Again: Chapter Seventeen (17/?)
Summary: Oliver let Chloe down time and again. She could only depend on two things these days- her rationality and her work. So what was her logic doing, constantly giving him second chances?
Note: Spacing is being a pain today. I tried fixing it like four times today, and this is a long chapter, so you can understand my frustration. I'm sorry, guys. I really am.
[Chapter Seventeen]
Chapter Seventeen
She dropped by the coffee shop for a refill before heading back to the Watchtower to try and calm her nerves a little bit.
She had the trail of the city that she wanted Oliver to go through, found a couple of Met U theatre students who were thrilled at being paid to run around and pretend to have government jobs for a screenplay she said she had written for them. They had their scripts, knew their lines, and understood that Oliver would only be making an appearance on the day, that Mr. Queen is a very busy man. There would be no second takes. No questions were asked, which for once was nice and easy.
Chloe had set up the warehouse that she wanted him to be trapped in, found an old source from the paper who had a friend at a trucking company who was willing to rent out some equipment to her for the day at a reasonable price, and made enough hype about a fake casino that it might as well have been real.
It had been a very busy day, and even though it looked like everything was under control, every detail planned and scripted on her computers, she still needed willing participants on the team to make it happen. She told them to all get together by 10:00 tonight, and it was 9:45 before she darted out of the Watchtower anxiously.
They all still felt betrayed because of Doomsday. She wouldn’t have blamed them for coming in and killing her before she did any more damage. A couple of locks and fingerprint scanners could be easily broken by them.
She invited a handful of super-people over for a chat, and they all could easily decide to take it in another direction. She had a stun gun in her bag, two guns in her coat pockets, and some pepper-spray on her keychain, but she wasn’t sure how effective they would be.
There was a device that Oliver had come up with a couple of years ago when Canary joined up that would allow them all to be unaffected by her cry. Chloe dug it up this morning just in case.
“Are you okay? You seem a bit off today.”
She looked up at the sweet old man who was handing her the cup of coffee and smiled.
“Yeah”, she said, accepting the cup and pulling some folded singles out of her pocket. “Just meeting up with some people I haven’t seen in a long time. Not sure what to expect.”
“I know how that is”, the man said. “Sure that ice will be broken five minutes in.”
“I sure hope so”, she gave him the money. “Have a good night.”
“You too”, he said back as she headed out the door and started walking back to the Watchtower.
If they weren’t coming, then she would have to track them all down, and she was sure that it would be more difficult this time. She would have to re-examine her approach, since the filters she was using for the street cameras around the world didn’t seem to be working.
She taught them all how to be better at blending in, and now the kids were trying to use her own tricks against her. All it meant was that she would have to come up with new tricks.
She stepped into the elevator at 10:00 and loaded her guns, just in case. She made a mental note to replace Oliver’s target later for when she got him back in the crime-fighting game. It was getting a little crowded with bullets these days, but at least she was able to sleep knowing that the gun she kept by her bedside wouldn’t be used as a blunt object if she got attacked in the middle of the night.
She opened one of the double doors, and kept the other hand firmly on a gun in her pocket. She walked in, trying to keep an emotionless face as she saw them all in uniform and in front of her.
Bart and AC were smiling at her, so that had to be some sort of good sign. Victor was looking down at his feet, and Dinah looked like a stubborn child who had been reprimanded and dragged over here, arms crossed and avoiding eye contact.
“You’re all here. Good.” Chloe said, putting her bag, trying to forget about the thought in her head that was telling her that having everyone here was right, that as soon as they got Oliver back on his feet, they would all be where they were supposed to be.
That Clark told her that none of them didn’t have a home, that Watchtower wasn’t their home, and that seeing them all here proved otherwise.
She might have even smiled a little bit as she walked over to one of the monitors as she started typing, pulling up part one of her plan. Victoria was going to show up tomorrow- she was the only person who was going to be fully informed of the plan that Oliver would be interacting with.
Victoria was an old client from Isis that Chloe was able to track down once the jet touched back down in Metropolis. She agreed to get Oliver back on his feet, swore to keep his identity a secret, and hooked Chloe up with a couple of people with bartending and card dealing experience for the game that she was about to start.
“Before we get started with whatever you have planned, I want to make something clear.”
