In Brightest Day, In Darkest Night

September 6th 2019

Ever since her dad had been taken into custody Delilah had been relatively alone in the house. Her sister would come over maybe once in a little while to check up on her, but other than that it was just Bear and Delilah in the big house. It also meant that it took Delilah a bit of time to go through all the things her dad had, luckily Monroe had helped her go through her dad's closet, and they even moved most of the stuff into storage. There wasn't any need for this stuff to be in the house if her father wasn't going to live in it. Part of Delilah was seriously considering renting the house, but there was just too much stuff to move out of the way for that.

So instead with the usage of the empty house Delilah just decided to have Oliver over. Today they were hanging out upstairs in the study. It was one area that her father had a lot of stuff in that she had managed to sort into various boxes at this point. The room was quite big, and wasn't quite like the other rooms upstairs. It still had some of the same light colours as the rest of the house, but the wood furniture was darker. Instead of a light oak they were a dark oak. One wall was covered in just bookshelves with various books on them. Some ranged from stuff about prosthetic, to memoirs or even to philosophical books. It would seem William Lockwood had a variety of things he was interested in. She could remember finding some of his old journals among all the books in the shelves and that's what she was reading.

The brunette was sitting cross legged on a chair sitting across from Oliver at the desk as he had papers and pencils all over. She heard him mention he wanted to work on some stuff, and that was why she suggested the study. Out of all the rooms practical to sit somewhere and do something it'd be the study as it had the most natural light. The only other place she could think of would have been the TV room, but there wasn't even a window in that room.

As she was flipping through the pages of her father's journal she spoke up, "So, what ideas do you have in the works right now?" She asked in reference to what he was working on. "Do I get to be a muse for something?" She asked jokingly as she looked up from the book to flash a smile at him.

Oliver had been at Delilah's everyday since Tuesday. It was a lot easier for them to spend time together now that they were both on the same page. Once Oliver had decided when he was going to ask Delilah to be is date, he hadn't given any thought to the time after, with the exception of final plans for his birthday, but even those were done without thinking too much. He had had no idea what his life was going to be like after Operation Ask Delilah. And, honestly, it was so much better than he would have expected. Delilah had had a confidence that he didn't about admitting feelings. Now they could sit here together and just feel calm. Or, calmer.

Oliver had all of his stuff spread out on dark wood desk in the Lockwood study. It felt very different to be here. This felt like the kind of place where kids didn't belong. Sure, he was turning 18 next week, but he still felt like he didn't belong in adult spaces. Maybe that was because where he grew up, there weren't adult spaces because it was so small. He had just seen strict dads on tv kicking their kids out of their offices or studies.

Oliver was working on a new proof for a new comic book idea. He'd done a lot of the outlining and writing, but he was starting to go in on the actual drawing. When Delilah asked if she could be a muse, he couldn't help but laugh because, in a way, she was. But so was Lachlan, and Skye, and their other friends. Seeing the Cul De Six interact, he got inspired for a new team-up book, his favorite kind. At this point, the characters were so different from his friends, but they were built around the bones of them.

"It's a new comic book idea. It's not developed enough to share yet." That was half-true. It probably needed a little bit more before he could share it, but mostly he just wasn't ready to share it yet. He looked up at Delilah.'

"Don't worry, though. I'll share it with you first when it's ready." He flashed a white smile before looking back down to his work.

It had been nice to spend time with Oliver. He was over a lot more often now, but they also could finally just breathe and be themselves again. Knowing that they both had feelings and they were similar ones just evened the playing field back up and honestly it was such a new feeling for the girl. Having all these feelings for someone and actually saying and doing something about it, it just gave her that slight feeling of control she always yearned for in her life. It was the same sense of control she could feel with her youtube channel or her instagram account. It was her gaining the control back on her own life, for once she was making the calls for herself and results were happening. Delilah liked that feeling and even though everything she went through was difficult, she felt like she needed to go through with it to get to this point.

Delilah was very happy to spend time with Oliver, she'd still get moments where her heart would beat faster or whenever she'd see him she couldn't help but smile, but they were good feelings and she wouldn't ever ask to not have them. He started to make the house feel less lonely and more lived in, because Oliver Garrett could breathe life into any room that he walked into.

"Well I look forward to hearing about it when it's ready." Delilah said with the same smile plastered on her face. She wasn't going to push on it, she knew what it was like to be in the works for something, it was the same way when her and Kara would sit down to work on animations and story lines to go along with the animations. Stuff like that took time so no doubt that Oliver's work would take longer than that.

Delilah looked back down to her father's journals, they weren't that interesting, most of them just talked about Sam Reid or her grandmother and aunt. She didn't even know her father documented this kind of stuff and it really made her wonder how far it goes. She was going to assume it went on fairly long, given the fact there were a few books. She closed the one she was on and decided to open a different one.

"Do you have a favourite series of comic books or a favourite superhero?" Delilah asked Oliver as she was just starting to go into her head a little bit, but she had genuine curiosity for the things that interested him and to get to know more about him in general.

Oliver nodded in response to Delilah being excited to hear about it. He was focusing on the outline sketch he was doing. He was hunched over the desk, his tongue subconsciously sticking out a little it as he focused on the pencil lines. Oliver knew that one day he was going to have to show Delilah. Usually he was super casual with showing his friends his work, but never wanting to show it to the world. This time he was okay with everyone in the world seeing it but his friends. Maybe that was because he knew how they would react to a certain plot point of the story, but he was confident in that decision and he was going to stick to it.

