Love, War & Tears (AvaLance)

Chapter 2 - The Legends

Sara was in the cockpit of the plane sitting in the pilot's seat with Nate sitting next to her in the co-pilots chair. They had just taken off from Zambesi and were on their way back to Star City, the home base of The Legends. The Legends gained their title as they completed their missions and their reputation grew as an extraction team who were able to get into any place in the world to rescue abductees.

Sara's Dad, Quentin Lance had wanted her to follow in his footsteps and join the Police Department however she had other ideas as she wanted to get away from Star City. Her and her sister Laurel had a falling out over Laurel's boyfriend when they were younger, so Sara decided to join the Army to escape. After discharging from the Army, Sara put the extraction team together recruiting a bunch of misfits she had worked with throughout her military career. She also took on a few civilians she knew would be assets to the work she endeavoured to carry out. Sara had put together an extraction team, who were now referred to as The Legends.

Sara through her army career, trained in the Cultural Support Team, known as CST's and had graduated from selection school at Fort Bragg. The CST were a new initiative for Special Operations created in 2010. They were a unit of female soldiers embedded with Rangers and SEALS carrying out raids in Afghanistan. Their objective was to collect intelligence from local women which their male counterparts were not able to do. Since discharging from the Army, Sara had put together an extraction team running missions into regions where even some governments were hesitant to rescue abductees. Sara's team consisted of Mick Rory, Zari Tomaz, Amaya & Charlie Jiwe who are twin sisters, Nate Heywood and Ray Palmer.

She had met Mick while she served in the CST in Afghanistan where their teams ran raids together. Mick was a Ranger and initially had reservations about working with females in the field. While in a village, Sara had gathered information from one of the women about the location of a number of roadside bombs which the Rangers were about to walk into as they were clearing an area in a village they had been sent into. Mick was leading the Rangers when Sara had managed to get to the other side of the village in time to warn him of the danger they were approaching. Mick had since come to trust Sara and had acknowledged that she had his back and from that incident onwards he referred to her as 'boss'.

After discharging, Mick found it difficult to adjust to civilian life and finally found himself in jail for petty theft and grand larceny. Sara had heard about Mick being in jail through Oliver Queen, the Mayor of Star City and an old boyfriend of her sisters'. When she was putting her team together, Sara knew that she needed Mick for the team with his experience in combat and that he was the muscle she knew she could rely on. With the help of her sister Laurel who was a Lawyer, she managed to get Mick out of jail and join the team. He was one of the first she recruited.

Sara had met Amaya in Afghanistan during Amaya's first deployment. Amaya was a Doctor in the Army working as an orthopaedic surgeon in a level two facility at Kandahar. Sara had first met Amaya when visiting one of her team who was being treated at the facility. They hit it off straight away and had become good friends.

Charlie, Amaya's twin sister was an Army bomb disposal expert attached to the Explosive Ordinance Disposal Team. Charlie was a Corporal in the British Army and when she learned Amaya was deploying to Afghanistan for a second tour she managed to get a deployment at the same time.

Amaya and Charlie's Mom who was born in Zambesi, had moved to the US when she was younger and had met their Dad there. Their dad was British and had moved to the States for work. When their parents split up Charlie wanted to move to England with her Dad and experience a life there. Amaya stayed with her Mom in the US growing up and eventually her Mom moved back to Zambesi. Even though Amaya and Charlie were living in separate countries they still shared their close bond and kept in constant contact with each other.