Man I Used to Be #11
Title: Man I Used to Be
Rating: R
Spoilers: Up through 2x07
Pairing: Alec Hardison/ Eliot Spencer
Genre: Drama
Warnings: WIP
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: The present's a mess, and the past isn't helping.
A/N: To all that are celebrating Thanksgiving, here's some food coma reading. :)
Banner by the wonderful and amazing and brilliant cybel
Previous Chapters: Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Eliot had been through enough psych evaluations in his time to know that talking it out was supposed to help. Reintegration, they'd called it.
Distance, not actually being there, had more to do with soldiers coming home and not totally fucking cracking than sitting in an office and finding the words that would get them out of there soonest. The same shit was still out there, the same fighting and the same fuckups. But maybe that was just him. He wasn't one to spout off.
Hardison wasn't a base shrink, even if he cede the couch and move to the chair, telling Eliot to lie the hell down, man, or Sophie's going to have both our asses. He didn't ask a whole lot of invasive questions, didn't ask him how he felt about anything. He didn't spout off heavily-laden un-hmms or interestings. Half the time, Eliot wasn't even sure he was listening, though he never slid his eyes from the ceiling to check.
He told him about the room, about how cold it was, and how dark. He was careful not to belabor the point, mentioning it only once, and that was enough. Hardison wasn't stupid, after all. Instead, he described the dimensions, the way the door was mounted, and his suspicion that the single window faced south.
Told him about the drugs, his best guesses as to what they'd been. If Hardison wanted to know how they felt, how the muffled everything and made the world seem small and huge all at once, he could look them up himself.
He didn't talk much about food or water, beyond pointing out that if it weren't for their lack he probably could have gotten out of there, even with the drugs. He didn't speak of the thirst, and never of the hunger.
The photos, though. Those, he could talk about.
"Woke up and they were in the room, someone had brought them in while I'd been passed out. Stared at them for hours, but nothing came to me. It was weird. No idea who the guy is, how he relates to anything. I know he probably does, but. I can't figure that one out." Hardison was focused on him now, he was sure of it.
"No idea?"
"I know for a fact that I didn't see him in Pakistan. Might have come across him before, but as to when that would have been?" He finally swiveled his head. "Your computer got anything yet?"
"Nothing yet," Hardison admitted, checking his phone, irritated. Realizing he was being watched, he explained. "Had to leave the analysis running on the main system back home. It'll ping me once it's gotten anything better than a 95 percent match. Been running ever since last night, could be another day or so."
"Why's it taking so long?"
"Global search, almost literally. There's a lot out there. I was hoping you'd be able to give me something to narrow it down."
"Yeah, well. Guess this wasn't so useful after all."
"Right." Hardison turned back to his computer. It felt like a deliberate move. "So you didn't learn anything from the guards?"
"Never really saw them." It was the truth. Incoming boots and an arm grappling at him out of nowhere didn't count, after all, and he didn't really need to get into it. So there was no useful reason for him to admit, "by the time they showed, I was messed up enough that I couldn't track them."
"Huh. Not to sound like, you know. A complete asshole or anything, but is there anything else that you do remember?"
"No." Like he thought it would, his answer was met with silence.
It lasted a while.
Eventually, he heard a resigned sigh, and the sound of a laptop being closed. "Right. Sorry, man. If it's dragging anything up, but from what I'm seeing now…" He trailed off, trying to choose his words perfectly. "I thought this would get us somewhere." Hardison was giving up.
"Yeah, well. Things don't always work out like they do in the movies." His shoulder was starting to throb again, and he weighed the pain against the effort of going to the kitchen for another ice pack.
"No kidding."
Eliot swiveled his legs over the side of the couch first, let them carry the momentum that got him standing again, and watched Hardison shoving the computer into his bag, a little defeated and a lot pissed-off.
Like he had cause to be taking this personally.
Whatever.
"So now what?"
"I'm gonna go home, take some aspirin. Hope that maybe something brilliant occurs to me while I'm going through the videos again." He checked his phone again, glancing up at Eliot, though his attention was already elsewhere. "You should crash out, though."
"Right. Cool," was all he said, distracted by the knowledge that if he'd come up with something more useful, Hardison wouldn't be going back to watch the footage again. It was stupid to think otherwise, but also more disappointing than Eliot would have expected.
It didn't help that Hardison had probably caught on, the way he wasn't cracking wise, or talking about it at all, directly. And it wasn't that he didn't appreciate it.
But it meant he didn't know what he saw, when he watched it, and didn't know what he saw when Hardison looked at him. If he still saw Eliot, or if he saw the person he'd become, there, in that room.
Watching through the window as Hardison walked down the driveway towards his car, Eliot felt insubstantial and in between. He wished he'd managed to get him to tell him who he thought Eliot was supposed to be, given him something to work with.
But for once, Hardison hadn't seemed to have all the answers, so he'd kept his mouth shut.
---
All he knew was the chill of the cell, and then the explosion and death.
But he could hear voices.
Nate muttered into the air, apparently checking with Hardison for an update, while Parker strolled over the rubble.
Sophie called after her from the sidewalk, littered with debris, warning her to mind her footing. Surveying the chaos, her eyes followed the uniformed men picking their way across the wreckage of what had once been the Federal Building. Eliot was one of them, but she didn't notice.
She definitely didn't notice him watching from just behind and above her, seeing everything, all of it, missing no detail.
Until he blinked, and everything went dark, and he couldn't see anything at all. He could only feel. A massive sharp pressure on his chest, pain and cold fading away too quickly. The sensation of falling without movement
And there was sound. He could still hear them talking, everyone in the whole world, it seemed.
"Can you tell me what's happening?"
Sophie's question was answered by a woman's voice, vague and indistinct. "Search and rescue. It's not going so well. Sorry, I."
"I'm sure you're doing all you can," Sophie replied, sympathetically.
"I'd like to think so, but. It's hard. We're going to have to pull out soon. It's been days, now."
"Well, I'm sure you've gone all you can, Miss…?"
"Hardison. Sandra Hardison," she trailed off, and the voice was gone, buried under sirens in the distance, the ticking of the office clock that was mysteriously still working.
Another shower of grit and dust was falling nearby, and the stop-start scraping of concrete against concrete was growing louder, until it was all that was left to notice and Eliot was left trying to decide if this is what the end of the world was going to sound like.
He almost didn't notice the grinding cease.
But that wasn't right. It wasn't the sound that was pulling away and fading out, it was Eliot, falling away into the distance, back and up.
---
It was that scraping sound that woke him.
Eliot peeled his eyes up towards the ceiling, trying to catch his breath as the grit and cold darkness sank down beneath the blankets somewhere.
He groaned. A moment or so ago, he was pretty sure he'd dreamt he was dying. Now he just wanted to. But he didn't have time to think about it now, not if he sounds from downstairs were anything to go by.
There. There it was, again. A kitchen chair scraping across the floor, and then nothing. He lay flat, unmoving, and concentrated, trying to figure out if someone was sitting down or standing up, what those two actions could mean.
It all amounted to the same thing. Someone was waiting for him. If they'd wanted him, they could have taken him already, while he slept. He'd left himself wide open for attack.
And while lying there wasn't doing much to change that, the pain wasn't letting him labor under any pleasant delusions of having anything by way of options that wasn't hidden at the back of the closet.
---
Tyler was from Miami, a no-bullshit kind of guy, probably had been when he'd first gotten posted in Zagreb. By the time he and Eliot met, three or four years later, his sense of humor had been buried deep, but it wasn't dead.
Eliot wasn't the same guy who'd left home, either. He could relate, but Tyler was brutal. Efficient. Careful, even when he was kicking Eliot's ass at pool.
It made him a great guy to have on hand when things went to hell, right up until everything started going right. Too many wins, all in a row.
Clothes and women, cars and drugs. Living the life. Five-in-the-morning phone calls that made no sense at all, later recognized as the beginning of the end.
Less than a month later, Tyler was trying to drag Eliot down with him. It hadn't gone well, for either of them.
Eliot took Tyler's Desert Eagle with him when he left the other man in the back corner of the laundromat, slipping on blood and detergent as he ran for the door, looking for somewhere to ditch the gun.
And it was stupid, he knew it was a stupid thing to keep with him. A hell of a lot of risk, just to have a reminder to take with him.
---
He hadn't fired it in years, not since that last shot sent Tyler down, and it would probably misfire if he tried, but it would be one hell of a distraction.
Besides. Reminders were only useful to the living. Didn't do the dead any good.
Trying for silence would only alert the visitors that he knew they were there, so he took no pains to muffle his steps.
Eliot wasn't going to creep through his own damned house jumping at shadows.
He quickly unwrapped the gun, sliding it into the pocket of his sweatshirt, and headed down the stairs, listening carefully for any sign of movement.
At the bottom of the stairs, he heard it, a kitchen chair being kicked back.
He wrapped his fingers around the grip, and got ready.
---
Counting the ticks in his head, Alec knew that he hadn't been home for more than three minutes when the door buzzer went off. Looking out through the peephole, he wasn't even surprised to see Nate standing there.
He opened the door, and stepped back. "Yo, man. What's up?"
"It's not all of the parking lots, is it?"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean there were cameras inside the building, and-"
"Hold up. I ain't been home ten minutes yet, and this can wait until I down something for my head." Something to stop the noise. "C'mon in."
Nate pulled a face, but followed him into the kitchen, but he was obviously impatient, and waited only a beat after Alec threw the aspirin back to start in again.
"I know there's more to all of this than you're telling me, Hardison, and I'm pretty sure Sophie knows it too. What I'm telling you is that I'm not going to ask. I'd tell her to do the same, but it might just make her more curious, and anyway, she's not too thrilled with me at the moment," Nate trailed off, rubbing at his face.
"Look, man. I don't know where you're going with this, but-"
"You've been over there all day. If you had any other leads, we'd all know about it by now. So you're going back to the data. I'm guessing the footage."
Hardison was almost sure that his rummaging through the refrigerator gave nothing away, but this was Nate. He'd probably pick up on it anyway, and offering him a soda wasn't likely to distract him. "I told you, it's nothing but parking lots."
"Oh, come on. Whoever put Eliot in the state he's in would have had to weaken him first, to prevent him from getting the advantage. That would have taken, at the very least, time in a locked room with no direct contact, even with the drugs."
"There was a window in the door," Alec could tell by Nate's expression that he'd only confirmed everything he'd been trying to deny.
"If they were looking through it, he would have seen them, and given a full description the moment he was lucid, but he didn't, did he?"
"Fine," Alec admitted with frustration. "Yeah. They had cameras on him the whole time. Caught the whole thing, and it ain't pretty." He shook his head. "You think he wants everyone knowing it?"
