Okay. Now that we're back, you all get to see what changes I've made to the original timeline that differs from the show. I know a lot of you have been waiting for this, so without further ado, my co-authors are Brightburn1985 and ThomasMarieAmell2.0/
Disclaimer: I don't own The Flash.
As it turned out, Iris wasn't dead and Barry could now breathe easily. What had actually happened was that Eddie had managed to survive his encounter with The Reverse Flash and still erase him from existence. Eddie did this by aiming his gun a little lower…
Either way, Eddie could no longer reproduce, which would mean Eobard would still never be born.
With Eddie still alive, after some surgery, the two of them went off on their own to live their lives away from the dangers of Central City and The Flash. They stopped by every now and then, but they mostly spent their days in Coast City.
Joe was a little sour about that, seeing as Iris left pretty unexpectedly with just a note to give an explanation. But Joe did understand that Iris was her own person and capable of making her own decisions.
He was mostly upset about the fact he didn't get to walk her down the aisle when Iris and Eddie decided to elope before they left Central City. Nobody knew about it until they already left for Coast City.
This change worried Barry as there may be other things that changed with the timeline when he traveled back through time, which caused him to seek the aid of Felicity.
Barry sped into the Arrow Cave where Felicity currently was. "I need some help." Barry announced.
Felicity let out a shriek at his appearance before she managed to compose herself. "You'd think after over 2 years I'd have gotten used to that."
"Felicity can you help me?" Barry asked again.
"Sure, what do you need? Are you looking for something specific?" Felicity asked.
"I'm not sure what I'm looking for exactly. I'll tell you when I find it," Barry answered.
"That's helpful." Felicity said sarcastically. "Do you need some help?"
"No, it'll be faster if I look through them myself. And you're not going to be looking for what I am." Barry said, getting onto the computers. Moving between them, looking over every little information he could find in the span of a few seconds.
Barry ignored everything that didn't involve himself or his personal group of friends and co-workers. While there may be things outside of that circle that changed, it wasn't like he would recognize it if it did.
He checked the school records, medical records, police records. Anything that could relate to his friends. He even went as far as to check if his favourite supermarket was still there. Everything seemed to be in order.
Wait a minute. "Dante died?" Barry exclaimed as he saw the death certificate of Cisco's brother.
"That happened months ago. How do you not remember?" Felicity asked.
"That never happened before." Barry said.
"Before what exactly?"
"Flashpoint! When my father died, I wasn't in the right frame of mind, so I went back to save my mother from being killed and lived this whole other life where everything was perfect, but everything went to hell so I changed everything back. But things aren't the same as they were before I changed the timeline."
"Cisco's brother wasn't dead? What else has changed?" Felicity asked. "You wouldn't have come here if it was just a hunch that things had changed."
"Iris and Eddie. Eddie died, shot himself in the chest. Now, he's alive and living in Coast City." Barry explained.
"So, one person comes back from the dead…" Felicity began to say.
"And another is taken from life," Barry finished her train of thought. He was starting to see where this was going.
"Has anything else changed?" Felicity asked.
"Not that I can see. Everything here seems normal," Barry continued typing on the keyboard to see if there were any discrepancies with the original timeline. "Wait, who's that boy next to Dig?"
"His son. Why, he didn't have a kid before?" Felicity asked.
"He had a kid. He has a kid. Baby Sara," Barry informed her.
"Baby John," Felicity points to the child in the picture.
"Oh no," Barry moaned as he rubbed his head. Apparently he could even alter the gender of a child. He wasn't even sure how that would be affected by time travel.
"Oh my god, it even affects us," Felicity gasped in shock at the thought that her life may not be how it was before. That certain aspects of her life did not exist any longer.
"Alright, bring me up to speed on everything that has happened in this timeline since the year 2000." Barry said after getting over the initial shock.
So began a long lecture on everything Felicity could recall. Barry listening to everything. All the things they talked about seemed to align with what originally happened. Nothing life threatening popped up. No meaningful changes occurred. No more people rising from the dead or getting an early grave.
