(Follows and favorites are nice, but reviews really cook my rice. Also, you guys are delightful and I love reading your comments. Oh Jell-O Squares, get ready, this chapter is [hopefully] going to be fun to read. Hopefully. -Doverstar)

Earth-66's S.T.A.R. Labs was completely abandoned.

It had all the tech. It had all the space. It even had a few new rooms. What it was missing was people. Caitlin walked through the glass double doors, instantly thinking that this must be what it felt like when people swore their houses were haunted. She could've been a ghost herself. Leaves were strewn everywhere; cobwebs stretched across the welcome center's main desk, the rafters, the monitors. And the corridors leading to the Cortex were no better. The entire building smelled acrid, as if someone had dunked a rag in gasoline and wiped down every surface. Outside, they had noticed that unlike on their Earth, where just one of the towers was charred and dysfunctional, Earth-66's version omitted all three, only blackened stumps in their places.

Savitar hadn't said much to her since they arrived. Caitlin had laid out the plan for him in her typical all-business fashion: Get to S.T.A.R. Labs, settle in, and figure out the details of his new home—whether there was a fitting job for him close to the Labs, maybe a way to disguise his scars in order to avoid questions, and most importantly, whether this world needed the Flash.

Savitar did not seem concerned with any of it. He barely made a single comment; she couldn't tell whether he agreed with her ideas or not. Instead, the moment they entered the musty Cortex, he dropped his bag right on the floor, sped away and returned a second later with a bag of fried food. It was nice to see he hadn't just been antagonistic back on Earth-1; he really meant it when he said he was hungry.

When Caitlin gave him a look that told him with pinched eyebrows and pursed lips that the sight was surreal, Savitar said, as though she were the weird one, "I eat," and began unwrapping his burger.

Caitlin watched him chewing at hyper speed, and the first thought that came to her mind popped out of her mouth without her consent. "Did you...pay...for that?"

Savitar sat down in one of the chairs by the desk, propping his feet up. "Would you believe me if I said I did?"

Caitlin raised her eyebrows, showing her palms. "Just asking."

There was only the sound of rustling paper as Savitar finished off his lunch in the space of two minutes. Caitlin walked around the Cortex, switching the emergency lights on and running a finger over her old examination table, making a face at the dust it collected.

"Everything seems to be in working condition," she announced after a few more minutes of turning things on and plugging things in. "The particle accelerator explosion released a wave that was toxic to human life within the machine's surrounding area, but the pipeline where it actually took place is the only part of the building that's really damaged. All of this—the cobwebs, the rust—it's just due to neglect, inactivity. One of the monitors where the suit should be is cracked. And more than one lightbulb needs changing..."

Savitar crossed his arms. "So, what? Should I grab a mop?"

Caitlin glanced over at him, curls swinging, distractedly saying as she waited for her usual screen to boot up, "If you want. There's bound to be some kind of health violation—" and then she remembered who she was talking to. Savitar was looking at her with the expression Barry used when she babbled on about the technical flaws in the punchline of a joke. It was an expression that said, stop embarassing yourself. "Oh. You were being sarcastic, weren't you?"

Savitar stood, and instead of answering her he clapped his hands together. "Not that this isn't a very exciting step in our little journey," he said, sighing, "but all that food gave me the urge to go for a nice run. When you come up with something relevant for me to do with the rest of my existence, you let me know. I'm not going anywhere." He headed for the entryway. "Nowhere far, anyway."

"Wait, you need—"

FSHHH!

And he was gone. Spitting the hair out of her mouth in his wake, Caitlin huffed. "Comms," she finished dejectedly, staring at the exit after him.

With nothing left to do, she started cleaning.

Wind rushed past Savitar's face. The Speed Force churned and flashed behind his vision. Earth-66 became a blob around him, and he closed his eyes as he ran, sensing objects around him, avoiding collision with anything or anyone. No one could see him. Nothing could touch him. He was too fast. This Earth's air was sweeter than Earth-1's, but the smells and the colors were the same.

