"We can't let him do this," Felicity says A few moments after Oliver leaves. "He has to know this isn't going to change anything. John frowns and rubs his face, looking as frustrated as she feels.

"I'm sure he does," he replies and shrugs helplessly. "But he's lost hope. He can't see a reason to fight anymore."

Felicity opens her mouth to speak again when the sound of John's phone ringing interrupts her. He frowns and looks at the screen and seems surprised by the name he reads on it. She's about to ask him why when he taps the phone and brings it to his ear.

"Ms. Lance," he says formally and Felicity guesses he must mean Laurel because she's definitely never heard him call Sara that, "is everything alright?" He listens a moment and then says, "I'm not with—" before she seems to cut him off. His eyebrows shoot up in surprise and he glances at Felicity a moment before giving his full attention to what Laurel is saying. Felicity waits, wondering why it has John looking so determined, and is surprised when he speaks again and says, "we'll meet you at Verdant.

"What did she say?" Felicity asks.

"That she knows Oliver is the Arrow," he says without preamble and Felicity is too shocked to respond before he adds, "and she has proof that Sebastian Blood is working with Slade and that's why he killed Moira—so he could be mayor." She stares at him, stunned a moment and unsure which information is more shocking before she realizes what the information on Blood could mean.

"We have to tell him, Digg," she says eagerly. "If that doesn't make him want to fight again, then nothing will." He nods and strides toward the door and she follows him, glad to leave Oliver's back-up lair.

Felicity couldn't tell what she didn't like about it at first, but it all became clear the moment Oliver told them he frequently came there to be alone, or more accurately, to get away from them. It is devoid of any trace of the team they've built together—no glass cases, no fancy equipment, none of John's weaponry, not a single computer screen. She tries not to take it personally, but it's hard to ignore that the differences can be summed up by the fact that nothing she's changed since the Undertaking made it here.

Felicity loves the foundry. She feels more at home there than in her own house sometimes. She thought Oliver felt that way too, or at least felt comfortable there in a way he couldn't anywhere else. But to see that he escapes to a place that is so stark and lonely is just a painful reminder of how much he isolates himself, how there will always be a distance between him and everyone else. And she's beginning to wonder if he will ever allow himself to eliminate that distance, if she ever has a chance of really knowing him, if she could ever really be with him without constantly wondering what he's hiding.

"Damn it," John swears under his breath when they're standing outside again. "He's already gone," he adds, turning from searching the street to look at her.

"I can find him this time," she says and moves toward the car. "Using facial recognition to track his movements should be easier now that I've got his starting point."

They head back to Verdant and find Laurel there waiting for them. She's confused when only the two of them appear and Felicity lets John explain, rushing past in eagerness to find out where Oliver is going before he can turn himself over.

But she doesn't have as much luck as she expects. She can track him for the first few minutes after he leaves the secondary lair, but Oliver seems to have a preternatural ability to evade cameras when he wants to and she quickly loses track of him. She searches fruitlessly, growing more and more worried as time goes on and is just beginning to lose hope when–for whatever reason–Oliver turns on his phone again.

"He's at the Queen mansion," she says excitedly. John grabs his jacket and the tranq gun and starts running toward the door.

"Call me if he moves," he yells over his shoulder. He's just about through the door when she stops him.

"Wait!" she calls out. "It looks like he's leaving," she says, switching over to the tracking program on her tablet as she stands to follow him and watching the dot that represents Oliver slowly moving away from the mansion.

"Where do you think he's going?" Laurel asks, leaning over to stare at the screen too.

"I don't know," Felicity admits, "but wherever it is, it's probably where he's going to give himself up to Slade."

"Should I try to intercept him?" John yells down.

"I think we should wait to see where he's going," Felicity suggests. "If he realizes we're following him, he might disappear again and we won't get a chance to stop him."

The three of them stand there in tense silence as Oliver travels away from the Queen Mansion and into Starling City proper and Felicity jumps when Laurel suddenly gasps.

"I know where he's going," Laurel says. "The marina," she says excitedly.

"How do you know?" Felicity asks.

"It's where the Queen's Gambit launched from," she says, pointing to the docks on the map. "This started when he took off on that boat. If he wants to end this, I think that's where he'll do it." That reasoning seems as good as any, but something about Laurel's sureness irks Felicity.

