Cure: Chapter Nine (9/20)
Banner created by the absolutely fantastic alxnhnt22, whose artwork gives me incredible inspiration.
Summary: Chloe is trying to find a doctor to help her with her meteor infection and a playboy-like Oliver Queen is trying to find a a physician for his Green Arrow wounds. They begin a sexual relationship, which becomes a problem once Ollie's softer side develops.
A/N: Let me get one thing clear. If you do not like my story, I'm not holding you at gunpoint and forcing you to read it. You don't need to like my story. In fact, you do not need to even be involved in the process at all. You can just leave. If you think that I'm unoriginal, then that's just too damn bad.
Chapter Nine
There was an empty glass of whisky and a half-empty bottle on the table, and as he sat staring at the light reflecting on the crystal for a moment, Oliver noticed that his phone was vibrating.
He glanced at the screen, but it wasn’t to check and see who was calling. He knew that it was the same stupid message- Incoming call from: Emil Hamilton. Instead, he looked at the time, wishing that he could extend it somehow.
He rested the phone on the table and poured himself another drink, his eyes unconsciously flickering to the couch every couple of seconds. Soon, the battery would force his phone to shut down and he wouldn’t have to deal with the calls and messages.
He wondered what would happen to him without the distraction.
You can’t stay here.
He had spent the night trying to come up with a strategy of how to get his company where they needed to go internationally to compete with the Luthors, but the research stopped three hours after the last employee left.
Oliver started doing research on people with abilities. It looked like Lex’s 33.1 project was just one of a list of people around the world who were experimenting on outstanding people out of fear.
The research on extraordinary beings who could do things that he never would have imagined possible took away from time that should have been spent on business deals. He knew that he was in trouble. He was already trying to go head to head with both Luthors instead of teaming up with one and either putting a son in his place, or sticking it to Daddy.
Midnight turned into 3 AM, but he couldn’t stop reading article after article. The words were familiar, and he couldn’t put his finger on it. Assuming that he was just tired, he packed up his things and started to head over to the penthouse.
Harvard had granted him an honorary graduate degree in business six months after he had returned from the island. They said that it was for being one of the most successful businessmen in the world- that a fellowship with Queen Industries would be a terrific opportunity for any graduate. And that was all fine, except Oliver knew the truth.
They gave it to him because they were surprised that he hadn’t fallen apart. He readjusted too quickly. Two nights later, he stayed up all night and slept with seven expensive escorts before he realized that paying for sex was too easy.
He didn’t deserve the little piece of paper that others spent years chasing. Not while he knew that his business wasn’t as good as when his father ran things. His company knew it, and Oliver didn’t let himself be blind to it.
He distracted himself from it, but on nights like these, he really felt the truth- that he wasn’t truly qualified for his job. People were looking to him to make decisions that he had a hunch he would be more sure about if he spent less time trying to survive in a deserted island and more time writing a dissertation.
Archery hadn’t prepared him to run a Fortune 500 company. Oliver dropped the keys on the sidetable in the dark and stopped short for a second when he realized that someone was sleeping in his bed.
I’ve got to be honest, out of all of the things that you could have been doing, this one was a lot closer to familiar waters than I could have thought possible.
The voice was quiet, and was echoing instead of coming from one place. He quietly sidestepped into the kitchen and pulled open the fridge, taking a bottle of water and closing the door. There were only two people with the security code, while both of them were too proud to crash here instead of at work, he would have too many questions to ask if Emil was in his bed.
Might explain the guy’s celibacy, but wouldn’t explain why he was here. It made more sense to assume that it was Chloe.
He checked the security of the Arrow room- the only person who had opened the door was him, and that was yesterday for patrol. It was a good thing that he hadn’t patrolled tonight.
For a moment, he swore that he saw a flash of fire surrounding him.
“Hey”, a sleepy voice said. “Sorry I just dropped by. I didn’t trust myself to drive home and for some reason, I can only accidentally fall asleep at my desk.”
He ignored the strange feeling that something was out of place and walked over to her. “It’s okay, I just wish I was here earlier to let you in.” He leaned forward and kissed her.
She pulled away and sat up. “Ollie, I really don’t want to have sex right now.”
He sat down next to her. “We’re allowed to be in the same room without having sex, you know. Can I get you anything? There’s Chinese food in the fridge.”
“Thanks, but I’m fine. How was your day?”
“Long”, he said, loosening his tie and taking off his shoes. “Yours?”
She let out a sigh. “Dramatic.”
“Want to elaborate?” He asked
“Not really.”
He pulled off his shirt and lay down on the bed. He was about to pull the covers on both of them when it looked like a chunk of the ceiling was about to fall down on Chloe. He covered her with his body, preparing for something to hit his back, but nothing did.
“Are you okay?” She asked
You’re going to be okay. I’m going to figure something out, okay?
“What are you going to figure out?” He asked her
“What?”
He looked up at the ceiling, which was perfectly steady. “I’m probably just tired or something”, he said, lying down again. He closed his eyes to sleep when he saw the flash of fire again. His eyes snapped open and there was a small crack in the ceiling that hadn’t been there before.
The crack was starting to spread, the line travelling along the ceiling. “Chloe, do you see that?” He asked
He looked over, but she wasn’t there. He was alone.