Not a full month ago, he had wanted to be a god. He was determined to be a god. Gods feel no pain. He wouldn't have to suffer through the memories of everyone he loved—everyone Barry Allen loved—rejecting him. Not if he was ruler of time. Not if he was a god.

But they had proved him wrong. Not 2024's Team Flash, no, they had still abandoned him. The present's Team Flash. The one that had saved him. He looked down at the Hammond Cuff as he ran, knowing exactly where Ramon's lightning bolt signature was carved against his wrist.

He had wanted to be a god, to be worshipped, so that he wasn't alone. Because they had made him alone. Broken. Joe, Wally, Cisco, Barry Allen.

But now they had flipped everything he'd believed on its head. He had tried to wreck them all, make them feel what he had felt for an eternity at their hands. And in spite of what he'd done, they had helped him? Didn't that make him wrong? Wasn't he wrong? Because by saving him, they proved that they were not going to forget him, the way their future selves had. They proved he wasn't alone, not exactly.

So he didn't need to become a god.

Barry Allen, the original, had told him, "You can have all that again."

Friends, a family.

He could have it all again if he was willing. And he wanted it, he wanted it. The part of him, the remnant part, the part that lingered, before the rejection. The part that was still trying to be Barry. It was aching and screaming for the life he remembered. That was why he had agreed to come to Earth-66. That was why he couldn't speak when Barry had told him not to screw it up. There was nothing he could say. He couldn't make any promises, because he didn't know what he was supposed to be now. But he wanted to try something, anything.

The bitterness was not gone. It saturated his tone and the way he moved, he couldn't get it out of his bloodstream. Not yet. Still recalled every detail of the day they had shunned him. He couldn't forget it.

But the pain didn't have to last. And here, in another world, he didn't have to see them every day. He didn't have to see Iris with him, with the original. He didn't have to see Cisco, Wally, Joe. He was free of reminders. He was supposed to be starting over.

Anger stabbed him. Starting over. Here? They wanted him to do...what next? Become the Flash, fight a few metas, try being a forensic scientist again? With the face he wore, the scars inside and out? It wasn't that easy.

That was probably why Snow had volunteered to join him. Help him settle. He knew her, he knew her so well—the doctor, the healer, she wanted to fix everything. She thought he could be Barry Allen, she thought he was just like Barry Allen. She thought it was closer to his surface than it was.

She was wrong.

She didn't know him. She wanted Barry—wanted him to be Barry. Not enough to treat him with equal familiarity, not even enough to treat him with the respect she gave the original. To her, he was surely just the copy of a salve she was desperately fond of, but someone had botched the recipe. Head high, hands steady, she took it upon her professional self to study his ingredients, trash his flawed formula and start him from scratch.

The things he had seen, the things he had been...you couldn't simply reverse that. Doctor Snow would be in for a surprise.

His thoughts were interrupted as a sudden wave of high temperature claimed the area he was speeding by.

BOOM!

A deafening explosion.

Savitar leapt through the air, momentum carrying him at least twenty yards farther than it should have. He was avoiding a splash of fire lashing out in his direction.

He raised his eyebrows, transfixed, as an entire skyscraper became engulfed in flames.

Caitlin was wiping off the demonstration board when Savitar returned. When she'd begun, she was stunned to see that they were an exact replica of the calculations the original S.T.A.R. Labs staff had left up—in celebration of their success—before the particle accelerator exploded on Earth-1. It even had Cisco's energetic, sloppy handwriting in the corner in red—S.T.A.R. Labs forever! Caitlin had cleared this phrase off last, feeling the room grow even colder as she realized that the Cisco that had written this triumphant phrase was dead. Wally had been right. This Earth was left wanting.

With the typical blast of air and a few scattered leaves fluttering in, Savitar interrupted her.

Caitlin whirled around, trying her best not to look like he'd caught her off guard. "You're—" She broke off, squinting. Savitar was covered in sweat. He smelled like smoke. "I-Is that...soot?" She pointed to his hands, his nose.

