Author's Note: So, I really wanted to write something after 5x09. For those of you who follow me on Tumblr (shannyfishwriter), you know that I've been struggling with getting back into writing for Arrow. So, this is sort of one of my chances to do that. This time, I'm going to do scenes as chapters. So, it'll be really short, but then there will be a lot of updates. Whatever it takes to get back to writing, right? Also, not quite sure if I'll be mentioning Laurel or not, I might just skip her being in the final seconds. We will see. It all depends on where this goes.
It wasn't the grief that consumed her, but rather the guilt.
Billy.
They'd lost so many over the last four years since Team Arrow had been formed. Billy wasn't the first person that she'd lost and she knew he wouldn't be the last. Even though Oliver had been the one who had put the arrows into him, Felicity knew logically that it had been Prometheus who had not only abducted Billy but had also tricked Oliver into killing him. As her tears fell, all she could think was that she just couldn't be involved with anyone while working on Team Arrow, it was a little bit of a lonely life, but it was less dangerous for those she cared about.
Drowning in guilt or grief wasn't going to bring Billy back and it wasn't going to bring Prometheus to any form of justice...and the 'justice' that Felicity had in mind didn't involve the Star City Police Department or any attorneys or judges or prisons...it only involved Prometheus dead.
Death even seemed too good.
At the same time, it felt like the only just thing.
Over and over, she'd thought about everything she'd said to Billy, the information she'd gotten from him, and the information that she'd given him… Had there been another way? Could things have gone differently? Or was this the universe's way of telling her that this was the only way things could be, that she could never be happy unless she wasn't on Team Arrow (and she'd gotten a taste of a world where she wasn't part of Team Arrow when she and Oliver had gone to Ivy Town, she'd been the one unable to do it). Nothing had changed. Not in the ways that mattered. There was something about what they were doing that Felicity found that she craved. There was just no giving it up, not yet…
There was regret.
So much regret.
But she couldn't change who she was…
Just like Billy couldn't…
She understood that now.
Too well.
TBC...
