"Second upstairs sweep is done," announced Felicity, entering the kitchen where Oliver and Diggle had placed the surveillance tech the three of them had found and promptly deactivated. "The hallway, office and two bedrooms were still the only spaces hit. All clear down here?"

Diggle nodded. "We ended up with twelve pieces altogether, mainly audio." He picked up one of the bugs with a gloved hand to inspect. "I thought the paparazzi thrived on their incriminating images?"

"The sound could be incriminating enough," said Oliver sullenly. "If we spoke about anything Arrow-related then all hell's going to break loose. Not to mention what the local law enforcement will have to say." He closed his eyes and tried not to sigh. "Lance is going to kill me isn't he?"

"I don't think you'll have to wear your 'I'm the Hood, ask me how!' button just yet," said Felicity, pulling back a chair to sit down. "I've been trying to remember all of our chit-chat in here and I think we've been pretty good at keeping the foundry shop talk at the shop."

"Except for William Tockman," Oliver reminded her gently, but he was happy to note that the name didn't affect her as much as it had previously.

"True, but that was in the theater which was thankfully bug-free… alas sadly not Stallone-free," she remarked, opening her laptop to start searching for more mentions of them in the news. "I just think that if there was anything truly salacious recorded about your night-time activities then it would have been published already. That's probably why they went with the pregnancy angle."

"Initiated by a night-time activity in its own right it would seem," noted Digg, responding to his colleagues' withering stares with an innocent look.

Felicity scrolled through more links. "You're lucky this child isn't real or Uncle John would definitely be on diaper duty," she muttered.

"We should try and track down whatever data was collated from the gear, just to be sure," said Oliver, taking a seat across from Felicity. "And I'll need to change the passcode for the elevator too."

Diggle rested against the island bench. "Who else has access to the code besides us?"

"The hotel manager," Oliver mused, "a few cleaners, the family chefs…"

The sound of keyboard clicking stopped as Felicity gaped at him. "Oh my God, it must have been Benny," she exclaimed. "I ran into him in the foyer last night because he said he was dropping off more food supplies. But I'm guessing you never asked for an extra delivery did you?" She contorted her face in disgust as Oliver shook his head. "Ugh! That sneaky, untrustworthy, polite bastard!"

"Looks like we'll be paying him a little visit this morning," said Oliver. "Felicity can you bring up his home address please; last name Hendrix."

"Done and done," she replied, locating the information and syncing it up to her phone for the GPS coordinates. "Just to be clear," she said, as Oliver stood, "this isn't a 'go in with arrows blazing' visit, right? More like an 'Oliver Queen is not amused' type thing?"

"If we have to use a name then yes, the second one." He took out a container from one of the drawers and swept the bugs into it. "Less chance of arousing suspicions that way."

"Speaking of," Diggle piped up, "when I got here earlier there were a crowd of photographers camped outside the hotel waiting for you two 'lovebirds' to emerge from your nest." He fished around in his pocket for his keys. "Is there another way out of here where I can meet you with the car?"

Oliver frowned in thought. "If we weren't in daylight we could have used a zip line from the roof."

"Yeah, great idea," Felicity laughed as she packed up her computer, her smile fading when Oliver's expression didn't change. "Hang on, you were actually serious weren't you?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

She opened her mouth to respond but quickly changed her mind. "You know what? Nevermind. Far be it for me to argue with a superhero about his mode of transportation." She walked out of the kitchen with the men following.

"… I guess we could go via the staff entryway," Oliver's voice said from behind her.

Felicity affectionately rolled her eyes at his dejected tone. "If you're good I'll jump off a building with you another time, OK?"

The cracking sound of bamboo sticks locked in combat met the trio's ears as they made their way down the foundry stairs a few hours later. Sara and Roy lowered their weapons, putting a halt on their workout to welcome Oliver and Felicity with a smattering of applause.

"I hear congratulations are in order, mom and dad," said Sara, swapping a smirk with Diggle as the 'parents' in question sighed in unison. "Do you know what you're having yet?"

"Whatever it is I hope it gets Blondie's IQ level," said Roy, wiping a slick of sweat off his forehead as Oliver glowered at him. "And your sunshine-fuelled personality of course," he mocked, twirling the bamboo at him with a flourish.

Oliver rewarded him with a sarcastic smile before effortlessly knocking the stick out of Roy's hands.

"Who needs fake children when we're already running a day-care center right here?" stated Felicity, taking a seat in front of her computers.

Sara plonked herself on the desk, glancing at the grey flash drive Felicity took out of her purse. "Where have you been anyway? Playing hide and seek from the paparazzi?"

