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Kitty sits in front of her computer, fingers flying over the keyboard as she works tirelessly to find redacted information from the CIA file her team had recovered yesterday. It’s times like this that she really hates Felicity, both for making the team believe it’s even possible to recover this information and for leaving in the first place. Her fingers itch to call her and ask for her help — or really just hear her best friend’s voice — but it’s currently 3am in Bali and now that Lis is semi-retired from the vigilante life, she’ll be fast asleep.
The door opens and Piotr walks in, no doubt, having been chosen as the spokesperson for the team, sent in to ask how the research is coming along.
“If I had the answer, don’t you think I would have told you?” Kitty says with a roll of her eyes. “I would have come running out of this room cheering my success. No cheering. No celebration. Ergo, no information.”
“Forget about it, it’s not important,” Piotr says. “There’s a new threat. You need get information on a mutant that’s missing.”
“Who’s missing?” Kitty asks, her voice going up an octave as she instantly remembers Felicity’s kidnapping and how they’d all nearly lost their lives trying to save her.
“Was it Essex Corp?” she asks. She shudders to think that they’ll have to go up against Sinister so soon after having their asses handed to them. It’s been two months, but some of their wounds still haven’t healed.
“We don’t know,” Piotr says, moving in closer to stand next to her. “But it’s imperative that we find her.”
“Her who?” Kitty asks, eyebrows drawing together in confusion when Piotr places his hand on her shoulder and begins rubbing it gently.
“What are you doing?” she asks, shrugging him off.
“You seem tense,” Piotr says. “I was going to relax you. You’ve got a long night ahead of you if you’re going to find our mutant.”
“Well stop,” she says, looking at him like he’s lost his mind.
There’s something off about him, but she can’t place her finger on it. Then again, she’s felt like everything has been off ever since they broke up.
“You broke up with me. Remember?” she tells him, frustrated that he’s forcing her to talk about it yet again. She’d promised him that she would be civil. That she would try and be friends, but she can’t be friends with him if he’s going to give her mixed signals.
“Right, of course,” he says, and there’s just the tiniest hint of shock in his voice. Like he has no idea what she’s talking about, which is entirely infuriating.
And entirely odd.
Kitty’s eyes meet Piotr’s as she tries to figure out what’s going on with him. He’s not a drinker and he’d never do drugs, so she knows that’s not it. It’s possible that something or someone is controlling him. It wouldn’t be the first time, and his eyes do seem different.
He’s not looking at her with either extreme affection or insurmountable guilt, which seem to be the only two emotions he’s capable of with her.
That’s when it clicks.
It isn’t Piotr at all.
Instantly, she moves, but she’s not quick enough. Before she can get into any sort of defense stance or think about phasing, large hands grab her by the hair and slam her head into the desk, disorienting her enough that she can’t think straight.
She just barely has enough energy to phase through the floor as the person pretending to be Piotr yells, “Where’s Current?”
Then everything goes black.
****
“I thought you were going to go down to the beach,” Oliver says as he walks out onto the patio of their villa to find her laying in the chaise by the pool.
Felicity sets down the book she’d been reading to look up at him. He’s positively delicious in his long sleeved navy henley and khaki pants, even if it’s an ensemble that would fit better in Starling than it does in Bali.
“Aren’t you hot?” she asks, reaching out to pull at the hem of his shirt.
“Trying to get me naked, Ms. Smoak?” he says with that devilish grin of his that sends bolts of energy straight to her core.
“I don’t have to try,” she says. “You’re not that hard to seduce.”
That earns her a laugh, which is honestly one of the most rewarding things. For all of the trauma in Oliver’s life, it’s so nice to see him like this — unburdened by the past. No longer carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders. It certainly makes the near 16-hour flight in between a screaming baby and an entitled jackass worth it.
Bali is a magical place.
“Are you sure you don’t want to go into town with me?” Oliver asks, hopefully, despite having said no the last three times he asked her.
Their relationship can survive a lot, but it can’t survive another 5 minute grocery store run turned into a 2 hour excursion because Oliver can’t decide if he wants to try the soba noodles or if he’s going to stick with the udon.
“I’m good here,” she tells him, patting her book to remind him that she’s already explained she wants to spend the morning finishing up her book before they go check out the festival after lunch.
“Mmm,” he hums, crouching down so that his face is level with hers. “Yes, you are.”
He leans in to give her a kiss and she doesn’t object.
“Have I told you that I love that new swimsuit on you?” he says.
She glances down at the new blue floral piece she’d picked up yesterday with the express plan to drive Oliver crazy.
“I think that the mind blowing orgasm you gave me last night said as much,” she says, remembering how he’d skillfully kept her on the edge of bliss for a tantalizing long time before finally giving her what she wanted.
She squeezes her thighs together in an effort to ward off the growing desire for him. If they are going to make it to the festival, she needs to not start this game with him. Not when it takes her far too long to recover afterwards.
Then again… He is looking exceptionally handsome today with his newly tanned skin and the way his shirt clings to his body in the humidity. It’s not as if they couldn’t go to the festival tomorrow.
