Disclaimer: See chapter one
See my A/N below for further information.
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Chapter 29 – Returning Prey
Felicity looked up as Sara came racing into the lair, a deep look of worry crossing her face. "Sara, what's wrong?"
"My dad's going after someone tonight but something tells me it's going to go down badly." She caught up her leathers and headed for the back of the lair to change. "And with Slade around..."
Felicity immediately touched her ear-piece. "Arrow, you need to watch over Detective Lance tonight with Canary."
"I'm coming into the Lair, Shadow, are the other there?"
"Upstairs watching Thea," Felicity pressed a couple of keys and her smile promptly seemed to light up the lair as a parkouring Oliver jumped onto the roof of the Foundry. "Welcome home Arrow."
He laughed slightly and a few minutes later, arrived in the lair to swing her around in his arms before holding her against his chest as they waited for Sara to rejoin them.
An hour later they were in the same position – except Felicity was looking up at Oliver as she removed his mask and then resting her hands on his shoulders (The fact that she was trying to stop him from yelling at Sara again was beside the point!). "Frank Bertinelli, are you sure?"
"Unfortunately," He replied, allowing her to divert him.
"You do realise what this means, don't you?" This time he tightened his hold around her waist to keep her calm. "I've been tracking her for the last year and the things that she has done, she'll be here long before we want her to be."
Oliver ran his hand over her cheek, realising that she was thinking back to the last time they had anything to do with Helena Bertinelli. "You're not the same girl, Felicity; you've got your memories back now."
"That doesn't exclude the fact that your psycho-ex-girlfriend is going to be rolling back into town as fast as she can finally get round to killing her father." She shot back at him to the amusement of the other three people watching and listening to them.
"Ex-girlfriend..." Sara repeated in amusement as Roy asked in puzzlement, "Why does she want to kill her father?"
"He had her fiancé murdered, she wants payback." Oliver replied, still looking down into Felicity's worried eyes. "She would also like to pay Felicity and I back for stopping her last time she was here."
"Then we're on full alert then." Diggle replied simply.
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"Have I mentioned just how much I dislike a certain elder sister of a certain ally of ours any time lately because let me tell you that of right now that particular dislike – which was huge as it was – has suddenly increased in size and I could really do without that particular headache!"
Diggle grinned as Felicity continued to ramble to herself before the phone rang and he picked it up. "Oliver?"
"I just had a call from Lance to the Arrow as Lance." Oliver said as he glanced back over his shoulder at the detective.
"I told him that was going to happen one of these days!" Felicity growled as she stormed over to where her winter leathers were stored. "I take it you would like your work clothes brought to you."
"If you would be so kind and where's Sara?"
Diggle and Felicity shared a concerned glance even as she packed her boyfriend's bag. "She's not here, Oliver," she replied when it was clear that Diggle was not going to tell him. "The moment she heard that her sister was still inside, she was gone."
"Just get here as soon as you can." To his surprise, they arrived and Felicity was fully dressed as the Shadow. She threw his bag to him and then pointed to the inside of the car and he obeyed her silent order. Returning to her, he found her looking at her tablet which had the inside feed from the courthouse of several screens.
Her small squeak had him looking over her shoulder to find her looking at an image of the Canary standing with her sister in a corridor and he immediately pressed his com. "What's going on?" He growled.
"She won't leave, give me a second." Sara replied before turning back to her sister.
"She's not going to be able to do it." Felicity looked back over her shoulder at him. "Of all the times to show the Lance backbone, she's doing it now. Things are about to go to hell in a teacup."
And she really was not happy to find herself proven right when it came out that Helena had left the building with the aforementioned elder Lance daughter as her only hostage.
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"Today is going down in the record books as one of the suckiest that we have ever had." Felicity glared at both Oliver and Sara as they walked into the lair. "And I am so mad with the two of you right now that it actually hurts to look at you – although not quite so much at you, Sara, because you didn't kill Helena – your sister, that's another matter altogether."
The two looked at each other realising that the other blonde was clearly not happy at being tricked out of going in the van with them to the hostage switch.
"You, however..." Felicity marched right into Oliver's path and hit him in the shoulder as hard as she could (as she was wearing her Shadow leathers at the time, it was much harder that anyone had expected, leaving them all rather stunned as Oliver was literally pushed back to the stairs.)
"Now that I didn't expect..." She looked at her leather gloves, glaring at them slightly before she turned her glare back to the tall man in green leather. "I deal with this later, you need to change and go speak to your sister." She pushed him slightly. "Your 'talk' to Roy has left your sister broken-hearted, go be her brother. As for Roy, I've already spoken to him."
(That's only if you consider being hit round the back of the head for listening to the advice of her emotionally-challenged other half counts as being spoken to – it was only the fact that Roy had had been mirakuru'd that had hidden the sudden difference between an ordinarily dressed and an Amazon leather dressed Felicity.)
As he went to speak, she held up her hand to stop him and he stopped promptly. The look in her eyes was one he knew only too well and leaving her to brood (her word, not his, he would point out if anyone had asked him – which they didn't) over things.
Fifteen minutes later, he returned and found her (changed as well) curled up on the bed in the lair, a stunned look in her blue-grey eyes. He immediately went to her side and pulled her into his arms, realising that whatever she had learnt in his absence had trumped her anger over being left out of their confrontation with Helena Bertinelli and his apparently bad advice to Roy over his sister.
"Felicity?" He ran his hand down her arm as she wrapped her own tight around his shoulders, burying her face against his neck for a moment.
"I spoke to Diana." She said simply as she then rested her head on his shoulder and curled into his embrace. "Apparently father left something out when he gave her my winter leathers and he's only just decided to let her know."
"And..." He asked simply as he ran his fingers down her cheek.
"Wearing my leathers, just my leathers mind you, I don't even need to be wearing the mask or hair but it works with them on as well, gives me back everything mother took from me when I chose to leave home." She buried herself even further into his embrace pulling his arms around her. "Oliver..."
Oliver tightened his hold around her – he remembered only too well the fully empowered Amazon princess he had met on the island and the fact that she was now returned to them was something that neither of them had expected.
It looked now as if they had an ace up their sleeve and one their enemy may or may not remember at that.
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I know, yet another shortest chapter - I have a list of excuses but I'm really not going to bother with them - that and the cold that came out of the blue today!
As always please review ;op