Arrow

by Marc Guggenheim

  “I won’t be back.” She said it with defiance and slight anger mixed, he thought, with embarrassment. He was the mayor, there was no reason to be scared of the mayor.

  “No, you won’t.” Oliver guided her with a sweep of his hand. She stepped over the threshold and turned, mouth open to say something.

  He shut the door firmly in her face.

  She was gone from his mind the second he stepped away from the door. He shook off his suit jacket, laying it over the end of the couch, then stepped over a broken plate containing the remains of someone’s—probably William’s—dinner mixed with shards of shattered porcelain. Squaring his shoulders he moved toward his son’s room.

  The door was shut again.

  He knocked softly and turned the knob. Pushing the door open gently, he tensed, waiting for some thrown projectile to smash against it.

  Nothing happened.

  The door opened to a room that looked almost normal. Based on the rest of the apartment, he had anticipated some destruction. William’s room looked just as it had when he’d left this morning, the bed slightly more rumpled, a few action figures and other assorted things in different places but, on first glance, fundamentally the same.

  His son was nowhere to be seen.

  “William.” He stepped into the room, eyes scanning.

  His voice was the only sound. The covers on the bed revealed that William wasn’t under there. The closet door yawed open, showing the jumble of shoes and boxes that lived there at the moment. There wasn’t enough room in there, unless William could fold himself into a tiny square that didn’t breathe.

  He leaned over, peering into the small gap between the matched set of dressers. William could fit there, hidden almost perfectly.

  It was empty.

  A noise from outside the room made him step back into the hall.

  It wasn’t a sob, not strong enough for that, not sharp enough for that. It was smaller, quicker. A hitch of breath, a brief—so brief—little strangle of noise. Frowning, he moved down the hall to the bathroom. It was a small room, all white tile with a blue accent that surrounded the sink, toilet, and tub. The shower curtain was closed, but it moved, just slightly, and there was a dark shadow inside it.

  What should I do? he thought.

  If only he’d brought Felicity with him. She was awkward with people sometimes, but her good-heartedness would’ve shone through, would have set William at ease.

  Oliver didn’t have a good heart to shine through. He had made himself a vessel of violence, of vengeance. But a traumatized boy, his traumatized son, couldn’t be dealt with using fists and arrows and brutality.

  He wished for Thea.

  His sister would’ve had William comfortable in moments. But Thea wasn’t here, couldn’t be here.

  He was.

  He was here with his son.

  Oliver knelt on the tile next to the shower. He didn’t say anything, simply stayed, letting his presence fill the space, waiting to see if William would acknowledge it. After many long moments, the form shifted inside the tub, moving just enough to make the vinyl curtain rustle.

  “When I was your age I used to have a space in the kitchen.” He lowered his face closer to the shower curtain, his voice even, almost monotone, as he tried to speak gently. “A cupboard that everyone had forgotten about. When I found it the only things inside were dozens of jars of something that looked like mint jelly and two dented cans with no labels. It was small, not much bigger than I was.” He swallowed his discomfort, not knowing where his confession was going, just working off feeling. “It was dark but I liked that. It was my place. I was safe there because no one could find me—they didn’t know where I was. It was my hiding place.”

  “I’m not hiding.” William’s voice was quiet, but the bitterness still cut through.

  Gently, Oliver nudged the curtain open. William lay in the bottom of the tub on his back, eyes closed. His hair was plastered to his forehead with dampness, but otherwise he looked as if he were simply sleeping.

  “What are you doing then?”

  It took a long time for William to answer.

  “Being alone.”

  He didn’t open his eyes.

  2

  The whiskey splashed into the tumbler. There was no ice or water to break it up, just a fall of deep amber that filled the glass two-thirds full. He set the bottle down and lifted the drink.

  The fumes of it took his breath slightly, filling his mouth with the taste before he even took a sip.

  The doorbell chimed.

