Board Thread:Fun and Games/@comment-32805729-20191205175234/@comment-43689675-20200103030712

I have a sort of story here; i wrote it for a Roleplay on another site. For my OC’s story and info see here[]

Here’s the story post :)

Swift gasped as she opened her eyes and looked around at her surroundings. ‘’Where‘s Mark’’ was the first question that came to her mind, followed quickly by Where am I? What happened? And I wonder what I’m wearing, which was weird, considering she didn’t usually care so much about that, things were completely foreign here, and she should be figuring out how to get home. Glancing down to answer the third question, she saw that she was wearing her Arrow suit, purple leather scuffed and slightly faded in some areas. She reached into her pocket and drew out her mask, just like her sister, Thea’s, except purple. That was an apt way to describe most aspects of her; like Thea, but different in a small way. Swift pulled her thoughts away from Thea. Thinking of Thea leaving hurt too much — Thea leaving Star City, leaving Oliver, leaving this dangerous but fun-filled life as a vigilante.

Leaving her.

Swift and Thea had always been close when they were younger. Rich, daughters of billionaires, but still daredevils, Swift (and Mark) especially. Her daring — Oliver called it recklessness, others called it bravery — had gotten her scars, weeks in bed, and trips to Starling City General. She didn’t much like the hospital, but when you were a seemingly faceless archer, sometimes you got hurt fighting and needed help from someone who had actually learned to set bones and bandage wounds properly. She touched each of the scars in turn, looking back to the memories that came with them. A short, thick line of white on her shoulder showed where she had taken an arrow to the shoulder when their friend Roy had been driven slightly crazy by a drug called Mirakuru. A long streak across her waist obtained when her former Leaguemate Nyssa hadn’t trusted her and slashed out with her sword. Scarring on her arm where a piece of shrapnel had gone straight through it from the explosion on Lian Yu, the one that had killed Samantha Clayton and left William motherless. And then she reached up to her ear, then down to a small scar on her jawline, one from an injury that hadn’t been sustained while crime-fighting, one that had a good memory behind it. She smiled. She’d got this one on a dare from when she and Mark were twelve. They’d been playing on the roof of the Queen mansion with some of their siblings and friends, like Oliver, Thea, Laurel Lance and Tommy Merlyn. They weren’t supposed to be up there, of course. The few times adults had caught them hadn’t nearly been enough to get them grounded; just a lecture or two about safety and not following their peers into senseless danger, which she hadn’t thought was fair; being up on the roof wasn’t senseless. When they were perched on the highest point, she and Mark felt like they could rule the world. The others knew it, too, and they’d all climb up together and look almost haughtily down at their homes, feeling big compared to the small-looking houses and buildings. At times the twins had even jumped off the balconies onto a thick, soft patch of grass, branches and leaves that had piled up, discards from trees and fields. Always they had avoided getting hurt, landing on the same patch of safety over and over again.

And then came the dare.

