jendavis

Man I Used to Be #9

2009-11-07T06:25:26Z

Title: Man I Used to Be
By: Jendavis
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.

Previous Chapters: Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8

Chapter 9

It was still dark outside, and Eliot was awake for what felt like a long time before he noticed that he wasn’t alone. Another moment passed, and Nate noticed it too.

"Eliot!" his voice rasped from the chair at the foot of the bed, but he was trying to talk quietly for some reason. "Good to see that you're awake. How're you feeling?" He rose, stepping towards the bed to stand over him.

He could feel the weight of Nate's eyes on him, pressing into every bruise, grinding over every scrape, pulling apart every cut to see deeper. The gown and bandages didn't cover it all. Too much was left open, exposed.

Eliot had never been so aware of relative positions in his life. Lying here, there wasn't any further he could get. And Nate didn't look like he was planning on stepping back.
He shook his head, as if it would offset Nate's closeness, and tried to shift, to sit up, but his ribs protested too strongly. Like he needed to give Nate any more proof of how weak he was.

"Take it easy, Eliot. We're in the clear for now, and we'll find the people who did this. Looks like two got away, and we got some information off the guard's wallet. We're on it, but I'm going to need you to tell us what happened. You up for it now?" Apparently one look told Nate all he needed to know, and he backed off apologetically. "It can wait a bit, until you're feeling up to it. No rush." He rocked on his heels, once, like he had too much energy, and Eliot wasn't giving him anywhere to go with it.

"You don't need to stay," Eliot ground out. For an opening salvo, it wasn't much, but he managed to hold Nate's eyes long enough that he should have been convinced.

"Huh?" Nate shook his head, distracted. "If someone comes after you, you're in no shape to fend them off. Besides. You, Parker and Hardison could have been killed yesterday, so…"

If he could only get free of the painkillers. Wake up properly and get out of bed, he could show Nate that everything was fine. That he had it under control. That he didn't need anyone sitting watch, staring down at him like they knew everything already.

Nate moved towards him, hand outstretched like he was preparing to shove Eliot back into bed if he had to, and Eliot hadn't even realized he'd moved.

The fact that Nate had done so, though? It was all too much.

"I'll be fine," he tried. "You don't need to lose sleep over it. I'll get out of here-"

"You're in here for a reason. And we're not leaving you alone. And it's not just because I'm. You know. Worried. I've got the others to worry about as well. And they're. Ah, you know."

"Worried."

"Right." Because you messed up, got yourself beat, Nate didn't say, but Eliot heard it anyhow. "Right. So. Ah. Go back to sleep. Rest up, and we'll get you back in the ring when you're out of here."

Nate seemed distracted, not really looking at him, but he talked a good game, he always did. But Eliot knew the score. When your hitter couldn't hit, it was time to move on. Nothing personal. Just business. It was smart, logical, and Nate knew it, but he was too much a white-hat to say so.

Nate was staring out the window, somewhat dazed, or maybe just lost in thought, and Eliot took the opportunity to study his face. His eyes were bloodshot, and needing a shave and a change of clothes, Nate looked beat to hell, like he needed the sleep more than Eliot did.

But he was still planning things out like he assumed there was still some sort of future, or and that Eliot had a place in it. Desperation, maybe, or denial.

Because it took one hell of a set of blinders to assume that Eliot would be up to the task anytime soon. Though the IV drip had run its course last night, he was becoming resigned to the fact that the other tubes might be staying in a bit longer. He didn't even want to get up, truth be told.

But he didn't want to be there, either. It was the only thing on which he and Nate agreed.

If Nate was in this much denial now, he had to wonder what he must have been like, before. Hours spent in uncomfortable waiting rooms, impatient for the doctors to give him news on his son. Another round of test results, another suggested treatment.

At least then it wasn't the kid's fault, he thought, though he wasn't so far gone that he'd say it aloud. But if Eliot hadn't fucked up, Nate wouldn't have to be here, now.

But Nate was leaving, anyway. Nodding once, he said "I'm gonna go see what the doctors have to say about Hardison."

Eliot hadn't even thought to ask about him. He stared at the ceiling, listening to his own breathing, and added one more thing he should have done differently to the list.

---

Nate was waiting outside the examination room, and smiled widely when Alec told him he was being released, but his face was weary and haggard. He looked like he'd been up all night. Probably had been, sitting in the chair, keeping watch.

Alec wished he could think of something to say that didn't relate to Nate's son. The other options, though, weren't much better. Eliot was so much on their minds that he was sure he should probably be trying to think about anything else.

Before going to see the doctor, he'd ducked his head around the curtain, just checking, and Eliot hadn't stirred.

He hadn't looked like he would be stirring any time soon, either, and even though Alec knew better, even though he'd heard the same reports from the nurses, he couldn't stop thinking about how close it had been.

It was probably the kind of thing someone should say something about, but he wasn't that guy. Nate wasn't, either. He just handed Hardison his jacket with a tired grin and headed for the parking lot. "Sophie's going to drop Parker off here," he said, pulling the car door shut. "After I get you to the hotel I'm going to head out, go track down the guard. See what he knows."

Alec nodded, waited until they'd turned out of the lot to ask, "Don't you need me riding shotgun on that?"

Nate snorted. "I caught you, didn't I? Caught up with all of you, at some point, even without having you on the line. Think I can manage one guard." His eyes slid over towards Alec as he smirked, some of the usual life showing through. "Besides. Parker got his wallet."

"But." Several arguments were boiling over in his head, but I already screwed one job up wasn't going to work in his favor, and now he was getting hung up on shouldn't Eliot be the one to go with you? Nate must have sensed it.

"Hardison. Look. You need to focus. I want you takin' it easy, but I also want you on comms, running what you can from the hotel. You took a hit yesterday-"

"And I'm fine now."

"-and we all know that you're the best one for the job."

"I ain't gonna argue with that. Just. Don't seem right, is all."

"None of this is right. But it's just a temporary thing, you know? Eliot'll be fighting his way out of there in another day or so."

Alec sighed, shook his head, and apparently Nate wasn't expecting the disagreement. "What?"

"You seriously think everything's gonna go back to normal the moment he walks out of there?"

"Not right away, but. Yeah. Look. He freaked us out, and he's probably a little freaked himself, which is something we're not going to point out to him. But. He's not made out of glass. This won't break him."

Alec wanted to agree, he really did, but he wasn't there yet. "You know that for sure?" Alec looked down at his hands, annoyed that he was asking for the confirmation, feeling like an ass for saying it out loud.

"I have to. So do you guys, and so does he." Nate cut Alec a pointed look before turning his attention back to the road.

"Hey, man, look. I hear ya, and I don't want to be the one to rain on anyone's parade, but. What if the man ain't ready to hear it?"

"We tell him anyway." Nate stated with a shrug; apparently the topic was closed. "Now look. In the meantime, Parker said you grabbed some hard drives from the warehouse?"

"Yeah man. Mostly security footage, who knows what else, if anything. But I'm on it. Soon as I get in."

"Good," Nate nodded. "Because if our guard's a bust, it's our only lead."

---

With Parker's pale face staring down at him so sadly, he wasn't sure which of them was the ghost. He still had a body that could feel pain, so he knew he was still alive, but Parker's silence told him nothing.

She got you out of there. Her and Hardison. Use your head, you know this already.

Taking a breath, because one of them had to speak, he blinked heavily and asked, "What?"

In the time it took to open his eyes again, everything had changed. Maybe it was because she'd stepped from the gray and into the light, but there was color in her face again, or maybe it was because she was just smiling. Maybe it was just motion that gave her life, but when she bounced one knee on the bed next to him, shifting the mattress and his ribs with it, pulling the blanket tautly over his bruised kidney, he felt like he was dying.

This time for sure.

"Oh my god, I'm so sorry!" she exclaimed, springing back as Eliot slipped and let the agony show. "I forgot. Are you alright?"

"M'fine." He swallowed thickly

"Good. That's good. I. You weren't moving much. Hardison was here too, told me you were fine, but he's gone now. Been gone a while."

"Gone?" Eliot's throat wasn't working right, and maybe his ears weren't either, because Hardison- he'd been fine, right?

"They released him a few hours ago," Parker explained. "He's probably going to have a headache for a day or so, but he's okay. Nate took him to the hotel to get changed and stuff. I brought you a present!"

Eliot blinked, trying to track her as she stepped towards the nightstand and failing. Trying to string the words together to ask for more details about Hardison, he was in no way prepared to fight the stuffed bear that she shoved into his field of vision, and would have recoiled, probably, but there was nowhere to go.

"Um. Thanks," he said, reaching up to take it, considering it more closely as if it could explain it's own existence. It didn't even explain why it was wearing a green sweater, just stared at him with dark button eyes. It was a ridiculous thing to be contemplating.

But Parker, when he glanced at her, was bouncing on her feet. "Sophie helped me pick it out. I was going to get you a horse, because I know you like those, but they only had them in blue, and there were no markers to make it look more like a real horse."

Eliot nodded, as if it made sense. Okay, so in Parker's world, horses aren't pink, but bears wear sweaters the same color as the one Hardison wore- the door slammed on the thought before he even knew it was there.

"Um. Thanks." He toyed with the idea of trying to sit up again, but his chest was still feeling twisted in knots and his shoulder was throbbing. His body felt like it was swimming as it was, and it wasn't anything he wanted to think about. Instead, he sighed, blinking against another rush of cold oxygen hissing straight for his brain. He felt lightheaded again, but he needed to know. Taking another deep breath, he found the air to ask, "What's going on?"

Parker scowled, apparently thinking it over. "Nate said that we're supposed to let you recover, not to bother you with things to worry about."

Distracted by sudden vertigo, he almost missed her answer, and it took him a few moments to parse it. She'd just told him two things. One, that there were things to worry about, and two, that they thought he couldn't handle them.

If his distress showed, and Lord, he hoped it didn't, Parker didn't notice. She was already on the other side of the room, which seemed to be falling further away. He could hear her voice calling for a nurse, but he couldn't figure out why.

---

Nate was just arriving at the address he'd gotten of the guard's ID card, and it was about damned time. It had taken him long enough to get out there that Alec had already scanned the photos he'd grabbed from Eliot's cell, started the facial recognition program, and started in on the hard drives. Nothing too deep, just surveying.

The first, the one that had actually been plugged into the computer, contained all the security footage from the warehouse. Unedited live feeds of the parking lots, the hallways, and the room where they'd kept Eliot.

The second hard drive apparently served as an archive. A quick perusal gave him little more than hundreds of hours of Eliot's suffering. It didn't look edited, but there were breaks in the footage, minutes missing here and there where the camera had probably been turned off. It wasn't the most elaborate setup he'd ever seen. The system, from what little he could see of it, was the kind of thing an underpaid guard could be trained to handle, no problem.

Aside from tying the bombs to the system, if his suspicions regarding the computer's wiring job were anything to go by. For all he knew, removing the connected drive from the computer could have set it off. Great.

He'd check it out more completely later, try to enhance what little he had. The information he wanted, their best chance at getting the sniper on camera, was probably back on the first drive.

There wasn't anything he could do to figure it out now, even if he did want to go back and sort through the rubble. Hopefully, the outside footage outside would tell him everything he needed to know.

But for the moment, everything he needed to know right now was beginning to come over the comms. Nate had arrived.

"I'm here," he said, and a car door slammed shut. "Going in now."

"You know how you're going to play it?"

"Depends who opens the door." A few moments passed in near silence, and then Nate was talking to someone.

"Is this the Geffin residence?" There was a pause, muted words that the microphone didn't pick up. "It is. Ah," Nate was about to start talking his line, but he'd been interrupted.

Alec sat up a little straighter, closing his eyes to hear, cursing the world for making him sit in a room miles away from disaster, unable to do anything but take it in. It was starting to wear on him.

Nate's tone, when he spoke again, was surprised, disappointed. "Oh. I. Well. I must admit, this is a shock. Ah. I'm sorry for your loss. Ah. No, I don't want to interfere, I just. What? Oh, no. I." Alec could almost hear the other voice, female. "No, that's okay. I'm guessing right now you're not too interested in listening to canvassers talking about the city council elections. I don't want to disturb you more than I already have, I. I'll just be on my way."

Alec glared at the ceiling in annoyance, and listened to the car door slam shut again. A moment later, Nate spoke. "Apparently, Shane Geffin died yesterday. I just spoke to his wife."

"Shit." Alec shook his head, ignoring the dull throbbing that was setting in again, and pulled up his browser, pulling down the headlines. "They found his body in the rubble after a gas line exploded at a warehouse on the North side."

"You sure you saw him leaving?"

Alec rolled his eyes, forced himself to unclench his fist. "Yes, and he was running away from the building, or, more accurately, away from Parker, who is quite terrifying with a gun in her hands." His eyes traced the path Geffin had taken across the security footage, once, back, and again, but something wasn't quite adding up.

"Looks like someone's cleaning up after themselves."

"Uh huh." Alec checked the time stamp in the corner of the screen, and felt the floor begin to drop out from under him. He must have made a sound, because Nate was asking, "Hardison. What is it?"

I fucked up. Big time. "Still got that wallet on you?"

"Yeah. IDs, credit cards, business cards. Think you can get anywhere with them?" Nate asked, already knowing the answer.

"Ain't got no choice," Alec said, trying to think, trying to work around the edges and find a way through. This can't be happening. "Hey. Ah. You know how we busted Eliot out?"

"I'm aware, yes."

"Nah, man. I mean. You know how."

"Not the specifics."

"Well I might have some bad news. Gonna keep looking, but." Alec "In order to get in there, I had to make sure the security cameras didn't see us."

"Right."

"So I looped some footage and fed it to the system. The thing is," Alec swallowed and wondered if he was going to be sick. "While it was doing that, the computer wasn't actually getting any information from the cameras."

"That's good, isn't it?"

"Normally? Yes, that's excellent. But think about it. The one timeframe where the cameras definitely would have picked up someone, say, for example, a man with a rifle, moving around outside?"

"Hardison," Nate sighed. Alec could see him pinching the bridge of his nose from here. "You're telling me you got nothing but your own fake footage?"

"Ah. Yeah. That's what I'm telling you," Alec stared at the wall and waited for the hammer to fall. But it never came. Nate remained silent enough that Alec could hear his footsteps as he made his way back to the car. "Yo, Nate. I'm really damn sorry, I know I messed up. Wasn't thinking ahead, didn't think it through, I-"

"Hardison, shut up."

And here it comes, Alec thought, glad that no one else was on the line to hear whatever was coming next. Should have planned it out better, should have seen this. Should have known.

"You got Eliot out. That's what matters. We've got other avenues we can take for the rest of it, all right?"

Alec nodded to the empty hotel room, wishing he had Nate's optimism. "All right. Yeah."

---

The X-rays told him what he'd been wanting to believe anyway. Not broken, just fractured. Even so, the doctor explained, while they were going to lower the stream of oxygen, she wanted to keep the canulla in for another day or so, and she wasn't letting him out of there on his own feet any time soon.

"We don't want you stressing your body any more than you have to, right now," she explained, apparently preferring mental stress as a treatment method. The indignities were starting to pile up, and the worst of them?

The fact that he was too messed up to fight them. Eliot let them shift him back onto the gurney, and managed to keep from reacting when, a while later, she told him that the catheter had to stay in at least until his next batch of test results had come in.

He thought, for a moment, that maybe his head was sorting itself out, getting itself back together, because he knew, even before he saw her, that Sophie would be waiting in his room when they rolled him through the door.

Mercifully, the nurses politely asked her to wait outside while they got him settled. At least she wouldn't be there to watch. He had a few minutes to prepare for the onslaught.

Any thoughts that they'd help evaporated the moment she opened her mouth.

"Oh, Eliot," she began, stepping into his line of sight with a sad look on her face. "Poor thing."

If he smiled strongly enough, he could probably throw her off the scent.

It didn't seem to work, though. Her smile only grew more watery, and she began rambling,

"You had us worried sick, you know. It was a mess. No one was sleeping right, and it seemed like everything was going to fall apart." She sniffed. "But you're here now, and you're going to get better."

"That's right, ma'am." It hurt to cough, but it beat the alternative. He couldn't spare the breath to tell her that really, he wasn't up to meeting her expectations.

---

After lunch, Alec went to Nate's room to retrieve the guard's wallet, before heading back down the hall to his room.

He wasn't even surprised to see Parker standing in the middle of it when he arrived.

"Hey. What's up, girl?"

"Nothing. I just woke up, and wanted to see what was happening."

"Ah. The footage was a bust. Just about to get started tracing Geffin's accounts."

"Cool," Parker nodded, distracted, looking at his computer. "Find anything yet?"

"No. Should have more info in a few hours, though I got nothing but two handfuls of nothing." He thought that was the end of it, that Parker would leave.

But she was never that great at following cues. She didn't move an inch. Didn't seem to know where to go. Instead she shot distressed and wary glances at Alec out of the corner of her eye. He didn't have the time to parse their meaning. Every moment he waited, more information was falling into cracks somewhere. Her body language, though. That, Alec understood.

"Yo, Parker. You want to hang out, put the TV on while I work or something?"

Parker nodded, and paused like she was about to say something, but instead, she sat down on the chair at the other side of the too-small table. "If it's okay, I'd rather just watch you. Work." I don't want to be alone right now.

