Oliver: My name is Oliver queen.
For five years, I was stranded on an island, with only one goal...
Survive.
Oliver queen is alive.
Oliver: Now I will fulfill my father's dying wish to use the list of names he left me...
And bring down those who are poisoning my city.
To do this, [must become someone else.
I must become something else.
Narrato r: Previously on arrow:
- Who supplies you with vertigo? - They call him the count!
Fifty-six people died to perfect this high.
Police never caught your brother's shooter. Bullets were laced with curare...
- That's Floyd lawton's mo. - Lawton's alive.
- I'm sorry, John. - Felicity: Lawton kick his dog or something?
Oliver: How we doing? Tommy: We are in the black and the green.
I like how we've gone from throwing money at clubs to catching it.
Oh, look at these.
What sort of business has a lost and found...
- Filled with women's underwear? - Best business ever?
Oh, having this much fun should be against the law.
Oh, if wishing made it so.
- Sorry, am I interrupting anything? - Tommy: Is Laurel okay?
She's fine. This visit is about something else.
A girl just got mowed down a couple blocks from here.
On the starling bridge.
Ring any bells with you two?
- No. - Should she?
- Lance: She was in your club tonight. - A lot of people were.
- You think someone killed her? - Not someone. Something.
- Had a problem with that in this club? - Not that I'm aware of.
We don't allow drugs here, detective.
Lance: Control your clientele.
Before anyone else wanders into traffic.
Any chance she could have scored the drugs in here?
Doubt it. I tried not to hire too many drug dealers.
Get me a list of employees. I'll have Felicity cross-reference it for drug arrests.
That includes the two of us, you know.
I thought the vigilante finished off the count.
Lance: Just need to ask him a few questions, doc.
You're welcome to try, detective. Not sure you'll get very far.
Lance: What does that mean? Is this a load about doctor-patient privilege?
No. The unrefined vertigo overdose he suffered...
Caused damage to the caudal portion of his anterior cingulate.
Lance: You'll be shocked that I didn't go to medical school.
Doctor: I've been working with him for months.
All I've gotten out of him is word salad, the occasional spit in the face.
- Best of luck to you. - Yeah, thanks.
Here I was born and there I died.
It was only a moment for you. You took no notice.
Green arrow: A woman died tonight.
- From your poison. - Lots of women die...
Lots of nights, for lots of reasons.
Someone is selling vertigo again. Where is it coming from?
I remember you. Man in the hood.
You are never far from my thoughts.
You have failed this city! You have failed this city!
You could've just said he was nuts.
You have failed this city!
- You're teaching me that one. - Only if you show me where the knife was.
- Who taught you how to fight? - My father wanted a son.
He got one. Shado: Careful.
Tension on that bow's a hundred and fifty pounds.
Snap it, you'll end up with carbon fiber shrapnel in your eyes.
Slade: She's right. You're not strong enough, kid.
Go again?
You know, it's pretty exciting that both of you are such bad asses...
But you think that we should be making a plan to stop fyers?
- And I don't know, save your dad? - Does he always whine this much?
- This is one of his good days. - Shado: Can he fight?
I've tried. Limited success.
I'm sitting right here.
Well, I haven't tried yet.
- Uncle John? - Hey, buddy.
Will you read Logan bogan to me?
Sweetheart, get into bed and mommy will read to you.
But I want uncle John to read to me.
Uncle John's had a long day.
He'll read to you next time.
Hey, I'm sorry. I've been some place else today.
- What's going on with you? - I'm just trying to figure some stuff out.
If you need to talk about anything, you know I'm here for you.
It is Oliver queen. With an emergency.
I gotta go.
Diggle: Got here quick as I could. This about the glyph in your father's notebook?
Oliver: Felicity is still working on that. We have another problem.
Woman: Starling city is once again at war with the drug...
Known on the streets as vertigo. It used to be the city's most lethal vice...
But the purple and green pill was nowhere to be found the last three months.
Over the past few days...
City's been flooded with new version of vertigo, more addictive, more unstable.
It killed a girl in the club. Just like it almost killed thea.
Okay, what are you thinking? We should pay the count a visit?
He was my first visit. Waste of time. He's sumasshedshiy.
Since he's the only one who knew the formula for vertigo...
