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AN:

Thank you for all the reviews and follows and favorites, its lovely the reception this story has been getting.

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There was silence for a split second and then all three started talking at once.

"The future? Are you sure? What did you see?" Barry asked.

"Not good, not good. That was one trippy trip and man was it crazy intense. I feel like my head just got whammied, kinda like that time I ate all those sherbet lollies in one go and I was loopy out of it but that was my stomach not my head and-" Cisco babbled.

"What are you two on about? What just happened?" Caitlin demanded looking wildly between the two of them.

Barry looked between up at Caitlin where she was still perched half on top of him and realized how surreal this must all be for her. First day at a new school was hard enough, let alone when you threw elements like powers and talk of the future into the mix.

"The two of you were just like that but someone was in pain from something and-"

"Cisco stop talking and take a breath," Barry commanded and his friend surprisingly did as he was told. "Caitlin?"

She turned to face him, her eyes wide with uncertainty.

"I'm sorry, this must be really confusing. I promise we can explain everything," Barry said earnestly. "But you'll have to do something first."

Caitlin screwed her face up warily, her hands fisting against where they rested on him. "What?"

"Can you give us the time to do so? This isn't exactly the place to go into depth and you deserve to know everything if what I think just happened has actually happened."

"Oh frack! We're on our asses in the corridor!" Cisco exclaimed and jumped to his feet.

Caitlin jolted and seemed to realize she was still leaning heavily on Barry, quickly pushing herself away and into a standing position, her arms crossed over herself. Barry got to his feet too, never taking his gaze off the girl in front of him.

"Please," he said softly. "Meet us after lessons in the science common room. It's along the corridor from Dr Wells' lab, looks like an encyclopedia library from the doorway. Hardly anyone ever goes there but us so we'll have privacy and can explain everything. We haven't got time now in a lunch break."

"Ok," Caitlin said quietly. "After lessons in the science common room. And you explain what just happened."

With that Caitlin grabbed her bag from the floor and quickly took off down the corridor, her long legs striding away, her shoulders up and hunched in on themselves. Barry stared after her, wondering just what her story was and how she was going to become part of theirs.

"Hey," Cisco hissed thumping Barry in the arm. "Pretty big promise to make don't you think?"

"What do you mean?"

"'We can explain everything'?" Cisco said, his fingers making quote marks in the air. "How are we going to do that when we don't know the everything to explain it?!"

"I meant your vibe Cisco. We can explain those."

"How I get them technically I suppose," Cisco said glumly. "Not what they mean or what to do about them."

Barry stared at his friend worriedly. "What did you see?"

Cisco shivered. "You and Caitlin. Just how you were then, I mean in that position, you holding her as if from a fall. But you guys were both in pain and upset. And there was blood Barry, there was blood everywhere." Cisco shook his head as if to clear the image. "You were both in these suits…"

"I'm ok Cisco, I'm right here," Barry reached out and grabbed his friend's shoulder. "It hasn't happened yet."

"You're right," Cisco answered and straightened himself up. "And it won't happen. Not if I can get control over my vibes. Let's get to lunch, get some fuel and then we're hitting the powers gym. I gotta get this ability under wraps."

Barry grabbed his bag off the floor and followed his friend down the corridor. He knew his friend's vibes were intense, that he'd need to work through it in his own way. But he'd never had a vibe that had shown anything bad before. And Cisco's vibes had so far always come true… So was it him or Caitlin that was hurt? Or both of them?

If there was so much blood… was it fatal?

"I'll text Felicity and let her know to meet us later," Cisco said as they reached the cafeteria. "I think she's on defensive training and we've both got active this afternoon, right?"

"Yeah," Barry replied. "I wonder what Caitlin's got…"

The two boys joined the line for food and grabbed whatever they could that was left, as the incident in the corridor had taken longer than Barry thought and their lunch break was already halfway finished. With active training this afternoon they would both need their energy.

Barry had always found it easy to speed, to have the lightning of the speed force move within him and allow him to just go. But learning the control and all the tricks that came with his speed was the hard part. It was easy enough to just run, but to run fast enough to go across water or up the sides of buildings? Or to be able to change his speed enough to switch between the two velocities needed for each different scenario? That was what Dr Wells had him working on.

Cisco too was learning about the finer nuances of control. He could manipulate vibrational energies and that came in the form of teleportation breaches, energy blasts and projective visions. If he had to rank them Barry knew Cisco would say breaches were easiest followed by the blasts with the vibe visions last. His friend struggled with the amount of sensory overload a vibe vision could give him whereas a breach was energy channeled in a specific way.

Barry and Cisco had bonded over explaining the different yet similar spectrums of their powers in one of their first ever active power lessons together. It was the same with Felicity; the amount of energy and stimuli they all had to process whilst harnessing their powers was intense and something that was very hard to understand if you couldn't relate to it.

Both Cisco and Felicity's families had struggled with adapting to children with meta abilities for that very reason.

As soon as they were finished eating Barry and Cisco headed for the lower level of the school. It was twice the height of all the normal floors and ran the entire length of the school building, with divider walls that could be changed depending on the need of the day. Two rooms were always there, though their size could change; the changing room and the control room. The amount of tech that lined the walls and ceiling always sent Cisco into a giddy rush and Barry had to stop him many times when he got lost in monologues about what great invention he would create one day and add to the school's vast collection of gadgets. Barry knew Cisco couldn't wait to get to senior level when they were allowed into the control room.

The boys quickly changed into their 'active' wear - tight gym clothes that were made of a special material designed to be resistant to all types of things – and headed out into the main arena where Diggle was waiting for the students to assemble.

