AN – Sorry it's taken so long to update. Everything's been crazy and my health issues have been chaotic as well. Hope you enjoy the story and continue to enjoy!
Oh, and by the way, I'm a very huge fan of the comics and like to keep continuity as close as possible, so while I love the relationship between Dinah (Laurel of course) and Ollie in the comics, in Arrow I love the relationship between Oliver and Felicity. Just for the record, so far I don't like this whiny sounding, baby faced detective she's apparently involved with at the moment in the show. I read somewhere that Andrew Kriesberg and Greg Berlanti have said that "Olicity" is officially over and done with, and would not be rekindling. I don't like this bit of news any more than the rumor/announcement that Supergirl will not be joining the "Flarrowverse" universe.
It's silly to say that someone had to have mentioned Superman and Supergirl literally all the way across the country (in Superman's case), and aliens to boot, for them to exist in the same universe. First, remember the god awful movie Batman and Robin (1997), starring George Clooney as Batman, and his statement to Robin that, "This is why Superman works alone?" Superman was never mentioned before, or after, this statement, yet he exists in the same universe.
Also, in the deleted scenes in the pilot episode of The Flash, Joe and Barry are walking down the street, discussing Barry's obsession with "the impossible." Joe mentions both "a guy that can supposedly talk to fish," and "a guy that can bend steel in his bare hands." Sounds like Aquaman and Superman to me. Further, when Felicity is trying to think of a codename, Oliver says, "I was going to suggest Oracle, but it's taken." This is an offhanded way of mentioning that the Bat Family, or at least Barbara Gordon, exists in the Flarrowverse. If you insist on them absolutely having to have been mentioned, those are the definition of "having been mentioned." Nobody around here mentions Billy Joe Jim Bob Walton, specifically, yet it's entirely possible that he exists somewhere in the world. Stranger things have happened, and yet need not have been mentioned in order to exist.
Anyway, I thought I'd bring those points up while they were on my mind. Enough ranting! On with the story!
Chapter 6
Team Arrow were still licking their collective wounds, both to their bodies and their pride, on the way up to Felicity's office in the elevator. John inserted a fresh magazine into each of his pistols, and chambered a round in each. "So, you think this Grayson guy is a costumed crook, like we're costumed vigilantes, or a thief that can bounce down a hallway like Bugs Bunny, and fight like Bruce Lee?"
"Well, he wasn't wearing what looked like a costume to me," interjected Thea as she adjusted the strap on her quiver and held her bow at the ready. "He looked more like he was dressed for a garden party than wearing a costume. Unless, of course, he's Soirée Man or something." She started to laugh at her own joke, but stifled it when she saw Oliver's expression. He was many things, but amused wasn't one of them.
Green Arrow set his jaw, clenched tightly, and switched his bow to his left hand, while drawing an arrow from his quiver. Above them, the numbers counted up, until the floor with Felicity's office was reached. "He's a talented guy, with more training than one would notice under normal circumstances, who decided to mess with the wrong crowd tonight. No costume, no codename, just bad choices." He readied his bow, as Speedy did with hers, and Spartan did with his guns. The elevator dinged, and the doors started sliding open.
X
Dick slipped back in the bathroom window, and retrieved his jacket, putting it back on. His shirt was stained, but mostly dry by now. He checked his hair in the mirror, smiled at his reflection, then headed back to Felicity's office.
Barbara had her hand on Felicity's shoulder and was apparently trying to console her when he walked into the room. Barbara looked up at him, and he gave her a subtle signal to expect trouble, serious trouble. Barbara nodded almost imperceptibly. She wasn't sure what the trouble might be, but the prearranged signal was one that meant big trouble, and she mentally prepared herself for whatever might come.
"Sorry about taking so long, ladies," Dick said with a half chuckle as he came through the door, making a subtle show of brushing the stain on his shirt with a hand. "It was a little awkward trying to get the entire stain under the hand dryer. I almost fell twice." He laughed good naturedly, making light of his own implied clumsiness.
