Technical Assistance

Chapter 9: Digital Photography Analysis

She shakes her head.  "Never mind," she assures him.  "The bottom line of that is I'm a nerd who likes to make references to fifty-year-old British television shows and that this doesn't seem like real life anymore.  It doesn't matter."  Then she remembers why she called him to her apartment in the first place.  "Come with me—I have something to show you."

She charges into her living area, and both the Vigilante and Saphira follow her.  He sits down on his end of the couch, and somehow ends up with the twenty-pound shiba inu on his lap.  Felicity picks up the laptop with her carefully organized information, and the Vigilante shifts Saphira on the other side of him, taking up one couch cushion and part of another.  Felicity flops next to him as she opens the laptop, opening to the picture she found of the assassin flying down the road—headed East, as Oliver had said—running a red light at a ludicrously high speed.  She practically sits the laptop on his lap, her leg brushing his as she points to the blurred photograph.  "This is what I have on our shooter," she informs him.  "It's a pretty rough photograph, but I was able to edit it so that we could get a better picture of who it was."

"Who is he?" the Arrow asks, and his confidence in her is overwhelming for a moment.  He doesn't know her all that well, yet his faith in her is so solidified—and it shouldn't be.  She doesn't trust him, and he should most certainly not trust her.

"He is a she," she corrects as she shows the modified image, and that leather jacket clings to every curve.  "I traced her back to a warehouse on Eighth, where an ATM camera found her"—she points to the next photograph, one of a woman with black hair—"exiting the same building a few hours later."  She pulls up the result from the facial recognition program she borrowed from Homeland Security.  "This is Helena Bertinelli—heir to the Bertinelli crime family.  The guy Moira Queen was meeting with worked for the Bertinellis wanted to talk about building contracts for the new Applied Sciences Division of QC."  She chuckles humorlessly, but then it turns into a jaw-splitting yawn.  "There have been several other reports," she continues drowsily, "all of them affecting the Bertinellis in some way.  I don't think Moira was the target.  I think Helena is trying to sabotage her father's business."

Another yawn courses through her, and sleep starts to coat her eyes.  She leans back against the couch, and the Vigilante says in his deep voice, "It must have taken a lot of work to come to that conclusion," he says slowly, his tone different, even under the synthesizer.  "Oliver Queen is lucky to have you in his life."

She blinks twice at the compliment, turning her head toward him, though she still lay against the sofa.  He's turned away from her, facing forward, and all she can see his the firm line of his mouth and the sharp contour of his jaw.  "I know you don't like him," she says suddenly, and he turns toward her with that tilt to his head again.  "I can tell by the way you talk about him.  You say I don't know Oliver, and you probably think I'm just another stupid girl under his spell, but you're wrong."  She takes a deep breath, and it feels like it takes a Herculean effort to lift her head.  "I think he's troubled, confused, and no longer the man everyone thinks he's supposed to be.  Everyone he knows either wants him to be the person he was before—or they want him to tell them about his five years in his own personal Hell."  She shakes her head.  "But no one stops to think about what he's going through.  He's not perfect—and I don't expect him to be." She sighs.  "But he needs someone to listen, and I think I might have volunteered for the job."

She expects disapproval to answer the statement, but instead he says to her, as if weighing every word, "He doesn't deserve you."  Felicity waits for more, but he doesn't continue, but he does turn his head up, and she's able to see those indecipherable eyes again.

"Neither do you," she says flatly, causing him to frown.  But of course he doesn't let her finish before coming to the wrong conclusion.  She continues anyway, with a hesitant nudge to his shoulder, "But somehow you both got me anyway."  The corners of his mouth turn up then, and she's about to goad him again when another yawn tears through her.  "Sorry, I'm apparently too tired to tell you about my wonderful qualities."