Shit, this wasn’t supposed to happen.
A bright light was coming through the crack in the ceiling. “Chloe?” He called out as the light started to fill the room as the crack got deeper.
The crack in the ceiling started to almost resemble a pattern of veins as the light filled the room. His eyes were forced shut. He felt an external heat enter his body from somewhere and spread throughout his body.
Heat. He was in a fire.
This here? Lying in bed with Chloe at the end of a busy work day- this was last night. He remembered staying here with her until night turned into day, day turned into the next night. He finally slipped out of bed when his cell phone went off because someone had a question to ask. He remember thinking that people were off their game a little bit, if it took them this long to try and track him down.
She had woken up and left before he got back, there was disappointment. And then he checked the news, saw that there was a fire, not far from there. He got in his gear, and barely looked back as he switched on the voice distorter, pulled on the hood, and jumped out of the balcony.
He remembered hearing the police transmissions on his way to the building, the voices continuing as he created a hole on the roof as he dropped down, almost making the entire structure crumble on top of him.
There was a child huddled in a corner, covered in a yellow blanket and crying. He scooped him up and nearly got them both killed getting out of there.
An uncoordinated batch of sirens blocked out the voice of the paramedic who had rushed over to him, asking if he was okay. The woman had moved quickly, taking the child from his arms before turning to retrieve a supply of oxygen and a mask.
He checked her out before his eyes drifted over to the faces in the crowd that had formed. They were like ants crowding over a dropped piece of food, all of them. Their faces were the same, filled with terror. He scanned all of the faces until he found one man, who was flicking the cover of a lighter back and forth, a look of pleasure on his face.
Oliver was a little bit dizzy, but he wasn’t delusional enough to make up the look of a man who looked like he was about to get off on the fear of others here. He started running towards the crazed maniac, when he caught on and started running away. The paramedic probably wanted to know where he went while he was running.
He ran into the alleyway, not even thinking about the danger, just knowing that the guy that he was chasing was responsible for the fire. That there might have been a person or two that he couldn’t go back inside of the burning building to save now, lives that were lost.
He didn’t realize that one maniac on the street would turn into seven carrying weapons. He didn’t anticipate needing to fight through his own failing senses as seven people seemed to turn into fourteen as the dizziness continued. He disarmed a man with a gun, pulling out the ammunition and throwing it aside when he realized that he was starting to have trouble breathing.
A majority of them were taken out with taser darts, electricity disarming them and knocking him out. Except the dizziness caused one too many misfires, so he needed to resort to hand-to-hand combat in order to take out the remaining two.
He didn’t stop punching until they were all on the ground. He thought that they were all knocked unconscious, so he bent down, hands on his knees, and started coughing.
Fifteen seconds he was distracted, trying to get himself back in control. Fifteen seconds of vulnerability, and when the fifteen seconds were over, something sharp hit his back, and even though he was about to stand up fully and get going, he found himself frozen in place somehow.
He was only able to identify the sharpened pole that the thug had struck him with because a small portion of one end was sticking out of his stomach.
He fell down couldn’t get back up, and he felt the terror that the faces in the crowd had felt. They were so far away from him now, and he felt the helplessness of his voice not being able to travel the distance needed.
He couldn’t get up or run, and he definitely wasn’t going to just sit here and wait to die. He fumbled with his crossbow until it unfolded again, and he fit a zip-line arrow in place.
It was normally better to travel if he was completely vertical, since that was the only way to really see where he was going, but he couldn’t complain now. He launched the arrow, and let the cable lift him up in the air until he landed on a random rooftop.
He reached for his cell phone and called Emil. The phone rang ten times before he finally gave up. He tried Emil’s emergency pager number, but that wasn’t working either. He let out a curse and looked around. There were a couple of random buildings, but he couldn’t tell where the ambulance was, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted a crowd of people to see him right now.
The only building that he recognized was the Daily Planet, the globe rotating at the same constant rate as it always had. The building was in the middle of the city- if he could just get there, then he could drag his own ass to the hospital.
When he finally got to the roof, there was blood everywhere, and his arm gave out. He knew that this was the farthest that he was going to go, and maybe his arm giving up on him translated to his hand, and quite possibly his brain too.
But he called Chloe Sullivan, asked her to come up to the roof, and dropped his cell phone, since the weight of it seemed too heavy for his hand to deal with.
He forgot that he was wearing his gear until he heard heels clacking as she came up the stairs. He blacked out right as the door opened. And as he felt the strange heat travelling from his stomach and spreading up towards his chest and around his shoulders and down his back, he could hear her voice again.
Promise me that you won’t take me to the hospital.
He inhaled deeply, and found himself back on the roof, a pole tossed aside next to him, blood everywhere. He looked up at Chloe Sullivan, her eyes were completely white. They were starting to return to their normal color, and she gave him a weak smile.
“What did you do?” He asked
“It’s not important”, she gasped, wrapping an arm around his neck. “But what is”, she took a couple of shallow breaths. “No hospitals, no morgues. Please, Ollie.”
He was incredibly confused. “Okay”, he said, uncertainly.
“You’re a pain in the ass.”
He let out a laugh, and looked at the pole. “How did you…?”
He looked back over at her, but there was no response. She was cold, and her eyes were shut.