---

Eliot woke to muffled music and the clicking of keys, and opened his eyes to find Hardison lounging on the chair, legs thrown over the armrest, nodding his head under his earphones.

Intent on the screen, he was playing that stupid game of his, or maybe crashing the stock exchange. Apart from the surroundings, he looked as content as he always did.

Scratch that. He didn't always look so relaxed. Not when he was on his knees on a basement floor, checking for injuries, or when scrambling across the parking lot trying to get them to safety. Now, though, there didn't seem to be any stress creasing his face.

Didn't mean it wasn't weird, being in the same room as him.

He was just getting around to thinking about saying something, talking himself into attracting his attention, when Hardison happened to glance over. Springing into motion, he scrambled to get his headphones off while sitting up, nearly knocking his computer over in the process, but he didn't stand.

"Eliot. Yo, hey man. How're you feeling?"

"Fine," Eliot lied, suddenly feeling buried under the weight of Hardison's assessment. "Considering," he amended.

Hardison nodded awkwardly. "That's cool, man. Uh. I'm just working on tracking the people that did. All this. You feelin' up to telling me what you know?"

"Don't know much of anything." It wasn't an entire lie, he just didn't know where to start. Eliot glanced at the wall, wishing that the windows weren't frosted over, wanting to be able to see outside. "Head's still…"

"Right, right. I'll give you some time. Sorry. You need anything?" he trailed off, awkwardly, his eyes retreating back to the screen for a scant second, like he was itching to get back to work.

Eliot considered the offer, wishing he had the energy to sit up and take stock, but the painkillers they'd given him were starting, probably a bit too well. He barely noticed the catheter that was stuck to him, and realized glumly that there was probably a good chance that Hardison already knew it was there. "Nah," he decided. "I'm good."

"Cool." Hardison settled back in his chair for a minute, resettling his laptop, but something stopped him in his movement. "You. Ah. If you want, I can go move out into the hall. Y'know, if the noise," he nodded down to his computer, "is bugging you. Ain't tryin' to bother you, so let me know, and I'll jet."

I could leave you alone in here.

If he looked uncomfortable, it was easily passed off as reacting to the canulla irritating his nose as he shook his head. The noise hadn't bothered him that much, not really. Hardison hadn't, either, when he hadn't been looking. Eliot's eyes were getting heavy again. "Nah. Think I'm gonna pass out again."

"You do that," Hardison snorted, laughing quietly.

Eliot hadn't heard that sound in weeks. It was relaxing.

Eliot drifted off to the sound of typing, and a few minutes later, he could almost hear Hardison's music. He kind of hoped it would still be there when he woke up.

---

TBC...

Man I Used to Be #8

2009-10-30T05:14:07Z

Title: Man I Used to Be
By: Jendavis
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.

Previous Chapters: Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Alec's head bounced against something, hard. Maybe the back of the seat, maybe the frame, he couldn't be sure, but it hurt like a bitch.

Outside, rubble was still falling as the van continued to rock, shaken by the explosion. Each shudder sent more glass loose from its frame, sending it raining down over the front seats.

Parker had blood running down the side of her face, as she unclenched her eyes and turned to check on Alec. Alec found himself mirroring her movements, feeling his face gingerly, careful not to cut himself on the razor sharp splinters.

As far as he could tell, she'd borne the brunt of it.

"Parker?!"

"I'm fine," Parker shook her head, scowling. "It's nothing. You?"

Still shaking his head, trying to clear it, he decided, "I'm all right. Eliot?" He twisted, trying to see back into the swimming darkness of the van and getting no response. "Eliot!" Gotta check on him.

With a final look through the nonexistent windshield and almost as an afterthought, he tried to search out the sniper, but there was no one on the roof. The guard was already halfway across the parking lot, destination unknown.

Probably scared off by the explosion, or at least by the attention it's going to bring. It was as safe as it was liable to get. Doesn't mean he went far.

"Wait here," he told Parker. "Keep a lookout." His body ached as he opened the door, and he nearly fell to the ground. He felt himself starting to weave. It's just the adrenaline wearing off. Too many muscles relaxing all at once. Coughing as he used the van as leverage, he eased around to the side and slid the door open.

Eliot was still lying there, curled in on himself, one arm over his head, like he was waiting for the rest of the world to finish collapsing.

"Hey man," Alec crawled in beside him, glancing nervously up over the seat towards Parker. "You alright?" He reached out to brush over Eliot's shoulder, a move that any other day probably would have landed in the emergency room.

Ain't like we're not on our way there anyhow.

He ran his palm carefully down to Eliot's elbow, feeling the warm breath at his fingertips as he passed near Eliot's face, just barely brushing against Eliot's matted beard. Under his arm, Eliot's head was rocking back and forth. He pulled his arm down, in towards his chest, but didn't shake off Alec's hand. He tried, for a moment, to turn his head, but got as far as catching one glimpse of Alec before settling again. Speaking to the interior of the van, which had evidently provided better protection against the blast than the glass up front had, he rasped, "What happened?"

"There was an explosion-" Alec said, and he wasn't sure it was his words that caused Eliot to go so suddenly pale, but he hurried to continue. "Think the bomb was set off. Parker's a little cut up, but we're fine."

Eliot started to say something that sounded like "did," "dad," or "dead," but cut himself off with a cough. Just as well. Alec wasn't feeling too verbose himself at the moment, either.

His hand was still settled unnoticed in the crook of Eliot's arm. Got better things to be doin' than worrying about awkwardness. Focus, man. Squeezing gently, he pulled away as Parker's startled shout swung his head in her direction.

"We got incoming!"

Alec craned his neck to see through dizziness and the rear door's smoked windows, just in time to see the silver sedan pulling into the parking lot, aimed unerringly in their direction.

---

Lord, not now. Ain't got time for- Shit. What do we do?

There wasn't enough time to get up front and get the van moving before the car reached them, and anyway, it was blocking their exit.

You could always get out and run, his brain offered unhelpfully. If you don't have anything better to do.

Slamming the door shut behind him, he swung into the driver's seat, not quite carefully enough to avoid the glass Parker hadn't managed to sweep aside. He startled as a sharp pain announced itself in his palm. He didn't need to look down to see the glass stuck in it, and anyway, he could deal with that later. He could make himself deal with it later. They had to get out of here.

His foot was on the pedal, the keys in the ignition, and the van was actually starting.

He didn't bother to stop and appreciate the miracle, just started turning the wheel.

"Hardison!" Parker's shout stopped him before the sight of the car slamming to a stop three feet from the bumper did. He was too startled not to stomp on the brakes.

Over the hood, staring back at him as she edged the passenger side door open, was a panicked looking Sophie. On the other side of the sedan, the door was already slamming shut, Nate stalking hurriedly around towards the van.

He was asking "What the hell's going on?" even as Sophie started in with "Did you find him?"

He couldn't not laugh, even if he couldn't find the joke. It was Parker who answered.

"Eliot's in back, needs a doctor. We're fine. The bomb went off."

Sophie dove for the side door of the van as Nate stepped back to let her pass, glancing back towards the road, already thinking.

"Okay. We need to get out of here. Can Eliot sit up?"

"Mostly, I think. Not for long."

"Okay. You and him are riding in the back of the car. Sophie, you're driving. Parker-" he broke off, catching a clear look at her for the first time. "Your face."

"Just some scratches."

"There's a first aid kit in my pack," Alec said, stepping tiredly out of the van and truthfully, acutely aware of how glad he was that Nate was there to run things. That it wasn't all on him anymore.

Nate was nodding at Parker. "Grab it, then. You doing okay enough to help me ditch the van?" Parker nodded, rummaging to find what she needed before tossing Alec's pack to Nate, who transferred it to the car.

Turning back towards the van, Alec could see that it was taking a massive effort for Sophie not to react to what she was seeing. He could almost see the words trying to sort themselves out in her head.

He couldn't blame her for going so pale. He felt a lot like throwing up too.

Off in the distance, there were sirens.

Scrambling, he had to force himself to not just reach in and yank Eliot out onto the pavement. Instead, he slid in next to him, offering an arm where he could, something to clamber up against so he could swing his legs out of the van.

With Sophie there for him to lean on, Eliot managed to stand much easier than he'd done before, and made his own way to the car.

Nate already had the door open, and was watching him with keen concern, but Eliot didn't notice. Eliot hadn't looked at either of them since they'd arrived. Alec wondered what it meant.

Don't mean nothin' at all, and you got plenty of time to think on it on the road.

Shifting his legs to make room, he settled in next to Eliot, watching out the car window as Nate said something to Sophie that Alec didn't quite catch, understanding more when her hand went from her pocket to her ear, swiveling her comm. unit into place as she hurried around to the driver's side.

Alec wanted to say something to Nate, wanted to ask him something, but he was already slamming the door shut. As soon as Sophie was seated, the sedan turned, and the van slid from view.

---

If he sat up straight- and for a moment, there, he'd tried- his ribs would have started screaming again. It wasn't worth it, so for the time being, he let every turn the car made, every vibration coming up from the road, settle his body a little closer into Hardison's.

Hardison wasn't saying anything, it was probably killing him not to, but for now, Eliot figured, he'd let himself play the injured card. Long as anyone wasn't asking.

And besides. He was out of that place that wasn't even a place anymore, that was really, from what he'd been able to tell, just a pile of rubble. Still nowhere anyone wanted to be, but that space that he'd occupied had been filled in. Didn't exist anymore, even if he couldn't stop seeing it as he screwed his eyes shut a little bit tighter.

Now, though, he just pictured that space filling in, concrete and filing cabinets and rebar crushing in on him, against his ribs and stealing the air from his lungs so he couldn't call out, couldn't get Shauna's or Stella's or whoever's attention.

You don't need to. You're out. You're here.

He was dimly aware of the fact that he didn't know where here was, exactly, but if he wanted to figure that out, he'd have to open his eyes and ask.

And he'd probably find Hardison there, all too willing to tell him, looking down at him like he knew damned well how bad things were, like he knew every thought running through his head. Leaving him with nothing that wasn't his alone.

Like that's something new.

Hardison was solid against him, and didn't move away, and his skin, in the small spaces where Eliot's touched his, was warm.

His arm hurt like a bitch, and he knew he should move. He would, in a minute, but for now, the heat was worth it.

If anyone asked, Eliot was asleep. It wasn't too far from the truth, anyway.
---

"I'm not trying to be. You know. But shouldn't we be with them? It's not like we can't afford to pay for the damages on the van."

"We can't afford to have the damages traced back to the warehouse."

"Hardison could probably-"

"Hardison's probably got a concussion. He's dead on his feet and it's probably just hitting him now. No. What we're going to do is ditch the van somewhere, and grab a taxi back to the hospital. So. In the meantime. Tell me what happened."

"Um." Parker thought for a minute. "We got in, there was only one guard. I distracted him while Hardison went after Eliot," she said, following Nate's lead and shoving her comm. unit into place. Not bothering to see who else was on the line, she continued. "He spooked, and. Oh! He asked where you two were. Had a gun. Hardison came up and we took him out, tied him up. Got him out of there when he did, but he ran off. Eliot wasn't doing so good. Awake but not really there, but he was mostly moving on his own. Got him into the van, and were ready to get out of there when the building imploded."

"Did you see the detonator?"

"I don't know. You'll have to ask Hardison, but he didn't seem like he was expecting the bomb to go off while we were still there. Oh! And there was a sniper on the roof of the warehouse across the street. He could have had a remote detonator."

"A sniper?" Sophie's disbelief crackled loudly in their ears.

Nate turned off the main avenue as the fire truck crested the hill, speeding towards the warehouse. Glancing in the rearview, the police cars that followed had evidently made no note of the van. He sighed, a little more heavily than usual.

"Okay, so Sophie. What's the story when you get to the hospital?"

There was a murmuring in the background, evidently Hardison wasn't on the line. A moment later, Sophie answered.

"Agent Brakowski has been in deep cover for the past eleven months. Two weeks ago, he fell off our radar, and we sent Agent…" Sophie paused, before confirming, "Agent Harris in to recover him."

"Okay, good," Nate nodded, already going into spin mode, reciting their cover, giving Sophie her lines. "We recovered him from a tenement downtown, and apologize that we cannot share more details, as the investigation is ongoing. Might want to remember that any mention of their presence would not only blow the case he's put so much into, but it would attract the exact sort of attention that no hospital is built to handle. You've got the IDs you need?"

"Two undercover agents and a very stressed but otherwise beautiful section chief, coming up," Sophie tried to answer lightly. "Let me know when you two arrive at the hospital, and I'll step out to slip you your badges."

"Hardison's got covers for all of us?" Parker's question turned into a dry cough, but she waved away Nate's offered water bottle.

"Three full sets at least," Sophie replied, amusement showing through. "I'd give you the full rundown, but I'm just hitting traffic."

"Don't crash!" Parker coughed adamantly, this time accepting the water.

"Right. Well. Be there in a bit. How're the guys doing?"

Sophie didn't reply for a moment, and Parker swung her head, her face tight with worry at what the silence could mean.

"We're about five minutes out," Sophie sounded like she was trying to assure the entire universe, trying to set reality. "It's going to be fine."

---

By the time Sophie had turned out of the parking lot, Eliot had either gone unconscious or catatonic, Alec couldn't be sure. Not without turning to look.

And he didn't want to. If he saw Eliot fading out on him, dying on them, Alec wasn't sure he'd be able to stop himself from freaking the fuck out.

If Eliot was looking better, more aware, whatever, then one of them might have to start talking.

He just needed a minute.

Alec stared out the window, aware of little else besides motion and the dim realization that he had no idea where they were going, that the landmarks passing by probably meant something to someone, but not to him. Under all that was the strip of heat along his right arm, where Eliot's shoulder was pressing in, a bit too closely to be ignored.

Blinking out through the window, he realized that they were probably due for some rain.

Sophie was asking him questions, then, but mostly talking to Nate. If Alec could've found the energy to go into his pockets, he could have dug out one of the comm. units and gotten in on the action, but for once, he was willing to let the information pass by unheard and unknown.

For now, he'd just sit there, letting the vibrations from the road lull him into a stupor, and try to ignore the pounding in his head.

They pulled up to the emergency room entrance, and Sophie left the car running as she hurries inside. Alec was dimly aware that there was something he should be doing, but he couldn't figure out what it was, couldn't find the energy to try. The idea of moving made him sick. Dizzy. He still wanted to puke.

Chill.

In a few moments, they'd be inside. There would be the usual antiseptic smell and cold fluorescent lights shining over walls painted in neutral colors, a failing attempt to make the hallways seem healthy, alive and calm. There would be doctors, nurses, and a rush of questions while everything got sorted. There would be the usual tension at the back of his neck while he worried that they wouldn't buy the story, that he'd missed something while forging their identification. That he'd grabbed the wrong insurance cards.

For now, though, he sat next to Eliot and waited for Sophie to go start digging them out of the mess he'd made.

---

Alec tried to wave off the nurses and the doctor, tried to get their attention to where it needed to be- on Eliot! I'm fine- but he was outnumbered and outgunned, and they were leading him to a bed but not letting him lie down. Shining lights in his eyes, wrapping the blood pressure cuff around his arm.

Blinded by the light, it was hard to see what they were doing, where they were taking Eliot.

The hands of some nurse named Rita were pushing and pulling and poking and prodding at him, and he wasn't sure that he didn't actually try to swat her off. He wasn't sure of much at the moment, other than how tired he was. He was only dimly aware of Sophie's voice, talking to someone about medical records. She said something about security and a private recovery room.

In the background, there was a beeping, too slow to be counting down seconds, edging everything else out of his consciousness, and eventually, edging Alec out too.

---

It took him a few minutes, but Eliot could remember making it to the gurney, but then nothing. A blank space that went on too long, interspersed by brief flashes. Strange efficient hands. Footsteps in the hallway and muted voices talking fast.

He wasn't sure he'd been aware of them at the time, but he was coming out of it again.
The ground beneath him was too soft, the lights too bright and muted all at once.

But the cold was back.

They'd taken his clothes, the ones Hardison had brought him, and somewhere in the back of his head he'd had to know it was coming, but it didn't help buffer the shock and indignity of it all.

The hands were back, two sets this time. One set was shoving his arms this way and that, and the other was trailing a warm dampness that froze on his skin, and he wanted to tell them to stop, to leave him alone, but they were ignoring him. Or maybe they didn't notice.

The gray haired woman seemed to be talking about her daughter's karate classes. Or maybe a movie she'd seen, he couldn't be sure. Couldn't concentrate enough to find words, and he was too tired to be sure that his attempts to move, to get some distance, weren't just batted away without a glance.

He just wanted to be left alone, figure this out. Assess the situation and move on, but he couldn't think with all this going on.

When he rolled his head to the side, it felt like it never stopped moving, continuing down through the pillow, down and down.

They'd drugged him. They'd fucking drugged him.

They wanted to keep him weak, complacent. Keep him down and under control, and if-

Where's Hardison? Parker? If they-

There was a clattering out on the other side of the curtain, something falling to the floor, and he only really noticed it because one of the nurses jumped, dropping his arm, which wrenched as it fell to the mattress.

They're coming back, going to get you out, he thought, but then the younger one carefully picked his arm up again, resettling it at his side with a look on her face that looked like apology. Sympathy maybe.

It was all wrong. Didn't make sense. If he could just get clear-

You need to think. Use your fucking head. You're fine.

They had realized he was awake, and were smiling calmly down at him as the older one began to speak.

