I hear ya, sister."
Cecile glared at her, unamused, and Joe shook his head a little. "I think we're close…" he murmured, and raised his eyebrow at his partner. "You good?"
Cecile let out a short gasp. "Oh, yeah, jeez, sorry," she rambled, shaking herself a bit and turning back towards the path. "Uh… this way."
Barry fell back a few steps so that he'd be able to speak to Frost. "Hey," he said softly. "I never thanked you."
Frost squinted a little. "For what?" she asked.
"For keeping our baby safe." Barry glanced down at her stomach, wondering how long it would take her bump to show through her suit. "I know we haven't talked a ton about the pregnancy, but the fact that you're doing that for our baby is just… well, I really appreciate it. It makes it so I have to worry just a little less."
A rare genuine smile crept across Frost's face. "No problem," she said with a modest shrug. "Besides, I can't really control it, so I would really say it's something that I'm doing."
Barry smiled, too, and squeezed her shoulder. "Still. But anyway, be safe out there tonight, okay?"
"You got it, handsome," Frost agreed. "Back atcha."
A couple minutes of walking later, they came across a small clearing and a cabin. Joe and Cecile hung back, leaving Nora, Frost and Barry to slowly approach. "Guys, we found her," Barry reported into his com. "Get ready."
The trio walked slowly forward, surveying the area. Other than the cabin, there wasn't anything there save for an ominously familiar sphere of glass and technology: a time machine.
Sudden, there was the rasp of Cicada's breathing and a figure thumped down behind them. The three heroes spun to see Grace slowly pulling off her hood, her dagger glowing in one hand. "I'm actually glad you found me before we left," she said. "Now I can end your lives twice today."
"Not on my watch!" Joe cried from the tree line. He flung a small piece of tech towards Cicada and a breach opened, swallowing her up before she had time to move and depositing her in the cage in the Speed Lab.
"We got her!" Cisco reported through the coms. "Nora, you're up."
Cecile led the way into the cabin, coaching Nora as they went. "If you can connect with Grace as an adult, you can connect with her as a child," she said bracingly. "You just have to tap into her anger."
She handed Nora the mental activity dampener technology and Frost put a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, niece-daughter," she said, smiling a little. "You got this."
Nora smiled back at her, a little nervously, and pressed the technology to her forehead. She knelt in front of the unconscious Grace's cot and took a deep breath. Then her eyes went golden-red.
Things were tense and quiet for long moment. The group in the cabin could hear electrical pops over the coms as adult-Grace tried to drain her prison's power.
"40 percent!" Cisco reported anxiously.
"Nora's gotta convince Grace now!" Iris added.
Frost shifted tensely, exchanging a glance with Barry. He put a hand on her bicep, steadying her.
"Get ready!" Cisco cried as the shield energy dipped dangerously low.
A second later, Nora's eyes cleared and she gasp. Grace's own eyes snapped opened, glowed, and turned brown.
Nora helped her sit up and turned her wrist over. "Thank you," she whispered as she depressed the cure into Grace's bloodstream.
The scar on Grace's forehead glowed orange through her bandage, then faded to blue. Frost smiled happily.
"Did it work?" Iris asked over the coms. "Guys, what's happening?"
Barry opened his mouth, about to respond, when an orange glow suddenly burst from him and filtered away under the door. Then the door itself was shoved clean off its hinges, and Cicada II stood facing them.
Joe raised his gun but Grace knocked it aside, wrapping her arms around Joe's neck in a chokehold. Frost tried to get an ice blast in but Cicada II was too fast and sent a jolt of energy in her direction, knocking her hard against the wall. Grace flipped Joe over the table.
"Joe, no!" Cecile cried, rushing forward, but she was quickly stopped by a bottle to the head from Grace. Then the meta thrust out her arm and took Nora and Barry out in one blow with another jolt of energy.
There was a terrified, high-pitched scream. Young-Grace was cowering on her cot, her hands covering her eyes. Older-Grace approached her and carefully tugged her shoulder so they were face to face. She pulled off the bandage to see her scar turning from blue back to orange again.
The cure hadn't worked, which meant only one thing.
They had to destroy the dagger.
Flash!
The next events happened so quickly that there was no time to confer or decide on a course of action. Grace dragged Nora away from the wall and leveled her dagger at her chest. "You took my family away from me, Flash," she said, glowering at Barry, who was still pinned to the wall with a ring of golden energy. "Now watch me take yours."
She raised the dagger.
"NO!" Barry screamed.
"Barry!" Cisco yelled, and a second later a breach was opening and an object was flying through it.
The Mirror Gun landed squarely in Barry's palm. Before he could think he aimed and fired.
The dagger was flung out of Grace's grasp. It careened through the air and froze, crystallizing immediately. Grace got slowly to her feet, horror filling her face as the dagger began to disintegrate. Its power gone, Barry was free to stand, too, and was quickly followed by the rest of his team.
The dagger vanished.
