True freedom is not being able to do whatever you want—it's being able to refuse what you don't.
Coming to this world, Jack Kadere believed he was free.
He had no intention of sleeping on the floor. So while Felicity was still puzzling over what the floor had to do with self-restraint, Jack pulled back the covers and lay down, wrapping an arm around her waist as naturally as breathing. Her body went rigid—yet somehow also soft, yielding against him despite herself. Felicity didn't move. Her fingers stayed locked around her phone, but her mind had gone completely blank.
"The new pillow isn't very big either," Jack murmured after a moment, and closed his eyes.
Some time later, Felicity carefully turned her head. His breathing had slowed, his chest rising and falling in an easy rhythm. She reached for his hand, trying to slide it off her hip.
It slid right back.
She moved it again. It returned.
After several rounds of this territorial dispute, she surrendered. Fine. It's yours. Take it.
She glared at him, shouting silent curses in her head. But her eyelids were already heavy, and soon enough, she drifted off.
She dreamed.
In the dream, she had just graduated and landed a job at Queen Consolidated. She and her boyfriend had rented a small apartment—cramped but cozy. After hours of scrubbing and unpacking, they'd ordered Thai food because neither of them had the energy to cook. That night, he'd pulled her close, his hands warm through her shirt, wanting her. She'd been shy. Nervous. But she'd also felt, with a certainty that made her chest ache, that she'd found someone she could trust completely.
She stopped resisting. Let him undress her. Let herself be undressed.
His mouth found her neck, her collarbone, lower. She arched into him, fingers threading through his hair, breath catching when his tongue traced the curve of her breast. He took his time—agonizingly slow—until she was squirming beneath him, hips lifting off the mattress.
"Please," she heard herself whisper.
He laughed against her skin, warm and teasing, and pulled back.
That made her annoyed. She grabbed his shoulders and pulled him down, kissing him hard, tasting him, wrapping her legs around his waist until there was no space left between them. He groaned into her mouth and finally, finally, pushed inside her—slow at first, then deeper, filling her completely. She gasped, nails digging into his back, and he started to move.
The rhythm built. Her hips matched his. The bed creaked beneath them, and she didn't care, didn't care about anything except the heat coiling tight in her belly, the slick friction, the way he said her name like it meant something. She came with a sharp cry, clenching around him, and he followed moments later, burying himself deep and shuddering against her.
Then things blurred. And the dream ended.
She woke to find Jack gone.
Her pajamas were also missing.
Felicity stared at the ceiling, face burning. Because in the dream, her boyfriend's face had been Jack Kadere's.
"Damn it," she muttered, pressing her palms against her eyes. "I'm not—I'm not like that. Why would I dream—"
Her gaze caught the alarm clock. 8:47.
"Oh no. Oh no, no, no—"
She scrambled out of bed, yanking open drawers, hopping into pants while stumbling toward the bathroom. Five minutes of frantic brushing and splashing water on her face later, she emerged, grabbed her bag, shoved her feet into flats, and was halfway to the door when she realized Jack was sitting on the couch.
He'd clearly watched the entire performance.
The words left her mouth before she could stop them: "I get off at five."
She fled.
Bang.
The door slammed behind her. Jack shook his head, a low chuckle escaping him. Felicity was far more interesting than Harley Quinn.
He stretched out across the sofa, sunlight warm on his face, and let his mind wander. Green Arrow hadn't been born yet. No word of the S.T.A.R. Labs explosion in Central City. That left only the Legends.
Their mission was to travel through time, correcting aberrations, protecting the timeline. If he changed their history—created a deviation significant enough—they would come. And when they did, he could hitch a ride. Wander through time at his leisure.
Whether they'd accept him aboard?
Life hadn't taught him much. Just four words: Take what you want.
Since he was already in Starling City, his attention turned to Laurel Lance. She was righteous to a fault—kind, principled, the type who hated injustice with every fiber of her being. If she became Black Canary early, if she gained the power to protect herself, then her sister Sara would have no reason to betray the League of Assassins on her behalf. No reason to be killed by a mind-controlled Thea. No Lazarus Pit resurrection. No redemption arc. No joining the Legends.
And when the Legends discovered their captain had simply... vanished from existence?
They'd come running through time to investigate.
Besides, he was curious about Laurel herself. Not to make Oliver Queen's eventual cuckoldry more elaborate—though that was a bonus—but because he genuinely wondered: what would happen when the shipwrecked playboy finally returned, ready to save his city, only to find the criminals already dealt with? The vigilante role already filled?
Would he still become Green Arrow? Or would he shrug and go back to being a billionaire?
Probably still Green Arrow. Except by then, his opponent might be Laurel herself.
Lovers turned enemies. Cliché, yes.
But appealing.
Jack closed his eyes, sunlight pooling golden across his chest, and let the plan take shape.