Chapter 4
In the monastery, Oliver, Ollie, Slade, Nyssa, Laurel, Diggle, Roy, Rene, and Quentin stood opposite of Adrian Chase, Black Siren, China White, Carrie Cutter, Liz Warner, and the rest of Talia's students.
"Where is my son?" Oliver demanded, keeping his anger in check.
"I love this," Adrian said with an insane grin. "Even now at the end, you're still ten steps behind."
"Where... is my son?" Oliver demanded again, this time more firmly.
"William? Good name," Adrian said, throwing a glance at Black Siren before turning back to Oliver. "Sort of a sweet kid actually. You sure he's yours?"
"ADRIAN! WHERE IS MY SON?!" Oliver shouted furiously, not in the mood for games.
"If you wanna get your son back, you know what you have to do," Adrian said.
"I know what you want me to do, and I won't do it," Oliver growled. "I'm not gonna kill you no matter what you do. That is never going to happen."
"Never say never," Adrian said, before charging at Oliver with his sword.
Oliver sidestepped Adrian's attack and used his bow to block the following swings of Adrian's sword.
"Superman to the rescue!" Oliver exclaimed, causing Adrian to pause in confusion.
Taking advantage of his opponent's distraction, Oliver punched Adrian in the face and followed up with a kick to his abdomen, knocking Adrian to the ground.
"Superman to the rescue!"
Clark's eyes lit up as he heard Oliver's voice and turned to the others. "I have to go."
"Go where?" Malcolm asked, frowning. "What's going on?"
"He said the phrase, didn't he?" Chloe asked Clark with a knowing expression.
Felicity frowned in confusion. "Wait, who said what phrase?"
"Oliver – your Oliver, that is – and I agreed on a phrase he would use to summon me as soon as he needed my help," Clark explained. "My super-hearing just picked up his voice saying that phrase."
"Well, make sure you throw Chase into outer space for all of us," Thea said. "It's not like anybody'll miss him."
"Not sure about the 'throw him into outer space' part, but his reign of terror is definitely about to be over," Clark stated.
Curtis and Samantha widened their eyes in astonishment as Clark levitated into the air.
"Please save my son," Samantha pleaded.
"I will, Ms. Clayton," Clark said with a reassuring smile, before flying off in a red and blue blur.
Oliver and Adrian engaged each other in a fierce clash of bow and sword, while the rest of the heroic team and Adrian's army rushed each other. Slade, Roy, and Diggle took on Talia's students. Laurel and Black Siren rushed each other and started engaging in a close combat fight. Carrie Cutter fired an arrow at Nyssa, who effortlessly swatted it aside with her sword. The two women then rushed each other and engaged in a hand-to-hand fight. Rene ducked and rolled away as Liza Warner fired several bullets at him from her guns.
Ollie was approached by China White, who was armed with her two karambit knives.
"Let's dance," White challenged with a smirk.
"Bring it on," Ollie replied, before the two rushed each other.
He dodged and used his bow to block White's attacks as she tried to strike him with her knives. Ollie tried to punch her, but White blocked and kicked Ollie in the chest, staggering him back. White then tried to slash Ollie in the face, but he recovered quickly enough to jump back to avoid it. She tried to stab him several times, but Ollie blocked all of her attacks with his bow.
"Okay, you're definitely a tough one to deal with, I'll give you that," Ollie remarked.
Just then, a pair of reddish-orange beams shot down and struck the ground seemingly out of nowhere. This caused everyone from either team to stop dead in their tracks and look up at a handsome man clad in a mostly blue suit with a red cape who was floating in the air, his mere presence bristling with power.
Laurel and Diggle immediately recognized the man, having met him months earlier during the Dominator invasion, while Roy, Rene, and Quentin eyed the newcomer in awe as they wondered who he was and if he was part of either team.
"Who the hell is this?" Rene asked, warily.
Adrian Chase and the members of his team stared at the blue and red figure with stunned expressions and dropped jaws.
"Oh, I'm so in love! That's my flying super-guy!" Cutter said dreamily as she eyed the Man of Steel with a lustful expression and blew a kiss up at him.
"Thank you for coming, Superman," Oliver said to Clark in appreciation.
"My pleasure," Clark replied with a smile.
"So that's what he's capable of," Slade said in a rare moment of astonishment.
Oliver turned to Adrian, staring with satisfaction at the shocked look on the madman's face. "You know what's funny, Adrian? All this time you kept saying how were you ten steps ahead. Well, guess what? You're not anymore, because there's no way you saw this coming. This is our very powerful ally and he is firmly on our side."
