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thejusticelounge2012-09-16 11:08 am
bossymarmalade) wrote in thejusticelounge2012-09-16 11:08 am
now for wrath, now for ruin
The doctors had long since closed up, cleaned up, and vacated, leaving Hal alone with Ollie. He had every kind of tube and monitor imaginable hooked up to him, but not a single one as good as the one on Hal’s finger. Hal’s ring was keeping up with the blond’s condition, monitoring every spike or dip in Oliver’s condition. They would know the second he pushed a threshold either way.
Whatever happened, Hal was not going to lose him.
Like hell you’re not, Ollie grins back, and it’s only when he takes off -- flying? speeding? he can’t even tell, just that he’s moving too fast for it to be his own ol’ feet -- that he realizes this isn’t normal, and the Hal who tucks his arms in close to himself to give high-speed missile chase, laughing all the way, isn’t a real, normal Hal.
But this isn’t … this isn’t the afterlife like it used to be, like it was the first time. This is a swirling, nebulous space, red in places, red, gold and green, karma karma karma --
Hey, don’t get distracted. Hal bowls him over and they go flipping through the empty gel of their space, whatever it is, slowing into twirls and broadside spins, Hal guiding them through until they’re both floating right side up. Hal’s arms feel real enough under Ollie’s hands, and the crooked curve of his smile seems like it always has. But this still isn’t the afterlife like he remembers it.
What does it mean? Ollie asks, only realizing when the words squeak into bubbles in front of his nose how scared that question makes him. Hal catches each bubble tenderly in his long fingers and arrays them along his shoulder before he points with his chin behind Ollie. Ask her, Hal smiles, and takes Ollie’s hand as he turns.
Hi there, big guy, the dark-haired goth chick says, her smile crinkling the Egyptian-style makeup around her eyes. Guess introductions are in order.
Death didn’t scare Hal, not personally. He’d been dead and come back, they both had, though Ollie had fought it. Still, Hal couldn’t be happier that the other had given in, stubborn cuss that he was. But that was part of what Hal loved about him...
“You old bastard,” he muttered, gently stroking Ollie’s hair. “You’re not going to die on us...We need you too much right now.”
He shook his head and sighed, gaze falling a moment. He slid his hand gently over his arm, rubbing a thumb over his ring. Shifting his construct chair closer, he laid his head beside Ollie’s on the pillow, arm stretched out alongside the archer’s as he laced their fingers together.
You probably don’t remember me from last time, Death’s voice pipes up from next to Ollie, and he looks down at their interlaced hands, startled. Where’d Hal go? he demands, and she points a finger upward with a glance up as well. Ollie lifts his head to look even though there’s nothing around them but karma chameleon colours.
He’s out there, Death says. Keeping watch over your body while we sort this out. You’re amazingly lucky, Ollie.
I am, I know. No, wait, am I? Ollie asks, half-distracted by the way there’s bands of blood forming and spreading across his arm, his throat, soaking through his shirt, streaming down his nose. He refocuses suddenly when the blood reminds him of what happened, clutching Death’s hand hard. Kate -- is she--?
Not here, Death says, after a moment’s consideration. Hal’s right, you do get distracted easily. Ollie opens his mouth to protest but she keeps talking. You’re only here as a courtesy, because you inadvertently helped punish a man named Stanley Dover, and my brother Morpheus remembers these things. Honestly, otherwise? You’ve used up all your get out of jail free cards, Ollie. We need to discuss this.
“We talked about this,” Hal said, his voice having an almost scolding note. “You and me are supposed to grow old together...Pass on our lineage to the next generation and watch them screw up like we did...and be there to pick them up afterward.” He nuzzled his cheek, trying to ignore the sterile stink and constant beep beep behind him.
“See?” he said. “You can’t die...You’ve gotta watch Connor get older and screw up just like his dad did. You’ve gotta take care of Mia...Not to mention Kate would never forgive you if you did.” He closed his eyes tightly, giving Ollie’s hand a squeeze.
“Then there’s me,” he said. “You know I’m hopeless without you. This planet doesn’t have anything for me if you’re not on it, waiting to yell at me for being in space and smelling like ozone..”
Turning his head, he kissed Ollie’s cheek softly, nosing at his cheekbone lightly. He knew he’d have to leave, and much sooner than he’d like to. He wanted to wait until he knew Ollie was on the mend, hell until he woke up and demanded chili or something. But he’d have to leave...and go find Roy.
“I’ll find your boy, Ollie,” he said softly. “We’ll get him...and we’ll do what we can for him.”