She turned around and looked at Dinah. “Sure, what’s up?”
“Chloe, we’re not a team anymore. We’ve all gone separate ways, started our own lives in different parts of the country. We’re not at your beck and call.”
“I never wanted you guys to be involved in Doomsday.” Chloe answered.
“Now. We’re not at your beck and call now”, Dinah corrected. “We came here because we owe Oliver- one last hurrah, paying back a debt. He met all of us in less than ordinary circumstances, and he gave us second chances. The least we can do is save him this one time.”
She looked around at the rest of them, looking for someone to disagree with her, but nobody did. Of course they didn’t come back to be a team again. What a ridiculously naïve thought.
She forced herself a crack at least half of a smile before turning back to the computer and typing. After all, what was the point in creating a plan if they weren’t going to use it?
All business. No sarcastic valley girl tones asking if a wig made Dinah look washed out. No fish jokes that even AC laughed at a little bit, no comparing coding techniques and having discussions about new operating systems with Victor, and no random flowers super-sped from the other side of the world from Bart.
No real names, no first names. No laughing or small-talk. Just code-names and formality.
She swallowed, holding back the first word that came to mind in her first sentence. Trust. They didn’t trust her anymore, and statistically, they had no reason to anymore. It was just number-crunching. It wasn’t rational for Chloe to be mad.
“Believe”, she started instead. “Believe me, as long as we follow the plan to the letter, Green Arrow will be running on rooftops again."
She pulled up one the files and loaded it up to the touchscreen on her desk before walking over to it and pushing it out to the projector on the wall.
“Blueprint of the city”, she started as she took two fingers on the touch screen and expanded it before scrolling through the pages. “I have this part of the city blocked out from here”, she marked a portion, “to here”, she ran along a line so they could see the area they had to work with. “The most important thing is this- we need to make sure that he stays in this area. Otherwise there’s a chance of getting the press and civilians involved.”
“How are we going to do that? Pull him back if he gets too close?” Bart asked
“No”, she said. “If he sees any of you on-site, he’ll figure out what’s going on. I have someone that he hasn’t met who’s going to be with him the whole time. I’ll be connected with her the entire way, she knows her script backwards and forwards. If he gets close, she’ll lead him in a different direction.”
“Who is it?” Dinah asked
“Someone who’s only coming for the encore”, Chloe told her.
“You’re bringing in a rookie to play with all of us? That’s not going to work out. We’ve been working together for years.”
There was nothing wrong with the plan- Canary was only here for a couple of added effects. Chloe pulled out one of the guns in her pocket and set it on the table, keeping her hand there. “You said it yourself- we’re not a team anymore, right?”
“Whoa, no need to bring out the firearms”, AC said, putting his hands up. “I’m sure whoever she found can get the job done.”
“You’re not going to kill me, Chloe”, Dinah said. “I don’t think you can. You need us.”
“I don’t need your arm, Canary”, Chloe shot back. “Just your pretty little singing voice.”
“What makes you think that you’re getting it?”
“I can manage either way.”
“Both of you, stop it”, Victor said, as they both stared at each other, daring the other to act first.
“You weren’t there”, Dinah told him. “You didn’t set off those explosives. No more casualties. I don’t want some kid dying out there because we’re unfamiliar with working with them.”
“I was”, Bart said, putting an arm around Dinah. “Mistakes happen, Canary. She screwed up once in three years.”
They all went back and forth while she stood silent. She couldn’t defend herself, there was only one argument that she could present and she already did in that hotel room. There was nothing more to say.
Chloe, it’s not working anymore. You’re not working.
It needs some work. But so did we. I just saw us here, you know? Taking something that the rest of the world had forgotten about and making it ours.
Being here around them and watching them remind her was making her lose her mind. Chloe suddenly felt the need to leave here, to run away, to start again tomorrow, but she knew that if Oliver tried to kill himself before, he might try to do it again.
Save me? There is nothing left to save!
“We don’t have time for this”, she said over all of them. She walked up to one of the monitors, typed in something that would give them limited access to the computers for the files only relevant to saving Oliver, and turned around. “Look it over. I’m telling you that I’m doing this tomorrow night, so you can either help me and guarantee that Ollie will come out of this alive and back in the game, or you can sit back and watch as he kills himself. Game starts at 10 PM.”