"No, which is the only reason I'm not telling you to let me see it. And I'm not telling you to stop, because you wouldn't listen to me anyway. But I'm telling you to be careful. I don't want you sitting up all night torturing yourself with it."
"You really think I'm the type?"
Nate laughed. "Of course you are."
---
"So how'd you find me?" Alec shouted across the airfield, wanting to zip his parka, but not wanting to make any sudden movements, even though Nathan Ford was armed only with a styrofoam cup of coffee.
"Because you switched off. Went into slack mode a little too early. When you're in crunch mode, Mr. Hardison, you blast through it until you're done and pay attention to nothing else, until in your world, there is nothing else. Believe me, that part, I understand." Ford took an abortive step forward, and Alec drew back, sharply, raising his hands again.
Ford continued on, conversationally, grinning like he knew he was right. "But then the job's done and you're too fried to remember to punch out before leaving the office. You tired, you get sloppy. Mess up."
Alec took a moment to be mortified that of all the investigators and detectives and agents in the world, Ford, with his greasy hair, rumpled suit and casual demeanor, was the one who caught up with him. "And it was one hell of a crunch, wasn't it? To get you all the way out here?" Ford shook his head in amusement. "It's ironic, you know."
"What do you mean?"
"Apart from the fact that the only reason I caught up with you is because you've been choosing caffeine over sleep for three days straight?" Ford snorted. "Ah. Well. There's the fact that my partner and I are supposed to bring you in for freelancing the same job that General Delaney wanted to contract you for. And you can't tell me that the money wasn't good enough, because…" Laughing, he trailed off.
"Never said there was anything wrong with the job itself," Alec couldn't help but grin, though he was pretty sure that Ford was forcing his reaction. "Apart from having to clock in, and do what I'm told, and, well, everything. And have you looked at the hinky shit Delaney's into? Man's as crooked as they come."
"Yeah, well. Believe me, if my bosses could come up with a financial benefit to nailing him, we'd probably be on it. Put your hands down, would you? You're making me nervous."
Alec did as he was told, and then figured that at this point, shouting through the wind was equally ridiculous. He was too exhausted to keep running, anyway.
"I mean, I've been tracking you since you left for Keflavik, but I didn't expect to find you still here. Must be my lucky day."
"That's great. So what do I have to look forward to?"
"Locals are handling it. They know damned well they can't charge you in the States without it being made public that they tried to hire you, so they're claiming no knowledge. To them, it's just happy coincidence."
"That's something, at least."
"Well. Here's the deal. You still have the original drive?"
"I might."
"Well. Here's how we play this," his tone changing slightly, almost joking. "Since the suspect knew he was being pursued, he dumped the dead weight, left the drive behind, which my associate came across just as the plane was taxiing down the runway. It's unfortunate that our target escaped," he ended his narration, explaining, "Since the drive is returned, the investigation is called off within another few days. Politics being what they are, they're not going to be pursuing extraditions, so the investigation will be dropped."
"Fine. You give it back, and I'll just duck out through Reykjavik, or something, and we all pretend that this was a bad dream, yeah?"
"You'll never make it through the airport. They've got your picture, and they've got it on paper. Unhackable and waiting at every gate. It's going to take some time for the dogs to be called off. The investigation will be dropped, but that only means that they're not actively pursuing. The charges will still stick."
"So they get the files back, and I'm stuck either way."
"Well, no. I presume you've already copied them, right? Well. If you were to concede to being chaperoned until liftoff, you could be heading back to Virginia within six hours. By the time my company's making calls to the General's office as a show of patriotism and good faith, you're halfway to Chicago. Of course, you're welcome to take your chances, here."
"So you're going to just let me go?"
"I'm not the sheriff, I'm the detective. I connect the dots, and sort what needs to be sorted. Figure you're smart enough that if you sorted yourself out, went straight and maybe worked on that focus issue you've got, you could run half the world."
"As if those aren't mutually exclusive," Alec said, pulling the drive out of his pack and handing it over. "It's a deal."
"Right. Well." Ford nodded, before turning back towards the terminal, hefting the metal case in his hand. "Get your ass inside before I change my mind. It's freezing out here."
---
"You're going to wear yourself out," Nate was explaining. "You're going to mess up. And right now, you messing up could mean that Eliot's not the only one looking into a whole world of hurt."
"I know. It's serious, and I get that. But you can't just tell me to stop. You know me so well, you know how I roll."
"I'm not telling you to stop. I'm telling you to work on it. In the morning. I mean, we all saw him when he got out of there. If the footage is what I think it is, you should at least deal with it with a clear head, all right?"
He stared until Alec surrendered. Done handing out orders for the time being, he changed the subject. "If it makes you feel any better, I actually came here to help."
"Please don't tell me you came to tuck me in."
"What?" Nate blinked. "No. Give me what you got. The warehouse, files on the guards. Another set of eyes, which, by the way, were picking apart crooked paperwork since you were in diapers, might not be the worst plan."
"All right. Cool." Alec felt suddenly heavy, tired, and the room had gone too quiet, except for the ticking of the clock, which never really went away anyhow. Sleep, now that he thought about it, sounded really good.
Leading Nate towards the office end of the living room, Alec sat down began to transfer the files to a jump drive.
"How's he doing, anyhow?" Nate asked, frowning a little as he considered the spread of computers and parts lying out on the shelf behind the desk.
"Huh? Oh. Still a little beat up and out of it, but he's with it. You ain't been over there yet?"
"Was going to, but Sophie was going to head over there. Way things are going today, last thing Eliot needs is us arguing in his living room." Catching Alec's raised eyebrows, he snorted, explaining. "It's the usual baffling array."
The files were finished transferring, and Alec was pretty sure there was something else that he was supposed to remember, but it wasn't coming to mind.
"But he's okay, though? I kind of figured he'd be crawling over the walls."
"Probably will be by morning, yeah."
"Good. Maybe he'll actually be bored enough to appreciate the doctor's appointment, if only for the. You know. Novelty."
Alec thought back, but couldn't remember anything. "What appointment?"
"Follow up. The usual. Tomorrow afternoon. Parker found the paperwork he got at the hospital and ordered me to set it up. He's going to love this."
"Warn me so I can head to the bomb shelter."
"Right." Nate agreed glumly, eyes still regarding the shelves. "Any of those laptops spares?"
"Yeah, what for?"
"Got some games recorded at home that I missed when we were gone. Packers versus the Vikings, a few other ones."
"Ah. Bribery. Right. This one's running basic Windows, nothing fancy. Plenty of space. Think it probably has pinball loaded if he's desperate, but he doesn't seem the type."
Nate blinked, taking the laptop while Alec rummaged through the box of power cords. "The type? For video games?"
For a mastermind, Nate could be unimaginative sometimes, but Alec didn't figure he really wanted the full explanation. "You can tell a lot about a person by the games they play."
---
"How do you want me to play this?"
"Clean. No electronic trail. At all. Cash only, and assume every call you make is going to be traced. No digital surveillance, either."
"You're cutting me off at the knees, here. Your man really that paranoid?"
"No. But he's smart, fast, and careful. Thinks the best of everyone until he has evidence to the contrary. He is curious, though, so he usually finds it."
"Good to know. I can use that."
"See that you do. I was careful not to leave a trail the first time, but recent activities will have caught his attention."
"So you're promoting him from collateral damage to primary target, right." There was a pause on the line. "What about Spencer?"
"Alec Hardison is the priority for now. Take him out, their whole unit falls, and Spencer will be a walk in the park."
---
"Eliot?"
Shit. "Sophie?" He managed to get his hand out of his pocket, swiveling his side away so she wouldn't see evidence of the nutcase he'd become. By the time she came out of the kitchen, his hand was resting casually on the railing.
"Are you alright?"
"I'm fine," he yawned, like the adrenaline wasn't coursing through him. "What're you doing here?"
"I wanted see if you needed any help with dinner, and see how you were doing."
"Oh." Something about this wasn't making sense. Not that Sophie wasn't the sort to hover and try to take care of people, but the fact that she'd take the chance and insert herself until she was confident that it was worthwhile.
"So?"
Eliot blinked. "So what?"
"How are you doing?"
Eliot pasted a grin on his face that he really didn't feel, but it beat leaving the mask off entirely. "Starving."
Sophie was already turning back into the kitchen, talking over her shoulder, and Eliot released the breath he hadn't known he'd been holding. Christ.
"I've looked through the larder, you've got some sauce, here, and I was thinking pasta and salad?"
"Sounds good," Eliot agreed, sliding the gun into the raincoat hanging on the hook by the front door before following.
He only made it as far as the doorway, however, when he caught sight of the newspaper lying folded back on the table. She'd been doing the crossword puzzle while waiting for him.
He could see her, trying to come up with a six-letter word for witty reply, while he'd been going for the gun. Scrawling in pen as he came down the stairs, aware of the weight in his pocket, mentally rehearsing the draw and how he'd correct his aim without the use of his steadying arm. Looking up the next clue-
If she hadn't called out...
He thought he might be sick, and didn't even notice that she was setting aside an alarmingly large amount of spaghetti until she spoke. "Before you ask, I'm making enough for three. Parker might be joining us."
Eliot turned back towards the hallway. "She here?"
"Well. Sort of. She was reluctant to actually come inside until I talked to you." Sophie smiled, softening her next words. "She wasn't sure she was welcome."
"Why wouldn't she be?" Everyone else seems to be making themselves at home.
"I think she's worried that you're mad at her. Apparently you were grumpy the other day. Not, mind you, that you weren't without reason, of course, but."
"Right." You scared off Parker, and that wasn't even when you were going for the gun. This is going to go well.
Sophie looked up from the refrigerator, her face shifting slightly downwards in speculation. "You weren't expecting me, either, were you?" She read the answer on her face. "Oh dear. Hardison said he'd warn you."
"Think he had some stuff on his mind." And please don't ask me about what. "But. It's cool, thanks for comin', and all." Eliot realized he was still standing in the doorway, and made his way to the counter. "You're welcome any time, you know. Don't need a written invitation."
If Sophie realized he was deliberately turning on the charm, she played along anyway, instantly brightening. "Okay. Could you keep an eye on the water? I'll go see if I can find Parker, if you're really okay with it?"
"Huh? Yeah." He shook his head, waving her away from the stove. "Get her ass in here."
She brushed past him, entirely too close, but he held the flinch back until she'd left the room. He listened to her calling out for Parker as he opened the freezer, grabbing another ice pack. He'd have to bring down the ones that he'd been stockpiling upstairs, but it could wait. Right now, he had to get his shit together. Get his game face on.
The footsteps behind him were careful and hesitant. Parker, then, not Sophie. It was easier to talk to the frozen peas, though. "Sorry about yesterday. I'm not mad at you, and I wasn't then. Just stressed out."