"Hello, Agent Brakowski. Good to see you're back, that is, if you're done fighting. We're just about done getting you cleaned up. We'll get some clothes on you again, and the doctor will be back to- don't touch that," she caught his hand en route to his face, where there was something touching his skin. "We've got you on oxygen as a precaution, okay?"

Dropping his hands, he nodded, too distracted to figure out why they were calling him Brakowski. He missed hearing his own.

But there was sense to be found, now. They were nurses. He was in a hospital. They got his name wrong, but who knew what the hell he'd told them when he arrived- he couldn't even remember getting there.

Warm cotton and a moving car. Back seat. Clouds moving in outside the window, and Hardison next to him as he tried to keep his eyes from searching out Sophie's in the rearview mirror.

---

Alec woke up to Parker's stare breaking into a tired grin that pulled at the bandages on her face. She looked like she was about to say something, but even then, Alec startled when her voice echoed in the hallway outside.

"Hey! Ah, guys? Harris is awake!"

Harris? Oh. Right.

Sophie's heels clicked across the floor as Nate followed in exhaustion.

"Ah. Hey guys," Alec waved, squinting them into focus. "How long was I out?"

"Not long," Nate looked to Sophie, who answered Alec's next question.

"They're moving Eliot into a recovery room any minute now, but they've already ducked out to tell us he's going to be fine. You got him out of there in time."

Alec's grin felt more tired than it should have been. "Age of the geek, baby." Sitting up was awkward, but he was relieved to find they hadn't changed him into some nightgown or something embarrassing like that.

For long moments, the four of them were left floundering for something to say. It lasted until Parker, all adrenaline worn off, yawned heavily.

"Let's get you to the hotel," Sophie said, hand resting on Parker's arm. "Nate's already made reservations for the three of us."

"Three of us?" Alec could feel the panic welling up, and already his head was beginning to throb again as worst-case scenarios played out. A thousand different doctors walking into the room, gripping clipboards with trained seriousness. "We've found something…"

"I feel fine. Ain't no reason to be leavin' me-"

"On the down side, you've got a concussion. On the up side, you'll be rooming with Eliot once they get him moved in. Easier for us to maintain security, see. The three of us will rotate. You're probably going to be released first thing in the morning."

"But."

"You really feel like moving more than fifty feet right now, you let me know," a voice said from the door, and Alec turned to see a woman pushing a wheelchair into the room. She was young, but something in her reminded him enough of Nana that the only response he could possibly make was no, ma'am.

Sitting absolutely still and on his best behavior, he watched Nate usher Parker and Sophie out of the room and half-listened to him explain that he'd be back in half an hour.

That's something, at least. He wouldn't have to suffer the indignity of having them watch him being wheeled out in the chair.

He wasn't counting on Sophie waiting in the hallway outside. Leaning in close, she whispered, "We'll be back soon. Keep an eye on him," before kissing him on the temple.

He pulled a face, pretended like it wasn't making him feel any better, because there was only so much humiliation a man could take.

The nurse, though. She just laughed.

---

Eliot was starting to doze off again, still thinking about the doctor's words.

"Stay in bed…between the dehydration and malnutrition…rest…renal function, hopefully you won't need dialysis but we're going to be monitoring it 'round the clock…but if the pain gets worse, we can up your dosage…"

The usual, then.

In another few hours, he'd start fighting it, probably. Go find the others, who were probably nearby.

Or maybe closer, judging by the racket coming in through the door. Hardison.

"I can walk, you know. It's my head that got hit. Ain't like some shark came along and bit my legs off."

"That would be impressive, though," a woman's voice replied in a stage whisper. "Concussions, I've seen plenty. Just hang on…get you situated here. Okay, Mister FBI, up!"

Eliot swallowed, rolling his head slightly to look at the door, seeing only the curtain shifting to the side.

"A'ight, see? I'm fine."

"Then you're well enough to keep it down, aren't you? Agent Brakowski needs to rest, so you need to stay quiet. I can sedate you if need be."

"That a good idea with a head injury?"

"You passed out when we drew blood earlier, and you're still here, so I'm not too worried."

"I am so going to call the American Medical Association when I get out of here."

"Let's get you out of here, first, and I'll give you the number myself. Now hush. I'll be back in a bit to check on you. If you're good, I'll even bring you a magazine. I think we've got enough copies of Highlights to keep you entertained for hours."

"Great." There was a pause, then, and Eliot had to strain to hear what came next. "Um. Hey. Is he. Ah. Can I see him?"

The nurse must have acquiesced, because the curtain was beginning to move, though Eliot slid his eyes shut before it opened completely.

"He looks…"

Eliot listened hard, needing to hear, needing to know, but for once, Hardison fell quiet and stayed there.

That's not good.

"He's resting," the nurse's tone was kind. "But he's going to be fine."

A few moments more, and she drew the curtain closed again, and Eliot allowed himself to breathe.

The nurse was talking again, her voice serious and quiet.

"You got him out of there. From what your boss said, you got everyone out. It went great."

A few moments later, and the door was closing again, her footsteps fading down the hall.

Eliot listened hard for a few moments, and wasn't even surprised when he heard it.

"Yeah. Great," Hardison muttered with a quiet snort.

Eliot wished he hadn't closed his eyes, wished he hadn't pretended to be asleep. Setting aside the entire notion that his first instinct had been to do what he could to hide, he was slowly catching onto something, here.

Visitors don't get put in hospital beds.

But Hardison had been talking, he was probably going to start in on some rambling dissertation about some inconsequential thing or another any minute now, and everything would start inching back towards normal. Eliot could lie here and listen, pretend they were in a hotel somewhere, out on a job, and that he only ached because the bouncer had turned out to have a black belt or three. Pretend to sleep as Hardison's voice washed over him like a blanket.

Any minute now.

---

Eliot had looked bad. Didn't matter what the nurse said, they were trained to say that sort of thing. Keep everyone calm and quiet.

He resented the hell out of it, and on any other day, he would have been most vocal in his disagreement, but.

Eliot looked bad. Asleep or comatose or who knows, he was lying on the other side of the curtain, on his back with tubes coming out of his face.

He'd been totally still, and laid out like he was rehearsing for his funeral.

Alec wanted to call out, get his attention, get him talking and alive again. But if things were half as bad as they'd looked, well.

He could shut the hell up for once in his life.

He lay back against the pillow and stared up at the ceiling, already impatient.

He needed to get out of here. Somewhere he didn't need to worry about the sound of his own breathing, somewhere with a connection.

The guard got away, had made it a good distance by the time they were pulling out.

And there was the small matter explosion large enough to shatter glass. It would probably make the news. Gonna have to get on that. Start tracking the photographs, too.

And there's the sniper.

He needed to get back to work. Needed information, needed to know what was coming down the line. Needed to do something other sit there in depressing silence straining to hear Eliot's breathing.

He still had his watch on, and it had been twenty minutes since the nurse had left. He could get up, if he wanted to. Peek around the curtain, even if it only served to confirm things he didn't want to know.

He needs to sleep. He doesn't need you buggin' him. Man up and shut up.

Minutes later, there was still no sign of the nurse, no doctor coming through. If Eliot started fading out, there'd be no one there to stop it.

For all Alec knew, Eliot could have been dying in his sleep, quiet, and leaving no one the wiser.

He wasn't surprised when his feet found the floor, but he was pleased to see that the dizziness had passed, and with it, the nausea.

Careful to tread lightly, he edged around the curtain, watching Eliot for signs of waking, and forcing himself to take stock.

Alec wondered briefly if hospital gowns were designed to make even the healthiest wearer look like they were at death's door.

The arm on Eliot's far side was bound, and looked like it had been set. The gown left most of his other arm bare, revealing skin that had been cleaned, as well as a bandage around his elbow. There was an injury there he hadn't seen before. Could've been a scrape, could have been twenty infected stitches, for all Alec knew.

Could have been avoided.

Working his way up, trying not to notice the oxygen tube lying across Eliot's face- that's good, though, right? If it was bad, he'd have one of those plastic masks over half his face. The swelling around his eye had gone down quite a bit, but the shadows and bruising were as apparent as before.

And through it all, Eliot was as still as the dead. And apparently his sixth sense, the one that told him that someone was about to come around the corner swinging a lead pipe, or that Parker was trying to make a grab for his glasses again, was no longer working.

Hardison wasn't sure how long he stood there, arms crossed at the foot of Eliot's bed, just staring.

---

Chapter 9

Hmmm

2009-10-27T02:38:13Z

Anyone else watch White Collar yet?

It's pretty good (even if it has killed an evening of what was supposed to be writing time) but the best part? Playing "spot the guest stars from my other favorite shows."

I'm giving it a week before the Leverage crossovers start filtering onto the net. Tops. :)

Okay, back to writing.

Man I Used to Be #7

2009-10-23T06:34:16Z

Title: Man I Used to Be
By: Jendavis
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: In the interest of getting this posted, I ran a quick spell check, but didn't do much by way of editing, so if you see something that looks wonky, let me know! Thanks!

Previous Chapters: Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6

Chapter 7

It was an hour before his alarm was supposed to go off, but the clock was already ticking.

It ain't a clock, it's a damned bomb, and you know damned well that leaving the audio feed on can't be doing nothing good for your peace of mind.

Alec had upended most of his apartment, trying to guess what the hell a person was supposed to pack when preparing to kidnap someone who'd already been kidnapped.

Wait. Hold up.

That wasn't right. He wasn't kidnapping Eliot. He was retrieving him.

Seriously. We're all doomed.

He was on his knees in his studio, rummaging through another bin of tools and art supplies and adapters for computers he hadn't used in years. His first set of insanely expensive and lately underused paintbrushes clattered to the floor as he dug deeper.

Finally finding the bolt cutters, he shoved them onto the pile and paused to take inventory, but his mind was still on the paintbrushes. He hadn't used them since doing up Harlan's portrait. Not for over a year, now. He missed it.

Focus, man. Later.

After the bolt cutters were in the bag, in went the bandages, just in case they needed them. A change of clothing, sweats, because he knew Eliot did. These he wadded up tight and stuffed into his backpack with a pair of trainers and some socks. Three different kinds of painkillers. The next round of fake IDs, and insurance cards for everyone.

He double-checked to make sure Eliot's was there. Checked again five minutes later.

H was going back a third time when he realized that the tapping noise wasn't actually a sleep-deprivation-induced hallucination, and it wasn't coming from the audio feeds, it was coming from the door.

Parker, who patiently had decided not to pick the lock, was on the other side, standing in the hallway with tissue-thin skin and bags under her eyes.

"You look like crap," she accused, pushing past him and on towards the kitchen, where she eventually ground to a halt, looking around for the source of the noise. "What the hell is that?"

"It's. Ah." Alec hurried over to his desktop, fairly certain that he'd minimized the video feed, but needing to be sure, even though it was probably too dark where Eliot was to see anything. Wasn't the point.

Pressing the mute button, he glanced up, only to find her scrutinizing him with a sad look on her face. There was a moment, there, where he was dreading the next words to come out of her mouth, but she merely shook her head and turned back towards the kitchen, evidently in search of coffee, or food, or something.

He'd catch up with her in a minute. He had to check something, first, and brought up the screen. Couldn't see nothing anyway.

Soon enough, he'd be seeing too much of it. As soon as they got their act in gear.

---

If Eliot died right now, he wouldn't have to watch the countdown, wouldn't have to hear it. And at this point, it probably wouldn't even hurt anything but his pride.

It also pretty much guaranteed that the others would show up five minutes later. It was pathetic.

And it would hit them hard, Nate and Sophie, so soon after losing Parker. Alec would be the first one to get over it, probably. The guy was a geek, but he was probably the best adjusted of the bunch.

Not that you'd ever tell him that. Not that you're likely to get the chance.

Eliot almost laughed. Probably would have, if his ribs would've allowed it.

Man up. You ain't coughing up blood. You're fine.

Eliot tried to hold the thought in his head. Tried to think it more loudly than the other one that refused to fade out.

Don’t care.

He probably should have died a thousand times somewhere else. If he hadn't taken up with Nate's crew, he would have been dead a year ago. Wouldn't have been able to afford turning down that gig in Manhattan that O'Mally had offered.

Eliot had only known Turner by reputation, and what he'd known, he hadn't liked. It probably had taken those three dozen bullets to put him down. He never found out whether Turner had known he hadn't been the first choice for that job.

But he could probably ask him pretty soon, if he wanted to, down in the pit.

He hadn't believed in that for a very long time. Probably never had, not really, but he'd gone and sat and fidgeted through church every Sunday as a kid, and anyway. It was one of those things you couldn't help thinking about, knowing you'd have been dead for days by this time next week. Deathbed conversions were probably more common than people knew. As common as death itself.

Eliot took a breath. He could do this. His father had managed it. Grandpa too, way back when. Turner, in another empty warehouse on a Tuesday afternoon, his mother in a hospital a thousand miles away less than a month later.

And there were the lives Eliot himself had taken, probably including the man in the photos.

Fuckfuckfuck.

He reached for the pictures, meaning to wad them up and throw them into the corner, but his shoulder ground stiff and fierce, though the rush of pain felt something like warmth. It was almost worth it. By the way, he addressed whatever godlike was working the lines, all that stuff I said, about not wanting to die in a hospital? Changed my mind.

---

Parker pounded on the warehouse door with a stressed pout on her face.

Hardison waited in the van for her to start talking about the weather, the signal that they were on their way towards the office, but hadn't made it yet. They'd guessed it would take about twenty or thirty seconds to make it through the empty reception area, and back to where the security monitors were.

Parker would distract the guard all she could, but both knew there was no guarantee.

"I'm not Sophie. Be ready to run," she'd said, sliding the utility van door almost completely shut.

Alec tried to watch his breathing. Closed his eyes and just waited.

The next ten minutes or so, he knew, would be some the most stressful of his life, this, he knew.

He hadn't expected the waiting to be this hard.

Maybe they won't answer.

Maybe they're not near the door. Maybe they're down in Eliot's cell, killing him right now.

Maybe one of them slipped out the back and is creeping up on the van right now. Open your damned eyes. Pay attention.

---

"Seriously, man. Look up from your little flashing box for a minute and take a look around, would you?"

"Hey Bro, I am watching y'all six ways from Sunday and back again. You're in the steam tunnel, about seven feet below Nate and twice that to the west. Parker's in the office, and Sophie is coming out the door right now and crossing the lot. She should be getting into her car right about…" he heard a door slam on the left side of the van, and the sound of the vintage MG's engine turning over. "Now."

Eyes darting over to the other feed, he saw Eliot flipping the bird and waving it around, clearly not knowing where the camera was down there, but wanting to make sure it was seen. "Oh, and by the way. If you're finished? There are five guys coming down the stairs. Should be there any second now. You done with that wiring yet?"

"Dammit, Hardison!" Eliot growled, his voice going quiet. "When we get out done with this, I'm gonna-."

"Sure thing. Meet you at the playground after school."

---

"Thanks, and I'm sorry for the inconvenience. I could have sworn I plugged my phone into the charger before I went to sleep last night."

"No problem, ma'am. The phone's just back here."

"Thanks." There was rustling, and the sound of footsteps and Parker's breathing as they walked into the building. A few more steps, and she gave the signal. "So, you think we're going to see any sun today at all?"

Alec checked the straps of his backpack and slid out of the van and across the parking lot. Easing the front door open, he peeled back the tape Parker had left over the bolt, preventing it from connecting.

He stalked carefully across the reception room, until he reached door that led to the stairwell. Mindful of any noise, he carefully turned the handle, half expecting to find it locked.

Something was on his side. The handle turned, and the bolt slid back into it's housing.

The first hard part was done.

He had to force himself not to run down the stairs. He was in, the cameras where ghosted, and he had the run of the place. All he needed was silence.

Some areas of the basement looked more familiar than others. There was only so much a man could learn from security monitor feeds and a twenty year-old blueprint.

The warehouse was nearly empty, barren metal shelves here and there, and a fire extinguisher that had seen better days waiting in a cupboard. Other than that, his path was clear.

Nate and Sophie's flight would be landing soon, he told himself. He wanted to be gone before they made it out of the terminal.

Turning once, he saw the door to Eliot's cell, down near the end of the corridor.

He couldn't bring himself to grin as he passed under the useless camera, but he couldn't quite stop himself from muttering. Beyond Parker's call to a dummy line, there was too much silence on the line.

"Get in, get Eliot, get done and gone," he repeated to himself in a whisper. "Get him and get gone."

Nothing had changed. The steel bar was still there, still held in place by a large metal clasp and a padlock. Two more steps now.

Another moment later, and he was peering in through the metal grate at Eliot, his fingers closing over the padlock as he slid the pack off his shoulder.

"Get in, get out, get gone." He slid the bolt cutters out of the pack, and clipped the lock. "Don't get us killed, and get gone."

Peering through the grate, he could see Eliot lying on the floor. He's just sleeping. Nothing more.

"Yo man! Gettin' you out. Hang tight just a little more…"

Tugging the lock out of the way, he shifted the heavy steel bar that was holding the door closed, but Parker's insistent voice tugged his attention back to the comms.

"I don't know what you're talking about," she was saying. "Please, put the gun down."

They were blown. Fuck.

---
As long as he kept his breathing in time with the ticking, the sound of the air passing into his lungs blotted out the noise a little bit, or at least gave him something else to focus on.

