bankai777 - No, the Watcher is gonna remain just a narrator for a while.
"A monster on the loose. A Goblin on the run." The Watcher narrated as he looked down at the team, currently training Barry to get faster. "It's time for these heroes to meet their greatest challenges yet."
"That was too close," Caitlin tells Cisco.
They were all standing in Barry's training area, and Cisco was shooting his drones at Barry.
"Hey, he told me to make it hard." Cisco protested.
"Pretty sure he didn't say to make him dead," Caitlin replied.
"Remember, this is a training exercise to improve Barry's speed." Wells reminded them.
Cisco shrugged as Barry yelled into the comms. "Cisco, you gonna bring it or what?"
Cisco looked to Wells for his vote in it and he sighed. "Bring it."
Caitlin's lips pinched together unhappily, but she raised her binoculars to get a better look at what was going on.
Cisco pressed a few buttons on his tablet controller to the drone. A large, black missile shot out towards Barry as he ran, dodging and sliding on the pavement, but Cisco's missal exploded and sent him tumbling to the ground.
The drone came at him, ready to release another drone as Caitlin started to get worried. "Why isn't he running away?" Barry just stood there and allowed the drone to come closer. "Barry, run away."
The binoculars fell to her side and Caitlin glanced at Cisco, her eyes making her feelings very clear. She raised her binoculars and peered through them. When the missal was seconds away from hitting Barry, he grabbed it and swung it around. It made its way toward Cisco's drone, and it went up in flames within seconds.
Barry flashed back to the group and wiggled his eyebrows and Caitlin. She rolled her eyes in his direction, blushing. He made his way over and started to eat an entire family's worth of Big Belly Burger
"Very impressive, Mr. Allen." Wells congratulated as Barry took some time to cool down. "Your relation to stimuli at super speed continues to improve."
"Still not enough." Barry was sorry to admit.
"It will be," Wells promised him. "You keep working like you are, stay focused like you are, and you will be ready the next time that the Man in the Yellow Suit comes around."
"Don't you mean...the Reverse Flash?" Cisco asked them, finally having a name for the guy. But then he saw the faces they had, most of them unsure of his name. "What? He said it, not me. And he's right. The yellow suit, red lighting, and he's evil. The reverse of Barry."
Meh." Caitlin shrugged, not seeing the name as anything spectacular.
"Actually, I kinda like it," Wells admitted.
"Okay, I'm ready for another round." Barry grinned as he walked off. "Got any more drones left?"
"Well... two more of those, and they got lasers," Cisco said to him.
"No!" Both Caitlin and Wells yelled.
Back with Peter, he and Bobby were looking into the gear from the Sinister Six. After their arrest, Peter snuck their gear away to make sure they didn't get their hands on them again. Not to mention that after figuring out that it was the Green Goblin who brought them together, they figured there were bound to be some clues as to who he is.
Peter tried asking Flint about it, but he assured him he didn't know anything about him. Only that the Goblin broke him out of prison, as long as the other members of the Sinister Six. He didn't have any idea who he was, but that he was a loner, meaning he was a genius, who was able to build all of this gear. This would mean that he had money somewhere.
"There needs to be some way to find out who is under that mask," Peter said as he and Bobby were in the cortex. Bobby was laying back and tossing the Shocker's gauntlet around. "Some clue."
"The only way you can do that is by ripping off his mask. Because in reality, he could get that gear from everywhere." Bobby was sorry to say, but then he slipped and dropped the gauntlet and caused it to go off. The gauntlet sent a small blast that shattered the glass in Cisco's lab. "So, I'm gonna go! See ya later!"
Peter sighed as his friend ran off to not take responsibility. "How sad is it when the most helpful man in the room is the man made of sand?"
At a car containment building, the door starts getting frozen over and a car comes ramming into the door, shattering It. Leonard Snart and Mick Rory, his new partner with the heat gun, exit the car.
"Told you It would break," Snart states to Mick.
"And the shrink says I'm crazy," Mick states to himself. "What is this place?" He asks Snart.
"Customs warehouse. Imported cars from Europe, all worth a fortune." Snart explains and Mick removes the covers on them and sees the brand-new vehicles.
"Question. How do you suggest you and I drive all these cars out of here?" Mick questions seeing they didn't bring any vehicles except the one they rammed.
"We're not. We're not stealing anything." Snart answers.
"What are you talking about?" Mick asks now believing he truly has gone crazy.
"Our entrance set off the silent alarms. The cops will be arriving in two minutes and 14 seconds." Snart starts explaining the plan since Mick doesn't exactly have the brain to ask him about the plan.
"Bring them," Mick states and goes for the case with the heat gun from the car.
"That's not for the cops, as we discussed," Snart warns him as he sits against the cars. "He'll be here."
Peter heard the alarms off of the alerts while he was still inside STAR Labs. He didn't have much to do, and MJ wasn't in as she had plans with some of her friends. So, while the team was off training Barry, Peter decided to just go and deal with it himself. But on the way there, he also put a mental list of suspects in his head.
