Wrinkles

Barry runs to the Arrow cave to talk to Felicity about everything and she's sorta confused at what he's saying.

"Okay, why don't you just run me through...walk me through what happened. And we'll try to figure it out." Felicity offers.

-

12 hours earlier, Central City.

Barry knew that some things had changed but e had to deal with a man robing a jewelry store without Spider-Man.

While the cyclist was shooting at him, Barry was able to dismantle his motorcycle quickly.

"You're not gonna get too far on that thing anymore, are you?" Barry asks him and takes his bag.

"I will be taking these back to the jewelry store you stole them from. But you can keep these if you'd like." Barry says and hands him the bullets as the police come up to arrest him. "Gotta do everything myself today. Spidey seems to be taking the morning off." Barry comments before speeding off.

-

At Caitlin's apartment, she starts waking up when something was tickling the length of Caitlin's left leg. She tried to push it away without opening her eyes, but it always came back. For a moment, she thought that it was her cat.

Only one problem with that, she didn't have a cat.

She pushed it away again before the cloud around her brain began lifting itself. It was definitely not a cat. It was a leg.

That's when she felt an arm draped over her waste, pulling her tighter behind. She heard a soft hum of contentment and that's when the memories came flooding back to her, like a dam had broken down.

Caitlin remembered her and Peter making it to her apartment and them making out like teenagers and him pushing her against her kitchen counter, bringing her closer to him.

She remembered unbuttoning his shirt and throwing it on the floor. She could still feel him chuckling in her neck when he had tried to take her sweatshirt off but she hadn't wanted to take her lips away from his in order to do that.

And she could still see the laugh twinkling in his eyes when he had managed to take it off.

She could still hear the happy groans and muffled moans as their mouths fused back together and their hands travelled up and down each other's bodies.

She could see flashes of herself taking his hand and leading him to her bedroom where a night of passion had followed.

She remembered him humming "livin la vida loca'" on their way to her bedroom where she had playfully slapped his shoulder, as he had to get his Spider-Man suit off.

She could still see them stumble on her bed, laughing like little kids and turning serious again just seconds later.

That's when she felt his breath tickling the back of her neck, bringing her back to the present and that's all she needed to let warmth spread from head to toes.

Caitlin put her hand on Peter's that was currently lying on her stomach and he just spooned closer to her. She cracked an eye open and saw sun come through her curtains. She had absolutely no idea of what time it was, and she definitely didn't care.

She felt Peter stir behind her as he was waking up. He moved up to place a kiss delicately on the back of her neck where he had been peacefully breathing just moments ago. She then turns her head to meet his still sleepy eyes.

"Morning, Snowflake." Peter whispered, a smile illuminating his whole face. The sight was breathtaking.

She let a hand run through his small stubble, go up to his ear and then to the back of his head to bring his face closer to hers. He stopped just a breath apart from her, rubbed his nose on hers, and finally closed the distance between their lips. The kiss was sweet and short.

"Hmm...Morning to you, too." Caitlin whispered against his lips. She let her fingers play with his hands and turned completely on her back to look up towards him.

"How did you sleep?" Peter asked softly.

"Pretty good actually. I had my personal superhero-blanket protecting me through the night. It even woke me a little around 3 am." She said, eyebrows lifting seductively.

Peter starts blushing at the mention and buried his face in the crook of her neck.

Caitlin chuckled at his response and buried her hands in his hair, playing with it.

"You didn't seem to complain at the time." Peter mumbled, his voice vibrating against her skin.

"I wasn't and I'm not going to start now." Caitlin replied cheerfully while laughing.

She wished she could just freeze time, stay here like this forever, just the both of them, happier than they'd ever been. She felt her heart swell and herself turning into a puddle. Caitlin was on cloud nine, keeping the man she loved so close to her as he was pressing kisses along her neck after two years of sitting on their feelings.

"Hmm...I could get use to this." Caitlin whispered, closing her eyes, losing herself in the moment.

