A/N: Hello m'dears… I hope the week has been a good one for you!
Please, if you like this story, click the follow/favorite button. Also, reviews are deeply cherished!
"Isn't this sweet?" Sienna's voice dripped honey. "Link is trying to put on his big boy green hoodie so he can race off to stop the big bad Ganon before he can capture the poor, defenseless Zelda."
"Love." Slade coughed to hide the laughter flavoring his voice. Ah, but his dove's acerbic wit (and sharp tongue) always managed to amuse him. Normally, he was the recipient of her sarcastic diatribe. Seeing it being aimed at someone else (and his greatest enemy at that) had amusement slapping back the bitter resentment he felt at seeing Oliver with his woman. "How is it that you know about a videogame like the Legend of Zelda?"
"Bruce's youngest son loves the series." Her lips curved; warm with affection for the young boy neither man had ever met. "He tends to call me Zelda when he's happy and princess whenever he gets annoyed at me." She made a low sound of amusement deep in her throat. "He tended to call me princess quite a lot."
Oliver and Slade both watched as a shadow of melancholy flickered upon her face; in the depths of her eyes. Oliver found himself wondering at it, but a glance at Slade's face revealed he didn't seem surprised. It reminded Oliver, yet again, about how tied these two individuals were. Slade knew the majority of Sienna's secrets (he suspected the woman had a few skeletons left in the closet she'd yet to reveal to Slade) and Sienna largely knew the majority of Slade's (with the exception of things that happened here on the island).
"You do have a way of exasperating a man, little one," Slade rumbled in a light, almost teasing tone.
Sienna snorted. "You are no less exasperating, Slade."
Oliver ended the teasing banter by saying, "And keeping you from falling into this Ganon's clutches is exactly why you're staying here with Slade."
"Just who do you think you are?" Sienna demanded, turning to face him. "Just who in the hell do you think you are?"
"I'm the one that you came to when you were looking for help in figuring out who Ganon and his cronies are."
"Help, Oliver!" she spat. "I wanted your help to uncover just who it is that is behind this entire damned fiasco. I did not want, nor do I need a drill sergeant ordering me about like some damned pledge!"
"I know that you are not capable of seeing it at this moment," Oliver declared in a rough voice, "but I am helping you, Sienna."
"Not by treating me like a child you're not!"
"That is not what he is doing, love."
Even as Slade spoke, the keen edge of her gaze cut to him, raked over his face. Recognizing his fire Maiden was looking to roast a man's balls over the spit; Slade merely smiled his most beguiling smile at her and decided to keep his mouth shut. This could, he decided, prove to be the most entertainment he'd had in a long while.
"You don't own me." She rounded on Oliver again, stabbing a finger into his chest. "You don't get to tell me what to do." She poked him again. "And you don't get to make important decisions for me."
"Stop poking at me, Sienna."
"Do not think that because I agreed to give you your life back in exchange for access to Slade, as well as your help in locating the person or persons responsible for everything that happened upon this godforsaken rock that it allows you to make decisions about my well-being for me. You're not my father, Oliver," she uttered in a rasp. "Nor are you my husband."
"He doesn't get to make decisions that concern your well-being, love," Slade said to Sienna. "But as I am going to become your husband as soon as I am released from this cage," his voice dropped an octave. "I most certainly do."
Sienna tossed a black look at him from over one shoulder. "No, you do not."
"I do whenever armed gunmen are trying to kill you."
"You don't own me, Slade." A wealth of emotion throbbed in her simple statement. "I am not your property. I refuse to be treated as such."
Slade knew the largest reason for why she so vehemently opposed staying with him here on Lian Yu rest upon her father's having decided every faucet of her life (pre-traffickers) for her. Once his dove had been considered one of Gotham high society's princesses, and she'd groomed herself as befitted their expectations. She'd dressed as she'd been told to dress, wearing sleek, sophisticated clothes that had been selected by a father who claimed to only have her best interests in mind. She'd known the feel of raw silk against her skin, knew what it was to casually clasp jewels as big as her fists around her swan-like throat. Sienna James had known all the privileges to come from being born into great wealth and social prestige.
And loathed every moment of it with every fiber of her being.
Then her life and everything she'd known got turned upside down. Gotham's dove had had her wings broken. It'd taken over a year before Sienna's wings had healed enough to allow her to fly once more. And yet returning to Gotham, as well as the life of privilege she'd once lived, no longer appealed to her. Now she was more comfortable wearing a simple cotton dress that moved like water with every step she took. She preferred to walk around with her feet bare and with her hair left to fall around her face in soft waves. The only jewelry she wore now was the ring he'd given her after proposing to her. Her life now had a purpose to it. She had someone who loved her for who she was, and not what. Someone who'd burn the world to the ground in order to protect her.
