I decided that the first thing that I should do to celebrate my mother not being dead was to convince her to drop out of the race. I would give Sebastian the chance to do the right thing and I didn't think that losing the election would be good for him. She had called a press conference in front of Queen Consolidated.
"You're probably wondering why I am here today." She remarked. At least Emiko was with us now. I knew that she would insist on fighting alongside me, despite the fact that it probably wasn't safe. "Last night, me and two of my daughters were abducted by Slade Wilson and an attempt on my life was made. We managed to get away from him, but I have to come to the realization that it is not safe for me or my family to stay in this race. I thank all of you for your support and I wish that I could continue. I am putting my support behind Sebastian Blood and hope that he will be able to stop the menace that is Slade Wilson. Thank you again."
I knew that the next thing to do would be to have her, Thea, and Malcolm go into hiding until we were able to stop Slade. I was not going to let him hurt my family. They were going to be staying at Walter's vacation home. He was still a good enough friend to allow them to use it and he would be stepping in as temporary CEO in Thea's absence.
"Are you sure that you can stop him?" Thea asked.
"Yes I am. I don't know how, but I'm not alone and I will take him down by any means necessary." I promised. "As soon as this is over, we can be together again."
"How are you going to explain why you're not in hiding with us?" She responded.
"I'll just say that I don't want to miss any school." I replied.
"You're such a nerd." She teased. I frowned. "But next year when you give your speech at graduation, I'll be so proud of you."
I was pretty sure that I wouldn't be the valedictorian as long as Felicity was around. It was possible that she wouldn't be around though. I really hadn't even seen her much this year, but she was still at the school.
I then went to Sebastian's swearing in as mayor. Technically, they weren't supposed to do it until after the election, but considering the only candidate that had a chance to beat him dropped out, they kind of just skipped it.
"So I guess congratulations are in order." I told him. I still wasn't ready to tell him that I knew he was working with Slade or that I was the Arrow yet.
"I'm really sorry about what happened to you and your family. This isn't how I thought that I would be celebrating my victory. I thought it would be a little tactless to have a party considering the circumstances." He stated.
"Well just know that Slade Wilson is your responsibility right now. We have a terrorist in our city and it is up to you and your department to stop him." I remarked. I knew that it was pointed language, but I was hoping to play to his conscience, because I was pretty sure that he still had one. Assuming he was like the one that I had known, he wouldn't be on-board with Slade's plan to destroy the city. I couldn't help but wonder what would happen if he managed to survive.
"I will insure that he sees justice." He declared. I knew that was also pointed out language. That could be whatever his or Slade's version of justice was. I was also fairly certain that he was afraid that Slade was going to kill him.
"Olivia, I thought you would be with your family right now." Dinah interrupted.
"Well they're going to go away for a few days, but I didn't want to miss any school." I lied. I was pretty sure that she knew about my secret, but until she said something, I wasn't going to say anything to her about it.
"I saw that Emiko was back at the press conference." She declared.
"Yeah she just needed a little bit of time." I explained. Well that and some convincing from Courtney. It was a little hard to believe that she was going to be a different hero than the one she was where I was from. I still hoped that she would remain a hero. "I was just here to wish Sebastian good luck. I should probably get going now."
There was still a lot of anger inside of me, but I knew that I couldn't let that anger control me. I really did want to kill Slade not only for what he had done here, but also for what he had originally done, but I knew that I could not give into those urges.
The thing I needed to plan for the most was how I was going to stop the mirakuru. The first person that I wanted to heal was Artemis, but she definitely wasn't the only one. I also knew that things could be worse than last time because I assumed that Slade still had Tara working with him. I didn't know what the mirakuru would do to her powers.
I decided that I should call them to make sure that they got there okay.
"So how are things over there?" I asked.
"Are you sure that Slade isn't going to know that we're here?" Mom asked.
"He shouldn't." I replied. None of us were even using our phones because we realized that he could have tapped them or something. I would do whatever I could to protect them from him. "If there's anything at all that you need, I'll make sure to send it you. I'm sorry that it came to this because of me?"
"It's not your fault, Olivia. It's his." She explained.
"I'm sorry for not telling you about Slade sooner." I added.
