A/N: Holy Incredible Response, Batman! I know, I know, that's a Batman/Robin thing but as far as I'm aware, Green Arrow doesn't have a catch cry… but hey, I kept it in the DC world, that's something, right? Although I do feel a little whorish as I've gone steady with the Marvel word with some of my other stories. Now I'm going out with Marvel's brother/arch nemesis, DC… it's going to make the next family get together pretty awkward… at least until Uncle Frank gets into the homemade beer he brewed in his bathtub. After that, it's pretty much just everyone trying to keep him away from small animals and open flames.
I was blown away by the epic response to my first chapter – you're all chock full of creamy fabulousness, deep fried in awesomeness and rolled in sugary amazingness… bottom line, you're my cardiologist's worst nightmare… but that only makes me love you all the more. 3 I won't tell Dr Chin if you don't… we can be each other's dirty little secret. ;) Mmm… life-shortening secret pacts…
The only trouble now is that I feel pressure to actually produce the goods… dang, did not see that one coming! Consequently, I'm not that thrilled with this chapter. It has a fair bit of exposition, moving the story along but I feel like something is missing… only I don't know what… which makes it particularly difficult to look for it… the missing thing, I mean. But never mind, if my fad dieting experiences have taught me anything, it's to use that block of chocolate as a paddle to eat the last of the Chunky Monkey ice cream directly out of the carton (bowls trap calories, from the carton is way better, everyone knows that) and then get back into the diet the next day like the piranha-like feeding frenzy of the night before never happened. Meaning, I'll try and do better in Chapter Three… I have some fun ideas and you'll be thrilled to know that only half of them revolve around urine… yes, I am not a one trick pony… I can diversify when it comes to bodily functions. Speaking of which, as I typed that, my little Silky Terrier, Mabel, who is asleep beside me, just passed gas (possibly mustard gas, mental note, must review what I'm feeding her… my eyes are stinging, silent but deadly indeed), as though on cue. Sure, I can't teach her to sit, come or any of those common place tricks but if Crufts ever starts a flatulence category to their esteemed dog show, we're in with a real chance!
Hmm… wander a little off topic there… what was I talking about? Never mind, I'm sure it wasn't important. But, let's crack on with the next chapter while we're here, eh? I'll see you at the end, we'll chat and besides, I've got to return some of the stuff I boosted from your room in the first chapter. Turns out it doesn't go with any of my decore. Bummer.
CHAPTER TWO
Diggle looked up as Oliver walked into his office and just stood there. He arched an eyebrow at his friend. "There you are. Did you forget I'm meant to be driving you to that meeting up town this afternoon?"
"I didn't forget," said Oliver distractedly.
Diggle looked him over. "What's wrong?"
"That's a great question," said Oliver flatly.
"Do I get a great answer in reply?"
"I was sitting at my desk and notice Felicity was gone from hers."
"I guess that's the benefit of glass walls between you two," noted Diggle.
"She was gone for over half an hour."
"Okay."
"I went looking for her and found her in the photocopying room."
Diggle made a face. "The beginning of your story was intriguing but if I'm honest, the ending was a bit of a letdown."
"Diggle, she was asleep."
"In the photocopying room?"
"On the photocopier," Oliver corrected him.
Diggle frowned. "What does that mean?"
"I mean she was bent over on the thing, face down, fast asleep, standing up." Oliver waved his hand around, still not quite sure he'd seen what he'd seen. "You know, like a horse."
"Horses aren't big on photocopying." Diggle made a pawing motion with his hand. "It's the hooves, can't operate the buttons."
Oliver scowled at his flippancy. "I meant the standing up sleeping thing. Don't you think that's weird?"
"I think it's weird that you're stalking Felicity," observed Diggle.
Oliver sent him an annoyed look. "I'm not stalking, Felicity."
"How many other places did you check before you ended up in the photocopier room?"
"Two," said Oliver shortly and then relented when Diggle just stared him down. "Okay, fine, seven."
"Was one of those places the lady's room?"
Oliver glared at him. "She could have fallen or something," he said defensively.
