IMPORTANT: Please read my note at the end of this chapter. It concerns the direction of this story.

Oliver looked out at Starling City as the luxurious Bentley rolled through the streets, the very expense of the car seemed to part the traffic, as if because the occupant was rich that they had the very right of way in every street even if that meant cars pulling into illegal spots or even breaking the speed limit to get out of the way.

Ollie 'womaniser' Queen would never had noticed such a small and seemingly inconsequential change but Oliver of Lian Yu did and that it disgusted him.

Ollie Queen if he did realise would probably make some ignorant comment as if he was somehow superior than the other citizens of Starling simply because he was rolling in cash; but now he was horrified that he used to treat others like that, that he was so selfish, that he used to send such a sickening subliminal message to the masses that he was better than them.

Little wonder that most people hated the rich and despised him in particular because, if anything, his playboy actions enhanced the already exacerbated situation.

As the vehicle smoothly slid through the expansive gardens and emerald green lawns that surrounds the Queen Mansion, Oliver looked at the luxurious house and felt a stirring of abhorrence, remembering the sordidly poor conditions of other countries, in particular, Hong Kong.

He remembered the people living in rooms barely bigger than a few feet square, in unimaginably filthy conditions with up to ten people, sleeping, eating and living together. And yet here was a mansion, where the smallest room was twice the size of theirs and only three people living full-time inside.

The car stopped and the blonde chauffeur stepped out and opened the door with an indifferent face, before stepping around the car to open the boot.

Not wanting the man to touch Yao Fei's practically sacred wooden case, he stopped the man with a few words, and lifted the case up himself with insistent stare at the other man, who involuntarily flinched unused to such a vicious glare from a supposedly weak playboy.

As he walked up the fine white sandstone stairs, the double wooden doors swung inwards to reveal his parents standing together, all the part the perfect couple that the media made them out to be.

Inside Oliver felt painfully bitter, all throughout his life he had been constantly lied to, especially by his own parents.

With only a glance Oliver could tell that his parent's marriage had no love, only held on by the barest threads of respect for Thea and the spiteful fear of what a mess the scandal of divorce would cause.

He ignored his parents carelessly in favour for one of the few people whom had always believed in him, no matter how low he stooped.

Rasia stood hopeful yet obedient at the edge of the opulent foyer.

Striding easily across the oversized room, he clasped the Old Russian women's hands warmly, making an internal promise to treat her with the respect she deserved.

"It's good to see you, Rasia." He stated, smiling more genuinely than he had in longer than he could remember.

"Welcome home, Master Oliver." Turning towards her mistress, Rasia continued, "Mister Merlyn phoned. He wants to join you for dinner."

Oliver's body stiffened at the slight sound of bare feet upon wooden floorboards upstairs and a door closing. He moved away from Rasia to the bottom of the stairs, eager to see his precious little sister again.

"Wonderful. Oliver? Did you hear that?" His mother, showing her lack of respect to Rasia and the weakness of her hearing at the same time, frowned at Oliver.

Thea then appeared at the top of the stairs, slightly startling Oliver with her change of appearance.

The young little girl whom loved wearing pink and running through the hallways after him, her mischievous laughter bouncing off the high ceilings, had gone and in her place was a beautiful, if somewhat irresponsible – Oliver still remembered the drug dealer he dealt with when Waller forced him to break into Queen Consolidated – teenager.

"Hey sis."

Her long tousled brown hair was out, and her bare feet skimmed gracefully down the carpeted stairs and into his waiting arms.

It struck Oliver instantly how fragile and venerable Thea was in his grip. Her small thin frame held against his own broad strongly muscled one.

"I knew it. I knew you were alive. I missed you so much." Her trust was always something that Ollie of the past could barely understand, but Oliver of purgatory couldn't even begin to fathom the blind faith she had in his existence.

"You were with me the whole time." He murmured quietly into her ear; Thea, the one person he could truly thank for any humanity and light within him. She was the one thing that actually mattered in this world of Ollie Queen the billionaire playboy.

Laurel was someone he lusted for but he worked out years ago that there was no real love in that relationship.

He had loved the idea of her, not the women herself.

It was a love similar to that of Slade and Shado, they loved the ideas of each other, however emotionally and physically it could not work, it could never work.

