A/N: Expanded Oliver POV from "Streets of Fire" (2.22). Again, by necessity, this is an internal scene. Also, because just like following recipes or knitting patterns isn't my style, I promptly altered the episode dialogue I lifted. I hope y'all enjoy!

Up In Flames – Part Two

"Can you believe that asshole still thinks he's a good mayor after all this?" Digg scoffs and indicates the destruction in the city. His gun is drawn, and he covers us as we make our way back to the stolen car we left outside the municipal building with our precious cargo. "Men who sleep well at night scare the shit out of me, and that man sleeps like a baby. What are you going to do about him?"

"Slade will kill him."

"You think?"

I nod. Sebastian was a pawn, and his inability to recognize that will be his downfall. He'll demand too much. Criticize too openly. He made his deal with the devil, and the devil will end him.

"Aim higher," I tell Digg. "You need to shoot them in the head or it won't stop them."

"I wish I had a sword," Digg mutters. "I wish I had a sword and knew how to use it. I don't care if Felicity is right and their brains realize their heads have been cut off before they die." He shudders. "Do you think that's really true because that's been freaking me out since she said it."

"Let's get back to the tower," I say instead of answering, sliding behind the wheel. I'm driving because shooting a bow from the confines of a compact car small enough to maneuver around all the debris littering the streets would be next to impossible.

"Yeah," he agrees as he wedges the thick case from STAR lab between his feet. "I really didn't want to leave her alone with Roy."

"She's fine."

She has to be fine. I have to believe she's fine. I concentrate on the road, my eyes sweeping for hazards as well as enemies, but all I can see is the small amount of venom left in Roy's rapidly emptying IV bag, and we've been guessing how much we should give him to keep him unconscious in the first place. He could wake up at any moment, and we all know it.

"Remember the last time we left her with him?" he reminds me, as if I will ever possibly forget.

She didn't want to stay. She might've been afraid to be left alone, but I know she was even more afraid of not being with us, no matter what might happen. Especially because something might happen. She wanted to be close to us. To be helpful.

I know Felicity, and asking her to stay behind was cruel. But unlike Laurel, who ignored my wishes and rushed head-first into harm's way because that's what she does best, I knew Felicity would do what I needed her to do. She didn't like it, but she would stay behind because I asked her to. Because she trusts me. Because she believes in me.

She stayed behind not because Roy needs her, but because I need her to be safe, and unconscious Roy is the better option. Because I don't trust Sebastian and knew there was a good chance we were walking into a trap. With her dilated pupils and blood still oozing from her nose, she's in no condition to go anywhere except a hospital.

God. She has to be fine. She has to be.

I drive as fast as I dare, and then maybe just a little bit faster, cursing this cheap-ass car and wishing I had my Ducati.

"My phone's dead," he says. "You want to call? You know she's wearing a hole in the floor pacing."

"We'll be there in a minute," I say as I ease the car as quickly as possible around a flipped and smoldering Starling City bus. "I don't know when we'll be able to charge them again."

"Sure thing, boss," Digg says with a knowing nod.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You just want to hear her excited squeal when we walk up those stairs."

"Shut up."

"You can admit you love the squeaks, man. I know I do, and her 'Digg's okay' squeak is definitely a different sound-effect than her 'Oliver's okay.'"

"Shut up," I say again.

"Maybe she'll run," Digg continues, ignoring me. "Grateful and relieved, into your arms like one of those movies ladies always make us watch."

"Are you twelve?" I snap. "This is serious. And we might need the phones later."

Out of the corner of my eye, I see Digg smile, even as his gun is drawn and ready. "Come on, Oliver. Let a man have some fun." He sighs and shakes his head. "While he still can," he adds under his breath.

"We're going to be okay," I assure him. "We're going to fix this."

