Arrow The Cat and the Canary

Chapter Two

Looking around at the surrounding pile of unconscious bodies, Laurel took a second to breathe. She finally took in her surroundings. The dimly lit warehouse was home to several aisles of large nondescript wooden crates, each holding high tech army weapons and devices meant only to be used in the most brutal of combat. 'What's Darkh planning?' She thought aloud running her fingers along the smooth grain of one of the crates. She was disrupted by the sound of her comms being activated and the sound of Felicity's voice falling into her ear.

"Okay, so after just a teeny bit of hacking in to a federal database, which I know 'technically' is wrong, immoral and just a little illegal, I managed to get into the inventory for the warehouse. The deed belongs to one; Mr Ted Kord. I mean, you'd think after all this time tech companies would think to up the security in their warehouses." She laughed to herself for a second. She loved to be smarted than everyone else. While at times it could be a bit cocky, Laurel respected it. She knew that Felicity was sure of herself and confident in her work. She admired her. "Anyway, from what I can tell, Kord Industries is housing one third of a chemical weapon they've just completed in there. It's a powerful airborne hallucinogen capable of incapacitating opponents and leaving them in a crippling state of fear, trapped in their worst nightmares. Fair to say it's something that we want to keep out of Darkh's hands."

She had been talking at a hundred miles a minute, which was nothing new, it just took Laurel a second to fully process all the information. She glanced over to Oliver to see the look on his face. Something not too far off fear. She understood how serious this was now. He was the first to break the silence;

"We need to get that out of here and as far away from Star City as we can." He spoke with such dominating purpose. "Digg, can you contact Lyla and organise transportation to an A.R.G.U.S. black site?"

"On it." Diggle replied, stepping away to call his wife, the head of the secret government organisation A.R.G.U.S. As he walked away, Oliver turned back to Laurel and Thea.

"Let's try and find the compound before Lyla gets here and have it ready for her. The sooner that it's away from Darkh, the better. Laurel, search along the south wall. Speedy, you check along the north and I'm going to look upstairs." The two of them nodded simultaneously at him before turning and walking away.

Walking along the long aisles, Laurel was dwarfed by the enormous wooden crates piled high on top of each other. This wasn't going to be an easy task, she thought to herself as she stood silently, pressing her fingers lightly against the side of one of the crates while trying to read the minuscule black ink printed onto the shipping label. She didn't understand half of the words on it but hope she would know it when she came across it. By the time she got to the third row of boxes, words were starting to blur together and not make sense anymore. She was wiped out from taking on the ghosts after spending four hours in court earlier that day trying to plead the case of a wrongfully accused victim in a homicide case which had been grasping the attention of everyone in Star City. The jury was still out and was set to reconvene the following day, if she had the energy to get up the next day to be there. Her attention was fully snapped back to reality however when her eyes roamed across the words "CAUTION: Dangerous Hallucinogen". Bingo! She grabbed the top of the box and began to pry the lid off with great difficulty, finally managing to loosen it free enough to reach in and take out the vile containing the lime green liquid. It was about the size of a water bottle, with crystal clear transparent glass. Her hand trembled slightly as she held it, fully aware of the power it held and the potential danger it possessed if it were to fall into the wrong hands. Before she was able to activate her comms to contact Oliver or the rest of the team to let them know she had located it, she heard the sound of glass shattering and spun around to see a large figure all dressed in black leap down from one of the skylights above her. He landed on one knee and looked over at her, his dark eyes full on intention. A black domino mask adorned his face, the same colour as the leather bike jacket he wore with a pair of black jeans, dark grey t-shirt and heavy black boots. The shock of his arrival caused Laurel to take a step back and delayed her reaction. It took her a moment to process it all. By the time he got to his feet however, she had already set the vile back into its crate and drawn her tonfa.

"I'll be taking that if you don't mind." He said to her, his voice digitally altered by the same type of technology Oliver used in his Green Arrow suit. Impressive.

"I can't let you do that." She replied sternly, tightening her grip on her tonfa. Her eyes darted all around the stranger, trying to anticipate any sudden movements.

"I guess I'll just have to take it by force then." He said as he lunged towards her, taking her by surprise. His shoulder slammed into her ribs as the two of them went tumbling to the ground, her assailant landing on top of her. Without even having to think, she took a deep breath and released a blast of her Canary Cry on him dazing him just long enough to grab him by his jacket and push him off of her. She quickly got to her feet and looked on the ground for where she had dropped her tonfa. She didn't notice her assailant get up behind her or see him swing her tonfa back and clock her on the side of the head with it. She dropped to the ground as the pain exploded along the side of her head. She fell with a thud and just about heard her tonfa clatter onto the floor through the ringing in her ears. Her vision began to blur, but she could make out the silhouette of her attacker walking towards the crate and taking the vile out. He turned back to look at her and she could hear the muffled sound of his voice through the growing ringing.

"'Til next time...", before turning and walking away as her the world around her darkened and turned to black.