We're going to jump forward a few weeks here. This chapter lends itself for conclusions to be drawn as to what happened in the interim.
Pippa leant against the red brick wall out the back of Verdant. It was late, nearing nine and she was getting impatient. The thought had crossed her mind to bang on the heavy steel door and raise holy hell until Felicity came upstairs, but she decided that it probably wasn't the best first impression to give the tiny blonde, although Pippa was sure she had already made up her mind.
Oliver's motorbike screeched into the car park, followed by Diggle's sleek black car.
Pippa pushed herself off the wall and waited with her arms folded.
"You guys took your time," she scoffed, "I've already been to the scene."
"We had something else to finish on the way home," Oliver replied bluntly.
He punched the code in, putting himself between the numbered pad and Pippa, not allowing her to see it.
"Where's Slade?" she asked.
"He went straight home," Diggle said, squeezing past her to get to the door.
"I've been trying to call him but I haven't heard anything back," she explained, "Was he okay when he left?"
"Seemed to be, we had to leave pretty quickly," Oliver replied from halfway down the stairs.
Diggle looked expectantly at her, holding the door open, motioning for her to follow. She could have just as easily gone home, now that she knew Slade wasn't with them. But curiosity got the better of her.
She ducked inside and the door slammed behind her.
"Felicity," Oliver hollered.
"Yep, here, present," she came quickly from a different room of the basement.
"You know Pippa?" he asked, motioning to the long legged red head that was cautiously making her way down the stairs.
"Uh, yep, hi," Felicity rung her hands and waved.
Pippa nodded and smiled, taking in the surroundings.
"Welcome to the Arrow Cave," Felicity tried to start a conversation.
"Thanks, it's bigger than I thought it'd be, and this," she motioned to the computer set up, "this is very impressive."
"Thank you, you should have seen it when I first started working for Oliver, the set up was way back in the late 90s," Felicity grinned, and then winced when she caught the evil eye from Oliver.
"Terrifying," Pippa ran her fingers over the top of the monitor.
"You have no idea."
"You track everybody on this?" Pippa asked.
"Yep, just to make sure everyone is where they are meant to be, you know, make sure that nobody has gone rogue, not that anyone would go rogue, right? We're all in this together."
"Pretty sure there is a song about that," Diggle returned to the main room.
Felicity and Pippa raised an eyebrow each at him.
"What? AJ has a heap of friends that are girls, don't judge," he scoffed.
Pippa stood in silence as Felicity and Diggle traded their version of tonight's events. Cherry Noller was the leader of the Four Horsemen drug cartel that ran primarily out of the Glades selling a lethal version of cocaine in large amounts.
"Can you see if Slade made it home tonight?" Pippa spoke up during a longer silence, turning her attention back to Felicity and her computers.
"Sure," Felicity plopped herself down in the black chair and tapped away quickly. "Looks like he did, the GPS in his phone is pinging at your address."
Pippa pulled her phone out of her pocket and glanced at the screen which notified her of no new messages or missed calls.
"Mmm," she sighed.
"You were lead at the crime scene right?" Felicity spoke up, swivelling around in her chair.
Pippa nodded.
"So you'll be running the blood samples taken from the scene then?"
"Most probably," Pippa nodded, knowing where this conversation was going. "We did collect a lot of Cherry Noller's blood, but there was at least one male sample collected."
"Could be any of us," Oliver returned, a bad cut on his left arm that was held close to his side.
"Holy crap!" Felicity jumped up.
"It's okay, not very deep, just bled a lot," he sat down and let John tend to it.
"I'll make sure the male sample disappears," Pippa assured them.
"Thanks," Oliver nodded. Pippa could see the discomfort on his face. She would have put it down to the gaping slice in his arm, but she had seen it on his face ever since their dalliance the day before Slade arrived. She hadn't been able to get him alone to talk about it.
"Alright, well, I'll get going and go home and check on Slade," Pippa tucked her phone away, turning to leave.
"It was nice to meet you," Felicity smiled, "I'll buzz you out."
"Thanks, you too," Pippa paused in her departure.
"Night Pippa," John called, although it was drowned out by an annoyed and agonized hiss from Oliver.
"Slade?" Pippa called the minute she opened the door.
"Ssh, Joe's in bed," she heard him called from the kitchen.
"Why haven't you answered my calls?" she raced off to her right, finding Slade leaning heavily on the bench. She hung her bag on one of the breakfast stools.
"I'm sorry," was all Slade could manage.
"You're sorry? Are you kidding me?"
"Darling girl, Joe is asleep, please, ssh," he whispered.
"You could have sent me a message!" Pippa was blind to Slade's ashen appearance and quick breaths, the anger she felt at being ignored too much for her to stop and look at him even a second.
"I'm sure Oliver and John filled you in, there's not much I can add."
"Are you okay?" she asked after a brief pause. The long sentence Slade had just spoken seemed to exacerbate his already noticeable symptoms.
"Yeah, I'm alright," but he wouldn't look her in the eye.
"There was blood all over the scene and it wasn't Noller's."
"Jesus, Pippa," he breathed out heavily, her name almost inaudible as he sank to the kitchen floor.
"Slade, are you okay? Slade!" she raced around the breakfast bar and knelt next to him. His right arm was wrapped around his stomach and a limp hand, sticky and red, had fallen away from a very obvious knife wound in his left side.
Pippa put a hand on Slade's thigh, his legs splayed out in front of him. His slouched form was lifeless and Pippa had to use her body weight to pull him back upright and towards her.
She felt his forehead press against her shoulder and a tormented moan pushed hot breath on her arm.
"Slade, open your eyes," she cupped his face.
His lips were parted slightly, and she returned his head to her shoulder, holding him close with one hand while she pulled her phone out of her back pocket with the other.
"Everything alright?"
"Oliver, Slade's hurt, and my first aid kit doesn't cover deep stab wounds and internal bleeding."
"I'm on my way," Oliver stated before Pippa had even finished the sentence.