What Brings Us Together (A Ralph Dibny/ The Flash Fan-Fiction)

Chapter Sixty-Five: I Lose You Either Way

"Motion detectors just when off in the pipeline intake." Iris warned. I quickly changed into my suit, and Barry did the same, and we headed out of the Cortex to check out the pipeline. We came around the hallway to see Ralph in his suit, the scepter in his hand, with Edwin.

"You're gonna open up a pocket dimension into DeVoe's lair, and I'm gonna stop him for good."

"No you're not." Ralph turned around, looking at us. "Cisco installed motion detectors in the pipeline intake. We thought it was DeVoe coming for Edwin. Now I kind of wish it was."

"Edwin can get me into DeVoe's lair. I can end this. All you have to do is let me go."

"Ralph..." I trailed off. "If you do this...letting you go is exactly what we'll be doing. We will have to let go of all the progress you've made, the person you've become. We can't let you do this."

"Um, listen, I don't really do confrontations, so uh, can I just go back to my glass cage?"

"We're both leaving in a second."

"Just give me the scepter," Barry said, "You know I can take it away from you if I have to."

"Yeah?" He unzipped his suit and I furrowed my eyebrows.

"Well you're gonna have to take it out of me." He then proceeded to literally put the scepter inside of his chest.

"Woah bro, ok, I'm actually glad I stayed for that, that was trippy."

"Ralph..." My voice was breaking. "Ralph, we're going to have no choice but to stop you. Please don't make me do this."

"Don't do this." Barry added.

"Do what? This?" Suddenly his hand turned into a hammer and his arm stretched towards Barry, but before it could hit him, or before Barry could do anything, a force field knocked Ralph against the wall, rendering him unconscious. Barry looked at me and I wiped a few tears from my eyes, closing my hand.

"I was protecting him." I justified out loud. "That's gonna hurt a heck of a lot less than what I know you were planning to do to him."

~~~Ralph~~~

When I woke up in the med-bay, my head was pounding. 

Laura had attacked me...why did she attack me?

I groaned, sitting up and looking at Barry, who sat on a stool with my favorite alcohol in his hand.

"Laura went to go get you an ice pack," He told me. He held up the bottle,"Olive branch? You don't wanna have a drink with your buddy?"

"Is that what you call someone who just teamed up with your girlfriend and went all 'Thor son of Odin' on you?" I asked.

"You can take it." He put the bottle down. "Plus...she was protecting you. Other wise I would have Flash-punched you and she knew that would hurt a lot more."

"Yeah," I swung my legs over the bed.

"Look...I know you're worried about DeVoe, about what he might do to you, but there are some lines we can't cross." I scoffed.

"Wow...you really don't know as much as you think you do, rookie."

"I know what killing DeVoe would do to you, and Laura does too. She was right, you would be throwing away everything you've done to become a better man, to become a hero. You gotta realize that."

"You...are a moron." I told him.

"Ralph-"

"I am not afraid of DeVoe and what he might do to me. I am afraid of what he might do to you and Iris and Caitlin and Cisco, Joe, Harry, Cecile...Laura most of all." Tears welled up in my eyes. "Devoe has taken out everyone that's gotten in his way, and Team Flash...they will always be in his way."

"This was never about protecting yourself." Barry realized.

"I know that killing DeVoe would mean throwing away everything I've done to become a hero...but aside from my mom, this team is the only family that I have ever had, and I would throw myself into a furnace to keep them safe. DeVoe cannot have them. They are mine." I shook my head, reaching into the pocket of my suit and pulling out the little velvet box I'd been carrying around since the day I first impersonated DeVoe in court.

"What is that?" Barry asked. 

"I've been carrying this around with me for months," I told him. "I was waiting for the right time to ask Laura to marry me, and if she dies before I get the chance...and protecting me no less, I...I wouldn't be able to live with myself."

"What about what we want?" I looked from the box up at him. "You may not care about losing what you've become but we do. We like hero Ralph...please don't take him away from us." He stood up, leaving the room, and Laura came in. I quickly put the box back in my pocket.

~~~Laura~~~

I came in after left with the ice pack. I felt immensely guilty for hurting Ralph, but...I couldn't let him do it. I couldn't. I leaned against the door until it closed, standing in front of Ralph and pressing the ice pack to the back of his head, where it collided with the wall.

"You have to see how you killing DeVoe was a lose-lose for me." I whispered. "I lose you either way, Ralph."

"But Laura, if something happens to you-"

"If something happens to me, the final part of my life has been the absolute best." I cut him off, putting the ice pack down and looking into his eyes. "And I am the happiest I've ever been, and you know I'm going to fight anyone who tries to take that away from me...yourself included." He shook his head, tears rolling down his face. I wiped them away and he wrapped his arms around my waist, his face pressed against my shoulder. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders, crying into his hair. "I love you, so much. I love the person you are now and I don't want that man to change." He pulled away, pulling me so that I was sitting sideways in his lap. He wrapped his arms around me and I laid my head on his shoulder, my forehead pressed to the side of his neck.

"I love you too." He said quietly, pressing his mouth to the top of my head. I sat up, putting a hand on his face and pressing my mouth softly against his.

"And I'm sorry I knocked you out." He shook his head, laughing. All of a sudden, the alarm went off. I jumped off of him.

"Something's happening.  Edwin." He grabbed my hand, pulling me down the hall towards the pipeline.