The kid had definitely played his cards right when he'd brought his dove here to Lian Yu. There wasn't anything he would not give, or do (including unwillingly working with the very man he hated with every fiber of his being) in order to keep this little nymph safe. Fury all but swallowed him whole about how it had been Oliver, and not himself, who'd been there to prevent Sienna from being killed by this lone shooter.
"Sienna..." he didn't growl it. No, Slade just sounded...off. If all she'd heard was anger, or any type of egotistical bullshit, she'd have blistered his hide. But the sound of fear intermixed with grief and exhaustion unraveled her temper like a ball of string. She went to him, sliding her small hand through the bars to rest it against his cheek.
"What am I supposed to do while Oliver and his team are out there and hunting up the ones who are responsible for creating this entire mess?" she asked him quietly. "Cower like a shrinking violet and wring my hands? That's not the woman you've been teaching me to be this past year, Slade."
"You'll be safe." He turned his head and placed a soft kiss in the middle of her palm. "That is all that matters to me, love. You'll be safe."
"Will I be safe, Slade?" Her thumb slid over his whisker rough cheek in a light caress he felt deep in the pits of his black soul. "Or will we just be lambs waiting for the slaughter? It's not just me that th..."
He silenced her by laying his fingers across her lips. "I will not let anybody hurt you, love," he crooned in a smoky timbre that had her belly doing jumping jacks. "I promise."
It was the first promise he'd ever made to her. They were the very first words he'd ever spoken to her, in fact. The night he rescued her from the auction house he'd sworn to her how he'd "kill anybody who" attempted to "ever hurt" her "again." It was the one promise (one of the three remaining promises) he'd yet to break to her. And as Sienna James had come to learn in the time they'd been together, promises carried a very special meaning to this man. They were not guarantees he made either recklessly, nor wantonly. They were things that he took very, very seriously. Sienna felt her heart beginning to melt, her anger and remaining resentment for the way he'd treated her (even though she understood why he'd done it) slowly dissipating. She slid her other hand through the bars, curled it around the back of his neck and let her fingers wander into the silky hair at the nape of his neck.
"Oh, honey, I know you are not going to allow anybody to hurt me," she whispered while staring into his eye. "But..."
"I am not going to lose you, Sienna," he uttered in a low growl. "Do you understand me? I am not going to lose you."
Sienna studied his face. The raw and naked emotions swimming in that obsidian gaze; over that swarthy face left her heart quivering. For days she'd lived in a quandary about what she'd see once she looked in his face. For days she'd wondered how much of his feelings for her had been his own and not something that'd been caused by the serum slithering through his veins. For days she'd agonized over what version of Slade she'd be reunited with: the one who'd nearly been driven insane by the malevolent hallucination his fractured mind had created, or the good man who'd been shaped, bent by the traumas he'd endured upon this island.
For the past few days she'd been in knots about this moment. Now it was here, and the only thing she saw was a man desperate to protect the woman he loved. Her heart tripped over itself and a gasp lodged in her throat. It was the first time she'd seen he loved her. Sure, she knew he tended to show her he loved her in the little things he did or said. Seeing his affection for her burning within the depths of his eye, though, brought her a measure of calm. It told her that the voice in his head, the one created by that vile poison he'd been given, was gone.
All that remained now was a man. A man that for all of Slade's skill, for all his experience, was still only human. He had wants, same as everybody. He had needs, like everybody. He could be hurt, just like everybody. Sienna recalled the three things that she'd learned about this man during the time they'd been together:
He was not immortal.
He was not invincible.
And he needed her to love him almost as much as he needed to love her.
Slade knew she'd yielded by the softening of her eyes, the relaxing of her posture. "I really hate how you do that," she muttered.
"Do what, love?" his lips trembled.
"Win."
His fingers were gentle as they swept the curve of her cheek. "You will stay here with me then?"
"Do I really have a choice in the matter?" she drawled.
His lips curved now. "No."
"I didn't think so."
Over an ocean away and safe in an undisclosed location, a woman watched the interaction between the James woman and the most dangerous criminal A.R.G.U.S had ever had the pleasure (and privilege) of housing. A smirk curved her lips as she realized that she'd finally found the way to have Slade Wilson at her mercy.
All it ever took, she thought as she tapped well-manicured fingernails upon the computer console, was the right persuasion.
And threatening to harm the James woman seemed to be the most effective incentive to use in order to bend Slade Wilson to her will.
