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The alarms started beeping and Cisco headed straight for the computers. He pulled up the surveillance footage for everyone to see.“Guys!” he called Caitlin and Barry over. “We’ve got company.” The trio huddled around the computer to have a look at her visitor.“Well, she doesn’t look evil,” Caitlin commented. The woman on screen was looking straight up at the camera and had her arms raised in surrender.“Well, she hasn’t barged in on her own like the last three metas we’ve had,” Barry agreed.“And she’s pretty,” Cisco said. “Very, very pretty.” After a moment of silence he noticed the annoyed looks from his friends. “What? Facts are facts.” Caitlin rolled her eyes at him.“Right.” Barry zipped around the room in a flurry of lightning and appeared dressed in his Flash suit. “I’m gonna go out there and bring her in. Be prepared for anything.” As he zoomed out of the room in a whoosh, both Cisco and Caitlin found their arms loaded with stun guns. A split second later, the Flash reappeared with a woman in his arms, only slightly dazed as she moved out of his hold.“My, that’s fast even for you, Mr. Allen,” she said breathlessly in a British accent as she swiped her brown hair out of her face.“How do you know who I am?” Barry demanded.“Sorry, I suppose – have we not met yet?” she asked confused. “I thought I got the time right.”“You’re from the future?” Cisco asked, keeping his guard up just in case.“Yes, well no. But also yes.”“Any time you want to start making sense?”“Sorry.” She turned to face Barry. “Hello Mr. Allen, I am Gideon. And you are, will be, my creator.”Barry’s jaw dropped the same time Cisco and Caitlin’s guns clattered to the ground. Cisco moved around them in a circle, pointing fingers from Gideon to the wall to Barry as inaudible sounds and squeaks left his mouth.“But, no, cause Gideon is-”“I was an Artificial Intelligence created by you, yes,” Gideon said easily. She moved around the room and turned up her nose at the archaic technology around her. It would have to do for now. Caitlin was wary and kept her distance around the other woman. Gideon swiped her hand over the desk and looked back at them again. “I believe Eobard kept me in the hidden wall of this lab? Please either disconnect me or do not tell me that I am here, it was in my past.”“Yeah, you’re there, so how can you be-”“Future,” Gideon said simply, cutting Barry off again. She wrung her hands together. “After some time, the Time Masters took me, I went rogue with my Captain and we recruited the Legends.”Understanding dawned in Barry’s eyes. “So you’re the Gideon from the Waverider, the Legends’.”“I am one and the same, both of them at different points in my timestream.”“But you’re human now,” Caitlin said slowly.Gideon nodded. “Yes, an unfortunate accident made permanent.”“And you want us to change you back?” Barry asked slowly.“Not exactly.” Gideon took a deep breath and raised her palm, blue sparks shot out as electricity crackled under her skin and out her fingertips. “There was a complication with my transformation.”“You’re a meta,” Cisco whispered.Gideon nodded once more. “It seems that way.”“Well, what do you want us to do?” Barry asked.Gideon looked down sadly. “I made a mistake. Nearly killed the one I love. If you can’t fix me, I need you to teach me how to control it.” Gideon took a deep breath and concentrated, the white ball of electricity in her palm expanding and crackling. She could feel the heat of it, the white blinding her eyes until she saw spots, it felt like something was tugging on her heart. It made no sense. When she wanted to control it, it hurt, and when she didn’t, it poured out of her like water.Finally, it all got too much and Gideon released the glowing ball with a painful scream. The ball shattered, electric snakes and sparks flying in complete disorder. Gideon did nothing to help her companions as they all took cover from the danger. Her composure and expression were kept calm and cold as she watched the chaos. Even as the sparks hit her, they didn’t burn or hurt her. They simply melted into her, a piece of her life force now. It wasn’t fair.“You’re getting better,” Rip said as he stood up and brushed off his duster.“You don’t need to lie to me,” Gideon said miserably.“He’s not. You held that for a whole five seconds this time,” Jax said encouragingly. Gideon shook her head and looked away from them.“It’s not getting better.”“You just need more practice-”“It’s not just practice!” she screamed at Rip. Sparks shot out from her fingertips and she could feel the current running under her skin in blue streams. Rip’s eyes widened and took a step back. She gasped lightly, her energy dying down, and stepped back again. “You’re scared of me,” she whispered.