Felicity Smoak's Terrible, Horrible, No-Good, Very Bad Day
Author's Note: This is my first foray into the Arrow world, and I'll admit, I was dragged kicking and screaming. But Felicity Smoak simply wouldn't leave me alone. So I'm really not sure where I'm setting this continuity-wise, but it's definitely post-Undertaking, pre-Sarah and pre-Slade-traumatizing-everyone. Olicity if you squint, not very kind to Laurel (who had potential in season one, and then went off the rails, and since I have Felicity, I don't really care). Felicity whump because I'm oddly obsessed with tasers, but otherwise very fluffy. Very.
For any of you kind enough to be here because you've been following my other work, don't worry: Earth 2's still in progress, and I'll have Season Three at some point. But I hit a point where I needed to give myself a break, so here we are.
Summary: I have definitely had better days, Felicity thought, letting her head hang limply. Like the day of the flat tire and the horrible hair dye incident. Green hair was definitely better than this. In fact, I'm not sure I can think of a day that wasn't better than-
Dr. Evil used the taser again, and Felicity wasn't thinking about her day anymore.
Disclaimer: Arrow and all its characters are not mine. If they were, Oliver would not have been so awful to Felicity in Unthinkable. And if he had, Felicity wouldn't have put up with it.
"8 o'clock tomorrow, Oliver," Felicity said. "I mean it. You can blow off investors once, maybe twice if you have a spectacularly persuasive and charming executive assistant, but not three times. Not if you want me to keep doing...this," she added, waving her hands disgustedly at her desk.
"I promise," Oliver said, pausing to smile at her as he headed for the elevator. "Will I see you...later?"
Felicity sighed. "Yes, Oliver, you'll see me...later," she said, putting air quotes around "later." "I just have to finish up some of the vast amounts of paperwork that I do for you."
Oliver walked up to stand in front of her desk. "I know I don't say it enough-"
"Don't," Felicity cut him off. "Don't you dare be nice to me right now. I'm working on a good mad here, and I will not have you ruining it with 'I couldn't do it without you, Felicity,' or 'You're a valuable member of the team, Felicity.'" She glared at him. "You're damned right, you don't say it enough. Especially not enough when it isn't because you're feeling guilty." She flapped her hands at him. "Shoo."
"Felicity," he said, in that tone that made her insides feel like marshmallows having a grand mal seizure.
"I said shoo," she said, her tone softening in spite of her resolve. "I really have to get this done, or we'll both look like idiots tomorrow. And while that may work for you, it most certainly does not work for me." She flapped her hands at him again and then looked back at the computer screen.
Oliver hesitated, and Felicity held her breath, hoping he wouldn't push it. She really was angry with him, even though she knew it hadn't been his fault her day had been so rotten. But she'd had to lie for him, something she hated almost more than anything else, and she'd had to do it repeatedly and persuasively to get the team from the Fergus Group to come back in the morning.
And all because Laurel Lance broke a nail.
Okay, so that wasn't fair either, but honestly, it was maddening that the one person who always seemed to have the highest expectations of Oliver was the one who kept finding ways to make him screw up meeting them. Never mind that he was working harder than anyone she'd ever met, not just as the Arrow, but as Oliver Queen, too-none of that seemed to matter when it came to Laurel. I should say something, Felicity thought for the thousandth time. I should tell her what I think, or tell him, or—
"Okay," Oliver said finally, and Felicity let out the breath she'd been holding. "If it gets to be too much tonight, don't worry about...later. Digg and I can manage without you."
"Thanks a lot," Felicity said acidly.
"I didn't mean—" Oliver said, but then stopped. "You know what I meant, Felicity."
"I know," Felicity said, but she made herself not look up at him. He finally made his way out, and Felicity sighed again. I sound like Charlie Brown, sighing all the time. It's not like my life sucks or something. I'm getting paid ridiculous amounts of money to do work that's really not that difficult, just mind-numbingly boring, but I get to go out at night using my real talents in exceptionally cool ways to fight crime alongside a man whose hotness could power interstellar flight. She felt herself about to sigh again and stifled it ruthlessly.
An hour and a half later, she finally finished the stack of work she'd been piling up all week. She gathered up her things and headed for the elevator, wondering whether she should stop for takeout Chinese before she headed to the lair. I really need to start eating better, she thought. It's not like I'm working out all the time like Oliver and Digg. I need to get more vegetables. Like kale. Kale's supposed to be good for you. And less grease. And more exercise. Maybe I should work out with them. But that conjured up an image of Sweaty Oliver, and she ripped her mind away from that, only to imagine herself dangling helplessly from the first rung of the salmon ladder looking like the Hang In There cat, and she almost laughed at the thought. No. Just...no.