Not a meta himself, Diggle had been in the army and trained Special Forces so Dr Wells had thought him a great candidate to teach control and discipline whilst sharing his knowledge of offensive and defensive fighting. It wasn't that they were being trained to fight, but the world was still unsure of metas and Wells wanted them all prepared for anything whilst being confident in their own abilities.

Active classes were usually quite small, only a handful of students at a time so they could focus as much as possible. Today there were only four students Barry noted; himself, Cisco, Bette and Caitlin. He smiled readily at the girls – Bette was fairly good friends although they didn't have many classes together and didn't hang out enough but when they did she and Barry got along fine.

"Hey guys," Bette said in greeting whilst Caitlin stood next to her in silence, her arms wrapped around herself in what Barry was coming to think was her usual stance.

"Hi Bette, how's it going?" Barry said. "Caitlin, seeing you again so soon huh?"

"Too soon," she muttered looking down and away from him.

Barry felt a clutch in his stomach and didn't know what to say as unexpected hurt crashed through him. He'd done nothing but try and make her first day nice and yes there's been that bump and Cisco's unintended vibe but did that mean she had to be rude? He wanted to ask her outright and started to open his mouth to do so when he realized that Caitlin wasn't really looking away from him but rather trying to look at everything surrounding them. Her eyes were glancing up at the tech that lined the walls and some of the apparatus that was stacked up here and there. She was biting down hard on her lower lip and her knuckles were almost white from where she was clutching her arms against her sides so tightly.

She looked almost petrified.

"Hey," Barry said gently, his mood changing from hurt to protective as fast as he could run. "I know this place looks scary but it's all safe. Once you see what everything is and how it works you'll feel comfortable with it, I promise."

"You're making a lot of promises Barry," she said softly.

He grinned at her use of his name, a light feeling coursing through him. "Well you'll soon see that I'm the kind of guy that can keep them."

A small smile flitted across Caitlin's lips and her eyes crinkled, lightening her whole face.

"Ok you four, listen up!" A loud voice Barry recognized as Diggle's called across the room though the man was nowhere to be seen. "Today's lesson is simple. Use your powers to find me."

"That sounds way too easy," Bette muttered.

"What's the catch Dig?" Cisco hollered, winking at Bette as she shook her head and Barry groaned. Cisco's banter with their teachers never ended well though it never stopped him from trying it.

"The lesson Mr Ramon," Diggle responded. "Is to be completed in pairs, two of you actively using you powers at all times, meaning you'll have to be aware of your interactions and each other's strengths and weaknesses. Oh, and if you get bogged down in any booby-traps you've failed. Understood?"

"Yes sir," Barry and Bette chorused.

"Good. You've got three minutes to discuss your plan of action. At 3.01 a ten second countdown will begin and when you hear zero the mission is a go. You win by finding me. If the lesson finishes before you find me you'll hear the buzzer and I'll review your attempts. Your three minutes start now."

"Alright let's start with basics," Bette said quickly as the four huddled together. "Whose powers are going to work well together? I can combust anything plastic but I don't think there's going to be that much around."

"Yeah especially after what you did last training with Dig's precious example dummies," Cisco murmured.

"Not helping Cisco," Barry said. "I can speed around and look for him but I'd have to carry someone if we're supposed to do it in pairs and there may be a kinetic energy device somewhere."

"Oh they are nasty," Bette said.

"I could try and vibe him but it's not at all consistent and would probably take me the whole lesson."

"What about you Caitlin? What's your powers?" Bette asked.

"Ice," Caitlin replied shortly. "But I don't really control it."

"Ice and speed are opposites," Cisco said. "Barry if you took Caitlin her ice should be able to negate any kinetic devices."

"Great idea Cisco," Bette breathed. "Barry you take Caitlin and speed around looking for Diggle. Cisco and I will create some diversions, try and make it look like we're causing such a ruckus to get Diggle to come to us."

"Sound good to you?" Barry asked Caitlin but before she could answer the others reacted.

"Let's do this!" Cisco sing-sang as he and Bette ran off.

"But I can't control the ice," Caitlin said looking panicked. "I can't help you with anything!"

"Hey, hey, it'll be ok," Barry said reaching out and grabbing Caitlin's hands.

"But what if this is what your friend saw? What if this is how I hurt you?" Caitlin asked.

Barry frowned. "How you hurt me? Caitlin that wasn't- you're not going to hurt me."

Caitlin backed away from him shaking her head and balling her hands into fists as a white mist began to surround her, filling the air. Her hair began to change too, white steaking through the brown strands.

"I always end up hurting someone," she whispered and her voice had a strange echo to it. "It's always my fault."

"Ten," an automated voice suddenly boomed. "Nine…"

Caitlin jolted and threw her hands up, shards of ice shooting out from her in a wave as she screamed. Barry dodged the ice missiles and turned quickly to get to Cisco and Bette and move them out of the way of any projectiles. He watched in shock as the training room began to be iced over by Caitlin, her face crumpled in nothing short of abject misery as she held her hands out as if they didn't belong to her, ice coating everything they were directed at.

Barry sped around the level, grabbing everyone there and getting them to the elevator so they could get out ahead of the ice but he couldn't leave. He couldn't just abandon Caitlin to face this on her own. He turned back and headed straight towards Caitlin even as the cold washed over his body, slowing him down.

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An alarm sounded on his personal computer and the man turned to it in interest; he couldn't remember any events that were supposed to happen on today's date. He opened the window and looked on in surprise as a live camera feed sprang into action, a young terrified girl spreading ice everywhere and a boy turning into a blur of lightning as he moved around her.

"Well, well," he murmured. "That's ahead of schedule. But look at all that young power. Shame it won't be yours for long eh, Flash and Frost."

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AN:

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