There was one point of interest. "Who's Julian Albert?" Barry asked.
"He's the Metahuman CSI expert you work with on cases. You're always complaining about the guy," Felicity said.
"I don't know Julian Albert," Barry informed her, shaking his head.
"Really? You've been working out of the same lab for the past few years." Felicity said.
"I do?" Barry asked.
"Think of him as the Draco Malfoy to your Harry Potter." Felicity stated.
"They're fictional characters." Barry pointed out.
"Well you always compared him to that snake." Felicity said. "You two have never liked each other. That's just a fact."
"He can't be that bad,"
"Barry, you are like pudding. Everybody likes pudding. Julian Albert is not everybody." Felicity told him.
"I guess we can put Caitlin in that pile as well." Barry mentioned.
"Are you kidding? That girl adores you. You're just too stubborn to realize that."
"Here we go again. I'm really not in the mood to talk about how people think Caitlin and I are in love. It's getting annoying."
"Hey, you're the one who brought her up." Felicity said in her defence.
"Irrelevant. Anything else you can think of?" Barry asked.
"Laurel came back from the dead, but she's different now. She's all evil." Felicity said.
"That didn't happen before. She died. We went to her funeral." Barry said in shock.
"We were all surprised as well. But we saw her, very much alive." Felicity said. "Did you have anything to do with that?"
"I don't think so." Barry said, but a flashback appeared at the front of his mind. When they unleashed the sound wave to stop the metas from Earth-2, Barry had run around picking up any and all metas he could find. He did see some familiar faces in his search. Barry didn't think of it at the time, but he could have sworn he saw Laurel Lance among the unconscious bodies.
"About a month ago. The metas from Earth-2. When I was rounding them up, I could've sworn I saw Laurel. But there were hundreds of other bodies I had to haul. Maybe in this timeline, I missed her and she got away before I could. The Laurel you saw could be her Earth-2 counterpart." Barry said.
"Thanks. I'll be sure to let the rest of the team know when they get back," Felicity said. She sounded a bit dejected at the news though.
"What's wrong? I thought you'd be happy?" Barry asked.
"I'm content. I mean, it's nice to know that our Laurel hasn't been changed so fundamentally, but it was nice to think that Laurel was back, even if she turned out like that,"
"Well she's still Laurel. She's gone through different things in life, but she's still the same person underneath all that. If it helps, don't think of her as Laurel. Think of her as a second chance at a new friend."
"But she's evil," Felicity pointed out.
"I think everyone deserves a second chance. Even if others think they don't," Barry said. "Thanks for everything Felicity. I'm gonna head back to Central. I'll call you when I get there,"
Barry ran out of the cave and arrived at the West household within the next few seconds. Keeping his promise, he dialled Felicity's number on his phone.
"What did you do? Take the scenic route? I expected you to call sooner."
Barry tried to dive right into his new life. It wasn't as easy as he'd hoped. Cisco seemed to be giving him the cold shoulder. Caitlin was trying to avoid him at every turn, which wasn't all that different, but these seemed different for some reason.
And that was on top of everything he was going through. He'd watched his father die twice in a matter of months. And after watching his mother die again, he had to beg his mortal enemy to kill her once more. There were times in the day that he wished he could just curl right back into his bed, or go someplace where he could be alone.
Sometimes he would speed out of wherever he was and go to the house he'd inherited from Thawne and just break whatever he could get his hands on in that house. Then he'd rebuild whatever he had destroyed. At this point, the house had to have been reconstructed from the ground up at least 4 times by now.
He could still see his parents' glazed eyes. Their bodies being riddled with bullet wounds. Then he could possibly see the bullet that was about to lodge itself into his brain.
Those were the really bad days, where his dreams were plagued with the image of his parents being shot. And sometimes he would dream that he was the one holding the pistol that shot them. Those were terrible that made Barry want to stay in bed all day with barely anything to eat.
