Anything But Ordinary:Chloe/Oliver (NC-17) Chapter 4

[gen717]

Title: Anything But Ordinary
Pairing: Chloe/Oliver
Author: Genevieve
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Sexual Content/Violence, also spoilery for season 8, don't read if you don't want to be spoiled.
Summary: After being poisoned, Oliver Queen sinks into darkness, questioning his role as the Green Arrow and the sacrifices to his personal life, but when danger threatens and he's needed, will he accept the burden of a hero?

Anything But Ordinary
Chapter 4

“She wasn’t kidding you know.”

Oliver, who was just about to fall backward onto the bed, blinked and shook his head to clear it. He lifted his head to see Clark filling his bedroom doorframe. “Huh? How did you get in here?”

Clark stepped into the room. “I’ve been on the balcony, but I heard everything. Sorry. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, it’s just that I’ve been concerned about her…and sort of checking up on her.” He shrugged. “It’s not about you, it’s about Davis Bloom.”

“Seems to be both of us.” Oliver really wanted to sleep off the buzz. “Listen, Clark…”

Clark could hold his tongue no longer. He needed to get this off his chest. “No Oliver, you listen to me for once. You’re the one always spouting off to me about stepping up… but you’re not the only one who’s had to sacrifice something for the benefit of others, and I’m not going to stand by and watch Chloe make sacrifices for someone who’s just going to throw it away.”

Oliver’s brows furrowed. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“She wasn’t kidding. She’s not giving up on you, yet.”

“Okay Clark, I know I’m halfway drunk, but you’re making no sense, and unless you’d like to spell it out for my semi-functional brain, then let me get some sleep.”

“Get yourself together, Oliver. You owe her that.”

Oliver stood up, swaying slightly, as though ready to meet Clark’s challenge. He wished Clark would stop talking in riddles, or simply leave so he could sleep off the buzz. “How the hell do I owe anyone anything?” His voice rose in irritation. “I think I’ve sacrificed enough!”

“She saved your life!”

Oliver stood, shocked into silence, then sunk down onto the bed once more, his face a mask of incredulity. “Chloe? How?”

Clark swallowed tightly. She’d kill him if she found out he’d told, but he needed to let Oliver know. “Chloe has an empathic healing ability. When she heals others, she takes on their illness. I watched her do it. I saw her. When you were poisoned... she took on your pain, Oliver. Your suffering. She sacrificed a bit of herself for you.  If not for Chloe, you'd be dead.  She saved your life.”

Oliver was nearly struck mute, his mind working on all that Clark had just said. Finally, he found his voice. “Why didn’t she tell me?”

“Does the Green Arrow announce to everyone that he’s just returned a stolen, priceless artifact to its rightful owner? Or rescued test subjects in a 33.1 facility? Or made a donation to an orphanage?”

“Was she... was there pain? I mean, did it hurt her?”

“Physically? Yes. But she wanted to do it.”

Oliver shook his head in disbelief, quiet for a moment. Chloe had saved his life, took on his pain and made it her own. “Man, talk about a guilt trip, Clark,” he said, softly.

“If that’s what it takes for you to wake up, and see yourself, what you’re becoming, then I don’t care if it’s a guilt trip. I wasn’t going to tell you at all, Chloe didn’t want me to tell you. But when I see you wasting yourself on drinking and parties… I’m sorry, it made me angry to think that Chloe risked herself for you… for what? So that you could go to one more nightclub? Or pick up one more woman? Get drunk one more time? She believes the world needs both Oliver Queen and the Green Arrow. She thinks you’re a hero. She believes in you. Is her belief for nothing?”

Oliver hung his head. “I didn’t know, Clark… I… I didn’t know.”

“Well, now you do,” Clark said as he turned to leave. “Sleep on that.”

