Through the Looking Glass, part 2
Through the Looking Glass, part 2
Here is part two of my recent fic.
Rated NC-17. Supergirl (CW)/Arrow (CW), Kara Danvers/Oliver Queen.
Author’s comment: I always thought it was a bit unfortunate that Oliver didn’t get to do more outside of his heroic persona -other superheroes manage to have careers so why not him? (And yes I realize that unlike some other superheroes Oliver is an unaugmented human, but still.)
In the show, Oliver only took over as CEO of Queen Industries for a brief period in season 2. However, I’m giving that part of the story a bit of a makeover. LOL.
Also, full disclosure: when I first started writing this I goofed on when the CEO thing happened in that I thought it was season 1 but it was season 2 (and for some reason I forgot to look it up). Then, once I realized I have made a mistake and thought about changing it I also realized I preferred things that way and decided not to change them.
Italics indicate characters’ thoughts.
Oliver Queen glanced up at the wooden placard announcing 'Mom & Pop's Deli', uncertain what his reception would be.
Two weeks ago he had witnessed one of Queen Industries' employees (he had only been in charge of the company for a few weeks, so he admitted that he didn't always tend to think of these people as 'his' employees) accuse her direct superior of sexual harassment and abuse.
He had charged Felicity Smoak, who was one of the very few people he trusted, to look not just into Ms. Danvers' allegations but also into the entirety of the HR department’s activities. A quick (and, as Felicity admitted, probably illegal) hack of their personal email accounts had revealed that the three managers of the department liked to boast of their 'conquests' and, based on the language used, it was likely that several of these encounters were not consensual. Based on what she had found, it seemed that QI's Human Resources was run by individuals who were both incompetent and abusive towards their employees.
He had spoken with the men in question himself but had not been not surprised when his efforts hadn’t turned up anything. Knowing that any further attempts he made would most assuredly be noted and relayed to those he was trying to investigate (there was a definite downside to being a media celebrity, and all in all he could have happily forgone the experience). Aside from digging into HR's emails and computer files, he had also asked Felicity to try to approach some of the identified victims as well as other employees who might have had similar experiences (and who could have responded more favorably to a woman, given their experiences). The few responses she had gotten thus far, despite her avowal of being much less comfortable with this aspect of the investigation, had certainly been illuminating. The combined evidence had been sufficient to justify the firing of certain individuals, yet the investigation was still ongoing.
He had made several attempts to get in touch with Ms. Danvers, yet his repeated telephone messages were never returned. Given what had happened to her, he had hesitated to visit her at home. Felicity had however discovered that she had found a new job, which was why he now stood in front of a restaurant that appeared to have seen better days a few centuries ago. (In a perhaps vain attempt to have his attempt to contact her appear less frightening, he had come alone.) Sighing, he stepped inside.
The decor was an unfortunate combination of an attempt at 1950s diner booths mixed in with a few mismatched tables and chairs, several of which appeared to have various dried food items such as gum and ketchup stuck to them. The walls seemed to have been white in a previous life but were now mostly yellow, probably from years of cigarette smoke which had never been cleaned or repainted and despite a citywide ordinance banning smoking in public venues having been passed eons ago.
He looked around the place, trying to spot Ms. Danvers, when a harried looking waitress came up to seat him. When he refused and asked her whether he could speak with Kara Danvers, she gave him a curious look before directing him to the back of the establishment.
She looks unhappy, he thought as he finally caught sight of her.
And she did: he waited as he overheard her being dressed down by a woman, probably a manager, who appeared to be ranting at her for something. Which, given the state this place was in, most likely wasn't her fault.
Well, not unless she cooks the food, and honestly even then it really is the management who should take responsibility for the problems with this place. I know I wouldn't eat here if I could avoid it...
She stood there rather stoically until the woman was finished, then turned around and pasted a smile on her face and walked towards him.
He held up a hand as she approached him. “I'm actually just here to see you, Ms. Danvers.”
She gave him a puzzled look. “Me? Um, I don't think we know each other,” she replied quietly, casting a furtive look in the direction of the recently departed manager. “Look, I'm not really supposed to just stand here and talk -”
“I know,” he replied, cutting her off, “but this is important. Is there somewhere where we could speak in private?”
She seemed to think about it for a moment, then nodded. “All right. Why don't you meet me outside? I'll just take my break now.”
She turned away as he nodded his thanks and heard her mutter, “This'd really better be good, because she's not going to like this...”
He stepped out of the restaurant to wait for her. After two to three minutes, she joined him outside and stood, gazing at him expectantly.
“What is it?” She asked.
“I've actually been trying to contact you for two weeks...” He paused, considering how to explain.
“I'm Oliver Queen and I’m currently running my family’s company. I understand that you recently left-,” he stated, and watched as she immediately began to shake her head.
“I don't think there's any point in talking about it. I mean, your HR didn't care.” She said, the suspicion evident on her face.
He held up his hands, hoping she would listen to him. “Look, I promise I'm not here to defend what Williams did. What I wanted to tell you was that I actually overheard what you said to him and Hoskins before you left the company. I also wanted to tell you that a few people have already been fired...” He trailed off, looking at his watch, “as of three hours ago. That includes both Williams and Hoskins.”
She looked at him with mistrust, appearing to find him wanting. Which, honestly, wasn't something he was used to and was pretty unsettling.
After a brief silence, she spoke.
“I tried going to the media, you know. No one was interested. It wasn't said to me in so many words, but I was made to understand that no one wanted to take your family on, especially since you also seem to own a good part of the media in this town. The only people who were actually willing to publish anything about it were pretty far out of the mainstream. I mean, it got published, but only in a few rags no one will ever read.”
She paused, then continued, “So you tell me. Exactly why should I believe you or give you the time of day?”
He sighed. She was entirely right. He certainly hadn’t paid attention when his parents had run the company but Walter Steele, who had taken over afterwards, had been a very careful, conscientious, and *ethical* individual. He had also been very knowledgeable and had become a mentor when Oliver had taken over as CEO. Oliver had discussed the issue with him and had witnessed the man’s shock at the revelations regarding the company. The question of how this had occurred was therefore one they deeply wanted to answer.
The only explanation which Oliver had been able to come up with was that no one seemed to have dared to bring the problem to them, which was deeply troubling.
He was under no illusions where his family’s ruthlessness in business matters was concerned (Walter had been a notable exception in that regard). It wasn’t something he agreed with at all, quite honestly, but he could well imagine that they wouldn’t have wanted the media they owned to provide negative coverage of their bread and butter. Despite this however, to the best of his knowledge, neither his parents nor Walter had ever tried to steer editorial policy in the way other media owners and conglomerates were wont to do in this country. However, given how wrong he had been about other things of late, it was certainly possible that he was wrong about that as well and there might be yet another aspect of the huge monster that was Queen Industries that he would have to take on.
She wouldn't believe him if he tried to tell her he wasn't responsible for that though, and he honestly couldn't blame her.
“Ms. Danvers, I came because I wanted to say that I’m sorry.” He paused and took a deep breath before continuing, considering his words, because he really hoped she would let him try to make this right.
“I also wanted to offer you a job.”
“What?” He could tell from her expression that she was one second away from walking away and slamming the dingy restaurant’s door in his face.
“What happened to you was unacceptable. I've ordered an investigation into Human Resources and several other departments. I want to see to it that this kind of thing never happens again, and I thought you might be able to help me with that.”
“Help how?” She was still suspicious.
He looked her straight in the eye. “I'm going to be completely honest here. I only took over at Queen Industries a few weeks ago...” Based on her expression he surmised that this was news to her, which was surprising.
“What happened to you has made me understand that there is a lot that needs fixing in my family's company, both in terms of personnel and policy. I also honestly don't entirely know who I can trust to help me do that, but I figure that I could trust you to want to fix things as much as I do.”
“Would you by any chance want to do that?” He truly hoped that she would say yes.
She pursed her lips and thought about it for a few moments. Finally, she seemed to come to a decision. “If I agree, what exactly are you proposing? And how do I know it's not just a way to shut me up?”
He smiled, relieved that she seemed to at least be willing to consider his offer. “Well, the way I see it, the only way to go would be to make you my personal assistant. That would give you the power to help me overhaul things, because any orders you gave would be seen to come from me.”
She didn’t trust him: that was obvious. Despite that however, fifteen minutes later she had agreed to a contract of a month. She had been surprised when, upon mentioning the fact that she had resorted to posting her story online, he simply shrugged and stated that he personally believed her and that anything that was true (and which didn’t violate company rules on confidentiality, copyrights and so on) was her story to tell.
The contract he had agreed to have drawn up for her included a guarantee, in writing, that she could still pursue the topic of her harassment in any way she subsequently chose to. After a month, the contract would have a renewal option in the event she didn't find him to be too much of an asshat.
All right, so that's my way of putting it. She was a lot more polite. But firm.
He walked away smiling.
Quentin Lance walked into the Star City police department a few mornings later while nursing a splitting headache.
Laurel is probably right when she says that this job has a really bad effect on my blood pressure, he thought to himself. He’d certainly worked through a lot of double shifts of late.
Back to business, he thought tiredly, walking into his lieutenant's office.
“Any news?” the man said, looking up from the report he was reading. Lieutenant Espinoza was a middle-aged black man with graying brown hair and steely eyes, who had paid his dues as a police officer and detective in another city prior to transferring to Star City. Quentin respected him deeply, as did the other men and women of the precinct: the lieutenant had gone to bat many times both to protect his people and in order to do the right thing, even when it wasn't the popular thing to do.
“Nope. I asked around, talked to his friends, neighbors, everyone who knew him. No one saw a thing.”
“So it's just like the others, then.” Espinoza replied.
Lance nodded. “Yeah. So that makes twenty-three disappearances in the past six months. Most of which we haven't been able to make any progress with, much less solve. And I don't know about you, but it feels to me like there's some kind of connection between at least some of these. Otherwise, how do we explain the numbers? I know it's mostly been transients that have disappeared, but that many people don't generally commit suicide or have accidents or decide to leave all at once, no matter what 'alternative explanations' are helping the politicians sleep at night.”
Espinoza nodded. “Agreed. None of it makes sense to me either. Here's the latest on the Grimes case, by the way.” He handed Lance the file he had been reading.
The file in question detailed the investigation into the disappearance of one Shelley Grimes, a local homeless woman who had to all appearances vanished from the streets of Star City a few months earlier. Shelley had actually been quite well known among Star City's downtrodden both for her wild conspiracy theories about governmental spying and for her the help she attempted to provide to those living on the streets of Star City, despite her own situation. What was unusual in her case was the fact that there were witnesses, as most of the recent cases had involved people seemingly vanishing into thin air. A few individuals had overheard her arguing with a ‘well dressed’ man shortly before her disappearance (from what Lance had gathered, around The Glades, that simply implied 'not homeless').
As it turned out, a few cameras had also caught an image or two of the man, enough so that they were able to obtain footage which they had first had enhanced prior to running facial recognition software. (Lance, after reading up on the technique, still had his doubts about its efficacy, but they’d had to try something.) They had eventually released the image to the media.
Which led to exactly nothing. Zip. Nada. It was truly frustrating.
“So we have nothing so far.” He said aloud as he placed the file back on his superior’s desk.
Espinoza nodded. “The brass has been up my ass about the time we've already spent on these.”