The biggest change he had to get through was his new co-worker, Julian Albert. Felicity was right. He really did remind him of Draco Malfoy.
He was disagreeable in every sense of the word. Everything Barry did was met with suspicion or outright contempt. Nothing seemed to please the guy. Barry hoped with his mind free of any bias toward the guy from previous meetings, Barry would be able to get along with the guy. The same couldn't be said with Albert. The moment Barry walked into the room, he was met with witty comments and constant slams. It was like having to live with a person who believed they were better than him in every way.
"Barry, he's at Grant and Main. Cut him off at your next turn." Cisco said to him through the comms.
Barry was chasing some perp on a motorcycle. The criminal robbed the city's bank, stole two bags of diamonds before making a run for it. He managed to get a gain from Barry after recklessly shooting at the civilians he was passing by.
But for all his work, it was pointless as Barry was quick to get the civilians out of harm and dismantled the bike while it was still in motion. The bike halted to a stop and completely fell apart. The police were right behind them ready to lock up the criminal.
Barry quickly left now that everything was in the hands of the police.
Barry arrived back at STAR with a smile on his face. Today was a good day for him. He hadn't even thought about his parents… Flashpoint all day. Barry pushed that thought aside. "Well, that's another win for Team Flash."
"It was just a robber. Nothing too special about him." Cisco said dejectedly.
"A win is a win. You need to celebrate the simple things in life. If nothing else, just be happy we caught him and didn't get away."
"He was trying to out speed The Flash on a motorbike. Police were right on his tail. The guy couldn't have gotten far even if you weren't there." Caitlin pointed out.
"Way to rain on my parade Ms. Frosty. You just can never let me be happy can you?" Barry said.
"Someone needs to keep your ego in check, Fleet Feet if you're going to celebrate the capture of a petty thief. We deal with bigger threats than a jewelry thief on a weekly basis." Caitlin responded.
"Why can't you let me enjoy my moment? Everything is calm in Central City if the greatest threat of the day is a 'petty jewelry thief'. Just relax a little. No need to be so uptight,"
"Who are you calling uptight? I'm not uptight." Caitlin rapidly said. "Do you guys think I'm uptight?"
Nobody dared to answer that as they all looked away from the doctor when she directed her question to them.
"Why does everyone think I'm uptight? I'm not!" Caitlin declared.
"Caitlin, you're icing your computer," Cisco pointed out at her sudden outburst of power.
Caitlin looked down to see a coat of frost covering her desktop that was originating from her fingers. She immediately let go and the frost began to melt. Hopefully it wouldn't cause too much damage.
"I don't appreciate what you guys are saying about me." Caitlin took deep breaths to calm yourself.
"We're not saying there's anything wrong. It's just we think you've been a bit… stressed these past few months without a chance to relax. With how calm things are now, this may be our best chance to unwind." Joe tried putting it delicately.
"That's just a nice way to say you think I'm uptight. Just be honest Joe," Caitlin called him out on his words.
"Caitlin, we've all gone through a lot with Zoom and all the metas he brought with him. We're still trying to track some of them down. But everything is peaceful and I intend to enjoy it while it lasts, because I know it just means something big is coming soon, and we need to be at the top of our game." Barry said.
"Alright fine," Caitlin submitted. "Maybe I'll go home. Read a couple books I've been meaning to get to,"
"Exactly," Barry exclaimed. Happy that Caitlin seemed to be so acceptable of this.
Suddenly both Barry and Joe's phone alerted them of a message. The two of them took a look at the message to see what it was about. "We need to leave. A body's been found in the river." Barry announced.
"So what is this? The fourth husk we've found?" Barry asked Joe as they approached.
"Fifth actually." A voice corrected Barry.
"Julian," Barry said, recognizing the blonde man.
"I'll save you some time. The husk is human. What caused this, we still don't know."
"I'm guessing you have an idea," Barry said.
"It's not natural. I can tell you that much. I'll know more once I'll be able to get a sample to the lab," Julian responded.
