Felicity woke, a full week after her imprisonment, to an achy feeling in her back. She frowned and looked at her calendar, her period was late by nearly a week and a half. She dropped her hands to her sides and stared up at her blurry ceiling. Oliver hadn't stayed over the previous night and she debated calling him. Although she'd had a lot of extra hormones in her body recently, they'd had unprotected sex on her living room floor. She chewed her lip and eventually sent Caitlin an email, asking her about likely side-effects from the hormones.

Along with the headaches, fatigue, imprisonment and molestation Felicity had received, she was also blaming Merlyn for the additional pimples and flat, oily hair she was getting. Getting up and checking herself with the black light, she was pleased that only a trace of glow appeared under her arms. She washed and sprayed herself, carefully before dressing for the office in a neat black pantsuit with a yellow shirt. She'd asked Ray to report her as 'Down with the flu' to explain her absence and prevent surprise visitors. On her way to the office, she stopped at the pharmacy and bought a pregnancy test. They were more sensitive these days than decades ago when one needed to take them first thing in the morning. Still, she waited until after a lunch meeting, and she was squirming in her seat, to take it. While she waited, she entertained the idea.

At twenty-five, Felicity could hardly call herself a teen-mother. Her current salary was very good and her health insurance had good coverage, but the thought that came to her was the delivery. Would Oliver be there with her? Would he want to? She knew she wasn't being fair, and that Oliver Queen took his responsibilities seriously. How would she even tell him? Would it affect his decision to don a mask and fight crime? Would he allow her to continue doing her part. It wasn't like he could stop her, but she'd seen the way Diggle took his parenting seriously. Would Oliver want to get married?

Felicity glanced at the clock on her phone and checked the test. It was negative. She sighed with relief. She wasn't prepared for parenthood right now. She wasn't sure she would ever be ready, but with the relief came a tiny pang of loneliness. A small part of her wanted the bond she'd have with a child. It would have meant a long-term connection to Oliver as well. Ray had been avoiding her most of the day. Her explanation of his sudden urge to kiss her was that she'd had a hormonal imbalance due to some medication; it had met with skepticism, but like many of the secrets she openly kept from him regarding her life, he accepted that.

Caitlin called and told Felicity that she'd likely been thrown off her normal cycle but couldn't determine, without knowing much about the synthetic compound, when, exactly she could expect her monthly visitor. She suggested an ovulation predictor, kit, and an investment in panty liners. When the biologist had gently inquired about how everything else was going, Felicity told her that she was having nightmares without chemical assistance, but wasn't jumping at every shadow anymore.

"We're uniquely qualified in our respective cities," Caitlin said, a little sadly, "to take traumatic experiences in stride."

"Over a good bottle of vodka," Felicity said, "we'll have to compare notes on being used as collateral, or considered acceptable collateral damage."

"Too bad there's no guide book for vigilante support staffers on burnout rate," Caitlin sighed. "We're not usually in the crosshairs, but we are considered far more disposable."

"Women behind the Masks. I mean, nobody ever thinks of taking Dig hostage."

"Can you blame them?" Caitlin's voice held a hint of pure female admiration, "Mr. Diggle is made of muscles."

"I used to get very distracted when they sparred."

"Shirtless. They do it shirtless, don't they?"

"All three, but between the… suit, and Wells' shirts, you do have a lot of snug fabric."

"True, It's like Dr. Wells went from kinda hot professor to broody clubber in his wardrobe style. And sure, there's a bit less nudity here, since Barry woke up, anyway."

"Oh my," Felicity chuckled with genuine amusement, "I never thought about who'd do the sponge bathing."

"Only two doctors and one's in a wheelchair."

"If only you weren't bound by Doctor-patient privilege." Felicity let out a low whistle.

"I did not find it a joyless task." The two women, usually serious, broke into very girlish giggles. "Oh, I've got to go. I'll take you up on the vodka offer." Felicity heard her talking to someone in the background before she hung up. The phone call, paired with a lot of busy work, proved therapeutic for the computer whiz.

After leaving the office around seven in the evening, Felicity went to the foundry to catch up on inventory and research into the piracy case they'd worked on before Merlyn had taken over their lives. Roy was cleaning his bow when she walked down the stairs. He greeted her with a smile and an affectionate shoulder squeeze. She got to work taking her inventory list and a pen and checking the medical supplies and armory items. She unpacked a crate of CO2 cartridges; un-surprisingly, in her absence no one had gotten around to it.

Felicity asked Roy about the piracy problem , she was surprised to learn from the young archer that Captain Lance had gotten a break on the money trail with one of his computer experts and the Arrow and Arsenal had captured the crew on land. Feeling a little left out, Felicity re-grouped and went looking for more work.

