A/N: This chapter continues on with the finale, 1x23. Enjoy! Let me know what you think.
Felicity stood still for a long while after Oliver left. When she managed to cajole her legs into working she sat slumped in her chair; numb. It was only the ringing of her phone that jarred her from her stupor.
"Ms. Smoak. Long time no speak." Lance said in a strained voice.
"One moment Detective and I'll patch you through to our...I mean my...I mean." she sighed heavily and decided to forgo any attempt at subterfuge, "Our communications system."
"You know, one day I'd like to hear how a nice girl like you got involved with the Hood."
"If we do our jobs tonight maybe you'll get that chance." she replied and then she could hear him in her earpiece, but Oliver and Digg could not.
She'd decided to keep herself on mute to them, and had asked them to do the same. There was no way she could listen to Oliver fight Malcolm Merlyn again.
"I'm in the subway, but I'm not really sure what I'm looking for." Lance said, sounding a little breathless
"Would you like me to describe it to you Detective." she offered, but Lance cut her off before she could continue.
"Never mind." his voice dropped, "I found it."
She took a deep breath, and adjusted her glasses. "There should be something that looks like a circuit board. Take it out." all she could hear was the sound of Lance's breathing.
"Do you see a timer?" she asked
"Seven minutes."
"Okay," she gasped out, "Well, good news is, this is going to be a paperweight in three." she hoped she sounded more convincing than she felt.
She talked Lance through which wires to cut, but the relief of him finding the right one was only temporary.
She heard a high pitched whirring sound and then Lance said "Holy god!"
"No, no, no, no, no!" he cried, and her stomach dropped
"There must be some sort of anti-tamper safe guard." she explained as she searched the schematics for a way to shut it down. "Hold on, I'm going to figure out a way to over ride it."
"There's not enough time." Lance said, panic evident, "There's not enough time!"
"Just hold on." she told him
"There's not enough time." he repeated, but she refused to give up
It was hard to concentrate when she heard him call his daughter. From the sound of it Laurel was at CNRI which was almost sitting on top of the device. Tears pricked Felicity's eyes as she listened to him tell his daughter goodbye. She swiped at her face, and redoubled her efforts.
"Detective Lance, I need you to listen to me very carefully."
She could hear Lance struggling as she told him what to do. As tense and scared as she was right then, she couldn't imagine how he felt being the one responsible for shutting it down.
There was a beep, and then Lance let out a long exhale. "Good work, Ms. Smoak." he said, making no effort to hide the relief in his voice.
She muted Lance hastily, and pressed the earpiece to connect to Oliver, every fiber of her just hoping that he would be there to respond.
"Oliver, Lance did it." she said breathlessly
There was silence, for too long, and then she heard him. "It's over." he growled
"If I've learned anything as a successful businessmen, it's redundancy." Merlyn's pained voice was weak, but righteous.
Fear gripped her as she considered what he meant, but it was Oliver that said it aloud, "Felicity...there's another device. There's two of them."
The first tremors began shaking the building and she clutched the table in front of her as mortar dust began to fall all around.
Sparks shot over her head when cables snapped and she couldn't help letting out an involuntary cry.
"Felicity!" Oliver came over the comm, and she tired to calm herself before she answered him,
"I'm here." she said weakly, and looked warily at the hundreds of tons of metal and concrete that was above her.
"Are you ok?" he demanded
She was as about as far from ok as she had ever been, but there was nothing Oliver could do about it. There was no way for him to get back to the club in time.
'Time to be brave, Smoak.' she told herself,
"Yeah," she half whispered, cringing as a stronger tremor hit.
"I turned the damn thing off!" Lance's voice interrupted them
"There was a second device." she told him
"Laurel...she's at CNRI!" he exclaimed, and then all she heard was static.
"Felicity!" Oliver called again, and she couldn't hide her tears when she answered.
"Oliver," she said shakily "The damage is worse on the east side. You're close...you should...Laurel's at CNRI. You should go." she could barely get the words out. She clapped a hand over her mouth as the next tremor caused shelving to fall over and the lights flickered dangerously.
"Felicity, no! I'm coming back!"
"No! Go help the people you can!" she ordered, "I'm in a foundry. I'll be fine. I promise." and they both knew she was lying.
"Felicity..." he could barely say her name
"I know." she choked out, and then deliberately cut the comm link.
She knew she didn't have much time. Working as quickly as her shaking hands would allow she plugged in a spare external hard drive and began doing a massive data dump in an attempt to save as much as their work as she could.
