History Fanfic / ForgingABetterFuture

** After he's pardoned, Oliver {{trolls}} Slade by using his interview with the ''Daily Planet'' to publicly imply that he knows Slade is alive and is Deathstroke. This unhinges Slade earlier, and the gradual ascent of the Justice League (complete with the unveiling of Atlantis) furthers Slade's breakdown to the point that, instead of joining H.I.V.E., [[spoiler:he decides to attack Oliver head-on at the gala the following night, in spite of knowing that at least ''half the Justice League'' will be present, leading to his capture earlier and completely averting the Siege of Starling City before it can even happen]].

''[[https://archiveofourown.org/series/2060202 Forging a Better Future]]'' is a series of Series/{{Arrowverse}} [[FanFic Fanfics]] by [[https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArlyssTolero/pseuds/ArlyssTolero ArlyssTolero]], the author of ''Fanfic/ArrowRebirth'' (later on in the story, Arlyss added Tropers/{{Nyame}}, author of ''Fanfic/ToHellAndBackArrowverse'', ''Fanfic/OneDayAtATimeNyame'', and ''Fanfic/TheSuperheroGame'', as a co-writer for the series). This series is a ReCut of ''Rebirth'', containing the same general premise but heavily expanded in many areas and cut in others.

[[folder:''The Reckoning of Starling City'']]

Returning to the real world after almost three weeks at the Vanishing Point reading three books that unveiled the events of the coming two years (as well as significant details of the life Oliver Queen experienced prior to being sent back in time by Mar-Novu), the Justice League and its allies prepare to step forward and serve the role they must, to act as champions for the world, fighting for it as it should be, showing it what it can be.

But as they suspected, Mar-Novu is displeased with the intervention of The Source and The Spectre and becomes the Justice League's adversary, promising to throw trial after trial at them until they acknowledge the truth: that only ruthless pragmatism will save the universe from the Crisis, not compassion and selflessness.

The heroes themselves face new trials as Malcolm Merlyn becomes imbued with power from Gordon Godfrey to serve as an agent of Darkseid and the Court of Owls joins forces with Tempest and others like them to bring an end to the golden age of heroism before it can even begin...

[[/folder]]

''[[https://archiveofourown.org/series/2060202 Forging a Better Future]]'' is a series of Series/{{Arrowverse}} [[FanFic Fanfics]] by [[https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArlyssTolero/pseuds/ArlyssTolero ArlyssTolero]], the author of ''Fanfic/ArrowRebirth'' (later on in the story, Arlyss added Tropers/{{Nyame}}, author of ''Fanfic/ToHellAndBackArrowverse'', ''Fanfic/OneDayAtATimeFanfic'', and ''Fanfic/TheSuperheroGame'', as a co-writer for the series). This series is a ReCut of ''Rebirth'', containing the same general premise but heavily expanded in many areas and cut in others.

* HasTwoMommies: Thea, who has two ''daddies'' in the case of Oliver and Tommy. After Malcolm's arrest Oliver is made Thea's official guardian but Tommy and he more-or-less share the responsibility of raising her. Laurel and Sara also play significant roles in this endeavor.

* ArmorPiercingSlap:
** Laurel slaps the hell out of Tommy the first time she sees him after he outs Oliver. Sara goes for one better and breaks his nose.
** Laurel also slapped Oliver when he first came to see her after his return from the island. Oliver is fully expecting it, lets her do it and doesn't hold it against her, as he's well aware that he does deserve it.

** Bruce Wayne quickly realizes that Oliver Queen is Green Arrow, due to them being NotSoDifferent in their MO. And in chapter 65 Oliver realizes that Bruce is Batman, especially because of his information on future Kate Kane.

*** Similarly, most of the people of the Glades drop whatever grudges they had against Tommy and Thea, because this revelation makes it clear they're victims of Malcolm as well. [[spoiler:This is one of the reasons why many of Blood's followers are uncomfortable with trying to abduct and kill her, as it's not hard to see her as the innocent she really is]].

** Bruce Wayne quickly realizes that Oliver Queen is Green Arrow, due to them being NotSoDifferent in their MO. There's also [[spoiler:the FBI agents]] doing so as well, after the Mob War arc. And [[spoiler:Emiko]] also realizes that Oliver is Green Arrow due to [[spoiler:him wearing an exosuit developed by the Applied Sciences Division at Queen Consolidated, where she works]].

