AN: Rampant speculation from the 2x14 promo pics and trailer. Probably off base, but whatever, hopefully it will entertain us all while they are on mini-hiatus. Unbeta-ed and barely edited, so all the mistakes are mine. Unlike the characters.

Felicity sat on her couch, tapping her finger against the edge of her tablet in frustration. She still couldn't believe that Tockman had succeded in accessing their servers at the Foundry. She had designed the firewalls herself, and while she knew nothing was impenetrable to a skilled hacker, she considered them damn close. Tockman's taunt ran through her head again and again as she waited . . . Waited for Oliver, who was MIA on an "evening out" with Sara, to finally return their calls; waited for John, who was out attempting to track down Oliver. She had told him it was ridiculous, that there was nothing that could be done tonight. The computers at the Foundry had been damaged beyond repair—she would have to order new servers and start from the ground up first thing in the morning. Dig had managed to put out the fire that had been caused when the servers had exploded. It could have been worse, if it had happened when they were gone, their entire lair could have burnt, if not the entire building. But the damage was contained to only the computers.

Well, at least the visible damage. She heard Tockman's voice again, an mp3 entrenched in the code that had started streaming as he had latched on to their systems. "Are you home? Somewhere safe? Somewhere you think you're safe? . . . Where no one can get to you? But I can."

It had felt like home, until a few weeks ago, when it had suddenly felt overcrowded and awkward, and for the first time she had felt like maybe she didn't belong there, among four jaded warriors who had scars and stories to share. Well, Roy didn't have any scars anymore, thanks to the mirakuru. . . but still. She had still felt safe there though, until tonight. She sighed and shifted impatiently, pulling up another access point on her tablet and trying again to find a trace of Tockman's attack on the offsite backup server she had set up to mirror the servers at the Foundry. She'd been looking ever since Dig had left, nearly an hour ago, but had no luck so far. She tried a different approach this time though, and was rewarded with a tiny breadcrumb. A little blip in the code. "Gotcha," she said under her breath. She followed the breadcrumbs.

It only took her five minutes to get an address. He was near the courthouse, in the basement of a building awaiting demolition. She picked up her phone and tried Dig first. His phone went straight to voicemail. She cursed and hung up, considering. If they waited, they could lose him. It had already been over an hour since he had hit their systems—he could already have moved on to another location. Or he could still be there. Or he could be preparing to leave. Damn it all. She did not want a repeat of the incident with the Count a few months before, where she had stupidly allowed herself to be taken and held as leverage against Oliver. She couldn't continue to be the weakest point in this team. But at the same time, she couldn't let this lead slip past them. She grabbed her jacket, and dialed Oliver's number as she headed out the door, just as a formality. He hadn't answered after the initial attack, and hadn't called either her or Diggle back. She doubted he would pick up now. She wasn't wrong.

xxx

Diggle said goodbye to Detective Lance, apologizing again for intruding on him at home. Fucking Oliver was still MIA. He hadn't wanted to go knocking on Lance's door, but a cyber attack on the lair was something he should be aware of. Oliver had a tracker in his Arrow boots, but right now he was Oliver Queen and he wasn't answering his phone. Felicity would have been able to track his phone, if the servers at the Foundry hadn't just been flambéed beyond recognition, but then if the servers hadn't been flambéed he wouldn't fucking need to find Oliver, now would he? After checking the mansion, where he really didn't expect to find him, and a few other of Oliver's regular haunts, Dig had become desperate. He didn't like leaving Felicity alone, because things had been off with her the last few days, and watching the computers spark in to flames sure as shit wasn't helping matters much. She wouldn't talk to him, or anyone, about what was bothering her, but it was there in her eyes, plain as day for anyone who was paying attention to see.