A lot of people have had fingers in the pie doing what they can when it comes to your soul and your mortality. Death counts them off on her own fingers: The Spectre, Hal Jordan--
Aren’t those the same guy? Ollie interjects, and she rolls her eyes and shakes her head so emphatically her ankh necklace bounces against her chest. Hal made efforts to resurrect you that are separate from things he did as the Spectre to smooth your way back. You wanna cool it with the questions so you don’t worry your poor boyfriend more than you have to?
Partner, Ollie corrects sulkily, rubbing his ring with his thumb and wishing Hal was still here. Death gives him a flat look. Anyways, she says, both of them, and Jason Blood and Etrigan, LeNoir and Doctor Fate, Stanley Dover. Point is, you’re well overdue for death to stick, or for your soul to go to the highest bidder, or both. So this is the last time, Ollie.
If you’re saying this is the last time I should get nearly beaten to death by my own son, don’t worry, I’m a step ahead of you there. He’s impatient, and that’s probably not wise right now in jelly karma chameleon world, but Ollie can practically feel Hal touching him, talking to him in the real world, and he’s almost sick with wanting to actually have Hal’s long nose brushing along his cheek. Everything in here is too cold and too heavy, too lonely. There’s a lantern been hung out there to guide him back, and he’s itching to follow its green light.
Oliver, Death says, and this time he looks at her. They’re all tied to this now. Mia and Connor were there when Stanley got his comeuppance, so you’re riding on their accrued goodwill with my brother. Hal spent a lot of spiritual currency bringing you out of the afterlife -- in two stages, no less. Next time you sign your soul away or get killed and brought back? You’re using up years from their lives. She sighs at the look on his face. The universe isn’t made of infinite energy, Ollie. Replenishing one life that’s used up its own allotment takes away from another, and after this, you’ll be using up theirs. The space inside you has to be filled with what you take from them.
I fucking hate space, Ollie says faintly. Death smiles.
Go back to him now, she tells him, voice gentle. But remember what I told you.
Cold was what he felt first, then a haze of pain grinding under it, screaming along like ice scraping along itself -- a glacier crawling with claws into an iceberg. Ollie could barely see for the swelling in his face, but even as he gasped raw and dry at the freezing cold, a warm brownness pushed softly in against him. Hal, Hal sounding haggard and determined at once, talking about Roy. As Ollie slowly began to become aware of the other parts of his body, a catalogue of agony, he got small places of comfort as well: Hal’s nose touching his cheek, the heat of his breath, the feel of his hand folded into Ollie’s.
Baby, he wanted to say, but he couldn’t make any sound other than a wretched, thin whine, hollow as an old hose.
The sound caught Hal’s attention, and his head came up quickly. He saw a flicker of movement from his swollen eyes...and smiled. He squeezed Ollie’s hand and rubbed his thumb across his fingers.
“Hey handsome,” he said softly, nuzzling into his cheek again. He closed his eyes, warm tears slowly falling over his cheeks. Tears of joy and relief. “I knew you’d be alright.” He pressed the very softest of kisses to the corner of Ollie’s mouth, standing slowly to lean over him. “You look like you had a rough night.”
Even as he stood, he kept his hold on his hand. This was good..this was what he’d needed to see. Now...well, now he knew what he had to do.
“I’ve gotta go, babe,” he said, voice soft as he leaned down to brush another kiss over his lips. “Keep the bed warm...I’ll be home soon.” Gazing down at him, he squeezed his hand one last time. “I love you.”
Reluctantly, he let go and stood, backing away from the other’s bed. He turned sharply on his heel, heading for the airlock. His uniform spread out from an emblazoned lantern symbol on his chest, stretching out in green to black to white over his body. With a flash like fire across his eyes, his mask settled into place, his eyes burning bright emerald green.
“This is Lantern Jordan to Rayner and Gardner,” he said, transmitting a message to the other two as he stepped out into space. “We’ve got work to do.”
--- --- ---
Kate had been allowed up, after the first twelve hours. That is, after the medics had her burns washed out and covered, then were convinced that she wasn’t going to collapse from the concussion being worse than anticipated. She was utterly exhausted, only having had a short nap once she was cleared.
Hal had spoken to her briefly, before he’d left, and now…well. Ollie had woken up for a moment or two at least, and that… Well, for some reason that eased things, a little, the pain and the fury that left her this close to rocking and keening and tearing her hair out with frustration—were it not for the fact that she needed to keep it together for Mia and for the sake of not scaring the medical team.
After sending a message via the medics to Mia that she was going to go see Ollie, Kate washed up, then went into the other room, quietly. It wasn’t as if Oliver Queen could ever look small, against the bed, but…unwell, that was certain. Face drawn, bruised all to hell, paler than his usual guero self.
Kate sank into the chair by the bed, biting her lip, and rested her forehead against the mattress, next to his arm. She wasn’t going to cry. Really, she wasn’t. It was just because she was tired.