"We'll get over it." She promised. "I love you."
"I love you too, Mom." I replied. I supposed that I was glad to know that I wasn't going to lose her again. I then hung up and looked at Mia, who was standing beside me. "So did you ever get to meet your grandma?"
"I did. Sara brought me to your funeral. I'll also tell you that she managed to live for another 15 years after you died." Mia explained. That made me wonder how she died. I assumed that she figured that I was thinking as well because of what she said next. "It was cancer."
"Well I'm grateful that I was able to give her that much more time." I explained. Not to mention, I was glad that Mia had gotten to know her.
From there, I decided to go to the police. I knew that they wouldn't be able to do anything, but I wanted to see Quentin.
"Detective, do you have any leads on where Slade is?" I questioned as I walked over to him.
"As of right now, we don't." He admitted. "I'm kind of surprised that you're out in the open like this."
"I'm going to be afraid of him right now." I answered. "I know that he's dangerous, but I want to see him brought to justice for what he did to my family."
"We'll find him." He promised. "There is something else that I need to know. Have you heard from Sara lately."
"Sara and I broke up." I explained. "She said that she needed to get out of town and this was before the thing with Slade even happened. If she contacts me, I'll make sure to let you know."
At that point, Dinah came over to us.
"Dad, I want to talk to you about Sebastian. There's something seriously off about him." She declared.
"Sweetie, don't go down this road again." Quentin pleaded.
"You told me that a cop is only as good as his gut. Well I'm the daughter of a cop and something is off about him. Can you please look into it?" She requested. "Before I was a drunk and you were right not to trust me, but I'm sober now and I still think that something is wrong."
From there, I went to the club where Artemis was still unconscious.
"We're almost out of venom." Iris told me.
"Well do we have any leads on the cure?" I questioned.
"I'm still working on it. I'm not used to this kind of science." She replied.
"What about Slade? Do we know where he is at all?" Courtney inquired.
"He's very good at not being found. The only thing that we can assume is that he's talking to Sebastian, but at this point, finding him won't even matter if we can't stop him." I pointed out. I knew that we could probably check the phone records from the mayor's office, but there really wouldn't be a point to that.
I then went upstairs where Emiko was working as a bartender again.
"So do you know where Slade is at all?" She questioned.
"No and even if I did, we can't fight him right now. We can't stop him without a cure for mirakuru or something else that we don't have." I explained. There probably were other ways to stop him but we didn't have any of those either. What we had now wasn't going to work. "Right now, I need you to do your job, but keep training with your sword, because you probably are going to need it."
"Well what are you doing right now?" She asked.
"I'm waiting. Emiko, I know it's not easy to understand but what I do isn't all fighting bad guys. Sometimes you have to plan so you can get an advantage on the bad guys. I know that Slade could be trying to kill more people, but until I know that I can defeat him, I have no choice but to wait." I explained. Impatience was definitely something that ran in our family.
"Well can you at least tell me why Slade is doing this?" She inquired. I supposed I did owe her that.
"He wants revenge for what happened when we were on the island together." I stated. "When I was there, we had a friend named Shado. I think she was like a mother figure to me. Anyway, the man who gave me powers, forced me to choose between saving her and saving Sara and Slade found out about it. Now he is not only obsessed with getting revenge on me but also with trying to force me to marry him."
"What the fuck? Ew." She commented.
I was still getting over the disgust of him liking me in that way. I didn't know if the fact that Slade had a twisted crush on me was worse than the fact that I was still a child, even though that would only be true for a few more weeks. I knew that he wouldn't get his way, but if he did there would be no restrictions to forcing his twisted idea of a union on me. But I knew that I couldn't focus on what could happen if I failed because I knew that I couldn't fail.
"Have you ever thought about trying to replicate the formula that gave you superpowers?" She asked. That was…an unusual question.
"No. For one, I don't even know the formula that he used and it was likely destroyed when his ship was." I explained. "But the more important thing is giving people superpowers can be dangerous. Artemis has literally lost her mind. I know it's not the same thing, but you don't want powers. It may sound cool, but even something as simple as my healing has its downsides. I have to eat 6000 calories a day just to maintain a healthy weight."
"That's really why you eat so much?" She questioned.
