A/N: I'm certainly not the first person to take a shot at the "Oliver Says/Does Something Interesting Because He's Drugged" type of scenario, but this is what insisted on rattling around in my head this week so I thought I'd run with it. Then it sort of exploded and became this – the longest piece I've written for this collection.
Out of His Mind
Felicity's role in rescuing Oliver from the latest masked psycho was frustratingly simple. Sara and Digg had told her that what they really needed was eyes and ears. Once they were close enough, Felicity's job was to hack the uber-protected wireless of the warehouse laboratory, and help them make it through security. She noticed that it also put her well clear of any actual fighting, which managed to make her annoyed and grateful at the same time.
And so she sat in the back of the black town car on the docks of Starling City, madly typing and whispering through her earpiece. The unintentional side effect of all of this was that she found Oliver before they did.
As the security feed flipped images of rooms and corridors across the corner of her laptop, she caught a glimpse of a man strapped into a chair. Even though his head was slumped to his chest she recognized him immediately.
"He's on the second floor!" Felicity told Digg. "Lab number seven"
"We just need a minute," Sara replied, her tone even but with a hint of humor. Felicity heard grunts and shouts of pain in the background. Seriously, that girl knew how to kick butt.
In spite of the situation, Felicity couldn't help but smile a little as her fingers flew over the keys, pulling the image of lab seven to the center of her screen. The smile disappeared as she watched Oliver twitch and squirm as if in pain.
"Hurry," Felicity whispered, more to herself than to Digg or Sara.
"What?" Digg's voice snapped back through her ear piece.
"He's alone, but something is really wrong," she said, unable to keep the panic out of her voice.
In the image Felicity could see his lips moving. A few extra commands allowed her to engage the audio record feature of the security camera, and suddenly Oliver's voice came through her laptop speaker. The words were broken and mumbled, almost impossible to make out, but the tone of his voice made her sick to her stomach. He sounded more broken and more scared then she had ever imagined Oliver could sound.
She caught an occasional word - his sister's name, a phrase in Mandarin, and in a moment that stopped her cold, three distinct words. "Please, not Felicity."
Her throat thickened, and without even consciously realizing what she was doing her hand went to the handle of the car door. They had to get to him. Just as she was about to get out of the car, the surveillance footage showed her a welcome sight - Sara and Digg crashing through the door of the lab where Oliver sat.
"We've got him," Digg said.
It seemed like it took an eternity for them to make it from that room to where the car waited. The minute Felicity could see the trio she ran toward them. Oliver was propped between Sara and Digg. His face was ashen, but Felicity couldn't see any major injuries. However, the look on Digg's face told her that all was not well.
"What is it?" she said, shouting to Digg before she'd even reached them.
Digg shook his head as she came forward. "Some kind of drug, I think. It's really messing with his head."
"Oliver?" She wanted so badly to touch him, but felt awkward with Digg and Sara watching her.
Oliver's eyes came open, but they were unfocused. "Felicity?" he said, and there was heartbreaking confusion in his tone.
Unable to stop herself now, she raised her hand to his face. He sucked in a breath as her skin came in contact with his and he said, the words slightly slurred, "Then I didn't kill you?"
"Of course not," she said gently. She exchanged a look with Sara and Digg.
"Let's just get him out of here," Digg said, his voice full of the same worry Felicity felt.
Sara stepped back as they reached the car. "You go. We still haven't found the chief nutjob yet. I'm going to see what I can get out of the ones we left alive."
"I can't let you do that alone," Digg said, his voice sounding torn. He looked at Felicity. "Let's get you two in the car."
Felicity wanted to argue, to tell him that they needed to get Oliver some help, but she knew that Oliver would be the first person to tell them that the mission came first. She nodded and reached to shove the back door of the car farther open.
"Get in and pull," Digg told her. It wasn't the first time they'd done this.
She did as instructed, sliding into the car, hardly noticing when she knocked her laptop to the floor. Reaching up she took as much of the weight of Oliver's head and shoulders as she could, pulling him with her as she moved across the backseat. As Digg shoved his friend's legs in Oliver twitched violently and Felicity barely moved in time to avoid getting head butted. Wrapping an arm around his upper body she pushed him down, and tried not to think too hard about the fact that half of him was in her lap.