Besides the fact that it's gotten colder in here. They left, and there's no heat anywhere in the building. You're going to freeze, and if you're lucky, it will happen before you're buried in warehouse debris.

You have to eat. Get your strength up.

Struggling up onto his elbows, he managed to hook the corner of the box of power bars and drag them closer, before lying down again in disgust. Eliot's stomach was so badly cramped from hunger that he probably couldn't have kept any food down if he tried, and at this point, there wasn't much point in taking pains to ensure a longer survival.

You really want to go out like this? Giving up? Pussin' out?

No. Yes. I don't know.

I don't want to be here anymore.

So damned hungry, though.

It was getting harder to think in straight lines. Maybe he was going insane, maybe it was the crack to the skull he'd taken. It was also getting a lot harder to care about anything other than the fact that he was cold and alone and probably dying.

There was something wrong with the timer, it wasn't sounding right anymore. More of a shuffling sound and a murmur. Still keeping a steady pace, but not the right one.

Eliot tried to follow it, he really did, even if he was only imagining it, because there wasn't much by way of new experiences for him to look forward to. Madness, though, he could afford.

The shuffling was growing louder, and the whispered murmurs began tumbling into words. Something in him, probably the same something that kept trying to get him to eat, made him turn his head toward where the sound seemed to be coming from.

"Get in get out get gone. Okay… this thing, the rest will sort … out."

It was coming from the other side of the door, but it brought nothing else with it.

Until.

There. He saw it. A hint of movement, heard zippers and rustling and scraping, and something that sounded like his name.

"Yo man. Gettin' you out. Hang tight just a little more."

Hardison.

They were here. They'd come.

He wanted to call back, to tell him to hurry, to do something, but he didn't know where to begin. Didn't have the words anymore, but fuck, didn't matter. Wasn't like Hardison was one who needed anyone else to get a word in edgewise.

He could start by getting his sorry ass up off the floor, though, already wondering if Hardison had another radio on him, if he'd be able to hear Nate directing Sophie through conning the guards while he tried to make sense of Hardison's computer, trying to keep their path clear.

Hardison was talking again, but this time, it took even longer to understand what he was saying, and by the time Eliot parsed it, Hardison's footsteps were already running down the hallway.

"I'm sorry," he'd said. And then he'd left.

---

Nate should be here, Alec thought, his fingers slipping away from the door as his feet carried his body towards the stairs. Eliot should be. Hell, anyone but me.

"I mean it. I'm alone, I just need to use your phone- I'm. Look. Here," Parker was saying, and he wished she'd give him a signal, something to expect, because at the moment, he had no plan, no training, no idea what he was doing. Just a heavy set of bolt cutters.

Screw it.

Trying to stay silent, he inched down the hallway towards the office, sure that any moment he'd find the creaking floorboard that would set the guard off.

The door was slightly ajar, and swung inward when he burst through to find Parker standing against the far wall, still as a statue, staring back at him.

Or maybe she was staring at the gun that was now pointed at his head.

Alec glanced at the face glaring at him behind the barrel. The guy was huge.

Nate and Sophie were still an hour at least, and Eliot was down for the count. They would be no help.

"You seeing this, Hardison?"

"The situation has my attention, yes."

You see? That's why I don't like guns. They have a specific range of efficacy. See, most guys make one mistake. They get too close."

Alec wasn't Eliot. But he had played some football down in the yard.

He could do this.

Operation This Will Most Likely End Badly is a go.

Staring ahead at Parker's frozen expression, not telegraphing a damned thing, he just had to wait, until-

Now.

"Where are your friends?" The guard, distracted by the words coming out of his own mouth, broke off as Alec fell against him, knocking him into the wall and tumbling down with him as the gun fired wild.

He'd check for damage in a minute, too busy elbowing the guard in the face to look now. Parker was there, twisting the gun out of his hand before he could get another shot off, and leaping away, backing to a safe distance, her aim trained all the while.

She looked like she knew what she was doing. "My bag," was all she said, and Alec threw himself back and away. Grabbing the edge of the desk, he pulled himself up. As he rose, he couldn't help but notice the idiotic connection array at the back of the computer. It looked wrong- one Ethernet cable too many trailing out of the computer and trailing down towards the floor, all jumbled up with speaker cables and who-the-hell-knew what else

One of these days, he'd have to get working on that entire focus issue. For now, though, he was scrambling for Parker's oversized purse, finding handcuffs, zip strips, duct tape and nylon cord.

Once the guard was bound, they stepped out into the hallway, Parker keeping her eyes trained on the guard, the gun in her hand, low and ready. It wasn't a good look on her. Alec nudged her gently, needing her to look him in the eye for just a minute, so he could be sure. What he needed to be sure of just then, he didn't pretend to know. "You alright?"

"I'm fine," Parker was speaking in a clipped monotone again, the one she used when she was seven kinds of stressed. "Where's Eliot?"

"Just got the door open, think he's still down there. Gonna take a few minutes."

"What's taking so long?"

He needs a few minutes to freshen up. "He's taken a few hits," Alec said, because it wasn't a lie. "But I got it."

"I'll keep an eye on our friend, here." Blinking, she realized that Alec was still there. "Go. And. You know. Be careful."

He backed through the door, not quite willing to take his eyes off Parker just yet, but that wasn't the issue right now. "Grab the external drives, too," he gestured towards the two metal cases on the desk, one still connected.

"Right. Holler if you need me to shoot this guy. I can be down in two shakes of a lamb's tail," she said brightly, clearly enjoying the unease in the guard's eyes.

"No doubt. I'm out."

He was halfway down the stairs before he realized what he'd missed, what it was, in the middle of all this, that was making him uneasy.

"Where are your friends?"

It wasn't just that the guard had been waiting for Nate and Sophie- it wasn't the fact that he knew about their existence, though that was unsettling enough. It was the fact that he knew them well enough to expect them.

Knowing that they weren't there, having that one edge in the information race, didn't give him the charge it usually did. And he had more immediate things to worry about, anyway, down at the end of this corridor.

---

The shot echoed off walls and stairs and threatened to bring the entire world down with it.

And who knew, maybe it did. First Parker, now Hardison, or maybe it was Sophie, up there, bleeding out on the floor, Nate scrambling to push the blood back in.

Someone else's life flashing across their eyes, when he was supposed to be the only one with tickets for that particular show.

He knew field triage. Blood was dangerous when it wasn't controlled. They'd have to pull out, get Sophie to the hospital, transfusions and doctors and stitches and cold plastic seats in the waiting room. Bad coffee and waiting.

Maybe they'd think about what they'd had to leave behind, down here in the basement.

"The thing about hope? It hurts more than love does when it leaves," his mom had said, sitting next to him at the kitchen table and trying to explain why they had to go to the church even though it wasn't a Sunday. "Sometimes, even when things look like they're supposed to go right, the body just gives up."

Eliot was seven, and Grandpa had been sitting right there a week ago, before the hospital, before all of this.

Years later, and this was probably the closest he'd ever been to the guy. But Grandpa had died in a hospital bed, and he hadn't taken anyone else down with him.

---

Alec threw the bar aside and opened the door, wide, waiting for Eliot to walk out.

He didn't, though. Didn't even move.

Eliot was curled around himself in the corner like a dog that knew it's time was up, too tired of living to track Alec's movement towards him.

He'd lost so much weight it was like a part of him was missing. Alec could figure out the percentages later. His skin was too loose in some places, too taut over his bones in others. Alec could see the detail of too many bruised ribs as Eliot breathed. The fingers of his left hand were splayed out over his shoulder, the nails broken and ripped down to the quick. And his eyes.

Fuck, his eyes weren't tracking anything at all, just staring like they were made of glass, turned towards the ceiling. When Alec moved closer, they stared right through him.

It was near impossible to hear anything beyond the ticking of the timer, but Eliot was breathing.

Only mostly dead, then. But not far enough away from it that Alec could take his time. He cast his eyes around the room, until his eyes lit on the object that had attracted so much of Eliot's attention.

The timer, counting down, in the neighborhood of 45 hours. For once, at least, his life wasn't going to play out like the movies. Even with the setback, they would still be long gone before it hit zero. As long as he stopped contemplating all the ways the James Bond movies were wrong and just got them out of here.

Crashing to his knees in front of Eliot, casting an appraising eye over his body and forcing the overwhelming panic down.

Ain't like you didn't know this was coming.

He took a breath, and then he spoke.

"Eliot. Eliot. Hey, wake up man. It's me."

"Hardison?" Eliot's voice was rasping and quiet and entirely without hope, but Eliot rolled his head to look in his direction. "Can't-"

Alec never found out what it was that Eliot couldn’t do, already talking over him.

"Shit, man. Gonna get you out of here. Got a clear path out and we'll get you help, okay? First, though, you gotta help me. Talk to me. Are you hurt?" He reached for Eliot's arm, finding it cold to the touch.

Alec would figure, later on, that he shouldn't have been surprised by the sound of Eliot's weak humorless laughter, even if the waking expression on his face looked like madness.

"Is he all right?" Parker's concern was blistering in his ear.

"Hang on a minute," Alec shook his head. "Eliot, man. Stay with me, here."

"Har'sn?" Eliot was still staring down at his arm where Alec was touching him. As answers went, it wasn't much, but there wasn't a lot to be done for it. "Okay. Here," he said, tugging the clothes free of his pack. "Gonna get you sorted. Can you move?"

"Yeah." And Eliot did, then, though it was slower than Alec would have liked. Still, it was more than he'd been expecting a minute ago.

"All right, come on. Here." It was a testament to how bad off he was that Eliot didn't grumble or resist, but let Alec pull the sweatpants up his legs and tug the shirt down over his head. "Watch out, I got ya." Elbows weren't meant to bend the way Alec needed them to, but Eliot wasn't complaining.

Eliot wasn't doing much of anything at all- he'd faded out again. His body, though, seemed aware of Alec's presence, though, even if his mind wasn't. Alec could feel the twitching through the fabric and under the skin, and babbled, not wanting to guess what it meant.

"Get you out of here, get us somewhere safe. Got a few of your IDs on hand, and we'll get you to the hospital. Just gonna need you to hang on for a bit, you hear? Ain't no way I'm putting up with cleaning up after your dead body, so you're gonna have to help me get you out. Gonna need you to walk, in a minute. There are stairs, but then it ain't far. Parker's got the situation under control, she's covering out exit, and-"

Hardison pulled the collar down over Eliot's downturned head, fingers brushing against matted stubble and down behind his ear, tugging Eliot's hair free. There wasn't much he could do about getting the other arm into its sleeve, though, and Alec cursed himself for not thinking this through. "Sorry, man. I didn't know about your arm when I was packing. Gonna have to make do with what we got, just a little while longer. And by the way, this is where you tell me to shut the hell up and that everything's fine. Just so you know, you're totally blowing your lines, and-"

Something he said must have gotten through, though, because Eliot's eyes were still swimming, but they were searching out his face for the first time since Alec had gotten there. "Park'r s'here?"

"Yeah. She's fine, you can-" he broke off at Parker's interruption.

"I'm not fine, I'm holding a gun on a guy. Tell Eliot hi for me!"

"Tell him yourself. Hang on."

Alec patted down his pocket, finding the earpiece he'd brought along and fitting it carefully into Eliot's ear. It wasn't necessary, but it wouldn't hurt, either.

"Parker, go ahead."

"Eliot! We missed you! I. I'm really glad you're not dead. Um. I'll tell you about everything you missed when you get out of there. Hardison, you need help?"

"We got it under control," Alec felt his face cracking open in a smile, trying to find the socks he knew he'd packed.

The grin fell away the moment he looked up again.

Eliot Spencer was not supposed to be curling his head down into his own shoulder, hiding his face. He was supposed to snap out of it with a gruff "c'mon," and fight Alec every step of the way as they headed for the door.

The things Alec was wrong about were starting to pile up, and they needed to be out of here before he the whole mess of them toppled over.

The socks were on, and the shoes were a size or two large, but they'd do. "Parker, give us a few minutes to get up the stairs, we're almost ready to go."

"Finally. I don't think Shane here likes me very much. He's glaring at me like I stole his mother, and I haven't even met her yet."

"We're on our way. Hang on." Alec looked down again to find Eliot turning his head up towards him. He was shaking his head in confusion, but Alec didn't know where the explanation was supposed to begin. "Come on. You ready to get out of here?"

There it was- what he'd been waiting for. Staring at Alec without meeting his eyes, Eliot began the messy business of sitting himself up.

Getting him standing again was equally awkward, but his legs seemed to be the least injured parts of his body. Didn't mean he was steady, though. If Alec took one step back right then, Eliot would probably go down.

"You ready, man?"

"Yeah. Just." Eliot's hand twitched in the direction of the pictures scattered on the floor. Moving slowly, making sure Eliot would stay standing, Alec stooped to shove them in his jeans pocket.

Moving slow, and looking like it was taxing him something fierce, Eliot was already making his way to the door.

But he was doing it under his own steam.

If it wouldn't have startled Eliot, Alec would have shouted his relief, but instead, he inched down the corridor pretending that he didn't actually need to be following Eliot so closely.

---

Eliot wanted to lie down again, wanted to rest, but if he didn't go forward and up, he'd go down and take Hardison with him.

Hardison, whose hands had been warm and real, and who was climbing not one step behind him. Who was fucking there.

There would be time for relief later, when these stairs, that room, this entire fucking place was nothing but a speck in the rearview. He just had to make it there.

And he was so damned close, there was sunlight, glaring in through the probably-not-really-so-luxurious windows, and already the air was less stale, even if it felt thin.

It's just the exertion, he told himself, gonna have to get used to it before you head back to Kansas. Got holes to dig.

Eliot wasn't heading for Kansas, though. Right then, he was heading for the floor.

---

Alec grabbed at Eliot, but wasn't fast enough to keep him from hitting the carpet he'd tripped on.

"Parker, come on!" He shouted, forgetting that he didn't need to, as he stepped over Eliot and began to pull him up again.

Eliot was still shaking his head, and Alec was pretending that he hadn't expected him to be unconscious, when there were heavy, plodding footsteps coming from the hall leading to the back office.

The guard- Shane, apparently- wasn't having the easiest time of it, not with the gun pointed at his back and Parker's irritated glare following him into the room.

"On your stomach," she instructed, and Shane stumbled hard, not having his hands to balance him as he knelt, and he fell forward, landing face down.

With one final angry assessment, she decided he was secure enough for the moment, and she twisted her head, looking over her shoulder with a wide grin, leaping towards them. Without dropping the gun, she helped settle Eliot on his feet, and immediately came within a hair's breadth of knocking him over, crashing against him so hard, wrapping her thin arms around his back, pressing her face next to his.

"Thanks for not dying," she said, pulling away, only then becoming fully aware of the state he was in. Eliot, for his part, wasn't aware of anything but her, staring at her like she shouldn't exist.

"You too."

---

Eliot didn't recognize the world anymore, or maybe it was just the warehouse across the road. But the sky was larger out here, and too much freedom for being so close to a highway.

The entire world had been out here, going about its business, while he'd been inside.

The nausea was threatening to take him down, but he'd spent too much time on his knees lately, and it didn't matter, anyway. Hardison's hands were back, holding him up by his elbow, and there was another warm spot on his lower back, through the soft cotton, and he didn't say anything when Eliot stumbled against him. Just gave him a moment and walked him to a van that was parked nearby.

Parker moved fast and efficiently, like she had never been dead, and slid the utility door open, crawling inside before swinging around to reach out to him.

He stopped short, brushing against Hardison again, feeling his grasp tighten on his arm.

It's a trick. She's here to take you across the river.

"Eliot?" Her voice was too wary to be the ferryman, and this was a parking lot, not the River Styx.

"C'mon, man." Hardison said, quietly, like he was telling him a secret. "We need to get you to the hospital. Get in."

---

Twisting in his seat to secure his seatbelt, because he'd had enough of death-defying antics for one day, Alec glanced over at Parker.

His eyes caught on the gleaming jewel at her neck, part of the disguise she'd decided to use. It wasn't the type of thing she usually wore, he half realized, and looked again.

And then he saw clearly. It wasn't a ruby. It was a sniper's laser sight nestled in the hollow of her throat.

"What is it? Drive! We-"

"Hold up," Alec said, still staring. Parker scowled at him in irritation, before trying to follow his eyes down.

"What? What is it?"

"Ah." Alec realized then that he had no idea whatsoever how one was supposed to go about telling a person that someone had a bead on them. Warning her, telling her to move could have been just as deadly as telling her to stay still. "Ah. Parker."

"What?"

But they could have shot already. Could be squeezing the trigger right this moment. "Don't move." He met Parker's eyes, which had gone from confused to concerned, and he shook his head, staring her down. "I don't want to alarm you, but. It seems that we've got company."

He put his hands up, raising them to shoulder height, and looked out the windshield.

Across the street, up on top of the other warehouse, there was a small aberration. And then it moved, rising.

Parker saw it too, and Alec was pretty sure that her startled gasp sucked the last of the air from the van.

"What do we do?"

"I don't know, I. Fuck."

There wasn't one part of this entire situation that had gone according to plan, and it was starting to look like Alec had missed something. This was his fault.

"The windshield might deflect the bullet," Parker said conversationally, but her muscles were starting to tense, she was coiling to move.

"Might not." His eyes darted down towards the dashboard. If only he'd managed to get the van started already, maybe. If he floored it, went forward instead of backward, the sniper would lose his target.