Felicity stiffened as Oliver's message came through her ear com. She wasn't sure what to do, or how, exactly, to keep Dick and Barbara busy, but her worst fears about the coming events seemed to be coming true like a doomsday prophecy. Oliver and the others were only seconds from coming out of the elevator at the end of the hall. Images of Dick in the bathroom, trying to twist his stomach and pelvis under the hand dryer to try and dry his clothes, and almost falling, raced through her mind, and she felt mortified once more.
"Oh, my God, I'm so sorry about that, Dick. You didn't hurt yourself, did you? I'd feel really bad if you did, and of course the insurance company would have a field day with my premiums if a guest was injured during a visit, and I don't even want to think about what your impression of our company, and by extension me, would be after such a disaster, that'd be bad, really bad, and I don't want you to leave with bad memories, so please let me try to make all this up so you leave with a good impression, I hate bad impressions," blurted Felicity, the color draining from her face more and more as she spoke, running her words together like a bolt of lightning.
Dick chuckled and held up his hands again, even as Barbara gave her shoulder a friendly squeeze. "Felicity, really, it's okay. My own insurance would handle any sort of injury like that, or anything, and you haven't made a bad impression at all. In fact, you've —" He was cut off in mid sentence by the sound of the elevator dinging.
Barely a second later, the Green Arrow, Speedy, and Spartan burst through the door of the office. "Dick Grayson," growled Green Arrow, his bow drawn, and his disguised voice sounding quite pissed, took up a position where his arrow wouldn't harm Felicity, or the woman in the wheelchair he assumed had to be Barbara Gordon, if he fired. "You've broken into a secure vault in the building, and stolen proprietary property of Palmer Technologies, and if you surrender now, you'll be handed over to the SCPD, and be comfortably in a cell by midnight. If you don't surrender…well, let's just hope you're as smart as I think you are."
Felicity was staring, open mouthed, at the scene occurring in her office at that moment in pure shock. She started to think that this couldn't possibly be happening, but this was Oliver. Of course it's happening. Just when you think your day couldn't get more complicated, she thought in an almost defeated voice. "Okay, okay, let's everybody just calm down, and let's handle this peacefully, okay?" she asked. Her hands were up in a separating motion, trying to turn the confrontation into a standoff, or better.
Dick's face underwent a transformation. Gone was the happy go lucky, roguishly charming smile and easy going attitude he'd had up until this point. His face was now serious, far too calm to have two arrows and two semiautomatic pistols pointed at him in a confined space. His eyes had hardened, not to a wrathful glare, but to a ready to act firm gaze. "You're right, I have broken into a vault and stolen property of Palmer Tech. But, if you give me a moment, I think I can explain –-"
Unfortunately, Dick didn't get the chance to finish his sentence. Speedy's bow went suddenly from a ready draw to a full draw, aim, and fire position. "There's nothing to explain, Pretty Boy. You put up a fight downstairs, so we're not giving you a chance to do your jack rabbit routine again!" As she spoke her last couple of words, her fingers released the arrow, sending it racing towards the billionaire's shoulder.
As the talk was distracting everyone, Barbara had surreptitiously wheeled back from Felicity's side to a position closer to Spartan. Her hands moved from the wheel rails on her chair to a pair of shafts that appeared to be, for all intents and purposes, some sort of brace for the chair. All she was waiting on was a reason to act. Her proximity to Spartan was a precautionary measure, a setup position that she hoped she wouldn't need to act on.
Dick saw Speedy's fingers release the arrow, and instantly, his amazingly honed reflexes took over. He sidestepped to the left, spinning clockwise at the same time. He snatched the arrow out of the air with his left hand, which would have only grazed him had it been allowed to continue, instead of striking him full in the shoulder. As he spun, he reached into an inside pocket and withdrew two circular disks, and released them as he turned. The disks traveled with lightning speed and accuracy, striking the fingers of both Green Arrow and Speedy which held their bows, the impact stinging enough to make them drop their weapons.