I don't even know where to begin. Felicity: Good, you're here.
Of course you're here. Where else would you be? Clearly love it down here.
You got to see this.
I'm here at the scene where police say a disturbed patient escaped only hours ago.
Authorities issued an immediate lockdown...
At the starling county institute for mental health following the breakout.
Police are warning people to avoid contact with the drug dealer known as the count.
Not so crazy after all, huh?
Doctor: I was administering his meds.
He was babbling, his usual ranting, then he's ice-cold.
He overpowered me. Forced me to take him out through the maintenance exit.
I thought he was harmless. Basically a vegetable, you said.
I know, which means... I've interviewed him dozens of times in the past few months.
To be deceived by a patient so completely...
Don't worry. We'll find him.
And he's going to find prison a lot harder to break out of.
Detective, he's dangerous. Don't underestimate him.
- Lance: Anything from the security cameras? - Not according to the orderly.
Due to budget cuts, the cameras were the first to go.
That is unbelievable.
There's another angle. Veronica sparks, the dead girl from verdant?
- Lance: Yeah? - I checked her luds.
The last person she texted before she died was Tommy merlyn.
He said he didn't know her.
Hilton: Merlyn has two collars for possession, one with intent.
Lance: Yeah, that was over five years ago.
Hilton: Maybe he's just better at not getting himself arrested.
Laurel says he's changed ever since his father cut him off.
Leopard and his spots.
Maybe pushing vertigo is a way of maintaining his old lifestyle.
Maybe going after merlyn is a great way to get my daughter...
- To stop speaking to me again, hil. - Quentin, I get that.
But here's the thing, on a hunch, I subpoenaed the club's bank accounts.
Ten large missing from their operating expenses.
Merlyn spent that money on vertigo?
I can't explain how that much money just gets misplaced.
I'll take a run at him, keep you out of it.
What you need?
All right, the person-of—color has successfully purchased your drugs.
For the record, I offered.
How will we know the tracker is active?
It already is.
Good signal off the monofilament strips we placed in the bills.
Drug money's like a pigeon. Always finds its way home.
- Follow the money back to the count. - Felicity: Okay.
Oliver: Keep tracking it.
So what are you gonna do with all the vertigo you bought?
Plan on having a party?
My only experience with drugs was an encounter...
With a pot brownie my freshman year. By mistake.
Which could've been fun, except I'm allergic to nuts.
All right. Deadshot kills again. This time, a us. Senator.
- Where you been tracking him? - Not far.
I ran his Floyd lawton alias through every law enforcement database.
He's made a series of calls to an Alberto Garcia.
According to NSA, Garcia's a reputed underworld talent scout.
He books all of deadshot's hits.
- It's not much to go on... - Yeah, but it's something, Felicity. Thanks.
- Don't you think Oliver should know? - No. This is personal.
Lawton's my problem to deal with.
What brings you by? Tommy: Hey.
Like some dinner? Your daughter ordered too much Thai food.
No, thanks.
This is a business visit, actually.
I have some follow-up questions on the sparks girl's death.
Sure. The girl was in the club before she got run-over.
You said you didn't know her, but the last text off her phone was to you.
Really? Because...
Well, I'll be damned.
Hm. I didn't reply. I get a hundred texts a night. People wanting to get into the club.
So that's what she meant by, "can you hook me up?"
What else would it be about?
Ten thousand dollars is missing from your club's bank account.
What'd you spend the money on?
No idea. There must be some sort of bookkeeping error.
Okay, let me put this another way: If you spent that money on vertigo...
- So you could hook up your clientele... - Dad!
The best thing for you is to cop to it, get out in front of this.
- Don't say anything. - I'm trying to...
To do your job? I know. And this is me doing mine.
Laurel, I know I look like that disapproving father, again.
But I came down here so another cop wouldn't.
You understand?
- Tommy I... - I'm not hungry anymore.
Shado: Hold up your hand up.
Palm facing me.
- Hit the water. - What?
Hit it.
Again.
Again. Harder.
If the point of this is to make me feel like an idiot, it's working.
"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."
Confucius. Great. I'm starting to see the family resemblance.
Lao tzu, actually. Again.
- Now what? - Fill the bowl. Start again.
- What have you got? - The end of the money trail.
