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As his body shredded away from the force of the blast, Leonard Snart saw Time.
He saw the entire expanse of the universe from its creation to its end and all the messy details down the middle. For each second of time it gave, it took and clawed away something in return. The Oculus poured itself into him and traded his remaining life for a glimpse of Time. He could have seen anything, but the Oculus grabbed onto the first thought in his mind-
His vision dimmed and Leonard was encompassed in darkness. He felt nothing, but when he went to raise a hand he found himself unable as his body had been ripped apart, leaving his conscious floating, the last remaining bit of him before the Oculus would complete its destruction.
A bright light blinded him.
Len watched as a doctor came into an understaffed and poorly maintained hospital room carrying a red-faced bundle in blue. A mother, exhaustion creasing her face, held her arms out to accept the newborn child. A father, dirty and aged, glanced down at the child with little interest. Two boys of ages five and seven slept shoulder to shoulder on the chairs nearby, unaware that they were joined by another.
“What’re we callin’ this one?” the father asked.
The mother looked up momentarily before smiling down at her new son. “Mick.”
Len watched as baby Mick Rory learned the ways of life in early childhood: how to walk, how to run, how to speak, how to keep his mouth shut, how to listen, how to disappear, how to dodge, how to hide, how to mask, how to cope. He watched him learn from a father aged with wisdom, peers of mutual understanding and a mother of quiet acceptance. Len watched the possibility of a happy childhood vanish before Mick could even understand what he had lost, the potential that was no more.
Len watched as Mick aged, from his birth to age ten, abandoning his chubby baby fat for scrawny arms and legs, smooth and puff baby skin turning tan and burnt from the harvest sun.
Len watched as rage controlled a father's fist to a young boy’s cheek, mother turning her back for deniability. Len watched as an eleven year old Mick decided to hit back, unaware of the consequences and found that they didn’t matter to him in the heat of the moment. Len watched as Mick Rory learned, slower than Len did growing up, that the best way to deal with this abuse was to bottle it up and accept the punishments dealt on to him.
Len watched a twelve year old Mick, locked in a dark room without supper, find comfort in a match flame, letting it fizzle out on soft-tipped fingers and leaving a stinging burn. Len watched the first genuine smile come to Mick’s face after twelve years of tears and whimper-filled swallows. Len watched as Mick found his happiness for the first time.
Len watched as Mick learned, with no master or teacher, only his experiment. Len watched as the flames grew from match-tips to piece of paper to t-shirts to a bed. Len watched years of expertise behind the boy's eyes, learning to control and master the flames, joy of unlike anything before fill the child's face.
Len watched that joy turn to fear, as control was stripped away and Mick was left powerless against the roaring flames. He watched a young boy with burnt fingers and toes run onto a dew soaked law, turn around, and fall to the ground to watch the house he grew up in collapsed, the other inhabitants still inside.
Len watched the authorities come and ask questions and Mick lie, despite all evidence showing otherwise.
Len watched Mick, fourteen years old and angry at the world, move into a new home and leave two years later as a man of sixteen on his way to juvie for aggravated assault and battery, and ambulance taking away a man with burns on his face.
Len watched a sixteen year old Mick Rory be out-casted, rumors of the flaming farmhouse and four deaths ominously hanging over him. No one spoke to him; no one touched him, all too afraid of the boy with match-burned fingers.
Len watched the sixteen year old get a private bunk, the guards not trusting him with another. Len watched the perimeter around the boy widened after a riot and Mick hide a shard of glass in his bunk. The glass was not to be used as a weapon, he would later find, but as a way to regain what he had lost.
When allowed in the courtyard, Len watched as a young Mick Rory learn that if layered and angled in the right fashion on a dried leaf, he could get a spark of the flames that he’d die for.
Len watched as six months passed and the boy never opened his mouth, almost as if it had been sewn shut. Len watched as the boy never fell out of line, never caused a problem, never made waves. Not until a loud mouth brat by the name of Leonard “Leo” Snart was brought in and caused enough trouble for both them.
