"Good morning my lovely ladies!" Cisco chirped bright and early the next morning. "I have even taken the liberty of stopping by Jitters for fuel and java."
Caitlin daintily nibbled on her butter croissant while Frost munched on a blueberry muffin almost the size of her face. Both women liked their coffee black, one sugar, two creamers. Cisco drove them in Caitlin's mint green Ford Fusion, that way Caitlin wouldn't have to rely on the extrapolater to get home. While both women looked calm on the outside, inside they were just a mass of nerves. They were both ready to get the day over with.
Caitlin wore one of her darker red sheath dresses and nude pumps, going for a more subdued and severe look, while Killer Frost wore black boots, black pants and a sky blue sweater that matched her eyes. They wanted to set the stage for their return, the doctor and the meta. Cisco, bless his heart, was just along for the ride. The women linked arms and walked behind Cisco as they entered the lab. They could hear voices from the lobby, and they knew everyone was already there for the day. In unison the woman looked at each other before stepping into the cortex behind Cisco.
"Cisco, man!" Ralph was the first to greet them, completely obnoxious and over the top, not seeing the two women behind the ex meta. "Glad to see you back. Changed your mind about leaving?"
"Nope, just came by to drop these two off." Cisco stepped aside and the whole team fell silent.
Caitlin knew he heart was racing as she moved forward, Killer Frost mirroring her steps. Everyone was shocked. The one she was most concerned about was Barry. As Caitlin's eyes panned over the group, her eyes caught on Nora's and the panic she read in them. Instant warning signs went up. Something wasn't right, but now was not the time to dig. Beside her, Iris looked impassive, frozen into a state of apathy. She was beyond caring what happened to anyone other than herself. She had always been that way, but now she was finally showing it where people could see. Past her was Barry, but what she saw broke her already fragile heart.
There was anger in his eyes, a frown on his face. He looked like they had done something wrong, and he was about to scold them for it. Caitlin couldn't understand why. He'd been wanting to keep Caitlin herself when she was losing control to Killer Frost, but now that they were two people, he looked almost disappointed. The two women glanced at each other again and broke apart, both of them moving to stand on either side of Cisco.
"What the hell is going on Cisco?" Iris demanded in her usual snarky and bored tone. "Did you go to another earth and grab another Caitlin doppelganger?"
"Aww, so you aren't happy to see me?" Frost drawled, snarking right back, fake pout on her face. "After all, we've been on the same side for the last few years."
"Frost?" Ralph asked. "Is that you?"
"In the flesh, thanks to Vibe here." The white haired woman rolled her eyes when Cisco cleared his throat. "Sorry, Cisco."
"How did this happen?" Barry found his voice, breaking away from the others to stand in front of Caitlin. His tone was harsh and bitter, more wounded sounding than anything Caitlin had heard. There was also accusation in his tone, eyes dark and a frown on his face. "Is that where you were when you took your vacation? Letting Cisco experiment on you in secret?"
"Hey!" Cisco got all up in Barry's face, indignation in his tone. "I'll have you know Caitlin and I have been spending weeks researching different topics in relation to the split, so we were are prepared as we could possibly be."
"Weeks?" Sherloque inquired. "Is that why you went offsite? To work without interruption?"
"Yes, but not just on our split, he - we - did work on the meta cure first. It was always our priority." Caitlin stepped into the fray, ready to defend her best friend and brother, as well as her sister if needed. "The thought of Killer Frost and I splitting was just thrown out as a 'what if'."
"In the end we decided to try it." Frost shrugged, eyes glinting blue, ice white hair a stark contrast to Caitlin's warm brown. "It wasn't fair to either one of us to try and live a half life, always bound to the other."
"Especially for you." Iris sounded almost jealous. Caitlin and Frost exchanged a raised eyebrow as everyone turned to look at the dark skinned woman. "After all; you depended on Caitlin to survive, to keep you in check. Now that you have your own body, who knows what kind of damage you'll do."
"IRIS!" Barry called her name, turning to look at his wife with lightning in his eyes. Now that was pure anger. Caitlin had seen it before, but never aimed at one of them, especially Iris.
"What? You know it's true. Killer Frost is evil and there is nothing that will change that."
"I prefer to think of myself as a firm anti-hero." Frost drawled in her usual lazy tone. Caitlin knew she did it on purpose to rile the other woman. Was it wrong of her to enjoy her former other half needle the 'reporter'? Nope.
"Anti-hero?" Nora asked, eyes big as they darted around the room. To Caitlin it looked like she thought Savitar would pop out of the shadows at any second, or worse yet, Zoom.
"That's right. I'll fight on the side of good, but I'm not afraid to get a little blood on my outfit. I do what needs to be done when the good guys can't afford to have their names tarnished."
"Honestly, I'm glad that she's around full time now." Caitlin spoke up, crossing her arms and glaring at Barry. "That way I can be here, in the lab, doing what I'm supposed to be doing. At the same time though, I know that you still have Frost's powers to back you up in the field."
"With practice, you could go back out into the field as well." Cisco bumped Caitlin's shoulder, sly grin on his face. He knew that they were slowly feeding the others all the info regarding the two women and how they came about their split.