Because he had said he would be out with Sara, Diggle had eventually resorted to paying Detective Lance a visit. Lance had been an unusually talkative mood, which may have had a little something to do with Oliver crashing the first sit-down dinner Lance had been able to talk all of the women in his family in to in six fucking years. Christ, but he didn't know what that kid was thinking ninety percent of the time. Why on earth he felt the need to put himself smack center of the Lance's family saga, he couldn't understand. It was clear he and Sara had a thing going on, which no one seemed willing to talk about. Which Diggle could sort of understand, because Sara was wicked smart and skilled in combat, but that was without considering the train wreck of a history Oliver had not only with her, but with her sister. But the while the "thing" with Sara was not openly discussed, it too was obvious if anyone was paying attention. Just like Felicity's unspoken discomfort these past few weeks . . . which was when Sara had been resurrected and had suddenly taken a firm place in all of their lives. He suspected those two little unspoken yet obvious things had more than a little to do with one another. He scrubbed his hand over his face and groaned. According to Lance, dinner hadn't ended well. Some things had been said, and some things had been thrown. Both of the Lance girls had stormed off, and Oliver had given chase. After which one, Lance wasn't certain, but it was obvious whatever ground Oliver had gained with the good Detective in the past six months or so had quickly been shot to shit.

He pulled out his phone to check it, and cursed when he realized he had missed a call from Felicity. He had muted his phone before going in to talk to Lance. The call was from a good ten minutes before. He quickly dialed her back.

"Dig," she said. And he could swear he heard a car whoosh by her. Which didn't make a fucking lick of sense because he had left her on her couch in her damn apartment.

"Felicity . . . " he said cautiously. "Where are you?"

"Ummm," she said. Fuck. This wasn't going to be good. "I'm over by the courthouse." He waited for her to give him more. "I . . . I traced Tockman's hack. I tried to call you, but he may be on the move and I didn't want us to miss the chance."

Fuck, fuck, fuck. Where in the FUCK was Oliver. He remembered Oliver's words, on the night Felicity had first become a part of this team, a year ago. We can protect her. There is no we when Oliver wouldn't answer the fucking phone. "Where, Felicity?" He demanded. She rattled off an address. A good thirty minutes across town. FUCK!

"I'm on my way. For God sake, Felicity, do NOT go in there before I get there." Even as he said it. He knew she wouldn't listen. Her sense of self preservation was far outweighed by her desire to do what was right. He ran to his car, trying Oliver one more time as he put it in gear and sped across town. You've reached . . . "Fuck!" he yelled. As a last ditch effort, he dialed Sara. And was shocked as shit when she picked up.

xxx

Sara couldn't believe what a fiasco dinner had become. She hadn't wanted to face it alone, so she had foolishly, oh so foolishly, agreed when Oliver had offered to come with her. She wasn't sure what she had been thinking. She hadn't wanted to go at all, but he had always been persuasive and while many things had changed abou t him in those six years since she had gone on the Gambit with him, that hadn't. So before she really had known what was happening, she had agreed to go, if he would come to. She hadn't been thinking about a damn thing except having a friendly face to look at if Laurel started spewing more of her anger in her direction. You ruined my life. She gunned the Arrow's bike, and relished in the speed, letting the wind wash the memories and the tears away.

Dinner had been okay for, oh, maybe ten minutes. Awkward, but okay. Her dad had been in a better place as far as Oliver was concerned than she was expecting. Her mom too. But then, she had told her mom, before she had left, that she thought she was in love with him. Her mother wanted nothing but her happiness. It wasn't that Laurel didn't want her to be happy. She just was so far down her own shit-hole of a life right now, she couldn't see which way was up, yet thinking about Sara's happiness. And what in the world did it say about her, as a sister, that she hadn't considered that? She was so used to thinking only of herself, of surviving from one moment to the next, that she had forgotten what it was like to be a part of something bigger—of a family where your choices might hurt another person. She had seen Laurel's eyes tighten when she had seen Oliver standing just behind Sara at her father's apartment door. She hadn't really asked Ollie what had happened between them, not in detail, and it occurred to her that maybe she should. It was probably a conversation they should have had before they launched back in to each other, but at the time, she had (once again) forgotten that her actions could have a profound effect on those around her. She was not only a part of a family again, but she was also a part of a team.

