Chapter 4: Caitlyn

Caitlyn had just finished swiping her card on the door entry and entered the main lobby of her apartment complex when her phone buzzed. Pulling it from her pocket, she quickly hit the accept call button. "Hey Cisco, sorry I missed the party, but I had to take Dr. Stein's daughter, Lily, home. I bet it was fun to be able to relax and chat with all the heroes."

"Yeah it was cool hanging with everyone, celebrating a huge win against aliens. Not every day you can say that is it?" Cisco replied over the line. "You should have brought Lily to the festivities. I bet she would have loved to have met her dad's time-travelling team."

Caitlyn made her way over to the elevators, and shook her head. "Not such a good idea, actually, since apparently the team doesn't know that Lily even exists."

"What do you mean they don't know she exists?" She could almost see her friend's face as Cisco sighed over the phone. "Let me guess, another present courtesy of Flashpoint?"

"No, for a change, Flashpoint is not responsible for her existence." The brunette pushed the button for her floor and waited for the doors to close. "Turns out Dr. Stein met his younger self back in the late 80's, and told the young Dr. Stein to stop neglecting his wife. The young man took the suggestion to heart and poof, our Dr. Stein came back to the present to meet a daughter he never even knew he had."

"Wow, at least his change had a positive effect."

"It's great he has a daughter, but who knows what other effects are a result of her existence." The elevator doors opened and Caitlyn walked out onto her floor. "When he first told me about it, he was talking about going back to fix his error. He called her an aberration. But I don't think he'll go back now and change anything."

"Why not?"

Caitlyn dug her keys out of her pocket and began unlocking her apartment door. "Well for one thing, he got to work with her and know her, plus he told me that he's been getting sporadic memories of her. These memories just keep popping into his head. It's almost like time itself wants to keep him from erasing her." She entered her home and closed and locked the door behind her. "But aside from his new memories, if he were to go back and somehow not have that conversation with his younger self, then our present might be affected in a big way. Lily was instrumental in making that little device that Barry and Kara placed on all the Dominators before they took off."

"Just another example of what Barry kept telling me when I begged him to go back and save Dante. Time travel has consequences."

The brunette removed her coat and hung it in her closet. "Please tell me that you were at least cordial to Barry at the party. You're going to have to forgive him one of these days, Cisco. He isn't responsible for Dante not being in your life anymore. At least not directly. He's Barry, and you know he'd do anything for you. For any of us. He gave up his job at CCPD so that Julian wouldn't turn me in. If that doesn't prove to you what a true friend he is, I don't know what will."

"You don't have to worry, Caitlyn. I've come to terms with what happened and have forgiven him."

"It's about time." Caitlyn lips spread into a genuinely happy smile. "What made you have a change of heart? Was it because he was going to turn himself over to the Dominators to save all us metahumans?"

"No, actually, it wasn't that. And I'd like to think my forgiving him had a hand in keeping him from being so selfless and dumb. But it turns out that travelling through time is not as cool as I always dreamed it would be."

"That doesn't sound good." Caitlyn sat down on her couch. "Didn't you enjoy your own venture into the past?"

"Yes, and no. Spent most of it on the timeship. Don't get me wrong, the Waverider is totally awesome, and Felicity and I did get to play hero, saving Heat Wave, Nate and Amaya, but I also got to experience, firsthand, the results of what travelling through time can do to the present."

She heard the pain behind her friend's words. "What do you mean, Cisco? What did you do?"

"Well as you know, we went back to 1951 with the intent of questioning a Dominator. Mick caught one but before the team could get anything out of him, the alien and the team were taken by a young Agent Smith and his government cronies. After Felicity and I got there and rescued Mick and everyone, we decided we couldn't let the Government torture the alien, and figured if we showed him we were good guys, maybe, in the present they'd be forgiving and leave the Earth alone."

"Well since the Dominators decided to invade all over the world, I'm guessing it didn't go as planned?" Caitlyn silently drummed her fingers on the arm of her couch as she listened to her friend.

"When we got back to the present the one we had rescued contacted us using a device I kind of stole from his ship, and told us that Barry needed to surrender himself to them. Once we found out the exact details, Nate and I contacted our friend again, and found out that because we let the alien go, and showed proof of more metahumans than before..."

Caitlyn closed her eyes. "They decided we all needed to be exterminated, anyway. Something tells me that even if Barry had gone through with the deal Agent Smith made, they probably wouldn't have been satisfied with just Barry, right?"

"I guess, but who knows." The brunette could almost see her friend shrugging his shoulders. "They did drop the big bomb which if Firestorm hadn't pulled off the coolest trick ever, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now. But then again, we didn't give Barry the chance to surrender, so we have no way of knowing if his sacrifice would have been enough. After my second conversation with the Dominator, I realized when you make one change in the past, it ripples forward in unseen ways. The choice we made to set the Dominator free put everything into perspective, and I suddenly knew exactly how Barry's been feeling for the past two months."

"Well I'm glad you finally forgave him. Did you two have a chance to talk and clear the air at least?" Caitlyn kicked off her shoes and, picking them up, rose from the couch to make her way to the bedroom to get changed for the night.

"Yeah, we're good."

"Good. We all have too much history together. We're a family, and we can't be an effective team and defeat Savitar and this Dr. Alchemy if we're holding grudges." She dropped her shoes inside her bedroom door and made her way over to her dresser. "So did you get to meet the President?"

"Yeah, briefly. I could have stood up on the stage with everyone, Barry tried hard to convince me to, but I didn't feel like much of a hero, so I declined."