Peter immediately stopped, pulled back and looked at her, surprise written all over his face. She opened her eyes, flushed under his stare and tried to hide her face in her cushion. With one hand on her chin, he turned her face back to his.

"You really mean it?" Peter asks her.

She nodded softly and felt herself being pulled back towards him.

They met for a passionate kiss, tangling themselves deeper under the covers. When Peter broke the kiss, he whispered "Me too" against her lips. They both giggled and snuggled closer to each other.

She never thought that two people could be this perfect. When she was with Ronnie, she thought she was happy. But this was an even bigger feeling than what she felt with him, and she never wanted to stop feeling it.

"I can't believe it actually happened." Caitlin tells Peter while kissing him, since she never thought she would be this happy ever since Zoom kidnapped her.

They start kissing once more when Peter's phone goes off and he sees its work.

"Oh, great. I gotta go. A meeting about transferring everything from Mercury labs name over to me." Peter explains to her. "So I gotta get to my place and get something nice for the fancy people."

"Well, you better get going, I'm gonna go to Star labs since were late." Caitlin informs Peter and she got dressed and move on with their day.

Peter just put on his suit to get back to his place and leaps out her window.

-

Barry was speeding to Star labs after stopping the criminal. "What kind of idiot still thinks I can't outrun bullets?" Barry asks as he enters the cortex to see Cisco, Joe, Iris and Wally.

"That guy is the poster boy for what you shouldn't try to do when fighting against team Spider-Flash!" Cisco cheers while holding his coffee.

"So where's Peter, he not show up to help?" Wally asks.

"Apparently he has a meeting with the board about Mercury labs and Caitlin will be here soon." Cisco says.

"I should get back to the paper." Iris says while standing up.

"It's okay, I was just leaving." Joe tells her, knowing she doesn't want to see him.

"Hey, guys look. I'm sorry. I just know you guys aren't speaking to each other right now, but I was just thinking maybe we could talk about why for a minute." Barry offers and they get offended.

"Look, I'm sorry. I just thought it would be good for you guys hear it said out loud." Barry explains.

"This is because of what he did, Barry, not me." Iris states while pointing at Joe.

"Iris..." Joe tries apologizing but as always Iris interrupts him.

"What? What could you possibly have to say?" She asks and Joe takes Wally with him.

Barry also returned to work to meet his said to be CSI partner Julian Albert who is the metahuman expert of the CCPD while Barry is just the CSI.

-

"There's a whole new guy at work you didn't even know about?" Felicity asks him, breaking out of the flashback.

"Yeah. And he's worked there for over a year. And he doesn't like me very much apparently." Barry informs Felicity.

"Well, that's impossible. Everybody loves Barry Allen. You're like pudding. Everybody loves pudding." Felicity states to him.

"Not everyone." Barry says.

Felicity is just wrapping her head around everything to try and understand to help him.

"Okay, so altering the timeline caused Joe and Iris to not talk anymore, there's a new guy at your work who doesn't like you, you never kissed Iris, and in both timelines Peter and Caitlin finally get together." Felicity recaps to him. "Note to self; call and ask why I haven't been told he's in a relationship." She tells herself for later and Barry looks annoyed. "Back to your current situation, admittedly, that is an issue."

"And there could be more things. I haven't seen Peter's aunt. Maybe something happened to her." Barry says since he could've done to his Peter what he did to Punisher-Peter.

"Well, has anything here changed?" Felicity asks him and Barry looks around and grabs her computer to look.

He then finds that not much has changed in there lives and not much has changed in the way of Peter, Cisco, May or Caitlin's lives. Everything seems fine with their lives until he comes up on a photo with Diggle and a little boy.

"Whos that young boy with John?" Barry asks Felicity.

"He didn't have a kid before?" Felicity asks him.

"He has a kid, baby Sara." Barry tells her.

"Baby John." Felicity corrected him and Barry can't believe what he did.

"Okay, you know what. I don't want to know anymore." Barry states.

"I know this is a lot of pressure, but everything's gonna be fine." Felicity assures him.

"I screwed up their lives." Barry reminds her.

"Maybe you should tell them." Felicity says.

