[OOC] Sanctum revisions

[levelofrestraint]

This city was damaged. Oliver hadn't realized how damaged it was until the pieces fell into place and he learned that people were being snatched right off the streets. Sometimes they came back in one piece, and other times, they came back in pieces. And then there were those who came back in terrible shape, minds warped by horrible things that no one could even begin to imagine. Oliver didn't know anymore who was worse off, those who were dead or those who came back alive but completely and irrevocably scarred.

His initial resolve had been to keep a low profile, to see about joining the Order of Justice, but limiting himself to basic investigations and recon. He wasn't the Arrow anymore, and he had no intentions of putting on the hood again. But that was before the abductions began. That was before Oliver saw the ruined states that people were being reduced to. Yes, this city was damaged just as Starling City had been. Only this time, Oliver didn't have a list of people he could take out and cross off. This time, Oliver didn't have any leads.

This time, Oliver just had a bow and arrows and a lead that wasn't really a lead. It was just a whispered name that was followed by a shudder of fear, but to Oliver, it was a crack in an otherwise impenetrable wall. The only problem was that the person to whom the name belonged might as well have been a ghost. Oliver spent hours each night walking the streets trying to locate this mysterious man who seemed to have made it his mission to abduct and experiment on as many unfortunates as possible. Nothing ever shook out, though, and after weeks of questioning people and circling through the various notorious hangouts throughout the city, Oliver was about to give up.

Pounding the pavement was getting him nowhere, and he was beginning to get a reputation amongst the seedier crowd that came out when the sun went down. They thought of him as a cat chasing its tail, going in circles but getting nowhere quickly. But every dog has its day, or so the saying went, and one night, Oliver was out again, making one final attempt to find the culprit, because people were turning up dead every single day. Sometimes, there could be as many as ten dead victims in just one day. Enough was enough. Something had to be done, and both Oliver and the city's version of law enforcement were growing tired of coming up empty.

It happened quickly, and looking back on it, Oliver would just remember a darkened street, the sound of hurried steps, and a man glancing repeatedly over his shoulder. Pulling the hood further over his eyes, Oliver followed after the man, ducking behind walls whenever possible, because after weeks of failing, he wasn't going to just let this go. Almost automatically, Oliver's hand tensed on his bow, but he wasn't going to shoot until the man knew he was there. It wasn't in his style to catch someone unawares.

Soon enough, the man turned and caught sight of Oliver standing in the shadows. "Who are you?" He snapped out, eyes narrowing in suspicion with a hint of derision in his voice.

"It doesn't matter who I am," Oliver said, after he'd quickly flicked the switch on the voice changer he carried with him. There wasn't much point in concealing his voice since he was largely unknown anyway, but he knew all too well the consequences of letting his guard down. "What matters is who you are and if you know who's behind these abductions. Whoever that person is, they failed this city a long time ago." The old line slipped out with ease, because Oliver had said it to so many people over the years. "That stops now."

"Oh, does it? Who says?" The sneer on the man's face grew, and he looked back defiantly at Oliver as if daring him to continue making threats.

"I do." Having given the man a chance, Oliver raised his bow, took aim, and after a second's pause, let a deadly bolt fly into the wall just behind him, going fast enough to set the hairs on his head bristling. "Next one goes through your ear, and you should know that I don't miss."

"It's all big talk until you actually show me something. And you haven't shown me anything except that you know how to stalk someone and can put an arrow into a wall." The man tossed his head back and let out a bark of laughter, because from his perspective, Oliver looked nothing short of ridiculous. But then he stopped laughing, because just as he'd said it would, an arrow zipped past the man, nicking him on the ear and taking a piece of flesh with it.

The man let out a howl of pain, no longer laughing, and clamped a hand to his now-bleeding ear. All traces of scorn were gone from his face, and he just stared at Oliver with horror plain in his eyes.

"Now, why don't you and I have a talk, or should I put this next arrow somewhere a little closer?" He knew there was a fine line between giving a person the chance to talk and threatening the information out of them, but the last thing he wanted was for his mark to pass out or give up the ghost before he could tell him anything useful. But those worries were for nothing, because the man in front of him had just become a veritable font of information.

Unfortunately for Oliver, he was just someone's crony, and the real threat was still out there. A vigilante's work was never done.