maskormenacelogs | Woke up sweating from a dream

Entry tags:

Woke up sweating from a dream

WHO: Harrison Wells + folks
WHERE: Heropa 10, around town
WHEN: June 18 and beyond
WHAT: Road Not Taken aftermath catch-all
WARNINGS: Grumpiness and introspection, nothing else yet

Most people, upon waking, experience a certain moment of existential uncertainty—who am I, how did I get here, what time is it, and so on—and usually the answers arrive so quickly that the moment passes unremarked. That's usually how it goes. Unless you've just spent a week as someone else.

When Harrison Wells wakes up on the morning of June 18th, he just stays where he is and considers the merits of doing that for the foreseeable future. The events of the past week tidal wave through his mind, all at once, then one right after the other. Every conversation, every encounter, every heroic act—god, he should call Will, he must have no idea what just happened, and had he actually helped stop an assassination as the Flash? Had he actually called Barry Allen his nemesis? And Hunter—he wonders absently if Hunter is going to try and kill him even more now. He probably has several people to call.

Anyone who encounters Harrison for the next week, probably the whole rest of June, will find him oddly thoughtful and subdued as he goes about his (ordinary, non-speedster) days, and steps up his powers practice in a big way. Anyone who heard about him or met him as the Flash can now meet the Real Harrison Wells, how lucky. Come help him eat the mountains of leftovers and cookies at Heropa 10, now that speedsters don't live there anymore.

[PM or hit me up at

voxmyriad for a starter or add your own, especially people who ran into Flash!Harrison or who spotted his name in the Majority Report and have some questions about that, or people who still think he's the Flash, etc. He's definitely not going through Speed Force withdrawal, no matter how snappish he is, shut up and mind your own damn business. He is also definitely not thinking about heroism and what it means to involuntarily be one for a week, a good one at that, and then suddenly wake up and not be one again.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Jesse tumbles from the bed, hitting the floor with a thud. Her back feels like it’s on fire, in so much pain it’s hard for her to breathe, and for a moment she’s just a little muddled, not sure what’s going on. But memories of the past week come rushing back, as she forces herself up to her hands and knees.

Speedster.

She was a speedster.

More than that, she was a superhero. Jesse Quick: speedster. Foiling bank robberies, stopping criminals, and eating her body weight in food.

There’s an odd sort of emptiness where the Speed Force used to be, but she doesn’t have a chance to dwell on it, to pinpoint exactly what it is, what it means, because there’s a throb of pain through her back and she’s doubling over with a strangled keening sound.

She was a speedster.

Which meant for a week she’d been wingless. And it wasn’t the way her dad’s power worked, with the wings temporarily blinking out of existence. She literally had never had the ability to fly. Never had wings.

And now she’s growing them back.

The next pulsing throb of pain through her back is intense enough to make everything go a little white at the edges, and there’s no swallowing the scream of pain, fingertips digging furrows into the hardwood floor and tears welling up in her eyes.

It hurts worse this time, she thinks.

There's nothing quite like hearing the voice of your child lifted up in pain. Harrison sprints up the steps to her bedroom, acutely aware of how slow he is doing it, and that he's a little out of breath once he's at the top, there's an ache there that shouldn't exist, but he can't think about that now.

Usually he would knock, but not this time, he pushes her door open and it takes every ounce of concentration not to rush over and grab her. He needs to cling to the doorframe to keep himself far enough away, because she's, she's growing her wings—oh god. He hadn't seen this last time—and if he touches her, they'll disappear. And this might start all over again.

"Jesse, baby, look at me, just breathe, sweetheart," he says, hoarse, almost begging as he sinks down to his knees to be on her level, staring at her back in horror. "Just breathe. I can't—it'll be over soon." He hopes. He has no idea how long it had taken the first time. She hadn't ever wanted to talk about it, and now he knows why.

Jesse looks up at him through a curtain of messy brown hair. “Daddy.” Her voice is plaintive and so, so filled with pain; she lets out another ragged sob and doubles over. It’s hard to think, hard to breathe, but she tries to do as her dad instructs, gasping through the pain. Tears patter silently down onto her hands, the furrows in the wood. All she wants is to fling herself into his arms, to hug him, but she can’t. Not yet. Because his power would just make them disappear and then she’d have to start all over again when he let go.