"I'm not gonna tell them. That's gonna make everything worse and Peter might punch me like he did in the other timeline." Barry replies.

"Peter punched you?" Felicity asks.

"Yeah, in that reality he was a vigilante known as Punisher. That timeline killed his aunt and uncle." Barry explains to her.

"Okay, if there's one thing I've learned from you, is that with you, anything is possible. Because you're Barry Allen. And sweet, loving, kind Barry Allen. The Barry Allen who's just like pudding, can fix this. So go fix this." She tells him.

Barry then runs off to Central City to do as she says, not knowing that the man who is the Rival in Flashpoint is about to gain his abilities with the help of a man known as Alchemy and his philosopher stone.

-

Before he could fix anything there was a crime about a jellyfish like substance body skin on shore. Barry took a sample after sneaking it while Julian wasn't looking and took it to star labs.

"You know, there's really not that much here." Caitlin says.

"Yeah, no, I know. It's basically touch DNA. I had to steal the sample because our metahuman expert wouldn't let me take one." Barry tells them.

"You mean Julian Albert?" Cisco asks.

"You know him?" Barry asks.

That question gets some weird looks from the other two since he never stops complaining about him.

"Yeah, we've known him for a while." Cisco says before leaving to work on something.

"So, I was told you and Peter..." Barry starts while smiling at Caitlin.

Caitlin starts blushing and looks away from the speedster thinking of her new relationship with Peter.

"Hey, I'm happy for the two of you. I've known Peter had feelings for you for some time." Barry tells her. "Also, where is he?"

"Oh, after the meeting he had, he now has full control over all of Mercury labs properties so he's going to be making some changes. Staring with the name, and then he's meeting up with Lucius Fox to take a close look at some of his gadgets dr. McGee had him working on." Caitlin says and Barry wonders if this is because of Flashpoint or it was gonna happen no matter what.

"Do you think you guys and Cisco could come to my house for dinner tonight?" Barry asks.

"Maybe. But why?" Caitlin wonders.

"Maybe with you guys I could fix things between Joe and Iris. Besides, I kinda wanna know what happened while I was gone for you two to get together and sneak off." Barry explains to her.

Caitlin smiles and decides to do it. "But you do know you have to talk Joe and Iris into it." Caitlin reminds him.

"I'm on it. Quick question, isn't that Peter's shirt?" Barry asks while leaving and Caitlin looks to see she's in fact wearing Peter's shirt and she hadn't even realized it.

-

At the Spider-cave, Lucius is showing Peter all of the gadgets and suits he created for him.

"This suit I got the idea for when you were fighting Electro. It's a suit that actually absorbs the electricity that you get hit with and is able to store it into the gloves offering you to use electric punches." Fox tells him.

"Okay, I feel like McGee is spoiling me with you." Peter admits while feeling like a kid on Christmas.

Fox then shows him all of the gadgets he has lauded out on the table.

"This is a reconnaissance drone designed to scan structures, a mini microphone to hear through walls. And it even holds taser weapons inside I like to call Whistling Birds, they search for any heat signatures from either human or even main systems of anything from computers to cell phones. Best part is he can fit and disguise as the symbol on your suits chest. I just haven't worked out all the bugs yet, ironically." Fox explains to Peter as the drone that's shaped like a spider starts flying in front of Peter.

Peter puts his finger in front of the drone as he looks close at its spider-like face.

"Okay, I'm gonna call him Drone-y. Because I'm not gonna remember any of that." Peter says and notices a motorcycle. "Hey, what's that?"

"Oh, the speed-cycle? You wouldn't be interested in that." Fox says to Peter who just smiles.

They take the cycle to a large opening in the room and Peter starts speeding around the room with it.

"On the handles in front of you, you have cable web shooters for when you need to get down from high places. I got the idea for it from watching you swing around the city. I calculated you could make it from 80th street in 3.7 minuets, while using up fairly expensive webbing at maximum muscle stress. And then by the time you get to your mission, you have half of the webbing you could use to stop the crime. The cycle gets you there in a minute and a half. It's also got a boost for when you need to get there faster." Fox explains its functions to Peter from the systems to the cycle's speaker.