But he hadn't gotten that far.

By the time he lowered a hand to turn the key in the ignition, they'd both probably be dead, Eliot not far behind.

The shattering of glass, when it came, wasn't even a surprise.

---

Chapter 8

note to self: quit slacking!

2009-10-23T03:07:53Z

*sits down, cracks knuckles*

I'm gonna get this thing written and posted tonight if it freakin' kills me.

On a related note, death by Hardison and Eliot? Not the worst way to go.

Holy crap.

2009-10-16T04:39:13Z

So I've got my own internet connection now, which means no more heading out 30 minutes to get to the closest free wifi, which means...

Uh. Wow. I'm terrified of my flist. There's so much to get caught up on, I don't know where to start. So. What did I miss? Any recommendations? I'm gonna go read all of your stuff.

Also, Go read this! If not because it's the first beta job I've ever done, then because Oreogeekgirl wrote it, it's awesome, and the royal we wants to see her writing more!

jendavis @ 2009-10-12T22:28:00

2009-10-13T03:29:38Z

waaah! just spent all my online time messing with posting, i don't have time to read anything until THURSDAY WAAAAH

Man I Used to Be # 6

2009-10-13T03:21:05Z

Title: Man I Used to Be
By: Jendavis
Rating: PG-13 for now
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: Sorry about the eon between updates... :/

Previous Chapters: Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Don't open your eyes. Safer not to. Deal with yourself first, then the rest of it.

For a room full of so much nothing, Eliot felt it all too much upon waking. The temperature of the room and the gritty floor beneath him was probably no different than before, but he was colder, now, he could feel it in his legs.

It took him a few minutes to realize it was because he'd been stripped.

It was the most obvious next step his captors could have made, taking away one more scrap of preservation and safety.

Knowing this, however, did not help.

If you want to come in all cavalry style, he addressed his thoughts to the team, imagining somehow it would reach them, I really wouldn't mind.

It was as far as he went, though. Eliot Spencer did not ask for help.

He raised his left hand gingerly to catalogue the bruises, feeling a split lip here, dried blood there. He pressed careful fingers into the tender areas before letting his face drop to the floor again, as if the chill of it would reduce the swelling.

He wasn't so far gone- yet, he refused to think- that he didn't realize he was just asking for an infection.

His beard- he was long past stubble now, and probably looked a mess- was itching, probably matted with dried blood and spit. He'd give his right arm, which felt alarmingly heavy and useless anyway, for a toothbrush.

He'd give his right arm on the best of days for a lot of things right now.

Not wanting a repeat of before, he carefully opened his eyes, wary of brightness that wasn't there. The darkness was the smallest of mercies, though it didn't feel like it.

This was his punishment, then. Naked, cold, and hurting the total darkness.

This time around, Eliot didn't bother getting up.

---

"Give me five minutes," Alec said, well aware that he was striding through Nate's door like he owned the place. He managed to get the laptop plugged in before the last of the plugging his laptop in. "I'll have something for y'all. Just. Five."

He went back to the profile he'd started building on Mikel Dayan finessing it for a minute or two while reacquainting himself with the hitter's habits.

She had family in Canada, a younger brother and his wife. The only reason they were on Alec's radar at all was because the moment she got paid from any stateside job, she was on the next flight to Toronto. Usually flying coach.

It was an awfully mundane detail to know about her. Hell, even though he'd known Eliot for over a year, he still thought the man should've been living in a bat cave somewhere, even if he was more the Fortress of Solitude type. A house with a shed in the backyard was so damned domestic.

It should have been easy to track when she would have left Boston, or would be, if he was tracking anyone else. She had the propensity for picking up new aliases like Parker stole keys, and never flew direct. Tracking her tickets was going to be a bitch, so he opted for plan B, Pearson Airport's security system. Once he'd proven she was there, he could figure out the when easily enough.

It just felt right. He hadn't had a hunch like this since he'd figured he could roll the Bering Aerospace stock through the London market.

He stood up, brought his laptop to the kitchen table, and sat down across from Sophie. Parker was leaning against the island, and Nate was pouring himself another cup of coffee, but all eyes were on Alec, as evidenced by Nate's scalded hiss.

He recovered quickly, though. "Okay, Hardison. Tell us what you got."

"Mikel Dayan." He wasn't sure what sort of reception he'd been expecting, saying the words, but he would have thought someone would have said something. Instead, the stares coming back to him were nearly blank, with just enough processing for him to know they hadn’t simultaneously fallen into a coma. A muffled "huh," from Nate was all he heard, but it could have been a cough, for all Alec knew.

"I don't get it," Parker eventually said, staring across the apartment at the large screens, which were dark, like she couldn't track the information without visual assistance. "I know we messed up their con, but we kept them from getting caught. Mostly."

Sophie agreed, apparently warming to the idea. "And I can't imagine any of them losing too much sleep about, what was his name, Chaos? Getting nabbed, or where painting wound up. That was Marcus's concern, not theirs."

Nate finally nodded, his eyes suddenly clear. Buffering at 100%. "Yes. But. What was the fallout?" Nate looked from one face to the next, waiting for someone to pick up the train of thought. No one answered, and Alec knew he wasn't the only one half-waiting for Eliot to take his turn in the conversation.

Nate had to answer his own question. "We screwed them. They didn't get paid. Yeah." He smirked, then. "Hardison, can you find any link between Eliot and Mikel? Figure out where their paths might have crossed? They seemed pretty cozy at McRory's after the job."

"Shouldn't I be trying to find out where she and Eliot are linked now?"

"I want you to do both. She doesn't look the type to let an opportunity she wants pass her by."

"My point exactly."

"Yet if it was her, it took her weeks to get around to making a play."

Sophie disagreed. "She seems like she'd take advantage of element of surprise, does she not?"

"No. No." Nate paused. "I don't think so. If it was personal, she wouldn't have waited. It had to have been money."

Parker narrowed her eyes and stared at Nate, possibly trying to read his mind. "How do you know?"

"She didn't get paid." Nate blinked at the blank faces staring back at him. "When we screwed up their job? Ring a bell? We were just talking about it thirty seconds ago."

Alec rolled his eyes. "If we know it's just money, then why do I have to waste time tracking down ancient history?"

"Because for whoever's paying her, it's probably. You know. Personal." Nate nodded once to confirm the idea, and once at Alec.

"I see, right." Alec was already on it. "Between tracking her movements and her money…" he trailed off, already planning his strategy, scrolling down deeper into Dayan's profile, weighing eight different strategies for his approach.

Alec pulled his headphones on, chose a track off the Bloc Party's recently leaked album, took a breath, and dove in.

Start with what you know. Grab what you need on the way.

---

His limbs ached from curling so close to his body, trying to conserve heat that just didn't exist anymore, but his head was clear for the first time in days, the throbbing dulled into the background.

His thirst and hunger took the newly vacated space in his awareness to announce themselves with a vengeance, though. Still too shaky to pull himself up to stand, he half-crawled, half-dragged himself to where he knew food and water would be.

There was nothing, and he cast his left hand out, carefully, searching for anything, growing certain that there was more to his punishment than previously realized, when his ring finger brushed against something solid.

Water. In a plastic bottle. The lid was still on, and from the feel of it, the seal had not been broken.

Another careful sweep of his hand, and he heard the crinkling noise before feeling the wrapper. Rectangular, tightly wrapped. Grasping it with a careful turn of his wrist, finding the weight of it to be familiar, he supposed it to be food.

It was too dark to be certain, and even then, all anyone needed was a needle, but as far as Eliot could tell, it hadn't been tampered with.

Didn't mean he could eat it, though, at least not easily. He managed to twist the cap off the bottle with one hand, but couldn't manage the wrapper, not without making his right wrist scream in agony as he tried to hold it.

He still had his teeth, though. Even if they felt a little more loose in his gums than they should have been, they still managed to bite down hard enough to tear the wrapping apart.

Taking a bite, the texture was tough, and it tasted like nothing in particular.

"Hey man,' Eliot said, ducking his head into Hardison's office. "You gotta come eat something."

"In a bit," Hardison muttered, not so much blowing him off as barely paying attention in the first place.

"You don't eat, your brain slows down, you miss something, Parker and I get shot. So eat, already." Eliot glared at the back of his head, silhouetted by the screen's light. "'Sides. Can't make it three days without eating,"

"None of us will make it much further than that if I don't get the workarounds set on these security parameters, neither."

Eliot gave in. It wasn't the sort of advice Hardison was liable to take, but it was worth a shot. He could report back to Nate, tell him that he'd done as instructed. "Here," Eliot warned him, before throwing a power bar at his chest, too fast for him to catch.

Fifteen minutes later, he stood in the hallway, Old Nate staring down at him from the wall, and peeked his head around the door to see the empty wrapper abandoned on the side of the desk. Heading back to the conference room, he pretended not to understand Sophie's question when she asked him why he was smiling.

---

The seventh time he widened up the time range, Alec caught up with Mikel going through customs in Toronto a few days ago, arriving about 36 hours after Eliot's flight left Kansas, on a ticket originating at Pittsburgh International.

He traced her path and Sarah Fayruz, her alias, back through the airport to the rental agency, where she'd returned a utility van that she'd picked up at the Hertz, not a mile from Eliot's house.

And she'd supplied a phone number when signing for the van. Alec set a trace on it, and within minutes, every single number the phone had connected to was logged on his computer.

He forced himself to set it aside for the time being. Digging a bit deeper, he found that the van, like most rentals these days, was equipped with GPS. It should have been the easiest hack ever. Accessing the GPS and mileage data from the system would be simple enough.

It was an older model system, with very little memory. If the agency wanted to keep the data from the tracker, they'd have to dump it onto a computer, effectively deleting it from the original device.

And that's where it stopped. Suddenly, the information led nowhere. From what he could guess, the computer was non-networked. He'd have to pull what he needed directly from the source.

---

Alec pulled his headphones off and winced at the sound of angry voices falling abruptly into awkward silence as a door slammed behind him.

Alec coughed as he turned, trying a smile without really expecting it to work. "Hey guys-" Only one set of eyes met his. The second set of eyes was already halfway out the window, and the third had presumably taken the door.

"Sophie. What the hell's going on?"

"Maggie," was all she replied, as if waiting for him to read her mind. Eventually relenting, she sat down on the end of the couch with an angry sigh. "She's coming to visit." Her tone was arch, but her expression hesitant. She and Alec never talked. Not really. It was probably a bit of the geek versus the prom queen thing- mutual misunderstanding.

"What's going on?" he repeated, resolutely ignoring the accusations of jealousy and competition that his mind was supplying. He sat down at the other end of the couch.

"It's just." Her eyes widened in exasperation as she glared through the wall across from her. "Don't get me wrong. I expected it to be bad, what with the anniversary coming up, Sam's birthday, but…"

"Aw, hell," Alec interjected, realizing the calendar date. "Totally forgot about that."

Sophie shrugged. "And I know that she's the only one who could understand what's going on with him, but. I could help. I could be there, if he'd let me." It felt just awkward enough that if Sophie was putting on an act, she didn't realize it.

Alec sighed, wondering if this was about as honest as things would ever be. "I wouldn't force it. You'll be there when she leaves."

"Which one of us is sloppy seconds, then? Me or him?" Sophie smiled sadly. "And it's horrible of me. I mean. We've got bigger problems right now and I know it. Nate does too. But."

"There's not much you can do right now."

"That just makes it so much worse." Drumming her nails on the armrest, she sighed. "I keep waiting for him to saunter in here, reeking of alcohol and bragging about some swimsuit model down in Miami."

Alec's eyes flashed towards the door, half expecting it himself, now, but the door remained closed.

Life's never as cool as it is on TV.

"But in the meantime," Sophie continued, guiltily following Alec's eyes to the door, "I think we managed to scare Parker off, too. I don't know where she went."

"I'll find her," Alec said, standing. "Any idea where Nate went?"

"Out for coffee, I hope. And he's probably going to call Maggie back. He did growl out something about being back in twenty minutes, as he was leaving."

"That's good. Because I think I got something."

---

"Parker?" Alec called, scanning the roof for any movement, and finding none. "Yo! Parker!" His breath fogged in the air, and the sight of it only made him realize how cold he was.

"What?" Her voice was clipped and half lost to the wind, coming from behind a chimney on the west side of the building. Moving towards it and around, Alec found her, sitting on the ledge, her feet dangling over the edge.

"You alright?"

"I'm fine," Parker said, angrily enough that she probably wasn't, not entirely. "They were arguing, and then Nate started shouting. I left. Didn't know what else to do, I got-" Parker sniffed, still not looking at him. "So I came up here."

"Right on. Nate's gone too, but he'll be back soon. Sophie filled me in. Maggie's wants to visit because it's their son's birthday."

Parker turned her head to look at him quizzically. "I thought he was dead."

"Exactly."

"Oh." Parker tested the strength of the gutter, her fingers flexing around pipes and into niches. Nervous, or habit, or nervous habit, Alec couldn't tell. "I forgot about that."

"It's okay."

"I don't know. It's just. I can't sit around here anymore. I need to be doing something." The frustration was clear on her face as she squinted out over the neighborhood. "I'm not good at. It's too much around here, with Eliot gone, and yeah, I mean, he's a jerk, but things never got this bad when he was around, you know? He knew how to talk to Sophie, rein Nate in. But instead of trying to find him, they're fighting." Parker laughed. "And I'm up on the roof again, so it's not like I'm any better."

"Yeah. But you didn't go any farther, right? So if you want to come back down, I think I've got something."

---

Nate came in through the doorway with a cardboard carrier full of coffees and orange soda, the usual peace offering. He still held his cell phone in his other hand. "Ah. Guys?" He looked guilty, as if whatever he was going to say would be surprising. "Maggie's coming to visit. She'll be here tomorrow."

Sophie sighed, opened her mouth to speak, but Parker got there first.

"Does anyone here remember the part where we're in the middle of a job?"

To his credit, Nate looked apologetic, but not quite shamefaced. "I know, I know. But. Ah. She needs this." The unspoken and so do I was heavily implied enough that technically, it wasn't a lie. He wouldn't even look in Sophie's direction, though.

Parker and Sophie both looked like they wanted to argue, so Alec cut in first, raising a hand, waving for their attention. "All right, all right. Seriously. People? Table this right the hell now. I have something."

"You find Eliot?" Nate's face contorted, and it looked a lot like hope crawling through.

Alec found the urge to hit Nate dwindling down to nothing, and wished he had more information that he did. "Not yet. But I tracked Mikel Dayan down to Pittsburgh, and I got her phone. Between phone records and the GPS, we should be able to find Eliot pretty easily." Alec took a quick breath, not wanting to lose the floor just yet. "The GPS data's stored on a non-networked computer at the rental office. Have to go there to find it."

"What about the phone records?"

"She made several calls on the same phone, mostly to set up the rental and her tickets, judging by the numbers. There is one other number, but it goes to a ghost phone. No identity, so it's either hacked, or prepaid. No one tied to it, but the number originates in London, and there's no recent activity on Dayan's phone, so I think she dumped it before she left."

"You think Eliot's in London?"

"Either service was set up there, and the owner's roaming, or it was set up to look like it originated there. Not much use either way, but I'm watching both that line, and Dayan's, in case any other calls go through. Hopefully, somewhere between here and Pittsburgh, we'll be able to find out more."

Parker nearly jumped out of her seat. "I'm coming with you."

Nate coughed, again looking tense, his eyes sliding over towards Sophie, who was pretending to ignore him. "I. Ah."

In light of the evening so far, the idea of sitting in a car with Nate and Sophie was a nightmarish prospect, so Alec thought fast. "For all I know, the trail could lead right back here. This entire thing could be a red herring."

Parker's eyes darted away from the back of Sophie's head to meet Alec's. "What if someone's waiting to know that we're back in town to come forward with a ransom demand? At least one of us should stay here."

"Or, you know. Two." Alec wanted to disappear through the floor for how awkward he'd managed to make it sound. Even Parker picked up on it.

Sophie smiled into her coffee, though, and Nate blinked once and snorted. It was as close to approval as he was likely to get.

---

Alec was packing up his computer, as usual, the last one to leave. He could tell when Nate's attention was on him, and began to dread the inevitable conversation to come.

Don't even. No. This entire agony aunt thing's gettin' old, man.

Thankfully, though, Nate was all business. "How long will it take you and Parker?"

Alec hated this, more than anything. Deadlines.

Like he had any clue where the information would take him as he followed it down. It would end up at Eliot, but between here and there?

Who the hell knows?

It was half the reason he'd been fired from the two legit jobs he'd held, back in the day.

"Depends on what I find and when I find it. Can't say, 'cause I don't know."

"Best case, worst case," Nate said.

"Best case. Get out there. Spend a day or so searching. Luck out with triangulation. Worst case. I'm wrong and this is a dead end. Look."
Alec leaned his back against the counter and scratched at his ear. "There are a lot of ways this could wash out. I only barely have Mikel's MO down in the first place. Even then, I don't know if she was actually involved. If she is, I still don't know who she's working for, or with, or where they are, or what they're doing. So." Alec shrugged, dimly aware that he was the one unloading, that he'd had it wrong, before.

"You've got what you've got. Okay." Nate nodded his understanding. "Just. Be careful. Let us know the moment you find anything. Keep your earpieces in, and keep an eye on Parker. Those trackers still in her shoes?"