"Is that something we have to worry about now? Felicity falling and not being able to get back up?" asked Diggle in consternation.
"I don't know, maybe," said Oliver in exasperation. "She's currently sleeping on a photocopier. Something is wrong with her."
"Something is wrong with you that you feel the need to track her every movement."
"That is not what I'm doing," snapped Oliver. "My assistant goes missing for half a day, I'm going to go and look for her."
"I thought you said it was half an hour."
"It took me half an hour to find her. So that makes an hour."
Diggle folded his arms in front of his chest. "Two things. First of all, you really suck at hide and seek, never take it up professionally."
Oliver glared at him.
"Two, an hour is not half a day, at least, not on this planet."
"You know what I mean," said Oliver in irritation. "Felicity hasn't been herself lately. She's always tired. Don't tell me you haven't noticed."
Diggle gave a little shrug. "She's given up coffee. Maybe that's it, misses the caffeine boost."
"How much was she having that she now sleeps standing up without it?" asked Oliver in annoyance.
"I don't think that's a permanent thing on Felicity's behalf. The sleeping standing up stuff, I mean. I'm sure she normally sleeps in a bed, lying down."
Oliver wasn't convinced. "Has she said anything to you?"
"About what?"
"I don't know," said Oliver in frustration. "Anything."
Diggle thought for a moment. "She was thinking of getting more blonde highlights put into her hair."
Oliver look was full of annoyance. "How is that helpful?"
"You said anything."
"Anything which will tell me what is wrong with her," bit out Oliver.
"Personally, I don't think that there is anything wrong with Felicity but if you do, why don't you ask her yourself?" Diggle glanced at his watch. "But it's going to have to wait until you get back from that meeting. If we don't leave now, we're never going to make it through traffic in time."
Oliver made a little grunt of acknowledgement, not really in the mood for a business meeting but knowing he really didn't have a choice. "Fine, let's go." He turned and headed towards the door.
Diggle was right behind him. "Oh, and what happened to the BMW? There is a big chunk taken out of its front bumper."
"There was an incident," said Oliver vaguely.
"Felicity said you pulled out into traffic without looking."
Oliver side eyed him. "Why did you ask if you already knew the answer?"
Diggle smiled. "I just like hearing you admit to screwing things up now and then. It warms the cockles of my heart."
"Your cockles aren't my concern," he said in ire. "And it wasn't my fault. Felicity distracted me."
"A recurring theme of late, it seems." Diggle jerked his head towards the other end of the corridor. "The garage is this way."
Oliver glared at him and turned around, heading back towards the other man. "I know that. I was just—"
"Taking a run up at it?" offered up Diggle innocently.
"If you can't be helpful, can you at least be silent?" muttered Oliver as he joined Diggle in the elevator.
Diggle just smiled as the elevator doors closed. "Now, where is the fun in that?"
#
Two hours later Oliver was back in the office and standing in front of Felicity's desk which Felicity was actually at this time. However, she was fast asleep again. Oliver stared at the top of her blonde head and just knew something wasn't right. He opened his mouth to say her name but the phone rang instead.
Felicity jerked awake and automatically reached for the phone. "Oliver Queen's aaarrkk!" She gave a little squawk of surprise at seeing him standing right in front of her. Felicity pushed up her glasses and glared up at him. "You scared me." Her attention was back on the caller. "Sorry, no, not you, Mr. Styles. Yes, he's in, I'll put you right through." Felicity pressed the on hold button. "It's your accountant. I'll put it through to your desk."
"Tell him I'll call him back."
"But you're standing right here."
"I'll call him back."
Felicity gave up. She took the call off hold. "I'm sorry, Mr. Styles but Mr. Queen is busy right now. Can I take a message? Okay, I'll let him know." Felicity looked up at him. "Your accountant called," she said flatly.
"Felicity, can I talk to you?"
She hesitated. "Isn't that what we're doing now?"
"You were asleep at your desk."
"No, I wasn't, I was just thinking," said Felicity quickly.
"You were snoring."
"No, I wasn't!" she gasped and then grimaced. "Was I?"
"It was more of a gentle buzzing but it was definitely a noise someone who is awake doesn't make." Oliver looked at her intently. "You want to tell me what is going on?"