She stepped out of the elevator and headed for her car, and for once, the prime parking space was more annoying than a perk, reminding her of all the things she knew people had to be thinking of her and how she'd gotten that prime parking space, and she felt the mad building up again. I need to—
"Miss Smoak?" a man's voice said from behind her, and she whirled. There were two of them, standing a few feet apart, clearly blocking her main avenues of escape.
Wonderful, she thought. The perfect way to end this day. "What do you want?" she asked warily, backing towards her car.
"We need you to come with us," the man said, and there was a strange accent to his voice. Russian? she thought, trying to decide if she had time to grab for her phone.
"Uh, sorry, but I have someplace to be, a nice place, with people who are expecting me, like, fifteen minutes ago, and they're very big, scary men, scarier than you, so you might want to rethink—"
The second man was moving towards her, and as he reached for her, she ducked away from his arm and threw a roundhouse punch into his nose. She was so surprised that it hit, and that his nose made a sick crunching noise and immediately started gushing blood, that she didn't see the first man coming before he'd grabbed her arm. She stomped hard on his instep with her momentarily-practical heel (thank you, Miss Congeniality) and he howled, releasing her, and she turned to run for the car. He grabbed at her again, catching her purse strap. She yelped as it spun her around, then it snapped suddenly, and she fell.
Stupid, cheap, knockoff Gucci, she had time to think before her head hit her bumper and she stopped thinking altogether.
"She should have been here by now," Oliver said, frowning as he dropped down from the top of the salmon ladder.
Digg raised an eyebrow. "You did tell her if she needed a night off..." he said, trailing off meaningfully.
Oliver glared at him. "I know, but this is Felicity. Even if she did decide she wasn't coming, she'd have called, or texted."
Digg wasn't as sure of that as Oliver seemed to be. Felicity had been really angry, though he suspected it was less about Oliver's missing the meeting than it was about why he'd missed the meeting. But was she mad enough to want to make him worry? he thought, and knew the answer before he finished the thought. Felicity might get mad with Oliver, but she never stayed that way for long. He pulled out his phone as Oliver toweled his face. There weren't any messages from Felicity on his phone, either. He felt his own knot of worry building.
Oliver was standing at her computer. "How does that phone tracer thing work?" he asked.
Digg went over and called up the app. It showed her still at QC Tower. "Did you try calling her?" he asked.
Oliver gave him a look.
Digg smiled crookedly. "Yeah, right. I'll give it a try." The call went through, but Felicity didn't answer.
"I'm going over there," Oliver said, heading for the Arrow suit. "You stay here. If she shows up, let me know."
"Sure," Digg said, but the knot in his stomach was getting bigger. He frowned at the unmoving dot on the computer screen as Oliver vaulted up the stairs. He hit dial again. "Come on, Felicity. Answer the damned phone."
Ow, Felicity thought. Her head hurt, badly, and for a moment, she couldn't remember why. It couldn't be a hangover. She'd only gotten drunk enough to have a hangover once, and that had been such an unpleasant experience on so many levels—
Oh, she thought as she felt the zip ties holding her hands behind her back. She was sitting in a chair, and the back of the chair was cutting uncomfortably into her arms. She carefully tried to open her eyes, but only her left one wanted to open. The right one felt stuck. It finally opened with a weird, sticky pull, and she could see a pair of shoes in front of her.
A hand grabbed her hair and pulled her head up, and the sudden movement sent her head spinning and a rush of saliva was the only warning she had before she hurled a half-digested grande Americano all over her lap and onto the shoes in front of her. Oh, thank god I hadn't gotten the Chinese yet, she thought, her head pounding. The hand let her go as the man danced away from her, cursing, and her head fell forward again. She closed her eyes, willing the spinning to stop, breathing raggedly.
There were voices nearby, one of them clearly angry, but they weren't speaking English. Russian, she thought again, and tried to raise her head. After a few moments, she was able to look up, and there was a man wiping her Americano off his shoes with a rag. He looked over at her, glaring, and Felicity almost started laughing. Oh, my god, she thought giddily, I just puked on Dr. Evil. "Where are the sharks with lasers on their heads?" she mumbled.
The man threw down the rag angrily and stalked over to her. He was bald, heavyset, with a ridiculously cliché scar on his cheek, and Felicity had to fight back another wave of laughter. "Your login and password," the man said.