"We'll head there and change course if it looks like he's heading somewhere else," John says, grabbing Felicity's arm to take her with him.

"I'm coming with you," Laurel says firmly. "If he realizes you're after him, I doubt he'll stop to listen unless I'm with you." They can't argue with that reasoning and the three of them quickly set off in the direction of the marina.

Laurel's hunch happens to be right and they find Oliver standing at the end of a dock and, luckily, he's either too distracted or too resigned to dying to notice them. They're lucky to have Laurel with them because Oliver really is heavy and Felicity isn't sure how they would have maneuvered him into the van and back to the lair if she weren't.

He's angry when he first wakes up, thinking she and John defied his wishes, but then he sees Laurel. He seems worried that Slade has spoken to her and even more so when she says he told her Oliver's secret, but that doesn't seem to make him any less resigned to dying.

"Will you give us a moment?" Laurel asks and Felicity reluctantly steps away and John follows.

"You think it'll work?" she says lowly when they're out of hearing distance.

"I hope so," John says with a sigh, sounding weary. "He's always been easier to convince where she's concerned."

"Yeah," Felicity says, thinking she's succeeded in keeping the bitterness out of her voice until she looks over and finds John giving her a sympathetic look. She shrugs and he reaches out and grabs her hand a moment, squeezing it comfortingly.

Laurel does eventually convince Oliver and while Felicity tells herself that avenging his mother is finally what convinces Oliver to fight again, she can't help but wonder if the news about Sebastian Blood would have been as effective coming from someone else—even Sara. Laurel knows him in a way nobody else seems to and he listens to her in a way unlike anyone else. Felicity wonders if any woman who ended up with him wouldn't always be competing with Laurel in some way, whether he compared them consciously or not. It sounds exhausting and she wonders if that's why Sara left or even if she herself could live like that.

Though Felicity gets a reminder of the importance of her position in Oliver's life later–after she's politely tortured information out of Blood's bodyguard and John, Oliver and she are leaving to find Slade–when he outright refuses to let Laurel come with them.

"This started with the three of us," he says firmly. "It's time we got back to that."

She, of course, doesn't listen and follows them anyway, which Felicity respects because that's exactly what she would do too. And it wouldn't be so much of a problem except things go to hell in a hand basket—as they always do.

Cisco calls her to say they've developed a mirakuru anti-serum just as John blows the charges and Felicity is screaming into the comms trying to make sure Oliver made it though when she hears a yelp of pain and a familiar voice in her ear.

"You killed me," Isabel Rochev says, "let me return the favor." She starts the van immediately and hurtles toward John's location, hoping she can get there in time to help him, all other concerns forgotten. She finds Isabel standing over John with swords ready, saying something about wanting to kill Felicity that sends a chill down her spine and she doesn't even have to consider what she should do: she slams the gas pedal to the floor and hits her at full speed.

"I really thought the airbags were gonna go off," she mutters to herself, making a mental note to check out safer vans when the whole world isn't basically on fire. She feels bad about maybe killing Isabel for a second, right until she stands up like some sort of terminator and Felicity is all for the idea of hitting her again.

John tells her to drive away instead and they meet up with Oliver and Laurel on a street not far. She's surprised Laurel can convince him to let her go to the precinct unattended, but she's too worried about finding the Star Labs guy with the serum to dwell on it too much. Though Oliver still does, of course.

"I should have gone with Laurel, made sure she got to the precinct," he grumbles.

"She'll be with her father, she'll be fine," she assures, but he gives her a skeptical look anyway. "She will, Oliver," she says again with more conviction.

Though she soon realizes Laurel isn't the one they should worry about.

"Floor it!" Oliver yells when they spot the men in the masks running toward them. John does, but it doesn't matter. Felicity knows things are about to go very wrong when one of Slade's soldiers pushes a car into their path—the van can't maneuver that well and they're moving too fast to avoid it.

"Hold on!" John yells a second before they go flying. Her last thought before she's knocked out is that she hopes he'll be OK.

Thanks for reading. Not much left in this fic and I'm hoping to try to finish it before the new season starts. Reviews would greatly help in pushing me to write faster. ;)