And then so did Cicada II, disintegrating into blue flecks and particles and an outraged scream.
Flash!
It took Team Flash just minutes to regroup. Nora and Barry took off for the future to face off with Thawn, and Frost returned to STAR Labs with the time travel machine Cicada had been preparing to use to collect the rest of the Team.
They appeared at just the right moment, the time machine wizzing through a breach in time for Thawn to smash right into it. The combined force was enough to send him reeling across the pavement. When he pulled himself onto his elbows, it was to see the core of Team Flash striding towards him, Nora and Barry ringing Frost, Cisco, Ralph and Iris.
"Isn't this nice," Thawn hissed. "Team Flash, back together again… With a new guy. Ralph Dibny. Welcome. You should be dead."
"I guess we have that in common," Ralph rejoined.
The Reverse Flash smirked slightly, though it was barely visible through his vibrating face. "We'll take care of that in a moment. Iris! Always a pleasure. And Frost. How's the baby?"
Frost's eyes flashed an even brighter blue. She didn't even want to know how Eobard was aware of her child.
"Cisco," Thawn said, locking eyes with the man who had once been something of his protege. "It warms my heart to see you again. I want to apologize for-" He jerked out a his hand, miming the time he'd killed Cisco. "But if I'd never done that, you never would've had the means to become extraordinary."
Cisco shook his head slowly. "I don't need powers for that," he said.
Thawn dipped his chin and suddenly raced forward. Cisco jabbed out an arm and sent him through a breach, forcing him out on the other side. Frost sent a jet of ice at him, Cisco opened another breach, Iris shot him through. The Reverse Flash fell from the sky this time, and Ralph used an elongated arm to punch him hard, sending him flying high enough to be level with the top floor of a nearby apartment building.
"Now!" Cisco yelled, opening yet another breach. Nora and Barry raced towards it and through it, vanishing just before Thawn landed on the pavement with a grunt of pain.
Barry and Nora shot through the blue vortex of the breach and out through an entranceway provided by Cisco. They'd had just enough time to build up to a super sonic punch- or two, actually, one from each of them.
Both their fists collided with Thawn's face. He flew spectacularly through the air and crashed into a nearby electrical box, sparks flashing at the impact.
Before he had time to recover, Nora flashed to him and ripped off his mask. "It's not my father's legacy that's gonna disappear, Thawn," she growled, before her eyes glowed red and she drew back a vibrating hand. "It's YOURS!"
"Nora!" Barry yelled, and he and Frost ran forward in an attempt to stop her.
The cry was, thankfully, enough. Nora spun partway to face them, the light in her eyes dimming as she looked in horror at her hand. It was turning faintly blue, starting to particalize.
"So close, Little Runner," Thawn murmured. "It was never going to work anyway."
Nora tossed him back with a gasp. Now both of her hands were threading with blue and letting off a faint whispering sound. "Mom?" she croaked, and Frost immediately faded into Caitlin, who reached for her. "Dad?"
"No no no," Caitlin breathed, hurrying forward.
"Mom, what's happening?" Nora asked desperately.
Barry's hand landed on her shoulder and he stared in horror at her glowing hands, then back to the Reverse Flash with terror on his face.
"A new timeline is setting in," Thawn said.
"What?"
"A new timeline that you created," Thawn went on, "where you destroyed the dagger! I'm sorry, Little Runner, for trading you in like this. But I had to be sure that I could go free."
Barry put on a burst of speed and slammed Thawn back into the electrical box. Caitlin grabbed for Nora and held her close.
"You can still save her, Barry," Thawn murmured. "There's still time. You can still save her."
"How?!" Barry demanded.
"The Negative Speed Force," Thawn said. "She has to go there. It's the only place immune to timeline changes. But you have to go now. You have to go, Barry! Or we lose her forever."
Barry eyebrows furrowed slightly, noting the use of the word 'we'.
"That's right," Thawn breathed. "I've grown fond of her, too. In many ways, she's shown me what it's like to have daughter."
Barry slammed him harder against the power box, but Thawn just smirked. "See you in our next crisis," he said quietly.
Barry flashed off, Nora following along with him. Cisco reached out for Caitlin and she grasped his arm gratefully, heart fluttering in her chest as panic and fear started to rise. The Reverse Flash was quick to follow the speedsters, and he opened a breach in the Negative Speed Force for them.
Barry and Nora ran through. Everything was hazy, red and black, and Barry could feel the weight of it settling into his bones.
"I can't do this!" Nora cried.
"Yes you can, yes you can, you have to, all right?" Barry shouted back desperately. "Just hold on a little longer."
"No dad!" Nora shrieked, her voice beginning to modulate as her eyes glowed. "I can't!"
"Nora!" Barry yelled.
"I can't!" Nora repeated, and pulled out of the Speed Force.
Barry peeled away after her, the two of them pulling to a stop right where they'd begun. "Nora, what're we doing?" he demanded frantically.
"It's too late," Nora cried.
"No, it's not, we gotta go back!"