The surprise was visible on the two archers' faces. They definitely weren't expecting that sort of accuracy. Apparently, Dick Grayson had far more martial arts training than even his earlier exhibition suggested.
At the same time, Barbara withdrew the two "braces" from her chair, which were, in actuality, Escrima sticks. With her left hand, she swung upwards, catching Spartan's wrists with the strike, sending his arms upwards, causing the involuntary gunshot to go through the ceiling, instead of someone. A split second later, her right stick slammed horizontally against his lower abdomen, right above the belt, sending him flying backwards, stunned, to the floor. He scrambled to his feet as quickly as he could, to find himself facing a wheelchair bound, but nonetheless very mobile, Barbara Gordon, her Escrima sticks at the ready, and an expression that said she meant business.
Angered, and more than a little surprised, Speedy growled and leaped forward towards Dick, spinning in the air with her body parallel to the floor, to deliver a brutal spinning kick to Dick's neck and shoulder. Her training in the fighting styles of the League of Assassins, taught to her by her father, Malcolm Merlyn, came to the fore, thought trading places with instinct and reaction. Her feet touched the floor, and she immediately whirled clockwise to strike at his face with a vicious elbow strike.
"Speedy!" yelled Green Arrow, but his shout was lost in the confusion. They'd already faced Dick once that night, and had been unprepared, and subsequently were walked over like they were barely an obstacle at all, by a man they'd severely underestimated. They wouldn't make that mistake again.
Immediately, he stepped forward, intent on helping Speedy take Dick down with as little trouble as possible. The quicker they had him down, the quicker he could be restrained, and turned over to the police.
The spinning kick from Speedy had taken Dick off guard, despite his amazing reflexes, so had landed solidly on his neck and shoulder, forcing him to hunker down with the impact, and feel a stab of pain where it connected. However, that stab of pain also cleared his mind, made him more alert, and when she spun for her elbow attack, he was turning counter clockwise, evading the strike all together. Her strike passed through empty air, throwing her center of gravity off, and her balance faltered.
Meanwhile, Dick dodged one attack to immediately find himself in the path of another. A green gloved fist was hurtling towards his face like a freight train out of control, so he raised his right arm in a semicircular motion, his forearm striking Green Arrow's forearm right behind the wrist, and twisted his hand to grab the archer's wrist, intending to use his own momentum against him, and flip him over and to the right into the wall.
It was Dick's turn to be surprised when Green Arrow did the unexpected. He allowed Dick's block to alter the trajectory and momentum of his punch, and as he felt Dick's fingers grasp his wrist, he instinctively twisted counter clockwise and moved forward, slipping under Dick's arm and gaining leverage into a wide crouch, grabbed the arm that held his, and with a swift rocking motion, flipped Dick over his hip to land him on his back on the floor, hard. There was more than a little satisfaction in his face as that split second registered in his mind.
The billionaire struck the floor hard, in an impact that would have jarred most men. His extensive training under the Batman, and his own escapades solo and with the Titans as Nightwing, had made such occurrences a momentary annoyance, rather than a setback. Still, he was impressed. Green Arrow's reputation wasn't overstated. Few people could pull such a maneuver successfully on him. He could see extensive training in the archer, some of it League of Assassins training, in his fighting style, and it was a force to be respected.
He rolled back to his feet quickly, prepared to continue the fight, but as Green Arrow had kept him occupied, Speedy had recovered her bow, and fired an arrow, striking him in the shoulder, just under the clavicle. He growled out as the sharp point of the arrow stabbed through his flesh, erupting out the other side of his body. Blood spurted from the wound, but though it felt like hell, it was a shot intended to shock him and slow him down, not hurt him. The shot was too precise to have been an accident.
As all this was playing out on one side of the room, at the same time on the other side, a slightly different scenario was playing out. John was assessing the woman in the wheelchair with the Escrima sticks, and was figuring out quickly that she was a much more capable and formidable opponent than anyone would think. She could, and would, hurt him if she had to, he could see it in her eyes. Her eyes were steel, full of determination and fight, held in check by both her lack of desire to hurt anyone, and by the cold assurance she could most definitely hurt someone, badly, if she felt it necessary.