"Oh sure. First we'll just capture one of these masked minions and somehow restrain him and inject him and make sure it works," Digg says with a sarcastic edge to his voice. "Then, by some miracle those kids at the lab knew what the hell they were doing and this stuff does work, we're going to somehow track down however many of them there are running wild all over the city and inject them, one at a time, until they're back to being just regular ol' murders and thugs and thieves who will probably be pissed at us for taking away their super-powers. We'll be singing kumbya while we shovel rubble in no time."

"Yes," I reply with a nod. "That's exactly what we're going to do. Except for the singing."

"You seemed to enjoy singing not so long ago," he says, but I don't take the bait and just drive because I don't know what made me sing to Felicity while I carried her and I can't think about that right now. "Listen. Oliver," he begins. "We need to rethink our strategy."

"You know the best way to eat a whale?" I interrupt him because I'm well aware of all the ways our plan is a long-shot at best. "One bite at a time, Diggle. Chew, swallow, repeat."

"She needs to repeat whatever pep talk she gave you," he says as I ease the car into the shadows by the tower in case we need it again. "'Cause it was obviously a good one and I could use it about now."

I don't say anything, but I can feel the heat rising up my neck and spreading across my cheeks as I remember the feel of her lips pressed against my forehead like they were always meant to be there. Her crushing hug that seemed to assume I'd never been hugged before and never would be again. Her hug that asked nothing in return except to allow her to give it. The way her warm strength poured into me, anchoring me, giving me the courage I needed to keep fighting. Because she believes in me.

"I'll settle for the edited version," Digg says as he stares at my flushed face.

"It's not like that," I begin to explain, but Digg holds up his hand to stop me.

"I don't want to know right now. But listen. She's my girl too. It's different between us. But if you hurt her, you and me, we're going to have problems."

"It's not like that," I say again, more quietly this time because even I don't know what exactly it is or isn't when it comes to Felicity. All I know is that she simultaneously sets me on fire and extinguishes the flames. She's too good for me, and I know she deserves better, but I can't bear the thought of ever letting her go.

I need her.

"Let's take care of this madness first," Digg grimly says. "And then we're going to have a talk."

"Oh thank God!" Felicity squeals when we finally make it up the stairs. "You're here! You're back! You're not dead!"

She puts down the gun she'd been pointing towards the stairwell and throws herself into my arms. Digg gives me a pointed look, and I roll my eyes back at him, annoyed that he's ruining this. Fortunately, she's too busy squeezing me to notice our silent exchange.

"You too, Digg," she demands, reaching for him and pulling him into the crush. "I want to hug you too. We should all hug each other more often, not just when we're all about to die."

She has one arm around each of us, but her head is resting on my chest. I lean my head into her hair and breathe the comforting smell of her and can't even pretend I don't want this group-hug.

"I'm glad you had the gun ready in case it wasn't us," Digg tells her. "Just like I showed you."

"I'm so glad I didn't shoot you! I almost shot you."

"I'd forgiven you," he says. "Oliver would have too," he adds when it's obvious I'm not going to answer.

"I'm just so grateful I don't have to be pissed off at you because you're dead. Give a girl a minute. I think I may have minor head trauma. And quite possibly, I'm developing a heart condition. You kill me, both of you. All this drama! I just want to hug you, and then we can figure out how we're going to save the world. Okay? Great. Thanks."

Digg chuckles softly and drops an easy kiss to the top of her head. I try to picture myself doing the same thing, and even in my head, it's all wrong and awkward and nothing like the simple affection they share.

"We wouldn't have left you here if we didn't think we'd come back," he tells her.

"Liar," she accuses, and rightfully so. "You left me here precisely because you didn't think you'd come back."

"But here we are," he says.