  He set the glass down, the whiskey untasted.

  Moving quickly, before the doorbell could chime again, he crossed the room and opened the door. John Diggle stood there.

  “John,” he said in greeting, stepping back to let his friend inside.

  Diggle looked him up and down, taking in Oliver’s rumpled sleeves and creased pants, then glancing around the still disheveled apartment.

  “Rough night?”

  “I just got William to bed.”

  The newcomer didn’t even glance at his watch. He knew exactly how late it was.

  “Well, turn the television on to channel fifty-two, the evening is about to get worse.”

  Oliver sighed, stepped over, and picked up the whiskey. He raised it. “I have a feeling I’m going to need this. Would you like me to pour you one?”

  Diggle just shook his head.

  Oliver took a pull from the glass, the dark liquid lighting the back of his throat with heat. It splashed down into his empty stomach, his half-finished sushi dinner long departed from his system, and began to work immediately.

  Topping the glass, he left the bottle open on the bar and went to the couch. Diggle had already found the remote and sat perched on the edge of the couch with the television on. Oliver sank into the cushions as Diggle found the right channel and anchorwoman Bethany Snow filled the screen. Tonight she wore a sharp blue suit that made her hair seem more blond than normal, and she wore an expression more stern than usual. She was mid-sentence as Diggle unmuted the television.

  “—we live in this city with vigilantes as a fact of life. Unlike the bright and shiny Flash in Central City, ours operate in the shadows. Most of the time they seem to make a difference. However, their means and methods are always questionable.

  “Should we allow these people to interfere in police investigations just because they have costumes? Worse, what happens if they decide to go rogue and become criminals? Would the police be willing to stop them, and would they even have the means? Are we simply biding our time until we are in danger from the very people some look to as heroes?

  “Channel fifty-two has this exclusive video, obtained just tonight, showing the Green Arrow crossing the line.” She leaned in to the camera. “Before we roll I have to warn you, this footage may be unsettling for many viewers. It depicts a brutal attack. Yes, the victim is a criminal who had just been part of an armed robbery attempt moments before this was recorded. That aside, this footage contains violence that is difficult to watch. If you have young children in the room, you may want to send them out now.”

  Oliver looked over at Diggle, who nodded back to the television.

  The footage began, silent, a grainy image of a door in an alleyway. From the left side of the screen a young man stumbled into the frame, coming around a corner. He crouched against the wall for a long moment before glancing around rapidly. This stopped as his face turned toward the camera. He moved to stand when from the left side a dark figure, moving in a blur, crashed into him, driving him to the ground.

  The figure bent, lifting the man before slapping him with a wide swing of his right hand. The young man raised his hands in supplication to the hooded figure who loomed over him, then turned back to the camera.

  The young man was begging for mercy.

  The hooded figure pulled a gun from a holster he wore on his side. Oliver leaned forward, the half-full glass of whiskey forgotten in his hand.

  The
hooded person swung the gun high, reaching far behind him for the maximum amount of force. He held the gun back, shoulders moving in a way that Oliver recognized as the body mechanics of yelling. He had a moment to wonder what the hooded figure had screamed before the beating began.

  Over and over and over again the gun rose and fell, coming back up a little darker each time.

  For the last few minutes of the beating the young man lay motionless on the ground, long unconscious and unable to fight off his attacker. Appearing to be satisfied, the hooded figure wiped his gun on the young man’s shirt, holstered it, and moved off camera.

  Bethany Snow’s face came back on screen. Diggle muted the sound before she could speak, then he turned toward Oliver.

  “That wasn’t me,” Oliver said.

  “I know,” Diggle said. “I’ve trained with you enough by now to recognize your moves. Lyla turned me on to this, so I came over to give you a heads up.”

  “Does A.R.G.U.S. know who it is?”

  “She asked me the same thing. Looks like you have a copycat.”

  Oliver took another drink. This time the alcohol tasted bad in his mouth. He made a face and set it down on the table.

