You Have Failed This City
Part 1 of a fan-fiction Arrow/Supergirl crossover 2-part series 6/series 3 finale
Dinah and Rene – in their vigilante aliases, Black Canary & Wild Dog – began to search the building they were in.
"Anything yet"
"Zilch, Lassie; I doubt anything is being stored here"
"This has gotta' be the place! Spartan said he saw some of Cayden's men here two nights ago."
"They must have gotten wind they were under surveillance and told James. He must've ordered them to switch locations. We're wasting our time here"
"Wait, Blackie!"
"What is it?"
"A car headlight, I think" said Rene, as he stared at the window through which he saw it.
A familiar sight greeted Black Siren as she looked to her left. Blue paint from a half-full pot started to ascend.
"I serious doubt that, Lassie!"
Her observation was on the mark. Outside the building they were searching, a portal between this Earth and the 38th opened and Samantha Arias's dark persona came through, dragging Ruby. She wore her Reign outfit, but the mask that covered her face had gone. The portal vanished, but just for a moment. It then re-opened. Supergirl, carrying Alex and Eliza, James Olsen in his Guardian gear, Valor, Saturn Girl, Braniac 5 and Winn entered this universe. For the latter 3 entrants, this was the first time he'd set foot on Earth 1.
"Let Ruby go!" Alex yelled.
Twice as aggressively, Samantha shouted back "Make me!"
Kara was the one who obliged. She tried three times to land a punch. Samantha avoided each one by flying up and out of range. She retaliated by hurling the Girl of Steel into the premises Wild Dog and Black Siren had infiltrated. Kara crashing through one of the upper floors was what alerted them they weren't alone. Supergirl wasn't inside with them long enough to be identified by either of them. Flying out the way she'd been thrown in, she landed in front of Samantha. Ruby was not by her side. Kara's distraction had allowed her to run over to where Alex was stood.
"Give her back to me, or you will feel the full force of the Awakening!"
She was sounding more like Reign than Samantha. Kara decided to take advantage of that.
"I wanna' talk to Jekyll, not Hyde"
Dinah emerged, followed by Rene. Once they were back outside this building, they looked around them to discover if any of Cayden's men were in the vicinity.
"Samantha has left the building!" she replied, switching back to her Reign persona.
Her heat vision was employed to try to wound Supergirl. Kara used hers to block Samantha's. Imra's stared hard at a nearby parked car. No-one was in it, so she felt it safe to use as a weapon. The vehicle launched itself into air and then plummeted towards Reign, knocking her over six feet to the right. Rene and Dinah had to move out of the way quickly, as Samantha went hurtling past them.
On his way to Black Canary's and Wild Dog's location, Oliver was talking to Felicity via his earpiece.
"There are multiple vehicles approaching the building" he heard his wife inform him. "They'll be there in less than 2 minutes."
He increased the speed of his motorbike as he rode it past what had been the headquarters of his family's defunct company.
A convoy of four trucks surged through an area of the Glades still not fully rebuilt after the earthquake. Inside the one leading the procession were Cayden, Black Siren, Ricardo Diaz (plus some of his men), and Vigilante.
"We're almost there" said Cayden dryly.
"Are you sure Oliver won't suspect it's a trap?" asked Earth 2's Laurel. "He's learned how to sniff them out"
"Ms Lance, that's what I'm hoping will happen" Cayden said, with malevolent patience.
Black Siren took that as a sign he'd something up his sleeve.
"Ten steps ahead"
"Twenty's a more accurate number. I'm not Chase."
"Aren't you?"
Cayden frowned.
Reign redirected her biological arsenal to Imra. She had to land to dodge the streams of heat surging out of her eyes. A wheel of one of the approaching vehicles was hit. The brakes were suddenly applied.
"What the hell was that?" Diaz enquired menacingly.
"You and your men should find out then."
"Safety catches off!" he called out to the twelve men accompanying. "Make sure some of the bullets hit Oliver Queen and co!"
They emerged from the back of the vehicle, just as the Green Arrow turned onto this road. Diaz's foot-soldiers opened fire. Oliver jumped away from his motorcycle to avoid the hail of bullets. He ran for the cover of one of the surrounding buildings.