"We were also tracking down the asshole who bugged us," said Oliver, pulling up a chair to join them.

"Turns out it wasn't the butler who did it," said Felicity, plugging in the USB. "More like Benny the personal chef, in the penthouse kitchen with the surveillance gear."

"Did he just confess outright?" asked Roy, slipping his shirt back over his head.

Diggle snorted. "Not exactly. We discovered that Felicity here is pretty good at playing bad cop when the situation calls for it."

"You don't screw with the WiFi puppet master," Felicity boasted before fighting off a shiver. "Unless the puppets turn out to be those creepy ventriloquist dolls. Or marionettes, they're nightmare-inducing too." She cringed. "Can I change my ranking and be the WiFi ringmaster instead?"

Oliver placed a hand on her shoulder. "If you keep getting results like today you can be whatever you like," he said with an entertained smile.

"So what was Benny's deal?" asked Sara. "Career criminal or one-off douchebag?"

Felicity clicked through a few of the labelled folders stored on the device. "Well after my threats he sang like a canary." She threw an apologetic glance at her friend. "Sorry. Do you get that a lot? You must get that a lot. Anyway," she continued, "we found out that our chef had been cooking up some pretty nasty debts, so he was offered this job as a way to repay them."

"Did you get a name out of him?" said Roy.

"He was dealing with someone via text that he only knew as 'X' – original," Oliver sniffed in contempt. "Mr or Mrs X had already told him to delete all messages and decimate the phone, so that was a dead end."

Sara furrowed her eyebrows. "But then why didn't he destroy the USB evidence too?"

"Benny swears black and blue that this mysterious X person must have planted it in his apartment after I showed him where I found it," Diggle replied. "Felicity thinks it might be someone who has links to the Starling Whispers gossip website since they seem to have all the exclusives."

"And also just because I really hate their name," said Felicity, copying the audio and visual files to the hard drive. "I mean are you a blog or a feminine hygiene product?"

Sara and Felicity swapped a bemused look at the uncomfortable silence that settled over the men of the lair. "So what's the plan now?" Sara asked, readily passing her bamboo stick from hand to hand. "Anything we need to suit up for?"

"We already gave Benny over to your dad for an official chat, so hopefully he'll dig up more clues," said Felicity. "And as for the gossip blogs, well they're about to get a hacking of a lifetime."

"Sounds kinky," mused Roy.

Peering at the audio files onscreen, Oliver took the mouse from Felicity and clicked on one, wincing when his voice filtered through the speakers. "Felicity you should probably stop staring at it."

"I'm trying but it's just… how is it so big?"

"It's not that big."

"Oliver I've seen a few in my time and trust me, the width alone is…"

The conversation promptly cut out as Oliver and Felicity both scrambled to click the pause button, but the rest of the team were already struggling to compose themselves.

"I stand corrected," said Roy, the corners of his mouth twitching. "That sounds kinky."

"And extremely out of context," Felicity stammered, holding a hand to her neck where she could feel the heat of a blush emerging.

Oliver shot an exasperated look at his so-called friends. "There was a cockroach in the kitchen one morning, that's all," he explained.

"I think we just found tomorrow's big news story," said Diggle, as Sara dramatically clutched his arm.

"Hang on a sec, don't be too hasty, Digg," she replied in mock protest. "It's not that big, remember?"

Felicity sank further into her chair as her three colleagues traded more quips, glancing at Oliver who gave her a wry smile. "Would it be bad if we spiked all their coffees with Tibetan snake venom?" she said under her breath.

"It would be worse if we didn't do it immediately," he muttered in response, smirking at her snort of laughter. "Although we should probably comb through all these audio files first," he said, holding back a sigh at the gargantuan task. "We could all take turns or…"

"Or we could remember that we live in a technology enhanced world where computers are our friends," Felicity teased, bringing up a program on the screen as the rest of the team tuned in to what they were doing. "This little guy here is a voice recognition tool, so all we have to do is make a recording of ourselves saying key words like 'vigilante' and 'Arrow' and…"

"Big?" Roy supplied helpfully, quickly ducking away from a projectile sailing towards his head.

"Any words that may send us up a certain creek without a paddle," said Felicity, putting back her box of paperclip missiles. "Then the program will scan through all the files and alert us of any matches."

"Sounds good," said Oliver, nodding approvingly. "I should do some damage control at my mother's campaign rally this evening, too," he added, absently drumming his fingers on the desk. "Maybe release a statement to the press dismissing the pregnancy rumor."

