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"Oliver, you're not listening to what I'm telling you."
Felicity watched with growing frustration as Oliver donned his leather uniform in terse silence. He was acting as though she weren't in the room and with every tense second that passed her desire to rip that hood off his head and strangle him with it grew exponentially.
"This is a trap," Felicity declared, eyes wide. "We're talking neon sign, flashing lights, hundred-dollar-bill-on-a-string level of trap here and you're just planning on walking right into it," she finished incredulously.
Oliver checked his arrows, but spared her a tight look. "I'm aware of the trap."
Felicity breathed a sigh of relief and released the death grip she'd maintained on the hem of her sweater. It was probably ruined. "Good." Frowning, she watched as Oliver slipped the quiver onto his back and picked up his bow. "So what's all this then?"
"I'm springing the trap."
All the tension that had seeped out of Felicity only moments ago returned ten-fold at Oliver's words. She fought the urge to yank the bow out of his hands. Oliver was being more infuriatingly stubborn than usual and while normally she would have waved it away and thrown a sarcastic comment or two his way to get him to understand, she realised that this was different. Unfortunately, it was the kind of different that had the potential to get him seriously injured or killed.
She told him as much.
His only response was a long, slow breath. She watched him pull on his bow string, gauging the tension, satisfied with whatever he felt there before lowering it and turning to face her.
"I can't let him do this." His voice was as steady as always, but his eyes were dark and troubled and could barely hold her gaze. "It's my fault."
"He's a grown man capable of making his own decisions, Oliver. You're not responsible for that," she told him softly. Wrapping her arms tightly against her stomach, Felicity took a step towards him as carefully as one might approach a frightened animal. She didn't really think anything she could say would dissuade from his current mindset, but she knew she had to try.
Oliver shook his head. "Not responsible. At fault."
"Not at fault either." She stood a foot away from him and figured that was close enough. She'd learned long ago that caging in Oliver Queen wasn't the ticket to calming him down; it had the ability to do the exact opposite and right now she needed to talk him away from the metaphorical ledge not push him towards it.
Oliver's eyes snapped to meet hers. There was anger now just below that troubled, boiling surface – anger that he kept in check through what she knew to be strength of will alone. His voice was low and coarse when he spoke, "How can you say that?"
"Because it's the truth." Shoulder's lifting in a heavy sigh, Felicity's hands curled into her sides. This wasn't the first time they'd had one variation or another of this conversation. She knew where he would take this next.
"I killed his father."
"He's not dead."
"No," Oliver snapped. "He's in a coma the doctors say he has almost a zero chance of waking up from. That's much better."
"Are you forgetting the part where his father tried to kill you?" Felicity exclaimed. "Repeatedly and violently and on more than one occasion he got pretty damn close. I'll bet that he never sat around afterwards trying to make peace with his guilty conscience."
"Doesn't matter," Oliver said.
Felicity's eyes widened. She opened her mouth to respond but Oliver spoke first.
"Doesn't matter," Oliver repeated firmly. "This is between me and Tommy now. What his father's done – it doesn't matter anymore. I can't let Tommy make the same mistakes."
There was a terrible ache growing behind her eyes and all Felicity wanted to do was collapse back into her chair and finish the diagnostics she'd been running before Oliver had come storming in demanding she start accessing the harbour's security systems.
"Oliver," Felicity began, voice soft and eyes sad. "I get it. I do. I really, really do. And if I weren't so absolutely, positively sure that the only reason we found out about this meeting was because they wanted to use it as a trap for the Hood then I'd be handing you that bow and all but throwing you out of this place to go kick their sorry asses." Felicity paused "If I could throw you anywhere that is."
There was a flicker of amusement on Oliver's face and Felicity pressed on, her tone growing more earnest with every word. "But I do know it's a trap because I am very good at what you've asked me to do for you. I know that they've mobilised a veritable militia on the ground ready to shoot a mouse at the slightest squeak. I know they've got their men in the precincts creating a dead zone around the meeting point." She couldn't keep still anymore as the information she'd frantically rushed to gather over the past few hours came bubbling out of her in a well of fear and frustration.
She began pacing in front of him as she spoke, her hands flying out to punctuate her words. "There's chatter coming in that they're moving homeless people from the Glades into the harbour that suggests they're not above collateral damage, but I can't be sure because there's no time to run the recon." Her glasses were falling down her nose as she moved and she pushed them back up with the back of one hand. "There's been increased activity and movement in the shipping yards, so who knows what they're bringing in because – again – I can't be sure without doing the proper recon." Felicity stopped mid pace, a couple of steps off to the side of where Oliver remained standing, his body absolutely still save for the way his head had followed her back and forth.
Felicity moved towards him until she stood much closer than she'd dared earlier. They'd been working together like this for over a year, but she still couldn't say that being in close proximity to him was something she was yet comfortable with. There was a near constant tension that radiated off of him that set her on edge. Even knowing where some of it stemmed from did little to ease the pinpricks that raced up and down her spine whenever he moved too close which, fortunately enough for her, wasn't altogether too often. It seemed Oliver Queen was a firm believer in personal space and for that she was grateful.