But god she wants her dad.

Swallowing, she tries to talk. She hadn’t told him about what it was like, growing her wings the first time. Hadn’t wanted to worry him. But now he’s seeing it firsthand. He needs to know. “It takes -” she breaks off with a whimper, god it hurts, she hurts, it’s so much worse than before... “takes longer than I’d like.”

Anything would be too long.

"Look at me, Jesse, look at me, talk to me, tell me—" He flounders, searching for a topic that will distract but won't bring her down or upset her.

"The experiments in the garage, the graviton research, I know what it is, look—" He does the only thing he can do that isn't going to cancel out her powers, he puts out a hand and lowers the gravity around her, and now the weight of her growing wings won't be as much weight. It's a little thing, but it's something.

He doesn't have his sound-dampening tech with him right now either and he winces, listening to every little crack and tear as the feathers begin spreading, it's a horrible wet messy sound and not something he's ever going to forget. And for a moment he hates this place, he hates everything that's brought them here more fiercely than he'd thought possible.

She does, as much as she can, even though she hates this, hates that he’s seeing this. He’s her dad, and he’s always protected her, taken care of her... This has to be tearing him apart. And she can’t even hug him. She watches him put out a hand, feels the gravity around her shift, the weight of her growing wings easing a little. She breathes a shaky, sobbing little laugh. “We weren’t sleep sciencing.”

They just hadn’t remembered the experiments because they hadn’t BEEN those people. Hadn’t needed those experiments in the first place. It’ll be more interesting later.

After. Then she can start wondering how it happened.

And she watches him, watches the way he winces and realises with a sickening sort of lurch that he’s not got his sound-dampening tech on him. Oh no. How much worse does this sound to him? Her stomach turns, and only part of it is the pain. The rest is that she’s putting him through this, that he’s having to listen to her wings re-grow in a way that can’t be... pleasant. “I’m sorry.” It’s all she can say, whimpering out the words through another sharp throb of pain through her back.

"No. Jesse. It's not—you don't have to apologize, it isn't your fault, you'll be fine." He casts around desperately for something, anything to talk about that will distract her from what's happening to her right now.

"Do you remember the lake we took you to, during your first summer vacation?" He's creeping a little closer now, not close enough to brush her with the edge of his power-damping field—god, the last thing he wants is for this to take any longer than it has to—but maybe close enough that she'll feel less alone. "Your mother and I were so proud of you for making it through the entire school year. It seems silly now, I know, but we just, we didn't know how you'd react to be around so many other kids. You were so smart, even at that age. We knew you'd be the smartest kid in your class, no question, but you got along so well with the other kids. We were so proud of you."

She can feel the edges of his power field brushing at her, not enough to affect her, really, but just enough that she can feel what’s almost like... numbness, but not really (it’s hard to describe. Especially in the middle of re-growing an extra set of limbs). And it helps, oddly enough. Not that she needs it. He’s here.

And doing everything he can to distract her. She breathes another laugh and nods. It had been beautiful, and she still remembers watching her mom and dad, the way they’d looked at each other, the sunlight catching her mom’s hair as her dad tucked a few strands behind her hair before stealing a kiss. The way her mom had grinned at her dad before knocking him over in the water so he was soaked. They way her dad had scooped her mom up after, dunking the both of them even as her mom laughed and protested, clinging to his shoulders.

It’s a hard memory to forget.

“I can still hear the way Mom laughed,” she tells him, voice tight as she continues to ride out the agony in her back. “And I rode on your shoulder back to the car.”

It's a hard memory to forget, and it's a good memory to pull forward to try and distract her from this very real horror. "Yeah, yeah you did, just on the one side," he says, smiling, laughing a little even as his eyes keep moving to her wings, gauging their progress. They look terrible, bedraggled and ruffled, possibly even heavier than they are ordinarily.

"You balanced, just on one shoulder, that's how you climbed up, I never knew why."