Savitar brushed a thumb across the bridge of his nose, rubbing it against a finger and glancing down at it. He flopped an arm out and let it slap against his side. "Looks like it to me."

"Why are you covered in soot?" Caitlin cautiously moved closer to inspect him, but Savitar turned his back to her.

"I found out your Earth isn't the only one holding metas," Savitar grunted.

Caitlin felt her heart drop for a moment, but she counted to ten inwardly. This was not something she wasn't fully prepared for. In fact, this was good. This was very good. If Savitar was to put his speed to good use, containing metahumans was the perfect outlet; they had learned that with Barry. This meant, more than ever, that every Earth could indeed use the Flash.

"What happened?" She reached for the bucket of tap water she'd been using to clear the demonstration board, soaking a fresh sheet of paper towel in it.

Savitar exhaled, sounding very impatient. "Mick Rory happened."

The rag in her hand slipped in surprise; she squeezed it out and offered it to him. "Heat Wave?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Is that what we used to call him?" He stared at the paper towel she was holding out for a moment, as if it might be soaked in vinegar rather than water. Finally he took it. "I forgot how young and cute we were." He began clearing off his hands first, which Caitlin found counterproductive as it meant there wouldn't be any clean portions of the rag once he started on his face. But she wasn't about to tell him that. "Yeah," he let out a chortle that spoke to his opinion of Heat Wave. "He was uh...he was playing with one of the buildings downtown."

"He blew up a building? Where is he?" Caitlin demanded. "Did you double-check the perimeter for stragglers? Why didn't you let me set up the comms—"

"Stop—stop." Savitar spoke at the tail of her babbling, loudly, drowning out her panic. When she was finally quiet, he paused in his washing and scoffed, "What are you talking about?"

Caitlin blinked. Twice, very quickly. Her head reared. "The people. The civilians, didn't you clear them out first?"

"First."

"Before you went after Rory."

Silence. He just stood there. He didn't look confused, he didn't ask for more of an explanation, he just stood there with a hollow, sleepier version of Barry's poker face.

"Oh god." Caitlin struggled to keep her voice steady. "Please tell me you got everyone out safely."

Savitar turned and began walking lazily up the dais to the workspace on the right of the entrance, glass walls distorting her view of him. He was examining the tech.

His careless gait turned Caitlin's innards to crystal. She could practically see her own breath as a cloud in front of her, stomach turning over at the ice cold fury that overwhelmed her.

"You didn't help them." She didn't know why she was so shocked. But she knew why she was fighting a lump in her throat—she was looking at someone who wore the body of a man who embodied her definition of safety, and all the people in that building had burned while he looked the other way. The lump was for them. "You saw people suffering, in danger, and you ran away!"

"Wait a minute, aren't you always the one telling Barry not to rush in?" Savitar turned around, head jerking back, mouth pulled down in the perfect picture of confusion. But she saw it was as sincere as styrofoam fruit.

She couldn't speak. The smell of smoke he'd brought with him made her want to vomit. After a moment, she thought she said something like, "They needed your help!" but the roaring in her ears was too loud.

"But Caitlin," he said, cocking his head at her. "It wasn't safe." He spread his arms, a horizontal shrug. "I had to go."

Caitlin didn't remember taking off her necklace. She heard it clatter to the dusty metal ground, felt the blizzard surge up her arms. Before she could take her next breath, she was blasting subzero air in his direction.

The force of it slammed the speedster into the computer resting on the table in that station. She heard the glass fold in on itself, watched him pick himself up. The world grew sharper suddenly and she knew her pupils had gone dangerously white.

He stood up, but she had already reached him, bunching the color of his stupid black shirt in her hand and pressing him against the back wall. An ice dagger formed in her right hand.

What stopped her was the smile.

He was smiling. He was grinning Barry's big, infectious grin, but this was different. It was the scariest thing she had ever seen. There was malice in the very shape of it.

"Welcome back, Killer Frost," he breathed.