"What he means by that is you and evil merry band are completely screwed, jackass," Ollie added, glaring at Adrian with disgust. "You're better off surrendering now because it's pointless to continue a losing fight."
"I haven't lost anything yet," Adrian said with an arrogant smirk. "And I'll never surrender." He turned to Oliver. "Like I said, there's only one way all of this ends."
"This will end, but not in the way you want it to," Oliver growled.
"We'll see about that," Adrian said.
Oliver charged at him and Adrian raised his sword just in time to block Oliver's bow as their fight resumed.
In an attempt to catch Ollie off-guard since his back was turned to her, China White tried to put her arm around his neck in an attempt to slit his throat, but Ollie suddenly reacted and caught her arm.
"Not so fast, Whittie," Ollie quipped. "I'm not that easy to sneak up on."
He reverse-headbutted White in the face, forcing her to let him go. Ollie spun around and punched her in the face, knocking her a few feet back. Wiping blood from her bleeding nose, White quickly recovered and tried to kick Ollie, but Ollie ducked and tried to kick her too, only for her to avoid it.
Nyssa and Cutter resumed their fight as they exchanged several blows before Nyssa kicked Cutter in the knee and elbowed her in the chest, knocking her down. Cutter got back up and swung her bow, but Nyssa blocked it with her sword. As the fight went on, it was clear that Nyssa was quite more skilled than Cutter.
Liza Warner shot at Clark five times and, much to her shock, the bullets bounced off of his chest. She then shot him in the forehead, only for that bullet to bounce off its target as well. Clark descended in front of Warner, who started backing away in fear, and lightly tapped her forehead with his index finger, rendering her unconscious as she fell to the floor.
Clark looked around at the various fights happening around him. He saw Slade, Diggle, Roy, and Rene holding their own quite well against what remained of Talia's students. Oliver and Adrian were in a deadlock as their fight went on. Ollie was also doing well in his fight against China White. Nyssa disarmed Cutter of her bow with a kick and, in a spin motion, drove her sword through the redhead's chest. Nyssa retracted her sword and Cutter fell to the ground, dead.
Laurel and Black Siren fought each other in a hallway of the monastery. They seemed to be evenly matched as they exchanged fierce punches and kicks and blocked and dodged each other's attacks. The stalemate continued for several more seconds until Laurel grabbed Siren and flipped her to the ground. Black Siren got back to her feet and unleashed her sonic scream. However, Laurel released her scream at the same time and the two energies clashed, resulting in the two women getting thrown back in opposite ends of the hallway. Laurel crashed against a shelf before falling on the ground with the shelf under her.
Recovering first, Black Siren got back up and stalked towards Laurel. "You thought you were the better Laurel just because you're a goody two-shoes who can never be as ruthless as me? That's cute."
A whooshing noise sounded and Superman was suddenly standing between the two Laurels a moment later. He slammed his hands together, creating a shockwave that sent Black Siren flying back before she fell headfirst on the ground, out cold. Turning to Laurel, Clark held out his hand, which she took, and helped her out of the fallen shelf.
"Thanks for saving me," Laurel said, with a smile.
"You're welcome," Clark replied, smiling back at her.
Chloe, Samantha, Thea, and Malcolm were standing by while Felicity and Curtis were trying to locate the bombs' trigger via tablet and get the comms working respectively.
Then, a red blur appeared with a whoosh and everyone turned to see that The Flash had arrived.
"Barry!" Felicity called out in surprise.
"Hey, guys," Barry greeted, smiling a bit before expression turned serious. "I just got here on an A.R.G.U.S. plane a few minutes ago. I've been searching the island trying to find William."
"Did you find him?" Samantha asked, desperately.
"Not yet so far, but this is a large island and I've still got quite a bit left to search," Barry said. "There are also A.R.G.U.S. agents sweeping the island as we speak. I'll be back to let you know whether or not I found him."
He turned around, about to speed off, when Felicity's voice stopped him.
"Wait!"
Barry turned around and saw the pale look on her face. "What's wrong?"
"You need to get to Oliver now," Felicity said, urgently. "There's something he needs to know."
Oliver and Adrian were still fighting intensely as Oliver blocked a swing of Adrian's sword with his bow. Oliver punched Adrian in the face, staggering him back, and Adrian swung his sword twice, only for Oliver to block both attacks. Determined to break their stalemate, Oliver roared angrily as he pushed Adrian back and performed a flip-kick, getting Adrian in the chest and knocking him back against the wall. The sword fell out of Adrian's hand as he lost his grip on it. Oliver swung his bow, which Adrian ducked under, and switched to his fist, punching Adrian several times before throwing him against the railing.