Ollie’d drifted off again after waking up to Hal kissing him oh-so-gently and then bravely heading out to the wars, dear fellow, the relief washing from him in waves as he murmured fond words and reluctantly left Ollie’s bedside. He was still half-dazed, coming up in and out of exhausted sleeps wondering if his encounter with Death had been literal, metaphorical, or both.
He swam up to consciousness this time because he felt warmth next to him, smelled something scorched but familiar and comforting amidst all the sterility and antiseptic. And there was Kate, head down, her dark hair getting that overly-sleek bristly look it did when she’d been up too long or unwell, and Ollie weakly moved his hand to catch a lock of it between his finger-joints.
“Katie,” he croaked. “He didn’t get you, wasn’t sure if Death knew what she was talking ‘bout. Honey.”
The trying not to cry thing had sapped a good chunk of Kate’s small remaining energy reserve, and as such she had fallen into a light sleep. The touch and the sound brought her out of it, though, and she shifted a little to look up at Ollie from where she was lying, realizing it was him talking to her that had woken her up.
She bit her lip, felt herself well up—madre di dios, like in a bad movie or a telenovela or something, get a grip, Spencer, her brain said—but she no longer could bring herself to care. It felt like those cliched statements and images implied, actually, like her eyes were filling up, puddles and rainstorms and…
(A part of Kate wondered, vaguely, detached, if she was going to have permanent brain damage from this that made her mind ramble from pillar to post, or if it was still lingering effects from the concussion and exhaustion. Hopefully the latter.)
“Ollie,” she said quietly, biting hard into her lower lip. It hurt to smile, shifted the bandage on her face against the burn, but she found she couldn’t not do it, even though she was nearly crying. “Nah, he didn’t get me. Besides, I’m too big a pain in the culo, Death wouldn’t want me around…”
She didn’t need to say that it had been close for him, though, and that thought was what made the tears actually start. Quiet, not pretty—not like the shitty movies or telenovelas, there.
“Sweetheart,” Ollie mumbled, watching helplessly as Kate started to weep. Ollie’d been near enough himself with Hal’s soft, saltwater words of reassurance, and now Kate with tears rimming her brown eyes and streaming down her poor burned face — he felt a prickling high up in his broken nose, blinking once before he was crying too. As if he fucking cared at this point. She could’ve been killed, and she was hurt, and between the relief and sadness of both Hal’s and now Kate’s reactions, Ollie was starting to really understand how close it’d been for him.
Oh god, Roy, he thought in shock of pain and sorrow, but right now … right now he didn’t have the energy to think of Roy and what it all meant. Right now he was just really goddamn happy to be alive, even if he could feel ribs grinding against each other when he breathed and his left arm (his fucking bow arm, and it damn well better be set right) aching and immobilized.
Ollie tried to wipe some of the wetness from Kate’s pretty, pointy chin, but his fingers were clumsy at best and he ended up just kind of knocking her ineffectually with his knuckles. “Hey, watch it,” he said, his own wrecked voice low and unsteady with the tears that were still slipping unheeded from the corners of his eyes. “Gonna soak off your bandages there.”
Kate had been furious—still was, a current of anger streaming below the surface that wouldn’t end until this reached resolution. It was the kind of feeling she knew too well, had transmuted too often—
and especially since she stole the suit, since she killed Copperhead
—into righteous wrath, because anything else would be unacceptable. And between dear old dad and what had just happened to her and Ollie, she’d seen what the alternative was. Looking into the abyss, or something poetic and stereotypical to that effect.
But right now she just felt tired, and so glad that he could talk to her, that he was in one piece. And, to be fair, he was right, her bandages were getting wet, and the medics were going to kill her when she got back to her own room. She could feel the salt and the damp irritating the burn already.
Ollie was crying too, and that eased her into stopping, mostly, as she moved up to kiss his fingers when he tried to wipe her face. “Hey yourself,” she said, voice a little raw. “It’s okay. We’re both here, we’re both going to be fine. Might take a while, but we’ll get there, cielo.”
And si, the anger, just there, because they shouldn’t HAVE to get better, they had just spent time getting better. She bit it back—the last thing Ollie needed to hear right now was how she was going to tear his son a new one.
“I missed you so much,” she said, quietly, because it wasn’t for anyone else to hear.
“I’m gathering you might have missed me a whole lot more, if things had gone sideways,” Ollie said, letting his fingers trail from Kate’s lips to her chin, his hand still feeling too heavy for fine motor skills. She was visibly pulling herself together — no doubt because he was totally losing it — which was *so much* his Katie that Ollie nearly laughed. Nearly, because that was what he wanted to do but all that happened was a wheezing sob and more tears, which was very fucking uncomfortable given the tubes up his nose and abrasions and cuts on his face, and oh man, such ridiculousness.
