#arrowverseocs

Nina held her newborn daughter in her arms while a nurse checked her vitals. A moment after the nurse left the room, there was a very, very light knock on the door.

"Knock-knock?" Belén poked her head inside the hospital room. "I didn't know if knocking might have woken her up so I went with a light knock, but I also felt the need to let you know and—"

"Breathe," Nina laughed quietly.

"You'd think she'd learn by the now," Barry walked in with Belén, his free hand holding three different balloons while Belén herself held a gift bag.

"This coming from the uber nerd of all nerds," Belén mumbled and ignored his mock offended face. "How are you, though?" she asked Nina and eyed the newborn curiously. "Elliot called saying you went into labor and I swore we'd be down quick, but...she's out…" Belén's eyes did a little widening, which made Nina laugh.

"Yeah, no, she was in a hurry to get out, thank God!"

"I don't mean to...ask hard questions, but...isn't there a danger of the doctors figuring out she's a meta?" Barry asked. It had been the same question bothering him ever since Belén woke him up.

"I'm a Doctor myself, Barry. I have connections around this place," Nina reassured him. "But, uh, after we're out of here I would like Caitlin to run her own tests just to make sure everything is okay."

"I'm sure she would be more than up for it," Belén smiled and set down her gift bag on the table. She pulled the balloons from Barry's hands and settled them beside it. "So, where's Elliot—"

"Right here!" A dark-haired man strode into the room with a cellphone in hand. His dark eyes radiated at the site of his wife and newborn daughter. "I had to make calls to the family to let them know how things are going. But thanks for coming." He smiled at the two metas, but Barry was just a little awed since he technically hadn't met Nina's husband yet.

For him, he was just another Julian Albert. Another addition to the timeline.

"Everything okay, Barry?" Elliot asked, eyeing the speedster as he moved to take his seat beside Nina's bed.

Nina gave a sharpened look at Barry. "He's just not used to waking up this early. Right?" By her gritted teeth, Barry knew better than to not play along.

"Yup. Plus, Belén almost smothered me with a pillow, so…"

"The world's toughest hero, ladies and gentlemen," Belén rolled her eyes and moved closer to Nina's bedside cautiously to peer at the newborn. "So, what's her name, then? Did you guys pick it already?"

"Yes we did," Nina was proud to say. She pulled her daughter's blanket just a little lower to let the others see her. "Say hello to Emery Kemper."

"She's so adorable!" Belén gushed. "I remember when Maritza had Axel - babies are just so cute!"

"You want to hold her?" Nina's question made Belén freeze.

"I-I...could I?"

"Of course," Nina chuckled and carefully passed her daughter to Belén.

"Oooh...look at her," Belén didn't even want to move for fear of waking Emery up. She moved only a bit so that Barry could get a better look at the baby. "Isn't she adorable?"

Barry chuckled at her. "Yeah, she is."

Emery gave a meek yawn and barely opened her eyes to reveal chocolate brown irises. The more Barry stared at her, the harder it was to picture her as what she was: a little meta. It was almost bittersweet thinking about it. Such a sweet innocent little being could face so many dangers in the future.

"Get a good look at her because you'll be seeing a lot of your goddaughter in the future." Nina smirked when the two in question froze. They both simultaneously looked at Emery then at her. "I said what I said."

"We decided that we would very much like it if you were Emery's godparents when it came time to baptize," Elliot said in a much nicer, nonsarcastic manner.

"U-us?" Belén blinked, for some reason swallowing hard.

"L-like…us?" Barry pretty much did the same as her.

Both Nina and Elliot laughed.

"Yes," Nina answered after a moment. "I can think of no one better than the Azalea and the Flash to be my daughter's godparents. She'd be in the safest hands if something were to happen to Elliot and I."

"So...what do you say?" Elliott seemed to be amused like Nina, but was far more modest about it.

Belén exchanged a look with Barry, both sharing identical dumbfounded expressions. Their heads turned down at the newborn in Belén's arms who'd gone back to resting quietly.

"Why are you two acting like bigger dumbos than usual?" Nina raised an eyebrow at the pair. "We're not asking you to do anything that you haven't already done before. You guys go out and save people all the time!"

"Nina, it's just we don't usually have to think about saving babies," Barry said solemnly. It made it that much harder not to get upset when they failed to save some part of the city. Adults were one thing, but children?

"Of course we'll be her godparents," Belén eventually said, smiling softly at the baby, "It'll just take some time getting used to it…having another baby around. The last one was Axel and that was in a very, very different version of my life." She then handed Emery back to her mother before the nerves got to her. "I just don't know what a godmother really does…"

"Or a godfather…" Barry admitted awkwardly.

"Good news is you'll have plenty of time to figure it out before she starts walking and talking," Elliot said. "And who knows, by then you might be expecting your own little one!"

Nina snorted at how synced up Belén and Barry were. They jumped simultaneously and immediately started sputtering about how crazy that was.

Barry nervously reached for Belén's hand, his face the same shade of his Flash suit. "Hey Bells, you want to go?"

Belén nodded fervently and gripped his hand, begging him to get her out of there. "Uh...yeah, um... congrats, obviously…"

"And thanks!" Barry called just before hurrying towards the door.

~0~

"So Nina had her kid already? I have to go see her," Iris grinned at the news when Belén and Barry informed the group.

They were in the cortex while Caitlin and Cisco examined Wally's new speedy abilities.

"She's so adorable," Belén gushed. "Axel already wants to be called uncle Axel. He doesn't quite understand how it works, but…"

Iris laughed but quickly sobered when Caitlin and Cisco walked in. "Is Wally…?"

"He's fine, your dad took him out to eat," Caitlin said but Cisco went straight for his chair without looking at anyone.

He was still having trouble with Barry and the fact his brother was dead...because of a timeline change.

"Wally is showing remarkable progress in such a few days," Caitlin was happy to report. "His running economy, lactate threshold are all way above expected levels."

"I think we might have a little prodigy on our hands. Like a Wizard of Whiz," Cisco remarked but kept his eyes off a certain speedster.

Iris pinched the bridge of her nose, eyes shutting for a second. "Guys, I don't want Wally thinking that he's Barry, rushing off half-cocked, trying to take down Alchemy or Savitar the next time one of them shows up."

"Well he won't do that if he gets the proper training," Belén tried to dissuade her doubts. "But, to be fair, none of us really know how to fight the monk and the disappearing speedster so he really wouldn't be at a greater disadvantage than the rest of us."

Iris dropped her hand and released a deep exhale. "I'm serious. He has to be ready and to do that for the time being we should tell him that he's not ready."

"Iris... I'm not sure that's a good idea," Barry said hesitantly. Wally had definitely shown he was capable of great speed and with some more training he could really become an important asset to their team.

"We can't encourage him, train him, and you…" Iris settled a sharp look on Cisco, "...no talking to him about a suit, please. It's for his own good."

Before Cisco could even tell her how ridiculous she sounded, Belén made her own remark. "Yeah, I don't think making that decision for him is the best idea."

"Belén…" Iris knew where Belén was going with it, her own choice not to suppress her powers had been a delicate subject amongst the group, "... he's not you."

"Yeah, thank God. That means he's more than capable of getting things right and not losing control. And I'm sorry if this sounds rude but you are not qualified to make any decision like that for your brother."

Iris blinked at the blunt statement that apparently wasn't supposed to be offensive. Her eyebrows soon raised with growing irritation. "Well maybe—"

The alarms went off in the room, and while Caitlin and Cisco quickly searched for the new problem, Barry turned to the side and mumbled a 'thank god' because the last thing he wanted was for Belén and Iris to go at it. The group was divided enough as it was.

"Was that...is that a meteorite?" Caitlin's eyes widened in alarm as the screens changed to an incoming object.

"Why, yes, that is a meteor, and yes, it is heading for downtown," Cisco rubbed his eyes over and over. This was actually happening, a meteor…

"We got to go," Barry told Belén, although he waited for her to respond. She hadn't been out in the field since her small-time personality switch and she had been training a bit but it could still be too early.

Belén nodded with a clean smile. She wasn't going to be scared and stay away. That would mean they won, and she couldn't go down without at least trying.

"Let's," she gave a firm nod.

~0~

The 'meteor' crashed down near the waterfront, thankfully without any casualties. Smoke billowed from it, shielding itself for a moment. However, once it started to clear, Barry noticed the strange appearance.

"That doesn't…" Belén stopped on instinct. Her eyes narrowed on the meteor suspiciously. "That's not a meteor…"

"What is it, then?" Cisco eagerly asked from the other end of the comms.

Barry slowly walked forwards, missing Belén reaching out for him from behind.

It was not a meteorite, Barry was now sure of it. The structure of it was all wrong. His hand barely grazed over it when it burst open. The force of it knocked Barry back and he fell on the ground.

The next thing he knew, something(s) burst through the opening of the not-meteorite and rushed past him.

Belén let out a shrill scream like in a horror movie and cowered with her arms above her head. Massive creatures with tall long legs and monster-like claws swarmed past her.

"What!? What is it!?" Cisco managed to shout over her screams.

Barry scrambled up to his feet and sped over to Belén. "Aliens!" he exclaimed. He held Belén his arms, both of them staring after the creatures disappearing (regretfully) in their city.

~0~

'Government officials are reporting the mysterious object that crashed in downtown Central City was simply a DOD aircraft on a routine training operation.'

Caitlin turned off the television in the cortex and pursed her lips together as she looked at the rest. They, however, were staring at Director Lyla Michaels of A.R.G.U.S, who came to STAR Labs as soon as she learned that the team had made contact with the ship before the government even got there.

Before Lyla said a word, a strong force of wind slapped her in the face. When she re-opened her eyes, Barry had appeared with a tall blonde woman at his side. Said woman angrily ripped her arm out of his grip.

"How did you find me!?" Anais glared at him.

Given the situation they were in, Barry found it best to be direct with her. "We pinged you!"

"How!?"

"From the tests we did on you!"

Anais gasped and rounded on the rest of the team. "Seriously!?"

Cisco shrugged nonchalantly at her from behind the desk. "People from different Earths have a different frequency. You thought we weren't going to keep that in our data?"

Belén stepped in as Anais made a clear beeline towards the desk. "Anais, hold on there! We have a situation, okay?"

"Yeah, hear us out here," Barry reached over to turn her in Lyla's direction.

Lyla didn't appreciate the disdainful look-over Anais gave her.

"Am I supposed to know her?" Anais looked between Barry and Belén.

"This is Lyla, director of A.R.G.U.S," Barry explained, "And she has some information about something we stumbled on last night."

"Which would be…?" Anais folded her arms disinterestedly.

Barry looked at the woman in question and gestured for her to use the screen behind her to make her point. "Lyla, please?"

Lyla barely understood what was happening but for the sake of moving things along, she obliged. She lit the screen with a video loop of the same aliens that they had seen last night.

"Dominators?" Anais' interest was still barely piqued.

"So you do know them?" Belén raised an eyebrow at the blonde. She had her reservations about dragging Anais back to STAR Labs after making it clear it was the last place she wanted to be in, but 'aliens' was uncharted waters for them all.

"I've heard of them on my birth planet. That's it," Anais said sharply. "You want me to tell you that I brought these aliens to your world? Well, I didn't! I'm not even from here, remember!?"

"Wait, you're an alien?" Lyla pointed at Anais then looked at the others for an explanation.

"Multiverse," they all chorused together.

Anais groaned. "Look, if you guys think I E.T'd these Dominators, I didn't. If they're here, they're from your world. Isn't that right, director Lyla?"

Lyla begrudgingly nodded. "This," she gestured at the screen behind her whose loop she had finally ended to show them the real footage, "is a clip from the 50s. It's the furthest we've known about the Dominators."

"That was them. Redmond, Oregon," Joe snapped his fingers at Lyla with the sudden knowledge. "The government tried to cover it up." He then saw the amused glances of the others and shifted. "What? I watch Syfy channel."

Lyla gave a nod to confirm his statements. "In 1951, they appeared under the same sort of circumstances. A ship crash-landed. Little to no communication. We learned they were abducting humans to gather intel about us. They attacked, and hundreds of soldiers lost their lives. Then, for some inexplicable reason, they left. All contact had been lost until three months ago when the DOD received this." She produced a voice message left by the aliens themselves.

'We pose no threat, human inhabitants. Understanding is our purpose. Any action against us, as shown to us in the past, will prompt swift retaliation.'

"So when we discovered four ships heading towards Earth, we were concerned that it was happening all over again," Lyla said with deep regret. "One of them, obviously, landed here."

"Right, 'cause we don't have enough crazy going on here in Central City," Veronica said bitterly. They really could not catch a break. "Do you know what they want?"

"Mom, they just said it," Belén shuddered. "'Understanding is our purpose'. Cisco has made me watch one too many alien movies to know what that means. Dissection!"

"They've ignored all attempts to communicate," Lyla said, "but we do know, just like before, that the dropships contain reconnaissance teams sent here to gather more intel about us. Looking for our weaknesses."

"See?" Belén frowned. "We need to do something."

"We are," Lyla reassured. "Nearly every member state in the UN is in talks to coordinate a response. Action is being taken."

"So, wait, you want us to just sit this one out?" Barry frowned. "These things are like 'World War Z' zombies. If they decide to attack, no military can stop them."

"Neither could you. Not by yourselves, anyway. Just let us handle this. For now." Lyla eyed Anais who was refusing to say anything and much less look at anyone. There was no point in sticking around, so Lyla left the room.

"Sooo…we're not going to listen to that, right?" Belén specifically looked at Barry for the answer.

"No," Barry was on the same page as her. That was probably why they were together — for better or for worse.

"Barry, you heard Lyla. You can't do this alone," Caitlin reminded quietly. She would help, she would, if she didn't fear her powers.

"And I'm sorry, but I am not signing up for this," Anais made sure to leave clear as she got ready to leave as well.

"Wait a minute, you're the only alien who isn't evil and you're not going to help us?" Cisco stopped her midway.

"You don't need me."

"Uh, yes, we do!"

"I can't!" Anais practically shouted and made sure everyone in the room heard her. "I'm sorry but I just literally got out of a war and I don't exactly feel like entering another one." She dared anyone to tell her she was in the wrong. When no one said anything, she walked out of the room.

"She's sure a lot of help," Cisco mumbled under his breath.

"What are we going to do if Anais doesn't help us?" Belén asked Barry off to the side. "Because I don't think we're all that qualified to do it on our own."

Barry had to agree. They needed a lot more back up to handle all those Dominators. The good news is that their team wasn't the only team they knew…

~0~

Cisco bitterly adjusted his goggles to make an interdimensional trip across 30 different Earths. That was the cost of fighting aliens. It was just too bad he had to make the trip with Barry.

Thea Queen was looking at the spacious hangar in awe. It was meant to serve as their temporary team-up headquarters. "What is this place?" her voice echoed.

"It's this old hall hangar thing that S.T.A.R. Labs owns," Barry explained, rubbing the back of his neck. "Or I guess I own it." He supposed at some point he should actually sit down and go through the list of properties under STAR Labs' name.

"Well, you should do something with it," Thea said and gave a knowing smile like she already had a few ideas for him.

"Yeah, what exactly are we waiting for?" They heard Belén's question when they walked out of the hangar. She, Felicity and Diggle were staring up at the clear sky for something.

"The Legends," Felicity replied with an anxious smile.

Diggle didn't exactly share the same excitement. He was still trying to understand. "All right, so let me get this right. Our time-traveling buddies in a flying timeship are supposed to just pop up right here, right?"

"Yeah. This is the time and place I gave them, so if they got my message, they should be here…" Felicity trailed off just as a large gray ship appeared out of nowhere in the sky. "Right now!"

Belén laughed in awe, but Diggle stared with wide, blinking eyes. "You know why I've never done drugs? It's 'cause I was always afraid I'd see weird stuff."

"Okay, take everybody inside, all right?" Barry instructed Belén who quickly nodded. "Tell Oliver I'll be right back."

Belén saw Cisco putting on his goggles on the side and wondered how awkward that would be. "So, you're going to get... her…?" She tried to be nonchalant about it but the specific Earth that Barry would be travelling to was a special one.

"Uh, yeah," Barry cleared his throat, his cheeks getting warm. "We'll be back…"

"Where are you going?" Felicity asked before Barry left them.

"Well, since we're fighting aliens, I figured we should get one of our own, right?" he smiled and then turned for Cisco. His smile slowly faded into a serious expression. Cisco barely directed a word to him so Barry always tried to be careful with the few words he got to say around him. "You found the right Earth?"

"Tachyon device tracked you on Earth-38 when you met them, so we should find them there," Cisco said. "Just so you know, I'm only doing this because we're on a mission. I'm not gonna let my issues with you get in the way of that." All Barry could do was simply nod and give him the space he needed. "This might take a few tries."

A few tries turned out to be five times first. By the sixth time, the two found themselves inside a spacious apartment with a fresh scent of cinnamon.

"This better be the right place. 'Cause if this isn't the right place, someone's about to be real confused," Cisco pulled off his goggles to get a better look at the empty apartment.

Barry wasn't sure this was the right place. He'd never seen where Kara lived nor Anais. Thankfully, he wasn't left pondering for much because a minute later they heard the apartment door unlocking.

A familiar blonde in glasses walked in with a grocery bag. Kara Danvers gasped at the two men in her apartment but didn't seem so surprised to see them.

"Barry? I knew it! I knew that was you!" she exclaimed, rushing to put her bags down and hug him. "I knew it was you in that weird space…" she pulled away, revealing a confused face.

"Sorry, it took a couple tries to get here," Cisco gave a meek wave. He was still trying to get the hang of that power.

"This is my friend, Cisco," Barry introduced before thinking it clearly.

Cisco extended a hand to shake with Kara, smiling awkwardly. "Well, friend is a loose term. We work together."

"Hi," Kara was happy to meet any of Barry's friend. But then she realized who would be even more happy. "Oh! Anais!"

"Uh, yeah, can you help us—" Barry began to ask when Kara whipped out her phone to send a quick text, "—get in contact with her? We weren't even sure how to get here…" But he was forced to stop when a strong force of wind slapped him and Cisco on the faces.

Anais Allen squealed at the door.

"Dad!" she ran and basically threw herself on Barry.

He laughed and hugged her back. This was definitely a different doppelganger than Earth 19's Anais.

"You're back!" Anais only let go when she saw Cisco awkwardly standing on the side. "Uncle Cisco!"

"Nope, no, not doing that," Cisco warned her with a finger. "I don't—!" Anais didn't let him finish because she jumped to give him a hug next.

"You look so young!" she laughed again then took a step back to really examine them, ultimately having a stare-off with Barry.

"Still weird," they both concluded about their relationship.

"Still my adoptive dad here…" Anais reminded, making Barry's go warm again.

"Oh yeah, I've seen them now!" Kara was happy to announce, furthering Barry's embarrassment. "You look…" Kara purposely hesitated to finish when she realized what her words would be.

Anais however, had no issue. "Old, you look old. But Mom looks great!"

Barry wasn't even going to start on that topic. Finding out on Earth 38 that his doppelganger and Belén were older, both scientists, and adoptive parents of an alien daughter was something he would never get over. "Okay, um, do you remember last year when I helped you out and you promised to do the same for me?"

Anais and Kara exchanged glances, both silently agreeing they were ready to follow through on their word.

"What are we up against?" they simultaneously asked.

~0~

When the Legends landed and emerged from their ship, their Captain was the last to actually step out. Belén's mouth dropped open in astonishment as Graciela Haynez stepped down.

"Graciela!?" Belén didn't waste a second and sprinted towards the brunette. "Oh my God! Graciela!" She threw her arms around Graciela who sheepishly patted her back.

"Hey, Belén…" Graciela chuckled, "Nice to see you again…"

Belén pulled away, still laughing from sheer confusion. "Last time we saw you, you were…you were being…you were going…"

"Going to jail?" Graciela bobbed her head at the memory, her short curls framing her face with every bounce. "Yeah, I mean I did go to jail. No trial — shockingly — and definitely imprisoned, but the good news is that it all blew up!"

"It bl — what!?" Belén's exclaim was interrupted by the sounds of a breach opening up in the hangar. She turned, as well as most of the others in the hangar, just as Cisco and Barry popped out with two women behind them.

"Woah…" The two blondes gawked at the site, and technically of the new universe they were now in.

"Um, everybody," Barry called to the watching teams, "these are my friends, Kara Danvers and Anais…" he cleared his throat and hoped to God his face wasn't already red again, "...Allen, or, as they're known on their Earth, Supergirl and Golden Girl."

"Um," Anais tapped his shoulder, her face still cheery but with traceable dislike for the name he'd given her, "that's not my name."

"It's not?" Barry recalled that being what Cat Grant had branded her as. It had been a long time ago.

"No, it never was, remember?" Anais clarified before speaking out loud, "Scratch that please, I'm Solar. Nice to meet everyone."

Those who met Anais' doppelganger from Earth 19 were surprised to find this woman to be much more cheery. Their questions over just how different she was from her doppelganger were answered pretty quickly when she and Kara started going around to people in an attempt to learn their names.