He sighed. “You're a good detective, Lance, and I trust your instincts. I agree with you: something is going on here and we need to find out what it is. I'll talk them down somehow. Just make sure you dot all your Is and cross all your Ts because they're not really happy with me right now because of this.”
He gave Lance a firm look. “You find whoever is doing this.”
Lance nodded and walked back out of the office to get to work.
Six months after Oliver made his dramatic job offer, Kara's life had changed rather drastically. As for her new job, it had turned out to be both much more rewarding and frustrating than she could have anticipated.
Oliver had certainly NEEDED an assistant, as she had realized upon glancing at the tangled state of his office files. Why he hadn't hired someone before was something she couldn't understand, though she could concede that he hadn't been at the head of his family's company until quite recently. She also quickly came to realize that a certain level of chaos had ensued when employees who had tried to contact him had frequently found themselves unable to reach him. It had also been an eye-opening experience to discover just how much power the Queens wielded in this town: as the Big Boss’ personal assistant she had found that his name opened more doors than she had even conceived of.
One aspect of her job which had been particularly rewarding had occurred when she had contacted (and in some cases befriended) the many people who had been wronged by Ben Williams and his ‘friends’. Her report on that situation had resulted in the last of his cronies being fired, which she attributed largely to conditions being put in place such that people finally felt secure enough to come forward. That part of her job had also resulted in an unexpected bonus when she met Felicity Smoak.
As it turned out, she and Felicity had a lot in common. While Kara readily admitted that she wasn’t an MIT graduate and that Felicity was a much more accomplished nerd than she was, they had a very similar sense of humor. Both appreciated the occasional practical joke as well as most types of comedy (including the occasional potty humor flick, truth be told). Felicity also *understood* what Kara had gone through -she had competed and frequently outperformed male students and even some professors during her time at M.I.T., where she had even been stalked. Two weeks into her time at Queen Industries Kara had invited Felicity over for a girls’ movie night and the two had been fast friends ever since.
She had also gotten to know Oliver’s bodyguard and friend, John Diggle, who had been much friendlier and more approachable than Oliver himself. She had quickly found that the fastest way of determining whether Oliver would be reachable in the near future was to call Diggle, who could always be counted on to give her an honest answer. It was also refreshing that, while Diggle seemed to like and respect Oliver, he was also the kind of person who would not hesitate to inform his employer when he was being an idiot.
She had learned a lot about running a business and, by dint of hard work, had managed to do some good things for the company. Most of the time, Kara liked her job and found it fulfilling.
Most of the time.
One problem, as it turned out, was her boss. It went without saying that he was a definite improvement over ‘Ben’ and several other bosses she had had. On the other hand, if she were to be honest, Kara would have had to admit that she truly didn’t know what to make of him.
Kara’s first problem with Oliver Queen was his occasional foray into, as she had come to call it, ‘idiot asshole’ territory. Most of the time he worked very hard (when he wasn’t disappearing to somewhere mysterious and incommunicado). He also definitely wasn’t an idiot. As his personal assistant she knew for a fact that he had made several changes to the company which had given a serious boost to its revenue stream. He had been behind the company’s efforts to branch out into some new sectors in order to both diversify and offset the decreased revenue from some of Queen Industries’ more traditional revenue sources. (She had first discovered this when listening to the company’s accountants make the final touches to their latest quarterly report and, notwithstanding their desire to please their employer, their report had been glowing.)
Queen Industries had actually begun many years ago in shipping, but now touched on a truly huge number of areas including pharmaceuticals (which included an R&D division), various products including processed foodstuffs which could be found in grocery shelves around the nation, and a new line of environmentally friendly products for home and garden (the latter actually a new creation courtesy of Oliver). Among the changes to the company, Oliver had opted to make serious improvements to its ethics, notably by making it greener and by halting production of items which were damaging to the environment. He had also terminated several ventures which had not proven profitable and managed to refocus QI’s efforts on what was working. He had accomplished this while going out of his way to avoid firing people: most such modifications led to people being assigned to new departments which suited their particular skill sets, while those few who were incapable of accepting and working with the changes were given generous severance packages and/or pensions.
So he definitely wasn’t an asshole, either.
Which was why she couldn’t understand why he invariably turned into both a complete idiot and an asshole whenever even a single camera was present.
The last incident had been involved a reporter who had asked to interview him regarding the changes he had made to the company: not only had he shown up late, but late AND apparently drunk. He had stumbled into the furniture and talked loudly and nonsensically about football, refusing to answer the reporter’s questions. However, when the woman had finally left in a disappointed huff he had immediately returned to his usual serious (and not drunk) self and had immediately gotten back to work. What was more, if he had had even one drink, Kara would have known (she did have super senses after all), and he hadn’t. She was truly at a loss to explain why he felt it was necessary to pretend to be something he wasn’t, especially when that something wasn’t exactly flattering.
The second problem Kara had with Oliver was his absenteeism. Despite his apparent work ethic, there had been several instances where a major situation had arisen at the company and Oliver’s input had been rather desperately required, yet he had been unavailable. And unreachable. Incommunicado.
Kara had tried to raise the topic with him, only to be told very politely but firmly that sometimes he wouldn’t be available and that she was paid to deal with it. From what she had discovered, he seemed to have a serious objection to normal avenues of communication (such as the phone) when away from the office. Unfortunately for her and the rest of the company, his absences took place with considerably more frequency than she would have first thought. As for what he did whenever he disappeared, it was both a complete mystery to her and apparently NONE OF HER BUSINESS.
She had to admit that she had felt that last part was a bit unfair. The truth was that she simply hadn’t had the knowledge or the experience to deal with all of the ramifications of the situations which could arise at such a huge company. It had also been rather unexpected, mostly because he hadn’t even hinted at this being a part of her job when he offered to hire her. It was certainly possible that he simply hadn’t realized the position he was putting her in, since this seemed to all be rather new to him as well. The truth however was that she would have had difficulty figuring things out even if it had been a small company. Queen Industries most assuredly wasn’t that -the behemoth was firmly ensconced among the Fortune 500, as it turned out. And while she did feel honored that he trusted her enough to figure everything out, she honestly thought that he needed to learn to trust others more.
Somehow, by burying herself in the work, Kara had managed to avoid making truly huge mistakes. One thing she had decided on from the beginning was that even if Oliver had a hard time trusting people, she wasn’t going to let that affect her where business was concerned. In other words, one of her best weapons had been carefully delegating various tasks to the most qualified people she could find. She had also decided early on that if he left her in the lurch and stated that he wanted her to handle things, he couldn’t very well complain about her decisions afterwards.
From her first days in her new job Kara had realized that she couldn’t handle everything without involving other people. She knew that she just didn’t have the knowledge and skills required: she wasn’t an accountant, so she’d had to call on the company’s accountants when the banks came calling about various details pertaining to the company’s finances. She also didn’t know anything about pharmaceuticals, so she’d had to call on the firm’s pharmaceutical R&D people to help when issues arose involving unexpected side effects resulting from the use of one of Queen Industries’ latest creations. After much consideration and tortuous deliberation with the various people involved, that situation had required her to pull the drug from the market. This had made several people in the pharmaceutical department very unhappy with her. She had however decided that she was damned if she was going to let a potentially hazardous product be on the market while she had anything to say about it -and even the experts hadn’t been able to provide any good arguments in the face of the side effects data. That particular snafu had resulted in quite a bit of insomnia on her part, which had actually turned out to be somewhat useful when her midnight reading had resulted in her being able to cite the precautionary principle as a reason for her decision. Despite this, the worry and anxiety involved in facing down the irate managers of the pharmaceutical division had stayed with her for some time. She also wasn’t an expert in the physics or the mechanics of commercial renewable energy sources, so she’d had to call in various experts when issues arose surrounding Queen Industries’ solar panels. These were meant to be a more affordable alternative to what was already on the market, but problems had arisen when she read the accounting department’s report on the panels, which had stated that ‘soft’ costs were on track to be essentially the same as the rest of the market despite hefty government subsidies specifically earmarked to offset those costs. She had opted to sicc the company’s accountants on the entire department involved in the panels’ production, in order to figure out where the money was going and to ensure everything was aboveboard.
Therefore, her role at the company and Oliver’s frequent absences had resulted in a great deal of anxiety as she had found herself responsible for things she hadn’t been prepared for or knowledgeable about. It was also true that some of her decisions had made her some enemies. On the other hand, while that fact had definitely kept her up at night a time or two, she had also come to realize that most of Queen Industries’ people seemed to value her hard work as well as her honesty and ethics.
This had been amply demonstrated in several meetings where several individuals from various areas of the company had defended her handling of the various situations and crises which had arisen: for example, several of the accountants had sent written memos to Oliver praising her efforts at increased financial transparency. This had prompted Oliver not only to congratulate her on her efforts but also to modify the company’s financial policies, particularly where use of public monies were concerned. In general, it also hadn’t hurt that Oliver had backed up every one of her more controversial decisions, once he deigned to make himself available again. So all in all, Kara had begun to prove that she could handle the job and that she just might even have a bit of talent for business, thank you very much.
Therefore despite the difficulties, her job was something she had unexpectedly come to enjoy. In fact, all in all life was now pretty good (or at least much better than it had been) for Kara.
Still, aside from her boss’ somewhat eccentric nature, there were definitely still some personal issues she struggled with. In particular, she had been extremely leery of using her powers and hadn’t since her arrival. She still had no idea how she had ended up in Star City or whether she would ever be able to go back home.
And she missed her foster family.
I wonder what Alex would say about this place, she thought to herself one day as she walked to work. It was a beautiful spring day and throughout the city both trees and flowers were beginning to come alive. As she stepped into the Queen Industries building lobby, Kara felt energized and ready to get to work.
Unfortunately, that feeling lasted until she arrived at her office on the forty-third floor, where she was greeted by the usual chaos. Chaos which she was expected to deal with, as she had somehow (and unexpectedly) become not only a personal assistant but also effectively co-CEO of Queen Industries.
Of course, there’s still plenty of time for me to screw up in a truly spectacular way, she thought to herself as she walked into a situation. She figured she’d begin by trying to get the two angry men before her to lower the volume of their argument.
“Miss Danvers!”
“Yes, that’s me,” she replied. “What… seems to be the problem?”
One of them, a pale looking young man who didn’t seem to have ever been exposed to much sun, replied, “Well… I was hoping to get Mr. Queen’s approval…”
Kara’s office served the combined function of office and bulwark, in that it was necessary to walk through her office in order to get to Oliver’s. Judging from the closed door and the lack of light visible beneath his door, Kara knew that Oliver wasn’t in his office. Which meant a discussion with him wasn’t going to happen.
On the other hand, if there was one thing Kara had learned the hard way, it was that not every problem was a problem for Oliver to deal with. Or for her to deal with, for that matter. “I’m afraid he isn’t here.”
The young man before her began to wring his hands in obvious worry. “It’s just that I’ve stayed up all night to deal with this report for the regulatory department. I wouldn’t have bothered him with this but he did tell us that we could come to him if we were having trouble…”
The second man interrupted him brusquely, “I *told* Karl it wasn’t necessary. I also told him that he should go to HR if he had a complaint, and not bother Mister Queen.”
Kara carefully nodded. If there was one area where Oliver agreed that he should have been clearer both when he first took over as CEO and afterwards, it was in communicating and clarifying his readiness to listen and deal with his people’s problems. Given what had happened to her and to other employees, he had wanted people to be able to come to him when needed (definitely important, as evidenced by what had happened to her in her previous position). However, he had failed to appreciate the fact that proper channels were also important since a CEO was literally only one person (of course, one had to ensure those channels were adequate, which had been a big part of the problem in her case).
