{And in that moment, I swear we were infinite

[myheadisaprison]

For all your Soulmate AU desires!

Comments

for Leonard

[adultflash]

It's during the middle of a therapy session. One he was desperately seeking a way out of anyway, but the sensation hits him like a truck, and he legitimately feels dizzy.

"I...I'm sorry, I have to go. I don't feel well," he says, giving both Iris and the therapist an apologetic look. It's not the first time he's bailed, so they let him go. It's not a lie, either. He just doesn't know why he doesn't feel well.

He runs, and he doesn't even really know why he's running the direction he's running in, until his feet seem to stop on their own outside of Saints and Sinners.

FLIP A COIN, I GUESS?

[quinnbee]

Leeny knows it can't alway be like the movies where the first words you hear your soulmate say are romantic or poignant or touching or, or, or at least funny. Most soulmate tattoos are boring regular stuff, but at least individual enough to be useful.

She has a scribbled HA HA HA on her left wrist. How the hell is that going to help her? Is she fated to be with everyone in a sitcom studio audience? It's impossible. She'll never find out who is her match.

But when she hears it at Haly's circus, she knows this is right. She can feel something just click inside her and she follows the sound behind the tents, where the performer trailers sit.

"You gonna share the joke?"

[mypriority]

Leonard tried. He really did. He tried to stick it out with the team, to continue whatever purpose he seemed to have found in them somewhere along the way. But the truth of it all was... it was just too much for him to deal with. A Waverider without Mick just wasn't the same. So, he left and went home because it was the only place that made sense. The familiarity of the city is a bigger comfort than he expected it to be. Sure, there are plenty of gut-punches painted around the city blocks, but it's still better than being stuck on a timeship. Leonard finds himself at a bar that's more familiar than just about anything else in the whole city, nursing a beer in a booth in the back when something tugs and bursts a familiar warmth in his chest. He has no reason to think it's anything but the alcohol in his system and the memories long gone. He sips at his beer in silence, giving off enough of a 'leave me alone' vibe that most people are perfectly content to do just that.

Is this double dipping or triple dipping?

[itistolaugh]

The pain in her chest wakes Harley from a dead sleep. She doubles over to catch her breath and seriously thinks she might be dying before she realizes it feels like a pull. It's time, and it is total bullshit that she has to meet her soulmate at 4 friggin AM on a work day.

She slips on a beat up pair of sneakers and doesn't bother changing out of her pajamas, because if it really is her true soulmate then they just have to accept her pink flannels and all. But she does put on a bright red lipstick, because it isn't like she doesn't care.

Harley walks through the empty streets, letting the tug on her heart lead the way to a rundown park. When she sees him, she nearly turns on her heel and goes back home.

"You have got to be fucking kidding me."

[adultflash]

Fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately), Barry Allen is not most people. He just makes a beeline for him when he sees him, and it feels like he can't breathe for a moment. For some reason, a memory of that brief touch to his shoulder surfaces.

"Leonard?" he manages to ask quietly, sitting down next to him. "It's been awhile. Are you...are you back? Or just...here for a little bit?"

[mypriority]

A soft smirk slowly rolls across his lips as Barry sits down with him. "You would be the first one to find out I'm back," he drawls lightly, glancing up from his beer to look at the younger man. "You know, I haven't even told Lise yet. She might slap you for being first." There's a beat or two before he actually responds to the questions, but he does answer all the same. "It's...not temporary. I'm back." The words have a weight attached to them that he just can't shake.

[adultflash]

Barry laughs awkwardly. "I...I don't even know how I knew you were here. I just didn't feel well, and I started running, and then I was here."

He lets out a slow breath when Leonard says he's back. "Good. I'm glad. Things have been...well. You wouldn't have known, being out there in time and space, but I was trapped in the Speed Force for six months. Coming back has been...an adjustment."