“No, no, Gideon. Of course not.” Rip reached out, trying to comfort her but Gideon shrugged him off.“You pulled away. You were scared. Of me.”“You have great power now, Gideon. And yes, at times it gets erratic, which is why we need to practice.”That brought everything rushing back to her. “There is no ‘we’ in this, Rip!” she hissed at him. His hand hovered over her arm warily as she glared at him. “It’s not you. It’s me. Just me, as it always has been.”“Gideon, I know how hard it is to adjust to new powers-”“You had Professor Stein to teach you,” Gideon cut Jax off. “You were never alone either.”“And neither are you,” Rip insisted. “We’re here for you, Gideon.”“And you’re scared of me! You’re scared of how much power flows through my veins.” She took a step forward as her eyesight fogged up and a blue haze filled her vision. “You resent me-”“That’s not true-”“You hate that I’m human now. That I have all this power and can’t even be useful. That I can’t even connect with the Waverider anymore. That I can control electricity but haven’t mastered technology. That all of this is just bottled up inside of me, crackling, fighting, just waiting to be let out.”“Gideon, please.” Rip touched her lightly and she screamed.He was thrown back against the wall and slumped to the floor as waves of blue voltage exploded from Gideon. As the dust cleared, she choked back a sob at the sight. The lights were half blown out and the others were hanging by a single thread. The tables and chairs had been overturned. Jax cowered behind one, and Rip…Rip laid unconscious on the floor.Gideon pressed a hand to her mouth and shook her head, her line of sight blurring with tears. “Oh, oh no,” she whimpered.“Gideon,” Jax said slowly, raising his hand for her.She shook her head and took a step back, her hand crackling with remnants of sparks. Jax eyed them carefully; the slightest bit of fear in his eyes and Gideon broke down in tears again. She stepped back shaking her head, her hand emitting sparks as a warning not to follow.“Sorry, I’m sorry. So sorry,” she repeated before she took off at a run. Gideon was a menace. Gideon concentrated, feeling the tugging of her heart and allowed the energy to trickle out of her. It helped if she thought of it as a faucet like when she had been an AI. She could control the flow with as much pressure as she wanted. A little more….sparks shot out of her palm and she directed a stream of current to her target. The cardboard villain was burnt to a crisp. Gideon took a deep breath and imagined the faucet turning off, all the power going back to her heart.Clapping sounded behind her and she turned to grin at her creator. Barry came up with a smile and hugged her tight.“You’ve been doing great lately. Honestly, you’ve improved so much in such a short time, Gideon,” Barry said sincerely.Gideon blushed. “Thank you, Mr. Allen. It’s all thanks to you.”“Nice job, Gideon! Very nice work,” Cisco cheered from the sidelines. “Three in total, your accuracy is forty three percent better and your control has improved by seventy percent.”She smiled at the words. Things always made more sense in statistics and binary. “Thank you, Mr. Ramon.” She blew a kiss at him and winked. Barry shook her head at her and she shrugged innocently. Harmless flirting was fun. Besides, Mr. Ramon always did look so adorable all flustered.“And now that you’re finished with training, it’s time for your medical examination,” Caitlin said, coming up next to her.Gideon grumbled under her breath, she was starting to understand why her Captain never liked going to the medbay. It was so boring to sit around for an hour. Not that she would ever tell him that. Gideon felt a stab of pain in her heart, remembering how long it had been since she had seen her Captain and wondered if she ever would again. She couldn’t chance hurting him or any of the Legends again. That was why she went to Mr. Allen in the first place, for help. So far, her shooting accuracy had improved, but controlling technology still took more focus than it had as an AI. It wasn’t just a matter of thought anymore, it was work. The last two times she had tried she had fried the computers they had. She held a funeral for them but only Cisco had shown up.“Just take a seat, I promise it will be over soon,” Caitlin said, patting the bed. Gideon swung her legs up and tried to make herself comfortable and Caitlin ran her tests and poked her with needles. It was all in hopes that perhaps they could still remove her powers. “There we go, I’ve got what I need for the blood test.” She put a sparkly pink bandaid on the spot, an inside joke between the two women, and grinned.