Taking Karl aside, she promised his argumentative friend she would deal with the situation. Waiting until the second man had left, she encouraged Karl to have a seat. “I need to ask this, because it’s important for the company. Is there a reason you didn’t feel comfortable taking this to HR? That isn’t a criticism of you.” Kara said carefully.
“It’s all right. I know you have to ask.” Karl nodded, evidently feeling better now that someone was listening to him. “I just know that they don’t usually do anything about this. I mean, I tried discussing the fact that I was having a hard time with them a few months ago but they just wouldn’t listen.”
Kara nodded and decided to deal with the situation directly. “Why don’t we go there now and talk to them together.” She said. He nodded and together they left her office.
By the end of the day, Kara had dealt with three different departmental deadlines (she had to make sure all departments were taking the proper steps to comply with the applicable federal, state, and municipal laws and regulations, which required her to be present at various meetings preparing quarterly reviews for several departments), two regulatory requests for documentation (wherein she had to ensure that each request was forwarded to the correct individual(s) in the company, as well as make sure that it was dealt with in a timely manner), as well as young Karl’s distress and her employer’s being a no show for that day.
She had taken Karl over to HR and had ensured that the proper action would be taken to deal with his concerns: a supervised meeting was organized with Karl’s superior under the auspices of HR. As he had also reported feeling both tired and overworked, he was encouraged to visit his doctor and consider a leave of absence if required, to be paid for by Queen Industries’ generous medical coverage for its employees.
Therefore, as she walked back to her office at the end of a very long yet productive day, she could have been forgiven for feeling both exhausted and a little smug.
Upon reaching her office, however, her acute hearing caught a muffled sound coming from beyond the closed door to Oliver’s office. She paused, wondering what might be going on, then walked over and opened the door.
She gasped in shock at the sight that met her eyes: Oliver was lying on the floor of his office, apparently unconscious and with a bloody head wound. Running into the office and putting out a hand to touch him, thinking to try to take his pulse (or something), she was somewhat startled when he moaned and seemed to come slightly awake.
“Oliver!” She yelled as she knelt down next to him, looking around to try to find something that might work as a bandage to staunch the bleeding. She turned her attention back to him as he grabbed her hand. His eyes were now open.
“…Sorry. I didn’t manage to get…” He began, when Kara interrupted him.
“Don’t try to talk. I’m calling an ambulance.”
Oliver shook his head. “No ambulance. Call… Call John, or Felicity.”
“What?” Kara asked, not believing what she was hearing.
He gave her a firm yet imploring look. “PLEASE. Just do it.”
Shaking her head in disbelief, Kara nonetheless took out her phone to do what he asked. After a wait which lasted only a few minutes but felt considerably longer, both Diggle and Felicity burst into the room.
Diggle was shaking his head.
“I swear, I leave you alone for one hour…” He said as he sat on the floor next to Oliver, “You need a doctor, genius. Who did this to you, anyways?”
Oliver shook his head, and Kara noticed his purposeful glance towards her own self before he spoke, “Let’s deal with that later, okay?”
He and Diggle argued back and forth for a time, before Oliver finally and reluctantly agreed to go to a discreet private clinic. (The clinic in question were known to take care of celebrities while remaining mum over who and what and where and when.) He did however insist on walking out of the building without assistance, after having made a brief attempt at cleaning up his appearance (though he was still clad not in his usual business suit, but in some kind of ragged dark pants and t-shirt combo). Oliver and Diggle insisted that the situation was well in hand and Felicity therefore opted to leave, but Kara insisted on going with him and Diggle when they drove to the clinic, wanting to ensure he made it there in one piece.
One doctor’s consultation and a CT scan later, Oliver was diagnosed with a concussion and a scalp laceration, which was sown up by the tight-lipped doctor. After paying what Kara felt was an obscene amount of money which didn’t even seem to faze Oliver, they were once again on their way.
Once Oliver had painstakingly climbed into his car and Diggle offered to drive her home, she shook her head. “Look, no offense, but I just found my boss lying in a pool of blood. I have no idea how that happened, but I think that if I’m going to continue doing the work I’ve been doing for him, I have a right to know whether he’ll be around for me to do it. So I’m going to drive him home and we’re going to talk -assuming he’s able to. But if he can’t, then I’ll sit on him until he does. Okay?”
Diggle threw up his hands. “Okay. Whatever.” He said, shrugging, as he climbed into the backseat next to Oliver.
Kara rolled her eyes. “Don’t think I don’t know that you know just what he’s been up to, Mr. John Diggle…” She muttered to herself as she took the driver’s seat and sent the car to join the local traffic.
The only people Oliver Queen seemed to confide in were Felicity Smoak and John Diggle: they were always around when he was and tended to be unavailable when he wasn’t. She could also state with confidence that, during her interactions with them all, they had been the only people towards whom he had ever indicated trust.
However, while he might not trust her in the same way he trusted them, the fact was that she and Oliver needed to come to some kind of understanding.
She drove the car to the Queen mansion, where Diggle indicated that a staff member would take it to the mansion’s garage. (Or was that garages plural? She had no idea.) Between the two of them they watched as Oliver made his way through the mansion and away from his staff. They accompanied him as he climbed the stairs to his suite.
Once there, Oliver placed a hand against the wall, apparently to hold himself up.
“Look, Kara…” He began, but Kara cut him off.
“Nope. Not this time, mister.”
“I’m going to make sure you’re all right. I’m also not going to leave until we talk about some things. Now is probably not the best time for that, but I just KNOW that if I leave you alone you’ll disappear on me again and it just won’t happen, so I’m going to wait. Right here.” She stated in a firm tone.
Oliver’s response was a simple shrug. His lack of response only served to further emphasize just how much he needed the rest.
She watched as Diggle grasped his arm and, despite his protests, helped him inside and onto his bed. After removing his shoes, Kara turned to ask him if he needed anything else, when he took her hand.
“I thought you were going to stay here.” He said teasingly. She rolled her eyes.
“All right, I didn’t mean right here, Romeo. I figured I’d find some room somewhere and crash…” Her words trailed off as she realized that he had fallen asleep while holding her hand. When she tried to pull her hand away, his hand only tightened around hers.
Diggle threw her an amused look. “How about I get you a chair? One of us should probably keep an eye on him. If you want, you can wake me up later and I’ll spell you.”
Rolling her eyes, Kara opted not to share the many sarcastic responses she could have provided and remained silent as he brought her the promised chair. Then she sat quietly as Diggle left, eventually managing to reclaim her hand from Oliver’s grasp.
Night fell outside the room. There seemed to be lights somewhere on the grounds outside, but they didn’t really penetrate into the room, despite the open window and the gentle breeze that tried to drive away the slight touch of spring humidity.
Kara sat quietly and watched both Oliver and the room for some time as darkness and quiet gathered. Eventually, she heard him move, and he awoke.
“You’re still here?” He asked softly, sighting her through the gloom of the surrounding night.
“Yeah I am. I did have my own reasons for staying, but we can talk about it later.” She whispered back. “John thought we should keep an eye on you, he’ll be by later.”
Oliver nodded and sat up. Kara quickly moved forward, thinking to keep him from moving or, if he had to get up for other reasons, ensure that he didn’t trip on his way to the bathroom and kill himself.
He held up a hand, smiling, “Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.” He paused, “You know, I’ve been thinking. I’ve come to realize that I should… apologize for leaving you in the lurch so often with the company. I’m sorry I implied you had to deal with that -John pointed out the other day that that wasn’t really fair of me, and he’s right.”
He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I just have trouble trusting people, and you’re actually one of the few people I do trust. That’s why I left it up to you, but I realize now that what I did to you wasn’t entirely fair.”
Kara shrugged, then spoke, “Yeah, I’ll admit it was hard. I figured it out though. And it’s not like you weren’t a decent CEO and boss when you were around. But… maybe we can talk about why you keep disappearing on me sometime, or we could at least plan for what to do when that happens. You know, *together*. So I have a little more direction.” As she spoke, she moved to sit next to him on the bed.
Oliver nodded, “All right. That’s fair. I can do that.” He smiled and took her hand.
Then he kissed her, and Kara froze in shock.
She had honestly not even let herself consider the idea of something like this -particularly since he was her boss. Then she found herself kissing him back.
She knew this was a terrible idea, yet somehow… Somehow she couldn’t pull away. Somehow, the fact that was foremost in her mind was that she found him much too interesting and attractive for her peace of mind.
…Because there’s a lot I still don’t know about him, she reminded herself firmly as their kiss ended.
Pulling back, he leaned his forehead against hers as he spoke. “I should apologize for that too, I suppose. I’ll admit I don’t want to.”
Kara smiled and he winced. “I’ll admit I’m not thinking straight right now. God, given what’s happened to you recently, I just wouldn’t want you to think that I was implying…”
She burst out laughing at that and smacked his arm. “For the record, I know you’re no Mr. Benjamin Williams. Something’s going on with you, I think, and it’s something you don’t want to or can’t tell me about, but you’re a good man. For one thing, no one could care about their employees the way you do and be totally evil.”
She was still smiling as he turned away from her. Kara took note of his expression, which was somehow full of an immense sadness. He shook his head while visibly closing himself off from her.
“Don’t believe everything you hear.”
Her eyes snapped wide with shock at his statement. As he moved to turn away from her, she placed a hand on his arm.
“I think you just might be better than you think,” she said as she placed a hand on his face.
He didn’t respond and she sighed, realizing she had all the answers she was going to get for now. Standing, she left to get Diggle, leaving him to his demons.
A few days later, it was as if nothing had happened between them. Everything was business as usual, which was fine with Oliver. Kara, on the other hand, looked about ready to scream.
It’s for the best, Oliver reminded himself firmly as the day progressed.
The facts, unfortunately, hadn’t changed. There was too much going on in his life -things that were just too heavy to ask someone to share with him. He didn’t even know if he’d ever be ‘normal’ enough for that to be a possibility, and Kara deserved better. Better than him.
There’s also the fact that we work together and that I’m her boss, he thought again, before putting such thoughts firmly to the side to focus on business.
As he had promised, he had taken steps to set up a plan of action for the company, in preparation for the frequent instances where he wouldn’t be there in person. This had involved enlarging the strategic planning that he had already set up for the company, so as to include contingencies for extended periods of time when he was unavailable. While the person who would carry out the largest portion of those plans and contingencies was Kara, they had also involved many other people in the organization and documents had had to be drawn up. In the end though, he had provided everyone with clear directions on what actions to carry out in his absence.
He could admit that this was something he should have thought of before, rather than leave Kara and the rest of the company in the lurch. The only defense he could offer was that he was still new at this and that it truly hadn’t occurred to him.
(He also had to admit that one of the rare instances in which he was happy to use the power that came with his last name and position had been when it came to impressing on everyone, aside from Kara, that he simply wasn’t going to discuss the *why* of his absences.)
Oliver concluded his daily schedule of meetings, reviews, and dealing with other minutiae of running one of the country’s largest corporations. Shutting down his laptop, he got ready to leave the office. As he stepped outside into Kara’s office however, he noted that she was sitting at her desk and seemed to be waiting for him. That impression was confirmed when she shut down whatever she had been working on and stood.
“Is everything all right?” He asked.