When he turned, shutting the door, Parker was nodding awkwardly, clearly embarrassed, and Sophie coming into the kitchen behind her probably wasn't helping things any. Eliot rushed to change the subject. The sooner they'd seen for themselves that everything was fine, the sooner they'd leave him alone. "So. You guys want garlic bread, too? Think I got some wine around here."
"Do you think you should be drinking?"
"I'm on water, but believe me. Hardison bought the sauce. You'll probably need it. Besides," he said, shifting into a heavy drawl, "I got my two favorite ladies in here, of course I'm going to try an' get 'em drunk."
Rolling her eyes, Sophie ordered him to the table. Parker watched him sit down, before disappearing again, her footsteps strangely heavy and loud, up the stairs and down again. Her entrance was announced with the shuffling of feet and the rattling of pill bottles.
"You should take these with meals, right?"
He regarded the antibiotics, seeing the bottle sailing across the kitchen, crashing into the wall behind the sink, pills scattering on impact as the intruders ran from the room, leaving him to his own business. Grimacing, he accepted the bottle and set it aside, careful to nod his thanks. "Right."
He looked at the clock. An hour, two tops, and they'd be gone.
---
He'd missed three calls while he'd been sleeping, all from Ron, who'd also texted him, apparently drunk. Wondering if he was about to hear really bad news, really confusing news, or a just bunch of random bar noise, he listened to his voicemail.
"Alec! It's Ron. I'm sitting here with the guys, and no one's seen you for a while, so we're wondering where you've run off to. And, more importantly, who you've run off with. I got a twenty riding on this one with Mike, man, so call me back and I'll cut you in."
Christ Almighty.
The rest of the world had been spinning onwards through another uneventful month, full of the usual wars, economic crises, wars, reality shows. People had been going to work, getting the mail, and staying out too late on work nights. Some of them had been doing so at Alec's favorite bar.
It was kind of nice to be missed, it made him laugh. But mostly, it was just surreal. There was no way he could call Ron back to explain away the clusterfuck that everything had become since the last time he'd seen him.
He remembered sitting down at the bar, not knowing what came next except for some vague plans involving Kansas, not knowing that in the next five minutes, something unexpected was going to change.
Not knowing that in less than a thousand hours, he'd be standing in his kitchen, holding his phone as listened to the clock ticking in his head, feeling nostalgic over it.
"As if I needed to be cut in on a twenty, " he was going to say, as he scrolled down to call back.
When the phone rang, vibrating in his hand, he nearly dropped it to the floor.
It was Nate, and the past was the past. He'd deal with it later.
"Hi, ah, Hardison. I made some headway with the warehouse. There was a prospective buyer in one of the files. All I needed to do was pose as on of their insurance contacts following up on the property damage. Spoke to a woman named Miranda, who couldn't tell me much because of the investigation, but she said that the direct mail company went under months five months ago and moved out. They'd been keeping it empty in anticipation of the sale. Which reminds me, though. The investigation. We're clear?"
Alec had to take a few seconds to parse it out, take it all in. "We're good. Ripped the drives, all that was left was hardware, no way to tell where they lead, and if I missed anything, it's not going to be on our head, but on our guy's. Just to be on the safe side, day I got out of the hospital I cleaned us out of the traffic cameras, and did a real obvious hack into the cameras leading out towards Ohio. Anyway. You got nothing?"
"Yeah. Now that I think of it, it's not really headway, though. Sorry."
"Hold up, man. At least we know it's a dead end, right? So we follow the guards. Shane Geffin wasn't the only one. It's sloppy as hell, but if I used him as a model, I'm guessing we're looking for someone local. I get into his accounts and look for cash deposits."
He wasn't sure where to go from there. Considered a few options before continuing. "Once I've got that figured out, I can see if there's any similar activity happening nearby. It's too much to hope for that others were depositing the same amounts, or. Hell," Alec broke off with the realization. "It's not likely that they were depositing the cash at all."
"Geffin had a wife, and a house that looked like it was still being paid off. He probably would have deposited at least most of it. And if I'm right, the others would be in the same boat. Whoever we're looking for probably wasn't local, otherwise he wouldn't be having to hire out rent-a-cops under the table, he'd have his own crew. And it's probable that he found them through the same source. Where else did Geffin work?"
"He was unemployed for the last few months, if I'm remembering right, until about five weeks ago."
"Crap. I was hoping our guy would have pulled from the same source."
Hardison nodded to himself, then shook his head. "No. Wait, Nate. Hang on." After a moment to gather his thoughts, he continued, bringing up Geffin's bank accounts. "Geffin's wife was working part time at the school, but not enough that he didn't have to collect unemployment. Aw, hell, this is going to be easy."
"What do you mean?"
"What you said about hiring from the same source. Kansas went to direct deposit for unemployment payments a few years ago, which means they have to maintain bank account numbers. I can filter them out by location and gender to narrow the field. Take the account numbers and look for cash deposits starting at about the same time. Now some people, you hand them a pile of cash, they're not going to put it in the bank, but like you said. Geffin might not have been the only guy with a mortgage."
"And if that doesn't work?"
Alec turned to the other screen. "I'll check the local libraries, see if he's got a card."
"Okay. Why?"
"Not seeing any bills for internet access being paid out of any of his accounts, not for months. They canceled the cable a few months back."
"Scaling back on expenditures. Cautious, for a guy who sat idly by to watch a man get tortured."
"Right," Alec stumbled over Nate's words, and tabbed through a few more screens. "And his local library system, like most, requires a library card to log into the computers."
"Okay, so if he has a library card, you can find out what he's been looking at?"
"Doubt it. Ever since the Patriot Act came down, most libraries have been deliberately purging their circulation records, and I've never seen any of them keeping web histories on the computers. But…" he trailed off, using a false account setup to worm his way into the system. It was the standard setup, the same as a hundred other library systems. Gotta love vendor systems. It wasn't even a challenge to get into the librarian interface and do a quick patron search.
"Hardison," Nate growled impatiently.
"Wah? Oh. Okay. Not seeing anything. He doesn't have a card. Which means no computer, which means for him to get hired out, he wasn't responding to anything online. Doesn't mean the job wasn't posted, but frankly, given the nature of the position, I can't see our guy advertising it so widely."
"So you're thinking?"
"Could be anything. If it was posted on a wall somewhere, the best thing I can think of is to see what I find out about the other guards, map out where they might cross paths."
"That's great!"
"It's going to take a day or so, though. And it might not lead anywhere."
"But it's a plan. Plans, I'm good with. Let me know when you need us to follow up on foot. I'm going to call Eliot, get him out to his appointment, but if you want to call me when you get somewhere with all this?"
"Will do."
---
Eliot was pretty sure he'd cut Nate off mid-apology when he hung up the phone
It wasn't worth fighting, and anyway. It wasn't like he hadn't been meaning to set up the appointment anyway. In a day or two.
He was stiff enough that getting out of bed took two attempts. Scrubbing the tears away, he groaned at the feel of the stubble against the back of his hand. This is pathetic.
The shower was already filling the room with steam by the time he realized that at some point, he'd have to get undressed. He'd thought about it, yesterday. But Hardison had been downstairs, waiting in his kitchen, and all Eliot could think about was the sheer effort it would take to hold himself upright, and the mortification that would come pounding up the stairs on Hardison's heels if he failed.
Giving up, he'd leaned in enough to dunk his head into the stream, and dried his face off before trying to towel his hair dry.
He'd barely managed it, and had to satisfy himself with running a comb through his hair. His shirt had been soaked, by the end of it, so he'd pulled another sweatshirt on over it, and called it good. It wasn't until he'd gotten the sling back on that he'd gone back and turned the shower off.
How he'd thought he'd manage actually bathing was beyond him, now.
It had been almost a month since he'd taken a proper shower.
He was probably still carrying around trace amounts of that month on his skin, under his clothes. In his hair.
Fuck, he was disgusting.
Stepping on his own toes, he managed to get the socks off, and the sweats, and the boxers. Then came the hard part. The first sweatshirt unzipped, and came off easily, but the two shirts beneath it were pullovers.
The shoulder was bad enough, but the twisting felt like it was going to tear him in half.
Think, man. What did they do at the hospital?
He remembered an orderly helping, taking turns with the nurse to manipulate Eliot's arms in the correct order, tugging the material where it needed to go.
They also pumped you so full of drugs you wouldn't have noticed it if they'd stolen half your organs.
He didn't have two sets of extra hands, didn't even have one full set.
He was standing in his bathroom, trying not to move his shoulder at all, trying not to breathe, with no pants and two shirts on. He didn't need to open his eyes to know what a ridiculous reflection he'd see in the mirror.
Opening the drawer by the sink, he was relieved that the scissors, at least, were where they were supposed to be.
It was awkward as hell, he couldn't get the angle right, and the blades kept getting caught on the material, but he eventually managed to cut the shirts open from the hem to the collar.
Satisfied by his victory, he put the scissors away and glanced at himself in the mirror.
It was a mistake.
He'd been warned, back at the hospital, that he'd lost some weight, but he wasn't ready for the sight of it, muscles gone to waste, gray sick skin hanging too loose and paper-thin, like he'd deflated. The bootmark on his side faded to green at the edges, though maybe it was just a trick of the light, and bruises radiated out from his visibly swollen shoulder, streaks of jaundice-colored skin radiating out from the purple and blending into the red.
It was his hand, though, curled rigidly against his chest, immobile, that stayed with him after he closed his eyes. Useless and gnarled, and it wasn't even everything that was wrong with him.
He reached out, feeling his way carefully into the shower and backing slowly into the heat. Tried not to think about it, tried to relax. He tried not to fucking start freaking out, and mostly, he failed.
This is what he was now.
And hell, everyone else was so damned aware of it, too. Always watching him like he was going to fall over, like they thought he couldn't handle anything. Worrying about him, if not outright pitying him.
It should have been comforting, that they were there. That they came around to check on him, make sure he ate. All that.
He wasn't supposed to fucking need all that. Not that, and not their concern. He was supposed to be able to take care of his fucking self.
And yet, here you are.
Freaking out in your shower, sniveling like a bitch.
He took a deep, wet breath and tilted his head under the stream. Face up and deal.
This would pass. He'd heal and get himself back into shape. Work himself back up into who he used to be.
Calm the fuck down.
It was a pain in the ass getting the shampoo where it needed to go, and he was pretty sure he used too much, but he managed to wash his hair without too much trouble.
He'd never felt so sickened by the feeling of his own skin under his hands as he tried to rub the bruises out, but that's what washcloths were for.
He stayed under the spray for a very long time after the soap had been rinsed away, staring at the grout between the tiles for an indeterminate length of time until the water threatened to cool.
Nate was going to be there soon, and he still needed to get a comb through his hair. Brush his teeth. Still needed to get dressed.