Forcing all that aside, Felicity stepped into his space and tilted her head back to look up at him. She hoped the panic twisting her stomach into knots that were making it hard to suck in a full breath was also all over her face.
"Diggle's not even here to back you up," she added softly, almost pleadingly. "You'd be going in alone and you'd be going in blind."
Oliver was quiet for several moments, his knuckles going white as his grip on his bow tightened in frustration. Felicity held her breath as she watched a war wage itself across his face. She didn't dare to hope that she'd actually gotten through to him. Not even when his eyes slid shut and his mouth tightened in a grim line.
"I wouldn't be blind," Oliver offered. His eyes flickered open to meet hers and he tried a tight smile. "I've got you. You're very good at what I've asked you to do."
Felicity actually smiled a little at that – a smile that she tamped down on almost as quickly as it appeared on her face lest he get the impression that he'd converted her to his crazy plan. "I am good. That's why I can tell you how impossible it would be for you to come out of this with all your limbs still intact." She tilted her head to one side. "Sometimes it seems like you're trying your hardest to separate yourself from them, but I thought maybe I'd help you keep them attached to your body for just a little while longer," she added lightly before growing serious again. "It'd be my fault, you know?"
Oliver frowned down at her, confusion replacing the resignation on his face.
"If something happened to your limbs," Felicity explained, "or to the rest of you even," she amended quickly, "while I was supposed to be your eyes in there. It'd be my fault."
Oliver shook his head at her. "Someone once told me that grown men are capable of making their own choices." She felt his fingertips touch her wrist lightly where it hung at her side. "And that they happen to be responsible for them too."
"Yeah, well." Her neck was protesting being tilted back for so long so she allowed her head to fall forward in relief, her gaze catching on where his free hand remained on her wrist. She swallowed. "It seems we've both got some work to do on that front."
Suddenly Oliver's hand was gone and he was moving away from her in long strides. Felicity absentmindedly rubbed at her wrist as she watched him toss his bow onto the stainless steel table holding most of his other equipment. She winced at the sharp clang and knew he'd regret doing that later.
"I can't just sit here and do nothing." Oliver clenched the edge of the table in a bid to stop himself from throwing anything else in anger. His body was bent over the table, muscles tense and hardened with fury. "He's been my best friend for years; whatever's happening between us now, that still means something."
Staring at his back, Felicity's mind worked furiously, racing through possibilities and alternate scenarios.
"Tommy's the only one you really need to get to, right?" Felicity turned on the spot, not waiting for Oliver to respond. "I mean, he's the keystone here." She practically ran back to her computer and threw herself into her chair, hands reaching for the keyboard before she'd even sat down.
"It's a save-the-cheerleader-save-the-world sort of scenario." Felicity paused and frowned at the reflection of Oliver walking towards her on her screen. "Were you around when that was a thing?" She resumed typing, her gaze focusing back on the characters on her monitor. "Doesn't matter."
"What are you getting at?" Oliver leaned over her shoulder and tried to make sense of the windows that were popping up in rapid succession and the characters flooding one half of the screen.
"You don't need to get to the meeting," Felicity said. "You just need to get to Tommy."
Oliver glanced at the digital clock in the bottom corner of her screen. "He should already be on his way there."
"I know," Felicity muttered, hands flying over the keyboard. Biting her lip, she squinted at one window in particular and scowled when her repeated attempts to gain access didn't produce the desired result. "But being on his way to the meeting means that he's not already there which means-" Felicity let out a triumphant noise midsentence as another window popped open. She spun in her chair with glee, forcing Oliver to take a step back to narrowly avoid being whipped across the face by her long ponytail.
"Which means," Oliver prompted.
Eyes wide and bright, Felicity gazed up at him with a satisfied smirk on her face. "Which means I just bought you twelve minutes to get to tenth and Main." At Oliver's raised eyebrow, she clarified, "Security cameras have him leaving his condo approximately ten minutes ago and with some clever manipulation of the traffic light system, I'll have him in the area of tenth and Main about twelve minutes from now."
"Twelve minutes?"
Felicity smile waned. "It's the best I can do."
Oliver grinned. It was a sudden flash of a smile across his face that took Felicity by surprise. "It's perfect. I can work with twelve minutes."
He moved quickly to gather his gear and Felicity turned back to her computer to ensure that everything was still functioning (or not functioning as it was in some cases) the way she needed it to. Satisfied that everything checked out, she focused her attention on Oliver's reflection in her monitor's screen. He was securing his bow when she called his name and his head jerked towards her, their eyes meeting.
"Do you think he'll listen to you?" Oliver's reflection stiffened and she suddenly wanted to take the question back.
"He'll listen to the Hood," Oliver replied darkly. "It's Oliver Queen he hates."
Felicity nodded as she mentally chastised herself for bringing it up. "Eleven minutes," she told him.
Oliver held her gaze a moment longer before he turned away and was gone.