Sending the dealer's location to you now.
Man 1: Oh, man. It's freezing.
Man 2: Oh, hey! Man 3: Hey, check this.
Man 1: Hey, come on, let's see what we can get.
Man 2: Get back, guys. Get back.
Hey, yo. Who's looking to party?
Man 1: Vertigo. Man 2: Right here.
That's not enough, man. You don't pay, you don't play.
Boss: It's all right. Good for business.
My boss seems to like you, g.
Man 1: Hey. Hey, hey. Give it. Give it.
Man 2: How much for this?
Now that, that will buy you a brick, my man.
Boss: Go, go, go!
Don't forget to breathe. If you won't, I won't.
Congratulations. You're officially the creepiest person I've ever met.
- I don't feel so good. - Get away from me, creep.
Hey, we got a problem here? Are you okay?
Dispatch: All units. Code 99.
4-1-7 in progress, starling aquarium.
This came over the police frequency.
Hacked the aquarium security system to get a better look.
You want to argue with me, huh?
Bystanders said they saw him pop green and purple pills.
There's a lunatic high on vertigo who's taken hostages...
And you're making tea?
Medicinal herbs from the island...
Counterbalance the effects of certain drugs and poisons.
They should counteract the effects of vertigo.
- Then you aren't going to... - What?
You know...
My sister got high on this garbage. Could've killed someone.
She didn't deserve an arrow in the heart. This guy didn't fail the city.
The city failed him.
What's happening now isn't your fault. You didn't make him take drugs.
I failed to put the count in a grave so he couldn't hurt anyone.
- They locked him up... - And now the city is on fire!
So clearly it wasn't the right decision.
Get in touch with diggle.
With the security feed out, I'm gonna need a second set of eyes at the aquarium.
- Glad I caught you stateside. - Just barely.
- I leave in two days for Pyongyang. - Isn't that classified?
I figure an old army buddy can keep a secret.
- I was glad to get your call. - Lyla, that's not why I called.
There's something else you'd like me to do, then.
Well, actually, I think there's something I can do for you.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and assume that deadshot...
- Is on argus's most wanted list. - What do you know about him?
Well, his name, for starters. Floyd lawton.
We don't even have that. Where'd you get it?
Same place I got this.
It's everything you need to locate who's giving deadshot his targets.
What's your interest in this?
Lawton came up in connection with some things I'm working on.
Decided to pass it off to you.
I remember you being a better liar than that, Johnnie.
Listen, Lyla, lawton is a very dangerous man.
Your people are qualified to take him down. It's simple.
Nothing in our business is simple.
You come to ask for my help again, Mr. Lance?
Lance: Eric messner.
Who?
He's a zoning commissioner for starling city.
A notoriously corrupt one at that.
The missing 10 grand...
You paid him to skip the inspection of your nightclub.
Why'd you do that? What didn't you want him to find?
- We've got nothing to hide here. - Great. Then let's just take a look around.
- —Absolutely. - Yep.
When you come back with a search warrant.
You sure this is how you want to play this?
Apparently.
Doesn't my daughter know how to pick them?
Stop laughing at me!
Shut up! Just shut up!
Green arrow: Stop! I don't wanna hurt you!
Hey, easy. I'm here to help you.
My mom does yoga.
Hey, remember when Slade and I rescued you?
You rescued me?
Fine. When we all rescued each other.
You said you knew why fyers wanted yao fei...
And how he was forcing him to help him.
Feel like sharing?
I'm almost out of slapping water.
My father was a shang Jiang in the people's liberation army.
A general.
I didn't hear the details of fyers' plans but he wants my father to be the face of it.
A scapegoat.
To take the blame and conceal their own involvement.
Why was yao fei on the island in the first place?
Fyers says he murdered people.
No, he didn't.
The Chinese military committed a massacre.
Someone had to take the blame.
They chose him. Sent him to this island, for life.
I spent years looking for him.
A few months ago, a man came to my apartment...
Said he had information about my father's whereabouts.
I had given up hope.
I let my guard down, didn't see the taser until...
When I woke up, I was here.
I'm worried. This island...
What he must have had to do to survive.
That it changed him.
He saved my life.
He's still a good man, shado.
Again.
Laurel: So there I am sitting at our favorite Sushi restaurant...