"That tech could be coming from anywhere, but if I had to guess, that is his tech. He knows how to use it too well." Peter said to himself as he swung around the city. "That glider, those powers, the weapons. He needs to have a facility somewhere to make this gear."
Then his senses went off and he looked up to see a pumpkin bomb falling toward him. He didn't have the time to react when the bomb went off and sent Peter flying and slamming into the wall.
Peter was sent skidding and slamming into the wall as he grabbed onto any part of the wall he could. Panting and feeling his mask was scorched by the explosion, he looked around to see where he was.
"Show yourself, you psychotic maniac!" Peter called out, just for him to hear a bomb. "What?"
Then came a second pumpkin that he jumped and webbed higher up the building to dodge. Then the Green Goblin finally came out of hiding as he flew over, shooting blasts out of his fingers toward Peter.
"Think fast!" Goblin cried out as Peter jumped to dodge it, sticking to the wall the whole time. "Think faster! Tonight, you are in a particularly unfriendly neighborhood!"
"Oh, clever. Taking my motto and changing it around." Peter mocked as he jumped out of the way and shot out a web.
"Why, thank you!" Goblin said as he flew over and cut the webbing with a blade.
Peter then shot out another web to try and grab the building. But that failed when the goblin flung several of his razor bats at him. Every time Peter shot a web at the building, one of the blades came past and slit through the webbing.
Peter tried to shoot, but then he hit the side of the building and quickly grabbed onto the wall.
"Or maybe instead of just watching you splat on the pavement, I'll impale you!" Goblin cried as Peter watched the blade come flying at him.
"At least you're going for originality," Peter commented as he leaped and grabbed onto the glider. "But I like it better if you're the one going splat!"
"Ooh, I love the banter tonight!" Goblin commented as he flew them towards the building. "But wheels are in motion. And I'll be back to see you be crushed beneath them."
"What are you talking about?" Peter asks when his senses went off.
Looking at the building coming too close, Peter abandoned the glider and dropped off it. He fell and grabbed onto the building. Aiming his web shooters out to where he was, he looked around to see that the Goblin had suddenly vanished as if out of thin air.
Even with no sign of him, Peter looked around and kept looking to find him. "What?"
Back inside the containers, Snart starts hearing the sirens and is getting confused. What was keeping a man who could run fast this long? He already knew that Goblin was going to be keeping Spider-Man busy so they could have their rematch.
"You do hear that, right?" Mick asks him.
"He's not coming." Snart realizes and they start leaving. Seeing they won't be getting the fight they were hoping for.
"Seatbelt," Snart warns Mick, and they escaped without stealing anything.
Later the police show up to see what's happened. There was no sign of Snart or Mick or even any sign of anything stolen.
"Are you sure nothing is missing?" Joe asks the officer.
"That's what the supervisor said." He explains to Joe. "I can check again."
"Well, the breakage indicates the door somehow had zero viscoelasticity when it hit the ground," Barry explains and then noticed that they don't understand. "I'm sorry. The steel shattered like glass. It was frozen, Joe."
"Snart." Joe states.
"I thought Snart was some world-class thief." Eddie states. "All these expensive cars...he didn't take any of them?"
Barry had to admit that was something racking in his head around. But then the idea of why
"Eddie, put out an APB on Snart," Joe tells him and he leaves to do it.
"Snart wasn't here to steal anything," Barry tells Joe and saw the confused look on his face. "He was setting a trap for me."
Barry returns to STAR Labs to try and fill them in on what's going on. They were shocked to hear that the non-powered criminal Leonard Snart was back.
"Captain Cold? He's back?" Bobby asked.
"For a non-metahuman, Leonard Snart is proving to be quite the nemesis," Wells states to them.
"Well, what does he want this time?" Caitlin asks him.
"The Flash," Barry answers them. "If Snart wants a fight with the Flash, then I'll give him one." As soon as he said this, Wells moaned in disagreement. "You don't think I should?"
"I didn't say that, but as fast as you are, you cannot be everywhere at once. And it becomes a question of priorities." Wells explains to him his dismay at the idea to fight Snart. "Now, in the last month, you have committed to increasing your speed, enhancing your reflexes, and it's working. You're finally getting faster."
"Okay, but I can't just ignore Snart," Barry states to him not wanting another chance of someone else dying.
"Last time you fought with Snart, a train derailed. You were lucky to get all of those people to safety. Now if you don't give him a fight..." Wells explains and Barry understands.
"He might just back off, and there'll be no casualties." Barry shrugged, feeling he could fight him this time.
"Look, Barry, Cisco, and I will work with Joe and the police and devise a way to catch Cold. Yes, I said it, Cisco. As soon as it came out of my mouth, I heard it." Wells realizes and Cisco just smiles that his name is spreading.
"We can easily devise a way to stop Snart," Cisco tells him.
"Whether or not you go after Snart, that's your choice. We here, we will do whatever we can to support it." Wells tells Barry. "But after this past Christmas, after the events with the Reverse Flash, I just think he poses a greater threat to all of us."
"Yeah." Peter groaned, getting them to look out to the hallway and see him limping. "To all of you, maybe."