"There's the killer that I know and love," Adrian said with a smirk.
Oliver angrily punched him in the chest. "Tell me where my son is!"
He punched Adrian in the chest again and followed up with an uppercut, knocking Adrian over the railing before the madman fell to the ground below. Oliver leapt over the railing and jumped down after Adrian.
Meanwhile, Ollie smacked China White in the hand with his bow, disarming her of one of her karambit knives. He jumped back as White lunged at him with her remaining knife. She then followed up with a kick, but Ollie dodged it and punched White in the chest, staggering her back.
Ollie leapt back ten feet as he pulled out a small dart.
"What's the matter? Afraid you won't beat me?" White asked with a smirk.
"It's not that," Ollie replied. "And I am gonna beat you."
He flipped forward, hurling the dart at White as he did so. She was too late to react as the dart embedded itself in the side of her neck, causing her to lose consciousness and collapse to the floor.
"Bet you didn't see that one coming," Ollie remarked.
Oliver grunted in anger as he held Adrian in a firm chokehold.
"Do it, Oliver," Adrian taunted. "You know you want to."
"Adrian, tell me, tell me where my son is!" Oliver exclaimed desperately as he looked like he was on the verge of breaking down.
"Never," Adrian declared, his voice barely audible against Oliver's grip.
Having taken down all the enemy combatants, Clark, Ollie, Slade, Nyssa, Diggle, Laurel, Quentin, Roy, and Rene stood around each other as they watched Oliver and Adrian.
"It's all over, but only if you do it," Adrian said, hoarsely. "Do it, Oliver, and show everyone, show yourself who you really are."
The others watched as they all wondered what Oliver was going to do.
Oliver held Adrian for a few more seconds, feeling conflicted, and suddenly made a decision.
"No!" Oliver shouted angrily, as he let Adrian go.
He grabbed a gun that Adrian had strapped to the holster on his pants, emptied out all its bullets, and tossed the gun aside.
Clark nodded in approval at Oliver for not giving in to what Chase wanted him to do.
"I was never the person you think I am!" Oliver said to Adrian. "I only killed when it was absolutely necessary and to protect the city and everyone in it! You do it because you want to!" In a lower tone, he added, "That is who you are, not who I am. You can blame me for your father's death for the rest of your life. I am done blaming myself for mine."
He turned away from Adrian.
"I knew it would come to this," Adrian said, catching his breath as Oliver turned back to him. Looking up with a smirk, Adrian added, "Your son is dead, Oliver."
Laurel gasped in horror, while Ollie, Diggle, Quentin, and Rene all had sad expressions on their faces as they could understand Oliver's pain due to being fathers themselves. Clark and Roy both looked sad as well, due to the fact that a young boy had lost his life at a very early age and would never have the chance to grow up. Clark clenched his fists, tempted to use them to turn Adrian's entire body into a bloody, splattered mess. Slade took off his mask, looking down in sadness as he, too, could understand Oliver's pain due to having a son of his own. Even Nyssa didn't look too good either.
Oliver was speechless for several moments as he mentally tried to determine whether or not Adrian was telling the truth. He walked up to Adrian and grabbed him by the jacket.
"I don't believe you," Oliver growled. "Because you're a liar. You're lying to me, to manipulate me into doing what you want. But, Adrian, here's the thing. If you are telling the truth, if you killed my son," he practically choked as he said those words, "I am never going to be the person you want me to be. Not ever."
He threw Adrian on the ground and turned back to the others.
Then, The Flash suddenly appeared and stopped in front of Oliver.
"Oliver!" the scarlet speedster called out.
"Barry?" Oliver replied in surprise.
"Oliver, I searched the entire island for your son and I couldn't find him anywhere," Barry explained. "I also met up with your friends near Chase's plane and Felicity found out he's rigged the entire island with explosives, which are remotely linked to a dead man's switch. If Chase dies, it will detonate all the explosives. That's why he wants you to kill him."
Adrian stood up with a smirk and took a flashbang grenade out of his jacket. He threw it on the ground and everyone, except Clark, winced from the resulting explosion. Once the smoke cleared, they saw that Adrian was gone.
"Barry, Clark, get everyone to the plane and make sure they're all safe," Oliver ordered.