She whipped the bike around a tight corner and gunned the bike again. Ten minutes of semi-normalcy until the shit had hit the fan. The insults, and a glass, had started flying, and Laurel had come unhinged. She closed her eyes at the memory. She wasn't sure what had clued her sister in—a look or a touch or something one of them had said, but it had made her come unglued. "You couldn't even wait a few weeks before getting back in his pants again, could you Sara?" Laurel had screamed at her. The worst part was that Laurel had been wrong. It hadn't been anywhere near a few weeks . . . it had been more on the scale of hours. God, she sincerely hoped Laurel never found out that part of it. The guilt from this was bad enough. Part of her longed to go back to the simplicity of her former life. . . do the job, stay alive, and move on. Simple rules to live by. Laurel had fled, and she had tried to give chase. Oliver had touched her shoulder, and told her he would take care of it. She had let him go after her, because what in the hell would she say to her sister when she caught up to her? There was nothing she could say to make any of this right, or to take away her hurt or pain. Laurel was drowning, but Sara couldn't help her because she had been swimming alone for so long, she had forgotten how to do anything but keep her own head above water.

She had gone to the Foundry, expecting to find Felicity, Roy or maybe Diggle hanging around—one of them was almost always there in the evenings. Instead, she had found a ruin of soot and smoke, empty and dark. She had grabbed her Canary leathers and Oliver's bike and headed out to clear her head. Because even Oliver's friends, her "team", was outside of her comfort zone.

Her phone rang, and she touched her Bluetooth to answer it. "Hello?"

"Sara." She heard relief in John Diggle's deep voice, and slowed the bike to a slightly less insane speed so that she could hear him better. "Where are you?"

She glanced around. "Washington and Fifth."

"Ah, finally a fucking break. Go to 2949 Allenson, NOW. Felicity has a location on Tockman, and I'm worried she may engage."

"Alone?" She asked, incredulous. She was already spinning the bike and gunning it. Thinking of Oliver's tiny assistant, trying to take down the man who had alluded the police for months.

"She couldn't reach me. Tockman breached the servers at the lair." Sara thought of the ruined black pillars in the lair. Another sign of her failure in this resurrected life. Why hadn't she thought to reach out to Dig, or Felicity, to make sure that they were okay?

"What about Ollie?" Sara asked, cutting on to Allenson.

"I can't reach him. Do you know where he is?"

She thought of him going after Laurel. "No clue." And it wasn't a lie. She knew who he was probably with, but not where. It really didn't matter right now, anyway. She could see Felicity, in a white pencil skirt, a leather jacket, and high heels. Christ, she knew the woman was tiny, but she was going to have a serious discussion with her about what to wear into the field. "I see her," she told Dig. And then she tapped the ear piece, disconnecting the call.

xxx

Felicity's eyes widened when she saw the bike swing in front of her, and she breathed a sigh of relief that Oliver was here, and she wasn't going to have to do this alone. And then the helmet came off, and she felt her heart sink a little. Because it was Sara, in full Canary garb. Where in the world was Oliver?

Sara stepped toward her. "Where?" She asked. Felicity had to appreciate Sara . . . she was all business when it was necessary.

"Basement, there," she said, pointing toward the door down the alley.

Sara nodded. "Stay here," she said. "You are in no way ready for a fight." And then Sara was sprinting down the alley toward the door that would lead to the basement. Felicity watched her for two beats, Sara's words ringing in her ears. She was a liability out here, in the field. Outside of her comfort zone, certainly. Sara was as well trained as a woman could be.

Then she shook her head, and reminded herself that it was her that Tockman had taunted and engaged. Sara may be a badass trained assassin, but Tockman was, at heart, a hacker, just like her. She wasn't about to sit on the street corner and wait for news, like some damsel in distress. She would do what she could to help. She headed down the alley as fast as her designer knock-off high heels would allow.

