Denial
On the fourth day after Oliver leaves her, Felicity sits in the Arrow Cave alone.
Roy returns in the early afternoon, and he brings food with him: dumplings, from her favorite restaurant.
She barely touches them.
He stays with her for a few hours before throwing on his Arsenal gear and leaving to "let off some steam."
Around 8, Diggle brings her dinner. More dumplings, from her favorite restaurant.
She eats more than she did for Roy, but she does it for John's sake and not her own.
He stays with her for a few hours and tries to convince her to go home.
He falls asleep on one of the cots around midnight.
Felicity crawls into Oliver's bed around three in the morning. She breathes deep, hoping to catch a memory of his scent, but he hasn't slept here in a long time.
She falls asleep around five.
She doesn't cry.
She hasn't cried since he left.
She hasn't cried since he told her he loves her.
At 8 in the morning she wakes Diggle and goes home. She showers, downs a cup of coffee, puts her hair up, and goes back to work.
She doesn't know what else to do. All she knows is that Roy and John are worried about her, and the last thing she wants right now is for them to worry.
So she throws herself back into life.
Oliver isn't dead. He can't be.
Oliver will come back to her, and when he does he won't find her pining in the dark.
But she does go back to the Foundry that night, and the next night, just to be sure.
Oliver doesn't return on the fifth night.
He doesn't return on the sixth night.
On the seventh night, she returns to the Arrow Cave to wait, and she finds Diggle and Roy already there.
They've stumbled onto a case. It should be an easy one, and while none of them really wants to do anything without Oliver, Roy and Diggle are clearly going stir crazy and feeling useless. And so Felicity fires up her computers and puts in her earpiece.
Roy goes as Arsenal, and Diggle goes as himself.
It does turn out to be an easy case. Two hours later, Diggle deposits the bad guys at the back door of the SCPD and tells Felicity they're on their way back.
Felicity takes out her earpiece and leans back in her chair.
"Felicity Smoak?"
His voice makes her blood run cold.
Swiveling around, she finds Malcolm Merlyn standing at the foot of the stairs. In his hands is a sword.
The sword is covered in blood.
"I have a message for you."
He steps towards her. Felicity stands, and she knows what he's going to say before he says it.
"Oliver Queen is dead."
He holds out the sword, and she takes it from him. It feels like it weighs a ton, and she grasps it in hands that have gone suddenly numb.
Merlyn keeps talking. He talks about how Oliver was stabbed by Ra's Al Ghul. How he fell off the cliff of the mountaintop they were fighting on. How his body was never found, that it was most likely buried under the snow. Ra's Al Ghul's men looked for him, as did Merlyn himself.
As Malcolm Merlyn talks, Felicity stares at him in disgust.
Malcolm Merlyn: the man who snuck, unnoticed, to the top of a mountain, to watch a fight that he caused himself.
Malcolm Merlyn, who wanted to see what happened to Oliver Queen so he could deliver the news to Thea.
Malcolm Merlyn, who poisoned his daughter, forced her to kill an innocent woman, and blackmailed Oliver into turning himself in.
Malcolm Merlyn.
Felicity wants to say so much. She wants to tell him how much he disgusts her, how he's a monster for doing this to Oliver, for doing this to his own daughter.
She wants to say so much, but her voice isn't working, and she can only stand in silence as the devil talks in her ear.
"I've already told Thea. I thought you deserved to know as well. Feel free to test the blood on the sword, but I promise that it's his."
Felicity stares at the sword in her hands, but when she finally finds the courage to speak, Merlyn is long gone.
Felicity runs an analysis of the blood, just to be sure.
The results are what she expected.
It's Oliver Queen's blood on the blade.
She sets it on the table in front of her and sits down.
That's how Diggle, Roy, and Laurel find her twenty minutes later.
"We ran into Laurel upstairs," Diggle starts to explain from behind her. "She wants to know where Oliver is. I thought that…."
He trails off, and she knows he's seen the bloody sword on the table.
Felicity looks up, and her gaze meets Laurel's first. Laurel looks from her to the sword and back again, and her eyes ask a question that Felicity doesn't want to answer.
But she doesn't have to. Laurel puts it together and shakes her head,
"Oh my god. Oliver."
Felicity tells them what Merlyn told her. She tells them how she ran a test, and she confirms that it's Oliver's blood on the sword.
Diggle doesn't say anything; he's already accepted that Oliver is gone.
Roy curses Merlyn's name, and as he vents, Felicity finds herself glad that Merlyn has gone already.
"How could he do that? How could he tell Thea that her brother is dead? He had no right! After everything he's done to her?! After he betrayed her, and framed her, and blackmailed her brother? After he sent Oliver to his death?! He has no right to be anywhere near Thea anymore, much less to tell her that her brother is dead."
"STOP!"
It's Laurel who screams the word.
"Stop saying that word. Stop saying he's dead!"