A bottle of sake, and the only thing that's missing is my boyfriend.
Oh, god, I'm so sorry, baby. I just have a lot going on here.
Tommy, whatever's going on with you, I want you to know I believe you.
I'm here for you.
Oliver: Sorry. Laurel: Ollie.
- What's wrong? - Bad night.
It's about to get worse.
Mr. Merlyn, as requested, a warrant to search these premises.
- I can't believe you're doing this. - Believe it.
Detective, I'm not an attorney...
But on what grounds are you searching my club?
Your manager bribed a government official...
To keep him from inspecting your building.
-What? Lance: He's selling vertigo out of the club.
- Ollie, it's valid. - Lance: Thank you.
A sublevel is not listed on the inspection's floor plans.
However, I pulled the county records.
There's something down there.
I wanna see for myself what it is.
Oh, look at that.
Open the door.
- You're making a mistake. - No, you are if you don't open that door.
I said, open the door.
Thank you.
Tommy: The place is a kind of a mess. I've been using it to store the bulk of our inventory.
- What's in the boxes? - Tommy: Why don't you have a look?
If prohibition were still in effect, you might have the basis of a criminal complaint.
Would you like to open the crates?
So if you don't have anything to hide...
Why didn't you want the inspector down here?
Well, the ventilation system in this place hasn't been updated since the '603.
I mean, we shouldn't even be open.
Laurel: I'm sorry. I thought he was okay with us being together.
Tommy: He wasn't wrong. I bribed a guy.
That's not why he brought out his jackboots.
It's all gonna be fine. I'll see you at home.
- Good night. - Good night.
- Is there something you want to say? - Thank you.
No, the thing that you were thinking...
When Lance accused me of dealing out of the club.
I don't understand why you wouldn't tell me about the bribe.
I run the club, Oliver. I don't tell you a lot of things.
So let me ask you a question, pal...
What have I done in the six months since you've been home...
That would lead you to believe I would sell drugs?
In the last six months, nothing.
- Yeah. - But before I left, you played hard.
You played with bad people who were in...
And so did you, Oliver.
But I changed. Just like you did.
Now you put arrows in people who do illegal things.
Last time I checked, bribing a city inspector was not legal.
Do you actually think that I could hurt you?
Truthfully, I have no idea what the hell you would do.
You are a complete mystery to me.
I've got no idea how you find it so easy to kill people.
The next time you decide to think the worst of me imagine what I now think of you.
- What's his problem? - What's yours?
- Excuse me? - I asked Felicity to get in touch with you.
There was a hostage situation at the aquarium.
-Sorry, I didn't get message till it was over. —why?
I was busy doing something else.
Lawton.
- You didn't end up needing me. - You couldn't have known that.
In other words, "find your brother's killer on your own time."
Vertigo is tearing this city apart, diggle, so yeah, maybe now is not the best time...
To indulge a personal vendetta.
You're telling me...
That you going after the count is not personal?
Oliver, I cannot read a book to my nephew without knowing lawton killed his father.
I can't move on with Carly, I can't move on with my life...
Knowing that he's still out there.
I thought if anybody got that, it'd be you.
- What happened here? - The ethernet cable still works.
- Would you plug in your tablet? - You decide to remodel?
- Oliver: Long story. - Where's dig?
- Oliver: Long story. - Okay.
The hostage-taking junkie is our only lead to the count.
What type of information are you looking for?
Anything that would give us a line on the count's location.
Has the me performed the autopsy yet?
Yeah. Just pulling it up now.
Check the toxicology to see if there's something related to vertigo.
- He didn't die from a vertigo overdose. - I saw it, Felicity.
According to the coroner, cause of death was severe anaphylaxis.
He died of an allergic reaction to chlorpromazine.
That's an anti-psychotic.
Pull up the Veronica sparks autopsy.
Did she have chlorpromazine in her system?
Yes. How'd you know?
The count must've added it in this latest iteration of vertigo.
Wouldn't the amount he'd need...
To manufacture enough for circulation be huge?
- Where would he get that much? - A mental institution.
- What if we're looking at this wrong? - How so?
Everybody is looking for him outside the asylum.
But what if he never left?
What if he faked his escape, the same way he faked being insane?
Never forgets.
Always back for more.