She pulled the door open and padded quietly down the stairs. There was a narrow hallway with four doors, two to each side. She froze and listened. She couldn't hear anything, but she could tell only one door was opened. As quietly as she could manage, she slipped carefully toward the open door. She peeked around the frame and could see a wide room with surprisingly beautiful tile on the ground. There were scaffoldings and several ladders, indicating that at some point in the recent past, the room had undergone renovations that had stopped unexpectedly. Probably when the undertaking had ravaged the city, if she were to take a guess. Her eyes widened as she saw a squirrelly looking man in glasses hidden in a dark corner, about three feet from the doorway. She followed his line of sight and almost cursed when she saw Sara slink into view, bo staff at the ready and looking carefully around. The only problem was that she was facing away from Tockman.

Tockman stepped out from the corner, gun lifting. He raised a hand. "Tick tock," he declared, calling Sara's attention to him. "Your time has come." Sara spun the staff in her hands, but Felicity knew that even as fast as she was, she wouldn't be able to dodge a bullet from this man. He was too far away for her to reach him, but close enough that Sara wouldn't be able to dodge every shot he fired. "Tick tock," he said again, in an almost sing song voice. "Your time of death is here."

Felicity couldn't wait anymore. She launched herself toward him, yelling "HEY!" to draw his attention away from Sara. He spun toward her, and fired. She felt a red hot pain in her shoulder as she simultaneously heard a loud "boom". Sara crashed in to him then, and Felicity didn't know what happened next, because all she saw was a blaze of white in front of her eyes, flecked with black dots, as the pain overtook her. She realized she was on the floor, and Christ did her shoulder hurt.

She felt a hand on her waist, and heard Sara's voice. "Easy, Felicity."

Tockman started in again. "Tick tock, you can't stop death. Delay, maybe, but never stop. Tick tock, the clock keeps counting down."

Sara raised her hands toward him. "Look, no one has to die tonight, okay?"

Felicity gritted through the pain. "You aren't as good as you think you are," she said, hating how her voice sounded.

Tockman tilted his head at her, and she took that to mean he hadn't been expecting her to say anything.

"That's how we found you, you know," Felicity said. Sara looked down at her, meeting her eyes, and Felicity knew she should continue to distract him. "You left a trail, when you burnt my servers to the ground. You didn't think about a ghost server. But I had one, and I followed your trail right back here."

"Hmmmm," Tockman hummed. "Your firewalls were good, but I was better."

"But we're here, so maybe I'm better," Felicity said. It lost some of its effect, though, because tears from the pain in her shoulder slid down her cheeks. Her hand was slippery with her own blood.

"Ahhh," Tockman said, tilting both hands out in a shrug. "But I have a gun, so I think that makes me the winner." There was a gleam in his eye, and Felicity knew that he was about to go back to his little time of death tick-tocking, but Sara took that brief moment of abstraction to pull a knife from somewhere in her jacket and threw it. Not towards him, but towards the electronics panel immediately to his right. There was a huge spark, and in the darkness that followed, the Canary was on the hunt. She put him down within seconds, retrieving her bow staff and striking him in the neck. She pulled the blow, meaning to stun rather than kill, but she wasn't sure it was enough, and with Felicity already bleeding on the ground, she couldn't afford a lesser plan of attack.

When he fell, she kicked the gun away and knelt to check his pulse. It was then that she heard Ollie, rather than saw him. She heard a raw, nearly unintelligible sound, and saw a flash of green as he went to Felicity.

She rolled to her back, her hand still on her shoulder. "You're here . . . " she said, and Sara could hear surprise in her voice.

Ollie pushed the hood back, and so that Felicity could see him more clearly, and then he was opening her jacket. Sara could swear that every ounce of color drained from his face when he saw what was under there. She had known Oliver Queen for a long time, and she had seen him at some of his worst times. She had seen his face both times when he had been surprised to find her alive. He had seen his face when Shado had died, and when he had thought Slade had died. She had seen him look at Laurel, and at her. But she had never seen him look at anyone the way he was looking at Felicity Smoak in that moment. She couldn't even find the words to describe it.

"Fe . . . Felicity, what were you thinking?" He choked out.

Sara could hear sirens then. "She saved me," Sara said. Because unlike her, Felicity Smoak was well aware of the people around her. She might not be trained to fight, but she fought with her brain and her heart. "We need to move."