Kara was more serious in learning everyone's names and alter-egos but Anais was speeding back and forth across the hangar, blowing wind in people's faces as she stopped to greet them and ask if she'd gotten their names right. She left those she knew for last because she was extra giddy about them.

"Aunt Caitlin!" Anais didn't hesitate to give Caitlin a bone-crushing hug.

"O-okay…" Caitlin just blinked rapidly and patted the woman on the back, though she thought it was all strange.

"And Uncle Cisco—!" Anais made a second attempt to hug him but Cisco pointed at her finger.

"Ah! Stop where you are speedy-alien," he warned, but Anais laughed it off.

She laid eyes on Iris who, for the time being, had been struggling not to laugh. "You're a lot more gleeful than the last version we met," Iris remarked.

Anais paused, her brows furrowing. "What other version?"

"We sort of met another you from another Earth," Barry was the one to explain when he and Belén joined them.

Anais momentarily forgot about Iris' comment and gasped with delight. "Mom!" She squealed and sped up to Belén to give her a bone-crushing hug.

Belén was frozen in her spot, feeling her face practically go up in flames. "Uuh…Barry?"

Barry cleared his throat awkwardly. "Yeah…"

Anais held Belén by the shoulders and pulled away. "Gosh, you're so...you look exactly like Mom's pictures! Except, you know, you have powers and she doesn't, but…" she chuckled. "It's really nice to meet you. Barry told me all about you."

"Yeah, he told me about you too…" Belén swayed her head to Barry. "Adoptive daughter and whatnot…"

"Mom and Dad are doing great, though!" Anais clapped her hands and acquired a somewhat smirk on her face. "In fact, things have been going so great that…" A giggle filled the air around the group, "...Mom's pregnant."

Belén nearly choked on her own saliva.

Barry had his hands behind his neck, his face red as his suit. Their friends were really trying not to laugh at them but it was physically impossible. Iris and Caitlin lost it. He might just speed those two to the pipeline if they didn't stop soon.

"Send her back! Send her back right now!" Belén shook Barry by the arm, forcing him to drop both his hands.

Anais laughed, quite proud of herself. When she finally felt like she had her fun, she confessed. "I'm just kidding. They're happy, but definitely not pregnant."

And that earned simultaneous glares from Belén and Barry.

"Not funny," Belén pointed at her.

"Hey!" Anais touched Belén's finger with her own. "You do the same thing like Mom!"

Belén pulled her hands behind her back and glared up at Barry. "Fix this, now."

"Oh, I like her so much better," Iris was happy to tell Caitlin. She wiped a fake tear from her eye. "She's so funny!"

Cisco was the only one not too content. He was only happy to hear that on another Earth there was no psycho-Belén and that instead she was happy. "So, are we going to start?" He got up from his chair, his seriousness ending all laughter amongst his team.

Barry agreed that it was time to get to business. They gathered the other two teams in the middle of the hangar. Cisco activated all the screens and played the footage Lyla had left behind of the 1950s Dominators for them to see.

"These are the Dominators. We don't know much about them. Except they're really strong…"

Kara gave a thoughtful tilt of her head when she saw the creatures. "I heard a lot of stories about them when I was a kid." Everyone, including Anais, blinked at her. She pursed her lips together, forming a little smile. "They came to my planet before I was born. They did experiments on a lot of people. Killed a lot more."

"I've never heard of them," Anais admitted, sounding rather ashamed of the fact. Kara put a hand on her friend's arm and eased her thoughts.

"Well, they're not the only ones with superhuman strength, I hear," Thea eyed the two blondes with curiosity. "Barry says that you're more powerful than a locomotive."

Oliver Queen believed what he heard and instantly thought of the obvious place to start. "We should use Kara and Anais as stand-ins for training."

"Since when is Robin Hood calling the shots?" Mick Rory grumbled from his spot with his team. He paid no attention to the mini-glare Oliver sent his way.

"What I think Mick is trying to say is it would be nice if we knew who was in charge around here," Jax simplified his teammate's words for his sake.

Ray Palmer certainly liked the idea. "Maybe we should take a vote. Choose a leader." He grinned cheerfully, much like Anais. "Someone we can all trust."

"Well, I trust Oliver. He's got my vote," Cisco's unusual coldness did not go unnoticed by most of the teams. He plopped against the desk and waited for the others to make their decision.

"Appreciate that, Cisco, but Barry put us all together," Oliver motioned to the speedster who was trying not to look as hurt as he was. "It should be him."

"Uh, okay…" Barry thought fast since now everyone was staring at him, waiting for him to start leading. "Cool, all right, well, I guess as Team Leader, first thing to do is start out by…"

Oliver gave him a couple more seconds to figure things out, but since it wasn't working he went ahead and quietly "whispered", "Doing a test run…"

"Let's do a test run. Yeah, let's do a test run," Barry grabbed the words but failed to take the assertive leadership attitude which might have helped him figure out his next words.

"Against Supergirl and Solar…" Oliver threw out there in his whisper.

"Against Supergirl and Solar, all right?" Barry once again took what he could get. "Test run against Supergirl and Solar."

Sara Lance raised a finger, probably amused but she was trained to keep a straight face. "Are we just supposed to pretend like we don't hear him?"

Graciela nudged her elbow in Sara's ribs. "Obviously," she whispered and Sara smirked.

Barry purposely did not look at either one of them. "So just suit up. Mm-kay? Look alive. We're training to fight aliens by fighting an alien, so...do it. Suit up."

Although it wasn't the most leadership way, the others followed the instruction.

"Oliver, hey," Barry reached out for the man, "Kara?" the blonde in question stopped and turned back. "Really quick," he brought both of them together. "I was excited about the two of you guys meeting each other. Oliver was the first person to train me."

Kara beamed. She knew a thing or two about being a mentor since that's what she was for Anais. "Really? Well, you did a really good job!"

Her cheeriness made no effect on Oliver. His straight face eventually made Kara stop smiling, even more so when he responded with, "It's 'cause I didn't hold back. I shot him." Kara paused and looked at Barry. The speedster gave a small nod. "You can't hold back either."

"He did shoot me," Barry whispered.

"Ouch," Kara made a face. "I didn't even do that with Anais and she's just as strong as me. I just met these people, so…"

"These people need to understand this isn't gonna be easy. Don't hold back," Oliver reiterated, leaving no room for arguments. "Especially against me."

"Yes, sir," Kara felt compelled to say. Oliver thanked her and moved on his way. "Wow. Does he not like me?" She looked after him with a degree of concern.

"He's like that with everyone. He'll warm up to you," Barry said, although saw it hard to see Oliver warming up to anyone for that matter. Kara took his word and headed to join Anais again before the two were subjected to training.

"Barry, so, Oliver Queen is the Green Arrow?" Iris had that question ready the moment Barry returned to them.

"Yeah," Barry nodded, now realizing that after everything Iris was the last to know about Oliver's true identity, and the rest of Team Arrow and Team Legends for that matter.

"Oh, my God. He just got so much hotter," Iris put a hand to her cheek and thought about it some more.

"Mhm," went both Belén and Caitlin behind her, even simultaneously nodding dreamily.

"Oh, my God," Barry whispered, throwing his head back.

"Don't get jealous," Belén warned and moved around the desk to walk up to him. "There's just, admittedly, good looking heroes around here…" Her eyes drifted past him to the other teams.

"For real?" came Barry's sour response.

"Don't forget I'm co-adoptive parenting with you in another world," Belén reminded, her face soon red as she grabbed his hand to lead him away.

It may have helped a little bit.

~ 0 ~

Cisco was conversing with Ray about the latter's Atom Suit. Apparently, Ray had gone through quite a journey with it as of late.

"Old West Dwarf Star plus Replicator, equals new suit," Ray said cheerfully as he reminisced about the Legends' most recent trips.

"You know what, Ray? Maybe it's just me, but I think this thing's due for an update," Cisco eyed the suit with some potential ideas.

"I wouldn't mind a suit either," Graciela startled him. She smirked at his girlish squeal. "You know I just stole this thing?" she gestured to her own purple and black leather suit. "Well, technically, I pieced it together from older Jinxes but it would be nice to have one of my own, you know?"

Cisco pointed at her with the same look that he had when he was studying the Atom suit. "We could talk," he told Graciela who immediately beamed. However, the moment was cut short when he saw a certain speedster being dragged towards them. "Later. We can talk later!" He said to Graciela then bolted.

Graciela and Ray didn't make anything of it and moved on.

"You think I should be worried that Nate isn't answering?" Graciela asked Ray dead seriously.

"Amaya is with him," shrugged Ray.

"Yeah, leaving the two newbies on the ship…that sounds smart…"

"Grace!" Belén exclaimed as she and Barry came to join them. "Hey!"

Graciela smiled at the two metas. "How's the training going? Mick hasn't accidentally killed anybody, has he?"

"Uh, no, no…" But Barry still peered behind Belén just to make sure the ongoing training was still doing fine. When he was sure things weren't going up in flames — literally — he shifted his focus back on the conversation. "So you're…here…here?"

"Unless I'm a ghost, yes, I am here," Graciela nodded. Belén giggled beside Barry.

"H-how is that possible?" Barry asked, subtly nudging his elbow in Belén's side to make her stop. She seemed to be very much in control of the Legends. It was a huge jump from going to prison. "Weren't you arrested?"

"Mhm," Graciela nodded again, "Basically the Time Masters - the ones that imprisoned me for time travelling to this time period to kill Vandal Savage - were all wiped out by a band of misfit Legends…"

Ray waved a hand when Belén's and Barry's gazes drifted towards him. "Uuh...yeah, that was us. I guess we never really thought about what would happen to the Time Masters' assets after they were wiped out."

"Okay, so the people holding you in prison were cleaned out but...that still doesn't explain how you went from convict to the Leader of a time travelling team?" Belén said, confused.

Graciela's playful demeanor changed as she cleared her throat. Ray's eyes flickered from her leader to the metas. "Uuh, I will go see if Sara knows where my...helmet is…"

But everyone knew that was a blatant lie since his suit came with the head helmet together.

Graciela shook her head at him. "I've only been on this team for a couple of weeks and Ray is probably the softest man I have ever met," she ended up chuckling. "It's funny. He's funny."

"Grace?" Belén eyed the curly-haired woman, getting the sense that Graciela was hiding something, probably even from her own team at the moment.

"Remember that friend I stole the time watch from?"

"Yeah, you said you loved him," Belén remembered all too perfectly, much to Graciela's dismay.

Graciela crinkled her nose, scrunching her face. "Yeah, don't say that so loud please. No one knows. Anyways, he's...he's gone missing. The Legends say that there was a mission that went wrong and he…he sent them all away from the ship, dispersed them through Time. They were able to come back but now he's missing. Nobody knows where he is. He, uh, he left this letter for his team to, um...come and find me, back in the future. Apparently, he thought that if he was ever in deep shit, I'd be able to get him out of it. We had some problems in the past, and...he wrote that letter before we had a really bad fallout. I'm not really supposed to be here, but...I want to find him. I need to find him."

"Grace, we're so sorry," Barry said, "If you need anything from us, tell us."

Graciela shrugged. "It's Time travel. We just have to follow some clues and hopefully find him before something bad happens. I'm not exactly the best of leaders so I'm hoping we find him fast."

"You will," Belén assured her, "You seem like you get whatever you set your mind to. I'm just glad we get to see you again."

Graciela's lips spread into a soft smile. "Believe me, I'm happy about that too."

Somebody yelped from the training session and Belén had an inkling suspicion that it belonged to Cisco. Graciela thought the same considering it sounded like his squeal from earlier.

"Let me go check in with them," Belén volunteered and walked off — sprinted.

Barry moved to do the same when Graciela grabbed his arm.. "Um, can I have a word with you? Just you?"

From the cortex, the others tried to get ahold of Barry but were stumped to find him virtually all over the city.

"The suit's tracker must be malfunctioning," Cisco tried to get in touch with Barry himself. "It says he's appearing and reappearing all over the city at once, and that's impossible. He can't be moving that fast."

"Well if he can't, maybe something else can…?" Iris nervously watched the blinking dot meant to be Barry go in and out of appearance in every corner of the street map.

"What about the others?" Caitlin murmured as she switched to the comms. They might not have visuals on the subway but their communications were still intact. "Belén? What's happened over there?"

"I-I messed up, Caitlin!" Belén was quick to respond and let her frantic state be felt from across the city. "S-something took Barry! And it hurt Anais! Wally too - I don't know! I just don't know!"

"I got it!" Cisco cheered with his arms in the air. "Whatever it is, it stopped at the waterfront!"

"We have to get to him," Iris looked between the two considerably.

"Anais is down and I...I don't think I can reach them," Belén sounded on the verge of tears. They had yet to know what happened to Wally because she messed up.

"Cisco, you can open a breach and get you both to the waterfront," Iris thought of instead since this was a clear emergency.

"Guys, I can't," Caitlin gulped just by looking at her hands. "It's too dangerous."

"I'm begging you. Please!"

~ 0 ~

"Still alive down there?" Savitar's taunt came through the raspy, drawling voice of his his armor. Even as Barry tried getting up, Savitar forced him to stay put with a foot on him. "You are only a shadow beneath my throne. You are the past, whereas I... I am the future, Flash."

A breach opened up across them and out jumped Cisco and Caitlin. Cisco lost his balance with the source of energy he just pulled for the breach.

Caitlin wiggled her fingers and looked up ahead but all she saw was Barry in midair. "I can't see it!"

"Just do it!" cried Killer Frost in Caitlin's mind. Even as she shivered from it, she fired a large quantity of ice, probably more than she ever created since she got the powers. It encapsulated Savitar's form and made it visible for her and was able to feel the deep cold through Savitar's grasp.

Barry heard the cracking of the ice and the next he knew, he dropped to the ground. Savitar had disappeared. Cracks of ice sprawled underneath Barry's form, but otherwise he felt he would manage to pull himself up with Caitlin's support.

"Oh, boy. I'm gonna feel that tomorrow. Ah," Cisco groaned as Caitlin helped him stand. "That was a new and painful use of my powers." Caitlin rubbed his arm and looked back to Barry. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm okay. I'm just cold," Barry nodded them. "Thanks for coming."

~ 0 ~

"Barry, you're already healing. You should be fine soon," Caitlin moved over to the x-rays she'd taken from Cisco, the man lying on a bed with a hand on his forehead. "Um, Cisco, the MRI I did of your brain shows changes in the capillary morphology similar to that of a mini-stroke. I wouldn't try an intra-dimensional breach like that anytime soon."

Cisco nearly went pale as he sat upright. "Okay, okay. Mini-stroke? You can't just gloss over that like that, okay? What does that... what does that mean? Am I gonna have this migraine for the rest of my life?"

"It means you should take a few aspirin and you'll be fine," Caitlin reassured him his health.

"Oh. Well, just lead with that next time!"

"Cait, I know what a risk you took using your powers," Barry stopped her just as she was leaving the side room. "Thank you."

"I didn't do anything..." Caitlin said sheepishly.

"Well, you saved my life."

"You've saved mine plenty of times. I'm gonna go check on Wally," Caitlin turned to finally leave. As she walked on, her eyes flickered silver to dark. Let me out, Caity…

~ 0 ~

Shortly later, Belén and Anais had joined the group in the cortex, each one looking worse for wear in their own way.

"Anais, you're okay?" Cisco asked, much kinder than before now that he knew where his dampeners had actually gotten to.

Anais knew this and scowled at him in return. "You care?"

Cisco figured he had that well earned. "I said I was sorry—"

"Keep saying it, then," she walked past him to her folded suit left on a chair.

"What are you doing?" Barry asked, curiously watching her get the suit.

"I'm leaving," she announced sharply.

"What - now? You're choosing to leave now?" Cisco blinked. Just when he was beginning to like her a bit more.

"Caitlin said I finished with my tests and Barry said I could leave whenever I wanted to after that. Well, I want to leave now," Anais informed them and walked up to them. She didn't quite care for the group's reaction. "No offence, but I didn't come here to sign up for another war."

"Uh, no, you just stole the passageway of another man," Cisco reminded him but it did no good for the case.

"Here," Anais handed Barry a card with a number on it. "I'm not disappearing, but I...I just don't want to be here anymore. I just got out of a war, I can't get into another one. You understand, right?"

Barry gave a nod without the intention of pleading her to stay. Unfortunately, he could understand what Anais was trying to say. In the end, this was their problem with Savitar and Alchemy, not hers.

"Iris got me the cellphone, I will answer if you call, I swear," Anais stepped around Barry and stopped by Belén. "Please take care of yourself, okay?" Belén meekly nodded and rubbed her arm. Anais was sure there was something Belén wasn't saying but who was she to start asking questions? All Anais wanted to do was get the hell out of there before something targeted her next.

"Well, there's your daughter!" Cisco gestured after Anais once she was gone, eyes set on Barry and Belén. "You're not going to stop her!?"

Belén shrugged at Cisco. "What do you want us to do? Call her to come back and fight a battle that's not hers?"

Barry tucked the card with the number inside his pocket. "Maybe she's making the right call, alright? Let's just give her some space."

Cisco wasn't even going to waste more breath on the matter. "Fine, whatever. So what was that thing in the waterfront, anyways? All frozen and whatnot."

"I don't know. But now we know Alchemy is just the lackey," Barry said. "Whatever that thing was, it's what we're really up against."

"So why couldn't any of us see it?" Belén asked. "Joe and I, we-we tried but...there was nothing." Of course maybe she would have seen more things if she wasn't dealing with the insanity going on in her head.

"Maybe it was a speedster thing?" Cisco offered, even though there was no clear explanation for it. "I mean, Anais saw it, right?"

"Maybe, but I think he's more than a speedster," Barry admitted. "I mean, when he had me, it wasn't like we were even moving; it was just like, 'bam!' we were instantly somewhere different, even from my perspective."

"Did he say anything else?"

"He said his name was Savitar."

"Nice name," Belén said distractedly. She felt the echo of pain on the side of her head.

"Bells…" Barry stepped towards her but she sniffed and nodded to the threshold.

Belén blinked at Barry, her face flushing when she realized she wasn't paying attention again. "Uh, Wally's still...I'm so sorry." She shook her head and rushed out of the cortex.

Barry was exhausted and yet this single moment felt even worse than him getting punched by Savitar. Whatever was going on with Belén was distancing them again and the last time that happened, Belén almost didn't come back from it.

~ 0 ~

A few hours had passed by since they brought Wally back and since then, Caitlin had performed a series of tests to see his condition. Her news wasn't relatively the best except that Wally wasn't entirely dead.

Belén heard the whole news and couldn't take the guilt. She cooped herself up in the greenhouse room and tried her damn best to meditate. It wasn't working. In fact, it was perhaps one of the worst meditation attempts of her life. Belén felt like sobbing at one point. That was when Barry found her.

"Bells, c'mon..." Barry had no sophisticated strategy to get her to open up. He was too tired for that stuff today. He sat down on the floor directly in front of her, crossing one leg over the other as if he was going to meditate with her. For the first couple of minutes, he didn't say anything to her. He just looked at her.

Belén did the same. Somehow, the silence between them was even more difficult to manage than when Barry actively tried to find out what was going on with her. In the end, she gave up. "It's my fault," her confession was a quiet whisper.

"Your fault?" Barry repeated. He hoped that it was glaringly obvious how eager he was that she had finally said something to him. Hopefully it would pave the way to her revealing what was really the problem.

Belén swallowed hard. "Yeah," she nodded. "I messed up. I messed up so badly. I let Wally walk right past me to that stupid stone! He was right in front of me and do didn't do anything!"

Barry was still, honestly, stumped about that moment. Even though there was still some fuzziness about what happened there, he knew something prevented Belén from stopping Wally. She was right. He had walked right past her and she didn't do anything. That wasn't like her. Lately, she wasn't acting like herself. "Bells, you have to help me out here, what's happening? I-I am being patient, but...look at yourself. It's like when Datura was getting to you and...and you shut yourself off from everyone, including me."

Belén bit on her bottom lip nervously. As hard as things were getting, she was scared to tell Barry what was happening. "It's scaring the living crap out of me right now," she admitted.

"What is?" Barry gently pushed for the answer. He reached for one of her hands on her lap, enveloping it between his hands. "You can tell me anything."

"I'm afraid how you'll take it," Belén said, watching him carefully. Already, she saw a spark of guilt in Barry's eyes. She couldn't imagine how he would take the news that his changing the timelines truly affected her and Caitlin in the worst ways. She couldn't do that to him. "But it's okay. It's okay. I have it under control."

"But, Bells—"

Belén leaned forwards and pressed a kiss on Barry's lips. She smiled softly at him, eyes looking at him fondly. "I really love you, do you know that?"

Barry recognized a tactic when he saw one and he was ashamed that it worked. Belén was purposely keeping something away from him and he couldn't force it out of her. The only thing left to do was wait and tell her that he loved her too.

~ 0 ~

"Alright then," Veronica settled a folder of evidence on the interrogation table and watched the lone acolyte of Alchemy's shift nervously in his chair. "Now that you lost the monk disguise, we can talk. Let's start with Alchemy."

The man gave her almost a sneer.

Veronica raised an eyebrow. "I wouldn't test these waters," she warned in a deadly tone. "Why don't—" the door of the room burst open with Joe.

