UFC: Flash AU Season 3

Summary: An alternate take on Season 3(Hint: I didn't like the original and thought it was the start of the downward spiral of the show).

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author's Note: The 7th story of my Unfinished Chronicles where I bring back abandoned stories for one brief airing.

Prologue

As usual when Barry appears at superspeed there is the accompanying gust of wind that blows everything about.

"Noooo," Felicity whines as her neat pile of paperwork is ruined. She was down in the Foundry working. It doesn't take much of a guess to know who is responsible for this. She looks up, away to chew Barry out only to see him completely on edge, fidgeting and then he explodes with information.

"So I reset everything. I put everything back to the way that it was before. Except some things weren't the same any more. Not even a little bit."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow down. Take a breath," Felicity instructs him which he does. "You were talking way too fast. Yeah. What happened?" she asks her friend.

"I really screwed up, Felicity. And this time I don't know if I can fix it," Barry says.

"Yeah, that's not really clearing it up for me," Felicity snarks. She gets to her feet and drags a chair over before physically shoving Barry down into it. "Ok. Start again...at human speed this time."

Barry rubs his face. Where to begin? "After my dad died I couldn't...I couldn't deal with it. It was too much...so I decided to change it."

"Change it?" Felicity queries, not understanding.

"I went back in time and saved my mother."

"Y-You what? Your mother's alive?"

Barry shakes his head. "No. No. You see when I did that I created an alternate timeline...called Flashpoint apparently. It seemed like a paradise at first. My parents were both alive but it wasn't what it seemed. It turned out it was a bad place. A really bad place so I had to reset it. Change it back...but things are different. The world isn't the same as I remember it."

Felicity just looks at him. Barry can do amazing things but this is just incredible. "Okay, let me get this straight. You ran back in time?"

"Yeah."

"Stopped the Reverse-Flash from killing your mom and then lived in an alternate reality where both your parents were alive?"

"Yeah."

"And then you restored the timeline, came back to the moment you left, and noticed that things were different?"

"Exactly."

Does that just happen when you travel through time? Do things just change like that?"

"No, I mean, not like this. Not on... I don't know. I don't know Felicity. I don't know what I'm gonna do," Barry says with increasing desperation.

"Okay, why don't you just run me through... walk me through what happened? And we'll, uh, we'll try and figure it out. So, um, what was so bad about Flashpoint?"

"There was a guy there called Alchemy. He was like a cult leader...and he was, um...kinda like Damien Darhk. You know wanting to see the world burn."

"Charming," Felicity says with overflowing sarcasm.

"Not in the least. Unlike Darhk he succeeded."

"What?!"

"Alchemy...I couldn't stop him and to cut a long story short he basically started World War 3. I had 30 minutes before the warheads hit so I did the only thing I could. Let Thawne kill my mother and reset the timeline. Only as I said things have changed."

"Like what exactly?"

"It started almost immediately after I got back..."

Barry stood on the porch, trying to figure out what Thawne's words meant.

"There we go. Things are back to how they should be. Well, for me, anyway. For you..." Thawne chuckles... "Well, I guess you'll just have to wait and find out."

"What? What does that mean?" Barry asks.

The Reverse-Flash doesn't answer. Only says, "See you sometime soon, Flash."

What was Thawne meaning?

Barry shakes his head, renewed grief threatening to overwhelm him. His parents were gone..again. He turns and heads for the door...only for it to open just as he reaches for the knob. His eyes go wide.

"There you are, Bear. Are you ok?"

Barry's mouth hangs open. "E-Eddie?" he stammers at the sight of a very much alive and well Eddie Thawne. It's only later he will notice a certain gold ring on the man's left third finger.

"Why were you so surprised to see Eddie?" Felicity asks in puzzlement. "He is your brother-in-law...sorta yeah."

"No. No he's not...or he wasn't. Before."

"He and Iris weren't married?" Felicity thinks Barry means.

"No. Eddie wasn't..." he trails off.

"Eddie wasn't what? Blond? A police detective? Living in Central City? Oh gosh, was he actually the Green Arrow instead of Oliver?"

"Alive, Felicity! He wasn't alive!" Barry snaps without meaning to.

Felicity's eyes go wide. "How?" she asks, sounding breathless.

Barry slumps down, the guilt of that awful memory weighing on him like a mountain. "He died stopping the Reverse-Flash. He shot himself and because he was Thawne's ancestor that erased the Reverse-Flash from history."