She walked out of the room and tried to stay as calm as she could before the elevator doors shut. The second it started moving, she pressed the stop button and sat on the floor and stopped fighting it. She wrapped her arms around her knees and closed her eyes.
When Hades offered Persephone her chance of freedom, to everyone’s surprise, Persephone chose to live underground with the dark prince.
She remembered when they found her, how they automatically attacked Davis, and how she screamed not to, how they didn’t understand, how she could save him.
She remembered when Brainiac took over, and her screaming for Clark to get it out of her. But he couldn’t hear her. She begged him to make the pain stop, to make it go away.
When Chloe and I were little girls, we made a promise- neither of us would get married until we found our soul mates, the one person in the whole wide world that we were destined to be with. Which is why you can't take a 10-year-old on their word.
She could still hear the sound of the pole skewering Jimmy’s body, pulling back from the kiss, because it felt like he had frozen in place and something was wrong.
He didn’t scream, but she heard the faltering breath, felt the pole brush against her own stomach. She knew that he didn’t scream because he was trying to be strong.
So, this whole time, that you were with me, it was for Clark? How could you do this? I loved you. You’re the only one who ever loved me. Why? Why?!
She opened her eyes and looked down at her hands. Through the tears, she could still see the stain of red on her hands and smell the ammonia from when she scrubbed the stain from the floor. So much for the ice being broken five minutes in.
She hated remembering it all, hated that she couldn’t let it go or control her emotions. She hated that she was weak like this, that every time she promised herself that she would be strong and that she wouldn’t cry anymore, she ended up crying alone.
Like she was some sort of self-deprecating pain addict who kept relapsing every time she was supposed to be strong. She couldn’t even have a calm twenty minute debriefing with these people, couldn’t have a two second conversation with Clark without analyzing every facial movement and wondering why he wasn’t picking up on more.
She could never hold onto happiness long enough for it to stick, but she wasn’t even looking for that anymore. She just wanted things to move on, to continue, for the verbal aggression to stop and be done with. For even the physical fighting to start so that she would have some way to defend herself, win, and then have it all be over.
She told herself that it would be once Oliver was safe, that getting him back on the horse would be taking care of the last part of all of this. The plan will have started already this time tomorrow, and by the end of the week it would be okay.
She took deep breaths to stop the tears and stood up strong and pulled out her cell phone and took a look at the screens that they were taking a look at. Victor was trying to hack into her personal system, but she made it Cyborg-proof.
Files on Davis from last year, Isis patients, and video footage of Tess Mercer. And files on everyone on the team- she hacked into Met Gen’s database to get updated information on Emil to check up on him. This wasn’t any business of theirs, it was her job. Making sure that everything was taken care of was something she had been doing for years.
Victor hadn’t plugged himself into the system yet. There was no need for her to intervene and stop him, but she put the elevator back in service and went back up. “I’m assuming that you guys want in since you’re perusing?” She asked
“Limited access isn’t like you.” Dinah told her
“One last mission isn’t like you guys either”, Chloe shot back. “But here we are.”
“It had to end sometime, Chloe”, AC told her. “Lex is dead. 33.1 is over.”
“We won”, Bart said
She went to her desk and pulled up the video footage of the underground cage that Oliver was in. She pushed play and watched Oliver get thrown to the floor and say that he would get up in a second before she cut it off. “Does that look like we won to you?”
“That’s why we’re here”, Dinah said.
“Do you have any questions?” Chloe asked
“Glorified glass breaker, I’ve got it.” Dinah told her
“I have a question”, Bart interrupted. “You want me and AC to hit Oliver with a truck? And you’re trusting that I’ll be able to pull him away from the car in time? Puts a lot of pressure on me not getting him killed, don’t you think?”
“You’re fast enough. You can handle it.”
“Not without him seeing us”, AC pointed out.
“Why not? It worked on me”, Chloe said. “Just sneak up on him super-fast.”
“Chloe…” Bart started
“Apples to apples. The ability was there then, it’s still there now. I trust you at any rate. Any other questions?”