"Dad, no," Nora sobbed.
"Barry, you have to take her back!" Caitlin cried, tears welling in her eyes.
"I know, I know!"
"Mom!" Nora tried. "Mom!"
"Nora, you have to go back, please!" Caitlin begged.
"NO!" Nora shouted, her eyes flashing a dangerous golden and her voice taking on a double tone.
That shut both her parents up and they stared at her, gasping for breath.
"If I go back in, the Negative Speed Force will a part of me forever," Nora sobbed.
"We'll get it out of you, Nora!" Caitlin cried. "We can get it out; we can save you, please, I promise!"
"Mom, you can't," Nora insisted, and grabbed at her arm, squeezing hard. "You can't. None of you can. It's making me like Thawn. Full of anger and hate. I- I don't want that to be my legacy. This is all on me."
"No-" Barry tried.
"All of it," Nora said firmly. Her voice was wobbling but her hand on Caitlin's arm was surprisingly steady. "My mistake. And I'm not gonna make another one."
She stared up at Barry, blue particles beginning to creep up her arm and chest. "Sometimes all you can do is live with the consequences."
Barry felt his heart drop, knowing that it was him that had given her that advice just one short day ago. An ache growing in his chest, he dragged both Nora and Caitlin into his arms.
"It's okay," Nora whispered, wrapping her arms around her parents even as her entire body began to glow blue. "It's okay."
Caitlin let out a sob, pressing her forehead into Nora's temple and holding on as tight as she could. She could feel a shift of atoms, a tingling under her fingertips, as Nora's body began to disintegrate.
"We love you," Barry murmured, holding them tight even as the ache in his chest grew and grew.
"Thank you for everything," Nora whispered.
And then she was gone.
"No," Caitlin whispered as glowing blue particles filtered up through the air. Tears masked her face and a sheet of ice began to spread around her feet. Clouds filled the dark sky and snow began to fall in thick drifts. "No, no, no, no-"
Barry held her.
Flash!
The air at STAR Labs was grim when Barry and Caitlin came into the Cortex.
Iris, Ralph and Cisco had left the two of them in the street, snow still falling as Caitlin proceeded to cause the first white out in April Central City had ever seen. She and Barry stood in the middle of the dark pavement, holding each other and crying, for what felt like hours.
After that, a numbness settled in. They returned to STAR Labs, holding tight to one another, and found their Team waiting. Joe gave them both hugs. Cecile was crying.
Barry let out a breath, feeling as though he should say something. "Nora made sure that we didn't lose everything tonight," he said quietly.
Ralph nodded his agreement. "She saved every meta in the city," he said. "And she gave Grace a new future."
"Gave all of us, right?" Sherloque added. "Especially me. Without Nora, I never would've met the love of my life, Renee."
"And you wouldn't have stopped your 38th Cicada," Cisco added. "Or your… 39th."
Sherloque nodded, touching the brim of his hat. "Right," he said. "It's been quite a journey."
He grabbed his coat and shook hands around the room. "Pleasure," he said when he reached Barry. "An honor, Flash."
"We never could've solved this mystery without you," Barry replied, nodding at him.
"Well, don't be to sure," Sherloque replied, and turned to Ralph. "You already have a master detective in your midst. Congratulations, Adult Giraffe."
Ralph smiled, looking a little teary.
"Well all right then, without further ado…" Sherloque reached into his pocket and opened a breach. "Mes Amis. Good luck, Team Flash."
He raised one hand in a wave and stepped through the breach.
The other members of Team Flash filtered out soon after, leaving Barry and Caitlin alone. Caitlin walked over to the nearest gurney and began to set up equipment, ignoring Barry's quizzical glances.
All was revealed, however, when Caitlin smeared a glob of blue gel on her stomach and pressed a small wand to her skin. A blurry black and white picture appeared on the screen: the barely formed figure of a baby.
Tears swam in Barry's eyes. He reached out and brushed his fingers across Caitlin's stomach.
"Hi, Nora."
Author's Note: WE FINISHED ITTTTTT!
As I'm writing this, it's 11pm on New Years Eve of 2020 and I finished Snowbarry Season 5! We made it guys. Another entire season in the bag.
Lowkey tho- wouldn't it be crazy if I caught up? Like if I finished the entirety of Season 6 before Season 7 started? That wouldn't be all that convenient, because then Season 7 wouldn't be on Netflix and I'd have to wait to rewrite it, but it'd still be cool lol.
Oh, and yeah- I'm doing a Season 6. In case that wasn't obvious XD It'll be the same format as Season 5, with the Full, Partial, and Scene chapters. Personally I think that worked pretty well, even if the plot was a little less congealed. Ah well, what can you do, right?
(Side note on the end of Season 5- I wrote the whole Crisis time change thing before the Flash did. Last story in the Flux series. MY IDEA. Hmph. Would they just hire me already? XD)
See you guys in Season 6! Love you all so very much, and thank you for your continued support 3