#I have no idea how he'd convince cisco not to trust barry but I do not doubt he could

[vexic929]

Post no no, pick the idea back up, I want to know what it is👀

oooh okay so! the idea is kind of an eowells/cisco au where instead of killing cisco in the day that didn't happen and triggering his vibes, cisco's vibes start earlier and eobard recognizes this and chooses to train and manipulate cisco into being his ally against barry

[kitkatt0430]

Oooh how about an AU where Hartley’s part of Team Flash from the start 👀

I have soooo many thoughts on this kind of AU. Some of which may or may not be contradictory. :D

So first and foremost, I do not see Hartley agreeing with the pipeline. Either he convinces the team not to go in that direction at all or it becomes the sticking point that makes him leave the team when it becomes clear the pipeline isn't going to be the short term solution he was assured it would be.

Hartley does leave the team at some point regardless of the pipeline. I could see this either as EoWells swaying Hartley to his side and pitting him against Barry only for Hartley to learn the truth of his friend/lover in the worst way, or him splitting from the team due to being unwilling to work with Harrison anymore over his growing number of secrets.

I really like the idea that if Hartley still knew about the flaw ahead of time and that's what splits him from the team, that he turns whistleblower about it and goes to Iris. He may not trust EoWells anymore but he's grown to trust Barry and, through Barry, Iris too. It'd be good for Iris too to get something big to her name early that has nothing to do with the Flash (that they know of anyway) and I could see it spurring Mason to be more respectful of Iris and give her an in for picking up Mason's investigation into Wells when it gets him killed.

While Hartley would split from the team during S1, I think S2 he'd be firmly back in with the team. It'd be awkward at first and take time for ruffled feathers over S1 events to settle, but he'd be a permanent part of the team going forward.

Romance wise, I'd either want him to meet Roderick but not necessarily start dating him yet, meet David Singh and get to have his canon love interest from the comics, or have a belligerent UST thing with Cisco that settles into dating eventually (but maybe they both casually date others first). Admittedly, Hartmon is my preference but I could see any of these working out really well. (Or I could go even more AU and do pre-Barry/Hartley...)

Ronnie and Hartley are friends. Which probably bewildered Cisco until he and Hartley begrudgingly became friends too.

Hartley would at least talk about having a younger sister, if not have Jerrie show up. (If she didn't appear in S1, then she'd definitely show up in S2.)

Hartley has pet rats! They are cute and he's so soft for them. :D

S2 events would have Hartley's parents reaching out to him and the struggle there for reconciling with them. Hartley wants it very much, but not to the point of compromising on certain things his parents need to keep working on if they're serious about wanting their son back. I can see him pointing out that them trying to be less homophobic is great, but he can't trust it if they aren't going to work on not being transphobic or otherwise queerphobic.

The Rogues! I can see him teaming up with Snart in S1 perhaps, making his choice to side back with Team Flash in S2 rockier with a more Rogues focused S2. Snart wants Rathaway's skills back on his team and Hartley is running out of polite ways to say 'no'.

I've got a lot of ideas for this kind of AU, really. And it's one I very much want to write at some point.