Disclaimer: See chapter one
Please see my A/N below for further information.
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Chapter 31 – Hooded Shadow
Felicity sat back in her chair, casting her gaze over the list of chemicals scrolling across her screen and swore swiftly in ancient Greek (something she had learned to do when she realised just how much it annoyed her mother – especially as the Amazon Queen had never quite managed to use the old language as colloquially as her youngest child).
It was clear that Isabel was using the Applied Sciences Division to manufacture the mirakuru for Slade Wilson and as much as it pained her, they were going have to do something drastic to stop them before they had too much of the drug.
She turned in her chair to look at the surprisingly empty Lair. Sara was up in Verdant, readying the Club for the evening now that it appeared that Roy was no longer turning up to work there and Thea had also disappeared as well.
Diggle had gone home to speak to Lyla to bring her up to date (and A.R.G.U.S in an oblique way) on the current situation in Starling City while Oliver...
The man himself walked down the stairs, casually throwing his suit jacket over the empty table he used for his arrows and across to her side. He gently placed a finger under her chin and raised her eyes to his. "I know that look, Felicity; you've come to a conclusion that you don't like and you think that I'm not going to like either. Why don't you tell me and you might find that I right there with you in your thinking."
She sighed and rising to her feet, wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her head on his shoulder, speaking as he wrapped his arms around her in return. "We're going to have to blow up the Applied Sciences Division to stop them developing the mirakuru, Oliver and when I say blow it up, I really do mean a fire Hephaestus would be proud of."
Oliver closed his eyes, aware deep in his heart that she was right but dreaded even the thought of it. He released her and sat down on her chair whereas she immediately sat down on his lap, one arm around his shoulders as she cupped his cheek with the other. "Oliver?"
He sighed again but leant into her hand as he wrapped his arms around her waist and rested his head on her shoulder for a moment. "When you're right, you're right sweetheart but..."
"I know." She ran her hand over his head in quiet reassurance before he lifted it to look at her. "Oliver?"
"Hephaestus?"
She laughed and wrapped her arms around his neck. "Half-brother, Oliver and don't tell me you didn't know that because I saw that book on Greek myths you've got hidden near your bed!"
He returned her laugh with one of his genuine smiles, pulling her into a kiss just as the upstairs door opened and announced the entrance of their other partners.
"To be continued." She murmured against his lips as he kissed her again.
"Always," He replied as drew her into another quick kiss before putting her back on her feet again so he could rise to greet the others.
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Felicity finished tying the thick plait she had placed her brown hair in before pushing her mask back. Unlike the others, who were all dressed in black bike leathers, she had chosen to dress as the Shadow to ensure that the clumsiness that sometime accompanied her every day ultra-ego did not make an appearance.
"Did I forget to mention that this is a big move, even for us and we've cornered the market on big moves!" She murmured as she rested her head on Oliver's shoulder.
"Don't be nervous." Sara responded as she played with her black ski mask, still casting looks across the van at the currently brunette Felicity. (She still could not believe how much of a difference it made to her, especially as every so often, she now remembered the other woman on the island).
Oliver linked his fingers with Felicity as he rested his head against hers for a moment. "Slade left us with no choice."
He could feel her sigh as she prepared to speak again."And as far as plans go, this is not a good one."
"Felicity, this was your idea." He replied as he looked into her eyes as she raised her head.
"Exactly," She replied, a hint of laughter in her voice lending a lie to the seriousness of the previous statement. "And I have the right to mock my own genius when needed."
That actually surprised a laugh out all three of her companions before Diggle spoke up. "We're here."
Five minutes later, the two guards were unconscious, although there had been a slight spat between Sara and Oliver over the way that she had taken down the second guard which Felicity had shut down swiftly. ("That man used to work for me!" "And now he works for the enemy!" "And you both need to get over it – quickly, it's what being done here we're after, not the people!")
She then pushed back her mask into the position her sister normally wore it and jumped up the stairs, pulling out a familiar round cylinder. "Isn't that the universal key that the Clock King used?" Sara asked as Felicity moved past her.
"I may have lifted it from him." Felicity responded as she unlocked the door.
They quickly moved through the facility, placing the bombs that Diggle had brought with him in the strategic places they had discussed to achieve full collapse of the facility (the chemicals contained within the building would do the rest of their work with them).
"I really need to add bomber to my list of special skills." The Amazon murmured to herself as she placed her last charge.
She started to turn when a third guard suddenly came round the stand to hold a gun at her head, "Freeze!"
She reacted without even thinking, spinning round to take the gun from him as Oliver came from out of nowhere to deliver a knock-out blow to his chin with his elbow and throw him over his shoulder. "We have to go."