"I really don't want to fight you, Lady," he said slowly, trying to catch his breath, and get over his surprise. "I'm not in the habit of hitting women. Now, why don't you play nice, and put the sticks down before someone gets hurt." He was trying to reason with her, and she gave no indication that she was acknowledging reason. Not to mention it's very possible I'll be hurting at least as much as you will if this goes any further.
Barbara's lips curled into a faint smile, and the steel in her eyes didn't diminish or soften at all. "You won't hit a woman, but you have absolutely no problem pointing two .45's at one, a woman in a wheelchair at that, fully prepared to pull the triggers? That's a bit of a schism, don't you think?" Her voice was calm, and quiet, but her eyes spoke of anything but calm. She was a bolt of lightning, prepared to strike at any moment.
She didn't lower the sticks a fraction of an inch, and John could tell that business was the very least of what she meant if he didn't play this very carefully. Wheelchair or not, this redhead knew how to fight, and fight damned well. He could feel his abdomen and wrists bruising even as he stood there. His guns had fallen to the floor several feet away, and he knew Barbara would be on top of him if he even smelled like he was going for them. If only my troops when I was in Afghanistan could have been handicapped in such a way, he thought with no small amount of irony. We could have taken down the insurgents and cleared the city safely in days, rather than months, without firing a shot.
The sounds from the fight across the room reached John's ears and he chanced a glance in that direction, and saw that Oliver and Thea seemed to have a handle on it. It was a good thing she couldn't see his eyes under his helmet, John thought. He turned his attention back to her, "I just didn't want you to get any funny ideas. You're a lot more dangerous than you look, Red."
Barbara's smile turned wry, and she kept her eyes on him. "Why, thank you," she said, and he wasn't sure if she was being sincere, or sarcastic. It sure sounded sarcastic, if it was or not. With the speed of a striking cobra, her hand lashed out, landing a strike with the stick on his inner thigh. Instinctively, he bent double to try to protect his groin, and Barbara took advantage of that. She swung the second stick hard, slamming into his helmet, the sound reverberating through his head, along with pain and dizziness.
Barbara had no illusions about the match up between her and her opponent. If it came down to strength, he had her without question. If it came down to mobility, pretty much the same thing. She knew, just from how he held himself and his actions, that he was an honorable man, and wouldn't resort to fighting a woman if he could avoid it. Unfortunately for him, Barbara wasn't so inclined to let him avoid it. If she had use of her legs, she knew she could give him a very damned good run for his money. She used to make Dick work hard before the Joker crippled her. She'd had to change her style and tactics since then, though. Right now, she was intent on using that style and those tactics to their full extent, to subdue the vigilante without really hurting him.
At that moment, however, all the fighters in the room were startled by the sudden sound of a very loud crash. Felicity had slammed both fists down on her desk, yelling at the top of her lungs, "Will you all just stand the hell down and listen to me?" Stunned, everyone stopped in mid action, and slowly lowered their weapons or hands, turning to look at her, mostly in shock that the quiet and often babbling woman had so forcefully demanded their attention.
Felicity kept her momentum going, stepping out from behind her desk, glaring at all of them. "Listen to me, all of you, and don't you dare say a word until I'm done," she began, daring each of them with her eyes to open their mouths. "I don't know, exactly, what's going on here, but I know there's a perfectly reasonable explanation for all of it. There has to be."
She continued to glower at them all as she stepped further away from her desk, her speech gaining speed, but losing none of its determined force. She touched Dick on the shoulder, and gestured towards Barbara. "I know there has to be because this is Dick freaking Grayson, and Barbara freaking Gordon, two of the nicest, most genuine, most selfless, and most helpful people on the damned planet. Dick's a damned billionaire, so his theft of that software, and I know exactly what it was that you stole, by the way, has to be for a good reason, and not something malicious or dangerous. They wouldn't do that, despite how this all looks right now."