"What?" Felicity said, blinking owlishly at him, and she realized that somehow she'd managed to keep her glasses in spite of everything. That's good, she thought. I like these. They're really nice frames.
"For the Queen Consolidated system," Dr. Evil said acidly, his Russian accent comically thick. "I want your login and password."
"Oh," Felicity said, and a million thoughts went through her muddled head. How long was I out? Oliver might think I just went home, but no, he wouldn't, he'd be all worried if I didn't text, and he'd be blowing up my phone. Where's my phone? Probably still by the car. With blood. It feels like I'm bleeding. I bet I bled on the car. Well, at least the exterior will wash off easier than the interior. Oliver had better not ever be bleeding inside my car again. But he'll find my car if he comes looking...and the blood. Unless they dumped my car. No, they didn't, because if they did, I'm screwed, and I am so not being screwed. So Oliver will find it soon. Or he did already, if I'm lucky. "What time is it?" she asked.
The man's frown deepened. "Your login. And password."
Login. Password. I am not screwed. I am brilliant. Felicity frowned. "Um..."
"Leonid," the man said, and Felicity's world exploded into pain.
"She's not in her office," Digg said, studying the image from the surveillance cameras. "Or the elevators."
"What about her car?" Oliver said.
"Checking the parking garage now," Digg said, switching the feed. "Hang on... Her car's still there, but-"
"But what?" Oliver's voice said, muffled by the roar of the Ducati.
"So's her purse," Digg said, and he couldn't keep the fear out of his voice.
Oliver swore, and Digg saw him come into view on the screen, skidding to a stop next to Felicity's Mini. He knelt next to the rear bumper, picking up her purse, and then he reached out and touched the bumper.
"Oliver?" Digg said quietly.
"There's blood on the bumper, Digg," Oliver said, his voice barely audible.
"How much?"
"Not enough to kill her," Oliver said, but he didn't sound confident.
"I'm pulling up the last three hours of footage," Digg said, trying to remember how to do that and trying even harder not to think about who should be doing it instead of him.
Ow, Felicity thought again, but this time she knew why everything hurt. So now I know what it feels like to be tased. I don't like it much. Those guys on Cops always scream, and I thought they were just wusses, but it really hurts. Did I scream? I hope not. I don't want to sound like a wuss.
"The login," Dr. Evil said yet again.
Oh, I have definitely had better days. "If you'd...give me...a second," Felicity gasped. "I could..."
He looked at the man behind her and nodded.
"No!" Felicity said, turning to look at him. It was the guy whose nose she'd broken. He didn't look sympathetic. "Please...please don't..."
"Tell me what I want to know," Dr. Evil said.
Is it too soon? Felicity thought. Will he believe it if I tell him now? She swallowed hard.
And felt the searing pain of the taser in her side again.
She must have blacked out, because the next thing she was aware of was the men having a conversation on the other side of the room. She tried to stay still, but one of them must have noticed her move.
"Miss Smoak, I am getting impatient," Dr. Evil said, grabbing her chin and lifting her head, though he did it more slowly this time, and Felicity tried not to think about the sting of the acid soaking through her skirt.
Okay, I don't care if he buys it or not. I am not getting zapped again. "The...the login," Felicity said, her tongue feeling four sizes too big in her mouth, "it's...Smoak dot Felix. Like the cat."
"And your password?"
"Six—spelled out...s, i, x—exclamation point, p,k...ampersand, b, s, zero, m, g."
"Amper...?"
"Ampersand," Felicity said impatiently. "The thingie...on top of the 7." Please let this work like it's supposed to, she thought.
"That's my girl," Digg said, watching the surveillance feed as Felicity punched the guy trying to grab her. He winced as she fell against the car, her head bouncing off the bumper, and then crumpled bonelessly to the ground.
"What happened?" Oliver said.
"Two men grabbed her, about an hour and a half ago," Digg said. "But she made them pay for it. Remind me to never let her get a solid punch in on me." He watched as the two men picked her up, one holding his nose gingerly, the other limping badly as they loaded her into a van. "I think I can get a plate number. Hang on."
Oliver felt his phone vibrate as he paced beside Felicity's car, waiting for Digg to get him something from the video. He pulled out his phone, and his eyes widened. "Digg, I just got an email from Felicity."
"What?" Digg said. "Where is she?"
Oliver read, then smiled. "I'm forwarding it to you."
Digg pulled up the email and couldn't help but smile as he read it.
