Summary: Cisco Ramon died the night the accelerator exploded. Hartley just... can't seem to let that go.
Notes: Hartmon Bingo 2021 O5 - Resurrection
Phoenix
The funny thing was, Hartley didn't like Cisco Ramon. And Cisco hadn't liked him either.
So when Hartley heard that Cisco had died stopping the accelerator from blowing up and taking half the city with it, well... it shouldn't have hurt that much. Except it did. It ached in Hartley's chest and distracted him from the pain in his head... and it fueled him with the angry spite Hartley needed to get his act together. He made hearings aids that made him... functional and then he visited Cisco's grave.
There'd been no body. Reports were that Ramon had been incinerated. Depending on how fast it happened, it could been a second of pain and then nothing or an eternity of his nerves screaming until... either way, Cisco Ramon had deserved better. This was where being Harrison's favorites got them. A pariah standing over a dead man's empty grave.
What had the point of their rivalry even been in the end?
"I'm sorry, Cisco," Hartley told the gravestone. It had Cisco's name on it and the years of his life, listed 1989 - 2013. Twenty-four years old. Too young to be dead. "I'm so sorry. I should have done more. If I had, you'd be alive." Hartley let out a shaky breath and wiped at his cheeks. Put the flowers he'd brought down against the stone.
"I don't know how to make this right, but I'm going to try."
STAR Labs is closed, declared a disaster site by FEMA. It's not a hazardous chemical site, but the building is no longer structurally sound. Well, most of it is still sound, but there's a not insignificant portion that is. No one is allowed back until it's been thoroughly inspected and it can't be a place of business anymore until the structure itself is repaired. Retrieval teams have retrieved most people's personal items, but when Hartley checks his old office - forcing the lock - he finds all the stuff he'd left behind when he'd been thrown out of the office.
He might just take some of that back with him when he leaves.
But for now, Hartley's real goal is the pipeline itself. Which is where the structural problems in the building are the worst.
Hartley's not entirely sure what he's looking for. Not closure, that's for sure. Though it's tempting to use the STAR Labs supplies for whatever plan he comes up with to stick it to Harrison.
He just... Hartley needs to see the damage for himself.
The elevators are right out, Hartley's not even going to bother to check if they're still running. He could easily rewire them to work without the rfid card authentication, but in a structurally unsound building, well, Hartley's not taking that risk. So it's the stairs. And there are a lot, leading deep, down into the building.
Down there, the damage is more obvious. There are a lot of shorted out lights. Debris from cracked walls and cables hanging down from the ceiling, getting worse the closer he got to the pipeline entrance.
Hartley reaches the pipeline entrance and hesitates. The last time he was in the airlock - not a real airlock, but that's what they'd called the little corridor connecting the main building to the accelerator's interior - his whole world came crumbling down. All caused by the man Hartley'd considered his best friend.
Now STAR Labs was a shambles too and Hartley didn't understand why. And Hartley couldn't figure out how to make things right if he didn't understand what the purpose of all... this was.
So Hartley stepped forward, one step at a time, through the ruin of his life's work and his painful memories until he was standing in front of the door into the accelerator's interior. The door is open - probably pried open by inspection team trying to assess structural damages.
It's just open enough that Hartley can step through instead of shuffle, though he'd have been relegated to shuffling if his shoulders were even slightly broader.
He has to stop on the other side, though, because... this is where Cisco died. Locked in and scared but still doing what it took to save the city from far worse than it got.
Shining his flashlight around, Hartley grimaced at the fine layer of carbon all over everything. His boot prints thankfully blend in with all the footprints already there, but he's not happy to be leaving evidence of his passing. The broken lock on his old office could be attributed to looters. There'd clearly been a few in various parts of the upper areas. And since Hartley'd worked here not long ago, lingering fingerprints weren't exactly unexpected. But his boot prints in the soot of the accelerator could come back to bite him on the ass if he wasn't careful.
Hartley headed first to where he'd seen the flaws in the accelerator the last time he was here. He's not surprised to find that the whole section is blown out so badly that any evidence of a pre-existing flaw is gone. Same with the next place he checks. Hartley takes pictures on his phone anyway, but he's pretty sure there's no evidence left down here that can help him. Harrison's office is his next stop once he'd finished up in the pipeline.