She purposefully rolls onto her stomach to reveal the back of the bikini, causing him to groan. It’s a series of thin blue straps that cross in such a way that it’d given him some very creative ideas last night…
Oliver leans over her until his entire upper body is nearly covering hers. He leaves an open mouth kiss right behind her ear that causes her to spark involuntarily, but neither of them so much as flinch at it. They’ve been together long enough by now that she knows those little sparks don’t scare him. They turn him on.
He whispers into her ear, “If I don’t go to the store, we’ll starve.”
She smiles to herself at how affected his voice sounds. It’s always thrilling to know that she has the power to bring a man like Oliver to his knees and that it has nothing to do with her mutation.
She looks behind her at him and schools her expression into one of complete innocence. “I was just going to ask you to put sunscreen on my back.”
Oliver licks his lips as he stares at her, trying to gage if he believes her or not.
“You don’t want me to get burnt, do you?” she adds, which only earns her a playful bite to the shoulder.
“Five years in hell and yet you are going to be the thing that finally kills me,” he says, before he stands up to go grab the sunscreen from inside.
Felicity can’t help but smile at that. She almost can’t believe that there had been a time where she doubted that Oliver Queen could ever love her.
Oliver returns with the sunscreen and takes great care in rubbing it all over her back, slowly, and carefully. It’s a near sinful experience that has her shocking him on more than one occasion because it’s just too much. His calloused fingertips from years of archery, mixed with his gentle, massaging hands have her melting into a giant puddle within minutes. She’s not even ashamed to admit that it has her moaning aloud.
If the way that he’s fidgeting on his feet is any indication, he’s just as affected by the entire experience as she is.
“Let’s stay in bed all day,” she tells him.
“Don’t tempt me.”
He places an open mouth kiss to the back of her neck.
“Why not?” she says, not caring that she’s whining. “I’ll make it worth your while.”
“Oh I know you will. That’s why it’s tempting.”
She rolls over onto her back so that she can see him properly.
“We didn’t fly to Bali so that we could stay in bed all day everyday, as wonderful as that sounds,” Oliver says. “We could have done that at home.”
“No, we flew to Bali so that we could hide away from the world. Nobody said anything about ever having to leave the bed.”
Oliver smiles down at her as he plays with the strap of her top.
“I’ll remind you that you were as excited for this festival as I was,” he says, smiling down at her.
“Yes, but it’s hard to remember that when you’re looking at me like I’m dessert and touching me with those hands of yours,” she says with a playful glare.
He removes his hands and holds them up in surrender. “Alright fine. I’ll go. I’ll be back in time to make us lunch. Don’t eat ‘til I get back.”
“I promise that I’ll eat lunch with you,” she says, leaving out the fact that she’s 100% planning on eating a second breakfast the minute he leaves the house.
“Good,” he says. “Enjoy your book.”
“Love you,” she says, sitting up to give him a goodbye kiss. “And don’t forget my—”
“Martabak,” he says with a roll of his eyes. “It’s like you want to have a heart attack.”
“And it’s like you want me to starve. My body can’t live on all that healthy stuff you eat. I need calories,” she says, raising her eyebrow in a challenge.
It’s become a game of theirs, started before they even began dating. He teases her endlessly about her eating habits, even when he knows full well that she has to consume more calories than the average person thanks to the exorbitant amount of energy coursing through her veins.
In the early days, she would get offended and doubt herself, thinking that Oliver was subtly trying to tell her she was fat or something. She now knows that it has nothing to do with how she looks. She has plenty of evidence that Oliver is more than satisfied with her appearance. He’s simply an overprotective idiot who’s terrified of losing her for any reason.
“I’ll bring your Martabak, but I’m also bringing you fruit,” he says, daring her to argue with him, but the joke’s on him, because the fruit here in Indonesia is amazing.
“Yes, Sir,” she says, giving him a salute.
“Don’t call me, Sir.” He shakes his head as he stands up to leave.
“That’s not what you said last night,” she says, playfully slapping his behind, which earns her a glare.
“I’m going to leave before you get yourself into any more trouble, Ms. Smoak.”
“That’s probably a good idea, Mr. Queen ,” she says, placing extra emphasis on his name, knowing what it does to him. And he doesn’t disappoint. She catches his involuntary shiver as he has to pause to compose himself.
He eventually makes it out the door after several innuendos, three goodbyes and four kisses. Once the door shuts behind him, she picks up her book again and happily loses herself in the murder mystery she’s been reading all week in honor of Halloween.
****
That evening, Felicity sits in between Oliver’s legs with her back against his chest as they watch the various traditional performances from their spot on the beach. The sun has finally started to set in a beautiful mix of purple, pink, and blue, after a long day of beaming down harshly on them. They are both more than a little bit burnt after forgetting to reapply sunscreen in all of the excitement of the festival.
“I probably look like a lobster,” she says, touching her cheeks and wincing.
“My lobster,” Oliver says, kissing the top of her head and wrapping his arms around her tightly.
“You know lobsters mate for life, right?” she says before even realizing what she’s implying. She’s lucky that she’s facing the stage and not him at the moment, because she doesn’t want to see his reaction.
The arms at her waist tense, and she can tell that he’s made the same connection to her statement as she has.
Did she honestly just say that to him? They’ve talked about the future a few times, sure. In a distant, far off way. In that, ‘one day. Maybe’ kind of way. They’ve discussed possibly moving in together. Maybe getting a dog. But marriage and forever have never been part of the discussion.
