A/N: Hi there! I'm fairly new to writing fanfiction. I was debating to write this for a long time, but I eventually decided to go for it! So here it is. Please let me know what you think. I've rated this story M for sexual content, drugging, and language. If this is not for you, please don't read.

I have read other stories with the same theme, and they inspired me to write my own take on the idea. So thank you to all the other writers who inspired this story!

Disclaimer: I do not own Arrow or any of the characters.

The Fire Inside: Chapter 1

The pounding bass of whatever song that was playing wasn't working as efficiently to block out the past week as the alcohol was. She was on her third drink of something and she was pretty drunk, but not nearly as drunk as she'd hoped. Felicity had had one of her shittier months ever. And it was only Friday night. Between trying to balance her day job and her night job, Slade coming back from the apparently not-so-dead dead, Isabitch Rochev being completely not who they thought she was, her being used as bait and stabbing a super soldier in the neck, ruining her favourite blouse yesterday, and breaking one of her heels today, not to mention the city was burning only fourteen days ago, Felicity figured she was long overdue for drink or five. She almost laughed at the fact that the clubs in Starling were up and running already. People and their idiotic, desperate need for normalcy, she thought while rolling her eyes. Sitting on the bar stool in a random club near her apartment - she flat-out refused to go to Verdant - Felicity felt oddly out of place. She was just as drunk as most of the people here, wearing the same bright clothes as them and listening to the same music as them, but even in her intoxicated state she knew that she didn't and never would fit in with this crowd.

Turning to the bartender, she asked for her fourth drink. Felicity had never liked feeling excluded, not in second grade when the other girls wouldn't let her play with them and not in eleventh grade when all the girls were getting boyfriends and she wasn't. When a different bartender handed her her drink, she downed quickly before receiving another. For another twenty minutes, Felicity sat there sipping on her drink before she got tired of the loud music, sweaty people and sleazy men. She fumbled through her purse looking for her wallet. After paying for her multitude of drinks, she turned to the dance floor.

Almost immediately, she was swallowed up by a crowd of sweaty, drunken people with their hands in the air. The people around her were grinding on each other, women scantily clad in dresses that barely covered their butts, pressed into the bodies of the men and few women closest to them. It was then that Felicity started to feel it. The feeling of complete, carefree ecstasy hit her hard. She threw her hands up in the air and joined in with the mass of people. She felt a body behind her, and following the example of the people around her, she pressed against it and swayed her hips. Screw what her ex-boyfriends thought, she could be sexy when she wanted too. It was as if nothing mattered to her anymore. Who cared about work and Arrow business and broken heels? Felicity was finally feeling happy and not stressed. And damn, it felt good.

After almost a half hour of dancing and carelessness, she remembered the conversation she had with Oliver and Diggle two evenings ago.

*2 nights ago*

Oliver slammed his bow down on the shiny metal table, as Felicity spun around in her chair and jumped at the loud sound it made.

"Anything?" she asked.

"Nothing! The only thing we know is what the drug has been nicknamed. I spent hours trying to scare the lowlifes into giving me information but we got nothing, not even a name or alias. Of all the people I talked to, not one of them knew anything. How is that even possible?" Oliver was beyond frustrated.

"Something will happen, Oliver." Diggle replied. "People make mistakes, and a name will turn up."

"Well, actually, I think I just found something." Felicity informed the two men standing behind her. "There was a women admitted to Starling General Hospital about an hour ago, with extensive damage to her reproductive system."

"Okay, and how does that relate to this drug that's apparently called Fire?" Oliver asked.

"She was found to have the same drug in her body that the women from three nights ago did as well as the same one the woman from last night did. Those women weren't just some unlucky victims who happened to be taking drugs as well. The drugs in their systems caused this. Oliver, Digg, this isn't just some drug like Vertigo. It's a date-rape drug."

"Okay, so we really need to find this drug and cut it off at the roots." said Oliver.

"The supplier." Diggle offered.

"Exactly." Oliver answered. "Felicity, what do we have to go on?"

