The Rise of Athena (An Arrow: Season 1 Fanfiction)

Chapter 18: Training

Evelyn Queen's POV

The three of us: John, Oliver and I all sparred with knives in a small training room in our base of operations. Duck down, slice. Stand up, slice. Duck down, slice. Stand up, slice. Over and over, we kept going. Quicker and quicker John was getting, and Oliver and I would train together sometimes, the both of us honing our skills as the knives slid against each other and clicked constantly. For a few moments, I would forget that life was a pain in the ass, that I had to keep secrets, that I was suffering from PTSD. Training and my nightly shooting sprees as Athena helped keep my mind off of those things. 

'Nice!' Oliver commented to Diggle. 'You're picking up the pace.' 

'H-hey! What about me?!' I puffed out. 

'You were always good at this,' he pointed out. I pouted silently and kept going. 'But you're still pretty fast. You're getting as good as me.' 

'Well, gee, thanks.' We kept going through our routine. 

'I could say the same thing about you. You and Evelyn crossed three names off your father's list this week alone,' Diggle commented. 

'Yeah, well, some of these guys are just giving it up now. All I gotta do is pay 'em a visit.' 

'It seems the vigilantes' reputations are beginning to precede them,' Diggle fired back. Oliver ducked another cut and sliced into Diggle's arm. He grimaced and backed away from him. I laughed and backed away. Oliver tilted his head like a happy puppy, with a cheeky smile on his face. 

'Another round?' he asked. Diggle met his eyes. 

'No,' he said resolutely. Oliver smiled and ducked out of the makeshift training ring that we had. He flipped the knife around and came over to the desk where the computers were at, putting the knife down. I did the same with mine and took a small hand towel that I'd swiped from the house, wiping my neck, torso and shoulders down with it, as I had been wearing a workout tank top that defined all of my muscular features that I'd honed for five straight years of being in Russia, then on the island with Oliver. 'Gotta take my nephew over to the mall so he can let Santa know what he wants for Christmas.' Oliver sat at the desk. 

'Oh. Christmas. I didn't even realise,' Oliver and I said at the same time. We met each the other's eyes. 

'Great, we might as well be twins,' I said, placing the towel down and putting my hands on my hips, looking at the two men. 

'That was because you've been logging in so many Hood hours since that thing with Helena.' Oliver glared at him. 

'Here we go again,' I mumbled. I hated Helena Bertinelli. Literally, bitch +5000. The Huntress, as Helena was known, had started to plague Starling City for however long, and he'd bumped into Helena during a business deal with her father, Frank. The two fell in love, which was weird, and Oliver took it upon himself to make the bad girl a good girl. That - didn't work so well. I hated her, and when she met me, I swore I could see that she'd had a written vow behind her eyes to always hate me. Not that I was paranoid or anything. 

'I meant... There were no holidays on the island. Every day was... how do I stay alive? To do that, you had to forget things, like Christmas. My dad threw a party every year,' Oliver said, a nostalgic smile coming over his features, 'and he would put a Christmas tree in every room. The whole house smelled like - it smelled like Christmas.' Diggle looked at me, leaning against one of the workbenches, with my head down. Oliver turned and looked at me. 'What's wrong, Evelyn?' I looked up. 

'It's just... I had very painful memories of Christmas. When I was in Russia. When it rolled around, the mafia boss I was entangled with, he would ask me to give him a Christmas present. And every time I told him I didn't have anything, which I didn't, he would lock me in his room and fuck me like there was no tomorrow. The next day he would say that he'd had his Christmas present from me and that there was no need to worry. He called me pet and stroked my hair.' The room went strangely silent. 'Sorry about that.' I wiped a tear from my eye and Oliver walked over to give me a hug. I leaned into his embrace, silently crying. When I was done, I gave his upper arm a gentle squeeze. 'Thanks, Ollie.' 

'Anything for you, sis.' 

'Maybe you two can just give the list a rest and enjoy the holidays with your family,' Diggle chimed in. 'Besides, I hear Saint Nick has a list of his own. I wager you two are in the 'nice' column.' He clasped Oliver's shoulder and walked away. 'Go home, Oliver,' he called out. Oliver looked down at me. 

'You good?' he asked. 

'Yes. Let's go home, enjoy Christmas.' 

Sweet bit of X-Mas fluff from season 1, episode 9. I needed the light stuff before the whole 'Malcolm Merlyn evil' stuff pops up.