Right as Oliver finished part of one of his sketches, Delilah asked about his favorite comic series. He looked up at her, sitting up straight in the soft office chair. He started twisting his pencil between his fingers and said,

"You know you're opening a real can of worms here. It could take me hours to answer those questions." Oliver had been a real comics nerd his whole life. He remembered the first time he bought a comic book. His mom had let him pick out a comic from the quarter bin. Now, he knows that those are kind of just cast off stories and often drop you in the middle of a story. It was an X-Men comic focusing around Nightcrawler. To this day Nightcrawler was still his favorite member of the X-Men character, but he was much more of DC comics guy now. Sure, he loved the MCU movies, but in terms of the actual comics, Marvel couldn't touch DC.

"My favorite comic book series is the Geoff Johns run on Teen Titans which comes right after one of my favorite mini-series: Titans/ Young Justice: Graduation Day. Donna Troy has an amazing line in there where she says, ' I have no idea where I'm going to be tomorrow. But I accept the fact that tomorrow will come. And I'm going to rise to meet it.' which is still one of my favorite quotes of all time. I love team books a lot." Oliver could go on for hours about why that comic meant so much to him and how it totally changed Teen Titans forever, but he knew that wasn't what Delilah was asking for.

"My favorite superhero is Dick Grayson. I like him as Robin, but I absolutely love him as Nightwing." Oliver said. Him and Lachlan had matching Batman and Robin tattoos. Lachlan liked Batman and he liked Robin.

He had warned her before he spoke, but it was moments later when the flood gates would open and Oliver went into explain what was his favourite comic book and superhero.

Delilah raises her head up to look at Oliver as he spoke. She couldn’t help but watch his facial expressions. They just. Hanged in such a way that someone’s face would turn when they were truly excited and passionate about something. In some ways you would think she’d grow tired with the conversation but it meant so much to Oliver and seeing him happily talk about something he was so into meant the world to Delilah. She could truly listen to him talk about it forever.

When he mentioned Dick Grayson as Nightwing something sparked her brain and gave her a memory. It took her a couple minutes to remember why but suddenly the memories from a few weeks ago flooded into her brain. The daughter of Epione remembered the box of comics she had come across. I’ve heard of Dick Grayson being Nightwing before. Hold on.” She said with a huge smile on her face as she took her legs out of the cross cross they were in and she got up from her chair to go into the hallway.

She pulled a box off a shelf and she walked back into the study with it. The same big smile plastered on her face as she was excited to share it with Oliver. The girl sat back down in her chair and pushed the journals to the side so she could place the box down.

“So a few weeks ago I was going through things in the house and I found this box.” She said before her hands went to the top of the box. ”My dad collected comic books and he’s been doing so for as long as I can remember. Some are really old I think, but either way I figured you’d like to go through them and maybe you could tell me about the ones you know or want to talk about? I could listen to you talk about comic books all day.” The legacy of Cupid said as she realized she set the bar so low, but we didn’t want him to hold back.

Oliver watched Delilah's face as he talked. She seemed genuinely interested, if not in what he was saying, at least in listening to him talk. It was nice to feel like he mattered in some way to someone, like they cared to get to know him personally. Of course he had friends like Lachlan and Leighton, and Brian and Emily, but with Delilah it just felt different. He smiled wide at her when she said that she had heard of Nightwing before, but before he could say anything in response, she had gotten up and was hurrying out of the room.

Oliver was confused, but quickly she was back, setting a large box on the ground in front of him. She explained that her dad had collected comic books and his eyes started growing as she talked. He'd never had much of a chance to get his hands on real, vintage comics. He felt a small pang of guilt being this excited, though. He knew why Delilah was going through stuff and it wasn't a good reason. They had talked a little bit about her dad, but not too much. He guessed that this wasn't the time to either, especially with her looking at her with that excited and adorable smile.

So, Oliver opened the box. He started picking through the comics. In all honesty, he could probably explain any of these comics to Delilah. They were all iconic, but he was picking through looking for ones he especially enjoyed. The first one that he came across was a copy of Showcase #4.

"This is the first comic that introduced Barry Allen as the new Flash. He's the second Flash, you see, after Jay Garrick. This came out in October 1956 and is what people cite as the start of the Silver Age of comics. It is by writer Robert Kanigher and artists Carmine Infantino and Joe Kubert who are all iconic in the comic industry. It's cool that Barry is making his return to the mainstream over the last 5 or 6 years, because for people like me and also a bit older, Wally was our Flash." Oliver explained, flipping gently through the old pages before adding it to the stack.

Seeing the look on Oliver's face as he opened the box and started to go through them was priceless. Even if it pained Delilah to go through her dad's things these passed few weeks she was glad she could at least turn one part of it into a positive experience. The comics were tied to her dad, but to actually have Oliver sit there and talk about them and go through them with her with all the muse in the world, they began to feel more and more tethered to the son of Letus and not her father.

The trials weren't coming up for awhile, they were probably in the midst of November somewhere, but either way they weren't to be worried about for quite some time now. Delilah wanted to focus on the good things happening and ignore what bad was going on in the world, and Oliver was the perfect person to have that with. Sure being with her other friends was a positive time too, but nothing could pull her into a positive and happy feeling like he could. He was genuinely easy to be happy around, he was easily excitable. Delilah couldn't help but adore that about him. In the moment it felt like she had butterflies in her stomach, just being here in the room with him made all the emotions stir inside of her, but all good emotions.

