Finally Home

Chapter 56

We just closed up the club, and Oliver and I were heading over to speak to Tommy.

"How we doing?" Oliver asked as we came to Tommy's side, at the bar.

"We're in the black. And the green." Tommy said handing Oliver a bunch of papers.

"I like how we've gone from throwing money at clubs to catching it." Oliver leaned against the bar. "Oh, look at these. What sort of business has a lost and found that's just filled with women's underwear?"

Oliver picked up the lost and found bucket. I shook my head, as Oliver joked.

"The best business ever?" Tommy smiled. "Having this much fun should be against the law."

It was good to see them back to normal. I heard a door shut and I quickly looked in it's direction. Mr.Lance.

"Oh, if wishing made it so." He quipped. "Sorry, am I interrupting something?"

"Is Laurel okay?" Tommy asked, his face growing concerned.

"She's fine. This visit is about something else. A girl just got mowed down a couple blocks from here. On the Starling Bridge. Ring any bells with you three?" Mr.Lance showed us a picture of a girl on his phone.

I shocked my head, the girl completely unfamiliar.

"Nope." Tommy said.

"Should she?" Oliver asked Mr.Lance.

Mr.Lance pulled out a bag of evidence with an access bracelet. On it was the word Verdant.

"She was in your club tonight." He said.

"A lot of people were." I defended.

"You think someone killed her?" Oliver asked.

"Not someone. Something." Mr.Lance held up a bag of scary familiar pills.

"Vertigo." Oliver looked at me, both of us shell shocked.

"Yeah. You got a problem with that in this club?" Mr.Lance asked.

"Not that I'm aware of." Tommy said.

"We don't allow drugs in here, detective." Oliver spoke up.

"Control your clientele. Before anyone else wanders into traffic." Mr.Lance left.

The look in his eyes said he suspected Tommy and Oliver. Given the Queen family's past with Vertigo, he probably suspected Tommy more than Oliver.

"Is there any chance she could have scored the drugs in here?" Oliver turned to Tommy.

"I doubt it. I try not to hire too many drug dealers." Tommy quipped, as Oliver started to move towards the basement door.

"Get me a list of employees, anyway. I'll have Felicity cross reference it for drug arrests."

"That includes the three of us, you know." We stopped moving as Oliver punched in the code to open the basement door. "I thought the vigilantes finished off the Count."

"We did." I shook my head walking into our base.

~~

Oliver suited up in seconds. He was gonna go check in on the Count, while I stayed back. I shot a text to Diggle, telling him to get here as soon as possible. Within 20 minutes he was at the base.

"Got here as quickly as I could. This about the glyph in the notebook?"

"Felicity is still working on that. We have another problem." I clicked on a news channel.

"Starling City is once again at war with the drug known on the streets as Vertigo. It used to be the city's most lethal vice. But the purple and green pill was nowhere to be found for the last three months." The news anchor spoke before I paused her.

"Over the last few days, the city has been flooded with a new version of Vertigo. More addictive. More unstable. It killed a girl in the club. Just like it almost killed Thea."

"Okay what are you thinking? We should pay the Count a visit?"

"He was my first visit. Waste of time." Oliver entered, setting down his bow. "He's sumasshedshiy."

Oliver's final word confused Diggle. It was Russian for crazy. Of course he was, with as much Vertigo as we dosed him with, he got out lucky. Diggle looked at me confused.

"Crazy." I said.

"Since he was the only one that knew the formula for Vertigo I don't even know where to begin." Oliver continued.

"Good, you're here. Of course you're here. Where else would you be? You clearly love it down here." Felicity entered and went straight to the computer. "You gotta see this."

She clicked a few buttons before a new news channel popped up.

"I'm here at the scene where police say a distured patient escaped only minutes ago. Authorities issued an immediate lockdown at the Starling County Institute For Mental Health following the breakout. Police are warning people to avoid contact with the drug dealer known as the Count."

"Not so crazy after all." Diggle turned to Oliver.

~~

Slade and I sparred as Oliver and the girl, Shado, talked. Slade held his ground easily. I eventually found an opening and knocked him to the ground. I pinned him with my legs.

"You're teaching me that one." He smirked.

"Only if you show me where the knife was." I felt the steel blade press against my back.

I stood up and reached my hand to him. I helped him up.

"Careful. The tension in that bow's a 150 pounds. Snap it, you'll all be covered by fiber shrapnel in your eyes." Shado warned as Oliver played with Yao Fei's bow.

"She's right. You're not strong enough, kid." Slade then looked at me and Shado. "Go again?"

"It's pretty existing that the three of you are such bad asses but do you think that maybe we should be making a plan to stop Fyers, and I don't know save your dad?" Oliver's voice was full of sarcasm.

"Does he always whine this much?" Shado asked, standing.

"This is one of his good days." Slade quipped.

"Can he fight?" Shado asked, getting in stance.

"I've tried. Never much success."

"I'm sitting right here." Oliver's voice was now full of annoyance.

"Well, I haven't tried yet." Shado said.

Slade laughed, and then we started sparring again, this time with the addition of Shado.

~~Hi, Fallen_Angel here. Sorry for not posting on Friday. I had a really hectic weekend, and only just got to writing this chapter. I should be back on a normally schedule this week. See you on Friday. Have a good day. Be good people.~~