AN: Okay. So this is my first foray into Arrow fanfic and I am currently addicted to Bratva fics. This idea came to me. This is just the prologue, so I'd love to get some feedback on whether or not people are interested in the story! This will more than likely be a slow build to an actual relationship, but I will be using a few things that happened in Season 1 in the story. Also, I do not have a beta at this time, so if you see any errors, feel free to let me know! (I try and reread my own work a couple of times, but sometimes things do escape me). This is also posted on AO3 under my main penname for now: Lexi_The_Dragon_Muse. :p

Chapter One: Prologue

Felicity Smoak tugged at the bottom of her black suit jacket self-consciously, the style an abrupt change from her normal attire of jeans and combat boots that she had worn proudly during her life as a hacktivist at MIT. After the mess with Cooper (with him being arrested and subsequently committing suicide in prison), she had completely put those times behind her. Now, she was embarking on a journey to become the one thing that she had spent the last four years rebelling against. A government worker. And not just any government worker, but she had applied for and gotten a position at the CIA.

She had awoken that morning with a veritable swarm of butterflies in her stomach. She wasn't have second thoughts (okay, really more like fifth and sixth thoughts), but she was more concerned with fitting in with her new coworkers. Really, the Felicity of a year ago was rolling over in her grave at the steps she had taken to completely break free of her life. But, this was a change that she felt necessary and more importantly she thought it was the best fit for her skills.

"Agent Smoak?"

Felicity looked up to find a woman dressed in a black suit, much like her own, and a plain white shirt standing in front of her. "Yes?"

"I'm Agent Vendler. Will you come with me?"

She rose and grabbed her bag from where it was laying in the chair next to her. She followed the woman into the bowels of the building, past many cubicle farms and finally to a locked door.

Agent Vendler smiled. "This is our analyst's room. Where we process a multitude of different incoming information. All you have to do is swipe your badge to get access. Go ahead."

Felicity nodded and quickly swiped the badge, shiny in its newness, and the light flashed green. Agent Vendler opened the door and Felicity walked into heaven. There were high-tech flat screen monitors all over the room and a quiet that she always associated with working on a computer. The click-clack of keys being struck and muted conversation. The agent motioned for her to follow and she did, to an empty chair in front of a monitor. "Did they give you your login information?"

Felicity nodded. "Will this be my station?"

"Yes. Let's get you logged in and make sure everything is in working order."

Felicity quickly complied and in moments her screen was active. She was just about to ask what her first task was when another analyst's head popped up. "Yo! Vendler! Gotta live one for you."

The woman shook her head. "What is it Ash?"

"Plane crash in Russia. Russian television is reporting that a plane carrying Robert Queen and his son crashed over Siberia. Mechanical failure they are saying."

Agent Vendler walked over to Ash. "Mechanical failure on a plane carrying a billionaire? Not likely. What do you know?"

"Not much. I've tried getting information, but I can't make it past the firewalls."

Felicity was listening with curiosity. She knew that when she was hired, she would be working with the best of the best and to hear one of them admit to failure kicked her competitive streak into high gear. Quickly she focused on the screen in front of her, pulling up a coding box and began to type furiously. Three minutes later, she did a fist pump of glee. "I'm in!" she called out.

"In to what?" Agent Verdant said as she walked back over to her.

"The Russian government's computers. What do you want me to look at?"

There was surprise glittering in the woman's eyes. "You broke in to the Russian government in minutes?"

"Well, yeah. It's not like their sites are secure enough to hold me out. Really, it was harder to hack the DOD than it was them. Not by much, seriously both systems are crap, but that is just what made it easy. Also, I've put a false trail in so that even if the Russian's do manage to find the hack, which is not really likely at this point since they made it so easy for me to get in, but if they do, then they will trace this back to the Chinese." She looked at the shocked look on the agent's face. "Okay. Shutting up now in three, two, one."

Agent Vendler just shook her head. "Tell me anything and everything that Russia has on Robert Queen."

Felicity nodded as she turned her attention back to the monitor, cheeks burning at the unexpected word vomit that had just come out. "So, it looks like Robert Queen did a lot and I mean a lot of business with Russian companies." She started as she pulled up more information and applied the translation program. "Oh, wow. It looks like a lot of those said businesses had ties to the Bratva? What is the? The Russian mob?"

"Yes, it is," came the reply to her question.

"All righty then. So, Mr. Queen was working with businesses that were associated with the Russian mob, but it looks like he may have found out about that…" she trailed off as her fingers flew quickly over the keys, pausing to pull up another window and quickly gaining access to the information at Queen Consolidated. "Yes. Here is a memo from Mr. Queen to his board of directors. It looks like he was trying to cut ties with the businesses affiliated with the mob and that was the purpose of the trip to Russia." She turned in her chair and looked at the Agent, who she believed at this point was actually her supervisor.

"Did you just hack into QC?" called out a voice from across the room.

Felicity turned to look at the man, Ash, and nodded. "Yup."

"I've been trying to break into their systems for months, but they've always managed to block me. How the hell did you do that in a manner of seconds?"

"Um, it was easy?"

Agent Vendler cleared her throat. "Thank you for the information, Agent Smoak. No one has been able to successful hack the Russian's system since they did their last upgrade two years ago."

Felicity felt her cheeks warm again. "Oh."

Agent Vendler smiled. "Oh, indeed. Beginning tomorrow you will be attending our Russian language class. I expect you to get fluent in the language, both written and verbal, so that you don't have to rely on a translation program. Good job."

And with that note, Felicity felt a weight lift off her chest. It felt like she had found the place she was meant to be.

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AN: Thanks for reading! Please review and let me know what you think!