A/N: Whohooo, longest chapter yet! I hope you like it:)
EDIT: I'm so sorry I forgot the trigger warning for manhandling, violence and injuries.
"The league does not take prisoners. And yet here you are, alive. I advise you to tell the truth if you want a chance to keep it that way," the Demon's Head leans in and whispers into her ear, "Sara Lance."
This isn't possible!
He can't know who she is!
Sara feels like she's drowning again, the panic making it impossible to breath as she watches the man who just crumbled her world stand up again.
"How- how do you-" she tries to form a full sentence while scrambling to her feet but a steady hand on her shoulder keeps her on the ground as the demon's head steps away.
"Now, I ask you again; How did you end up on Lian Yu?" he repeats his question with his back still towards her.
Sara can't stop the tears from streaming down her face.
"Answer me, child!"
She flinches at his booming voice.
It's the first time he raised his voice.
She tried. She really did. She tried to keep her family safe.
I'm sorry. She thinks as if it matters even if she could say it her family.
"I was shipwrecked with my boyfriend," she forces the words out of her mouth.
What if they know that it's Oliver?
What if they hurt her family if she tells them about everything?
What if they hurt them if she doesn't?
"But after the boat went down, I was the only one rescued by a man called Anthony Ivo. He was searching for this drug, a biological enhancer. It was supposed to heal anything, safe the human race," Sara chokes out a bitter snort when she repeats Anthony's words. The Mirakuru can do everything but save someone. It's their doom.
"Tell me about this drug."
No!
Everything in her is screaming that these people should know nothing about the Mirakuru.
The Demon's Head turns around to look at her and that's all that it takes to silence the warning bells inside her head.
"The Japanese developed it during World War II but the submarine transporting it ran aground. It was said to enhance a persons strength, regeneration, pain tolerance and even their perception," Sara recites emotionless what she heard and read so many times during her time on the Amazo.
"Ivo was - he was experimenting on people. Doing whatever it takes to find the Mirakuru and replicate it. And I- I helped him." the blonde looks up at the ceiling, directly into one of the lanterns. Maybe the light can blind any mental image she has of what she has done for a whole year in Anthony's name.
But of course nothing can ever erase that. Not even from her own mind.
"He took pity on me for whatever reason and I was just happy not to be one of his lab rats," Sara defends her choices though the only one who looks bothered by it is herself, "He searched island after island to find the submarine. Eventually it led us to Lian Yu."
"And how did you end up stranded on the beach with everyone else dead?"
Everyone else is dead. Everyone.
Sara already knows that from Nyssa but hearing it confirmed by someone else feels as much as a knife to her chest as it did the first time.
"There were people living on Lian Yu. They were stranded there. I helped them take down Anthony." she answers and it's the first time she looks at the man in front of her with pride and determination.
She wants him to know that maybe she's a naive and weak girl but damn those that underestimate her.
"We wanted to use the feighter to get off the island but one of them had been injected with the drug after we found it and it made him… mad."
It's an understatement but Sara can't think of a simpler way to describe it.
"He turned on us and in the fight the freighter got destroyed."
She fails to mention that one of the men on the island was the same one she had been on a boat trip with and what he had gone through on the island while she had been on the Amazo.
For all they know Oliver Queen died on the Gambit.
"And the drug?"
"I pray that whatever was left of it was destroyed when the freighter went down." She can't keep the snarling out of her voice.
At least all the records Anthony had collected went down with the ship too. And if they think that she'll help them recover any of the information they bet on the wrong horse.
No one should every be able to use the Mirakuru again.
Sara doesn't say it but the way she clenches her jaw and stares up at the man in front of her she doesn't have to.
It's quiet for a moment.
The man seems to consider what to do with her.
Out of the corner of her eyes she can see Nyssa and the other man but neither look at her. It's more like they're looking through her.
Their leader says something in that foreign language without taking his eyes of her and Nyssa responds. The man on the Demon's other side adds something.
Sara knows they are talking about her, talking about her fate, as if she isn't even there.
And she has no idea what the verdict might be.
"It'd be great if you could plan my execution in a language I understand."
She has no idea what just came over her.
It's pretty much suicidal to get sassy.
