Just a little idea I had one night. Yeah, no real idea how to explain it. Takes place a few weeks after 3x01, so spoilers for that episode. Reviews are appreciated and thank you all so much for reading!
It had been a fairly normal night. Well, normal for her anyways. It was a few weeks after Sara's death and the entire team was still taking it hard. They had worked in the Foundry until two in the morning, which was when Oliver sent them all home as he stayed to shut things down.
Normally Felicity would have put up a fight, but she couldn't keep her eyes open and had a full day at Palmer Tech planned. She sleepily drove home, with the full intention to sleep in mind. But the second she crossed the threshold into her apartment, sleep became a distant thought.
All she could see in front of her was Sara's lifeless eyes, her broken body. Felicity forcibly shook the memory from her head, took a deep breath, and set her things down. She changed into pajamas and grabbed her favorite blanket before cuddling up on the couch. If sleep wouldn't come to her, then she would watch TV until it decided to show up.
Half an hour passed and she was still getting nowhere. She had even put on a boring romance movie, which usually had her out like a light. But she was still wide awake. That was when she heard knocking at the door. Or at least, she thought she did. Convinced it was the movie, she turned her attention back to the screen. When the knocking sounded again, she muted the television and listened. It was a quiet, desperate knocking.
Felicity looked around for anything that she could use as a weapon and settled on the remote. Who the heck would be at her door at three in the morning? She grasped it in one hand and walked up to the door to look through the peephole. When she saw who it was, she sighed with relief and placed the remote down.
"You should really text ahead or something before showing up at my apartment at three in the morning," she said, unlocking the door to let him inside. Oliver stood before her, clad in Arrow gear. "Why not come in through the chimney or a window or something? The front door isn't very menacing."
The first sign that something was wrong was when he didn't quip back. She stepped forward to take a closer look at him, pushing the hood back as she did. His breathing was shallow and he was leaning on the wall for support. Felicity's eyes scanned his body, landing on the front of his gear. That was the second sign. Three angry holes in the armor stared back at her.
"Oh God, Oliver," she whispered. He tried to smirk in response, but his face was a mask of pain.
"Inside maybe?" was what he managed to strangle out. Felicity nodded, getting his arm around her shoulders and supporting him as they made their way inside. Once he was on the couch, she closed and locked the door.
"What the hell happened?" Felicity asked as she took off the mask and began unzipping his outfit. She was prepared to see the bullets stuck into the fabric, as they had been many times before. Maybe some bruising around the ribs, which would require ice. She was most certainly not prepared for what she saw.
The three holes in the vest lines up with the three wounds in Oliver's chest. They were an angry mess of blood and fabric. In order for them to do that much damage, the shooter must've been very close. "You've been shot. Okay, wow."
"I know that," he ground out.
"I'm getting towels." With that, she ran down the hallway, skidding on the floor as she did. Felicity returned five seconds later with an armful of towels and began trying to stop the bleeding.
"We need to get you to the Foundry, where there are actual medical supplies. We need to call Digg," she said, reaching for her phone. As soon as she did, Oliver lightly grabbed her wrist with a pleading look in his eyes.
"I don't want to die down there," he wheezed out. "Digg can't do anything anyways."
"Okay, you're delusional from blood loss, obviously," was her half-hearted explanation. Oliver was not going to die. He couldn't die.
But as she looked him over, she noticed how his uniform was more red than green. His face was ashen and his normally bright blue eyes were half-open and gray. "What happened?" Felicity asked, pushing past the lump in her throat.
"Robbery. Should have been an easy take-down. But they had reinforcements that I didn't see. When I pulled my bow back, all I could imagine was that it was how whoever killed Sara felt. All I saw was her in front of me." Tears clouded his eyes. It was a strange sight for Felicity, to see him so broken. So wounded. Practically half-dead in more ways than one on her couch.
He had always been the invincible, immovable one. He kept them all going when there were no other options. He kept everyone else safe at his own expense. Oliver wasn't even dead yet and she was already talking about him in the past tense.
"Why didn't you call us? We could have come to help you. We would have been there in five minutes, maximum," Felicity replied. She wiped away the tears in her eyes as she watched the towels on his chest turn red. "I have pliers, alcohol, and a stitching kit. I can help you, Oliver. You have to let someone help you."
He shook his head, which was more like lolling it back and forth.
"Why won't you let me help you?"
"Because she's already here." He pointed to something behind Felicity, but when she turned, there was nothing there. His hand was drenched in blood, some of which had dried. It was shaking as it pulled it back in closer to his body. "Sara's already waiting. Tommy's behind her. And mom. And dad."
"No," she said forcefully, getting Oliver's attention. "I am not going to let you die on my couch. I am not going to let you die, period. All of the times you've saved me, I need to at least get the chance to save you."
