Team Arrow, with the help of Lady Shiva, retrieve the totem, but not without some trouble...
"Now, who are you?" asked Lady Shiva, as she faced the four 'vigilantes' in front of her.
"Like I said, we're friends of Supergirl" replied Oliver.
"You're here for the totem. Why?" she asked.
"We're here to get the totem before Simon Lacroix does" replied Oliver.
"You've already told me that. You haven't told me why you want it."
"Two weeks ago, Lacroix kidnapped Supergirl and tortured her because he lost the map to the totem" explained Oliver, "We've since rescued her, but Lacroix is working with Cadmus to fuel anti-alien attacks across the world. He says he'll stop the attacks if we get the totem for him, but we don't plan on giving it to him. We're here to make sure the totem is in safe hands, away from him."
"I can assure you that I am more capable of keeping this totem safe" she replied.
"I'm sure you can, but we're not leaving this island without that totem." replied Oliver.
"The totem has been on this island for years and he still doesn't know it's here. It's safe."
"The situation has changed. It's only a matter of time before Lacroix finds it, and when he does, he's going to bring an army to get it. An army which you won't be able to stop. We'll be able to keep it safe."
"Where could you possibly take it that it'll be safer than here?"
"The Fortress of Solitude." The mention of the fortress seemed to spark something in her mind, changing her full demeanour as she looked at Oliver with near disbelief, "I told you we were friends with Supergirl. We know Superman too. He can keep it safe." They could see her run a calculated thought process in her mind, pondering whether or not she should accept their help and trust them.
"Follow me" she eventually said, as she began walking in the direction of the cave.
"So, you're that Green Arrow that's been helping Supergirl?" asked Lady Shiva, as she walked with Oliver and his team towards the location of the totem.
"Yeah" replied Oliver.
"Is she your girlfriend?" asked Lady Shiva, curiously.
"No, no. She's just a…"
"Super-friend?" she said, finishing his words for him.
"Yeah, you could say that" replied Oliver, smiling a bit at the term.
"I suppose you being from an alternate reality explains how you know my real name?"
"There was a Shado on my Earth. A doppelganger. Slade and I knew her."
"He must have loved her."
"How can you tell?"
"The way he's been looking at me. I can tell the story of guilt and love just from his face. I've seen it on many men's faces before. I can see it on yours too, although it is for someone else.
"Hey, you never told us how you knew Lacroix!" shouted Roy from behind them.
"Many years ago, a young Simon Lacroix came to me" explained Lady Shiva, "He was still a nobody, a far cry from the suave businessman and cold-blooded murderer that you see today. He was filled with anger and rage, looking for a purpose in the world. So I gave him one. I trained him, and allowed him to join my crusade to take down The Outsiders."
"Why would you embark on such a crusade?" asked Nyssa.
"My father, Yao Fei, and my sister, Mei, were both murdered by The Outsiders. I made it my duty in life to take down The Outsiders, to avenge my family and make sure that no more innocent lives would perish by their hands. I thought that by helping Lacroix channel his rage and darkness into taking down The Outsiders, I could stop him from becoming something worse. I was wrong. We succeeded in bringing down The Outsiders, and I warned him about the totem, but he could not resist it. He became intoxicated with the prospect of wielding it, and one day, he betrayed me. He gave me this" she said, pointing to the long scar running down the side of her face, "He wielded the totem once, and once he had a taste of its power, he decided that he couldn't live without it. I managed to retrieve the totem from him and I've hid it here ever since."
"Wait, if you're hiding it here, then how was there a map leading to its location?" asked Roy.
"That 'map', was a decoy sent out by me, meant to lead him astray. We're here" she said, as they came across the entrance to the cave, covered by a series of vines and roots.
Entering into the cave, Oliver noted the relative emptiness of it. No weapons, no bodies of dead Japanese soldiers, only a single, small box, placed against the wall in the center of the cave.
"This is it" said Lady Shiva, as she picked up the box and handed it to Oliver. He carefully took it, slowly opening the lid to reveal the silver arrow artifact.
"If you're taking it, I must warn you about it" continued Shiva, "This totem… it doesn't just provide enlightenment and powers. It amplifies everything within a person. If you are a paragon of light, you will become even more so, but if you are filled with darkness… it will corrupt you even more. Drive you to madness. That is what it did to Lacroix."
"Don't worry, it's safe in our hands" replied Oliver, but his words seemed to fly over her head, as she stared blankly at the entrance of the cave. She pulled out a small device which started furiously beeping. A proximity detector…
"We're not alone" she said, before quickly pulling out a detonator and pressing the button. Immediately, explosions rang out around the cave, "Go, we need to move!" she screamed. They all ran for the exit, with their adrenaline pumping and their minds kicking into fight-mode. Immediately as they exited, they noticed several bodies scattered around the area in front of them. They immediately started firing arrows at the platoons of men on their right, with Slade drawing his pistols and firing bullets too while they took cover behind trees around them as the men started firing their weapons on them too.