"Oh, god. What happened?" Barry asked as Caitlin walked over to look at his injuries.
"My old nemesis the Green Goblin came back," Peter explains as she led him to the medical labs. "He attacked me on my way to stop...Snart, apparently."
"Oh, god. This guy just loves to constantly show up, doesn't he?" Bobby asks, wondering why now.
"No, this isn't a coincidence," Peter stated, allowing Caitlin to help heal his wounds faster. "He gave Snart the gun, remember?"
"So, he has some way of contacting Goblin." Joe was actually able to follow what Peter was saying.
"How come you understand him?" Barry asked his adopted father.
Joe shrugged it off and didn't see how either. "He makes it easy to follow."
"So, to find Goblin, we find Snart?" Bobby asks.
"I'm saying that we need to stop if we wanna take down the other," Peter explains what he's saying. "Then he said that wheels are already in motion. He has something planned."
"I don't wanna wait around to find out what," Cisco commented.
"None of us want to." Bobby agreed.
Snart and Mick made it to an abandoned OsCorp warehouse where they were told to meet up with their friend. When the two arrived, the Green Goblin came flying down and his glider was smoking.
"Well, it seems the Spider left me with a parting gift." Goblin commented as he started to fix the gear.
"What happened out there?" Snart asks as he approached the Goblin. "You said the Flash would be there."
"Yes, he should have been, shouldn't he?" Goblin agreed, focusing on his gear for now. "Maybe we need to level up."
"Level up what?" Snart asks him.
"Give him something to care about," Goblin explains, remembering how he drew out Spider-Man. "Give him some people to save next time."
Snart nodded, starting to follow that as something he should have considered in the first place. "So, he's running the shots now?"
"He's our partner," Snart explained to Mick. "This freak takes care of the Spider, and we take care of the Flash."
The next day, Cisco and Wells were demonstrating the shields for Snart's cold gun. Bobby surprisingly went out with Peter and MJ as she was gonna bring her friend Crystal along for a walk.
Back at STAR Labs, Caitlin was on her computer, scouring the internet for signs of Firestorm. That was what Ronnie (at least what was left of Ronnie) had called himself. Caitlin knew he had said not to look for him... but how could she not?
"Hey." Barry's voice startled her so much that she shrieked. "Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."
"No, it's ok, I was just kinda focused," Caitlin explained with a smile.
He leaned down and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. "Gotcha." He then noticed her computer. "What's Firestorm?"
"Something Ronnie said to me," Caitlin explained.
The two talked about what happened during Christmas and about Ronnie. Caitlin assured Barry that she just needed some closure due to what happened that night to try and help Ronnie. Barry wasn't exactly going to condemn her for helping her fiancé who's currently a literal Burning Man. He wasn't hurt that she was helping Ronnie, more that she felt she needed to hide it from him.
"It's one of the last things Ronnie said to me before he..." She paused, then shrugged. "Flew away." Caitlin wrinkled her nose at the reminder. "My dead fiancé can fly. Only in our lives, right?" She was expecting a laugh or a least a smile from Barry, but there was nothing. Now that she thought about it, she realized that he hadn't seemed himself in a while. "You doing okay?"
"Yeah, yeah, I just... I can't believe everything going on." Barry said as he looked to where Peter was getting patched up earlier.
"Yeah, you gotta remember your brother has been doing this for almost a year longer than you," Caitlin recalled the new named Sinister Six. A name that Cisco and Bobby have been going off on one another about changing. "He's made a few enemies out there. That seemed to include a giant Green Goblin."
"I miss the days of random muggings happening around the city." Barry agreed with a sigh.
"Well, we need to live what we have, don't we?" Caitlin guessed with a shrug.
"Yeah." Barry agreed.
"And if you need to talk about anything to do with Reverse Flash - Cisco made me call him that - know that I'm here to talk." Caitlin offered to him.
"Yeah," Barry confirmed he knew leaned down and kissed her gently, then turned to leave the room. Halfway out, he stopped." Hey, Cait? I just thought of something. Firestorm could be one word, but there's a second possibility. What if Firestorm..."
"...is an acronym." Caitlin finished his sentence, and her fingers flew across the keypad. Fast enough that it almost gave Felicity a run for her money. "Fusion Ignition Research Experiment and Science of Transmutation Originating RNA and Molecular Structures."
Barry raised an eyebrow when he saw her and gave him a look.
"It's... 800 pages." Caitlin hinted, sending her best puppy dog eyes to look up at him.
And how could Barry say no to that? He cleared his throat and leaned over the screen. Words and pages flashed across it at super speed, and Barry's eyes flicked back and forth until they were a blur. A second later he blinked and stood up. Caitlin tilted her head questioningly as to what he learned.
"There's a lot of stuff in there, but it mostly focuses on Trans-Mutation, which is the process of altering the structure of an element but unzipping the atoms-"
"And recreating it to make an entirely new element." Caitlin completed with a frown.
Barry nodded in confirmation. "The article was co-written by Jason Rush, a grad student here, at Hudson University. So, if there is anyone who knows what happened to Ronnie..."