That *did* make him laugh, although not much. Everything felt broken up in his chest and the last thing he wanted was a coughing fit to tire him out now that he’d regained consciousness. Especially since now he had Kate mercifully with him, showing no signs of leaving anytime soon. Ollie didn’t know what he would’ve done if he’d come to and Hal hadn’t been there, if Kate wasn’t here now. He felt like he couldn’t bear to be alone, ever again.
“Love you,” he said, to be able to say it. He wanted to tell her more, big things about how grateful he was that she’d thrown herself into the line of fire to keep him from being killed, little things like how astonishingly beautiful her wet eyelashes and tear-shining brown eyes looked, but that would have to do, for the moment.
“Yeah, no mierda, Queen,” Kate retorted gently, then bit her lip hard (not drawing blood hard, but hard enough so she didn’t break again). Ollie’s hand was clumsy, but endearingly so, and she leaned gently into the touch, desperate for it in ways she hadn’t known she could be, now that she wasn’t resigned to pure grief.
Besides, Ollie was looking like he was going to turn into a complete mess, End Of Old Yeller type—the medics were going to kill her dead, she could see one of them looking over at them now with a disapproving expression. Ms. Spencer, he nearly aspirated because of you, can you please…
Damn it, why wasn’t her brain working right? The mental image was almost funny to her. Though now Ollie was laughing at something else, insomuch as he could laugh at the moment, which did make her laugh, and oh damn, they were going to get their asses metaphorically kicked for acting like this. Maybe she could talk them out of it by saying it was a post-traumatic reflex. (Maybe it actually was.)
“I love you too,” she said finally, and the laugh turned to a half-choked sob. “Mind if I stay for a while?” Even if she knew the answer, just being able to hear it helped.
“Stay forever,” Ollie said, instantly, meaning it with all his heart. He was feeling calmer now, after getting out the initial burst of uncontrolled emotion, and probably Kate was too. Well, they were completely entitled to some wild weeping and laughing fits, as far as he was concerned.
“I almost feel like I should apologize for not giving you a full and detailed waiver to sign when you hitched your star to this gong show of a family, sweetheart,” Ollie said, resigning himself to just holding Kate’s hand instead of anything fancier. “Hasn’t been a quiet moment since you became part of us, seems like. And I betcha thought that the Batfam was where all the action was at, heh!”
He coughed a few times, tasting blood, feeling his heart speed up and head swim. Goddammit. Roy had been thorough, all right, and as if his own mangled body wasn’t evidence enough, there was the glassy haze of pain in Kate’s eyes no matter how much she downplayed it.
Kate blushed, a little, and found that the rush of blood actually made her face hurt a little more. Not that she could stop herself from doing it, around Ollie, to be fair. It was harder to ignore or brush aside the burn on her cheek than it was the rest—every time she talked, moved much, smiled. She was fine. She’d be fine. He needed to get better, not worry about her.
“Already sort of planned on it,” she said quietly, leaning in to brush a kiss against his forehead because there weren’t tubes and wires there, at least, and limited injury. “Told you I play for keeps.”
She was trying not to think about how terrible Ollie looked after he coughed. Fortunately she found a couple of good ways to do it, namely that it was easy to pick out oddities of speech and simply bizarre references. “I didn’t come for the action, I came for the party—though oh my god, gong show? I can’t believe you used that as a term, cielo, it’s not the 70s.”
“Hey, if you’re gonna be in the party house, you gotta expect some decade-of-groovy references. Because I already lived through 90s party culture, and lemme tell you, I am *not* going back to calling things ‘sick’ or ‘wicked’ or whatever ‘to the max’. That would mark me as a massive poser, dude.” Ollie took a few deep breaths after he wound down on talking, hoping it wasn’t obvious. His chest hurt in sharp stabs. His lungs felt like lead.
But fuck all that. He was gonna be limping and weak and aching enough for all the recovery time; if there was one thing he’d hang onto doing, it was at least TALKING to the people he loved. If he couldn’t talk he might as well just be in a damn coma.
Still, though. If his words would be curtailed by the frailty of the flesh, he might as well make them count instead of the usual blather. So, “You saved my life,” Ollie said, bluntly. “I would be dead right now if you weren’t there. If you didn’t slow him down. Kiss me again, please.”
“I am gonna assume you’re intending ‘party house’ ironically, these days,” Kate replied with a snort. She could see the pain in Ollie’s own face now, the way his breath caught, ragged and tearing more than a little each time, and she didn’t want him to overdo it. The nurses were starting to look over at them, check monitors that said things she didn’t want to even now about.
So she was startled when he was…considerably more blunt than usual, but it was entirely appreciated, made her heart pound a little, made her blush even more.