---
He grabbed the first button-up shirt that he could find and was dragging it up over his bad arm before he realized it was the one Hardison had mentioned. The one he'd worn when he'd run into Mikel Dayan.
It's just a damned shirt.
It was too thin, anyway, but it was already mostly on, so he settled for pulling on a flannel shirt over it. By the time he zipped up the sweatshirt, he was almost warm.
Socks, then, two pairs, and jeans. Trainers that he could slide his feet into without undoing the laces.
He really wanted to pull his hair back into a ponytail, but it just wasn't going to happen. He'd grab a hat before leaving the house.
Keeping his eyes averted, he ducked back into the bathroom and grabbed the bottle of painkillers, shoving them in his pocket, annoyed at how badly he wanted one, but it would have to wait. For all he knew, the doctor wanted him going in clean. He'd retrieve the antibiotics when he got downstairs.
And if he wanted to get downstairs before Nate arrived, he probably had to start now. It was one thing to be this fucked up. It was another thing entirely to let the boss in on it.
---
Eliot watched the door close behind the nurse and finally let himself relax. He'd never been so relieved to be told to wait in his life.
Even if it took an hour, at least from here, leaning against the paper-wrapped examination table, he couldn't feel eyes burning into the side of his skull.
On the ride over, Nate had been trying to make conversation. Something about the weather, something about a football game, something about the warehouse, and how he was sure they'd find something, soon.
"We'll get everyone on it, and we'll figure it out."
Everyone.The idea wasn't comforting, but even that was too much to admit, not if he ever wanted Nate to stop looking at him like that.
"I'm fine," was all the reassurance he'd felt like offering. He didn't think it had sounded like much.
---
Two blood draws and an X-ray later, the doctor declared him fit enough to go back to bed.
It was a little anti-climactic.
---
Someone had taken sandpaper to his eyeballs without his noticing, the numbers on the screen were starting to bleed into each other, and his back was killing him.
It was a good sign. Meant he'd been following the information for a long time without hitting an obvious dead end.
But it wasn't going as well as he'd thought it would, trying to find the other guards. There were just too many possibilities to choose from, and nothing was jumping out at him. He needed more information so he could get more information.
Story of your life.
Despite what Nate seemed to think, Alec wasn't trying to torture himself. He just needed to track something that wasn't even a fully-fledged idea yet.
He opened the first file on the drive, and watched the two guards drag Eliot into the cell, leaving him unconscious on the floor in nothing but his jeans.
Geffin was the first, he was pretty sure, but the angle was so awkward that he couldn't be sure. He couldn't get a clean enough image to run through his identification programs.
But it wasn't like those were helping, much, anyway. The search had shut itself down three hours ago, with no good matches. The man in the photo was a ghost.
Alec really wasn't looking forward to telling the others that it all had been a giant waste of time.
This, though, was another story entirely. At least one of the other guards had to be on unemployment. Had to have an ID somewhere. And if Alec was right, he already had the data he needed. He just needed to know how to recognize it.
The first scene ended about a minute after the door shut, and the file closed, leaving Alec no wiser than he'd been at the start.
The next file's time stamp jumped ahead three hours, and by then the cell had gone dark, really dark, but Eliot was beginning to stir.
His arm moved first, slowly, before his eyes flashed brightly as they opened, the night-vision turning them silver as they searched the room, finding nothing because there was nothing to find.
Eliot rolled over, pushed himself up and tensing, frozen and concentrating. Annoyed and calculating. Waiting. And then he was moving to sit against the wall. After a minute, the camera shut itself off again.
The next several files showed nothing more than minute differences in his posture over the next several hours, but apparently the shifts in his expression weren't enough to set the camera off.
Alec never saw the anger change to confusion. Boredom into irritation. The file after that, Eliot was pissed off again, and patting himself down, searching empty pockets. He'd apparently shifted in his sleep in the next few.
One of the clips was much brighter, and the night-vision had been turned off. Two men went into the room, both keeping their heads averted, hiding their faces from the camera. One had a gun trained and ready to go, while the other placed food and water on the floor, and a bucket in the corner. Then they ghosted away again, and the clip ended.
Now that Eliot had woken up, started moving around, inspecting the room, the files were starting to get larger, each one containing more footage. Sometimes pacing, sometimes trying to look out the door. Passing by the food and water, regarding it with suspicion.
Even before going in there, he'd known what to expect.
Some things in the world, no one should ever have to be right about.
Eliot didn't eat, didn't drink anything for more than two days, though the food and water were replaced nightly as he slept. Yeah, like he's really picky about the sell-by date.
But eventually, he gave in. Watching that clip, hell, watching it twice, Alec was sure without looking that his expression matched the one Eliot wore as he picked up the water. Disappointment. Failure.
Knowing damned well that he wouldn't have to be watching it if they'd only gotten their asses in gear sooner, found him more quickly, Alec stopped the playback, stabbing at his keyboard with a vengeance.
Focus, man. Move on.
Skipping ahead, next clip he chose was no better. Eliot stared across the room, his expression nothing but drugged blankness.
Alec knew how this all ended. Had seen enough of the show to know the plot, and he had the soundtrack memorized.
He went back and opened one of the earlier files, again studying the irritated and resigned speculation as Eliot surveyed the room, gearing up to fight. It was a familiar look. Compared to the other footage, it was actually almost comforting.
If Alec wanted to, he could probably keep clicking through the clips, following the glint of Eliot's eyes until he found the exact moment that the fight went out of them.
And anyway, he wasn't supposed to be watching Eliot, anyway. He was supposed to be doing research.
He checked the clock, surprised to find that an entire day had passed, and he'd never gotten back to Nate. And he should probably check in with Eliot, see how he was doing.
But it could wait. It wasn't like he had anything new to say, and anyhow, he probably wouldn't be able to hear anything either of them said over the sound of the timer counting down.
Now that he'd noticed it, it would probably fade out again pretty soon, it usually did. Then it would hide, waiting for the moment he turned his brain off, let himself get distracted, and it would come back with a vengeance.
Ain't fair.
Maybe if he just stopped, for a while, really concentrated on something, painting maybe, it would go away. But he wasn't in the mood for painting, anyway.
Alec stretched until his lower back stopped screaming, and tried to remember if he had anything worth eating in the fridge.
He was shoving a burrito into the microwave when he realized that he hadn't talked to anyone since morning, and he didn't even know if anyone was making sure Eliot was, what? Fed? Being seen to? Okay?
He ignored it for about ten minutes, but by the time he was finished eating, he was already picking up his phone.
---
Eliot spent the afternoon dozing on the couch, icing his shoulder and watching the game on the laptop that Nate had given him. It was past seven when the Vikings beat the Packers, though the file ended before he could get the post-game. Didn't matter, they'd just be droning on, blathering about Brett Favre, anyway.
There was nothing to do but eat something, maybe, and get ready for bed. Probably sooner rather than later, though he wasn't tired, not really.
The quiet was starting to set his teeth on edge, though.
He checked his phone, but there were no missed calls.
He considered calling Hardison to see how far he'd gotten with everything. See if he could borrow some DVDs tomorrow or something, now that he had the option of watching them. Maybe he'd even see if there was anything he could actually to do help. But Hardison was probably wired into his computer games by now. Out on the town, maybe.
Ain't like the guy's got nothing better to do than babysit your sorry ass.
Tomorrow. He'd make the call tomorrow.
---
By the time he reached the kitchen and considered the prospects, Eliot found that he'd lost his appetite.
Screw it. Should probably crash out, anyway. Just get the day over with, already.
The phone rang when he was halfway up the stairs, and he almost missed the call, a little short of breath when he answered. "Hey man, what's up?"
"I'm starved," Hardison answered. "Gonna order take-out. I can bring over some Chinese or something, if you haven't eaten yet."
"Sure. Um." Eliot was surprised at how quickly his appetite returned. "Order some Kung Pao chicken, would you?"
"I'm on it. Be there in a bit."
---
"I think that one's just rice," Alec said, indicating the carton Eliot was opening, rummaging through the bag for the chopsticks. Just because Eliot was temporarily in the fork utilization camp, didn't mean he had to, after all. "What d'you want to drink?"
"Beer's in the fridge, if you want. Grab be one while you're at it."
He opened two bottles without asking if he should be drinking, and dished some more rice into his bowl. He began to carry the provisions to the table, surprised when Eliot continued out of the kitchen and across into the living room. He was easing down onto the couch when Alec remembered to ask, "you go to the doctor?"
"Yeah, and everything's going the way it should be, and I've got test results on the way. Everything's fine, but. Really don't feel like talking about it."
"That's cool." The laptop was sitting closed on the chair, but with his hands full, it was too much effort to move it, so he sat down on the other end of the couch and changed the subject. "Nate said he got some football game on there. You watch it yet?"
"Haven't gotten to it yet," Eliot said. "Packers and the Vikings. I could throw it on if you want."
"Hell yeah, do it up," Alec said, before realizing that with Eliot's fucked up arm, it would be probably be easier if he got up and dealt with it.
But Eliot opened the computer and messed with it for a few seconds, getting it set up before balancing it on the chair again, swiveling the seat and checking to make sure they'd both be able to see. Satisfied, he grunted and sat back again, making sure his beer was within reach and his bowl was balanced in the crook of his arm.
It was awkward enough that if Alec shifted away, it would probably spill all over the place. So he didn't move.
---
It was halfway into the third quarter, and Eliot didn't even care that he already knew that there was no chance the Packers were going to pull ahead, because there was no one there to call him on his foreknowledge.
Hardison had passed out a while ago, not long after drinking the beer that Eliot had decided not to mix with painkillers and antibiotics, and eating himself into a probable food coma. His head was back against the top of the couch at an improbable angle, and he was close enough that Eliot could hear him breathing.
In a while, he'd kick him out. He'd wake up anyway, once the twinges looming over the horizon made themselves known and forced Eliot to make his way back up to his bed.
Well aware that it was only because there was no one else to see it, Eliot settled back, rolling his head against the back of the couch. From this angle, he couldn't see much of Hardison's face, but he'd be able to tell when he began to stir. He could watch him breathe, chest moving under the thin fabric of his T-shirt, shadows in the hollow of his throat. Long arms smooth and loose at his sides.
It would have been ridiculous, all of it, if there'd been anywhere to see it, but there were no eyes anywhere, no one to observe. And there was still a quarter and a half left to the end of the game, anyway.
Eliot thought about turning back towards the screen, but lacked the energy to do anything more than listen, drifting with half-closed eyes. At some point, Hardison shifted in his sleep, settling more deeply into the couch. The skin of his arm was warm, along the edge of Eliot's hand, falling still again.
He never stirred, but Eliot was instantly more awake than he'd been in ages. He'd probably never sleep again.
Didn't mean Hardison didn't need it, though. He'd let him sleep a little longer.