“Thank you, Doctor Snow.”“You are very welcome.” Caitlin took a seat and pulled out her tablet. “Gideon, I wanted to show you something. The brain scans we took when you first came here.”She sat up straighter and leaned over to look at the tablet. “I apologize, Doctor Snow. Much of my medical knowledge did not transfer over in the change to human.”“Do you see these shaded areas?” Caitlin pointed out to the purplish mases. “Those are where the brain collects our memories, and yours, there’s something wrong with yours. Gideon, I think some of your memories might be missing. And from this, I think it was something significant.”Gideon frowned. “From the change to being human?”“I’m not sure,” Caitlin admitted. “But if you’re interested, we can have Cisco try to vibe and help you remember.”Gideon nodded. “Yes, I would like that very much.” Caitlin turned and paged Cisco, a few minutes later he appeared at the doorway. They quickly explained the situation to him and he held out his hand for Gideon’s.Taking a deep breath she locked hands in him and was plunged into her thoughts. Blue tinted memories gave way to the missing one. It all swirled around her and she could only watch in horror. The sparks flew everywhere and she heard the Legends yelling for her. But it was done.Cisco broke apart from her, gulping for breath as he took a step away. Gideon reached for the bed in support, still trying to grapple what she had seen. What she had done. Caitlin went for them both, a hand on each shoulder until Gideon pulled away. But Cisco held onto his friend as he looked at Gideon worriedly.“What did you see?” Caitlin asked.“Cait, we shouldn’t have…” Cisco trailed off quietly, watching Gideon carefully.“I’m fine, Mr. Ramon,” she said coldly.“Really? Because what we saw-”“What? That I’m a monster?” she snapped at him. Cisco flinched at her tone and Gideon took a deep breath, trying to keep herself calm, keep her powers calm. That was what had started this all.“I never said that,” he said softly.“I’m sorry.” She wiped a tear. “But maybe it isn’t real?”“Gideon, I’m sorry, but it was real. My powers can differentiate between the real and fake. That memory…”“Was erased from my mind,” Gideon whispered in realization.“There was probably a reason for that. This is why.”“It was just one memory that was missing?” Caitlin asked in surprise. “From the scans I would have expected it to be a significant chunk, it seemed like it was on your mind a lot.”“Yes, I imagine so. It’s what I am as a human.”Caitlin looked between the two, understanding that whatever they had seen, it had been unpleasant. “You blocked it out?”“No, I didn’t. The Time Masters, however, they had technology that could,” Gideon said slowly, feeling the anger in her bones as she realized the betrayal.“You said the Time Masters were gone.”“They are. Except for one. And he’s the only one that has the means and knowledge to wipe my mind like this.” But in all her existence, Gideon never thought Rip Hunter would have been the one to hurt her like this. Sara stared at the sleeping woman on the medcouch and then at Rip sitting in the chair, holding his hand and pressing it to his lips. She walked over and rested her hand on his shoulder for comfort.“How is she?” Sara asked quietly.“She will be in a medical coma for another two days. It should be enough time for her body to heal.” He hoped.“And her powers?”“Doctor Palmer and Professor Stein have tried everything, but even they can’t think of a meta cure. She’s stuck like this.”Sara leaned over and moved Gideon’s hair out of her face. “She really is pretty.”Rip quirked his lips. “She is. And she would hate being demeaned to only being a pretty face. Why do you think she never showed us her true form as an AI?”“Because you would have gotten distracted and crashed the ship?” Sara joked. Rip rolled his eyes at her but didn’t argue. After a moment they both sobered. “What are you going to tell her?”“Nothing.”“Rip-”“She won’t remember this, Sara. She won’t remember any of it and that’s what I want.”“It doesn’t matter what you want, this is about Gideon, Rip. Your Gideon!”“Yes, mine. Mine to look after and protect no matter what. Just as she has me all these years!” Rip squeezed Gideon’s hand. Unconscious as she was, she still gave him strength. “I owe her my life and more, Sara. And if I can take this small piece of pain away from her, I will.”“So she won’t remember what happened?”“No. I administered the amnesia drugs earlier today.”Sara sighed and shook her head. There was no going back now. Even if she didn’t agree and was Captain, Rip knew Gideon best.