“Why does it have to be tomorrow?” Victor asked
“Sooner is better”, she said as she printed out copies of the plan detailed, lines that needed to be said and time stamps with when everything needed to be done. She walked over to the printer and handed copies to each of them. “Besides, what better day to bring him back to the land of the living than on his birthday?”
***
She was in her apartment setting up the program that would make it seem like Oliver’s bank account was depleting. She was going to set it up remotely at the Watchtower, but she didn’t want the rest of the team to know that she needed to pay for the bill for all of this when it was done. She used to access his bank accounts from his office when she needed it, and since it was only a handful of times, she didn’t have the account number memorized yet.
Paying for window repairs for the buildings they were destroying today and paying all of the students who were helping her, not to mention tipping the pilot for getting her back and forth when she was trying to track down Bart and Victor was costing her a bit of money.
She didn’t exactly want to send Oliver a bill when this was all over, especially since he didn’t ask for any of this. It’s not like he would notice a little money going missing anyway, and besides, this was part of her job. Taking care of things like this was her job and he never complained about it before. He didn’t even notice when Emil took some money to fix up the Watchtower.
The program was going to hold onto the numbers and she’d get them back and be done with the whole thing. She had slipped the laptop into her bag and was about to leave for Metropolis again when Lois burst in.
“I cannot believe him. I cannot believe either of them!”
She folded the laptop bag down and checked the time quickly. Ten minute conversation, 2 hour train ride, quick coffee stop before the subway, and at that point Oliver will be in the secure building where the program will execute. Cutting it a bit close, but doable.
“Subject has re-entered the casino”, Victor said in her earpiece. Good thing her hair’s covering it.
“Okay”, she said to both Victor and Lois, slipping the earpiece out of her ear quickly and covering it in her hand before turning back to Lois. “You’re going to have to be a bit more specific with the who and the what.”
“Do you remember the Queen Industries and Luthorcorp gala from, I don’t know, last week?"
Not the right time span, but sure. “Yeah, what about it?”
“Oliver didn’t know that the bomb had been diffused. He stepped off of the podium and tried to kill himself. And the worst part is that Clark was right there and neither one of them told me! Can you believe that?”
“I thought you had feelings for Clark”, Chloe emphasized.
“Oliver and I are still friends. I can’t believe that he didn’t come to me about it. And that Clark would just lie to me about it. And his excuse was that he was trying to protect him.”
Chloe blinked, trying to think of something to say back, and for a split second, she could have sworn she saw Davis covered in a pool of kryptonite.
“I don’t think it’s something that people like to share with the world”, Chloe tried.
“I want to help him, but he’s not answering my phone calls. Smallville and I had to break into his office to try and find him and we found the footage instead.”
“Why did you break into his office?” Chloe asked
“Because of the tradition that we’ve had for the past couple of years on his birthday. We share a pack of beer, bond a little bit, have a good time.”
Which, knowing Lois and knowing Oliver, meant that they’d share multiple packs of beer, bond a little bit, slip into bed, and have a good time. Explained why the team always jetted out of town on a new mission the next morning.
Nice.
“What about Clark?”
“What? No, it’s been friendly and platonic since last year. But I’m still pissed off with Clark for not telling me. I’ll kick his ass once I find Oliver and kick his ass.”
“I wouldn’t be too mad, Lois. You have been incredibly busy over the past couple of months. Paper’s running you a bit ragged.”
“Well, if Tess and I keep up this firing and rehiring crap, I have to at least prove that I’m worth it. And besides, I haven’t been too busy for you and Clark.”
Correction- Lois hasn’t been too busy for Clark. End of story.
Chloe was paying rent from Jimmy’s life-insurance check, she paid for the funeral by selling her car, and she once spent the morning unconscious in what turned out to be Atlantis before magically getting back to Metropolis in time for lunch. She wouldn’t have told Lois about the underwater kingdom part, but she would have mentioned that Jimmy and Davis were dead if Lois hadn’t been focusing on The Blur.
If Lois had even mentioned that the parking space next to her car was empty now, she would have told her.
She looked at her watch. Ten minutes were up, and Chloe was heading towards the door to leave. “Sorry, Lois, I’ve got to go.”
“That’s it?” Lois asked. “I told you that Oliver tried to kill himself and Clark didn’t tell me and you have to go.”
Funny, it didn’t seem to be a problem when Lois did it.