Felicity bumped his knee with hers in solidarity. "Two fun things to look forward to now," she said sympathetically as he gave her a small smile in return.

"The Canary and the Arrow should be seen in public while Ollie's busy as well," Sara suggested. "That way he can have an alibi just in case the audio files pick up on something."

"I'll volunteer," said Roy, raising his hand. "How hard can it really be?" He glanced at Oliver's costume in the lit-up cabinet. "Although how do you run in those leather pants, dude? That's gotta chafe."

Oliver stared at him before turning his head to look at Diggle. "So you're on Arrow duty, yeah?"

"Was there ever any doubt?" replied Digg. "We can check out some criminal hotspots for tonight on the other computer," he said to Sara, smirking when he heard Roy muttering under his breath. "You can come along too, Harper."

"Maybe you should change into some yoga pants, though," said Sara casually, as the three of them moved to the other side of the lair. "We can't have you feeling uncomfortable while you're protecting the city now can we?"

Chuckling at Roy's complaining ("Just so you know, I hate everyone"), Felicity focused her attention back onto her task. "You ready to do some recording?" she asked Oliver.

"Yeah. I just wish we had the original source data as well," he replied with a frown. "There's no way in hell other copies weren't made."

"At least we have something to go on. And once we get confirmation that no beans were spilt and everything's fine – because I know it will be – then we won't have to worry." She pointed towards the microphone with a smile. "I'll get you to do a test run to make sure everything's working OK. Just babble anything – otherwise known as my life's motto."

He leaned in towards the device and paused for a moment, before the corners of his mouth curled up. "Sometimes the leather does chafe," he admitted seriously into the mic as Felicity choked on a laugh.

The kitchen table was covered with an array of paper as Felicity scrolled her tablet with one hand, while the other shoved a forkful of fried rice into her mouth. She gave Oliver a nod of greeting when he arrived home, noting the way he was rubbing at his temples. "I didn't expect you back for another hour," she said, swallowing the last bit of her food. "Was the rally that uninspiring?"

"More so the company," said Oliver tiredly, loosening his tie. "Playing happy families with my mom in front of the cameras wasn't exactly the way I wanted to spend the evening. It didn't help that the pregnancy rumors made her think back to…" Oliver sighed, shaking his head "Nevermind." He took a fork out of the cutlery drawer and walked over to Felicity, digging into the takeaway container of beef and black bean. "Smells good."

"Please, help yourself," she teased as he settled on the chair beside her. "I was going to have whatever was prepared in the fridge but everything would just taste like traitorous lies now."

"That'd definitely be an interesting flavor."

"I should market it to some frozen yogurt shops," she said thoughtfully, biting into a prawn cracker.

"Did we end up getting a result from the audio?" he asked, licking some sauce from his bottom lip.

Felicity brightened. "All clear! Well, almost all clear," she clarified, dismissing his slight alarm with a wave of her hand. "It's OK, it's just a few vague mentions here and there of our night time work, but it all can be explained away if need be, thank God." She pushed her glasses back up the bridge of her nose. "I also got some promising news from Mr Lance."

"Did he manage to get more information out of Benny?"

"Not quite," she said, scrolling through the memo pad on her phone where she'd jotted down some dot points. "They did some investigating at the Starling Whispers HQ," she paused, breaking into a chuckle, "OK now I'm thinking it sounds more like a really posh horse riding school run by someone called Bryndolyn Weathersby and…" Felicity cleared her throat when she noticed Oliver raising an eyebrow at her. "Wow, super side-tracked."

"The cops investigated and…" Oliver prompted kindly.

"Right, and they found all of our files on the deputy editor's computer, who eventually confessed to being our not-so-mysterious person X," she finished with a grin. "I'm still going to keep hacking the living daylights out of their site, though, just on principle."

"I'd be worried if you didn't."

She took a sip of her soda. "How'd the 'there's no bun in anyone's oven' part of your night work out?"

Oliver chewed his food, giving her a half-shrug. "About as well as any of these press things go. I said my piece, the journalists only heard what they wanted and tried to press me for more information, so I dropped the mic and left."

"Dropped the mic?" she laughed. "Settle down, 8 Mile."

With a smirk, Oliver reached over to exchange his container for the box of rice when he registered what all of the paperwork was strewn across the table. "Rental applications?" he queried, trying to hide his disappointment. "I didn't think you'd found anything suitable?"

