William didn’t look up.
“Do you like it?”
William shrugged, but kept his head down.
“Have you gotten to the part with the falcon?”
William twisted, drawing his knees up and turning to face away from his father. He pulled the book up closer to his face. As he did, Oliver’s chest felt like it had been filled with cement. He watched the son he didn’t know, but loved so much it hurt in a way he didn’t know things could hurt.
Slowly he stood, “I’ll go make dinner. If you need me, I’m here.”
William didn’t respond.
11
“You about ready?” the driver asked.
The man in the back of the van didn’t look up, just kept pushing bullets into the curved magazine between his knees. “I’d have been ready if One-Eyed Joey here had done his job.”
“Hey!” Joey said from the bench across from the speaker. “I’m not your butler.”
“I go on a job I expect everyone to be professional.” The man shoved the magazine into the assault rifle across his lap and pulled back the bolt.
“Professionals check their own equipment, Chavis.” The driver slid out of the seat, joining them in the back of the panel van and picking up a shotgun. “Joey got the guns and the ammo, you do the rest.”
“Look, Mick,” Chavis said, and he narrowed his eyes. “I don’t like you two. I’m an idiot for signing on to be a part of this crew.”
“This is your audition.” Mick began pulling things out of the bag on the floor between them. “You’re not a part ’til you pull this off.”
“I’m from Blüdhaven,” Chavis said. “Knocking over a nightclub will be a piece of cake. Hell, with credit cards and e-tickets, it’s hard to get decent cash from a place like that.”
“Yo, it’s a big nightclub,” Joey said, and he laughed. “Blüdhaven ain’t got nothin’ on Star City.”
“You don’t even know Blüdhaven.”
“Knock it off, you two.” Mick handed Chavis a wad of cloth. Chavis shook it out, holding it up in the dim light. It was a slipover hood, the face of it painted with a wide red X below the eyeholes.
“What’s this?”
“You gotta have a gimmick in Star City, if you want attention.”
“We’re criminals—why would we want attention?”
“Look, Chavis, you got a good rep, quick with a gun and not a coward.” Mick leaned in. “Here we got players who do big things. You want the real money, the real power, you get their attention and they bring you into their operations. That’s what the gimmick is for.”
“Your gimmick is a bloody X on your face?”
Mick pulled his mask on. “We’re the X Gang, and we’ll cross you off the list,” he said, words muffled. “Now mask up.”
Chavis shook his head. “I should’ve stayed in Blüdhaven.”
* * *
“Hurry up, old man!” Mick screamed over the music that throbbed around them. He pressed the muzzle of his shotgun against the back of the security guard who sat in a chair in front of him. He had his hands raised and his eyes closed, trembling lips moving in a silent prayer to someone who might or might not be listening.
“I’m trying, I’m trying.” The man’s hands shook as he shoved wads of crumpled money from the counting table into the bag.
“Don’t drop any of those bills!” Joey rammed the muzzle of his rifle into the man’s ribs, making him jerk sideways. “We want them all.”
Chavis shook his head. The bass line of the music from inside the club pounded against his temples and the mask made him sweat and his face itch. The X on the front of it had been done with spray paint and the harsh chemical burn of it was all he could smell. He looked left and right, keeping watch for anyone coming from the concert in the arena. Some kind of jam band was on the stage, all drums and guitar and heavy bass. He hated that kind of music, hippie music, but it made for a light security staff and a lot of money in the box office.
Money the man was done shoving into the bag.
“Here, take it.” He pushed it away as if it were on fire.
Joey giggled and grabbed it, swinging his rifle up and clipping the man across the temple with the muzzle. The thin skin over the man’s brow split wide, blood rushing down over his eye as he stumbled from the blow.
“That’s for not moving faster.” Joey moved around the table to join Mick as the man wiped blood from his eye and stood straight.
“Please,” the man said. “Take the money and go.”
Chavis shook his head again.
“Before we do,” Mick racked the slide on his shotgun, the metal-on-metal clack cutting over the deep throb of the music. “You’ve been crossed out by the X Gang.”
The man stood there, hands raised, one palm bloody.
“Say the name!” Mick screamed.
“The X Gang!” the man cried. “The X Gang!”
“Hey,” Chavis reached his hand toward Mick. “We got the cash. Let’s go…”
Mick swung the shotgun toward him.
Chavis jerked his rifle up on instinct. The two of them stood, fingers on the triggers, staring at each other though the eyeholes of their emblazoned hoods.
Joey giggled.
The security guard wept.
I’m going to have to shoot this idiot, Chavis thought.
“We gotta spread the rep,” Mick growled.
Joey screamed when the first bullet struck him in the thigh.
* * *
Chavis slammed his back against the alley wall. He couldn’t breathe, his chest feeling like iron bands had clamped down and been cinched around him. He could only sip the air. Through the pounding in his ears he heard himself. It sounded like he was crying.
Salt tasted on his upper lip. It could’ve been sweat. Could’ve been tears.
In his head all he saw was One-Eyed Joey bleeding out on the ground, the puddle under him spreading in a rush, streams of thick syrupy crimson pulsing from between his fingers.
And Mick.