Len watched in a twist of nostalgia as a gang of boys cornered his younger-self on his first day of juvie. He watched fist after fist, blow after blow hit him yet he still stood there yammering away, snapping insults and puns like it would change the predetermined outcome. Len shook his head at his younger-stupid-self. However, if he could go back and change it, he wouldn't. Not when moments later, Len watched a young Mick rip the shiv from the tallest of the boys and toss it over the fence wordlessly. The boys fled in fear of “Pyro Rory” but Mick stayed, towering over fourteen year old Len like a God and offered a burnt hand up. Bruises already began to color on Leo’s cheeks and as the guards made their rounds, they pulled Mick away and took him to confinement thinking the worst case scenario. Len watched his younger-self say nothing as he was dragged away.
Len watched as a week passed by and Mick was released back into gen-pop. He watched as his young-self enter the cafeteria, eyes landing on Mick in surprise and awe. He watched little Len saddle up to little Mick's empty table and sit directly beside him, not across from him.
The guards all stiffened and watched hawk-like as Len bartered his cookie for Mick's fruit roll-up. It hurt to, but Len smiled as Mick denied the trade and gave Len both his cookie and fruit roll-up and asked for nothing in return, still barely speaking a word.
Len watched as a week went by and the guards watched Mick take the younger crooked cop's kid under his wing, everyone astonished that Mick hadn’t killed him and Len said something stupid yet. Len grinned as he was moved to Mick's bunk and Mick still refusing to give Len top bunk.
Len watched four months drift by as young Mick and Len ruled juvie with an iron, sleight of hand, fist. From his new out of body perspective, he watched as a young Len dropped his guard around Mick and a young Mick find joy in something that wasn't the flames. If only they had knew then that they were completely obsessed with each other.
Len watched the quiet moments between him and Mick more than the loud ones. Like when Len rambled on about his baby sister back home or how Mick showed Len his first burn, a half-moon shape on the back of his hand. Len’s stomach tightened (or at least it felt like it did even though his body no longer existed) as a young Len took Mick’s hand and traced the burn with a cool fingertip. Len watched as a young Mick’s eyes shift from hot to warm and wondered if this was the moment it all changed.
When Len left juvie, Mick and he didn't hug or say goodbyes. Mick watched from the top bunk as Len was escorted out. Len watched the life drain from Mick’s eyes once more. Len knew the look- hopeless acceptance .
Len watched as a few more months passed and Mick was released, two more months and he would be seventeen. A fifteen year old Len was waiting outside the gates with a bag of chips he nabbed for the convenience store a few blocks over. Len watched as both grinned at each other as they headed toward Mick's new foster home.
Their first kiss came three months later on a side of a bar they were kicked out of and had their fake IDs confiscated. Len watched the anxiety melt from both the young men’s' faces as their lips touched and then ripped apart just as quickly. He watched two days go by before fifteen year old Len pushed seventeen year old Mick against the pole of the swing-set in the deserted park at midnight and their kiss go from a gentle peck to an exploration of mouths and tongues.
Len watched those kisses turn from lips against lips to exploratory touches and hushed moans. Len watched as heat came over both their eyes but fear of onlookers kept them at bay. Len watched the little touches they gave each other in public and the shared look of excitement they gave each other when they got away with a nudge of a knee or a hand on a shoulder. Len watched as they would meet in private later to celebrate another day of their affair going unnoticed.
Len watched the day Mick met Lisa in vivid detail. How his little sister, who was usually terrified of strangers, ran straight up to Mick and punched him just above the groin, staring up at him with heat the rivaled the flames young Mick loved.
"If you hurt him, I'll hurt you," Lisa's seven year old voice threatened with deadly connotations, never breaking eye contact with the older teenager.
Len watched as Mick stumbled and stuttered before agreeing that yes, Lisa should come after Mick if he did anything to hurt Len.
Len watched as a smile flew to Lisa and as she held their hands to walk through the dimly lit streets, unaware of the look of adoration painted of both their faces when they looked down at her and then back up at each other.
Len watched was one day as a sixteen year old Len approached an almost eighteen year old Mick with a fresh bruise of his face. Len watched as Mick caressed his cheeks and edged the bruise around his eye with callused fingertips, being far gentler than either of them had ever been before.
Len watched as Mick made every threat in the book to kill Lewis and Len making every excuse in the book as to why Mick shouldn't.
