The Arrow & The Huntsman [The 1st Installment of DC HEROES: CHAMPIONS OF EARTH]

[21] Family Secrets

The next day, Dearden was getting ready for the day and wandered around his room shirtless trying to get his outfit together so that he could leave before Aaron could stop him since Oliver had gone out earlier that morning with Diggle so it was just him today. As he moved around the room, the television was switched over to the news station, and Dean overheard the reporter stating that Martin Somers would not be testifying or pleading guilty in the case filed against him.

Dearden stopped in his tracks and he let the button-down shirt he picked out hang loosely in his hands, as he struggled to repress a sneer. As the reporter went on, Dean felt his boil beginning to simmer beneath his skin, and a slow, burning rage glossed over his bright green eyes.

Well, at least you'll get to kill someone else tonight. A voice in his head remarked.

Dearden let himself smirk inwardly while his face remained impassive. "Oh, my God!" he heard his sister say behind him. "Dean, how did you get those scars?" Dean mentally chastised himself for not being more aware and letting himself get distracted. He quickly tried to put his shirt on to cover his scars, but it was too late. Thea was on his case and she was not backing down. "Thea, it's not a big deal," Dean sighed. "Just get out of my room, please?"

"Not until you tell me what the hell happened to you on that island," Thea retorted as she pushed her brother from side to side to analyze his old wounds.

"I don't wanna talk about it, alright?" Dean snapped, wrenching himself away from his sister's grasp roughly. Thea jumped back instinctively with a scared look on her face. "What happened to you?" she whispered faintly. "Nothing happened to me, Thea, just get out!" Dean yelled.

Thea stumbled back away from her brother and hurried out of his room fearfully. Once she was gone, the red haze lifted from his eyes, and guilt and realization washed over him like a tsunami.

"Oh, shit!" He swore.

He quickly finished buttoning up his shirt and darted after his sister. "Hey, Speedy, wait! I'm sorry, I just--" "Save it, Dearden! You don't want to talk? Fine," Thea shouted as she stormed down the hallway. "C'mon, Speedy, can you just wait?" He pleaded. Finally, he caught up with her and grabbed her arm, but she flinched away making him frown. "Look, I'm sorry I blew up at you," he apologized. "I just don't do well... with opening up to people about what happened to me there. Ollie and I didn't exactly have the same... Experiences on the island."

She eyed him carefully as though she were a zookeeper trying to take care of a dangerous animal. "Do you have a second?" she said after a while. Dean simply nodded in response. "Good. I wanna show you something out back," she answered back. Then, she led her big brother out towards the backyard of the house."

* * *

"Sometimes, when I... Felt... Whatever," she sighed. "I'd come here." At first, the vigilante was confused until Thea stepped aside to reveal three gravestones, each bearing the name of one of the Queen family members that went down with Queen's Gambit. "About a month after the funerals, Mom stopped going out," Thea explained. "Pretty soon, she stopped talking altogether. The house got so quiet, so I'd come here. To talk to you and Oliver."

A serious look came over Dearden's face, he listened to his sister speak. He tried to imagine what it was like for her to be by herself for the last five years without anyone being there for her. Each time he felt a little more guilt seep into his heart. "And you know, sometimes, I'd ask you, beg you to find your way back to me," she cried. "Now, here you are, but the truth is, I felt closer to you and Ollie when you were dead. Look, I know it was hell where you were, but it was hell here too."