So the main season 4 villain of Arrow was a man named Damien Darhk. He was half friendly business man half scary mob boss. He had magic and his powers while along the same lines as John Constantine were fueled by death. Like literally. He had a tendency fo choking his victims without touching them. He was also a former member of the league of assassins who had a HIVE of agents at his disposal that he drugged to make his lackeys. His main mission was to cleanse the world of a millennia of rot it had been infested by.
(After Oliver Queen surrendered himself to the NAZI version of Supergirl to save his friends)
Kneeling before Overgirl, Oliver saw his friends gagged & bound before his eyes. He made a snap decision. “You've won. Alright? So take me. But spare my friends please ...I beg you.”
“Choose one to be spared.” Overgirl said easily. Oliver looked up, confused and humiliated. “What's that look in your face Oliver?”
“I cannot. To chose one of my friends to live while the others were slaughtered. I cannot...”
“Well I can understand that, but you draw more horror from this offer than needs be. All of your friends will live Oliver. But that one will be released. The others will live their lives serving the Fatherland in whatever capacity my husband and I see fit.”
“Felicity. Let Felicity go free.”
“She already hid herself away from us. We don't know where she is. Choose again.”
“Barry Allen.” Oliver said immediately. “Spare his life, let him go. Once I know that he is safe, I won't resist anymore. You can do what you want with me.”
“We don't have a Barry Allen in our data-banks. Which means we don't have a version of him on our Earth. But for you to show this much regard for him, he must be a truly great man.”
“No, I'm a great man. Barry Allen is a GOOD man. And I cannot stand to think what even being around your kind will do to him.”
“Well, your mind is as sharp as your arrows. Very well. Once we find a way to permanently remove his power, he'll be released. You have my word on that Oliver Queen.”
“Thank you Kara Zor'el.” He bowed his head to the ground. “I thank you, my master.”
The next several days were hell. They kept him in a room fittingly called the forge. Thanks to the geothermal heat that poured through floor it was easily 130 degrees Fahrenheit in there. They hung him up from the ceiling, had varlets, for lack of another word bring him water and food but no one spoke to him. Damien was the only one to approach him. And that was just to ensure he had all of his ribs. “Nice to see you're as much of a dick on this Earth as you were on mine.”
“Hehe, likewise. No seriously. As I'm sure you're well aware you are an absolute DICK here. It's nice to see you keep at least some of your backbone across the multiverse.”
“May I ask you a question? Besides that one I mean.”
“If you let me punch you in the face afterward.”
“Agreed. Is Laurel Lance...still alive on this Earth?”
“Yes she is. We call her Siren-X.”
“She's a Nazi? Of course, Lance is a high-ranking Nazi officer. It makes sense that she'd want to follow in her father's footsteps.”
“I take it she's dead on your Earth. And I'm surmising the 'me' you know had something to do with that.” Oliver nodded. “Elaborate.”
Oliver sighed. “On our Earth Quentin Lance is a police captain. He fought with my team against you. And you...made good on your threat...and stabbed her through the heart.”
“Well that is good news.” Oliver's eyes shot harpoons. “Not, I expect for you. But the only version of myself I ever met was a sniveling coward. The phrase 'soft-hearted fool' is the kindest way I have to describe him. Good to know he's the exception not the rule.”
“You're lying Damien.”
“Ex-cuse me, Oli-ver.”
“You were glad to hear a doppelganger of yourself had a backbone. But you are not pleased the cowardly version was the exception. I spent a year chasing you down before I stabbed you through with an Arrow. We got pretty good at reading each-other.”
“Heh over here Chase was my only professional antagonist.”
“God it seems like that guy rattles pretty much everyone's rankles.”
“And not without reason either. Now just so you know, I'm about to punch you in the face.”
“It's fine by me.”
Damien stepped back and delivered a vicious backhand to Oliver's jaw. Then without another word to the man's face, turned and walked away. “rajul sharaf. takhayal dhalika.”
“What what did you just say?” Oliver yelled after him. “What was that..Ara...”
Damien spun on him. “If you know what is good for you, you'll keep your mouth SHUT!”
“This is...something new.” Oliver breathed. He hung his head, a non-verbal 'understood' gesture that seemed to satisfy his keeper.
Several days later Damien returned. “I have one question for you. Well somewhere between an insistence and a demand really.”
“Something you're curious about and you want to know if I understand it any better?”
“Oliver, you are seriously creeping me out. But yes, that's about the size of it.”
“Then pose your query.”
“alhikayat alati yajib riwayitiha – tabda alan.”
“Not a question. You want to know if I know what you just said?” Damien Darhk nodded.
Oliver looked Damien squarely in the eyes. “ 'The tale to be told, begins now'.”