He loved his mother, but she lied like she breathed, Oliver knew for a fact that she was already hiding something.

The way she wouldn't meet his eyes properly, and how she seemed to expect him to start accusing her of something.

As for his father – Oliver wasn't an idiot, the Queen's Gambit was sabotaged, the sinking was too quick to be anything else.

After Oliver's firsthand experience upon the sinking Amazo, Oliver was certain that the Queen's Gambit sinking was no accident, and neither, he suspected, was his father's continued existence.

There was only one person could have possibly been a target that was on that damned boat and it certainly wasn't a young womaniser and his latest slut.

He wants to stay friends with Tommy but doesn't need the dead weight of his jealousy and irresponsibility.

All of his other supposed friends from before the island were most likely even more useless than they were before, not that it mattered, Oliver preferred to work alone.

Although Oliver had no immediate plans to return to the life of death and blood, there was no real escape from the past, and one day he would kill again, he just hoped it wasn't to be any day soon.

.../|\...

Oliver slowly wandered through the long opulently decorated halls that dictated the Queen Mansion, remembering his way through this claustrophobic mess with ease, stopping at the dark panelling of a wooden door.

It was plain, almost basic, yet the rosewood and exquisite workmanship spoke of time, care and – perhaps most importantly – money.

He pushed open the door carefully, and was unsurprised to find that little had changed. He scanned the room, learning the escape routes and entry points (the three floor-to-ceiling windows along the back wall, the balcony to the right, the bathroom which had a small window above the bath) and the places to hide (the walk-in-wardrobe, under the bed, the cavity behind the door, the balcony, and the four large cupboards along the left wall).

Ascertaining that the room was safe enough, Oliver closed the door, noting the silent, recently oiled hinges.

He stashed Yao Fei's case under the bed, promising himself to find a safer alternative after scouting the rest of the house and dealing with his family.

After a quick yet thorough shower of ice cold water, he wrapped a luxurious cream towel around his waist and with a shaky breath calmed his tumultuous mind before walking purposefully to the large mirror.

It was there that he began to catalogue his scars, trying to imagine how one would react if they had never seen such damage on a person before.

You were horrified. That scar on your right shoulder was your first and you were horrified.

Making a mental note to avoid taking his shirt off at all costs in the presence of others, Oliver palmed the scar on his shoulder and remembered, with a bittersweet twist to his mouth, his first few months on that hellish island under the care of Yao Fei.

His right shoulder took years to recover completely from that wound, and despite that it now was as strong as his other arm, he still naturally favoured his left arm.

Oliver wandered through his childhood room admonishing himself for the foolishness of his innocent youthful years.

The wealthy and rare items that lay scattered upon tables and shelves meant nothing to him now; in fact, he could not even remember where, when, or who had gave them to him.

After five years, everything that was once familiar was now unrecognisable. The face that stared back at him in the mirror was a stranger.

He looked back into the mirror and for just a moment he could see himself in the familiar green hood that was once Yao Fei's.

Dressing casually, making another mental note to buy new clothes as most of them in his wardrobe were ill-fitting, attention-drawing, and/or tasteless, Oliver allowed himself one look in the mirror before turning away.

Walking through the labyrinth of the Queen Family mansion, he headed to the dining room, despite being not particularly hungry and knowing that the food would be rich and virtually indigestible considering his diet for the past few years.

As he passed through the foyer, he stopped and picked up an old photograph of the Queen's Gambit.

His face darkened as he remembered the night that the yacht was sabotaged.

He remembered his thoughts when he first washed up in Purgatory; He would get revenge, someone would pay for sending him to hell.

He was pulled out of his reverie by the sound of a car pulling up outside the mansion and he placed the photo down as the double doors opened to reveal, Tommy Merlyn, his childhood best friend.

"What did I tell you? Yachts suck." Oliver smiled despite finding no real humour in that statement.

"Tommy Merlyn." Oliver allowed him to close the gap and grip him in a hug.

"I missed you, buddy."

Oliver leaned back to look at his old friend wistfully; he looked, acted and even sounded the same.

Time had been kind to Tommy Merlyn, perhaps as kind as it was bloody for Oliver.

Letting Rasia usher them both into the dining room with Thea, Robert and Moira, Oliver carefully noted the dynamic between Tommy and the rest of the Queen family, Tommy had clearly stayed close with them despite Oliver's believed demise.

