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"So, what are we blowing up today, Dr. Snow?"
The surprised way she jolted then tried to casually conceal it amused him more than it probably should have. Even covered in a sheen of ice, with her hair a shimmer of frost and her eyes leeched blind of their usual rich color, one reaction could make her suddenly seem so very like the Caitlin Snow he had worked beside for so long.
"It's none of your business, ahem," she said curtly but the stumble over the end of the sentence took away a bit of the confident mien she clearly wanted to project.
She doesn't know what to call me, he realized, pushing his hood back.
Dr. Wells? Harrison? They were names from another life... for her, as well. The Reverse Flash and the Man in the Yellow Suit belonged to the man who killed Nora Allen and that reminder made her flinch like a thorn pressing into her skin, even still, even now.
Eobard Thawne, the puppetmaster, the shadowy figure behind the curtain. Calling him that meant accepting the death of the man in the wheelchair, meant accepting that the man in the wheelchair had never actually even existed as she had known him. Eobard meant she was ready to close the door on the past and to begin moving forward again.
He turned his attention back to the business at hand. "This property is owned by H.I.V.E., isn't it?" he said, inclining his head at the warehouse that was encrusted in a thick layer of ice. "Well, with half a dozen or so shell companies in between them and the property, of course, but none of that explains why you're blowing up their building."
Rage went across her face, cold and merciless. "Ronnie's dead because of them. They killed him!"
So that's what you're telling yourself these days, is it? he thought but nodded agreeably.
"Well, then, you should definitely blow up their building," he said. "Need some help?"
"Of course not," she snapped. "I can certainly blow up a building without any interference from the likes of you!"
He held up both hands in mock surrender. "Then, by all means, carry on. Don't let me stop you."
The remote detonator sat atop a nearby stack of crates. She reached for it then hesitated and pulled her hand away again with a frustrated huff.
He noted the slivers of components on the ground around her feet, glittering wetly. "You keep freezing the detonators, don't you?"
She spun to face him and he had to deftly side-step a spray of sharp icicles. "I--" she began then her angry tone deflated and her shoulders drooped slightly. "I keep freezing the detonators," she admitted. "I brought three backups. This is the last one."
He made an understanding noise but didn't repeat his offer, waiting her out.
Her pale lips twisted, emotions running the gamut over her icy features from dismay, to hope, to irritation and annoyance, hitting multiple stops in between. Then she finally gave a soft, resolved sigh. "I would appreciate it if you would push the button," she said through gritted teeth.
"Happy to be of assistance," he said, spreading his hands amiably.
As he stepped forward, she asked, "Why would you help me? Aren't you on their side?"
"Why would you think that?" he scoffed. "Do you think there's some sort of Secret Villain Clubhouse where we all go for coffee klatches and to swap cookie recipes while we twirl our mustaches and laugh evilly?"
She quite literally bristled, tiny, sharp icicles flaring all over her skin, and she made a sound between anger and pain. The air around her began to fog as she inadvertently lowered the ambient temperature.
Toning down the sarcasm seemed prudent. "I'm not on their side," he said, letting his voice drift into his "I am being very scientific right now" Harrison Wells register. "I've used them in the past if they served a purpose but I have no loyalty to them."
"Yes, you're good at that," she said so bitterly that he winced, realizing he had said exactly the wrong thing. "Me, Cisco, Barry... We all served our purpose and then when you were done with us, you threw us away. You threw me away!"
"That's not what it was like between us, Caitlin, you know that," he said softly. "You and I have known each other a long time. Yes, I had an ulterior motive but that doesn't mean that everything was a lie. We work well together. There's no reason why we can't work together again."
"No reason other than the fact I can't trust you," she spat at him and the temperature plunged again. He began subtly vibrating to keep a sheen of ice from spreading across his yellow suit.
"You know me," he said, his tone lowering to a more intimate tone. "Our interests are aligned, so why don't we put aside any hurt we caused each other in the past and--?"
"I didn't come here for couples' therapy," she interrupted, irritably. "Either push the button or I'll take my chances and do it myself."
He exhaled in a steady, controlled breath. Bide your time, he thought. There's too much she's still not ready to hear just yet.
"All right, then," he said, walking towards the detonator. She quickly sidled away, either afraid that she would injure him with an unprotected touch or, perhaps more likely, she was simply avoiding him, period.
He mentally ran the calculations, saying, "Depending on the type of explosive you used--" he actually knew but thought it better to not mention that fact "--we're potentially inside the radius of the blast zone."
"What? Do you want to stand behind me or something?" she asked sarcastically. "Push the button already."