She’s not opposed to the idea, but she has no idea what Oliver’s thoughts are on the matter. And somehow, sitting on the beach, slightly buzzed on wine, while watching various bands play is not really the appropriate setting for such a serious talk.
“Well, regardless, I still think you look cute, even if you’re as red as a tomato,” he says, clearly giving her an out and she gladly accepts.
“You’re biased,” she says with a roll of her eyes.
She picks up his beer and takes a sip of it, having already finished her wine three performances ago. She should get up and get them another round, but she’s too lazy at the moment.
“We should stay here,” Oliver says, absently tracing designs into her stomach in the way he always does.
“Yeah, I’m good if we don’t check out the rest of the booths,” she tells him. “I’m comfortable and my feet hurt.”
“I told you to wear tennis shoes,” he says and she can hear the exasperation in his voice.
“I can’t wear tennis shoes with this outfit.” She sits up so that she can turn and look at him properly. “Am I going to hear you complain about this dress, too?”
“Nope,” he says with a smile, running a finger along the skin of her thigh, exposed thanks to the long slit up the side. “No complaints from me.”
“That’s what I thought,” she says, turning around to settle back into his arms.
“But I wasn’t talking about staying here at the beach,” he says once she’s comfortable again.
“Oh,” she says. “What did you mean then?”
“I meant we could stay here in Bali,” he says. “Be lobsters together.”
That gives her pause. It’s not the first time Oliver’s expressed a desire to run away with her. In fact, this entire trip had started because he’d wanted to get away from Starling City after everything that had happened with her getting kidnapped and him having to don the hood again to save her. But is he really suggesting that they never go back?
“You mean like move here?” she asks.
“Why not?” he says, placing a kiss on her bare shoulder.
There are about a million reasons why not, and she’ll think of them. She’s sure of it. Right after Oliver stops running his finger up her thigh like that.
“What about the company?” she asks.
Oliver removes his hand from her thigh to take her hands in his own. He runs his fingers over her ring finger absently.
“Who cares about the company,” he says.
“You care.”
He doesn’t say anything, but the way that he keeps rubbing at her finger like he typically rubs at his own tells her that he’s lost in thought.
“Oliver—” she starts to protest… Or perhaps ask him if he’s sure that’s what he wants… She honestly doesn’t know what she’d been able to say. For all she knows, she was about to throw caution to the wind and say sure, why not? Because there isn’t anything she wouldn’t do for Oliver or anywhere she wouldn’t follow him.
Except, she doesn’t get the chance to find out what her response was going to be because he cuts her off.
“I forgot something at the market this morning,” he tells her.
Without warning, he stands up. The movement is so abrupt that she can only just barely throw her hands down soon enough to stop herself from falling back.
“What are you doing? I thought we were going to finish watching the show,” she says, confused at the sudden departure.
“I need to go get something from the market,” he says, looking around quickly, like he’s searching for something.
“The market? Um… Okay,” she says, slowly. She moves to stand up and go with him, but he quickly puts his hands out to stop her.
“No.”
“No?” she says, confused as all get out. Has he lost his mind? What is going on that he’s suddenly so jumpy and weird?
“I’m gonna go watch the game afterwards,” he tells her.
“The game?” she repeats. She feels like an idiot parroting him, but she can’t make sense of his erratic behavior right now. It’s not him.
“The game’s on,” Oliver says. “World Series? Game 5?”
She stares at him for another minute, completely confused as he gathers up their things and hands her her purse.
“Okay,” she says, standing up. She feels like she’s missed something major, but she can’t figure out what. “I’m guessing you don’t want me to come with you then.”
“Well, I mean, you said yourself, you don’t like sports,” he says with a shrug.
She shakes her head and bites her tongue. She wants to remind him that she happily watches games with him even if she can’t follow along because she enjoys watching him get worked up over something normal for once. It’s fun to see him yelling at referees for bad calls rather than dealers for selling bad drugs.
It’s obvious that he doesn’t want her to go with him, so she’s not going to force the issue.
She can only hope that when he comes home later, he’ll tell her what’s clearly bothering him.
“Where will you be?” she asks him, reluctantly agreeing to part ways for the evening. So much for their romantic night. At least they are here for another three weeks. There will be plenty of time for romantic evenings together.
That’s what she tells herself.
“The bartender where we got our drinks said they’d be showing the game, so I’ll go there.”
She nods her head, still feeling like she’s got a case of emotional whiplash.
“I’ll walk you home first,” he says.
He moves to take her hand but she shakes her head. She needs a minute to process what just happened.
“It’s okay, I can walk myself home,” she says.
Oliver looks like he’s about to argue with her, so she holds up her hand to silence him.
“It’s a five minute walk and the complete opposite direction from where you’re headed,” she tells him.
“I really don’t mind,” he says, but she shakes her head again.
“It’s really okay. I can take care of myself,” she says, letting a little bit of her energy out so that her hand turns blue for a split second, reminding him of her powers. “Nobody’s going to hurt me.”
“You’ve said that before,” he says, giving her a serious look. “You’re not invincible.”
“I know that,” she tells him seriously. She knows better than anyone how vulnerable she is given the right conditions. He doesn’t have to remind her of that.