Green arrow: I should've killed you when I had the chance.
Turn around.
I said, turn around.
Oliver queen.
All those years on that island.
Guess you really did go crazy.
So the count didn't fake losing his mind, did he?
This was you the whole time.
How did you get him to give you the formula for vertigo, huh?
Chemistry doesn't seem like his best subject right now.
He couldn't tell me if he wanted to.
I ordered a biopsy on his kidneys.
The tissue was suffused with the narcotic after his od.
When I got the results...
I realized I could reverse-engineer the chemical compound of the drug.
Produce a synthesized version myself using the facilities here.
And made a few improvements like adding chlorpromazine.
That's how you found us.
Cops came around and started asking questions...
You faked the count's disappearance to draw attention away from yourself.
It's clever.
I wasn't trying to be a criminal mastermind.
I just needed the money.
Something I'm sure a billionaire wouldn't understand.
Believe me.
I understand you perfectly.
Open his mouth.
From what I've read in the tabloids...
No one will be surprised to hear Oliver queen died of a drug overdose.
Oliver: Dig!
Oliver: Argh!
Clear.
Freeze!
Doctor: You don't look so good.
I doubt you could aim a single arrow.
Count looks like I'm the last one standing.
Sitting.
Spinning.
Something to do.
What was I going to do? Memory not what it once was.
Nothing what it once was.
Is there a name on the gravestone?
It's new...
And clean...
And waiting.
We're finished here.
- Oliver: Hey. How we doing? - In the black.
Did the hood get his man?
Well, we won't be having any problems with vertigo anymore.
- Look, Tommy, I'm sorry... - I've caught up the bookkeeping...
And all my notes on the inventory are in there...
- Along with the list of suppliers we use. - Okay.
- I don't see why you're telling me that. - This club is important to me.
But for you it's just a front.
You want me to keep your secret, help you be this thing you've become...
But you refuse to see me for what I've become.
I've gotjust a bit too much self-respect for that.
I quit.
Slade: Dinner.
You're still doing that?
Fyers better be careful with his bowls of water.
When are we gonna do actual training?
Shado: There once was a young boy whose father dropped him off...
- At a Shaolin monastery to study kung fu. - Good. A story.
After a year, the boy came to visit his family.
When asked what he'd learned, the boy hung his head in shame.
All the monks had him do was slap water in a barrel for a year.
We don't have a year, so I hope your training regimen is a bit faster.
The family didn't believe him, so he showed them.
He raised his hand and hit the table they were eating on.
- It broke in half. - I'm going to be able to break a table?
Better.
Okay.
Draw the bow.
I'll be damned.
What's next?
We teach you to shoot.
- Drinking alone? - Oh. Well, not anymore.
Justsoda?
Bartender forget the scotch?
I didn't really feel the need for it.
So, um...
The girl who died...
Turns out that she got her vertigo from a co-worker.
- Guess I owe your boyfriend an apology. - He has a name, you know.
I just can't seem to bring myself to use it. Baby steps.
Did I screw things up between us again?
I really wasn't looking to jam up merlyn.
I knew by pursuing him that I could throw a wrench in us...
- Then why'd you do it? - There was evidence, Laurel.
And I had to follow it, I had to.
Your mom was right. You were right.
Like you said about me and the vigilante, I can't let things go.
And I close cases. It's what I do. Everyone else be damned.
Maybe the fact that there's no scotch in there means you're ready to work on that.
People can change.
- Diggle: Hey. - Hey.
You had my back.
You needed me.
- Felicity told me where you were headed. - You okay.
I'm the killer, remember?
I've killed before, Oliver. It's just been a while.
If you're the killer, why isn't the count down too?
Sure it must have been tempting, take him off the board for good.
- People change. - People like the count?
No, I meant me.
Not so long ago, I would've put that guy down for good...
But looking at him today, all vacant...
There didn't seem to be a point.
But not everybody deserves mercy.
For example.
- I thought he wasn't a priority to you. - He's a priority to you.
And you two have unfinished business.
Where do we start?
I'd prefer we skip the i-told-you-so's, but the nightclub...
Wasn't really working out.
I guess I need something more boring.
Stable.
Nine to 5, go home, kiss Laurel, that sort of thing.
I guess what I'm saying is...
I want a job.