Mick took one high in the chest, a bullet that hit him like a sledgehammer hit concrete it intended to pulverize. He watched as Mick flipped backward, picked up off his feet and spun head over heels before gravity slammed him to the ground. Whatever sound he made as he landed, it was drowned out by the thunder of the gunshot so concussive it breezed across his chest when it hit.
He had run then, run as fast as he could, following Blüdhaven rules.
“Masks on the scene, get gone, get clean.” So the song went.
Blüdhaven had vigilantes, just like Star City. You didn’t stay while they were on the scene. Especially when you watched them drop two of your three-man crew.
I thought they used arrows in Star City? he thought. I hate this town.
What was that sound?
He looked around the corner.
Nothing, just a dirty alleyway, trash piled and strewn across it.
Lucky I didn’t break my neck.
He slumped against the wall.
Maybe I got away.
Cameras! He jerked up, eyes searching the alley for any sign of a camera. In Blüdhaven, that was how the masks tracked you. They saw you on camera and next thing you knew, bam, you were busted.
There, on the corner of the building, a dull red light. A security camera. He had to move.
Rolling left, he pushed off the wall with his shoulder, sucking in air to—
WHAM!
Something hit him in the temple. He stumbled, dropping to one knee. Pain pulsed from his ear across the backs of his eyes. His head felt swollen, mushy on the inside, his entire brain rattled. His vision went blurry, everything skewed, the colors all wrong. Nevertheless, he could see a dark shape that stood between him and the light above.
The figure was tall and wore a green hood. It leaned down toward him, the space where the face would be just a shadow in the blackness. Noises came from the hood, but his ears rang like epileptic church bells and he couldn’t hear anything
but them.
He tried to talk, but his swollen head wouldn’t let his brain connect with his mouth. There was a flash of darkness and sharp pain jolted from his face.
He’d been slapped. The green hooded figure had slapped him across the face.
He knelt, rocking from the blow, but it cleared his head a little bit. He raised shaking, empty hands. He was caught, he’d go to jail. No big thing—he’d be back on the street in forty-eight hours and back in Blüdhaven in another four beyond that.
“I surrender.”
The hooded figure pulled out a pistol, the sodium-yellow lights in the alley gleaming along its barrel.
“Tell me what I want to know.” The voice was amplified, booming and thunderous, rattling his skull.
What? What the hell does he want to know? Chavis tried to find the knowledge in the soup his mind had become. The hooded figure moved the gun to the other hand, holding it by the barrel now. He raised it, Chavis’s eyes tracking it, as it moved up and back to the furthest arc of the vigilante’s arm. Just past it, up on the wall, he could see the steady red dot of the still-watching camera.
He was still focused on it as the gun fell, but he stopped seeing it as the pistol-whipping began.
12
Oliver looked up as Lance stepped into his office, shutting the door quickly behind him. He set aside the report he had been reading. The look on Lance’s face said he wanted to discuss something, and that it wouldn’t wait. He waited for him to start.
Lance pulled up a chair.
“We need to put someone in Thea’s place.”
Oliver leaned back in his chair. “You think so?”
“Look,” Lance said, “I don’t mean to bring up anything painful. You know I love that kid, but she did a helluva job keeping up with you and making sure you see everyone you need to without making anyone suspicious of where you go when you do your ‘other work.’” He shook his head. “I can’t keep up with it all, not and do the job you ask me to do.”
“Thea isn’t just my family, Quentin, she’s an excellent chief of staff. It’s not like we can replace her by calling an employment agency.”
Lance blew air out of his mouth. “You don’t know the half of it. I’m taking calls and trying to juggle people for you. Man, they get upset if you mess up their time with the mayor.” His hands went up in surrender. “I just can’t do it.”
“Then let’s move Rene up.”
Lance stared at him for a long moment. “You did hear the part where I said people are hard to handle?”
“I did.”
Lance shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
“He’ll be fine.”
“Yeah, but will everyone else?”
Oliver’s cell phone vibrated on the desk by his hand. A glance showed that it was Felicity texting. He picked up the phone.
“Let’s give him a chance.”
FAUST LOCATION UNLOCKED.
TRANSMIT OR F2F?
“We have to finish this later,” he said, fingers already typing.
MOBILIZE THE TEAM
Lance didn’t even try to keep the irritation from his face.
13
The water lapping against the hull of the boat was black and looked slick in the sparse light of the riverfront. It wasn’t the biggest ship in the harbor—a mid-sized freighter one-third the size of the one on which he perched—but it would have at least five levels and countless nooks and crannies for enemies to hide in. This was going to be a hard mission. They would have to hit fast and drop as many as they could to keep from being overwhelmed.
Men and women carrying guns moved around the dock and the boat, not being subtle. He studied their movements and found no indication of military training. Not even the precision he had seen in the Skulls. These criminals simply wore dark clothes, no uniforms to make them easily recognizable to each other, no masks to conceal identity, just a bunch of thugs walking around “protecting” the dock. There were only four of them on the deck, none of them guarding the two gangplanks that were the only way someone could get on or off.
Amateurs.