She moved on to look at Oliver, Thea and John, one after the other. "And you guys are Team Arrow. Team Arrow. You protect people, you keep the city and the people in it safe. Masks or no masks, or helmet in your case, Spartan, you guys are the good guys. Do you hear me? The good guys."
She let silence reign for a moment before continuing, "Dick and Barbara, no matter what this looks or seems like, are the good guys. Good guys fighting good guys is a bad thing, and good guys shouldn't do bad things, so why don't you all stop doing bad things and talk to each other, listen to each other, and stop the damned fighting? You're all smart people. You know you should think with your heads, not your fists. Now, are you guys done beating the shit out of each other, or should I ring the bell for round three?"
As Felicity finished her rant, everyone glanced at each other, not really sure of what to say. Nobody had seen that coming, not in a million years. Still not quite believing what she'd just seen and heard, Thea turned towards Felicity, her voice rising in pitch, "But they stole stuff from you, from this company. No matter what the reason, stealing is still stealing, Overwat—"
Thea had clamped her lips shut, but not before her slip was noticed. Barbara cut her off in mid word, "You're Overwatch? The hacker that has been chasing Freejack all over the world's systems, and, I might add, very talented and skilled? That's you?" She gave Felicity a strong, appraising look, the wheels in her mind turning rapidly.
The blonde became flustered, and red in the face. Her eyes darted back and forth between them all before settling on Barbara. "Yes, yes, that's me. I'm— wait a minute. How do you know about Overwatch, not even mentioning how you know whether or not I'm talented and skilled, but thank you very much for the compliment. It's nice to know someone appreciates the scope of my contribution to the cause, or crusade, or whatever you want to call it. Nobody takes into account all the cool computer stuff I do, because they don't understand what I'm doing or how difficult it can be, and… and I'm going to let you answer me now." She nervously rubbed the back of her head and averted her eyes from the redhead for a moment.
Dick and Barbara looked at each other, then around the room at the others, who were all trying to figure out just what was happening, and they started laughing, slowly at first, but gaining volume and speed rapidly. Soon, the pair of Gothamites realized that they were being stared at by everyone else in the room.
As she tried to suppress her laughter, Barbara wheeled closer to Felicity, and gave her a crooked smile. "I know about Overwatch, and how talented and skilled you are for one very simple reason," she said, the smile growing a little. "I know because I've seen your work first hand. I know because I'm Oracle."
The sound of silence was deafening. Dick and Barbara were the only people not staring with their mouths somewhat agape. If it hadn't been for the fact that Felicity's nicely shaped bottom had hit the edge of her desk, she'd have fallen out in the floor in very literal shock.
"Wait, wait, wait a minute," she stammered, still not believing what she'd just heard. "You're Oracle? You, Barbara Gordon, you're Oracle? You're the same Oracle that's a legend on the net, the same Oracle that's a super computer whiz kid, er, I mean person, that is the go to person for most of the superhero/vigilante community for information and computer needs?" She was near babbling again, trying to process the information.
Barbara laughed a rich, musical laugh, and leaned an elbow on the arm of her wheelchair. "Yes, that's me," she confirmed, a hint of mischief glinting in her eye. "What's so hard to believe about that? It's not like I need my legs to sit at a computer and find stuff, and do what I do."
Felicity blinked rapidly several times, then the mortified expression returned. "Oh, no, no, no, nothing's hard to believe about that. Nothing! I'm just amazed to be meeting you in person after we worked together to push Freejack out of that system the other night and we worked together so well, I thought we worked together well, did you think we worked together well, I do. Well, we sort of met in person, as much on person as a digital online communication can be in person, it can be personal, but not literally in person because we weren't physically in each other's presence, though, existentially you could argue that we were in each other's presence because we were conversing person to person in real time, not delayed like email or something…" She trailed off, after realizing that she was babbling a little once more.