Oliver, if you're reading this, then somebody just logged into the QC network using my emergency login. That means something very bad is probably happening to me, because believe me, I wouldn't give that login to anybody just for kicks and grins. It doesn't even really go to the QC main network, just to a mirror network I set up with a bunch of fake stuff in it. Because, hello, Paranoid Girl! Anyway, please hurry up and find me, okay, because I'm getting scared just typing this. Just shut up and read, I'm about to tell you how, Impatient Boy...jeez...
Digg followed her instructions, opening a dizzying series of applications that he wouldn't have had a prayer of figuring out on his own, and within five minutes, he had a location for Oliver, a warehouse down by the docks. "I'll be there in ten," Digg said.
"No!" Oliver said, zooming out of the garage. "Get me anything you can on the warehouse. I can't go in there blind."
"You can't go in there without backup, either," Digg said.
"Yes, I can," Oliver said. "Just do it, Digg."
Digg grumbled audibly over the earpiece, but it sounded like he was staying put. "Okay, I've got a layout for you." He ran over it with Oliver as he approached the docks. "I really don't like this, Oliver."
"It's okay, Digg," Oliver said, pulling the Ducati up next to a police cruiser. "Felicity sent backup."
"Huh?"
"Hello, Detective Lance," Oliver said.
"You wanna tell me what this email is all about?" Lance said, waving his phone at Oliver. "What's Miss Smoak gotten herself into?"
It had been almost fifteen minutes since she'd given them the password-long enough for her to go through the Han and Leia parts of The Empire Strikes Back in her head in a failed effort to keep from freaking out—and they were still leaning intently over the computer. Hopefully, that meant the fake stuff she'd put in the mirror site was enough to fool them. Otherwise, she was back to being screwed.
Dr. Evil turned to look at her.
Okay, so I'm screwed, she thought. But at least I bought myself fifteen minutes. If these guys aren't smart enough to cover their tracks, which they can't be, because honestly, who doesn't know what an ampersand is? Certainly no hacker worth her salt, that's for sure-
"I am disappointed in you, Miss Smoak," Dr. Evil said.
"Seriously?" Felicity said. "You really need to watch some more movies. I'm thinking I'd start with Marathon Man, because at least that dialogue was interesting, and dentists are inherently scary-especially Nazi dentists-and Laurence Olivier could freaking act. But hell, you could do better even with some of the Bond—"
"Leonid," Dr. Evil snapped, cutting her off. "The taser."
"See, even that's silly," Felicity continued, suddenly unable to stop as she watched Broken Nose approach. "I mean, taser, laser, it's all too close. And the way you say it—taaaaaaaaser—"
"You have one more chance," Dr. Evil said, clearly ready to snap.
"What, to get you in so you can steal one...million...dollars?" Felicity said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "What is this all about, anyway? Because, honestly, I have had it up to here between my head and the zapping and the stupid, stupid—"
Dr. Evil lunged forward, grabbing the taser from Broken Nose, and turned to shove it against her, a snarl on his face-but before he could trigger it, an arrow plowed through his arm, pinning it to Broken Nose's thigh, and they both fell to the floor, writhing.
"Well, it's about time!" Felicity said over Broken Nose's screams.
Oliver landed with a whoosh next to her and sliced the zip ties with an arrow.
"Look out!" Felicity yelled as the remaining man aimed a very nasty-looking machine gun at them.
But before Oliver could do anything heroic, the man fell to the ground with Detective Lance standing over him holding his nightstick at the ready. "Are you all right, Miss Smoak?" he said.
Felicity let out a long, slow breath. "No," she said finally. "Not really."
Oliver leaned over her, brushing the hair out of her face, and the look on his face was heartbreaking. "You're bleeding."
"I thought so," Felicity said. "My head hurts. So does the rest of me." She wrinkled her nose. "I puked. Thank god I'm wearing my good und—" She stopped, for once able to cut off the thought before it came out. But apparently not soon enough, because Oliver was looking very, very intently at her forehead.
"You gotta get out of here," Detective Lance said, coming up and covering the two remaining Russians. "The cavalry's about to arrive."
"I'm not leaving her," Oliver said, and even through the voice distortion, he sounded sweet.
"I'll be okay," Felicity said, even though she wanted nothing more than to curl up in a ball with him holding her. But she could hear the sirens getting closer. "Go."
Oliver looked like he could have crushed concrete with his jaw at that moment, but he finally nodded. He stood up. "Thank you," he said to Lance.
"Just doin' my job," Lance said, smiling.
Oliver looked back down at her, still hesitating, then touched her cheek gently, turned, and was gone.
The aftermath was concrete proof that in spite of the Dr. Evil appearance, this was not a movie. In a movie, Oliver would have scooped her up and swept her off to the lair to doctor her himself, and she would have had the unmitigated joy of being held in his arms. And there would have been kissing. Lots of kissing.