She nodded, “Fine. Everything’s fine. I did want to talk to you, though.”
He sighed. Then, figuring he couldn’t avoid speaking with her (he had managed to it so far, but he figured his lucky streak had to end sometime), he set aside his briefcase and sat in one of the chairs in front of her desk. “Okay. What’s going on?”
Kara shrugged, “Look, I don’t… I don’t want to intrude. You’ve obviously got things you want to keep to yourself and that’s certainly your prerogative. But I…” She paused, gesturing with her hands, “I’m just worried about you.”
He cut her off, “I’m fine.”
“Are you?”
“Yes. Is that all you wanted to ask me?”
“No!” She shouted the last in her frustration, then obviously tried to dial it back, taking a moment to calm herself.
She sighed, “What I’m trying to say is that you were injured the other day. Someone did that to you. You don’t want to talk about it. That’s okay, I can accept that. I guess I’m just worried…”
“About what?”
“Honestly, I’m wondering whether something could happen to you. Like I said, you don’t want to talk about it, but the fact is that whatever you’re doing affects me too. Actually, it affects everyone here. You’ve taken steps to spell out what should happen when you’re not available, but what if it’s more than that? What happens to all of us if someday you don’t come back?”
Oliver sat back, somewhat at a loss for words. Eventually, he shrugged and replied, “I hadn’t thought about that either, but it’s a good point. I do need to make plans for my death, because it could happen.” He spoke calmly, quietly.
Kara shook her head, obviously in shock. “I can’t believe you’re just that calm about dying.”
He smiled, “It happens to everyone, you know. Between you and me, yes, it could happen a little sooner in my case, but you’re right. I’ll make arrangements.”
Somehow, that statement really seemed to bother her. That wasn’t his problem though.
Standing, he picked up his briefcase and turned to leave.
Kara moved to intercept him, “There’s just one last thing,” she said.
“What is it?” He said. She didn’t immediately reply. She seemed nervous, somehow.
Somehow, without meaning to, he noticed again just how lovely she was. Putting that thought firmly aside, he brought his mind back to business. When she didn’t speak, he again moved to leave.
“Would you like to go out sometime? On a date, I mean?” She blurted out.
All right, he really hadn’t been expecting that one. He turned back to her. “Did you just ask me out?”
She smiled, “Who says only guys can ask? You don’t have to say yes, by the way. I just thought… Well, you know…” She cut herself off, looking a bit flustered.
“Okay.” He heard himself say.
Okay? What the hell happened to this being a bad idea, Oliver? He asked himself.
He realized what the answer to that question was though, when she smiled at him again.
Somehow, that smile at that moment looked to him like a sliver of light, illuminating his own personal darkness. Somehow, that sweet smile meant that his life was just a little less bleak and so, despite this whole thing being a terrible idea, he just couldn’t stay away.
“Okay then.” She said to him as he nodded and he quickly excused himself and left her office.
Kara wasn’t quite sure why she had done it or even whether it was a good idea, but she had taken the huge step of asking Oliver on a date.
To begin with, he had baggage. She had no idea whether he was ready for a relationship. Of course a date wasn’t a marriage proposal, but it certainly did have the potential to complicate things for both of them.
Yet for some reason she didn’t entirely yet understand, she had wanted to do it. She didn’t want to examine that too closely, partly because that would have involved considering what she was doing. All she knew, all she was letting herself think about at this point, was that she liked him and that she was attracted to him. And that despite the potential for this to complicate both their lives, she couldn’t stay away.
As it happened, their single date took place a few days after she had asked him out and nothing happened the way she had thought it would.
Oliver picked her up in a chauffeured car, sans bodyguard: while Kara had initially suggested that they keep things simple and just meet somewhere he had wanted to go all out and surprise her. In the end he had taken her to a little Italian restaurant in a relatively modest part of the city, overlooking the river.
They had spent a very pleasant time at dinner, their discussion having little to do with work. Oliver told her a bit about his childhood, including many pranks played both with and on his sister. He told her about his best friend, Tommy Merlyn, and how much he regretted that they weren’t close anymore. Kara couldn’t help but notice, however, that there was a big part of his life which he didn’t talk about.
Her own life presented yet another obstacle. She discussed growing up with her sister and foster parents but had to skirt the issue of where they were living now, as she had no idea exactly where *here* was. She also had to avoid discussing her early childhood on Krypton and remained vague on where she was born.
For this reason, despite having had a nice time, she was left feeling both unhappy and dissatisfied.
Oliver’s phone rang as they walked out of the restaurant. “Hello?” He said, as he took the call.
As she waited, Kara purposely tuned out the conversation in order to respect his privacy. As she watched he soon began frowning and, after a brief conversation, ended the call.
“I’m really sorry, but I have to go.” He said, his mind obviously on other things.
To Kara, this wasn’t an entirely unexpected event and she nodded as he hurried away, leaving the car behind.
Seeing as it was a truly beautiful evening, she refused the chauffeur’s offer of having the car take her home and decided to walk along the riverside.
The call Oliver had received had been from Felicity: it seemed she had a lead on one of the city’s recent disappearances.
The local rumor mill as well as social and mainstream media were abuzz with speculation regarding a recent upturn in disappearances in the city. The authorities, on the other hand, had yet to address the problem. Therefore, despite his interest in his crossing more names off his list, Oliver had felt that he had to do what he could. Especially given the fact that most of the missing seemed to be the kind of people who didn’t usually have a voice, in anything.
Taking a shortcut, he managed to make it to Verdant in a few short minutes, where he quickly changed into the Hood outfit.
“What’ve you got?” He asked as he walked up to Felicity, watching as she continued to work her magic on her bank of computers.
“Suspicious bank transactions.” She replied without looking up.
“…And this relates to people going missing how?” He prompted her.
“Well, that doesn’t. Not directly anyways. However, this does.” She said as she brought some information up on one of her screens. “The last disappearance was Oscar Ramirez, who disappeared not far from here. And guess who was in the area at the time, at least according to my new and possibly not totally ethical experimental facial recognition program?”
“Who?”
She pressed a button and one of her screens began displaying footage of a white-haired woman with Asian features, somewhere near the river.
“China White.”
Felicity nodded. “This is footage from… well, never mind. I hacked into the security systems of a building near where Ramirez disappeared and I found this. And according to the timestamp on the footage…”
Oliver leaned over and read the figures. “This places her near Ramirez’s last known location around the time he disappeared.” He said as he turned to look at Felicity, who nodded.
“Based on some other footage from around the area, I was able to determine that she spends quite a bit of time in or near certain warehouses that are owned by a company called Infinity Dynamics. Also, based on some… interesting bank transactions I was able to get a look at through yet some more judicious hacking, and while I’m so not an accountant, it’s pretty obvious there are some shady deals going on. And luckily as well, I do have a pretty good forensic accounting program which actually skims from some pretty good databases to figure whatever I can’t once I’ve managed to get access...”
Oliver gave her a look.
“All right fine, I’m babbling a bit. The point is that I identified some really *interesting* transactions which are suggestive of money laundering, as well as some other shady dealings, all tied to that company. That also sounds right up her alley and probably explains what she was doing there. At the very least, she may have some idea of what happened.”
Oliver nodded, “Good work. I’ll go see about having a chat with her now.”
Flipping the hood up over his face, he picked up his bow and quiver and was on his way.
As it turned out, China White didn’t know what had happened to Ramirez.
That’s what she claims anyway, Oliver thought to himself as he left Infinity Dynamics’ warehouse roughly half an hour later, having been lucky enough to find her in the establishment in question.
As usual, she had objected rather strenuously and physically to his looking into her affairs. However, while he certainly didn’t trust her, he felt she was telling the truth. He hadn’t missed the brief flicker of confusion in her expression when he had called out his questions regarding Ramirez’s disappearance.
So what now? He thought as he made his way back to Verdant.
He set out at a run across a warehouse roof, which lay partly under one of the city’s bridges over the river. As he did so he heard the screech of tires on asphalt, accompanied by screams, coming from the bridge up above.
With dawning horror, he realized that someone seemed to be falling from the bridge. Increasing the speed of his run, he tried to think of a way to help, despite knowing he would be too late.
Then, the impossible happened. Somehow, a person rose up and *caught* the figure tumbling down from the bridge.
Somehow, defying belief, the two figures came to a gentle landing a mere one hundred meters away. Oliver noted the young woman -teenager really- who had just been snatched from the jaws of death. She seemed stunned, yet managed to turn to thank her savior, gasping out an apology and something about a ‘dare’ from a friend and having climbed up onto the bridge’s railing.
That was when Oliver’s eyes turned to the girl’s savior and he gasped in shock as Kara waved away the girl’s thanks.
Hearing his gasp, she turned towards him and her eyes widened in recognition. Then she was somehow gone.
Well, this certainly changes things, he thought to himself with a certain mordant wit.
Part one is here, part three is here, part four is here, part five is here, part six is here, part seven is here.
Notes (again, because I’m a nerd and I like learning things):
-Apparently there had been issues with facial recognition software and its use by police has yielded a lot of false positives: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/may/15/uk-police-use-of-facial-recognition-technology-failure
-On the ethical and legal issues raised by the use of facial recognition software: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/07/how-good-facial-recognition-technology-government-regulation/397289/
-I used Arrow’s wiki pages on Felicity Smoak: http://arrow.wikia.com/wiki/Felicity_Smoak
-On what the Fortune 500 is (because I am not American so I wasn’t sure): https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/05/21/big-winners-fortune-500-list-walmart-exxon-mobil-amazon/628003002/
-While it is true that it is impossible to provide evidence of absence of an effect (such as in the case of a potential side effect of a medication), the precautionary principle really is a thing and it is an important concept in public health: “The principle states that in the case of serious or irreversible threats to the health of humans or the ecosystem, acknowledged scientific uncertainty should not be used as a reason to postpone preventive measures.” (From this reference: http://www.who.int/hia/examples/overview/whohia076/en/)
-On the cost of solar panels (includes an explanation of ‘hard’ vs. ‘soft’ costs, as well as how much of each is involved in the high cost of solar panels): https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/energy/2010/11/101105-cost-of-solar-energy/
-I wanted to know, just a little bit, what strategic planning is, because I was clueless.
(1) How to… design and implement a strategic plan. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2013/sep/19/how-to-strategic-planning
(2) What is strategic planning? http://www.diycommitteeguide.org/resource/what-strategic-planning
(3) Strategic planning. http://www.infoentrepreneurs.org/en/guides/strategic-planning/
On strategic vs. business planning…
(1) https://onstrategyhq.com/resources/what-is-the-difference-between-a-business-plan-and-a-strategic-plan/
(2) Business plan. What is a business plan? https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/business-plan.asp
-What is the difference between a company and a corporation? https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-a-company-and-a-corporation
-Inc. or Ltd.: which sounds better? (refers to the Canadian context) https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/small-business/sb-money/inc-or-ltd-which-sounds-better/article4258956/
-Finally, HR professionals do mediate workplace disputes and grievances: https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbeshumanresourcescouncil/2018/04/10/14-ways-hr-professionals-can-solve-workplace-conflict-efficiently/#6566bd191250
-What is renewable energy? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy (It should also be noted that ‘renewable’ does not necessarily mean ‘environmentally friendly’, as the following references point out:
(1) https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/036054429290116H
(2) https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2016/nov/14/hydroelectric-dams-emit-billion-tonnes-greenhouse-gas-methane-study-climate-change)
Here is part two of my recent fic.