*** Chapter 39: Tommy [[BrokenMasquerade finds out]] that Oliver is Green Arrow

* WhamEpisode: ''Legend'': The last three chapters! To wit: [[spoiler:While Ra's is willing to trade Malcolm for Tommy, he refuses any and all offers for Thea, forcing Oliver to challenge him for his sister. Oliver ultimately wins the duel, and becomes Ra's al Ghul. He later travels to Tibet and hands the position off to Talia, but not before merging the League of Assassins and the League of Shadows back into one]].

** Wilhelmina Hollinger is this UpToEleven.

* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome:
** Even after learning that Oliver's actions as Green Arrow are sanctioned by the U.S. government, Moira refuses to accept his offer for help and turn on Malcolm because she can't fathom the idea that she would so easily be out from under Malcolm's thumb after years of being afraid of him.
** While Tempest managed to corrupt most of the local government, they didn't dare try anything with federal authority, such as the local FBI field office. This is because the penalties for federal corruption are ''much'' more severe than local corruption, so federal employees are far harder to subvert. Even ''trying'' could've blown Tempest's existence into the open and ended the conspiracy before it could even get started.
** It doesn't matter how rich you are if you don't have the right connections -- your wealth might be able to buy you out of local charges, but it means nothing against the might of the U.S. Government.
** When Amanda tries to chew out Oliver for turning himself in (thus, risking his life against Tempest's retaliation) and giving up the Bunker in exchange for Laurel's immunity, Oliver flatly tells her she's being petty as the Bunker is just one random base with minimal to nonexistent connections to A.R.G.U.S., and if Oliver actually ''had'' died she could have easily had Malcolm and all of Tempest murdered if she wanted to in retaliation. Malcolm is just one assassin and wealthy businessman -- and not even an important defense contractor like Lex Luthor is. Killing him would mean nothing to her nor to any of her superiors.
** Even after accepting that Malcolm is a monster and doesn't care about her, Thea's behavior is still horrid over a month later since it also stems from years of ''Moira's'' inadequate parenting. In the end, all Malcolm did was just make it worse, so it's going to take more extreme measures to deprogram her and force her to grow up. Tommy and Oliver are eventually forced to send her to rehab to get her clean of her addictions and poor behavior.
** Upon seeing how badly Malcolm has influenced Thea's behavior, Tommy constantly expresses regret over the fact he didn't try to take custody of her himself. When he says this out loud in front of Oliver, however, Oliver gently rebukes him, telling him that even if he had, Malcolm would've found some way to subvert that and sink his claws into Thea anyway, since he controlled most of the courts in Starling. That's the only reason why Oliver himself didn't try to transfer custody of Thea to Tommy instead of Malcolm.
** Even though he has more time to devote to Thea and her needs and no longer has to worry about Malcolm taking guardianship of her away from him, Tommy can't be an effective guardian for her because he's now the city pariah, which is why he gives up official guardianship of her to Oliver.
** Thea's [[BrattyTeenageDaughter poor attitude]] in general gets hit with this a lot once she no longer has Malcolm's protection and she's forced to face the (possible) consequences. To wit:
*** Her refusal to answer Alex and Trimble's questions after Malcolm is exposed and captured nearly gets her slammed with a federal obstruction of justice charge, which -- as she's almost an adult -- could mean up to eight years in prison. She wisely shuts up and answers their questions after that.
*** When Thea accidentally breaks Malcolm's tablet in a rage, he brushes it off since she bought him a new one with his money. When she tries to break ''Laurel's'' in a rage, Tommy quickly stops her and rebukes her, since Laurel isn't ultra-rich like they are and likely can't afford to buy a new one herself. Sara later confirms this; Laurel bought her tablet used and on discount, as she can't afford a brand new one even as Director of CNRI.[[note]] As a billionaire, Oliver of course could afford to buy her a new one (and promises that he will replace anything that Thea breaks), but that's not the point.[[/note]]
*** After exhausting all other options with Thea short of a stint in jail (which would ruin her future prospects since she's now permanently cut off from the Queen Estate [[spoiler:and the Swann Estate]]), Oliver plans to do what any other rich person does with a relative with major drug addiction problems: send her to rehab.
** After Malcolm is exposed, riots start breaking out in the streets and everything associated with him, such as Merlyn Global and Merlyn Manor, becomes the target for the citizens' rage. As a result, Tommy and Thea are forced into the temporary protective custody of the FBI until the heat dies down. Over a month later, Oliver has to personally escort Thea to school everyday just so she won't be attacked by someone who wants revenge on Malcolm, while Tommy is holed up in the Quiver and hasn't been seen in public outside of a scant few appearances in over a month.
** While everyone who sees Thawne's video will confessing to the murder of Nora Allen believes it to be genuine, the DA comments that it will have to be verified before Henry can be freed. Evidence always needs to be verified after all, especially something like this.
** Quentin is [[PassedOverPromotion passed over a promotion]] to Captain of the MCU because of his drinking. While his superiors are willing to tolerate his drinking as a field detective, they won't tolerate it when he's in a position of authority. The next senior detective, Quentin's partner Lucas Hilton, gets the promotion instead.
** [[spoiler:Since Talia didn't inherit the mantle of Ra's al Ghul or won it a duel, but instead had it handed to her by Oliver, her position as Ra's is shaky and she still needs time to properly establish herself. That means she can only show so much favor to Oliver before putting her foot down, lest she be accused of being his puppet and lose control of League]].
*** [[spoiler:The number of changes Talia makes to the League aren't well-received by the traditionalists because they're made so close in succession, leaving them little time to adjust. When she decides to modernize the League entirely after Oliver and Sara were forced to out the organization's existence, it sparks a rebellion from the faction led by Al-Owal. While she manages to put it down, her position is still shaky, so she can't grant any more extensions to Oliver for Thea's training period for fear of being called too soft]].
** While Oliver had no choice but to [[spoiler:kill Ra's]] in order to save Thea, that doesn't change the fact he did what Malcolm and Moira have been doing over the past five years -- bail her out of trouble, which is why she didn't properly appreciate the lengths he went to in order to protect her, or how serious of a threat the League of Assassins is. Oliver himself acknowledges this, and rectifies it by cutting Thea off for her poor behavior and forcing her to go to rehab so she can get clean.
** Oliver's destruction of the Vertigo supply makes it harder to nail the Count with a conviction since it was the primary evidence. On the other hand, the reason Oliver destroyed the supply is because he didn't want any of the remaining [[DirtyCop dirty cops]] in the SCPD to steal it from evidence lock-up to either sell it for themselves or (worse) reverse-engineer the formula to make it themselves -- which is what happened in the ''last'' timeline. Even Pike is forced to acknowledge that he has a point about the lingering corruption in the SCPD, and aims to fix that by creating an Anti-Corruption Task Force to deal with the issue.
** Almost all of Team Arrow is dropped by their insurances after joining the Justice League, due to the danger their new roles will land them in. Oliver decides to remedy this by creating/buying his own insurance company for members of the JL, which Ned and Emiko suggest he expand to include members of other law enforcement agencies and employees QI to make it more viable as a business.
** Sometimes, it doesn't matter how hard you try to change someone for the better, if they aren't willing to change themselves. [[spoiler:As proven with Thea in ''Perils'', with tragic results]].
** In ''Perils'', after [[spoiler:Thea is taken by the League]], Oliver and the rest of Team Arrow take a leave from Justice League missions because they're too emotionally compromised to conduct those missions effectively. Unfortunately, they also make up half of the current membership of the JL, forcing Oliver to start searching for new members to make up the deficit.
** Someone as toxic as Felicity should have never gotten away with behavior as bad as hers so much without someone calling her out on it or kicking her to the curb for it. Whenever Oliver mentions something objectionable she did that he ignored at the time, someone else (usually Laurel or Sara) points out how wrong it was, causing Oliver to recognize that himself and wonder why he (and the others) let it slide so often. [[spoiler:It turns out that's because Felicity programmed/brainwashed them into doing whatever she said, including ignoring her toxic behavior. If it hadn't been for that, the team would've gotten rid of her a long time ago]].