“Well, I wouldn’t have done it if you weren’t fuckin’ dope, Ollie Queen,” she murmured, bending down and kissing him slowly. “Since you said please,” she added softly, easing back after a second, just only so she could talk before kissing him even harder, almost desperately.
And man, fuck the medics glaring at them, seriously.
Whatever happened, Hal was not going to lose him.
Like hell you’re not, Ollie grins back, and it’s only when he takes off -- flying? speeding? he can’t even tell, just that he’s moving too fast for it to be his own ol’ feet -- that he realizes this isn’t normal, and the Hal who tucks his arms in close to himself to give high-speed missile chase, laughing all the way, isn’t a real, normal Hal.
But this isn’t … this isn’t the afterlife like it used to be, like it was the first time. This is a swirling, nebulous space, red in places, red, gold and green, karma karma karma --
Hey, don’t get distracted. Hal bowls him over and they go flipping through the empty gel of their space, whatever it is, slowing into twirls and broadside spins, Hal guiding them through until they’re both floating right side up. Hal’s arms feel real enough under Ollie’s hands, and the crooked curve of his smile seems like it always has. But this still isn’t the afterlife like he remembers it.
What does it mean? Ollie asks, only realizing when the words squeak into bubbles in front of his nose how scared that question makes him. Hal catches each bubble tenderly in his long fingers and arrays them along his shoulder before he points with his chin behind Ollie. Ask her, Hal smiles, and takes Ollie’s hand as he turns.
Hi there, big guy, the dark-haired goth chick says, her smile crinkling the Egyptian-style makeup around her eyes. Guess introductions are in order.
Death didn’t scare Hal, not personally. He’d been dead and come back, they both had, though Ollie had fought it. Still, Hal couldn’t be happier that the other had given in, stubborn cuss that he was. But that was part of what Hal loved about him...
“You old bastard,” he muttered, gently stroking Ollie’s hair. “You’re not going to die on us...We need you too much right now.”
He shook his head and sighed, gaze falling a moment. He slid his hand gently over his arm, rubbing a thumb over his ring. Shifting his construct chair closer, he laid his head beside Ollie’s on the pillow, arm stretched out alongside the archer’s as he laced their fingers together.
You probably don’t remember me from last time, Death’s voice pipes up from next to Ollie, and he looks down at their interlaced hands, startled. Where’d Hal go? he demands, and she points a finger upward with a glance up as well. Ollie lifts his head to look even though there’s nothing around them but karma chameleon colours.
He’s out there, Death says. Keeping watch over your body while we sort this out. You’re amazingly lucky, Ollie.
I am, I know. No, wait, am I? Ollie asks, half-distracted by the way there’s bands of blood forming and spreading across his arm, his throat, soaking through his shirt, streaming down his nose. He refocuses suddenly when the blood reminds him of what happened, clutching Death’s hand hard. Kate -- is she--?
Not here, Death says, after a moment’s consideration. Hal’s right, you do get distracted easily. Ollie opens his mouth to protest but she keeps talking. You’re only here as a courtesy, because you inadvertently helped punish a man named Stanley Dover, and my brother Morpheus remembers these things. Honestly, otherwise? You’ve used up all your get out of jail free cards, Ollie. We need to discuss this.
“We talked about this,” Hal said, his voice having an almost scolding note. “You and me are supposed to grow old together...Pass on our lineage to the next generation and watch them screw up like we did...and be there to pick them up afterward.” He nuzzled his cheek, trying to ignore the sterile stink and constant beep beep behind him.
“See?” he said. “You can’t die...You’ve gotta watch Connor get older and screw up just like his dad did. You’ve gotta take care of Mia...Not to mention Kate would never forgive you if you did.” He closed his eyes tightly, giving Ollie’s hand a squeeze.
“Then there’s me,” he said. “You know I’m hopeless without you. This planet doesn’t have anything for me if you’re not on it, waiting to yell at me for being in space and smelling like ozone..”
Turning his head, he kissed Ollie’s cheek softly, nosing at his cheekbone lightly. He knew he’d have to leave, and much sooner than he’d like to. He wanted to wait until he knew Ollie was on the mend, hell until he woke up and demanded chili or something. But he’d have to leave...and go find Roy.
“I’ll find your boy, Ollie,” he said softly. “We’ll get him...and we’ll do what we can for him.”
A lot of people have had fingers in the pie doing what they can when it comes to your soul and your mortality. Death counts them off on her own fingers: The Spectre, Hal Jordan--
Aren’t those the same guy? Ollie interjects, and she rolls her eyes and shakes her head so emphatically her ankh necklace bounces against her chest. Hal made efforts to resurrect you that are separate from things he did as the Spectre to smooth your way back. You wanna cool it with the questions so you don’t worry your poor boyfriend more than you have to?