He'll comb them out, he decides at once, they figured out just a few weeks ago that he can touch her wings as long as he doesn't touch her, and he's going to comb her wings out. No matter how long it takes. He shifts back to his feet, puts a hand out to keep her from turning to follow him, then moves slowly and carefully around to her back, crouching and reaching out to set an experimental hand on the ruffled feathers. They twitch, but they don't disappear and he lets out a quiet sigh of relief.

"What else do you remember? What do you think about when you think of Mom?"

“It seemed like a good idea at the time, I think.” She huffs a laugh that turns into a soft, choked cry of pain. She doesn’t really remember why she did it. Just that she’d been determined to perch on his shoulder. Just ONE. Her mom had laughed, and taken a photo.

She starts to try and move, instinctively, to follow her dad, but he holds out a hand and she stills, waiting. He has something in mind, it’s just a matter of what it is. And then she feels a hand settle lightly onto one of her wings. She lets out a relieved little sob and closes her eyes, focusing on that. It’s not a hug, she can’t hug him yet, but the weight of his hand is soothing. Reassuring.

Her back is throbbing in time with her heartbeat, almost, and as bad as it hurts it’s a good sign. Means it’s almost over. That her wings are almost fully re-grown. Just a little bit longer... “How much I miss her,” she murmurs softly. “How much she loved us. The way the two of you looked at each other.” She can’t help but smile a little. “Her dabbing frosting on your nose from your birthday cake.”

"You were like a parrot, perching up there." He still has that photo, back home on Earth-2. It's one of the pictures of Jesse in his office, and more than one visitor has remarked on it.

He keeps his hand in place, starts carefully straightening feathers with the other. They really are a mess, but being able to fix them is going to mean a lot to Jesse, and it will mean a lot to him, it's a way to help her. To ground her out of the pain and back in the real world. The memories are helping too, he thinks as he listens.

"I'm glad you remember her," he says quietly, not loudly enough to interrupt, just adding to her thoughts. "I was so worried. That was one of the things I worried about. You seemed so young, I was afraid you wouldn't remember her after a few years. Some things, I knew you'd remember, but the small things like this, I didn't know."

It's easier than he'd expected to focus on straightening feathers, grooming them into place, and dismissing how distressingly wet and sticky they are. He tries not to think about how she'd managed the first time. She'd never talked about it.

It helps, it helps so much. The memories, too, talking about her mom with her dad is always important, always something good, but the weight of his hand on her wings is a physical thing, giving her something to focus on besides the pain throbbing in her back. She can feel him carefully straightening her feathers. They’ve got to be so... wet and sticky and it’s not pleasant; she knows, she’s all too aware of it herself, can feel it, had been left to deal with them on her own that first time.

And even though she hates that he’s seeing this, HEARING this... she’s really glad he’s here.

“I was scared of that, too,” she tells him softly. Even as young as she’d been, she’d been aware of that possibility, to some degree. There had been a night, shortly after, where she’d closed herself in her bedroom, sobbing, and writing down everything she could about her mom, in her messy 9-year-old handwriting. “Scared I’d forget her.”

Caitlin has all but been in hiding from the people she knows from home. Harrison was the Flash, Barry was Zoom, Eobard was very distinctly not like the man she knows. Being around Eddie had made her chest ache with sadness. And Hunter seemed to be some version of his Earth-1 self. None of them except Eddie knew her as her, which has been a crushing feeling all on its own.

The world seems to be righting itself, though, as much as it could here. Harrison is the first one she's talked with since... everything. She'd seen his name in the Majority Report, though it didn't surprise her. Not with how he was as his world's Flash. Heroics were just part of the job.

She isn't having a bad day today, that's not why she's going over to Heropa #10. The message says something about apologizing, though she can't imagine what Harrison feels compelled to apologize for. She knocks on the front door and waits.

There have been several people Harrison has wanted to talk to, not always to apologize but certainly to clear the air: he was never the Flash, he isn't even a speedster (and that thought aches in a way he doesn't want to think about) and he's certainly no hero. He is, however, full of nervous energy he can't explain away, so when the knock comes, he's out of his chair and crossing to answer it only a few seconds later.

"Snow. Caitlin." And he doesn't actually wait before reaching out to set a hand on her shoulder, and look, it does just what it used to do. Also neatly veiling the roiling feelings inside him as he tries to come to terms with everything that had happened. "Come in. Are you hungry? We have. A lot of leftovers."