  Have to remember to pour that out before William wakes up, he thought. “Could it be one of Faust’s operatives? Perhaps someone else Chase has set up for me to deal with?”

  Diggle considered both possibilities. “I’d strike the Chase angle just because that psycho already showed he’ll let you know—even from the grave—when he is messing with you.” Diggle shook his head, “Man, that guy.”

  Oliver knew exactly what he meant. It was difficult to grasp how meticulously evil Adrian Chase had turned out to be. Keeping secret his identity as Prometheus, while working alongside them as Adrian Chase. Burrowing his way into all aspects of Team Arrow, turning people he, Oliver, had taken under his wing and using them to betray the team. Uncovering his secret son. Even now, dead by his own hand, he still tormented Oliver and Star City.

  Adrian Chase was a nightmare in human form. Pure psychotic obsessive evil personified.

  “Back on track,” Diggle said. “We’ve gone up against Faust twice now, with the fire at Dearden Tower and then on that ship. He had some muscle working for him, but nobody like this. This guy is completely different. He looks low-key, more like a lone wolf vigilante.”

  “You think he’s purposely copying me?”

  “Did you not hear the ‘lone wolf vigilante’ part?”

  “I’m not a lone wolf.”

  “I’m your friend, and on your team. Trust me, you’re still a lone wolf at your core.”

  Oliver said nothing. Even this far in, he still found it tempting at times to default to his original modus operandi. To working alone. Every time he worked with Team Arrow, it took a conscious effort. Being solo had been ground into him during his time on Lian Yu, where he could only rely on himself.

  It was more complicated than self-reliance, though. He’d seen too much bloodshed, too many people hurt and killed—too much mourning caused by his mission in life—to be entirely comfortable having other people do what he did.

  Even the man sitting next to him.

  John Diggle had proven himself a warrior long before Oliver ever met him and brought him into the fold, serving in the army with distinctions for valor in combat. He’d listened to the stories Diggle told late in the night. John had also proven time and again that Oliver could rely on him, trust him with his life and the lives of those he loved. Yet Oliver still had to fight the temptation to cut him out when things got bad.

  John had a family, Lyla and John junior. If anything happened to him because Oliver included him in a mission…

  The guilt wouldn’t destroy him—his heart was too closed off, too calloused for that—but it would drive him further from his tenuous connection with humanity, push him back over into the killer he always could become again. He was never far from that, really, but if Diggle was killed, he might well embrace it.

  Just like Adrian Chase had said.

  “—get out there and find him.” Diggle was talking, but he hadn’t been listening.

  “I’m sorry, John, what was that?”

  Diggle looked at him. “You okay?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Diggle turned his head, giving Oliver the side-eye.

  “Really, I’m fine, I just have a lot on my mind.”

  “Oliver, you always have a lot on your mind.”

  “Then you should be used to it.”

  “Was that a joke?”

  “May have been,” Oliver replied without changing his expression. “You were saying—”

  “I said maybe we should hit the streets, and find this copycat of yours.”

  “I agree.”

  “Gotta wonder if he might even be a good addition to the team.”

  The words made Oliver clench his jaw. “I don’t think so.”

  “I’ll admit that what we saw in that footage was pretty brutal,” Diggle pressed, “but really, we’ve both done just as bad. Judging from the reports, this guy took down three armed criminals. That’s impressive by any measure.”

  Oliver didn’t say anything in response, but the tension across his shoulders made him shift on the couch. He glanced at the glass of whiskey, but left it where it was.

  “The team is fine as it stands,” he said.

  “We lost Ragman and Artemis. We could replace them.”

  “The team. Is fine.”

  “We could always use another shooter.”

  “I’ve got you and Rene. Shooters are covered.”

  “I’m former military, Oliver, you always need more shooters.”

  Oliver gave his friend a hard look.