Felicity liked to think of herself as a practical minded woman. The way she saw it, when you were the IT girl for a man with a crime fighting career like Oliver's, you kinda had to be the practical one. However, there were times when what seemed reasonable struck Felicity as being anything but. She knew locking Sienna up with Slade (something she doubted the older woman would much mind) to be one real solution for how to keep her safe. However, the closer they got to Lian Yu, the more Felicity started thinking it to be the most unreasonable course of action to be chosen. Oliver, for all that he was wonderful and brilliant (and gorgeous at that) just wasn't thinking clearly here. What he planned just wasn't practical.
In fact, since figuring out just what he'd intended to do with Sienna (whom Felicity found she liked despite the whole dating a psychopath thing), she'd been battling between wanting to smack Oliver over his head for not seeing the potential disaster this plan could have, and holding to her unwavering loyalty and support of him and his decisions (no matter how foolish she thought they might be). Finally she had enough of the niggling voice in the back of her head telling her that this was wrong and turned to the two men who were seated upon a fallen log, quietly conversing while they waited for Oliver to return from Slade's bunker.
"So," she said. "Do either of you see the potential catastrophe that this whole stash-Sienna-with-Slade-Wilson plan could turn into? Or am I the only one who can see the huge red letters painted on the wall that spell out how this is one huge disaster in the making?"
"What do you mean by it turning into a disaster, Felicity?" Dig asked on one long breath. "We talking the bad guys are gonna come here to this island, raid it, kill everybody in their path, break Slade Wilson from his cell, inject him with another dose of Mirakuru, rile him up by killing Sienna and blaming it in Oliver before unleashing him upon the world again kind of disaster?"
Felicity's lips quirked. Leave it to John Diggle to totally understand what she was thinking and feeling without her having to come out and say something. "Yes, that is the kind of disaster I am seeing."
He gave a slow nod of his head. "Been having that thought run through my mind ever since Oliver admitted on the plane that this is what he'd been planning to do with Sienna before the shooter took a shot at her."
"You know she's not really as safe here as Oliver thinks she is, right, Diggle?" She phrased the question slowly, feeling like a traitor for saying it. "In fact," she added after some thought, "this island isn't a safe place for Slade Wilson, either."
Diggle remained silent, contemplating what Felicty was saying without actually coming out and saying it. He knew as well as Felicity that by putting Slade Wilson on an island controlled by A.R.G.U.S that Oliver had essentially put the mercenary in the hands of Amanda Waller. He knew Waller would love nothing more than to add a man who possessed the training and skill level that Wilson did to her Suicide Squad. He planned to make sure that that did not happen. Why Diggle felt compelled to keep Slade Wilson from becoming Waller's puppet, he could not explain. Becoming one of Waller's indentured agents in order to make restitution for some of the crimes the man had committed seemed fair in his mind. Yet, Diggle just knew, after seeing Waller's callous disregard for the city of Starling City during Wilson's siege that allowing her to have the former A.S.I.S agent on her Squad could prove fatal to a great many people.
"No," he agreed with a slow shake of his head. "The island is not as safe a place for either of them as Oliver thinks it is." He leaned his head back to look up at the cloudless sky. "But it is a whole lot safer here than Starling at the moment."
"Wait." Roy frowned his confusion. "Do you mean that by bringing Sienna here to the island that Oliver has made it a breeze for the bad guys to swoop in and not only get their hands upon her, but on that one-eyed prick as well?"
Diggle cocked his head to the side, studying the younger man. Roy Harper's violent intendancies and vitriolic temper had not been caused by the Mirakuru. Those were things the kid had had issues with long before he'd received his dose of the serum. So he knew to tread lightly, cautiously while trying to get the young man to pickle of a predicament they were in.
"Yes," he finally intoned in a slow drawl. "By putting Sienna in a place where he thinks she is safe, he's also kept her in the heart of the danger and made it easy for whomever is after her, to come for her."
"Why?" the younger man gritted. "Why would he bring her here if it's only going to keep her in danger? What's that serve to do? Huh?"
"He's hoping it will lure the shooter out of hiding," Diggle explained patiently. "And 'cause him to make a mistake that Oliver can capitalize upon."
Roy exploded off the bench and began to pace in small, agitated circles. Sand kicked up around his feet, creating a small sand cloud, and a small sea creature that Felicity didn't recognize (but thought might be some type of crustacean based upon the amount of legs it had) went careening into the gently foaming surf. Poor little guy, she thought with a small smile.