"You have saved me, Felicity. More times than you know." She grasped his hand and squeezed it lightly as he offered a small smile. She could tell by the way his body melted into the couch and the sunken look in his eyes that Oliver had given up. Never, in her time of knowing him, had he ever given up.
Maybe everything had finally gotten to him. All of the killing, the loss, the stress. Maybe when he finally allowed himself to grieve, it was in private so no one else could see it when he fell apart. Maybe it was by taking it out on the bad guys when his head wasn't in the game.
"We won't find her murderer," he whispered.
Felicity shook her head. "Yes, yes we will. Because that's what we do. We just have to dig a little deeper, and something will come to light."
"And what if it doesn't? We could spend the rest of our lives looking for the killer and never find them."
She shook her head again, tightening the grip on his hand. "This is blood loss and half-consciousness talking. The Oliver Queen that I know, the one that I care about, would never say these things. He would never give up. Ever."
"What if I'm not Oliver Queen anymore? What if I don't know who I am, or what I'm supposed to be?" the question settled between them and Felicity found that she didn't have an answer for him.
Felicity watched his eyes close and his hand start to go slack in hers. "You are not doing this to me! Oliver!" She sat up and pressed a desperate kiss to his cold lips, begging him to come back. The taste of blood and ash filled her mouth as she sat back on her heels. He squeezed her hand again. "You are going nowhere, Oliver. You have to pay to get the bloodstains on my couch removed."
Her hands scrambled to find her phone, where she reached Digg's contact, not even hesitating before pressing the number.
After a few tones, Digg picked up with a sleepy "hello?"
Felicity sighed a little in relief and spoke past the nervous lump in the throat. "Oliver got hurt, badly. He's lying on my couch bleeding out and talking about giving up."
Instantly, Digg's tone sounded more awake. "Can you get him to the Foundry?" She heard rustling on the other end of the line, which she assumed was him putting on a shirt or shoes, possibly both.
"Probably. But he said he didn't want to die down there."
"He won't, Felicity. We can make sure of that. I'll be there in five minutes." With that, he hung up and Felicity put the phone down.
She turned back to Oliver, checking nervously for a pulse, almost collapsing into a puddle of relief when she found a faint one. "Okay, I'm going to lift you up and we are going to walk to the car. Then we are going to the Foundry, and I will break multiple laws to get you there. And you will not die, got it?"
Felicity tried to smile a little when she saw Oliver's head move up and down slightly. He hadn't completely given up. She could see it in his face that he wanted to. God, how he wanted to. But for some reason, he still hung on.
She stuffed a few towels onto his chest before zipping the suit back up, keeping them in place. As gently as she could, she got him into a sitting position and slung an arm around her shoulders.
Felicity could feel him try to stand up when she did, but his legs were simply too weak. It took everything she had to get him off of the couch and into a standing position. "Halfway there," she muttered, grabbing keys from the table. From there, she supported Oliver to the elevator, where they rode it down to the garage. Felicity opened her car and gently lay him across the back seats.
As she got into the driver's seat and buckled herself up, she took a second to look at him. "Funny, this is how I found out that you were the Arrow. Bleeding from a gunshot wound and clad in your Arrow gear while in the backseat of my car." Once she pressed on the gas, Felicity realized that she had forgotten to put on shoes. And decent clothes. She was in a sweatshirt, leggings, and fuzzy socks. At least she hadn't forgotten her glasses. Shrugging it off, she pulled the car out of the space and sped off towards the Foundry.
Oliver was used to the feeling of death. By now, the weightlessness and the blackness didn't scare him. He had faced death so many times that it simply didn't bother him. It had almost become a normal sense to him. It was always completely silent and black. It was endless. Sometimes there had been a light at the end, but he had never gone into it. This time, however, he heard footsteps approaching behind him. When Oliver turned around, Sara had appeared out of the darkness. She was wearing her Canary gear, minus the mask and wig.
"What are you doing, Ollie?" she asked, coming up to face him. There was color in her cheeks and life in her eyes. There was no blood on her body or holes in her torso. She looked…alive.
"I don't know," was what he admitted.
"Why are you giving up?" was Sara's next question.
"I'm not…giving up," Oliver stuttered out.
Sara motioned to the blackness around them. "You're hallucinating me, talking to you in a void of blackness. This kind of counts as giving up, Oliver." She paused for a second. "You can't die, you know that. It's not your time."
Oliver sighed. "But what if it is? I've almost died too many times to count. Everyone that I try to protect ends up getting hurt. Or-"
"Dying, almost dying," Sara finished his sentence. "But it's not your fault. Everyone chooses their own life and while you can clear a path, you can't make them follow it."
"What's the point of what I'm doing if I can't protect the ones that I care about? If I couldn't protect you, three times, how can I protect Thea, or John, or…" he trailed off.