---
Chapter 12
Rating: R
Spoilers: Up through 2x07
Pairing: Alec Hardison/ Eliot Spencer
Genre: Drama
Warnings: WIP
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: The present's a mess, and the past isn't helping.
A/N: To all that are celebrating Thanksgiving, here's some food coma reading. :)
Banner by the wonderful and amazing and brilliant cybel
Previous Chapters: Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Eliot had been through enough psych evaluations in his time to know that talking it out was supposed to help. Reintegration, they'd called it.
Distance, not actually being there, had more to do with soldiers coming home and not totally fucking cracking than sitting in an office and finding the words that would get them out of there soonest. The same shit was still out there, the same fighting and the same fuckups. But maybe that was just him. He wasn't one to spout off.
Hardison wasn't a base shrink, even if he cede the couch and move to the chair, telling Eliot to lie the hell down, man, or Sophie's going to have both our asses. He didn't ask a whole lot of invasive questions, didn't ask him how he felt about anything. He didn't spout off heavily-laden un-hmms or interestings. Half the time, Eliot wasn't even sure he was listening, though he never slid his eyes from the ceiling to check.
He told him about the room, about how cold it was, and how dark. He was careful not to belabor the point, mentioning it only once, and that was enough. Hardison wasn't stupid, after all. Instead, he described the dimensions, the way the door was mounted, and his suspicion that the single window faced south.
Told him about the drugs, his best guesses as to what they'd been. If Hardison wanted to know how they felt, how the muffled everything and made the world seem small and huge all at once, he could look them up himself.
He didn't talk much about food or water, beyond pointing out that if it weren't for their lack he probably could have gotten out of there, even with the drugs. He didn't speak of the thirst, and never of the hunger.
The photos, though. Those, he could talk about.
"Woke up and they were in the room, someone had brought them in while I'd been passed out. Stared at them for hours, but nothing came to me. It was weird. No idea who the guy is, how he relates to anything. I know he probably does, but. I can't figure that one out." Hardison was focused on him now, he was sure of it.
"No idea?"
"I know for a fact that I didn't see him in Pakistan. Might have come across him before, but as to when that would have been?" He finally swiveled his head. "Your computer got anything yet?"
"Nothing yet," Hardison admitted, checking his phone, irritated. Realizing he was being watched, he explained. "Had to leave the analysis running on the main system back home. It'll ping me once it's gotten anything better than a 95 percent match. Been running ever since last night, could be another day or so."
"Why's it taking so long?"
"Global search, almost literally. There's a lot out there. I was hoping you'd be able to give me something to narrow it down."
"Yeah, well. Guess this wasn't so useful after all."
"Right." Hardison turned back to his computer. It felt like a deliberate move. "So you didn't learn anything from the guards?"
"Never really saw them." It was the truth. Incoming boots and an arm grappling at him out of nowhere didn't count, after all, and he didn't really need to get into it. So there was no useful reason for him to admit, "by the time they showed, I was messed up enough that I couldn't track them."
"Huh. Not to sound like, you know. A complete asshole or anything, but is there anything else that you do remember?"
"No." Like he thought it would, his answer was met with silence.
It lasted a while.
Eventually, he heard a resigned sigh, and the sound of a laptop being closed. "Right. Sorry, man. If it's dragging anything up, but from what I'm seeing now…" He trailed off, trying to choose his words perfectly. "I thought this would get us somewhere." Hardison was giving up.
"Yeah, well. Things don't always work out like they do in the movies." His shoulder was starting to throb again, and he weighed the pain against the effort of going to the kitchen for another ice pack.
"No kidding."
Eliot swiveled his legs over the side of the couch first, let them carry the momentum that got him standing again, and watched Hardison shoving the computer into his bag, a little defeated and a lot pissed-off.
Like he had cause to be taking this personally.
Whatever.
"So now what?"
"I'm gonna go home, take some aspirin. Hope that maybe something brilliant occurs to me while I'm going through the videos again." He checked his phone again, glancing up at Eliot, though his attention was already elsewhere. "You should crash out, though."
"Right. Cool," was all he said, distracted by the knowledge that if he'd come up with something more useful, Hardison wouldn't be going back to watch the footage again. It was stupid to think otherwise, but also more disappointing than Eliot would have expected.
It didn't help that Hardison had probably caught on, the way he wasn't cracking wise, or talking about it at all, directly. And it wasn't that he didn't appreciate it.
But it meant he didn't know what he saw, when he watched it, and didn't know what he saw when Hardison looked at him. If he still saw Eliot, or if he saw the person he'd become, there, in that room.
Watching through the window as Hardison walked down the driveway towards his car, Eliot felt insubstantial and in between. He wished he'd managed to get him to tell him who he thought Eliot was supposed to be, given him something to work with.
But for once, Hardison hadn't seemed to have all the answers, so he'd kept his mouth shut.
---
All he knew was the chill of the cell, and then the explosion and death.
But he could hear voices.
Nate muttered into the air, apparently checking with Hardison for an update, while Parker strolled over the rubble.
Sophie called after her from the sidewalk, littered with debris, warning her to mind her footing. Surveying the chaos, her eyes followed the uniformed men picking their way across the wreckage of what had once been the Federal Building. Eliot was one of them, but she didn't notice.
She definitely didn't notice him watching from just behind and above her, seeing everything, all of it, missing no detail.
Until he blinked, and everything went dark, and he couldn't see anything at all. He could only feel. A massive sharp pressure on his chest, pain and cold fading away too quickly. The sensation of falling without movement
And there was sound. He could still hear them talking, everyone in the whole world, it seemed.
"Can you tell me what's happening?"
Sophie's question was answered by a woman's voice, vague and indistinct. "Search and rescue. It's not going so well. Sorry, I."
"I'm sure you're doing all you can," Sophie replied, sympathetically.
"I'd like to think so, but. It's hard. We're going to have to pull out soon. It's been days, now."
"Well, I'm sure you've gone all you can, Miss…?"
"Hardison. Sandra Hardison," she trailed off, and the voice was gone, buried under sirens in the distance, the ticking of the office clock that was mysteriously still working.
Another shower of grit and dust was falling nearby, and the stop-start scraping of concrete against concrete was growing louder, until it was all that was left to notice and Eliot was left trying to decide if this is what the end of the world was going to sound like.
He almost didn't notice the grinding cease.
But that wasn't right. It wasn't the sound that was pulling away and fading out, it was Eliot, falling away into the distance, back and up.
---
It was that scraping sound that woke him.
Eliot peeled his eyes up towards the ceiling, trying to catch his breath as the grit and cold darkness sank down beneath the blankets somewhere.
He groaned. A moment or so ago, he was pretty sure he'd dreamt he was dying. Now he just wanted to. But he didn't have time to think about it now, not if he sounds from downstairs were anything to go by.
There. There it was, again. A kitchen chair scraping across the floor, and then nothing. He lay flat, unmoving, and concentrated, trying to figure out if someone was sitting down or standing up, what those two actions could mean.
It all amounted to the same thing. Someone was waiting for him. If they'd wanted him, they could have taken him already, while he slept. He'd left himself wide open for attack.
And while lying there wasn't doing much to change that, the pain wasn't letting him labor under any pleasant delusions of having anything by way of options that wasn't hidden at the back of the closet.
---
Tyler was from Miami, a no-bullshit kind of guy, probably had been when he'd first gotten posted in Zagreb. By the time he and Eliot met, three or four years later, his sense of humor had been buried deep, but it wasn't dead.
Eliot wasn't the same guy who'd left home, either. He could relate, but Tyler was brutal. Efficient. Careful, even when he was kicking Eliot's ass at pool.
It made him a great guy to have on hand when things went to hell, right up until everything started going right. Too many wins, all in a row.
Clothes and women, cars and drugs. Living the life. Five-in-the-morning phone calls that made no sense at all, later recognized as the beginning of the end.
Less than a month later, Tyler was trying to drag Eliot down with him. It hadn't gone well, for either of them.
Eliot took Tyler's Desert Eagle with him when he left the other man in the back corner of the laundromat, slipping on blood and detergent as he ran for the door, looking for somewhere to ditch the gun.
And it was stupid, he knew it was a stupid thing to keep with him. A hell of a lot of risk, just to have a reminder to take with him.
---
He hadn't fired it in years, not since that last shot sent Tyler down, and it would probably misfire if he tried, but it would be one hell of a distraction.
Besides. Reminders were only useful to the living. Didn't do the dead any good.
Trying for silence would only alert the visitors that he knew they were there, so he took no pains to muffle his steps.
Eliot wasn't going to creep through his own damned house jumping at shadows.
He quickly unwrapped the gun, sliding it into the pocket of his sweatshirt, and headed down the stairs, listening carefully for any sign of movement.
At the bottom of the stairs, he heard it, a kitchen chair being kicked back.
He wrapped his fingers around the grip, and got ready.
---
Counting the ticks in his head, Alec knew that he hadn't been home for more than three minutes when the door buzzer went off. Looking out through the peephole, he wasn't even surprised to see Nate standing there.
He opened the door, and stepped back. "Yo, man. What's up?"
"It's not all of the parking lots, is it?"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean there were cameras inside the building, and-"
"Hold up. I ain't been home ten minutes yet, and this can wait until I down something for my head." Something to stop the noise. "C'mon in."
Nate pulled a face, but followed him into the kitchen, but he was obviously impatient, and waited only a beat after Alec threw the aspirin back to start in again.
"I know there's more to all of this than you're telling me, Hardison, and I'm pretty sure Sophie knows it too. What I'm telling you is that I'm not going to ask. I'd tell her to do the same, but it might just make her more curious, and anyway, she's not too thrilled with me at the moment," Nate trailed off, rubbing at his face.
"Look, man. I don't know where you're going with this, but-"
"You've been over there all day. If you had any other leads, we'd all know about it by now. So you're going back to the data. I'm guessing the footage."
Hardison was almost sure that his rummaging through the refrigerator gave nothing away, but this was Nate. He'd probably pick up on it anyway, and offering him a soda wasn't likely to distract him. "I told you, it's nothing but parking lots."
"Oh, come on. Whoever put Eliot in the state he's in would have had to weaken him first, to prevent him from getting the advantage. That would have taken, at the very least, time in a locked room with no direct contact, even with the drugs."
"There was a window in the door," Alec could tell by Nate's expression that he'd only confirmed everything he'd been trying to deny.
"If they were looking through it, he would have seen them, and given a full description the moment he was lucid, but he didn't, did he?"
"Fine," Alec admitted with frustration. "Yeah. They had cameras on him the whole time. Caught the whole thing, and it ain't pretty." He shook his head. "You think he wants everyone knowing it?"
"No, which is the only reason I'm not telling you to let me see it. And I'm not telling you to stop, because you wouldn't listen to me anyway. But I'm telling you to be careful. I don't want you sitting up all night torturing yourself with it."