As Oliver looked for a place to sit down he acknowledged the subtle manipulation of power in the seating arrangements; At the head of the table was his father, to his left was Moira – his father's greatest ally and advisor, beside her mother Thea had taken her seat, across from her was Tommy.

Oliver, aware that this was a crucial moment, he could take his usual place to the right of his father, or he could challenge his position by sitting at the other end of the table.

Before, Ollie would not have hesitated but Oliver did, deliberating his position and weighing the pros and cons of both seats.

Finally deciding that the head of the table was a better for a quick escape.

He sat, a mask of confidence concealing his internal doubts about how this meal would end.

"Ok." Tommy, ever the conversationalist, spoke first after they had been served elaborate dishes by Rasia. "What else did you miss? Super bowl winners Giants, Steelers, Saints, Packers, Giants again. A black president, that's new. Oh, and 'Lost,' they were all dead I think." He finished with a crooked smile.

Oliver who was barely trying to process what Tommy was saying, concentrating instead on digesting the excessively rich meal before him, wondered vaguely why Tommy was bothering to talk about something as mundane as sport, politics and TV, especially as he was never that interested before the Island on any of those topics.

Suddenly Thea leaned forward and asked somewhat naively, "What was it like there?"

Oliver internally froze, unsure exactly how to answer such a loaded question. Eventually he decided on a blunt, true but final word, "Cold."

"Tomorrow, you and me, we're doing the city. You've got a lot to catch up on." Tommy, sensing the tension, quickly changed the subject.

"That sounds like a great idea." Moira said.

"Good." Oliver replied, internally cursing that he would have to reuse the playboy mask again tomorrow, "Then I was hoping to swing by the office."

Moira made a noise at the back of her throat and Robert set down his almost empty second glass of wine and intervened, "I don't think that is wise Oliver. You've barely returned, Queen Consolidated isn't going anywhere."

Oliver could see the internal battle in his open eyes, happiness that Oliver was finally interested in the family company and concern that Oliver was still unfit to be paraded around the office.

Robert, as always, was thinking of the image that would pertain, if Oliver physically collapsed or worse, went back to his playboy attention-seeking ways at the new Queen Consolidated Office.

Raisa came back into the room with a metal bowl of pears and oranges. She tripped on the rug and stumbled into Oliver, who deftly caught both her and the bowl, "Oh, I am so sorry, Mr. Oliver." She said.

"Ni dlya kogo ne volnuites." He replied involuntarily and then silently scolding himself for the unintentional slip-up.

"Dude, you speak Russian?" Tommy exclaimed surprised.

"I didn't remember you taking Russian at college, Son." Robert frowned, suspicious of Oliver's mastery of Russian.

What Oliver wanted to reply with was – I don't remember you ever caring enough to remember what I did in college – but the iron-clad restraint he had built over the years forbade him from saying it.

Instead he simply shrugged and replied, "Its fine. May I be excused?"

With a nod, he was free and as he strode out of the dining room Tommy called out. "Hey, don't forget about tomorrow, buddy."

He quietly slipped back up to his room where he began to move and remove furniture and other miscellaneous possessions until it was better suited to his current needs.

He then made a list of items that he would need to purchase to make the room safer, including a proper lock for his door.

Resolving to find a place to train properly tomorrow, he forced himself into a punishing series of exercises in the limited space that he had.

As he lay, covered in sweat, he looked at the moulded patterns on the ceiling with disinterest.

"I thought you were being melodramatic when you described your childhood house, how could you live in this… this place?"

With a twisted half-smile Oliver allowed his head to roll lazily to the side to see Slade Wilson standing leaning against the door frame, his combat boots kicking apathetically against the expensive wood.

"I wasn't kidding when I said that it was a mansion." He replied, used to the ghost appearing whenever he felt like it.

I just couldn't help myself, even though I promised myself that I would only post another chapter of this after finishing more of Four Vigilantes, I just had to post another chapter of this fic.

Anyway, I have put a POLL up on my account about how you (the readers) want this fic to go. While I usually don't like asking about how others think my fics should go. I really have had a serious indecisiveness problem when deciding how to continue this fic in the long term.

So please go and cast your vote.