[mypriority]

"Weird." but that's really all he thinks on it; Barry's comment just doesn't seem like a thing that should take his focus just then. "Trapped?" He frowns at that confession. "What Big Dumb Hero move were you pulling, Barry?" Because that's clearly what it was, no doubt about it. "It's hard...trying to remember what normal is after a life-altering event." His voice is quieter on that note, barely more than a whisper and the sort of thing he wouldn't normally admit. But Barry has always gotten peeks like that from him. It's like he can't stop himself from letting the mask slip, at least a little, whenever the speedster is around.

[adultflash]

Barry gives him a small smile. He's not wrong, on either point, and the way Leonard's quiet admission is delivered doesn't escape him.

"To sum it up, the Speed Force was in a state where it had to have a speedster in it to be stable. Savitar had been trapped there, and when we defeated him, it needed someone else. It needed me. Or the instability would have destroyed Central City."

He sighs a little, wishing he'd thought to bring some Speedster-strength booze. "I don't remember it. When Cisco got me out, I wasn't even myself...I was a mess, speaking in riddles and writing some language I don't know on the walls. Iris putting herself in danger snapped me out of it."

The only part of that that isn't true is not remembering it, but it's a well-rehearsed lie.

[mypriority]

"So, a typical day for you." He deadpans, staring over his beer at him before taking a drink.

He lowers the beer and levels Barry with a look full of doubt. "Not buying it." There is no way in hell he didn't remember something. Leonard just...feels it, down into his bones. It's a lie. Maybe one built to protect the people he cares about, but a lie just the same.

[adultflash]

Barry gives him a sheepish look. Then he shrinks a little under that look. "Not buying what?" he asks, carefully. There's a lot in that story someone might not buy. Of course, Leonard's seen a lot of crazy things.

[likeavirus]

She's greeted with identical faces twisting toward the sound of her voice in unison. Their reactions to her presence couldn't be more different, though.

"Uh- you know, you're really not supposed to be back here." This one was...well, geekier looking by all accounts, and sounded small and meek in a way the vibrant, animated boy next to him definitely wasn't.

"Who cares," he pipes up, bounding to his feet in one fluid motion, already walking over toward her. "She can be anywhere she wants." He doesn't see his brother's exaggerated eyeroll as he stops just short of her, extending one hand in an exaggerated fashion. "You're gorgeous and I'm Jerome. The wet blanket over there," he motions with a jerk of his thumb over his shoulder. "is Jeremiah. What can we do ya for?"

[likeavirus]

Jerome felt it too, and he isn't sure what's so specific or special about today or 4am, but it seems like as good a time as any to discover whoever might have been born specifically to fall in love with him. It was...little more than a game to him, really. Poor schmuck wouldn't know what was comin' to 'em!

The too-familiar cackle can be heard across the way as she meanders her way through the park to the bench he's taken up residence on. He couldn't have been happier to see the woman walking towards him. He jumps to his feet and claps his hands together with a loud snap. "What'd I tell ya, all this time, doll? You and me," He makes an exaggerated sweep of his hand to indicate the space between them. "Meant to be, huh?"

[mypriority]

"The part where you don't remember." He answers easily, watching him carefully. Leonard's always been the observant type, but he feels the need to be even more so with Barry just now. It's the tiny reactions that people can't hide that give more away than anything. Blink-and-you-miss-it stuff.

[adultflash]

"I really don't. I just remember walking into it. The Speed Force took my mother's form when it guided me in." He tries to keep his expression calm, knowing how well Leonard can read him, but there's a rising sense of sheer panic within him. Leonard can't know the truth, he can't. For his own sake. Because he falls into that same category of people he cares about.

[mypriority]

He might have said something, if not for the sudden way that a panic that makes no sense at all pin-pricks across his skin, makes his heart skip a beat or two. Oh, but he recognizes this. The aftershock of feeling something that doesn't belong to him.

Not that he's willing to look that idea in the face. Not here, or now, in this bar with baggage as deep as his.