"Yeah my cells regenerate at such a rapid pace that they also burn calories really first. It actually is even worse if I actually have to heal from something." I remarked. "I promise you that I will stop Slade as soon as I get the opportunity. I want this to be over just as much as you do."
From there, Courtney took me to the docks. I wasn't sure why she wanted to go there, but it was kind of nice to be alone with her. It kind of felt like it was the first time that we had been alone together since we broke up, even though that wasn't true.
"So why did you want to bring me here?" She asked. "Did you want to talk about your father?"
"No, I just wanted to see how you were holding up. I know that you've been through a lot but I don't believe that all of that would just make this easier for you." She stated. "On top of that, your girlfriend just broke up with you and that can't easy either."
"There are times when it is hard for me to keep fighting." I admitted. "I also I don't think that I ever properly thanked you. It's because of you that my mother and sister are still alive."
"Do you want to know why I've stuck by you all of this time, even though there are times that I don't agree with you, even though there are times that you've felt like you needed to give up?" She asked.
"Is it because you love me?" I questioned. She seemed to be caught a little off-guard by that response so it must have been something else.
"Well…yeah, but the main reason is there is nothing that you can do to make me stop believing in you." She declared. "Also I have something that I need to tell you. You might not like it, but I told my family everything, including who you are."
I couldn't help but sigh. The thing was if she trusted her family, I would have to trust them too.
"How did they take it?" I asked.
"Well my mom is worried about me, but I think she knows that I need to be one of the ones to protect this city. Mike thinks that I'm cool for the first time ever and Pat told me to thank you for saving his life." She explained.
"You know there are times when I wanted to give up. Even though I have defeated Slade before, I sometimes just want this to be over." I declared.
"Do you really think that he would stop just because you agreed to sleep with him?" She asked. "He's not going to be satisfied with what he has. People like him always want more. Who's to say that he would stop at trying to rule the city? He could try to take over the whole state or country or even the world."
"I know." I answered. "And that's why I know that I can't give in. Even if he killed my entire family, I would still keep fighting. I will not let him get away with this."
At that point, she leaned in and for the first time in months, she kissed me. We held onto the kiss for a few seconds, before I leaned against her shoulder. Even though I knew of everything that was about to happen, I still couldn't help but feel happy. I was happy to still have my mom alive and I was happy to be loved by someone like Courtney.
"You know it might be a good idea for your family to get out of here too." I remarked. "As much as we need to stay behind to fight this, we don't have to put the people that we love at risk."
"Well isn't this sweet?" Tara interrupted. "You know that I could do so much to you, especially since you don't have your magic staff right now."
I didn't think Courtney's staff was magic, but I did know that she could always get it to come to her.
"What do you want?" I questioned. "There's no way that Slade would let you do anything to me."
"I'm here to give you a chance to turn yourself in. If you do not we wish unless our army on the city and who knows how many will die?" She stated.
"I'm not afraid of you." I declared.
"You are very brave but you are also very stupid." Tara declared. "And while I won't kill you, that doesn't mean that I am not above making you suffer. I hope you know how to swim."
With that the ground that the two of us were standing on started to break apart as her eyes glowed yellow and the railing began to fall into the water. She then made her exit as Courtney hung onto me.
"You need to get your staff here." I told her. Courtney held out her hand and within a few seconds, the flew under us, catching us right away we managed to fall into the water.
We went back to the club and started to dry off.
"What happened?" Iris asked as she looked at our wet clothes.
"I was right. Tara is still alive and she seems to be stronger than she was before." I explained.
"Well we'll be able to take her down too." Mia remarked.
"Yes we will." Dinah remarked as she walked out. So it seemed like she was ready to tell me. She also gave Tommy a kiss. I was glad that the two of them managed to patch things up. "Slade Wilson told me who you were."
"Yeah, Tommy already told me that part." I declared. "And that was when the two of you broke up. So why are you here now?"
"So this is quite the team that you have here." Dinah remarked. She then looked over Mia. "I'm still not even sure who she is."
"She's my daughter from the future. It's a long story." I explained. "But that still doesn't tell me why you're here."
