Second Chances: Red Arrow

Chapter 5

Emiko was currently moving into her new home, which, to the surprise of everyone, was actually an old lighthouse in Hub City, since Emiko had always been partial to the water, even after what happened with the Queen's Gambit and she wanted a place by the water and what better place than a lighthouse, especially since it had been abandoned years ago, around the time the Hub City Penitentiary had been built on a small island in Lake Michigan about a dozen miles away from the shore to keep dangerous criminals away from the population. Though Emiko wasn't sure how good a job they did at that, since the city's crime problem was out of control. Then again, from what she heard, the prison had been shut down and now the inmates were shipped out to either Blackgate or Iron Heights for incarceration now for better containment.

Anyways, as said before, one of the reasons Emiko chose to live in a lighthouse was because of how much she loved water. Unlike her brother and sister, who'd always hated swimming, something Emiko found ironic considering where they'd both been over the past few years, meaning Lian Yu and Atlantis respectively, Emiko had always loved it. She'd been the captain of her middle school, high school and college swim teams, where she'd been a champion on all three. She'd even been in training for the Olympic qualifiers before the Gambit went down and she'd had to focus on her family.

But her love of water wasn't the only reason Emiko had bought this lighthouse. She'd also bought it because while she would be living in the sizable house right next to it, she felt that the abandoned lighthouse itself would make a good base of operations for her and the team that she'd eventually build.

Emiko had also taken more steps to establishing her life in Hub City, since while she'd been recruited for college for swimming, Emiko had been studying to become a teacher, since it turned out that in this reality, instead of wanting to run Queen Consolidated like in the old reality, Emiko had decided she wanted to be a teacher after the Olympics, though some of her plans had gone off road due to the Gambit going down, she'd still gotten her teaching degree and she'd taken a job at Hub City University as a professor of Japanese History and she was also the new coach of their swimming team, since the dean was hoping that with her mentorship, their swim team would win a championship and help promote the school's agenda. Emiko had taken the job because she wanted to help students keep their lives on track.

And Emiko wasn't the only one who was setting down roots in Hub City. Tommy Merlyn had also moved to Hub City, though while Emiko was more content with a more humble home and career, Tommy had gone all out. In addition to starting up Merlyn Global's new office in Hub City, he'd also bought a swanky new penthouse in uptown Hub City.

Emiko had rolled her eyes about that, but that didn't stop her from smirking in amusement about how he was clearly overcompensating with a huge apartment and show of wealth. She'd seen him and Oliver do it plenty of times. Speaking of Oliver, before she'd left to move to Hub City, he'd asked her to keep an eye on Tommy for him, since there was something different about him that he didn't trust and Emiko couldn't help but agree. Especially since they, along with Thea had left Tommy alone under his father's influence without any defense against it, since all three Queens had been away after the Gambit went down and she was concerned about him. She was hoping that the more time she could spend with him, away from his father, might help bring back the old Tommy and deprogram him from whatever Malcolm had pulled off.

And now it was time for her to start her mission, once Oliver's friend Cisco got her a proper suit, since she did not want to use her old Ninth Circle gear since for one thing, it had no identity concealment and for another, there were too many bad memories tied to that uniform from both realities. She wanted a fresh start.