Rated NC-17. Supergirl (CW)/Arrow (CW), Kara Danvers/Oliver Queen.
Author’s comment: I always thought it was a bit unfortunate that Oliver didn’t get to do more outside of his heroic persona -other superheroes manage to have careers so why not him? (And yes I realize that unlike some other superheroes Oliver is an unaugmented human, but still.)
In the show, Oliver only took over as CEO of Queen Industries for a brief period in season 2. However, I’m giving that part of the story a bit of a makeover. LOL.
Also, full disclosure: when I first started writing this I goofed on when the CEO thing happened in that I thought it was season 1 but it was season 2 (and for some reason I forgot to look it up). Then, once I realized I have made a mistake and thought about changing it I also realized I preferred things that way and decided not to change them.
Italics indicate characters’ thoughts.
Oliver Queen glanced up at the wooden placard announcing 'Mom & Pop's Deli', uncertain what his reception would be.
Two weeks ago he had witnessed one of Queen Industries' employees (he had only been in charge of the company for a few weeks, so he admitted that he didn't always tend to think of these people as 'his' employees) accuse her direct superior of sexual harassment and abuse.
He had charged Felicity Smoak, who was one of the very few people he trusted, to look not just into Ms. Danvers' allegations but also into the entirety of the HR department’s activities. A quick (and, as Felicity admitted, probably illegal) hack of their personal email accounts had revealed that the three managers of the department liked to boast of their 'conquests' and, based on the language used, it was likely that several of these encounters were not consensual. Based on what she had found, it seemed that QI's Human Resources was run by individuals who were both incompetent and abusive towards their employees.
He had spoken with the men in question himself but had not been not surprised when his efforts hadn’t turned up anything. Knowing that any further attempts he made would most assuredly be noted and relayed to those he was trying to investigate (there was a definite downside to being a media celebrity, and all in all he could have happily forgone the experience). Aside from digging into HR's emails and computer files, he had also asked Felicity to try to approach some of the identified victims as well as other employees who might have had similar experiences (and who could have responded more favorably to a woman, given their experiences). The few responses she had gotten thus far, despite her avowal of being much less comfortable with this aspect of the investigation, had certainly been illuminating. The combined evidence had been sufficient to justify the firing of certain individuals, yet the investigation was still ongoing.
He had made several attempts to get in touch with Ms. Danvers, yet his repeated telephone messages were never returned. Given what had happened to her, he had hesitated to visit her at home. Felicity had however discovered that she had found a new job, which was why he now stood in front of a restaurant that appeared to have seen better days a few centuries ago. (In a perhaps vain attempt to have his attempt to contact her appear less frightening, he had come alone.) Sighing, he stepped inside.
The decor was an unfortunate combination of an attempt at 1950s diner booths mixed in with a few mismatched tables and chairs, several of which appeared to have various dried food items such as gum and ketchup stuck to them. The walls seemed to have been white in a previous life but were now mostly yellow, probably from years of cigarette smoke which had never been cleaned or repainted and despite a citywide ordinance banning smoking in public venues having been passed eons ago.
He looked around the place, trying to spot Ms. Danvers, when a harried looking waitress came up to seat him. When he refused and asked her whether he could speak with Kara Danvers, she gave him a curious look before directing him to the back of the establishment.
She looks unhappy, he thought as he finally caught sight of her.
And she did: he waited as he overheard her being dressed down by a woman, probably a manager, who appeared to be ranting at her for something. Which, given the state this place was in, most likely wasn't her fault.
Well, not unless she cooks the food, and honestly even then it really is the management who should take responsibility for the problems with this place. I know I wouldn't eat here if I could avoid it...
She stood there rather stoically until the woman was finished, then turned around and pasted a smile on her face and walked towards him.
He held up a hand as she approached him. “I'm actually just here to see you, Ms. Danvers.”
She gave him a puzzled look. “Me? Um, I don't think we know each other,” she replied quietly, casting a furtive look in the direction of the recently departed manager. “Look, I'm not really supposed to just stand here and talk -”
“I know,” he replied, cutting her off, “but this is important. Is there somewhere where we could speak in private?”
She seemed to think about it for a moment, then nodded. “All right. Why don't you meet me outside? I'll just take my break now.”
She turned away as he nodded his thanks and heard her mutter, “This'd really better be good, because she's not going to like this...”
He stepped out of the restaurant to wait for her. After two to three minutes, she joined him outside and stood, gazing at him expectantly.
“What is it?” She asked.
“I've actually been trying to contact you for two weeks...” He paused, considering how to explain.
“I'm Oliver Queen and I’m currently running my family’s company. I understand that you recently left-,” he stated, and watched as she immediately began to shake her head.
“I don't think there's any point in talking about it. I mean, your HR didn't care.” She said, the suspicion evident on her face.
He held up his hands, hoping she would listen to him. “Look, I promise I'm not here to defend what Williams did. What I wanted to tell you was that I actually overheard what you said to him and Hoskins before you left the company. I also wanted to tell you that a few people have already been fired...” He trailed off, looking at his watch, “as of three hours ago. That includes both Williams and Hoskins.”
She looked at him with mistrust, appearing to find him wanting. Which, honestly, wasn't something he was used to and was pretty unsettling.
After a brief silence, she spoke.
“I tried going to the media, you know. No one was interested. It wasn't said to me in so many words, but I was made to understand that no one wanted to take your family on, especially since you also seem to own a good part of the media in this town. The only people who were actually willing to publish anything about it were pretty far out of the mainstream. I mean, it got published, but only in a few rags no one will ever read.”
She paused, then continued, “So you tell me. Exactly why should I believe you or give you the time of day?”
He sighed. She was entirely right. He certainly hadn’t paid attention when his parents had run the company but Walter Steele, who had taken over afterwards, had been a very careful, conscientious, and *ethical* individual. He had also been very knowledgeable and had become a mentor when Oliver had taken over as CEO. Oliver had discussed the issue with him and had witnessed the man’s shock at the revelations regarding the company. The question of how this had occurred was therefore one they deeply wanted to answer.
The only explanation which Oliver had been able to come up with was that no one seemed to have dared to bring the problem to them, which was deeply troubling.
He was under no illusions where his family’s ruthlessness in business matters was concerned (Walter had been a notable exception in that regard). It wasn’t something he agreed with at all, quite honestly, but he could well imagine that they wouldn’t have wanted the media they owned to provide negative coverage of their bread and butter. Despite this however, to the best of his knowledge, neither his parents nor Walter had ever tried to steer editorial policy in the way other media owners and conglomerates were wont to do in this country. However, given how wrong he had been about other things of late, it was certainly possible that he was wrong about that as well and there might be yet another aspect of the huge monster that was Queen Industries that he would have to take on.
She wouldn't believe him if he tried to tell her he wasn't responsible for that though, and he honestly couldn't blame her.
“Ms. Danvers, I came because I wanted to say that I’m sorry.” He paused and took a deep breath before continuing, considering his words, because he really hoped she would let him try to make this right.
“I also wanted to offer you a job.”
“What?” He could tell from her expression that she was one second away from walking away and slamming the dingy restaurant’s door in his face.
“What happened to you was unacceptable. I've ordered an investigation into Human Resources and several other departments. I want to see to it that this kind of thing never happens again, and I thought you might be able to help me with that.”
“Help how?” She was still suspicious.
He looked her straight in the eye. “I'm going to be completely honest here. I only took over at Queen Industries a few weeks ago...” Based on her expression he surmised that this was news to her, which was surprising.
“What happened to you has made me understand that there is a lot that needs fixing in my family's company, both in terms of personnel and policy. I also honestly don't entirely know who I can trust to help me do that, but I figure that I could trust you to want to fix things as much as I do.”
“Would you by any chance want to do that?” He truly hoped that she would say yes.
She pursed her lips and thought about it for a few moments. Finally, she seemed to come to a decision. “If I agree, what exactly are you proposing? And how do I know it's not just a way to shut me up?”
He smiled, relieved that she seemed to at least be willing to consider his offer. “Well, the way I see it, the only way to go would be to make you my personal assistant. That would give you the power to help me overhaul things, because any orders you gave would be seen to come from me.”
She didn’t trust him: that was obvious. Despite that however, fifteen minutes later she had agreed to a contract of a month. She had been surprised when, upon mentioning the fact that she had resorted to posting her story online, he simply shrugged and stated that he personally believed her and that anything that was true (and which didn’t violate company rules on confidentiality, copyrights and so on) was her story to tell.
The contract he had agreed to have drawn up for her included a guarantee, in writing, that she could still pursue the topic of her harassment in any way she subsequently chose to. After a month, the contract would have a renewal option in the event she didn't find him to be too much of an asshat.
All right, so that's my way of putting it. She was a lot more polite. But firm.
He walked away smiling.
Quentin Lance walked into the Star City police department a few mornings later while nursing a splitting headache.
Laurel is probably right when she says that this job has a really bad effect on my blood pressure, he thought to himself. He’d certainly worked through a lot of double shifts of late.
Back to business, he thought tiredly, walking into his lieutenant's office.
“Any news?” the man said, looking up from the report he was reading. Lieutenant Espinoza was a middle-aged black man with graying brown hair and steely eyes, who had paid his dues as a police officer and detective in another city prior to transferring to Star City. Quentin respected him deeply, as did the other men and women of the precinct: the lieutenant had gone to bat many times both to protect his people and in order to do the right thing, even when it wasn't the popular thing to do.
“Nope. I asked around, talked to his friends, neighbors, everyone who knew him. No one saw a thing.”
“So it's just like the others, then.” Espinoza replied.
Lance nodded. “Yeah. So that makes twenty-three disappearances in the past six months. Most of which we haven't been able to make any progress with, much less solve. And I don't know about you, but it feels to me like there's some kind of connection between at least some of these. Otherwise, how do we explain the numbers? I know it's mostly been transients that have disappeared, but that many people don't generally commit suicide or have accidents or decide to leave all at once, no matter what 'alternative explanations' are helping the politicians sleep at night.”
Espinoza nodded. “Agreed. None of it makes sense to me either. Here's the latest on the Grimes case, by the way.” He handed Lance the file he had been reading.
The file in question detailed the investigation into the disappearance of one Shelley Grimes, a local homeless woman who had to all appearances vanished from the streets of Star City a few months earlier. Shelley had actually been quite well known among Star City's downtrodden both for her wild conspiracy theories about governmental spying and for her the help she attempted to provide to those living on the streets of Star City, despite her own situation. What was unusual in her case was the fact that there were witnesses, as most of the recent cases had involved people seemingly vanishing into thin air. A few individuals had overheard her arguing with a ‘well dressed’ man shortly before her disappearance (from what Lance had gathered, around The Glades, that simply implied 'not homeless').
As it turned out, a few cameras had also caught an image or two of the man, enough so that they were able to obtain footage which they had first had enhanced prior to running facial recognition software. (Lance, after reading up on the technique, still had his doubts about its efficacy, but they’d had to try something.) They had eventually released the image to the media.
Which led to exactly nothing. Zip. Nada. It was truly frustrating.
“So we have nothing so far.” He said aloud as he placed the file back on his superior’s desk.
Espinoza nodded. “The brass has been up my ass about the time we've already spent on these.”
He sighed. “You're a good detective, Lance, and I trust your instincts. I agree with you: something is going on here and we need to find out what it is. I'll talk them down somehow. Just make sure you dot all your Is and cross all your Ts because they're not really happy with me right now because of this.”
