Bloodlust: An Arrow Fanfiction: Chapter 5: Water Makes Things Wet

Chapter 5-Water Makes Things Wet

“How is she?” Oliver asked.

“She’s stable,” Bruce’s voice crackled over the phone. “The bullet missed her heart by half an inch. The doctors have stopped the bleeding and sowed her up. Felicity will have a hasty sear and she’ll have to day in bed for a few weeks, but she is alive.

“Good,” Oliver sighed in relief.

“I’m …I’m sorry Oliver,” Bruce said. “That bullet was most likely meant for me. If I hadn’t…”

“It’s already done,” Oliver grunted, tempering the anger he felt towards Bruce with a quick breath and an iron grip on his bow. “Just make sure she is safe.”

“I will,” Bruce replied firmly. “I’m leaving Alfred here with Felicity. My presence will only bring more harm them good. I’m removing myself from the equation. I’m heading back to Gotham tonight. You should be here Oliver.”

“Once I find Lawton I’ll stop by,” Oliver growled and hung up the phone.

Hitting the speed dial on the phone with a quick tap of his gloved hand, Oliver waited for the line to finish ringing as he gazed from the rooftop across the street from Queen Consolidated.

“Oliver,” Diggle answered with a brief crackle of static.

“Do you have eyes on Felicity?”

“Yeah.  I can see right into the room. Everything’s five by five,” Diggle replied. “Wayne is on his way out. The butler is reading a magazine in the corner. I can see the butt of a silver revolver poking out from the corner of his waistband.”

“Keep her safe John,” Oliver said. “I’m tracking Lawton.”

“Give him my regards, “Diggle replied and hang up with an audible click.

Gazing out into the night Oliver stood in the darkness. The air conditioning unit hummed steadily behind him. The lights of Queen Consolidated illuminated the street down below. Even on a Wednesday night the mass of people kept a steady buzz in the air with the soft padding of their footsteps as they walked on by down below. Off in the distance he could hear a faint car alarm go off and then the echo of a police siren answer its mating call. The cool air of the night streamed across his face fluttering his hood slightly in the breeze. He could see the spot of concrete across the street when Felicity had been hit with the bullet meant for Bruce Wayne. He had come here hoping to find some sort of clue as to when Deadshot could have disappeared to. He had come up empty. All he had found was the buzz of the city and the breeze blowing in his face.

The distinctive click of a hammer being cocked back on a revolver caught his attention through the buzzing of the city.  Spinning around Oliver drew an arrow from his quiver, placed it on his bow, and cocked it back so fast the fletching ticked his check and drew a drop of warm blood.  Out of the darkness stepped Detective Quentin Lance, his thinning black hair fluttering in the breeze and his sidearm pointed squarely at the center of Oliver’s chest.

“I was wondering when you’d show up,” Lance said as he lowered his gun and holstered it.

Releasing the tension on his bow string, Oliver smacked his chest and heard the faint beep of his voice coder signal its activation.

“Detective,” he said in a cautious greeting, his voice coming out three octaves lower and distorted to his own ears.

“I wonder how long it will take Bruce to realize his voice coder is missing,” he thought to himself in amusement.

“Got yourself a new toy?” Lance asked with a questioning raise of his eyebrow.  “You sound different.”

“It’s a gift from a friend,” Oliver replied.  “What are you doing here Detective?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” Detective Lance said as he stepped towards the edge of the roof and into the glow of the streetlights.  “But I think we both know the answer to that question.  We’re here about our mutual friend Miss Smoak.”

Stepping deeper into the shadows to hide his face Oliver asked, “Did you find anything up here?”

“Just a shell casing with no prints,” Lance replied as he retrieved a small evidence bag from his pocket and tossed it in Oliver’s direction.

Catching the bag Oliver examined the nickel and gold plating of the shell while keeping one eye on Lance.

“There’s really nothing too special about the shell,” Lance said as he stared out across the downtown skyline.  “There were no fingerprints, no distinctive beveling marks, no unique powder residue, nothing at all.”

“What about traces of poison?” Oliver asked snapping to attention as an inkling tickled the back of his brain.

“Why would there be poison?” Lance asked looking back at Oliver with a quizzical look adding extra wrinkles to his brow.

“The shooter coats his bullets with a poison called Curare.  It paralyzes the diaphragm.  Anyone poisoned dies a swift death,” Oliver explained.

“We ran a full chemical analysis,” Lance said as he shook his head back and forth.  “There was no trace of any poison.”

Turning away from Lance, Oliver tapped his earpiece and dialed Bruce Wayne’s phone number discreetly.

“Master Wayne’s phone, Alfred Pennyworth speaking,” a crisp British voice answered.

“It’s me,” Oliver said, “Where is Bruce?”

“Ahh, Mister Queen.  I’d recognize the sound of my voice coder anywhere.  I told Master Wayne that I had taken it from his suit to do some routine maintenance on the thing.  I knew you must have taken it though.  The growling voice you used before must be murder on the throat.”