"Maybe he does." Caitlin breathed hopefully. He smiled at the way her grey-blue eyes lit up. "Thanks."
"Anytime." Barry kissed her on the lips and strode out of the room.
Caitlin picked up her purse and knew it was time to visit Jason.
While they had their moment, the Watcher eyed the double date (unofficially) with Peter and MJ, along with Bobby and Crystal. The two formals just stayed back and watched as their friends got close.
"So, you have any siblings or anything?" Bobby asks Crystal as they walked ahead of their friends.
"I have an older sister." Crystal informed him. "She basically became a mother-like figure to me since our parents worked a lot."
"What's your sister's name?" Bobby was curious to hear she had a sister.
"Don't laugh." Crystal warns him with a stern face. "But her name is Medusa."
Bobby heard and promised not to say anything from that, but all he could do was hold it in. Taking a moment to breathe and cool himself down and sighed before talking again.
"That's a... particularly unique name," Bobby commented.
"Yeah, I know," Crystal confirmed. "Yet again, so is Crystal."
"Not that unique," Bobby muttered, thinking of how there are a few people with that kind of name. "So, what do your parents do?"
"They're nutritionists." Crystal tells him.
"Well, that's unique." Bobby had to admit it.
"Those two seem to be getting along alright," Peter commented far back enough so they couldn't be heard.
"Yeah, I had a feeling they'd get along." MJ was proud of herself. "He won't need to be our third wheel from now on."
"I'm glad he can have a second chance. He was hurt when Liz broke up with him." Peter told MJ.
"Yeah, he told me about that at Homecoming," MJ assured Peter she knew part of the story.
But just as the four of them were having a good time, his senses alerted him of something coming. He looked around and was trying to follow where the alert was coming from when an explosion went off.
At a nearby building, a giant chunk of the wall was blown off, and Peter had a feeling just who was the cause. While MJ, Crystal, and Bobby all had their eyes covered due to the flash of light in the night. While they were busy, Peter ran off to the nearest alley where he could quickly change into his Spider suit.
That night, Snart was taking Goblin's advice and was planning on stealing a painting resembling fire and ice. The Rathaway's, two richest people in Central City, are leaving their airplane with the painting as they speak as Snart approaches them. He shoots at the ceiling, covering it in ice causing everyone to run away in fear.
Everyone started to run for it when
"Somebody better call 911!" Snart tells them, hoping the Flash will show up this time.
Back in the building, it was revealed to be a STARK Industries-funded location when Peter swung in. When he looked around the room to see all of the destroyed technologies and debris, he saw someone in the middle of it all.
Jumping over the broken glass, and broken tech, Peter landed near the man and quickly dusted off the debris. What he found was a man, bald with a wound to the head from the fall.
"Hang on," Peter said as he picked the man up and made his way out through the hole.
As time passes, the police approach with their new STAR Labs' cold shields in hand. Snart shoots his cold gun and took notice of how it does not affect any of them with the shields.
"Mick!" Snart shouts and the police and the police see his partner.
"What the hell?" Joe asked.
"Why do they call you people the heat?" Mick asks them shouts and shoots them with his heat gun, which they can't protect themselves against. "I'm the heat!"
"Forget them, Mick. Get ready for him." Snart says and Mick isn't listening as he's losing control over himself as he keeps burning.
"It's beautiful!" Mick becomes more focused on the cops than him and uses it as an opening to shoot at him, the bullet ended up hitting his gun and caused the gun to short circuit.
"We go, now!" Snart tells him and shoots at the cops before they could stop their escape.
When Peter reached the bottom of the 50-story building with the unconscious man, where the paramedics were. They took the man out of Peter's hands and raced him into an ambulance.
"Says his name is Ivan Renz." One of the paramedics said as they read his nametag before they drove off.
Peter then looked back up to the explosion and made himself a slingshot. Shooting two webs at the flagpoles, he pulled himself back and released his footing. He went flying straight into the hole that was caused by the explosion.
When he landed back up on the location, he became worried about what was going on in the building. He didn't know if it was even the Goblin who did it this time or if it was some accident.
Luckily his senses answered that question for him when a pumpkin bomb came down and landed in the room. Jumping to dodge the explosion, Peter watched as it exploded, taking a portion of the roof he was holding onto at the same time.
Getting back up on his feet, Peter watched as the Green Goblin flew out of the building and tossed another bomb at him. He quickly jumped to avoid the bomb while also kicking the Goblin off his board. The two of them started to plummet towards the ground as Peter shot a net to wrap Goblin.
"This feud of ours ends tonight, Goblin!" Peter proclaimed, ready to end this fight between them.
"Oh, but why would you want our little game to end so soon?" Goblin asked as he used a finger to shoot a blast to burn the webbing. Having a second, he touched a button on his wrist and the glider started to follow them. "I'm only getting warmed up!"
"Is that why you sent the Sinister Six after me?!" Peter asked as he shot a web, dragging the Goblin closer before kicking him back.
"You know what they say," Goblin said as he punched his nemesis back. "When the idiots don't succeed, do it yourself!"
