Only Because I Need You Too

Chapter 17: Observance

Caitlin felt her chest constricting. The dark night air pressed down on her shoulders and her breath curled upwards in smokey plumes. Powerful street lamps from above nearly blinded her as she swung aimlessly back and forth on the creaky swing below her. The park she was in was deserted and only held a faint whisper of the children that had been plaguing it all day. A roundabout creaked in the wind. The noise sent shivers down her spine. The empty swing next to her squealed as it was tickled by a breeze. Caitlin wrapped her arms around herself. She could do nothing but stare into the dark abyss that lay beyond the park, only disrupted by the towering silhouette's of buildings that stretched far into the sky. "Don't worry, I've got your back," Ethan's course voice echoed in her ears. Caitlin swallowed hard, her pulse slowed. Ethan was on top of a building to her left. She dared not to look or speak in case of giving him away.

"Me too," Killer Frost mentally whispered.

"Can you feel anything?" Barry's velvety voice drifted down the comm link pressed into her ear. Caitlin shook her, only a fraction of an inch, in the general direction of the park's security camera. Getting no reply, she let out a sigh and began to push herself gently backwards and forwards in the swing. The roundabout creaked again, sending goosebumps reverberating across her body.

Caitlin's gut dropped, her hairs stood on end and the temperature dropped. Peeking upright, she realised what she was feeling. The Observer. Before Caitlin could call out to the masked man, he made himself known to her. His tall and slender silhouette stepped out from the shadows that concealed a broken and rusted slide. Caitlin froze, her heart faltered and her breath began to race. The Observer didn't move. The doctor swallowed hard, realising the Observer wanted her to explain herself just like last time. Just like last time. Of course. A light bulb pinged in Caitlin's mind. The Observer wasn't stupid, he knew Caitlin would not leave herself unguarded. He had come to listen. Licking her lips, she sat forwards, "Where is Nora and Iris West-Allen?" Her voice was firm and steady. Caitlin could hear her teammates shuffle behind the mic, they too clearly had a view of the masked man.

The light reflected brightly off the wicked smile lined with rows of sharp teeth that cut the mask in half. The Observer's finger's twitched and he shifted his weight. "Caitlin, if you need me to step in-" Ethan was cut off when the Observer took a step forwards and aimed his bow directly at Caitlin.

Within a fraction of a second, Caitlin felt herself being whisked a few meters away with speed she could not comprehend. Steadying herself she realised Ethan hadn't moved her far, only ten meters. A large plumes of smoke had begun to envelop the Observer. The speedster let out a snarl of rage and whisked himself into action. It was too late. By the time Ethan had made his way to the smoke, it had consumed the archer whole. Ethan too had vanished into its grey midst. Caitlin felt her heart beat falter, her eyes widened as she took a step towards the smokey smudge.

"No!" Barry cried down the link, nearly deafening them all.

"Calm down Barry," Ethan's gravelly voice grunted over the link. He emerged from the smoke staring down at something clasped in his hands. "I think I might have something."

*

Caitlin leaned on her elbows. She was seated at one of the smaller desks in the cortex, an image of a helicopter displayed on her large computer screen. Most of the team was dotted around the cortex, aside from Cisco who was seated by the main desk, his fingers flew across the keyboard in a fury of tapping. Placing her head in her hands, she let her eyes land on Ethan. His jaw was clenched and his entire body tense as he glanced over Cisco's body. Barry's body language mirrored his double's. Nora had clasped her hands and she constantly wrung them together and apart. The doctor couldn't help but hold in a smile. All of the speedsters were tapping something. Nora and Barry their feet, Ethan his hands. She supposed that any length of time must crawl by for them. Caitlin paused and stared down at her impressively large stomach. Pursing her lips, she couldn't help but wonder if Dawn felt the same way. What if Dawn was desperate to be born, only she had to wait an excruciatingly longer time to her than any other baby. "Okay," Cisco sighed, leaning back into his chair.

"Although I'm still not sure how you managed to grab a business card off of the Observer, it looks like it was worth something." Cisco cracked his knuckles and stretched his arms far above his head.

"What did you find out?" Barry asked, crossing his arms over his chest and peering over Cisco's head.

"Well, for a start, the companies CEO, Charles Donovan has a very suspicious background. It looks as though he literally appeared out of nowhere with buckets of money." Cisco turned to Nora with raised brows.

"The Observer?" Nora screwed up her nose.

"Possibly in the short time he has been CEO, he has had to buy himself out of three different law suits for violent and destructive behaviour," he turned to his teammates with a wide grin and gleaming teeth.

Caitlin stared at the image of a young man that popped up on her screen. He was young, a mop of curly brown hair rested around his ears and dark peering eyes stared out for, underneath thick lashes. 'That can't be the Observer, as if a scrawny little pretty boy could best us time and again.' Frosts voice echoed in Caitlin's mind. The meta had a point, Donovan certainly wasn't what the doctor expected the Observer to look like but he was a possibility they couldn't ignore.

"Did you find anything else?" Barry asked, raising his brows and repeatedly clenching and unclenching his hand.

Cisco nodded. A wide smile split his face. "This company is called Copter Away and it rents out its helicopters and offers travel overseas." Caitlin nodded, they had been over that many times so she lacked to see the relevance. "I checked the companies flight plans and they have a flight taking place in three days. The bank files however, did not match the flight. It only payed for an adult Male traveling across the sea, and here's the kicker, two adult women and a child were listed for the flight also." Barry visibly stiffened up. "So, I dipped into Donovan's personal account and found a much larger payment, which is nearly four times the size, with no mention of who the money was from and was made the same day the flight was bought. The best part is, two days after Tate was freed, Donovan started receiving monthly payments from the same unknown source."

"So Tate and Medusa could be paying Donovan to act as the Observer and go after me for revenge?" Caitlin asked rearing her brows.

Cisco sent her a feint nod. "That flight, it could be Iris and Nora. We should stake it out," Barry told them. His eyes were glued to the figures on Cisco's screen and his body had hardly moved.

"Sounds like a plan," Nora replied with a cheery smile, but it didn't reach her eyes. Caitlin was noticing more and more since Iris's disappearance that nobodies smiles were reaching their eyes anymore.