“It wasn’t a problem when I found you in the hospital a couple of months back. It’s going to have to wait, right?”
“What are you talking about?”
Okay. Fine, Lois. Want to do this now? Fine.
“I told you that I had to drop a bomb on you and instead of sticking around to listen, you run off to meet The Blur, a perfect stranger, over your cousin. I ghost-wrote stories while you were gone, called the police every day, and searched for you like my life depended on it. A big reason as to why Tess decided to keep you around was probably because it looked like you had never been fired. But you didn’t even ask me later what it was. Never did.”
Chloe took a breath and continued. “You’ve been so wrapped up in your life and in Clark that you didn’t even notice that something was going on at that charity ball. The one that you crashed to one-up Clark. Do you remember that? You were there, Lois. You were there that night. But you want to know who’s not here, Lois? Jimmy. And Davis. You want to know why they’re not here? Because they killed each other. Do you think that you’ve been here for me now?”
Lois stepped forward. “Chloe, I’m sorry”
Chloe pulled back before she could give the pity hug. “-Don’t expect to be kept in the loop if you’re not actually interested. Oliver’s had countless girlfriends and flings, you think all of them are up to date with everything he does?”
“I’m not like all of his other exes, Chloe. It sounds weird, but I know a lot of things about Oliver that nobody else does. He should have come to me.”
Chloe was going over her allotted time just having this conversation. She was going to have to wait an extra five minutes to get the next train. She didn’t have time to do this beating around the bush with the whole ‘I know Oliver’s secret and I think you don’t but you know it too and we’re just not talking about it’ thing.
“He doesn’t need your permission to end his life, Lois. And standing around here talking about it isn’t going to change anything. Oliver’s fine, I’m taking care of it.”
She opened the door.
“What are you talking about?” Lois asked “How are you taking care of it?”
“That doesn’t concern you”, Chloe told her. “And don’t bother following me. They might tell you at the Planet that you’re worth your salt, but you’re not that good.”
She left without another word and hired a taxi to gun it to Metropolis- a cab-fare that left her wincing, but she didn’t want to risk the mission by asking Bart to come pick her up from Smallville, something that she regretted when she found Impulse just hanging around the Watchtower, eyeing the security cameras as Roulette and Oliver ran through the streets.
“Cutting it kind of close”, he remarked. “Is the laptop ready?”
She ignored the comment and pulled out the computer, slipping the earpiece back in her ear. “Here.”
“Back in a flash”, Bart said before speeding out.
“What’s with the whole back in a flash thing?” She asked out-loud.
Victor opened up the bookcase where he had been working behind and poked his head out. “He’s hoping that it’ll stick as a new nickname. He’s been using it for a month now. Hasn’t worked yet. He’s still mad that he didn’t get to pick his own nickname.”
She studied the security camera and watched as Roulette faked her death and the fake police surrounded them. “You’re going to have to pop back in there when the program executes. I think Clark’s catching on, trying to find him. I’ve got a counter-mission to keep him distracted, but if he finds Oliver, this’ll be the first place he takes him.”
“No problem. Impulse will have to drop Victoria off here when Clark leaves, unless you want Clark in?”
“No.”
“Does he know what we’re doing?”
“No.” She didn’t go any farther than that. It wasn’t necessary to the mission.
Victor looked around awkwardly. “Okay then.”
“Watchtower, looks like Boy Scout’s heading your way with Arrow.” Impulse came through the earpiece.
“That’s my cue”, Victor said, hiding back behind the bookcase.
She barely had time to change the screens from the security cameras to her database when the double doors opened. Oliver looked beaten up, but he was still in one piece. Thankfully the stun gun that he had been hit with was on low voltage and the guns were loaded with blanks.
She had gotten good at lying to them- Chloe played her part, ran a fake search with a story that Victoria had come up with as the results instead of her Isis foundation files. She thought that she was good at anticipating what Oliver was going to do during this mission- the script back in the dark warehouse was executed perfectly with what he said. But Oliver wanted her to fetch his gear for him.
Probably to use an arrow designed to kill instead of the trick arrows that he normally used to knock out civilians and guards. She didn’t go along with it, but she was worried about what this would mean, whether he would be able to come back from this instead of committing another murder.