It's as he's headed back to the same entrance he'd used to get into the pipeline that he hears it.
Hartley's never heard anything like it before. Like... the universe was singing.
Blue light flickered in front of Hartley - the source of the sound he could hear. It was like... looking into a glittering, silvery crack in the universe. What the hell had Harrison done here that night?
And then... Hartley heard something else. For just a moment, he knew he heard Cisco's voice.
As fast as it appeared, the crack in the universe sealed up. The blue light gone and the sounds went silent.
But... there'd been no body. What if that was because Cisco had been caught up in whatever that... anomaly was. What if, somehow, Cisco Ramon was still alive?
The convenient thing about having a scientific problem in the remains of STAR Labs was that all the equipment was still there. The inconvenient thing was that a lot of the scanning equipment was heavy. To heavy to bring down on his own with the stairs. And Hartley didn't know that there was anyone he could trust to help him. Though if it came down to it, he supposed he could reach out to Ronnie Raymond.
Not that Hartley had even the faintest idea of how to explain... any of this to him. Or to Snow since those two were living together. Engaged, but still not married. Wedding postponed while they grieved the loss of their friend.
Hartley did end up finding a work around. He'd load up the elevator with what he needed, walk down the stairs, press the elevator call button and the whole thing became a dumbwaiter for tech. After a few rounds of that Hartley figured the elevator shafts were still sound, but he didn't want to press his luck. So he stuck to the stairs.
Great work out for his legs, anyway. His thighs were going to look amazing by the time he finally figured out what he was doing.
Hartley set up a camera, various sensors, the whole nine yards. He was going to get as much data - and as many visual angles - on this thing as he could.
Two days later, it paid off. He came back down to find that while he'd been away sleeping that night, the crack in the universe had reopened. Six seconds of light and sound. And what was undeniably the voice of Cisco Ramon saying the words "help, please."
Whatever that thing was, dark energy and matter was streaming off it. But even when it was closed, sensors were picking up after shocks. Like there was something there, in the very fabric of the universe. Invisible to the naked eye and intangible to the rest of the world, but quite real.
Hartley needed to build a better sensor to get all the data he needed, but already the form and shape of an idea on how to force that crack open long enough to pull Cisco out was starting to form.
Once again, STAR Labs resources were invaluable. Hartley cobles together an enhanced sensor and gets the data he needs to start working on a technological wedge.
Hartley has to work around his part time job - he really needs a second job or more hours, but he doesn't have time for that and working to save Cisco so Hartley does what he can to make his income stretch and what little remains of his savings fill the gaps. So many people died that night and Hartley knows every one of their names. Each one a person he failed, though none hit harder than Cisco Ramon's death. The one person he'd actually known. If Hartley can just... bring him back, maybe he can learn to live with himself and this mess his life has become.
If Hartley can bring Cisco back, then that's one awful thing Harrison used them to cause undone.
Learning how to manipulate the universe's energy is not an easy task. It wouldn't be an easy task for an entire team of scientists with years to research together and bounce ideas off each other and Hartley's got none of that. He doesn't have a team and he doesn't have years. He's pretty sure - some gut instinct - that Cisco's time is limited. That it's a miracle he's still alive, wherever he is. Cisco has no supplies - the lack of food and water alone should have killed him already, which might mean that he's been altered by the energy and matter released by the accelerator just like Hartley was, though with wildly different results.
Hartley's pretty much given up trying to hide his presence at STAR Labs. He covers the whiteboards of his old labs in equations and sleeps in his old office when he can afford to put in long hours. He knows he's probably causing a rise in power consumption, but hopefully no one will notice or care for a while. Long enough for Hartley to rescue Cisco.
Meanwhile the crack opens a little wider and a little longer each time. Cisco's voice gets a little stronger to Hartley's ears. And it's not some weak plea for help Hartley's hearing. It's screaming. And Hartley maybe has a panic attack when he realizes that's what he's hearing. Cisco screaming for help, trapped in a void.
But despite running himself entirely ragged, Hartley finally gets a prototype 'wedge' ready to go. And it's just about time for the crack to open again. He's got everything set up and ready to turn on, he just has to wait.
"What the hell are you doing here, Hartley?"
Which may now be a bigger problem than expected.