Oliver was listening intently, looking from one person to the other as they spoke, paying close attention to what was being said. Frowning behind the mask, he lifted a finger towards Barbara, "If you're Oracle, that means that, considering his exceptional talent for acrobatics and the martial arts training he has, and that—"
Dick held up a hand and cut him off in mid sentence. "I know where this is going," he said with a wry smile. "Yes, I'm Nightwing. You're absolutely right… Oliver Queen. And I'm sure you, Thea Queen, and given who these two are, logically that makes the most logical candidate for the man under the helmet to be none other than John Diggle, formerly Sergeant John Diggle of the United States Army, married to Lyla Michaels, current director of ARGUS."
There was another deafening silence in the room as people were too surprised to speak. Finally, Thea, in a characteristically energetic way, gaped at him, then looked at the others. "How did… how the hell do you know who we are? Seriously?!" If the subject matter hadn't been so serious, they might all have had a good laugh at her expression.
Barbara smiled, and shrugged, waving a hand towards Dick. "Oh, come on, it can't be that hard to work out. He was trained by the world's greatest detective. We both were. Deductive reasoning is one of our things."
"It's really very simple," Dick picked up from Barbara's words. "Green Arrow requires a lot of money, and I do mean a lot for the very specialized and custom equipment he, or rather you, and your team uses. You need a good location, with plenty of high powered computer access, and immediate access to cutting edge technology. There are several places, and therefore people, that fit the bill."
He paused, letting that bit of information sink in before going on, "But, since Thea let it slip that Felicity is Overwatch, we know from experience that this tight knit a team aren't strangers. They're very familiar with each other. So with the money in place, location, computer access, and so on, and the fact that Felicity is Overwatch, it's very easy to deduce that Green Arrow must be Oliver Queen. The personal familiarity and relationship with Felicity makes sense, plus Green Arrow is Oliver's height, build, and to be honest, one doesn't survive on an island like Lian Yu for five years, and not learn something about combat and survival."
He paused, not wanting to make his deductions any longer than necessary, but he wanted them to understand that not just anybody would notice these details and make the same discovery. "Then, too, there's the fact that upon her death, Laurel Lance was revealed to be the Black Canary, whom Oliver is also known to be very close to, and his attitude during her memorial service and the dedication of the statue display more than an ex boyfriend shocked to discover his former girlfriend, and fiancé of his deceased best friend, is a costumed crime fighter. Deducing who Speedy and Spartan are after that was a piece of cake. But don't worry. Most people, including talented detectives, wouldn't notice half of this stuff, and it only makes sense if you know for a fact that Felicity is Overwatch."
"Only… only we don't have a relationship anymore. Oliver and me. Not a romantic one, anyway. We're no longer together. We're broke up, which is kind of obvious when you learn that we're no longer together so if we're no longer together then its only logical to assume that we no longer have a romantic relationship…" spoke up Felicity, but she trailed off, realizing that she was babbling again, seeing the hurt and pained expression on Oliver's face, and the stab of pain through her own heart at saying such a thing out loud.
There was another awkward silence lingering in the air until an alarm sounded from Felicity's computer. She rushed to her desk, with Barbara right on her tail, and began tapping keys rapidly, and the images on the screen cycled through several things until there were police camera images displayed. "Oh, my God…" breathed Felicity, not believing her eyes. She looked up at everyone, the look on her face made it ashen and drained looking.
"What is it? What's wrong?" asked Oliver and Dick together, as one. They glanced at each other, frowning.
Felicity gulped and swallowed heavily, unable to speak. Barbara's face was serious as she also looked up. "Slade's outside SCPD headquarters. Either he's going to break Freejack out of jail, or he's going to kill him. Either way, he has to be stopped. He's already killed several cops."
Oliver glanced at his team, and then to Dick and Barbara. "Felicity, get to the Bunker. Take Barbara with you. Try and keep eyes on him, and try to keep him busy. We'll take Slade head on." He turned towards Dick and gave a grim half smile. "You might want to suit up, if you want to help. It wouldn't be refused by any means."
Dick's smile may have appeared flippant to most people, but it was obvious to Oliver that despite it, he was dead serious. "I wouldn't miss it for the world."
Oliver nodded, and everyone moved to their respective positions. It was going to be a long night, that much was certain.