-10-

It had been seven hours since she had walked out of S.T.A.R Labs, and Felicity was starting to think that someone out there didn't like her very much. How in the world did it take this long to wait for a train that would take her back to Starling City? Surely trains should always be running there – especially for people like her, who needed them for emergencies! And now, now that she was finally on a train, she was waiting at a main hub for another train to pass in the opposite direction? Didn't these people know how much of a hurry she was in?
She rubbed her eyes wearily, realising that she had been awake for almost twenty-three hours. The bustle of the station outside was thankfully keeping her awake, as was the impatient tapping of her foot as she waited for the train to get moving again. Her phone sat uselessly on her lap, dead. The last phone call she had received was from Diggle telling her that he was on his way to help Oliver. She had no idea if Oliver was ok or not. She had no idea if Diggle had gotten to him on time.
She glared down at her phone, willing it to come back to life. What kind of an IT girl was she, if she couldn't even get her phone to work?
Frustrated, she went back to staring out of the window, bringing her hand jerkily to her face. Her fingernails were already bitten down to the skin, ruining the manicure she had treated herself to just the weekend before. She wondered again if she should have made another choice, found another way to get to Starling City, but she knew that it was pointless to think anything now. Since she had arrived at Central City station in the middle of the night to find it closed, she had gone through a million other possibilities she could take that would get her back to Starling City – hire a car, hijack a fire engine, commandeer a helicopter – but none of those options were as quick or less difficult than waiting for the hours to pass until the station resumed its train services.
It had been the longest hours of her life.
And now, as she made her way back to Starling City, her heart was filled with dread at what she might find there. What if Diggle hadn't gotten to Oliver on time? What if he was already…
She shook her head and inwardly scolded herself. There was no good in thinking the worse. They had gone through bad situations before – no reason for things to be different this time round.
Except things were different. Because she wasn't there. She wasn't there helping Diggle find Oliver, she wasn't there making sure Oliver was ok, she wasn't there telling him off for not being careful. And that one reason alone made her realise how wrong she had been for the past three months. She couldn't move on with her life – because her life was back in Starling City, with Oliver.
She was an idiot. It didn't matter if she never ended up with him. It was enough for her that she was a part of his life, that she was there to support him and make him smile once in a while. She had thought that she needed both – that she had needed to be his one true love and his partner-in-crime – and when he had told her he couldn't give it to her, she had run away from him, thinking that there was nothing worse than being with him and not being with him.
But she had been wrong, so so wrong. There was something worse. There was Oliver being dead. There was Oliver being dead, and her wasting three months when she could have been with him. Not with with him, but just with him.
She let out a sigh of relief when she heard the other train they had been waiting to pass by approach the platform. She looked at her watch, seeing that she had been waiting there in the train, not moving, for ten minutes. Her stomach clutched and she looked at her dead phone again rather helplessly.
Please, please don't let me be too late.
The approaching train cruised to a halt on the opposite side of the platform. Her eyes flickered absentmindedly along the windows as the train rolled in so slowly that she thought it might possibly be going backwards. She bit back a scream of frustration, stopping herself from standing up and finding someone to yell at to get the train moving again. As her gaze moved along the windows of the opposite train, she suddenly stopped breathing.
No, it couldn't be. That couldn't be…
In an instant, she was up out of her seat and sprinting to the doors of the train. Pushing the button frantically, the doors opened with a hiss and she practically fell out onto the platform. Then she was running, sprinting, across to the other train.
"Oliver!" she shouted at the top of her lungs, waving her hands at the window of the opposite train through which she could see Oliver's form slumped on a seat. His head turned at the sound of her voice and when his eyes met hers, he was suddenly up and running to the train door just like she had only seconds before. Behind him, Diggle followed.
She hurried to meet him as he stepped off the train, but froze in her tracks when she saw the state of him. He was pale, so pale, and pain had etched lines at the corners of his eyes. She felt tears spring up in her eyes and she looked up at Diggle with a questioning look. Thankfully Diggle gave her a small, reassuring smile, then moved away from them, leaving them alone.
"I–" Felicity started to say, then had to stop to clear the lump in her throat. "I was on my way back to see you." She wrung her hands nervously, her eyes anxiously searching his body for injuries. "I heard on the news that you had been shot. I got on the first train I could."
Her gaze finally went back to his face, after failing to find any outward sign of injury. She found him studying her closely, his clear blue eyes steady.
"I was on my way to Central City," he finally said, his voice soft.
"Oh?" she said. Despite herself, she frowned. "Shouldn't you have gone to a hospital instead?"
The corner of his mouth twitched. "Diggle fixed me up. Besides, it couldn't wait."
"What couldn't wait?"
"What I had to tell you."
Felicity swallowed heavily as the way Oliver was looking at her turned more intense. He took a step towards her, then stopped, standing so close that she could feel his body heat emanating towards her. She barely noticed when the two trains on either side of them began to move away.
"I wanted you to know that you don't have to be sad anymore," he said quietly, his eyes never leaving her face. "I almost died last night, but you were wrong. I wasn't going to die not remembering what it's like to be happy. I did remember. I remembered you." His hand unconsciously reached up to his side, making her wonder if that was where he had been shot. He took a deep breath, then continued to talk.
"I hopped on the first train I could to see you, Felicity," he said. "I realised that you are the most important thing to me. Not being the Arrow. Not fighting for the dead. You."
Felicity's eyes widened.
"You're choosing me?" she breathed.
In answer, he just smiled.