Then before they could hit the ground, Peter shot a web to get himself out of the way when Goblin landed on his board. Before he could take off and escape, Peter shot a web and hitched a ride through the city.
"Looks like we have an unscheduled passenger!" Goblin cried as he rammed Peter into several cars and dragged him across several roofs. "I guess means that this means we'll need to make an unscheduled stop!"
Goblin then turned and shot a blast from his finger, hitting his web and sending Peter dragging against the roof and slamming into the wall.
"Okay...ow." Peter groaned out in pain. He tried to get up but ended up limping from the pain. "Everything everywhere hurts." He pulled himself together as he tried to get back up, only for him to fall on his side again. Quickly pulling out the contacts he had on his mask, he called out to the one person he knew would come by. "Hey...I need a ride."
At their hideout, Mick and Snart think about what to do now they have the painting. Snart was upset that they didn't get their rematch with Flash, only wasting another fight with Spider-Man and Goblin. Mick was currently working on fixing the gun that Joe was able to damage.
"The cop's shot fried the secondary internal fuel chamber," Mick explains as he fixes the gun while Snart marched over. "It could've been worse. You were right to get me to learn every part and circuit of this thing." He states as Snart comes up completely angry. "Repairing It was...a snap."
Snart then raises the cold gun at Mick, and he raises the heat gun on Snart.
"Give me one good reason I shouldn't kill you right now," Snart asks Mick.
"It's gonna be hard to find someone else to listen to your winning speeches," Mick replies to Snart.
"You lost it out there," Snart tells Mick, "Just like the last job. You lost focus; became obsessed."
"I'm obsessed? What about you?" Mick asks Snart since he's been obsessed with the Flash for months. "What about you? You're usually counting the seconds, got the whole thing planned out. But all you care about now is the Flash."
"We have to put him down. With him gone, that will only leave Spider-Man and he's useless against these weapons." Snart states to Mick. "And if our partner is any use, he'll make work of him and that woman spider."
"We got the finger painting. It's worth millions. It's ours. We're rich, job is done." Mick counters seeing no point in going after someone faster than the two of them.
"What about the next job, Mick? And the job after that? With weapons like these, no one can stand against us, no one except the Flash." Snart explains then lowers the cold gun. "If you want out, take the painting and go. But if you want Central City to be our home where we can do and take whatever we want...this is our chance...your chance."
Mick listened just turns to the painting and burns it with the gun. "Very motivational. How do we get him?"
"Flash isn't so different from us. He has partners, too." Snart states and remembers the people who saved them the first time.
Back with Peter, Bobby leads his friend through the streets of Central City so that he could get him home. When the two made it inside his home, they were happy to see that May was gone for the night at work.
Bobby led his friend to the couch and dropped him off. "There you go." Peter winced in pain as he laid down and held his hip. "You gonna be okay?"
Peter wheezed through the pain as he tried to relax. "Next time he shows up, I'll let you fight him. See how you turn out."
"To be fair, I have an ice coating." Bobby reminded his friend, who only became annoyed at his friend. "Sorry. Trying to lighten the mood."
"Not helping," Peter stated. He has never felt pain like this in the year of being Spider-Man. "Any news on that guy from the building?"
"That Ivan Renz guy?" Bobby asks, remembering the news on the way. "He's fine. They said they needed to amputate a few limbs due to the injuries, but he'll live." Peter groaned and started to feel worse, which was something Bobby immediately stopped. "Hey. Don't do that. You saved his life. If you didn't interfere, he'd be dead."
"Doesn't make it feel better." Peter groaned out.
"Well, I called Caitlin. She should be here soon to look you over." Bobby assured Peter.
"Okay," Peter said with a groan. "So, what's going on with you and Crystal?"
Bobby looked at his friend as he took a seat in one of the chairs. "You wanna talk about this?"
"Come on, get my mind off the pain I'm in," Peter asked his friend.
Bobby sighed and nodded, seeing it'd be nice while they wait. "It's going pretty well. She's a sweet girl." He then looked down at his hands and sighed. "I just hope she doesn't get scared off by what I can do."
"You never know, MJ said that she might surprise you," Peter said, trying to breathe with what felt like a broken rib.
Caitlin was talking with the co-author on the paper to do with FIRESTORM when she got the message from Bobby. He told her it was a medical emergency between Goblin and Peter, and she was making her way over to her car. But when she reached it and took out her keys, a blast of ice came and layered her car with it.
"Car trouble?" Snart asks.
Caitlin screams and tries to get into her car. But as she tried to do so, Mick walks up and grabs her.
"When the heat-gun was fried, it increased the surrounding temperature of the air dramatically, sort of like an extreme heat wave," Cisco explains the next day at STAR Labs to Barry and Wells as they're unaware of what happened, and Cisco gets a name for Mick. "Heatwave."
"Stop doing that," Wells exclaims at him.
"Okay. I measured the temperature output of both the cold and heat guns, right? And it seems that while the cold-gun achieves absolute zero, the heat gun successfully reaches absolute hot, or the hottest temperature an object can reach." Cisco keeps explaining to them.
