Killer Frost continued to keep having immaculate timing showing up in their lives.
First it was trying to save Tracy, then at Jitters, now in the cortex. When they took away Barry's memories, they also took away Savitar's. It was the plan, just a little more extreme than any of them wanted it to be. She showed up to help them figure out how to get the memories back.
Since Savitar lost all his memories, the cause and effect of it had taken away Wally's speed as well. They had a tough choice to make. Give Barry his memories and Savitar's along with get Alex killed, or keep them away and Wally loses his speed forever. The choice to Alex was obvious.
They needed Caitlin's help to get their memories back. Wally wanted his speed for so long and so desperately, she wasn't going to be the source that took them away from him. While Cisco and Julian worked alongside Killer Frost - Barry, Alex, Iris and Joe headed down to the speed lab.
If Barry wanted to be a speedster, then that was the best place for him to practice. He seemed to get the hang of running pretty quickly, it was the stopping part that he couldn't grasp. He ran laps and laps around the track, amazed by these powers and what he could do.
"I don't think I've ever seen Barry this happy before," Alex watched him. The perks about her being a speedster, was that the blur that the West's saw, she could see the grin that was stuck on his face as he ran. "I mean it's the first time in his life that he hasn't been dragged down by his parent's deaths."
"You don't want his memories restored, do you?" Joe raised an eyebrow at her. She had thought about it quite a bit during that day. When Barry created flashpoint, it was to relieve his pain, now, he had that again. She wanted what was best for him, and maybe this was just it.
"I think Alex is right, dad," Iris joined her side. "I mean I can't say that seeing him this happy and light isn't something that I have wished for him, because, yeah, it is."
"I wish that for him too," Joe told the girls. "But Alex, you didn't fall in love with the Flash, you fell in love with Barry Allen. Until yesterday, Barry had twenty-eight years of experience to define him, and some of those memories were bad, but some of them are good too. Without those memories, the Barry Allen you know and love is gone."
Barry had raced down the ramp once again, this time landing a bit of a better stop. He gained his balance again right in front of Alex who helped stabilized him again. "Do you wanna run with me? Please?" Barry had a glimmer of happiness in his eyes. Alex looked over to the father-daughter duo, who nodded their heads.
"Of course, my love," Alex nodded. Iris watched them with admiration as they ran around the track. Several times she had heard the couple call each other that and each time her heart melted a little bit. Iris thought that it was the cutest thing that they called each other that pet name.
No matter what her father thought about what they should do with his memories, Iris wanted him to stay that way. She wanted what was best for her friend and she knew that this could be it. Iris truly believed that this was a blessing in disguise for him. No matter what he remembered, his love for Alex was going to still be in his heart.
Barry seemed to enjoy running alongside Alex. It was just as every other time was for her, but for him, it was everything. Racing her felt familiar to him, even though he couldn't point out the exact reason behind it. Alex laughed as she kicked her speed up a gear and surpassed him by a lot.
He tried his best to catch up to her but couldn't seem to do the trick. As soon as she was out of sight from him, she stopped and turned invisible. It took him several more laps to notice that she had disappeared again. He stopped and yelled out her name to see where she was.
"Boo!" Alex sneaked up behind him. She made herself visible again and admired his look of awe. Barry asked if she could do it again, to which she complied. Once he was satisfied with her little trick, she grabbed his hand and tugged him out of the track. "Come on, I want to show you something."
They joined with Iris and Joe again, who looked like they were still chatting about their previous conversation about whether or not it was a good idea to bring his memories back. The four of them went up to the cortex, this time taking the elevator instead of running there.
Alex brought Barry over to where his suit was on the mannequin. "Is this mine?" He questioned. The three of them nodded. "You really weren't kidding when you said that we were heroes. What was it again? The Flash? Are you sure that The Streak isn't a better name, maybe?"
The three of them looked at Barry and then at each other before erupting in laughter. The irony of it all. Just then, Wally and the others stormed into the cortex demanding to turn on the TV. On the news, there was a building that was completely erupted in flames. According to the news host, it was, Heat Monger that set it on fire.
"That's the guy that went free because of me," Barry gained a sad look on his face. Alex didn't hesitate to switch into her suit. Just because Wally and Barry couldn't do anything didn't mean that she couldn't. "Whoa, where are you going? You can't stop that by yourself you could get hurt."
"I have to try. This is what I signed up for," Alex assured him. She left the lab and headed towards the building. The fire was a lot greater than she had originally thought and to be honest she wasn't sure if she could put it out on her own. Alex ran up the side of the building and began to at least try to stop the flames.