He let the door slam behind him as he walked over to the table. "Tell me about Alchemy," he commanded. "What he does, how he does it. Say it now."

There, the man repeated his sneer. However, he spoke this time. "His powers are beyond human understanding."

"Try us," Veronica leaned back on her chair and motioned him to get a move on.

The man merely smirked. "Oh, you will be tried. All of you. When my master rises, the human race will be judged. From where I'm sitting, you will not fare very well."

Veronica was about to tell him how delirious he was when Joe reached out and grabbed the man by the nose, almost threatening to break it. Veronica, startled, straightened up on her chair.

"You think I'm playing with you? My son is in one of those cocoons, and you're gonna tell me how to get him out. Now talk!" Joe ignored Veronica's attempt to get him to stop. He was beyond words at this point. The only salvation was the relentless knock on the door.

"Please just stop," Veronica warned him when she went to go answer. "Caitlin?" she blinked then looked past her to see if she was alone.

"It's Wally," the brunette said, immediately catching Joe's attention. The man hurried over. "He's out of that thing. He's fine."

"And he's okay?"

"Yeah. He's fine. I promise."

"Oh, thank God. Thank you, Caitlin," Joe glanced back at the suspect.

"You should probably go see him, then," Veronica smiled at him. "I can take care of this joke in ten minutes."

Joe laughed and merrily went on his way.

"Actually, Belén is waiting for you in the reception," Caitlin informed Veronica. "She said it's something important."

"Oh, wonder what it is now," Veronica smiled again and walked out of the room, leaving the door to close on its own.

Caitlin struck a boot just before it did close. She waited until Veronica was out of the way then walked in, backwards, and shut the door. Her eyes flickered to the security camera up on the ceiling and shot a hand up at it, freezing it completely.

"Where is Alchemy?" she revealed her silver eyes. The white streaks of hair were already making its presence on her head. "Tell me where Alchemy is."

The man eyed her with curiosity. He was not afraid, merely interested like he expected this to happen. "I sense great fear in you. You fear your power, your own greatness."

"I don't fear anything anymore," Caitlin's voice overlapped with Killer Frost. "Where is Alchemy?"

"The only one I fear is that whom Alchemy serves, the dark lord Savitar."

Caitlin regarded that with some amusement. Her eyes became a stronger silver as she rose her hand with threatening ice. "Maybe it's time you started fearing me."

GetHimGetHimGetHim, Killer Frost commanded and this time had the perfect control over Caitlin. Ice spread to the suspect's hands, causing terrible screams to erupt.

In less than a minute there was pounding on the doors. Caitlin's eyes briefly reverted to their normal chocolate brown. Caitlin herself whimpered as she felt the force that was Killer Frost trying to push her way out again. Her eyes flashed silver again and she filled the air with a cold fog then allowed the door to open. As the two officers hurried inside, she slipped out and shut the door, icing the doorknob as a measure of caution.

She was on her way out when someone called her back.

Julian Albert stood behind with an air of confusion as he heard his co-workers calling for help from the inside of the interrogation room. When he turned to Caitlin, he gasped at her very near proximity.

"I need you to come with me," she informed with her frost smoking up from her hands.

~ 0 ~

Joe came in a hurry into Wally's room and was stunned when he found his son was in the same condition as when he left. He met the others' confused looks and explained to them that Caitlin had assured him that Wally had woken up.

"What? I didn't even see her leave," Cisco realized that Caitlin had been out of sight for a while now.

"She said that?" Belén asked, focusing on the more important details of the story.

"Yes," Joe said, quite irritated to see that it was all lies.

"That's not like Caitlin..." Iris shook her head, thinking the same as the others.

Belén was the first to realize what was going on. Iris was right. Caitlin wasn't like that. Caitlin didn't lie to get officers out of interrogation rooms.

But she knew a certain metahuman who would do all those things.

~ 0 ~

The precinct was on red alert when Barry got there. Before he reached the offices, Veronica caught him on the side, startling him.

"You have got some explaining to do!" Her snap put him even worse for wear.

"What!? I—"

"Come here," Veronica grabbed Barry by the collar and dragged him into the bullpen, ignoring his 'what' again. She stopped by her desk and pulled up the security feed of the interrogation room where they'd kept Alchemy's acolyte. "Caitlin just attacked two officers, one suspect and kidnapped Julian."

"What?" Barry leaned closer to the screen just to make sure they hadn't made a mistake. He could only see Caitlin's side profile as she iced down the camera.

"No one's recognized her from the video but if Julian gets out first, he'll turn her in," Veronica warned him. "What the hell is going on?"

"I...I don't know," Barry rubbed his forehead. Killer Frost was making her appearance, that's what. Just like her earth 2 doppelganger, the ice made her bad.

"When did she get powers? And why would she take Julian?" Veronica's questions went unanswered.

Barry couldn't focus when the bigger issues were at hand. It would be a race to find Caitlin before the cops did.

~ 0 ~

As soon as she could, Belén fled to her greenhouse room to call a certain doppelganger to answers. She faced Datura on a video call while she paced back and forth. "What the hell is happening? Killer Frost is already taking Caitlin over! You said there was more time!"

Datura snickered on the other end. "I said there was only a question of who would end up taken first. Looks like I got the answer. Killer Frost was always a rowdy, annoying meta."

"Well now she's inside my friend and she's making Caitlin do things she would never do!"

"That's the point, stupid," Datura rolled her eyes. "Killer Frost wants access, and since Caitlin is probably getting more desperate, it's been easy for Killer Frost to take over."

"But she kidnapped a friend — Killer Frost kidnaps?"

"No," Datura said with some thought put into it. She looked to the side as she recollected patterns of the Earth 2 meta. "She kills. It's in her name. I think this little outburst might be Caitlin and Killer Frost together as a...mixture. One is just fighting the other."

"So, Caitlin is actively fighting back but losing?"

"Don't know. Look at her intentions and then let me know," Datura winked then shut off the call before Belén could say more.

Belén stuffed her phone in her back pocket then rubbed her face. "Caitlin, what are you doing?" She hated to think what Caitlin might be feeling - if Caitlin was feeling anything as herself at all. If what Datura said was true, then perhaps Caitlin was on her way to merging with Killer Frost to create a whole new person.

Who would that person end up, though?

~ 0 ~

"So, they don't know why she took Julian?" Cisco asked just to be sure. He was currently trying to locate Caitlin's location and a little stress might be making it more difficult.

"No, they don't. But more importantly, they don't even know that it's Caitlin yet, so we need to find her before they do," Barry couldn't hide the urgency in his words.

"Okay, let's say we do find her, then what are we going to do?" Iris made them stop for a moment. "It's obvious she's not thinking straight but have we thought about the reasons? Maybe something that could help us?"

"Killer Frost from Earth 2 is inhabiting Caitlin's mind," Belén walked in, her face expressing nothing but guilt. "Caitlin is literally having a battle with another person inside her own body."

"She's becoming Killer Frost. It's just like in the Vibe," Cisco shook his head.

"We don't know that yet," Barry reminded, but the doubt was still hanging over everyone's head.

"Her mother said the more that she uses her powers, the faster she's gonna go," Belén relayed what Caitlin once told her. "These powers aren't just powers, they're actual people that Datura siphoned. They're sentient and some of them are more forcible than others."

"How do you know that?" Iris now laid suspicious eyes on Belén.

"Because that's what Datura told me," Belén replied, hiding behind the technicality that she was not lying. "We just need to find Caitlin and make her see what's happening."

"I tried pinging her cell and Julian's, but she must have ditched them both," Cisco said with a groan of frustration.

"Stop thinking Caitlin is a regular person and start searching for another meta with cold powers," Belén moved over to him. "The answer here is not to ignore. Caitlin's powers, they're cold, so...could we use something we used for Captain Cold?"

"We tracked him using the satellite to scan for ultraviolet cold signatures," Cisco thought about it then snapped his fingers. "You're good!" he told Belén, making her smile, and got back to work. "Frozen food warehouse! That's where she is! Okay, I'm gonna isolate the feed so that no one else can see it!"

"Please do," Belén hurried after her suit.

"Figure out what she's making Julian do," Barry instructed as he went with Belén. The two would certainly need to know to help.

~ 0 ~

Julian worked incredibly fast despite the fear over his shoulders. Caitlin had him searching for acolytes of Alchemy and with a good motivation too. Find someone or be killed. She had already proven that she was willing to follow through by giving a deadly frostbite on his wrist, so...

"I found two individuals that have searched for the name Savitar. Here are both their addresses, both of them in Central City," he stopped working and looked at the woman. He still couldn't believe this was Caitlin Snow, a friend of Belén's who'd gone mad all in a week since the last time he saw her. "What exactly are you gonna do to them?"

"I don't know," Caitlin admitted as she walked a bit to the side. Killer Frost was screaming in her head to do something more fun, to use her powers. But all Caitlin wanted to do was silence her forever. "What am I doing?" She asked as herself. The noise of typing brought the more suspicious Killer Frost out. Julian had attempted - successfully - to send a message to the police. Angrily, she iced his laptop and destroyed it. "What part of "I'll freeze you to death" did you not understand?"

"Stop!" Barry sped in with Belén. Both were stunned to see Caitlin's appearance. It was half her, half Killer Frost.

Exactly what Datura said, Belén remembered.

"Get out of here," Caitlin warned them with one hand raised.

"You know we can't do that," Barry shook his head.

Belén swallowed hard and moved towards the woman but Caitlin brandished a frosty hand. "What are you doing?" Belén whispered in disbelief. "I know the powers are doing this but you have to fight it."

"Take her out. Take her out!" Julian frantically urged behind Barry.

"That's what I'm doing," Caitlin responded as herself, taking Belén by surprise. "I'm not trying to hurt someone—"

"You are wiring to hurt someone!" Julian was the first one to argue. "Knock her out!" he ordered the two known metas.

Barry didn't hesitate to knock him out instead. Belén threw Barry a look for that, eyes sharp with disapproval.

"Priorities," Barry reminded, though his lips did try to form a smile when Belén returned her attention to Caitlin.

"Cait, these powers, we can work with them—"

"I'm doing something about it!" Caitlin snapped at Belén. "I'm finding Alchemy!"

"We will find him. All right? Together," Barry misunderstood her intentions, as did Belén, and hoped to be reassuring.

"No. You don't understand. I don't want to lock him up. I need him to help me," Caitlin frantically argued.

"Help you what?"

"I need him to get rid of my powers!"

Both Belén and Barry paused in their tracks. Belén sighed at the brunette. "Caitlin... I'm not sure Alchemy can deal with...this sort of power," Belén felt sorry to say. She wished it would be that easy.

"You don't know that it doesn't," Caitlin very logically made her point. "I need her to stop talking to me! To stop controlling me!"

"Then let us help," Barry slowly reached out for her. "We all love you, and we will do everything that we can to help you. We've been through too much together to let each other down now."

Caitlin's eyes glimmered blue and silver. "Like you helped your mother?" Her voice vibrated with Killer Frost's. "Or Wally? Or me? You keep messing with everyone's lives, wrecking everything, and we're left behind to pick up the pieces from your mistakes. Some things you break can't be put back together!"

Barry, ashamed, took that with a hang of his head. "I can fix this."

Killer Frost had no mercy. "Oh, like you fixed Cisco's family? You didn't tell Cisco that you screwed him worst of all, did you?" she purposely spoke louder for the audience watching from STAR Labs. "You hear that, Cisco? Dante was alive, healthy and happy, until Barry created Flashpoint. When he reset things, that's what killed him. Barry is the reason your brother is dead."

"Caitlin, stop!" Belén ordered but Killer Frost was not done.

The best thing about accessing Caitlin's mind was getting a full view of her memories. "You're both—" she nodded to Belén and Barry, "—meant for each other, you know. Keeping secrets, it's what you do best. At least Datura was never a hypocrite about it."

Belén's anger was quick to form. "Be quiet!" she hissed, not entirely as herself, and nearly attacked if the police force hadn't arrived.

Before the bullets could reach them, Barry got them across the room towards another exit. "Bells?" he worriedly saw her holding her head again, reminding him of the last time they'd been like this.

Caitlin, on the other hand, saw a golden opportunity. She created an icicle and stabbed Barry on the lower part of his ankle, and smirked at Barry's cry of pain. "That severed your triceps surae. Even with your healing abilities, it'll take four hours to regenerate! Don't follow me!"

"Caitlin—" Belén didn't even move an inch before Caitlin threw another threat.

"Follow me and I'll say everything," Caitlin rushed out of there.

Belén pursed her lips together, guilt settling over her like layers of mountain.

~ 0 ~

Both Veronica and Joe walked into the cortex, Axel in tow behind his grandmother. The two detectives moved directly for the side room where they could see Barry. Axel, in the meantime, stayed behind with Cisco, chatting him up with questions over what was happening but Cisco barely regarded the boy.

"I'm not a good doctor so just...tell me if that hurt?" Belén slowly pulled her hands off the bandage she'd wrapped around Barry's ankle.

"It hurts as much as I deserve probably," Barry mumbled, feeling pain alright but it didn't exactly come from his injuries.

"They took Julian to County General," Veronica informed them both. "Mrs. Andrews is with him which is why I had to bring Axel around." Axel had given up on talking to Cisco and now directed all his questions to Iris.

"He's still out cold. How hard did you hit him?" Joe had to wonder.

"I don't know. I didn't mean to knock him out," Barry swallowed the pain he felt and he moved his legs to one side of the bed.

"Mhm," Belén's sharp eyes made him reevaluate his statement.

"Or maybe I did," he relented and got himself up. Belén rolled her eyes and let him move towards the cortex.

Barry saw Cisco crossing the cortex for the desks, and took his chance at a little explanation. "Cisco. Hey, man, um, what Caitlin said…"

Cisco stopped and sent him an scrutinizing glance. "Was she lying?"

"No. Um…"

Cisco almost rolled his eyes despite tears threatening to break free. "You're sorry? That you killed my brother? 'Cause he was here. He was alive—" he enunciated slowly, one hand jabbing at Barry's shoulder, "—until you created Flashpoint, until you did this!" he shoved the speedster backwards.

Axel scurried from Iris towards his aunt. "Why are they…" he stopped when Belén warned him to stay quiet with a finger over her lips.

"I don't even know how to feel right now. All I know is Caitlin is out there, and we need to find her. Can we do that?" Cisco backed to the desk, not giving much of an alternative. "I hacked Julian's computer. Caitlin had him look up two addresses: 16 Hawthorne Avenue and 1104 Truman Place. She's trying to find the acolytes, I was trying to say."

"What exactly would she want with Alchemy's followers?" Iris wondered out loud.

"Caitlin doesn't want her powers so... she thinks these acolytes can take her to Alchemy who would then take away her powers," Belén explained. It was exactly what Caitlin, in such a state, would attempt to do.

"We heard," Cisco muttered from the computers.

"Well, two acolytes, two addresses. Which one's she gonna hit first?" Veronica inquired, but knew there was no certain answer.

"We got to watch both," Barry decided. He was shot down before he even took a step towards his suit.

"You're gonna stay here. You can barely walk," Joe pointed him to the chair.

"We can take care of Hawthorne," Belén moved over to Cisco.

"I'll take Truman," Veronica volunteered.

"I care about Caitlin, but I don't want to leave Wally," Joe admitted.

"Dad, Barry and I will stay with Wally," Iris offered instead. "You go with Detective Greene."

"Alright," Joe sighed and moved with Veronica.

Belén started for her suit in the meantime.

"Cisco, if you find her…" Barry trailed off when Cisco directed a cold glare on him.

"I won't call you. You've done enough," Cisco mumbled and went on his way.

Belén came back but before she even called for Cisco, Barry motioned her to stop. "Just be careful," he told her and limped his way to Wally's room.

"Look after him, please?" Belén asked Iris quietly. Iris assured she would, allowing Belén to go on in a relative peace.

~0~

"The acolyte's on the second floor," Veronica settled her eyes on the apartment across them. She picked up her coffee cup then offered the second one to Joe. He shook his head and simply stated ahead. "I understand how you feel about Wally but he's going to be okay."

Joe's face said something else. "How would you know?"

"I think logically," Veronica shrugged. "If they wanted him dead, then that would've happened yesterday."

The manner in which she said it was so...carefree. There really was no trace of concern in her. "How do you do that?" Joe asked incredulously.

Veronica gave a small smile. "You're forgetting my own children have been affected. My eldest is in prison for murder and theft, my son is dead and my youngest...just won't stop fighting. After a while, you catch on that no matter how many times you attempt to stop them... they won't."

"So, what? I'm just supposed to let them do what they want even when my gut tells me something's off?"

"No. You use that intuition to help them. At the end of the day they're young and don't have the same experience that we do. That's why they need us," Veronica said with the utmost certainty. She exchanged a smile with Joe after. "So next time, just follow your intuition."

~0~

The first acolyte had been signaled out as the one chosen by Caitlin. She was sneaky like Killer Frost, but cautious like Caitlin as she waited for the acolyte, named Craig apparently, to come out of his bedroom. Just as the he went for the temperature controller, she let the hiss of her ice scare him into turning around.

"Both of my parents are doctors. It's all I ever wanted to be. Growing up, I used to practice the Hippocratic Oath. I was obsessed with it," she started moving towards the nab who only plastered himself against the wall. "If anyone was even gonna step on a bug, I would say, 'Do no harm'. It's built into my DNA." She raised a finger at him, letting ice encapsulate around it to create a perfect icicle. "Unfortunately, my DNA isn't what it used to be. So, believe me when I say answer every one of my questions, or I will harm you and your family." This left the acolyte with no choice. "Who is Alchemy?"

"I don't know. I've never seen him without the mask!"

"I know he can give people powers. Can he take them away?"

"Yes. But you can't make Alchemy do anything. He's just an acolyte, like me," the man admitted, his eyes constantly flickering to the icicle threatening to claw his eyes out. "We both serve the speed god, Savitar. He's shown us the future. I saw you there." Caitlin's eyes turned back to their regular color, even the icicle disappearing from her finger. "You were glorious and powerful. My lord has special plans for you. He will come to you and speak to you. The honor of that is..." his laughter only brought out Caitlin's fear even more. "He will call you...the Bringer. After all, only you, Caitlin Snow, can bring Her."

Caitlin backtracked, her eyes going back and forth between blue and brown. She was terrified. She needed to leave - now! She hurried out of the house, but by the time she managed to get out, Killer Frost was surfacing again. The light rain made for an eventful night, at least that's what Killer Frost kept saying in the head.

"Caitlin!" Cisco's voice stopped her across the road.

She smirked at him. "Really? You brought your toys?" she nodded to his goggled which he had yet to put on.

Cisco's hand gripped around hid goggles. "I'm hoping it won't come to that."

Caitlin raised her icy hands. "It won't."

"Look, I'm not leaving you out here. I want to help you."

"There's only one person who can help me."

"Really? You really think seeking medical advice from someone named Dr. Alchemy is the way to go?"

"Why not? My name is Killer Frost," Caitlin threatened to shoot frost from her hands.

Cisco moved a step forwards. "Your name... is Caitlin Snow.

"Can Caitlin Snow do this?" Caitlin's eyes glowed stronger. Killer Frost commanded her to start firing, and so she did. Icicles stormed towards Cisco and since he couldn't bring himself to attack yet, he ran for cover behind a tree.

Caitlin pulled back a hand to fire stronger but a vine latched onto her wrist, preventing her from moving it. Belén stood behind her, very much in the same cautious state as Cisco. "Caitlin, please!"

"My name is Killer Frost!" Ice zoomed up Belén's wrapped vine, forcing her to let it go before it reached her. Caitlin then whirled around and blasted a powerful mass of frost at the other woman. "Why fight me? We could be a killer team, you know."

Belén motioned Caitlin to calm down. "Caitlin, I know it's hard. The voice is strong but you are stronger. Don't let her control you."

"I'm doing fine, thanks! Can't say the same for you!" Caitlin swung icicles like boomerangs at Belén, forcing the meta to fight back. She moved forwards as her poison swished forwards along with pieces of vines trying to trap Caitlin but it wasn't enough to keep her down. The frosty meta engaged Belén in hand combat.

"Belén! Move!" Cisco put on his goggles, figuring that the best thing would be to bring Caitlin back to STAR Labs...and for that she needed everyone to help.

"I can't!" Belén was in the middle of dodging Caitlin who was probably drawing on Killer Frost's combat skills.

"Unleash those powers," Killer Frost taunted in-between punches. "You know they're itching to play!"

She's right. Let us out! Belén heard the voices begin to scream. With that distraction, Killer Frost backhanded her to the ground.

"Come on out!" she practically demanded, going as far as putting a boot over Belén's back.

Belén screwed her eyes shut but this time the voices weren't going away. They were doing the same thing Killer Frost said to. They wanted to come out.

Caitlin was drawn back by the noises of a zip. She caught Barry's light as he charged towards them. She froze the roadside and watched as the speedster slipped over and rolled on the ground. She walked over to him, glaring down. "How's the leg?"

Barry hated her sense of humor at the moment. He saw her boots from the corner of his eyes and retaliated in the simplest way. He swiped his arm across her legs and knocked her down beside him.