“Come on,” he says, going to take her hand again, she lets him this time, but doesn’t let him pull her towards the villa.
She knows that he’s been on hyper-mode since her kidnapping, but if things are going to work between them, at some point he has to start trusting her ability to take care of herself again. She needs to feel confident that she can take care of herself.
And that starts with her walking herself home.
“We’re in Bali. We are a half a world away from all the threats against us. It’s five minutes,” she tells him. “I promise I’ll be safe. I’ll mind my surroundings. Eyes on a swivel and all.”
“It’s head on a swivel,” he says.
Felicity knew that, but it’s totally worth it to see the amused smile on his face as he starts to laugh. Whatever weird tension was building up between them since his abrupt change of subject is gone and her Oliver is back. Heart eyes and all.
Maybe he just needs some space to watch the game, she tells herself. He just needs some guy time. After all, doesn’t she need her own girl time sometimes? Isn’t that why she’d refused to go to the market with him this morning, choosing to stay back and read her book instead?
Perhaps she’s reading too much into his reaction. He’d probably did just forget something at the market and remembered that the game was going to be starting soon and was anxious to get to it. She doesn’t need to make it a big thing. Oliver will tell her if something is wrong. She trusts that much.
“Love you,” she says, standing on her tip-toes until Oliver graciously wraps his arms around her and pulls her up the rest of the way to meet her lips. Kissing is much more difficult without the height of her heels, but it’s a challenge they both are happy to overcome.
“Love you, too,” he tells her. “My lobster…”
She rolls her eyes at him. He can be so incredibly cheesy sometimes. That’s something that she had never expected when she’d started dating him. With his playboy past and the stoic persona he’s had ever since coming back from Lian Yu, she never would have pictured just how much of a romantic he is. John and her still joke about what a surprise it is that Oliver is Mr. Domestic.
“Enjoy your game,” she tells him as they part ways.
She makes her way back to their villa, making sure to stop by and grab herself an overly priced bottle of wine as well as two martabaks. Without Oliver around to judge her, she figures, why not. The damn things are addicting and she needs all the energy she can get if she’s going to survive this vacation. Last night’s activities had certainly been memorable, but they’d left her feeling more drained than usual. She needs to start paying better attention to what her body needs. The last thing she wants is to drain herself dry and end up in the hospital again. Oliver would lose his mind.
When Felicity gets back to the villa, she’s surprised to find the door slightly ajar, and wonders if they’d really been so careless as to forget to lock the door. Oliver is always hyper-vigilant about those kinds of things. She could have sworn he’d locked the door and not only double, but triple-checked.
In fact, she’s positive that he did. Oliver is the kind of person that can’t function if there’s even a sliver of a chance of danger. He has a checklist of things he has to do in order to be able to breathe. He can’t have his back to the door at restaurants. He has to sleep on the side of the bed closest to the door. He has to know where every emergency exit is in a building. And he has to, has to , lock all doors and windows when leaving.
Oliver may be relaxed in Bali and showing her a side of him that she’s never seen before, but he’s not that relaxed.
A flash of memories make their way to the surface. Men in camo breaking into her home. The weight of two men on top of her, pinning her down, while a third sticks a needle in her neck, suppressing her powers. Hands clawing at the wood floors, fingernails breaking as she tries to stop them from dragging her out of her home.
Felicity can feel her heartbeat in her throat as she looks at the slightly ajar door to the villa. There’s no way that Oliver and her left it like this, so somebody has broken in.
What if they’ve found her again?
What if they’re here?
Felicity debates turning around and leaving. She knows exactly where Oliver is. She could go right now and get him. But if she does that, she risks giving whoever’s broken into the villa time to escape. Can she really take the risk of somebody confirming to Essex Corps that they’ve found her?
She blinks back tears and tries her best to remain calm, but her heart is pounding and her knees are shaking.
She can handle this, she tells herself. She can hold her own in a fight. That’s what her powers are for. She’s a mutant — one of the most powerful mutants in the world — She can do this. The only reason they’d gotten the drop on her before was because they’d caught her unaware.
She takes a deep breath, trying to silence her nerves and curses Oliver for suggesting they leave their electronics at home... Curses herself for agreeing. She has no way to contact him. Even if she could find an outlet and send a message to him that way, he doesn’t have his cell.
As quietly as she can, she sets her things on the ground so that her hands are free to fight. She then releases the energy in her body and allows it to start flowing to her hands. If there’s somebody inside, she’s going to be ready for them.
Ignoring the way her hands are trembling from fear, she channels her inner X-Men and forces herself to be brave. She pushes the door open slowly and steps into the villa, eyes scanning for the slightest hint of movement, ready to hit first and ask questions later.
Upon first look, it appears as if everything is exactly how they’d left it, right down to Oliver’s wet towel on the arm of the sofa.
The TV is still hooked up to the wall. The expensive antique watch Oliver had been given by his grandfather still sits on the coffee table next to her designer purse. If somebody broke in here looking to steal things, they’d done an awful job.
Which checks burglar off the list of possible suspects and brings her right back to where she’d started. Whoever is here, is looking for her.
She carefully walks through the living room on her tiptoes praying that the wood floors don’t squeak underneath her and give her away. The bedroom door is ajar and she can hear somebody moving around in there, but she can’t see them.