"What are you doing with all of this tech?" Ronnie Raymond demanded as he and Caitlin Snow had made their way into the pipeline.
"What are you two doing here?" Hartley countered, nervously checking his watch. Only two minutes and the next event should start. If he could stall for that long then they'd be too shocked by the universe cracking before their eyes to stop him from activating the wedge. He did not have the time or inclination to try and explain things before hand.
"We're here because Dr. Wells asked us to get the main areas ready for use. The building's been signed off as structurally sound after all and we're..." Caitlin trailed off, frowning. "You shouldn't be here, Hartley. You quit."
"Actually Harrison fired me because I found the very flaw that made this place explode that night and he preferred to bury it than address the issue," Hartley remarked blandly. Inwardly he kicked himself because he could have been using the damn elevators himself the entire time.
"Dr. Wells would never," Snow objected the same time Ronnie insisted, "Dr. Wells wouldn't put us at risk like that."
"He did. He risked the whole damn city and it's Ramon who paid the price for it." Hartley can hear the first notes of the universe but it'll still be another thirty seconds or so until the fissure opens.
Snow's face went icy with anger even as Raymond's face turned pale. "Don't you dare talk about Cisco like you cared," Caitlin snarled. "You hated him."
"But I'm not the one who got him killed. That's on Harrison." And that was when the crack began to appear, flooding the pipeline with bright blue and silvery light.
"Oh my god," Ronnie breathed.
Snow stepped back in shock. "What is that?"
"That is what all the tech is for," Hartley said, hitting the activation button. And then breathing a sharp sigh of relief as it worked. Oh, thank god, it worked. The fissure spread open into a fully fledged breach and, just beyond the event horizon, Cisco floated within a cacophony of light and sound, still screaming for help.
It's so loud Hartley's brain wants to just stop thinking. It's too much input and he's going to overload and... and Hartley narrows his focus. All that matters right now is Cisco.
He walked forward through the pain - and in some ways just entering the pipeline that first time after the explosion was worse than this - and fearlessly stuck his hand through the gap, reaching for Cisco. He didn't dare actually step inside, for fear of being lost in there too. But his hand almost reached Cisco. He was so close.
"Ramon! Take my hand!"
Cisco stared at Hartley in shock. His pleas for help going blessedly silent. And then he reached for Hartley, grabbing on to the offered hand.
Hartley wasted no time, pulling Cisco back into reality. But it was like dragging the other man through molasses. That place, wherever - whatever - it was, wanted to keep him. But then there were hands reaching out on Hartley's side to help. Snow on Hartley right and Raymond to the left and together they brought Cisco the rest of the way home.
Almost the instant Cisco's free, the breach closes and Hartley's machines short out. Hartley only realizes because he can smell the smoke, which makes him realize that his hearing aids stopped working at some point too. Which is just great. He's stuck with everything being to much and too loud until he can get to his spare pair. Which is back home at his apartment. And they're the spares because they don't work as well as his main pair.
At least he had no qualms about making one last theft of STAR Labs equipment to fix them. Hopefully Ronnie and Caitlin wouldn't either.
Cisco was having a nosebleed. And he was pale, swaying dangerously.
"Ramon, are you okay?"
It was hard to tell - lip reading had never been Hartley's greatest strength - but it looked like Cisco said, "is this real?" But then he was slumping towards the ground. Hartley darted forward, catching Cisco awkwardly and lowering him to the floor the rest of the way with Ronnie's help.
Ronnie shook Hartley's shoulder and repeated something that... his mouth was moving too fast and the lighting wasn't good enough. Hartley couldn't make it out. "Sorry, that breach blew out my hearing aids. I don't know what you're saying, Raymond."
In pain and suddenly acutely aware that he hadn't been eating or sleeping well for the last... was it really late February already? The day's date didn't even feel real to Hartley at the moment. Nothing seemed real. No wonder Cisco had asked that.
Was it getting a little darker in the pipeline? Hartley wasn't sure. He was just... tired. And he couldn't hear what Raymond and Snow were saying anyway, so why not just... take a minute. Rest his eyes...
Hartley woke up on a break room couch on the first floor. Cisco is on another couch that they must have dragged in from somewhere. There are a few possibilities.
Ronnie must have heard Hartley, because he was rushing over and still speaking incomprehensibly.