"I'm sorry, Caitlin," he heard her groans beside him and truly felt bad for her. Everything she said was right. It was his fault.

"That was cold, Flash," she gave him his due. "But this is colder." She jumped to her next move and straddled him, planting her lips over his for a frosty kiss.

Cisco knew it was time to act no matter his feelings. He could practically see Barry's blue face thanks to Caitlin. Belén was still on the ground once again raging at herself to 'stop' ... again. Cisco put on his goggles and struck Caitlin with a vibe energy that knocked her over a car. Cisco then came running forwards.

"Start vibrating. It'll warm you up," he left that advice for Barry on the ground.

Caitlin was just attempting to get up when she felt a hand curl around her ankle. "Oh let go you pathetic plant girl," she hissed with a raging icy hand.

"You wanted me out? Now I'm out," Belén had an unusual glare on her face, her eyes glimmering colors.

"Bells, just hold her!" Cisco ran up to them with the intention of knocking Caitlin out.

"I've got a better idea," Belén smirked. Heat erupted from her free hand and sent Cisco back against the same car that Caitlin had rolled over.

Start killing! Get them all out! Let us be free! The voices chanted in unison. Belén felt herself slowly lose against them. She didn't want to be like Caitlin, she wanted to control them...but she was so tired. The stronger they got, the less pain Belén felt, the less stress and ache.

"Well, you came out to play," Caitlin as Killer Frost looked down at Belén with a smug face.

Belén held her head in pain. "Leave me alone, Frost!"

Caitlin circled the woman, taunting her to come out and match her powers. "We could have some fun, can't you see? I hadn't thought about it before but, after all you were the one who wanted me to come out with Caitlin."

"I SAID STOP!" Belén screamed and whirled around to deliver a punch across Caitlin's face. She raised her hands above her head and let white energy blink into existence around them.

"Belén?"

Belén lowered her arms but kept the moon energy stirring between her hands as she turned to face Barry. He was stunned to find Cisco outcold over a car, Caitlin pretty much under the same state on the ground and... Belén being the cause of it. Her white eyes made him fear that perhaps Killer Frost wasn't the only one who was affected by the siphoning device. Had he done that to her as well?

"Shoot," Belén commanded, but as herself trying to regain control. The power around her hands struggled to keep itself going. "I don't want…" her white eyes flickered to Caitlin, "...I don't want to be...like her...knock me out!"

Barry couldn't believe his ears. Belén stumbled towards him, begging him to do what she asked. "But Belén—"

"KNOCK ME OUT!" she screamed at Barry, eyes flickering to gold. The sight terrified him. "DO IT!"

Barry shut his eyes and absolutely hated himself. He streaked forwards and knocked Belén down as cautious as possible. A smack would be enough, he hoped.

~0~

The next time Caitlin awoke, she found herself inside the pipeline with the group, save Belén, staring at her from the other side with sympathy. "Phew, guess I just needed a little sleep. Thanks, guys. I'm feeling much better now. It's okay. You can let me out. I promise I'm not gonna hurt anybody." Her eyes blue eyes scanned the group to see if anyone faltered, but they knew better. "Hmm. Guess you're all smarter than I thought. You know, that was some blast there, Vibe boy. It kind of hurt."

Cisco's eyes were still glossy with tears. He couldn't believe this is what they were reduced to in the end. "I didn't want to hurt you."

Caitlin's face contorted to disgust. "You're pathetic."

"Alchemy can't help you. But we can. I promise," Barry couldn't stop staring at her, hoping that she would come out of her trance.

Caitlin scoffed. "Oh, like you promised Eddie? And like you promised Ronnie? You know, for a hero, Flash, you sure let a lot of people around you die."

"This isn't you talking. It's the powers. They're messing with your mind. You're sick—"

"Killer Frost might be in my head but Caitlin is broken, Barry. And that's all your fault," Caitlin tapped her finger against the wall. A smug smile spread across her face, almost threatening to laugh. "But this time around, justice came through. You're not getting away with a happy ending this time. You hurt the person you supposedly love most. Belén? She's going to become just like me and then we'll take this city together."

Barry swallowed hard, the guilt he felt once now too hard to push with words of comfort. "We're not letting this happen…" He reached for the controller's to close the pipeline up.

"You did this to me!" Caitlin raged from the inside just before she was lost behind the pipeline.

"Do you have any idea how we can reverse this?" Barry turned to Cisco, hoping for anything at this point. "How we can get her back?"

Cisco refused to look at him. "It's like Caitlin said: sometimes when things get broken, they can't be fixed."

~0~

Belén sat at the edge of the medical bed with her head held low in shame. She couldn't stop staring at the meta dampener cuffs adorning her wrists. Cisco must have put them on her after being taken back to STAR Labs. The voices were dead silent in her head. It was as if everything was normal again.

Except she wasn't. She was far from it.

The sound of footsteps rose her head. She was mortified to see her friends and mother staring at her with...pity. She pulled her legs up to her chest and rested her head over her knees.

"I'm sorry," she said, not that it mattered. She had punched her friend and thrown the other over a car. One apology made no difference.

Barry asked with a pleading look to let him talk to her first.

"Do not let her become like Caitlin," Veronica warned with the same hostility she once showed him when they first met. She was angry. Hell angry.

Barry cleared his throat and walked into the side room once the others had gone. "This was it, wasn't it? The thing that you were hiding? It was about this and Caitlin."

"I could never say anything about Caitlin. It wasn't my secret to tell," she rose her head once more. "And I just didn't want you to think it was your fault."

"But it is," Barry said grimly, "This is all my fault. In the other timeline, this didn't happen to you. It didn't happen to Caitlin either."

"It does no good to think about that anymore," Belén said, letting out a heavy sigh, "You can't change it anymore. If I could, I would have tried to fix this on my own."

"But you shouldn't have to," Barry said, coming over to sit down on the bed with her, "This is my fault so please let me help to fix this. We're a team, right? You and I, we're partners above everything and everyone else. Please, trust in me that I will fix this."

"There's not much to work with," Belén said, "The voices are just getting stronger now."

"These voices... there's more than one?"

Belén nodded. "There's three. One who controls earth, the other controls the moon elements and the other has heat abilities. They're some of the victims Datura siphoned and killed. They're mad and they want to be free. Datura said that it's only a matter of time until I lose it. She was right about Caitlin, so…"

"Datura?" Barry raised an eyebrow at her. "You've been speaking to that woman?"

"Yeah, she called me one day because apparently she can now see the future sometimes. I visited her too," Belén said, deciding it was best to put it all out there now that the truth was out. "We, uh, we made a deal. She said she'll help and in return, she'll get Frost's power back. But being honest...I don't think she'll be able to reverse it. And I certainly don't want to wear these," she raised her cuffed hands. "If I have to live with these powers, then I want to control them. I don't want to hide them."

Barry ultimately knew she wanted the cuffs off. He could already hear Veronica shouting that it wasn't the safest thing but...he had already messed up by creating this situation. The least he could do was give Belén her choice. It was all he had. He reached over and unlocked the cuffs. Cisco had placed a password on it just in case Belén switched personalities again. Belén was a bit awed that he was listening so easily. Anyone else would've told her absolutely not.

"I'm sorry for doing this to you, but I swear I will do anything and everything I can to help you," Barry promised her. "Just please don't feel like you need to be sorry. This isn't on you."

"Yeah, well, it doesn't exactly help to hear you continually blame yourself. There's nothing you can do by that," she leaned her head against his arm.

"I should have just followed you inside the house," Barry deeply regretted that night he changed the timelines. He had everything and he didn't see it. It would probably be his biggest regret.

"But you didn't, and that's the fact. I'm sorry you feel this way but...there is nothing you can do to change it. There is no fixing. We are not projects," she shifted her head to look up at him. "We are your friends and we need you."

Barry wrapped an arm around her and pulled her closer. "I've been the villain of this story, Bells."

"Change the course," Belén said, resting her head on his shoulder.

Their moment was cut short when the lights mysteriously malfunctioned in the building. The only possible source of power had to be from Wally. The two metas hurriedly rushed towards Wally's room and found Joe in the middle of breaking Wally out of his cocoon.

"Joe! Hey! What are you doing?" Barry frantically urged him to stop but Joe had already made the decision long before. "You can't cut him!"

"I have to!" Joe argued back. He didn't want Joe to follow in Caitlin's footsteps, nor Belén's. With the help of a power saw, the cocoon was opened in half but along with it came an odd noise.

Barry figured what it was and sped the others away from the cocoon just as an energy exploded from it. Smoke filled the room over the tipped over furniture. There was only s familiar vibrating noise heard and it wasn't from Barry.

Wally stood in the middle of the room, his entire body vibrating. His gaze slowly went around the room but he never made a noise. Then, just like that, he zipped out of the room.

The group quickly intended on finding him, as well as seeing what exactly the cocoon made him.

"No sign of Wally. I've got the satellite scanning the entire city for rapid movement," Cisco called from the desk.

"If he's a speedster, he could be halfway across the country by now," Iris remarked, still unable to believe what they'd seen mere minutes ago.

"Barry, we have to find him," Joe felt the urgency of a parent but also knew it was his fault. He had only wanted to help his son before something bad happened.

"I'm more worried about what happens when we do find him," Barry admitted. "He didn't seem like he was all there."

"I shouldn't have cut him out of that thing," Joe put his hands over his head.

"If we have no way of knowing what effects Wally did under...should we really try to find him first?" Belén asked. "We need to be smart about this and the only one who could possibly know is…"

"Caitlin," Barry exhaled. "We need a biochemist."

"And how do we break her out of...whatever is in her?" Veronica inquired, accusing eyes landing on her daughter. She had spotted the clean wrists.

Belén sucked in a breath and walked to the desk. "Killer Frost from Earth 2 expects us to fix Caitlin by erasing the powers, her mind. If we want Caitlin back, then we need to remind her who she is."

"Remind her who she is? I think I can do that," Barry decided to play one last card and headed for the pipeline.

Veronica quickly took her daughter by the wrist to the side. "What the hell are you doing? Where are the cuffs?"

"I'm not wearing them," Belén pushed her mother's hands off and returned to the desk.

"I knew we shouldn't have given Barry the password," the woman came after her.

"Mom, you can't just lock them up! I mean, that's exactly what Caitlin tried to do and look where she is right now?" Belén turned to Cisco with the most sincere face possible. "Cisco, I swear I am so sorry that I threw you over a car! I'm sorry that I lied to everyone but you cannot force me to shut my powers away!" she shouted. "Like I said to Barry I am not a project to fix!"

Get them. Make them fear you, Belén closed her eyes and leaned on the desk. The others exchanged cautious glances.

~0~

Caitlin was smug when Barry reopened her prison. It was going to be difficult convincing her but Barry was not planning on stopping.

"We need your help, Caitlin. Wally... he's... he's out of the cocoon, but his biochemistry is all out of whack. He went AWOL."

Caitlin casually leaned against the back wall of the pod. Her lips formed a mock pout. "So?"

"So, when we find him, he's gonna need your help. He's gonna need your medical expertise, your experience with metas. What he needs is Caitlin Snow, MD."

Caitlin gave a mocking laugh. "So, you came to try and talk some sense into me."

"No. I came to let you go," Barry moved to the controls again and opened up the pod.

Caitlin waited a second fir any trick he might be holding back on. Barry just stood there waiting for her. She mocked him and walked out. "For a smart guy, that was an awfully dumb move."

"Like I said, you're free to go."

"What's the catch?"

"You have to kill me," Barry answered in a matter of fact tone.

From the cortex, Iris was deadlocked on the plan, thinking it stupid. "What is he doing!?"

"He's bringing Caitlin back," Belén shushed her, she and Cisco being the only ones not as worried. She had faith that their friend was still there, and if Barry really wanted to help them then he needed to be the one to take the leap. He was faster; he could move if he needed to.

Caitlin raised an eyebrow at Barry and moved up to him. He didn't move an inch. "You want to fight, Flash?"

"No. I'm not gonna fight you," Barry continued with his nonchalantness. "But if you want to leave this room, you're gonna have to kill me."

"Don't think I won't," Caitlin warned, Killer Frost lacing every word spoken.

"Then do it."

Caitlin turned her palm over and created one lone icicle.

Barry braced himself and didn't move an inch. Caitlin, for some reason, only raised the icicle to his chest. "What are you waiting for? What's the big deal? Come on! Live up to your name, Killer Frost. I want to see some killing!" he grabbed onto her wrist holding the icicle and yanked her forwards. "You want to be the villain? This is what they do. They kill their friends, because nothing matters to them anymore, right?"

Caitlin seemed to struggle to push the icicle. Killer Frost raged to do it already so they could go. I can't, Caitlin was the one to think. She's not in control.

"Kill me, Caitlin!" Barry practically ordered to the still woman. "You can't do it. You can't, because underneath all that cold, you're still you."

Caitlin released a shaky breath, Killer Frost's rage was being sealed away at least for the time being. She was not a killer. Killer Frost could not make her become that. Absolutely not.

The blue in her eyes faded away and were replaced by tears. She dropped the icicle in her hand and broke into sobs. "Barry!"

Barry hugged her with no hard feelings. "It's okay. I got you. It's okay." He held her tight and sighed of relief to have her back with them.

~ 0 ~

Caitlin felt a huge relief having the meta-dampeners back on her wrists. Her mind was clear again, there was just her and only her. It left her entirely focused on Wally's current state, the latter still unfound. She'd taken a couple of bits left over by the cocoon to see where exactly Wally's structure was at the moment. And because of it, she was able to form an injection that might help him.

"I think extracting Wally early from that cocoon left him in a fugue state. His synapses aren't used to functioning at super-speed, so his mind and muscles are misfiring," she stopped by Barry with the serum ready to go.

"I mean, will this stuff help?" Joe eyed the serum with weariness.

"I've synthesized a neural compound that I think will get his mind and body running at the same speed. We just have to find him first."

"Well, computers aren't doing a damn thing," Cisco muttered from his spot at the desk. He rubbed his face then dropped his hands and turned to the group. "I don't know what else to do."

"But maybe Joe does," Veronica gave the man a glance, knowingly smiling. "Father's know best. "What's your intuition saying?"

Joe had to smile, but didn't disregard her attempt that fast. He got to wondering if perhaps Wally wasn't lost. What if he had just...gotten nostalgic in that state he was in? When nothing made sense, what kept him together?

"The house that he grew up in," he said before he could even solidify the thought. "He used to go there when he missed his mother. In Keystone."

"Let's go," Barry got ahold of him and left together.

As soon as they were gone, Caitlin moved towards Cisco and Belén with that face that spelled utter guilt. "I, uh... I just wanted to…"

"It's okay," Cisco got up from his desk and hugged her tight. "You scared me for a second, getting all Mother of Dragons on me with that hair."

Caitlin managed to chuckle but she was still feeling pretty bad in regards to Belén. "I shouldn't have said anything, b-but I...I wasn't…"

"You don't need to explain anything to me, Cait, I know exactly what that feels like," Belén raised her hands. "I guess they had to know sometime…"

"Still freaked us out…" Iris was heard mumbling from her spot. "I nearly went reporter on you two earlier."

"I know," Belén mocked a putout face. "But it's a scary thing, and that's why we kept quiet. But rest assure—" she placed a hand on Caitlin's arm, "—that we will find a way to help you. Datura said she wanted her power back, so...she's on board."

"Woah, woah, we're letting psycho-Belén help us now?" Cisco went wide-eyed at the news, something that both Iris and Veronica shared.

"You can't be serious," Veronica shook her head. "Tell me you're not serious."

"Who's psycho-Belén?" Axel looked up from the tablet he'd gotten from home.

"No one, go back to your games," Veronica shushed him with a pointed finger.

"It's okay, we're on the same boat - believe it or not - so she's helping," Belén made it clear this was something that had already been decided.

"But did she ask for something in return besides her power?" Caitlin had to wonder. Datura, while Belén, was still dangerously ambitious.

Belén cleared her throat and shook her head. "Nope, just Frosty back." There was no point in telling Caitlin that she would also have to give up her powers to Datura as well. Caitlin felt terrible enough.

That would just remain her little secret till the end.

~ 0 ~

"Oh, so she got back to normal?" Belén rolled her eyes at her doppelganger's disappointment of Caitlin triumphing over Killer Frost.

"Please, don't try to hide your goodness…" Belén sat down on the edge of her bed and glared at Datura on her phone screen.

"Can't hide what I never had," Datura snorted and put a finger to her chin. "Though I do have to express my disappointment of getting this prediction wrong."

"What prediction?"

"I saw Killer Frost in all her frosty glory," Datura shared the vision she'd gotten that day, earlier, but nonetheless about Killer Frost.

"So your psychic abilities aren't always correct, then?"

"Well of course not, the future is never written in stone."

"So...right now, what do you see about...me?"

"Ooh, scared are we?" Datura was quick taunt before laughing. Belén hated her, she really did, because it was fear that was constantly coursing through her. Datura leaned closer to the screen. "I see nothing."

"I know you see something you—"

"Maybe I do, maybe I don't. Dream about that," the doppelganger spat and ended the video chat.

Belén growled and tossed her phone over her shoulder. She buried her face in her hands and thought about the possibilities if she did not learn to control these powers. She already made it clear to her friends that suppressing them was not an option for her - it never would be.

When she heard the front door unlocking, she quickly jumped up from the bed and ran up to the mirror. She didn't want to look so distressed when they had oh-so many problems as it was.

"Yikes," she whispered at her reflection. She combed through her hair with her fingers and walked out of the room to see how Barry did with...getting Julian not to say a word about Caitlin. She offered to go herself but Barry decided that he needed to, because it was part of him owning up to his mistakes. Barry had a somber face until he saw Belén coming out of the hallway. "So, how did it go?" she leaned against the hallway threshold. "Is he going to tell? Do you need me to try?"

How could Barry tell her that one of her closest friends had forced him to quit his job so that Caitlin could avoid jail? He couldn't. At least not tonight when Belén was already looking far too tired to deal with something else. "He's not going to say anything," he informed her with a the tiniest of smiles.

A big relief washed over Belén, even making her laugh towards the end. "Oh my God that is so good to hear!" she walked over and hugged him tight, swaying them a bit.

"Yeah," Barry rubbed her back and rested his chin over her head. Keeping his sudden departure from his job wasn't going to last a day, probably not even a week, but for tonight he would like to give Belén a moment of peace.

After everything, she deserved that much.

A/N:

"Something I'd like to see," Sara smirked. The reactions would be priceless! "Can we do it right now?"

Graciela rolled her eyes at her and moved around the control panel. Sara watched as Graciela switched one profile for the other, going back and forth on at least 2 of them before discarding them both in the end. There was a fierce determination in her eyes to solve the mystery, but it was that same determination that was causing other features to deteriorate simultaneously.

Sleep was probably the biggest issue.

"How long have you been here?" Sara asked when she gave up trying to figure it out on her own.

"Dunno. Three? Maybe 4 hours?" Graciela mumbled while writing something down on a notepad.

"Right. And how much sleep did you actually get? Because you were probably doing some calculations in your room, right?"

Graciela paused to give Sara a 'duh' look. "So what?"

"We're...a little worried about you," Sara's admission confused Graciela. The woman stopped working and closed her notepad.

"What?"

"You've been skipping sleep and I don't think you've actually had a moment to just...rest."

Graciela's eyebrows knitted together, further confused yet also frustrated. "Well I'm on a mission to find Rip, did you forget that? That's the whole reason you brought me along."

"Believe me, no one's forgotten, but I think there's a line between loyalty and your own personal health."

"I'm fine," snapped Graciela, though she shut everything down afterwards. "I'm just doing what I'm meant to do. The longer I take, the worse Rip could be." Frustration etched across her face while her voice sped up in her frantic ramble. "I don't know if he's being tortured or-or starved or just...I don't know if he's okay and it kills me. Least before all this," she gestured to the room, "I knew he was just doing his job. Didn't matter if he talked to me or not, I knew what he was doing and that was enough."

Sara took in the ramble silently. The underlying desperation in Graciela's voice was all Sara needed to draw her own conclusions. It helped that she was nosy and tried getting information about Graciela and Rip from Gideon and even though the A.I. dodged and deflected, Sara was able to figure things out.

"So at what point did you tell him that you loved him?" Sara watched the way in which Graciela frantically looked away. "Or did he never realize it like most men?"

Graciela's head tilted while she desperately tried to cling onto casualness, or at the very least some calmness. "I don't know what you mean."

It was Sara's turn to tilt her head, a bemused expression taking over her face. "Okay, so we're going down that path I guess…"

"I'm not lying!" Graciela exclaimed way too fast, making Sara justified in having to smirk. "Stop looking at me like that!"

"I just...I mean...I can see it," Sara crossed her arms over her chest and thought about the idea of the pair as a couple. "Is that why he left the letter for you?"

"I think that is none of your business, Sara Lance. This is ridiculous, a waste of time, and I'm not talking about it!"

"Well, I'll be here when you do." Sara mocked a salute with her two fingers, smirking wider when Graciela groaned loudly.

Graciela took off before she could hear any more of Sara's words. She wasn't going to entertain them at all, not when she could keep it all hidden until she had to leave the ship anyways.