Swift remembered it had been a glorious late spring or early summer day, the days getting longer and warmer, but not yet hot. The trees had been still beautifully green, leaves of emerald with some the exact shade of the hooded suit Oliver would wear later in life, after the death of their -- no, his father Robert Queen and being stranded on an island in the South China Sea, Lian Yu. The twins had been playing knights and dragons on the roof with the others sitting nearby talking about their own stuff. Swift and Mark hadn’t cared a bit that they weren’t in the conversation; they’d known that they could get Thea to tell them with just the right amount of rounded green eyes and sad little-kid looks. But right then they were bored, so they’d gone up to them and asked, and got the dare as a reply. Agreeing readily — it couldn’t be much more dangerous than the balcony-jumping — they’d walked up to the edge and made sure no adults were around. Then Mark had went down, rearranged the scattered, leafy cushion and returned to prepare for the jump. They reversed well back for a run-up, then gone for it. Swift had done it like always, a clean leap off the roof, but Mark’s foot had caught on the very edge and he’d veered sharply off course, plowing right into her. Swift could remember Laurel’s gasp as they plummeted away from the leaves onto uneven ground. She’d landed on her side, fracturing her arm, then a leg when Mark landed on it, and slamming her face into something hard on the ground, leaving a gash on her chin. Then her brother came down, breaking a few ribs and spraining his ankle. Their mother, Moira Queen, had come out to investigate the loud thump and screamed at the blood across Swift’s face and the grass, instantly calling the doctor. With a fair amount of groaning, the twins were carried into the house. Their older siblings and friends came down from the roof; Moira hardly noticed, frantic over the injuries. Later, after the twins had been bandaged and carried to their room, the others had come up. They had commended them for their bravery and all agreed that the stunt had been absolutely wicked. They’d healed quick and they now remembered and referred to it as “the time Thea and Oliver were so sick of us that they got us to jump off the roof”. Us. It had always been ‘we’ or ‘us’, never ‘him’ or ‘her’. Always together, always happy. Even through the day they got onto the Queen’s Gambit and it went down, the thread of their lives tangling crazily into a matted mess. And when friends died they’d stuck together, always a pair no matter what. Not Cayden James, not Adrian Chase, not even Ricardo Diaz could separate them. And then she remembered.

’’Mark, turning away to say something to Oliver. Diaz, pulling out a gun. Laurel — the Laurel from Earth-2 — letting out a Siren cry at the criminal but it was too late. She didn’t even think about it; instinct and loyalty launched her forward, knocking her brother out of harm’s way. They tumbled to the ground. Mark was up first, pulling her into his arms and staring in horror as red spread across the purple leather. “You idiot,” he whispered, trying desperately to stop it. She smiled weakly. “No more than you,” she murmured back, “standing directly in the path of a gun.” “C’mon. We’re getting out of here.” He tried to help her up, but tears blurred his vision and she was too weak to stand. She glimpsed Oliver in the background with an arrow nocked, already bent on revenge. She grimaced as he lowered her back down. “I can’t. You guys have to go. Run. Don’t let Diaz get anyone else.” Of course, he protested. “No! I won’t leave you here.” He sobbed. “You said we’d always be together. That you’d never leave me behind.” And it hurt, because she had said that, when it was unimaginable to shoot arrows or evade criminals. “I know.” And now she was starting to cry. “And I’m sorry,” she continued. “But now you have to leave. Tell Max—“ she gasped. “Tell Max I love him. And Thea. If you can find her.” It was getting harder to breathe; her words came in short gasps. He clung to her tightly, as if he could press life into her. “Tell them yourself. You’re—“ He obviously knew it would be a lie if he said ‘you’re going to be okay’ but he said it anyway. “No, I’m not, and you know it.” She shook her head and summoned her last burst of strength to say “Now go. Run, Marky. Run.” She lifted a hand and brushed a tear away from his face and let it fall as life left her and she went limp. “No,” he cried. “Swift!” As her vision darkened and sounds muffled, she thought of Laurel — her friend from Earth-1, not Black Siren from Earth-2 — and Tommy Merlyn, of her mother, Moira Queen, and her biological and adopted fathers, Malcom Merlin and Robert Queen. Of Samantha Clayton and Slade Wilson. Of Quentin Lance, killed just like this, by the same person. She missed them all. Maybe she would see them, wherever she went. And then, eventually, she would see Mark.’’

She gasped as the memory flashed in her mind. Mark. She’d promised not to leave him, and she had. She’d said they would always be together, and what were they now? One dead and one grieving. She wanted to get back to him, to them — the team, but how? They couldn’t use the Lazarus pits, Thea and Roy had destroyed them. And even if they hadn’t, would she even want to go back like that; bloodthirsty and half mad, soulless? Thea, Sara and Roy had all done it, and Swift had seen the consequences — terrible things had happened when they had come back from the dead. But even though she knew that, she wished she could go back, for so many reasons, the biggest one to see and be with Mark again. She missed him so much her heart hurt; they had never been separated like this before. She wasn’t sure whether it was possible, but as determination grew in her heart, she knew one thing. I have to get home.