  Diggle raised his hands. “I’m just saying, with this Faust still out there, and the fact that the bad guys just keep coming, we could bring this guy in, see if he’s a match, and then train him if he is. It could be a good thing.”

  Oliver forced himself to consider it. “I don’t like the idea,” he said, “but we should find this copycat and see what side he’s on. That may give you your answer.”

  Diggle let it stand.

  It was as close as he would get to an agreement.

  3

  No one questioned her as she walked down the hallway. Beige walls, pastel artwork in blond wood frames, and tile on the floor a pale eggshell-and-sage-green speckle turned off-white from the cast of the fluorescent lights above. Everything seemed bland, muted, designed to keep people calm in uncalm times.

  Until she reached the uniformed Star City police officer reading a magazine outside room 623 of Starling General. He was lanky, stretched tall, all knees and shoulders in the chair he sat in. He had the sleek otter build of a swimmer. He stood out, his dark blue SCPD uniform a harsh contrast as it ate the light.

  He didn’t stand as she approached, but he did give her the once up and down, his eyes flinty, checking to see if she was a threat. He seemed to dismiss the notion, then gave her another up and down look over, this time with a cocky grin and a sparkle in his eye.

  She shrugged as she drew near, moving the hem of her short-cropped leather jacket.

  Exposing her badge.

  The cocky grin disappeared as he jumped to his feet.

  She raised her hand, reassuring him. “It’s alright, Officer—”

  “Kannan, ma’am.”

  “Drake, Dinah.” Her hand went out between them. It took a moment for him to reach out and shake it, and when he did it only lasted a second. She noted that he didn’t give his first name as she had.

  “I’m here to ask our suspect a few questions,” she said.

  “I thought he was the victim of a crime?” Officer Kannan scratched the bottom edge of his jaw. “He took a real beating from the Arrow.”

  “I think they call him Green Arrow now.”

  “Green Arrow, Blue Arrow, Purple Arrow,” he said, his voice harsh. “It don’t matter what they call him.”

  Great,
she thought, this guy doesn’t like vigilantes.

  Then again, neither had she once.

  Before she became one.

  “We have two eyewitnesses who put him as part of a crew called ‘the X gang,’” she replied. “They tried to rob the Cashmere Club. He’s not just some civilian who got jumped.”

  “He looks like he should be dead,” Kannan said. “Nobody should’ve lived through a beating like that.”

  “I’ll see that when I go in.”

  Officer Kannan nodded. “You want me to keep my place? ’Cause I could go take care of some business.”

  “Go stretch your legs, do your business, get some air and some coffee.” She waved him off. “I’ll handle this for the next half-hour, so be back before then.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.” He touched his fingertips to his brow in a salute.

  Dinah watched him walk down the hall, pausing to check the nurses’ station. She allowed a tiny smile when all the nurses ignored him completely, and he kept going.

  Once he’d rounded the corner, she pushed the door open.

  * * *

  “Tell me if this hurts, and how much.”

  The doctor’s thumb pressed deep alongside the thick scar, digging underneath it. Diggle watched it happen but there was no sensation, not even pressure. The area felt numb, as if it had been anesthetized. That sent his mind back to some of the things Oliver had shown him about pressure points. There was a nerve bundle where the doctor was applying pressure. He should have had pain shooting all the way up into his neck, making his jaw clench and his eyes water as the muscle chain spasmed.

  Instead he felt nothing.

  “Now, don’t be stoic, Mr. Diggle,” she said. “I need honest feedback to this, that’ll get us nowhere.”

  “I’m not being stoic, Doc.” He took a deep breath, trying to clear some of the bitterness out of his voice. “Nothing is happening.”

  Dr. Schwartz moved her hands, using her fingertips to feel along the edge of the scar. “I know it can be frustrating, Mr. Diggle.”

  “That’s not as comforting as you think it is.”

  “Have your symptoms gotten worse?”

  “That’s why I’m here,” Diggle said.