~ 0 ~

Once the day got started for the rest of the Legends, they resumed their discussion about the amulet they'd retrieved from Damien Darhk. Nate had been expecting some help from Graciela since she'd volunteered herself the previous night, but she never showed up. It left him with dozens of books to go through and only one burning mind.

"So, do we have any idea why Darhk wanted this?" Ray picked up the amulet from the study desk, careful not to knock over any of Nate's books.

"All I know is, it's never a good idea when your nemesis starts accessorizing," Sara remarked as she took the amulet from Ray. "And he's teamed up with a speedster, because that's what we needed too."

"Okay, but what exactly is a speedster?" asked Amaya. She'd just heard the word in passing and even the fact she'd witnessed said speedster whisking Darhk away hadn't really made better sense.

"It's basically someone with super speed," Jax answered for her. "And that's how Darhk escaped."

"The energy of the Speed Force grants the speedster chronokinesis, temporal manipulation," Stein added.

"English, Professor," Mick called from his seat in the study.

"It means that his running is real fast and lets him time travel," Stein said, and received a gruff in return.

"I'll be in my room." Mick got up and took his beer with him, disappearing into the corridors.

"Martin, I need you to gather everything you can on Speedsters," Sara pointed at the man, taking charge since Graciela hadn't shown her face since their early morning chitchat. "And Nate's right. This amulet looks a lot like the one we recovered off the Nazis. There's got to be a connection."

Nate sighed. "Let me guess, I'm on library duty?"

~ 0 ~

On his way to his own research, Jax tailed Stein down the corridor with his concerns over their current situation. "We're dealing with a Speedster here! How long we gonna keep this secret from them, Grey? Come on, future Barry's message—"

"Yes, I know what you're talking about, Jefferson," Stein stopped walking and turned around, bumping into Jax in the process. "And we cannot say anything!"

"But—"

"You two need to start talking quieter!" Graciela strode down from the opposite end of the hallway. "I can hear you from my room!"

"I was just saying that since we're dealing with speedsters, we should let the others know about future Barry's message—"

"Absolutely not," Graciela cut him off and gave him an 'are you crazy?' look. "That message, first of all, was not for the team. Are you forgetting that?" Her eyes flickered between the two shifting men, more so Jax. "Didn't think so. Neither of you will say anything to anyone, got it?"

Jax reluctantly agreed. He stuffed his hands into his pockets and looked away, mumbling an 'alright' under his breath.

Stein suddenly gasped and flung a hand to his forehead, startling the other two.

"Grey, you okay?" Jax held onto the man's arm in fear that Stein would fall.

"Maybe we should get you to the infirmary," Graciela suggested but Stein shook his head.

The secret images he'd been getting as of late were leaving anyway. They usually did. "I'm fine, it's just Just a headache."

"Didn't look like one…" Graciela said, eyeing Stein curiously. "Unless headaches are different in the past?"

"You would tell me if something was up, right?" Jax raised an eyebrow at Stein. "Cause if we start keeping things from each other—"

Stein languidly raised a hand to stop Jax. "I just need to rest. Saving history can be extremely wearing on the body."

"Get some rest then," Graciela prompted, gesturing the way to his room. "We can deal with things for today."

She moved around them and continued down the corridors. She'd been purposely avoiding the group for fear of Sara's questioning in front of the others. That was the last thing she needed right now. Unfortunately, she couldn't avoid going out forever. If she was to succeed with her plans, she had to actually leave her room.

~0~

"Alright Nate, what do we got?" Graciela strode into the study, giving Nate a light pat on the shoulder as she moved around his desk. The rest of the group were still scattered around waiting for anything concrete on the amulet.

"And where the hell have you been?" Nate looked up at her with sourness.

Graciela ignored his question as she picked up the amulet. "What do we got?"

Nate huffed and looked back at the book in front of him. "I'm thinking the amulet dates back to Late Antiquity and is Judeo-Christian in origin. The problem is that I can't find a reference of it anywhere. Like, none. Historically speaking, this doesn't exist."

"Well I say you're wrong because it's right here," Graciela waved the amulet in front of her then gave it a little flick with her finger.

"And we know that Damien Darhk and the Speedster are willing to kill for it," Sara added. "Sounds like you got some more homework to do."

"Oh c'mon!" Nate let his head hit the open book in front of him.

"What's wrong with you?" Amaya made a face as Nate raised his head from the book.

"I-I just thought, becoming a superhero, I would spend less time in the library than my old job. That's all."

"I'm confused, aren't you supposed to work at something you like?" asked Graciela, lowering the amulet beside him.

"Well, research skills are a kind of superpower," Ray said as a means of comfort for Nate. "And you can turn to steel. So you got two!"

And yet somehow that didn't make Nate feel any better. But before he could say it out loud, an alert interrupted them.

"Saved by the Aberration!" Sara said cheerfully as she headed for the control room.

"And what's the Trouble Alert say?" Graciela boredly asked. She knew how it would end by now: a bigger mess than when it started yet somehow saved in the end.

"Hey don't call it that," Nate frowned. "I worked hard on that."

Sara looked up the trouble and raised an eyebrow once she realized their next destination. "Themequake's epicenter is Liberty, Colorado, 1874."

"Hah!" Ray said suddenly with newfound laughter. Those who hadn't been to the Wild West before turned to give him the same odd, confused look. "Back to the Wild West!" he said excitedly.

"You guys were in the Old West?" Nate asked, but assumed the answer based on Ray's sole reaction.

"Yeah, town made me a Sheriff," Ray proudly said.

"I hate the Wild West…" Graciela grumbled and earned herself various glances from the team.

"Have you been there?" Sara raised an eyebrow.

Even though Graciela didn't answer immediately, the look of disdain on her face said it all. "Of course not, I have never time traveled before," she said in a very abundantly faux voice. "So let's get going!" She announced and led the way for the corridors, ignoring Sara's suspicious stare.

"Okay…" Sara put her hands together and rubbed her palms, "So today's going to be 'annoy her till she cracks and tells me everything' day." She then brought a finger up to point at the rest. "She's mine." And with a promising smirk, she went off in the same direction Graciela had gone in.

"...should we be worried?" Amaya peered around to see Sara disappear in the corridor. "Should we really be bugging the temporary captain?"

"She wouldn't be Captain if we didn't," Ray casually shrugged.

~0~

Each time they left the waverider, Graciela felt like the outfits got even more ridiculous. Today's theme was Wild West, and while that involved more pants than usual, she felt the get-up was just as awful. Not even the nice horseback riding was making it better.

It had been a long time since Graciela saw a nice free animal, and much more one that liked her. The future was not for the faint, no matter how much it was propped up to be.

"Where's the professor?" Mick finally realized they were short one team member about halfway towards their destined town.

"Uh, he's feeling a little off," Jax answered, though he sounded unsure himself. He still had some suspicions about those headaches of Stein's…

"More whiskey for me," Mick said without a clue.

A few more minutes down, they heard the collective voices of men arguing with each other.

"Everyone off their horses," Graciela gave the command as she got off her own. She heard the clicking of a gun and looked back to find Sara taking the huge rifle she'd brought from the ship.

The blonde only smirked at Graciela as she started off. Together, they followed until they got a better look at what was causing so much noise. It seemed like someone was about to be hanged...and it looked like the group knew who it was.

"Is that Hex?" Sara blinked first, stunned the man would ever find himself in that kind of situation. Jonah Hex was not an easy man to subdue.

"Of course." Graciela rolled her eyes so heavily that she might end up with a headache later on. Everyone noted the look of familiarity on her face.

"You know that man?" Amaya asked her.

"No."

"Uh, then why does it look like you want to be the one hanging him?" Sara questioned next.

"Guys c'mon, focus," said Jax as he took in the scene ahead of them. "We gotta take out the crew before we can get to Hex and I count at least five men there."

"Don't worry, guys." Nick rose with confidence and made his way out of the bushes towards the scene.

"What does that mean!?" Graciela called out in vain since Nate made it his purpose to get the attention of the men. He did it right on time too because Hex had somehow gotten the chance to kick one of the men across the face, angering the entire group.

"You might want to slow down there. Because these here parts ain't big enough for the…" Nick did a pause to quickly count the crew, never seeing the faces of his friends for using such a ridiculous accent, "...six of us."

"And who the hell are you?" the leader of the crew stepped forwards with a hand tightly clasped around a gun. "On second thought, I don't give a damn!"

Nick saw the man raise the gun to shoot and quickly went "metal" to take the impact.

"He's loving this," Graciela said from their hiding spot. Sara nodded at that, unimpressed.

The rest of the men had started to shoot as well, but no bullet ever left a scratch on Nate. He caught the last bullet between his teeth, then making the entire group roll their eyes.

"Alright, that was kind of cool," Graciela admitted and gave the props to the man.

Sara cocked her rifle to take aim at Hex's rope in the meantime. "Hold still, Hex."

"Not like he has much of a choice," Mick remarked.

Finally Sara shot and ripped the rope.

"Nice shot," grinned Ray.

"Now you get on that horse and you ride till you feel like you can't ride any further, then you ride some more," Nate moved over to the frightened men. "Now go on, get! Go on!" He laughed when the men scrambled to escape before another gunshot went off. "Whoo!" He expected Hex to thank him or at the very least to look content he survived, but instead he looked worse.

"Oh, hell. They're back," Hex's gaze landed on the Legends coming out of their hiding spot like a swarm. There was a spark of honest shock when he saw Graciela, and that was something that didn't go unnoticed by Sara.

"You better come back with us," Graciela nodded for the trail leading back to the Waverider, her voice grim as her face.

~0~

"Never thought I'd see you again," Hex remarked to Graciela once they were back in the Waverider. She was doing everything in her power to be as far away from him as possible.

"So you do know each other?" Sara looked between the two curiously.

"Nope," went Graciela at the same time Hex answered "Yeah".

Graciela looked even more displeased then. The team was staring at her with more questions and she didn't really want to answer any of them.

"Where's Rip?" Hex finally asked, if only to ease the tension in the air.

"He's...M.I.A," Sara answered with her eyes on Graciela.

"Damn," Hex gave a low chuckle. "Did you finally kill him, Jinxy?"

Graciela slammed a hand against the control panel before whirling around towards the group. "I told you to never call me that!"

"I... thought you didn't know him…" Amaya said slowly, eyes casting against Hex for his amused smirk.

"Fine! Clearly, I do know him but I never wanted to know him!" Graciela set her sights on Hex who was taking the whole thing with a stupid grin. "Rip's missing, there?" At least the grin on his face seemed to lose power at the news. "We don't know where he is but I am looking for him."

"I'm sure you are," Hex gave a nod at her then looked at the rest of the crew. "So how the hell did you miscreants manage to not get yourselves killed without him?"

"Grace has been serving as Captain," Ray gestured towards the woman in question.

"Really? Her? But she's a criminal. And a lady," Hex's doubt was both insulting and plain irritating. "Last time I heard, Rip wouldn't let you near his dear ship. What were his words again?"

Graciela pursed her lips and folded her arms. "He'd rather die…" she mumbled, barely audible to the others.

"Well she's being a good Captain," Sara said on behalf of Graciela. Those were some harsh words if Rip really said them to her. "But enough questions for us, how about you explain to us how the hell ended up in the noose?"

Hex thought it was a fair question, and who knows...maybe with their presence they might be able to help. "Well, I was collecting the bounty on a pissant by the name of Quentin Turnbull."

At that moment Nate strode in with a history book in hand. He seemed to have the urge to talk about something. "As in Turnbull Country?"

"Never heard of it," Jax bobbed his head while he thought of all the history lessons he had in high school.

"That's because it's not supposed to exist." Nate nodded for them to follow him into the study. "This book has changed since the last time I saw it. Check this out. Gideon?"

"Right away!" Gideon pulled up a map of the U.S, but something didn't look quite right about it.

"That's a map of the United States from 1876," Nate nodded to the West part of the country that read 'Turnbull Country'.

"All right, who is Turnbull?" Sara asked, frowning because she was sure Hex had just mentioned that name.

Hex groaned at the mention of the man. "Two-bit, yellow-bellied cattle rustler."

"Who controls all of the land west of the Rocky Mountains," Nate finished with the important part.

"Looks like we found our Aberration." Graciela found comfort that at least they'd gotten something useful out of this trip, not that saving Hex's life wasn't important but...she wouldn't mind avoiding anything Wild West for the rest of her life.

"Am I supposed to have the faintest idea what the hell this means?" Hex looked at her wearily. "You know I never did before."

"Only difference now is that I'm calling the shots," she warned.

"Weren't you already doing that before?"

Graciela briefly scrunched her face in irritation. "It means that we need to stop Turnbull from taking over the West. And that is the only thing I'm talking about while we're here!"

~0~

Hex had reluctantly brought the group, sans Stein, back to his town. He was sure that despite their best intentions, they would only cause bigger problems.

"Where is everybody?" Ray was disappointed to find his town rather solitary, almost like a ghost town.

"Ever since Turnbull set up shop 'bout six months ago, everyone's been run out of town or made to work in the mine," Hex explained.

"Mine? What kind of mine?" asked Graciela. "Is there gold?"

"Hm, you'd like that wouldn't you?"

She rolled her eyes at his smirk. "Who the hell wouldn't want that?"

"No that can't be right," Nate stepped up to her side, missing the sarcasm between the two while he got into historian mode. "Gold wasn't found around these parts for a good half century or so." He then chuckled to himself. "Listen to me, 'these parts' I sound like I'm a cowboy."

"Well, he's pulling something out of the ground that's making him rich," Hex stopped in front of a saloon. "Turnbull also owns the saloon, the hotel, the laundry and the whorehouse."

Mick was just about to open his mouth when Sara called, "The answer's no, Mick."

"Turnbull's got an office above the saloon. It's also got about a dozen men making sure nobody gets close to him."

"We'll see about that," Graciela said with a smirk. Her hazel eyes flickered around the group while she thought of a plan. A minute later, she had one. "Mick, go on and have some fun won't you? Order anything you'd like and put it on Hex's tab."

Mick didn't question the plan; he thought it was excellent. "Finally, you're making sense," he said with a grin as he headed for the saloon.

Hex stared after Mick then shot Graciela and incredulous stare. "Did you just—?"

"Yup," Graciela turned to Hex with a wider smirk. "Keep messing with me, I dare you."

"Hey," Ray planted a hand on her arm. "I'm not sure I understand your plan here.

You just set a match to a powder keg."

"So if Turnbull doesn't want his precious saloon to burn down, he's gonna have to come out of his office and deal with it."

"Better yet, get your boy to get in a fight with Turnbull and bring him out here on the street," Hex suggested.

"Fine," Graciela agreed with a spat. "Amaya, your job is to make sure Rory keeps his pistol in his pants until he's outside the saloon. Good luck."

Amaya was not content with her assignment. "Did I draw the short straw or what?"

"Just do it!" Graciela then switched gazes towards the remaining men. "And you three better put those weapons away and anything else that might make you remotely dangerous."

"Why?" chorused Nate, Jax and Ray all in disappointment.

"The way I discovered how my enemies made their money was to infiltrate their base of operations. I can't tell you how many disguises I had to go through," Graciela shook her head. "Anyways, tax collectors should do it. Be simple and don't mess up."

"Are you kidding me!?" Nate scowled.

"I'm not, actually. Go," Graciela reiterated into a better command without leaving room for a debate.

~0~

"This place hasn't changed much," Graciela remarked as Hex walked her and Sara down the path to a campsite. Her nose was crinkled in what could only be described as disgust. "It still smells. People are...bad smelling. And it's boring. It's so boring."

Hex stopped walking to turn around. "And you're still the same. How long has it been?"

Before Graciela could answer, Sara cut in with a loud, "Finally! We're moving past the 'I don't know him' and getting to the good part." She turned so that she was right beside the two. "Because I am really curious to know how this," she moved a finger from Hex to Graciela, "all happened."

"She hasn't told you?" Hex raised an eyebrow, briefly glancing at Graciela who was doing her best to remain casual. "Well, why would she when it wasn't one of her finest moments."

"Oh, do tell," Sara rubbed her hands together, gleeful at what was coming.

"Stop!" Graciela exclaimed all of a sudden. "I'd rather tell her myself then let you twist things around."

"What would I twist? You were being punished!"

"I—"

"Oooh, punished? For what?" Sara put on a big smirk for Graciela.

"Stop talking!" Graciela warned Hex so that she could take charge. With a sigh she faced Sara to finally tell her the story. "You have to understand that this was a long time ago. I used to...do things that...were not...very lawful."

"Yeah, I get that, believe me," Sara nodded. "What did you do?"

"One time...I messed up…badly."

"How badly?"

Graciela crossed her arms tightly. She could feel Hex staring at her with burning eyes. "There was, uh…hundreds of, um, casualties."

"Hundreds?" Sara blinked. Her eyes flickered to Hex who nodded that it was all true.

"It was a chain-reaction," Graciela said in a weak defense

"Yes," Graciela let her head hang in shame. "Truly not one of my finest moments. So, when Rip found out it was me... instead of turning me in...he punished me himself."

"How?" Sara looked at Hex who was at a cross of amusement and disapproval.

"He brought her here," the man answered.

"He left me here on my own...for 6 months," Graciela further explained. "I was meant to repent for what I did but I know he just dumped me here to get rid of me."

Hex let out a loose laughter, almost mocking her for her words. "He stayed with you for another 6 months, did you forget that? Cos I bet he sure didn't."

"Yeah, I know, because I was a royal pain in the ass," Graciela rolled her eyes. "Rip made sure to tell me that every day after he came back."

"So you lived a whole year in this place?" Sara's eyes flickered to the town behind them, unable to consider such an idea.

"Yeah, all because Rip chose to become some martyr who needed to teach me a lesson."

"And in those 6 months on your own…"

"He was the supervisor," Graciela jerked a thumb in Hex's location. "And a jerk."

"And the reason why you didn't get killed on day 1," Hex added as a means for gratitude, but Graciela snorted instead.

"Oh please! It takes more than a bullet to kill the Jinx."

"Right." Hex gave a low snort then walked off, completely missing Graciela's glare.

"I hate him."

"Haven't noticed," Sara remarked. "But at least he told me that awesome story of you being a prisoner."

Graciela quickly looked back to Sara, seeming almost offended by the assumption her 'prison time' had been a lovely era. "Are you kidding me? Rip left me here! I was like the rubbish you take out each week! It was under no circumstances a 'good time'!" She huffed and stormed away without giving Sara the chance to say anything else.

~ 0 ~

"Don't you think we should contact the others?" Jax asked Ray and Nate as they entered a dark train passage in a cave.

"No, because then Grace will just tell us — order us — to come back," Nate rolled his eyes in annoyance. It got to him that Graciela still treated him like a normal human who couldn't defend himself. He was made out of steel. That literally protected him from anything and everything.

Including a solitary train passageway.

"Oh my God," Ray suddenly stopped when he spotted something familiar on the walls.

Jax and Nate stopped as well but neither recognized the stones.

"What is it?" asked Jax after Ray's silence had gotten to him.

"One of the rarest minerals in the universe."

"Okay, how does this help Turnbull take over the West?"

Ray looked back at the two with his widened eyes. "I used dwarf star to power the ATOM suit. The piece I had was the size of your little finger. There's enough potential energy here to power the entire Wild West."

But Nate saw the alternative that he was sure Turnbull had already thought of "Or blow it up. Question is, how does Turnbull even know what it is? We—" he pointed at himself then Jax, "—didn't even know what this was."

Jax, however, spotted something shiny and white sitting on a rock. "Bet ya this has something to do with it." He walked over and gingerly picked up the device that resembled a largened watch. "It's a time pirate watch, a tracker of some sort. Probably stole it from the time pirate."

"We got to get this out of here," Nate moved to the closest stock of minerals to pick up but found...that he couldn't.

"Don't even bother," Ray set his hand on Nate's arm just as the man had gone steel. "I should've mentioned, it's also the densest material in the universe. Let's get the rest of the team."

"Fine," huffed Nate as he stepped back. "But I am helping!" he warned.

~ 0 ~

"Hey Graciela?" Amaya's voice called through the earpiece in Graciela's ear. "We may have a problem."

Graciela stopped picking at the fire some group started and turned away. "What happened?" Both Sara and Hex started nearing her to see what was going on.

"Well, it's hard to... but Mr. Rory and Mr. Turnbull...like each other."

Graciela's entire face scrunched. "What? What do you mean they like each other!?"

Sara rolled her eyes. Of course the one time they needed Mick to pick a fight would be the one time he'd become friendly.

"If they're clinking glasses, it's over," Graciela groaned.

Without saying a word, Hex turned in the opposite direction that would lead back to the saloon.

"Hey!" called Sara. "Where are you going?"

"I'm gonna collect my bounty, whether you like it or not."

Graciela quickly forewent the conversation with Amaya. "Are you out of your mind?"

"I'm not, actually, but you are if you think you can handle this team of miscreants—" Hex flapped a hand in Sara's direction, the blonde in question blinking in surprise, "—like Rip would. You ain't nothing close to a Captain."

Graciela's eyes flashed a dangerous dark purple. "Before, I didn't have a choice but to take your words but now it's different. Rip's not here anymore."