Partner, Ollie corrects sulkily, rubbing his ring with his thumb and wishing Hal was still here. Death gives him a flat look. Anyways, she says, both of them, and Jason Blood and Etrigan, LeNoir and Doctor Fate, Stanley Dover. Point is, you’re well overdue for death to stick, or for your soul to go to the highest bidder, or both. So this is the last time, Ollie.
If you’re saying this is the last time I should get nearly beaten to death by my own son, don’t worry, I’m a step ahead of you there. He’s impatient, and that’s probably not wise right now in jelly karma chameleon world, but Ollie can practically feel Hal touching him, talking to him in the real world, and he’s almost sick with wanting to actually have Hal’s long nose brushing along his cheek. Everything in here is too cold and too heavy, too lonely. There’s a lantern been hung out there to guide him back, and he’s itching to follow its green light.
Oliver, Death says, and this time he looks at her. They’re all tied to this now. Mia and Connor were there when Stanley got his comeuppance, so you’re riding on their accrued goodwill with my brother. Hal spent a lot of spiritual currency bringing you out of the afterlife -- in two stages, no less. Next time you sign your soul away or get killed and brought back? You’re using up years from their lives. She sighs at the look on his face. The universe isn’t made of infinite energy, Ollie. Replenishing one life that’s used up its own allotment takes away from another, and after this, you’ll be using up theirs. The space inside you has to be filled with what you take from them.
I fucking hate space, Ollie says faintly. Death smiles.
Go back to him now, she tells him, voice gentle. But remember what I told you.
Cold was what he felt first, then a haze of pain grinding under it, screaming along like ice scraping along itself -- a glacier crawling with claws into an iceberg. Ollie could barely see for the swelling in his face, but even as he gasped raw and dry at the freezing cold, a warm brownness pushed softly in against him. Hal, Hal sounding haggard and determined at once, talking about Roy. As Ollie slowly began to become aware of the other parts of his body, a catalogue of agony, he got small places of comfort as well: Hal’s nose touching his cheek, the heat of his breath, the feel of his hand folded into Ollie’s.
Baby, he wanted to say, but he couldn’t make any sound other than a wretched, thin whine, hollow as an old hose.
The sound caught Hal’s attention, and his head came up quickly. He saw a flicker of movement from his swollen eyes...and smiled. He squeezed Ollie’s hand and rubbed his thumb across his fingers.
“Hey handsome,” he said softly, nuzzling into his cheek again. He closed his eyes, warm tears slowly falling over his cheeks. Tears of joy and relief. “I knew you’d be alright.” He pressed the very softest of kisses to the corner of Ollie’s mouth, standing slowly to lean over him. “You look like you had a rough night.”
Even as he stood, he kept his hold on his hand. This was good..this was what he’d needed to see. Now...well, now he knew what he had to do.
“I’ve gotta go, babe,” he said, voice soft as he leaned down to brush another kiss over his lips. “Keep the bed warm...I’ll be home soon.” Gazing down at him, he squeezed his hand one last time. “I love you.”
Reluctantly, he let go and stood, backing away from the other’s bed. He turned sharply on his heel, heading for the airlock. His uniform spread out from an emblazoned lantern symbol on his chest, stretching out in green to black to white over his body. With a flash like fire across his eyes, his mask settled into place, his eyes burning bright emerald green.
“This is Lantern Jordan to Rayner and Gardner,” he said, transmitting a message to the other two as he stepped out into space. “We’ve got work to do.”
--- --- ---
Kate had been allowed up, after the first twelve hours. That is, after the medics had her burns washed out and covered, then were convinced that she wasn’t going to collapse from the concussion being worse than anticipated. She was utterly exhausted, only having had a short nap once she was cleared.
Hal had spoken to her briefly, before he’d left, and now…well. Ollie had woken up for a moment or two at least, and that… Well, for some reason that eased things, a little, the pain and the fury that left her this close to rocking and keening and tearing her hair out with frustration—were it not for the fact that she needed to keep it together for Mia and for the sake of not scaring the medical team.
After sending a message via the medics to Mia that she was going to go see Ollie, Kate washed up, then went into the other room, quietly. It wasn’t as if Oliver Queen could ever look small, against the bed, but…unwell, that was certain. Face drawn, bruised all to hell, paler than his usual guero self.
Kate sank into the chair by the bed, biting her lip, and rested her forehead against the mattress, next to his arm. She wasn’t going to cry. Really, she wasn’t. It was just because she was tired.
Ollie’d drifted off again after waking up to Hal kissing him oh-so-gently and then bravely heading out to the wars, dear fellow, the relief washing from him in waves as he murmured fond words and reluctantly left Ollie’s bedside. He was still half-dazed, coming up in and out of exhausted sleeps wondering if his encounter with Death had been literal, metaphorical, or both.
