#CHARACTERS WITH INCREDIBLE BACKSTORIES. CHARACTERS WHO UNDER THE SAME SITUATION CHANGED IRREVOCABLY IN SUCH DIFFERENT WAYD

[starry-toya]

every day i mourn what mha could have been

[smkkbert]

Olicity Fanfic Recommendation

Hey, guys! With all the stress going on, I didn’t have that much time to read lately. I have finally managed to finish reading another fic, though, and figured given the long weeks without Arrow that are waiting for us, I should sit down and rec the story. That is why this is the recommendation/review/meta on The reluctant Queen by @anextraordinarymuse.

To check out all my Olicity Fanfic Recommendations, click here.

OVERALL PLOT

The synopsis of the fic offers the following information:

Oliver Queen's life is irrevocably changed the day Felicity Smoak sets foot in his office.

And it has surprisingly little to do with the fact that the first time they meet, she's blackmailing him into a marriage.

When reading this, I really didn’t know what to expect. My first thought kind of went in this direction.

But the last sentence of the synopsis made it seem unlikely. 

The Bratva didn't prepare him for this (and Digg is never going to let him forget it). I figured I had to read the story to find out what would make our beloved – as in super-badass-but-also-incredibly-sweet - Felicity blackmail Oliver into a marriage and how that could be the start of our OTP getting together. The answers are mirrored in the following themes that carry the story:

- Family -

Family is always one of my favorite themes when it comes to Arrow. I love the theme on the show, the families made of blood and the families made of love, and I love reading different scenarios and different takes on stories about it in fanfiction.

The story actually begins with a heartbreaking goodbye-scene between Felicity and her mother. Felicity doesn’t want to go, but she has to. Donna encourages her to even so. This first scene is basically the starting point for Felicity into a new life. Forced to leave her mother behind with her mafia-father, Felicity travels to Starling City to get married to someone who is supposed to give her and her mother protection. Felicity wants to save her mother from her father by finding a husband able to protect her.

Then there’s Oliver. Thea is his whole family, a family he might know he neglects more often than he should. Their relationship is complicated to say the least and one of the reasons for that is there have been too many secrets being kept.

Just like for Felicity, his mother has an important part in his life. Even though she is dead, she is still there in a lot of ways. And of course his mother’s death makes him understand Felicity’s need to protect hers. 

Anyway, Moira Queen isn’t only a subject for Oliver. Thea, even though she is mad at her mother for a lot of reasons, feeling her being replaced by another Queen-woman is a sore spot for her. It causes a lot of problems for everyone involved. 

Like I said before, the family-theme is going all through the story.

- Trust -

Trust is a sore issue for both, Oliver and Felicity. Felicity has been through hell.

Growing up with a mafia father is not something that will give you an easy childhood, especially when you start turning against the whole organization. Between fearing for her life and worrying about her mother’s there is not much room for Felicity to have trust in people. Yet she has to trust Oliver to protect her and her mother instead of killing her the moment she sets a foot into his office.

Oliver had had his own fair share of misery, too. Being part of the Bratva made him trust only a handful of people. Then there’s a weird blonde coming into his office and half-blackmailing, half emotionally manipulating him into marriage, though. It takes time, but eventually Oliver does know that he can trust Felicity and he learns that he needs to to avenge his mother’s death.

It doesn’t mean that these two doesn’t get to feel the pain of betrayal a couple of more times in the meantime…

TONE OR RATHER TONES OF THE STORY 

��If I had to describe the tone of the story in one word, I’d go with thrilling.

There is a lot going on in the story. Oliver and Felicity both have their own kind of agendas which I love a lot. At the same time their stories are linked through the marriage Felicity blackmails into. The story unfolds piece by piece, bringing new turns with almost every chapter.

Thrilling is especially what happens towards the end of the story when all the threads run together and the connections between all the sub-plots form a bigger picture. I loved those turns. It was why I the last part of the story, the last few chapters, were my absolute favorites. I loved all of it!

That being said, of course the story also offers some fun or some quiet moments that focus on the emotional sides. I never thought that Felicity alone in the shower with a spider could make a great scene, but with Jessica’s great way of words, there was an emotional depth to this that was really surprising to me.

OLIVER

Oliver starts out almost unreadable. I was left with a thousand questions after his first introduction in the prologue. As the story continues, we get to know more and more facets of him.

My favorite side of him is probably how protective he is of the people he cares about. His and Felicity’s marriage might not be real, but he does care about her and he does stick to his promises. He promised to protect her, so that is what he does. He does that as long as he can.

What else do we learn? Well, Oliver certainly is a guy with a past, a complicated past even more so. Of course, like in every good story, that past eventually comes back to haunt him and it does so in a surprising and thrilling way. Oliver’s reaction shows him in one of the rawest moments of the story and it’s a great turn to the much quieter Oliver we see in many chapters before.

Summed up, there is a lot to Oliver’s story – family, Bratva, his mother’s murder - and his character – the need to protect his family, the brutal way he able to act out when people he loves are being threatened, the undying endeavor to make things tight - that makes a character we love.

FELICITY

The first we learn about Felicity is her backstory. Just like in the show, our favorite girl hasn’t been met with much kindness where she has grown up. Saying that life has been tough to her would be a huge understatement.

Yet it didn’t keep Felicity from growing the strong, badass woman we know and love. I guess a lot of people would give up after being put through what she has been put through and nobody could blame them. Felicity didn’t let that put her down, though. Instead she comes out stronger, willing to do whatever she feels is necessary to protect herself and the people that she loves.