"So, potentially, these two guns could cancel each other out." Wells realizes seeing where Cisco is going.
"Yes, but to do that, you'd have to make them cross streams," Cisco informs them.
"You mean like in Ghostbusters?" Barry asks him as Bobby walks into the room.
"That film is surprisingly scientifically accurate." Cisco realizes.
"Hey, has anyone seen Caitlin?" Bobby asks them.
"Not recently, why?" Barry was starting to get worried.
"She was on her way to Pete's place, look him over from a fight with the Goblin, but she never showed up," Bobby explained when Barry's phone started to ring.
"I'm sure it's nothing serious," Wells assured the young man. "Where is Mr. Parker now?"
"At home. May is patching him up." Bobby explained.
But his worry was well met when Barry became afraid and he flashed off, leaving Cisco and Wells to wonder what the heck had just happened.
Barry ran to the crime scene, his heart pounding so hard he could barely breathe. The only thing he could think of was It couldn't be her car. It has to be someone else's. Not Caitlin.
"Joe!" Barry called, running to meet up with his adoptive father. "Anything?"
"There's no sign of Caitlin," Joe said worriedly, watching Barry's face grow pale as he saw the ice covering the side of her car. Barry ran his fingers through his hair as he strode over to Joe, a hard light in his eyes.
"We're getting her back. We have to find Snart." Barry became angry at himself and was determined to stop Snart now.
"Darn right we do." Joe agreed. "Come on, let's go."
Barry followed Joe to his car, even though he could have flashed to the CCPD in seconds. His legs felt like Jell-O, the same way they had when he had gotten electrocuted. Except for this time, there would be no Dr. Caitlin Snow to patch him up. That dug deep.
After an agonizingly long car ride, they arrived at the Police Department. Eddie ran down the stairs calling, "Joe! Joe! Oh, Allen, thank goodness. We got a hit, the second pair of prints." He then handed the two a file on Snart's accomplice. 'Mick Rory. Big time arsonist. He and Snart used to work together, until last year when a job went bad. Half of Rory's body was burned in a fire that got out of control. Escaped from an ambulance on the way to the hospital and hasn't been seen since. But why would they kidnap someone like Caitlin?"
Captain Singh strode out of his office. "Turn on the T.V. It's on every station."
One of the officers pressed the power button and the television in front of them flickered to life. Barry crossed his arms, trying to control his heart rate.
"Greetings citizens of Central City. I am Leonard Snart, but you can call me Cold." Barry could barely hear him as he was paying attention to the background.
In the back of the corner, Caitlin was struggling against Mick who was holding her back.
Snart continued. "I'm gonna make this very simple for everyone. He's real. He calls himself...the Flash. Poter and Main. Tonight. Sundown. Or this woman dies."
"No, don't come for me. Stay away!" Caitlin screamed, and then Snart ended the feed. "He'll hurt-"
Right now, Caitlin was being roped to a chair, Mick was breathing down her neck. She has never been in this kind of situation and wasn't exactly looking to make a habit out of this.
"Your friend. He's fast." Mick commented. He pulled out a lighter and held it up to her face. "Like fire. It's an evolution when things burn."
"You're sick." Caitlin scoffed.
Mick then turned off the flame and eyed Caitlin. "Maybe you're the sick ones, you ever thought of that?"
"Not really." Caitlin eyed as she glanced at his arms and noticed the burns. "You've got third-degree burns. Why didn't you get skin grafts?
"The fire revealed my true self. Showed me what I really am." Mick said as he started to get too close for comfort. "I wonder what the Flash will reveal... when I burn his suit and skin off."
Protective fury rose in Caitlin like a wave of heat. She leaned towards Mick and growled. "Do whatever you want to me. But leave. Him. Alone."
Mick backed off a bit. "Ooh." He grinned. "You and this Flash must be really close if you're willing to die for him."
He had no idea.
"Now, now." Someone got in between them as they both turn to see Goblin coming in on his glider. "No harming our little guest here. Not until the fireworks begin."
"Green Goblin, I presume." Caitlin guessed as he flew down towards them.
"You presume correctly, my dear," Goblin confirmed with a giggle. "But now, I'm sorry to say that we will be leaving. For now."
Mick then place a gag over her mouth so Caitlin couldn't scream as she noticed him placing a tripwire. "You better pray the next people to walk through those doors is us."
Barry stood in the Cortex, pacing a hole in the floor. Then his phone buzzed. He quickly answered it and knew who it was as he saw time approaching.
"Alright," Joe spoke into his ear. "You're on."
In seconds he was in his suit and at the place where Cold has told them to meet up. He broke through the police tape and came to a stop. The entire police force stopped and stared. He looked back silently as he was ready to take these guys on.
A voice broke through the tension. "The scarlet speedster!" Cold yelled. He approached Barry, gun drawn with Mick at his side. "Any preference on how you'd like to die? The flame? Or the frost?"
Barry took a deep breath, hoping against hope that the rescue plan was working. He, of course, had wanted to be the one to save Caitlin, but they had convinced him that he was the only one who could fight against Central City's worst non-meta menaces.