Barry made a move to obtain his own sample to study, but Julian interrupted him. "Don't touch it. Until it's proven otherwise, this is my investigation. I'd like if you didn't tamper with my evidence,"
Barry reluctantly packed his kit, but when Julian's back was turned, Barry managed to snatch a sample at super speed and safely place it in his bag without Julian noticing a thing.
"I believe you should be on your way gentlemen." Julian bid them goodbye.
"How have I put up with this guy for so long?" Barry muttered to himself as they walked away.
"You've been saying that for the past two years," Joe remarked.
"Still as true as the day I said it," Barry retorted. "I just don't get what his problem is."
"Well, you're just the complete opposite of what he expects of his co-workers. But you're also the CEO of a company, so he probably just has no idea what you're doing in a job you're overqualified for," Joe said.
"Still doesn't give him the right to be a prick," Barry rolled his eyes.
"Just hang in there Barry. You know, you don't even really need this job anymore. You already make more money from STAR in a month than you do in a year at CCPD."
"I feel I'm putting my skills to better use at CCPD than at STAR. The most science I get from STAR is looking over the projects all my other labs are working on. Other than that, it's mostly just business. I should've paid more attention to my financial classes in school." Barry commented.
"Well, it's your decision. Just know you can quit at any time. Nobody would blame you if you decided to focus all your attention on STAR. It's the most logical thing to do."
"I like being a CSI. Being CEO is just a way to give our side project some backing," Barry said, talking about being The Flash as their side project.
Taking the sample of the husk back to STAR Labs, they set to work on finding out where it came from and what could cause such a thing.
"Well it's definitely human. There's no mistaking that," Caitlin reported.
"Any idea who it is?" Barry asked.
"Running it through the database. We'll get a match soon."
"What could have caused such a thing?" Cisco questioned.
"Who knows? Most likely, it's meta related, but there doesn't seem to be a reason for it. You said this was the fifth husk you've found?"
"Yeah, haven't been able to find a positive ID for any of them,"
"We'll find them soon. It should only be a matter of time." Caitlin said, facing towards the ground, trying to avoid eye contact with Barry.
Barry didn't see anything wrong with that. They'd been avoiding each other for years now. Not to mention he'd said he hated her right to her face. Said that he didn't care about her. He didn't mean those, but he did at the time.
They hadn't gotten a chance to clear the air between them yet, but for the moment they were both content to leave things as they are and talk later.
Barry soon left when there was nothing to do. His CEO duties kept him busy and there was a particular project about robotic prosthetic arms he was taking an interest in at the moment. It had the possibility of responding to the user's thoughts and gave a sense of touch to the user as well. It could be revolutionary.
Cisco was a little more observant of his best friend. Caitlin wasn't like her usual self. Now that he was thinking about it, it all really started when she managed to escape the clutches of Zoom. At the time, Cisco just thought she was reeling from the shock of being held captive, but now Cisco was starting to think there was something else to it.
"Are you alright?" Cisco asked.
"Yeah, why would you ask that?" Caitlin responded.
"You just don't seem okay. It's okay if you're not. We'd all understand if you're not,"
"I'm fine, I just got a lot on my mind lately,"
"Care to share? Maybe I can help you,"
"No, I'm not going to tell you. And you can't help me with this. It's personal and I don't feel comfortable telling you,"
"Come on, we're best friends. When do we not tell each other everything? Can you at least give me a hint?" Cisco asked.
Caitlin shook her head. She didn't want Cisco to know what she had been thinking, which were her rising feelings for Barry. Every time she saw Barry was a struggle to keep her bodily functions unnoticeable. She couldn't risk letting anything away that she had developed feelings for their resident speedster.
"I'll guess then. Does it have to do with Barry? With you, it usually has to do with Barry,"
Caitlin kept still at the mention of his name. Maybe a little frost formed on her fingers, but she didn't acknowledge it. Unfortunately, Cisco did notice.
"So it does. That's not a surprise. What's he done this time? Have you two finally realized your feelings for each other?" Cisco joked.