But a lot of them. Just with the ones below him, they were outnumbered ten to one, and most of them were armed with more than a bow and some arrows. With that thought he shifted the quiver on his back and kept watching, and waiting.
“Spartan in position.” Diggle’s voice was clear in the comms.
His eyes shifted to the far side of the boat where Spartan would be hiding in the shadows, waiting on the signal. He couldn’t see him, but knew he was there.
“Black Canary in position.”
He twitched a smile at the sound of pride in Dinah’s voice. She had been a good addition to the team. Even though he was a little wary of meta-humans, he found that having one on his side could be a good thing. As a result, when Rory—Ragman—left and Dinah came along, he’d been comfortable asking her to join the fight.
He looked to where she was supposed to be, spotting her on top of a stack of crates on the deck of their target. She blended into the darkness, thanks in part to her new tactical suit. He only saw her because he had the higher vantage point, and knew where to look.
“Mister Terrific checking in.”
He didn’t look for Curtis. He would be way on the other side of the ship, somewhere out of sight. Hopefully out of sight. Holt had come far since joining the team, applying natural athleticism to combat skills, training under the guidance of the more seasoned members. He was the weakest fighter on Team Arrow, but more than able to handle the level of thugs they were dealing with this night.
His stealth skills were hit or miss, though.
Maybe Sara could work with him while she was here. She would be able to teach him more than anyone else about stealth and camouflage. Thinking about her caused him to look where she was supposed to be, and he caught a glimmer of something light coming over the rail of the ship near the bow. It was just the faintest flicker of not-dark against the night. He didn’t know how she could blend in like that, wearing white leather and having blond hair. League of Assassins training was the only explanation.
“White Canary in position,” she said, her voice a whisper. Then the comms went silent as everyone waited.
“Any word from Wild Dog?” he asked.
“He responded,” Felicity said. “But nothing since.”
“He had that thing,” Curtis said. “Maybe he got delayed.”
Oliver shifted his weight, changing position to ease the bulk of the loaded quiver on his back, considering how the plan could be adjusted if he wound up a man short.
“I’m here,” Rene snarled across the comms, his voice in a lower register than normal, simmering with anger. “Ready to put the hurt on some bad guys.”
Green Arrow stood from the shadow of the stacked tractor-trailer containers and drew his first arrow. He didn’t say anything over the comms, but simply let fly.
* * *
The two explosions lit the night from the left, throwing orange firelight up over her. She crouched lower, in case anyone was looking in her direction, but all the crooks below her were running to the rail to see what the ruckus was. A few started down the gangplank on her end of the ship. She could hear their boots clanging on the metal stairs, even over the chorus of their shouts.
Her heart raced, a thrill chasing through her veins on a stream of adrenaline. The explosions were jarring, the sound and light of them, trying to toss her mind back to Lian Yu and the hell into which it had exploded. She’d barely escaped with her life alongside the others.
But they had escaped.
Dinah pushed all that away, focusing on the here and the now, applying to the situation a mindfulness that only came with combat training. She wasn’t on Lian Yu, she was here, on this ship, in her new costume. She felt invincible, the new suit fitting her as if it were custom made—which it probably was.
Black Canary.
She’d been called the name, but now, in this suit, she felt… well, she felt l
ike a superhero. Gripping her bõ staff tightly, she waited for the signal to begin.
Another explosion rattled the ship, vibrating into her joints even up on the stack of wooden crates on which she perched. After the boom of it was a screech of metal.
The signal.
Up and over, she dropped from the top of the crates, giving just a brief glance up to see Green Arrow zip-lining across the space from the huge Japanese freighter he’d been on to the deck of the ship the rest of the team occupied. Her boots hit the deck, and immediately she had to duck to keep a thug from caving her skull in with a crowbar. As she dropped low the metal bar hit the crate with a thud. She used the momentum of her drop to swing the bõ staff in a low arc that connected with the man’s ankle. It snapped under the blow and the man fell.
She pulled back to hit him across the temple to stop him from screaming, but he passed out cold.
Movement to her left made her jerk around.
A flash of light, and she spun away.
The gun fired in the woman’s muscular hand, spitting muzzle flash just inches below her chin. The bullet missed her, singeing its way through a wave of her hair and lodging in the crate as well, but it was high enough that the flash took some of her night vision, solid dark eating the bottom edges of what she could see. She stepped back into the woman’s reach, getting inside the firing range, and locked her arm over her opponent’s outstretched one to keep the gun pointed behind her.
The woman snarled and lunged, her forehead crashing into Black Canary’s, making her diminished vision flare white with sharp, jolting pain. She dropped her bõ staff, knees nearly buckling. The woman jerked her arm, trying to free her gun hand. Dinah clamped down tighter and threw herself at the woman’s chest. Pressed closely against her she could see—mostly— enough to twist and slam the hard point of her elbow into the woman’s chin. That close she heard teeth clack, even over all the chaos around them.
Blood sprayed up onto the thug’s cheeks, her lip split from the elbow strike, eyes rolling up. Black Canary let her go and stepped back, making room, then bent to retrieve her bõ staff. Two quick strikes, one to the forearm to make the gun clatter to the deck, and the other across her temple to drive her down, as well.
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