"What about you, Ollie?" Laurel asked in concern.
"I'm going after my son," Oliver said in a tone that left no room for argument.
"What if Chase is telling the truth?" Quentin pointed out.
Oliver shook his head. "I don't believe him. I can't believe him. But either way, Adrian Chase is not getting off this island."
Ollie stepped forward and stood next to his counterpart. "I'll go with you. On top of helping another me find his son, I'm dying to give this psychopath the beating he deserves."
Laurel walked up to Oliver, grabbed his face, and gave him a quick kiss.
"That's for good luck," Laurel said with a loving smile.
"Stay safe," Oliver told her, before he and Ollie took off.
As the two Green Arrows made their way out of the monastery, they raced frantically through the forest as fast as their feet could carry them, with Oliver running slightly faster than Ollie.
They soon reached the shore near the docks and stopped as they saw Adrian on a boat in the water. Adrian noticed the two archers and grinned smugly at them. He then started up the boat, which began to sail away.
With looks of determination, Oliver and Ollie continued after Adrian. They leapt off the shore and down onto one of the docks, which they continued their run on. Once the boat was close enough, Oliver and Ollie simultaneously leapt towards it, both of them managing to grab onto the boat's railing. They climbed over the railing and into the boat, and rushed along the roof covering the boat's engine room. They then leapt down to the floor of the boat and Oliver shoved Adrian, pinning him against the edge of the boat.
"WHERE'S WILLIAM?!" Oliver roared, furiously. As Adrian simply smirked, Oliver punched him in the face. "WHERE?!" He punched Adrian in the chest. "IS?!" He punched Adrian in the chest again. "WILLIAM?!" He gave Adrian a third punch to the chest.
"You really love that kid, don't you?" Adrian asked, but Oliver was in no mood to answer that question.
"ADRIAN!" Oliver shouted, before punching Adrian in the face three times.
He then threw the madman roughly against the steering wheel, causing the boat to slow to a stop as Adrian's back hit the controls.
"For an absentee father, your devotion is impressive," Adrian said, as Oliver put a hand near his quiver.
Ollie angrily raised his bow, pointing an arrow at Adrian. "You better answer the damn question or you're gonna be in a world of pain!"
"Who the hell are you?" Adrian asked, glaring at Ollie.
"I'm William's fun uncle who is just as pissed at you as his father, let's leave it at that," Ollie retorted. "You're a rotten sicko, you know that? Involving an innocent child in your twisted schemes just to prove a sick point." He moved closer to Adrian, training the arrow on the madman's right leg. "Now tell us where the hell is the kid or I swear to God I'll make sure you never walk a day in your life again! We may not be able to kill you without risking the lives of our friends, but that doesn't mean I can't make you suffer!" As Adrian just burst out laughing, Ollie got madder. "What the hell is so funny?! Tell us where he is now!"
"You two are worried about William when everyone else that you care about is on an island about to get blown up sky high," Adrian chuckled.
"We'll never let that happen," Ollie said.
"Our friends and our team can take care of themselves," Oliver growled.
"By using my plane to escape, right?" Adrian said, smugly.
Oliver and Ollie paused with worried looks, the meaning of Chase's comment immediately dawning on them.
Oliver tapped the comms in his suit. "Felicity, do you read me?"
"Yes, Oliver, I'm here," her voice responded.
"Are you and everyone else getting off the island okay?" Oliver asked.
"Yeah, it turned out that Chase sabotaged his plane, but Barry and Superman got us to the plane that Barry came here on," Felicity explained. "We're getting ready to take off now, but Barry, Slade, Superman, and Chloe are not with us. They didn't wanna leave you or your counterpart behind."
"Well, things aren't going exactly as planned, but we're not finished here," Adrian said, as he opened the door to the engine room.
Ollie was about to fire his arrow at Adrian, but suddenly stopped when Adrian pulled a little boy out of the engine room and held him in a headlock.
"Oh," Oliver groaned in alarm as he immediately nocked an arrow and pointed it at Adrian.
"Don't do that," Adrian said. "Even if you had a shot, you've already told me that you wouldn't kill me. Or have circumstances finally changed?"
Oliver and Ollie gripped their bows tighter as Adrian ran a hand through William's hair and grabbed a handful of it, causing the poor boy to feel even more terrified than he already was.
"If I die, everyone you care about dies, except your son," Adrian said to Oliver with sadistic glee. "They may have gotten on a spare plane, but it's likely they'll get caught in the explosion either way. But if you don't kill me, I kill him."