She turned back when she heard Roy snarl, "So he's using her as bait." He made a sound that was somewhere between a scoff and a growl. "That's just awesome, man. Putting a woman in a cell with a now serum-less Wilson as their only means of protection against who knows how many assailants." He sniffed once, disdainfully, before spinning away and tossing over his shoulder, "Why doesn't he just take out an ad in the newspaper saying he'll hand her over to the man if he wants to draw him out? Be so much simpler than this."
"If there's one thing that Slade Wilson has never been," Diggle stated in calm voice, "it's defenseless. The man was dangerous long before he received that injection of Mirakuru," he paused for a second to take a drink from his water bottle. "And he's still dangerous post-Mirakuru. The man is a former A.S.I.S agent. You don't become a field operative unless you have some skill and ability."
"Yeah?" Roy shot back. His mouth was on rapid-fire as always. Yet, this time he felt justified in what he had to say. "Well, he doesn't have the healing properties of the Mirakuru to save him from a bullet, now does he?"
Diggle just shook his head. That they were arguing over a man who'd literally just taken them all to the brink flabbergasted him. Yet, he saw the point Roy (who, out of them all, actually knew what the Mirakuru serum could do to the physical body) was attempting to make.
"Look, man, I get you," he rumbled in that smooth baritone Lyla called his calming voice. "You like Sienna. You don't want to see anything bad happen to her. But," he stated now in a much firmer voice, "that man can still take care of anybody who manages to break into that underground bunker. He trained Oliver, in fact. So I can guarantee," he continued saying before Roy could toss out the heated retort he could see flashing in those hazel blue eyes of his, "that anybody who even dares to try and harm his woman is not going to remain alive long."
Roy sniffed again. Louder this time. Then he said, "And what weapon is Wilson supposed to pull outta his ass in order to defend them?" He locked gazes with the older man. "Answer me that one if you can."
Diggle just sighed and looked out over the glistening water. For her own part, Felicity, who'd started this argument, understood just why Roy was so upset about what could happen. She liked Sienna James, too. She'd liked her from the moment their eyes had met across the expanse of what had once been Oliver's (and his mother, step-father and father's) office at Queen Consolidated. She'd seen a kindred spirit in the dark haired woman, someone who not only understood what it took to love a man like Oliver Queen, but how exhaustive dealing with him could be as well.
Sienna was capable of empathizing with her over how difficult it was to love someone who came with so much baggage (and Slade Wilson carried even more baggage than Oliver in her mind). Unlike Sara and Laurel (who Felicity saw as friends, but knew she could never talk about her feelings for Oliver with), Sienna could listen to her whenever she needed to vent about something Oliver had done that particularly irritated her. She could offer her advice for how to deal with his nightmares, the secretiveness, and the bouts of male bitchiness (and exactly how she managed to handle Slade when he got into those types of moods she couldn't quite figure out). But still...
"Oliver is doing his best to try and force this shooter into revealing his face," she spoke gently. "And while the plan has some risks..."
"Ya think?" Roy flipped around to stare-glare would be more accurate, at the petite blonde. "There are more than just some risks here, Felicity. There are two lives at stake-three if you count Slade Wilson getting another injection of Mirakuru and being sent after Oliver again."
"We know that, man," Diggle said. "But whoever is targeting Sienna is not going to balk at either coming to the island themselves, or sending the shooter to finish the job they'd failed to do in Starling." He glanced over at the clearly agitated man. "Drawing them out and stopping them they get their hands upon her is crucial."
"Why are these people even after her?" he demanded. "She's not us. She doesn't have any enemies..."
"Yes, she does," Felicity interjected in a quiet tone. She reached up to draw the end of her ponytail over her shoulder, combing her fingers through the silky strands. "Sienna has one very powerful enemy, in fact."
"What?" Diggle asked at the same time that Roy demanded, "Who?"
"Her father."
"Her father?" Diggle rumbled in a low tone that Felicity recognized as him taking the information and analyzing it to see how it fit with the rest of the pieces of the puzzle. "You think that Barclay James hired someone to kill his own daughter?"
"I can't tell you that. Not for sure."
"But you suspect it."
"What she told me I can't repeat. I can't break her trust." The fear in Felicity's eyes crawled into Diggle's belly. "What I can say, what I will say, is that her relationship with her father has not been a good one since her brother Jonathan died. It's why she moved to Miami, in fact."
"And which is where she got taken by the human traffickers." Diggle went to push the subject back, but something flashed across Felicity's face, stopping him. A thought came to him, seemed far too incredulous to even be possible. However, if there was one thing John Diggle had learned while working with Oliver Queen, it was that those things you doubted as being possible, most likely were. And that meant…
"Felicity," he rumbled then in a deep baritone. "Was Sienna's father behind her abduction?"