"Yes you are." She leans back and looks at us, her face bright with a smile. "Okay. But we have trouble." She untangles herself and suddenly looks serious. "I mean, more trouble than the obviousness of the super-thug gang burning down the city." She walks over to Roy and points at his fluttering eyelids and twitching fingers. "We're out of time. He's waking up. Please." She closes her eyes, and I think for a moment that maybe she's praying. "Please tell me Blood actually had the cure and gave it to you. Because if he didn't. If it doesn't work." She doesn't finish, but by the way she's looking at Roy, I know she realizes that we'd have to kill him before he wakes up. We can't risk it, not with everything else that's going wrong and no way to contain him.

Digg sets down the heavy case.

She raises her eyes to the ceiling. "Thank you Jesus, Mary and Joseph." She looks at me and blushes. "I like to think I'm entitled to ask them for the occasional assistance, what with us all being Jewish and everything, and I decided if ever there was a time to call on divine intervention, now would be it. I was seizing the day."

I open the case, and we all peer at the vials of luminescent blue liquid.

"The force is strong with this one," she says. "I'm not complaining, especially if it works, but why does every secret formula have to a color?" she murmurs. "Mirakuru's all glowing and green. Those syringes of Vertigo you brought me with the lame story about it being an energy drink were weird and yellow. And now this. It's so bright it's throwing shadows. It looks like a case full of tiny lightsabers."

"Tiny lightsabers?" I ask as I slide one from the protective padding and hold it up, swirling the tube as if looking at it will tell me whether or not it will work.

"Yeah, you know, for the little padewans and Yoda. His lightsaber is really small. Well, I mean it's green. But still."

"I think he missed the prequels," Digg tells her.

"We need to test this," I say, turning to face Roy, wishing there was someone else I could use as a lab rat other than the boy my sister loves. "Just how good are these friends of yours?"

"They're pretty good," she admits. "But." We all hover around Roy, none of us moving. "What if it doesn't work?" she finally whispers. "What if he wakes up and kill us?"

"He's waking up anyway," Digg points out. "Whether we try to cure him or not. And we're definitely in bad shape if he wakes up uncured."

"What if the cure takes away whatever magic the Mirakuru had that saved his life, so once it's out of his system, he dies again?" Felicity asks. "Or what if it just kills him outright?"

"What if Blood double-crossed us and gave us a case full of glowsticks?" Digg adds.

"How did he get his hands on this case in the first place?" Felicity chimes in. "I know Slade's missing some sandwiches from his picnic basket and all, but I can't imagine he'd just hand over the one thing that could stop him. And how on earth are we going to find everyone to cure? We can't miss a single one or it was all for nothing."

"Enough," I say to both of them, anything to get them to stop pointing out all the impossibilites. "We need to know." I swallow and know they're both looking to me. To make this call. To be the leader. "One way or another, we need to know what this does."

I try not to mind as Felicity holds Digg's hand when I load the vial into the syringe. I think we're all holding our breath as I rest one hand on Roy's chest and feel for his carotid with my fingertips.

"I'm sorry," I whisper to him. To Thea. To Digg and Felicity.

To everyone, really. I'm just so, so sorry.

The needle is poised just above the throbbing artery in his neck. His pulse is strong, defiant in the face of such heavy toxins we've been giving him for days to keep him unconscious and not a threat.

What if this doesn't work and we have to kill him anyway?

What if it kills him?

What if it somehow does the opposite and makes him even stronger? More crazed? What if it makes him immortal and we can't kill him?

My hands are shaking when I drop the syringe onto the table next to him.

"I can't," I whisper.

Felicity picks up the cure, what we hope is maybe the cure, and instead of handing it back to me, she rests her other hand on top of mine.

"I'll do it," she says.

Felicity hates needles. Felicity's never killed anyone. Felicity's heart is pure. I can't ask her to do this for me.

"Let me do this for you, Oliver," she says as if she read my mind and heard my internal argument against her being the one. "Please. Let me be the one this time." But before I can respond, her phone rings. Glancing at the screen, she quickly says, "It's Detective Lance" and swipes it on to answer.

"Yes," she shortly replies to whatever it is he's asked her. "Yes," she says again, pulling out her tablet and pulling up the local news app.