Instead, she got a ride to the hospital with Detective Lance (very nice, but not on her kissable list) taking her statement on the way, followed by a long examination from a doctor with ridiculously bad bedside manner and unpleasant breath (oh, sooooo not kissable) who told her that she couldn't have the good pain meds because she had a concussion, so all she got was acetaminophen.
And no Oliver.
She fell asleep while the doctor was still being obnoxious, which shouldn't have been a surprise to anybody. But sometime later, she jolted awake because someone had taken her hand.
"Shh, go back to sleep," Oliver said. "It's okay, you're safe."
"Oliver?"
"I'm sorry I woke you," he said. "I had to go...change, and you were asleep when I got here."
"Where's Digg?"
"He's talking to the doctor," Oliver said, and something about his expression told her he had about the same opinion of the doctor as she did.
"Oh," Felicity said.
"Go back to sleep," Oliver said, stroking her hair, which felt nice. Really nice.
"I'm really tired, Oliver," she said.
"Which is why I want you to sleep," Oliver said, smiling faintly.
"Tasers really hurt," she said. "I don't recommend them."
"I'll remember that," Oliver said, and though he tried to keep his tone light, he had his grrrr face on.
"I'm okay," Felicity said, patting his arm with her free hand, and realizing as she did that he hadn't let go of her hand. Or stopped stroking her hair. Which was really, really nice.
"I'm so sorry—"
"What did Dr. Evil want?" she cut in to keep him from diving into guilt.
"Dr. Evil?" Oliver said blankly.
"Oh, come on, I know you saw Austin Powers—that was like, fifteen years ago," Felicity said.
"I know Austin Powers—oh, you mean the guy that took you," Oliver said. He smiled. "I thought you meant the doctor here."
"He's not very nice either, but I wouldn't call him that," Felicity said seriously. "So what did he want?"
"An algorithm," Oliver said, looking confused. "I think. Something to do with encryption?"
"Oh," Felicity said. "Well, I guess that's better than one million dollars."
"Severin in Applied Sciences seemed to think so," Oliver agreed. "He said it was about to be a game changer in satellite phones. It'll make us a bundle."
"So I got kidnapped by Motorola?" Felicity said.
"No," Oliver said. "Motorola wouldn't be stupid enough to mess with you." He squeezed her hand. "You were amazing today."
Felicity waved her free hand dismissively. "I'm amazing every day," she said. "You just don't notice."
"Yes, I do," Oliver said. "But today was exceptional."
"Today I had to get rescued. Again," Felicity said, finding it harder and harder to keep her eyes open with Oliver stroking her hair like that.
"Don't do that," Oliver said, frowning.
"Do what?" Felicity said, blinking tiredly and wishing she had her glasses on so she could see his expression better.
"I didn't rescue you," Oliver said. "You rescued yourself. And covered my back while doing it. I don't know how you did it, but that email was brilliant."
Felicity blushed. "Yeah...well, if you ever need to take somebody out with an email, I'm your girl."
"You're always my girl," Oliver said, and there was something odd about his tone.
"No, I'm not," Felicity said, her temper flaring again. "Not always."
"Felicity," Oliver said, and there were those seizing marshmallows again. "I'm really sorry about today."
"I don't like her," Felicity blurted.
"I know," Oliver said, and his hand stopped stroking her hair.
"She's not good for you, Oliver. And she's always getting into trouble, and you don't see her sending out brilliant emails, do you? No, she's siccing the police on you, after everything you've done for her, and it just makes me crazy—"
"Felicity—"
"—that she could be so oblivious—I mean, it's not like you're hiding your identity all that well. Seriously, you go to the trouble to disguise your voice, but that jaw that could cut diamonds is still out there for all the world to see, even with the hood, and there's no hood covering that spectacular ass, and—oh, 3, 2, 1..." She closed her eyes, blushing deeply. "It's the drugs, okay?"
"They gave you acetaminophen," Oliver said.
"That's a narcotic."
"It's Tylenol."
"Which is like a narcotic."
"You like my ass."
"Also like a narcotic...and I really, really need to sleep now."
"Which is what I keep telling you," Oliver said, and it was all okay because his hand was on her cheek now, his thumb moving gently across her cheekbone, which was even better than him stroking her hair. She leaned into it, giving a faint hum of pleasure, and she couldn't have opened her eyes if she'd tried.
So maybe the day wasn't so bad after all, she thought dimly as she fell asleep.