Arrow The Cat and the Canary

Chapter Fourteen

An hour later, and several irritating tests carried out by an array of doctors and nurses, Laurel had finally been discharged from hospital. That hour had been spent thinking one lone thought: 'I killed Luke'. Oliver and her father tried to dissuade her, telling her that it wasn't her fault and there was nothing she could have done to change the outcome of that night but she knew that it was her fault that she was there and Luke wasn't. She told herself repeatedly that it should be him there instead of her. Walking along the white-wash corridor, she took it slowly, still not fully balanced on her own feet. She refused her from her father and Oliver no matter how much they insisted. She let them walk ahead, needing a minute to herself. She walked along slowly, stumbling forward as a strong shoulder collided with her. She caught herself before hitting the ground, standing up to see who it was that had hit her. She gasped in shock as Luke looked back at her, dressed in his Black Cat costume, only without the mask. He looked as handsome as ever, the fluorescent casting a bit of a shadow across his face. He looked her dead in the eye, a morbid scowl painted on his face.
"What's up, killer?" He asked her casually as though this were a normal conversation. Laurel couldn't make sense of the situation. She must have been dreaming, she thought to herself, trying to think of any other logical reason he could have been standing there in front of her.
"Am I still hallucinating?" She asked him in a worried whisper. She looked ahead to see Oliver and her father standing at the end of the corridor, looking directly at her. How are they not freaking out too? Can they not see him? She thought as she looked back at Luke, his arms crossed and expression intense.
"What are you doing here? How are you even here?" She asked, her brain working at a mile a minute to try and concoct some sort of explanation for it.
"I'm here because you want me to be here. Must be because you feel guilty about killing me."
"I didn't kill you! Darkh did!" She yelled at him.
"You may as well have stuck the knife in yourself!" He shot back at her spitefully. She began to tear up, feeling that on some level he was right.
She felt a hand on her shoulder, looking up into the eyes of the owner, seeing Oliver looking at her worried.
"Who are you talking to Laurel?"
"Oh... Ummm... No one." She stammered, looking around for Luke but not being able to find him.
"You okay?" She could tell that he knew something was up but she couldn't explain to him now what was going on. Theres no way he would understand. No way he could understand. She didn't even understand it. How could Luke be there talking to her as if everything was normal? As if at the moment he should have been six feet under the ground in a casket. Could he have been resurrected in the Lazarus Pit like Sara was? Could Sara have saved him by travelling back in time? She nodded silently in response, taking his outstretched hand and allowing him to lead her along the pale corridor. Arriving at the nurses desk to sign out, she heard the rhythmic chiming of Oliver's phone in his pocket. He took it out and slid the ringer across to answer.
"Hey Felicity." He said cheerily. She felt a small twinge if jealousy in her heart. The same twinge she felt every time she saw them together, so in love with each other. That had been her once. He used to smile like that at the sound of her voice. Oliver had long since moved on from her, but Laurel had never fully been able to move on from Oliver. She stood patiently, her hand still gently resting in his large calloused hand as he listened to Felicity's voice on the other end of the line.
"Yeah, I'm here with Laurel now, she's just about to get discharged." He looked over to her as he said this, giving her a quick smile. He listened intently to her as she spoke to him.
"Wait... What?" He said in a hushed yet intense tone, his expression changing drastically as he listened. Laurels heart began to beat quicker inside her chest, panic rising throughout her body. What was it that made his mood change so swiftly.
"Okay." She heard him say. "I'm on the way." He ended the call, stuffing his phone back into his pocket. Quentin walked over towards them, confused as to what was going on too.
"Ollie, what is it?" Laurel asked, grabbing him by the arm. He let out a sigh before looking down into her eyes.
"Felicity managed to access the toxicology reports from you and all of the other people that Darkh managed to drug in the courthouse. Apparently that was only a very diluted form of the hallucinogen. She also thinks she knows what he's going to do with it. There's a gala being held in the Star City Plaza tonight for the mayoral candidates and the constituents. She thinks he wants to use the fully concentrated form of it there to make sure that Ruvé Adams wins the race." Laurel gasped lightly, thinking back on how bad the effects had been on her, how real it had felt and how soul crushing it had been to experience it. What would it be like if that had been the fully concentrated form go the chemicals?
"Ollie, we cant let him use those chemicals on anyone else. It's unbearable. I won't let that happen to anyone else." She felt the adrenaline rush through her chest and her veins.
"Laurel, you cant go back out on the field. You're not ready yet. You haven't even been discharged yet, and it's too soon after Luke, you saw what happened in the park." His voice was stern and authoritative. She knew that he was more than likely right. Everything was still so fresh, she was nowhere near over what had happened to Luke, and it was going to take a while longer to recover from the incident in the courthouse, but there was no way she was going to sit aside and let Darkh do even worse to innocent people.
"Oliver, I'm not going to allow that son of a bitch get away with doing this to anyone else. Theres not a hope. You and I both know that theres nothing you can say to change my mind." She pulled her hand back to herself and looked him dead in the eye. Quentin looked from Oliver to his daughter, torn on whose side to take. After several seconds, he spoke up.
"Laurel, baby, maybe Oliver has a point. As much as I hate to admit it, he's right. You're not your usual self, and all of this stuff with this Luke guy; you're in no shape to be going out with the team." She was shocked. He was meant to have her back. She looked at the two of them, her jaw hanging in annoyance.
"Oddly enough." She said, her anger present in every syllable. "I'm a grown woman, and if it's my choice. I'm putting a stop to Darkh one way or another. Now, either you can have my back or you can not. Thats your choice, but Oliver, this is my choice. That asshole is going to pay. I swear it." She didn't wait for a response. She turned on the spot and strode towards the nurses desk ahead of her, signing the release form and walking out the hospital doors, into the dull evening. Oliver and her father looked at each other and sighed in unison before following suit.