"These are Lacroix's men! Mercenaries!" screamed Lady Shiva over the chaos, "You guys need to go! Take the totem!"
"You can't take these guys by yourself!" screamed back Oliver.
"I'll be fine! Take the totem, it's more important!" Oliver groaned, as he realised what had to be done. He quickly nocked two explosive arrows, firing them at Lacroix's men. As the arrows exploded, sending several of Lacroix's men into the air, he, Nyssa and Roy started to run back to the plane, but not Slade. Oliver noticed him stay put, rather continuing to fire upon the men attacking them.
"Slade! Slade!" screamed out Oliver.
"I'm not leaving her kid!" scowled back Slade, "Not this time!"
With those words, Oliver realised that this was something Slade had to do, and regretfully continued the run back to the plane.
"I'm running out of bullets!" exclaimed Slade, as he continued to shoot at Lacroix's men. He watched from his peripheral vision, as Lady Shiva turned to a bush next to them, lifting it up and pulling out an LSW light machine gun. She tossed it to him before returning to her cover behind the tree.
"Now we're talking" said Slade jovially, as he dropped his pistols, and began firing mercilessly upon the mercenaries. He couldn't help but chuckle a bit as he watched the bodies drop while the magazine emptied, as he felt like The Terminator once more. It took no more than a few seconds before the men there were eradicated, but it took the proximity detector even less time to start beeping once again.
"There's more men. They're heading for the totem" said Lady Shiva, before she quickly returned to the bush where the gun was being kept, and threw Slade another magazine, "Get to them before they get to Oliver and the others" she said, before she started heading straight towards where the men initially came from.
"Where are you going?" asked Slade, concernedly.
"Lacroix is here. I know it."
"Hey!" called out Slade, before she started running, "Be careful."
She acknowledged his request with a nod, before they both ran in their opposing directions.
Before Lady Shiva could even make it halfway across the clearing towards where she thought Lacroix was, he appeared on the trail, almost as if he rose from the bodies of the dead men around him. Lady Shiva turned around to see if Slade was still there, but he was gone. It wasn't a worry to her of course. In fact, she preferred if Lacroix died by her blade, rather than a bullet from a gun. He was clad in his full Komodo uniform, with the mask, black hood and black sleeveless top all making him stick out amongst the brown forests of Lian Yu. As he walked hastily towards her, she dropped her bow and opted to draw her sword instead.
"I bested you the last time we fought" said Lady Shiva, "This time won't be any different… Komodo."
"我们拭目以向，森西" – We'll see about that, Sensei.
With those words, they began the fight. Lady Shiva swung her blade first, a strike blocked by Komodo's bow. The fight continued, with the synergy between student and master being on full display as they traded blows in the forest. Years of training together allowed them to see the fight through two sets of eyes. Their own, and then their opponents. They knew each and every move they'd try to make on one another, blocking many of their opponent's strikes.
However, the ferocity of Komodo's strikes were something that was throwing Lady Shiva off. Many had told her she was possibly the greatest martial artist in the world, but she was slowly starting to find herself on the losing side of this battle with Lacroix. Her strikes were starting to oscillate through the air while his started to make contact with her body. An evenly contested fight like this meant mistakes were simply not an option. Two skilled assailants like this would capitalise on a single mistake of each other's, with the consequences being the end of the fight.
They each hurt each other in the duel, with Shiva managing to lacerate Komodo's skin a couple of times, while the strikes of his bow were bruising her body to beyond belief. He whacked her across the face with his bow, causing her to stumble back, momentarily dazed. He threw another strike into her abdomen, causing her to kneel over in pain. Shiva could barely register what was happening around her. The whole fight seemed even until Lacroix wanted it to be. He had been toying with her from the beginning. She swung her blade at his head but once again, the blade sliced nothing but the air, as he ducked underneath it and knocked her to the ground with a savage punch to the head. Hurt and defeated, Shiva could only look up at Lacroix, who stood over her and ripped her sword from her hands.
"What can I say? The student has surpassed the master" he said mockingly, "Rest well, Sensei" he said, before he lifted the sword up, preparing to drive it into her chest.
Slade sprinted through the forest of Lian Yu, back to Lady Shiva's location. He had shot down the men on Oliver's trail, and wanted to make sure she was alright. She was a different person, of course, but she wore Shado's face. To Slade, that meant they were almost the same. Seeing made him understand what it must have felt like for Oliver when he first Earth-38 Kara, and why it was so important for Oliver to save her.