"I did and I didn't," she said evasively, hastily scooping everything up and putting it into a messy pile away from Oliver. "But I figure it can't hurt to apply. I mean yeah, in one place I swear there were a family of raccoons living in the walls but that's a great talking point for dinner parties if I've ever heard one."

Oliver watched her smooth her fingers across the dent in the table. "Please don't tell me you think you have to do this because of what happened today."

She stilled her movement, giving him a tight smile. "Did you know I was in a musical back in high school? Total disaster from beginning to end as you could imagine."

He forehead creased in confusion. "What?"

"Well you said 'don't tell me this is because of today' so I decided to tell you something else instead to take your mind off it. Which obviously didn't work," she added with a cringe, "because you're making that face where you're about to draw out my name into a thousand syllables."

"Fe-li…" Oliver stopped himself before her point was made. "I thought we already discussed this the other night? There's no expiration date on you staying here no matter what's going on." A sudden thought struck him. "Unless… you want to leave of course and I'm just making things worse," he said uncertainly.

Her heart clenched at the troubled look on his face. "You're not making things worse," she replied, offering him a genuine smile. "I'm actually enjoying living here, privacy breaches notwithstanding. I just didn't want to be a burden."

"You could never be a burden. And I enjoy having you here too," he said, returning her smile.

"So I guess we're still roomies for a while then."

"Yep…" He sank back into his chair with a smug look. "On one condition."

Felicity narrowed her eyes. "You're going to make me sing a song from the musical aren't you?"

Queen Consolidated was mostly empty in the late hour, aside from the usual security guards and a brunette woman working diligently at her desk alongside her assistant. She thumbed through a stack of files (Butler, I printed on one, Pearson, J on another), glancing up at the young businessman before her. "Did you type up the brief to Mr Wilson as I asked?"

"Yes, Ms Rochev," the man nodded, sliding a manila folder over to her with the brief stapled inside.

Isabel took the papers out and skim-read them, shaking her head slightly at a few paragraphs. "Reduce the amount of attention given to the closeness between Mr Queen and the blonde."

"You don't think he'll be interested?"

"Oh he will be, that's the problem," Isabel replied, pursing her lips in contempt. "The last thing I need is for Slade to take on a crusade that's already mine. I have other plans in mind for our dear Ms Smoak."

Her assistant leaned in conspiratorially. "I take it things are still on track now that we had the deputy editor take the fall? Mr Queen still believes the paparazzi were to blame for everything?"

She arched an eyebrow in muted amusement. "He does. It was quite the well-thought-out distraction if I do say so myself." Isabel ran her eyes over some information she'd highlighted on the top file. "Mr Wilson acquired the trial surveillance run he needed, and I have extra ammunition to forge ahead with my plans for this company."

"It's about time Mr Queen stepped down."

Isabel's mouth curled into an icy smile. "Do you know what my favorite part is?" She picked up a red pen, scratching an X through Oliver's name on the company stationery. "The poor, idiotic bastard has no idea what true suffering awaits him and the people he cares for most."

Oliver leaned contentedly against the open door of the storage unit, arms crossed, as Felicity sorted through her belongings like she was reuniting with long lost friends. "Bring as much stuff back as you want," he said.

"Well the comfy sofa blanket is a must," she replied, pulling it out of a cardboard box. "I still can't believe you don't have one of these. They're so good for snuggling."

"Is that so?" he asked innocently, strolling over to where she was standing.

"Mmm-hmm." Felicity folded up the blanket, matching his light-hearted tone. "You should find a snuggle buddy and try it sometime."

"Maybe I will one day."

They regarded each other with shy, contemplative smiles before Felicity turned her head to rummage through another box. "Need that, need that," she murmured, taking out the items and piling them on top of the bedding in Oliver's arms. "Oh God, don't need that," she said in embarrassment, trying to close the lid.

"Don't need what?" asked Oliver, setting down his handful of items on a desk. "If it's another piece of technology then no, you probably don't," he teased, as she gave him a mock glare.

Weighing up whether to show him or not, Felicity lifted the cardboard flap and took out a small stuffed bear that had seen better days. "This is Ted. I've had him since forever."

"Ted, huh?"

"It was either that or Donut. If you hadn't noticed I take my food pretty seriously." She ran her hand across a patchy tuft of brown fur with a fond look before gently putting it back in storage. "Anyway, the last thing we need right now is for any press to see us with a child's toy."

Oliver nodded, tucking his hands into his pockets. "I used to have a blue and grey train set when I was a kid," he shared, smiling at the memory. "My father brought it back from one of his business trips."

"What happened to it?"

