Day 34 - Oliver

"So maybe I was wrong."

"Oliver, are you- Oliver?"

His eyes go to the window.

"Oliver?"

Except he doesn't look back, his gaze remains fixed on the dark window. Where Starling should be, there's only blackness. This was the end, he thought. He fixes the thought: This is the end.

"Are you still trying to figure this place out?"

"No, I can't remember anything," he looks past her, "there were two people sitting over there. And... and maybe there. I just, I can't remember."

"I thought you always knew your locations."

"I wasn't focused."

"Right," Felicity says, her voice dry.

He looks over at her. Felicity is playing with her napkin, distracted, bored. It bothers him. This isn't what he wanted. He had wanted this to be.. so much more. Oliver sighs, desperate, "all I could think about was you."

Her eyes flick to his.

"I think it may be... I think this place may be for me to say goodbye."

Felicity gives him a skeptical look and then turns her gaze to the window. He takes the moment to examine her. Felicity is beautiful. He knows this. When they're working, she prefers a pony tail and glasses. It's how she's put together in his mind: ponytail, glasses, a bright dress, painted fingernails and a brain so brilliant, so good it overwhelms him.

"I'm so sorry Felicity but I had to, I had to save Thea."

"I know," she says, her eyelid flickers and a tear falls down the profile of her cheek. She doesn't look at him and her words come out simply, matter of fact. "Oliver, don't do this."

After he kissed her, she blushed. He could feel the warmth of it in his fingers. He died with that warmth still there, lingering, a hearth fire burning at home. Oliver looks back to the window just as he feels Felicity turn to look at him. The window seems larger now, the curtains have gone dingy grey, the room wine-dark.

When he had seen her, in her date dress, hair soft and flowing, it had felt like they had gone to some foreign land. A place. Where there was hope and love and Felicity smelling like mandarin blossom and peony. Only to watch it be shattered moments later. Oliver blinks and the room is even darker.

"You deserve so much more than this ending, Oliver."

Oliver looks back at Felicity, who now is lit only by the last remaining candle on the table.

"Don't say goodbye. Fight. For me if you have to Oliver. Fight."

Her features start to dim, the earrings lost in the hair, the line of her dress merging with her shoulder. "I don't know how."

Felicity smiles, "yes you do. Oliver, I know you do. Just... just wake up."

He watches her, searching her face, but her features dim. The room becomes darker and darker, swallowing them whole. When he tries to say her name, nothing comes out. Oliver closes his eyes, he tells himself to fight, but the darkness feels like a syrup entering his lungs. Fight. Fight.

And then it's there, something deep in him. There's a violent impact, a flicker of white, electric light, and finally a complete obliviousness that feels like relief.

** MORE TO COME. It picks up significantly from here out, thanks for being patient reader. **