“I’m doing this for her,” Rip insisted. “It’s better this way. She wouldn’t be able to live with herself if she knew the truth.”“Can you live with yourself knowing what you’ve done to your best friend?”Rip looked down and didn’t answer. Sara shook her head and walked out of the medbay. Gideon sat at the picnic table, listening to the wind whistle through the trees. It was silent otherwise, no children playing, or couples on dates, no one. It always was at night. It was perfect for stargazing. She could see Orion the clearest, but could also make out Gemini through the wispy clouds. It would have been better on a clear night, but Gideon had craved the solace, the emptiness. It mirrored how she felt on the inside since she had found out the truth.The truth that her Captain had hid from her. It was why he was scared of her. Now that the memory was unlocked, some days, it was all Gideon could think about. The crackle of electricity, the smell of hair burning, the screams of the Legends, and numbness she had felt. Empty. Gideon shook the thought from her head and watched her skin glow a faint blue. Sparks shot out of her fingertips and she bounced them along from finger to finger, playing with the voltage. It helped soothe her these days when nothing else could.She was so entranced with the white, purple, and blue intermingling, she didn’t hear the rustle of the leaves, feel the shift in the air. She didn’t even know anyone was there until she heard the engines settle down. Gideon quashed the sparks in her fist immediately, the hair on the back of her neck standing up on end.“Gideon.”“You found me,” she said coolly.“Hiding in Central City. Smart.” Rip took a step towards her, eyeing her as if she were a stray kitten. Gideon made no move to leave.“All the metas and temporal anomalies shield this place from normal time travelers. And yes, I did quite enjoy meeting my creators. How did you finally find me?”“You were scared and you didn’t want me. Where else would you go but to your father?”Gideon swallowed and looked away. Rip took a step forward and she glared at him. “Stay where you are.”He froze mid step. “Gideon, please. Come home,” he pleaded.“I don’t have a home.” Her voice cracked as she remembered what he had done to her. What she had done. “I-I don’t deserve one.”“Gideon, it was an accident. I’m fine. Look at me.”She shook her head. “I can’t, not without remembering what you did.”“What I di-aah!”Rip had taken a step forward and Gideon had retaliated. Blue volts blasted out of her hands and circled Rip, floating him up in the air where he stayed as her prisoner. She moved his body easily with just a swish of her palm. Simple static electricity. She had learned that with Mr. Allen, too.“Yes, what you did!” she yelled at him. “My memories, how could you?”Rip opened and closed his mouth a few times. “I was protecting you.”“Protecting me? From the truth?”“I thought it would be best for you if-”“If what? If I didn’t know what I really am.” Tears filled her eyes and her power stopped flowing. Rip dropped to the ground as Gideon fell to her knees in tears. “Why don’t you just call me what I really am, Rip? A murderer.” Gideon pressed herself against the wall, her heart racing as Jax pressed against her. Her heart was racing but they were almost home free. This was the last time she would insist on going out in the field with the Legends. No, it was much safer on her ship. No crazy people shooting at them. Human skin was so delicate. She didn’t like it.“Come on!” Jax grabbed her hand and they were running again down the halls, narrowly missing the guards until they came to the end of the hallway. The doors were just past him. He raised his gun at them and called for backup.Gideon’s eyes widened, her heartbeat picking up again, beating like the wings of a hummingbird. The guard stepped towards them and all she saw was blue.“Gideon? Gideon!”Jax’s voice sounded far away, filtering through syrup. Gideon needed to protect them. That had always been her job. Her hand raised and blue streams of light hit the guard in the chest. He ricocheted off the wall and fell to the ground in a heap. But Gideon couldn’t stop it anymore, it was all leaving her in a rush. The electricity kept sparking but she didn’t notice as she leaned over him to check on the man. A simple touch and the electrostatic pulse stopped his heart. One second it was there, and the next it wasn’t.“Jax?” Gideon said weakly, the faint crackling in her ears still.“Gideon, relax.”“Jax, I killed him!” She couldn’t get air fast enough. Gideon was drowning. She pressed her hand to the guard’s chest. If she could stop his heart she could restart it. Surely, she could restart it.“Gideon, we have to go.”