"You really think I'm the type?"
Nate laughed. "Of course you are."
---
"So how'd you find me?" Alec shouted across the airfield, wanting to zip his parka, but not wanting to make any sudden movements, even though Nathan Ford was armed only with a styrofoam cup of coffee.
"Because you switched off. Went into slack mode a little too early. When you're in crunch mode, Mr. Hardison, you blast through it until you're done and pay attention to nothing else, until in your world, there is nothing else. Believe me, that part, I understand." Ford took an abortive step forward, and Alec drew back, sharply, raising his hands again.
Ford continued on, conversationally, grinning like he knew he was right. "But then the job's done and you're too fried to remember to punch out before leaving the office. You tired, you get sloppy. Mess up."
Alec took a moment to be mortified that of all the investigators and detectives and agents in the world, Ford, with his greasy hair, rumpled suit and casual demeanor, was the one who caught up with him. "And it was one hell of a crunch, wasn't it? To get you all the way out here?" Ford shook his head in amusement. "It's ironic, you know."
"What do you mean?"
"Apart from the fact that the only reason I caught up with you is because you've been choosing caffeine over sleep for three days straight?" Ford snorted. "Ah. Well. There's the fact that my partner and I are supposed to bring you in for freelancing the same job that General Delaney wanted to contract you for. And you can't tell me that the money wasn't good enough, because…" Laughing, he trailed off.
"Never said there was anything wrong with the job itself," Alec couldn't help but grin, though he was pretty sure that Ford was forcing his reaction. "Apart from having to clock in, and do what I'm told, and, well, everything. And have you looked at the hinky shit Delaney's into? Man's as crooked as they come."
"Yeah, well. Believe me, if my bosses could come up with a financial benefit to nailing him, we'd probably be on it. Put your hands down, would you? You're making me nervous."
Alec did as he was told, and then figured that at this point, shouting through the wind was equally ridiculous. He was too exhausted to keep running, anyway.
"I mean, I've been tracking you since you left for Keflavik, but I didn't expect to find you still here. Must be my lucky day."
"That's great. So what do I have to look forward to?"
"Locals are handling it. They know damned well they can't charge you in the States without it being made public that they tried to hire you, so they're claiming no knowledge. To them, it's just happy coincidence."
"That's something, at least."
"Well. Here's the deal. You still have the original drive?"
"I might."
"Well. Here's how we play this," his tone changing slightly, almost joking. "Since the suspect knew he was being pursued, he dumped the dead weight, left the drive behind, which my associate came across just as the plane was taxiing down the runway. It's unfortunate that our target escaped," he ended his narration, explaining, "Since the drive is returned, the investigation is called off within another few days. Politics being what they are, they're not going to be pursuing extraditions, so the investigation will be dropped."
"Fine. You give it back, and I'll just duck out through Reykjavik, or something, and we all pretend that this was a bad dream, yeah?"
"You'll never make it through the airport. They've got your picture, and they've got it on paper. Unhackable and waiting at every gate. It's going to take some time for the dogs to be called off. The investigation will be dropped, but that only means that they're not actively pursuing. The charges will still stick."
"So they get the files back, and I'm stuck either way."
"Well, no. I presume you've already copied them, right? Well. If you were to concede to being chaperoned until liftoff, you could be heading back to Virginia within six hours. By the time my company's making calls to the General's office as a show of patriotism and good faith, you're halfway to Chicago. Of course, you're welcome to take your chances, here."
"So you're going to just let me go?"
"I'm not the sheriff, I'm the detective. I connect the dots, and sort what needs to be sorted. Figure you're smart enough that if you sorted yourself out, went straight and maybe worked on that focus issue you've got, you could run half the world."
"As if those aren't mutually exclusive," Alec said, pulling the drive out of his pack and handing it over. "It's a deal."
"Right. Well." Ford nodded, before turning back towards the terminal, hefting the metal case in his hand. "Get your ass inside before I change my mind. It's freezing out here."
---
"You're going to wear yourself out," Nate was explaining. "You're going to mess up. And right now, you messing up could mean that Eliot's not the only one looking into a whole world of hurt."
"I know. It's serious, and I get that. But you can't just tell me to stop. You know me so well, you know how I roll."
"I'm not telling you to stop. I'm telling you to work on it. In the morning. I mean, we all saw him when he got out of there. If the footage is what I think it is, you should at least deal with it with a clear head, all right?"
He stared until Alec surrendered. Done handing out orders for the time being, he changed the subject. "If it makes you feel any better, I actually came here to help."
"Please don't tell me you came to tuck me in."
"What?" Nate blinked. "No. Give me what you got. The warehouse, files on the guards. Another set of eyes, which, by the way, were picking apart crooked paperwork since you were in diapers, might not be the worst plan."
"All right. Cool." Alec felt suddenly heavy, tired, and the room had gone too quiet, except for the ticking of the clock, which never really went away anyhow. Sleep, now that he thought about it, sounded really good.
Leading Nate towards the office end of the living room, Alec sat down began to transfer the files to a jump drive.
"How's he doing, anyhow?" Nate asked, frowning a little as he considered the spread of computers and parts lying out on the shelf behind the desk.
"Huh? Oh. Still a little beat up and out of it, but he's with it. You ain't been over there yet?"
"Was going to, but Sophie was going to head over there. Way things are going today, last thing Eliot needs is us arguing in his living room." Catching Alec's raised eyebrows, he snorted, explaining. "It's the usual baffling array."
The files were finished transferring, and Alec was pretty sure there was something else that he was supposed to remember, but it wasn't coming to mind.
"But he's okay, though? I kind of figured he'd be crawling over the walls."
"Probably will be by morning, yeah."
"Good. Maybe he'll actually be bored enough to appreciate the doctor's appointment, if only for the. You know. Novelty."
Alec thought back, but couldn't remember anything. "What appointment?"
"Follow up. The usual. Tomorrow afternoon. Parker found the paperwork he got at the hospital and ordered me to set it up. He's going to love this."
"Warn me so I can head to the bomb shelter."
"Right." Nate agreed glumly, eyes still regarding the shelves. "Any of those laptops spares?"
"Yeah, what for?"
"Got some games recorded at home that I missed when we were gone. Packers versus the Vikings, a few other ones."
"Ah. Bribery. Right. This one's running basic Windows, nothing fancy. Plenty of space. Think it probably has pinball loaded if he's desperate, but he doesn't seem the type."
Nate blinked, taking the laptop while Alec rummaged through the box of power cords. "The type? For video games?"
For a mastermind, Nate could be unimaginative sometimes, but Alec didn't figure he really wanted the full explanation. "You can tell a lot about a person by the games they play."
---
"How do you want me to play this?"
"Clean. No electronic trail. At all. Cash only, and assume every call you make is going to be traced. No digital surveillance, either."
"You're cutting me off at the knees, here. Your man really that paranoid?"
"No. But he's smart, fast, and careful. Thinks the best of everyone until he has evidence to the contrary. He is curious, though, so he usually finds it."
"Good to know. I can use that."
"See that you do. I was careful not to leave a trail the first time, but recent activities will have caught his attention."
"So you're promoting him from collateral damage to primary target, right." There was a pause on the line. "What about Spencer?"
"Alec Hardison is the priority for now. Take him out, their whole unit falls, and Spencer will be a walk in the park."
---
"Eliot?"
Shit. "Sophie?" He managed to get his hand out of his pocket, swiveling his side away so she wouldn't see evidence of the nutcase he'd become. By the time she came out of the kitchen, his hand was resting casually on the railing.
"Are you alright?"
"I'm fine," he yawned, like the adrenaline wasn't coursing through him. "What're you doing here?"
"I wanted see if you needed any help with dinner, and see how you were doing."
"Oh." Something about this wasn't making sense. Not that Sophie wasn't the sort to hover and try to take care of people, but the fact that she'd take the chance and insert herself until she was confident that it was worthwhile.
"So?"
Eliot blinked. "So what?"
"How are you doing?"
Eliot pasted a grin on his face that he really didn't feel, but it beat leaving the mask off entirely. "Starving."
Sophie was already turning back into the kitchen, talking over her shoulder, and Eliot released the breath he hadn't known he'd been holding. Christ.
"I've looked through the larder, you've got some sauce, here, and I was thinking pasta and salad?"
"Sounds good," Eliot agreed, sliding the gun into the raincoat hanging on the hook by the front door before following.
He only made it as far as the doorway, however, when he caught sight of the newspaper lying folded back on the table. She'd been doing the crossword puzzle while waiting for him.
He could see her, trying to come up with a six-letter word for witty reply, while he'd been going for the gun. Scrawling in pen as he came down the stairs, aware of the weight in his pocket, mentally rehearsing the draw and how he'd correct his aim without the use of his steadying arm. Looking up the next clue-
If she hadn't called out...
He thought he might be sick, and didn't even notice that she was setting aside an alarmingly large amount of spaghetti until she spoke. "Before you ask, I'm making enough for three. Parker might be joining us."
Eliot turned back towards the hallway. "She here?"
"Well. Sort of. She was reluctant to actually come inside until I talked to you." Sophie smiled, softening her next words. "She wasn't sure she was welcome."
"Why wouldn't she be?" Everyone else seems to be making themselves at home.
"I think she's worried that you're mad at her. Apparently you were grumpy the other day. Not, mind you, that you weren't without reason, of course, but."
"Right." You scared off Parker, and that wasn't even when you were going for the gun. This is going to go well.
Sophie looked up from the refrigerator, her face shifting slightly downwards in speculation. "You weren't expecting me, either, were you?" She read the answer on her face. "Oh dear. Hardison said he'd warn you."
"Think he had some stuff on his mind." And please don't ask me about what. "But. It's cool, thanks for comin', and all." Eliot realized he was still standing in the doorway, and made his way to the counter. "You're welcome any time, you know. Don't need a written invitation."
If Sophie realized he was deliberately turning on the charm, she played along anyway, instantly brightening. "Okay. Could you keep an eye on the water? I'll go see if I can find Parker, if you're really okay with it?"
"Huh? Yeah." He shook his head, waving her away from the stove. "Get her ass in here."
She brushed past him, entirely too close, but he held the flinch back until she'd left the room. He listened to her calling out for Parker as he opened the freezer, grabbing another ice pack. He'd have to bring down the ones that he'd been stockpiling upstairs, but it could wait. Right now, he had to get his shit together. Get his game face on.
The footsteps behind him were careful and hesitant. Parker, then, not Sophie. It was easier to talk to the frozen peas, though. "Sorry about yesterday. I'm not mad at you, and I wasn't then. Just stressed out."
