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AN: Jumping ahead a few months, this is basically set a few days after the resolution of the Crisis, including the final defeat of the Anti-Monitor and Oliver's funeral; hope you all like it.

The Angel of Fire

As far as Barry was concerned, the only reason this hadn't been one of his first priorities after he realised that he and Kara shared the same Earth was that there'd been so many other things he'd had to deal with more immediately. Confirming that Oliver was dead and he still had to stop the Anti-Monitor from destroying everything had been the most obvious priorities they had to deal with, but once the Anti-Monitor had been defeated, Barry had made it a particular point to look up most of his old allies to determine how they were doing in this new world.

It had been a relief to confirm that Stein's family were all still the way they'd been before the Crisis, and it had been a strange comfort to know that Julian Albert still existed even if Barry would never entirely like the guy. Jax and the Hawks were still living their lives after their official 'retirement' from the vigilante business, Lisa Snart was making an interesting living as a security consultant who tested the systems she was hired to examine directly, Oliver's old teammate Ragman was back in action in his own home town, Tina McGee maintained a research facility in another city, Patty was still doing fine in her new job, Linda Park was living her life with no sign that she'd ever been Doctor Light…

Still, as much as he'd told himself he just wanted to be sure that the people he'd known longer were all right, Barry knew the real reason that he'd saved Linda Danvers for last; when he knew for a fact that Kara's family had come through the Crisis intact, he didn't want to have to face the idea that someone he'd helped save was gone forever because he hadn't told Oliver about her. He still wasn't sure how much control Oliver had been able to exert when he'd recreated Earth, as most of Oliver's dead friends and family coming back to life could have been a subconscious wish rather than a controlled plan, but when Oliver had never even met Linda even if he and Kara had told the archer about her…

Frankly, Barry had never been sure about spending time with Linda himself, but how much of that was just because he couldn't stop himself seeing her as 'not-Kara'? He'd given Linda a phone she could use to call the team if she needed any help, but had he truly given her the impression that he'd answer that call if she made it, when he, the Legends and Kara had basically left Linda alone after the cult had been dealt with?

It wasn't like they had done nothing to help Linda beyond Kara giving her permission to use her image in her new state. Once Lexa and Linda had agreed to keep the existence of the Legends secret, Sara and Barry had taken Linda back to her parents, claiming that the cult that had abducted her had also subjected Linda to a harsh drug treatment to try and brainwash her into becoming a member, which had given Linda an excuse not to talk about what she'd been through as she could claim she didn't remember. Constantine had left her with a couple of supernatural contacts she could consult if she had any questions about things she might encounter while defending Leesburg, but for the most part Barry had kept an eye on news from the city and been satisfied that Linda could handle herself well enough. Lexa had also cropped up in the news a couple of times, but even those reports were mostly just linking her to some of Supergirl's cases, such as that report about the time the Leesburg police had managed to capture Kyle Nimbus when he'd finally resurfaced.

Right now, as he moved briskly through the small town, fast enough to take in everything while not so fast that he'd leave traces that might leave people wondering what the Flash was doing here in the first place, Barry finally found what had to be Linda, but he was surprised to see the changes. From his position watching her at the top of a building, he could see that Linda still looked a bit like Kara when she was in action, but her outfit had gone from Supergirl's blue top and red skirt to a white T-shirt with the S-shield on it and tight blue shorts, although her long red cape still gave Barry that vague impression that there was something under it…

"She looks… well, right?"

"Kara?" Barry looked at his friend in surprise as Kara landed on the rooftop beside him. He still wasn't entirely used to the idea that Kara could just drop in on him this easily, even if they liked handling things the way they always had in their respective cities unless something big came up. "What are you doing here?"

"Same as you, I think," Kara shrugged, awkwardly indicating where Linda was currently tying up the last of the gang of crooks. "I got to thinking about Linda, and I just… wanted to see that she was OK."

"Yeah… same here," Barry nodded in agreement at his friend. "Do you… I mean, is she related to you now?"

"I think her dad's now some cousin of Jeremiah; Alex has mentioned that they visited us once or twice when I brought it up, but when one of you's a big-league scientist and the other's a small-town cop… I mean, it's not that they're jealous of each other, but it kind of makes things difficult."

"Mmm," Barry acknowledged, recalling how weird it had sometime been finding ways to justify him interacting with Oliver; even after the first vigilante had lost most of his money, he still had enough of a reputation in Star City that it was hard to explain why he was hanging out with some CSI tech from a different city. "So… what do you want to do now? Do we tell her the truth?"

"Is it worth it?" Kara said, looking uncertainly at the girl who was now talking nonchalantly with a couple of police officers as others escorted the prisoners into a van.

"Well… doesn't she have the right to know-?"

"That I basically stole her life?"

"Hey, you didn't steal-"

"When the universe was rebuilt, I'm the one who got Alex," Kara said, shame on her face as she looked sadly at the girl in the makeshift suit, already flying off to another part of Leesburg. "OK, so Linda still has her parents, but she gets to deal with the mystical entities and all kinds of super-crooks passing through her town until that chaos flow's run its course, and I get the sister who… always believed in us… who'd give everything to help us…"

"Hey," Barry said again, reaching over to give Kara a brief hug before he stepped back. "It's not your fault, OK? However Oliver rebuilt everything… he might have saved most of his family, but it's not like he knew about Linda and chose to let you have Alex and leave Linda on her own. Believe me, I still find myself looking at Nash and wishing he was Harry or H.R. or Sherloque, but we've got to just… accept the way things played out and be grateful any of us got out of that Crisis with any part of our lives intact."

"Yeah…" Kara nodded, her expression becoming solemn. Barry briefly wanted to kick himself when he remembered what Kara had told them about how her friend 'Brainy' had run into a few other versions of himself and almost had to kill one of them to stop the alternate trying to replace this Earth with his.

"Well," Kara said, sparing Barry from apologising as she gave him an understanding smile, "at least Linda seems happy now… and where's the point in telling what she's lost when we can't do anything to bring it back?"

"That's the problem of being… well, us," Barry smiled uncertainly. "We can learn so many incredible things about the universe, and we can't tell anyone about them because… well, seriously, who'd believe most of them? We can't bring back the way things were, so all we can do is just… let her live her life and hope she'll be OK."

"Yeah," Kara nodded, returning Barry's tentative smile with one of her own. "So… we just keep an eye on things here until we know if we're needed?"

"That's… probably the best bet," Barry nodded at her, looking at Leesburg with a thoughtful smile. "But hey, at least we know we've got back-up if we need it."

Kara's tentative smile at that comment made it clear that she knew Barry was just trying to make her feel better, but she at least appreciated the sentiment behind his comment.

Looking out at Leesburg, the two heroes exchanged another cautious smile with each other before they went off back towards their home cities. Leesburg's guardian angel had lost more than she knew, but if she could fight even ordinary crime and still wait to hand them over to the police, Supergirl and the Flash each had faith that the other Supergirl (or whatever she was calling herself) would cope with the challenges still facing her.

AN 2: Well, that's that for this series (unless something comes up in the show where I feel it would be appropriate for the others to call in Linda for help in her angelic capacity); after setting Linda up as a character, it just seemed appropriate to confirm that she wasn't erased from existence after the Crisis.