We've made it to the last chapter! I won't say much, other than to stick around at the end for a few details about the next fic.

Enjoy!

Rose Canton's hair had never looked so bright red, Caitlin thought. Maybe it was the way it punched through the smokiness of the hallway, a spot of color. Maybe it was simply the contrast of her hair against her unusually-pale skin, the result of days of captivity. It was amazing, Caitlin mused, what only a few days with Eiling could do to a person. Canton, as Caitlin knew her, had been strong willed—yet her body language spoke of defeat, and the paleness of her skin echoed something far grimmer.

Eiling tightened his grip on the gun that now pressed against those red locks and said, "Leaving so soon?"

Barry stiffened, twisted out of Caitlin's grasp. "It's over," he said. "You've lost. Let her go."

"You have no idea what's going on here," Eiling said. "You really think I've lost, after one minor inconvenience?"

Canton was mouthing something, and it took Caitlin a moment to realize that it was Run. Run.

"I'm not leaving you," Caitlin said. She hadn't meant to say it out loud, exactly, but she needed Canton to understand. It seemed silly that just minutes ago she'd been resigned to leaving Canton behind, and yet—

"Didn't think our friend Jason could pack such a punch," Eiling said. "Explosive personality, and, well...caught us all by surprise, didn't it?" He laughed a hollow laugh. His sleeve still smoldered. "His demise doesn't negate what you can do, does it? Doesn't negate the fact that I still want you."

"Yeah?" Barry said. "Well, you're not going to get me. You're done."

"Funnily enough, I wasn't talking to you," Eiling said, his eyes still fixed on Caitlin. "Oh, I would kill to have you, Flash, but you're not the only chosen one now."

The words sent chills of terror through Caitlin's body. What did he mean by chosen one?

"I'm not joining you, if that's what you're thinking," she said. "Just because your temporary serum worked—"

"That's exactly why," Eiling said. "You're not going to go back to all of your friends at STAR Labs with those powers, are you?"

Caitlin pressed her lips tight together. Barry leaned against the wall for support, head turning from Caitlin to Eiling and back again. "What is he talking about?"

"Oho!" Eiling barked. "You haven't told him?"

"I've been a little busy," Caitlin snapped.

"Clearly!" Eiling's delighted tone gave Caitlin pause, carved out a new pit of unease in her gut. She'd never seen him look so triumphant; the sight of him battered and scorched and still smiling was more terrifying than anything she'd seen before.

Clearly. The understanding arrived at once. She saw his eyes flick toward the wide-open door she'd just emerged from. Barry caught the pointed look, too, and craned his neck to look into the room.

"What?" he said. "Cait, what is he—what hap—"

"It's nothing," Caitlin said hastily, but her heart wasn't in it. She didn't try to block the door, and didn't look at Barry's face, either. She didn't want to see it crumple.

"Is that…" Barry said. "Is he dead?"

"Frozen through like a popsicle, I'd say," Eiling said. "Killed just for doing his job."

"How?" Barry sounded breathless, confused, fearful. "What's going on, Cait?"

"I did it," she responded. She didn't wait for the silence to stretch, couldn't bear it. "Eiling's been developing a serum to give people powers. He tested it on me and, well…"

In her periphery, Barry shifted. "He made you kill that man?"

"He didn't make me," Caitlin said, voice cracking. She finally looked back up at Barry, vision blurred so much that his features swam. "He was hurting you, and I…I didn't mean to, but…"

"Doesn't matter what you meant," Eiling said. "Powers are damn useful regardless of meaning, aren't they?"

Caitlin kept her eyes locked on Barry's, simultaneously pleading and apologizing, but his expression was too hard to read. A tear escaped the corner of her eye and streaked down to her chin. She averted her gaze and instead looked to Rose Canton—and the intensity in her eyes shocked Caitlin. Even with a gun pressed to her temple, an arm around her throat, she suddenly emanated such a fierce and unrelenting energy that it threatened to knock Caitlin backward.

"Don't do this to yourself, Snow," she croaked. "Get out of here."

Eiling's chokehold tightened, and Canton squeezed her eyes shut.

"If you two speed out of here, I will kill her," Eiling threatened. "I'll kill her and then, mark my words, I will come after you. We have what we need from her. She's expendable to us. Is she expendable to you?"

Caitlin didn't dare glance at Barry. It would be easy, she thought. Just a blink and they could both be gone. That Barry could run them to safety she had no doubt; he'd done more miraculous things under more physical stress before. If they stayed any longer, their window of opportunity would likely shut, and all three of them would be trapped. But, at the same time, Caitlin did not doubt Eiling's promise.

As if to solidify the sense of urgency, the bootsteps of reinforcements stomped above, clattered in the stairwell. Eiling heard them at the same time, tilted his head.

At the minor distraction, Canton leapt into action. Her head jerked backward and caught Eiling in the nose, and simultaneously her elbow slammed into his gut. It was hardly enough to stop him, but enough to slow him down. On instinct, Caitlin launched forward and threw Canton bodily behind her. She went for Eiling next, but she stopped short at the click of a gun's safety.

