Chapter 2 - Emptiness in Starling City
Felicity Smoak had just entered the Lair together with John Diggle, Roy Harper and a mug of hot chocolate when it happened.
From out of nowhere, a large emptiness filled her up from inside. It was as if someone had sucked out all oxygen from the room, leaving nothing for her to breath into her lungs. She froze in shock; dropping the full glass, which fell slow-motion-like from her limp hand towards the floor, where it collided with the massive concrete and shattered into a billion tiny shards.
This nasty emotion grew stronger and stronger by the minute, completely consuming her. Felicity didn't even realise that both men in her company had grabbed hold of her in support – as she swayed dangerously – and both were desperately trying to get a response from her. But she simply stared blankly into the air; mind somewhere else and eyes not focusing on anything.
A single tear escaped her eye and made its way down her rosy cheek.
As John started shaking her right arm while simultaneously yelling her name, she finally took notice of the two worried faces in front of her. But as her gaze travelled between them, her eyes stopped in between and instead fell onto the rack usually storing the Arrow suit.
"Oh no... Something must have happened to Oliver! I can feel it! It's like we've established this connection lately – almost like the Force in Star Wars. Well, it's not exactly like the Force, but-" She stopped at the confused stare the other two gave her. "Emn… You don't know Star Wars? Science Fiction, lightsabers, Jedi, Sith, a mechanically unreliable spaceship, good against evil: that thingy…? NO?! Gosh, you two must live on Vulcan or something... But no time for a lecture about that now! This connection between us... I can't… I can't feel it anymore!" At the end of all her ranting, Felicity's knees suddenly buckled wholly beneath her and if it hadn't been for the support, she would have hit the ground hard; not having enough strength anymore to remain standing.
She broke down in fresh sobs as Diggle gently lowered her down onto the floor. Roy had grabbed a nearby blanket and more or less flung it over her shoulders. Both lads then tried their best to assure her it was only the stress and anxiety getting to her, but she would hear none of it.
"IT'S NOT LIKE THAT!" Felicity exclaimed more powerful than any of the two had ever heard her do prior. "It felt like he fell and called out one last time, before being silenced into an inhuman silence, and-"
That was when Roy's cellphone rang, representing a grateful momentarily distraction. He picked it up from his jeans pocket and as the display read 'THEA' he answered.
"Hey, what's up?" A pause. "No, he's not here, what-" Roy was cut of. A few seconds later he paled while his eyes immediately found Felicity's; staring disbelievingly at her like he'd just seen a ghost. "I'll... I'll tell Oliver to call you the second I see him. Yeah, promise. Yeah, bye."
Roy hung up with a short beep. He and Felicity hadn't broken their eye contact as he disconnected the call.
"That was Thea. She just had a really bad feeling about Oliver. The same type of feeling she had that day when the yacht sunk about 8 years ago..."
A gasp escaped Felicity's lips before everything went eerily quiet. The silence was so dense you could cut it with a knife.
Diggle however was quickly the first to break it.
"Guess we'll have to find out ourselves what happened to Oliver. One way or the other..."