When he turned, shutting the door, Parker was nodding awkwardly, clearly embarrassed, and Sophie coming into the kitchen behind her probably wasn't helping things any. Eliot rushed to change the subject. The sooner they'd seen for themselves that everything was fine, the sooner they'd leave him alone. "So. You guys want garlic bread, too? Think I got some wine around here."
"Do you think you should be drinking?"
"I'm on water, but believe me. Hardison bought the sauce. You'll probably need it. Besides," he said, shifting into a heavy drawl, "I got my two favorite ladies in here, of course I'm going to try an' get 'em drunk."
Rolling her eyes, Sophie ordered him to the table. Parker watched him sit down, before disappearing again, her footsteps strangely heavy and loud, up the stairs and down again. Her entrance was announced with the shuffling of feet and the rattling of pill bottles.
"You should take these with meals, right?"
He regarded the antibiotics, seeing the bottle sailing across the kitchen, crashing into the wall behind the sink, pills scattering on impact as the intruders ran from the room, leaving him to his own business. Grimacing, he accepted the bottle and set it aside, careful to nod his thanks. "Right."
He looked at the clock. An hour, two tops, and they'd be gone.
---
He'd missed three calls while he'd been sleeping, all from Ron, who'd also texted him, apparently drunk. Wondering if he was about to hear really bad news, really confusing news, or a just bunch of random bar noise, he listened to his voicemail.
"Alec! It's Ron. I'm sitting here with the guys, and no one's seen you for a while, so we're wondering where you've run off to. And, more importantly, who you've run off with. I got a twenty riding on this one with Mike, man, so call me back and I'll cut you in."
Christ Almighty.
The rest of the world had been spinning onwards through another uneventful month, full of the usual wars, economic crises, wars, reality shows. People had been going to work, getting the mail, and staying out too late on work nights. Some of them had been doing so at Alec's favorite bar.
It was kind of nice to be missed, it made him laugh. But mostly, it was just surreal. There was no way he could call Ron back to explain away the clusterfuck that everything had become since the last time he'd seen him.
He remembered sitting down at the bar, not knowing what came next except for some vague plans involving Kansas, not knowing that in the next five minutes, something unexpected was going to change.
Not knowing that in less than a thousand hours, he'd be standing in his kitchen, holding his phone as listened to the clock ticking in his head, feeling nostalgic over it.
"As if I needed to be cut in on a twenty, " he was going to say, as he scrolled down to call back.
When the phone rang, vibrating in his hand, he nearly dropped it to the floor.
It was Nate, and the past was the past. He'd deal with it later.
"Hi, ah, Hardison. I made some headway with the warehouse. There was a prospective buyer in one of the files. All I needed to do was pose as on of their insurance contacts following up on the property damage. Spoke to a woman named Miranda, who couldn't tell me much because of the investigation, but she said that the direct mail company went under months five months ago and moved out. They'd been keeping it empty in anticipation of the sale. Which reminds me, though. The investigation. We're clear?"
Alec had to take a few seconds to parse it out, take it all in. "We're good. Ripped the drives, all that was left was hardware, no way to tell where they lead, and if I missed anything, it's not going to be on our head, but on our guy's. Just to be on the safe side, day I got out of the hospital I cleaned us out of the traffic cameras, and did a real obvious hack into the cameras leading out towards Ohio. Anyway. You got nothing?"
"Yeah. Now that I think of it, it's not really headway, though. Sorry."
"Hold up, man. At least we know it's a dead end, right? So we follow the guards. Shane Geffin wasn't the only one. It's sloppy as hell, but if I used him as a model, I'm guessing we're looking for someone local. I get into his accounts and look for cash deposits."
He wasn't sure where to go from there. Considered a few options before continuing. "Once I've got that figured out, I can see if there's any similar activity happening nearby. It's too much to hope for that others were depositing the same amounts, or. Hell," Alec broke off with the realization. "It's not likely that they were depositing the cash at all."
"Geffin had a wife, and a house that looked like it was still being paid off. He probably would have deposited at least most of it. And if I'm right, the others would be in the same boat. Whoever we're looking for probably wasn't local, otherwise he wouldn't be having to hire out rent-a-cops under the table, he'd have his own crew. And it's probable that he found them through the same source. Where else did Geffin work?"
"He was unemployed for the last few months, if I'm remembering right, until about five weeks ago."
"Crap. I was hoping our guy would have pulled from the same source."
Hardison nodded to himself, then shook his head. "No. Wait, Nate. Hang on." After a moment to gather his thoughts, he continued, bringing up Geffin's bank accounts. "Geffin's wife was working part time at the school, but not enough that he didn't have to collect unemployment. Aw, hell, this is going to be easy."
"What do you mean?"
"What you said about hiring from the same source. Kansas went to direct deposit for unemployment payments a few years ago, which means they have to maintain bank account numbers. I can filter them out by location and gender to narrow the field. Take the account numbers and look for cash deposits starting at about the same time. Now some people, you hand them a pile of cash, they're not going to put it in the bank, but like you said. Geffin might not have been the only guy with a mortgage."
"And if that doesn't work?"
Alec turned to the other screen. "I'll check the local libraries, see if he's got a card."
"Okay. Why?"
"Not seeing any bills for internet access being paid out of any of his accounts, not for months. They canceled the cable a few months back."
"Scaling back on expenditures. Cautious, for a guy who sat idly by to watch a man get tortured."
"Right," Alec stumbled over Nate's words, and tabbed through a few more screens. "And his local library system, like most, requires a library card to log into the computers."
"Okay, so if he has a library card, you can find out what he's been looking at?"
"Doubt it. Ever since the Patriot Act came down, most libraries have been deliberately purging their circulation records, and I've never seen any of them keeping web histories on the computers. But…" he trailed off, using a false account setup to worm his way into the system. It was the standard setup, the same as a hundred other library systems. Gotta love vendor systems. It wasn't even a challenge to get into the librarian interface and do a quick patron search.
"Hardison," Nate growled impatiently.
"Wah? Oh. Okay. Not seeing anything. He doesn't have a card. Which means no computer, which means for him to get hired out, he wasn't responding to anything online. Doesn't mean the job wasn't posted, but frankly, given the nature of the position, I can't see our guy advertising it so widely."
"So you're thinking?"
"Could be anything. If it was posted on a wall somewhere, the best thing I can think of is to see what I find out about the other guards, map out where they might cross paths."
"That's great!"
"It's going to take a day or so, though. And it might not lead anywhere."
"But it's a plan. Plans, I'm good with. Let me know when you need us to follow up on foot. I'm going to call Eliot, get him out to his appointment, but if you want to call me when you get somewhere with all this?"
"Will do."
---
Eliot was pretty sure he'd cut Nate off mid-apology when he hung up the phone
It wasn't worth fighting, and anyway. It wasn't like he hadn't been meaning to set up the appointment anyway. In a day or two.
He was stiff enough that getting out of bed took two attempts. Scrubbing the tears away, he groaned at the feel of the stubble against the back of his hand. This is pathetic.
The shower was already filling the room with steam by the time he realized that at some point, he'd have to get undressed. He'd thought about it, yesterday. But Hardison had been downstairs, waiting in his kitchen, and all Eliot could think about was the sheer effort it would take to hold himself upright, and the mortification that would come pounding up the stairs on Hardison's heels if he failed.
Giving up, he'd leaned in enough to dunk his head into the stream, and dried his face off before trying to towel his hair dry.
He'd barely managed it, and had to satisfy himself with running a comb through his hair. His shirt had been soaked, by the end of it, so he'd pulled another sweatshirt on over it, and called it good. It wasn't until he'd gotten the sling back on that he'd gone back and turned the shower off.
How he'd thought he'd manage actually bathing was beyond him, now.
It had been almost a month since he'd taken a proper shower.
He was probably still carrying around trace amounts of that month on his skin, under his clothes. In his hair.
Fuck, he was disgusting.
Stepping on his own toes, he managed to get the socks off, and the sweats, and the boxers. Then came the hard part. The first sweatshirt unzipped, and came off easily, but the two shirts beneath it were pullovers.
The shoulder was bad enough, but the twisting felt like it was going to tear him in half.
Think, man. What did they do at the hospital?
He remembered an orderly helping, taking turns with the nurse to manipulate Eliot's arms in the correct order, tugging the material where it needed to go.
They also pumped you so full of drugs you wouldn't have noticed it if they'd stolen half your organs.
He didn't have two sets of extra hands, didn't even have one full set.
He was standing in his bathroom, trying not to move his shoulder at all, trying not to breathe, with no pants and two shirts on. He didn't need to open his eyes to know what a ridiculous reflection he'd see in the mirror.
Opening the drawer by the sink, he was relieved that the scissors, at least, were where they were supposed to be.
It was awkward as hell, he couldn't get the angle right, and the blades kept getting caught on the material, but he eventually managed to cut the shirts open from the hem to the collar.
Satisfied by his victory, he put the scissors away and glanced at himself in the mirror.
It was a mistake.
He'd been warned, back at the hospital, that he'd lost some weight, but he wasn't ready for the sight of it, muscles gone to waste, gray sick skin hanging too loose and paper-thin, like he'd deflated. The bootmark on his side faded to green at the edges, though maybe it was just a trick of the light, and bruises radiated out from his visibly swollen shoulder, streaks of jaundice-colored skin radiating out from the purple and blending into the red.
It was his hand, though, curled rigidly against his chest, immobile, that stayed with him after he closed his eyes. Useless and gnarled, and it wasn't even everything that was wrong with him.
He reached out, feeling his way carefully into the shower and backing slowly into the heat. Tried not to think about it, tried to relax. He tried not to fucking start freaking out, and mostly, he failed.
This is what he was now.
And hell, everyone else was so damned aware of it, too. Always watching him like he was going to fall over, like they thought he couldn't handle anything. Worrying about him, if not outright pitying him.
It should have been comforting, that they were there. That they came around to check on him, make sure he ate. All that.
He wasn't supposed to fucking need all that. Not that, and not their concern. He was supposed to be able to take care of his fucking self.
And yet, here you are.
Freaking out in your shower, sniveling like a bitch.
He took a deep, wet breath and tilted his head under the stream. Face up and deal.
This would pass. He'd heal and get himself back into shape. Work himself back up into who he used to be.
Calm the fuck down.
It was a pain in the ass getting the shampoo where it needed to go, and he was pretty sure he used too much, but he managed to wash his hair without too much trouble.
He'd never felt so sickened by the feeling of his own skin under his hands as he tried to rub the bruises out, but that's what washcloths were for.
He stayed under the spray for a very long time after the soap had been rinsed away, staring at the grout between the tiles for an indeterminate length of time until the water threatened to cool.
Nate was going to be there soon, and he still needed to get a comb through his hair. Brush his teeth. Still needed to get dressed.