Killer Frost. "No." Caitlin's icicle fell from her hand shattering to the floor. Echoes of her voice ran up and down the room as she forced the word out again, "No—"

Eyes on his grin, Caitlin felt herself regain control. She shoved the rage down, pushing as hard as she could, staggering backward and retrieving her necklace from the main floor. She couldn't. She couldn't do it again. Fastening her lifeline around her neck, the cold in her fingertips and her lungs died out. Heat pulsed through her. The world became closer, everything was thicker beneath her.

Savitar was standing where she'd left him. She was not at all displeased to see that his hand was bleeding, probably from the collision with the monitor, red oozing between finger and thumb.

Caitlin met his gaze, struggling to breathe.

Savitar turned his head slightly to the left, but his one functioning eye remained on her. "What made you think Rory was my problem, anyway? I didn't think we came here to give Team Flash a sequel."

He wasn't addressing her transformation. He had barely changed his tone. She felt bile rise in her throat as she looked at him. She didn't know how much longer she could keep it up, standing there.

"You're sick," she spat out. She couldn't think of anything else.

"Guilty." Savitar bowed to her. "Is this you saying you didn't bring me my meds? Doctor?"

Barry's voice. Barry's eyes, Barry's bleeding hand. But no one had ever looked less like him in that moment.

When she didn't respond, Savitar stepped amiably over to the nearest keyboard, tapping a few times with one finger, something she couldn't see from where she stood. A moment later, one of the monitors mounted near the north wall flickered to life, fuzzy, out-of-practice speakers stuttering sound through the room.

On the screen, the remnant of a skyscraper, churning smoke into the air, could be seen. A frozen autumn sky was deep blue, in stark contrast to the cloud of black trying to blot it out.

"...just joining us, this is Sandra Peterson, reporting live from downtown Central City. I'm here outside the city's largest residential structure, just a block or so away from Englewood, where it seems a freak explosion has claimed the building. Central City's fire department responded not ten minutes later, pulling in to contain the flames—only to find that the fire had gone out, seemingly on its own. Police and ambulance are still searching for casualties, but Chief John Diggle has reported that there was not a soul in the area when they arrived..."

Caitlin felt all the air she'd managed to gulp in leave her abruptly. The world spun for a second; a glove of pure relief slid over her entire body.

Eyes glued to the screen, Caitlin spluttered, "You—you—"

She turned to gawk at him. Savitar was still bent over the keyboard, but he too was fixed to the news report. Completely emotionless. The malice was gone, the grin was gone.

"You did save them." Caitlin whispered it. Her hand went to her snowflake pendant, clutching it as if it were an inhaler. "You stopped the fire."

No response.

"But..." Her breathing picked up again; the anger was back. "Then—why did you—"

"I wanted to see if you'd do it." Savitar's shoulders bobbed, rising exaggeratedly high, nearly touching his jawline. A small smile, the smile his duplicate wore when something was giving him boyish delight, appeared slowly. His nose even scrunched up. "I wanted to see you take it off." He held a finger and thumb—the ones covered in blood—a millimeter apart. "Just for a li'l bit."

Caitlin could not wrap her mind around him. She could hardly believe she wasn't dreaming just then. Everything, every detail of what had happened in that last fifteen minutes did not make sense to her. She just looked at him, feeling the crease of horror in every muscle of her face.

"What you just did..." She sucked in. "I was right. You are sick." She made her way to the exit—she had to lie down. She had to get away from him.

"Disappointed?" Savitar called, and she heard a rumble of satisfaction in the word.

Caitlin paused. "No," she told him. "I'd only be disappointed if I expected something better."

She didn't see it, but his grip on the edge of the screen's frame tightened considerably, turning his knuckles white.

"You are trying so hard not to be Barry Allen," Caitlin began, swallowing, "that you've forgotten what it means to be the Flash."

She turned out the lights before she left.

(Ayyy, all first days in a new town are rough. I can't wait to see you in the reviews. Next chapter coming soon! -Doverstar)