But if they want her dead there's nothing she can do about. So she might as well stop being afraid.
Someone grabs her hair and yanks her head back as a sword is held to her throat.
It presses down on her windpipe and nicks at her skin.
"You dare to interrupt Ra's al Ghul?" the man behind her hisses into her ear, pulling at her hair.
She suppresses a whimper.
The Demon's Head, Ra's al Ghul or whatever his name is, raises his hand and whoever grabbed her lets go.
Sara falls forward to her hands and knees, spluttering and gasping for air.
Ra's al Ghul.
Al Ghul...
Still on her knees, gasping and choking, she glances up at Nyssa.
Nyssa al Ghul, Heir to the Demon.
She remembers the full name now and it rips away whatever little hope she didn't even realize she had in the woman becoming an ally.
"I think you might be at a disadvantage here, child. While I know who you are, it appears that you have no idea who we are." Ra's al Ghul says as Sara scrambles to her feet.
"We are the League of Assasin." he raises his hands, his cloak slipping down to the ground and the torches on the wall flame up with perfect timing.
"My men..." he gestures to the people around him and as if on cue all hell breaks loose around them.
"...are made up of the fastest..." everyone seems to be fighting everyone. It's a blur of black leather, arrows and blades around them. But nothing ever touches her or the man in front of her as if they are in the eye of a storm.
"...strongest..." the shortest of them, perhaps the teenage boy, jumps onto the shoulder of another, bringing him down with an acrobatic rolls. Another fighter shakes of four attackers at once.
"...and most skilled fighters in the world." A group has formed around Nyssa. Within seconds she has brought several people down and disarmed even more, fighting them with their own weapons.
Ra's al Ghul's hand shoots up and Sara flinches. It takes her a second to register the arrow he caught inches away from her face before he drops it to the ground.
"We make the Mirakuru look like a child's play." the Demon's Head smiles at her.
The noise of fighting is drowned out by the rushing of her own blood.
Sara never mentioned the name of the drug.
Like she never mentioned her own name.
"We step in when others fail to do what is necessary to keep the world at peace."
Out of nowhere Sara bursts out with laughter.
It's just too much. Like an overload in her brain.
She has gone insane, it's the only explanation.
Everything reminds her of a terrible action movies that tries to make up for weak characters and little plot by including grand speeches and every single stunt they can think of to impress their audience.
This is a stupid power play.
Here stands 'The Demon's Head' with an army of skilled fighters trying so hard to impress a little girl as if it matter what she thinks of them. As if she'd live to tell the tale how he talks about peace while who Sara guesses is his daughter holds a dagger to someones throat.
"Peace." Sara repeats and laughs harder, barley making a sound anymore.
If she felt like being in the eye of the storm before, she now feels like a natural disaster herself - something you should run from but can't help yourself but stare at frozen in spot - as everyone's attention shifts to her and the fighting slowly dies down.
Sara can't breathe, her cracked rib piercing her side, when confused and uncertain eyes beneath black hoods shift back and forth between her and their leader.
She wipes away the tears as her laughter slowly dies down.
An action movie with a character confusing the bad guys into the defeat by laughing into their face would be gold.
Ra's al Ghul raises his hand and everyone's attention shifts to him.
"Leave us." he demands and for the first time his calmness seems forced.
His men start to collect their weapons and help up those who were injured during the fight.
"NOW!" Ra's al Ghul bellows so loudly it's ringing in Sara's ears, the pulsing vain on his forehead betraying his otherwise stoic expression.
Immediately Sara feels completely sober as she watches highly trained fighters hurry past her and out the room - with or without their weapons - as if they don't even see her. As if they are afraid.
Up close the blonde notices blood seeping through the black clothes of some of them.
Some are limping.
One of them is clutching a gaping wound on his abdomen as Nyssa gives him back his sword that looks like it has been dunked in blood.
Nyssa catches her eyes for a split second and there is something like curiosity in her eyes. But also pity.
This isn't a bad action movie with stunt doubles and fake blood.
This is very real.
A/N: Uh, Sara left alone with Ra's al Ghul? That can't be good.
But at least we know what Nyssa meant when she talked about Sara laughing at Ra's al Ghul. What's your headcanon of that story?
As always, new chapter next Sunday :)