Len watched as Mick turned eighteen and a sixteen year old Len crawled on top his lap and promised him the night of his life. Len blushed and held back a chuckle from second(first?)-hand embarrassment at the teenagers’ fumbles; how Len elbowed Mick in the gut and how Mick nearly caused Len to fall into the ground.
Len watched as they both came without any penetration and barely any touching. The heat of the moment being enough to push both inexperienced teens over the edge.
Len watched as a flushed Mick said they should wait until Len was eighteen and do it right. They both knew, even then, the real reason was that they were both nervous to take it further and were too inexperienced to make it all the way through. Both of them were fine with the lie they took up and spent the rest of the night kissing with Len tracing over the burn on the back of Mick’s hand.
Len watched as a nineteen year old Mick went to prison and left Len to hide in the alley way after a robbery gone wrong. Len watched a furious Mick push Len back behind the dumpster and say, “Let me take the fall. You still got Lisa. Don’t be an idiot for once in your damn life.” Len watched a quiet seventeen year old Len nodded his head and ducked behind the dumpster as Mick went to face the police and turn himself in.
Len watched for eight months as Mick struggled against the larger men who thought that Mick had a nice enough face. Len watched as Mick broke three jaws before being sent to confinement. Len watched Mick at night trace patterns on his chest the way Len did when they spent the nights together, Len watched as Mick paid extra attention to the burn scar on the back of his hand, curling it against his chest like it was the most precious thing in the world. Len watched as Mick went through four violent prison riots, each of them hardening him more and more and the Mick Len had grown up with be pushed further and further down.
By the time Mick got out, Len was nineteen and Mick had a hard shell Len wasn't sure he knew or wanted to know how to crack. They only lasted three months in each other’s company, prison changing Mick more than either of them expected. They went separate ways and never had that first time that had wanted to wait for so long ago.
Len remembered finding his kicks but he never knew how Mick got his. Len watched as Mick found satisfaction in whores and cheap women and while Len was possessive, he had watched Mick's life up until this point to see that he never got the look in his eyes he did when he was with Len. No one else could give Mick that, not even the fire (although it had its own special look).
They were so wasted on each other, Len wished he knew sooner. He would have looked for Mick then and claimed him, not wait until fate pushed them together a year later.
Mick was hired for his muscle and his affinity for fire; Len was hired for his brain and swift fingers. No one suspected the two knew each other. No one noticed the surprise that came to both their faces when they met again, how Mick’s eyes lit up and Len’s smirk deepened.
No one noticed the looks they shared in the warehouse during meet-ups and jobs, how they always ended up seated next to each other at the table or in vans, how a warning look from Len stopped Mick from charging or a grunt from Mick signaled Len to caution. Even with those minute interactions, they didn't actually speak until the fifth month on the shared crew.
Len watched as Mick finally had enough of their silence and stepping around each other. When the crew was heading home to the evening, Mick grabbed Len by the arm and dragged him off away from prying eyes. As soon as they were alone, Mick slammed Len against the wall and towered over him. Both of them had grown since they last saw each other and while Mick had always been bigger, they finally were evened out. Still, Mick was always more imposing physically than Len.
Len remembered thinking Mick was either going to punch or kiss him in that moment and Len wasn’t sure he remembered which he wanted. He wasn’t expecting the question: "Want to go for a drink?"
Both knew Len didn't drink often and both knew that it was a weak attempt on both their parts to act like this was normal and they didn’t have a shared history, no matter how naïve and idealistic it had been. Regardless, Len nodded his head and Mick let him go.
Len watched them and couldn't felt but smile fondly as Mick got two beers for the purposes of being allowed to taking up a back booth. Neither of them drank that night, the beers growing warm on the table top, still completely full.
They barely talked, both unsure how to proceed and where to go from here. For Mick, Len could see that those juvie years had meant something to the little pyro. Len hadn’t known it at the time, he wouldn’t know it until now, his death, but he hoped that Mick was somehow able to read in that moment that those juvie years had meant something to Len too.
In the end, they say there for two hours in near silence (briefly talking about some jobs and Lisa, but little else) before Len grabbed a pen from his pocket and wrote a number on the back of Mick's hand, right below the burn mark, for him to call in five days. As he let go of Mick’s hand, Len had brushed his finger along the burn, just as he had done in juive all those years ago. Len remember thinking he was so fucking mysterious and cool when doing so, that somehow that move would impress Mick and make him desirable or something. God, he was still an idiot then. Probably still now.