"Felicity," Sara whispered. She placed a hand on Oliver's shoulder. "They all chose to go on this crusade with you. You have protected them with you life more times than anyone can count. You guys always have each other's backs. Right now, Felicity is on the verge of a breakdown because you're flatlining. Digg is trying to keep her calm so that he can try to save your life. They care about you, Oliver, in more ways than one."
"And if I can't protect them?"
Sara shrugged. "It's life. If something happens, you find a way to make it right. They need you, and you need them. I know that it can be hard, holding the weight of the world on your shoulders, but you don't have to. That's why you have your friends and family. They will always be there for you, no matter what."
Oliver sighed. "What about you and Tommy and Shado and mom? And all of the other people that have died because of me."
"They—we—did not die because of your actions. We will always be here for you, too. But right now, they need you more. You can't give up. The second you give up on yourself, you give up on everyone."
With that, she was gone and he was left to face the blackness by himself.
Felicity paced nervously back and forth, which she was sure was making John crazy. He was propped up against a table, watching Felicity as she wore a trail in the concrete beneath her feet. "Why hasn't he woken up yet?"
Digg shrugged. "Oliver's a strong guy. Maybe he just needs to recover more, or find a reason to stay." He had been able to remove the bullets and stitch Oliver up before hooking him up for a blood transfusion to replace some of what he had lost. "I'm going to head up for a few minutes, update Lyla on his condition." He placed a steady hand on Felicity's shoulder before walking up the metal steps, opening and closing the door behind him as he went.
Felicity walked over to the med table and pulled up her chair next to it. She took Oliver's hand in both of hers, trying to warm it up. His chest was mostly covered in bandages. He would have three more scars to add to his growing collection.
But there was no color in his cheeks, no liveliness in his body. He was pale and cold on the medical table. If not for the small amount of movement in his chest and the beeping heart monitor, Felicity would've assumed that Oliver was dead.
"I know you said you didn't want to die down here, and you usually don't do what you don't want to," she joked to his unconscious form. "I know, it's probably hard for you to find reasons to stay. With Sara and Tommy and your parents gone, I can't even imagine how hard it is. But you still have a family. Me and John and Thea and Laurel and Roy. We will always be here for you. No matter how much you don't want to believe it, you rely on us, and we rely on you."
She toyed with his fingers more, which were so much larger and rougher than her small, nimble ones. "We need you, Oliver. And I need you too. I was thinking that you need me too, since you did stumble into my house at three in the morning. Everything we've been through has brought us here, and there is so much more to get through. We will find Sara's killer and stop them, you have my word. But we can't do it without you."
Felicity took a deep breath in and a shaky one out. "I may not know a whole lot about what goes on in your head, but I do know two things. The first is that you will do whatever it takes to keep us safe. And the second is that the moment we aren't safe, you blame it on yourself. But every single one of us makes our own choices. In the end, it's our decision whether we live or die."
Felicity dropped her head, willing for the tears to stop clouding her eyes. "Right now, you have to make that exact same decision." She smiled to herself slightly before adding, "I know you're not so good at listening to other people sometimes, Oliver. But I want you to stay."
He heard her. Every single word that she said. He saw her. Ever single movement that she made, each of the tears that fell from her face onto the med table. Oliver watched her toy with his hands, tell him cheesy jokes, and list the reasons why he should stay. He also watched her tell him why she understood if he went; it would probably be easier to accept his fate and join the rest of his family. But underneath it all was the hope that he would stay.
Oliver could admit to himself that he wanted to leave. It would be so much easier to let go into the abyss than fight to climb out of it. But that was giving up, and for the past few years that had not been an option. So now that death was once again knocking on the door, Felicity begging him to stay, was giving up still an option?
The night eventually turned into the morning, which shifted brightly into the afternoon before darkening to the evening. After calling in sick to Palmer Tech, Felicity spent the entire day by Oliver's side, not leaving for more than ten minutes at a time. She busied herself with her computers, trying to track down more leads on Sara, even though there were none to be found. She had to do something to forget that Oliver was fighting for his life three feet behind her.
John had stayed with her also, bringing them food and training a little. Anything to keep Felicity company and keep watch over Oliver. When Felicity felt her eyes closing around seven that night, she tried to fight it. When nine rolled around, it had been almost three days since she had last slept and gave in. The last thing she felt was Digg shutting off her computers and gently placing a blanket around her shoulders.
"I am going to be sore tomorrow," she muttered sleepily. She was sitting in her chair at her desk, bent over so that her arms folded under her head to make a pillow.
"Sleep for a few hours, Felicity. You need it," was Digg's response.
What felt like five minutes passed before Felicity was awoken to an abnormal beeping. She assumed it was her phone or something on her computers and lazily blinked her eyes open. None of the monitors were on and her phone had a dark screen. Shrugging her shoulders, she sank back down into her arms.