There's something under the surface here, nerves and hurt and something else, that she can feel the minute he moves into her sensing field, a scant few seconds before the door opens and his hand rests on her shoulder. With the touch, Caitlin feels like a wall has been built around her mind, sealing others' emotions out and keeping hers in. It's a relief, proof-positive that things are coming back around to normal. Well, normal for here anyhow.

She smiles when he calls her Snow, quickly followed up by her first name. She has to wonder just how much of their conversation he remembers. "Two speedsters in one house. I can imagine how stuffed your refrigerator is." As she steps inside, she slides an arm under the one that touches her shoulder, a brief one-armed hug.

It doesn't need to be brief. He'd rather keep the contact. Yes, usually he's a little touch-averse, but it's grounding. "I'm just glad one of us organized it."

And the kitchen does in fact look like they're getting ready to host about fifty people: a huge basket of fruit on the table, boxes of cookies, the refrigerator is organized but a solid wall of plastic storage containers and pans of lasagna. "All of this would have lasted about three days last week." And there's something behind his voice, a little anger, a little pain.

"...Jesse grew her wings back two days ago." And that has a lot of pain in it. It's probably for the best that she can't feel what he's feeling right now.

She's about to comment on the food, about how he could probably take some over to Barry. They both know he'd be happy to take food off Harrison's hands and out of his fridge. But that train of thought is lost when he mentions Jesse and her wings.

"What?" There's an edge in her voice, more concern than anything else. She turns quickly on her heel to face him, her expression pinched with worry. "Why didn't you ca—" Call me. That's not the point now, it's not. There isn't much she'd have been able to do, aside from give Jesse something for the pain.

And Harrison. She comes to that conclusion quickly. "You couldn't comfort her. Because your powers were back, too, and it could have made the process start all over again." Caitlin takes a deep breath, before stepping closer to him and pulling him into a real hug this time.

"I'm sorry, Harrison. I can't imagine how much it must have hurt, to hear her in pain like that."

Yeah, the real speedsters could probably help them out of the bind they're in.

He stands still as she comes closer, and leans into it as she hugs him, letting out a hitched breath as his arms fold loosely around her back. "It wasn't—there wasn't time, and nothing—she's fine now, but all I could do was watch, and listen." That comes with a full-body shudder, and he hugs her a little tighter as his mind replays all the horrible little sounds that accompany a set of wings forcibly growing out of someone's back.

"I hated this place. For doing that to her. For keeping me from helping."

As he pulls her tighter, as that shudder runs through him, she starts rubbing slow circles on his back. She doesn't need her ability to know what he's feeling. It's plain enough, especially when she considers the fact that Harrison rarely shows things like this. And it's twice as worse, with his enhanced hearing marking each sound on his mind indelibly.

"You're right to hate it. I'm so sorry."

She hates this place almost every day, even just for a small portion of the day. It's easier, with him and Jesse and Eddie and Barry (...and Hunter), but she still struggles. How much would she hate it if she had a different power? No sense in playing what-if. She'll hold onto him as long as he needs it, letting him let go first.

It doesn't take long, all told, before he's letting out another shuddering sigh and taking a steadier breath, and straightening, one hand coming up to rub the back of his neck where the tension lives.

"We should have called you," he admits. "Neither of us thought of it. I'm sorry." And it's unusual enough that he offers apologies, but he's spent a week as someone who has no issue with admitting when he was in the wrong and apologizing for it. Maybe some of the Flash has rubbed off on him. "But I'm able to touch her wings as long as I don't touch her, and I brushed them out for her, and she's...she's back to normal now. We both are."

And it's wretched. No speed, not a trace, not even the possibility. He laughs, short and a little cracked. "I understand Trajectory a little better now."

As he straightens, Caitlin draws her arms back, takes a step back. Giving him a little space while staying close enough for him to keep his other hand in contact with her. She can only imagine the state he would have been in in the previous two days. It's likely another reason they might not have reached out.

"It's fine, Harrison. You don't owe me any apology. I'm just sorry that Jesse had to go through that alone. That you had to go through that alone." If she had been here, she would have had to stick close to him. No doubt, the pain and the emotions tied in everything would have instantly given her a migraine. And she would have been less effective for the both of them.

