Sorry for the long wait. There's just been a lot going on irl. but I do hope to get back to this and have chapters coming more often. I am not abandoning this story. Enjoy!

Moving Forward

Part Three

Oliver's eyes snap open, and he instinctively tries to breathe in, but his breathing is restricted. He takes a moment to assess his new surroundings. He doesn't fail to notice that he is stuck between two large slabs of concrete with a piece of rebar blocking his only way out. He put his hand on his comm: "Sara...?" he coughs, a cloud of dust particles surrounding him. "J'onn...?" He gets nothing but static. He turns his head toward the right and sees one of the specialty arrows on the ground that he can use to get rid of the rebar blocking him from getting out. He reaches for it, but it's just too far--a good arm's length away.

"Need some help?" someone rolls the arrow towards him. Oliver gratefully picks up the arrow. He finally looks up to get a good look at the person. Oliver freezes in place, the genuine surprise on his face is one he has only experienced a handful of other times.

"T-Tommy?"

"Hey, Ollie. It's been a while."

(With The Others.)

Thea and John were less than a mile away from the scene. After hearing Sara's desperate plea for Oliver to answer back, Thea turns to John with a scared look in her eyes. He already knows what she wants. "Go, Thea, I'll stay here helping get people out. Call me if you need me. Go get him..." Thea nods and beelines out of the makeshift triage center to the bike she borrowed from the DEO. She starts it up and using the GPS on her bike, heads off towards where Sara and Oliver are. John wanted to go with her, but these people still need help; he knew Sara and Thea had Oliver's back.

Back at the DEO, Kara watched the news coverage of the scene in horror. She berates herself: this is only happening because she fought that stupid android and didn't listen to her sister. She can't help but think this is her fault. That it should be her out there. Instead, Oliver and his team are out there putting their lives on the line. Now there's a possibility she might never see Oliver again...that she might not get the chance to tell him how she feels about him. In the months they have been working together and hanging out with each other, she has seen Oliver Queen in a new light. Kara recently admitted to herself that she is falling for Oliver. She can tell there is also something there from Oliver's side, but it's like something is holding him back. Barry has repeatedly told her that Oliver's life is very complicated. But what she sees from Oliver's side almost looks like...fear. Fear of what though, she doesn't know. She can't imagine what the Green Arrow could possibly fear given everything he has already faced in his past; Oliver Queen and fear are not two words that exist in the same context other than he being the one to instill it in others. She snaps out of her thoughts when she hears the breach alarm going off. Cisco was first to step through followed by Barry and Caitlin.

"All right, all right! Have no fear, Team Flash is here!" Cisco quickly regretted coming in the way he did. "Man, I totally read the mood of the room wrong, didn't I?"

Barry sees Felicity wiping tears from her cheeks as she works at her station. He then sees Kara not far from her staring up at one of the screens that has breaking news on it. He walks toward them, starting to ask, "Kara, Felicity...what's wro-" He's then able to see what has Kara's attention and what has them so worried. *Breaking news: Emerald Archer still trapped in collapsed building. Firefighters, EMS, and White Canary gearing up to go inside.* "Oh no. I-I gotta go. Where is he?" he asks the room, not knowing his way in the unfamiliar city.

Winn opens a desk drawer, takes out an Earth-38 comm, and tosses it to Barry. "I'll guide you, it's about three miles due west."

Barry speeds off towards the scene with Winn directing him through his comm.

(Back with Sara.)

Firefighters and EMS along with Sara and Thea are gathered around a table under a tent that has been set up for rescue operations in the area. The fire captain is giving a briefing on how they are going to enter the collapsed building. Another firefighter is helping Sara gear up with a firefighter's suit and a helmet for protection and to make it easier for them to see her while they're in the building.

"Ok, so according to these schematics and the last contact you had with the Emerald Archer, he's here near the daycare. We've only found one way in and it's not as close as we would like it to be. But we just need to get you close enough so you can use your heartbeat sensor so we can locate him and know his condition. We also want to be on the lookout for anyone else that could be trapped, especially children. He did say he was near a daycare; if there were two children in there, there could be more."

Everyone nods and grabs their gear. The captain sends one firefighter in ahead of them with the chemical and gas detector. They get halfway to their destination when the firefighter that was ahead of them starts coming back, telling them, "gas! get out!" Everybody files back out the way they came. The firefighter walks up to Sara and the captain.