“No, no, we have to help!” She pushed his hand off as she tried to help the man. The smell of burnt hair filled her nostrils. There were scorch marks still on the wall, evidence of what she had done.“Gideon, come on!”“No!”Someone grabbed her arms and she struggled and screamed. Rip shushed her and held on tightly as Sara yelled her name but Gideon still tried to escape.“Gideon, Gideon, he’s dead.”“I killed him? I killed him!” She clawed at his arms as Rip tried to drag her away. She still simmered with electricity. Rip winced a few times but didn’t let go of her. Nothing made sense anymore. She killed a man. She killed him. It made her heart ice at the thought of it. Soon the cold spread everywhere, from her tiptoes to the hair roots. Nothing but cold. “I killed him,” she whispered. It was the last thing she remembered before everything going black.Rip sighed and picked her up bridal style, nodding to the others. “Let’s go.” He dropped the stun gun on the ground.“Rip, is she going to be okay?” Jax asked worriedly.Rip stared at the man on the ground. “It was an accident. Gideon doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. She just couldn’t control her powers. She needs training is all. Newly minted human, she just needs time.”“But is she going to be okay? Her. Not her powers.”“Yes.” Rip would make sure of it. “Now, let’s get out of here before backup comes.” Rip dropped to the ground and gathered Gideon in his arms. He pressed kisses to her hair as she sobbed into his shirt. All he could do was hold her tight and hope she felt loved.“I killed him. He was innocent and I killed him.”“It wasn’t your fault,” Rip said sternly. “I took you out there before you were ready. Gideon, I am so sorry.”She shook her head. “This is on me, not you.”“Gideon-”“You don’t know how this feels. Because despite all your shortcomings, you have never killed another man.” The unruliest, most ruthless Time Master without a drop of blood shed. There was a reason he was infamous. “You are a good man. I am not.”“Yes, you are, Gideon. Don’t say that. You are!” He hugged her tightly.“You don’t really think that. If you did, you wouldn’t have erased my memory.”Rip swallowed the lump in his throat and looked down. “I was wrong. I see that now, Gideon. But truly, all I wanted was to take care of you. You have helped me and guided me so much over the years. I thought it was my turn to do so for you. Protect you. Sara was right. I went about it the wrong way.”“What if I can’t be helped?” she whispered. “These powers – I – I don’t feel like myself anymore. It’s like it’s churning inside of me all the time, begging to be let out. What if that’s who I really am? Just a monster?”“You’re not, Gideon. You’re not.” He brushed her hair aside and kissed her forehead. “You are the best person I know – AI or human. You’re not a monster or evil, you’re good. So, so good.”“I don’t feel that way. I hurt you!”“And I’m fine.” He took her hands and placed them on his face. “See? Not a scratch on me. Not one. After I came to in the medbay and didn’t find you, Gideon, I might have gone mad. You can’t just leave me like that.”“I was trying to protect you too. From me.”“I don’t need protection from you. I just want to be with you.”“Then you should have done that instead of wiping my memories! I needed you and you weren’t there, not like you should have been.”“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, Gideon.” He rubbed her arms. “You’re right, I should have been. I have no excuse except I truly though I was doing the right thing. But I’m here now, that counts, right?” Gideon nodded slightly and Rip kissed her hairline. “So you’ll come home?” he whispered hopefully.“I don’t know where that is anymore.”“With me. With the Legends. On the ship.”Gideon shook her head. “Not anymore. It’s – it’s too dangerous. At least for now,” she said hurriedly, seeing him about to argue. “I came here to learn how to control my powers. I still have a lot to learn.”“You want to stay here?”Gideon nodded.“Then this is where we will stay. Together. Because I am not letting you go again, Gideon. I can’t.” He held her tightly as if she were his lifeline. “Never again. We are staying together.”“I would like that very much, Rip.”She clasped their hands together and kissed his cheek. Sparks flew around them, looking like lightning bugs in the night sky. Beautiful and dangerous, all in one. Just like her. Rip laid out on the grass and pulled her with him, holding her protectively to his chest. She looked so innocent with her big wide eyes in wonder at the stars and how she curled around him instinctively. She had it completely wrong. Gideon wasn’t a monster.“You’re magnificent.”