The barrel of Eiling's gun stared her down, two feet from her face. "Are you going to kill me, Dr. Snow?"

She blinked, then realized that she'd thrown up her fists in defense, as if that could help against a flashing gun. It took her a moment more to realize that her fists were glowing blue and practically dripping with cold. She hadn't meant to summon the energy again, but here it was, a response as unconscious as breathing.

"I could," Caitlin threatened. "In a second."

"I know," Eiling said. "But you won't."

Caitlin considered, paused, looked down at her hands. The hesitation stretched. And in that moment of indecision, Eiling fired.

Caitlin had always heard that being shot was an out-of-body experience, that sometimes the pain of the wound was not immediately felt. She'd been a doctor long enough to know that adrenaline had miraculous numbing effects on the body. So when she saw the muzzle of the gun flash and felt nothing, she looked down at the front of her clothes to visually confirm where the bullet had hit her. When she didn't see any blood, the weight settled, and she turned.

Behind her, Rose Canton collapsed, blood gushing from a wound in her stomach. She didn't yell, or cry, or make any other sound aside from a weak exhale. She hit the ground, clutching feebly at her stomach, eyes blankly searching the ceiling.

Normally, Caitlin would have rushed to the injured woman immediately, offer assistance, press her hands to the wound as she'd once pressed her hands to the stab wound in Barry's gut. But now her hands could not be trusted; they sputtered frigid blue and had the power to kill.

Rather than give into that fear, she embraced it. She spun back around and grabbed Eiling's gun where it was still outstretched. It froze, almost instantly. Eiling's hand jerked away from it, and Caitlin clenched it so hard the ice cracked. When she tossed it to the wall, it shattered. Before the fragments had even touched the floor, she locked her hand around Eiling's throat and shoved him back against the wall.

She focused on her breathing, keeping it steady, keeping her pulse level. Now that she had opened up, she could feel the way the ice shifted and rippled beneath her skin. It no longer had a mind of its own—rather, it had a mind, but Caitlin's own mind was connected to it. She halted the flow of power at her fingertips, keeping her hands cold and blue, but not allowing the energy to spring outward. The spark of fear in Eiling's eyes, no matter how brief, was worth it.

"You won't do it, will you?" he choked against the stranglehold. "Or have I made you a killer after all?"

The bootsteps were thunderous on the stairs. Soldiers would be breaking through into the hall at any moment with muscle and mass and firepower. The earth seemed to rumble. Caitlin looked to Barry, who had fallen to his knees beside the prone, bleeding Canton. His soft words of comfort did nothing. She was fading, and fast.

I don't think I can carry two people, he had said.

"Barry, take her," Caitlin said. "You have to get out of here right now."

Barry looked up, blanched. "But…"

"Don't argue with me," she said. "She's going to bleed out, and you're not going to be able to escape yourself if you wait any longer."

Barry's jaw worked furiously, his fingers clenching and unclenching to mirror it—but the harshness was contrasted by that familiar lost, confused look crystallizing in his eyes.

"Cait," he at last said softly.

She swallowed hard, willed the tears to slow. She couldn't lose control, not now.

"Go."

The stairwell was alive with shouting and stomping: the soldiers began pouring into the hall, raising guns. Caitlin opened her mouth to say something else, something she would probably forget, but before she could get the words out, Barry streaked past her in a blur of golden light. All that remained of him and Rose Canton in the facility were the smears of blood in the hallway they had occupied just moments before.

As soon as they were gone, Caitlin wrenched herself away from Eiling, who spluttered and coughed. The fight was gone from Caitlin's body, the cold fast retracting from her hands, and she trembled like she'd never trembled before in her life. She thought she might crumple there, crumple to the floor like a poorly-constructed house of cards, but soldiers caught her around the arms before she had a chance.

"Knew you wouldn't," Eiling said once he had regained his breath. Even though Caitlin had held back her powers and left him alive, she could see what looked like black lines of frostbite on his neck from her fingers. "But you will," he added. "You will, my Killer Frost."

She wanted to see Barry's lightning one more time. She wanted to feel the warmth of it zinging past her, hear the crackle of light and hope and clarity. She wanted to sit on one of the beat-up STAR Labs couches with her friends beside her, and, most foolishly, she wanted a mug of hot soup at the close of a long day.

She thought all of this as the soldiers dragged her backward by the arms. They flung her into a cell with a cement floor and cement walls, and all light vanished when the heavy door boomed shut.

Join me in hell!

I know I'm going to get yelled at for this ending, but I figured...ending chapters with cliffhangers was getting old, so why not step up my game and END AN ENTIRE FIC ON A CLIFFHANGER.

As I mentioned at the beginning of this fic, this is the second fic of a three-part series, so never fear-I am hard at work on the third part as we speak. I'm about 60% complete, so if not by the end of the month, then definitely sometime in November I can start posting. And even if you don't join me for that one, thank you to everyone who has come along for the ride with this fic! I did not expect so many people to stick around, and your comments have been absolutely lovely and funny and thoughtful. I love sharing fic with you, more than I can express. So thank you, thank you, thank you!

See you soon, and, until then, come chat with me on tumblr at pennflinn. Till next time!

Penn