"We've been out-sourcing some of the tougher things to the P.D." Roy said when she asked him about current cases. "Oliver said you might not be back for a while."

"Why?" she asked. His glance dropped down and back up for a split second before he shrugged. For a man with a secret identity, he had a terrible poker face. She was from Vegas and knew poker faces. She turned around, picked up her purse and left, telling him to unpack the crate himself if he wanted any of his trick arrows to work. He called after her but she went back up through the club. It was early for a Thursday evening and the club was mostly filled with staff members who were readying it for the customers. She pushed past a man carrying a rack of glasses and bounced off a bouncer. The big man put out a hand to steady her, wrapping his fingers around her upper arm. She jumped back and pushed him, dropping her purse, spilling her phone, lipstick and wallet on the floor.

"Woah, you okay?" he asked, bending down to help her, his hulking form, blocking the spotlight from the ceiling. She stood up quickly and he grabbed her wrist. She tried to jerk away but he held fast. "Your phone," he said, holding out her mobile.

Felicity felt like she was suffocating. She grabbed it with trembling fingers and bolted for the door. Reaching the street her high-heeled shoe gave out, tipping her sideways, spilling her onto the sidewalk. Skinning her hand, she felt tears flowing down her cheeks and stood up, removing her shoes and sprinting for her car. She tripped once on broken pavement but managed to stay upright. She could barely see and realized her glasses had fallen off. Placing her scuffed palm on the hood of her car she bent double, sobbing for breath.

"Felicity?"

Oliver stood beside her. He'd made little noise, as usual, he just appeared and he was standing close, too close. She couldn't breathe and fumbled for her keys, unable to stop the painful contracting in her chest.

"N-no," she gasped before the ground rushed up to meet her.

Oliver caught her before she hit the ground and picked up her purse before hoisting her into his arms.

"Is she okay?" Matt, one of the bouncers stood in the doorway. He held her glasses in his hand and opened the door for Oliver.

"Get Thea," he said, bringing her to the business office. Carrying an unconscious woman down to what the employees all believed was a flooded basement, would look more than strange. He laid her gently on the couch in the office. He sent the bouncer to get her shoes and examined her. She had a chunk of glass in the ball of her left foot. He took a few tissues and blotted it gently. Looking at her face and seeing her eyes still closed, he removed it with a quick jerk, pressing the tissues hard into the cut. He gripped her ankle and managed to hold it still she started to sit up and tried to scramble backwards.

"Ollie?"The stuck her head in the office.

"Grab the first aid kit," he said, quietly. He continued to hold Felicity's ankle until his quiet words broke through the blind panic she was in. "Felicity, you're in Thea's office at the club. You're okay." There was a frightened, animal quality to her face as she looked around her.

"How did I get here?" she asked.

"You fainted in the alley."

"When?"

"You don't remember?"

"I remember coming upstairs and feeling someone grab my arm." She rubbed her scuffed palm with her other thumb. "I think I dropped my glasses."

"There's water in the fridge," Thea said, walking to her desk and opening the kit. She turned on a lamp and stood behind Oliver while he looked at the sole of Felicity's foot. "I'll get a dishtowel," she said and smiled briefly at the blonde.

"Matt, the bouncer has your glasses," He said, keeping his voice soft. She nodded but her eyes were still round. "You cut your foot on some glass, and we're just going to look at it."

"Here," Matt stuck his head in the office, looking nervous. He set down the glasses and shoes on Thea's desk and backed away, as if Felicity might explode. Thea returned with a towel and opened one of the water bottles, pouring cool water onto the towel before handing it to Oliver.

"What happened?" she asked.

"I think it got stuffy inside," he replied. "Felicity just needed a little air. I think we'll need more than a band aid. Can you grab a…kit from the…storage?" Thea nodded and left.

Watching Oliver gently blot at the bottom of her foot brought pain to the forefront of her mind.

"Ow," she said, pulling it back, reflexively.

"Keep still." He pressed the wet cloth to it, and gently squeezed, letting the blood carry out some of the dirt.

"I don't know what happened," she said, staring at her pedicure. "I was mad and I left and then I just remember being scared."

"Why were you mad?" he asked, scooting to sit on the couch, holding her foot in his lap.

"Long story," She said, not looking him in the eye. He accepted her answer and said nothing until Thea returned. She closed the office door and stayed to keep others from walking in. Oliver opened the suture kit and Felicity started to lift her foot.