"You son of a bitch," Oliver said brokenly as he let out a sob.
You know what, that's it, I'm through being Mr. Nice Guy," Ollie snarled, as nocked two more arrows to his bow. "It's time to take off the gloves."
With that, he fired the three arrows simultaneously. One arrow went through Adrian's right wrist near where his hand was still stroking William's hair. One arrow went through Adrian's left upper arm, while the third arrow went through Adrian's left upper leg.
Adrian cried out in pain as he lost his grip around William and collapsed to the floor of the boat.
"William! Come here!" Oliver said in a mix of relief and concern as he immediately grabbed his son and looked at him. "Hey, are you okay? Are you all right? Did he hurt you? You all right?"
William nodded and Oliver embraced his son, never wanting to let go.
"He's gonna be fine," Adrian said with a smirk as he sat up against the engine room's door.
"Don't you talk to him!" Oliver snarled in pure anger. "Don't even look at him!"
While Oliver continued to embrace William, Ollie shot an arrow into Adrian's right leg, making him groan in pain.
"You one sick bastard," Ollie snarled, as he stalked towards the madman.
He punched Adrian in the nose as hard as he can, causing it to bleed.
"This is for putting my doppelganger and all his loved ones through hell!" Ollie exclaimed, before giving Adrian another well-deserved punch to the nose, this time breaking it. "This is for all the innocents you murdered!" He kicked Adrian in the throat hard, causing the madman to gasp and clutch where he had been hit. "This is for being an all-around jackass!" Next, Ollie stamped on Adrian's right leg exactly where he had been shot, causing Adrian to cry out in pain, and did the same to his left leg, resulting in another cry from Adrian. "And this is for involving a child in all of this!"
He punched Adrian in the face a total of seventeen times, marking it with many cuts and bruises and blackening both eyes. He then kicked Adrian square in the chest twice, resulting in some broken bones.
"And this one's for good measure!" Ollie exclaimed.
He stamped Adrian in the groin with all his might, causing him to howl in agony, and finally knocked the madman out with a hard punch to his bruised and bloodied face.
Panting from exhaustion, Ollie turned around and saw that Clark and Barry had arrived and were now standing with Oliver, who was still holding William in his embrace, making sure the boy hadn't seen any of what Ollie had just done. Ollie realized he had been so engrossed in beating the crap out of the scum who had tormented his counterpart that he hadn't noticed Clark and Barry's arrival.
"Are you done?" Clark asked.
"Pretty much," Ollie nodded. "That felt really good."
"I bet it did," Barry agreed.
"Anybody who messes with another version of me are also messing with 'me' me," Ollie said. "Unless, of course, that other version of me happens to be evil."
"Thank you for taking care of Chase the way you did," Oliver said gratefully to his counterpart.
"No problem," Ollie noted. "Pretty sure you would've done the same for me if our roles were reversed."
"Whenever you need me to, don't hesitate to ask," Oliver said.
Down on the floor, without any of the heroes or William noticing him, Adrian opened his eyes as he came to. He pulled a gun out of his jacket and pointed it at his temple. He was about to pull the trigger when the gun suddenly became unbearably hot, courtesy of Clark's heat vision. Adrian dropped the gun with a cry of pain and, the next thing he knew, he was lifted off the floor by Superman, who effortlessly held him up with one hand.
"You're... not gonna... kill me..." Adrian muttered hoarsely as he struggled to breathe in the extremely firm, extremely painful grip of Clark's hand.
"You're right, I'm not," Clark said angrily as he glared at Adrian in disgust. "You may have lost, but you're not taking the easy way out."
He punched Adrian in the face with a very light punch, knocking him back into unconsciousness.
"So I guess that's it," Ollie said. "We finally beat this scummy jackass."
"Yeah," Oliver nodded, heavily relieved that the threat that had plagued him and his team for the past year finally came to an end. "It's over."
That concludes the showdown against Adrian Chase, without Lian Yu exploding. This is different from what happened during the events of Arrow 5x23 in the "Alternate Events" series, which stuck much closer to canon with the biggest change being Earth-2 Laurel and Dinah Drake's swapped roles and the island explosion resulting in several more deaths. As such, this story isn't actually connected to the "Alternate Events" series, despite that nearly all of the stuff from the first installment "When Heroes and Universes Collide" (the biggest change from that being Earth-1 Laurel participating in the Dominator invasion due to never dying) also happening here. Just wanted to clear that up to avoid any confusion.