DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the characters you might recognize in this fic. DC Comics, Warner Brothers, the CW, and a lot more people than I can possibly name here do and I am making no gains from this. I'm just borrowing them and I'll put them back when I'm finished, maybe a little the worse for wear, but I'll give them back. Please don't sue me.

Author's Note: This bunny bit me while I was watching Season 8 when Oliver started his downward spiral. It's obviously set in an AU, since none of this happened in canon. If AU stories offend you, then give this one a pass, okay?

Author's Note #2: My beloved AJ was helping me to RP this out, and helped me a great deal before her passing in March. She was the driving force behind the bunny and my sounding board, my research partner, and so much more. This fic is therefore dedicated to her memory. I will always love you and miss you. Rest in peace, my darling.

Beta thanks go to Rick Berko, River, and Ithil-Valon. You guys have been terrific, and believe me, if there are any mistakes left, they're all totally mine. I take full credit for them.

And Lastly: HUGE thanks go to Rick and company for helping me research the best kind of liquor to use for this story. It was fun, wasn't it? *gryns* Thujone is the ingredient found in European blends of absinthe. To my knowledge, it's still illegal to include thujone in American absinthe. The stuff is so powerful that "one shot of this stuff will have you seeing green faeries in seconds," according to Rick's BF (a bartender). Unless you're a hardened alcoholic, of course. Then it takes minutes. *LOL*

Part One

Mouse sifted through the garbage again, looking for anything she might be able to use. No such luck. She did, however, find a guy crashed behind the dumpster and if he didn't want to get rolled, he needed to wake up. "Hey, pal. Hey." She shook his shoulder, none too gently. "You better get up in a hurry. Trash men come through here in about half an hour, and they won't care if you're in the way. You'll get squished. Come on." She needed something she could sell but she hadn't found anything for a couple of days, and she was in a bad way. He looked like new fish, so maybe he'd help her out. "Come on, Blondie, wake up and get out of the way."

She moved back slightly as he opened one eye and looked her over blearily. "So who cares?" he shot back grumpily. He didn't want to deal with anyone until he was sober, and hopefully he'd never get that way again. He tried to push her away but he wasn't strong enough through all the booze in his system.

"Uh uh, no way." Mouse had to push past the pounding, throbbing pain in her head to grab his arm and pull it up over one of her shoulders. "I should let you get squashed like a bug, but I can't. So come on, Blondie, I'll take you somewhere you can sleep it off safe." He was much taller than her, so it was a struggle to get him to his feet, but she managed somehow. "Come on, it's just a little ways down to my flop. Cops don't check the places down here like they should so it'll be safe enough for you. Least you won't end up under the trash truck, or in the masher." Her first observation of him was right, apparently. Stoned out of his mind, probably on cheap booze, and still wanting more. She wasn't stoned, but she was sure looking to get that way as quick as possible. It was the only way to block the pounding in her head. "There's a kinda little box town down here, look after each other, sort we don't hurt each other. Keep to ourselves, but there's a safety in numbers sort of thing." She finally got him into her little cubby and dropped him on the not so clean mattress. "You're a heavy guy, Blondie," she wheezed as she leaned down, her hands on her thighs, trying to catch her breath. "You got any cash?"

She'd assessed him on the way in. He wasn't the same as the others down here. Drunk, stinking blotto, but his clothes and his watch were worth some serious money under the grime and ratty trenchcoat he'd covered everything with. She met his gaze when he looked up and nearly flinched from the self-loathing in those brown eyes, dimmed by alcohol and drowning in remembered regret. "Hide it if you do. There's some extra clothes lying around here, and I'd change if you've got the strength. Folks down here can smell money. I don't want you getting rolled while I'm gone. And let me see that watch."

He handed it to her without comment and flopped backward onto the mattress, throwing his arm over his eyes and sighing softly. "Get me something too," he asked quietly.

Mouse looked over the watch and would have smiled if not for the pain in her head. It would be enough to keep the pain at bay for quite a while, it looked like. It wasn't a cheap knockoff of a Cartier, like she'd originally thought. It was the real deal. "Okay. Look, just stay put. I'll be back with more booze in a bit. Don't go wandering around down here until I can vouch for you. They might try to put a hurt on you otherwise."

Blondie groaned slightly as he sat up. "Stay low, got it. Anything else?" His voice was rough with all the alcohol he'd poured down his throat.

"You want booze or something stronger?" Mouse wasn't judging. She needed the morphine so badly that she couldn't be such a hypocrite. It was the only thing that muted the pain, even if only for a little while. "You tell me and I'll get it. I've been down here long enough to know who's safe to buy from." That watch was worth more than she'd ever seen at one time in her life. It would be more than enough to get Rover to cut loose the good stuff for her.

He shifted again to watch her closely and rolled his head on his neck a bit to loosen the muscles. "Don't care as long as it takes off the edge." He regarded her steadily.

She thought for a moment, looking away from those mesmerizing eyes, shoving down a tendril of something that had swirled close in her head. "If you can move on your own at all right now, I'll take you with me. That way Rover'll know you for next time." She couldn't look at him. Even with three days' stubble and dirty clothes, he was pretty attractive. Men like him didn't stay down there long. They could climb back up if they wanted to. "Rover's my connection. He's got all the good stuff." Yeah, like the morphine that took the edge off of the pain that wasn't even hers, that let her sleep her life away rather than be tortured by the emotional overload, but that was fine with her. As long as she was in her flop before she nodded, she was okay. They guys all kept an eye on her since she was the usual runner for the group. Food, dope, meds if they were needed. Theft when there wasn't enough to go around. "You up for it?"

