Title: The Favor
Summary: My challenge at
caperland was to write a fic around the propt ride in a pick-up for seven hours
Characters: Eliot, Hardison, Parker
Rating: PG-13 for language
"Yo, brah, look alive you've stopped." Comes Hardison’s voice over the earpiece, interrupting the quiet from the rumbling of the engine being cut off.
"Really Hardison, like I wouldn't have noticed that myself, being the one that's in the back of this damn pick-up! FOR SEVEN HOURS!" Eliot grouses in a some-what hushed voice as to not alert anyone to his presence.
"Hey, don't be getting mad at me man, I was just trying to be nice. I'm hackin' into some CCTV footage now, the side entrance on the East looks like your best way in." Replies Hardison in a distracted voice already involved with the maps and video coming up on his screens.
The sounds of fists hitting flesh and the pained groans that give away the existence of a fight filter in through the speakers. "Eliot, you ok, what's happening?"
" A little busy here," was the hurried reply before more sounds of a fight were heard, then the grumblings of one annoyed hitter. " ‘Don’t be mad at me, use the East side, that will be easy’, my ass. I'm here. The door’s locked, work your magic or something."
"Yes mastah, right away" Hardison responded sarcastically before clicking away once again at his keyboard.
"Damn it Hardison! Just do it, or I could just walk away and-”
"Nah man, chill, it's open." He interrupts, knowing that this is important.
The sound of a door opening alerts the hacker and he quickly closes out the open windows and puts a football game from earlier in the week up in the monitors.
“What’cha doin?” Parker cheerfully asks while flopping onto the couch and helping herself to the gummy frogs that litter the coffee table in front of them.
“Nothing, just watching the game.” He replies, trying to sound innocent but comes off as nervous and guilty. The thief looks at him skeptically before wriggling further onto the couch, trying to find a more comfortable position, which indicates to the hacker her intent to settle in and stay for a while.
“Hardison” Eliot’s voice interrupts the nervous tension filling the room. “Alec! Help me out here man.”
His hurried voice pulling Alec back to the monitors and away from Parker’s judging stare. “Sorry, sorry,” he says as he quickly brings the maps and videos back up only sparing the thief a fleeting look before giving Eliot his attention once more. “Sorry, I’m good I’m back.”
“What the hell happened? No, nevermind, just tell me where to go, those guys won’t be out forever.”
Finding the location on the blueprints in front of him the hacker began to lead Eliot through the maze of offices and computer labs. “Go through the door in front of you and follow the hallway down until you reach the second right, make the first left and go until you see the staircase. Take that down two floors and then it’s the fourth door on the left, room 424. Tell me when you get there.”
Turning to Parker, Alec, stalled explaining what was going on by grabbing one of the liter bottles of orange soda. “Well…what’s Eliot doing and why didn’t you guys tell me?” She asks hurt that her friends left her out. Nate she could understand, he was weird when people made their own plans, but her!
“Nah, he, we… Whatcha doing here, I thought you were checking out the new security that the bank installed?”
“There was a glitch in the software so the bank isn’t installing it today, now stop changing the subject.”
“I’m here, now what?” Says Eliot in an agitated voice.
“Just plug the drive I gave you into the USB, I put an auto run program on it.”
“No, typing.” Eliot says with more relief in his voice then he normally allows.
“Nah man, no typing,” The hacker replies with a chuckle. “Just sit back and let it work its magic, it should only take a couple of minutes.”
“Done!” The hitter says just before the alarms start going off. “Hardison, get me an exit!”
“I got you man, just go out the door and to your left, there should be a closet on your right, grab something from in there to blend in and take the elevators to the 3rd floor, you should be good.”
“Should be? Hardison, I swear when I get back there you and I are going to have a talk.”
Sometime later that night
“Here’s your damn drive, I’m never doing a favor like this for you again man. My whole vacation was ruined for this!” Says Eliot as he throws the drive to Alec before going to the fridge to grab himself an apple.
“What are you wearing?” Parker asks with a laugh, unable to control herself even if Eliot is giving her the glare that would make most people turn and run.
Alec finally looks up from where he was already downloading the drive onto his computers and before he can think to smother a laugh one of his own escapes.
Eliot growls and throws his half eaten apple at Hardison’s head before storming out of the apartment.
“I still don’t know why he had to ride around in the pick up for seven hours to get the new World of Warcraft expansion for you. Couldn’t you have just told him where the Blizzard building was?” Parker asks in between giggles.
“That was just payback for his making fun of me earlier. FOR THE HORDE!" Both Parker and Hardison fall back onto the couch, their laughter quieting down and wait for the game to start up. He couldn't wait to see all the new loot Cataclysim had!
The shirt that Eliot wore to blend in and sneak out of the blizzard building