He watched Mick trace that number for the days and nights to come until it was barely visible. On the fifth day, Len watched as Mick held the landline phone in his hand a full hour before dialing. He waited another twenty minutes before actually letting it ring. When Len picked up, he watched as Mick's face adopted that soft smile he reserved for the only two things he enjoyed.
"You still like to watch things burn?" God, why did he fucking talk like that? How could Mick stand him?
Mick only grunted in response but Len could see his hands twitching with either nerves or excitement.
Len watched Mick listen carefully as his younger-self gave an address of a building to burn, a time line to follow, and a place to meet once the job was done.
Len watched as Mick took down that building, watching the flames even though he was trying to keep his timing for Len. He sat on the roof top a block away with a lighter clenched in one hand and a stolen wristwatch in the other.
Len watched as they met back up, young Len telling young Mick his plans to take over, to start his own crew, be his own boss, asking if Mick was in.
He watched as the twenty three year old pyro and the twenty one year old klepto did their first job together…and watched as it went up in smoke. Len had managed to get them both out of there but with nothing to show for. Mick, on the other hand…
Len smirked as his younger-self flinched as something cold and metal hit the back of his head. A metallic smack of metal and concrete followed.
“Mick?” Len turned to the pyro who was occupied with watching a flame from his lighter.
“Stop sulking.”
Len glanced down at the floor and picked up the ring, a dinky thing that was hardly worth anything. If it had been a part of a package deal, sure it would be worth fencing. But not on its own. “Really?”
“Now you can stop saying we didn’t make out with anything,” Mick glanced up, his eyes dancing like the flame in front of him.
“What am I supposed to do with it?” Len sneered, examining the ring unimpressed.
“Sell it, wear it, throw it out, I don’t give a fuck.” Mick flicked his lighter shut and stood up. “Just stop complaining. The next one will be fine.”
“How are you so sure?” Len cocked his head to the side.
Len watched as a sure grin came to Mick’s face and both present and past Len’s hearts stuttered. “’Cause you’re Leonard Snart and you always got a plan.”
Mick returned to his apartment, satisfied with staring at the flames and tracing the burn on the back of his hand. Len, even if he could view Mick’s timeline, knew that his younger-self was sitting on his own bed, fiddling with the ring on his finger knowing he could never wear it in public or in front of Mick, but maybe he could in private, just for a bit.
Len actually made the motion to say “ Finally ” when he watched Len grabbed Mick by his stupid (cute) suspenders and yank him into a kiss. Of course, his ability to do anything was gone with his body, but he could still think it as he watched his past.
It was after their fifth job together. All of them since the first had gone off without a hitch and Mick wore a smug grin every time, like a little I Told You So. Mick was splitting their profits and Len was already making plans for a new job. If he wanted recognition, he needed cred and a reputation. Mick didn’t seem to care either way as long as he burned something or –as Len found out by those long stares Mick made when his past-self wasn’t looking– he was with Len.
“Take a break, Snart,” Mick had ordered as he finished his counting.
“I am.”
“Not quite how I remember it,” Mick muttered and past-Len froze while present-Len wondered what took them so long.
“We tried that before.” Len was at least looking away from the plans now and was meeting Mick’s eyes. Len wanted to bash his past-self’s head in for continuing this game of cat and mouse.
“Was different then,” Mick shrugged. “It’s different now.”
“What about before?” Juvie.
“Can’t ever be like that.”
Len crossed the space between them, slowly and carefully, watching Mick’s every move. Len watched as his younger-self perch on Mick’s lap, cocking his head to the side in curiosity.
“How will it be now?”
“However you want it,” Mick responded immediately. Now-Len could see Mick’s hands were twitching to move while past-Len chuckled.
“I’m in charge,” Len warned.
“Whatever you say, boss,” Mick agreed and (thankfully) past-Len closed the distance. If present-Len still had a body and a heart, he was sure he’d have felt it crack, knowing how this tale ends.
Len watched as years went by and somehow Mick and he hadn’t parted yet. He watched as Len gained notoriety and Mick gained infamy. He watched them grow together and mold into a replica of what they were like before, back when they were young and stupid and idealistic and helpless romantics.