It’s now or never.
Felicity holds up both of her hands, ready to shoot, while she kicks the door open with her foot.
“Ahh!” an old woman screams and Felicity only just barely stops herself before she releases any of the deadly bolts she has saved up.
“I’m sorry. You scared me, Mrs. Queen,” the old woman says, placing a hand to her heart while she tries to catch her breath.
Felicity eyes her suspiciously. The woman looks old and frail, but she’s long since learned that appearances can be deceiving. After all, look at The Professor.
“I was told you weren’t going to be back for another few hours,” she says nervously, shaking her head as she apologizes again. “I’ll finish up in here and leave you to it.”
The woman turns back to the bed and removes the rest of the decorative pillows, moving to place them in the closet.
“Um…” Felicity’s mind goes crazy as she tries to figure out what just happened. “I thought the cleaning service came in the morning?”
The woman looks up at her with kind eyes and smiles. “We provide turndown service as well.”
“Oh. Um. Okay,” she says, feeling like a total idiot for getting as worked up as she had. She could have killed their cleaning lady all because she’s so paranoid about Essex Corp finding her again that she’d let her imagination run away from her.
“More towels, Mrs. Queen?” the woman asks once she finishes turning down the bed.
“What?” Felicity asks, still trying to catch her breath.
“More towels, Mrs. Queen?” she repeats herself.
“No. Thank you. But no,” Felicity says, shaking her head, trying to pull herself back together. “And it’s Ms. Smoak. Oliver and I aren’t married… Did we have turndown service last night?”
She can’t remember seeing the woman here and they hadn’t left the villa at any point after they got back from the market yesterday morning.
“You did,” the woman says kindly, looking at her like she’s crazy.
Felicity swears she would have noticed a cleaning lady coming into the villa, but then again, she’d spent the evening out by the pool with Oliver. Maybe she just snuck in without them noticing. That seems like the kind of service that a luxury place like this would provide. As she learned growing up with her mom working as a cocktail waitress and her time at the many swanky parties Queen Consolidated throws, the rich like their help unseen and unheard.
She wonders if the bed was turned down last night, but can’t remember. By the time Oliver was throwing her onto the bed, she wasn’t the least bit concerned with the state of the sheets.
She’s sure the woman is correct. And even if she isn’t, does it really matter? Felicity’s not about to call the manager and complain that they didn’t get the nightly turndown that she hadn’t even realized they were supposed to have. She’s not going to cost this poor woman her job.
“Okay,” Felicity says. “Thank you.”
“Of course. Towels?” the woman repeats for the third time and Felicity blushes.
She hopes that this woman doesn’t realize who Oliver and her are, otherwise she’s sure that she’s going to go running to the tabloids; who will be more than happy to give the woman a big payout for breaking the story that Felicity is as crazy and unhinged as the public fears.
“We’re okay on towels,” she says, smiling kindly as the last of the adrenaline leaves her system and she starts to feel like herself again. “Sorry. I think I just had a little too much to drink.”
“It’s okay,” the woman says. “It happens to all foreigners when they come to visit.”
“Yeah?” Felicity asks, not really sure how to contribute to this conversation. She honestly just wants the woman to leave so that she can die of embarrassment privately.
“The alcohol here is stronger than what you Americans are used to,” she says with a kind smile before heading out the door. “Have a nice night, Mrs. Queen.”
“Smoak,” Felicity corrects her, but the woman doesn’t react.
Felicity waits until the door closes behind the woman before she lets out a deep sigh.
“Well that was awful,” she says, rolling her eyes at her own paranoia. Honestly, Oliver’s rubbing off on her.
“I need a drink,” she says.
She gets her things from outside and brings them in, setting them down on the coffee table, as she looks around for a bottle opener. Upon finding one, she sits down on the couch to open the wine, groaning when her entire back hits wet fabric.
Felicity grabs Oliver’s towel off the couch, grumbling about how many times she’s going to have to ask him to hang the damn thing up before she freezes.
Why hadn’t the cleaning lady taken the towel with her when she’d come into to check the room? In fact, for how many times she’d asked if Felicity wanted towels, the woman hadn’t exactly had any on her. The cleaning lady that morning had been pushing around a cart. Where was this woman’s cart?
Felicity goes to double check the door, to make sure that the lock is in place. Once she’s assured that it is, she hurries into the bedroom to start check if anything is missing or out of place. She checks the closet, goes through their drawers, looks at their dirty laundry, and is about to check the garbages for any sign that things have been rummaged through before she stops and realizes how ridiculous she must look.
Is she really about to spend an entire night in this gorgeous villa obsessing over her cleaning lady and coming up with conspiracy theories? If the woman had been some kind of mutant out to get her, wouldn’t she have done something already while Felicity was alone and vulnerable?
She laughs at how absurd she’s being for even thinking that somebody is after her. They are halfway around the world right now. Nobody knows where she is, so why would they coming looking for her here?
Felicity is safe, Oliver had seen to that when he’d risked his life carrying her out of Essex Corp. She’s not being held captive anymore. She’s free. She should enjoy it and not let fear of the past ruin her vacation.
Felicity closes her eyes and begins the process of reeling her energy back in so that she doesn’t accidentally electrocute anything or anyone.