"I was proof reading financial reports." Felicity screwed up her face. "It's like a general anesthesia – everything goes black and suddenly you're asleep. It's like the ultimate cure for insomnia."
Oliver might have believed her story if he hadn't already caught Felicity napping several times over the last week or so. He stared at her, willing her to tell him the truth but Felicity just kept looking up at him expectantly.
"Was there anything else you needed?" she asked brightly.
"Why don't you take the night off tonight?" said Oliver, trying another tack. "We've all been working hard lately and I think we deserve a break. The Arrow stuff can wait a night."
"Okay, sure," said Felicity. "Sounds good. I could do with a night in."
Oliver smiled pleasantly. "Me too." He turned and walked back to his office. Okay, the direct approach hadn't worked, time for Plan B.
#
Hours later, Oliver was sitting in his parked car. He pulled out his cell phone and dialed.
"Hello?"
"Hey Felicity, it's me."
"Oliver, is something wrong? Do you need me to come in?"
"No," he said quickly, "everything's fine. I was just ringing to see how your night off was going."
"Oh," said Felicity in surprise, "it's going fine."
"What are you doing?"
"I'm just eating a pizza and watching a movie."
"At home?"
Felicity laughed. "Yes, the neighbors get weird when I do it at their place."
Oliver looked up at the darkened windows which belonged to Felicity's apartment. He'd been parked in her street for twenty minutes and there hadn't been any sign of life inside. "I guess they would." Oliver's pleasant tone belied his stony expression. She was lying to him. Felicity was lying to him. "What's the movie?"
"Oh, umm, Die Hard, the third one, I think. I don't know, they all kinda looked the same after the first one to me."
"Well, I'll leave you to your evening. Get some rest, I'll see you tomorrow."
"Okay, see you tomorrow."
Oliver hung up and expelled a long breath. So, if Felicity wasn't at home, then where was she and what was she doing that she felt she had to lie to him about it? Oliver's jaw hardened. He didn't like this, not one little bit and he was going to get to the bottom of what exactly Felicity was keeping from him.
#
The following night, Oliver was hanging upside down from a metal bar and doing mid-air sit ups. An upside down Felicity kept coming into his line of vision every time he released the stomach crunch. She was working at her computer, her back to him. Oliver swapped his hold on the bar, now moving into position to do chin ups. "You know," he puffed, a little out of breath from his work out, "nothing is really going on tonight. You should take an early night."
Felicity twisted in her seat and looked up at him as he continued his reps. "Two early nights in a row," she remarked teasingly. "What is the world coming to?"
Oliver hung from the bar and looked down at her. "We may as well take advantage of the quiet times when we can," he observed. "Diggle is doing recon on the Russians tonight, strictly observation only. There isn't much else for us to do."
"You going home too?"
Oliver dropped from the bar and landed deftly on his feet. "I'm going to get a little target practice in and then head off."
"Alright, you don't need me for that." Felicity stood up and grabbed her coat and bag.
Oliver couldn't help but notice how eager she seemed to be to leave.
Felicity smiled at him as she walked by. "Don't stay too long. I know how you get with you and your bow and arrows."
"I'll just put in an hour or so," said Oliver easily as he walked over to pick up his bow and quiver and started to aim a series of arrows at the back wall where he'd marked out a target. "Goodnight."
"Night, Oliver," said Felicity, as she walked up the stairs.
Oliver kept firing arrows until he couldn't hear her footsteps anymore and then he immediately dropped his bow and raced to grab his shirt and jacket. He leapt up the side of the wall and up onto the window ledge, peering out onto the street below. Oliver watched Felicity climb into her car and drive off to the end of the alleyway and then, instead of taking a left which would have her heading in the direction of her apartment, she turned right. He jumped down from the window and outside onto the concrete and ran to a row of trash cans. Oliver wheeled out the motor bike he'd stashed away behind them earlier that day and jumped on, pulling on the helmet which had been hanging over the handle bars. He started up the bike and took off down the alleyway, following Felicity's path.