"Cisco…"

"No, really. It's not because of what happened in the past. I didn't really do anything other than be part of the support team. I might have vibed onto an alien ship…twice. Once to see what happened to Oliver and company, and the second to talk to an alien. And I did get to be a passenger on a timeship and fixed an alien spaceship, but that's really all I did. It's not like I used my sonic powers to take down aliens."

Caitlyn wished she could reach through the phone and give her friend a big hug. He sounded like he could really use one about now.

"Well, I just wanted to make sure you got home okay, wasn't sure how the city was faring with aliens having been on the loose. I need to text Barry, see if my interdimensional extrapolator worked and that Kara made it back to her Earth okay. See you tomorrow."

"See you tomorrow, Cisco. And don't be too hard on yourself – we won. The aliens are gone, and Team Flash is whole once again." Caitlyn pulled a pair of pajamas from her drawer, and suddenly remembered the note about Lily she'd put in her coat pocket. She'd written down some of the things about the young scientist that she'd learned, just in case Dr. Stein did go back and correct the past. She just felt the need to keep the young woman in her memory somehow.

"I know, you're right. Night, Caitlyn."

"Night, Cisco." Hanging up, she put her phone on her dresser, before walking back to her coat closet. As she reached for the doorknob, she noticed the envelope on the floor in her entryway. She'd been too preoccupied with her phone conversation when she'd arrived home that she'd missed it when she'd first entered. As she picked it up, she couldn't miss Barry's unmistakable handwriting. Knowing what he'd been about to do, she had a suspicion that this had been his way of saying goodbye. She knew the speedster well enough to know that while fast, he wouldn't have had time to express what he'd wanted to say in person before going off into space with aliens from another planet.

She debated not opening it, after all Barry was safe here in good old Central City, and not out among the stars, and probably would have come to collect it if he'd thought about it. She briefly wondered who he'd left letters for, and had a feeling that the events of the evening had kept him from thinking about them.

As she made her way back to her bedroom, the urge to see what her friend could have said to her was just too overwhelming. She sat down on the edge of her bed, gently pulled apart the seam along the fold and took out the letter.

Caitlyn,

I know you now have these powers that scare you. That you think they make you cold. But you are one of the warmest, most loving people I know. I think, instead of reversing your cold powers, there's a way for you to turn them into something good. Just remember the love in your heart.

Remember that movie night when you won the toss and made Cisco and I sit through Frozen. In the movie it was Ana, stepping in front of the Prince's sword which ended up being the ultimate act of true love, saving Elsa. How it made Elsa realize that it was love that could bring back the spring. You can do that too, Cait, I have faith in you. Don't lose faith in yourself. Keep hold of the love you have inside, let that be your guide.

You once told me that you and Ronnie were like fire and ice. Little did you know how true that would turn out to be. Ronnie may be gone and after what happened with Hunter, you feel like your heart will never warm up to another person again. That can't be further from the truth. In my heart, I know there's someone else out there for you, someone who will warm you up again.

The team is there for you, especially Cisco. You and Cisco, you were a team long before Team Flash came into being. Don't lose sight of that. Be there for each other. Lean on each other and be each other's anchors.

I also don't think I've ever thanked you, at least not enough. You've been there for me from the start. You kept watch over me while I was in the coma. You've fixed every broken bone, cleaned up all my scrapes and cuts, and even burns. Thank you for all of it. Thank you for standing by me even when I make stupidly bad decisions (we won't get into all the times you told me to not have clandestine meetings with Iris before she knew I was the Flash).

Thank you for being the voice of reason on the team, for being the best darn doctor and friend any speedster could ask for.

Promise me you'll keep the warmth in your heart, don't give up hope on happiness.

Thank you for everything.

Love, your friend,
Barry

Caitlyn sighed. While she appreciated Barry's thoughts, she didn't believe she would find love again. In fact finding love now scared her. She believed that Ronnie was her soulmate and he was now gone. Then she'd fallen for Jay, who ended up being the psychopathic Hunter Zoloman hell bent on destroying a multiverse of Earths. She couldn't trust her heart, not any more.

Caitlyn glanced at the blue light on the power dampening cuffs adorning her wrists. She hated the fact that she had to wear them, but it was necessary. Without them, the evil of the cold powers coursing through her was too strong a pull. She knew Barry meant well in the letter, but he didn't know how scary it was to sit idly by while a harsher, colder version of herself took over. She still remembered all the terrible things she'd said to Barry at that warehouse, and how because of them Cisco had spent the last two weeks giving their friend the cold shoulder all because of these powers that she didn't want.

She shivered at the thought of what might have happened if Barry hadn't been able to warm her cold heart in the pipeline last week when Killer Frost had come to the surface. She could still feel the frozen icicle she created with her own hands, ready to pierce the speedster's heart. But the look of trust in Barry's eyes, as he stood there daring her to kill him, had helped bring her true self back. She had known, deep down, he had only done what he did to prove to her that she wasn't the cold-hearted killer she was afraid of becoming.

She was extremely glad, now, that Barry hadn't gone into space. She had a feeling she was going to need the speedster more than ever in the future, both him and Cisco. Their support was going to be the thing that kept her from crossing back to the dark side. She smiled to herself, knowing how much ribbing she'd get if her friends knew she'd just compared herself to a Jedi knight.

Suddenly getting the urge to feel warm, she decided she'd take a shower before heading to bed. Picking up the pajamas she'd taken out earlier, she placed the letter from Barry on her dresser and then headed for her bathroom. Who knew what the future held. Maybe it did hold love and warmth for her, and thanks to the Dominators metahuman bomb being destroyed, she'd have a chance to find out.