I have to get to her.
Every agonizing second feels like an hour as I hastily and messily park the car and rush through the double doors.
"May I help you?" the woman at the desk asks, looking up calmly.
"Lau—Black Canary," I gasp, leaning over the counter. "Her room—where is it?"
The woman turns and types something in. "Operating room three," she answers, giving me a scrutinizing look. "2nd floor."
I take off like a bullet. The thought of taking an elevator up, of waiting and standing until those doors opened to my floor, is too much for me to bear. So instead, I rush up the stairs, taking them two, three at a time. I plow down the hall, turn a corner, and stop.
Oliver Queen stands there, solemn and grim-faced. My heart rises into my throat.
I open my mouth to say something, but nothing comes out. Deep inside me, I think I already knew the truth, but the pained look in Queen's eyes just confirm it. He doesn't say anything. He doesn't need to. His torn eyes have already told me everything.
I slide to the floor weakly, my legs unable to hold me up with this new grief pressing down on my shoulders. I can feel tears in my eyes, agony in my heart.
My breathing shakes, and I grasp the wall, letting it support me as sobs fill my chest.
"When?" I ask hoarsely, looking up at Queen.
"Eleven-fifty-nine," he answers quietly, sounding more pained, more vulnerable, more weak than I have ever heard him.
I stagger upwards to look at the clock, and my heart shudders to a stop inside my chest.
Twelve O'Clock, it reads. Twelve O'Clock.
I press my eyes close, but nothing can stop the tears from leaking out and sliding down my face.
"I'm sorry," Queen says softly, looking away.
I don't answer.
My girl.
My precious baby girl.
She's dead.
She's dead—
And she's gone—
And and—
I'll never see her again—
And I've lost her.
Forever.
I sink to the floor and cry.
Little one-shot on Quentin Lance, after he arrives at the hospital looking for Laurel.