She glanced back at Digg and Sara and gulped as Digg thrust one of his guns at her. Looking up at him with panicked eyes, she took it.
"If anyone comes just point at the middle and shoot, alright?" Digg said.
She nodded, and looked between Digg and Sara. "Be careful."
Sara gave a grim smile, her eyes hard behind the Canary mask. "Not a chance." Then she disappeared into the darkness with shocking speed. With a muttered curse Digg followed behind.
Felicity carefully set the gun in the back window of the car and turned to Oliver. His eyes had closed and the twitching and muttering had started again.
"Oliver?" she said putting her hand on his face. "Oliver!"
His eyes snapped open and the twitching seemed to stop as his eyes met hers. "Still here," he said, his voice full of disbelief.
She didn't know exactly what he meant, but at least his voice sounded a fraction more normal. "Oliver, we think someone drugged you."
He nodded then, and his eyes actually seemed to focus for a brief second. "It's nightmares…nothing but nightmares, and they don't stop." His voice broke again on the last word, and Felicity felt like she was an inch from crying.
"Shhh…" she said, her fingers moving across his face. "It's okay. Everything is fine."
"I'm so sorry," he said, in a voice that came out between clenched teeth. "I'm so sorry for what I've done to you."
"You haven't done anything to me, Oliver. Whatever you saw wasn't real." She knew she should take her hand off of his face, but with the pain in his expression she couldn't bring herself to do it.
"This is real," he muttered. "And you're scared. I hate it when you're scared."
She smiled at him and did her best to force all the worry she felt out of her expression. "I'm not scared when I'm with you." As she spoke, the truth of those words made the first actual tear fall down her face – that was not helping.
He brought his hand up and wiped the tear off of her cheek. "Don't leave me," he said, and from the glaze in his eyes and the tremor in his hand she knew he was still under the influence of the drug. For all she knew he wasn't even talking to her, or even about her, anymore. Still the desperation in his voice, and her own longing cut into her.
She turned her face into his hand. "I'm right here," she said, leaning closer to him, hoping he could see her. "I'm not going anywhere."
"Why do you love me?" The words came out as an angry, desperate whisper.
She opened her mouth to dismiss the question, but couldn't do it. Suddenly it didn't matter to her who he thought he was talking to - her, his family, Shado, Sara, or hell, even Laurel. Whatever the drug had done to him she suspected that this question was an absolute reality in the life of Oliver Queen – that somehow, what had happened in his past made him feel unworthy of being loved. And she was going to answer that question, even if he didn't remember, or, what was more frightening, even if he did.
"I love you because even with demons eating you alive, you still care enough to help people," she said, reaching up to hold the hand that still hovered near her face. "I love you because you take everything head on, and because you make me smile and …" she struggled, shaking her head, "because I can't seem to stop, no matter how much you push me away." She swallowed hard, hating that another tear fell. She couldn't believe she'd said so much, it was like the drug in his system had overpowered her common sense as well.
He blinked, and the look he gave her seemed so truly like him that she froze.
"I don't want to push you away anymore," he said.
Their faces were a breath apart and afterward, she could never remember who had moved first – but their lips were pressed together, his hand tightening gently on her cheek and her hand sliding down underneath the sleeve of green leather to grasp his wrist. Whatever was wrong with him, it clearly hadn't affected his ability to kiss, and she let out a noise of protest as his head dropped back down.
"Not all nightmares, then," he said his voice rough.
The words pulled her back to her senses, and she wondered just how aware he was. Did he still think this wasn't real? Before she could ask she heard footsteps and yanked her head up, reaching for the gun. Luckily it was just Digg running back toward the car.
As he slid into the driver's seat, his voice was full of frustration. "They're all hired guns, didn't know a damned thing. How is he?"
"Digg?" Oliver said, still sounding more than a little confused. "Digg, I feel really weird."
Felicity's eyes met Digg's in the rear-view mirror. "Don't know," she said. "He seems to be a little better."
When she looked back at Oliver she saw that his eyes were closed, but this time the twitching and mumbling had stopped. In fact, if anything he looked more peaceful than she'd ever seen him. She felt an odd mix of hope and terror as she wondered what exactly he was going to recall about this night. "Let's just get him home," she said, running her fingers through his hair.
