I do not own these characters. No infringement intended.

Rating: NC-17 for sexual situations

Verse: Pre-Smallville

A/N: The title is shamelessly ripped from Pat Benatar's 'We Belong'. This story is not a prequel or sequel to my other Tollie story "We Belong to the Thunder". I was just too lazy to come up with a more creative title. And apparently I was playing a lot of Pat Benatar! :) Disregard most of Season 10.

We Belong to the Light
[Their story doesn't end.]

Chapter 1

Roughly Early 2002

He watched her sleep on the airplane for several hours. She'd only filled him in on very few details about who she was before she laid down to rest. Other than knowing she'd finished up her undergrad in Marine Biology at Harvard, he was at a pretty big loss as to her life story. Frankly though, he didn't need to know much more than that to be convinced that he wanted to know more. He made a quick few phone calls investigating her as delicately as he could, seeing if he could have any clothing and necessary possessions of hers delivered to Star City for the time being to help her adjust.

Only a few hours ago, he'd asked her for more than a shared plane right off that island of hell. He'd asked her to come with him to Star City, to join his life. He'd never asked anyone that before.

{Flashback}

"Oliver," she stated, as if adjusting to knowing his name.

They were sitting directly across from each other, the small, teak table between them.

"That would be correct."

She tried not to smile. She hadn't smiled in a long time and she almost felt like he was mocking everything she said because it was amusing to him. It wasn't that he wasn't funny, but she got the impression that he had already decided it was fun to get a rise out of her.

"I just want you to know that even though Marcos knew who you were, I didn't, and that's not why I did my part in saving you."

"Your part," he repeated, disliking the fact that she wasn't taking enough credit for all that she did.

"Are you hard of hearing?" she objurgated.

"No, I'm not. You think I'm unaware that they wouldn't have saved me if I weren't attached to a title I didn't ask for? I know exactly what those kinds of people are like."

"Yes, and I'm not one of them. And it's really hard to think about what I left behind on that island, who I left behind even though I'm free now. I should've been able to protect her and I didn't. But I don't care about what they care about."

Oliver lingered on the thought of her best friend's murder. "I'm sorry you lost her. It was because of me and I shouldn't have let that happen to either of you."

She could see the deep remorse in his eyes.

"I don't blame you for that," she said carefully and sincerely. "Marcos," she began to explain and then chose to not bother. "It's a long story, but you were a pawn for something he wanted. She and I were pieces just as much as you were. He was just a monster. That's not your fault."

He felt undeserving of her huge, green eyes looking at him like he was somehow more than he was. He may have saved her life, but she'd saved his first and he'd failed to protect Megan, who had been shot to death because of him. Tess could spin it anyway she wanted, but that was the truth.

"I know you're not like them. Where…where are you going to go?" he asked her, never having heard nervousness in his own voice before.

Had he ever been in this situation before?

"I guess back to Massachusetts. After that, I don't know," she said almost nonchalantly. "Massachusetts is fine, much better than the south, but I don't know that I really have to stay there to study what I want to study."

"I love that you still want to be around the water," he smirked at her.

"Earth is 71% water," she smiled. "I know," she nodded, realizing how silly she came off. "It still doesn't bother me. The island was beautiful to me. The company was pure, undeniable hell, but I've never minded the ocean."

He never thought someone might say no to a request he made - and he was pretty sure he could convince her, but it was definitely not lost on him that she was different than everyone else endlessly sucking up to him, telling him exactly what he wanted to hear, regardless of their own, actual thoughts. "Come with me."

"To San Francisco?"

"Star City. There's an ocean there."

"Yeah, I've actually heard of California."

Okay, now she was making it difficult for him to hold back from doing something she'd probably think was inappropriate without a bottle of wine or two. He settled for reaching for her face when she wasn't as focused on him as he would've preferred.

"I'm serious and you know that. Have a cup of coffee with me if nothing else. You can still get what you need from Cambridge, but I didn't get the luxury of meeting you in a normal situation. I have to push the limits in order to keep you around. If I don't manipulate the situation so we can see each other, we won't. It's not exactly my fault."

"Yeah," she nodded, pulling his hand down in hers. "I'll definitely buy that for a dollar. However - when you're you and I'm…not, I'm not sure I see the point."

"I could be obvious."

She gave him a look. "You could lose your arm too."

She let go of his hand, signaling that he not tick her off, but that she wasn't sincerely pissed off by the banter either.

"Coffee," she said. "I think we'll actually arrive in the evening, and I think a meal that included a decent amount of seasoning would be incredible."

{End of Flashback}

Tess Mercer now slept on Oliver's plane, heading to Star City with him. She woke up on her own as the plane began its downward tilt, and although they had both cleaned up a little on the plane, they joked about their mutual longing for a real shower.