Oliver followed Felicity's car at a safe distance, weaving in amongst the night traffic. They were heading to a seedier side of town, even worse than where the Foundry was located. It wasn't long before they were in an area famous for brothels, bars and generalized bad behavior. Oliver scowled behind his helmet. What could Felicity possibly be doing in a place like this? He watched her car up ahead as it pulled off into a side alley. Oliver parked his bike across the street and watched her get out of the car. She walked out onto the street and made a beeline for the entrance of the business next door to the alley. "She's not going in there," he muttered to himself. But then Felicity smiled at the large man working the door and then disappeared inside. Oliver blinked. Did he just watch Felicity Smoak go into the Fallen Angel, one of the more infamous strip clubs of Starling City? Oliver blinked again. Maybe she was lost and asking for directions? It was a faint hope and Oliver clung to it for dear life because he couldn't think of any other good reason for Felicity to be in a strip club except for the one he refused to think about.
#
Oliver stood in his office, staring out with unseeing eyes at the cityscape below him as Diggle gave him a rundown of the last few days of his surveillance.
"The main guy, Petrov, he seems to be the one who is running the show but he is definitely getting his orders from higher up," recounted Diggle as he flipped through his notes. "The guy has a lot of protection on him at all times but I get a definite middle management feeling from him. I think it's probably better to wait and work out who his boss is before we make any kind of move, know what we're dealing with before jumping in. He's got this girlfriend who might be a way in, she doesn't have as much security on her—"
Oliver listened to Diggle's running commentary without really taking anything in. After sitting outside the Fallen Angel for four hours the other night before Felicity had reappeared, Oliver had been forced to abandon his asking for directions theory. His next theory was that it was just a one off and maybe she was visiting an old school friend or something but the last three nights he'd followed her to the club and spent multiple hours waiting for Felicity to reemerge. The friend angle seemed less than plausible after that. Another theory shot down. Oliver was well aware he was circling around the most obvious reason Felicity would be frequenting a strip club because his brain literally couldn't go there. It was ridiculous and impossible and Felicity would never do what he was determined never to think about.
"There is a series of dry cleaning businesses which I think are being used as fronts too—" Diggle looked up from his notes to see Oliver still staring out the window.
"Uh huh," grunted Oliver distractedly.
Diggle pursed his lips and looked Oliver over. "Yeah, turns out it's a front for ferret racing, that's a huge thing in Russia. They use gerbils as the jockeys, think they staple the little guys on to keep them on the ferret's backs. It's kinda cruel, but damn if their little jockey outfits aren't as cute as hell."
"I see," murmured Oliver, hands in his pockets and still staring blankly down at the city below.
Diggle widened his stance and folded his arms in front of his chest, lips twisting. "Oh yeah, it's a huge business. You should see some of the guys coming into throw down some serious money on those little furry bastards. Why, in one night I saw Hillary Clinton, Kanyae West and Kermit the Frog go through the door. I think I was most surprised to see Santa Claus there though, but then when I thought about it, the guy only has one gig a year, so I can see him having a lot of free time on his hands for the rest of the year. Why not spend some of that time betting on ferrets with gerbils stapled to their backs, right? Who am I to judge?"
"Right," said Oliver absently and then he suddenly turned his head and looked intently at Diggle. "What was that about judging?"
"Oh, you're back with me, are you?" asked Diggle dryly. "I was beginning to think I was going to have to set something alight to get your attention."
"I was paying attention," said Oliver shortly. He scowled. "Did you say something about gerbils?"
Diggle rolled his eyes. "Oliver, what is going on with you lately?"
"Nothing," said Oliver, turning away from the window and facing the other man.
"Is it about Felicity?"
Oliver's scowl deepened. "No, why would it be about Felicity? Wait, did she say something to you?"
"About what? You being all vague and distracted all of a sudden?"
"That's not what I'm being," said Oliver shortly. He hesitated. "Why? Did she say I was vague and distracted?"
"No, I said that," said Diggle wryly, "just then, try and keep up." He smiled sweetly at Oliver. "But if you really want to know what Felicity is thinking about you, I can pass her a note in gym class."
