Chapter 16

                                    

                                          
Christmas was nice. I talked to Oliver and spent a bit of my break with him. I found out that Barry had been struck by lightning when the particle accelerator went off. After a while he was moved to STAR labs. Oliver decided that he needed to move out of the mansion that he and his family owned and into an apartment. It was closer to school, my gyms, Oliver's work and the club than the house. 
                          
"Peyton, school." Oliver yells up the stairs at me. I grab my backpack and run down the stairs I only had a few days left of school. I grabbed a pop tart for breakfast and my shoes before running out the door. I hurried  off to school. Moira had started to campaign for mayor. Thea found out her father was Malcolm Merlyn. She is just pissed at everyone. Oliver lost the company due to Isabel working for Slade Wilson who was on the island. Oliver trained Roy who was injected with the mirikuru. He ran after Oliver basically pushed him away. 
                          
"Thea Merlyn has a nice ring to it don't you think?" Thea said coming down the stairs of the club. Oliver was trying to get her to sign the papers. 
                          
"Merlyn was your biological father, but Dad raised you." Oliver said following after her.
                          
"Only because he didn't know I wasn't his."
                          
"Hey, hey." Oliver grabbed his sisters wrist and pulled her to look at him. "He loved you. So do I, and I am still your brother."
                          
"No, you're not you're my half brother. And you know who else was my half brother? Tommy. Tommy, who I tried to kiss. I tried to kiss my half brother before my real father killed him! That's how screwed up I am! And you know the sad part when I was actually starting to be in a good place. I had the club, I had Roy, I had a brother who wasn't lying to me. And for the first time in my crazy life everything didn't seem so completely and totally messed up. I though I was going to be okay. I'm so stupid. "
                          
"You're not stupid." 
                          
"No, what I am is the daughter of two murders, Not one but two. So, let's face it, Ollie. I was never going to be okay. It's not in my genes." Thea turns to walk out and Oliver tries to call after her. I silently follow her out. 
                          
"Thea?" I call out. 
                          
"Peyton." Thea turns around. "I don't want to talk right now." 
                          
"Then don't just listen." I tell her. "You think you're messed up. What about me?"
                          
"You know who your father is your brother isn't dead." 
                          
"I didn't know who he was until a year ago. You got to have a father figure in your life while I didn't get that. My father figure was always there, Oliver knows, Tommy, and Diggle know. You don't know what he did. I had a broken arm and 40 some stitches when we met. What you didn't know was that I had already open wounds from beer bottles and the knives that he would use to cut my skin open. Some wouldn't scar but not all the time. There are scars that I have that will never heal. You didn't have to deal with that. Now for once I have a family that cares about me." I look up at Thea's face which is full of sadness. "Your mom did what she thought was best, I wish I had that but I didn't. I got a mom who kept me from my biological father and let the man she married hurt me. She knew what he would do to me and just let it happen. Let Moira try to fix this. You have a second chance that my mom next gave me or will ever get again." I say almost in tears looking at her. She nods and I let her go. 
                          
The next few days we get ready for the Rally. Roy shows up and is then drugged in the basement. We all go home after the police release us. Oliver's knee in pain. It's the four of us. I sit next to Thea and across from Oliver. Thea talked with Oliver about Roy. 
                          
"We need to turn a new page."
                          
"It's not going to be that simple...or easy."
                          
"I know, if the truth were easy for me we wouldn't be in this situation. But to start, there is something about Malcolm that both you and Oliver need to know." She looks at both of her children before continuing. "Malcolm..." A car crashed into  my side of the car. We were all knocked out. 
                          
I awoke with my hands and feet bound and we were all together. I was scared. I hadn't felt like this since he almost died a few months ago. 
                          
"Oliver!" I cried out seeing his body on the ground. Moira was next to me and Thea. Thea was sobbing. I was too. "Ollie, wake up." I say his eyes opened. Moira was calling his name
                          
"I was dead the last time you were offered this choice."
                          
"Slade." Oliver grunted trying to see if he could get his hands out to help us. 
                          
"What's happening?" Thea asked. 
                          
"Ollie!" I cried out to my father. He sat up still bound. The ties around my wrist were too tight for me to get out of. 
                          
"I often wonder how you looked...when he pointed the gun at Shado... and took her from me." 
                          
"You psychopath. Shado, Shado wasn't yours!" 
                          
"No, she was yours. Until you chose another woman over her." 
                          
"That's not what happened!" Oliver screamed out at him. 
                          
"It is what happened. It is! She told me!" Slade pointed to thin air. 
                          
"There's nobody there!" Oliver yelled back.
                          
"Slade... you were on the island with Oliver?" 
                          
"I thought I had known true despair... until I met your son." Thea sobbed. "I trusted him... to make the right choice."
                          
"Let me make the right choice now. Kill me." 
                          
"No!" All of us scream out. 
                          
"Choose me, please!" 
                          
"I am killing you, Oliver. Only more slowly than you would like." He pulls a gun out of his jacket. 
                          
"Don't." 
                          
"Choose." Slade started to swing the gun from Moira to Thea's to my head. He rested the gun on my head. I cried out.
                          
"I swear to God, I am going to kill you."
                          
"Dad." I cried out the first time I had called him that. The name both familiar and unfamiliar on my tongue. 
                          
"CHOOSE." Slade screams pressing it farther into my scalp. Moira stood up. 
                          
"Mom. Mom, what are you doing? There's only one way this... night can end. And we both no that. Don't we know that Mr. Wilson. Both my children will live and my only grandchild too." Thea, Oliver and I were crying out to her but reaching deaf ears. "Thea, Oliver, Peyton, I love all of you. Girls close your eyes." Oliver screamed out. Thea sobbed even harder. 
                          
Slade was saying something  then turned to walk away before he turned back around, sword in hand and stabbed Moira in the chest. Oliver fell to the ground before Moira's body fell. 
                          
"There is still one person that has to die..." Slade came over and pressed the bloody blade to my neck. mine and Oliver's feet were the only ones that were tied so I couldn't run or fight. "...before this can end." He steps away and cuts my bindings and cuts Thea's before he walks away. Thea rushes over to Moira while I go to Oliver. 
                          
"Dad."  I hug him after untying his hands and arms. We move to look at Moira. A few days later we are at the funeral, Oliver not there. Whenever he doesn't want to deal with something he runs. This time he stays away for several days. 
                          
Masked men start terrorizing the city. Oliver was having me stay at the apartment where I would be safe. I snuck out and shot my arrows giving them all head shots to stop them from hurting people. I started to get the kids that I knew out and up into the roofs and out of the way. I helped and stayed out of Oliver and the gangs way.