"Yeah."

"Want them in yours, too. I want your car littered with them. I want them in your phones, and I want a way to see them on my computer before you leave. Got it?"

Alec pretended that he wasn't even tempted to grin. "Program's already on your phone, man, and your desktop. Here." He held out his hand for the phone, showed Nate as he navigated through a few screens until a blinking red light became visible, two intersections away from Parker's apartment.

Nate nodded, took the phone back. "Thanks. Ah. For everything, you know. Let me know if you need anything."

"Oh I will," Alec grinned as he made his way to the door, hopefully forestalling any attempts Nate might make to hand him a bagged lunch and change for the bus. "Don't you doubt it."

---

There was a ticking noise, coming from somewhere up in the ceiling.

Digital readouts didn't need to tick. There was nothing in them to create the noise. No gears, no cogs.

The sound was being piped in just to fuck with him.

It was working. Too fucking well.

Forcing himself to calm down, to fucking think, he rolled over onto his back and looked up at the ceiling.

Large digital numbers. Bright green digits on a small black box counting down, the only thing that would be visible in the growing dark.

They'd left him with food and water, enough to last him a week, in a cardboard box over in the corner. And they'd planted a bomb on his ceiling.

---

Eliot tried to figure it out, find the point where it all went wrong. Thing is, really, it was only a few days ago. Things hadn't been that bad.

But obviously the guy in the picture was supposed to mean something, and it really sucked not knowing.

The man didn't look like anyone he'd killed- those faces, he remembered the most, except for one brutal night in a half-completed suburban house. The collateral damage had worn a ski mask, and the sirens were too close for Eliot to stop and identify the body.

That was sometimes a mistake they made. Wearing a mask only meant they were prepared to leave survivors. In his line of work, it was the sloppiest tell anyone could have.

But that was neither here nor there.

The worst thing about all this, though, was that he'd just recently started thinking that maybe, when the time came- and of course it would - he'd be going down for a good reason. A little bit of atonement, maybe. Something that his folks, rest their souls, wouldn't be ashamed of. If the world worked the way it was supposed to, he'd be putting his life down for the crew.

But Parker was dead, he was useless, and his attackers hadn't been wearing masks.

---

He'd been in town for the Oklahoma City bombing, but his father had been in the damned building.

Eliot volunteered in the rescue effort, but wasn't the one to find him. Some girl- Shawna or Shayla or something like that, the records weren't clear- was the one to catch sight of him in the wreckage, to report back that there wasn't a pulse.

Eliot never found out who Shawna or Shyla was, doubted that she'd ever known his father's name. Glancing around at the funeral a week later, knowing it was foolish as he did so, he found no strangers in the church.

Enough families were double booked on that front as it was. Had their own to attend to, that week.

He'd arranged everything, the funeral, the death certificate, the insurance. Groceries and visiting family. Mom had turned into a ghost, sometime in the middle of all of it all.

He never told her what the coroner's report had said. That dad had survived for several hours with internal bleeding and a broken spine. The filing cabinet had been all that was holding him together, and when it had moved? That was it. No more.

Eliot had been less than two hundred feet away at the time, searching through the wreckage, still hoping. He'd had no idea, wouldn't find out for another day.

---

He wanted a bed. Sheets and a blanket, something more than this flattened cardboard box he'd laid out in an admittedly pathetic attempt to insulate himself from the chill of the floor. He wanted clothing. Socks. That shitty radiator in his first apartment. Someone else's body, solid and close. Fire.

He wanted hot tea. Soup. Something that he didn't have to chew, anything that would fill his stomach. Red beans and rice, collard greens. Something with vitamins in it.

He wanted to go home. Wanted to be working in the garden, grass under his knees, dirt under his fingernails instead of blood. Guitars on the radio and Loretta Lynn's voice.

He wanted to stop hurting. Tape for his ribs, enough morphine to take his body away.

He wanted to be clean. Water and soap and steam.

He wanted to hear other people, even if it was just Hardison cracking jokes. He wanted to have something worth laughing about. He wanted Sophie's calm voice, Nate's certainty. Even Parker's insanity would be nice right now, but fuck, Parker. She was. Fuck.

He wanted to stop thinking like this. Wanted to be who he used to be a week ago.

He wanted that timer to just fucking stop, already. Sudden malfunction, numbers freezing.

He wanted it to count down to fucking zero, already. Just get this over with.

He was so goddamned tired, too tired to think straight, to remember things. Names and faces in pictures from somewhere he'd been. He wanted to rest.

---

They were in Pittsburgh by two in the afternoon the next day, and had rented a car they didn't need to give Parker the opportunity to case the rental office.

"How to you want to play this?" Parker asked, slipping back into Alec's car. "Getting you into the garage should be easy. You think that's where they'll have the computer?"

Parker was waiting in front of the rental agency, pretending to talk on her phone and preparing to make a distraction if she needed to, but there was a line out the door of the rental agency, and the staff inside was already insanely busy.

Once the mechanic on duty snuck out for a smoke break, it was so easy to slip in through the garage entrance that Alec didn't bother asking Parker for help. It would have been an insult.

He found the most likely computer, an old desktop built into the wall, and was preparing to dive in, when he saw it.

Someone had taped a memo listing the new password to the front of the computer. Even better, it was the correct password, only set a day or two ago.

The heading of the memo read Computer Security: Do Not Post.

Alec allowed himself to laugh, quietly, but didn’t bother explaining it to Sophie, who was on the other end of the comms. "I'm in," was all he needed to say, anyhow.

He found what he needed, pulled the data from Dayan's returned van, and copied it over into his own computer. "Got it. Heading out, Parker?"

"Meet you at the car."

He was out of there in less than two minutes. Easy as lyin'.

---

Parker had said she'd be asleep in the room next door, but he could hear the sound of cartoons bleeding through the wall as he worked.

Ordinarily, it was the sort of distraction that sent him running for his headphones. Today, though, he didn't mind so much.

Didn't want to miss anything out in the world, not like he had yesterday.

He traced the van's route down from Boston, tying the GPS points from the file to his tracking program, watching as the map built itself up out of nothing. Deleting every stop that lasted less than 45 seconds, he wiped out most of the stoplights on the route, leaving him with less than ten locations to examine.

It probably wasn't the hardware store parking lot, and they'd already checked Eliot's house.

It probably wasn't the gas station outside Allentown, but he pulled up the local scanner records to be sure there were no strange reports.

It probably wasn't the drive through coffee shop, either.

The last point, the longest stop aside from the lengthy stakeout across from Eliot's house, was in Kittanning, Pennsylvania.

Middle of nowhere, or about as close to it as you can get. Mostly warehouses, and mostly abandoned.

She hadn't stayed there for more than ten minutes. Enough time to trade a hostage for cash and exchange a few pleasantries about the weather.

There was no way he was on the wrong trail. Alec was starting to breathe again, found enough air in his lungs to laugh.

He hadn't realized the earpiece was still in, and he felt bad, waking Sophie up like he did, because it was kind of late, but Parker hadn't really been sleeping anyway.

There was absolutely no reason to take that tone. It was just rude.

---

There was no way to be sure how exact the GPS was, not really. They had to check it out in person, driving around the parking lots, making a show of stopping and pulling out a map, shaking it open on the hood of the car. On the dashboard, one of his phones searched for networks.

"Found three," Parker said from inside the car, and Alec was surprised to hear Nate's voice on the wire a minute later.

"Excellent, Hardison?"

Parker was confused as well. "Nate? You're-" she broke off as she watched Alec shoving the phone into an empty paper cup, and gathering the other detritus of their fast-food lunch before stepping out of the car, shoving it into a dumpster standing near one of the buildings. "Thought you went to California."

"It was lunch and a walk in the park, Parker," Nate replied dryly. "Was never actually going away."

"Oh." Parker grinned. "Good."

"Ah, right. So, where are we at? Need us down there?"

Alec got back into the car, glancing at the surrounding buildings one last time before replying. "Don't know yet. I'll give you a call in a few hours. I gotta work on some stuff, depends on what I find."

"Okay, that's good. Keep me posted, and I'll call if I don't hear from you. Got my phone on. And, ah. The computer."

"Right."

---

This was insane. He couldn't figure out what his captors wanted. Couldn't make heads or tails of the photographs. Couldn't figure out a goddamned thing, because he couldn't concentrate on anything other than the green numbers counting down and down and.

In three days and change, he would be dead.

If they'd left him food, there probably wasn't anyone on the other side of the door waiting for his admission, his apology, for whatever he could give them.

He tried to call out, but it came out in more pieces than he meant to- words weren't lining up the way they were supposed to, and he didn't know if it was the drugs, something wrong with his jaw, or if it was brain damage.

He meant to say, "I don't understand what this is about. I don't know who this is! What do you want from me?" He really did.

But he tried three times, shouting up into the camera, and each turn was more twisted than the last. Either he couldn't speak the words in the correct order, or he couldn't hear them right. He was pretty sure understand wasn't pronounced anderstond, but it didn't help him figure out if it was his ears or his speech or his memory that was broken.

It didn't seem to matter to anyone but him. There was no answer.

Eliot was too frustrated and annoyed to try again. He turned his head to hide from the camera, stupidly ashamed to have tried in the first place.

Even if there was nobody there to see it. Even if he was totally fucking alone.

---

The first network had provided nothing interesting. Inventory listings, security and utilities monitoring. The warehouse itself wasn't actually abandoned, then, merely shuttered. Scanning through a few emails, he found that it would be reopened once the fire chief had verified that the violations had been taken care of, probably early next week.

The second network was more what he'd expect to find somewhere like this. Massive piracy, badly hidden. If he'd been bored, he would have hit the boards and found out who was running it, maybe bolstered their security for them if they weren't jerks. But he didn't have the time for it now.

The third one, though. It was different.

It was all being run off one new computer. It was the most generic out-of-the-box desktop on the market. Cheap enough to buy with cash without raising questions, especially if they were storing everything in external hard drives. Which it seemed they were.

Alec forced himself to back out, to double check his approach, make sure he was leaving no trail. Checked a third time, and again. Hadn't been this cautious since he'd hit Lockheed-Martin, just to prove a minor point to Eliot, back when things were sane.

Almost all of them looked to be video feeds. No email, no documents, no pictures. Not a single trace of pirated music or pornography.

It had solitaire, though, and someone had played a few hundred games.

Choosing one at random, he brought it up. Found a delivery truck driving past yesterday, time stamped and dull. Fourteen seconds, and it ended. Motion detectors, then, running the system outside. Good to know.

There was no way they hadn't been captured by this. Any other day, that would have mattered.

He began to pull them all down into his computer, before realizing that one feed was being recorded, and couldn't be moved, yet.

But it could be watched.

Eliot was naked, and from the looks of it, hurt. His right arm, at least, wasn't moving right, but to be honest, Alec couldn't tell blood from bruise from shadow. There was too much of all three.

The scruff on Eliot's face was mostly stubble, though, left too long.

There was sick feeling forming in his stomach as he tapped into the audio feed.

Like it's not enough to watch, gotta be listening, too.

Hardison didn't want to do either, but he knew, already, that he wouldn't be turning off. Not once he recognized the ticking for what it was.

It was the only sound, though. Eliot wasn't saying anything, and he wasn't moving much. Just lying in the middle of the room, fingers clutching at some pieces of paper over and over again. He was lying there like he'd forgotten how to hide himself, and Alec wished, more than anything, that he'd turn his head just a fraction more, so he could see his eyes.

---

Get your head together, man.

Alec began to pull apart the scene, isolating images, cleaning up the audio tracks every time he heard Eliot breathe funny, or when his head convinces him that the ever-present ticking sound has changed in pitch or timbre.

He knew he should've called the others in by now. He should have done so an hour ago.

But Eliot was beginning to stir, moving too slowly. The image of him struggling just to sit up, and the flash of pain that the camera managed to catch, was burned too deeply into Alec's brain for him to think around it.

No one should have to see this, let alone… He was halfway to standing before the other thought dropped. Fuck, Parker is going to see this. They all are.

But they don't have to.

Ain't lying. It's for their own good. For Eliot's. Won't have to live it down if there's nothing to see.

It ain't lying.

He pulled up the security feeds from outside, turning the sound off and minimizing the live feed, before standing to stretch. He willed his body to move faster, slipping out into the hallway and to Parker's door, forcing himself to tap quietly, not to pound, to scream, to wake up the whole damned floor.

"Found him. It's bad," was all he said when it opened. He couldn't lie that well.

---

"I gotta work on this some more," he finally summed up, adjusting his earpiece to sit more comfortably, "but from what we're seeing there were four people going in and out up until yesterday, except for when they brought Eliot in, and he's never come out. Now there's just one other person going in and out. Camera feed's too crappy to pull the plates without spending days cleaning the images, but I'm on it already."

"Okay. One person somewhere in the building, plus Eliot, who's locked up. Have you gotten a look at the door?"

"There's a camera in the hallway. Couple of crappy looking padlocks, nothing that some heavy bolt cutters won't handle if we're pressed for time. That's not the issue."

"It's the fact that there's probably a bloody bomb in there with him, and you don't know when it's going to go off." Alec could see the disapproval on Sophie's face, so clear she might as well have been in the room.

"Hardison. Parker." Nate was probably shaking his head. "Yeah. I don't know if it's a good idea-"

Alec shook his head right back, not caring that Parker was the only one who could see it. "If the other person is in there, we have to assume that they know about the bomb, and are going to clear out before it blows. As long as that person's in there, we've got a shot."

"Anyone with sense would clear out with plenty of time. Or maybe it's a fake bomb," Parker pointed out.

"Are they in there now?"

"Yes."

"When do they normally leave?"

"Every twelve hours, at nine, there's a shift change."

"That's in…"

"Seven hours," Parker nodded. "That's our window."

"I don't like it," Sophie said.

"I don't either. I don't like anything about this. But. We should do this."

"Parker, what do you think?"

"I want to go now, but that would be stupid."

"Fine. We're coming down there."

"We can't wait, man."

"We'll catch up. Keep in touch."

"Right," Alec nodded. Fine.

Sophie asked, "Be careful. Is there anything you need?"

"No," Parker said, before looking over to see if Alec disagreed.

"Thanks," Alec said, signing off, waiting until Parker pulled her earpiece out.

"Everything we need except a plan," she said, crossly. "What if he's hurt?"

Alec sighed, nodding, pretending not to know the answer to that. "First, we need sleep. Four hours. We wake up, and we figure it out. We have bolt cutters. I'll ghost the security feeds. You distract the guard, I'll pull him out. That work for now?" Alec waited, breathless, for her assessment. It wasn't exactly the level of planning they were used to.

But sometimes, a little more fluidity was useful, apparently. Parker was still beaming when she went back to her room.

The moment she was gone, Alec was back on his laptop, pulling up the feed again, but there was nothing to see. And he had work to do, anyway.

He selected a loop of the security feed, checking the weather to check for rain, sun, and cloud cover before selecting three from the files that would fit seamlessly into tomorrow morning.

---

He knew he'd fallen asleep only after jerking back to wakefulness, casting about for the signal that woke him. Trying to remember what he wasn't sure he'd heard.

Nervously, he looped the past minute for playback.

Eliot's voice, silent for days now, was little more than stuttering breath. "Fuck." Barely audible, but after so much silence, it had been enough to wake Alec. It was hollow enough, hopeless enough, that Alec figured he'd never sleep again.

Alec had no idea why his vision was blurring. Rubbed at his eyes, and his fingers came away damp. It was embarrassing. Eliot wouldn't let him hear the end of it. Ever.

The sooner Eliot was back, the sooner they could get on that. Alec wouldn't even mind. Not much.

He was reaching for the keyboard again when he was overcome with the sick sense that he wasn't the only one watching. Somewhere in a warehouse a little more than a mile from here, someone was sitting just like he was, eyes on the same screen. Maybe taking notes.

Maybe they were riveted, and this was entertainment, a movie to them, and he'd come in too late to catch the plot.

Eliot groaned once, maybe in his sleep, and Alec was pulling up the screen so fast he didn't even realize he was doing it. He watched for a while, trying to make sure Eliot was still breathing, trying to make sure his own heart hadn't stopped yet. Trying to ignore the ticking.

He was wasting time. Had to get back to work. He kept the audio on, though, and listened, but Eliot said nothing more.

Alec only let himself enlarge the feed screen once every ten minutes, to make sure Eliot was still breathing. Each time, he grew more certain that there were only so many turns he had left. He'd promise himself to hold out for ten minutes, next time, and every time, he failed.

He wanted to lie down, to get some rest. He had to be clear in the morning. Knowing it didn't help. But he couldn't bring himself to turn off the video feed. Didn't seem right to be listening to Eliot trying to breathe in the dark, but it was worse to shut it off, to leave him alone.

He drifted towards sleep to the sound of a bomb ticking down, and jerked awake every time it went off.

Chapter 7

note to self

2009-09-30T04:20:43Z

if you ever decide to live with someone who is dating someone, make them tell you all their grand relationshippy plans six months in advance, so as not to wind up having one week to find new dwellings and move.

So, in case you're wondering where the next update is, it's currently PACKED AWAY IN A BOX, but it will be broken out as soon as I get moved in. Depending on how irritating the move will be (and, well, let's face it- it's DAMNED irritating so far), it will probably be the first thing to get unpacked, as escapism is a wonderful wonderful thing, especially when compared to the prospect of having piles of unpacking to deal with.