He wasn’t too happy about that, and Clark almost went after him when Oliver used the old nickname on him on the way out, but Chloe was able to stop him with the counter-mission. The woman that she found on the video feed wasn’t made up, the counter-mission was real, but she found the footage days ago.
She had been saving it, keeping it from Clark until she needed to use it to distract him, to make sure that he wasn’t involved. She fed him the story and sent him on his way before telling Bart that it was okay to come back with Victoria.
Impulse sped in alone and Victor came back out of the room.
“What happened? Where’s Roulette?” She asked
“We have a bit of an issue in the plan.” Bart tried
“What is it?”
“Lois- she’s sneaking around the casino looking for Oliver. She’s near his car.”
Damn it. Why did she have to get involved?
“Watchtower to Roulette, what’s your status?” She spoke into the com.
“She’s at the car right now. Want me to take the joker out of the deck?” Victoria asked
She liked Victoria, she did. But she was making way too many card game references. “Play out the hand”, Chloe told her. “She’ll try to fight you to get in, but you can handle her. Take her as a hostage and use her to get to Oliver when he comes around.”
“Chloe, this isn’t part of the plan”, Bart told her. “She’s your cousin.”
“Lois is going to be fine.”
“Oliver has guns in his office and car. It sounded like he wants to kill Victoria. This could be bad.” Victor said.
“This is just Plan B”, Chloe said. “Roulette, there’s a computer activated fire in the next room of the Casino. You’ll try to set the whole place on fire, pretend to be stuck, and Oliver will rescue you.”
“He won’t do it if there’s a hostage.” Victoria said. “He’ll shoot me first.”
“Gun’s loaded with blanks”, Chloe told her. “Don’t worry.”
“Got it”, Victoria told her.
“Someone talk some sense into her”, Bart said into his com
“It’s a weird plan, but Oliver didn’t get hit with the truck. Highest chance of a screw-up, I think that one was it.” AC said
“Which ones did you get?” Dinah asked
“Car and Office”, Chloe said.
“Glove compartment?” Dinah asked
“Yes.”
“Trunk?”
“Yes.”
“Back seat?”
“Yes. Don’t you think Roulette would work better without the extra chatter?”
“Target secured”, Victoria said
“Good. Thanks, Roulette”, Chloe spoke.
“Office drawer?” Dinah continued
“Yes.”
“Did you take his arrows?”
“Sounds like he gave her all of his Green Arrow equipment.” Victor said.
“Really?” Bart interrupted. “All of it?”
“Yeah, it was all here one day. I didn’t see him.”
“Sounds like she’s clear”, AC said.
“Here he comes”, Victoria said into the com
Bart sped in AC and Dinah and they watched on the wall as Oliver talked to Roulette. She knew that the second he tried to shoot the gun, he would realize that it was all a set-up, and even though she wanted desperately for him to know that it was her, it would be too soon if he figured it out before saving Victoria.
There was a lot of chatter between Oliver and Victoria before the gunfire started.
“Roulette, you better make sure he’s not injured”, Chloe told her. “I don’t want a bullet even grazing him. Understand? Nod your head for yes.”
She looked at the video feed as the woman nodded her head. Good.
“So, how do I know that this isn’t just another part of your game?” She heard Oliver ask
Victoria raised her gun in the air and shot the ceiling three times to emphasize that maybe he was onto something. But it didn’t seem like he caught the hint. “Right”, he answered
“Let him figure it out for himself.” She instructed as Roulette ran out of bullets. “Get over to Lois. He won’t try anything around her. You’ll be safe. Impulse- activate the gas and get out of there. Make sure nobody sees you.”
“Got it.” She heard over the earpiece.
Lois was shouting something muffled. “Shoot her.”
“Here’s our moment of truth”, Chloe said.
“Strangely enough, I’m not in the mood for popcorn.” Dinah said
“We’ll put on the fake names and get girly drinks later”, Chloe answered with a smile, trying to hide the shaking in her hands and voice.
She ignored the cold vibe she was suddenly feeling from Canary. That’s right, this was a one-time thing. They weren’t even colleagues. She swallowed the lump in her throat and kept staring at the screen.