Tears start to fall down Laurel's cheeks, and Felicity finds herself acknowledging for the first time that, while Laurel may not necessarily be in love with Oliver anymore, she clearly still cares for him.
"I didn't even know he was gone. He never…he never even told me he was leaving. How can he be dead?"
Felicity wants to say something, but she doesn't know what to say. Oliver told her that he loved her before he left. It never occurred to her that he left Laurel without even saying goodbye.
"Laurel…." Diggle clearly wants to say something too, but like Felicity, he's at a loss.
They were all so caught up in their own torment and grief that they never thought to say anything to her.
In the end, she doesn't blame them for not saying anything to her, though she has every right to. In the end, the only thing she can focus on is the fact that-
"He never even said 'goodbye.'"
They all fall quiet, lost in their own thoughts.
Finally, Felicity can't stand the silence anymore.
"I don't believe him."
The three of them look at her like she's gone crazy, but she doesn't care. She doesn't believe it. She won't believe it until there's proof. Real proof. A body, or a video, or something. Yes, it's Oliver's blood coating the sword, but that doesn't mean he's dead.
"Felicity."
There's pity in the way Diggle says her name, and it makes her furious.
She gets to her feet angrily.
"This is Malcolm Merlyn we're talking about here. The man who tried to level half of Starling City. The man who forced his own daughter to kill Sara. The man who sent Oliver off to fight a duel to the death. Why should we believe anything he has to say?"
"Felicity."
Diggle takes a tentative step toward her, and when she doesn't flinch he moves closer.
"Look at the sword."
She looks, though she already knows what it looks like.
"Look at how much blood is on it. Think about how deep it must have gone in."
"Don't," Roy responds warningly, and Felicity agrees; she doesn't want to hear this, either.
"He's been gone for a week," Diggle continues. "If he was still alive, he would have found a way to contact us. He would have found a way to contact you."
Felicity shakes her head and steps in closer. They're practically on top of each other now.
"He's not dead, John. I'm sorry you don't believe that, but I do."
"Felicity," Diggle responds, and the pity is back in his voice. "I know you don't want to accept it. I know it's easier to deny it. I know-"
"You don't know anything! None of us do! Oliver is not dead. He can't be!"
She's nearly hysterical now, and the tears that are falling from her eyes are tears of frustration rather than sadness. Why can't any of them understand? Why are they all so willing to just stand here and accept it?
"How do you know?" he asks her, and something in Felicity breaks.
"Because he loves me."
She throws the words out in front of her like a shield, and maybe they are.
Oliver left because he needed to save his sister…but he's going to come home because he loves her.
I'm someone who will do whatever, whatever, it takes to save my sister.
I love you.
Oliver was willing to die to save Thea…but he's going to live for her.
Diggle doesn't have a response. None of them do. Maybe they all think she's crazy. Maybe they all think she's deluded, that she's lying to herself, but she honestly doesn't care. Let them think what they want.
Oliver is coming home.
Felicity's declaration must shake something in all of them, because suddenly they all need to leave.
"I need to see Thea," Roy says first, and he leaves just like that. He's been a man of few words this past week, and it seems the only person he really wants to share his words with is Thea.
"I…I need to be alone," Laurel says next, and she leaves behind Roy, her fists clenched at her sides.
Felicity stares at Diggle, waiting for him to leave, too.
Instead he pulls her into a hug.
John Diggle has never been an emotional man, and the hug surprises her at first, but then she realizes the hug is for her, and so she hugs him back.
"Go be with your family, John. I'll be okay."
It's the second time in a week she's told him this, and it's a fact that's not lost on either of them.
"Are you sure?" he asks as he pulls away.
"I'm sure," she responds, and she means it.
She's going to be okay….
Because Oliver is going to be okay.
Over the next five days, Roy spends more time with Thea. Apparently Merlyn came up with some bogus lie involving a plane crash that killed Oliver, and he faked some evidence to go with his story. Thea must trust him more than any of them do, because she accepts his story at face value. Or at least, she seems to. Roy plays up the story when he's with her, encouraging the rest of them to do the same.
They've all been lying to her for so long that no one thinks twice about doing it again.
Felicity expects to find Laurel spending more of her time at Verdant, but then Thea admits she hasn't seen her around. Eventually, Felicity discovers that Laurel is spending most of her time training with Ted Grant. It seems that Laurel really has begun to channel her emotions the same way that Oliver does.
Felicity wonders how much healthier it is than drinking away her feelings.
Diggle spends most of his time with Lyla and Sara, but he checks in on Felicity every day, whether it's a quick phone call or a lunchtime visit.
And Felicity? She throws herself into her job at Palmer Industries.
Oliver's not dead. She knows it.
Five days after Merlyn comes to them with the sword, Felicity wakes from a dream she can't quite remember, but one that leaves her with a small, annoying feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach.
Oliver's not dead. She can't believe it. She won't believe it.
But then Nyssa pays them a visit, and everything comes crashing down.
...tbc...