"I think it's packed away in the attic of the mansion somewhere," he frowned. "Or at least I hope it is. I always wanted to pass it onto," he stopped, giving her a sheepish look.

"To pass it onto your own kid one day?" she filled in with a smile. "I'm sure you will. And a real kid this time… With, like, superior archery skills and a penchant for leaping out of buildings."

Oliver quirked his lips into a half-hearted smile before ducking his head. "It nearly happened once, becoming a dad," he admitted quietly, taking a few steps back to sit on the plastic-covered antique couch. "Before the island."

Felicity's mouth parted in surprise as she blinked a few times, absorbing his revelation. "With Laurel?" she asked softly, sitting next to him on the sofa.

He shook his head. "Laurel was around, but it… wasn't with her," he said, his voice laced with shame. Felicity didn't say anything, just waited for him to continue. "The other girl I was with, she lost the baby pretty early on." Oliver felt a small hand slip into his and clasp it tight.

"I'm sorry, Oliver," said Felicity, her eyes filled with compassion.

"It's fine," he said. "It was a long time ago." Oliver huffed out a humorless laugh. "And I would have been a terrible dad. I mean, I was a complete idiot back then who could barely take care of himself let alone an infant."

She gave his hand a squeeze. "You're being too harsh on yourself."

He shook his head. "I'm not being harsh enough." Oliver sank his body further into the cushion. "I had no right bringing an innocent kid into my life. I still don't."

Felicity could almost feel the hurt radiating off him and shifted her body closer so that she was pressed against his side, her head leaning on his shoulder. "Whenever the topic of your past comes up you're always quick to tell Digg and I that we wouldn't have liked the old you." She glanced up at him. "But sometimes I think you don't like the new you a lot of the time either. Which is a shame, because you've got people in your life who think the absolute world of you."

Oliver contemplated her, allowing some of the tension to fade away as he took in the openness and truth in her expression.

"You mark my words," said Felicity. "That train set is going to make one little boy or girl very happy one day." She smiled, closing her eyes briefly as Oliver pressed a soft kiss to her forehead in a silent thank you, before gripping her hand tighter.

Felicity was alone in the penthouse a few nights later when she heard a commotion coming from the entryway near the elevator. Wrapping a robe around her pajamas, she rushed out of her bedroom and down the hall towards the stairs, her trusty iPad in hand as a weapon. "Oliver?" she hesitantly called out, her stomach flipping in concern when she heard him painfully grunt her name. Felicity ran the rest of the way, stumbling to a halt when she saw Sara and Roy helping Oliver limp over to the sofa, all of them in their casual clothes. "What happened?" she breathed out, making her way to the group. "I thought everyone was out on Team Arrow business?"

"Someone forgot they weren't the one injected with Mirakuru and acted like a moron so we had to detour back to the foundry," Sara replied sternly.

Oliver yanked up the left leg of his pants, hissing in discomfort at the movement. "I thought I could blow out the target's car tires in time with my arrows," he said through gritted teeth.

"Wait, you got run over?" Felicity exclaimed loudly, perching next to him.

"Not exactly," said Roy. "He managed to half leap out of the way, so it was more like a really dramatic nudge."

Felicity reached out her hand to touch Oliver's leg, wincing at the bruises forming. "Is anything broken?"

"I don't think so, but his knee is really swollen," said Sara. "Diggle checked him out as best as he could back at Verdant. Thinks it's probably a sprain."

"Maybe we should take you to the hospital just to be sure?" said Felicity, but she already knew what his response would entail.

"I'll be fine," Oliver grunted, elevating his leg as gently as he could to rest it on the coffee table. "I've had worse things happen to me than getting hit by a car."

She shook her head in bewilderment. "The crazy part is that I know that's true." Tracing her hand over the brace Diggle had applied to Oliver's knee, Felicity glanced back at her injured roommate. "You do realize now that you're going to have to rest so this heals right? This is just the icing on top of the injury cake for you lately." He began to protest but she silenced him with a glare. "I swear to God, Oliver, if you don't sit your ass down for the next couple of days then I will personally drive a vehicle into your other knee. Do you understand me?"

"Fine," he muttered, scrubbing a hand over his tired eyes. "Two days max, though," he added defiantly. "Painkillers and herbs from the island will get me through the rest."

"Congratulations, Blondie," Roy said under his breath to Felicity. "You've gone from fake baby to babysitting a cranky vigilante for the weekend."

Felicity dropped her head back with a moan. "Do you think he'll notice if I dip into his magical island herb stash too? Because I'm going to need something to take away the giant pain in my ass."