Near to this gunfire, Olsen found where Ruby was now hiding.
"Are you okay?"
She nodded. He took her hand.
"We need to run"
The two of them set off in a direction James Olsen thought safe. They were almost adjacent to the left side of another warehouse. Suddenly, he was hit by Laurel's canary cry. The force of it was such that he unintentionally let go of Samantha's daughter. Ruby tried to run, but Diaz laid her out cold. They spent a moment gazing at the unconscious teenage girl,
"So, Oliver finally found himself a replacement for Evelyn – how cute!" Black Siren wrongly concluded.
"If that's who she is, Laurel, we can use her to get one-up on the Green Arrow."
Ricardo lifted Ruby up and flung her over his right shoulder. His men continuing to open fire on Oliver gave Laurel and him the ideal opportunity to head into the truck Cayden was in.
"Who's this?" he asks, watching Ruby being laid on the floor of the vehicle's interior.
"A teen wannabe ally of Ollie's – Artemis number 2" answered Laurel.
"We'll find out if that's true when we get back to base"
Olsen recovered from the sonic force too late to reach the departing truck. It was speeding off just as he caught sight of it. The Green Arrow's motorbike rocketed past him. He was neck-and-neck with it, when one of the men next to the driver, got his gun at the ready. Oliver wasted not time in putting an arrow through the man's chest, killing him instantly. The driver than rammed his foot on the accelerator, making the vehicle too fast for Ollie to catch up to a second time. He turned his motorbike around and rode off towards his base of operations.
From above, Supergirl witnessed the botched pursuit. Tracking the vehicle's course, she flew down to a spot in the road the truck was about to turn onto. Vincent was the first to catch sight of her standing in the middle of the road.
"Who the hell is that?" he asked.
The driver didn't even get to slam the brakes. Kara flew over the truck and opened its rear doors.
"Is defying gravity your meta-power?" Black Siren quizzed Supergirl.
"Thank you for getting Ruby to safety," she said, not realizing who the vehicle's occupants were, "but we can protect her."
Diaz stared intently at her, then replied "This isn't a rescue. The Green Arrow's new teen sidekick has info we need."
"She's not his sidekick. We're from another universe"
"You really need to work on your cover stories" he remarked, with no flicker of emotion in his voice."
Three vehicles – containing a team of A.R.G.U.S agents, led by Lyla Michaels – came into view and came to a halt in sequence. When they began emerging, Diaz yelled "We've got gate-crashers! Take them out!" His men didn't hesitate to follow their boss's command, and they start firing their machine guns on Lyla and the operatives accompanying her. They all strategically take cover behind their vehicles.
The shootout between them and Diaz's henchmen gave Supergirl the chance to retrieve Ruby from the truck. She only got as far as helping Samantha's daughter to wake up.
She was about to say Supergirl, but Kara employed the 'shush' gesture. Without warning, Reign appeared and delivered a punch to Kara's face. Ruby made the most of this distraction, and escaped the prospect of being recaptured by either Cayden or Reign. The latter flew up to the sky and used her height to pinpoint where Ruby would head to. Part of the wall of a nearby building collapsed when the Girl of Steel collided with it. When Alex, Eliza and Winn got there, Kara had already gotten off the rubble.
"Her mode of attack's getting more ruthless" she said to her sister and close friend/ally.
"If you want to take the wind out of her sails, Kara, yours has to be more so" Alex declared.
This new chance for Ruby to escape is also thwarted. Its failure brought about by Boots - Cayden's right-hand man. He grabs the teenager from behind and punctures her right shoulder with a tranquiliser dart. Its contents render Ruby unconscious and she is quickly bundled into the vehicle Cayden is in. The van sets off, but its departure goes unnoticed by almost everyone, due to the gun battle between A.R.G.U.S and Diaz's foots soldiers. The exception is Winn. He rushes towards it, quickly sliding underneath. Winn grabs hold of something that will keep him from his back and legs scraping along the road below. He does not realize how much danger this effort to rescue Samantha's kid will put him in.