Peter spins and brings the cycle to a stop and Fox laughs at his smile.

"So what do you think?" Fox asks him.

Peter thinks for a minute when a idea enters his mind. "Does it come in black and red?" He asks Fox.

-

That night, Barry told them what time dinner was happening and no one has felt more uncomfortable being in the room.

Iris' looks could kill someone while Joe was focusing on his dinner and the rest of the team were just trying to find somewhere to look without feeling awkward.

May couldn't make it tonight since she had the night shift at the hospital, but promises to see if she can make it.

"This is nice." Barry says out of the blue.

"You can thank grandma Estar." Joe says to Barry.

"No, I mean, it's good. I just meant all of us here together." Barry says and gets nothing back as everyone just stays quiet.

"I've been in uncomfortable positions, but this one is the most uncomfortable." Peter whispers to Cisco.

"Epic fail, party of six." Cisco agree with him.

They all go back to an uncomfortable silence when their phones start going off.

"Oh, thank god." Cisco says a little too loud and looks at the phone. "Metahuman app. We gotta go." He calls and everyone is rushing to get out.

-

Barry speeds off with Spider-Man close behind him to meet the metahuman and sees someone he thought he would never see again. Rival.

"Remember me, Flash?" Rival asks as Peter shows up.

"Clariss?" Barry asks as he removes the mask.

"Oh, you do remember, Flash? Good, yeah. Because I remember everything, too." Clariss tells Barry and Peter.

"Did I miss the part where you explain who you are, or did I show up too early?" Peter asks them.

"Spider-Man. Or should I say Punisher?" Clariss asks Peter.

"Who the heck's Punisher?" Peter asks, completely confused.

"That doesn't matter right now. You see, what does matter is that I know your little secret. You changed the timeline." Clariss says and Peter looks surprised.

"What's he talking about?" Peter asks Barry who looks scared.

"Because if I recall correctly, the only speedsters in my other life were me and that smartass Kid Flash, and the only other pain being Punisher. That is until you showed up and stole everything from me!" Clariss reminds him.

"I didn't steal anything from you. I was just trying to put things back to the way they're supposed to be." Barry says.

"This is how my life was supposed to be! For years, I felt something was missing. And now I know why." Clariss states to Barry.

"Can you two even hear me?" Peter wonders.

"Your Rival, back again." Clariss says and Peter is seriously confused, but likes the name. "Believe me, Flash, this time, you're not gonna steal my life with a bullet from our friend, Punisher." He says and Barry races after him, leaving Peter behind.

"I'm seriously getting tired of speedsters." Peter says since he has no way of keeping up with them.

-

Peter returns to Star labs and tells them what he saw and what powers this guy has.

"We finally get rid of Zoom, and there's another evil speedster?" Joe asks Peter.

"Who is this guy?" Wally wonders.

"Barry said his name was Clariss." Peter says as Caitlin comes in.

"Hey, I got the test results back from that husk Barry gave me this morning. Is weird because there's no traces of dark matter, but there are traces of the Speedforce." Caitlin tells them.

"So this husk belongs to the speedster?" Joe asks.

"It appears so. His name like Peter said seems to be Edward Clariss. Strange how Barry already knew him. How'd you know him?" Caitlin asks and looks to the speedster.

"Can we talk for a second?" Iris interrupts and drags Barry out of the room to talk in private.

Later, Peter and Caitlin were talking about what Fox was showing him, when he gets a text from Felicity.

"Hey, did you tell Felicity we're dating?" Peter asks her.

"No, why?" Caitlin answers and wonders.

"Because she's just asked me why I haven't told her we're going out." Peter says.

As they're talking, Joe comes in wondering where Barry is when he suddenly appears.

"Speak of the speedster, and he shall appear." Peter states.

"I need to tell you all something." Barry tells them. "After Zoom killed my dad, after we defeated him...I wasn't in a good place and I felt like the only way I could fix that was to run back in time and save my mom."