He swam up to consciousness this time because he felt warmth next to him, smelled something scorched but familiar and comforting amidst all the sterility and antiseptic. And there was Kate, head down, her dark hair getting that overly-sleek bristly look it did when she’d been up too long or unwell, and Ollie weakly moved his hand to catch a lock of it between his finger-joints.
“Katie,” he croaked. “He didn’t get you, wasn’t sure if Death knew what she was talking ‘bout. Honey.”
The trying not to cry thing had sapped a good chunk of Kate’s small remaining energy reserve, and as such she had fallen into a light sleep. The touch and the sound brought her out of it, though, and she shifted a little to look up at Ollie from where she was lying, realizing it was him talking to her that had woken her up.
She bit her lip, felt herself well up—madre di dios, like in a bad movie or a telenovela or something, get a grip, Spencer, her brain said—but she no longer could bring herself to care. It felt like those cliched statements and images implied, actually, like her eyes were filling up, puddles and rainstorms and…
(A part of Kate wondered, vaguely, detached, if she was going to have permanent brain damage from this that made her mind ramble from pillar to post, or if it was still lingering effects from the concussion and exhaustion. Hopefully the latter.)
“Ollie,” she said quietly, biting hard into her lower lip. It hurt to smile, shifted the bandage on her face against the burn, but she found she couldn’t not do it, even though she was nearly crying. “Nah, he didn’t get me. Besides, I’m too big a pain in the culo, Death wouldn’t want me around…”
She didn’t need to say that it had been close for him, though, and that thought was what made the tears actually start. Quiet, not pretty—not like the shitty movies or telenovelas, there.
“Sweetheart,” Ollie mumbled, watching helplessly as Kate started to weep. Ollie’d been near enough himself with Hal’s soft, saltwater words of reassurance, and now Kate with tears rimming her brown eyes and streaming down her poor burned face — he felt a prickling high up in his broken nose, blinking once before he was crying too. As if he fucking cared at this point. She could’ve been killed, and she was hurt, and between the relief and sadness of both Hal’s and now Kate’s reactions, Ollie was starting to really understand how close it’d been for him.
Oh god, Roy, he thought in shock of pain and sorrow, but right now … right now he didn’t have the energy to think of Roy and what it all meant. Right now he was just really goddamn happy to be alive, even if he could feel ribs grinding against each other when he breathed and his left arm (his fucking bow arm, and it damn well better be set right) aching and immobilized.
Ollie tried to wipe some of the wetness from Kate’s pretty, pointy chin, but his fingers were clumsy at best and he ended up just kind of knocking her ineffectually with his knuckles. “Hey, watch it,” he said, his own wrecked voice low and unsteady with the tears that were still slipping unheeded from the corners of his eyes. “Gonna soak off your bandages there.”
Kate had been furious—still was, a current of anger streaming below the surface that wouldn’t end until this reached resolution. It was the kind of feeling she knew too well, had transmuted too often—
and especially since she stole the suit, since she killed Copperhead
—into righteous wrath, because anything else would be unacceptable. And between dear old dad and what had just happened to her and Ollie, she’d seen what the alternative was. Looking into the abyss, or something poetic and stereotypical to that effect.
But right now she just felt tired, and so glad that he could talk to her, that he was in one piece. And, to be fair, he was right, her bandages were getting wet, and the medics were going to kill her when she got back to her own room. She could feel the salt and the damp irritating the burn already.
Ollie was crying too, and that eased her into stopping, mostly, as she moved up to kiss his fingers when he tried to wipe her face. “Hey yourself,” she said, voice a little raw. “It’s okay. We’re both here, we’re both going to be fine. Might take a while, but we’ll get there, cielo.”
And si, the anger, just there, because they shouldn’t HAVE to get better, they had just spent time getting better. She bit it back—the last thing Ollie needed to hear right now was how she was going to tear his son a new one.
“I missed you so much,” she said, quietly, because it wasn’t for anyone else to hear.
“I’m gathering you might have missed me a whole lot more, if things had gone sideways,” Ollie said, letting his fingers trail from Kate’s lips to her chin, his hand still feeling too heavy for fine motor skills. She was visibly pulling herself together — no doubt because he was totally losing it — which was *so much* his Katie that Ollie nearly laughed. Nearly, because that was what he wanted to do but all that happened was a wheezing sob and more tears, which was very fucking uncomfortable given the tubes up his nose and abrasions and cuts on his face, and oh man, such ridiculousness.
That *did* make him laugh, although not much. Everything felt broken up in his chest and the last thing he wanted was a coughing fit to tire him out now that he’d regained consciousness. Especially since now he had Kate mercifully with him, showing no signs of leaving anytime soon. Ollie didn’t know what he would’ve done if he’d come to and Hal hadn’t been there, if Kate wasn’t here now. He felt like he couldn’t bear to be alone, ever again.