He knew he was nearing when he began to hear the sound of metal banging against metal. He sprinted even harder, ignoring the aching of his legs. The banging got louder, and soon enough, he could see them duelling. Shiva was losing. He watched her get knocked to the ground, which only fuelled him to run even harder.
"LACROIX!"
Slade screamed out as Komodo lifted the blade, causing him to whip towards Slade. He spun the blade around back into his hand before kicking Shiva in the face, making sure she was out of the fight. He readied into battle stance as Slade drew a sword of his own, sprinting towards Lacroix intensely as they began a sword duel.
It had been a while since someone had bested him in a swordfight. He was always the slightly better swordsman than Billy, and few other ASIS agents could keep up with his swordsmanship. The clattering of their swords echoed through the forests. Slade wasn't surprised that Lacroix could compete with him, he was more surprised that Lacroix barely seemed tired despite having just had another fight. He continued to slash at Lacroix, managing to slice a gash on his arm. However, Lacroix retaliated by slashing at Slade's abdomen. Slade dropped to a knee as the blade lacerated his stomach. Had he not partially parried it, it would have cut much deeper, possibly causing his intestines to spill out on the floor in front of him.
Suddenly, just as Lacroix was about to decapitate Slade, a strong wind burst through the area, and Lacroix found the sword slicing nothing but the air as Slade and Lady Shiva's bodies disappeared in front of him.
Oliver sat anxiously in the pilot's seat on the DEO aircraft on the shores of Lian Yu, waiting for Slade to arrive at any second. The thought of leaving without Slade was unthinkable, of course, but he couldn't help but think that if Slade hadn't made it here by now, he's probably dead. He hadn't thought about it, but the probability of Lacroix being on the island was pretty high. He'd want to get the totem himself, rather than trust it with one of his henchmen. The more important thought that Oliver tried to dwell on, was how Lacroix knew they were on Lian Yu. Could he have found the location of the totem as well? Possibly, but it was too strange of a coincidence.
A couple of seconds later, a gust of wind blasted through the plane, as Oliver turned around to see Slade and Lady Shiva, both badly hurt, while Clark, who had flown them in, appeared weakened too as several of his veins glowed green.
"Go, go!" said Clark, as Oliver quickly pushed the handle down to full throttle, as the plane started to glide over the water, and eventually, up into the air.
Having now placed the plane into auto-pilot, Oliver got up from the pilot's chair and made his way to the passenger area. Slade sat on the side, staring at Lady Shiva who lay on the floor atop a sleeping bag, with a respirator over her face. She had taken a solid beating at the hands of Lacroix, and Slade was a bit worse for wear too. His left arm remained over his abdomen, which had been bandaged up and treated. Clark had heard the commotion, and flew in to save them. As he approached the island, he felt his strength sapping away from him, having later discovered that all of the mercenaries, including Lacroix, were wearing kryptonite bracelets. He could only make a limited flight on the island, so he chose to save Slade and Shiva instead of take down Lacroix.
Oliver moved over to Slade, sitting down next to him, "You alright?" he asked.
"It's not every day that I get my arse handed to me" replied Slade, somewhat cheerfully.
"He is quite skilled."
"No, kid. It was… more than that. He was strong… It was like he was toying with me, like he knew what I was going to throw before I threw it" explained Slade. His words gave Oliver a lot to think about. Lacroix being enhanced would explain a lot about him. "I'm sorry kid. You know why I couldn't leave her behind" continued Slade, as he stared at Lady Shiva once more, "I told you Shado's death still haunted me. I was thinking that maybe if I could save her, I could redeem myself from that mistake."
"Have you?" asked Oliver.
A hearty smile appeared from Slade, one that Oliver hadn't seen since their first year on Lian Yu. Such a smile told Oliver all that he needed to know, as he patted Slade on the shoulder before standing up and heading back to the cockpit. He pulled out the satellite phone, calling J'onn.
"Oliver. Do you have the totem?"
"Yeah, we got it. We ran into some trouble though. Clark had to fly in and get us out of there" replied Oliver.
"What happened?"
"Lacroix showed up. Along with a few friends of his."
"Lacroix? How did he know the totem was there?"
"That's what I've been trying to figure out. J'onn, how many people knew of this operation?"
"Quite a few, but only DEO agents. Why?"
"There's only one way he could have known. There has to be a mole in the DEO."
"That's a bold assumption, Oliver."
"It has to be true. How else could he have known?"
"You may be right. I'll scan the minds of every agent to try determine who it is. I'll keep the whereabouts of the totem as discreet as possible."
"Good. We'll be back soon."
A/N: Next chapter, Oliver and Kara finally talk to each other about their feelings for one another...