Len watched as Lisa grew up from Mick’s perspective. He had always wondered why Mick loved her as much as Len but he could see it now as Mick taught her to drive, chased off boyfriends and girlfriends, made dinner, taught her to fight when Len wouldn’t, gave her a beer and warned her to always watch her glass, took her under his wing as he did with Len.
Len watched as Lisa cornered them some odd years later and demanded they cut the bullshit and get married. Len watched hope dawn on both their faces and watched it go away quickly as they both said no.
Len watched as they both thought of ways to convince the other without being obvious. Len should have known better when they had come to that agreement in bed, both of them bringing up the benefits.
“We can’t testify against each other.”
“Conjugal visits.”
“Always about sex?”
“Always about getting caught?”
They got married in some shit-stained town on the west coast. A town that didn’t know the notorious names of Mick Rory and Leonard Snart. There were no rings, no ceremonies, no vows, no crowds. Just Lisa, an officiant, and a drunk they picked up to be their second witness. Since Len was dead, or close to it, he would admit it was perfect.
Len watched their honeymoon. Both of them clean and sober and letting themselves fall back into that time that they were sixteen and eighteen and high on what they thought was love.
Len watched the years get closer and closer to 2016 and Len wasn’t sure he was ready for the shit-storm of what came next.
Len watched the Great Fire of 2014 for Mick’s point of view. He watched as his 2014-self ran and how Mick woke up, bandages covering half his body alone.
Len watched Mick come to the realization of what had gone down between him and Len. They had split up before, both too stubborn and hot-headed not to fall into spats every now and then. But Len always came back for him. Always.
Len watched as Mick waited, bidding his time with jobs in Keystone. Far enough to give Len space and close enough to be there when Len was ready to get him.
Len watched his poorly veiled proposition for them to work together. Len watched the fire return to Mick’s eyes and how it roared when Mick got the heat gun.
That night they took to the bed, consummating their reunion. Len traced the burn on the back of Mick’s hand and Mick muttered, “I love you.”
Len watched them fight The Flash. Len watched Mick and Lisa reunite. Len watched Mick take some solo jobs when he felt Len needed space. Len watched as Mick always came back. Len watched as Mick comforted Len when he killed his father. Len watched as Mick vowed to be there next time. Len watched as they made their bond as strong as ever.
Len felt sick when Rip Hunter appeared. He knew what was coming and he wasn’t ready to see it. He knew he could jump out of the time stream and finally lay to rest, but he waited. Despite knowing what came next, Len forced himself to stay in Mick’s timeline and watch.
Watched them as they got weird in the seventies. Watched them fight Chronos for the first time. Watched them go to a weapons auction and blow it up. Watched as Carter died. Watched them break into the Pentagon. Watched Mick’s face when he heard Len flirted with Vostok and watched as Mick possessively reminded Len who he belonged to. Watched Mick and Ray in the gulag.
Len wished he could close his eyes (if he had them) when 2046 came. Len wished he could look away when Mick’s control started to slip and Len wasn’t there to help him regain stability. Len wished something could be different when he knocked Mick out.
One good thing Len got to finally see was what Rip had said to his partner. Len wished he knew earlier so he could kill Rip for pushing Mick further away. Len might have gotten him to the edge and that was his fault, but Rip was the one to knock Mick over the edge.
Len watched in slow motion as he dragged Mick through the snowy forest and pointed his gun at him. He watched Mick’s face, betrayed and hurt. He watched Mick lie limp in the snow as the Waverider took off.
Len finally saw what the Time Master did to Mick to make him Chronos. He watched as Mick was brainwashed and stripped of everything. They took his mind but left his burns. They said it was mercy, that the flames suited what they needed from Chronos. They didn’t seem to realize the burn on the back of Mick’s hand was more than a scar of mishandled flames.
Len watched as Chronos was trained and educated on how to kill them all. When it came to Len, Chronos shook his head saying he already knew what to do. Len watched as Chronos graduated, top of his class and the best mercenary the Time Masters had. Len watched Mick got his own time ship and began the hunt.
From Chronos perspective, the timeline was off. First he attacked them in Russia at the gulag in 1986 instead of 1975 as Len had thought. After Russia, Chronos went to 1975 where they had their first meet up. Then, to Len’s surprise and confusion, Chronos went back to 1986 to handle Rip personally. Then Chronos chases the ship down to the Soviet Union where he is taken down by fighter jets. It was out of order and confusing but Chronos seemed to understand the order.