They took him back to the Foundry, and managed to wrestle him down the stairs and onto the medical table. Digg force fed him some herbs, and hooked up the blood pressure and pulse monitor. "Looks good," he said with a shrug. "All we can do now is wait." He glanced at his watch. "Maybe you should go home."
"No, I'm staying," she said. She caught his curious glance as she slid forward to reach for Oliver's hand, but ignored it, resting her head on the back of her chair.
She was half asleep when a twitch of that hand pulled her upright. "Oliver?" she said, standing beside him.
He blinked, and she watched his features change from peaceful to the carefully blank look he so often wore. It made her both sad and relieved.
"How are you feeling?" she said.
"Not great," he responded, his voice gravelly. He struggled to sit up, and used one hand to pull off the blood pressure clip and heart machine leads. Felicity was surprised when he made no effort to pull his hand from hers. Coughing he said, "What happened?"
"By the time we found you that freakshow had you tripping on some really nasty drug," Digg explained. "Physically you seem pretty okay, but…"
Felicity watched a haunted look cross Oliver's features. "Did we get him?"
"Not yet," Digg said. "Sara's on it."
Oliver nodded, and he swallowed in a way that looked painful. "Digg," he said, his voice a croak. "Could you get me some water?"
For just one moment Digg looked between Oliver and Felicity then he nodded, "Sure man."
The moment Digg had moved out of earshot, Oliver turned to her. He glanced down at their joined hands and then gave an odd roll of his shoulders, obviously uncomfortable. "So I've got a lot of crap rolling around in my head, but did I…" he paused and let out a breath. "Did I kiss you?'
"Yeah," she said. "Or I kissed you…I'm not really clear on the exact logistics of the situation, but …"
"Felicity," he said, his voice still sounding like sandpaper. There were a hundred possible meanings in the way he said her name and it made her nervous.
She pulled her hand from his and stepped back, feeling suddenly cold. "I get it, you weren't thinking clearly and you probably didn't mean any of what you said."
With obvious effort he hopped down from the table and on instinct she moved to grab him as he staggered a bit. Digg had pulled off his jacket to get the medical equipment on him, and Oliver's arm was warm under her fingers. He righted himself quickly, but instead of pulling away he held on to her, his hands gripping her shoulders.
"What you said to me," he asked looking down at her. "Was that real?"
"You mean the part about…" she hesitated, and looked down at the floor. "You caring about people, and stuff?"
"Yeah," he said. Then he let out a puff of air that was both half-a laugh and a sigh. "I guess that answers my question." He went silent then, and Felicity felt almost physically ill with embarrassment and sorrow.
"Really…we can…." her throat caught and she paused, hoping she could get out of here without crying. "We can just forget about it."
"I don't think we can," he said. His voice was thick with emotion, though she couldn't tell exactly what kind. Still it was enough to make her risk looking up at him. His eyebrows were lowered and his eyes locked onto her face, "My brain's still trying to sort out the real from the crazy, But," again he paused, but this time hope allowed her to be patient. "I don't think I said anything to you I didn't mean. Even if I never meant to say it." His hand came up from her shoulder then to touch her face.
"You said…you said, you were tired of pushing me away," she echoed. "Does that mean you're going to stop?"
He blinked and to her total amazement she saw his eyes were wet with tears. "I don't think I have a choice anymore. Tonight I saw things… kept seeing you and…" He sounded desperate again, and she realized how pale he still was, the deep circles under his eyes like bruises against his skin. "I don't think I could handle losing you."
"I'm not going anywhere," she said. "You need to rest. You're still not okay."
He nodded and let her gently push him back until he sat on the medical table. Digg came into the room and handed Oliver a glass of water. Oliver drank it greedily and handed back the empty glass. "I don't suppose…"
"You know," Digg said, sounding irritated, but there was a teasing look in his eye, "you could just tell me you need a minute to talk to Felicity."
"I need another glass of water," Oliver said firmly, but then he reached out and took her hand in his. "And my next conversation with Felicity is going to take more than a minute, so it might have to wait until we've caught this guy." He turned to look at her, and the depth of emotion in his eyes made her take a breath. "If that's okay with you?"
"I can wait," she said. "The mission comes first."
Oliver's face broke into a wide smile, and as Digg moved to go get the previously mentioned glass of water, Oliver pulled her close enough to whisper in her ear. "And that's part of why I love you."