"What practice?" Barry asked, stepping even closer to Caitlin. They were now almost face to face, closer than they have been in years. It made her wish they things were different, that Barry always stood this close. That was a different timeline though; in this one he was firmly in the grip of one Iris West-Allen.
"I still have my cold powers." Caitlin lifted her chin defiantly, only to see something flash across Barry's face. Relief? His bottle green eyes softened and he nodded.
"Good." HIs voice had gentled the way it usually was pitched when he spoke to her, soft and indulgent. "I won't have to worry about leaving you here defenseless."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Iris demanded, moving to stand between Caitlin and Barry, looking back and forth between the two of them. Caitlin merely raised an eyebrow at the other woman, knowing she didn't have to explain herself to anyone.
Parts of Caitlin were still Frost-like, and her personality was one of them. The other woman had a fearlessness about her that had rubbed off on Caitlin. Before Caitlin has been a somewhat reserved person who deterred to more demanding personalities, now she wasn't afraid to stand her ground. Now that she had more confidence in herself and the knowledge that she would still be able to hold her own in a fight, she wasn't about to back down when Iris threw a temper.
"Face it Iris, out of the two women in Barry's life, who has been used against him more?" Frost stirred the pot a little harder. "Who has more leverage in his life? His wife, or the only person who knows how his physiology works and understands his powers better than him?"
"Why you Frosty bitch!" Iris raised her hand to strike Killer Frost when several things happened at once. Barry grabbed Iris's arms to keep her in place. Caitlin and Killer Frost lifted their hands, cool mist fogging around them. Most surprising of all though was Cisco, who had his hand raised and glowing blue, just a foot away from the side of Iris's head.
"Woah! Everyone calm down!" Joe shouted. Everyone took a deep breath and stepped back, Caitlin, Frost and Cisco on one side of the room with Barry and Iris in the middle. Joe, Ralph, Sherloque, Nora and Joe stood on the other side of the room.
"Cisco, I thought you got rid of your powers?" Joe asked, confused. So was Caitlin; she was with Cisco when he injected himself with the cure.
"Just because I got rid of my powers doesn't mean I don't have the tech to replicate it for when it's needed." Cisco opened his palm to reveal a device more oblong in shape compared to the extrapolater, but otherwise looked exactly the same.
"You would use that weapon against Iris?" Barry scolded, but took a half step back when the long haired ex-meta looked at him, eyes fierce.
"Hell, I'd use it against you Barry if you ever threaten my girls in any way."
Caitlin couldn't hold back a soft smile, so very glad to have the man she considered her brother on the side of her and Frost. She knew Cisco was potentially burning a lot of bridges, but she also knew that in order for the team to grow, they would need to go through issues like this. Beside her, Frost smiled as well, blue eyes soft.
"Your girls?" Sherloque inquired, voice breaking the tension in the air.
"I've always considered Caitlin to be my sister. Frost is her twin, so she's my sister too." Cisco shrugged. "They have been through enough hell in the last few years to last anyone their entire lives, so yes, I am a smidge over protective."
Caitlin sighed and decided to move on with the day. She stepped away from the group of people, heels clicking on the tile floor. Easily she sidestepped Barry and Iris, waving a dismissive hand in their direction. She continued on, feeling the eyes of Barry and the others on her. Frost followed with one of her typical smirky sneers.
"We've got some more tests to run, so if you need either of us, we'll be in Caity's lab." Frost waved and disappeared down the corridor behind Caitlin.
Later that afternoon there was a meta call, basic mop up of a random bad guy. Frost decided to join Barry, Nora and Ralph in the field, to test how they worked together. Cisco was at the main console, monitoring things while Caitlin continued her tests. She was comparing her blood and genetic material from before the split to now, to see how the cloning and neural transfer changed her in any way. Outside her lab she heard the click of heels, and knew that Iris was approaching her lab. Caitlin sighed, pulling her concentration away from her research, even though she kept her eyes trained on the screens in front of her.
"Caitlin?" Iris knocked on the doorframe of her lab. "Can I talk to you?"
"Sure Iris." Caitlin did her best to keep her tone even. She turned in her chair to look at the other woman, waiting to see what she had to say.
"I wanted to apologize for earlier this morning." Iris perched on one of the other chairs in the lab, sitting for all the world like a scolded child who was forced to make an insincere apology. "I guess you can say I reacted badly to the news that you and Killer Frost split."
"Why did you react the way you did?" Caitlin honestly wanted to know. "Yes, she did some bad things when Savitar first arrived, but she's more than made up for it over the last few years."
"She's just a reminder of a time when I was scared, more scared than I had ever been before." Iris replied with a shrug, but Caitlin knew there was more to it than that. Time to poke the lion and see if she got any bites.
"Are you sure?" Caitlin said in her best doctor voice, gentle and unassuming. Iris folded her hands together and stared at the floor a bit before beginning to speak.
"Back when Barry first got his powers, you, Cisco and Wells were the only ones who knew what was going on. I could tell that there was something off, but I could never place my finger on it. When Barry began mentioning you, I thought that maybe he had found someone who he could be with."