"But that isn't what happened."

"No. Not in this timeline," Barry knows...well kinda. Not exactly how it happened because how can he ask without revealing everything?

"Well that's good isn't it? Eddie being alive is a good thing."

"Yeah. Of course it is."

"Well you don't sound happy," Felicity notes. Quite the opposite almost.

"It's...complicated."

"Try me."

"You know the last thing I did before travelling back to save my mom was?"

Felicity shakes her head.

"Iris and I were telling each other how we...loved each other."

"Oh!"

"I kissed her and then ran off and now I get back..."

"And she's happily married to Eddie," Felicity can begin to understand where Barry is at.

"You know what else, that's the 2nd time I've erased sharing a kiss with Iris."

"Yeah, I hate it when that happens...which is a thing that has never happened to me so I don't really know why I said that and please God, stop me talking," she babbles.

Barry manages a small smile. At least Felicity hadn't changed. "It's not all good Felicity and I don't just mean my love life."

Barry then goes on to tell her all the other things he has noticed that are different. Felicity in her manner then tries to summarise it all up. "So Cisco's brother is dead, Iris isn't talking to Joe because he lied over her mother still being alive, there's some mysterious metahuman activity involving skin husks and there's a new guy at work you don't know who hates you."

"Pretty much," Barry agrees with the surmise.

"Well that last one doesn't make any sense. Everyone likes Barry Allen. You're like pudding. Everyone likes pudding."

"Apparently not everyone," Barry laments thinking of Cisco and this new guy(new for him) at work; Julian Albert.

"I admit Barry there are some issues there."

"And what if there's more?" Barry asks.

"Well, has anything here changed?" Felicity asks him.

Barry looks around. "No," he says with a sigh. "I mean I think everything seems the same, I think."

"Good," Felicity says with more relief than she expected.

Barry moves over to her computer. "Can I use...hold on," he says.

"Uh..."

"I'll be real careful," he promises as he speed checks everything. "I got it, don't worry. I got it."

Despite his words Felicity is very worried about her precious computer.

"Yeah, I don't know...I mean, everything looks okay," Barry is starting to feel a little relief only to have it crushed. "Wait. Who's that young boy with Dig?"

"No way. He didn't have a kid before?"

"No, he had a kid," Barry says, his voice sounding more desperate by the second. "He has...he has a kid," he corrects himself. "Yeah, it was baby Sara."

"Baby John," Felicity corrects him.

"No. Are you..." Barry says, his voice croaking. What has he done?!

"Oh, my God. It really can affect us," Felicity says in shock as the true scale of what Barry has done finally hits her.

Barry gets up and strides away from the computer. "Okay, you know what? I don't wanna know any more," he says, wishing this was just a bad dream and he would wake up any second.

"Okay, I know this is a lot of pressure but everything's gonna be alright," the blond woman says, trying to pep Barry up...and herself.

"I screwed up everyone's lives," the speedster states it as he sees it.

Yeah, well, maybe you should tell them," Felicity suggests.

"I'm not gonna tell them," he replies. "I mean, how is that gonna help? That's just gonna make everything worse. I mean... I don't know how to fix this," he admits the awful truth.

"Okay, well, you're gonna figure it out," she tells him in no uncertain terms. "If there's one thing I've learned from you, is that with you, anything is possible."

"Why? 'Cause I'm The Flash?"

"No. Because you are Barry Allen. And sweet, loving, kind Barry Allen that everybody likes, the Barry Allen who's just like pudding, can fix this. So go and fix this!"

"Yeah. Okay, you're right. Yeah."

"Now!"

"Right now?"

"Yes!"

"Okay, all right."

And with that Barry is gone with his usual whoosh!

Author's Note: So yep, if I ever did rewrite season 3 I would start with making Flashpoint a much darker world, only seeming to be Barry's perfect one on the surface and Alchemy would be a much darker villain who crosses over from Flashpoint into the altered world. I would resurrect Eddie and yes that means he and Iris got married sometime during season 2 and yes, I know that means coming up with a different way they defeat the Reverse-Flash at the end of season 1 but it can be done(I have an idea or two how). At least all this puts a major damper on Barry's efforts to hook up with Iris which I'm sorry just doesn't work. They grew up like brother and sister. It's creepy. Also maybe now he'll pay some damn attention to his friends instead of obsessing over Iris. God I really dislike Barry in season 3. Anyway thanks to everyone who has previously written reviews.