"I still can't hear you," Hartley said. "So unless you're going to speak slowly and enunciate clearly, you might as well just grab a notebook. Since I take it you don't know ASL?"
Ronnie looked over at Caitlin and Hartley followed his gaze.
Snow signed "a little."
"My spare hearing aids are back home. And I'm actually in a lot of pain right now because of how my hearing was screwed up. I don't suppose I can convince one of you to take me to my apartment so I don't have to drive myself while the other stays here with Cisco?" He tried not to react as the loud, ever present... ringing was a mild word. Screeching was better. The screeching got louder for a moment. Who knew what he was actually hearing. "With my hearing aids, most of the pain goes away. And I'd like very much to not be in this much pain right now, so..."
Ronnie raised his hand. Classic 'I volunteer' motion right there. And then he offered Hartley a hand up. Which Hartley accepted. He still felt unsteady on his feet. Also starving, but he had basically instant ramen and instant macaroni left in his pantry at the moment. Maybe a can of soup. None of which sounded appetizing but Hartley was starting to suspect he'd forgotten lunch, again. So he really ought to eat something.
Cisco looked peaceful, still asleep on the couch. IV hooked up, so clearly Caitlin had already seen to him. And apparently decided to take care of him herself instead of involving a hospital. "How's he doing?" Hartley asked, looking over to Snow.
She nodded. "Dehydrated and..." she hesitated then added, "needs food." He was pretty sure she was aiming for malnourished, given what his limited lip-reading was giving him. "He should wake up soon."
Hartley nodded, relieved. "Good."
His head ached and his vision swam for a moment. Hartley swayed a bit but otherwise stayed on his feet. Caitlin gave him a genuinely concerned look, which Hartley found disconcerting to have directed at himself, and then she said something to Ronnie. He nodded and reached out, putting a steadying hand on Hartley's shoulder.
"Seriously, I need my other hearing aids."
Ronnie gestured to the door and then gently steered Hartley that way. His car was parked out in the front lot and Hartley curled into the front passenger seat. Once he told Ronnie his address, Hartley leaned the seat back some and closed his eyes again. He just sort of drifts after that until Ronnie's shaking him awake gently and sticking a bag of delicious smelling food on his lap. There's a note on top that says 'I got your usual order' and it takes Hartley a moment to realize they're in the parking lot for the Thai place between his apartment and STAR Labs that, sometimes, he'd get lunch or dinner from. He'd brought it to STAR Labs enough times that, apparently, Ronnie'd taken notice.
A glance at the receipt showed that Hartley's favorite really was in the bag.
And now Hartley really was starving. It smelled so good... "Thanks. I'll pay you back at the apartment," Hartley promised.
Ronnie's hand landed on Hartley's shoulder again. When Hartley looked over, Ronnie shook his head. "On me," he said. "Don't worry about it."
Hartley bit back the urge to argue. Now was not the time to be turning down free Thai food.
"Alright. Thank you." Hartley spends the rest of the ride resisting the urge to poke through the boxes and scarf down his food. But he managed some self restraint.
The apartment was a little cluttered and dusty, the table covered in hand sketched designs for the device he'd used to wedge open the crack in the universe. Hartley made a beeline to his bathroom where he, with difficulty, removed the hearing aides. They were wedged in his ear canals pretty good and stung coming out. Then he had to clean out his ears with antiseptic before inserting the backup aids.
Turning on the hearing aids was such a relief. His hearing mostly stabilized and worst of the pain slid away. Oh sure, there was also still the ache it left behind, but the worst of the assault on his brain was over. Hartley downed two Tylenol to take care of the rest and then joined Ronnie back in his living room.
"So you can hear again?" Ronnie asked, slowly and enunciating, but thankfully not pulling the cliche of trying to speak louder as though all hearing problems could be worked around by shouting. Hartley'd had a teacher like that in high school and Hartley'd never wanted to strangle someone quite so badly when she repeatedly singled him out because he was hard of hearing and needed 'extra help' to keep up with a the rest of the class. Never mind that he was taking all AP classes and a few college courses already. Oh no, he was the special needs kid.
Hartley nodded. "Yeah, doesn't really fix everything else, but I can hear fine again."
"You look like shit," Ronnie said, handing over a box of food. "Eat something. If you come back to STAR Labs still looking paler than the wall paint, Caitlin'll go all mother hen on you and I'm pretty sure you two don't get along well enough for that to turn out well."