"Yeah, I'm not the one you really want to fight," Hex said and turned back for the saloon.

"Forget it," Sara grabbed Graciela's arm.

The purple faded from Graciela's eyes.

"We gotta warn Amaya and get the others.

The two women rushed after Hex, but by the time they caught up the man was already inside the saloon and all hell had broken loose. Turnbull and Hex were specifically going at it with guns, while Mick and the others were simply riling up against each other.

Eventually, Turnbull had forced the team to run out of the saloon for cover. As they took cover behind some barrels, Nate, Ray and Jax returned from their impromptu visit to the mines.

"Why do you guys get to have all the fun?" Nate immediately demanded to know while he took cover as well.

"Seriously!?" snapped Graciela before shooting the trio a suspicious look. "Where the hell have you three been? It doesn't take that long to look at someone's tax records, does it?"

"We just got back from Turnbull's mine," Ray decided to go with the truth. "The reason for the Aberration is he's digging up dwarf star."

"Gonna have to explain to me what the hell that is later," Graciela dismissed in order to first survive. "Right now, get back to the ship!"

The order went for everyone, and those who decided to listen took their chance the first time they got. One, however, rose to the challenge against Turnbull.

"Mick no!" Sara shouted to the man as he cocked his large gun against Turnbull.

"And here I thought you and me was gonna be friends!" Turnbull paused his shooting for a second.

"I don't have friends," Mick prepared to shoot only to realize he was out of bullets. His eyes widened at what that meant.

Just as Turnbull fired, Nate ran into he way to block the blow in steel form, but the bullet still penetrated his chest. The steel disappeared from his skin in two seconds before he fell back.

~0~

Nick wailed as the bullet remained lodged through his insides. He'd been brought to the medbay as quickly as possible. "I'm the Man of Steel, how did I get shot!?"

"The bullet has lodged itself between several of Dr. Haywood's internal organs," Gideon reported.

"How!?"

"Because it wasn't a normal bullet. It was dwarf star," Ray reminded the others. "The densest material on Earth."

"I estimate his chance of survival at 51%," Gideon said.

"Gideon, with all due respect, shut up and heal him." Graciela closed her eyes for a second before heading out.

"Where are you going?" called Jax.

"To get some damn answers!" Graciela stormed into the hallway with the intention of ending things once and for all. This couldn't keep happening. She wanted to keep this team alive until Rip returned but every time she took them out, one of them got hurt.

Graciela found Hex inside the study, and with all reason made an entrance that caused a mini-explosion of the computers on the desk. "We had a frikin plan and you went off the rails! Now I don't care what problems you and I have, but those people are not to get hurt because of it. So you're going to tell me what exactly is going on between you and Turnbull!"

"I don't answer to you, Jinxy," Hex said all too calmly which only infuriated Graciela even more.

"My friend just got shot because of you so you best believe you'll be answering to me unless you want to find yourself on the other end of a Jinx's wrath," Graciela said with dangerous purple eyes. A purple haze started drifting from her fingertips. "And you know that I can and will hurt you."

Hex considered his options and the area where he was. At best, he'd survive for 10 minutes. "Alright. I've been after Turnbull for eight years now. I almost got him twice. He wants to see me pushing up daisies just as bad as I want to see him do the same."

"But why?"

"Little town in Oklahoma. Goes by the name of Calvert. Turnbull and his men were harassing it. And they hired me to fight back. My little rebellion made other towns think they didn't need to pay protection money to Turnbull and his gang. So one night...Turnbull gathered every man, woman, and child in Calvert. Locked us in the church. Set it on fire. Somehow, I escaped. The good Lord saw fit to leave me with a souvenir."

Graciela briefly looked at the marred side of his face. "So it's a vendetta. I used to have one, maybe Rip talked about him? Savage?"

By the sound Hex made, she knew Rip had. "Didn't he share the same one?"

"Exactly," Graciela said, drawing in a breath, "so how about instead of you and I arguing, we work together to catch Turnbull once and for all?"

Hex thought about it and ultimately agreed.

~ 0 ~

Ray stood at the front of the team to share his ideas on Turnbull's use of the dwarf star. "I know how Turnbull's gonna make his own country. When I saw how much dwarf star ore he had in that mine, I started to wonder, how could he transport such a heavy shipment? He'd have to use the railroad."

"Okay, get to the part where we care, Ray," Sara made a motion for Ray to skip all the unnecessary pauses.

"I think he's gonna use the railroad and the dwarf star to...wait for it—"

"He's going to close Summit Pass."

There was a heavy pause as Ray waited for them to react.

Being completely healed thanks to Gideon, Nate spoke up to explain the importance of 'Summit Pass'. "Summit Pass connects East/West via railroad. But not if Turnbull uses the dwarf star. If he destroys the pass, there's no way of transporting soldiers and supplies from the East coast. The U.S. Army is effectively locked out of the West."

"Alright, so it's simple: we just stop Turnbull from blowing up the pass," Jax said after some thought over it.

"Is it, though?" Graciela turned to face the group with visible doubt on her face. "You don't have a suit," she pointed at Ray then moved her finger towards Nate, "you just had invasive surgery, Stein's out of commission….need I say more?"

"Hey, I'm fine to go out there," Nate clarified for her and anyone having doubts about his aptitude for the mission. "If anything, I'm more motivated to stop Turnbull."

"Well, we know the plan, but do we know what Turnbull will be doing when the railway is supposed to go boom?" asked Sara.

"We overheard one of his people saying Turnbull was going to call for a meeting this afternoon," Ray said.

"Okay," Graciela started nodding once she began to see some solutions coming their way. "Nate, you're sure you can go out there again?"

Nate nodded his head. "Absolutely."

"Okay, so then you, Jax, and Ray, stop the train. The rest of us, we'll deal with Turnbull."

"You sure about this?" Hex gave the woman a long look to see if she had any doubt, but she looked as put together as possible.

"It's not like we have much of a choice," she said logically.

"Plus, this isn't our first rodeo," Nate said proudly though earned himself strange looks from the others. "What? I always wanted to say that."

~0~

Separated into trios, each team moved to its designated spot. That brought Nate, Jax and Ray towards the railroad tracks.

"There's our train," Jax pointed to the train in the distance.

"Loaded with enough dwarf star to punch a hole in a mountain and cut off the pass to the East," Ray wolf whistled. They had their work cut out for them. "How do we stop a moving locomotive?"

"We don't. I do," Nate said but after a moment's pause, he added. "I think." Before he got any more nervous, or doubtful, he and his horse took off for the incoming train, leaving Ray and Jax to process this sudden idea of his.

"So what do you think?" Ray asked Jax, not sure how else to react in the moment.

"Well...I think I liked him." Jax released a heavy sigh then went after Nate. "Nate, what are you doing, man? Hold on!"

"Keep your distance!" Nate shouted.

"What're you gonna do?" Ray called behind him.

"I'm gonna cut 'em off at the pass." A huge grin came to Nate's face. "I've always wanted to say that."

The others thought he finally lost his mind.

"You can't get in front of a moving train!" Jax frantically exclaimed, however it made no effect.

"You said it yourself... there is no bravery without fear!" Nate said to Ray. "Which is good, because I am scared as hell right now."

"Yes, because it's a moving train! C'mon man!"

~0~

"Alright," Amaya gazed at the mine where she and Mick were to go into. Them, Graciela, Sarah and Hex were scoping out the area before leaving to find Turnbull. "We'll need about five minutes to plant enough dynamite to seal the mine."

"It's about time we got to light something up," Mick, rather crazily, grinned.

Graciela couldn't help feeling a little concerned Amaya would have more to handle than the others. "Just light the fuse and run, don't stick around for the fireworks."

"Yeah, yeah," Mick got up from their hiding spot to lead the way, his hands gripping the box of dynamite.

"If you need to, you can set him on fire," Sara cooly told Amaya as the latter rose up.

"Sara!" hissed Graciela.

"What? Innocent joke," shrugged Sara, although by the look on Amaya's face she didn't like the joke either.

"Mr. Rory can handle his flame obsession, I know he can," Amaya's certainty was a genuine surprise for both Graciela and Sara. They didn't think the same.

~0~

Hex walked between Graciela's and Sara's horses in the guise of a prisoner. The women had covered themselves up to appear like men who'd caught Hex.

"Quentin Turnbull!" Graciela called with a deeper voice once they'd gotten close to Turnbull's camp.

The man himself rose from his seat once he saw the intruders. "Who's asking?"

"We heard you're looking for someone."

Once Turnbull saw Hex he got a good laugh that probably echoed into the woods. "Jonah Hex! Well, hell, looks like I'm gonna have to kill you for the third time."

Sara got off the horse first and pushed Hex forwards. As Graciela got off, she listened to Turnbull's and Hex's bickering. At least this time it led somewhere.

"Why don't I show you what I'm working on so you know why you died?" Turnbull so happily decided. His eyes flickered to Graciela and Sara behind and motioned them to follow as well. "You two come along too. Anyone who can bring in Hex always got a place on my crew."

They happily obliged.

~0~

Nate had to shake his body several times each time he saw the train getting closer. He'd left his horse and was now standing on the railroad tracks. "Okay. I'm in position!"

"And out of your mind!" snapped Jax on the other end of the line. "You couldn't even stop a bullet made with that stuff!"

"Nate, Jax is right," started Ray in a much calmer tone, "That train is loaded with dwarf star!"

"You guys aren't helping!" Nate reminded while still shaking off the fear from his body.

~0~

"You got a whole minute to get out of here," Mick warned Amaya after they'd set up all the dynamite inside the mine. The match was going to reach the dynamite in less than a minute.

Amaya turned sideways and gave him an odd, almost warning too, look. "You mean we have a minute."

"That's what I meant."

Amaya's look still lingered on the man but the sounds of Turnbull's men in the distance made her turn around to find the group standing across.

Mick followed her gaze. "Should we tell them about the minute?"

"No."

"Good. I was hoping you were gonna say that."

Amaya put a hand over her amulet and activated its rhinoceros abilities to get through a good share of the men. Mick, while having no gun, picked up a metal stick on the ground and used it to swing at the men.

Amaya turned to see him mercilessly smacking the stick on the already unconscious men on the ground. "Mick, we got to go!" She ran back to him and stopped his arm from whacking again. "Mick, now! Put the animal away!"

Mick blinked and looked down at Amaya. Her previous words about being in control rushed back to his mind. He gazed at the unconscious men and realized if he put this much effort into already dead men, he was going to die next, and he'd be damned if he let that happen.

~0~

Turnbull had brought Hex and the others to an entrance of the dwarf mine with the intention of showing off. He kept a gun firmly on Hex's back but no eyes on Graciela and Sara.

"Oh, yeah, those bullets ain't nothing. Wait till you see what I got now," Turnbull smirked. "Now get on in there!"

At the same time he pushed Hex towards the mine, the mine exploded. And with its explosion, it rocked all four.

Turnbull nearly lost it when he saw Graciela and Sara without their face covers. "You ain't no men!"

But before he could go further, Hex rammed him to the ground. "You burned down Calvert!" He threw a punch at Turnbull each time he accused the man. "You murdered all those people! For what? For power?"

Graciela and Sara exchanged glances while this went on. Neither really knew how far Hex would go, and they couldn't necessarily disagree either.

"Oh, get it over with!" Turnbull shouted at Hex.

Hex gripped Turnbull's neck and perhaps let it continue for a few seconds before releasing him. "You lucky son of a bitch!" He delivered one final punch that knocked Turnbull outcold.

~0~

Nate saw the train coming and it was definitely a lot closer now. "I got this! I got this! I got this! I got this, I got this, I got this, I got this!" He went all steel and put his hands forwards just as the train zoomed in.

It took him down the railroad despite the pressure he was putting against the train's front. Somehow, through it, his pressure started to affect the train and ultimately force it into a stop.

When Nate stepped backwards, he got a good look at what he did and, quite frankly, couldn't believe it. He saw Ray and Jax coming up on horseback and laughed loudly. "Did you see that? Did you see that? Tell me you saw that!"

"Yo, that was badass, dude," Jax had to admit. "Totally badass."

"You all right?" Ray asked since Nate was all disheveled.

"No. But I stopped a train!" Nate pumped his hands into the air. "Yeah! I stopped a train! "

~0~

Hex drank silently in the cargo room of the ship before he was to leave. He heard the clink noises of someone coming down. It was Graciela, who had changed back into her own clothes.

"I hate to admit that you did a good job out there," she began, though clearly in a struggle to confess. "Back in my day I would've killed him...but that's why I wasn't known as a good person."

"Thief," Hex recalled some of the descriptions famously known for Graciela.

"Hm," Graciela weakly smiled. "So now that you have your man, what're you gonna do with him?"

"Well, I'm gonna turn him over to the authorities. So you don't have to worry about your 'Aberration'."

"Good, because Rip would kill both of us if we knowingly, willingly, let it happen."

To that, both smiled.

"You do a mighty fine job bearing a burden few men could deal with," Hex had to admit. The team was still together, even with its same, dysfunctional dynamic. "Graciela."

A wider smile came to Graciela's face. He never once used her real name in the time she knew him. "Good thing I'm a woman then. And a bit of a better person, I think."

"I best get Turnbull. Collect my bounty," Hex got up and put his liquor bottle into his pocket. "Now, you try to stay out of trouble. If it's possible."

"Yeah, we'll see." She let a moment of silence pass before speaking up again. "I know you and Rip were really close, so I have to ask even if it means you telling his secrets. Is there...a place...that Rip ever told you about? Like, somewhere he'd go in times of...emergencies? Somewhere besides home and the ship?"

Hex honestly considered the question but as much as he would like to help find his old friend, he didn't have any answer. "No, sorry. I don't think he ever considered that one day he'd have to leave the ship."

"Nah, he did. I know he did," Graciela said with the utmost certainty. "He was annoyingly smart and tactical."

Hex had to agree. He finally made to leave but stopped at the open door to say one more thing that'd been gnawing at his mind since they arrived. "That year you spent here, as a 'prisoner', it wasn't really for the reason you think." Graciela's eyebrows knitted together while he went on with his explanation. "Rip thought you would be safe here while he moved the attention from the authorities off you."

"What?" she frowned. "I don't…"

With a sigh, Hex turned back to completely face her. "You always thought that Rip brought you here as a punishment for your massive crime, but he did it to keep you safe. The authorities from your time suspected that you were responsible."

"But I…" Graciela felt at a loss for words. Things were fuzzy and confusing. All she remembered were the terrible times and the rage she felt towards Rip for his prepotent attitude.

"It took him awhile but he pinned the blame on some dead guy," Hex went on. "And those next 6 months he stayed with you, that wasn't to keep an eye on you. He thought he could help you turn a new page. Sort of like you're doing now." A light smile came to his face. "I think he'd be happy to see you now."

"...why are you telling me this now?" she asked quietly.

"Because I don't think Rip deserves that rage you feel towards him. And I think it would do you some good to know that he never gave up on you."

Graciela was silent for a long time. She remembered all the screaming and cursing she did at Rip once she finally got away from the West, as well as the time she was dropped off and the moment he returned. It went back and forth with things being said that couldn't be taken back.

The urge to find Rip increased tenfold in that one second.

"Thank you," she finally said quietly. Hex gave her a final nod before heading out. She heard a distinct ringing from upstairs that but her mind was elsewhere at the moment, in a long buried memory.

"You and your lot pride yourself on being 'peacemakers' but that's a fucking sham!" Graciela mockingly laughed in Rip's face. "It's a cover-up for using all that power you're allegedly bestowed! I bet that's why you're trapping me here in this old rat town, right?" She stepped back to turn and look at the small town of the West Rip had chosen as her punishment. "It's the only way to put an ending to your so-called 'problem'!"

"You don't understand why you're here," Rip said in a matter-of-factly tone, though if Graciela hadn't been so focused on her anger she would have noticed that he also sounded a little bit offended. "This is for you—"

Graciela snorted and glanced back at him. "Do you think I'm stupid?"

Her hostility made no effect on him. He was quite used to it. "I think you are far from that, actually. You are intelligent but also conniving and I cannot allow you to keep doing what you do. One day, you won't be so lucky to survive!"

Graciela's scowl deepened on her face. "I hate you," she spat. "You think I don't know what this is really for? You're tired of me!" she started striding back to him. "And you know what? You shouldn't be." She got right in his face. "Because I'm not your burden. I'm most certainly not your responsibility."

Despite it all, Rip kept a cool face. He looked at her without any signs of anger, one she was hoping to get out so she could have something to work with. "You're not a responsibility. You're a friend. And despite everything you do, I'm still here. Kai is still here. And you should count your stars because you don't have a lot of people you can count on and trust."

A humorless laugh slipped through Graciela's lips. "You don't trust me. And I can't say I trust  you . Least Kai lets me have fun. Go ahead. Punish me. What else can I do? You've defeated me." She made a fake bow. "But we both know that you didn't really 'win' anything. This is all just an excuse to 'give up' on me, like you had any reason to be around me in the first place."

For a moment it looked like Rip would say something, but in the end he closed his mouth and said nothing more than the rules of this relocation.

"Grace?"

Graciela breathed harder than usual. She left the memory in the furthest corner of her mind to pay Nate the attention he needed.

"Sorry, were you eating?" Nate asked once he took notice of her odd state. She seemed like she had beene caught.

"No...no…" the woman shook her head. She hadn't realized she wandered into the kitchen. She wasn't even close to feeling hungry. "Well, I was going to do something." And without a warning she punched him on the arm.

"Ow!" the man recoiled away from her.

"That was for jumping in front of a fucking train!" she exclaimed through gritted teeth. But then she hugged him and audibly exhaled. "And this is for not dying!"

"I'm very confused," Nate said honestly and hugged back. He was afraid she'd have another moment and smack him for something else he did.

Graciela pulled away with a deadpanning look. "Stop doing stupid stuff with your powers! You just got them and you have to train!"

"I bet you did stupid stuff with your powers in the beginning too," Nate read Graciela's silent face as confirmation.

"I was a thief and a criminal. Do you really want to follow in my footsteps?"

"...no," Nate said after careful consideration. "But, c'mon, you know I want to be out there and now I can be out there fighting. You led a rebellion, didn't you? Help me train to get better."

"Since I guess it doesn't really matter what I'm going to say, I'll just pretend to agree!"

Nate's smile was wide but not for the reason that Graciela thought. "That's great that you say that because the perfect opportunity has arisen."

"Arisen?" Graciela raised an eyebrow at his odd choice of words. "First lesson, if you want to be 'cool' out on the field, we don't say 'arisen' like a loser."

Nate rolled his eyes. "I came to find you because Sara just got a call from your friends back in 2016."

"What?" she blinked.

"Yeah, you know? Your friends? Uh, what she say?" Nate thought for a moment before remembering. "Barry Allen? And Belen Palayta? Oh, and Oliver Queen! When we were you going to tell me that they were the Flash and the Azalea?"

Graciela's head was spinning with different thoughts that she blatantly told Nate to shut up. "Why-why do they want me to go back there? They don't even — they don't know I'm here!"

"Sara didn't tell them, so I'm sure that they still think you're in prison," Nate said, "So that'll make for a good surprise, right?

Mon-El didn't know much about the human world, but he still knew it was appropriate to glare at her. Kara, however, didn't notice anything. She had the day planned out in its entirety and it started with Mon-El's outfit.

While Anais went zipping around the kitchen making breakfast, Kara made Mon-El try on at least five outfits before deciding on a…

"Bow Tie and plaid…" Anais judged from the counter. She picked her fork into the air, letting syrup drop from her pancake, and grinned. "Sounds about right."

"Now you just need glasses," Kara presented Mon-El with a pair of black, thick-rimmed glasses.

"What for?" Mon-El asked with confusion.

"Well, maybe someday you might want to help people the way I do. In which case, these—" Kara pointed at the glasses, "—will come in handy."

"Or he could just do the easy thing of wearing a mask like I do," Anais reminded her of the other easy choice.

"You mean like you used to," Mon-El smiled knowingly. "Because Winn still hasn't given you back your suit."

Anais' lips curled into a frown. She menacingly pointed her fork at Mon-El.

"I'm sure we'll find a way to compromise," Kara, being the mediator, said. "Now Mon-El remember, you're not Mon-El to the world: you're Mike Matthews. Winn got you a birth certificate, Social Security card and everything."

"Oh, four-nine-eight, zero-zero, three-one-four-five," Mon-El said straight out of memory.

"Oh, soon you will get your FICO score."

"I don't know what any of those words mean."

"It's okay. You'll learn about it working at Catco," Kara patted Mon-El's shoulder and moved towards the kitchen counter to strap a piece of bacon from Anais' plate.

"Thank you for helping me be more...human," Mon-El straightened his bowtie but still looked like he would be toying with it for the rest of the day.

"You're welcome," Kara was happy to say.

Anais, on the other hand, assured him he'd be regretting it in a couple hours.

~0~

Both Kara and Anais brought Mon-El to CatCo. that morning, hoping that between the two of them, they could simplify what a regular human does at work. Of course the two differed in their tactics. Where Kara talked about coffees for people at work to be nice…

"Yeah. So, when I first started working here, I found it helpful to bring coffee to the other assistants to make new friends," Kara led Mon-El into the main offices with a tray of coffee in her hands.