"You need a hospital," he said to Felicity, but she was already shaking her head side to side.

It was a feeble shake, though. "No. Dig. Dig can fix it, right."

He nodded at her. And Sara had to look away because Oliver looked completely wrecked. She took a deep breath, and set about rolling Tockman, who was indeed not dead, over so that she could tie him up for Starling City's finest. She closed her eyes against Felicity's cry of pain as Oliver picked her up. "Shhh," he said. "I've got you."

Sara opened the door for him, then went to the bike as Oliver headed the opposite direction with Felicity in his arms. She supposed he had a car there, or Dig was waiting with one. She hadn't even asked them where they were going. Would they go to their charred lair, or somewhere else? Sara gunned the bike again. She would drive until they called to let her know where to go. Maybe she would stop by the Foundry to see if they were there. She may have a great deal to remember about team, and family, but she would be damned if she would let any of them down again. She considered bravery, and family, and love, as again the wind washed away her tears. For someone who wasn't sure she could even remember how to cry, she had been doing it a lot lately.

xxx

Diggle nearly jumped out of skin when Oliver opened the door and climbed in. When he turned, his heart bottomed out when he saw Felicity, lying too still and too pale against Oliver's green leather. Her jacket was open, and her yellow blouse had a bloom of red on it, a bright contrast of color against Oliver's green. Oliver pulled the mask off and looked at Dig, his eyes tortured as he pressed his gloved hand over her shoulder.

"She needs a hospital," Oliver choked out. "But she said she wants you to do it."

"Where?" Dig asked.

Oliver shook his head. "Dig, please." And John realized then that Oliver wasn't in the mental state to make any sort of decisions right now. He had a sizeable first aid kit in the trunk, and she would need comfort more than secrecy. The secrecy of the lair was for Oliver, and for him, who had to hide their injuries from the people in their lives. But Felicity didn't have anyone else. She didn't need to hide. He had learned, during the aftermath of the Undertaking, that the people who were currently in this car with her were the only ones who would check up on her. And one of those assholes had run half way around the world then.

"Sara okay?" He asked, turning the corner and gunning it toward Felicity's apartment.

"Yeah." Oliver said. "She said Felicity saved her." His voice was raw, and as pissed as Dig was at him right now, he felt for him. Hearing Oliver that scared for her scared him more than a little too. "She passed out when I moved her, John." Digg peaked in the rearview and saw Oliver cup Felicity's cheek. "Just stay with me Felicity. Stay with me. You're not losing me, and I'm not losing you."

They got there, and Dig pulled the first aid kit and a blanket from the back of the car. He also grabbed Oliver's go bag, packed with a spare change of clothes. "Wrap her in this, and then give her to me. I'll take her upstairs and get started while you change."

He saw a wild look in Oliver's eyes and he started to argue.

"She can't wait, and you can't go up there dressed in green! We don't have time to argue, Oliver!" Dig was done. He wanted to get her upstairs and make sure she was okay, that he hadn't inadvertently signed her death warrant by taking her here instead of a hospital. He settled her gently against his chest and carried her to her apartment. Thankfully, they didn't pass a single soul who would question what he was doing carrying her around in a black shipping blanket.

Oliver was there when he got to her apartment, he wasn't sure how, but he was. He used her key and opened the door for Dig. Dig carried her in, heading straight for her bedroom.

"Strip back the comforter," he demanded. Oliver did it, and he laid her down, pulling off her jacket and her shirt. Oliver was there dabbing at the wound with gauze as he examined it. He breathed a sigh of relief as he saw the wound. It went straight through her shoulder, in just about the best place it could have. He dabbed and did what he needed to. When he started to stitch her up, Oliver cursed and left the room, slamming the door as he went. The door opened again a short while later, and he was surprised when Sara appeared.

"I thought maybe you'd bring her here," she said softly. To his surprise, she took Felicity's hand. "How is she?"

"I think she's good," he said, finishing the stitches. He started to ask Sara for the dressing, but she was already putting it on. He forgot that she had probably patched herself up as many times as Oliver had. It was hard, seeing her in street clothes, to reconcile the beautiful woman with the deadly assassin that wore that black leather.