Their timelines matched up again in 1958. Len would vomit if he could as he listen to Mick or Chronos or whatever says those words again, reciting what Len had seen in the time stream and had heard the first time.
Len watched the battle of Nanda Parbat and saw firsthand the desperation on his face when he burst in there, frozen stump in hand, ordering the team not to kill his partner, his husband, his Mick.
Len watched as they placed Mick in the cube prison. How he sat their motionless and blank face. How he looked nothing like the Mick from before the farm house fire, juvie, teenage love, prison, crews in Central City, The Flash.
Len watched as Mick got visitors, ending with their fight. Outside, it was obvious Len didn’t put up a fight and Mick must have seen it.
Time seemed to speed up as they got closer to the Oculus explosion. Jonah Hex was barely a glimpse. The Pilgrim came and went in the blink of an eye. Savage’s daughter was even quicker than The Flash.
When they reached the Vanishing Point, Len watched for what went right and what went wrong and found he couldn’t figure it out. He watched Mick get inducted as Chronos again and watched as Mick held his gun against Len. Len smiled sadly when Mick turned his gun on the people who did this to him and knew they were quickly approaching the worst of it.
Len watched Mick sacrifice himself for Ray and watched as he took Mick out, dumping his cold gun and ring on Mick and getting him and Sara to move the fuck along.
Len was surprised that he was gifted the ability to watch what came next. He wasn’t sure how long the Oculus would let him view Mick’s life, but he wasn’t going to waste it, not when his only other option was the silence of death.
Len watched Mick hold the ring and trace the burn on his hand. Len watched the team go their separate ways.
Mick found Lisa almost immediately and told her what happened. She punched him, threatened him, told Mick he should have died instead of her brother before collapsing against him, soaking that damn Henley in tears.
They had a funeral. The team wasn’t invited but they showed up anyways. Sara and Ray taking Mick’s flanks while Lisa stood in the front. Barry came and sat in the back. No one said a word to him.
Before Len’s empty casket was lowered into the dirt, Mick left. He didn’t stick around or say goodbye. Mick turned his back on the funeral and left. No one said a word.
A month went by and Mick tried to fill the void. Len would have been pissed if it wasn’t for the hopeless look that seemed to now be a permanent fixture on Mick. Len couldn’t even feel anything but sorrow as Mick gave his gun to some idiot. Ray pulled him out of the reprieve and Len was given the bitter-sweet satisfaction of them taking down Savage
It wasn’t quite as satisfying to see it go down, although Mick beating the shit out of Savage and lighting him up made Len ecstatic. But to have lost so much to get there, Len wondered if any of them found it worth it.
Realization dawned on Len when he saw Rip take Mick back to 2013. He hadn’t thought about it when they were going through Mick’s timeline before and this meet-up hadn’t been present. It was so far out of his mind but then to watch it happen, knowing why his partner had given him that look and said those words…if Len could rip his heart out, he would.
Len watched as Mick time traveled without him. Len watched as Mick learned to be with others who weren't Len, who weren't Lisa, who weren't the flames. Len watched as Mick fiddled with the ring around his neck and traced the burn on the back of his hand. Len watched as the fire in Mick's eyes dimmed but never faded. Never faded but never shined as bright as before.
To Len's surprise, Mick was the last to die out of all the Legends.
Stein was the first to go, old age and a bullet during Rip's trips taking him out. To Len's surprise, Mick was the one who insisted they bring him back to 2016. Mick was the one to help Jax get everything prepared for a funeral; he even was a fucking pallbearer at the funeral.
When the funeral was over, everyone went to a reception except for Mick who sat in front of Stein's grave with a bottle of scotch. That night Mick went to a rat infested tattoo parlor and got a fucking marijuana leaf tattooed on his shoulder blade. Mick had always been a sentimental fuck, but not the type for ink. Burns were more his style.
In truth, Len was wondering where his tattoo was. Even as his mind was beginning to chip away as his body had, Len wanted his mark on Mick too.