"Sir, we have a huge problem-" before he's able to finish speaking, Barry arrived.

"Hey, I saw you guys gearing up on TV to go in, did you guys find anything?" Barry asked.

Sara tells him they only got so far inside before they were turned around because they found gas. The firefighter explains there is a gas pocket just on the other side of the walls adjacent to the daycare.

Thea holds her hand on her comm to keep the line open so the team and everyone at the DEO can hear the situation. "So what does that mean? Can't the Flash just phase in and get him out?" Thea asked turning to Barry, who nods, but the fire captain puts a stop to it.

"For one, we still don't know where he is. Also, your friend here generates electricity when he runs, right? Even when he...phases?" Barry nods. "Then it would be a bad idea for your friend to try. He might be able to get the Emerald Archer out, but he could trigger a gas explosion. The gas line under this building also runs several city blocks. Which means he'll be putting a lot of civilians and rescue workers at risk. Also, we don't know what kind of condition the Emerald Archer is in. We don't know if moving him like that will do more harm than good."

"He wouldn't want us to save him by putting others at risk," Barry says, and Thea and Sara both reluctantly nod in agreement. "OK, so what are our other options? What if we call Superman?"

"Again, we might run into a similar problem. One spark could set the whole thing off," the captain says. "I'm going to direct some firefighters to find and shut off the valve for this gas line. That will still leave the gas pocket in this building. We'll deal with that, but we just need to make sure we're not putting more of the city at risk before we make any other moves."

The three heroes look devastated because there is absolutely nothing they can do to help Oliver at the moment. They don't even know if he is still alive.

Alex's voice comes over their comms: "Guys, I was listening to everything. I think calling Superman might still be helpful. We can at least have him use his x-ray vision and superhearing to check on Oliver."

Kara's voice is next over the comms: "I'll call him now and ask him to come over as soon possible." She had seen on another screen showing news from around the country that the quake had also hit Metropolis since the fault line ran underneath both cities. Kara hoped Kal was free enough at the moment to at least drop in to National City and do this for her.

(Back with Oliver.)

"You look shocked... Uhm, is it the beard?" Tommy smirks stroking his beard.

A small smile graces Oliver's features: "no, you look good."

"Yeah, I know," Tommy replies giving his friend a cheeky smile.

Oliver takes better stock of his situation and can't ignore the thumping pain in his head. He sighs. "I must have a...really bad concussion," he says groggily and winces when he moves his head.

"Yeah, man, a building just collapsed on you. It could be a little PTSD, too. That position that you're in with the rebar..." Tommy says, pointing to the rebar that is just a few inches off from impaling Oliver, "it is remarkably similar to how you found me all those years ago." Tommy shrugs nonchalantly.

Oliver briefly recalled that night. The night where he was powerless to save his best friend. "The night you died," Oliver says with pain in his voice.

"Yeah..." Tommy quietly responds. They both hear a creaking noise, which causes Tommy to look up toward the ceiling and notice the unstable concrete above Oliver. "Uh, and I gotta tell you, man, it looks like the same thing is going to happen to you if you don't get out of here, like, right now."

Oliver agrees with a wheezed "yeah," grabs his special arrow, and uses it to freeze the rebar enough to where it can be broken. He slams his arm against the rebar snapping it and starts to wiggle his way out. With Tommy's help, he's pulled out just in time before more concrete falls where he was trapped moments ago.

"Ooooo," Tommy says looking up and down at the concrete that almost killed his friend. "Yeah, that was close." He then turns back toward Oliver and notices the archer hunched over, clenching his jaw in pain from his left shoulder being dislocated. "Uhm...You think you want to pop that thing back in?"

Oliver is taking deep breaths to control the pain. "Mmmhmmm," he answers curtly.

"Okay," Tommy starts to count, "one, two, and three" then snaps the shoulder back into place. Oliver hissed from the pain. Tommy pats him gently on the shoulder. "That had to hurt."

"Yeah," Oliver rolls his shoulder in relief, then turns to look at Tommy with a look that somehow seems to combine disbelief, frustration, pain, and anger.

Tommy stares back at Oliver, tilting his head slightly before suddenly declaring: "You have Oliver angry face on right now."

Oliver glares at his friend.