He didn't notice the way his fingers had tightened their grip on the bottle in his hand until he blinks and looks away for a moment. He decides, for now, that he'll let it drop. But this conversation is...far from over. Only on pause until another time that it feels like he is prepared to really get into it.

"...if you insist, I'll take your word." He wonders if Barry can sense the unspoken 'for now.' hanging in the air.

[adultflash]

Leonard might not notice the way his grip tightens, but Barry does. He almost reaches out to touch his hand, but then withdraws it. It's not like him to be hesitant about touch, but when he has what being in the Speed Force was like at the forefront of his mind, he can't help it.

"Thank you," Barry murmurs. He can absolutely hear that implication. "But you're right, it's hard to get back into normal life, especially when normal life has changed so much. The team dynamic is completely different, with Cisco out in the field more and Iris in charge at STAR Labs, and I'm mentoring someone new."

[mypriority]

The more Barry says, the more Leonard realizes just how much he's missed while he was busy being a time traveler in his own right. "....the journalist is in charge of the science lab?" Really, that's his takeaway, here. Iris. In charge. Something about that just feels wrong.

[adultflash]

"Yeah," Barry says, frowning a little. He's not entirely happy with the situation. "It's weird because....even when Cisco was on the comms, he was never in charge. Making the decisions. No one was ever really in charge of that, we all just...worked together. And she keeps asking me to trust her, but I don't think she even trusts that we've been doing this for as long as we have."

[mypriority]

"Sounds... tense." Not the actual word he had in mind, but 'toxic' is a little atrong and, dynamic issues aside, Barry still cares about her. "Have you talked to her about it?" That's the sort of thing Barry and his team did, right?

[itistolaugh]

Harley rubs her palm against her eyes, trying to stave off the budding headache.

"Fine, you were right. Hope you liked hearing that because you never will again."

She stares at him for a long time before opening her arms. Okay, sure, come get a hug or whatever, you awful demon.

[adultflash]

“I...tried? A little?” He sighs again. Tense is right. “There’s a lot going on. We’re trying to plan for the wedding, and she’s making me go to therapy, and I’m trying to get used to the team dynamic, and I have six months of work to catch up on...sorry, you didn’t come back just for me to dump all of my problems on you.”

[quinnbee]

Leeny giggles and offers her hand like a grand duchess, biting her lip to keep from blurting you can do me all damn night. "I'm Harleen. Leeny, to friends." She smiles and tilts her head to make her hair fall just so. Don't they want to be her friend? "Sooo, which of you was laughing?" Please let it be Jerome, please let it be the fun one.

[bringstheheat]

Mick has never given that much credence to soulmates or any of that destiny bullshit. Sure it's romantic and Becky eats that sort of shit up, but he's decided a long time ago that it wasn't for him. It doesn't matter that his soulmarks wind up his arms and across his chest like living flames because so far they haven't reacted to anybody.

Hell maybe he'll just spend his life Unmatched.
What? It happens. Sometimes.

Then he had to go and break up a fight on the quad and run into Leonard Snart. Tutoring became friendship and now they'd breeze in and out of one another's dorm rooms or meet for lunch or drinks and it was all good.

Well not really good.
Because Mick was stupidly fucking in love with Snart and the guy has absolutely no idea or no interest or both.

He doesn't say anything when his soulmarks start to hurt, when they start to burn when Lenny is around because that's stupid isn't it? It's nothing. He can swallow down the itching burn no matter how bad it gets.
Lenny doesn't love him so he can't possibly be his soulmate.
Mick sure as hell isn't going to mention that to him and risk losing him as a friend too.

[mypriority]

"That is...a lot." He isn't sure it's his place to say much more on the matter, even if Barry is giving it to him mostly unprompted. He shakes his head and sweeps a hand slightly. "It's okay, Barry... don't worry about it." The distraction away from his own problems is a welcome one, especially given at least some of these problems have potential solutions. Much more than he could say for what's driven him back home.