Looking over her shoulder, I watch the convoy that can only be ARGUS make its way towards the bridge where the we left the dead courier. While we watch the screen, uniformed men burst from the backs of the trucks and start setting up what can only be roadblocks.

People at home watching will think the military has come to save us. But that bitch is shutting down the only ways out of the city. They aren't here to help. They're here to contain the damage.

"Fuck," I growl, reaching for my phone.

"Waller?" Digg asks.

"It has to be," I say as her direct cell rings. She'd damn better well take my call.

I don't bother waiting for a niceties or a greeting when she answers.

"What the hell are you doing?" I demand before she can say hello. "Troops in position at the city exits? Those are your men, so you tell me what you're planning."

Silence.

"Amanda!" I shout into the phone.

"Slade and his followers are a clear and present danger," she says in a calm voice. "I cannot allow them to escape Starling City."

"I'm working on it," I snap.

"They must be contained," she continues, as if I hadn't spoken. "By any means necessary."

I turn and look at Felicity, who's watching me with wide eyes, her hand over her mouth.

Amanda means to level the city. Kill us all in order to kill Slade and his men.

Everyone in Starling is going to die.

"You can't," I say, not quite believing she's going to destroy a city full of civilians. "Amanda, you can't."

"There's a drone en route," she says in that infuriatingly calm voice, as if she's telling me it might rain.

"There are over half a million people in this city!"

"576,000," she says, as if her knowing the exact number means she cares. "But I have to think about the people in every city. You told me Mirakuru made a man virtually unstoppable. What would happen to this country, this world, if I don't end this here and now?"

Digg is right: there's nothing more terrifying than a man who sleeps well at night, and Amanda Waller's dreams are untroubled. She believes in her cause. In her mission. She doesn't doubt. She rains down righteousness and justice and doesn't even have to wash the blood from her hands because she never gets close enough to get them dirty.

Goddammit.

"Listen to me," I beg. "I have the cure. Do you understand? I can stop Slade and his men. I can end this."

"You're an impressive man, Oliver," she admits almost grudgingly. "But even you aren't that good, and I can't take the chance that you'll fail."

"I won't fail."

"I'd be willing to send a chopper for you and your team, in exchange for your future service."

I close my eyes and try not to even consider her offer. I could at least save Felicity. Diggle. But I'd be turning them over to her, to use their considerable skills for who knows what shady purpose. She wouldn't ask them for their permission or their thoughts. She wouldn't see them as people. She'd wield them like weapons, use them as tools. I'd be selling them into slavery, and I can't do that. Not even to save them.

"I just need more time," I tell her.

"I'm sorry," she says even though she certainly doesn't sound like it. "The drone will be there at dawn. And then Starling City will be a crater."

I hang up the phone and raise it over my head to throw it against the wall, but Felicity rescues it and gently eases it out of my hand.

"I don't think it will make you feel better," she says. "And we might need it."

"When does the drone strike?" Digg quietly asks, knowing Waller and her methods well enough to know what she's planning.

"Dawn."

"Dawn?" Felicity whispers, the word little more than a breath. "Dawn."

"So that's it?" Digg asks. "She's willing to kill everyone?"

I nod.

"You'd think she'd watch more hero movies given her line of work," Felicity says. She has tears in her eyes, but she's trying so hard to be brave. She even forces an unsteady smile. "Everyone knows killing all the civilians rarely happens because someone, some amazing guy, anonymously saves everyone just in the nick of time. Besides, if they do the city to kill the villains, one of the bad guys always claws his way out of the rubble in the final scene to set up the sequel. Her idea is terrible. The movies say so."

"What was her offer?" Digg asks. I look at him, and he shrugs. "I know her. She offered to get us out, I'm sure."

I nod.

"I'm glad you said no," he says. "So what's the plan?"

I pick up the syringe and, without hesitating, inject the cure into Roy.