Five minutes later, they were back in the van (even with taking the time to pull the three guards out of the facilities and into the clear). Pulling her wig and mask off her head, Felicity took the tablet that Sara held out to her and check the program she had waiting for her. "Thermal shows everyone is out."
She looked up at Oliver, the couple sharing one of their infamous silent talks before he lifted the detonator to look down at it. She wrapped her left arm around his as he held up the detonator control in his right and activated the bombs as Diggle looked back over his shoulder at them. "It's just a building Oliver."
Sharing one more speaking glance with Felicity, Oliver then actually closed his eyes and set off the bombs. After the initial explosion, all three Team Arrow members in the back of the van looked out of the windows to watch the A.S building go up in flames.
Felicity then handed her tablet to Sara and silently pointing to the other program she had running before turning to Oliver.
He was still watching the burning building with such a look of agony it actually hurt her to see it. Feeling her watching him, he turned to look at her and seeing her look of regret, he immediately rested his forehead on hers, shaking his head slightly and when he spoke, only she could hear him. "It was the right thing to do Felicity, Digg is right, it's only a building."
He then wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into his side, resting his head on hers where it rested on his shoulder.
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"For the record, can I just say that I hated her before we knew she was a super-villain?" Felicity murmured as she rose from her chair after watching the news on the bombing. Oliver promptly pulled her into his side, unwilling to let her move far from his side.
"Slade's goal was to scrape together enough mirakuru for his make-shift army." He said thoughtfully. "For which he needed an industrial centrifuge."
"Which he had through Isabel Rochev stealing your family company," Sara added as she leant against Felicity's desk.
"And we've promptly put a kibosh on that particular plan by blowing up Applied Sciences." Felicity added as she rested her hand on Oliver's chest. "Not something I really want to do again but I will if necessary."
Diggle actually shuddered at. "Felicity, you are down-right scary on occasion but at least we've started to fight back."
"All we've done is set him back; we still have no idea where his next move will come from." Oliver rested his chin on Felicity's head for a moment. "And I have to go, my mother and I are meeting with her lawyer, Diggle, I want you to stay with Felicity today."
"Oliver, no!" Felicity turned in his arms, placing both hands on his chest as he rested his on her hips. "I wanted to come with you." Behind them, Diggle and Sara moved away to give them some privacy.
"Sweetheart, as much as I want you there, mother's lawyer won't." He cupped her cheek. "And I'm hoping that this time she will tell me why Isabel hates us so much."
Felicity shook her head. "If it turns out to be what I think it is and the reason why she suddenly turned up on my island, I'm going to reserve the right to tell you I told you so."
Oliver actually smiled at that and bent down to kiss her swiftly.
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Several hours later, reeling from what his mother had told him (and knowing that Felicity was really going to take great joy in telling him she told him so) Oliver walked into Verdant to find Sara working, a thoughtful look on her face. Hearing him come in, she looked up. "Hey, we need to talk about my dad and Laurel."
"How is he?" He asked, turning slightly as he heard Felicity and Diggle enter the club as well.
"Willing to go to jail for the Arrow," She replied as she turned to greet the others with a nod. "And Laurel is up to something as well."
He nodded as Felicity arrived at his side, slipping his arm around her waist. "By the way, have you seen Thea?"
"No, not recently," Sara looked at Felicity and Diggle. "So where did you two disappear to."
"I know you said you weren't worried Oliver," Felicity looked back over her shoulder at Diggle, "But Digg and I went to Roy's apartment. It's empty."
"Seems he cleared out a couple of days ago," Diggle added.
"Where the hell did he go?" He growled slightly. "Roy will have to wait; we need to figure out what Slade is going to do next." He pulled Felicity with him and started for the lair. Allowing her to go in front of him, none of them expected the growling voice that greeted them.
Within seconds of hearing the growled "Welcome home!" Oliver had grabbed Felicity around her waist and thrown them both over the banister to the ground. He quickly pushed her back into the somewhat shelter of the stairs, ignoring the curse word that left her lips (and the fact that a bullet had glanced off the bracelets that she was wearing).
Even as all hell was let loose around them, both Oliver and Felicity were looking for weapons that he could use (Felicity only just suppressing her squeal as Sara was thrown across the lair by her throat) and Oliver yelling at Diggle when he started to shoot at Slade.
"Oliver, the bars over there," Felicity, knowing that there was no way that she could stop him attacking Slade the moment that Diggle was thrown through the glass display cabinet, pointed out the first weapon she could see (swearing internally that there was nothing that she could do to help him) and swiftly kissed him before literally pushing him out from shielding her.