Focusing on the task at hand, Barry walked towards Snart as he raised his gun. "Not in the mood for chit-chat; gotcha." He and Mick both powered up their guns. "Ready when you are."
Barry moved so quickly the malefactors weren't expecting it. He whizzed around the two of them, and they fired their guns. Snart ran to a car, "Cover me!" He yelled at his partner. Mick blasted flame unto the air.
Snart hit a fire hydrant with his gun, and the water shot into the air, freezing immediately. Barry didn't have time to slow down. He crashed into the ice, rolling to safety behind a car. So cold.
"Barry," Wells spoke in his ear. "Barry are you ok? You know what to do."
"Yeah!" Barry yelled back, shivering. He thought of Caitlin, hopefully getting rescued, and a new strength filled him. "I need to cross their streams and make their guns out. I know. Not as easy as it sounds."
With the rescue team, Barry was taking the beating while they were working on the rescue. Cisco tracked the car that Snart and Mick used to kidnap her to a warehouse district just a while out of the city.
"Starting from Caitlin's car, I pieced together surveillance footage that led us to this general area," Cisco said as he looked over his results.
"There's a dozen warehouses here." Peter reminded him as he gestured around them.
"But only one of them has had the heat on the last three nights," Cisco said as he gestured to one that was nearby. "I'm betting Mick Rory likes it hot."
"Okay, you three stay behind me," Joe said as he led the three inside.
When they opened the warehouse doors, they looked and noticed it was pretty set up like a secret lab. Peter also took notice of a few orbs inside the open containers that reminded him of something.
"These look familiar to you?" Peter asked Bobby as he picked one up.
"Pumpkin bombs?" Bobby asks, not entirely sure.
"Just without the painting on them," Peter confirmed that he had the same suspicion.
"Caitlin?" Cisco called out.
They heard what sounded like muffled cries. That at least confirmed that Caitlin was here for them as they started to look around. But as they were looking, Peter got a sense of fear down his spine.
As they were looking around, a glider came flying past them, causing the group to duck for cover. Several bombs were dropped, and they saw the Goblin flying around.
"Looks like they sprung the trap perfectly!" Goblin cried as Peter got right to it and sprang into action. He leaped off the ground and shot a web to attack Goblin, but he ended up throwing a razor bat to cut the webbing. "Welcome to the Green Goblin's House of Horror!" Peter fell and rolled on the ground, quickly making a stance. "Or should I say, Warehouse of Wackiness!" He then sent several more pumpkin bombs to Peter as he quickly did several backflips to avoid them as the bombs explode and was sending debris everywhere.
Joe and Cisco ran for cover while Peter jumped and shot several webs toward the Goblin. But the Green Freak shot either energy blast from his fingers or razors and then got a hit on Peter.
The blast caused Peter to drop and slam into the ground before hitting the stalls. "Ow."
Goblin then flew in and released the blade from the glider. Going in and getting ready to impale the hero. But before he could get too close to the hero, Bobby slid between them and shot a blast of mist at Goblin. That ended the Goblin's divebomb as he flew through the wall.
"Thanks," Peter said as Bobby held his hand for Peter to take.
"Take him down, and we'll call it even," Bobby said as he ran to find Caitlin.
"What? Even?" Peter was shocked to hear his friend was keeping score. But that was replaced by fear when the Goblin pulled out that device, he watched him open a black hole. "No! Not this time!"
Goblin then used the device to open a portal, setting a detonator to blow the whole place into the air. Once he opened a black hole, Peter leaped and the two were sent through the black hole.
Cisco and Joe found Caitlin as Bobby ran over, but then noticed something wrong. When he saw a bomb underneath the chair and the detonator Goblin left behind, he shot a blast to hit the bomb under her chair. That not only froze the mechanics but also slid it across the room.
Running to grab her, Joe quickly untied Caitlin and they booked out of the building before the bomb stopped. When the detonator hit zero, the whole building went up in smoke and reduced everything to ashes. The four of them were luckily shielded by Bobby with his ice shielding them at the last second.
When Bobby broke them through the ice, they made their way out and looked over the destruction.
"Where's Peter?" Bobby asked in worry.
Barry flashed off again, this time going up a building, the beams of both the guns following him. Barry leaped down from the apartment, landing in a crouch just as Snart shot him.
Blood pounded in his ears as he tumbled a few feet backward. He lay on the pavement, groaning in pain, and froze at the sound of Snart's gun firing up again. This was it. He just hoped that Joe and Cisco had gotten to Caitlin in time.
Much to his surprise, he didn't get frozen to death. Eddie threw himself to his knees, holding up a Cisco-made shield to block the wave of ice and fire that rained down on them.
"Go, go, go!" Eddie bellowed, and Barry flashed them both away. He pushed Eddie somewhere he wouldn't be hurt while he finished them off.
Barry stood in the middle of the street, panting. "I can't get them to cross streams. Speed isn't getting it done."
"You're right." Wells agreed. "Maybe speed isn't the way to do it."
"It's going slower," Barry murmured, realization dawning.