Blondie shook his head slightly and winced as the motion made him dizzy. He laid back down and threw an arm over his face again. "Not really. I'd rather be under that garbage truck." He only wanted to stay drunk enough, stoned enough, to not remember who and what he had tried to be.

"Okay." Mouse shrugged slightly. It didn't matter. "I'll be back soon. Just keep quiet and stay put, like I said. I'll make sure the guys know you're okay." Then she left him there to his quiet misery. That he was miserable was obvious, even if she could feel it pulsing from him in waves. She needed Rover to give her more of the juice, and she knew that watch would get enough for both of them.

It took all of ten minutes to reach Rover's little cubby, deeper in what the city had dubbed the Barrens. "I got some stuff for you. Need more spikes, you got any?" The morphine she needed was injection grade and she needed it badly. "Need some of the good hooch for my – my friend, too. This ought to cover everything and then some." She held out the watch and what cash she had come up with panhandling downtown. The watch alone should get her enough to block the pain for days.

Rover gave the watch a critical examination and then raised an eyebrow at her. "Where'd you get something like this?" he asked idly as he inspected it more closely. He knew the expensive brands, had to in his line of work. He took things in trade, and he had to know what they were worth on the street. "Swipe it off a body?"

"Not dead, just dead drunk," Mouse replied evenly without batting an eyelash at the implied criticism. They both knew she'd had to resort to theft on occasion to take care of her bunch. "He gave it to me to get stuff for both of us. How much will it get me?" She was trying not to let him see how desperately she needed the relief from all the pain she felt, all the time. Fear, pain, sorrow, the whole range of human emotion, and it pounded at her in never ending waves. The morphine was the only thing she'd found strong enough to block it out. "Need enough for two people for as long as possible. Spikes and some good hooch for Blondie." She'd given the man's name to Rover, he'd understand she considered him a friend. She was a little surprised, because she didn't know that much about him, but it didn't matter. They were the same, after all. Both hiding from reality in the only way they knew how.

Rover regarded her steadily for a moment, but she didn't flinch. "If I give you stuff, it'll have to last you at least three days. I can't get more until them. And no OD's, either, it's bad for business." He fingered the watch with a small smile. A Cartier this fancy would net him a lot of cash.

She snorted back at him and leaned back against the wall. "Not likely, Rover. I just want the relief, just like always. And I think that's what Blondie wants, too. No big deal. I'll take what you have and you can give me credit on the rest. That thing is worth a lot." She was hoping he went for it, but he should. She just needed to get the stuff and get going. Blondie might sober up enough to leave if she didn't get back soon, and she didn't want to be responsible if he got worked over.

There was a grumble of assent and Rover handed over a small bagful of syringes and a tiny bottle of morphine, as well as a small wad of cash. "I don't have any booze, that's Mikey's thing. Go see him. And come back when you run out of that, I'll get you more." Of course he would. She was one of his best customers.

"Okay." Mouse took the bag and the money gratefully and started out. "I'll be back in a couple days, then." She knew how she sounded but she didn't care. The confusion in her head was so painful she had to have relief somehow. "Thanks, Rover."

She stopped by Mikey's on the way back, got a couple bottles of the really hard stuff, and headed back to her flop. Blondie was still where she'd left him, passed out on her bed, and she nudged him gently as she put the bottles down within reach. "Absinthe. This stuff is so illegal it ought to burn when you touch it." She wasn't judging, though. Quite the contrary. Everyone in the Barrens had a reason they had left the so-called "real" world. They looked out for each other, but for no one else. The world had turned its back on them, for whatever reasons, and they had chosen to do the same. "You got a name or is Blondie good enough? Your call. None of us will care one way or the other."

He only snorted as he worked to open one of the bottles and took a hefty swig. "That works. The old me is long gone anyway." His voice was soft and she nearly flinched back from the wave of self-loathing he gave off before he glanced up at her again. "And what do I call you?" She'd been right, it was the illegal version. He ought to be seeing little green faeries any time. There was thujone in the absinthe, which was banned in the States. It would do nicely.

"I'm Mouse." She took out the first hypo and prepped it carefully. She sat down next to him, her back against the wall, and pumped up the vein in her left arm, slipping the needle in with the ease of long practice. "You're in what we call the Barrens," she explained as the first waves of numbness began to spread and she started to feel the relief. "There aren't many rules down here. We keep to ourselves, mostly, though if you have any talents that might help someone else, they'll occasionally ask you to use them. No questions, either. Who you were doesn't mean a damn thing any more. You can start over here if you want, hang around as long as you like. It's all your choice." She felt her eyes closing in appreciation of the sweet nothingness that now flowed through her head.

He watched her as he drank, knowing he was doing himself major damage, that this was a backward slide from what he'd fought to become, and no longer caring. He was no hero. Still he stood watch over her, taking care not to drink himself blind, knowing it was likely that someone less ethical than her might come along and try to roll her while she slept.

TBC…