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Absolute Cost by Red-Rum-18

“Please allow me to introduce myself, Mr. Queen. My name is Sebastian Resik, and, as you've witnessed, I have the power to make what has become of you a distant bad memory. Through my power, you no longer have to worry about the trigger stimuli that can control you, and I've undone the deaths of you family as though it never happened at all.”

“You can spare me the spiel, Resik. I know that you're after something from me.”

“Then you are as smart as CADMUS says you are. There is something you can do for me, in exchange. I don't want money or your soul, or some such. All I ask... is that you pick up the phone every time I call... and follow my instructions, no questions asked. Oh, and I probably don't need to say to keep this from the wife...”

Those words, that conversation between him and Resik, keep reverberating in the mind of Oliver Queen. Fugitive of the US government, brainwashed assassin, and one-time member of the Justice League, Oliver was given a chance to undo the suffering inflicted upon him over the past few years... but there's no such thing as a free lunch.

As he perched himself outside of the mansion of the mayor of the city he was sent to, late into the rainy night, Oliver readied himself with the equipment he was given by Resik and his... colleagues. No longer able top rely on the compound bow and arrows (both regular and explosive) provided by the League, Oliver donned his disguise and quickly memorized the blueprints of the mansion.

This was not the first phone call Oliver received from Resik since that fateful day. Anei, his wife, was becoming quite troubled by his “extended hours at work”, but he couldn't tell her because her life (perhaps her very existence) would be at risk. Oliver managed to ghost his way through the mansion and pacify the security detail within. He had the mayor, cowering and on his knees, at gunpoint until a final guard busted in, threatening to put a hole in Oliver. He nary had a glance at the guard, but it caused him to hesitate. The guard looked almost exactly Dr. John Jones, a member of the Justice League; he even spoke to Oliver in Jones' voice, trying to convince him not to kill the mayor. This was enough of a distraction for the mayor to get to the safe room. Oliver turned to see his target escape, and then the guard tackled him... and no longer resembling Dr. Jones. Oliver escaped through the window and evaded the resulting manhunt.

It took Oliver a few days to return to his home in Santa Fe by foot, as he couldn't risk getting recognized and arrested at the airport or a bus terminal. He got back into his house in the middle of the night. Oliver hid his gym bag, full of weapons, in the closet after stepping into the darkened house... but then the light came on. Anei was sitting in the dark, waiting for Oliver, and turned on the lamp. With a look of rage scrawled across her face, she exclaimed she was waiting DAYS for him to show up, and demanded to know what happened. Oliver realized he had now excuse ready and could only stammer as she awaited an answer.

Anei knew that Oliver had been murdering people; Oliver confessed, but said he couldn't say anything more. She was mortified. Oilver tried to comfort her, but she swung the knife at him; she couldn't allow him around anymore because “who knows who you'll kill next?!” so she decides to kill him. Anei and Oliver duked it out in the living room of their house, and she even resorted to pulling out his bow and arrows he had hidden away, as well. The fighting briefly ended when they noticed their young son, Robert, was standing there watching them fight.

Oliver: “Robert, this isn't what it looks like...”

Robert: “That's because you've been trapped in an illusion this whole time.”

Oliver: “What?”

Anei then grabs Oliver and slams his head against a mirror. With his head pressed against the shattered glass, he opened his weakened eyes to see, NOT his own reflection, but an overlook of the inside of decrepit warehouse. The pressure he felt instantly gave way and he fell to his feet. Dr. Jones was there, having freed Oliver from the illusion with his telepathic powers, to reveal that Sebastian Resik was using his own telepathy to manipulate Oliver. His deceased family was but a hallucination, but the murders Resik made him commit were very much real, and the failure of the attempt on mayor's life and Anei becoming suspicious of Oliver was Dr. Jones' attempting to free Oliver.

Swearing revenge, Oliver collected his weapons and went down to the lower levels of the warehouse with Dr. Jones following. They intruded upon a sacrilegious ceremony being performed by a cult led by Sebastian Resik, whom his acolytes call “Brother Blood". They battled the gun-drawing cultists and freed May Bennett, a kidnapped woman they planned to sacrifice to the demon lord they worshiped. Oliver had a chance to put an arrow through the heart of Brother Blood, but turned it down to allow May to shoot Resik to death with one of the cultists' guns. When all was thought to be said and done, Resik's blood moved of it's own accord to stain the statue of the demon they prayed at; the blood ignited (warding off Dr. Jones) and the carving became animated. Speaking in a horrid voice, the demon lord controlling it introduced itself as “Neronius”and tried to tempt Oliver with the same offer Resik used on him; Oliver gave him his answer... in the form of an exploding arrow to the forehead...

Notes:

* Here's more info on Oliver:

red-rum-18.deviantart.com/art/…

* Brother Blood's real name is a combo of Sebastian Blood and “Resik”, which belonged to a woman once married to a Brother Blood and was the mother of another in the main comics.

** His costume is based on a Blue Lantern's shawl I found, and the mask is a tattered-cloth version of his stone mask from the TV show Arrow.

* His opening line is from the song “Sympathy For The Devil” by The Rolling Stones, which is how the mainstream version of Neron (here renamed Neronius) introduces himself.

* Sebastian Resik is of Homo magi, a splinter race of humans that include the likes of Zatanna Zatara and other magic-users of this world. This is how he can control the minds of others.

* Oliver was in a comatose state while the simulation of his “fixed” life played in his head; Blood is able to use his powers subconsciously while focusing on other tasks.

** He was somewhat-free of Blood's power when on his assassination missions for him; all targets were threats to the cult.

** Resik was a wealthy man, and was able to provide Oliver with weapons and tools for his assassination missions.

* When Oliver began “fighting” with his “wife”, he was really thrashing around in his room in the cult's HQ while Dr. Jones was trying to free him.

** Anei using Oliver's bow and arrows is a reference to Shado, the villain from the original comics she was based on.

* “May Bennett” is a reference to Mother Mayhem, a mainstream character related to Brother Blood.

* “Neronius” is based on Neron, as I said. The mainstream version of Blood's cult worships Trigon, but due to the changes I made to Trigon for abDC, I changed it to Neron, another big-wig demon lord.

* Ironically, Resik kept one part of his bargain, albeit accidentally... he removed Oliver's behavioral programming forced upon him by Cadmus' "Checkmate Procedure"...