"Well, according to the first victim's medical file, she said that it started with euphoria. She felt carefree and excited, like nothing could take away her happiness. And then from there, it went straight to lust. And apparently, the extensive damage to her uterus was due to her inability to quell the feeling. Fire blocks out your ability to think clearly, while amplifying your pleasurable feelings. It leaves you in a constant state of arousal so essentially, if you have some way to um, release or quell the lust, you should be okay. Unfortunately, this woman didn't, and now she has damaged reproductive systems."

"Okay, so start with clubs. That's where she was before this happened, right?" Diggle suggested.

As soon as the conversation came to mind, Felicity started to panic. Because with the memory, also came the lust, and it came in waves. She took a deep breath, and stumbled her way to the exit, trying to force her way through the throngs of sweaty people. The alcohol was doing absolutely nothing to subdue the intense desire she was feeling, and she could already feel the arousal between her legs.

Once she was on the sidewalk, breathing in the fresh air rather than the heavy smell of cheap perfume, alcohol, and sweaty bodies, she began looking for her cab money before realizing that in her current drunken state she had paid the bartender with her cab money. A string of curse words left her mouth before she pulled her phone out and typed in Oliver's number. The lust was getting unbearable now, and she desperately needed to get home before she did something supremely embarrassing.

"Hello?"

"Oliver, thank god!"

"Felicity? Are you okay?"

"Not really. Can you come pick me up?" She asked him, after reciting her address to him. "I think I've been drugged."

"Tell me it's not…"

"I think it is Oliver." She was crying now.

"Oh, God. I'm on my way right now Felicity. I'm bringing the car not the Ducati, so you can sit comfortably. Hang in there."

"Okay." She mumbled.

"Felicity? Has anyone tried to do anything, um, inappropriate—"

"No, not if you don't count drugging me." Oliver let out a sigh of relief upon hearing that. He'd never left the foundry so fast. Seconds later, he was dashing up the stairs and into Verdant where things were in full swing. People were dressed in bright colours and high heels. The music was blaring and people were enjoying themselves. Suddenly the club scene didn't seem as appealing as it once had now that he held the knowledge that one of his best friends, the women he was in love with — although it's not like she knew that — was drugged in a place exactly the same as this. Just because Verdant had a different name than the place that Felicity was at didn't mean that it was any better. He knew Thea tried her best to prevent it, but the guys who did things like this, knew the tricks. God, even he knew the tricks. It's not like he would ever do that to a woman, but he used to frequent the club scene almost every night. It was impossible not to pick up on a few things, even if he was seven sheets to the wind.

As he sped around the corner, he came face to face with his sister, who seemed quite surprised to see him. "Woah." She said. "Where's the fire?"

"No fire. I just—I have to, I have to go Thea." He replied.

"Are you sure? Your appearance around here wouldn't go unnoticed and you kind of need it."

"Thea! I have to go! A friend of mine, she called, she was—is—" Oliver was cut off by Thea's angry remark.

"Oh so it's a booty call, huh? I thought those days were over Ollie?"

"Thea—" Oliver tried to interrupt.

"Apparently not, if you're still abandoning responsibility!"

"Felicity could never be a booty call, Thea!" Oliver exploded, before taking a breath and trying to get a hold on his anger. "And for your information, she's been drugged and called me for help."

Oliver turned sharply on his heel and navigated his way out of the packed club, pushing people around only a little bit, and only if they were in his way. That certainly stopped her rant in it's tracks and gave him time to make his getaway.

As he sped down abandoned streets, trying to leave Felicity in the cold for as little time as possible, he felt the anger course through his veins. The more he though about it, the more he felt the need to call Diggle, and ask him to pick up Felicity so he could turn around, grab his leathers and spend the entire night tracking the bastard who did this, just to empty his quiver into that son of bitch. But just as soon as the thought entered his mind, he pushed it the back of his brain. She had called him for a reason, so it was him who had to pick her up. He couldn't just send someone else in his place. That's not what friends do, that's not what he does. Oliver pushed those thoughts to the back of his brain, and pressed down harder on the gas pedal.

A/N: Please review and let me know what you thought! I'll be posting the second chapter soon. :)

— EC