Tess thought she'd mentally prepared herself for the difference between Oliver's wealthy lifestyle and her own on the plane ride over, however she'd been unequivocally wrong in assuming she'd done that sufficiently. It wasn't the size of his penthouse, it was more that he'd invited her to be with him in some fashion that they hadn't completely touched the details of quite yet, and she wasn't at all unaware that he held all of the power.

When he'd held his hand out to her on the island, every hope inside her wanted him to keep looking at her the way he was. But now, seeing what he had, and what he could easily have again, she felt completely out of place in this world he'd brought her into. Why couldn't he have been someone she could've felt worthy of? He was used to the most perfectly kept, socially connected women in the world and she stood there without a hair brush or a driver's license.

"Okay, you're not having a good reaction right now," he commented as he guided her to his open kitchen.

"It's not a bad reaction, and it's not a reaction to you or your home, it's just me thinking."

"Well, you can take a break from that and take your clothes," he said handing her folded clothes. "…and the bathroom's through there," he added gesturing to her left.

"My clothes?" she asked when he placed them in her hands.

"Not yours, I had them brought here for you. And I called Harvard and they did still have a few of your things that will be here tomorrow, being that there was still an open investigation for you. I told them you'd call them tomorrow for any arrangements, but I thought you might want the basic things. And since you don't have any immediate family-"

He stopped immediately as he noticed her expression of distress.

"—and I don't either, which may explain why I have no manners."

"You had my things packed and investigated me while I was asleep?"

"I didn't pack your things personally, no. I'm having them brought here. And I didn't investigate you…exactly."

"I was less than ten feet away from you. Why didn't you wake me up if that's what you were planning?"

"I was trying to help?" he said more as a question than an answer.

"I am suddenly disturbed by how deep a sleeper I must be."

She stared ahead, nervous thoughts of all the things he could've found out in a matter of minutes that she would've preferred that he not before knowing her only a full day, and it began looping, over and over in her head, freaking her out more and more. There was pain in her past that she had a hard enough time thinking about. She didn't want him digging it up.

"You scare me when you do that," he told her.

"What?"

"That! Think, analyze thoughts I can't see."

"Oh you should be very glad that there are some things that stay in my head," she shot back, frustrated and tired, and yet still mildly amused by his overall personality. "Alright," she sighed, giving in, feeling groggy, hungry, and overheated. "Shower's that way?"

"Yeah, are you going to climb out the window?"

"Why would I when the front door is right there?" she replied with a small smile as she walked to his bathroom.

~o~o~

Afterwards, he worked to take a faster shower than her so he could encourage her to have dinner at a restaurant two blocks away. They both sat in the late hours of the evening, victims to the smell of gourmet food. It became worse when the food arrived.

They both became enveloped in the flavors and they savored the moment before speaking. Just as she felt her stomach muscles really relax after having guns constantly aimed at her for several months straight, Oliver asked a perfectly logical question that sent her nerves spiraling again.

"Do you ever wish you had siblings to help fill the void?"

She swallowed, took a sip of water and looked him directly in the eye. "No."

Immediately knowing how bad that sounded, as much as she hated having to say anything else about the childhood she barely survived, she gave a little bit more.

"I don't want to think about anyone else having to bear what I did. I had a father who couldn't stand the sight of me and a mother who died before I could really stand up to him, and I barely survived it. It was enough. I wouldn't wish it on anyone else."

"And now he's gone?"

"He wasn't there when I left," she said, trying to take another bite of food, now biting into something that seemed to have lost all flavor. "Everything you're imagining he might've done, that I might've endured, you'd be close enough. I've spent years getting as far away from that as possible. I just need to think about something else if that's okay."

"Okay then," he said, amazing her as he brought the discussion to an end with a small laugh from her.

"Were your parents perfect and beautiful? And blonde?"

"Is that wrong?"

She rolled her eyes and sighed with a grin on her face.

"No, it's just a little nauseating. A life of perfection."

"Oh yeah, completely perfect," he replied cynically. "With all those thoughts you have in there, I know you can be more observant than that. But you, you know how to save someone from a poison of an exotic plant and you do it. And you have a life mission that you care about."

"Life mission?"

"You're a marine biologist. You don't call that something you care about?"

"More than anything, of course. I just never gave it that label."

"Why did you choose it?"

"It's something you can't see easily. It's precious life that we rely on, that we need to protect. And when I was a child, it was where I could go in my mind, and it's everything I love now."

When she looked at the color of his eyes, she began to notice the texture of the food in her mouth again, and then she noticed the bracelet missing from her arm.

"Her bracelet," she whispered.

"Megan's?" he asked her.

"I left it in your bathroom," she said, closing her eyes regretfully.

"We'll go back after dinner and you can get it," he assured her, working hard to not let her see her pain affect him when he knew he'd had a part in creating it.

"I know, thank you," she replied, trying to convince herself that what he was saying was sensible and all right. "But this is the first time I go out after her death and I still couldn't remember to wear it," she said aloud. "It's something so simple to do for someone you love."