"And how is that for you? The sudden lack of Speed Force."

Harrison takes a breath, lets it out slowly. It's still tempting to lie, to dismiss it, but these are allies, they're friends, Caitlin might understand better than most.

"Challenging," he admits after several moments. "I always wondered why Barry felt so useless without his speed. Why Jay hid when he lost his." Not that 'Jay' had ever really lost his, but now Harrison knows he really had reacted correctly. Just like someone might react who had lost their speed.

"He'd lost his speed once before," Caitlin says. "Barry, I mean. We had a meta who fed on electrical energy, and Barry had been back to 'normal' after encountering him. He was..." She shakes her head, sighing. "He was desperate to get it back. Even willing to electrocute himself to see if that would jump-start it."

She could remember arguing with him, saying that she couldn't do something that she knew would harm him. Just as she'd argued with Eliza over Velocity-9. And in the end, she caved anyway, both times, in attempt to save someone else.

"I'm just going to put it out there now: no Velocity-any-number." It's a terrible attempt at a joke.

"Wouldn't work." He shakes his head, arms folded, shoulders tight. "Now that I know...the difference...I know the V formulas never connected someone to the Speed Force if they didn't already have it. They just gave someone speed. It isn't the same."

The Speed Force is so much more than just running fast. That's what he misses, that sense of connection to something larger than what he knows, and that isn't something a drug will get back. He'd never really had it to begin with.

"I'll be fine," he says after a few moments. "We both will. It's just. An adjustment. That we're making."

[Eddie knows he's been a total downer for the past while - and he can still feel the weight of it, what might have been, sitting somewhere in his chest and aching like a physical thing - but it's getting better. The truth is, everything is a little better now than it had seemed before, he feels free and justified in a way he hadn't before.

The only problem is that he'd been buried so deeply under the crushing weight of depression, the constant agonizing and going over and over and over what he could have done differently was distracting enough that he can't exactly remember who all he might have burdened with it. So he's making a point of going to all of his friends from home, contacting them and checking in, ready to apologize for how he'd been if any of them need apologizing to. Harrison, he respects enough to come see in person, particularly.

Taking a deep breath, he knocks on the door to Heropa 10, lips pressed together, fidgeting slightly until Harrison comes to the door.]

Hi. How are you?

Edited 2016-06-23 04:21 (UTC)

[It doesn't take long. Harrison has been full of jumpy, nervous energy ever since the Speed Force disappeared on him, and he answers the door within a few seconds, and then frowns in surprise. Of all the people Harrison has been listing off to contact, clear the air, he hadn't thought of Eddie. They hadn't talked while Harrison had thought he was the Flash, had they? This must be about something else.

He stands back to let Eddie inside if he'd like to stay a while.]

Good as I can be after all that. I hope you're hungry.

[Everyone who comes to Heropa 10 gets food right now. There's a lot of it. Jesse and Harrison had been cooking for two speedster metabolisms.]

[Harrison looks a little wary when he opens the door, but maybe a little tired, too. Worn down. Eddie knows that feeling all too well, so he offers Harrison a smile that's a little ragged around the edges. It's a relief when Harrison pulls the door open a little wider as if offering him to stay a while, and says he hopes he's hungry.

A little, breathless laugh escapes Eddie, and he shakes his head. It bodes well, he can't have been too much of a bother with Harrison, if he'd spoken to him at all.]

Well, I did skip breakfast this morning, so yeah. A little.

[Stepping inside, he lets Harrison close the door behind him and licks his lips nervously.]

So. I am so sorry if this is weird, and awkward, but I'm honestly not sure if we talked during...well, whatever happened recently. A lot of it's a big blur, so I just wanted to check that I didn't say or do anything embarrassing.

Well then, Detective. You are, pardon the expression, in luck.

[He's about to head for the kitchen when Eddie starts, well, apologizing, which roots him to the spot instead. He listens to all of it without interrupting, arms folded, still with that concerned little frown.]

You didn't. Not to me. I was. [He gestures vaguely with one hand, trying out syllables, attempting to find a way to say it that wasn't just—]

I was the Flash.