“Love you,” he said, to be able to say it. He wanted to tell her more, big things about how grateful he was that she’d thrown herself into the line of fire to keep him from being killed, little things like how astonishingly beautiful her wet eyelashes and tear-shining brown eyes looked, but that would have to do, for the moment.
“Yeah, no mierda, Queen,” Kate retorted gently, then bit her lip hard (not drawing blood hard, but hard enough so she didn’t break again). Ollie’s hand was clumsy, but endearingly so, and she leaned gently into the touch, desperate for it in ways she hadn’t known she could be, now that she wasn’t resigned to pure grief.
Besides, Ollie was looking like he was going to turn into a complete mess, End Of Old Yeller type—the medics were going to kill her dead, she could see one of them looking over at them now with a disapproving expression. Ms. Spencer, he nearly aspirated because of you, can you please…
Damn it, why wasn’t her brain working right? The mental image was almost funny to her. Though now Ollie was laughing at something else, insomuch as he could laugh at the moment, which did make her laugh, and oh damn, they were going to get their asses metaphorically kicked for acting like this. Maybe she could talk them out of it by saying it was a post-traumatic reflex. (Maybe it actually was.)
“I love you too,” she said finally, and the laugh turned to a half-choked sob. “Mind if I stay for a while?” Even if she knew the answer, just being able to hear it helped.
“Stay forever,” Ollie said, instantly, meaning it with all his heart. He was feeling calmer now, after getting out the initial burst of uncontrolled emotion, and probably Kate was too. Well, they were completely entitled to some wild weeping and laughing fits, as far as he was concerned.
“I almost feel like I should apologize for not giving you a full and detailed waiver to sign when you hitched your star to this gong show of a family, sweetheart,” Ollie said, resigning himself to just holding Kate’s hand instead of anything fancier. “Hasn’t been a quiet moment since you became part of us, seems like. And I betcha thought that the Batfam was where all the action was at, heh!”
He coughed a few times, tasting blood, feeling his heart speed up and head swim. Goddammit. Roy had been thorough, all right, and as if his own mangled body wasn’t evidence enough, there was the glassy haze of pain in Kate’s eyes no matter how much she downplayed it.
Kate blushed, a little, and found that the rush of blood actually made her face hurt a little more. Not that she could stop herself from doing it, around Ollie, to be fair. It was harder to ignore or brush aside the burn on her cheek than it was the rest—every time she talked, moved much, smiled. She was fine. She’d be fine. He needed to get better, not worry about her.
“Already sort of planned on it,” she said quietly, leaning in to brush a kiss against his forehead because there weren’t tubes and wires there, at least, and limited injury. “Told you I play for keeps.”
She was trying not to think about how terrible Ollie looked after he coughed. Fortunately she found a couple of good ways to do it, namely that it was easy to pick out oddities of speech and simply bizarre references. “I didn’t come for the action, I came for the party—though oh my god, gong show? I can’t believe you used that as a term, cielo, it’s not the 70s.”
“Hey, if you’re gonna be in the party house, you gotta expect some decade-of-groovy references. Because I already lived through 90s party culture, and lemme tell you, I am *not* going back to calling things ‘sick’ or ‘wicked’ or whatever ‘to the max’. That would mark me as a massive poser, dude.” Ollie took a few deep breaths after he wound down on talking, hoping it wasn’t obvious. His chest hurt in sharp stabs. His lungs felt like lead.
But fuck all that. He was gonna be limping and weak and aching enough for all the recovery time; if there was one thing he’d hang onto doing, it was at least TALKING to the people he loved. If he couldn’t talk he might as well just be in a damn coma.
Still, though. If his words would be curtailed by the frailty of the flesh, he might as well make them count instead of the usual blather. So, “You saved my life,” Ollie said, bluntly. “I would be dead right now if you weren’t there. If you didn’t slow him down. Kiss me again, please.”
“I am gonna assume you’re intending ‘party house’ ironically, these days,” Kate replied with a snort. She could see the pain in Ollie’s own face now, the way his breath caught, ragged and tearing more than a little each time, and she didn’t want him to overdo it. The nurses were starting to look over at them, check monitors that said things she didn’t want to even now about.
So she was startled when he was…considerably more blunt than usual, but it was entirely appreciated, made her heart pound a little, made her blush even more.
“Well, I wouldn’t have done it if you weren’t fuckin’ dope, Ollie Queen,” she murmured, bending down and kissing him slowly. “Since you said please,” she added softly, easing back after a second, just only so she could talk before kissing him even harder, almost desperately.
And man, fuck the medics glaring at them, seriously.