The fact that Felicity is badass and would do anything to protect herself and her mother, doesn’t mean that she is blind to what she blackmails Oliver into. She does have worries about the way she barges into his life and demands things to from her that have a huge effect on his life. She knows that he might have someone in his life. She knows that she a thorn in Thea’s side. She knows all that and isn’t happy about it. Though she knows that there is no other way for her to protect herself and her mother, knowing that she worries about the effect her actions have on others is still a great part to see. It adds to her humanity and the depth of her character.

THEA

This version of Thea reminded me a lot of on the Thea Queen we met in Arrow’s first season. She is a young girl who has experienced way too much pain in her young life and who never got a chance to really process it all. She is hurt and feels alone. She is highly misunderstood.

Once you know that, you love her so much.

ANATOLY

I suggest you see yourself… 

OLICITY

Obviously, Oliver and Felicity don’t meet under the best circumstances. Actually, blackmailing someone into a marriage is probably the furthest from good circumstances to meet the love of your life.

It’s thanks to the similarities between Oliver and Felicity that these circumstances don’t turn into a disqualifier for more between them to develop. It starts out very slowly as both of them need to get used to the situation and comfortable around each other, but eventually it all becomes so clear.

This story really owns up to the word “slow-burn” because that is what it is. It starts out slowly, just a spark in the dark that grows and grows until it’s a mass of fire and I love it!

I should warn that who expects a lot of smoothing and a happy ending for the couple halfway through the story will be disappointed. Who is in for subtle and not-so-subtle signs of feelings developing between these two, will be very happy with the story, though. I, for one, loved it a lot!

EXTRACT

Like always, a little extract to let you know what you are getting yourself into. 😉

"We have a lot to talk about," he stated. "But that can wait until tomorrow. I'll show you to your room."

Oliver headed for the stairs and then stopped when another thought occurred to him.

He turned to Digg. "Raisa has a plate for you in the kitchen."

Diggle knew him well enough to pick up on the smile that wasn't quite there. The other man pursed his lips in his own version of a not-smile and nodded once before leaving.

Oliver had already turned and resumed his trek to the stairs, so he missed the way Felicity's brow furrowed at the exchange.

He didn't speak as he led Felicity down the mansion's wide halls. Her footsteps dragged across the carpet, an audible reminder of the exhaustion that must be eating away at her. Oliver slowed his pace. Thea was always getting on him about how fast he walked and how impossible it was for anyone who wasn't six feet tall to keep up with him.

Oliver had used the drive home to contemplate some of the more easily solved predicaments of this situation. The sleeping arrangements had been one of the first issues he'd resolved.

He stepped into the empty bedroom next to his. Felicity trudged in behind him.

"This will be your room," he informed her. "The en-suite bathroom is over there. It should be stocked with fresh towels."

Felicity nodded. She scanned the room and briefly entertained the idea of telling him how beautiful it was, but Felicity wasn't certain that she had the energy to carry on a conversation. She was well and truly drained.

Then she caught sight of another door, set into the wall opposite the bed. It was standing open.

"Where does that go?"

"My room."

He'd said the words casually, but he watched her closely for a reaction. The only one she gave was the brush of her shoes over the carpet as she moved around him and closed the door.

Oliver actually smirked when he heard the deadbolt click into place.

"Is that really necessary?" He couldn't resist.

The gravity behind her answer took all the humor out of him. "Better safe than sorry."

An irrational anger seized him. Oliver did not fool himself into thinking that he was someone else: he was a hard man, and he'd done things over the years that still kept him awake at night; his hands were not clean. Despite those things, he was not cruel, and he did not tolerate the cruelty of others.

He was, at heart, a protector - a guardian.

Something, he was being given to understand, that Felicity Smoak had not had the benefit of.

"That door only locks from this side," Oliver informed her. "The same goes for your bedroom door. Raisa has a set of keys if you lock yourself out."

"Okay." Felicity nodded.

Oliver was halfway out of her room when he turned back to address her. "Felicity?"

"Hmm?"

She looked at him from behind glasses that had started to slip down her nose; her hair was pulled back into a neat ponytail, but the ends were curled and rested on one shoulder; her lips, painted magenta, offset the pale cream of her blouse. Panda bears smiled at him from the tops of her shoes.

Everything about Felicity was innocuous – pleasant, even. This was clearly not the life and situation that she had been born into or brought up in, so why was she in it now? And why, for the love of all things sane, had Oliver ever let her blackmail him into this scheme?

"We made a deal: your technical skills, for my protection."

"I know. So?" Felicity replied.

"So, I never said I'd only protect you from your father."

That was not what she'd been expecting to hear. "Oh."

Oliver was not a man of many words, but he found himself speaking again anyway. "I don't know where you've been, Felicity, but you're here now. And here is safe."

Tears sprang to her eyes. She had no idea who this man was, not really, and that hadn't stopped her from barging into his office and attempting to blackmail him into pretending to be her husband. She had cajoled him, begged him, and threatened him (albeit in a rather roundabout way); yet, for whatever reason, Oliver Queen had agreed to help her – a woman he didn't know, and had every reason to mistrust. They had made a deal. A business transaction had taken place only hours ago, and the only questions that Oliver had asked pertained directly to what they were attempting to pull off.

Now, sequestered in the bedroom next to his in his family's mansion, he was offering her something that she'd never expected: kindness.

A tear slipped down her cheek. "I … uh …"

Oliver grabbed her doorknob. "Don't forget to lock it."

Then he pulled the door closed and disappeared down the hall.

CONCLUSION

I looooooved the fic! I really can’t put it into many words, but I really, really loved the fanfic. The starting point offers a story that I have never read before and it was so well executed that I really can just recommend everyone who loves slow-burns and is into some thrilling Bratva vs. mafia action to read this. You won’t be disappointed! So if you asked me if you should read this story, this would be my answer: