Good Versus Evil
"If you've come to tell me what a horrible person I am, I'm afraid you'll have to wait in a very long line," Malcolm sighed, sliding his hands into his pocket, shifting uncomfortably on the spot.
Thea knew his remark was supposed to be darkly humorous, but there was a definite sense of sadness in her father's words. "Actually, I'm here to do the opposite," she told him, wandering over to where he stood by his cabinet of weapons. "I told Roy about that night at the train station, how you saved my life." The night I first saw the Good in you, she thought to herself.
After the Undertaking, Thea, along with the majority of Starling City, had thought of Malcolm Merlyn as a heartless, murderous monster, one who would willingly destroy a place full of innocent citizens, dooming them to death, all while claiming it was for the city's own good. Even when he'd first approached her at the train station, she'd thought of nothing but the evil blood coursing through his veins, and the blood of good, innocent people dripping from his hands, including the blood of his dead son, Tommy. But regardless of his past, and regardless of the Evil that was no doubt still lurking inside of him, Thea couldn't ignore Malcolm's life-saving actions.
"You're my daughter," Malcolm responded.
The words sounded so sincere to Thea. She hadn't exactly reached the point of loving Malcolm like a father, and she wasn't sure if she ever would. Malcolm, despite his twisted and evil nature, certainly seemed to love her. His love had felt cold and brutal at first, while they were training in Corto Maltese. Thea could still feel searing burn of the boiling water trickling over her hands, like a fiery tongue licking her soft skin. Now, however, the love felt warmer, and more comforting. It almost felt... normal.
"You protected me, risked your life for me, just like my mother did," Thea insisted. Moira, her mother, also made plenty of mistakes, but she'd strived to correct them. After the Undertaking, it had taken sometime for Thea to see the Good in her mother again, but eventually she did, and her mother's death clearly proved it to be true. Horrible mistakes didn't permanently extract the Good from her mother, and she believed the same to be true of Malcolm, though he didn't seem convinced.
"Thea, I know you want to believe that there's more to me than a killer, but the fact is, there's not," Malcolm delivered what he believed to be the truth. He reached into the glass cabinet and retrieved his black bow, the weapon he'd soon use to violently end another life. "That man died with his wife."
Thea knew how badly the death of Malcolm's wife had affected him. The unbearable pain had forced a desire for revenge to fester inside of him, a desire that lead him down a much darker path. Now, with the opportunity to kill the man that murdered his wife, Malcolm had decided to let the Evil in him take the wheel. Thea watched him walk out the door, fully-dressed in his black League armour, with his bow and arrows, ready to kill. Come on, Thea begged silently, knowing that saying the words out loud would have little impact on her father's decision. I know you're better than this. There is Good in you. You don't have to let the Evil win.
oOo
That night, Thea lay asleep on the couch in her apartment. Much to her surprise, she woke to her father gently covering her with a blanket. The expression on his face appeared to be a mixture of relief and shock.
"You okay?" Thea asked, concerned.
"Yeah, everything's fine," he replied. "I just wanted to see you."
"I was worried," Thea admitted, pulling herself into a sitting position. Even once she'd fallen asleep, her dreams had been filled with worry. She looked up at her father. "Are you okay?" she asked again, not completely believing his initial response to the question.
"I am, in fact," he assured her. A hint of smile began to form on his face. "I didn't do it."
Thea felt a surge of pride in her heart for her father's decision. "For me?"
"For me," he answered, sitting down on the couch beside her. "But because of you."
A smile spread across Thea's face. Once again, in Malcolm's constant internal battle between Good and Evil, the Good had prevailed. He appeared to be a little more at ease, and perhaps slightly surprised by his own choice of actions. It was clear Malcolm only thought of himself as a killer, a title written in blood that he could never wash away.
But I knew, Thea thought, her heart swelling with joy. I knew there was Good in you. I knew the Good had the power to prevail. I just hope it continues to...
Written as part of The Hostile Takeover's Theme Writing Challenge for the theme "Good versus Evil".