“She knows I won’t- not if there’s a chance I’d hit you”, Oliver told Lois
“Screw the drinks. If this doesn’t work, we’re going to have to drag him to AA meetings for billionaires kicking and screaming”, AC pointed out.
“If this doesn’t work, we’re going to have to drag him out of a fire kicking and screaming.” Dinah said.
Victoria fake-screamed for help and Chloe watched as Oliver looked at Lois and then looked at where Roulette was supposedly trapped.
“Positive thinking”, Bart said as he sped in. “He’s okay so far. Let’s see what happens.”
She felt her face sweating profusely and her heart beating uncontrollably, yet time was slowing down almost painfully. It happened though- Oliver let Lois go and ran over to Roulette.
“Where is he?” AC asked
Chloe didn’t think that it was going to work, but it did. Oliver went off and played the goddamn hero like she knew that he was going to. She was so shocked that she forgot to change the screen. “Oh, I can do that”, she said, typing on the keyboard and changing the camera image.
Victoria repeated the words that Chloe wrote. “Why did you come? You could have left me here. After everything I put you through, no one would blame you.”
She knew everything that Roulette was saying, orchestrated it all herself. She had a visual of what she hoped that Oliver would say back so that she could plan everything. But what she didn’t expect was what happened next. “I don’t care what you did or who you are. I’m going to get you the hell out of here, alright? I’m not going to let you die.”
She felt the words apply to her. It didn’t make sense, but she felt the words address her.
“Well, I’ll be damned”, Dinah told her. “It worked.”
She had the entire team back. But they weren’t here to stay. Hollow victory. “Yeah”, Chloe said quietly. “Thank you, everyone, for your help. I’ll let you get back to your lives now.”
She thought for a split second that someone would stop her from going up the stairs, but nothing happened as she climbed the flight and shut the door behind her.
She had been working towards this, and now that Oliver was back and everyone else was tracked down, what else was she going to do? Just keep an eye on Tess Mercer and deal with whatever weekly emergencies Clark came up with, if she was lucky enough to be included?
***
Chloe woke up the next day and pretended to have an average life. She put on a gray suit and a pair of heels, as if she was going to work somewhere. She styled her hair and put on some makeup before heading out to get a copy of the morning paper and a cup of coffee.
This was normal. This is what people did most mornings instead of checking video footage around the world and eating cold noodles.
One leg was crossed over the other and she sat outside holding the coffee in one hand and the paper in the other. She didn’t pay attention to the traffic cameras or the people passing by.
And then something rested on the table, breaking her focus. Her eyes went to the white chess piece that was there- a queen.
“Nicely played.”
He wasn’t mad at her?
She looked up and saw Oliver standing over her before he walked to the seat across from her and sat down.
He was tormented on the screen on that podium, terrified in all of the footage from yesterday. He looked okay now- a little cut up, a bit tired, but himself.
“I started asking myself who knew about Lex, about Toyman, the things I had given up, what I tried to do”, he started. “Then it all occurred to me. Dinah shattered the glass in the warehouse, Bart rescued me from the car, Victor faked the computers, and Watchtower kept an eye on the whole thing, right?”
She smiled a little bit as he rattled off their first names. It felt like old times, like the past hadn’t happened and the rest of them weren’t battle-scarred. Like they weren’t their abilities, that they were part of a family.
She wanted to be cold, to act emotionless and brush him off. But the way he was speaking to her now was like when she would help the team with information before.
I don’t care what you did or who you are. I’m going to get you the hell out of here, alright? I’m not going to let you die.
Her and Oliver were on the same page. She saved him. She was starting to wonder if maybe he needed to kill her to make things right after all.
“You were living like you had a death wish, Oliver”, she started. “You had to face your demons if you were ever going to make it out alive and I had to push you over the ledge in order to pull you back.”
“Did you have to push with a three-ton truck?”
They were the same concerns that the team had, but she didn’t feel annoyed when Oliver brought it up. It was risky, having a truck hit him and having Bart run in and save him at the last minute. But it worked, just like all of the 33.1 plans. They all seemed crazy before they went in, but they trusted each other to make it happen and it did for the most part.
She leaned forward. “I didn’t think a tricycle would be a strong enough point. You’re a fighter, Oliver. You fought for yourself and for a second chance.”
He nodded. “Chloe, I’m not the only one you put at risk.”