He gave Lance a firm look. “You find whoever is doing this.”
Lance nodded and walked back out of the office to get to work.
Six months after Oliver made his dramatic job offer, Kara's life had changed rather drastically. As for her new job, it had turned out to be both much more rewarding and frustrating than she could have anticipated.
Oliver had certainly NEEDED an assistant, as she had realized upon glancing at the tangled state of his office files. Why he hadn't hired someone before was something she couldn't understand, though she could concede that he hadn't been at the head of his family's company until quite recently. She also quickly came to realize that a certain level of chaos had ensued when employees who had tried to contact him had frequently found themselves unable to reach him. It had also been an eye-opening experience to discover just how much power the Queens wielded in this town: as the Big Boss’ personal assistant she had found that his name opened more doors than she had even conceived of.
One aspect of her job which had been particularly rewarding had occurred when she had contacted (and in some cases befriended) the many people who had been wronged by Ben Williams and his ‘friends’. Her report on that situation had resulted in the last of his cronies being fired, which she attributed largely to conditions being put in place such that people finally felt secure enough to come forward. That part of her job had also resulted in an unexpected bonus when she met Felicity Smoak.
As it turned out, she and Felicity had a lot in common. While Kara readily admitted that she wasn’t an MIT graduate and that Felicity was a much more accomplished nerd than she was, they had a very similar sense of humor. Both appreciated the occasional practical joke as well as most types of comedy (including the occasional potty humor flick, truth be told). Felicity also *understood* what Kara had gone through -she had competed and frequently outperformed male students and even some professors during her time at M.I.T., where she had even been stalked. Two weeks into her time at Queen Industries Kara had invited Felicity over for a girls’ movie night and the two had been fast friends ever since.
She had also gotten to know Oliver’s bodyguard and friend, John Diggle, who had been much friendlier and more approachable than Oliver himself. She had quickly found that the fastest way of determining whether Oliver would be reachable in the near future was to call Diggle, who could always be counted on to give her an honest answer. It was also refreshing that, while Diggle seemed to like and respect Oliver, he was also the kind of person who would not hesitate to inform his employer when he was being an idiot.
She had learned a lot about running a business and, by dint of hard work, had managed to do some good things for the company. Most of the time, Kara liked her job and found it fulfilling.
Most of the time.
One problem, as it turned out, was her boss. It went without saying that he was a definite improvement over ‘Ben’ and several other bosses she had had. On the other hand, if she were to be honest, Kara would have had to admit that she truly didn’t know what to make of him.
Kara’s first problem with Oliver Queen was his occasional foray into, as she had come to call it, ‘idiot asshole’ territory. Most of the time he worked very hard (when he wasn’t disappearing to somewhere mysterious and incommunicado). He also definitely wasn’t an idiot. As his personal assistant she knew for a fact that he had made several changes to the company which had given a serious boost to its revenue stream. He had been behind the company’s efforts to branch out into some new sectors in order to both diversify and offset the decreased revenue from some of Queen Industries’ more traditional revenue sources. (She had first discovered this when listening to the company’s accountants make the final touches to their latest quarterly report and, notwithstanding their desire to please their employer, their report had been glowing.)
Queen Industries had actually begun many years ago in shipping, but now touched on a truly huge number of areas including pharmaceuticals (which included an R&D division), various products including processed foodstuffs which could be found in grocery shelves around the nation, and a new line of environmentally friendly products for home and garden (the latter actually a new creation courtesy of Oliver). Among the changes to the company, Oliver had opted to make serious improvements to its ethics, notably by making it greener and by halting production of items which were damaging to the environment. He had also terminated several ventures which had not proven profitable and managed to refocus QI’s efforts on what was working. He had accomplished this while going out of his way to avoid firing people: most such modifications led to people being assigned to new departments which suited their particular skill sets, while those few who were incapable of accepting and working with the changes were given generous severance packages and/or pensions.
So he definitely wasn’t an asshole, either.
Which was why she couldn’t understand why he invariably turned into both a complete idiot and an asshole whenever even a single camera was present.
The last incident had been involved a reporter who had asked to interview him regarding the changes he had made to the company: not only had he shown up late, but late AND apparently drunk. He had stumbled into the furniture and talked loudly and nonsensically about football, refusing to answer the reporter’s questions. However, when the woman had finally left in a disappointed huff he had immediately returned to his usual serious (and not drunk) self and had immediately gotten back to work. What was more, if he had had even one drink, Kara would have known (she did have super senses after all), and he hadn’t. She was truly at a loss to explain why he felt it was necessary to pretend to be something he wasn’t, especially when that something wasn’t exactly flattering.
The second problem Kara had with Oliver was his absenteeism. Despite his apparent work ethic, there had been several instances where a major situation had arisen at the company and Oliver’s input had been rather desperately required, yet he had been unavailable. And unreachable. Incommunicado.
Kara had tried to raise the topic with him, only to be told very politely but firmly that sometimes he wouldn’t be available and that she was paid to deal with it. From what she had discovered, he seemed to have a serious objection to normal avenues of communication (such as the phone) when away from the office. Unfortunately for her and the rest of the company, his absences took place with considerably more frequency than she would have first thought. As for what he did whenever he disappeared, it was both a complete mystery to her and apparently NONE OF HER BUSINESS.
She had to admit that she had felt that last part was a bit unfair. The truth was that she simply hadn’t had the knowledge or the experience to deal with all of the ramifications of the situations which could arise at such a huge company. It had also been rather unexpected, mostly because he hadn’t even hinted at this being a part of her job when he offered to hire her. It was certainly possible that he simply hadn’t realized the position he was putting her in, since this seemed to all be rather new to him as well. The truth however was that she would have had difficulty figuring things out even if it had been a small company. Queen Industries most assuredly wasn’t that -the behemoth was firmly ensconced among the Fortune 500, as it turned out. And while she did feel honored that he trusted her enough to figure everything out, she honestly thought that he needed to learn to trust others more.
Somehow, by burying herself in the work, Kara had managed to avoid making truly huge mistakes. One thing she had decided on from the beginning was that even if Oliver had a hard time trusting people, she wasn’t going to let that affect her where business was concerned. In other words, one of her best weapons had been carefully delegating various tasks to the most qualified people she could find. She had also decided early on that if he left her in the lurch and stated that he wanted her to handle things, he couldn’t very well complain about her decisions afterwards.
From her first days in her new job Kara had realized that she couldn’t handle everything without involving other people. She knew that she just didn’t have the knowledge and skills required: she wasn’t an accountant, so she’d had to call on the company’s accountants when the banks came calling about various details pertaining to the company’s finances. She also didn’t know anything about pharmaceuticals, so she’d had to call on the firm’s pharmaceutical R&D people to help when issues arose involving unexpected side effects resulting from the use of one of Queen Industries’ latest creations. After much consideration and tortuous deliberation with the various people involved, that situation had required her to pull the drug from the market. This had made several people in the pharmaceutical department very unhappy with her. She had however decided that she was damned if she was going to let a potentially hazardous product be on the market while she had anything to say about it -and even the experts hadn’t been able to provide any good arguments in the face of the side effects data. That particular snafu had resulted in quite a bit of insomnia on her part, which had actually turned out to be somewhat useful when her midnight reading had resulted in her being able to cite the precautionary principle as a reason for her decision. Despite this, the worry and anxiety involved in facing down the irate managers of the pharmaceutical division had stayed with her for some time. She also wasn’t an expert in the physics or the mechanics of commercial renewable energy sources, so she’d had to call in various experts when issues arose surrounding Queen Industries’ solar panels. These were meant to be a more affordable alternative to what was already on the market, but problems had arisen when she read the accounting department’s report on the panels, which had stated that ‘soft’ costs were on track to be essentially the same as the rest of the market despite hefty government subsidies specifically earmarked to offset those costs. She had opted to sicc the company’s accountants on the entire department involved in the panels’ production, in order to figure out where the money was going and to ensure everything was aboveboard.
Therefore, her role at the company and Oliver’s frequent absences had resulted in a great deal of anxiety as she had found herself responsible for things she hadn’t been prepared for or knowledgeable about. It was also true that some of her decisions had made her some enemies. On the other hand, while that fact had definitely kept her up at night a time or two, she had also come to realize that most of Queen Industries’ people seemed to value her hard work as well as her honesty and ethics.
This had been amply demonstrated in several meetings where several individuals from various areas of the company had defended her handling of the various situations and crises which had arisen: for example, several of the accountants had sent written memos to Oliver praising her efforts at increased financial transparency. This had prompted Oliver not only to congratulate her on her efforts but also to modify the company’s financial policies, particularly where use of public monies were concerned. In general, it also hadn’t hurt that Oliver had backed up every one of her more controversial decisions, once he deigned to make himself available again. So all in all, Kara had begun to prove that she could handle the job and that she just might even have a bit of talent for business, thank you very much.
Therefore despite the difficulties, her job was something she had unexpectedly come to enjoy. In fact, all in all life was now pretty good (or at least much better than it had been) for Kara.
Still, aside from her boss’ somewhat eccentric nature, there were definitely still some personal issues she struggled with. In particular, she had been extremely leery of using her powers and hadn’t since her arrival. She still had no idea how she had ended up in Star City or whether she would ever be able to go back home.
And she missed her foster family.
I wonder what Alex would say about this place, she thought to herself one day as she walked to work. It was a beautiful spring day and throughout the city both trees and flowers were beginning to come alive. As she stepped into the Queen Industries building lobby, Kara felt energized and ready to get to work.
Unfortunately, that feeling lasted until she arrived at her office on the forty-third floor, where she was greeted by the usual chaos. Chaos which she was expected to deal with, as she had somehow (and unexpectedly) become not only a personal assistant but also effectively co-CEO of Queen Industries.
Of course, there’s still plenty of time for me to screw up in a truly spectacular way, she thought to herself as she walked into a situation. She figured she’d begin by trying to get the two angry men before her to lower the volume of their argument.
“Miss Danvers!”
“Yes, that’s me,” she replied. “What… seems to be the problem?”
One of them, a pale looking young man who didn’t seem to have ever been exposed to much sun, replied, “Well… I was hoping to get Mr. Queen’s approval…”
Kara’s office served the combined function of office and bulwark, in that it was necessary to walk through her office in order to get to Oliver’s. Judging from the closed door and the lack of light visible beneath his door, Kara knew that Oliver wasn’t in his office. Which meant a discussion with him wasn’t going to happen.
On the other hand, if there was one thing Kara had learned the hard way, it was that not every problem was a problem for Oliver to deal with. Or for her to deal with, for that matter. “I’m afraid he isn’t here.”
The young man before her began to wring his hands in obvious worry. “It’s just that I’ve stayed up all night to deal with this report for the regulatory department. I wouldn’t have bothered him with this but he did tell us that we could come to him if we were having trouble…”
The second man interrupted him brusquely, “I *told* Karl it wasn’t necessary. I also told him that he should go to HR if he had a complaint, and not bother Mister Queen.”
Kara carefully nodded. If there was one area where Oliver agreed that he should have been clearer both when he first took over as CEO and afterwards, it was in communicating and clarifying his readiness to listen and deal with his people’s problems. Given what had happened to her and to other employees, he had wanted people to be able to come to him when needed (definitely important, as evidenced by what had happened to her in her previous position). However, he had failed to appreciate the fact that proper channels were also important since a CEO was literally only one person (of course, one had to ensure those channels were adequate, which had been a big part of the problem in her case).