Without asking, Sara gently rolled Felicity to her stomach so he could stitch the exit wound.

"She's very brave," Sara said softly.

Dig nodded. "And loyal, and selfless, and fearless."

"He loves her." It wasn't a question, it was a statement of fact, and it too surprised him. Sara pulled some things out of her jacket, and Dig realized it was blood, from Oliver's stash at the Foundry, along with some IV tubing. "This will work for her?" He nodded, and she started the IV.

His jaw worked as he thought about Sara's statement. He focused on the stitches, trying to keep them neat and tight so that the scar wouldn't be too bad. A hospital would have done better, but there would have been so many questions.

He placed the dressing on her back and gently rolled her back over, smoothing her hair out of her face. "All done, Felicity," he said softly.

"Did you give her anything for the pain?" Sara asked, taking her hand again.

"She passed out by the time he got her to the car." He pulled out a syringe from the bag and handed it to her. "Give this to her in maybe in 30 minutes? Sooner if she looks like she'll wake up."

Sara nodded. "Thank you for trusting me with her," she said softly.

Again John was surprised. "You helped her."

"I got her shot."

Apparently shouldering the guilt was a vigilante thing. "Tockman shot her."

"She was trying to save me."

"She'd probably be dead if you hadn't answered my call. So thank you."

Tears pooled in her eyes, and she scrubbed at them furiously with the back of her hand. "God, I almost wish I had forgotten how to cry."

John turned, needing to go deal with Oliver. But then he thought of what Sara had said earlier, and turned back to her. Maybe Sara should have some small understanding of the minefield she was walking in. "I think he loves her too, for the record. But he doesn't know it. She sure as shit doesn't know it. After the earthquake, he ran, mostly because of Tommy. But she stayed, and she always thought he'd come back. And when he didn't she went and brought him back. She's all alone, except for us. The rest of us have someone, but Felicity, we're all she has. He forgets that. So maybe he doesn't love her at all, or else he would see that."

Sara nodded. "I know a little something about that. When you spend every day just trying to survive, you forget to see the bigger picture." She scrubbed at her face again and sniffed, looking every part the scared girl instead of the world weary assassin.
Gotta work on that one."

He nodded. "I'm here, Sara, if you ever need help working through that." He didn't know what made him offer it, but he did anyway. Now, though, he had to go deal with Oliver. That would be fun.

He walked into the living room, and found Oliver doing pushups next to the coffee table. He couldn't sit and hold her hand while Dig stitched her up ,but he could do pushups in the next room. Dig lost it.

"Where the fuck were you, Oliver?" When Oliver had called him back, a good ten minutes after Oliver had sent Sara after Felicity, Dig had simply demanded to know where he was and had picked him up, throwing his go bag at him as he climbed into the back seat. He had updated him on the situation and hadn't said much else to him, because at the time it hadn't mattered. All that mattered was making sure Felicity was safe.

Oliver pushed back onto his knees, his toes tucked under him. He put his hands on his knees and refused to look up at Dig. "There was a situation . . ."

"Yeah, the fucking situation was that the servers got hacked, we had a fire at the Foundry, and we couldn't reach you."

"Laurel lost it, okay? She almost killed herself, and I needed . . ."

Rage, white hot and dangerous, coursed through Dig. He wondered if this is how Roy felt all the time. "Laurel?"

Oliver closed his eyes. "You can't say anything to me I haven't already said to myself." It was so soft Dig could hardly hear him.

"She could have died Oliver. You said we could protect her. But you didn't fucking answer your fucking phone."

Oliver started to speak, but Dig wasn't sure he could take it. He lowered his voice, mindful of the fact Sara was in the next room. "I understand things are fucked up, with your mom and all, but holy SHIT Oliver, why do you keep dipping back into this shit with the Lance sisters? Did you not consider that you and Sara falling back into bed together would have a fucking impact on Laurel, who should be a fucking program, I may add, before you add that on top of it? And what part of you going to their first family dinner in SIX YEAR, six fucking years, seemed like a good idea to you?"