He finally pulled out one of the comics and began to talk about them. This one was about Barry Allen as the flash who was Jay Garrick's successor. She couldn't believe the well of knowledge Oliver held about comic books. "What happened to Jay Garrick?" Delilah asked trying to make some sort of conversation and actually get to know what he was talking about. Maybe if she heard something intriguing enough she would decide to pick up some comic books and read them, but she was sure she could always get suggestions from Oliver if she asked.

"Is it becoming more mainstream because of the show that's been out for awhile?" Delilah said asking further questions.  

Oliver smiled and laughed when Delilah asked about what happened to Jay Garrick. He liked that she was actually interested enough in what he was saying to ask questions about it. At a young age Oliver had gotten good at recognizing when people weren't actually interested in the random facts he was spewing, especially about comics. That didn't mean that he didn't say them anyway, just that he was aware.

"Well, nothing exactly happened to Jay Garrick. Barry Allen's Flash stories was where the DC Multiverse was introduced, for the most part. It's the idea that there are infinite Earths that are usually similar, but different. Jay Garrick is the Flash of Earth-2 while Barry is the Flash on Earth-1. A really cool thing about the multiverse back then is that the heroes of Earth-2 were comic book heroes on Earth-1, like somehow stories can like transcend the boundaries between worlds. Barry was a big fan of the Flash comics, and so that's where he took the names from. Later, he got to meet Jay." Oliver explained. He'd always loved that Barry was a comic book nerd back then, because he related to it a lot. When Delilah asked about Barry coming back, he dug back through the pile of comics to his right that he had set aside.

"Well, this is the first issue of the Crisis on Infinite Earths plot line. It was a line-wide crossover in the mid-80s. At that point the multiverse was too much for DC comics to handle, so in the plot line the anti-Monitor basically ate up the entire multiverse and pooped out one timeline. Barry actually died trying to save the multiverse, and that was like 1986." Oliver said, setting the book aside. "Barry was dead in the comics for more than 20 years. He came back at the end of the Final Crisis plot line, but that is mostly handled actually in Flash Rebirth Vol 1 which came out in like 2009. So that was his big return to comics, and then he has the tv show and he is also the Flash in the DCEU, even though those movies aren't great." Oliver explained.

When Oliver first mentioned that nothing had happened to Jay Garrick she was confused. He continued on to explain how that was, but still trying to wrap her head around the idea of more than one earth. How was that possible? Of course she knew comic books obviously defied reality much like any form of literature does. Delilah kept making the mental notes she'd need to make to try and follow the conversation, but all that broke loose the moment he started to talk about Crisis on Infinite earth.

"Wait." Delilah said as her eyes started to look down trying to think of the words she needed. It was hard to even think of what she needed to say with all this new information in her head processing as she was talking. "So, I get that there's earth 2 Flash which is Jay and then Earth 1 is Barry. That's part of what you call..." She trailed off for a moment before she concluded, "the multiverse?" She asked. The daughter of Epione clearly didn't grow up looking at the comic books that her dad had, truth be told she only ever remembered him picking them up from time to time, but he never talked too much about them with her or Jules.

The whole second part of what Oliver had explained was working through her mind still and she started to form the words she needed to start asking questions, "So you're telling me this thing called the anti-monitor just ate the multiverse? So boom all the earths that were established and all the people on those earths are gone? How does one thing get the power for such a thing? Also if Barry sacrifices himself and dies, then how does he come back in the Final Crisis plot line? This is crazy. So if Barry dies, is he no longer the Flash when this anti-monitor basically destroys the multiverse and leaves only one?" The brunette was thinking hard about this now and in some ways she felt bad for having so many questions, but she was going to continue to ask anyways. "Does this thing just mush all these universes together? or does it just pick one to leave out?"

What a wild time to be alive. To have all these comic books exist and they all have these huge creative plot lines that Delilah wasn't sure she could ever make. Sure she was good with things like poetry, and journalistic writing, but heavily creative things weren't always her niche.

Oliver couldn't help but laugh a little bit as he watched Delilah get more and more confused. He had been steeped in all this lore for as long as he could remember. He thought that comic books were basically modern day North American mythology. This just all made sense to him without much thought, so he had to think about how to explain it.

"Okay, think about it like this." Oliver grabs a piece of paper and his black marker from the desk. "The Flash tv show actually explains it really well. So, this is our Earth. In this case, that is Earth-1." Oliver drew a big circle on the paper, and then drew another one next to it. "This is Earth-2. And Earth-3, Earth-4, Earth-5, to infinity." He said drawing more circles. "On every world, something happened to make it different. The idea is that for every decision that every person makes, a new world forms where they made the other choice. The classic example is that there would be a world where the Nazi's won World War 2. In DC that's actually called Earth-X. " Oliver explained.

"So, if we were on Earth-1 right now, there would be an Oliver and Delilah on Earth-2. Oliver-2 could be a world famous ballet dance, and Delilah-2 could be a master jewel thief. This is actually a theory that exists in our world, too. Do you remember the whole Berenstien vs Berenstain Bears thing from a few years back? People theorize that that was two different Earths crossing, literally changing the spelling of that book." Oliver explained. He watched Delilah's face before moving to her next set of questions.

"Saying that he actually ate the multiverse isn't really accurate, just a simplification. There are the Monitors who monitor all the different Earths, but like there is anti-matter, there is an anti-Monitor to balance out the Monitors. They are some of the most powerful beings in the multiverse. Basically, only Earth-1 survives, but some things or people from other Earths come to Earth-1. The multiverse comes back, though, in Infinite Crisis when some Earth-2 Superman characters like Lex Luthor and and evil Superboy called Superboy-Prime basically punch holes in reality to bring back the multiverse because they want their world back. Barry is not the Flash in that plot. Wally West, his nephew, and Bart Allen, his grandson, are both acting Flashes at the time." Oliver said, taking a pause before moving on to the Barry-specific questions of that. He really liked having a reason to use the knowledge that he had. It was one of the few times he got to sound smart.

"So, when Barry dies, he doesn't totally die. He goes to the Speed Force, which is the force that basically powers all speedsters and is kind of the Valhalla heaven for speedsters. So, in IFinal Crisis Barry is resurrected from within the Speed Force by powers unknown, which they explain kind of in Flash: Rebirth." Oliver said, with a huge exhale.

So when she initially asked all the questions she did, she didn't expect to get so many in depth answers, but she appreciated it. She loved how much Oliver had stored in his head. How someone could have so much information on one subject was crazy, but in some way seeing the abundance of knowledge he did have only made her more attracted to him. It seemed controversial in the sense that most people wouldn't find the talks of comic books attractive, but Delilah didn't typically follows norms, that and passion along with knowledge was far more attractive than superficial things. Delilah wasn't into people for their titles or their wealth.

She followed the sketch that he had drawn of the multiverse which made far more sense than it did to just talk about it. Delilah had a very loose understanding at this point and maybe one day she'd be able to make it a more solid foundation of information to have, but for now it'd be loose like gravel. The legacy of Cupid couldn't help but laugh at the mention of an earth-2 Delilah being a master jewel thief. "I would pay money to see myself try to steal something, but I'd pay even more to see you be a famous ballet dancer." Delilah said with a big grin on her face. She tried to imagine Oliver doing ballet and she could almost do it, but not quite. "For the record though, I wouldn't trade earth-1 Oliver for anything." Was she using his comic book explanations as a way to compliment him? Sure, but it felt completely natural and not at all forced, the way it should be. Delilah meant every word she said.

"Oh, don't they call that mandela effects or something? I've heard about that. I've dived into the conspiracy theory section of youtube every now and then, but you wont ever catch a video of conspiracies on my channel." The brunette said knowing she thought about it a few times, but it didn't really fit with her brand that much. "There never was a confirmed explanation on the whole Berenstein versus Berenstain was there? I don't recall hearing anything."

"The speed force sounds interesting. Does it just exist at all times no matter what do you think? Is there even that much known about the speed force? I'm sorry, I feel like I've asked you a million questions and I realize you don't have the answers for everything." Delilah said feeling a little bit of regret for asking so many questions. Just the thought of it all. Superboy-prime and Bart Allen, and everything else happening. The anti-monitors to balance out monitors. Would she ever be able to retain all of this?

Oliver laughed at the concept of them on Earth-2 alongside Delilah. It was crazy to think of how something like that could be. He did like to think that maybe that ballet dancer and the jewel thief had found each other, too. Oliver knew that this was all nerdy as hell, but it didn't seem to be deterring Delilah at all. There was a lot about him that he knew would deter her, but it was nice to know that this wasn't it. It was especially nice when she said she wouldn't trade him for a different Oliver.

"I like it when you talk nerd to me." He teased, leaning over to kiss Delilah lightly on the forehead. It was so nice to just be able to do that and not have to resist the urge. Oliver leaned back as Delilah asked about Mandela effects. "Yup. I didn't know if you knew the phrase. I don't think there will ever be an answer about Berenstain Bears thing. It's either the multiverse or just reporters writing articles in a certain way that tricks our brains."

Oliver let out a slow exhale when she asked about the Speed Force. "Weeellll," He started. "The Speed Force is accessible, but mostly to speedsters. The Speed Force fuels speedsters and was the first force, introduced in the Wally West era. He is the speedster who discovered it. The other forces are relatively new, so we know a lot less about them. The Strength force is pretty self explanatory. The Sage force is about a mystical power of the mind and soul. The Still force is a force of entropy and inertia. In edition to being these forces, they can also be like physical places, but only to people who can actually access them." Oliver explained as he set down the comics and began to flip through the others in the box. He came across a copy of Green Lantern Vol. 3 #48.

"Oh this is an interesting one. This is the start of the Emerald Twilight plot arc."

Feeling him kiss her on the forehead was enough to have alleviate all the butterflies in her stomach from earlier. The nerves would just melt away as the reminder that they actually talked about their feelings would sink in. Of course she always knew in the back of her mind that they had, but sometimes it just felt like one big crazy dream. For the longest time she was convinced people didn't like her in that way, and maybe she just had to be more open to the idea that she didn't need to hide behind things all the time. It was a work in progress for sure, but she knew she wanted to come out of hiding more. The safest person she could think to do that with was the group of friends she had, but most importantly Oliver. "I'll try my best to do it more often." The words fell out of her mouth while the grin on her face continued to grow.

"I guess that's the beauty and curse of life. A lot of things are unanswered and will forever remain that way. Doesn't mean we can't have fun making up our own answers, right?" The legacy said with a laugh to cover up the fact that the unknown actually scared her to her core. Especially with everything going on with her dad. She supposed that was less unknown though. He was beyond worlds guilty, but how do you even begin to think that of your own dad? The internal battle was one Delilah didn't want to have so she pushed it as far from the front of her head as she could and pushed in mandela effects and speed force stuff with it.

"So many forces, but that makes sense. Not everyone is a speedster. We both know I wouldn't be a speedster. I can run sure, but I'm so uncoordinated. Maybe earth-like-23 Delilah is a speedster who saves all the civilians from bad guys. The Flash on that earth if you will." One could dream and think about what their multiverse selves would be like and that was exactly where Delilah's mind had gone from the whole conversation. The speed force was interesting and she sort of understood it, but baby steps were all she needed at this point.

"Which one? Emerald city? Does the superhero had the word Green in their name? Get it... Emeralds are green, Emerald city.. I think that's the worst joke I have ever made."

Oliver chose to just give a little shrug to Delilah's comment about not knowing things. He felt like there were so many things in his life he didn't know or understand, and that freaked him out. If he didn't get something about himself, was he even 100% a person? Did you have to know yourself to be yourself?

"I really like the idea of the Sage Force. It's so hard to put into words but when it's used it's really cool." Oliver said, fidgeting with the marker in his hand, uncapping and recapping it. Oliver had to keep things out of his hands or he'd break them a lot. "I could see you being a superhero." That was mostly a joke for himself that he was making. He knew what he was working on, even if Delilah didn't.

"Emerald Twilight. Ans yes that was a really bad joke. You were on the right track, though." Oliver was laughing a little bit as he turned the book around and pointed to the issue title. "The Green Lantern. In this case, Hal Jordan." Oliver said, bringing the book back to his lap.

"Hal, like Barry, is the second comic book Green Lantern after Alan Scott. He is also originally from the Silver Age, like 1959 or something, but this comic is newer." Oliver said, moving into explaining Hal. "He actually has a really interesting back story. In his first issue he drunk driving and injures a bunch of his friends. Then, he gets the Green Lantern ring and becomes the protector of the sector Earth is in when the previous protector, Abin Sur, died. In this series, though, which is from like 1994, his city of Coast City has been destroyed, including all 7 million of his residents." Something in Oliver's stomach flipped, telling him to stop there and put the comic down, that reading this was a bad idea. He should have listened, but Oliver wasn't good at that.

"I can be your superhero." Delilah said with a laugh as she realized how ridiculous that sounded. If anything it was the cheesiest line she had ever said to anyone before, but in some way the words were true and genuine. "Okay, I realize that's super cheesy of me to say, but I'm serious. I will always be in your corner to save you from a bad day." The daughter of Epione spoke softly at this point and she would lean in to place a kiss upon his own lips before pulling back and letting him continue on with his explanation of things.

"Emerald Twilight? They make that too easy to guess the superhero's name. Emeralds are green, so Green. What could you use in the hours of twilight to help you see? Lantern. He's almost like a beacon of hope for the town if you think about it. Emerald City Twilight and you get saved by Green Lantern. In your darkest hour, he is the beacon of light to save you from the dark." Delilah concluded her analogy or whatever that was.

Hal Jordan, that was a name she was going to have to remember. It seemed vital now, she had a few names to remember. Barry Allen, Jay Garrick, and now Hal Jordan. She realized that Hal Jordan had to be separate from Barry and Jay, but she couldn't help but wonder if this whole infinite earth thing meant that Hal Jordan existed on a different earth. With the foundation she had, she had to assume the case to be very very likely. Delilah was hoping this information would stick and worst case scenario she was going to have to hit the books or the internet to try and learn more than she already knew, so the next time her and Oliver were talking about comics she could surprise him.

"All seven million? That's crazy. What else do you know about Hal Jordan. I take it he's not always going to be the Green Lantern, just as Barry Allen isn't always the Flash?"

Oliver absolutely loved the cheese from Delilah. It was so nice to have someone just confirm what you mean to them. Oliver lived for validation, and it was even better when it was spoken directly in his language. He kissed Delilah back as she leaned in to him. This time, it probably would have been better if time just paused here.

Oliver laughed as she talked about the Emerald City. It was really cute how she tried to compare this to stuff that she understood. "You would be correct. After him came Kyle Rayner, who actually gets introduced in the Emerald Twilight arc for reasons that will become apparent. Hal Jordan is actually best friends with Barry Allen and good friends with Oliver Queen. He's the first non-family member who Barry talked to after coming back to life, actually. That is after a line-wide reset, though. The Green Lanterns are a lot more logical to have several of. I can think of 5 famous Green Lanterns off the top of my head. The Green Lantern Corp is a group of people from different planets who get these power rings from the planet Oa and protect a sector of the galaxy. The rings let them basically create anything they want. They can lose charge, though. There are also other Lantern Corps like the Red Lantern Corp or the Star Sapphires and more." Oliver started to flip through the book and hit the first page of Parallax.

"Yeah, all 7 million. It's insane. You see, in Emerald Twilight, Hal uses his Green Lantern ring to bring back the entire city of Coast City. All the people, everything. Something in him had snapped. So, the Green Lantern Corp, and their leaders on Oa who are called the Guardians, called him back to Oa because they were mad at how he used his power. He attacked the Green Lanterns and killed as many as he could, taking their rings. Friends, like Kilowag, and enemies, like Sinestro, alike." Oliver could feel his stomach tightening and the voice who was feeding him these facts change. Instead of his voice, it was the deep suave voice he had gotten so used to hearing. Oliver's voice had gone mostly flat, his eyes locked on the page of the comic and his hands gripping it tight.

"Hal went on to kill the Guardians and entered the Central Power Battery, absorbing its power. Through gaining the power he let the entity of Parallax enter him and he is full evil." Oliver's stomach snapped, like a match had been struck and he felt the cold fire her knew too well.

Hearing the fact that she was correct about something in an area she knew very little about was the best kind of validation that she could have in this moment. It was an easy thing to assume and get right, but hey she didn't know. For all she knew they could have been just the two Green Lanterns. She sat there and listened to what he had to say for the Green Lantern comics, and she listened intently as she wanted to learn more of what Oliver Garrett found fascinating. That and she always remembered from the few times her grandma came around for holidays that she'd tell her and Juliana the most successful relationships have good trust, communication and listening. In order to communicate you needed to listen. You needed to ask about things you might not even think to ask.

Delilah had an okay relationship with her grandmother. She was a rather independent, 'I don't need no one', stubborn old lady. She told you what she thought of things and she was the only person she could see that her father was actually fearful of. Her grandmother just had that air about her that when she walked in the room you knew all the power went to her. From the stories she heard of her auntie Addy, the traits had passed down to her as well, she was a self-starter who worked her way up to praetor, but she had just disappeared. It was safe to say that Delilah didn't inherit the Lockwood traits that well, but it could be debated Juliana had adopted some of them. The line that always stuck with her about their talks with boys or she guessed significant others was, 'if you can't even be interested in what their hobbies are how can you like them?' so it was a good test to see where her feelings truly were. Honestly there was the biggest validation in finding out she genuinely wanted to know more about comic books and she wanted to hear him talk about them, it gave her hope.

She was reeled back into reality not too long after she had faded out of it. She had heard 90% of what he had said, just missing the last small chunk. Something about taking rings. Slowly the information she had actually heard processed and she was right on track, but she could see how intently he was looking at the comic book, the way his hand was gripping it. The daughter of Epione was a little confused about what was happening, but she realized it was probably beyond anything she knew. The worry began to settle in as she wondered if he was okay, she wanted to reach out to him, but she waited for him to finish up what he was saying.

"Oliver." Delilah spoke his name softly as her hand reached out to touch his hand. She tried to focus on soothing thoughts in attempts to help Oliver with whatever was happening. She realized there was a chance it wouldn't work, she didn't quite grasp how her powers worked sometimes, but even then it could even be something that didn't need to be soothed either. The brunette kept her hand on his though trying to radiate the soothing feeling if it worked at all. "Are you okay?" She asked as her other hand reached out to the other one. Her thumbs carassed over his fingers trying to loosen the tension he was creating. Having your fingers grip something like that was going to put strain on your fingers, and the last he wanted was him to hurt himself. "Look up at me?" She questioned, she wasn't going to force him to look at her, but she was ready to be there for him if he needed her. She was genuinely confused, but she reacted in the only way she could really think to.

The tiny shred of Oliver that was still in his head was telling him that he needed to stop reading and stop down this path, but that little ember is easily squashed by the other voice in his head. For the most part, Oliver couldn't actually understand the words that the voice in his head were actually saying. As time as gone on, they have become more and more clear. It was like he was learning its language. Oliver heard Delilah say his name, but he couldn't react to that. He could only keep going.

"Evil Hal Jordan came to a head in the Zero Hour story line when he wanted to reset the entire universe just to bring back Coast City. The comic had tie-ins with every line that was running at the time at DC. Basically everyone fought him and the collective force was able to stop Hal, but not easily." Oliver explained. His voice was slow.

That could be you, Oliver. That's where this is all going, don't you know?

Oliver couldn't think about anything to break what the voice in his head was telling him. Tears started to roll out of his eyes beyond his control. He couldn't stop them even if he tried. Then, something broke through. Delilah's voice asking him if he was okay. Oliver's voice started to creep back into his head, but the voice wasn't going to sit down quietly.

A tether is nice, isn't it? Fine, go ahead and tell her your fine, and you'd better make it convincing. You wouldn't want to lose her.

As Delilah asked him to look up, his head popped up. He could feel the tears on his cheeks, but he tried to ignore them. He put a smile on his face, "Yeah, I'm fine. Just lost in the story." Oliver looked back down on the book. He un-clenched his hands and where they had been, was a thick layer of black dust in the shape of his hands.

She sat there still holding her hands on his, hoping for him to respond to her, but at first he didn't. He only kept reciting things in the same voice he had been before. It didn't sound like the Oliver she knew, it couldn't have been him, could it? Even still she was going to be there in his corner for him, that's what she said she would do for him and so she was keeping her word. Besides that what kind of person would she be if she shut him out? There was no feelings of wanting to do either things if anything it was quite the opposite. She just wanted to be there for him if that was what he needed.

As she looked at him with a little bit of worry and asked for him to look up at her, he did. She could see his tear strained cheeks and it was enough to make some emotions stir inside of her. She couldn't even begin to fathom what had just happened, so her hands had moved from his hands and up to his cheeks so her thumbs could brush away the tears that had fallen on his face. Delilah's face leaned as she kissed his forehead and pulled back to look at him.

She knew he said he was fine and he placed the smile on his face, but she'd be the world's shittiest person if she just didn't confront him about it. Something obviously happened with him and he wasn't okay. Her hands went down to his again as she gently removed the comic book from his hands. Delilah intertwined her hands with his, "Oliver, it's okay not to be fine. Don't keep pushing things down, they'll only get worse. Like I told you, I'm always here in your corner." She spoke with care and softness.

"You don't have to talk about it, but I am here no matter what. Promise." She didn't know much more she could say without knowing more of the variables at hand, she just hoped she could help him in any way that was possible. She hated to see people obviously upset, especially Oliver, he didn't deserve it.

Oliver felt Delilah's hands on his face and her lips on his forehead. It took everything for him not to completely break down in her hands right there. He knew he had to keep it together in front of her, because he couldn't ruin what was starting here. It'd be so easy to walk away from something so new. Even as she insisted that she was in his corner, he couldn't believe her. Delilah didn't know what she was signing herself up for. He couldn't blame her if she wanted to walk away if she knew. He wished he could.

The voice in his head was still ringing to tell her nothing. Even know the voice was gone, the feeling of ice cold fire in his stomach was not. He could feel the anger and the pain that it brought, and he felt his smile starting to fall as the tears continued to roll. He looked into Delilah's eyes through the water.

"You just don't get it, Delilah. There is nothing you can do. There isn't even anything that I can do. It's like I have my own Parallax. This feeling of something or someone that wants me to be a different person. No, that's not it." Oliver had pulled himself back a little bit from Delilah. He was speaking loudly, tears flying as he did. "They know who I am going to be. They know that I am going to cause all of you pain. I'm like a nuclear bomb."

Oliver looked down at legs, where his hands had fallen when he pulled back from Delilah. He picked them up, shakily, and there was the black dust. He looked up at Delilah, his chest heaving with each breath.

"For every part of you that is an angel, I am a devil. Can't you see I'm bad for all of you?" Oliver said. He screamed back at the voice in his head that he'd lost and he told her. The Oliver had to think, was that voice him? It was in his head, the most him thing there was. How could it not be him?

Watching his facial expressions shift and seeing the sadness begin to seep into him again was hard to watch. It was hard to see him go through all these emotions and there wasn't much she could do to stop them or help him with them. Delilah didn't have the right coping tools, but she had some. Her father grew cold from her by the time she was at the age of eight years old. All she had in terms of loving family members was her older sister and they always had each other's back. They also comforted each other a lot, it was just what they did, so at least she could try and apply things like that to here.

"I'm sorry." She stated simply when he mentioned there was nothing she or him could do. She wasn't sorry as in she messed up, kind of sorry, but she was sorry that he had to go through this. That he had to deal with whatever was acting against him. Delilah shifted the box out of the way and she crawled across the floor to close most of the gap between them after he had pushed back a little bit and took her hands shakily. She continued to look into his eyes as she was formulating the words she needed to speak to him. She was a very organized person and she needed to know part of where she was going with her words.

"Shh, you wont cause us all pain." She spoke softly as her thumb traced small circles on the back of his hands. "No person is completely all bad or completely all good. I'm hardly an angel. I do wrong things all the time, I know this isn't the same as what's going on with you. How long have you been feeling this way? Maybe there is something we can do Oliver, we don't have to tell anyone else, but if we did maybe four brains is better than just one or two." Delilah said, she didn't mean for it to sound like she wanted to fix him, that wasn't the case, but obviously he wasn't happy with what was happening with him.

"Even if you are a nuclear bomb, Oliver, I'll be here next to you." She wanted to make this all go away for him, she wanted to tell him it'd be alright, but how could she do that? How could she tell him something was going to be alright, if he had been dealing with it for this long and she just learned about it, but she was going to try and do her best to help him, even if that meant doing a bunch of research or trying to get to the source of it all. Was that even possible?

"Oliver Garrett, you are not whatever that someone was trying to tell you to be. You are a kind, sweet, ride or die, positive, cheery, nerdy, handsome, cute, and endearing guy. You are not that someone trying to tell you to be something or who you're going to be."

Oliver looked up at Delilah as she took his hands again. He instinctively started to pull his hands back, but he couldn't. He was already too weak for that. "Why are you apologizing? You're not what's wrong. I am." Oliver could feel the pounding headache starting to form in the front of his head. He knew what happened after an episode like this. He would be completely drained with the worst headache of his life. As much pain as he was going through, he couldn't put Delilah through it. She wasn't doing anything wrong. He would not pull her into the muck with him.

Oliver couldn't think straight, he was barely even connected to the world at this point. He could feel his vision tunneling and then focusing back into the world around him. He could hear Delilah trying to comfort him, but it felt hollow to him.

"You don't understand. This isn't some tiny boyfriend issue or something that a group of teens can fix in their bedrooms. I am irreparably corrupted. You should get away while you can, Delilah, before I become more monster than man." Oliver has to scream to get his words through the tears. He feels like this could be the honest end of him.

Then, he hears Delilah's voice again, and she's telling him who he is. It feels like each word is a strand tying him back to the Oliver that he was, or at least the Oliver that Delilah saw. Just as fast as he felt the cold fire in his stomach light, it went out. Oliver collapsed into Delilah, his head falling onto her chest as he started weeping, feeling free from The Voice if even just for this minute.

She could hear him scream words at her and she was taken back by it a little bit. He was trying to give her the out, to give her the chance to get out of all of this now, but even if they weren't dating her response would still be relatively the same. She wouldn't back away from this, he obviously needed someone there for him, and she wasn't going to let him be alone. No one should be alone when they seem to be hurting so much. Even if he just did scream the words to get them out and scare her a little, she wasn't going to let that show, she knew that he wouldn't hurt her. It was Oliver they were talking about, he was too pure to do that.

"I'm not sorry in the way you'd be sorry for doing harm to someone. I'm sorry that you have to go through whatever this is, Oliver." She said to him still holding onto herself to stop herself from letting go. She didn't want to start crying, she always cried and for once she wanted to be the rock that someone could hold onto. She wanted to be Oliver's rock in the stormy sea that was happening for him. Delilah had no way of helping him, especially with little to no information about the situation, but she knew the last thing she would do was leave his side.

"That's just it, Oliver. We aren't just teens in our bedrooms. We are demigods, our lives are so beyond what any teen would believe to be possible. We can figure this out. You have to try and confide in hope. The hope that things could change the hope that things can be better." It was in that moment that Delilah really felt her words. It was what got her through the demons that haunted her day in and day out. The images that would flicker in her brain of the dark hardly candle lit room. It'd bring back the physical pain that was tied to those images, the sting and searing pain she'd feel on her back as the 'holy water' was flicked on her back. Or the obvious fact that she had been high on drugs for parts of her sundays. The feeling of that still laid in the dark waiting for the moments she was vulnerable.

It was only as Oliver's head had hit her chest that she realized that she had tears running down her own face. They were coming one after the other as she could feel him go into a sob. Seeing how upset he was tied in with her own demons had her near a break down, but she just took a deep breath in to even out the choppy water. One of her arms instinctively wrapped around him while the other had dug into her pocket to clutch the coin she kept in her pocket. It served as her reminder to strive for brighter days, to have hope that everything would work out. It grounded her. She let go of it and she let her other hand run her fingers through his hair.

"Shh." She started quietly as she let him just stay like that. "I'm not going anywhere. No matter what happens. Much like Belle could see the good in the Beast, I'll always see the good in you, no matter what. I promise you that."

Oliver probably blacked out at some point, but for the most part it was just lifeless sobbing. He couldn't move, or think, or breathe until the sobs started to slow down. When finally his mind started coming to, he tried to take inventory of the situation. This was a tactic that Dr. Burke had started with him when he first went to therapy when his mom was still in town. He ran through the things he knew about what had happened and were happening in his head.

(1) He was in the Lockwood house. (2) He was in Delilah's arms. (3) Her hand was lightly in his hair. (4) He'd heard the voice and  (5) he could remember what it said. (6) He'd Black Dusted both a comic book and his pants. (7) Delilah had witnessed all of it. (8) This was the worst time this had ever happened, except for The Breakdown.

As Delilah talked to him, he sat up slowly. He looked at her, actually seeing her for the first time in minutes. Tears were still falling from his eyes, but not enough to obscure his vision anymore. At first he thought it was just his tears blurring things, but slowly he registered the tears on her face. What had he done? Did he say something that he didn't remember. He reached his hand out slowly towards her. The son of Letus wasn't sure if she trusted him anymore, but he knew for sure he didn't trust himself, so he took it slowly. When his hand reached her face, he used his thumb to wipe some tears from her cheek as his hand rested on his face.

"Something is very, very wrong with me Delilah." His voice was flat, but quiet and entirely his own.

She sat there for awhile just holding him as he had sobbed in her arms. It wasn't quite the turn of events that she expected to happen, but life was filled with crazy unknowns that could flare up at anytime. They could be like a volcano that erupted. They would lay dormant for years and years until something came up, and that's what life was like. Things could be hiding in the shadows or they could be just below the surface. It reminded her of her father, how he was just non existent except for when he deemed it was important to be around. After that she would hardly see him until the night Delilah would see the first dead body in her life. Well her first murder scene was more appropriate to say.

Delilah's hand had moved lightly and slowly through his hair just trying to keep him calm. Her eyes closed for a few moments, in some weird way there was a moment of peace during this. He was sobbing and she was holding him, but nothing else was coming up in the moment. It was just them, but mostly Delilah trying her best to comfort him.

She could feel him shift and he would move to look at her, so she let her arms shift so he could get up. Delilah stayed silent letting him do whatever he needed and think whatever it was he needed to think. The daughter of Epione watched his hand slowly move towards her, but Delilah didn't flinch, she trusted him and she knew that he wouldn't hurt her, but feeling his touch on her face was nice. She closed her eyes again for a moment as she felt his hand rest on her face.

When he spoke she noticed it was a flat tone, but it seemed more Oliver and her eyes opened to look at him again. "Don't let someone who did you wrong make you think there's something wrong with you." Delilah spoke to him and she remembered what she wanted to do earlier while she held him. Her hand reached into her pocket while her fingers wrapped around the circular piece or metal. Pulling it out of her pocket, it was a shiny gold coin, it never seemed to dull and maybe that's why Delilah felt like it gave her hope in times of darkness.

"This coin has been with me for a long time. My grandmother gave it to me one year for my birthday. I'm not the type to be upset at little gifts like these, especially when she told me why she was giving it to me. That lady can be ruthless as the underworld sometimes, but she told me this was coin she carried with her when times got difficult. It would ground her a lot of the time. So on my sixteenth birthday she gave it to me. I never gave it much thought until June and July." Delilah started speaking about it and she realized she may have been talking too much at this time, but her mind was on autopilot now and she wasn't stopping, "After all the things I've been through, I've held this coin with me since. In times it feels like I can't make it through my demons or when it feels like I have this heavy weight on my chest, I clutch this coin and sometimes look at it. It just helps me ground myself. I consider it my lucky coin."

As she got closer to talking about her own problems she could feel the tears begin to well up in her eyes a little. She wasn't going to talk further about it unless asked, mostly because it wasn't her time to talk about it. Not after what Oliver had just been through. "I want to give you my lucky coin, Oliver. Even though I have so many hurdles to jump over, I think I can manage without it. I've been getting better, but I think it could be of more help to you right now than me. I don't know what you're going through and I can't begin to understand it, but I'm here for you Oliver."