Taking Karl aside, she promised his argumentative friend she would deal with the situation. Waiting until the second man had left, she encouraged Karl to have a seat. “I need to ask this, because it’s important for the company. Is there a reason you didn’t feel comfortable taking this to HR? That isn’t a criticism of you.” Kara said carefully.
“It’s all right. I know you have to ask.” Karl nodded, evidently feeling better now that someone was listening to him. “I just know that they don’t usually do anything about this. I mean, I tried discussing the fact that I was having a hard time with them a few months ago but they just wouldn’t listen.”
Kara nodded and decided to deal with the situation directly. “Why don’t we go there now and talk to them together.” She said. He nodded and together they left her office.
By the end of the day, Kara had dealt with three different departmental deadlines (she had to make sure all departments were taking the proper steps to comply with the applicable federal, state, and municipal laws and regulations, which required her to be present at various meetings preparing quarterly reviews for several departments), two regulatory requests for documentation (wherein she had to ensure that each request was forwarded to the correct individual(s) in the company, as well as make sure that it was dealt with in a timely manner), as well as young Karl’s distress and her employer’s being a no show for that day.
She had taken Karl over to HR and had ensured that the proper action would be taken to deal with his concerns: a supervised meeting was organized with Karl’s superior under the auspices of HR. As he had also reported feeling both tired and overworked, he was encouraged to visit his doctor and consider a leave of absence if required, to be paid for by Queen Industries’ generous medical coverage for its employees.
Therefore, as she walked back to her office at the end of a very long yet productive day, she could have been forgiven for feeling both exhausted and a little smug.
Upon reaching her office, however, her acute hearing caught a muffled sound coming from beyond the closed door to Oliver’s office. She paused, wondering what might be going on, then walked over and opened the door.
She gasped in shock at the sight that met her eyes: Oliver was lying on the floor of his office, apparently unconscious and with a bloody head wound. Running into the office and putting out a hand to touch him, thinking to try to take his pulse (or something), she was somewhat startled when he moaned and seemed to come slightly awake.
“Oliver!” She yelled as she knelt down next to him, looking around to try to find something that might work as a bandage to staunch the bleeding. She turned her attention back to him as he grabbed her hand. His eyes were now open.
“…Sorry. I didn’t manage to get…” He began, when Kara interrupted him.
“Don’t try to talk. I’m calling an ambulance.”
Oliver shook his head. “No ambulance. Call… Call John, or Felicity.”
“What?” Kara asked, not believing what she was hearing.
He gave her a firm yet imploring look. “PLEASE. Just do it.”
Shaking her head in disbelief, Kara nonetheless took out her phone to do what he asked. After a wait which lasted only a few minutes but felt considerably longer, both Diggle and Felicity burst into the room.
Diggle was shaking his head.
“I swear, I leave you alone for one hour…” He said as he sat on the floor next to Oliver, “You need a doctor, genius. Who did this to you, anyways?”
Oliver shook his head, and Kara noticed his purposeful glance towards her own self before he spoke, “Let’s deal with that later, okay?”
He and Diggle argued back and forth for a time, before Oliver finally and reluctantly agreed to go to a discreet private clinic. (The clinic in question were known to take care of celebrities while remaining mum over who and what and where and when.) He did however insist on walking out of the building without assistance, after having made a brief attempt at cleaning up his appearance (though he was still clad not in his usual business suit, but in some kind of ragged dark pants and t-shirt combo). Oliver and Diggle insisted that the situation was well in hand and Felicity therefore opted to leave, but Kara insisted on going with him and Diggle when they drove to the clinic, wanting to ensure he made it there in one piece.
One doctor’s consultation and a CT scan later, Oliver was diagnosed with a concussion and a scalp laceration, which was sown up by the tight-lipped doctor. After paying what Kara felt was an obscene amount of money which didn’t even seem to faze Oliver, they were once again on their way.
Once Oliver had painstakingly climbed into his car and Diggle offered to drive her home, she shook her head. “Look, no offense, but I just found my boss lying in a pool of blood. I have no idea how that happened, but I think that if I’m going to continue doing the work I’ve been doing for him, I have a right to know whether he’ll be around for me to do it. So I’m going to drive him home and we’re going to talk -assuming he’s able to. But if he can’t, then I’ll sit on him until he does. Okay?”
Diggle threw up his hands. “Okay. Whatever.” He said, shrugging, as he climbed into the backseat next to Oliver.
Kara rolled her eyes. “Don’t think I don’t know that you know just what he’s been up to, Mr. John Diggle…” She muttered to herself as she took the driver’s seat and sent the car to join the local traffic.
The only people Oliver Queen seemed to confide in were Felicity Smoak and John Diggle: they were always around when he was and tended to be unavailable when he wasn’t. She could also state with confidence that, during her interactions with them all, they had been the only people towards whom he had ever indicated trust.
However, while he might not trust her in the same way he trusted them, the fact was that she and Oliver needed to come to some kind of understanding.
She drove the car to the Queen mansion, where Diggle indicated that a staff member would take it to the mansion’s garage. (Or was that garages plural? She had no idea.) Between the two of them they watched as Oliver made his way through the mansion and away from his staff. They accompanied him as he climbed the stairs to his suite.
Once there, Oliver placed a hand against the wall, apparently to hold himself up.
“Look, Kara…” He began, but Kara cut him off.
“Nope. Not this time, mister.”
“I’m going to make sure you’re all right. I’m also not going to leave until we talk about some things. Now is probably not the best time for that, but I just KNOW that if I leave you alone you’ll disappear on me again and it just won’t happen, so I’m going to wait. Right here.” She stated in a firm tone.
Oliver’s response was a simple shrug. His lack of response only served to further emphasize just how much he needed the rest.
She watched as Diggle grasped his arm and, despite his protests, helped him inside and onto his bed. After removing his shoes, Kara turned to ask him if he needed anything else, when he took her hand.
“I thought you were going to stay here.” He said teasingly. She rolled her eyes.
“All right, I didn’t mean right here, Romeo. I figured I’d find some room somewhere and crash…” Her words trailed off as she realized that he had fallen asleep while holding her hand. When she tried to pull her hand away, his hand only tightened around hers.
Diggle threw her an amused look. “How about I get you a chair? One of us should probably keep an eye on him. If you want, you can wake me up later and I’ll spell you.”
Rolling her eyes, Kara opted not to share the many sarcastic responses she could have provided and remained silent as he brought her the promised chair. Then she sat quietly as Diggle left, eventually managing to reclaim her hand from Oliver’s grasp.
Night fell outside the room. There seemed to be lights somewhere on the grounds outside, but they didn’t really penetrate into the room, despite the open window and the gentle breeze that tried to drive away the slight touch of spring humidity.
Kara sat quietly and watched both Oliver and the room for some time as darkness and quiet gathered. Eventually, she heard him move, and he awoke.
“You’re still here?” He asked softly, sighting her through the gloom of the surrounding night.
“Yeah I am. I did have my own reasons for staying, but we can talk about it later.” She whispered back. “John thought we should keep an eye on you, he’ll be by later.”
Oliver nodded and sat up. Kara quickly moved forward, thinking to keep him from moving or, if he had to get up for other reasons, ensure that he didn’t trip on his way to the bathroom and kill himself.
He held up a hand, smiling, “Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.” He paused, “You know, I’ve been thinking. I’ve come to realize that I should… apologize for leaving you in the lurch so often with the company. I’m sorry I implied you had to deal with that -John pointed out the other day that that wasn’t really fair of me, and he’s right.”
He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I just have trouble trusting people, and you’re actually one of the few people I do trust. That’s why I left it up to you, but I realize now that what I did to you wasn’t entirely fair.”
Kara shrugged, then spoke, “Yeah, I’ll admit it was hard. I figured it out though. And it’s not like you weren’t a decent CEO and boss when you were around. But… maybe we can talk about why you keep disappearing on me sometime, or we could at least plan for what to do when that happens. You know, *together*. So I have a little more direction.” As she spoke, she moved to sit next to him on the bed.
Oliver nodded, “All right. That’s fair. I can do that.” He smiled and took her hand.
Then he kissed her, and Kara froze in shock.
She had honestly not even let herself consider the idea of something like this -particularly since he was her boss. Then she found herself kissing him back.
She knew this was a terrible idea, yet somehow… Somehow she couldn’t pull away. Somehow, the fact that was foremost in her mind was that she found him much too interesting and attractive for her peace of mind.
…Because there’s a lot I still don’t know about him, she reminded herself firmly as their kiss ended.
Pulling back, he leaned his forehead against hers as he spoke. “I should apologize for that too, I suppose. I’ll admit I don’t want to.”
Kara smiled and he winced. “I’ll admit I’m not thinking straight right now. God, given what’s happened to you recently, I just wouldn’t want you to think that I was implying…”
She burst out laughing at that and smacked his arm. “For the record, I know you’re no Mr. Benjamin Williams. Something’s going on with you, I think, and it’s something you don’t want to or can’t tell me about, but you’re a good man. For one thing, no one could care about their employees the way you do and be totally evil.”
She was still smiling as he turned away from her. Kara took note of his expression, which was somehow full of an immense sadness. He shook his head while visibly closing himself off from her.
“Don’t believe everything you hear.”
Her eyes snapped wide with shock at his statement. As he moved to turn away from her, she placed a hand on his arm.
“I think you just might be better than you think,” she said as she placed a hand on his face.
He didn’t respond and she sighed, realizing she had all the answers she was going to get for now. Standing, she left to get Diggle, leaving him to his demons.
A few days later, it was as if nothing had happened between them. Everything was business as usual, which was fine with Oliver. Kara, on the other hand, looked about ready to scream.
It’s for the best, Oliver reminded himself firmly as the day progressed.
The facts, unfortunately, hadn’t changed. There was too much going on in his life -things that were just too heavy to ask someone to share with him. He didn’t even know if he’d ever be ‘normal’ enough for that to be a possibility, and Kara deserved better. Better than him.
There’s also the fact that we work together and that I’m her boss, he thought again, before putting such thoughts firmly to the side to focus on business.
As he had promised, he had taken steps to set up a plan of action for the company, in preparation for the frequent instances where he wouldn’t be there in person. This had involved enlarging the strategic planning that he had already set up for the company, so as to include contingencies for extended periods of time when he was unavailable. While the person who would carry out the largest portion of those plans and contingencies was Kara, they had also involved many other people in the organization and documents had had to be drawn up. In the end though, he had provided everyone with clear directions on what actions to carry out in his absence.
He could admit that this was something he should have thought of before, rather than leave Kara and the rest of the company in the lurch. The only defense he could offer was that he was still new at this and that it truly hadn’t occurred to him.
(He also had to admit that one of the rare instances in which he was happy to use the power that came with his last name and position had been when it came to impressing on everyone, aside from Kara, that he simply wasn’t going to discuss the *why* of his absences.)
Oliver concluded his daily schedule of meetings, reviews, and dealing with other minutiae of running one of the country’s largest corporations. Shutting down his laptop, he got ready to leave the office. As he stepped outside into Kara’s office however, he noted that she was sitting at her desk and seemed to be waiting for him. That impression was confirmed when she shut down whatever she had been working on and stood.
“Is everything all right?” He asked.
She nodded, “Fine. Everything’s fine. I did want to talk to you, though.”