But then her eyes snapped open as she remembered. "Oliver," she breathed. Felicity jumped out of her chair so quickly that she ended up getting tangled up in the blanket and falling onto the floor. "Digg!" Felicity shouted as she scrambled to get untangled and rushed over to the medical table where Oliver lay.
She cast a frenzied glance to the heart monitor, where it showed elevated heart rate, but no flatline. Breathing a sigh of relief, she tried to steady her own racing heart. "Jesus, Oliver. Can't anyone get five minutes of rest without you almost dying around here?" she joked, expecting no response since he was still unconscious.
But he was not still unconscious. Oliver was very much awake, which Felicity didn't know, which was why it scared her so much when he replied with a quiet, "sorry."
Felicity stared at him, trying to make sure that he had actually spoken. "You…replied?" Felicity whispered, walking closer to the side of the table.
"Pretty sure I did, although I may have mumbled a little bit." Oliver opened his eyes to find Felicity staring at him. Her hair was a tousled mess and there were bags under her eyes, but there was an aura of relief and happiness around her.
"Oh my gosh," she laughed, throwing her arms around him in a hug. When he groaned in pain, she jumped back, remembering his injuries. "Sorry! But you're not dead! You were for a few minutes, but now you're not!"
"Really? Hadn't noticed," he replied with a smirk on his face.
"Felicity, what's wrong?" Digg asked, rushing down the steps so fast he almost tripped. "I was on the phone with Lyla and…" he drifted off, noticing Oliver staring back at him. "Hey, man," was all he managed to get out.
"Hey yourself," Oliver said as Digg walked over, shoes echoing on the concrete floor.
Digg had a mix of annoyance, happiness, and anger written all over his face. "Damn it, Oliver. If you weren't still half dead I would slap you. What the hell were you thinking?"
"I thought you guys had established that I wasn't thinking," he remarked. With Felicity and John's annoyed glances his way, Oliver continued. "But I am sorry. I've been bottling up everything because I couldn't afford to let Sara's death affect me in the way that it should have. I was irrational, I know."
"Why didn't you come to us?" Digg questioned.
Oliver let out a small sigh, which was about all he could manage with the pain in his chest and the bandages surrounding it. "I've never been good at talking about how I feel. It only gets worse when I am under stress. Losing multiple people just kind of shut me down."
Digg nodded. He noticed the worried looks that Felicity kept sending Oliver, and the ones that he continued to give back. "We can finish this later. You two have some stuff to talk about." He offered Felicity a small smile before walking up the stairs and out of the Foundry.
"I would suppose that we do," Oliver said. He gently sat up and swung his legs over the side of the table. Although the pain made him want to pass out, it was nothing compared to the look that he got from Felicity. "I'm s-" was what he managed to get out before she cut him off.
"Why did you give up?" was her question. She pulled up a chair and sat down. They were at equal height, Felicity in the chair and Oliver sitting on the table.
He sighed again. "I just… Living with the knowledge that everyone around me seems to die, what would happen if I couldn't protect you and Digg? And Thea and Laurel and Roy? I can't lose anyone else."
"But if you lose yourself, what good does that do any of us? You should know by now that we choose this life, we choose to work by your side, knowing that it could get us killed. I have literally told you this ten times now. You can not save everyone. No one can."
"I know that. It's just…" he was at a complete loss for words.
Sadness crossed over Felicity's face as she remembered something. She raised her eyes to his and said in a shaky voice, "a minute and forty-seven seconds."
"What?"
She repeated, "one minute, forty-seven seconds. That's how long the flat line on the screen mocked me. That's how long it took John and I to get the defibrillators and turn them on. That's how long you were gone, Oliver. I dreaded every single second of it. I begged you to stay. Pleaded with you to. Because after only a few short years of having you in my life, I couldn't stand it if you weren't."
Oliver looked at her curiously. "Because I care about you. And I mean really care. Not the middle school 'I love this person and will forever'. The version of I love you where it's 'I need you and can't live without you'."
He stared at her and smiled as she continued. "I know you may not feel the same way. Hell, I don't know why I feel this way. But you need to know that your life is not meaningless. You need to know that you should never give up. Because while there are people that are dead that cared about you, there are many more people on this Earth right now that still do. If I can't stand two minutes of you being gone from this world, then I will not be able to stand a lifetime of it." When she finished, there were tears dripping down her face that she made no move to wipe away.
With a small grunt of effort, Oliver took her small hands in his. "Felicity, you are perhaps the singular most amazing human being that I have ever met. I know that now, and I don't know how I didn't see it before." He watched as she smiled a little through her tears. "And I'm not going anywhere."
"Promise?" Felicity asked, looking down at their intertwined hands before turning her gaze back to his.
"I promise." And that was a promise that he intended to keep.