"I put a bug on Sebastian Blood's computer. We managed to find that he had written a press release about your mother dying before Slade even abducted you." She explained. "Sebastian is working with Slade Wilson."
"I think it's more accurate that Sebastian is working for Slade Wilson." I corrected. "That theory you had about him killing his father, I think it's true and Slade is blackmailing him about it. I think he does have some good ideas and I also think that there is a part of him that truly wants to save this city. Can you guys give us a minute alone?"
The rest of them all exited leaving just the two of us.
"So did you ever think about telling me?" She asked.
"Yeah, I did. I thought about telling you a bunch of times, but I didn't tell you for the same reason that I didn't tell anyone else close to me. I only told Tommy because it was the only way that I could convince him to let me save our dad's life." I responded. You know now that I thought of it, the fact that I had saved Malcolm despite not knowing he was my father actually made me feel better about it. "What's important to me right now is saving this city, even though I don't really have a way to do that right now. I've got people trying to create a cure for what gives Slade all of his powers, but so far we're not there yet."
"Well you're the strongest person that I know." She commented. "I thought that even before I knew who you were. To come back from what you did and not have severe issues is amazing in and of itself, but even as Olivia Queen, you've done nothing but fight for what you believe in. Like this club right here, even though you say that you built it as a front, I think you really did want a place that was safe for teens to hang out and have a good time. You defeated Robert and you can defeat Slade too."
"I didn't really need a pep talk here but thank you." I told her. It was good to know that people believed in me. Sometimes there were times that I didn't quite believe in myself, but I could always get back up because I knew that other people believed in me and were counting on me. Even though I knew that I wasn't alone, I still needed to be reminded it sometime. Even someone as strong as me felt lonely sometimes, but I knew what was really important and wallowing in self-pity really wasn't something that I needed to do.
"So Mia is your daughter from the future?" She asked. I nodded. "I'd really like to hear the story about that."
"I don't really want to go into that right now." I declared with a blush. I had thought several times about telling them that I had been a man, but when it all came down to it, it didn't matter. It didn't matter if they wondered who Mia's father was since I was supposed to be her mother and what I had learned was that being a teenage girl really didn't change my trajectory or how I was treated at all.
"I think right now I should try to stop Sebastian. However, he is probably the least of our threats. Outside of Slade, there is also a girl named Tara Knyazev. She has the power to control the earth and create earthquakes. I'm not certain, but I think that Slade may be planning another quake, but this one wouldn't only hit the Glades. She also has the same abilities that he has." I explained.
"Well we're not going to let that happen." She told me. "I believe in you and I'm pretty sure that the whole city believes in you as well."
From there, I decided to call Thea because I just wanted to hear her voice. Whether she was my big sister or my little sister, didn't matter as long as she was my sister.
"So how are you doing over there?" I asked her.
"This place is so boring." She complained. "I should be there with you right now and I miss Linda too. I can't help but wonder about the two of you."
You know I hadn't really thought about trying to protect Thea's girlfriend. Even after all of this time, we still didn't know each other that well. I had only ever been alone with her once. There was also something that I still couldn't help but wonder about. She and Thea had been in Central City at the time of the particle accelerator explosion, but as far as I could tell neither of them had shown any signs of special abilities yet. I knew that not everyone in Central City was affected by the device, but I also couldn't think why they would be there if they weren't going to receive powers. I would just have to keep monitoring the situation to see if anything developed there.
The first thing that I decided I needed to do was find out the restaurant where Sebastian was going to be having dinner. I knew that I would be able to get in because I was a friend of his. In fact, I made sure to get there before he did. I wore a black pinstriped dress and a pair of earrings that was probably worth more than some of the employees made in a year. I could tell that Sebastian was surprised when he walked in and saw me at the table. I still wasn't entirely sure how much of Slade's plan he was even aware of.
"Hello, Sebastian. Do you mind if join you for dinner?" I asked. It may have sounded a little flirtatious, but I was trying to make him feel a little bit uncomfortable.
"Olivia, I didn't know you were still in town. I thought your family was on vacation." He stammered.
"Well I had a few tests that I really couldn't afford to miss." I answered.
I currently had Iris and Dinah working on interrogating his bodyguard. It really wasn't much of an interrogation as much as it was keeping him away from Sebastian.