Hartley snorted in amusement, but accepted the food and a set of chopsticks.
Ronnie looked around the apartment awkwardly and then sat down at the table too, poking at the hand sketched blueprints in curiosity. "Do you mind if I...?"
"Go for it," Hartley replied. "Those are the initial designs for what you saw me with in the pipeline today. If the prototype hadn't actually worked, I was planning on showing everything I had so far to you anyway."
"Well, I'm glad it worked. My best friend was dead and... and it was my fault," Ronnie's voice cracked a little on that. "You brought him back to life. But what happens when that... thing opens up again?"
"I don't think it will now that Cisco's out." Hartley hesitated and then decided to keep quiet on his theories about Cisco's connection to that fissure and the place it led to. "But we can fix the sensors I moved down there later to keep tabs on it, just in case."
"What about your burned out hearing aids? Anything I can do to help with those?"
"Look the other way if I use STAR Labs resources to fix them," Hartley replied immediately. That got him a snort of amusement. And an agreeable nod.
Cisco's awake by the time Hartley and Ronnie get back to the lab. And when he sees Hartley, he gets up and hugs him which is...
Hartley doesn't really know what to do with that, though he hugs back on automatic.
"Thank you," Cisco said, voice rough sounding.
"You're welcome," Hartley replied. Cisco was shaking like a leaf and Hartley tightened his grip until the shaking subsided. Then, slowly, he let go. "Ronnie brought you food."
"Sounds..." Cisco stopped and grimaced, hand reflexively reaching for his throat.
Too much screaming into the void isn't good for the voice, it seemed.
"Sounds good?" Hartley asked, signing as he spoke.
Cisco smiled and nodded, mimicking the signs. And then he, hesitatingly, finger spelled out "hungry."
Hartley moved out of the way, letting Ronnie through with the food as they had what was an apparently much needed reunion.
"You're looking better," Caitlin said, walking over to stand by Hartley.
"I'm not going to be thrilled if you keep using Ronnie to manage me." Hartley gave her an amused look as she shrugged.
"Eat and sleep properly and you won't need managing," she retorted sweetly. "And don't tell me you have been, 'cause I'll know you're lying."
"I've been fixated on a difficult and time sensitive project."
"Why didn't you ask for help? If you'd told Ronnie what you were doing - shown us whatever that... thing was..."
"I didn't know what Harrison told any of you when he fired me. Hell, I don't know what told the other labs in the city about me. I just know that no matter who I went to try and talk about the flaws I found in the accelerator, I was lucky to be laughed out of the building. If I wasn't lucky I'd get thrown out on my ass without making it further than the lobby." Hartley fidgeted uncomfortably. "I wasn't sure you two wouldn't just slam the door in my face. If what I was trying today had failed, I was going to try reaching out to Ronnie anyway."
"Dr. Wells really... he really knew about the flaws before the accelerator went live?" Caitlin asked, voice small.
Hartley nodded. "He knew. He didn't care. And now the city's been flooded with dark matter. No one knows what the consequences of that will be. But that might actually be what saved Cisco's life."
Caitlin's eyebrows went up, which was a comical expression on her. "What do you mean?"
Nodding at the door, Hartley told her, "let's go over to your lab."
"O-okay." Caitlin followed Hartley out of the break room and down the hall.
Once there, Hartley flipped on the computer - he'd hacked his old account to work at the start of all this - and he brought up a series of files. "When I needed a break from working on what was going on in the pipeline, I've been working on something else. But honestly, it's more your area."
"What is this..." Caitlin muttered, skimming over the files on the screen. "There's dark matter in these blood tests. Who... whose is this, Hartley?"
"They're all mine. I was on the steps of the building the night of the incident. Out by the protestors. I got knocked down the stairs during the panic when the explosion funneled out of the top of the building and, initially, I thought that the fall, hitting my head, damaged my hearing further than it already was. Constant tinnitus, can barely hear anything over the sound of a constant shriek in my ears. Except hearing aids just made it worse. And it was a crazy thought that maybe if I used dampeners instead... except that's what works. My hearing aids dampen what I hear. And yet despite that I can still hear Ronnie and Cisco in the break room as clears as though they were standing right next to us. And it's because of this." He gestured to the files. "The dark matter altered how my hearing works.