The next to go was the Hawks. Len was surprised that Mick even bothered with them and made sure their plots were together. They died off Mick's timeline so Len didn't know what happened and Mick wasn't pressing for details. Just like he had with Stein, Mick drank Kahlua when everyone else was gone. Len thought Mick was always a dick about these things but drinking coffee liquor at the barista's grave was something else.
When Mick was drunk and wasted, he found his way back to that rat infested tattoo parlor and got two fighting Hawks on his bicep. When Sara picked him up in the morning and saw them, all he said was, "Wanna see them dance?"
Mick retired from Rip's mission from hell when Ray died. Len was surprised to see Mick take it so hard. No one knew Ray was alive except a small group of people but Mick didn't contact any of them. Ray died during the Revolutionary War and Mick buried him there.
With a bottle of moonshine, a needle, and a black ink pen, Mick locked himself in Ray's old room. With the dexterity of a man with two fingers, Mick tattooed the word “Haircut” in a third grader's handwriting on the underside of his wrist. Idiot nearly bled himself out but Mick had always been good at mopping himself up when Len wasn't there to do it.
That night, Mick ditched Ray's room and tumbled into Len's old bed. Len wanted looked away as Mick buried his face into the mattress and screamed.
Rip dropped Mick off in 2017. Mick didn't say a word to the remaining crew of Sara, Jax having left right after Stein passed.
Mick took one of their old safe houses and barreled himself inside. Not even a week in did he get a visit from The Flash.
Taking off the mask, Mick looked up at Barry unimpressed.
“You went to his funeral.”
“He was a hero.”
“I know.”
“I’m here if you-”
“Get lost, Scarlet,” Mick’s lips twitching up for the first time in…years? It was impossible to say with time travel, but using Len’s old nickname for The Flash seemed to bring something up in him.
Mick didn’t leave the safe house unless explicitly necessary. Every once in a while, Lisa or Jax would stop by but little was said during these meeting. Twice Barry had shown up, but it was the same result. Mick bought thousands of candles and watched the burn instead. All the while, he would fiddle with the ring around his neck and caress the burn on the back of his hand.
Mick left the apartment for Sara’s funeral.
In the same fashion as the others, Mick got drunk off vodka at Sara’s grave and got a tattoo of a white canary- “you mean a dove?” “No, a white fucking canary.”- on his other bicep, away from the Hawks.
Jax died ten years later from cancer. Mick wasn’t invited to the funeral, no one knowing their relationship. He found out when he read the Sunday obituary and immediately went to the liquor store, bought a case of beer and chugged them at Jax’s grave.
The Jax tattoo went on the shoulder blade opposite of Stein’s marijuana leaf. Jax was honored with a flaming hot-rod.
He never got a tattoo for Len.
Len watched as the remanding years of Mick’s life were hazy and dismal. With no one left, Mick deteriorated in the safe house. Nothing happened and Len wondered if it was his fault, if he had left Mick alone would he have been happier. The agony of watching what Len’s actions did was more painful that the shredding of his body and the splitting of his mind.
Len’s mind started to fray as Mick’s timeline came to a close. Mick was still alive but Len could tell it was coming to an end. He just never expected it to go this way.
Mick had gotten out of the safe house and Len knew something was up. Mick never left except on Tuesdays at one in the morning to get supplies.
Mick returned with lighter fluid, gasoline, and a match box. It didn’t take a genius to know where this was going.
Len tried to scream, tried to tell Mick to stop and to not do this. But it was in vain. Besides, Len knew there would be no persuasion. This was the first time since Len was alive that Mick had some fire in his eyes.
Mick spent the day dowsing the house in accelerants. He disabled his heat gun and took it apart, using the core as his ignition switch. Mick set the pieces of his gun on a pedestal on the coffee table as Mick sunk onto the couch. With deft fingers, Mick struck a match and dropped it into the pool of lighter fluid that surrounded the core of his gun. It caught within seconds.
As the house burned around him, Mick stayed completely still. Len watched as Mick closed his eyes and the flames began to lick his skin. In Mick’s hand was that goddamn ring and rested across his lap was Len’s cold gun. The remaining energy and life Mick had, he traced the burn on the back of his hand, whispering “Lenny.”