She only just managed to suppress her anguished cry as Slade stabbed Oliver in the shoulder with his sword before slamming him down onto the injury on the floor and knocking him out. "Don't forget who taught you how to fight, kid." He growled at him.
He turned to look at the young woman who suddenly appeared behind him to his surprise, holding the bow and arrow steadily aimed at him, "Another time I believe Ms Smoak."
"You may be assured of that, Mr Wilson." Felicity shot back before watching the man seemingly disappear in front of her. Dropping the bow to the floor, she dashed to the switch to turn on the lights and then to Oliver's side as he sat up, pulling her into his arms.
Together they looked around their invaded home, surveying the damage that had been done as Diggle and Sara came round from where they had been thrown. Even as they did, Oliver suddenly remembered the bullets that she had deflected and he pulled up her wrists to make sure she was uninjured. To his surprise, there wasn't even a dent in the bracelets she was wearing.
"Felicity, what the..." He looked at her in slight shock.
"Too complicated to explain," She replied as she tried to examine his shoulder as he kept trying to examine her wrists. "Just accept that they are a gift of protection from my father. We need to get you and Sara to the hospital, no arguments."
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Slade Wilson however was left with the sensation that the mystery that was Ms Felicity Smoak was even deeper than he realised and perhaps he shouldn't keep putting aside his investigation of the young woman - especially considering the belief of Isabel Rochev that she was possibly the most dangerous of the Arrow's associates.
It was then that perhaps he made his first real mistake in his campaign against Oliver Queen as he decided that her actions of this evening had been pure bravado and there was no way that the slender fragile looking blonde was of any real danger to him, even considering her genius IT abilities.
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Felicity walked into the treatment room where Sara had been receiving treatment for the hairline fracture of her wrist (not that she had gloated too deeply at being proved right that they need hospital treatment for once, much to Sara's amusement and Oliver's chagrin) and raised an eyebrow on finding Laurel in the room with both her sister and Oliver.
She immediately moved round the other woman to Oliver's side, silently asking if he was alright and receiving a silent reassuring nod in response as he gingerly slipped his deeply bruised arm around her waist. Leaning into him, she turned back to look at Laurel and caught the look on the other woman's face.
Felicity promptly decided that Sara was more right than she knew where Laurel was concerned because she really did not like the way that Laurel was looking at Oliver. It was bad enough when she looked at him on a normal day but this look, this look said I know something about you and I think it's finally the truth.
As she left them, it was also clear that as much as she wanted to be there for her younger sister, she also beginning to make some realisations about her as well – realisations that were quite frankly extremely ill-timed and Felicity came to the inspired guess that perhaps Slade had already made another move.
And the move just happened to involve Laurel Lance.
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It was Diggle that noticed that Laurel had been sitting in her car outside S.T.A.R Labs when he and Felicity arrived to check that Cisco and Caitlyn had been unharmed by Slade's unwanted visit to their facilities.
He tapped Felicity on her shoulder and nodded in the direction of the car where she immediately looked and swore (out-loud to his amusement but definitely in a language he was not familiar with), "Felicity."
"Give you ten she was here when Oliver and Sara came to check." She actually growled much like Oliver (who for once was listening on the other end of the Bluetooth for a change and couldn't stop himself from laughing before he caught on to what he said and swore in Mandarin).
"I really need to learn another language." Diggle murmured to himself as he followed Felicity into the reception room, earning himself a laugh from Sara.
The conversation with Cisco and Caitlyn went as well as could be expected, although the news that Iris was actually visiting the comatose Barry Allen was received well by both Felicity and the listening Oliver (although Felicity did wonder out loud whether she was visiting as the daughter of the man who had taken Barry in after the murder of his mother and the imprisonment of his father and therefore saw him as a brother of some kind or for other reasons that would be more agreeable to the comatose young man).
That particular ramble sought to lighten the slightly tense air currently building.
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That aura became even tenser as Felicity discovered what had exactly been stolen from S.T.A.R Labs (which in light of the fact that Slade had stolen the universal key from the lair to gain access there) did not go down well with Oliver.
It was very clear that his patience was coming to an end where things with Slade Wilson was concerned and Felicity was beginning to feel worried about the man she loved.
The news that Laurel Lance wanted to meet with the Arrow after all her suspicions did not go down with her well either - especially after he told her what Isabel had said about her relationship with his father and the fact that she was also doing it to punish Thea because Robert Queen turned his back on her to be her father when she broke her leg, even though he wasn't her birth father.
In fact she didn't like it so much, she suited up and sat on the back of his bike when he went to meet her. She then spent most of Laurel's speech to the Arrow rolling her eyes up until Laurel took a step towards him, a note in her voice she really didn't like as she said "I never asked why?"