She let out a laugh. The actors were hired and she knew ahead of time that she would be paying for damages. They weren’t exactly informed that a replica of Lex’s grave was going to be brought in for Oliver to deal with. Everything was okay. “If you’re worried about our little club and Lex, don’t be. I played my cards close to my chest."
“And Lois was what? She was just another ace up your sleeve?” He asked
“No, I never meant for her to get involved. She was chasing after you when she accidentally ended up storming the field. That’s when Victoria went off-script.”
“I could have killed her.”
She was mad at Lois, but she was never going to let anybody shoot her. “No offense to your manhood, but I made sure that your gun was loaded with blanks, just in case.”
He gave her a smile- almost like he expected it.
“I trust you, Oliver”, she said honestly, bringing the cup to her lips again. “Just…not that much”, she finished, taking a sip. She barely trusted herself to make sure that she could do her job. Since everyone left, it had been hard to do any more than that.
“Did Clark know about this?”
If everyone else on the team was going on and on about how dangerous the plan was, she could only imagine how much Clark would be against everything from the beginning if he knew. He had been keeping Chloe at an arm’s length since he came back, and she was just returning the favor
“You can’t be serious”, she let out. “Clark would never in a million years risk what needed to be done.”
She waited for Oliver to tell her that it was the wrong method, that she could have come up with something safer. But that’s not what came next.
“Well, he’s led a different life than we have, hasn’t he?” He started, eyes drifting off to the side as Chloe studied him. “I can’t expect him to know me like you do. The places that I had sunk to, the depths that you must have had to go to bring me back? Thank you.” He finished with soft thanks, almost a whisper.
Chloe felt a genuine smile creep up on her face, something that wasn’t just victorious or something that she plastered on when other people were around for effect. He understood.
“You proved it to yourself”, she insisted, almost not believing that this was the same man who was backing away from what he thought to be a loaded platform just days ago. “Even with your face in the gutter, you still had the hero in your heart.”
He reached across the table and grabbed her hand. “You saved my life, Chloe. Both the myth and the man.”
She smiled at him again and was silent for a moment before clearing her throat. “So, what’s next? Are you going to start patrolling again or ease your way back into it?”
“I want to get right back into it”, he told her. “Which is the main point of my coming here. I dropped by Watchtower to pick up my gear and talk to you, but it was empty and I couldn’t find it anywhere.”
“That’s actually my fault”, she said, putting the chess piece in her pocket as she got up and tossed the Styrofoam cup in the trash. “I locked it up at Watchtower for safekeeping.”
They were silent on the short walk back until they reached the building. “You don’t have to start right away if you don’t want to”, she told him as the elevator doors closed. “I don’t want you to push yourself too hard.”
“Trust me, I’ve had enough of a vacation. It’s time to get back to work.”
She opened the double doors, almost expecting to see the entire team back in front of her, but it was empty like it always was.
“Chloe?” He prompted. “You okay?”
She looked back at him. “Yeah”, she said softly. “I’m fine.” She refocused on a part of the wall, pushing the side of it until a keypad was revealed.
“There you go.”
“What’s the password?” He asked
“It’s Laura.”
There was a silence between the two of them for a moment and Chloe started to feel very nervous and stupid for using his dead mother’s name for a passcode. She customized it so that it would be five digits instead of four or six.
He spun around and pulled her close to him in a warm hug. The hand holding and this hug- it was the first time in a long time that she had let anybody close enough to physically touch her. She didn’t want their pity, but that didn’t seem to be what Oliver was doing.
He wasn’t apologizing for not being there before and he wasn’t holding her to comfort her. He was thankful for what she did, he forgave her for destroying everything.
Her eyes welled up with tears and even though she tried to pull away from Oliver, he grabbed her closer.
“You really never gave up on me, did you?” She heard him ask
She understood what he meant in between the lines- like the others did.
“This is where I belong”, she said to him, pressing the remote and opening up the control center of the Isis Foundation.
Last year on her birthday, he was there for her to hear her when everybody else was busy, even if it was only for a couple of minutes. And even though this year it was his birthday, he was still here to understand the unspoken words
“No”, she whispered, only pulling back when she was sure that the tears wouldn’t spill down. “And I never will.”