Collateral Damage (snowbarry)

Promise Fulfilled

Caitlin, Barry, and Wells stand in Caitlin's lab while Professor Stein lay, sedated, in the med bed. Barry is looking at Caitlin, trying to gauge her reaction to finding out Ronnie is alive. She hasn't taken her eyes off the monitors.

"Cait?" Barry says softly.

She grunts, eyes fixed, unfocused, on the monitors.

"Barry, will you give us a moment?" Wells asks.

Barry nods and exits the lab.

"Caity?" Wells says, wheeling closing to her. Her grabs her arm and lightly pulls her away from the monitor. She turns and focuses on Wells. He can see the confusion and fear in her eyes.

"He's alive," she whispers to him, looking at Ronnie's body out of the corner of her eye.

Wells sighs and turns to look at Ronnie.

"Do you remember when you were younger and you'd get so mad at me for bringing my work home?"

A small smile breaks on her face and she nods.

"You used to say work didn't belong at home." He chuckled to himself a little, remembering 14-year-old Caitlin sitting with her arms crossed, begging him to take a break. "Do you remember what I would tell you?"

"I am a scientist, and a scientist's work is never finished." She said.

"A scientist's work is never finished," he repeats in a whisper.

A few moments of silence pass.

"My work did this to him. To both of them. And my work won't be finished until I bring them both home." He says, now looking at Caitlin.

She turns to look at him, an unsure look on her face. He squeezes her hand and takes a deep breath. "I promise."

Caitlin nods and looks to Professor Stein over on the bed. She crosses her arms and huffs. "What do you think? Keep him sedated?" She asks.

"We could. Do you think you could give him something to calm him down? Make him more lucid?" Wells asks.

"I'm sure I could figure something out."

"Then do that. Keep him sedated until then." Wells says, wheeling out of her lab. She sits down at her desk, looking back at the monitors, focusing this time.

*****************************************

"Do you think we can separate them?" Barry asks. Him, Caitlin, and Wells are sitting in the cortex. Caitlin is spinning in her chair, staring up at the ceiling. Barry is witting on a desk, tapping his hand nervously against the top of it.

Wells, who is sitting behind the control panel, looks over his glasses at Barry. "Is it possible? Theoretically." He says, nodding his head side to side. "But splitting an atom and splitting a man are two very different things."

Barry nods, returning to his tapping. They have been waiting for about half an hour. Caitlin gave Stein some meds to help clear him up and then stopped the drop of the sedative that was keeping him asleep. She asked Barry to pick up some clothes for him and a razor. She laid the clothes, razor, and scissors out on the table next to the bed. Now they were just waiting.

Stein walks into the cortex. Barry sees him first and hops off the table. Wells turns to look at him. Caitlin notices Barry's reaction and turns in the chair to see what he's looking at. What she sees makes her stomach drop. She stands up slowly, not taking her eyes off the man that looks exactly like her fiance that, up until a few hours ago, she thought was dead.