As they pulled into the station, Oliver could feel Diggle's eyes on him.
"I'm fine," he said, sitting up straighter in the chair. Diggle raised a dubious eyebrow.
"You don't look fine," he said. "I hope the morphine's working for you."
Oliver grimaced at the dull, persistent ache in his side, then tried to put it out of his mind. When Diggle had found him late last night, unconscious and barely alive, he doubted Diggle would have expected them to be on the first train to Central City a few hours later. But morphine and a stubborn streak could work wonders.
"Could you try ringing her again?" he asked Diggle as the train pulled to a stop.
"I've tried," Diggle said, looking down at his phone. "It's going straight to voicemail."
Oliver frowned, staring out of the window. It was unlike Felicity to be unreachable. He wondered if something was wrong – or whether the unthinkable had happened, and she had finally moved on with her life, without him.
Felicity. He had lost her once already. There was no way he was going to lose her again.
As if he had conjured her up with his thoughts, from the station platform a flash of blonde hair gleaming in the sun caught his eye. He didn't believe it at first – but then she called out his name.
"Oliver!"
Without a second's hesitation, he was up and running out of the train, the pain in his side forgotten. When he got to the platform, there she was, standing there to meet him.
Felicity.
She looked beautiful, standing there in front of him, her blue eyes glowing, her pale skin so soft in the morning light. She was saying something to him and he was saying something back to her, but all he was really thinking was how much he had missed her. He hadn't realised quite how much until that moment.
"I realised that you are the most important thing to me," he told her. "Not being the Arrow. Not fighting for the dead. You."
"You're choosing me?" she asked, her eyes wide with disbelief.
He smiled at her, knowing that she would never believe that he would give up everything and anything for just one shot at happiness with her. That was fine with him – he would spend the rest of his life proving it to her.
"What are you doing here anyway?" he asked, suddenly realising where they were.
"I was on a train," she said. "I was going back to Starling City."
"You were coming back?"
She gave him a small smile. "Well, last night when I heard that you were shot, I realised that a life not being with you – and not with with you, but you know, just with you – I know it's the same word but it means different things in my head." She grinned then, a self-deprecating grin that made him smile back at her. "I realised that if I had to choose a life trying to find happiness with someone else, or being happy living a life fighting crime with you, I choose you."
It was his turn to look at her with disbelief. "Even if that means just being Girl Wednesday to the Arrow?"
"It's Girl Friday. And yes, that would be more than enough for me, Oliver."
Oliver felt something in his chest – years and years of anger, loss and loneliness – melt away until he felt the lightest he had felt in a long time. He couldn't believe it: here he was, racing his way to Central City to declare to Felicity that he chose a life with her as Oliver Queen; and she had been on her way to Starling City to tell him that she chose a life with him as his friend and as the Arrow's partner. He had let go of his life to be with her, and she had let go of her new life to be with him – and somehow, some way, they had literally met in the middle.
He realised then that this was what she had meant. He could be both Oliver Queen and the Arrow. Just as long as he was with someone who understood him, every side of him; just as long as he was with someone who was willing to meet him halfway.
It was the most perfect gift she would ever give him.
"I love you, Felicity," he said, the words bursting out of him, no longer willing to be contained.
She gave him a bright smile, her face lit with such happiness that he would always remember it looking back in later years; and then she was in his arms, faster than a flying arrow.

The end. Thanks for reading, and for all your lovely comments and reviews! Bring on Arrow Season 3, Olicity forever!