“Okay...I guess that answers my other questions.”
“That's why you sound the way you do, like you're not entirely sure how to speak English like a native-speaker. You are a native speaker. But you speak a language that requires far more deliberate diction. Which is why you speak so...deliberately. You're not being menacing, are you?”
“Okay....NOW you are creeping me out.”
“Would you believe me that for all of 5 minutes the League called me Rashe al Ghul?”
“There's not many other things that could explain that.”
“Were...were you Rashe, on this world?”
“Officially the League has no demon's head, no leader. We were 'disbanded' to use the PC term 20 years ago. Rashe, as he was, chose survival over identity. I continue the Leagues ways...yes.”
“Which is why you were so glad -relieved- to hear that another version of you had a back-bone. Proof that you don't need to be Nazi-strong to be Strong.”
“It is unsettling how well you seem to understand me.”
“Yeah, I can't say I find it particularly comfortable either.”
“You were close to your Laurel.”
“I think we've already established that.”
“Fair. But...that wasn't the only reason you have that look in your eyes right now.”
“The ONLY good things to come out of the year you terrorized Star City was that I found out my son even existed and after Quentin and I got into a shouting match we became true partners and equals. He never knew what he meant to me and he fell SO far in my eyes when I learned he was working for you. And trust me I got angry. But I didn't stay angry for long. And when the shock passed there was something...he saw something he didn't expect to see. that's the only way I know how to explain it.”
“Disappointment. He was your hero and he never knew.”
“Okay, now you are the one creeping me out.”
“I don't know the feeling personally, with anyone. But someone is a position of respect and authority in your life. Is a pretty universal tenant. And as universally understood. Justification and devastation are pretty hard to mistake for each-other. If you're expecting one and find the other. You were close to Quentin.” Olive glared. “You looked up to him. And he never knew. And finally being able to see you as you truly are, rather than what he always assumed was your true self. Believe me Sanjente that I understand."
AUTHOR'S NOTE: The Arabic phrase Damien said to himself on the way out the door translates as 'a man of honor; imagine that'. And was Damien's sincere, personal opinion of this 'sentimental doppelganger of the fuhrer'. Also, Oliver was chained by his wrists in the middle of the room. There is literally nothing Oliver could have done if Damien wanted to strike him. It is a hint at Damien's own sense of honor and restraint that he very nearly asks Oliver's permission to do so. "If you let me punch you in the face afterward". To which Oliver agrees. There was nothing stopping Damien from beating Oliver to a pulp. But all he does is what was agreed to, slaps him in the face, ONCE.
“Ich sah dich dort, ich sah dich, dann die traurigsten Worte, was hätte sein können.” Damien Darhk said in an almost gloating tone as he stood just inside the door to Oliver's cell. “If you prefer. In dieser verkorksten Welt istdas, was hätte passieren können“, das, tatsächlich passiert ist.”
“Damien in case you haven't figured it out yet, I don't speak German!”
“How does the League describe 'true strength' other than 'to cull weakness' what is the other measure?”
“Mastery over oneself.” Oliver replied almost instantly. “Forging your own path and identity. Standing apart as the word 'assassin' originally meant.”
“And that's what I'm doing now.” Oliver could barely believe his eyes as Damien undid the chains and handed him a water-skin. He did believe it but he clearly wasn't sure what to make of the overture. “I would say 'you can either trust me or you can wait here to be executed' except obviously no one around here is going to straight up execute you. The one thing you can be sure of is that I'm not deliberating taking you to your death. I get that. But trusting me really is your only option here.”
“Well or calling the guards and insisting they hang you as a traitor.”
“Say it as Sarab would have.” Damien looked at him blankly. “The question about true strength- ask it as Sarab would have. And I'll go with you. It's the only proof I can accept.”
“Proof that I do understand the strength of the League itself.” Damien muttered under his breath. He leaned down and and whispered in Oliver's left ear. “kayf yasif aldawriu "alquat alhaqiqiati" bikhilaf "'iiedam alduefi" ma hu almiqyas alakhar?”
“Okay, let's get the hell out of here.”
“You work with Leo?” Oliver asked as they ran across the field.
“You know the freedom fighters? No they're too uncoordinated. And they don't like my people much better than they like the Nazi's. But they're not the only group fighting the Nazi's.”
“I'm starting to pick up on that. Just tell me we're not running straight to meet the Magician because we might have a problem.”
“Oliver, that's what Rashe called me.” We ducked behind a few silver crates of supplies.
'Of course if Tommy can be Prometheus, Damien can be the Magician' Oliver thought to himself. “I mean Malcolm Merlyn. The Magician was his original League name back home.”
“Before he became Rashe Al Ghul. Which by the way, he did that here to. He was the last official 'demon's head' we ever had.”
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