There were way too many people to try and just get everyone out, she was going to need to stop it from the source. Alex ran into the flaming building and began to move her arms at such a high speed to suck all the oxygen out of the room. It had partially worked but not nearly enough for the fire to stop.
She tried another tactic of running around the entire building in hopes that the large surface area she was covering would extinguish the fire. Just as all of her other attempts, it was failing. It seemed as if the fire was getting greater rather than diminishing. It didn't seem like she was going to be able to do this on her own.
"Cisco!" Alex yelled through her ear piece. Cops and the fire department were finally showing up but there were still too many people in that building to save. "I could really use some help right now!"
Alex ran up alongside the building once more, this time focusing all of her energy on trying to be fast enough to put out this fire. Cisco mumbled something about working on trying to get her help but he wasn't working fast enough. Alex was getting worn out trying to fix this building before anyone got hurt.
Slowly, with the help of the fire department, she was managing to put this fire out. Just as she thought that she was going to lose feeling in her legs from pushing them so hard, the beautiful familiarity of Barry's scarlet streak joined her up alongside the building. Not a moment later, Wally was there as well.
Together, the three of them raced around the building. Their combined speed easily put out the remaining part of the fire that she was unable to accomplish. As soon as the last of the flame was out and darkness once more filled the night, they ran into the building, capturing Heat Monger and making sure that this time he would end up in iron heights.
They left him to the cops and made their way back to STAR Labs. They stood out in the hall as everyone inside waited on their return. Barry was quick to pull her into his arms and give her a long, much needed kiss.
"I'm back, baby," Barry grinned at her. She didn't have her comms on as she was running around the building. Iris had been the one to coax him to get his memory back after the jolt that he was given. It was their friendship that saved him, Alex prayed that when she was gone that she was able to do it again.
"I think I like Bart better than you though," Alex jokingly tapped her finger on her chin. "Maybe I'll just start calling you Bart from now on, does it still sound more natural?"
"Having you here in my arms is what feels natural," Barry rolled his eyes at her teasing. "I love you, Alex."
"I love you, Bart."
"Never mind, I take that back."
><
With less than a week left until May twenty-third, Dylan decided that he needed to come back to Central City. He had taken the time off of work, knowing that spending the last few days with his sister was more important than anything else that could be going on in his life.
The moment that he showed up at his sister's doorstep, tears brimmed his eyes and he couldn't do anything besides collapse into her arms. He didn't want her to die, she was all that he had left. Alex ushered him inside and they sat on the couch in silence, thinking about the days to come.
Dylan hadn't announced that he was coming but she wasn't surprised to see him show up either. In fact, Alex was thankfully that he was there. She needed his support in these next few days to keep strong for everyone else. Even if she accepted what was going to happen to her, she wasn't happy about it.
As much as Barry wanted to spend every single moment he had with her, he knew that she needed time with her brother as well. He was the last of her family and Dylan needed to know that he was going to be okay without Alex in his life, she needed him to know that. She tried to encourage him to be strong if things went wrong.
Alex told the truth about their mother. If there really was only less than a week left for her, then he deserved to know the truth from her. She told him about her trip to Gotham and what she had found there. Their mother had moved on from her old life the moment that she left Central City.
It was a hard truth for him to hear. Dylan tried to deny that their mother wasn't like that. She wouldn't just forget about them, not after everything that they had been through. However, it was true, she had left them, and there was nothing that they could do to change it. Alex offered to show him where she was, if he really wanted to amend that bond when she was gone, then he could.
Dylan denied. If this was all true - and he fully believed that she wouldn't lie to him about this - then he didn't want to mend that relationship. He didn't want to know the temptation of visiting his mother, not when she didn't want them in her life. He didn't know what he would do if he were to see her.
So, Alex crumpled up the paper with the address on it and with the use of her powers, burned it right in the palm of her hand. The Holt siblings didn't need their mother, not after everything that they had been through on their own. Now that they had each other again, that was good enough.
Alex decided to bring Dylan back to STAR Labs. Tracy had completed the Speed Force Bazooka, but there was one problem. The thing needed a power device that had more energy than the sun. They had no idea where they were going to find something with such power, but they were running out of time to do it.
When Dylan and Alex walked in, everyone was already hard at work, including Barry. They ran into him and Cisco first and checked in to see how they were doing. Still no luck with finding anything. Barry kissed the top of her head and reminded her that he loved her when they left to go see the West's.
Wally was down in the speed lab, once again working on his speed. Iris and Joe were monitoring him. Kid Flash joined them all, happy to see Dylan again. The two got along quite well, which Alex was happy about. They had no luck with either finding Caitlin or the power source. Alex sighed at the news, but she should have expected the news.