He reached across the table and placed two fingers over her wrist, so grateful for human touch again. "You just said no one else has to know or understand. You know about it, and she knows. The bracelet's still there, and I believe in your love for her."

She could've taken his hand and latched on, never letting go for the rest of her life. She could've guessed how many people had wanted him, needed him, fallen for him, but very few people had looked at her when she was at her lowest point and still pushed her to see her own strength.

"I'm sorry," she said. "You're trying so hard to comfort me and I'm not making it easy on you."

She might not have been complimenting him on an endless basis like he remembered being accustomed to, but she was real, completely transparent, and he could feel that she was reaching out to him even though she was purposely trying not to.

"You need to imagine I'm just a guy in a library or something so that nothing you or I do matters. I keep feeling like you have an image of me now that you didn't when we first met. And it's going to bother you every time you find out something about me."

"Oh yeah? Something like what?"

"Like, I own this restaurant."

She paused eating again, trying not to laugh at him.

"There anything in this town you don't own?" she commented questioningly while swallowing. "Tread carefully with that answer," she advised him and he laughed at her.

"I think I'll hold off answering that."

She watched him look at her, knowing she must've been different to him than what he was used to. She couldn't eat while he was that focused on her and she didn't feel like she could consume any more food anyway. She leaned back in her chair, smiling genuinely at him.

"You want to walk with me a little? I haven't seen Star City before."

~o~o~

"You were there two years, right?" she asked warily, feeling chilly from the temperature difference between the island and northern California.

"Yeah," he said, rubbing her arms for an instant, and then he pulled away when she looked down at his hands.

She didn't want him to think she minded, but apparently she'd done that anyway. She looked ahead, getting herself out of the awkward moment and she smiled uninhibitedly, rushing forward a few steps.

"Look!" she called back to him, jumping into the street and landing in a puddle of water. "Did you see it?" she asked him with the delight of a five-year-old and the perseverance of a warrior.

"You mean you jumping into a puddle in the middle of the road?"

Her eyes widened, exasperated that he'd missed it. "Oh you weren't a child once?" she goaded playfully. "Oh, I'm sorry. You probably had hired help catering to your every whim and making sure that you were tended to at all times."

She smiled at him, thinking that he was the one who was innocent and she came back to his side. "Look up," she whispered and he did, seeing a full moon with a large, visible white ring around it. "That was reflected in the puddle and I thought it was beautiful, so I embraced my inner child for a minute."

She was beside him now, totally immersed in the sky. He did enjoy the sparkling stars and moon that she was so moved by, but he could smell his shampoo in her hair and he wanted to move closer to her. He was charmed by her sense of youth, and that although she felt she was damaged, she could point out to him things he wouldn't have noticed otherwise.

"What does it mean?" he asked her just to keep her close.

"In literal terms it means that there are ice crystals in a hexagonal shape in the outer atmosphere reflecting in the sunlight, causing the ring. The folklore says bad weather is coming."

"Should I be worried?"

"You scared of rain?"

~o~o~

"This is not a Pretty Woman situation," he smiled, cautious yet cocky at the same time.

"I know that," she replied, laughing softly, still slightly unsure. She looked at the bedroom he was providing her.

"There are some spare clothes in the drawers and shirts you can use if you get cold. Do whatever you feel comfortable with and tomorrow we can figure out a plan."

He hesitated, worrying about her worrying. At this moment, though, she was more concerned with his reactions and with watching him. She wanted him to relax, to be in control and make her feel like he wanted her, that somehow this was a normal situation…that she was normal, and that all of this was normal. When she thought he might start to turn away, she spoke up.

"Oliver."

It was one word, but she had all the strength in her voice.

Her heart leapt and she couldn't tell if it was his hand or his mouth that got to her first when he kissed her, drawing her into the tangled web of emotions he seemed to have scrambled inside of himself. Her hand instantly went to his chest, feeling his heart pounding against her palm. Her lips parted against his as he began drawing her head back, unintentionally making her feel a need inside him she hadn't felt in anyone…possibly ever. She forced herself not to shiver or exhale too quickly even as she aligned herself against him, kissing him back, wanting to meet him, love it, and give into everything she felt for him.

She rose up on her toes a little, not used to being forced to have a response so quickly. He slowed down for her, making the kiss wetter, easier, sucking her lip gently, but more graphically. He hadn't tasted innocence on someone in a long time, and yet he still believed that she could win any argument. He knew that even though she wasn't pulling back, and even though he wanted her, that she wanted nothing more than a kiss tonight. Her fingers went to his face and although that made it harder to not hold onto her tighter, he pulled back, both of them hearing the loud break of their mouths as she opened her hazy eyes to look at him.

She widened her eyes and bit down on her swollen lower lip to keep from laughing at him trying to act as casual as possible. He said his most laid-back goodnight and disappeared into the dim hallway.

She knew they wouldn't survive very long living in the same space…at least not sleeping together immediately.

TBC?!

~o~o~