"And I think it altered Cisco too, but in a completely different way."
"He opened the..."
"Fissure, breach... crack in the universe... Cisco was at the heart of the pipeline while it was pumping out dark energy and dark matter that goes well off the charts. If that changed him, then it saved his life from the explosion when he acted on instinct using those abilities. But then once he's inside whatever that place is... he panics and keeps trying to get out, causing the recurring phenomena that I basically shoved a wedge into. And it might explain how he could be in there for two, nearly three months without food and water... if he was, say, somehow able to absorb than energy. Only it's not really enough to keep a person going indefinitely, no matter what the dark matter's done to him. Which is why he's still dehydrated and malnourished."
Caitlin nodded. "I'll ask him if I can test his blood. Compare the results to yours."
"These tests were run over as many weeks as there are files. And the dark matter levels remain stable. It's not leaving my system. And if it's messed with my hearing and given Cisco powers that defy physics... then what has it done to other people in this city?"
As the implications began to dawn on Caitlin, Hartley saw horror dawning on her face.
Somehow Hartley gets talked into going with the others to take Cisco home to his family. He's the one who knows the most about what was going on with Cisco, he's the one who can explain it best to the Ramons.
Sophia and Matteo Ramon open their front door and take one look at Cisco standing there and... Sophia bursts into tears. Matteo draws Cisco into a hug because it's a miracle.
His son was dead and now he's alive again.
Hartley can't help but feel a little jealous. Cisco's parents clearly love him. So does his brother, Dante. They're so overjoyed to have Cisco back, even if they don't understand how. Meanwhile, Hartley feels acutely aware of how his own parents would rather Hartley was dead than gay.
But the Ramons - who probably heard all sorts of bad things about Hartley, and well deserved too - welcome Hartley like family when Cisco tells them Hartley's the one who saved him. They're wonderful people. And Hartley feels awkwardly out of place around them.
Eventually Hartley excuses himself to the backyard. And Cisco follows him out.
"You okay?" Cisco asked.
"Pretty sure I should be asking you that," Hartley retorted. "You've been gone since mid December. Alone in that place. And now you're back to reality and surrounded by people... recipe for being overwhelmed right there."
"Oh, I am. I am very overwhelmed. And more than a little afraid of waking up only to realize I'm still there. I kept..." Cisco looked away, uncomfortable. "I was having these... visions. Hallucinations. While I was there. Things that didn't make sense. Events I'd never seen. Things from the past or... future events. I saw you in the pipeline with Dr. Wells..."
He hesitated. "He asked what you were doing in his accelerator and you... you said that you thought was our accelerator. Because it would be our fault when it turned on and blew a hole in the city."
Chills ran up Hartley's spine. Because that was almost word for word what he'd said that night. "You are wagering the lives of everyone in this building," Hartley murmured. Cisco speaking with him as he said, "everyone in this city."
"That was real?" Cisco asked.
"Yeah. That was real."
Cisco groaned and ran his hands through his hair. "I need more tea. My throat's still so sore."
"Life'd be easier on you if you knew more ASL than finger spelling." Hartley grinned as Cisco shot him annoyed look.
"How could I have seen what happened the night you were fired from STAR Labs when I wasn't there?" Cisco asked.
"I don't know. But I would like to help you figure it out. Harrison deliberately set off a flawed accelerator and I think he had a reason for it. We need to find what, because he's screwed up both our lives over it." Hartley paused and then added, "I realize it's not every day a person comes back from the dead, but you're going to have to do it twice. Legally, speaking."
Cisco snorted in amusement. "Yeah. I know. I'm going to have to find a lawyer and... it's going to be a mess. But my parents moved all my stuff from my apartment into a storage unit. They couldn't bring themselves to get rid of anything. Well, some of my furniture, but all my collectibles and keepsakes and the like should still be there. And I've been wanting a new couch, anyway."
"That's good."
"Yeah. But... I saw a lot more than just what happened the night you were fired, Hartley. And if what I saw between you and Dr. Wells was real... then what about the other things I saw? Hartley... if even half of what I saw was true, then Dr. Wells is a very, very dangerous man. And he will kill us if we get in his way. Because the accelerator... that was just step one."