Wells thought the same thing. "Yes."
"Ok." Barry took a few deep breaths, preparing himself for what was sure to be a whole lot of pain. Then he flashed to the spot in between both Snart and Mick. They fired their guns up, and he was hit by but two streams of agony.
On his left side, he could feel his suit burning away, melting off of him and leaving his skin exposed. On his right, he was turning to ice. He fell to his knees.
But his plan worked. The guns started to overload each other, and Mick and Snart were blown backward by their weapons. Snart scrambled toward his gun, but Barry struggled to his feet and laid a foot on it. "Ha." Snart began to laugh. "I didn't see that one coming. I guess you win this time."
"There won't be a next time," Barry growled. Eddie came up behind him, leveling his gun at Snart. He vibrated his voice so that Eddie wouldn't recognize it. "Thank you, detective,"
Barry then sped off into the night as Eddie nodded to thin air. "No problem."
The Watcher however was eyeing the entire world, searching around anywhere for where Peter and Goblin could have gone. "Where did you go? Where are you, Peter?"
But even Peter didn't know where he was as he flew through an almost similar abys that he and Spot flew through. But this time it was completely dark and had a light at the end of the line.
Every time the two of them hit the end of the line, they were suddenly somewhere else. When they reached the end of the tunnel, Peter screamed as he and the Goblin were flying through the Great Wall of China. They were sent flying out of the portal at high speeds and everyone around them shrieked at them.
As they were about to hit one of the buildings, another black hole opened and sent them somewhere else. When he found out where they were, it was only then that he found that he and Goblin were falling from a million feet in the air.
Goblin seems to still be into finishing what he started as he tossed a bomb at Peter. He didn't really have any comeback at this moment as his lungs were currently screaming at the top of their lungs. But seeing he is being attacked, he shot a web and tossed the bomb back at him. The bomb then missed Goblin as another black hole opened and the two fell in and the bomb was left behind.
When he fell out of the portal, Peter shot out a web and luckily landed in some sort of city somewhere and managed to swing away. When he managed to grab onto the wall, he took a moment to breathe and look around. Noticing where he was, it was Tokyo, he was shocked about how far the reach of the machine can go.
But while he took a moment to catch his breath, a black hole opened just for Goblin to come through and grabbed onto Peter. He tried to punch the maniac, but he just went through another black hole and Peter was dragged along with him.
Exiting the portal once again, they ended up on the freeway somewhere as Goblin grabbed Peter, holding him out and allowing his face to get hit by a car. Peter didn't take that laying down as he grabbed Goblin by the head, he then slammed Goblin into the road and allowed his face to be dragged across it. Peter then kicked the Goblin and shot a web to grab the device and set it to get him back to Central City, typing in its coordinates.
Once he had it set, the portal opened, and Peter flung through it. The Goblin managed to miss the portal but managed to swipe the device back out of his hands tossing the razor bats and cutting his hand.
Falling through the portal, Peter ended up flying out as he had no control over it and landed in the middle of the city. Working fast, he shot out a web net that he then used to catch himself. Finally, he knew he could catch his breath, with no incoming attacks from Goblin as he didn't know where Peter was anymore.
"How was that possible?" The Watcher said in shock. "You were invisible to my eyesight. That is impossible. At least it should be. What else can't I see in this universe?"
After everything was all said and done, Peter and Barry both returned to STAR Labs where May looked them over, as well as looking over Caitlin. When Barry left Peter to rest after his fight with Goblin across the literal world, he found out that Caitlin was still there in her labs.
"Hey," Barry called her out, getting her to look towards him. "What are you still doing here?"
"Well, you revealed yourself to save my life." Caitlin reminded him as Barry took a seat next to her. "I figured I should keep an eye on my rescuers."
"Thanks," Barry said as he pulled her close. "How are you holding up?"
"You want the truth?" Caitlin asked and felt him nod. "When Ronnie passed away, I didn't really see a point in living." Then she smiled and remembered those with her. "Then I found Bobby. I found someone to keep me going. But I still wasn't fully really living. Then tonight when I thought I was going to die, I could only think of you." She then tilted so she could look him in the eye. "And I knew that you would come and save me." Then she looked down at the ring and took it off of her finger for good. "Ronnie's gone. I need to stop looking into the past for my future." He then looked up at Barry. "I have my new future right here."
Barry smiled and leaned close and pecked her lips. Caitlin smiles and pulled him back and this time gave him a proper kiss. The two of them just stayed there. They felt nothing but newfound love within one another after being alone for so long.
But their moment was interrupted by slow clapping from the med bay, causing them to stop and look to see that Peter was watching them with a grin on his face. "That was beautiful, guys."
"How long were you standing there?" Barry asks him.
"Enough." Peter went with the cliche line and walked back off to the bed. "That was worth the pain."
"Oh, you are definitely a pain," Barry muttered to himself.
The Watcher stared off into the stars, feeling that the Goblin has done something to unstable the universe. "That machine... if Goblin continues to use that device, it could unstabilize the fabric of the BRANCHES. And I have no idea what could happen if that was accomplished."