Once she’s convinced that she’s no longer a walking time bomb, she quickly changes into her bathing suit and heads out to the pool grabbing her food and wine along the way. If anything can make her night better, it’s copious amounts of wine and butter soaked carbs loaded with cheese and nutella.
****
“Hey.”
Felicity wakes up to Oliver kneeling in front of her, whispering to her that it’s time to wake up. She wonders why he’s not running his hands through her hair and kissing her awake. It’s how he always wakes her up and she rather enjoys it.
“Is the game over? Did we win?” she asks, her voice still low and deep, full of sleep. She reaches out for him and takes his hand, shocking him in the process. He flinches away from her and stands up. Which is odd. She’d barely shocked him and it’s never bothered him before.
“I didn’t stay for the game. I decided to come back early,” he says. She has to look straight up at him because he’s so tall. Why is he so far away right now?
“What are you doing, come back down here,” she whines. He always takes every advantage to be as close to her as he can get, especially in the privacy of their own home.
It takes her a minute to process his words, and even then it’s difficult to consolidate her thoughts. What does he mean he hadn’t waited for the game to finish? He’d been talking about that game all day. What time is it? It’s gotta be late. She feels like she’s been sleeping for years.
She looks over to the floor to see that her wine glass is only half empty and the bottle sits nearly full beside it, so she knows she didn’t pass out from the booze. She had to have been a lot more tired than she originally thought.
Felicity rubs at her eyes, trying to clear her vision. Even with her glasses still on, she’s having trouble seeing straight.
“Felicity, you need to wake up,” Oliver tells her. “It’s important.”
“You didn’t stay for the game?” she asks, feeling completely off balance.
“No, something came up,” he says.
Reluctantly, she moves to sit up, feeling like she’s trying to move through quicksand. Once she’s seated, she notices that his hands are at her face. It’s an odd thing to notice, she realizes. Focusing on his fingers and how still they are. She’s never known him to be still in anything. Even when he’s stressed, he’s itching for a bow in his hands.
“What time is it?” she asks, looking up at him, again, wondering why he’s so far away from her.
There’s something wrong with the world. The room is spinning. His voice sounds muffled, like she’s underwater. Her vision isn’t clear.
She reaches out to grab onto his wrist, but he doesn’t move. He doesn’t take her hand.
She needs to tell him that something’s not right. She doesn't feel like herself.
“Wrong,” she says. “Wrong. Something’s… it’s not right. Oliver.”
He finally kneels in front of her and the sudden movement makes her vision swim. It takes her a minute to focus on his face, and when she finally does he doesn’t look concerned, he looks annoyed.
“We need to focus,” he says. “Something important came up.”
“Is it about the cleaning lady?” Felicity asks, wondering if her voice sounds as off to him as it does to her. “‘S okay, Oliver. I thought something was up to. But she’s just a cleaning lady. Right?”
“Felicity,” he says her name harshly. “Focus.”
“I’m trying,” she tells him. “My head is off.”
He shakes his head in frustration before pulling something out of his pocket and handing it to her.
She’s surprised to look down and find a cell phone in her hand.
“Liar, you said you didn’t bring your phone,” she says, and immediately starts draining the power from it, trying to gain some more energy in an attempt to clear her mind. It helps. It’s not perfect, but it helps. Her vision starts to clear and her thoughts, though still muddled, aren’t so out of reach.
“This isn’t your phone,” she says, looking down at it more closely. “You bought a burner phone?”
“I need you to find something for me,” Oliver says, a desperation in his eyes that she typically only sees when things get really bad.
While Felicity has a million questions, she doesn’t ask them. No. She knows Oliver well enough to know she’ll get her answers later. Once he gets his.
“What do you need?”
****
Felicity wakes up the next morning to a pair of soft lips making their way up her back.
“Mmm,” she hums in delight. “Somebody must be feeling better than.”
“When was I not feeling good before?” Oliver asks.
She feels him moving behind her until he’s cradling her and takes her left hand in his. His fingers absently rub at her ring finger again and she wonders if this is lingering anxiety from whatever was bothering him yesterday. Whatever crisis had him asking her to look up information on mutants in high security prison.
Felicity raises their hands up so that she can place a kiss to the back of his hand.
“You know you can tell me, right?” she says gently. She doesn’t roll over to look him in the eyes. She thinks it might be easier for him to talk about it if he doesn’t have to look at her.
Oliver’s arms tense around her and he sucks in a breath.
“I didn’t realize I was being that obvious,” he says. “I was trying to find the right moment.”
“You don’t need the right moment,” she says, shaking her head. “I’m not sure there ever is a right moment for stuff like this. But we’re a team. You can tell me what’s bothering you.”
“Bothering me?” he asks, confused. He gently prods her to roll onto her back so that he can see her face. When she complies and turns in his arms to meet his eyes, he adds, “Nothing’s bothering me. This is good news. Or… I like to think it’s good. It kind of depends on your answer.”
“Okay,” she says slowly, equally confused.
What does he mean it’s good news? Last night he’d made it sound like whatever was going on was serious. He’d looked at her with such desperation that she’d assumed somebody’s life was on the line.
“Yesterday when you said… I just kind of thought that we were on the same page,” Oliver says, eyeing her carefully. She’s not sure what he’s looking for, exactly.