She scanned the space quickly and realized the safest place would be an alcove, cut into the rock and shored up by cinder block. It wasn't large, and they only used it for storage, but it gave her the best chance of not being crushed if the entire club collapsed on top of her.
With strength and speed she never knew she had, Felicity quickly emptied the space and then filled it again, but this time with every medical supply she could move, and a small back up generator she'd insisted Oliver buy, 'just in case'. The last thing she drug over was Oliver's heavy chest he'd brought from the island.
There was only enough room for her to crouch low in the corner, and she raced back to the computers, barely glancing at how two of the monitors had already been crushed by falling debris.
The strongest tremor yet threw her to the ground, and she cried out in pain as a large chunk of concrete grazed her shoulder and left arm. Felicity felt dazed, and it seemed like it took her too long before she pulled herself up. She yanked the cord on the hard drive, before grabbing her tablet and half stumbled, half crawled to the alcove.
As she huddled in the corner, the building seemed to sway above her, which she didn't even think was possible. Then there was a groaning noise, and then silence before everything crashed down.
Felicity curled in the corner and wrapped her arms over her head; the noise was deafening. Dust choked the air and made it hard to breathe.
When she dared look up she could only see faint cracks of light where the opening had been. Now, there was nothing but broken I-beams, and huge slabs of concrete.
"Oh god," she gasped aloud and her breathing became erratic. She was going to die, trapped under a night club. An empty night club, some rational part of her brain informed her. An empty night club that would get passed over when search and rescue got to the area, because no one was supposed to be in it.
Her left arm was numb, and all she managed to do when she pushed on the pile with her right was break her nails and scrape her palms.
She could only hope that Oliver returned soon, but even then she didn't know how bad the damage was in the rest of the lair.
The tablet was still in her lap and she opened it in desperation. The light was comforting, and other than being incredibly dirty it was still working. But there was no signal, and no way to use it to communicate with anyone.
Dust was visible in the air. She coughed weakly, and tried not to breath too deep. Now that the initial adrenaline was wearing off, she felt weak and light headed.
The cinder block wall dug painfully into her back, but she had no room to move. She couldn't even reach the drawer of the medical cart to grab a bandage for her arm which she could tell was bleeding, but couldn't make out how badly. Truth be told, she figured she was better off not knowing.
Every five minutes or so she'd open the tablet to check the time, and provide some light in the space. It made it easier to wait. Her eyes grew heavy. The possibility that something had hit her in the head flitted through her mind, but she didn't dwell on it.
Faint voices calling her name snapped her out of her half awake state. At first she thought she was imagining it, and then she heard it again.
"Felicity!" it was Oliver, and then Digg joined him, and she couldn't call out immediately because she was sobbing too hard.
"Oliver!" finally erupted from her throat, "Oliver! I'm over here!" she called.
"Felicity!" his voice was closer, and she could see shadows through the cracks. "Are you in there?"
"I'm here!" she cried desperately
"Just hang on, we'll get you out."
She heard them struggle as they shifted the remains of the building out of the way. When the first sizable hole opened up she sobbed again.
There was the sound of both of them grunting with effort and then she could see him. Worry and pain were sketched all over his face, but she'd never been more glad to lay eyes on him.
He didn't say a word, he just reached in and hauled her out. Her legs scraped over the rough concrete, and the hand on her arm made her cry out in pain, but she didn't care.
They ended up in a heap together on the littered floor. She was sitting on his outstretched legs, his arms wrapped so tightly around her it was difficult to breathe.
She just clutched the strap of his quiver for purchase and burrowed her face under his chin. His hand stroked over her hair and she could hear the wild thumping of his heart under her ear.
"Why didn't you leave?" he rasped out
She shook her head against his chest, "There wasn't any time. I had to get the data, and save what I could, and..."
She felt him lift his head, and look towards where she had been. "Don't ever do it again." he said raggedly into her hair.
She nodded tightly. "I can't lose anyone else." his voice cut off and she pulled back to look at him.
"What happened?" she demanded, and really looked at him for the first time. The haggard expression, and devastated look he had wasn't just from being beat by Merlyn. The paint that had been around his eyes was all but gone, but what was left had what looked like tear tracks in it.
Oliver's eyes shut tight as if he couldn't look at her when he said what she heard next, "Tommy. Tommy's gone."
"No!" she gasped out, tears filling her vision once again. He opened pain filled eyes and she pulled him to her this time. His head lay pillowed on her chest and she kept running a hand over his head, providing any bit of comfort she could give him.