She was off the bike in a flash and at Oliver side, her hand on his shoulder. He immediately turned into her, adjusting his bow in one hand and covering her's as he asked, "Are you asking now?"
"I don't need to because I already know the answer."
Oliver and Felicity became like statues as she said that but before he could respond, the clear sounds of a phone ringing could be heard.
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Things began to unroll so fast it almost turned them on their heads.
Up until the point where Oliver found Roy had been used as the blood source for Slade's mirakuru army of criminals and Diggle (who had been sent after Oliver by Felicity and Sara) shot Isabel twice – which led Felicity to morbidly announce that Slade would most probably mirakuru her and Sara to hit her for saying it because it was most probably true.
And then for Oliver to reveal that he had chosen to kill Slade rather than use the cure Ivo had invented for the drug...
As soon as he finished speaking, Felicity moved away from Roy's side and straight into Oliver's path. She caught hold of his arm and pulled him to a stop, cupping his face with both hands. "And you made the right choice back then Oliver."
"Felicity..." He tried to step away but she ran her hands into his hair and dug her fingers in.
"No Oliver, listen to me, really listen to me." She actually shook his head. "Killing Slade back then was the right decision. If I had actually been on the island for these particular events and hadn't been separated from you, I would have told you to do the same thing because in some ways, with or without the mirakuru, Slade Wilson was already going insane and Shado's death was the final straw in that descent."
"Felicity, you can't mean that." Diggle was shocked.
"I mean every single word." Felicity turned to look at him, releasing Oliver slightly but only so far as to put both arms around his waist to hold on to him. "Killing Slade back then was the right decision but now..."
She looked up at him, pulling the test tube from her pocket. "Now we can be sure that any cure we make will be the right one and the right decision."
Oliver looked down into her blue eyes and then cupped her cheek. "Are you sure?"
"I'm always sure where you're concerned."
There was only response for that answer and he bent down to kiss her.
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Sitting on the stairs of Verdant, looking at old picture of what was once the Queen family; Oliver sat waiting for Felicity to return from her visit to S.T.A.R Laboratories and her two friends.
Hearing footsteps, he looked up to find Laurel walking across the floor towards him and cursed silently under his breath. That however changed when he realised that Felicity had also followed her in and was currently slipping into the shadows where only he could see her.
Before he could say anything, Oliver found himself being held in a hug by Laurel and glared at by the real love of his life. "What's this for?"
"Because you're important to me," She replied tightening her hold on him.
"That's good to know, Laurel and I really appreciate knowing that but..." Feeling uncomfortable, he pulled away and to her puzzlement, held out his hand to the shadowed area of the club. Immediately a delicate hand appeared out of the darkness to take his and he pulled Felicity's slender frame to his side. "You do remember Felicity, don't you?"
"Hello Laurel, how's your father?" Felicity wrapped her arm around Oliver's waist. "Sara said that he had been attacked."
Laurel looked from Oliver to Felicity, clearly together as a single front against her and took a step back. "He's coming home tonight and he's been reinstated in the force."
"Please give him my love." Felicity replied before pulling her phone out of her pocket. "Oliver..." She showed him the message on her phone.
"As Felicity said, give your father our best but we have to go." Oliver actually managed that faux-smile he had used as Ollie and led Felicity away from her.
Laurel stood watching them almost in disbelief at being so summarily dismissed. She also felt for the first time that she had been completely replaced in Oliver's life and she wasn't sure that she liked it.
Turning she walked out of Verdant, unaware that she was being watched by the couple as they came out of the shadows where they had been hiding waiting for her to leave.
"She's decided to fight for you now that she knows." Felicity murmured as she rested her head against his chest. "You do realise that, don't you?"
"Then it's a good thing you know she's lost before she even began." He replied as she turned in his arms to look up at him, her hand resting on his biceps, "Everything falling apart around us, Felicity."
"As long as we don't, we can face anything the world throws at us." She moved her hands up to his shoulders and around his neck. "Especially anything Slade Wilson throws at us."
"Even a mirakuru Isabel," He asked, actually grinning when she stuck her tongue out at him (he wasn't going to admit that he agreed with her about that just right then, it was enough that they themselves already knew that it was likely to be true).
Instead he lifted her so that she was level with him and kissed her.
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Now this is what I call an epic of a chapter and I think that it turns out well. I had planned to have Felicity to speak to Thea but I just couldn't work it in so it looks like the Queens will still lose everything - oh well!
Look forward to hearing what you have to say and welcome to all new reviewers! Please join in the fun and review ;op