“Yesterday you didn’t give me anything to go on. How are we supposed to be on the same page if I don’t know what’s happening?” she says.
“Wait, what?” Oliver asks, moving back and shaking his head like he’s got no idea what is happening. “I thought you said you knew what I wanted to ask you? God, this is not how I wanted this moment to go.”
“Are we having the same conversation?” she asks, moving to sit up. She doesn’t feel as foggy as she did last night, but clearly she must still be tired because Oliver isn’t making any sense.
“Clearly not,” he says, sitting up in bed and watching as she heads into the bathroom.
Felicity looks in the mirror, shocked to see that she’d slept in her makeup. She always washes her face before going to bed. She splashes some cold water on her face to help her wake up, before she begins the process of preparing for the day.
She just needs a minute to think. At some point, she and Olive have crossed wires and she’s not sure what she missed. Had she said or done something last night that she can’t remember? She had been really out of if, but not so out of it that she couldn’t conduct that research for him. He’s talking about good news and asking her a question like she should be on the same page as he is. But from what she remembers of last night, nothing good could be coming from it.
Last night, Oliver had switched back into Arrow-mode after swearing up and down that he’s hung up the hood. He’d been so deep in his head that he’d barely been himself.
Is he trying to tell her that he wants to go back to work? She has no problem with that, except that she’s never once asked him to quit. The idea to hang up the hood came from him. What could have possibly happened between her leaving the festival and him coming home last night that would have made him suddenly decide to suit up again?
Felicity brushes her teeth before beginning to take her pajamas off so she can shower.
And that’s weird, because she can’t remember changing out of her suit. Oliver must have gotten her ready for bed and brought her to the bedroom.
“Is everything alright?” Oliver asks, stepping into the bathroom. It’s now that she realizes he’s already dressed for the day. He’s wearing cargo shorts and a polo. He must not be planning on going for a run.
“Did we have plans today or something?” she asks, causing him to shake his head. “Why aren’t you going for your morning run?”
Oliver smiles at her oddly. Like he can’t decide if he’s amused or concerned.
“Because I went for my run hours ago,” he says slowly.
“How early did you get up?”
“I got up at my normal time…” he says, moving in front of her to place the back of his hand against her forehead. “Are you feeling alright?”
She nods. She’s feeling much better this morning than she was last night.
“Are you sure? Because you were out cold when I came home last night and didn’t even wake up when I moved you to the bedroom,” he says.
“What are you talking about? We talked when you came home,” she says.
Oliver looks at her like she’s crazy and shakes his head.
“No, you were sleeping,” he says. “I was surprised because it was only 10 when I got back and usually you’re wide awake at that time, but you were out. What time did you fall asleep?”
“No,” she says, shaking her head adamantly. “You came home and woke me up. We had a whole conversation.”
“We didn’t talk last night,” he says, growing frustrated. “I went to the game. When I came home, you were sleeping.”
“What do you mean we didn’t talk last night?” she asks, growing equally as frustrated. “You were here. Well not here here but out there. By the pool. You were all grumpy about something.”
“No. That never happened,” he tells her. “I think you must have been dreaming.”
“It was real,” she protests.
“You must be getting sick,” he says. “It’s almost noon. You never sleep in this late.”
“It’s almost noon?” she asks, confused. She glances over at the clock on the wall to see that he’s right. “I mean… I was feeling off last night. I thought it was the wine, but I only had the two glasses at the festival and half a glass here… We really didn’t talk last night?”
“Not after you left the festival,” he says. “When I got home, you were sleeping out by the pool.”
Felicity could have sworn that what happened last night was real, but perhaps not. Maybe it was just a really vivid fever dream.
“I guess I must have imagined it,” she says, shaking her head.
“Why don’t you shower. I’m sure you’ll feel better once you get cleaned up. I’ll have breakfast waiting for you.”
She nods, still confused at how she could have possibly made all of that up, but Oliver certainly doesn’t look like he’s lying, so it has to be true.
She’s about to step into the shower when she remembers something.
“Wait, if you weren’t going to talk to me about what happened last night, what were you going to talk to me about?” she asks.
Oliver blushes and looks down at the floor for a minute, scratching the back of his neck nervously before meeting her eyes again.
“It can wait,” he says with a shrug. One of his hands goes into his pocket and she notices him playing with something, but she doesn’t know what.
“Are you sure?” she asks, trying to figure him out. “The shower can wait.”
“No, it’s okay,” he says with a wide, nervous smile. “This isn’t exactly a ‘bathroom’ kind of question. We can talk about it later.”
“Alright,” she says slowly. “If you’re sure.”
“I’m sure,” he tells her. “Hey, do you want to go on a hike today? I was talking to this sweet old woman at the market and she told me about the perfect place to watch the sunset. I think it could be romantic.”
“You want me to hike?” She raises her eyebrow at him. “Me?”
“Yeah,” he says. “If you’re feeling up to it. It’ll be a good place to… talk. A memorable place.”
“Okay, I guess,” she says.
“Good. And maybe wear makeup and a nice outfit in case we want to take pictures,” he says.
“You want me to wear makeup. To hike?” she asks. “What’s up with you, Oliver?”