*grumble grumble stupid roommate-just-kidding-she's-a-wonderful-person-who-i'm-totally-annoyed-with-right-now grumble*

Man I Used to Be #5

2009-09-25T06:11:20Z

Title: Man I Used to Be
By: Jendavis
Rating: PG-13 for now
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: Posting because I can't stand to look at it any longer.

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4

Chapter 5

This was getting old.

Don't have time for this.

It wasn't like keeping quiet was going to prevent anyone from knowing he was there.

Ship's long sailed on that one, son.

But talking meant one of two things. Asking for information, or giving it away. The latter was the more obvious of the two, but the former was more dangerous. It wasn't just requesting information that was the problem. It was admitting that you didn't understand in the first place.

It meant putting yourself at their mercy, just a little bit more.

And he was already sitting on a gritty concrete floor, without shirt, shoes, or weapons. He had nothing. Down to his jeans and his pride, both felt a little more valuable than they'd been a week ago.

So Eliot remained silent. Mostly to alleviate the cramping in his gut, he paced the room again, trying the door handle on every hundredth pass. He wasn't expecting to find it open, but it allowed him the illusion that he was taking action-any sort of action at all.

He had a little while yet before the room would be too dark to see, and he was fighting sleep on his feet already, well past weary of the routine.

This time last, what, week? A few days ago? He'd been worrying about setting foot in a bar, of all places. Been sure that it would destroy him.

But it hadn't. Apparently his radar was off by a few days, nearly to the point of being comical. Instead, then, he'd shot some pool, and felt more comfortable than he'd expected. At least until finding Hardison sitting there in an obnoxious green sweatshirt, grinning at him like it was the funniest thing he'd ever seen.

No. Wait. That was later on.

Hardison had been convinced he was there for some nefarious purpose, and he hadn't known, at first, whether or not to be insulted by that assumption, or wary of the man making it.

Or a little of both.

But, flashing forward again, to when Hardison was smiling. Comfortable where he was sitting at the bar, only acting nervous because of Eliot's unease.

Even then, he hadn't been surprised that Hardison rolled with the punches, even if everything else-

God, you can't even think it.

Even if everything else was a little messed up.

Hardison was supposed to be at home, playing his stupid game, stuffing his face with junk food and shouting obscenities at the computer screen. Destroying monsters that went down a whole lot easier than the ones they encountered at work. He wasn't supposed to have a life.

Eliot hadn't let himself think about it, not much, but he was running out of other options. It was either Hardison, or the same four walls, the cool grittiness of the concrete floor under his feet, and whatever was due to come through the door the moment he let his guard down.

Given the options, maybe thinking a bit more on the topic of Alec Hardison wasn't so insane.

He wondered how he'd managed to figure everything out, how he'd probably done so at a fairly young age. If it really had been as bad as Eliot suspected. A broken wrist wasn't the hardest knock a body could take, but it wasn't fun. He tried to guess what Hardison would be like if he hadn't gone through it. More obnoxious? Less?

The guy was just a kid. Eliot wasn't sure how old he was, not really, but it rankled, just a little, to think that he'd already found his way through it all, that he was finished with that entire self-discovery bullshit. He was whoever he was now, and the big headfuck of getting there was something he was old news. Yesterday. Over and done with.

Hardison had to have been with guys before. It was an infuriating thing to be concerned with, all things considered, but it didn't stop the thoughts.

If it were anyone else- if both of them were someone else, maybe he'd have asked about it. What he'd done, what it had felt like, how much did it change you. If it had screwed with Hardison's head the way the mere idea of it was screwing with Eliot's.

But they weren't other people. He hadn't asked. And there they were. Well, there he was. Hardison was out in the world somewhere, existing. It was a little surreal to think about, impractical, how in his mind Hardison and Not Here were coming to mean the same thing, but Eliot was cold, worn out, and out of options. A little irrationality under the circumstances was one of the few things he could afford.

As long as he kept an eye on it.

---

He'd held out for hours. Hadn't sipped any of the water, eaten any of the sandwich sitting on the paper plate, too sure that the water was drugged and the food was poison. The need for both was winning out, though, and Eliot had to admit to himself that at this point, it probably didn't matter.

He was already weak, and his head hurt too much to concentrate. They didn't need to drug him. They already had every advantage.

You're whining again. Get over it, get a plan, and get out of here.

The cell had grown dark. He lay down, resolving to only fake sleep. He needed to be awake when the door opened.

---

Alec grunted and hefted another shovelful of earth up towards Parker, who caught it in the screen, sifting through the dirt, and thankfully, finding nothing.

It was just past one, and the heat was becoming unbearable, but with one more shovelful, he was finally done digging. He signaled Sophie, who knelt to hand the last three pieces of pottery down, her movements slow and careful.

Alec bit back a rude comment or two. Thing's been broken for a few hundred years. Ain't like another crack is going to ruin it.

He was pretty sure he wasn't cut out for this sort of thing, but he set his jaw. For now, he would concentrate, and keep his mouth shut. Arguing now would only cause more delays. Wasn't good for anyone.

By the time Nate caught up to them, camera in tow, Sophie was already on the phone, alerting the news. They were nearly finished.

---

He figured it had been a day or so since he'd caught sight of the person out in the hall. Since then, there had been no further change in routine, other than his failed attempt to avoid sleep. He was still tired all the time and still ached, deep in his joints, low in his spine.

But he was growing certain that it wasn't the drugs, it wasn't the near starvation, and it wasn't the lack of water that was going to kill Eliot. It was the boredom.

He'd been pulling out for longer and longer. Disassociating. He'd already thought about his garden, concentrating on creating it exactly from memory, down to the twine that held the young vines up against the trellis, and every cheap plastic garden stake that he'd meant to remove once the plants were grown enough to identify.

He'd mentally gone through the steps of building the Desperado cycle kit he'd picked up after getting back from Pakistan, belt drive to break lines to front end. Tried to remember every twist of the wrench it had taken, but it had started to get hazy.

It wasn't working as well as it had yesterday. He couldn’t concentrate. Kept thinking about the others. Trying not to hope that they were coming for him.

It's been too long, now.

Eliot tamped down on the panic that started to rise, recognizing it as the first twitches of dreaming. He'd been falling asleep again.

Dreaming that Parker was crawling through the air vents while Sophie distracted the guards out front, wherever out front was. That Nate was holed up in an office somewhere, standing over Hardison's shoulder. Watching, monitoring, impatient for updates.

He could see Hardison staring at his screen, too focused to notice Nate's hovering. Silent, for once

Wait, no. That was all wrong. That silence wasn't his, it was here.

It wasn't just the dark that was beginning to get to Eliot. The quiet took its own toll.

---

Alec spent the afternoon shutting down the project, setting the timer on a couple of alerts, and clearing out the hotel room, packing Eliot's belongings with his own before settling down in the lounge, drinking a soda, and checking his crawlers.

Nothing on Eliot. He tried not to be surprised.

Up in the corner, the television was on, quietly, but when it struck five, the bartender turned the volume up. It was the local news.

Weather, first, and a report on the preparations for the new community pool, but after a commercial, Sophie was on. Alec spun around to see if Parker or Nate had arrived yet, to see if they were watching too, but they still hadn't made it back.

He watched, intently, and strained to listen to the conversations around the room. She was really selling it. Hell, Alec knew Sophie, had gone over the story with her, but now, watching her in action, he was half convinced to take the classes she was teaching over at the University.

It would take a hell of a lot to remove the story from the video archives later, but for the moment, it was worth it.

The bartender came round down to his end again, curious. "So that was what you guys were working on?"

"Yep." Alec held up his right hand, showing the blisters that had formed on his palm, feeling like an asshole for thinking that Eliot should have been there to take some of the damage. "Hell of a day, man. The artifacts should tell us a lot."

"That's not all they're gonna do," the bartender replied. "See. You're new in town, but there's this guy. DeWitt. Been building up office parks, trying to pull more business into the area. Says he's reinvigorating the town, but the truth is, he's a snake. Whatever he touches turns to shit, you know? He's been destroying everything that makes this place home, you know?"

"Uh." Alec didn't know what to say to that. Truth be told, he hadn't noticed that the bartender was aware of what they were doing, why they were there. It all made sense, though, when he spoke again.

"So, that Susan. The research assistant, or whatever they called her. She seein' anyone?"

Alec wanted to consider that as much as he wanted to consider any more of this job. His fingers were already twitching, knowing that soon, he'd be able to put it behind him, toggle over, and get to work on tracking Eliot. But he played it off with a laugh and a shrug, and after a moment, the bartender was heading back into the kitchen anyway.

Looking back down to his laptop, Alec checked the Historical Society email servers again. Already, it seemed that some of the artifacts were coming into question, that a Dr. Henrikson had apparently found one of the more unique bowls the not six months ago, and it had disappeared from the site.

Another few emails, and it was apparent that DeWitt being the only one to know about the excavation was cause for concern. The paperwork, it seemed, had never arrived, and the State Archaeologist's office was already sending someone up from Kansas City.

It was cause for some mild concern, but he'd been carefully sloppy, ghosting everything through DeWitt's office server. To anyone looking, it would be clear that DeWitt trying to cover his trail.

The news hadn't aired fifteen minutes ago, but the mess the team had carefully left was already snowballing towards scandal. Another day or two at the most, and the Bradshaw ranch project would be scrapped. DeWitt would be ruined.

And Alec could get some real work done. Important work, though he knew better than to say so in front of the others. Something in his shoulders began to unclench, and his mind was beginning to spin into gear.

---

Eliot noticed two things upon waking. The first was that he felt worse than before, and that he was starting to shiver again. The second was the light. It was glaring, and felt like sunshine until he noticed that the bulb hanging from the ceiling was glowing.

He shut his eyes again, before opening them again carefully, adjusting to the brightness.
His mouth was too dry to even consider swallowing, but there was another half sandwich, and another cup of water in the middle of the room.

He'd failed, then. Fallen asleep again, and missed another chance.

He bit back a groan, the closest thing to sound he'd made since arriving.

Something caught his eye, then, over by the door. It took a few moments to focus enough to see.

A picture, glossy, hanging on the wall. A photograph.

He was rolling over, willing the strength to get up and inspect it, when he noticed a second, on the right hand wall. On a hunch, he turned his head to find a third, across the cell to the left.

They were unsettling, from here, even without knowing what images they showed.

None of them, however, made him as uneasy as the fourth, which he didn't see until he finished standing. It had been hung mere inches above his head. Someone had leaned over him while he'd been asleep. Someone had gotten that close.

It was the sort of thing that wasn't supposed to happen. All of this was.

Taking more time than he was comfortable admitting, he managed to tear the pictures from the wall. Gathering them together before settling down again, water temptingly close to hand, he set to examining them.

All four were of the same man, taken over several years. One had been taken inside a car. Another had been taken outside, in a place where the sun shone too brightly, bleaching everything out. One was in a crowded square, a banner in the background bore the Olympic rings, and writing in kanji. Nagano, then, probably 1998.

The man had dark hair in what seemed the earliest picture, but it was dyed nearly white in the three later ones, Eliot could see the roots showing. The grin was the same in all of them, never reaching the dark eyes, which were hidden by dark glasses in two shots anyway.

Eliot had the sinking feeling he was supposed to know who it was.

He turned the photos over, hoping for some further explanation, but he found nothing except the imprints striped up the backs. They'd all been developed at the same time. Recently. It didn't tell him when the film had actually been used.

---

Even after he'd memorized them, Eliot stared at the photographs for a long time, because there was nothing else in the cell worth examining. Something, however, an hour or several later, made him look up.

The noise was so faint that he couldn't be sure that he'd heard it. Voices. No. Wait. One voice, sharp and urgent and quiet. He strained to listen, long after it had faded, trying to confirm what he thought he'd heard, trying not to get his hopes up, but there was nothing for a long while.

And then, again, that same voice, whispering.

"-disabled the alarm."

It was Parker.

Eliot crawled up into a sitting position, ran a hand through his hair, and didn't move his eyes from the door. Breathless and waiting, he'd never paid so much attention to anything in his life.

So when the gunshot sounded, Eliot felt it rip through him, sure that he'd been struck dead.

But he was still sitting there, in the middle of the cell, with nothing but echoing reverberations shuddering through him. Once he was able to comprehend the notion that he was still there to feel them, he was on his feet, all weakness and resolution to remain silent forgotten.

"Parker!" His voice was a scraping rasp against his throat, and he wasn't sure how much of it actually made it out, and how much he only heard in his head. But it didn't seem to matter, either way. There was no response at all.

Just some shuffling out in the hallway, the sound of a body being dragged across a basement floor.

It's a very distinctive sound, Eliot thought hysterically, his hands clutching tightly into fists as he waited to fall apart.

He could feel the first tremors already.

---

"Hardison, tell me you've got something."

As he'd been getting out of the car the previous night, Nate had promised Alec eighteen hours to work before banging down his door.

He was thirteen minutes early, and didn't wait to be invited in. Standing in the middle of Alec's kitchen and barely noting the three open laptops on the table, he looked like he'd gotten twice as much sleep as Alec had. Zero twice was still zero.

"Just dead ends, all around. For all the sleep I didn't get, the results ain't turning up to be worth it."

"Nothing?" Nate assessed him with a glance, not liking the answer. His tone was needling. "You're sure about your sources?"

Alec snorted his frustration. "What did I just say? Man, I looked. I looked damn hard. I got military, police, every lease and title under every alias. I have pictures of him with a fantastic mullet back in high school. I've been tracking every dude and every lady who he's crossed, with us and before us, and there ain't nothin' goin' down with any of 'em. Only lead I haven't run down is his sister, and that's only because-"

"Don't," Nate intoned, his voice a warning as he picked up a deck of playing cards from the shelf, riffling through them with his thumb distractedly. "Don't even."

"But she might know-"

Still, though, Nate was shaking his head. "Alec, you've been keeping files on us since we started. What do they tell you about his sister?"

"She went off the radar the same time as his last posting in Afghanistan. Probably got her name changed. He hasn't contacted her or her kid since, far as anyone should be able to tell."

"He's been keeping them safe since the mid-nineties, then," Nate reasoned, cutting the deck single handedly.

Alec leaned forward, trying to catch Nate's attention. "But I already know where she-"

Any illusion that he'd been distracted died with Nate's glare. "Not the point, Hardison."

"Yo, man. Look. It don't sit right with me, neither, but for all we know, she could have been involved."

"You have any evidence to back that up? Anything at all? No?" Nate seemed close to shouting, but he stopped himself, his tone going quiet and patronizing. "Fine. Whatever. Tell me what will happen once we call Eliot's sister."

Alec wanted to throttle the older man, he really did. "We get some information? Even if it's a dead end, we'll know it's a dead end."

"Two," Nate picked up the narration impatiently, holding up two fingers to continue the list. "We tell her something's up, she worries, and starts looking into it on her own."

"If I can't find him, how the hell is she going to?"

"Then what's the point of asking in the first place?" Alec snorted, but Nate ignored him. "Three. She finds out what her brother's life looks like. We find Eliot, he comes back, whatever, and he finds out not only that she knows, but how." Nate looked away, out the window, or at it, maybe, his voice finally losing some of its rancor. "You're looking for a way to kill a man, destroy his family. Got it?"

"Yeah," Alec swallowed, sensing that the argument was closed, but refusing to let it go without making his point. "Just. If this was anyone else, if this was a client, we'd check it out. Wouldn't even talk about it."

Nate nodded, like he'd been in agreement with Alec this whole time. "This isn't just anyone else, though, is it? Listen. You get me anything that points in that direction, and I'll make the call myself. But for now, we leave his sister out of it. Are we clear?"

"Yeah, man. We're clear."

---

Eliot had mourned himself to sleep with the light still on, sure that there were only so many more times he'd be opening his eyes again. Only so many times he even wanted to try.

It wasn't the waking that surprised him, though. It was the presence of someone else in the room. He could hear the sound of breath, somewhere behind him, towards the center of the room. He could feel the stirring of the air against the bare skin of his back. They were close.

This is your chance. Don't fuck it up.

Eliot took one slow, measured breath, before going into action.

He swung his body over, swept his leg wide, hoping to connect with the back of a knee, but he wasn't dismayed to find that the inside of his ankle caught the intruder in the torso.

It brought him down even faster.

Eliot scrambled to drag himself over before the man, who had to outweigh him by more than he wanted to consider, had a chance to recover. His hand already wrenched into a fist, he got two hits in, sloppier than he'd like, but heavy enough for the time being. Caught him in the throat, the second time.

He would kill this man.

He began to press down, putting all his weight into it.

All his weight, these days, wasn't near enough, and something was off, even if he couldn't tell exactly what it was. He was still trying to identify the sound of the door opening when he felt the hands grab him from behind.

They pulled him roughly off his target, dragging him back and up until he was almost kneeling, but before he could shift his weight, get his feet under him properly, they'd thrown him down onto his back.

His head hit the floor sharply, but then he had a moment to look up at his assailants, only mildly surprised to find that he couldn't see their faces, not with the bright light turning them into silhouettes and the dark spots blurring his vision.

One of them had killed Parker, and the anger was starting to rise, trying to gain the foothold that shove him back into the violence, but the first kick came like a storm breaking.

Sharp and definite and different, it was everything he'd wanted, right up until he felt the second crashing into his hip, grinding his skin across the floor as the force pushed him away.