* * * * * * *

Oliver awoke to the aroma of fresh brewed coffee. He rubbed his eyes and sat up, still dressed in black dress slacks and an opened white shirt. What time was it? Who could be here making coffee? One word entered his fogged brain. Chloe. Glancing at the clock on the nightstand, he saw that it was 10:00 am. He grumbled inwardly, rolled off the bed, and lumbered toward the living room area. Chloe was sitting at his desk, biting her lip, her expression intent, eyes focused on the computer screen in front of her. He remained silent, simply watching her. Strands of golden hair hung over her right eye, and he had the urge to tuck them behind her ear. She looked adorably cute, lost in her pursuit of information gathering, and his heart swelled at the sight of her as he recalled the conversation with Clark the night before. She’d saved his life, not wanting him to know what she’d done, and a one-two punch of guilt and humility struck his gut, then filled him completely. Now that he knew what had happened, he almost wasn’t certain how to act around her. It was an odd, foreign feeling to Oliver, not knowing what to say or do around someone, especially Chloe.

He cleared his throat.

She didn’t look up, nor miss a keystroke. “I’ve brought breakfast. Coffee’s ready, but you won’t get a thing until you’ve taken your hung-over self into the shower first.”

Oliver didn’t know whether to scowl or laugh, so he did a bit of both. “Yes Mistress.” This time she did look up, smiling brightly, and whatever uneasy feelings he may have had instantly vanished, and he wondered how she managed to both comfort and lift him with just one beautiful smile directed his way.

Chloe had to admit she found him adorably cute when he was disheveled and unkempt. Cute wasn’t really a word one would use to describe Oliver Queen. Babies were cute, puppies and kittens were cute. Words like ‘devastatingly handsome’ and ‘gorgeous’, and ‘wow’ were more suited to him, but at this moment, just out of bed, still dressed in last night’s clothes, dress shirt hung open, well, he looked... boyishly, adorably cute. Of course she’d never tell him. It just wouldn’t be right. “Yes, Mistress,” she repeated thoughtfully, then nodded in approval. “I like the sound of that.”

He couldn’t help but smile back. “Oh yeah? Well, don’t get used to it.”

She smiled as he turned away, heading toward the bathroom. “And that’s Mistress Watchtower to you!” she called after him, unable to keep the laughter from her voice.

Twenty minutes later, a freshly showered and blue jean and t-shirt clad Oliver Queen peered over her shoulder to see what she was working on.

“Mistress Watchtower hasn’t found any information about Tess, because it’s been erased.” Oliver leaned on the arm of her chair. “And supposedly, she doesn’t remember anything after Lex found her there.”

Chloe looked up at him over her shoulder. “Found her where?”

“Tess was with me on the island.”

Green eyes widened. “What?”

“It’s a long story.”

“This calls for caffeine. Come on.” Chloe stood up, rounding the desk, and Oliver followed her to the kitchen area taking a seat. She poured coffee for both of them, and pulled out a small assortment of fresh bagels from a white paper bag, placing them on a plate. She then sat across from him at the counter, resting on her elbows in front of her, her palms flattened on the cool marble surface. “I’ve got time.”

Oliver took a sip of coffee, setting the mug down deliberately, hesitating before he spoke. “Of course, I didn’t know a lot of things until afterward,” he began, seemingly reluctant to go back and revisit the memories. But he thought he may as well tell her all of it, and suddenly the words poured out of him, all of it as he remembered, the pictures still vivid in his mind.

He released a heavy breath. “Tess used to be the head of some girl street gang. Small time really, petty theft, just regular juvenile delinquent stuff. But then they became affiliated with some real hard-core drug runners; heroine, cocaine… powerful group.” His eyes lifted to stare out through the large windows of the penthouse, but Chloe was certain it wasn’t the Metropolis skyline he was seeing. Oliver rose from his seat and paced a few steps left, then right. Chloe could tell by the far away look in his eyes that he was reliving his time spent on the island. She sat listening intently to his every word, and she went back with him as he described it all.