Oliver Queen is the first one to lecture her about how life isn’t a fashion show and that she doesn’t need makeup and nice clothes to be beautiful.
“The woman just said it was a nice place and I’d like to get a shot of us up there. You never let me take pictures of you without makeup on. That’s all.”
“That’s all?” she asks, suspicious.
He nods enthusiastically. He’s got the goofiest grin on his face and she can’t help but smile back at him.
“Okay,” she says. “Hiking it is. You’d better have plenty of snacks packed for me, mister. I’m not a hiker. My cardio comes from walking through the mall.”
“You’ll like this, I promise,” he says. “At least, I hope you’ll like it.”
He walks out of the bathroom with an actual skip in his step and for a minute she’s convinced that he’s been possessed. Or perhaps dosed with some really good drugs. The Oliver that just walked out is not the brooding, self-deprecating man she fell in love with.
But then, they are a world’s away from their problems and with Oliver no longer playing superhero, maybe he’s just finally feeling relaxed enough to show her the real him. The him that could have been if it weren’t for all the guilt he’s carried for the last several years.
****
Oliver and Felicity walk hand in hand through the town as they head off in search of this “perfect spot” Oliver wants to take her to. His thumb is rubbing at her finger again, but he doesn’t seem nervous, like he’s itching for a bow. She’s curious if this is going to become their thing, like him tracing designs on her body when they are in bed or him packing her lunch for work has become their thing.
“Oh, pretty,” Felicity says, stopping at a street vendor who is selling homemade jewelry. She picks up a necklace to look at it closer, but when she turns to show Oliver, he’s giving her an exasperated look.
“We’re never going to get there by sunset if we keep stopping,” he reminds her.
She puts the necklace down and rolls her eyes.
“It’s barely 2,” she says. “We have plenty of time.”
He gives her a doubtful look, so she adds, “I promise to walk fast. The map shows it’s only an hour and a half away.”
She picks up a pair of earrings and shows them to him. “Thea would love these.”
Oliver looks like he wants to argue with her more, but eventually just shakes his head and smiles at her.
“I assume you want me to buy you that necklace, too,” he says, reaching into his pocket to pull out his wallet. As he does so, a black box falls out. She’s about to reach down at get it, when he beats her to it.
“What’s that?” she asks, curious.
“Cufflinks,” he says, quickly shoving the box back into his pocket.
“Why are you carrying around cufflinks?” she asks, curiously. He hadn’t even brought a dress shirt with him, let alone a suit.
“I bought some this morning. While you were sleeping and I went for a walk,” he says.
“Oh,” Felicity says with a shrug.
He had said he wanted a new pair of cufflinks, so that makes sense. She turns back to the vendor and handing him the earrings and the necklace.
“Well I’m never going to turn down jewelry.” Felicity smiles at him.
“Good to know,” he says, leaning in to kiss the top of her head.
Oliver pays the vendor and Felicity takes the bag from him and places it in her backpack. They thank the man and continue on their way. As they turn the corner, Felicity’s sense are immediately consumed with the brilliant smell of something wonderful. It makes her stomach rumble.
“Oh street food!” Felicity says, causing Oliver to laugh.
“Oh my god, we just ate an hour ago,” he says.
“But what if I get hungry on the road?” Felicity asks, giving him her best puppy dog eyes.
“I packed you snacks.”
“But did you pack me sate lilits?” she asks.
“If we are going to eat again, we’re stopping somewhere with beer,” he says.
“Need to take the edge off if you’re going to have to deal with me on a hike?” she teases.
“Something like that.”
They walk to the end of the street where there is a small bar and find a table. They wait for the server to come and take their order before Oliver gets up to go check on the score of the game, leaving Felicity alone to wait for her food to come.
“The authorities are still looking for him.”
“That’s crazy. He just vanished?”
Felicity can’t help but overhear the couple at the table next to them talking, and it catches her attention. Years of working with Oliver have taught her to tune in when people are discussing criminals.
“Not vanished,” the man says. “They say he broke out.”
“Of a maximum security prison designed for mutants?” the girl says, sounding shocked.
Mutants? Felicity certainly perks up at that. What are they talking about? She turns to look at their table, no longer concerned about being caught spying and notices the man is reading something on his cell phone.
Despite promising Oliver that she wouldn’t use her powers this trip, she can’t help herself. Not when they are talking about mutants and maximum security prisons.
Felicity holds out her hand as inconspicuously as she can and begins tugging at the LTE signal the man is using to access the web. She’s careful not to pull too much of the signal, lest she create a spark that would be visible to the humans. She doesn’t want to expose herself, but she has to know.
She closes her eyes and processes the incoming data, and instantly an article appears in her mind with a picture of Erik Lehnsherr, causing her to gasp. The headline reads: Dangerous Mutant “Magneto” Escapes Maximum Security Prison .
She quickly absorbs all of the information she can get out of the article, then pulls up several more and reads them, trying not to panic. The man that killed Cooper is free. He’s broken out of prison, and not just any prison. He’s broken out of The Cage. The most secure prison ever created. A prison which had never seen a jailbreak before . . . and Magneto had escaped from it.
The only way Magneto could have broken out of The Cage was if he had several powerful mutants helping him. High level mutants. Possibly even a Level 5. Mutants like… her.
Well, frak.