She was so absorbed in sharing his grief that she didn't notice at first when he went limp against her. There was a change in his breathing, and her hand stilled over his head. "Oliver..." she said warily
When he didn't respond she struggled to hold him back enough to see. The most she could do was tip his chin up to see his face. He was pale, and unconscious. Fear ripped through her. Her hand fell down his chest and she lifted it back to see blood on her palm.
"Oliver! Wake up!" she said wildly, but he didn't so much as blink. Her heart thumped so hard she thought it may burst from her chest.
It was practically impossible to support his weight while she moved off of him, and she winced as his head lolled roughly to the side before she could ease him back.
The silence around them startled her and with dread she realized she hadn't heard a word from Digg since they'd dug her out.
Felicity whipped her head around and saw him behind her. Digg sat slumped against a pile of debris, his breathing labored.
He raised a weak hand when he saw her eyes on him.
"Oh god, Digg!" she exclaimed and crawled hastily over to him. "What happened?"
"He stabbed himself to kill Merlyn." Digg explained.
"What?!" she exclaimed, "He was..." and she almost retched right there.
"He did what he had to do, Felicity."
She looked at him closer and saw the dark stains on his jacket and pant leg. "You're hurt." she said unnecessarily.
"I'll keep." he assured her, "He may have nicked his lung, I don't know."
All the blood drained from her face and she turned back to Oliver. Memories struck her hard as she unzipped his top and saw the ragged, raw wound high on his left side. This was bad. This was gun shot wound in the back of her car bad.
She stumbled back to the alcove, and managed to move two fairly large pieces of concrete in order to get to the cart. She couldn't get it all the way out, but the drawers opened.
Felicity grabbed handfuls of gauze, and alcohol, and a few suture kits and eyed the defibrillator warily. She hoped she wouldn't have a need for it.
The way Oliver was sitting it was impossible to access the entrance and exit wounds.
"Digg," she called "We need to move him." she hated to ask, she knew he was hurt and needed help too, but she didn't know what else to do.
He didn't say a word, but pulled himself to his feet and shuffled over. She tried to help, but he brushed her off. Digg knelt down, and with an almost inhuman roar picked Oliver up and placed him over his shoulder.
"Oh god!" she exclaimed, "Okay, bring him over here." she directed.
There was one table in one corner that had barely been hit. Other than mortar dust it was clean and undamaged.
Digg's face was contorted in pain as he dumped Oliver unceremoniously onto the flat surface and then promptly collapsed next to it. Felicity only just stretched her hand out in time to place it between Oliver's head and the table.
"Sorry," Digg gasped out, using the legs behind him for support.
"It's ok. Let me just...let me just get him patched up and then I'll fix you." she was trying so hard to not completely lose it, but having both of them injured was pushing her well past her breaking point.
She got Oliver's arm out of the sleeve, but let him rest on it to provide some sort of barrier of protection against the dirt and dust that coated everything.
The holes weren't large, but they went through and through and she had no idea what kind of internal damage had been done. Or how close it had come to piercing his heart.
She cleaned them quickly and did her best with the stitches. He'd have more scars, but she'd take a million scars if it meant he was alive.
The wound on his back was worse. The tears were jagged where the point of the arrow had torn through, in both directions it seemed as she looked closer, and she wished someone with some actual medical training could be doing this instead of her.
There were several trips back to the medical cart for tape and shots of antibiotics that she really didn't know how to give properly, but she winced for him as the needle sunk in.
Digg was half conscious when she got to him. The blood had dried so much it was difficult to peel the fabric away from the wound.
He came to enough to help her slide his arm out of the sleeve, and then shut his eyes again to rest as she resorted to cutting the t-shirt away.
She gasped at the two inch long tear. The edges were ragged, and she suspected the knife had been serrated.
"Oh Digg," she said softly, "Maybe we should get you to a hospital."
"Just do it, Felicity. You got this." he told her
"I wish I had half the faith in myself that you do." she replied, but gathered what she needed.
She worked in silence, occasionally glancing up at Oliver to make sure he was still breathing and down at Digg to ensure he was doing the same. The wound on Digg's leg was worse. She didn't know how he'd managed to make it back to the lair on it.
"Do you want something for the pain?" she asked, noticing the sheen of sweat that had broken out across his face.
He shook his head no. "Can't. Don't want to pass out." but she could see how much he hurt.
"How about I just numb it?" she suggested, and he agreed.
She was rummaging in the drawers looking for the local anesthetic when the sound of the metal door to the basement banging open and crashing into the wall echoed around the room.
Felicity froze. She turned slowly and peered into the darkness. At the top of the stairs she could just make out a figure, silhouetted in the doorway.
Cold fear washed down her back. She had never thought to secure the lair.