"You stoped Thawne from killing your mom?" Caitlin asks.

"So is she alive?" Wally asks as well.

"She was. For a few months. I lived with her and my dad. I had a completely different life. I wasn't even the Flash for most of it." Barry explains to them.

"You created a whole other existence?" Peter asks. "Like Back to the Future 2?" He asks.

"And why would you leave?" Cisco wonders since he had the life he always wanted.

"That life started to spin out of control." Barry explains to them. "This guy, Clariss, he was a speedster there. He was known as the Rival. He caused a lot of problems. I even met Peter's doppelgänger, who was less than happy when he learned what I did and gave me a punch across the jaw." He says and rubs the place where Punisher punched him.

"In that timeline, your parents, aunt, and uncle were all killed and you turned all that rage into hatred and became a vigilante known as Punisher." Barry says and that causes Peter to look shocked.

"That's why he called me Punisher at the fight?" Peter asks.

"Yes. Either way, I decided to run back in time again and let things happen as they were supposed to, in hopes of resetting the timeline." Barry explains to them. "But when I came back, things weren't the same."

"You mean people. Like us." Caitlin says.

"Yeah, I created another timeline. It's the one we're in now. Not as different as the last one. Not in large ways, but in some ways, smaller ways, anybody that was close to me and I can't fix it perfectly again," Barry finishes.

"That's a lot to take in, Barry." Joe states.

"We got along in that other life, my dad and I, didn't we?" Iris asks him. "That's why you've been trying to get us to talk again."

"I can tell you what's different, all of you, if you want to know." Barry offers to them but he explains how he can't change any of the changes.

"So you decided it's okay to change things when someone in your family dies?" Peter asks, a little disappointed in his friend who he thought got over the time travel thing last year. He then leaves the team to get some air.

-

Peter decided to start walking around the city to keep clearing his head after the news. The thoughts of him being a murderous vigilante in a timeline he looses his family not leaving his mind. If it weren't for his aunt, everything would've changed just as he warned Barry last year.

As he's walking, he hears Caitlin chasing after him a while after he left. "Hey, where you going?" Caitlin asks him.

"Fox texted me saying he wanted to show me something about the updates I asked him to give some of the gadgets. Also needed to clear my head." Peter says.

"Yeah, it's a lot to take in I suppose. But you know he was emotionally compromised since he just got his father back and he was killed a day later." Caitlin reminds him.

Peter of course understands why, but it doesn't take away the thought of him being a Punisher in a different life.

As they're working, they get an alert about Barry and Rival.

"We gotta go." Peter says and grabs Caitlin and starts swinging to the warehouse.

-

Barry got some information about the Rival being at the waterfront and gets hit by a blast of energy from someone new.

"Oh, Flash, a little quaking in your boots wouldn't be inappropriate." Clariss quips what Barry said in Flashpoint.

Barry looks up and sees someone wearing a dark hood and outfit while covering his face with a strange mask while he's holding a glowing stone stone. He shoots Barry once again with the stone and he goes flying.

"And who are you?" Barry asks him.

"I am...Alchemy." He tells Barry who's seriously confused now.

"Okay, and what do you want?" Barry asks while getting up.

"To help people achieve their true potential..such as he has." Alchemy says pointing to Rival as he hears a motorcycle from somewhere.

"And why are you doing this?" Barry asks him.

"Because I'm preparing this world." Alchemy says when Rival speeds and slams Barry into the wall.

"Remember what happened here last time, Flash?" Rival wonders. "It's where I died. And I'm not gonna waste this second chance I've been given." Rival promises and keeps going on when a motorcycle comes crashing in and hits Alchemy while it also hits Rival.

Barry is confused when he looks to see Spider-Man on a strange sort of speederbike. It looks big enough to lay down on since that's almost how Peter's sitting on it. It has two huge wheels, several buttons and dials near the helm and looks customary designed with red and black design and a few spider symbols around it.

"I was supposed to do that, right?" Peter asks while his voice is shaking at the speed he was going.