Oliver looked up at him them, and Dig almost felt sorry for him, because he looked like hell. His eyes were red, and so anguished that he felt heavier just seeing it. He would have felt sorry for him, had he not spent the past half hour putting stitches in Felicity's formerly flawless alabaster skin.

"I didn't think about it like that," Oliver said.

"OF COURSE NOT!" Digg roared. "Because you didn't think! You don't think, Oliver!"

He pointed to the closed bedroom door. "You don't think about her—you didn't think about her when you ran to Lian Yu. You didn't think for a minute how that second device fucked with her head, or how responsible she felt. You didn't think about her, how whatever happened at your mother's rally affected her, or how you falling into bed with Sara Lance immediately after affected her."

Oliver looked at him with utter confusion in his eyes. "What?"

Dig sank on the couch and scrubbed his hands over his face. "You are a fucking idiot." Honestly, he had no idea what to say at this point.

"We never said we were together."

Dig just stared at him. "Fucking idiot." He reinterated.

Oliver scrubbed his hand over his face. "She knew?"

"Jesus, Oliver, do you not remember how smart that woman is?"

"Did she tell you about what happened with my mother?" He asked softly.

"Nope."

Oliver cleared his throat. "My dad wasn't Thea's biological father. Malcolm Merlyn was."

And okay, Dig hadn't seen that one coming. "What?"

"Yeah." Oliver leaned back against the couch, stretching his legs out in front of him.

"How is she doing in there?"

"Sara or Felicity?" Dig asked, feeling the need to clarify.

"Jesus, John, do you really think so little of me?"

Honestly, Dig wasn't one to kick a man when he was down. And Oliver clearly was down. He was scared and confused. But he was damn tired of being in the fallout of all that. "Actually, right now, yes, I really do think that little of you. Because you weren't there for her Oliver. She needed you, needed us. And I was out looking for you because you were AWOL with your love triangle. It's just like it always has been. It's always Laurel, everyone else be damned. Except now maybe it's always Laurel, or Sara, I don't even know. She won't blame you. She'll never blame you because for whatever reason, she always sees the good in you. But she deserves better, Oliver. You make promises you can't follow through on all the time."

"She's the one person I don't lie to," Oliver said, and he sounded a little desperate.

"You said you would protect her."

"Laurel was chewing pills and standing on the edge of a building John. She was going to jump. I got her to sign herself into a rehab program, because she needs help."

"I'm not talking about Laurel. I'm talking about Felicity."

"I know, but if it wasn't life and death, I would have . . ."

"BUT IT WAS," he was roaring again. "IT WAS life and death, Oliver. It's always life and death, because of what we do. Don't you fucking see that? And we all have someone. Sara has her family, and you have your family, and I have my family. Felicity is ALONE, except for us, Oliver. Someone should put her first, because she puts all of us, all of this first."

"I couldn't do this without her." He said, and Dig wasn't looking at him, but he could swear his voice broke.

"Well, if Sara hadn't picked up the phone tonight, you would be. We all would be. So either man the fuck up and come hold her hand, or get out."

He didn't look at Oliver. He couldn't, because he was afraid he would go ballistic if he saw sorrowful resignation there. He opened the door to Felicity's room and went to sit in the arm chair across the room from her bed. He was surprised to see Sara Lance had curled up carefully next to Felicity, and had fallen asleep, despite the fact that John had been railing at the top of his lungs at Oliver. She was the biggest surprise of this evening. He hadn't been entirely sure about her, beyond her kick-ass abilities to fight, but he saw now that she was devoted, and loyal. She was definitely more than a little lost, but at least she could admit it.

He heard the moment that the front door opened, and clicked shut as Oliver left. God damn it. He was going to have to be the one to explain to Felicity why he wasn't here when she woke up. He didn't deserve her.

Shit. This was supposed to be a one-shot. And now I've gone and written myself into a corner. I A six thousand word corner at 2am. I didn't mean for all the angst. Sorry/Not Sorry. Hope you enjoyed. Will probably try for another chapter from Oliver's point of view to fix this trainwreck.