"I just want to clean it, you might not need stitches." Thea put the disposable plastic-backed absorbent sheet on Oliver's lap when he lifted Felicity's foot. She checked the expiration date on the bottle of lidocaine and opened an alcohol prep pad. She popped the top off the bottle, revealing the rubber seal. She wiped the top and held it, top down. She grasped her wrist to steady her other hand while Oliver opened a sterile syringe and needle. He inserted the needle into the bottle and drew up the contents. He got up, briefly, allowing Felicity's foot to bleed freely while he used some hand sanitizer gel from Thea's purse to clean his hands.

Oliver used one of the orange sterile soap sponges on the skin surrounding the gash. He made several injections of lidocaine around the ragged edges of the wound. Felicity squeezed Thea's hand when she offered. The injections burned briefly before the pain retreated and was only present inside the cut. "Sorry," he said, sliding the needle into the wound and making the last two injections. Felicity felt nauseated but managed to keep herself still. He waited for the medication to spread while he took out the sterile tools. He washed the entire wound area with another orange sponge and Felicity felt nothing until the trickle of sterile liquid and blood dripped below the numbed area.

"Sutures?" she asked.

"The hard part's over," he said with a smile, gesturing to the lidocaine. He stitched quickly and neatly, wrapping the thread twice around the needle driver before pulling it tight over the previous stitch.

"How're you doing?" Thea asked.

"How do I look?"

"Pale." Oliver looked at her face and nodded his agreement.

While he worked, Felicity thought about being in the basement with Roy and why she'd gotten angry. She'd had a bad fall when she was young and she'd noticed how eyes were drawn to the bruise on her forehead and the cast on her arm. Over and over they looked at where she was damaged. When she'd asked Roy why Oliver had thought she wouldn't be working with them he'd looked hesitant, and then his eyes had darted downward. He'd looked at where she was damaged. All he, or anyone else who knew, could think about when they saw her was the assault. She wondered if they pictured it in their heads; and if so, what they saw.

There were lots of TV movies about it. It happened in soap operas all the time. In her women's studies class, a discussion had become heated about the subject of romanticizing rapists on television. Each show had its popular rapist, and some didn't become popular until they actually committed the crime. She'd written a paper about it entitled The Luke and Laura Phenomenon. It had been very serious with lots of sociology and psychology references. Women who watched soap operas from the seventies through the nineties were mostly stay-at-home mothers and housewives. These women, raised with traditional gender roles and Christian values felt so much guilt about fantasizing that they preferred to watch the object of their fantasy force a woman to have sex. Then, said woman with whom they identified, could have the dashing, dangerous man without guilt because she hadn't said 'yes'.

There was always dimmed lighting and shadows on the soap operas and Lifetime Original Movies; there was always the confrontation where the man professes his feelings (usually love,). He tells her how much he wants her while she gets increasingly nervous and slowly backs away. She's often dressed in a skirt for convenience. She denies feelings for him and tries to placate him with words before he drops his chin towards his chest, raises an evil eyebrow and throws her down onto the bed, couch, dance floor, or ground. Eventually the aftermath would show an emotionally devastated and frightened woman and the attacker who sometimes apologizes to his wife, girlfriend, object of obsession for losing control.

The inevitable frantic shower, unkempt, hair, baggy clothes and cowed demeanor for the woman is what inevitably followed, as well as the inability to walk ten feet in any direction without running into her attacker. Felicity had scored an 'A' on the paper by putting as much disdain for the women who popularized a crime, into her paper as possible. It wasn't fair. When it was Felicity's turn to be the victim, she hadn't been allowed the chance to fight her attacker. She couldn't strike out at him, or scratch his face. She wasn't even in the same room. Malcolm Merlyn had been the one; oh yes, but he'd tried to use Oliver's dick to rape -by-proxy. When Oliver had told Roy about it. Did they look down to the front of his pants and think about him the same way.

Felicity wanted to laugh at the situation she was in. Her lover had gently kissed and caressed her, against both of their wills, and it was his face she saw when she had nightmares. Oliver had finished with her sutures and was staring at her.

"What?" she asked, picking up her foot and swinging her legs around. He'd bandaged it with gauze so it looked neat and tidy.

"Why were you mad?" he asked. She wanted to tell him she didn't know, but his eyes were so earnest she didn't have the energy to be convincing.

"I'm a little over-sensitive these days."

**Author's note: to those of you who watch 'The Flash" Roger Howarth, the actor who plays reporter and Iris' mentor, Mason Bridge, spent over twenty years playing one of U.S. daytime television's favorite psychopaths. He originated the role of Todd Manning in 1993, a football player who leads a gang rape against a woman in a fraternity house. He was supposed to be on the air for a short time but got so popular after the rape, the writers had to make him heroically rescue his previous victim in order to 'redeem' him.