The Starling Saviour

Chapter 68

'No, I'm not angry anymore,' Tommy said as he held my hand to show me he now understood my actions. 'At first, I couldn't believe that you could be... Her, and then I became angry. But now, I've accepted what you told me, some of it at least. I was a jerk, Aria, to you and Ollie. I should've just let you explain why you do what you do, and how you can go home every night and be okay with everything you see, day in, day out.'

'You seem to know a lot about what we do, Tommy,' I grinned humorously.

'I just watch the news, Aria,' he responded just as comedically. 'I hear about the vigilantes of the city confronting criminals and getting them to give back to Starling, and I just don't get how you and Ollie so easily persuade murderers and corrupt morons to do the right thing. Yeah, I know I don't exactly agree with your methods, but you manage to do things no one else can, and I am amazed by that. And, you can really pull off that blue leather look.'

'Oh, shut up,' I rolled my eyes at Tommy's last sarcastic comment, sending him an unimpressed look. 'You are so-'

I was interrupted by not just the buzz of my phone, but the chimes of everybody else's device in the clubs, all of us turning their screens on to watch a video we had all been sent. It was live, and the man in the video looked familiar under its pixelated quality.

'If you make The Glades your home, you know who this man is - John Nickel,' a voice which I guessed belonged to the cameraman said promptly, the microphone he was using masking his identity. 'He owns your tenements, manages your slums, provides the leaking roofs over your heads, the lead in your pipes, the asbestos in your walls; basically, he makes money off of our suffering. But the police aren't interested in helping us. They may have let us down, but I won't. John, I wanna give you the chance to state your case. Why shouldn't you be punished?'

The ominous speaker tore the tape from Nickel's mouth, finally allowing him to speak.

'I knew there was bad stuff in my buildings,' Nickel admitted as he breathed heavily in nervousness and being short of breath after his mouth had been taped shut.

'Go,' Tommy knew I needed to do my vigilante duty, and so I rushed downstairs, joining Felicity at the computer she was incessantly typing at to get an idea of where the video signal was coming from.

'Track him, Felicity,' I heard Oliver on the other end of the phone Felicity had been communicating to him with.

'I'm looking,' Felicity responded in a hurried, stressed voice, her eyes not leaving the computer screen.

'Okay, yes, I made a little profit,' Nickel admitted, whining, as I tuned back into the video playing in my phone. 'At least they had a place to live. Without me, people like that would end up on the streets.'

'People like-' the mystery voice became infuriated in a matter of seconds, growling as two arms jolted Nickel around, harming him angrily. 'That's all we are to guys like this. John, I find you... Guilty.'

Three gunshots rung through the speaker on my device, silencing Nickel's screams and the video graphically showing the moment Nickel lost his life. I felt like I should've be more sympathetic towards the businessman, but he was so corrupt I felt like I was justified in my lack of emotion.

'There are plenty more people who need to answer for their crimes against us,' the voice announced, addressing the viewers of his twisted live stream, Felicity and I watching in horror as we awaited his next move. 'So, who's next?'