"You know it's a terrible thing about what happened to you and your family." He commented. "I feel like maybe I should congratulate you once again over your victory. This is what you wanted, isn't it?"
"Believe me, Olivia, I wish that it had happened a different way." He responded.
"And what is that different way?" I challenged. "Does it have anything to do with a certain press release that you wrote up but never released because Slade wasn't able to kill my mother? Do you really think that he will let you accomplish your goals for the city?"
"How do you know that I've been working with Slade Wilson?" He questioned. It was interesting how he didn't even deny it.
"Because I'm the Arrow." I declared. He looked surprised by that, but not totally surprised.
"Of course you are. It all makes sense now." He responded. "You came to my office and you shook my hand. You said together we can save this city."
"We still can, but it needs to be saved from Slade." I remarked. "Do you think that there will even be a city left to be saved when he and Tara get through with it."
"That will only cause enough damage to make this city ready." He argued.
"Ready for what? Your leadership?" I challenged.
"Ready for my vision of what this city could be." He declared. I was pretty sure that his idealism was blinding his judgment. However the fact that he had it made me believe that there was still a part of him that could be saved. He just had to see the error of his ways. "A better city and after the storm that they're about to suffer, the people of Star City will support and follow me to that city."
"Whatever Slade promised you, he is not going to keep it." I remarked. "All he wants to hurt me and to own me. You are a pawn in a much bigger game."
"Slade promised me city hall and he has already delivered that." He countered. "He makes good on his promises and I hear that he made you a promise too. It's nice like there's anything that you can do to me. I know that you're not stupid enough to attack the mayor in a restaurant full of people. It's a new day in Star City, Olivia and there's nothing that you can do to stop it."
He then up and walked away. He was wrong because I knew that I could stop it. I knew that I would stop it even though I was pretty sure that it would be difficult.
After we left, I called everyone there. We would all need to be ready for this. I really hoped that we would be able to have the cure for the mirakuru because we were basically out of time.
"Slade's men are going to take the city tonight." Iris told me as she grabbed her gun.
"They're not going to." I promised.
"Well there's more men than we thought and all of them have mirakuru in them." She explained.
"It could be a massacre." Mia added.
"Not if we get to them first. We have to stick to the plan. That means no one decides to go off on their own." I said as I looked at Emiko.
"Why do you think I'm going to do it?" She asked.
"Because I just want us all to be on the same page." I answered.
"Courtney, Mia are we ready?" I questioned. They were the ones that I trusted the most. Iris and Tommy were currently working on developing the cure. Emiko would be keeping an eye on Artemis.
"I'm coming too." Dinah announced.
"No, you're not." I replied.
"You can give me a communicator. I'll be your eyes and your ears. I'll stay out of your way and nothing will happen to me."
"What if something does?" I challenged. "Slade's men will be nearly impossible to stop. I need you to trust me and I need you to be safe."
"But why are you taking them?" She asked as she looked at Mia and Courtney. "Aren't they supposed to be the people you care about most?"
"Both of them are highly trained for this." I explained. We went underground. I knew one of the main things was trying to figure out where Tara was because it may have been more important to stop her than anyone else. She was even more dangerous than Slade was, but I didn't have any way to track her.
The first thing that I saw was Sebastian in his mask with a group of men that were wearing the same mask as Slade. Sebastian gave a rousing speech to them about taking back the city.
"I see Slade's army." I declared.
"I've gotten your location and I'm forwarding it to Courtney right now." Mia declared. "We can use the energy from the staff to cause the ground to cave and bury Blood."
"Are you sure it's a good idea to kill all of these guys?" Courtney asked.
"If it's the only thing that we can do to save the city then that is what we're going to do." I stated. At that point, one of them came over and started to fight. I knew that they were very hard to beat at physical contact. He started to choke me before Dinah showed up and I shot an exploding arrow to knock him out.
At that time, I heard Tommy over the comms.
"We've got it. We've got the cure." He said.
"I hope there's a lot of it." I declared. "Because we're going to need it."
So the final battle is just beginning. Olivia's family is out of town so they can't be hurt and there may another surprise guest in the finale. This story has kind of turned into Judas Contract. Please don't forget to review.