Caitlin's heart did a little leap, remembering how Barry had worked his way past her defenses quickly, becoming a fast friend. Then when Hannibal Bates kissed her wearing Barry's face, Caitlin's small crush became a secret infatuation. One that lasted to this day.
"He always seemed to light up a little bit when talking about you. When Zoom took you, he was devastated in a way I had never seen him before. I told him then of my feelings for him, hoping to take his mind off of his worries about you. I only partially succeeded. He was with me, but his mind was on you."
Caitlin didn't know what to say to that. She knew that Barry had been worried, but she never would have imagined that Iris would be jealous of her. Iris was Barry's perfect ideal, the one woman who he held in the highest regard. No other woman could hold a candle to the love of his childhood. Not even a woman who had more in common with the man he was now compared to the man he had been.
"After we got you back, things seemed to return to normal. Then he created Flashpoint and everything changed. You got powers, I got a brother, and Barry found out that his Time Remnant from his fight with Zoom was trying to kill me and everyone else."
"Yeah, I can see how things would get crazy." Caitlin cocked an eyebrow, not really sympathetic. "After all, it's not like I wasn't going out of my mind with fear and losing grip on who I was."
Iris winced at that, but glossed past it. As she continued to speak, Caitlin wondered how someone could be so selfish. Yes, she had a traumatic experience, but so did Caitlin.
"Seeing you, one of my friends, side with the man who was trying to kill me hurt. Watching Barry fight one of his best friends was horrible. Then you just turned your back on us at HR's funeral and didn't come back once you realized Barry had gone into the Speed Force. We needed you then, but you didn't come back."
"I'm sorry Iris, I really am, that you think you are the only one who suffered during that time. That you think your life is more important than anyone else's. Did you stop to think how it hurt Cisco, living with the knowledge that if you lost, he would lose his hands up to the middle of his forearms thanks to me?" Caitlin didn't care anymore about sugar coating things, and she failed to see the glimpse of red outside her doorway.
"How about the fear that not only would Barry lose you, but me and himself as well? My fear that I was becoming the woman who terrorized Barry and me on Earth-2? That I was losing myself over to a power mad and cold woman who cared for nothing and no one?"
Shock was written all over Iris's face, tiny tears leaking out of her eyes. Part of Caitlin hated herself for causing anyone pain, but she knew she needed to clear the air with the woman who claimed she was the 'leader' of Team Flash. Please, more like the West-Allen show and sidekicks.
"But that isn't why you reacted the way you did, is it? I get the feeling that there is a bigger reason you hate Frost and dislike me."
"Fine. It's the way Savitar looked at you, with devotion and passion. Barry has never once looked at me that way. Savitar called you his Queen and gave you everything. Barry treats you different than everyone else, speaks to you in a way that he doesn't do with anyone else. Barry may love me, but he desires you."
Caitlin was floored. There really wasn't anything she could say to that. She sat in her chair, white lab coat over a dress the same color as Barry's old suit, staring at the wife of the man she's secretly loved for years. Caitlin blinked a few times and then took a deep breath.
"Iris, there is no way that can be true." Caitlin denied even though it hurt her heart to admit it.
"Actually, it is." Barry stepped out of the shadows, making both women jump. Caitlin's heart was racing a mile a minute while tears rolled down Iris's face even more, red flags rising in her cheeks.
"What?" The other woman whispered, standing to face her husband. Barry pulled back the cowl of his suit, face sad yet relieved.
"I do care for Caitlin, far more than I should." Barry admitted, refusing to look at Caitlin, eyes trained on his wife. "Something about her keeps pulling at me, calling to me. I've chosen to ignore it and follow my devotion to you instead. You are my wife Iris, but I think Caitlin is my soul."
Caitlin couldn't move. She was frozen in place, mind too numb to even think. She felt like she was trapped in a Twilight Zone episode. She was waiting for something, but she didn't know what. Frost decided to waltz in right then, breaking the moment.
"So, are we finally having that heart to heart, getting all the feelings and emotions out?"
"What are you talking about?" Iris asked, turning to look at the cold woman.
"Savitar told me that this happened in one of the timelines he visited." Frost shrugged, waving her hands at the screens before her. "He saw a timeline where Caitlin and I were able to split into individual people. He told me that in that timeline is where Barry would eventually confess his feelings for Caitlin, and that they would go on to do great things for S.T.A.R. and for science. I thought after his death, and with the timeline readjustment, that that future was lost to my Caity. Now though, I see that it is alive and well."
"So you knew how I felt about Caitlin?" Barry asked quietly. "That I would end up breaking Iris's heart?"
"Yes, and no." Frost answered solemnly, eyes sapphire dark and serious. "In that timeline Iris meets someone, someone who she knows even now. Eventually that man becomes the man she falls in love with and marries."
"Who?" Iris asked, hope in her eyes. Frost tsked at her.
"Now you know I can't tell you that, or I run the risk of messing up the timeline." Frost turned on her heel and began to walk out, tossing over her shoulder,
"I've done my part, the rest is up to you."