---
He grabbed the first button-up shirt that he could find and was dragging it up over his bad arm before he realized it was the one Hardison had mentioned. The one he'd worn when he'd run into Mikel Dayan.
It's just a damned shirt.
It was too thin, anyway, but it was already mostly on, so he settled for pulling on a flannel shirt over it. By the time he zipped up the sweatshirt, he was almost warm.
Socks, then, two pairs, and jeans. Trainers that he could slide his feet into without undoing the laces.
He really wanted to pull his hair back into a ponytail, but it just wasn't going to happen. He'd grab a hat before leaving the house.
Keeping his eyes averted, he ducked back into the bathroom and grabbed the bottle of painkillers, shoving them in his pocket, annoyed at how badly he wanted one, but it would have to wait. For all he knew, the doctor wanted him going in clean. He'd retrieve the antibiotics when he got downstairs.
And if he wanted to get downstairs before Nate arrived, he probably had to start now. It was one thing to be this fucked up. It was another thing entirely to let the boss in on it.
---
Eliot watched the door close behind the nurse and finally let himself relax. He'd never been so relieved to be told to wait in his life.
Even if it took an hour, at least from here, leaning against the paper-wrapped examination table, he couldn't feel eyes burning into the side of his skull.
On the ride over, Nate had been trying to make conversation. Something about the weather, something about a football game, something about the warehouse, and how he was sure they'd find something, soon.
"We'll get everyone on it, and we'll figure it out."
Everyone.The idea wasn't comforting, but even that was too much to admit, not if he ever wanted Nate to stop looking at him like that.
"I'm fine," was all the reassurance he'd felt like offering. He didn't think it had sounded like much.
---
Two blood draws and an X-ray later, the doctor declared him fit enough to go back to bed.
It was a little anti-climactic.
---
Someone had taken sandpaper to his eyeballs without his noticing, the numbers on the screen were starting to bleed into each other, and his back was killing him.
It was a good sign. Meant he'd been following the information for a long time without hitting an obvious dead end.
But it wasn't going as well as he'd thought it would, trying to find the other guards. There were just too many possibilities to choose from, and nothing was jumping out at him. He needed more information so he could get more information.
Story of your life.
Despite what Nate seemed to think, Alec wasn't trying to torture himself. He just needed to track something that wasn't even a fully-fledged idea yet.
He opened the first file on the drive, and watched the two guards drag Eliot into the cell, leaving him unconscious on the floor in nothing but his jeans.
Geffin was the first, he was pretty sure, but the angle was so awkward that he couldn't be sure. He couldn't get a clean enough image to run through his identification programs.
But it wasn't like those were helping, much, anyway. The search had shut itself down three hours ago, with no good matches. The man in the photo was a ghost.
Alec really wasn't looking forward to telling the others that it all had been a giant waste of time.
This, though, was another story entirely. At least one of the other guards had to be on unemployment. Had to have an ID somewhere. And if Alec was right, he already had the data he needed. He just needed to know how to recognize it.
The first scene ended about a minute after the door shut, and the file closed, leaving Alec no wiser than he'd been at the start.
The next file's time stamp jumped ahead three hours, and by then the cell had gone dark, really dark, but Eliot was beginning to stir.
His arm moved first, slowly, before his eyes flashed brightly as they opened, the night-vision turning them silver as they searched the room, finding nothing because there was nothing to find.
Eliot rolled over, pushed himself up and tensing, frozen and concentrating. Annoyed and calculating. Waiting. And then he was moving to sit against the wall. After a minute, the camera shut itself off again.
The next several files showed nothing more than minute differences in his posture over the next several hours, but apparently the shifts in his expression weren't enough to set the camera off.
Alec never saw the anger change to confusion. Boredom into irritation. The file after that, Eliot was pissed off again, and patting himself down, searching empty pockets. He'd apparently shifted in his sleep in the next few.
One of the clips was much brighter, and the night-vision had been turned off. Two men went into the room, both keeping their heads averted, hiding their faces from the camera. One had a gun trained and ready to go, while the other placed food and water on the floor, and a bucket in the corner. Then they ghosted away again, and the clip ended.
Now that Eliot had woken up, started moving around, inspecting the room, the files were starting to get larger, each one containing more footage. Sometimes pacing, sometimes trying to look out the door. Passing by the food and water, regarding it with suspicion.
Even before going in there, he'd known what to expect.
Some things in the world, no one should ever have to be right about.
Eliot didn't eat, didn't drink anything for more than two days, though the food and water were replaced nightly as he slept. Yeah, like he's really picky about the sell-by date.
But eventually, he gave in. Watching that clip, hell, watching it twice, Alec was sure without looking that his expression matched the one Eliot wore as he picked up the water. Disappointment. Failure.
Knowing damned well that he wouldn't have to be watching it if they'd only gotten their asses in gear sooner, found him more quickly, Alec stopped the playback, stabbing at his keyboard with a vengeance.
Focus, man. Move on.
Skipping ahead, next clip he chose was no better. Eliot stared across the room, his expression nothing but drugged blankness.
Alec knew how this all ended. Had seen enough of the show to know the plot, and he had the soundtrack memorized.
He went back and opened one of the earlier files, again studying the irritated and resigned speculation as Eliot surveyed the room, gearing up to fight. It was a familiar look. Compared to the other footage, it was actually almost comforting.
If Alec wanted to, he could probably keep clicking through the clips, following the glint of Eliot's eyes until he found the exact moment that the fight went out of them.
And anyway, he wasn't supposed to be watching Eliot, anyway. He was supposed to be doing research.
He checked the clock, surprised to find that an entire day had passed, and he'd never gotten back to Nate. And he should probably check in with Eliot, see how he was doing.
But it could wait. It wasn't like he had anything new to say, and anyhow, he probably wouldn't be able to hear anything either of them said over the sound of the timer counting down.
Now that he'd noticed it, it would probably fade out again pretty soon, it usually did. Then it would hide, waiting for the moment he turned his brain off, let himself get distracted, and it would come back with a vengeance.
Ain't fair.
Maybe if he just stopped, for a while, really concentrated on something, painting maybe, it would go away. But he wasn't in the mood for painting, anyway.
Alec stretched until his lower back stopped screaming, and tried to remember if he had anything worth eating in the fridge.
He was shoving a burrito into the microwave when he realized that he hadn't talked to anyone since morning, and he didn't even know if anyone was making sure Eliot was, what? Fed? Being seen to? Okay?
He ignored it for about ten minutes, but by the time he was finished eating, he was already picking up his phone.
---
Eliot spent the afternoon dozing on the couch, icing his shoulder and watching the game on the laptop that Nate had given him. It was past seven when the Vikings beat the Packers, though the file ended before he could get the post-game. Didn't matter, they'd just be droning on, blathering about Brett Favre, anyway.
There was nothing to do but eat something, maybe, and get ready for bed. Probably sooner rather than later, though he wasn't tired, not really.
The quiet was starting to set his teeth on edge, though.
He checked his phone, but there were no missed calls.
He considered calling Hardison to see how far he'd gotten with everything. See if he could borrow some DVDs tomorrow or something, now that he had the option of watching them. Maybe he'd even see if there was anything he could actually to do help. But Hardison was probably wired into his computer games by now. Out on the town, maybe.
Ain't like the guy's got nothing better to do than babysit your sorry ass.
Tomorrow. He'd make the call tomorrow.
---
By the time he reached the kitchen and considered the prospects, Eliot found that he'd lost his appetite.
Screw it. Should probably crash out, anyway. Just get the day over with, already.
The phone rang when he was halfway up the stairs, and he almost missed the call, a little short of breath when he answered. "Hey man, what's up?"
"I'm starved," Hardison answered. "Gonna order take-out. I can bring over some Chinese or something, if you haven't eaten yet."
"Sure. Um." Eliot was surprised at how quickly his appetite returned. "Order some Kung Pao chicken, would you?"
"I'm on it. Be there in a bit."
---
"I think that one's just rice," Alec said, indicating the carton Eliot was opening, rummaging through the bag for the chopsticks. Just because Eliot was temporarily in the fork utilization camp, didn't mean he had to, after all. "What d'you want to drink?"
"Beer's in the fridge, if you want. Grab be one while you're at it."
He opened two bottles without asking if he should be drinking, and dished some more rice into his bowl. He began to carry the provisions to the table, surprised when Eliot continued out of the kitchen and across into the living room. He was easing down onto the couch when Alec remembered to ask, "you go to the doctor?"
"Yeah, and everything's going the way it should be, and I've got test results on the way. Everything's fine, but. Really don't feel like talking about it."
"That's cool." The laptop was sitting closed on the chair, but with his hands full, it was too much effort to move it, so he sat down on the other end of the couch and changed the subject. "Nate said he got some football game on there. You watch it yet?"
"Haven't gotten to it yet," Eliot said. "Packers and the Vikings. I could throw it on if you want."
"Hell yeah, do it up," Alec said, before realizing that with Eliot's fucked up arm, it would be probably be easier if he got up and dealt with it.
But Eliot opened the computer and messed with it for a few seconds, getting it set up before balancing it on the chair again, swiveling the seat and checking to make sure they'd both be able to see. Satisfied, he grunted and sat back again, making sure his beer was within reach and his bowl was balanced in the crook of his arm.
It was awkward enough that if Alec shifted away, it would probably spill all over the place. So he didn't move.
---
It was halfway into the third quarter, and Eliot didn't even care that he already knew that there was no chance the Packers were going to pull ahead, because there was no one there to call him on his foreknowledge.
Hardison had passed out a while ago, not long after drinking the beer that Eliot had decided not to mix with painkillers and antibiotics, and eating himself into a probable food coma. His head was back against the top of the couch at an improbable angle, and he was close enough that Eliot could hear him breathing.
In a while, he'd kick him out. He'd wake up anyway, once the twinges looming over the horizon made themselves known and forced Eliot to make his way back up to his bed.
Well aware that it was only because there was no one else to see it, Eliot settled back, rolling his head against the back of the couch. From this angle, he couldn't see much of Hardison's face, but he'd be able to tell when he began to stir. He could watch him breathe, chest moving under the thin fabric of his T-shirt, shadows in the hollow of his throat. Long arms smooth and loose at his sides.
It would have been ridiculous, all of it, if there'd been anywhere to see it, but there were no eyes anywhere, no one to observe. And there was still a quarter and a half left to the end of the game, anyway.
Eliot thought about turning back towards the screen, but lacked the energy to do anything more than listen, drifting with half-closed eyes. At some point, Hardison shifted in his sleep, settling more deeply into the couch. The skin of his arm was warm, along the edge of Eliot's hand, falling still again.
He never stirred, but Eliot was instantly more awake than he'd been in ages. He'd probably never sleep again.
Didn't mean Hardison didn't need it, though. He'd let him sleep a little longer.
---
Chapter 12