...Anais would then go...

"It's basically bribery," Anais chimed in with a casual smile even when Kara threw a mock glare her way.

"Ah, bribery, got it," Mon-El dutifully nodded as he took a mental note of what they said to him. "We have that on Daxam."

"It's not…" Kara glared at Anais again, "It's not bribery, it's just niceness. Here, you try." She handed the coffee tray to Mon-El then directed him to an employee passing by. "Say good morning."

"Good morning," Mon-El repeated and handed the employee a coffee cup. He was about to repeat it with another employee when several desk phones started ringing. "Wait, what are those alarms for?"

"They're not alarms, they're phones." Anais corrected but it seemed like he was still confused. She picked up a nearby phone to show him. "You answer with a" — she spoke into the phone — "'Hello, this is Catco, how may I help you?'" and then you help the person on the other line with whatever they need."

Mon-El nodded that he understood.

Suddenly, Anais heard the irritated person on the other line demanding to be helped. "Oh, sorry," Anais quickly said into the phone before hanging up.

"...you didn't help them," Mon-El noted.

"Not my department," Anais smiled.

Kara pinched the bridge of her nose. "Maybe you should just go to your office."

Anais agreed that would be the better option. She was done teaching for the day anyways.

"You have an office here?" Mon-El asked curiously.

"Yup," Anais popped the 'p' and folded her arms over her chest. "Come visit sometime."

As she was about to leave, Kara stopped her to say, "James and I are going to be seeing if we can get new shots of the hospital that was burned down. You think you can keep an eye on Mon-El then?"

"Yeah. We can have fun! I'll show you how to work the internet. You'll love that!" Anais said and got a kick out of Kara's reaction. She laughed and assured the Kryptonite she was only joking. She wanted Mon-El to assimilate successfully just as Kara did.

James emerged from his office and walked straight to the trio. "Hey."

"Oh, James. I want to introduce you to our new intern...Mike!" Kara exclaimed, turning Mon-El around.

James smiled at the man. "Welcome to Catco."

Mon-El looked James over at least twice before finally speaking. "You're...you're the big boss?"

"That I am."

"Huh. I kind of expected someone a little more intimidating."

James didn't take it with offence if not with more amusement. Behind Mon-El, Anais smirked and Kara face-palmed. James cleared his throat and directed Mon-El to a stack of files on his new desk. "I had Miss Teschmacher put some reports on your desk that should be put in order and filed. So, if you have any questions, my doors are always open."

"Okay," Mon-El nodded, though the look he was giving the stack of reports did not go unnoticed by Anais.

"We should get going," James told Kara. The blonde nodded but before leaving, she turned to Anais, mouth opened to say something when Anais cut her off.

"I will keep an eye out, promise."

The Kryptonian didn't look convinced but her job was her job. When she was finally gone, Anais watched in amusement as Mon-El prepared himself to sit at his new desk. He hesitated at first, as if the chair would bite him or something, and when he finally sat down...he stared at the stack of reports as if that would bite him too.

"So before this you were a guard, right?"

Mon-El looked up from the stack with an expression that said 'I will take any distraction and I can get'. "Yeah."

"Never thought you'd be doing human paperwork, huh?"

"Uh, no. And I can't use any of my…" Mon-El made a nod to the side, indicating he meant his powers.

"No," Anais crossed her arms. "I mean, Kara is going to tell you that using our powers at work is wrong, And she's right, but after you get the hang of things...there's no shame in using them for a little bit of a shortcut."

Mon-El smiled at the idea. "You and Kara…how do you guys get along? Because it looks like you guys are pretty different."

Anais shrugged. "Believe it or not, we actually get along pretty well. She's my mentor, to be honest. She knows exactly what she's doing. So, with that being said, please listen to her. Even though some of the things she asks for seem ridiculous to you, she knows exactly how things run around here."

Mon-El dutifully nodded and reached for the first folder of the stack.

~ 0 ~

As soon as Anais heard the fight between Kara and some thieves with high-tech (no doubt alien) weapons, she bolted from CatCo to go straight to the DEO.

"You should've called me," she told Kara in the control room. "Suit or no suit" — she found time to glare at Winn, the man making a face and looking away — "I would've gone out to help you."

"Negative, you would not have," J'onn warned her. "Identities are important, remember?"

At that, Anais turned her glare once more to Winn.

"Do we know who those guys were yet?" Kara decided to focus on the problem at hand.

Alex worked on the computers to bring up a list of weapons they were keen on identifying, and finding. Once she did, she got up from her chair and moved back with the group. "Any of these look familiar?"

Kara's eyes scanned the pictures in 2 seconds flat before pointing at one of the weapons towards the end of the list. "That one. That's the gun he was carrying."

Winn took over the computers again and pulled up the specific gun. "Okay. That is an Anndrannian Photon Cannon." He made another face because that was a high-tech gun only the DEO owned. "How'd these guys get their hands on alien technology?"

"Are you sure they weren't Anndrannian?" J'onn turned to Kara just to eliminate any other possibility.

"Well, they weren't purple with fins, so yeah, I'm sure," the Kryptonian crossed her arms.

Winn whistled the more read of the file. "Oh, you are lucky this thing hit you before it was fully charged. There's no telling what this might've done to you."

"If they got weapons like that then these guys are bound to make another appearance soon," Anais said as a warning that they should be prepared. "Is there any way we could track those weapons and beat them?"

"So it emits phased muon particles," hummed Winn. "I could maybe come up with a way to detect it."

But suddenly his screen, along with the rest of the screens in the room turned to pitch black. There was a small static noise before a modulated voice started talking.

'You were warned. The alien invaders are dangerous. Their intentions, malicious. They possess power we cannot hope to match. And their technology, brought from other worlds, is falling into the wrong hands. We should not be opening our arms to them. We should be locking them up and taking their weapons away. You did not heed us, but you will heed the chaos that amnesty has brought. You will pay the price in fear and blood. And you will beg us to save you. We are Cadmus.'

Alex sighed and turned to the rest after the transmission ended. "Kind of a coincidence that Cadmus releases a new video just as criminals get their hands on alien weapons."

"Not a coincidence if Cadmus is the one giving them the guns," Kara theorized.

"Trying to stir fear within the public. Smart," Anais hated to admit. "But we're stopping them." And she would definitely do that with or without a suit.

"Hey," Kara suddenly realized something and turned to Anais. "Who's watching Mon-El?"

Anais' eyebrows raised together. Oops, she thought. She hadn't even considered what Mon-El might do in hers and Kara's absence. All she knew was that she needed to go help.

Kara groaned. "Anais!"

"I'm sorry! I thought you guys needed my help!"

"I gotta go," Kara zipped out of the place.

Anais made a face and looked at the remaining trio. "I'll be hearing about this later. I choose to blame you, Winn!" she said before zipping out as well.

~ 0 ~

When the two women found Mon-El, he seemed alright — at first. In fact, he seemed to be spending it nicely with a red twizzler in his mouth.

"Uuh, what are you doing?" Kara looked down at the man in confusion.

"Eating these red tubes. They're amazing!" Mon-El waved around his half-eaten twizzler in the air. "Like pure joy in food form."

"No, Mon-El," Kara snatched the twizzler from him and chucked it to the side, "There's a time and a place for eating candy."

"Yeah, and it's this time and this place—"

"Uuuh, what are you doing?" They both heard Anais asking someone.

Eve Teschmacher was coming into the room with a stack of familiar reports in her arms. She was struggling to keep them all from falling. Anais rushed to help the woman, but it still left the question of where all that work came from.

"Oh, thanks, Anais," the squeaky-voiced woman said with an awkward smile.

Anais dismissed the apology as she brought the stack to Eve's desk and noticed the familiarity of them. "Aaaaand these are the yearly quarterly reports that Mike was supposed to do." She threw a look at Kara who then glared down at Mon-El.

The man just smiled.

"Oh, it was no bother!" Eve waved a hand. "He was really struggling with his work and it's his first day. So I was just trying to help him out. He's so nice."

"Nice isn't the word I'm thinking right now," Anais whirled around with one report in her hand that she purposely waved at Mon-El. "My office now."

"But I don't work for you—"

"NOW!"

Mon-El shot up from his chair and followed Kara and Anais into the latter's office.

"I was rooting for you, man!" Anais said as soon as she closed the door of her office. "You don't just hand your work to someone else!"

"That woman wanted to please me," Mon-El pointed out, meaning Eve. "On Daxam, when a woman wishes to please a man—"

Kara made a noise and waved a hand for him to stop right there. "Wherever you're going with that, just don't. We are not on Daxam. Thank Rao. Next time, you have to do the work on your own."

"But it was long," frowned Mon-El. "Is that what you two do all day? Because it's boring."

Kara looked frustrated with his clueless responses.

"Maybe this office thing isn't the best idea," Anais' remark definitely didn't help the case either. Kara shot the woman a look that clearly said not to keep talking. "What? Just a thought…"

Kara didn't know who to start with first, but someone knocked on the door which terminated the conversation anyways. It was quite the surprise to see Lena Luthor poking her head into the room.

"Anais? Kara?" She smiled with red-stained lips.

"Wicked lipstick," Anais had to say first and foremost, making Lena chuckle.

"Lena, what a surprise," Kara admitted.

"I didn't mean to bother. Miss Teschmacher just said you were both in here," Lena walked further into the room, though still looked cautious as if she would be asked to leave at any moment.

"What can we help you with?" Anais asked, though only after pointing Mon-El to sit down lest he make an escape and go do something else that was stupid.

"Well, it's not really a favor...as it is…" Lena seemed at a loss for the right words, which was strange considering she was a Luthor, but then again Lena wasn't an ordinary Luthor. She took in a breath to start again. "L-Corp is hosting a party this weekend. It's for a gala fundraiser for the Children's Hospital after that horrific attack on their new building. I was hoping you'd come."

As Kara and Anais exchanged surprised glances, Mon-El jumped from his chair with a finger in the air. "Gala?" It was then that Lena noticed his presence. "Is that like a party?"

Anais started going 'shhhh' at him while Kara tried to move the attention of him.

Lena still smiled at him and continued on with her explanation. "You two are literally my only friends in National City. Most people wouldn't touch a Luthor with a 10-foot pole."

"Oh, I'd poke you with one," Anais pointed at her with a smile.

Lena shook her head at her and laughed. "Please tell me you'll come. It would mean a lot to me if you were there."

"Of course we'll come," Kara assured the woman.

Mon-El inserted himself into the conversation, and quite literally in front of Lena with a big smile. "I love parties. I'm Mon — I'm Mike," he struck a hand to shake with Lena. "Can I come to this gala too?"

She shook his hand and chuckled again. "Of course you can. Find yourself a nice suit and I'll see you there." She offered one more smile to the trio before leaving, and when she did Mon-El found himself at the center of another argument.

"You are not ready for a human party!" Kara exclaimed.

"You weren't even ready for a job!" added Anais.

Mon-El looked between the two with a frown. "You guys aren't very supportive."

"What if I just heat visioned him?" Anais asked, her eyes already glowing orange. "Just a little bit." Mon-El stiffened and took a step backwards, but thankfully Kara pulled the woman and effectively shook her so that the laser never happened. "Fine!"

~0~

Winn was oh-so-focused on his work that he never saw a blonde alien coming up behind his desk chair. His 'work' was him rewatching CADMUS' latest transmission while holding a toy BB gun.

'You will beg us to save you. We are Cadmus.'

Winn stopped the transmission to mimic its robotic voice and aim his be-be gun at the computer screen. "You. Are. Lame."

Anais made her presence known by snatching the gun from behind him, ignoring his initial jump, and shooting a few BB pellets at his face. "You are dead," she mimicked his tone then added a sweet smile afterwards.

Winn took the blow with a nod and attempted to take back the gun, but she tossed it into her other hand and jumped to sit at the edge of his desk.

"We gotta talk!"

"I dread to do so," Winn admitted anxiously.

"Kara nearly couldn't save a cop today because she had a lot of thieves to deal with."

"But she did and that's the important thing," Winn reminded with a cheeky smile that died once Anais' eyes narrowed on him.

"I should be out there."

"Not arguing that you shouldn't," Winn said, raising his hands in front of him, "But more to the fact you'd be in danger because you haven't told J'onn—" Anais shot more pellets at his face. "I was just saying!"

"Well don't!" snapped Anais. "Enough is enough and let me tell you" — she hopped off his desk to press the BB gun at his forehead — "that when upset, a Solista can be very dangerous. I don't need Arun to give me a lesson on that."

Winn tried scoffing casually but he had to admit that her face did look kind of scary right now. "I know you're not going to hurt me, Anna."

"No," Anais agreed, retracting the gun from his forehead. There was a small dent on his skin from the pressure she'd applied. "But I can and will make your life miserable. For starters…" She shot more pellets at his face, this time enough for him to try and fight them off with his hands.

"Okay, I get it!"

"Have my suit by the end of the week, Schott." Anais was about to toss the BB gun to the side when she gave it another look. "I'm keeping this."

"That's my favorite one!" he complained as she strolled off.

~0~

Anais felt like Kara was putting way too much hope on Mon-El's successful assimilation. It felt like it was too early to hope like that. But that was Kara Danvers. She had faith in everything and everyone. And not to say that it was wrong but...sometimes being a little realistic meant that not everything would work out like that. And as Anais started to get the feel of Mon-El's unique vibe, she began to believe this whole office thing was not going to work at all.

Sadly, Kara wasn't there on that realization yet. That's why she was pacing back and forth in Anais' office, complaining about Mon-El's lack of work ethic.

"He just doesn't get it! It's not on Daxam! He can't just not do anything!"

Anais agreed on that. "Look, call me crazy, I know that he said he worked as a guard but it really feels like he's never worked a day in his life." Kara paused her pacing to look at the Solista. "So maybe that's how we should treat him; as someone who's never worked. We should start him off with a much simpler position."

"What's more simple than being an assistant?" Kara made a good point. "It's not like he's working for Cat Grant because believe me, that one would have killed him."

"Still, maybe we should discuss about setting simpler tasks and him actually trying to work on it," Anais figured it was their best shot if they wanted to see some improvement. Kara seemed to agree and took the lead out of the office.

The two women walked over to Mon-El's desk but found that he wasn't there. Kara, additionally, found a report that she herself had left on the desk with the task for Mon-El to do.

"I asked him to take this down to marketing like two hours ago," she frowned and glanced at Anais. "Where is he?"

Anais groaned. "Goddammit! You know we can't keep losing him like this, right? We should put a bell on him!"

Kara let the report fall flat on the desk then looked around. She honed in on her special hearing skills, while Anais kept grumbling they were not meant to be babysitters, and listened carefully for Mon-El's voice.

And soon, she really wished she hadn't tried at all.

With a loud gasp, Kara took off in a speedy sprint. Anais, lost of course, chased after her.

"Why are you running!?"

"Oh, God, get it out of my ears!" Kara just visibly shook as she ran down the hallway. She stopped at the copy room and flung the door open to find Mon-El and Eve Teschmacher in a compromising position.

"Kara!" Anais called as she caught up, "What are you—" But she gasped when she looked into the copy room. "Oh you didn't!"

"This is not what it looks like…" Eve hopped off the copier and hurriedly buttoned the top of her dress again.

"I will never use the copier ever again," Anais looked at Kara who was even more horrified.

"Just go, Eve!" the Kypronian sounded like she was begging for it.

"Are you kidding me!?" Anais glared at Mon-El who was quite proudly tucking his shirt into his pants.

"I think I might have more powers on Earth than we realized. Do you think that I can make any woman fall instantly for me?"

"Can I laser him now?" Anais muttered to Kara.

Kara pointed Mon-El to get out of the room and walk in front of them. "What were you thinking?"

Mon-El shrugged his shoulders and blatantly answered with, "That I haven't had sex in 35 years."

"And you thought the office would be the perfect place to break that streak?" Anais threw him a crazed look. "That's just...tacky!"

"Not helping," Kara told her wearily. "Mon-El, you can't do that here!"

"Are you sure? 'Cause I've been watching this TV show about doctors, and I'm pretty sure it's okay—"

Kara groaned angrily. "No! I am trying to help you fit in and you keep messing it up."

"Okay, I'm trying very hard to be Mike, okay? But it is not as easy as you make it sound, Kara. I'm used to doing my own thing."

"Well, you don't do your own thing here. You do my thing!" Kara snapped and stormed past him into the bullpen.

"Um, okay. And if I don't want to do your thing?"

Kara whirled around and responded with another snap, "Then find another mentor!"

"You really just can't help yourself, can you?" Anais sighed with Mon-El. "And it doesn't even look like you care that she's trying to help you."

"This may have worked for you but it's not doing it for me," Mon-El insisted, but Anais had already assumed this was the case. "I don't...I don't like the glasses," he pulled the things off his face, "And I don't like whatever the hell this is." He untied the bow tie bowtie from his neck. "I'm sorry I keep messing up but it's very hard to do something that's just not me."

Anais could get that. She hated that she could, but she did. With another sigh, she looked into the bullpen and decided to try and help both parties out. "Go sit down and do your work. I will talk to Kara."

"Thank you!" Mon-El exclaimed with newfound happiness. He took her into a surprise hug.

"Aaah! Hands off Daxamite! You are not breaking that 35 year streak with me!" Anais swatted his arms away from him. Mon-El just laughed and went to his desk.

Anais found Kara in the reporter's division, unsurprisingly, pacing back and forth.

"Hey Kara, you should probably try to calm down—"

"Don't tell me to calm down! You saw what he was trying to do! He's just not getting this!" Kara exclaimed, throwing her hands up.

"Yeah but maybe it goes back to what I was saying earlier?" Anais waited for Kara to get what she meant but the Kryptonian blankly stared at her. "Mon-El is not meant for office life, Kara. I'm not saying he's right in doing all this but it is a testament to what I'm saying."

"But I've given him everything he could need to assimilate!"

"You gave him everything you had," Anais quietly said. "I mean, you were lucky that it worked out with me because we are kind of similar…but Mon-El is nothing like me or you."

Kara groaned. She wasn't listening and, honestly, what Anais said sounded like it was her fault that Mon-El wasn't assimilating. She was trying her best here! "I have to go back to a report I need to finish," Kara grumbled and walked off.

With a sigh, Anais returned to her own job but she really hoped Kara would consider her words once she was calmer.

~0~

When Kara returned home later that day, she saw Alex stuffing her face with a donut right next to her apartment. "A donut? You never eat sugar in the middle of the day. What's wrong?"

Alex peeled herself off the wall, dusted her hands from powdered sugar and sighed. "I'm feeling confused about something. Your steps were exceptionally stompy just now. You all right?"

Kara groaned just thinking about what she had to deal with today. She unlocked the door and strode right in, tossing her things to the side. "Where do I start? Mark almost got fired today."

"Who?"

"Mark, uh... Mike!" Kara shook her head. Great, even she was messing up now. "Mon-El. He doesn't take his job seriously, at all. I have to give it to Anais when she says that it feels like he's never worked a day in his life."

Alex pick a seat at one of the stools by the kitchen. "Well, he's from a different planet."

"I'm from a different planet, and I had to deal with the awkwardness of seventh grade when I first got here!" Kara walked over to the fridge to take out drinks for them. "I helped him get a new identity. I helped him get an internship. I even got him a new pair of glasses for a disguise in case he wants to put on a cape and help people the way I do." She put the one drink. On the aisle and realize she forgot another one for herself. This is how out of it she was thanks to Mon-El. "He has everything he needs, and yet, he's still a disaster."

Alex didn't need much to know what the real problem was. "Well, that's the problem."

Kara angrily uncapped her own drink. "What, the glasses? I can take those back but I don't think it's gonna make any difference."

Alex sweetly smiled at her sister and potted the stool next to her. "Sit." Kara took the pointed stool and plopped down. "When you first arrived at our house, I thought, 'Finally, I have a sister'."

"An alien sister."

"Even better. But I still wanted you to be just like me. To do everything that I did. So I dragged you out to science fairs—"

Kara shook her head at the reminder of those things. "Those were so boring."

"Made you watch scary movies…"

"What do you have against a good old romantic comedy?"

"Forced you to listen to the music that I liked."

"Yeah, your punk-rock phase was very strange."

Alex just smiled and continued on with her point, "But finally, I let it go. Let you do your own thing, find your own hobbies, listen to your own weird music."

Kara took the last jab some offense. "Uh, NSync, first of all, is not weird. And second of all, they are amazing."

Alex nodded and motioned for Kara to listen to the point she's trying to make. "Mon-El is not you. Just like you're not me. So what works for you might not work for him."

Kara bit her lower lip as she recalled Anais' words earlier in the day. "Damn, Anais said something similar to that earlier and I kind of blew her off for it." Alex hummed, knowing Kara would be apologizing profusely to Anais when she came home.

"Oh, God. You came here wanting to talk to me about something and I haven't shut my mouth," Kara realized a few minutes later. "I'm sorry. What is it? What's wrong?"

For some reason, Alex's heart hammered in her chest. She felt her mouth dry and even as she wanted to tell Kara the problems Maggie was facing...she felt like the air from her lungs had disappeared. What is going on?