"Alex."
She didn't realize that she had zoned out. The four of them had been staring at her, wondering what was going on inside her head. These past few days she had been like that a lot. They didn't know if it was her trying to think of another way to fix all of this, or realizing that she only had a few days left on this Earth.
"Huh?" Alex looked towards them, wondering what they were talking about. They pointed towards her phone in her pocket, which had been ringing. She realized and pulled it out to answer. It was Dick, hopefully with some good news. Alex left the room, "Tell me you got some good news."
"Nothing in Gotham or Bludhaven that has the specs that you're looking for," he told her sadly. She called him asking if they had anything that would power the Bazooka a couple days ago. "I'm sorry, Alex, I really am. Is there anything else that I can do to help?"
"No," Alex shook her head. She didn't want him worrying about her, not when he had other things on the go. "Actually. There's something personal that maybe you could do for me."
"Anything."
"My brother is in town. I told him the truth about our mother and he didn't want to see her either. If all this doesn't work out and I don't make it, do you think that you can tell her the truth about me? Dylan is going to have enough on his plate, I don't want to throw this in with him as well but she deserves to know."
"Of course, but it's not going to come to that. You guys still have a few days to figure it out. I mean you have all of my knowledge and like what? Five other geniuses? Use that brain of yours, Alex. Sometimes it solves problems easier than muscle does," Dick suggested. He really wished that things were different for her.
"Thank you, Dick, for everything. You're been a good friend to me," Alex felt her heart tighten a little bit thinking that this could be the final time that the two of them would ever chat. She was glad that she got to see him in person once more, even if it wasn't under the best of circumstances.
"You too, Alex. I'm glad that we met," Dick smiled over the phone. They hung up after that. Alex knew that there were so many people that she needed to say good bye to and no time to do it. Oliver and his team, Kara, the Legends. She wanted to tell them how much they had all impacted her life but there was no time. Barry was going to have to do it for her once she was gone.
Barry found Alex standing in the middle of the hall with her phone pressed against her face. It was evident that she was no longer in conversation, but deep in thought once more. She looked to entranced, he didn't wish to bother her. She noticed him walking up to her in the corner of her eye.
"You know what I could really go for right now?" Alex looked over at him. He didn't bother guessing. "Pizza from Keystone. I was thinking about Francine the other day and how she used to buy it for me and Wally all the time. He always complained that I wanted to put onions on it and in the end I would let him win the argument."
"Wally is a smart man to know that onions aren't that great on pizza," Barry put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her into his side. Alex tickled his sides, knowing that he never once complained when she ordered their pizza with onions on it. "I'll run and get you some, how does that sound?"
"You don't have to," Alex fully faced him. "We've come a long way since we first met, huh?" From foes, to friends, to lovers, they had a classic love story that Alex had never known that she wanted until meeting him. It was cliche, all of it, but that was what she loved most about their story.
She tried to remember the exact turning point that they had decided that they wanted to be friends, not enemies. It was gradual, from the times that Barry saw the good in her to working had to earning their trust. But, Alex believed that the true turning point was during their training against the Reverse Flash.
They spent hours after hours working together to get stronger and faster. Every day, the would chow down on food, whether it was at her house, or being lazy and getting Big Belly Burger. In between breaks they would chat about their lives, their interests, and their lack of friendships. It was during that time that they realized how easy it was to interact.
Barry chuckled at her past thoughts. "It was Cisco's idea to get your help against Tony, you know? I loathed the idea of letting you out of that cell. You were too dangerous in my eyes, but he saw hope from you since the beginning. Then again, I think he also had a little bit of a crush on you back then."
"He did," Alex confirmed, laughing. "Couldn't imagine what life would be like now if you hadn't gotten my help. Crazy to think how much a life can change just by one choice, one decision. You were the best thing to happen to me in my life, no matter how short or long it is, it's always going to be you."
Barry fished into his back pocket to grab something. Between his two fingers, was the ring that he once proposed to her with. Alex grabbed it from his hand and examined it once more. After twisting it around in her hand for several moments, she placed it back in his palm and force it closed.
"May 24th. Only a couple more days," Alex promised him. She wasn't surprised that he carried it around with him. He kept it close just in case she changed her mind. Barry never had doubt about her wanting his marriage, he had no reason to doubt her.
"May 24th," He repeated, staring at his fist. Barry wished that she would accept the ring now, that she would be his fiancee no matter what happened. However, he understood why she still denied the diamond. "I'm gonna go get you that pizza."
"You've always known the way to my heart. And my pants, now get going."