[Wow. It just sits there. Harrison looks like he's going to add something, then turns abruptly and starts for the kitchen again, leaving the words lingering in the air behind him.] But I don't think I ran into you last week. What happened?

Just Eddie is fine, I promise.

[The smile he offers is a little weak, but it's an attempt, and he feels a little better for it. When Harrison says he didn't talk to him during the whole...thing...he breathes a sigh of relief.

He's about to go on, to make some self-deprecating comment to try to give the moment a little levity when Harrison says he was the Flash. Eddie's breath catches, and his brows raise.]

Oh.

[Eddie is a detective for a reason - he might not be a scientist, a genius like Harrison or Cisco or any of the others, but he is very perceptive. Good at reading people. Even with someone as inscrutable as Harrison, it's easy to see that something about having been the Flash is bothering him. That something's worked its way under his skin and is eating at him.]

I can't tell if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

[He leaves it at that, open-ended, suggestive, an option but not a demand, and moves on to his own issues. Which distracts him but not entirely in a good way.]

I...remembered things happening a lot differently than they actually did. It wasn't pretty.

[A long sigh, and Harrison scrubs his fingers through his hair, which doesn't do it any favors.]

Neither can I.

[In the kitchen is enough food to host a party for fifty guests. Some of it, the stuff that doesn't need to be refrigerated, is just stored on the counters: boxes of cookies, a cake, an entire basket of fruit. The refrigerator is stuffed to the edges when he opens it, organized but barely. Harrison gestures vaguely at the array, or maybe just the world in general.]

Jesse was...well. Two speedsters in one house. Ended up with all this. You like lasagna?

[Sure he does, everyone likes lasagna, Harrison pulls out one of two full pans of lasagna and dishes it onto a plate, into the microwave. He doesn't look over as he works, maybe it'll be easier for Eddie not to have the attention on him when he asks:]

How did you remember it?

[Eddie's chin lifts slightly, pale eyes searching Harrison's face as if he could figure it out from his expression. But Harrison is just scrubbing a hand back through his hair, making it stand up on end, and Eddie's mouth quirks into a slight smile. Lets the topic go because it seems to be hard for both of them right now.]

I'd love some.

[The truth is, he hadn't thought he was all that hungry until the lasagna starts heating up and he can smell it. It's like his senses are back to life, after what had happened. He takes a deep breath, and releases it, inhaling the scent and nodding.]

Wow, two speedsters. I am not at all surprised at how much food you have.

[When Harrison asks what he remembered, Eddie bites at the inside of his lip, his expression falling a little.]

I...remembered deciding not to...get rid of Eobard. [The most tactful way he can think of to say he decided not to commit suicide.] I was too afraid, at the last second I couldn't pull the trigger. So he killed everyone, right in front of me. Cisco, Caitlin, Barry, Joe, Iris. He killed my parents, Singh, Dr. McGee, anyone I could possibly have cared about.

[A shrug, and he can't look at Harrison's face, let alone meet his eyes.]

I still hate myself a little bit.

[They'll get to it. They will. It's just...Barry had always had trouble explaining it, what it was like to have that speed. Jay—or the man Harrison had thought was Jay—he hadn't been able to put it into words either. Now Harrison knows why, firsthand, and he also knows what it's like to lose that speed again, and it's.

They'll get to it.

Harrison leans against the counter, arms folded, waiting for the lasagna to finish heating up, and listening. Quiet. Not much reaction apart from a frown that grows deeper as Eddie continues, naming everyone he'd lost because he'd faltered. Christ. So these were the options the multiverse had in mind for this version of Eddie Thawne? Death, or surrounded by death?]

Don't.

[It's short, almost brusque, but there's no judgment there. He pushes off the counter to get the plate, find silverware, set it all at the table.]

Well. You can't help how you feel. But hating yourself for that...look. [He takes a breath, also carefully looking everywhere but Eddie.] I was the Flash for a week because I did step in. I went down myself to stop the reaction, I got hit by the dark matter, I got turned into a metahuman. And then...my world didn't. Hate metahumans. Because that had been the right thing. But I didn't really do that. I really vented the dark matter underground and covered it up. Not the right thing.