But before Alex could actually say something, someone knocked on the door. Kara was confused because Anais wasn't meant to be home for a while. When she used her x-ray, she was shocked to see Lena Luthor waiting on the other side of the door.

"What is she doing here?" she mumbled as she got up to go answer.

"Who?" Alex followed her sister and got her answer in a few seconds.

"I'm sorry to keep dropping in on you," Lena apologized as soon as she was let into the apartment. "It's…" she trailed off when she saw Alex behind Kara. "Hey, I know you. You saved my life."

Alex gave a nod and shook hands with the woman. "Special Agent Alex Danvers, FBI."

"She's my sister," Kara explained.

"This city's smaller than I thought. Hmm. Well, actually, maybe you can both help me," Lena said, clearing her throat. "Um…you remember, I told you about that stupid fight club last week?" Kara nodded. "Now it's my turn to ask for a favor."

"Anything. Shoot."

"I need to get in touch with Supergirl and Solar."

~0~

There was plenty to munch on at home and since Anais was pretty tired from her day, she munched. She laid with her feet on the couch and a bowl of chips on her lap. Of course she couldn't focus on the television on account of where Kara was. She'd gotten a quick text from Kara explaining Lena's request to speak with the two heroes. Being that Anais had no suit, she was out. So now here she was...doing nothing.

Well, not exactly 'nothing'.

"No, no, no!" she started shouting and wagging a finger at Mon-El. He'd found her stash of chocolate mint bars over the fridge. "No! Leave that alone!"

"But they're really good!" Mon-El exclaimed. "I had one in the morning and—"

"You had what!?" Anais jumped up from the couch, nearly throwing her chip bowl to the side. "Those are mine!"

"I thought you guys were all about sharing?"

Anais' face would have been comical if anyone else was around to see it. Her eyes were mildly wide, her lips flattened against each other. "You know what...why don't you stay with Winn today? I'm sure he'd love a roommate."

"Wait, what—?"

Anais didn't wait for Mon-El's response. She zipped him out of the apartment and went straight for Winn's. She knocked then returned to her place for some clothes. Winn was already at his door when Anais showed up, and mighty confused too.

"What's—"

"He's yours for tonight!" was all Anais had to say before leaving, leaving Winn even more confused.

By the time Anais had re-settled on her couch, Kara made it home.

"How'd it go?" Anais asked.

"Oh, you know, promised Lena both Supergirl and Kara would attend her fundraiser," Kara rubbed her face wearily. "Like stupid me would."

"Sorry to hear that…"

Kara dropped her hands to her sides. "I didn't mention Solar so you don't have to worry about that."

"Great…"

It was then that Kara looked around and noticed they were short one visitor. "Where's Mon-El?"

"Oh, he decided to stay with Winn tonight. Some kind of bro night or something," Anais shrugged so casually Kara never even stopped to think it was a lie.

"Oh, okay. Maybe it's for the best. I haven't been very fair with him," Kara sighed. She moved towards the other couch and sat down. "Nor with you. Alex made me realize that I haven't been a good mentor for Mon-El. And at the same time I haven't been listening to you either. Mon-El is not me and...I can't make him. I shouldn't be trying to."

"I don't think you realized it," Anais said with a slight smile. "You were trying to help. Plus, let's face it, Mon-El is kind of a difficult student. I'd go insane too. That's why I booted him to Winn's today."

Kara's eyes widened in alarm. "You did what?"

"What?" Anais repeated, startled she'd ratted herself out.

"You did what?"

"I said all is forgiven - you want chips?" Anais offered her chip bowl to Kara but the Kryptonian gave her a long stare for it. Eventually, though, Kara gave in and just took some chips.

~0~

Lena Luthor was an extravagant planner when she wanted to be. Her fundraiser was set outside as it was a lovely evening. There were seatless tables with a couple refreshment tables around. Waiters were passing by every couple minutes offering champagne and other snacks.

"She can plan parties for me any day," Anais remarked after taking a good look at the place. She had decided to go with a golden primp dress with accents over the bodice. Her hair had been pulled into a half-up, half-down style then curled.

"Yeah but we're not exactly here to party, remember?" Kara said, but received a scoff in response.

Apart from that, Anais leaned slightly back to give Winn a sharp look. "Right? Cos I'm missing something?"

Winn preferred not to answer. After having Mon-El dumped at his door, he'd been having a crazy day. The alien seemed calm but in reality was more of a child than anything else.

"Oh you guys," Kara huffed and looked at the two. "This is just getting childish now."

Before Anais could say something no doubt meant to jab at him, Winn spoke up with a device in hand. "Okay, the Muon Particle Detector will let us know if there are any weapons within 100 feet."

"Are you sure?" asked Kara.

"Have I ever been wrong before?" Winn's confidence was short-lived due to the look Kara gave him. "Okay, this time I'm sure."

"I see Lena," Anais nodded ahead at the finely dressed woman.

"Right! Commence Operation Doubtfire!" Kara took a lead start towards Lena, with the intention of making her presence known. "Lena!"

Lena smiled upon seeing the Kryptonian. "Kara! It's really great to see you. I'm glad you could come. Um, have you seen Supergirl?"

"I'm sure she's on her way," Kara casually waved to the side.

"Lena!" Anais exclaimed, pretending as if she'd never arrived with Kara, but instead with Winn.

"Hi," Lena turned her attention to the two, just as planned, and gave Kara the chance to slip away unnoticed.

"I invited a friend of mine, hope you don't mind!"

"Winn Schott," the man introduced himself and shook hands with Lena.

"Any friend of yours is invited, always," Lena assured Anais.

"Well, I say 'friend' very loosely, really…" Anais muttered to the side but Winn heard perfectly and deadpanned her.

Supergirl made her debut as she gracefully landed on the ground. Everyone around awed as they laid eyes on her. Lena was delighted to see the Kryptonian attend the fundraiser.

"Supergirl, I'm glad you could make it!"

"I still think this might be a bad idea," Supergirl remarked but, just like the previous times, Lena shook her head

"Well, why don't we wait and see how the evening pans out."

"I'll check the perimeter for any activity, and I'll be back at the first sign of danger," Supergirl promised before flying off again. Not a few seconds later did Kara come running back.

"Kara, you just missed Supergirl," Lena laughed in delight, still looking into the sky as if they would see Supergirl flying over them.

"Did I?" Kara looked at the others, desperately trying to be casual. "Golly!"

Anais passed some hair behind her ear and moved away. Soon as she did, she saw a familiar figure not too far from them. "Arun?"

At his name, both Kara and Winn turned to where she was looking and saw the Solista Arun taking a drink from a passing waiter.

"How did he get invited?" Kara whispered to the two.

"I don't know. I haven't really talked to him in a while," admitted Anais. "I'll see you later." She didn't really look back to see her friends' reactions as she made a direct beeline for Arun.

Arun's eyes blinked upon seeing her. He lowered his glass from his lips and gave her a look that said 'what the hell are you doing here?'.

Anais just smiled. "Nice to see you too."

Arun got over his initial surprise and returned to his almost emotionless face. "How'd you get the invite?"

"Oh, haven't you heard?" Anais made a show of passing her hand through her styled hair. "I'm besties with Lena Luthor."

Arun's face was comical. It changed fast from a 'you're kidding' to a 'you're crazy'. "No, seriously."

Anais laughed. "I'm friends with Lena. She invited me and a couple of my friends here. So, how did you get invited?"

"Well, some of my paintings are being auctioned here," Arun said, quite proudly as he fixed the collar of his black suit.

"And you didn't tell me!?" Anais playfully pushed him on his arm.

"Well, you haven't spoken to me in days!"

"Sorry," Anais bit her lower lip. "I don't exactly have the right requirements to train."

"You still don't have your suit?"

"Nope."

"You know, I know that humans are a lot slower than we are but...this precise human is being ridiculously slow."

Anais made a small noise that was a split between agreeing and laughing. She folded her arms and looked to the side.

"How's about we dance while we discuss how to get your suit finished faster?"

Anais gave a small nod and allowed him to take her to the dance floor. From afar, both Kara and Winn watched them with similar degrees of curiosity.

"Huh, his paintings are in the auction," Kara said after casually eavesdropping on the aliens' conversation.

"Really? Which ones?" Winn started looking around when he noticed Anais giving him a glare from her dancing spot. "A-are they talking about me? Because it looks like Anna wants to kill me. Again."

"Uuum…" Kara pursed her lips together and lowered her head. "I'd rather not repeat her language."

"Of course!" Winn flapped a hand and turned away.

Kara couldn't help smiling in amusement as he stormed off grumbling to himself about how he was being a good friend and whatnot. Her smile faded when she saw Mon-El making his way through the crowd. Quickly, she crossed the party and made it just in time as he took a champagne flute from a waiter.

"You came," Kara said, slightly startled by the fact but then again this was Mon-El and he was...the opposite of her.

Mon-El gave an eager nod but then studied her expression and started doubting. "...are you gonna yell at me again?"

Kara shook her head. "No, I'm not gonna yell at you." But of course she then noticed the sharp suit he was wearing and knew that was something neither the DEO nor Winn owned. "Um, where'd you get that suit from?"

Mon-El looked down at his outfit with a proud smile. "Oh, you like it? Eve gave me her little…" he started making a square figure with his fingers, "...her plastic rectangle to buy things."

Kara's mouth fell open. "You used her credit card?"

Immediately Mon-El knew he'd done wrong again. "You're gonna yell at me again."

Kara's mouth opened no doubt to do that but she caught herself and reminded herself that he still had no clue about Earth. "I'm...not gonna yell at you."

But even then Mon-El still knew he'd done wrong again. He felt so guilty that no matter how hard Kara tried to help him, he kept screwing it up and disappointing her. He turned his attention to the dance floor, where he saw Anais and that other Solista guy dancing together.

"I miss dancing," he admitted, hoping to change the topic and thus ease the atmosphere between him and Kara. "I used to dance a lot on Daxam."

Kara followed his gaze and had to nod. "Yeah, we danced on Krypton too."

"Well, then…" Mon-El held a hand out for Kara to take. The Kryptonian smiled and accepted it. Maybe dancing wouldn't lead to arguing.

The dancing was fun but, unfortunately, short lived as an explosion from the end of the party rocked the guests. The music was forced to come to a stop, as were the dancers, when a second explosion went off. The smoke billowed and faded as it reached the sky, but in its place was left Miner and his crew making an entrance.

"My, my... look how many pretty things there are," he smiled incredibly wide as he took in what he believed would be his greatest treasures of all.

Lena approached the man without looking the least bit afraid. "Oh, you picked the wrong party to crash."

"I don't think so, princess," Miner yanked a stone necklace around Lena's neck then moved on by her to address the rest of the party. "All right, I'm gonna keep this real simple, people. Hand over every ring, pearl, diamond, watch, wallet and no one gets disintegrated."

Kara disappeared from sight and returned a second later from the sky as Supergirl. "Did you really think I wouldn't be here?"

Miner was looking far too confident for Kara's liking. "Actually, I was counting on it." He gave the word for his people to start shooting and bombarding the site. He himself whipped out a decently-sized gun from his back and used it to shoot Kara straight across.

"Supergirl!" Anais exclaimed after she herself was forced to jump out of the way. She landed on the ground and admitted it was hard to get back up with all the clamoring people running around her. "Arun!" she started to call but it seemed like she had lost him in the crowd.

Instead, someone else found her.

"Bet you can't be that mad at me right now, huh?" Winn couldn't help the small smirk he gave her after helping her get back on her feet.

But of course Anais proved him wrong. She shoved him hard on his chest. "Give me back my suit! Supergirl's getting clamored over there!"

Before Winn could say anything, they heard the tower of glass from a table shatter. Mon-El had just been thrown over it, his body covered by said table.

"These guys are part of CADMUS, Anna!" Winn pointed at the mess they were surrounded by. "If you show up as Solar, they'll take you!"

"So the better option is to let Supergirl deal with it?" Anais made her own gesture as Supergirl was facing off laser eyes vs. another high-tech gun that seemed on the verge of overpowering her. "That's not Solar and you know it."

Oh, Winn knew that stance all too well. She was getting ready to run. "W-w-w-ait! Anais, don't you—"

"I have to help!"

"You're not dressed right—" Winn was just about to gesture at her golden dress when she zipped away. He turned in the direction her lightning streak went off in.

In a few seconds, Anais had dumped several of Miner's men to the side while their guns landed on the other side. However, even if she was a speedster those remaining guns still affected her. She came to a stop at the very end of the party, only for a quick second, and turned back to see Kara fighting off Miner himself with that impossible gun. Behind her, Anais saw James trying to defend himself as well.

These guns were just too powerful.

Unless she could zap the head of it all. Lightning. She started going in a full circle, ignoring the burning sensation from the friction of her pretty dress — not to mention the soles of her feet against her heels — and just focused on getting faster. Everything became a blur around her, her sight the same, and somehow...it felt lightweight. For the first time, it came naturally to her. She felt electricity crackle between the air and her body.

And just like that, she came to a quick stop and threw a perfect lightning bolt at Miner's back.

It zapped the man from head to toe, forcing the gun out of his hand, and shoved him to the ground. Supergirl blinked, stunned to see the trick, but even more so to have Anais be the one to do it. Even more to their luck, a streak of red energy blasted from God knew where and de-powered the rest of the guns.

Just as Anais quickly covered her tarnished dress with a tablecloth, the rest of the remaining guests started coming out of hiding. Among them was Winn and Lena who, somehow, ended up under the same table.

Winn saw similar expressions flickering from Supergirl to Anais and quickly shook his head. "Oh, we weren't under there...no…" He shot his hands into the air with a boyish grin, "We stopped it!"

He swore he saw smiles after that.

~ 0 ~

A short while later, when Lena had safely sent the rest of her guests home, she came face to face with Supergirl. The Kryptonian had more or less figured out what really happened tonight.

"You took a great risk, Miss Luthor," she said, almost sounding like a scolding mother. "Why didn't you tell me what you were up to?"

Lena shrugged and answered honestly. "I doubt you would've believed that a Luthor just wanted to see justice done."

"Well, I couldn't have stopped them without you. Thank you."

Lena smiled. "And I guess Solar? Why didn't she stick around?"

Supergirl discreetly glanced at Anais, who stood off to the side trying to cover herself up. "Yeah, well...like I said, she couldn't really show up. She's...getting some things fixed."

"Well, thank you and Solar," Lena chuckled. "Who would've believed it. A Luthor and a Super working together?"

Supergirl smiled. It was a nice idea.

To the side, Anais tugged the table cloth closer around her body. She was trying to collect Mon-El and go already before anyone decided to stop by and ask her why she was choosing to fashion a table cloth. As it turned out, Mon-El was very into the remaining champagne.

"Anais, are you alright?" James approached her with Winn.

"Yeah," she shrugged casually. "But I think I should be asking you that. You nearly got hurt back there."

Winn was shooting James the same glare Anais would give him. There was something going on there, she was sure of it.

"Just trying to help," James said. "Got more than what I bargained for, I guess. As did you."

"Hm," Anais muttered. She looked to the side and saw Mon-El going for another champagne. "Can one of you go collect him so I can go home and change?"

"I got him," James raised a hand and headed for Mon-El.

"Are you good?" Winn asked Anais after James had gone off.

"What do you want me to say, Winn?" she frowned. "I think I'm at my lowest. But hey, at least I got to help in my way. Suit or no suit."

Winn inwardly sighed. Yeah, suit or nor suit she was going to be out there fighting. "I'm sorry it cost you that dress. You looked really nice in it."

Anais lowered her head but settled a doubtful look on him. "It was the first dress I got to wear to an actual party and now…" She opened the table cloth just slightly for Winn to see the top of her dress practically gone. There was more skin than actual fabric.

"Oh, uh — I'm…" Winn got flustered fast but he got over it when he noticed her genuine sorrow for what was clearly a beloved dress. "Here!" He shook his jacket off and held it for her to take. Anais remained perfectly still with an indescribable expression on her face. Winn just waved his jacket in front of her face, wearing that usual grin of his. "Take it, Anna. You can hit me with it later."

As irritated as she meant to look, Anais took the jacket from him mumbling a 'thank you'.

~ 0 ~

"So, no Mon-El today?" Anais asked when she and Kara strode into CatCo.'s bullpen. What used to be Mon-El's desk was now empty save for the stack of work he left unfinished.

"Uh, no, James was kind enough not to fire him on the spot," Kara folded her arms and kept her amused smile barely hidden. "But it was for the best. Mon-El was not built for office life."

"No, he was not," agreed Anais with her own smile. She made a turn for her office. "So, what's he going to work now?"

"Don't know. He'd let me know when he found one," Kara shrugged. "But I'm going to give him some space. Let him...find out who he's going to be in National City."

"Trust me, it'll be the best thing you can do for him," Anais stopped by her office door and opened up, only to find she had a visitor waiting inside. "Arun...good morning."

Arun didn't really smile but his nod was greeting enough. "I came to discuss your training. We have yet to resume and since you finally have conjured up lightning, we need to pick up fast before you lose it."

"Yeah, that lightning was pretty cool," Kara pushed her glasses slightly up. Her beaming smile made Anais smile herself. As she thought back to that glorious moment.

Unfortunately, Arun didn't exactly share the same thoughts. "It was mediocre at best," his flat tone shut down both women. "We have a lot more practice to do."

"I thought it was…" Kara trailed off, her eyes flickering between the two Solistas. Arun looked dead serious and Anais seemed to be accepting of it. "I'll just... I'll just leave you two…"

Anais gave a small nod. She headed for desk and waited for Kara to be home before speaking up. "I thought my lightning was pretty good for being a first timer."

"It is taking far too long to conjure up a lightning bolt," Arun continued in that serious tone that made Anais feel small in place. "You cannot settle with the first time. You know how to keep practicing so that you can be the best that you can be. You are half of a Solista. You need to train twice as hard, remember that?"

"How could I forget when that's all you say," Anais mumbled under her breath but of course Arun heard with his super hearing.

"I only say it so that you know what you need to do. Can I expect you to show up and train tomorrow?"

"Yes," Anais nodded. She might not agree with how Arun was wording things but she had to admit that he made good points. Things that come easy for Solistas were not the same for her, being only half. She did need to work harder. "The DEO. Tomorrow evening after work."

"Thank you," Arun said, then turned to leave.

Anais slowly fell into her seat and while she was meant to be starting work, her head was too cluttered with her pending training. There were doubts about her skills, coupled with CADMUS' goals which... unfortunately, she didn't really fully understand yet. Eventually, she forced the thoughts aside at least until she managed to put together the new snapped pictures they'd acquired from witnesses for their next series of articles.

When she was finished, she gathered her things and headed for James' office to show him the final arrangement. Thankfully, he seemed to like them...only Anais felt like there was something troubling the man. Either way, she wouldn't ask because it was clear as day James wasn't in the mood to share. Anais left her board with him and went for some coffee in the lounge room.

On her way there, she heard her name.

"I've got your jacket, don't worry," she turned to face Winn who was coming towards her.

"What? That's not—" he shook his head and started anew, "I came to see how you were doing."

"Really?" she raised an eyebrow at him, not quite sure if she should be more upset with him because he was pretending there was nothing wrong. "What do you think? I don't have my suit and I need to train like crazy if I ever want to get my lightning bolts and all my other powers up to Solista standards."

"What?" Now it was Winn's turn to be confused. It was even more puzzling to see her so serious over the last bit she said. "You finally got your lightning bolt trick to work. You'd make your young dad from another Earth proud."

"No, because it wasn't good enough, apparently," Anais mumbled and turned to continue for the lounge, leaving Winn to follow her.

"What are you talking about!? That was wicked cool!" Winn was honestly still so dazzled by the action. It was one thing to hear about the lightning bolt trick and another thing to actually see it.

And clearly his honest excitement was believed because Anais stopped to smile. "Really? You think so?" she asked him.

"Yes! It was fantastic!"

Anais' smile widened a bit, but she did well in keeping her beam hidden. It was nice hearing someone thought her skill hadn't been mediocre. Then again, if she remembered correctly, Kara thought something like that too. "...thanks," she said quietly. "I have to get back to work. I'll see you later, okay?"

It looked like there was something else Winn wanted to say, but she looked so...content, that he didn't want to possibly ruin it with what he wanted to say. Besides, he'd already made sure she knew what he wanted to convey. "See you later."

Anais nodded and walked into the employee lounge room. There she made herself a nice coffee then returned to her office. Of course when she walked in and saw a large rectangular box sitting on her desk, she was perplexed.

As she walked further into the room, she looked around to see if anyone else was waiting for her. But it was empty. She came to the side of her desk and put her coffee down.

The box, which resembled more like a present, was shiny silver and seemed to have something white sticking out from one end. She moved to her chair where the white stuck out and pulled it out. It was a note card.

Anna, I'm so sorry about your suit. I thought I was doing what was best for you but Lena's fundraiser proved you are more than capable of taking care of yourself. I'm just the annoying tech guy pulling you down. You're Solar. You've got this.

Winn

It was impossible not to smile so big. Anais put the note down and pulled the lid off her present. Inside, nearly tucked, was her pastel orange suit. Her matching mask laid over it.