He sighed. Then, figuring he couldn’t avoid speaking with her (he had managed to it so far, but he figured his lucky streak had to end sometime), he set aside his briefcase and sat in one of the chairs in front of her desk. “Okay. What’s going on?”
Kara shrugged, “Look, I don’t… I don’t want to intrude. You’ve obviously got things you want to keep to yourself and that’s certainly your prerogative. But I…” She paused, gesturing with her hands, “I’m just worried about you.”
He cut her off, “I’m fine.”
“Are you?”
“Yes. Is that all you wanted to ask me?”
“No!” She shouted the last in her frustration, then obviously tried to dial it back, taking a moment to calm herself.
She sighed, “What I’m trying to say is that you were injured the other day. Someone did that to you. You don’t want to talk about it. That’s okay, I can accept that. I guess I’m just worried…”
“About what?”
“Honestly, I’m wondering whether something could happen to you. Like I said, you don’t want to talk about it, but the fact is that whatever you’re doing affects me too. Actually, it affects everyone here. You’ve taken steps to spell out what should happen when you’re not available, but what if it’s more than that? What happens to all of us if someday you don’t come back?”
Oliver sat back, somewhat at a loss for words. Eventually, he shrugged and replied, “I hadn’t thought about that either, but it’s a good point. I do need to make plans for my death, because it could happen.” He spoke calmly, quietly.
Kara shook her head, obviously in shock. “I can’t believe you’re just that calm about dying.”
He smiled, “It happens to everyone, you know. Between you and me, yes, it could happen a little sooner in my case, but you’re right. I’ll make arrangements.”
Somehow, that statement really seemed to bother her. That wasn’t his problem though.
Standing, he picked up his briefcase and turned to leave.
Kara moved to intercept him, “There’s just one last thing,” she said.
“What is it?” He said. She didn’t immediately reply. She seemed nervous, somehow.
Somehow, without meaning to, he noticed again just how lovely she was. Putting that thought firmly aside, he brought his mind back to business. When she didn’t speak, he again moved to leave.
“Would you like to go out sometime? On a date, I mean?” She blurted out.
All right, he really hadn’t been expecting that one. He turned back to her. “Did you just ask me out?”
She smiled, “Who says only guys can ask? You don’t have to say yes, by the way. I just thought… Well, you know…” She cut herself off, looking a bit flustered.
“Okay.” He heard himself say.
Okay? What the hell happened to this being a bad idea, Oliver? He asked himself.
He realized what the answer to that question was though, when she smiled at him again.
Somehow, that smile at that moment looked to him like a sliver of light, illuminating his own personal darkness. Somehow, that sweet smile meant that his life was just a little less bleak and so, despite this whole thing being a terrible idea, he just couldn’t stay away.
“Okay then.” She said to him as he nodded and he quickly excused himself and left her office.
Kara wasn’t quite sure why she had done it or even whether it was a good idea, but she had taken the huge step of asking Oliver on a date.
To begin with, he had baggage. She had no idea whether he was ready for a relationship. Of course a date wasn’t a marriage proposal, but it certainly did have the potential to complicate things for both of them.
Yet for some reason she didn’t entirely yet understand, she had wanted to do it. She didn’t want to examine that too closely, partly because that would have involved considering what she was doing. All she knew, all she was letting herself think about at this point, was that she liked him and that she was attracted to him. And that despite the potential for this to complicate both their lives, she couldn’t stay away.
As it happened, their single date took place a few days after she had asked him out and nothing happened the way she had thought it would.
Oliver picked her up in a chauffeured car, sans bodyguard: while Kara had initially suggested that they keep things simple and just meet somewhere he had wanted to go all out and surprise her. In the end he had taken her to a little Italian restaurant in a relatively modest part of the city, overlooking the river.
They had spent a very pleasant time at dinner, their discussion having little to do with work. Oliver told her a bit about his childhood, including many pranks played both with and on his sister. He told her about his best friend, Tommy Merlyn, and how much he regretted that they weren’t close anymore. Kara couldn’t help but notice, however, that there was a big part of his life which he didn’t talk about.
Her own life presented yet another obstacle. She discussed growing up with her sister and foster parents but had to skirt the issue of where they were living now, as she had no idea exactly where *here* was. She also had to avoid discussing her early childhood on Krypton and remained vague on where she was born.
For this reason, despite having had a nice time, she was left feeling both unhappy and dissatisfied.
Oliver’s phone rang as they walked out of the restaurant. “Hello?” He said, as he took the call.
As she waited, Kara purposely tuned out the conversation in order to respect his privacy. As she watched he soon began frowning and, after a brief conversation, ended the call.
“I’m really sorry, but I have to go.” He said, his mind obviously on other things.
To Kara, this wasn’t an entirely unexpected event and she nodded as he hurried away, leaving the car behind.
Seeing as it was a truly beautiful evening, she refused the chauffeur’s offer of having the car take her home and decided to walk along the riverside.
The call Oliver had received had been from Felicity: it seemed she had a lead on one of the city’s recent disappearances.
The local rumor mill as well as social and mainstream media were abuzz with speculation regarding a recent upturn in disappearances in the city. The authorities, on the other hand, had yet to address the problem. Therefore, despite his interest in his crossing more names off his list, Oliver had felt that he had to do what he could. Especially given the fact that most of the missing seemed to be the kind of people who didn’t usually have a voice, in anything.
Taking a shortcut, he managed to make it to Verdant in a few short minutes, where he quickly changed into the Hood outfit.
“What’ve you got?” He asked as he walked up to Felicity, watching as she continued to work her magic on her bank of computers.
“Suspicious bank transactions.” She replied without looking up.
“…And this relates to people going missing how?” He prompted her.
“Well, that doesn’t. Not directly anyways. However, this does.” She said as she brought some information up on one of her screens. “The last disappearance was Oscar Ramirez, who disappeared not far from here. And guess who was in the area at the time, at least according to my new and possibly not totally ethical experimental facial recognition program?”
“Who?”
She pressed a button and one of her screens began displaying footage of a white-haired woman with Asian features, somewhere near the river.
“China White.”
Felicity nodded. “This is footage from… well, never mind. I hacked into the security systems of a building near where Ramirez disappeared and I found this. And according to the timestamp on the footage…”
Oliver leaned over and read the figures. “This places her near Ramirez’s last known location around the time he disappeared.” He said as he turned to look at Felicity, who nodded.
“Based on some other footage from around the area, I was able to determine that she spends quite a bit of time in or near certain warehouses that are owned by a company called Infinity Dynamics. Also, based on some… interesting bank transactions I was able to get a look at through yet some more judicious hacking, and while I’m so not an accountant, it’s pretty obvious there are some shady deals going on. And luckily as well, I do have a pretty good forensic accounting program which actually skims from some pretty good databases to figure whatever I can’t once I’ve managed to get access...”
Oliver gave her a look.
“All right fine, I’m babbling a bit. The point is that I identified some really *interesting* transactions which are suggestive of money laundering, as well as some other shady dealings, all tied to that company. That also sounds right up her alley and probably explains what she was doing there. At the very least, she may have some idea of what happened.”
Oliver nodded, “Good work. I’ll go see about having a chat with her now.”
Flipping the hood up over his face, he picked up his bow and quiver and was on his way.
As it turned out, China White didn’t know what had happened to Ramirez.
That’s what she claims anyway, Oliver thought to himself as he left Infinity Dynamics’ warehouse roughly half an hour later, having been lucky enough to find her in the establishment in question.
As usual, she had objected rather strenuously and physically to his looking into her affairs. However, while he certainly didn’t trust her, he felt she was telling the truth. He hadn’t missed the brief flicker of confusion in her expression when he had called out his questions regarding Ramirez’s disappearance.
So what now? He thought as he made his way back to Verdant.
He set out at a run across a warehouse roof, which lay partly under one of the city’s bridges over the river. As he did so he heard the screech of tires on asphalt, accompanied by screams, coming from the bridge up above.
With dawning horror, he realized that someone seemed to be falling from the bridge. Increasing the speed of his run, he tried to think of a way to help, despite knowing he would be too late.
Then, the impossible happened. Somehow, a person rose up and *caught* the figure tumbling down from the bridge.
Somehow, defying belief, the two figures came to a gentle landing a mere one hundred meters away. Oliver noted the young woman -teenager really- who had just been snatched from the jaws of death. She seemed stunned, yet managed to turn to thank her savior, gasping out an apology and something about a ‘dare’ from a friend and having climbed up onto the bridge’s railing.
That was when Oliver’s eyes turned to the girl’s savior and he gasped in shock as Kara waved away the girl’s thanks.
Hearing his gasp, she turned towards him and her eyes widened in recognition. Then she was somehow gone.
Well, this certainly changes things, he thought to himself with a certain mordant wit.
Part one is here, part three is here, part four is here, part five is here, part six is here, part seven is here.
Notes (again, because I’m a nerd and I like learning things):
-Apparently there had been issues with facial recognition software and its use by police has yielded a lot of false positives: https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/may/15/uk-police-use-of-facial-recognition-technology-failure
-On the ethical and legal issues raised by the use of facial recognition software: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/07/how-good-facial-recognition-technology-government-regulation/397289/
-I used Arrow’s wiki pages on Felicity Smoak: http://arrow.wikia.com/wiki/Felicity_Smoak
-On what the Fortune 500 is (because I am not American so I wasn’t sure): https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/05/21/big-winners-fortune-500-list-walmart-exxon-mobil-amazon/628003002/
-While it is true that it is impossible to provide evidence of absence of an effect (such as in the case of a potential side effect of a medication), the precautionary principle really is a thing and it is an important concept in public health: “The principle states that in the case of serious or irreversible threats to the health of humans or the ecosystem, acknowledged scientific uncertainty should not be used as a reason to postpone preventive measures.” (From this reference: http://www.who.int/hia/examples/overview/whohia076/en/)
-On the cost of solar panels (includes an explanation of ‘hard’ vs. ‘soft’ costs, as well as how much of each is involved in the high cost of solar panels): https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/energy/2010/11/101105-cost-of-solar-energy/
-I wanted to know, just a little bit, what strategic planning is, because I was clueless.
(1) How to… design and implement a strategic plan. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2013/sep/19/how-to-strategic-planning
(2) What is strategic planning? http://www.diycommitteeguide.org/resource/what-strategic-planning
(3) Strategic planning. http://www.infoentrepreneurs.org/en/guides/strategic-planning/
On strategic vs. business planning…
(1) https://onstrategyhq.com/resources/what-is-the-difference-between-a-business-plan-and-a-strategic-plan/
(2) Business plan. What is a business plan? https://www.investopedia.com/terms/b/business-plan.asp
-What is the difference between a company and a corporation? https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-a-company-and-a-corporation
-Inc. or Ltd.: which sounds better? (refers to the Canadian context) https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/small-business/sb-money/inc-or-ltd-which-sounds-better/article4258956/
-Finally, HR professionals do mediate workplace disputes and grievances: https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbeshumanresourcescouncil/2018/04/10/14-ways-hr-professionals-can-solve-workplace-conflict-efficiently/#6566bd191250
-What is renewable energy? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renewable_energy (It should also be noted that ‘renewable’ does not necessarily mean ‘environmentally friendly’, as the following references point out:
(1) https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/036054429290116H
(2) https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2016/nov/14/hydroelectric-dams-emit-billion-tonnes-greenhouse-gas-methane-study-climate-change)