Caitlin sharply sucked in a breath of air and looked down at the ground in shame. Her face developed a red hue and steam rising from hands as a result of her ice evaporating rapidly.
Cisco's eyes widened in shock. There was no way. There was absolutely no way this could be happening right now. "No," Cisco gasped.
"I didn't say anything," Caitlin denied.
"Your face says it all. I never thought this day would come. I mean, I keep asking and I knew one day you would say yes, I just didn't realize it would be today. Yes!" Cisco shouted in excitement. "The day has finally come. Caitlin Snow is in-Mmph!"
Caitlin quickly covered Cisco's mouth before he could continue. "Would you shut up? No need to be so damn excited."
"You don't know how long we've all been waiting for this day. Me, Iris, Joe. The list goes on. When are you going to tell him?"
"Cisco…"
"No, no!" Cisco shouted in dismay. "This is the happiest I have been in a long time. You are not going to rob me of this. The past few months have been hell. You are not about to tell me you are going to keep this locked up in yourself. You are going to tell Barry you love him!"
"Cisco I'm so sorry," Caitlin shook her head.
"If you won't tell him, I will," Cisco threatened.
"Like he'll believe you? You've been saying this for so long, we've kinda become numb to it,"
"This is not happening! Over two years! It finally happens, and you're not going to do anything about it?!" Cisco shouted.
"I'm not," Caitlin shook her head, "I love him too much to risk telling him and he'll say no. I won't be able to take it if he says no Cisco. I just can't,"
Cisco was miserable. For the past few months, it was like walking in a daze. After his brother's accident, nothing seemed to make sense anymore. He and Dante may not have been close, but they were still brothers. They were family. They grew up in the same house, only a few doors down from each other.
Cisco did his job as well as he could but he just couldn't seem to put his heart into it. He showed up at STAR and did his part for Team Flash. He did research and prepared inventions they could use in future events and practised his powers.
But ever since Dante, nothing seemed right in the world. How could it? His brother was dead. Killed by a drunk driver. Nothing would ever be the same again.
Some days were just so hard to get through. It was like every memory he would ever make with his brother had been ripped from his grasp. There was nothing ever fair about this situation.
Cisco had been attending a support group for this and honestly he wasn't sure how that was progressing. And now Caitlin had finally come forth with the news that he knew from the beginning of their relationship. That she was in love with Barry.
But she wasn't going to do anything about it. After over two years of beating around the bush, one of them finally admits it, but were too afraid of the repercussions. Why couldn't it have been Barry who had the realizations? At least he would tell the truth and come clean about his feelings.
Speaking of Barry, he'd been acting squirrely himself recently, as though he had something to hide.
Barry showed up at his support group just as he was talking about how he always regretted the fact that he was estranged from Dante, and now it was too late to patch things up.
"What are you doing here?" Cisco asked. He was still feeling slightly raw from having to talk about his brother and dredging up past memories.
"I'm just trying to understand what's going on right now," Barry answered.
"My brother is dead. That's all you need to understand. And you won't go back to save him," Cisco reminded him.
Cisco had begged Barry to travel through time in order to prevent Dante's death, but Barry had repeatedly refused, saying there were consequences of time travel that none of them understood. That time wasn't something they could tamper with and hope for the best outcome.
On a subconscious level, Cisco understood what Barry was saying. That he didn't have any right asking Barry to change the timeline just for his own selfish reasons. Millions of people died on a daily basis. To the mass majority of the human population, his brother was just a statistic.
But Dante wasn't just a statistic to him. Dante was his brother. His family. His flesh and blood. And what was the point of having such an ability if you weren't going to use it? The timeline wasn't going to care if Dante survived. It was just one measly life that would be saved from an untimely death. What was wrong with that?
Cisco would have done anything to have one more moment with his brother. They loved each other. They lived just a hallway down from each other. They were never close, but they were family. And family was everything.
Barry was devastated. He was filled with the guilt of having caused Cisco's brother to die. Even if Barry hadn't intentionally wanted for Dante to die, he was still the cause of it happening.