Len watched as his vision dimmed and Mick was engulfed in the flames. Len wanted to cry, he wanted to scream, he wanted to go back and stop himself from sitting next to Mick in the cafeteria and offering to trade his cookie for a fruit-roll up. He wanted to go back and make sure Mick lived without him so Len could never push Mick to do this.
The bright lit of Mick’s final fire darkened and Len knew this was the end. As his vision went black, Len begged to be able to go back.
A match flame brought light to his field of vision. Len stared at the flickering flame and wondered how this was possible when he was supposed to be dead, the Oculus long ago ripping away the last remnants of Leonard Snart.
Len watched as the edges of the flame grew showing a hand, arm, torso, body, face, Mick. His breathe stifled, he actually had breath, as he looked at Mick. It wasn’t the Mick Len had just viewed that was old, decrepit and broken. This Mick was young, eighteen or so. He still had his fucking hair and was wearing that stupid jacket that they had stolen a year after they got out of juvie.
“Lenny?” Mick’s eyes widened on him and Len glanced down to see his body was whole? With a hand- shouldn’t that have been blown away?- he touched his face, feeling it smooth and stubble free.
Mick stepped closer and Len’s eyes were on him again. The only light given to them was a match flame that never lowered or extinguished.
“How-”
“You died,” Len realized, his hands shaking. “We both died.”
Mick didn’t seem as perturbed as Len; then again, Len had killed himself to keep Mick alive, not because he didn’t have anything to lose.
“Why are you sixteen?”
Len’s mind came to a halt as he looked up at young, so young, Mick and realized that the height difference was back to how it was when they were in juvie and it would explain the lack of stumble and-
Damn, apparently Time was just as sentimental of a fuck as Mick and Len pretended not to be. When Len wished to go back, he hadn’t meant like this, but he wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. Not when he was given one last moment with Mick.
“What is this?” Mick asked, looking around but there was nothing to see but black expanse. “Is this death?”
“No,” Len said confidently, although not sure why. “I think this is a waiting period.”
“Before death?” Mick swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. Len nodded his head. “You’re saying we are in the waiting room of death together?”
Len snorted, unable to contain himself as he finally reached out and gripped Mick’s arm, nearly crying in the fact that they could touch and Len could feel the warmth of his arm under his hand. Mick jumped at the touch, clearly not expecting it as well.
“How long do we have?” Mick whispered, as if he was afraid to remind death that they were waiting.
“I don’t know.” Len grabbed Mick’s other arm toward him. Mick seemed to finally get his head in gear as he hauled Lenny, little sixteen year old Lenny, up against him and tucked his face into Len’s neck.
“How are you here?” Mick shuddered beside Len. Len could feel he was shaking and Len wasn’t sure if he was shaking as well as he wrapped his arms around Mick and pulled him as close as possible. “You died so long ago.”
“Time is-” Len paused to press a kiss to Mick’s temple “-weird.”
Mick laughed sadly. “You died but you never left, huh? Can’t stay away?”
“What did I always tell you?” Len asked, lifting Mick’s face so they could see each other, one last time. “I will always, always come back for you.”
Mick grinned wildly and with the strength and ferocity of his eighteen year old self, Mick dragged Len into a kiss and it had been so goddamn long.
“It’s like those vows, huh?” Mick mouthed against Len’s cheek.
Len rolled his eyes but nodded his head in agreement. “God, you sentimental fuck.”
“You’re the one who waited.”
“You’re the one with the tattoos.”
Mick pulled back and watched Len. “You saw that?” He clearly looked nervous about Len seeing what had happened after Len’s death.
“I did.” Len wasn’t sure how much he should say he saw and he wasn’t sure how much time was allowed for them until they were absorbed in the nothingness. “You got one for everyone on the team.”
“Not you,” Mick filled in, knowing where Len’s mind was going.
“Why?” Len shrugged, trying to see uncaring, but Mick knew him better.
“’Didn’t need one,” Mick rumbled as he lifted his hand to show Len the half-moon burn on that back of his hand. “You already laid claim to a part of me. I had nothing left to give.”
Because they couldn’t be in this waiting room of death forever, Len wrapped an arm around Mick’s neck and brought him in for a kiss. Mick’s arms tightened around Len, afraid to let him go once ago. Len’s free hand found Mick’s, the one on his hip, as he traced his mark, the half-moon burn on the back of his hand.