“Tess is intelligent and beguiling, always gets her way,” he went on. “I guess the leader saw her potential and took her under his wing. I didn’t know it then, but one of my bodyguards, Hackett, was part of this group working for the same man. Hackett and Tess were friends; she’d convinced him that my yacht would be the perfect cover in their operation. Who’d search Oliver Queen’s boat, right?” He paused a moment to shrug, gazing over at Chloe, her emerald eyes giving him courage to go on. Oliver looked down and away from her. “Anyway, one night Hackett and I, we went for a little trip on my yacht. I don’t know just something crazy to do… I don’t know what happened, I was knocked unconscious. He left me for dead. Washed up on an island, and I had to use my bow to survive until eventually, I came upon some villagers.”

Oliver continued to pace in front of her slowly as he talked. “While there, I became ill. That’s how I met Tess. She was on the island, she helped nurse me back to health, and I promised her I’d get us both back home, back to civilization.” A ghost of a bitter smile played on his lips as he stared off into the distance. “Oh she’s good, very good at deception. Had me convinced that she was being held there against her will by the drug runners, when all the while she was working for them, right there on the island. I told her I’d help her.”

Oliver turned his eyes to Chloe once more. “The people living there… they were being used and treated like slaves to process the drugs and load them onto small ships as cargo. When I was well enough, I decided to take the drug runners down. And I did. Incited an uprising of the locals against the smugglers. Both the gang leader and Hackett were killed in the melee, and I couldn’t find Tess in all the chaos.” Oliver stepped back over to his seat at the counter and dropped down onto the stool, he stared at his hands not inches away from Chloe’s. “Basically she blamed me for the death of her mentor, and her friend, and probably for leaving her there too. Lex must have found her sometime after that.” He shrugged. “If it’s to be believed that she has no memory of it, you can throw in what Lex has probably fed her about me, and about the Green Arrow, and there you have it. She’s after me now, and she won’t stop until…” his voice trailed off, not finishing his thought, his mind taking him down the slippery slope.

Chloe dipped her head toward him peering up at him in an effort to get him to look at her. When his dark eyes met hers, she spoke. “Maybe she thought you could get her away from Hackett and the drug runners?” she offered gently.

“I found Hackett before he died. He told me the truth about Tess.” Oliver shook his head. “She saw me as another rung on the ladder in her quest for upward mobility. Tess doesn’t do anything unless there’s something in it for her.”

“I’m sorry, Oliver.”

“The experience on that island changed my life. I saw what one man could do, how lives could be changed for the better. It’s why I became the Green Arrow, why I fought for the things I did. Why I helped those less fortunate than myself.”

“And now?”

“I admit my idealism has taken a blow.”

Chloe reached for his hand, her soft touch and warmth nearly startling him, bringing him back to the present. “Your sense of justice and righting wrongs… it’s a part of who you are, Oliver,” she argued. “It’s not just something you can throw away.” Chloe’s expression was earnest. “The reasons you became the Green Arrow still exist, can’t you see that?”

“I want to believe again.” He said, glancing down at her small hand covering his.

“You will. I mean, maybe that idealism is little banged up, but it’s still there. You wouldn’t be helping me now if it weren’t.”

He lifted his eyes to hers, green eyes so full of hope, and Oliver thought he’d fall into them and lose himself right then. If she believed in him, then maybe there was hope for him after all; maybe she saw something in him. He turned his palm upward, fingers clasping her small hand in his, giving it a gentle squeeze. “Thanks, Chloe,” he murmured, his lips curving in a small smile. Somehow the words just didn’t seem to be enough, and he silently promised that he’d never let her down. Ever. He’d prove that she didn’t save his life for nothing.

Chloe returned his smile, and they shared a silent moment of understanding together. Just then her cell phone rang, and she left him to answer it. “Jimmy? Hey. Yeah. Okay.” She paused for a moment, listening. “Okay, I’ll pick you up at the airport around seven.”

Oliver’s heart sank at the mention of the photographer’s name. He didn’t need to wonder why. He knew. Crazy as it was, Lois’s cousin though she was, she was engaged to be married, none of that seemed to matter, logic and common sense played no part here. There was no denying it; he was falling for Chloe Sullivan, and there was nothing he could do about it.

End Chapter 4

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