“Guilty as charged,” Oliver whispered.  “Where is Bruce?”

“He has gone back home to rest and brood sir, an unfortunate trait that I think you both happen to share.  I should be with him, but he charged me with the protection of Miss Smoak for the time being.  Is there something that I can do for you Mr. Queen?”

“I need you to look at Felicity’s chart.”

“Is there anything in particular that I should be looking for sir?”

“A toxin,” he said.  “It attacks the lungs and causes…”

“It causes asphyxiation.  You’re looking for something along the lines of cyanide, oleander, strychnine, or even curare,” Alfred finished.

“You know your poisons Mr. Pennyworth,” Oliver said.

“I was a medic in the war Mr. Queen,” Alfred replied.  Miss Smoak’s blood analysis shows no trace of any of those compounds.  Other than her… ‘flesh wound’, she is in perfect health.”

“Thank you,” Oliver said and hung up.

Turning back to Detective Lance he said, “The shooter isn’t who I thought it was.”

“Who exactly did you think it was?”  Lance asked.

“Deadshot,” Oliver replied.  “His real name is Floyd Lawton.  My contact at the hospital confirmed that Miss Smoak had no traces of poison in her system.  Deadshot laces his bullets with a poison called curare.”

“Well then who the hell shot Ms.Smoak?” Lance asked Stepping closer to Oliver.

Moving out of the shadows while keeping his face turned away from Detective Lance, Oliver drew his grappling arrow from his quiver and nocked it into his bow in one swift motion.

“I don’t know, “he said with his deep voice disguised by the electronic scrambler under his tunic. “But I’m going to find out.”

Aiming at the brick building across the street Oliver let his arrow fly. It cut through the glowing streetlights and impacted the bricks with a dull thud. Oliver felt the line attached to his arrow Stiffen with tension as the hooks of the grapple deployed into the brick. With a small leap he jumped off the roof and felt the spike of icy wind hit his face as he swung off the roof away from Detective Lance and into the adjoining alley of the brick building across the street from the rooftop he had just vacated.

*6 HOURS LATER*

Oliver entered the lair through the side door that he had built into a concealed wall of Verdant’s exterior. The dim lighting flickered on automatically revealing the various computers, servers, training dummies, manufacturing materials, and tools that lay scattered around the room. Everything was as he left it…except for the compressed micro-fabric mask he used to cover his face. It lay next to the dock he used to house his bow when it was not with him.

“I thought I lost that,” he whispered as he cautiously walked towards it.

Entering the center of the room Oliver heard a deep voice echo around him, “And I found it.”

BOOM!

Oliver plunged into darkness as the lights of the liar all went out at once. Drawing an arrow from his quiver by pure instinct, he quickly nocked his bow as the lights flickered bade on. Spinning in a tight circle Oliver found himself surrounded by eight black clad figures with swords drawn. The hoods over their heads masked everything but their eyes. They all looked exactly the same as Malcolm Merlyn had on the rooftop in the Glades a year ago. Spinning into another circle to keep them all in his line of sight, Oliver came face to face with a black and orange metal mask with one eye.

“Surprise kid,” Deathstroke said as he punched Oliver square in the jaw.

Stumbling back from the force of the impact, Oliver dropped to one knee. Using his momentum to spin himself around he caught a falling sword on one end of his bow from a black clad figure from stabbing him in the back. Lashing out with his left hand he struck the figure just below the knee. Feeling the satisfying crunch of bone and cartilage as his opponent’s knee gave in, Oliver bounded up off the hard grand before the scream of pain left the lips of his attacker and drove the hilt into the air and onto a computer console. Drawing on arrow he spun to his left and let it fly at another assailant. The black figure sliced the shaft of the oncoming arrow in half, stopping its momentum midair with one swift stroke. The next two arrows plunged into the center of his chest dropping him to the ground as gravity pulls a falling stone. Spinning back around Oliver blocked another slash to his head with the gantlet of his left arm and smashed the hilt of his bow three times into the place where the hooded figures nose should be. Turning to the right as he shifted his weight to his left foot Oliver prepared to lunge at the other black clad attacker across the table when an orange helmeted head smashed into the side of his own. The impact of Slade’s head-butt sent Oliver stumbling back into the man whose nose he had just broken. Flipping over the man and onto the computer console Oliver desperate grabbed onto the man’s mask to steady himself. Feeling the fabric rip within his grip, Oliver’s momentum sent the man to the ground and Oliver upend over the computer table. Ignoring the agony in his back Oliver jumped up and nocked another arrow. He deftly drew it to his cheek and was about to let it sail across the upended table when the sight of a pair of familiar blue eyes stopped him dead.

An orange blur flashed across the distance between Oliver and those eyes. A gauntleted fist connecting with the side of his head sent him into a world of darkness.