"Just saying," Tommy lifts his hands up defensively.

Oliver turns away from Tommy and takes a few steps. "I've got to get out of here. My team probably thinks I'm dead. I need to get out of here. I need to find the others," he says while holding his injured shoulder.

"Um, isn't that going to be kind of hard considering your current position?"

"I'll find a way out of here," Oliver resolutely states, still keeping his back toward Tommy.

"Well, I hope you weren't planning on using your bow to get out of here cause..." Tommy points to the archer's heavily damaged bow.

Oliver finally turns and looks at where Tommy is pointing. The archer doesn't have it in him to hide the disappointment that crosses his face. He slowly makes his way over toward the bow and uses his good arm to pick it up and examine it before almost throwing it back down to the ground.

"Yep," Tommy unhelpfully adds.

Oliver sighs, taking a few steps away from Tommy, and decides to try his comm again. "Sara? J'onn? Winn? Overwatch? Does anyone copy?"

"Static?"

"Yeah..."

"You know, on a different note, it's insane that we both had secret half-sisters," Tommy chuckles motioning between him and Oliver.

"Well, yours didn't try to kill you, did she?"

"Yeah, well, you should give Thea some credit. I died before she got the chance to try."

Oliver turned around and gave Tommy a strange look.

Tommy just smirks back at his friend and then walks up to the broken bow and arrows laying on a slab of concrete. "A couple specialty arrows left, two explosive. Kind of risky considering the instability of this place, especially without a bow."

"There are solutions for that."

"Yeah, speaking of, what about Kara? What kind of solution do you have for her?"

Oliver was surprised that he brought up Kara. He guesses one of the perks of Tommy being inside his head is the knowledge that Oliver plans to put a stop to whatever this is with Kara. "One that she deserves..."

Tommy just looked at him and nods disapprovingly.

"She will be far better off without me, Tommy," Oliver continues. "Everyone who gets sucked into my orbit only gets hurt... Proof of that is standing right here in front of me," he motions to Tommy. Oliver then walks around his friend and picks up the bow and starts working on it.

"So that's it, Ollie? You're just gonna give up on this knowing that she could change everything for you. Even you have to believe that after everything you've been through, you truly deserve a shot at real happiness."

"Would it really be fair of me to bring Kara into my world knowing everything that I've done? She's so full of light and hope. She's literally the embodiment of a hero... she's everything I'm not. I'll just burden her with my darkness," he says as he continues tightening his bow string trying to fix the damaged bow.

"See, Oliver, it is exactly that kind of attitude that's going to keep you stuck down here."

(Back to the rescue operations and the DEO)

Kara was about to call Kal when--to her horror--the Metropolis news channel showed a live stream of Superman holding up a skyscraper that appeared to be on the verge of collapsing with hundreds of people trapped in it. Kara knew that was Kal's priority at the moment. She hoped that with Superman's help, they would be able to stabilize the building and the firefighters could get everyone out. Trying to keep the panic out of her voice, Kara informed everyone through their comms that Superman was currently unavailable. She again sent a silent prayer to Rao to keep Oliver safe.

Cisco was out in the city helping first responders. Caitlin had made her way to one of the damaged hospitals with Alex.

Thea turned to Barry. "Barry, there's not much we can do here until they turn off the gas and vent the rest. Oliver would want you to be out there helping people. Don't worry, I promise I will call you as soon as we get an update," she moves until she's standing just in front of Barry staring up at him. "Don't worry we are going to get the chance to tell him," she gives him a hopeful smile and takes one of his hands, squeezing it.

Barry can't help himself, and momentarily forgetting where he is, he wraps his arms around her and pulls her into a hug.

"Now, go be a hero..." Thea whispers into his ear.

Barry smiles and nods. He then speeds off, Winn guiding him around the city.

"Oh, Oliver is gonna get a kick out of this," Sara says her face sporting a cheeky grin. "Speedy and the Flash...Cute. I like it! Does Oliver know?"

Thea couldn't stop the blush that adorned her cheeks. "N-no, he doesn't know. We'd like to keep it that way; we want to tell him ourselves."

Sara just chuckles shaking her head. "Don't worry, Thea, your secret is safe with me, I promise. Now come on, you can give me some details later. For now, let's help people while we wait for the firefighters to vent the gas and for Superman to show up."