[Now he can straighten and look over at him, a little wracked with the fact that he's living in the world where he'd made the wrong decision, but bearing up under it.] You can't hate yourself for wanting to live, or you aren't going to live.

[It's almost a little unnerving, the way Harrison leans in against the counter and looks at him while he's talking, intent with those bright blue eyes locked on him. Eddie feels both like a specimen under a microscope and like what he has to say is important all at once - a strange combination of feelings that leaves him licking his lips nervously and glancing off to the side.

The response, when Harrison speaks, is blunt and to the point, and Eddie lets out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding. Shaking his head, he curls his fingers against the countertop, and opens his mouth to speak for just a moment before going silent as Harrison continues speaking, tells his own story, what happened to him, what could have been, and what is. Eddie winces a little, glancing down at his own hands for a moment while he thinks that over.]

Maybe it wasn't the right thing, not entirely, but it wasn't as bad as it could have been. Look at us, what happened in Central City. It could have been worse.

[Lifting his chin a little, he studies Harrison's face even though Harrison won't look at him at first. He's all tension, his body whip-tight, wound up, and Eddie can see it now, in how he holds himself. The stress and the strength in bearing up under all that regret.

When Harrison looks at him, he smiles, small and sad.]

You realize the same goes for you, right?

You haven't seen. My Central City. [It's low, rough around the edges, quiet enough that Harrison could, maybe, deny having said it. But his Central City glitters on the surface, all soft yellows and geometric edges, and it's been living in fear for months because of him and his, well. Yeah. His cowardice.

But that smile and those words, carefully gentle, pull him back from digging himself too deep into a reverie of what-ifs and might-have-beens. The same goes for him.]

Does it? I'm not—I don't... [The breath finishes on a long sigh as Harrison rubs the back of his neck and wonders what he might have been planning to say. Nothing honest, he's fairly sure. Nothing Eddie might take at face value, he's much too observant for that. HIs shoulders bow for a few moments beneath everything, before straightening again.]

I do, yes, regret my decision. And how I handled things afterward. But I'm not...not living because of it.

[Oh hey, he'd managed half a lie after all. He hopes Eddie doesn't think to ask Jesse how much of a life Harrison's been leading, living in STAR Labs, never venturing outside (for practical reasons, for fear of being spotted, recognized, arrested for a murder rap that wasn't his) as he avoids Eddie's thoughtful expression and waves a hand at the table.] It'll get cold again. Go ahead, I'm not hungry.

I haven't.

[He admits it openly, his head tilting a little as he watches Harrison seemingly struggle with himself. It's strange - Harrison seems like a very singular man who likes to deal with his own problems in his own time and his own way. He seems to be private and self-contained, capable. But Eddie can read his discomfort all over his body language, a sort of tension in his limbs and the way he rubs the back of his neck, the way his shoulders dip before squaring again.

Still self-contained, still strong, but struggling. Eddie feels a surge of empathy, and it's nice. It's nice to get out of his own head, think about someone else for a while.]

You could tell me about it, if you want. [He shrugs, picks up his fork and plays with the lasagna for a moment, pushing it around and watching it steam, letting it cool down a bit before he takes a bite, eyes lifting to lock on Harrison's face.]

You're not? Really?

[It's less a genuine question, spoken with a lilt to it that suggests Eddie knows better. And he does, even if he doesn't know much about Harrison's personal life. It's easy to tell considering his body language, the way he speaks when he says it, the hesitation.]

[He'd managed half a lie, but to a detective who can see through those without having to work too hard at it. Harrison huffs out a sigh, almost protests, then hooks a chair from the table and collapses messily into it, legs sprawled under the table, arms folded tight, gaze hovering somewhere in a corner of the kitchen, switching to the counter, the table.

There's something very tempting about telling someone who hadn't seen any of it. He might not be hearing it for the first time, Harrison doesn't know how much Cisco and Barry would have told him about the Harrison Wells from a different world, but he hasn't heard it from Harrison. And in truth, Harrison hasn't told the whole story to anyone from that Earth. Not all in one shot.]