* LockedOutOfTheLoop: Dinah refused to let her parents be a part of her daughters' lives and kept all news about her family away from them. So much so that not only were Edward and Regina unaware of her divorce from Quentin, they were also completely unaware of Sara be presumed dead for five years after the sinking of the ''Gambit'' until she entered the national stage as a member of the Justice League. Eventually, they have enough of this and head over to Star City to confront Dinah and hopefully reconnect with the rest of the family.

* TheUnapologetic: Dinah refuses to acknowledge that letting Sara sleep with Laurel's boyfriend was wrong and insists that Laurel is blowing it out of proportion.

** While Moira genuinely loved her children, she was not a ''good'' parent because she never properly punished them nor allowed them to face the consequences of their actions, especially evident in Thea who seems to think the world will bend over backwards to give her everything she wants. This reaches its logical conclusion in ''Dawn'', where Thea refuses to train to be a vigilante no matter what Oliver punishes her with, because she's convinced that not even the League of Assassins can touch her.
** As Oliver puts it, while Robert truly did love Thea and him, he was also a philanderer who abandoned Emiko and put way too much on Oliver's shoulders, while also trying to mold him into being a GenerationXerox of him. It's implied that a lot of Oliver's crazier antics prior to the ''Gambit'' were a result of him acting out to escape his father's expectations.