I wonder if she remembers that she's not invulnerable? he mused. I wonder if she cares?
His quick survey of the building before he had approached her had proved that it was empty. He wasn't sure if that was on purpose or if she honestly didn't care if she killed anyone in order to achieve her objective. One of the reasons this whole situation had piqued his interest was simple curiosity: how much of Caitlin Snow was left beneath the frost?
He picked up the detonator and pressed the button. Even as the first spark of the explosion came to life, he used his super-speed to grab her around the waist and haul her backwards far enough to avoid the shrapnel that rained down in sharp, flaming bits a few moments later. Even with the minimal time of contact and the protection of his suit, his left arm went numb from the extreme cold radiating from her. He increased the vibration a little more to restore blood flow, careful to keep it contained so that it didn't change his voice, and his accelerated healing ability took care of the rest.
He fully expected her to complain about being manhandled but she was staring into the flames of the explosion as if they held the answer to every question she'd ever had. She walked towards it in a daze, drawn to the blaze, and now that there was no danger of debris, he stayed out of her way.
She lifted the palms of her hands and drank in the fire. He backed away a little more, feeling the voracious hunger inside her try to wrap its tendrils around the heat his vibration was generating.
He'd only had the chance to view her metamorphosis once before and not at such a close range. Fascinated, he watched the ice thaw from her skin, color blooming through the paleness, touching her hair and blushing across her skin. When she turned his way again, her eyes were brown and, on the surface, she seemed very much like the Caitlin Snow he had hired so very long ago. Though that Caitlin had never had such a haunted look in her eyes, hadn't known the grief, the depth of pain, or the soul-deep touch of ice that this Caitlin did. When she was inviolate in her icy skin, he didn't think she regretted the things she'd done. Without the insulation of the Killer Frost, he saw a hint of the old Caitlin in her human skin, screaming against the horror of what she'd become.
She was going to bolt, he could read it in the minute shifts of her body language. And notwithstanding the fact that she couldn't outrun him, he preferred their encounter end on an entirely differently note.
"Need a lift somewhere?" he asked casually. "I'm parked just down the street."
That surprised her enough that she relaxed from her tense stance. "Parked, like... a car? You have a car?"
"Of course," he said. "Just because I can run anywhere I want, doesn't mean that I have to. Come on, I'll show you."
Without waiting for her answer, he started walking. He didn't glance back but he heard the soft click of her boot heels on the pavement and knew she was following.
"See?" he said when they'd traversed the block and a half and reached the little, dark blue sedan. "It's even incognito. I wanted something that wouldn't scream, 'Reverse Flash on board.'"
One eyebrow raised. "No, it screams 'Soccer Mom,'" she said archly. "You seriously drive around in a Mom car?"
He pretended to be offended. Well, he was vain enough to actually be offended but not to the degree he played up. "What? Should I paint it in red and yellow racing stripes and get a personalized license plate?"
"Maybe something like '2Speedy4U?'" she suggested then laughed.
He straightened as if mortally wounded by the mockery but thought, It's good to hear her laugh again.
"So, are you too good to ride in my Mom car or what?" he finally asked, giving the hood a pat.
The mirth faded. "And go where?"
He rolled one shoulder carelessly, then unlocked the car and opened the driver's side door. "Anywhere. You have some time before the heat you absorbed is metabolized out again. Is there somewhere you'd like to go that you haven't been able to?"
Her expression became so lost that his fingers momentarily curled around the door frame hard enough to hurt. "I don't know."
"You could come back with me, to my lab," he offered and she looked at him in sharp suspicion. "There haven't been too many things we couldn't solve once we put our heads together. Why don't we find a way to slow down your heat consumption, give you more control over your powers?"
"Why would you help me like that?"
"Maybe I miss working with you. Maybe I just like the challenge." He knew which one was more important to him but doubted that she did.
She was quiet for a long while, staring out into the darkness. "H.I.V.E. didn't kill Ronnie," she said in barely more than a whisper.
I know, he thought, but that wasn't what she needed to hear, so all he said was, "Well, that hardly means we still can't blow up more of their buildings. They're a bunch of pretentious idiots. I say we should be a serious thorn in their sides for a while, just for fun. What do you say?"
The look she gave him was fraught with a desperate need to have hope again, interspersed with the fear that there was no such thing left in the world for the likes of her.
Then resolve strengthened her features and she opened the passenger side door and got in. He did the same, looking at her steadily, waiting for her answer.
"Drive the car, Eobard," she finally said, "and switch on the heat."
He didn't even try to conceal the broadness of his grin.
"Yes, ma'am," he drawled and turned the key.