Barry hated seeing Cisco so depressed. And to know that Cisco had outright begged him before to change the past to save his brother hurt Barry more than Cisco would ever understand.
Because that was him a few months ago. In a vulnerable state after the death of his father, he decided to be selfish for once and go back to save his mother and father from their fates, only to bring them down again because of him. In the end, he hadn't made anything better. His parents still died. Caitlin died. He was about to die if his speed hadn't kicked in when it did.
Was Caitlin there? He was starting to have problems recalling that timeline. Barry was pretty sure Caitlin was there, but now he couldn't remember. The only thing he could be sure of was that he did save his mother but had decided to change the timeline back to normal.
Still, he would be the greatest hypocrite for having saved his mother and damning the consequences, but denying Cisco the chance to be happy with his brother.
His decision made, Barry prepared for another time jump. This one a few months back in order to prevent Dante from ever getting in his car and therefore saving his life.
Barry was in the Speed Force, waiting for the moment where he would exit and enter a different time when he was pulled out and dropped on the ground.
Clothes were thrown at him from a man in front of him. "Put those on. You're going to want to blend in here,"
There talking to him was the real Jay Garrick. The one they saved from Zoom's lair. And his father's doppelganger.
Cautiously, Barry followed the elder speedster into a diner. "Where, or when, are we?" Barry asked as they sat down.
"We're in the 80s. But that's not why we're here. We need to have a talk." Jay declared.
"Why did you pull me out? I was just about to-"
"Change the timeline, I know," Jay interrupted him. "And I'm here to tell you it's not going to work. I know about your little time travel incident. I could feel it. And I could feel it when you came back. That's why I'm here right now."
"You don't know what you're talking about," Barry shook his head.
"Oh, I don't? Believe me Barry, I have been in your shoes before. I was young. I thought I could change the world with my powers, but I soon learned the consequences we face. I'm trying to make sure you don't make the same mistakes I have made,"
"I don't understand what you're talking about. Something happened with the timeline. Things changed that weren't supposed to. I'm just trying to fix those mistakes," Barry insisted.
"You're familiar with the time boom? I believe it was explained to you?" Jay asked, which Barry nodded his head as he recalled Eobard talking to him about that. "Well, let's try a more visual representation. Humour me here. Let's say this cup is the timeline. When we use our speed to go back to change the timeline," Jay vibrated his hand with the cup until the cup broke off a piece, "a new timeline is forged. But when we try to fix what we made," Jay tried to place the broken chip back where it once rested, "you never get exactly the same thing again." Jay displayed the cup that now had cracks all over despite being in one piece again.
"So what are you saying? These alterations I've found, they're not a mistake?" Barry asked.
"No, simply repercussions, cracks if you will, in the timeline that have been caused by the use of our speed to manipulate the timeline," Jay responded.
"So it's still my fault? All of those repercussions are still my fault? I don't know where you are going with this, Jay?"
"You can't go back because the more you do it, the more cracks there will be. There will always be repercussions for when you travel through time. It will continue to the point where you won't recognize what's real or not." Jay told him. "Now that you've created this timeline, there is no changing it anymore. If you try, it will only create more differences. The life you have now is one you can still remember. Be grateful nothing larger has been changed. We're not gods Barry. We're men. Men who have been given a great gift, but we don't get to decide who lives and who dies. There are just some things that are out of our capability to change."
Barry didn't like this. In fact he hated it, being told what to do. But Jay wasn't going to allow him to change the timeline to suit his original life. But Jay was right about one thing. The life he currently had was one that closely mirrored his previous life. But it was just different in more meaningful ways than he would have preferred. Barry needed to accept that this life was what he'd been given, and there was no way he could change it without damaging it further.
So Barry learns what's different with the timeline and Jay shows up before Barry can alter the timeline again by saving Dante. We'll be seeing the team's reaction next week. It's going to be legen- wait for it- dary.
I'll see you all next week and sorry if this came out a little late for everyone.