"More or less." Barry admits.

"New bike, getting used to the speed. Oh, that's why you're always running like that." Peter realizes.

Barry laughs at his friend when Rival gets back up. "Oh just like last time, huh? Except your little speedster sidekick isn't here this time." Rival says and speeds at the two of them. Peter uses his senses to predict his attacks while Barry uses his speed to fight back.

But Rival seems to be just as fast as Barry, maybe even a little faster. Rival speeds Barry into the warehouse where he hits his head against some piping and more piles on top of him.

Barry speeds in to help his friend and starts fighting Rival off who isn't letting down his guard quite yet. Rival takes Barry and slams him into some boxes and grabs a pipe while he's at it. "Time to look for a new rival." Clariss says but before he could use the pipe on Barry, a blast of energy comes in and Barry sees Cisco.

"Stay away from my friends." Cisco says with his hand reaching out after sending the blast.

Barry gets back up and states fighting off Rival once more and punches him towards Cisco.

Cisco uses his powers and blasts him back when Peter gets back up and latches onto the ceiling and punches Rival in the face knocking him out and dropping his body to the floor.

"Sorry it took so long." Cisco apologizes to his friends.

"You were just in time." Barry assures his friend.

"A few minutes ago could've been better though." Peter replies.

"What are you gonna do?" Cisco asks and they all laugh almost forgetting about Clariss.

-

The three return to Star labs and Cisco even breached the Spider-Bike so it would be at Star labs when needed and start looking for what they can about this new Alchemy guy who Peter didn't realize he crashed into.

And all of their searches come up with nothing, and Clariss isn't talking either.

"Okay, Alchemy is the one who gave Clariss his speed back. He could possibly do it again." Barry tells them.

"He's kinda like a Doctor, that way, don't you think." Cisco says when an idea pops in his head. "Dr. Alchemy!"

"Okay, well, that explains why he didn't have any traces of dark matter in his cells." Caitlin says to them. "He didn't get his powers from the particular accelerator, he got them from Alchemy."

"What was that?" Cisco asks her.

"Dr. Alchemy." Caitlin corrects herself and he smiles at her.

"Didn't Alchemy...dr. Alchemy have something glowing when I hit him?" Peter asks Barry.

"Yeah, it looked like a stone or something. He also said that he was preparing this world." Barry says.

"For what, like the second coming or something?" Wally asks them.

"I think everyone who had powers in Flashpoint is going to get them back." Barry says and gets a little worried for what it could do if it happen to his family. Could he be turned back into the Punisher? Could Wally become Kid Flash again?

"Well, we already found four other husks, which means there's at least that many running around Central City as of now." Joe adds on. "I got to get to the prescient." He adds before leaving.

"Stop by Jitters oh the way?" Iris asks and Wally joins them and leaves.

When Barry and Peter left, Joe and Iris realized that everyone makes mistakes in a single moment and they have to live with the consequences and then they started talking again.

"You know, I've just been thinking it was pretty cool having you out with us, Cisco." Peter says to his friend.

"Hey, I'll always be there for my friends." Cisco says before he starts leaving and looks back at them. "Maybe one day all three of us could fight bad guys together. It'd be pretty bitchin'." He then takes his leave.

"Well, I gotta go take the Spider-Bike back to Fox for a few improvements, and possibly talk about tuning down the boost. That's too much for me, I don't know how you handle it all the time." Peter says but before leaving, he kisses Caitlin and she quickly kisses him back before he separates. "See you tonight." He reminds Caitlin about their date he managed to plan put for them.

"I'm happy for you two." Barry tells Caitlin. "I always knew that Peter held his feelings for you. Actually, out of everyone it seems you two were the least affected when I messed up the timeline. I mean, unless you're secretly moonlighting as an ophthalmologist."

"A what?" Caitlin asks, not understanding him.

"Kidding, its nothing. Flashpoint joke." Barry explains to her. "Have fun on your date. I'll see you later." He says as he takes his leave.

Caitlin looks at her hand as a mist of ice forms around it.

She's becoming Killer Frost.

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