"Everyone's a comedian all of a sudden," said Oliver flatly. "This is no joking matter."
"What isn't? I thought you said nothing was wrong."
"It isn't," said Oliver quickly. He couldn't tell Diggle about Felicity's late night adventures, not until he'd figured them out for himself.
"Just like nothing is wrong with Felicity either, huh?"
"What makes you think something is wrong with Felicity?" asked Oliver sharply. He gave Diggle a hard look. Could Felicity have already confided in Diggle about what she was doing? Why would she tell Diggle and not him and why wouldn't Diggle tell him if he knew Felicity was doing something dangerous? Oliver's head was starting to hurt as all the questions chased themselves around in his head.
"It was probably the conversation we had where you said you thought something was wrong with Felicity," said Diggle wryly. "Although, I gotta say, I'm a bit more worried about you then her right now."
"I'm fine," snapped Oliver. "There is nothing wrong with me."
"You know you missed shaving half your beard today, right?"
Oliver put a quick hand up to his face and felt a large patch of bristles along one jawline. "Damn it!" He glared at Diggle. "Why didn't you tell me sooner?"
"I thought you were going for a new look," said Diggle innocently. "Don't worry about it, you're ridiculously rich, sporting half a beard makes you delightfully quirky as opposed to, you know, homeless guy living in a box."
Oliver growled his disapproval and stalked off to his adjoining executive bathroom, looking for the electric razor he kept there.
Diggle followed him, lounging against the bathroom wall and watching Oliver quickly shaving off the offending stubble. "You know, I don't think you should be out on the street while you're like this. Maybe you should hang up your hood for the next couple of days until you've got all your ducks in a row again?"
"My ducks are in a row," ground out Oliver. Except for one little duck who had taken up frequenting strip joints. Oliver's hand tightened on the razor. There had to be a logical explanation for all of this. He was just missing something obvious.
Diggle sighed heavily. "Look, Oliver, I don't' know what is going on with you but your head is definitely not in the game and that worries me."
"I'm fine," said Oliver shortly, throwing down his razor and walking back out of the bathroom.
"You and I have very different interpretations of that word."
Oliver turned to face him. "We need to keep on this Russian thing. That's a priority. I'm handling the Felicity thing."
"There is a Felicity thing now?" asked Diggle in consternation.
"No, of course not," said Oliver hastily. "I just meant that we all need to be working on this together, as a team. I'll come out with you tonight, see what we can dig up."
Diggle didn't look enthused about the idea. "Maybe I should go alone?"
"I've got this, I know what I'm doing." At least out on the streets Oliver felt in charge of the situation. On the domestic front he was a little more at sea. But then, why was he letting this bother him so much? Felicity was a grown woman, she was free to make her own choices in life, who was he to judge? If Felicity had business at a strip club, what was that to him? They were all good questions but the bottom line was that it did matter to Oliver. He had to find out what Felicity was doing with her nights when she wasn't with him and why. Until he did, Oliver was beginning to realize he wasn't going to have a clear thought in his head, despite his protestations to Diggle.
"Famous last words if ever I heard them," said Diggle in exasperation.
Oliver wasn't fazed. On the street, wearing the hood, he knew what he was doing. It was familiar and brought an odd kind of comfort to him. Navigating relationships with people, that was the tricky and dangerous thing in his mind. A night spent doing something he didn't have to think about would give him a welcome break from worrying about Felicity. Plus, he knew Felicity wouldn't go anywhere while he and Diggle were out in the field and Oliver intended to make it a long night, so there would be no opportunity for Felicity to go anywhere afterwards. His plan was a win/win one. Oliver felt confident he had all the angles covered. Nothing was going to go wrong, he was sure of it.
Famous last words indeed.
A/N: So, anyone got any theories as to what Felicity is up to? Could Oliver's worst fears be confirmed? Would I do something like that to our good girl Felicity? I just drew eyebrows on my other dog, Tilly-Pearl, while she was sleeping – I have no boundaries or moral compass, so you know I would! Hope to see you all in the next chapter where I can promise partial nudity… now, whether it will be mine or someone in the story… only one way to find out. ;)