I know what went wrong. [And he'll spare Eddie the technical explanation of what went wrong, or that it took him poring over the data from the Earth-1 accelerator's failure to really pinpoint where he'd gone wrong with his own.] But knowing what went wrong. Isn't going to help now. There's no cure. For being a metahuman. Did you know that? The transformation, it alters DNA at a fundamental level that's. Far beyond our capabilities. Even gene therapy would— [He waves an impatient hand, impatient with himself for getting off-topic, laces both hands behind his head, stares at the ceiling.]

Tell you about it? I covered it up. The dark matter, the transformations being the result of our accident, everything. The STAR Labs in your world exploded, shut down, that Dr. Wells ruined, disgraced, but STAR Labs is still thriving in my world, because I covered it all up. More than that, I created products to help keep normal people safe. From the dangerous metahumans. I made it into us vs. them, and you know what? Most metahumans? Living their lives. Trying to cope with what happened. Trying to learn what happened to them. I could have opened up STAR Labs to them, offered them help, but no, they were pariahs, because of me. In every way because of me, and that. Was what I did wrong, and what I'll never be able to fix.

[There's no denying that it catches Eddie slightly off-guard when Harrison actually opens up and tells him the whole story. For a moment, the surprise shows on his face, but he stays silent, eyes on Harrison's face while he speaks. Eddie pays attention, focused on his expression, how he says things, but it isn't exactly hard to read the regret, the shame. It isn't hard to tell why Harrison feels that way, either.

The story is horrifying, and Eddie's brows furrow, he bites his lower lip. There's a surge of something in him, some complicated emotion between anger and shame. What Harrison did is terrible, he understands why he feels the way he does, and it takes him a few moments to collect his thoughts, to try to figure out how he feels about this, in the end.]

That was a big mistake, I'm not gonna lie.

[He takes a deep breath, holds it for a second, and then carries on, leaning in.]

But what I do know, is that punishing yourself forever for that mistake isn't going to fix it either. You're two worlds away from where you come from, now.

[A pause, and he raises his brows, then takes a bite of his lasagna, chewing thoughtfully for a few moments. After he swallows, he speaks, quietly.]

Maybe you can't fix it, but you could try to find some way to make amends. Plan something. You can't take away the meta powers, or change people's perceptions of them, not right away. But maybe if you did open the Labs to them, work with them, lead by example considering you still have a good reputation there...

[He shrugs, scoops up another forkful of food.]

Worth a thought, right?

[To his credit, after he's gotten it all out, he falls silent, and he listens. It's not always easy for him to sit and listen, but right now there's no threat to defeat, no world to save. There's just the memory of his reality back home, and the false, better reality that might have been, but—most significantly—wasn't.

But what Eddie is describing, it's something that could exist. Not at first, as he says, but eventually. After the threat of Zoom is gone. After Zoom's metahumans have been taken care of, either defeated or even reforming once their overlord isn't there to terrify them into compliance.

For a few wild seconds, it seems like a good idea.] It is. Worth a thought. It might be worth more than a thought. ...but it's easy to talk about what-ifs when I'm two worlds away from where I come from. Did you always know you wanted to be a cop?

[It's an abrupt transition, but it's something he's been wondering about off and on since he and Eddie had started talking. He's never once had the urge to be a police officer, only recently gained the urge to try being a hero. Selflessness is not a mindset that comes naturally to Harrison Wells.]

[It's obvious by the slight changes in expression on Harrison's face - a slight relaxing of the tension in his forehead, the way the wrinkles around his blue eyes change just a little - that he's taken it to heart. The surge of relief is a little surprising, but Eddie responds to the slight change in Harrison's facial expression, and the slight loosening of his body language with a warm smile.

It's nice, to be able to say something that helps, that makes a noticeable difference in someone else's mood and perception. To take some of the weight off another person. Even though Harrison brushes the thought off a moment later with saying it's easy to talk about two worlds away, it's something. Some small bit of comfort. And Eddie's glad for it.]

Well, there's always making real, tangible plans, and...

[He trails off at the abrupt question, then blinks a little. Laughs softly.]

Yeah. Since I was pretty young. I used to say when I was a kid that I wanted to be a policeman. My father would've preferred I followed in his footsteps, in politics, and I might've done alright at it. But it was never what I wanted to do.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Woke up sweating from a dream

Morning of June 18th.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

20th.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

June 21st

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject