Portal

Untitled Part 3

Oliver paced because he was frustrated, and he paced because how had he gone through his younger life being such a jerk? He needed to do something, something that would get his mind off of himself. He stalked over to the salmon ladder and removed his shirt. He liked to tease Felicity that he did the salmon ladder to distract her, but the truth was he also did it for himself. It helped him to clear his mind and focus on one thing at a time. Distracting her was usually just a bonus and always ended up leading to great sex when they got home.

Jonas heard a clanking noise coming from the far side of the room and his curiosity was peaked. There was nothing else to do in this godforsaken hole, and this sounded intriguing. He walked across the room and looked toward Felicity, who despite trying to act absorbed in her work was sneaking glances in the direction the sound was coming from. He walked around the corner and found Oliver, his older self, doing some sort of exercise that well, to be honest, looked hard.

Oliver was hanging from a metal bar that was supported by metal brackets on either side. He was swinging into a chin up and then on the second swing, throwing his body up to the next bracket causing the bar to clang against the metal bracket. He had gone up and back down twice and finally dropped to his feet with a thud. His upper body was covered in sweat and Jonas glanced at Felicity seeing a hungry, predatory look in her eyes before he turned back to Oliver.

"What is this?" He indicated the apparatus and Oliver glanced back at it before he looked at Jonas.

"It is called a salmon ladder. It works your arms and your core."

"Can I try it?"

Oliver quirked an eyebrow. He had worked out when he was younger and had been in pretty good shape for his age, but he personally had not mastered this piece of equipment until he had honed his body into the weapon he had become. He wiped his brow and glanced back at Jonas.

"You sure you want to try? I don't exactly remember my arms being that strong back in the day."

Jonas glared at him and then pulled his t-shirt over his head and threw it to the side. "I got this."

Oliver watched the cocky bastard walk over to the ladder and place his hands on it as he had seen Oliver do minutes before. He swung his body and was barely able to do the chin up and when he tried to swing the bar up to the next level he missed and hit the ground. Luckily there was padding below him, and he heard Jonas curse as he stood back up and placed the bar back on the lower rungs.

Oliver crossed his arms over his chest and watched as Jonas stubbornly tried again and again he hit the mat.

"Dammit!"

"Problem?" Oliver asked the question sarcastically, but Jonas did not respond. He could tell by the look on the kids face that he was not giving up and remembering how stubborn he had been at that age he just stepped back and watched. Four times Jonas tried and four times he fell to the mat. Oliver smirked as he knew he was getting frustrated. Maybe he should go easy on himself and tell Jonas to stop, but a part of him was enjoying seeing the cocky kid crash and burn so he finally settled back, his hips against the table behind him and just watched.

"Don't you have something else to do?" Jonas looked at him, clearly growing self-conscious.

"Oh no, I have all the time in the world." He gave him a sarcastic smile.

Jonas glared and tried it again, and when he fell one more time, he placed the bar back on the ladder and then stalked off. Oliver grinned taking satisfaction in the fact that his cocky, self-assured self was frustrated. Maybe it would teach him a little humility.

Felicity walked over as she saw Jonas stalk off.

"That wasn't very nice." She stood next to Oliver looking in the direction that Jonas had just gone.