He began to lose track of the individual sensations a moment later, too focused on curling in, trying to protect what was left of himself.

His knee screamed as it gave out under a boot heel, and the pummeling kicks, faster now and to numerous to count, were pressing the air from his lungs too quickly to be replaced. A foot glanced off his face, leaving him choking on his own blood, unable to stir enough air to cough.

Didn't matter, though. With his ribs feeling this broken, it hurt too much to try.

He started to black out, then, but it saved him the embarrassment of flailing, of begging them to stop. His last thought was that this falling, this fading out and under, was the first mercy that came for free.

Some small part of Eliot had won, and the rest followed him down.

---

The splinters were starting to show. Nate was burning himself at both ends, and looked worse than he'd done during his rehab stint. Parker was pacing and feral, snapping at anyone for looking in her general direction. Sophie, always the sort to care wherever and whenever she could, was starting to worry about the three of them, more than she worried about Eliot, and Alec really would have liked it if they could all just stay on topic.

Nate had finally determined that Parker was going to start eating into his security deposit if she was stuck there much longer, and that Hardison needed to unpeel himself from Nate's screens, so he'd kicked them out.

It was just as well, Alec decided, staring down in dismay at the desk shoved in the corner of Eliot's living room. It got him out of the place, away from the couch where he had nothing to do besides wish for intel that wasn't there, wondering if his basic assumptions weren't wrong.

It was insane to assume that Eliot would always be there, or that he'd be gracious when the time came that he decided he was through with the group. But things had been going well, Alec had thought. They were just starting to get their groove back after months apart, finding that nothing had changed, not really. Hell, maybe things had even been a little better than before.

Except- and it had been creeping up on him for days, but it stung fresh- Eliot might have left because of him, because of what he knew.

Maybe he didn't want to be found.

---

True to Eliot's word, Alec found no evidence of a television in Eliot's house. He did, however, have a computer. Of sorts.

The modem probably hadn't worked for ten years. It wasn't even plugged in, and the shoebox in the file drawer held, in equal amounts, floppy discs and dust. Indiana Jones himself would have choked.

Parker was finishing up in Eliot's insanely well-stocked and organized kitchen, having found nothing but a few dishes in the sink and an obscene number of cookbooks in the cupboard.

"I'm going upstairs to start on his room," she called out, and Alec couldn't understand, for a moment, why that made him nervous. Thought for a moment it was because he was hearing it on the comms, as well as from down the hall, then realized it was something else.

Alec shot out of his chair. "Nah, hey. Parker. I got it."

"You're still-"

"I've got everything from his computer."

"If he has a safe, it would probably be-"

"I'm just saying. You know. Man probably wouldn't appreciate a lady pawing through his underwear drawer, you know?"

"What, having another guy do it makes it any less weird?" But Parker's footsteps were creaking down the staircase again. "Fine. I call dibs on the garage, though."

"Fair enough," Alec agreed, confused by her happy grin as she passed by him coming out of the hallway.

---

As she rummaged through Eliot's truck, Parker described everything she found in the glove compartment, running it by Nate to see if he thought it would be useful.

Alec, for his part, kept his findings quiet. He'd already gone through the closet and the dresser, and was running out of things to check that weren't the bed, which had two bare pillows and a comforter piled on the bare mattress, and the nightstand.

Stay focused. Ain't here to know about that. Find out what happened. That's all. Ignore the rest.

Unable to put it off any longer, he pulled the drawer out of the nightstand. Found another knife, not the first that had been stashed away in the house. A half-finished Sunday crossword, a scattering of keys and paper clips. The small box of tissues and the bottle of lotion were so unsurprising that he should have barely noticed them. It wasn't until he flipped the crossword aside to find the magazine underneath that he was finally faced with what he'd been steeling himself to find.

One porno mag, with two men on the cover. It was six months old, and a little torn along the spine, but not so much that the cover was in danger of falling off.

It was a stupid detail to note, compared to the rest of it. But the alternative was to open it up and flip through, just to satisfy his own curiosity. To wonder which of the models were Eliot's type, if the images inside actually did it for him, or if they weren't quite enough. If Eliot was just making do with this outdated issue until he could get up the gumption to replace it.

This ain't what you're here for. Quit perving over his porn and get yo' ass to work finding him.

"Hardison, you find anything?" He jumped at the sound of Nate's voice.

"What? Ah. Nah, man. Just crossword puzzles and the usual," he righted the contents of the drawer and slid it closed gently. "Bed's been stripped, though."

"There are sheets in the washing machine. They got all moldy and gross," Parker said, and the crash of the lid back over the offending materials was deafening over the comms. "There's a pitcher of ice tea on the back porch, though I wouldn't recommend drinking it, and I found a book lying on the floor, though it looks like it got spilled on. Broken glass, too, but no blood. Doesn't look like there was much of a struggle, or a cleanup."

Go figure, while you're being creepy all up in Eliot's business, Parker's going all Grissom. She'll probably have one of those purple flashlights out by the time you get down there.

Alec cast one last glance around Eliot's room, mentally apologizing to the nightstand for intruding. Some pink material had gotten caught in the door of the closet when he'd been going through Eliot's pockets. Finding nothing in the pockets, he'd ignored the shirt, but now he tried to remember if he'd seen Eliot wearing it. If he'd given him any shit for wearing pink. Hoped he had.

Not because it mattered. It wasn't as if Alec himself didn't have a colorful wardrobe. But Eliot was the kind of guy to throw six fits over getting called on it, and it would have been a shame to miss such a great opportunity.

He was getting distracted again.

He was also being a total girl, holding Eliot's pink shirt in both hands, staring blankly into the closet while pretending that he wasn't considering the grown up version of yanking-on-pigtails.

The sheer number of bad jokes he could have made about his train of thought, at that moment, was overwhelming. It was fucked, the way his sense of humor worked sometimes. Suddenly needing to get out of there, he shoved the shirt haphazardly into the closet, and headed for the stairs.

He was trying to find a parking space near McRory's, half-listening to Parker explain all the reasons that sun tea was disturbing, even without finding it spilled at a likely crime scene, when his brain spit out the data that he'd forgotten he'd been trying to recover.

At the auction house, where they'd come across Chaos's crew. When Eliot had met and not fought that Mossad chick, he'd been wearing that shirt.

It wasn't an epiphany, not really. But it was getting there.

He tapped the comm. unit back on. "Ah. Guys? I think I just figured something else we gotta check out."

---

Chapter 6

Man I Used to Be #4

2009-09-16T04:42:35Z

Title: Man I Used to Be
By: Jendavis
Rating: PG-13 for now
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.

Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3

Chapter 4

"Sir, he's awake."

"Good. Has he said anything yet?"

"No sir. Not a word."

"It's as I expected, then. Very well. Leave me."

---

Eliot stayed awake long after the cell went completely dark, fighting the drugs still coursing through his system, making him sleepy and weak. He knew he needed to conserve his strength, that he should get rest when he could.

It seemed, however, that his body remembered to panic for him, waking him sharply whenever it felt he'd left himself open too long.

He caught himself patting at his pockets, looking for his phone, his watch, anything that would tell him how long he'd been there, and chided himself. They'd taken his shirt, his shoes, and emptied his jeans pockets. Of course they did. It was the most basic of tactics.

It kept the prisoner from knowing how long he'd been there. Took away one more semblance of control.

He told himself it didn't matter. He figured he'd been here for most of a night, based on his own awareness, but he had no idea how long he'd been out when he'd arrived. How long he'd been kept under.

For all he knew, the team might already be missing him, but he slammed the door shut on that thought the moment he became aware of it. No sense getting his hopes up this early in the game.

Eliot sat against the wall of his cell and did not panic. Tried not to think. He just waited.

He was getting hungry, and he really had to piss.

---

Alec adjusted the strap that secured the device to the tree's trunk. It was the kind people used for tracking game when they were hunting, so hopefully, the camo-painted camera would be overlooked, even if it was noticed.

It wasn't absolutely necessary, but it was an extra means of gaining information. There if they needed it, and it got him out of the hotel for a few hours. After checking the workaround he'd set up that would feed the images directly to his laptop, he was satisfied that his work, for the time being, was done.

Sophie and Nate were tying things up at the Historical Society, and Parker was, presumably, back at the hotel. If she was on comms like she was supposed to be, she didn't have much to say.

For the time being, Alec was alone out here, and he had to admit, it was kind of nice.

The project area stretched out for what had to be miles before ending at the tree line, a dark green silhouette near the horizon, in front of the setting sun. There were horses grazing out on the pasture to the south, but he didn't know what kind they were.

Even after that last job, with Eliot's ex-fiancée, or whatever. He'd learned a lot about horses, except for anything that was actually about horses. From here, he could tell, two were brown and three were gray.

It was the kind of thing that Eliot would know, that he'd explain patiently to Parker or Sophie, and spit out angrily if stuck explaining it to Nate or himself.

Such a mama's boy, that man. Seriously.

Alec drew himself up short.

No no no. You're just guessing, and it's based on a negligible amount of intel. Don't need to be thinking so much on him anyway. Thinking that because you know one little thing, you know more than you actually do. It's a trap.

Exactly the kind of idiocy that's going to get you caught.

Alec sighed, checked his gear, and began making his way back towards the truck.

Especially 'cause of the stuff that you actually do know.

Alec really wanted to stop thinking about Eliot's thinking. It was like picking apart Nate's motivations about Sophie, Sophie's interest in Nate, or the way Parker's terrifying brain worked. Wasn't fair, either.

When Alec had realized that he might be gay, it had been in the middle of so much angst and self-hatred that even now, he was still surprised that he hadn't taken out half of Chicago with him in the process.

It hadn't helped that his fourteenth year was the same one Kevin, his brother, the last of his real blood family, got stupid and gotten killed over some territory dispute down on the south side.

Finding himself, in the middle of all that, hadn't been easy. Nana had been there, and the others, but it wasn't the same. He'd spent half that year in church, it seemed, and the other half sitting in his room thinking about insane things like hell, and freakishness, and if being gay meant he was actually a woman, or trying to act white, or if it meant he was destined for a life of being a prison bitch. Thinking about where he'd go, and how fast he'd have to clear out of town once the Gangster Disciples found out.

Nana had been proud that he was so reluctant to fall in with the same crew that Kevin had died for, but she hadn't known his reasons. That he was sure they'd probably kill him on sight.

It took another two years to figure out that apparently, all that thinking he'd done was normal, at least according to the internet.

The first thing he'd learned, back before he knew anything, was to set up an email account.

The second was how to clear out the search history.

The third was how to become someone else online, and the fourth was how to become no one or anyone at all.

Anonymity was safety. Online, he could find out what he wanted, become who he wanted. Alec was smart, though. Even before he was released from foster care, he was well on his way to discovering that it wasn't something that could only be done on the internet.

By that point, telling Nana was just a matter of being himself. But it had taken him nearly four years to figure out how to be who he was, and it had taken a lot of sitting up nights, sure that he was doomed.

He wondered how far along Eliot was with all of it.

You ain't even gonna ask him about horses, man. How you gonna ask him about some scheduling bullshit? Just set it aside and move on. Move. On.

Move. His footsteps brushed through the undergrowth, setting to some rhythm in his head. On. Move. On. Move. His thoughts provided the counterpoint to the beat as he walked back to the car. His shoes were soaked through, the moisture seeping through to soak his socks by the time he arrived, but neither the mud nor the music was much of a distraction. Not really.

He pulled his phone from his pocket and set it on the dashboard, wondering who, among the billions of people walking the world, Eliot would call once he figured it all out. His sister, maybe. Probably. The man still had family, after all, people that were probably there to look out for him, and it wasn't Alec's business.

But he'd seen Eliot's phone records. Aside from a few local calls, he hadn't called anyone who wasn't on the team since he'd bought the house out on Hough's Neck a few months back.

---

When Eliot woke again for the fourth or fifth time, the sun had apparently risen. Light fought through from above, but it wasn't enough to reach all the way into the corners, and didn't reveal much of anything that he hadn't noticed earlier.

Except for four things.

A single bulb hung close to the ceiling, far too high to reach, but it was turned off, and there was no switch in the room that he could see. No way to know if it even worked.

He had to squint to see it, but up in the corner of the ceiling, eased in the familiar black hemisphere, was the inevitable camera. For all he knew, it could have been filming every move he made, or nothing at all. He decided to ignore it.

Sitting just inside the door was a plastic bucket, the kind kids hauled off to the beach for making sandcastles. Eliot knew it's alternate purpose without thinking.

Next to it, a paper cup dripped condensation onto the floor.

These last hadn't been in there before he'd fallen asleep. He hadn't been forgotten, then. He was supposed to survive this, for a while at least.

It wasn't as heartening a realization as it probably should have been.

---

Nate was dogging him, asking about Eliot's ETA before they'd even eaten lunch. Parker hadn't even made it past breakfast. It was going to be a long day.

"His flight's due to come in a little after five. He should be here by seven. He'll probably call and check in once he lands."

"All right. Let me know when he does," Nate poured himself some coffee from the carafe at the center of the table, frowning at it in distaste.

They were going to have to go over most of it again when Eliot got in, but Hardison passed out the field manuals he'd put together, complete with maps and charts and things that were there for show, should anyone want to look at them. Their discoveries were already logged and mapped. All they needed to do was go out there and look busy.

Sophie had decided that Parker needed new shoes, that the heels on her boots would not be suitable for working in the field.

"Sophie, what?" Nate was annoyed. It had been brewing all weekend. "Seriously. Shoes?"

"She's right, man," Alec cut in, seeing the chastened expression stealing across Sophie's face. "Been reading all weekend, and all the books say that you want to be wearing flat-footed shoes when you're digging in the field."

"Why's that?" Looking up from her fries, which she was stacking into piles that could have been teepees or whatever those things were that people used to burn witches, Parker looked confused, though Nate had clearly already lost interest, his eyes glazing over as he tried to flag the waiter down for the check.

"They mess up the floor of the hole that you're digging. Could wind up pushing artifacts down further into the ground unevenly or something like that. Make it look wrong."

"Nobody's going to be looking that close," Nate interjected.

"Not at the pits, but if anyone comes out and sees us, we should look the part, don't you think?" Sophie was smiling again, her grin widening a little as she caught Alec's eye when Nate cleared his throat irritably.

"Okay. Fine. You two go handle that. Hardison, do we know if DeWitt's been out to the site yet?"

"The cameras were triggered a couple of times last night. I was just starting to go through the images when you called me down here. I'll let you know what I find."

"We already know he's going to be out there," Parker said. "What are the cameras for?"

"To know exactly where he was, what he found," Nate explained, pulling out bills for the tip. "Possible evidence for later, if it's needed. If this doesn't work the way we want it to, at least the Bradshaw family will have some evidence."

"You don't seem as optimistic as you did last week," Parker said, but it was unclear if it was her words or the horrible coffee that sent Nate up out of his seat.

"He's just nervous," Sophie leaned towards Parker, smiling sympathetically as they watched him leave. She'd be a good mom someday, Alec caught himself thinking as she continued. "He'll feel better when everyone's present and accounted for."

"Him and me both," Parker said. "It's weird without him here. Even if he is. You know. Mean and grumpy all the time."

"Aww, you miss him."

Parker looked at him sharply. "You should talk. You're his friend."

"Nah, see. Hardly."

"I saw him leaving the other day. He was smiling when he left."

"He was leaving, I think that tells you everything you want to know."

"Or, it could be that you made him feel better."

Parker's grin looked a lot like the one she used when she heard you, but wasn't planning on listening. A little smug, a little patronizing, but adorable enough that you didn’t mind.

Kind of like a kitten, climbing up your pant leg with razor sharp claws.

So Alec let her get away with it, and followed them back to the hotel.

---

Whoever it was keeping him there, they weren't stupid, and they weren't amateurs. They'd grabbed him and shoved him here. They had a holding cell at their disposal. And they hadn't shown their faces. They didn't talk. They gave nothing away.

Eliot stood next to the door for hours, sometimes straining to see out into the space beyond, always listening, and finding nothing.

It was probably business. If so, they most likely knew him, or his rep, well enough that they weren't dealing with him directly. They could be weak, or smart, or both, but they were keeping their advantage.

He regarded the water again, considering the innocuous paper cup. It smelled okay. That didn't mean anything at all. They'd already drugged him to get in here in the first place. There could be a lot of things in that water.

But he was beginning to get thirsty.

---

Alec waited outside Nate's door, biting at the inside of his mouth as he listened to him move to answer.

Nate had read his expression even before the door was open.

"Hardison? What is it?"

"It's Eliot. His flight got in, but he wasn't on it. He's not answering his phone. Just spent ten minutes reconfiguring the monitoring for the comms, and he's not on there, either."

They stopped to retrieve Parker and Sophie en route to Alec's room, where they all stared at his screensaver like they thought it would tell them something useful.

"Ah. Guys? He's not on there, and how I know it? It's because he's not on there. He's off the grid and in the wind."

"He left?" Parker's disappointment was palpable. Then again, hers wasn't the only one drifting through the room.

Nate cut a searching glance in Alec's direction. "That remains to be seen." Running a hand over his face, he said. "Do you have any idea why he would leave?"

"No."

"That argument-"

"Got handled. We were cool when he left."

"It's true," Parker interjected adamantly, but Nate ignored her.

"Are you finding anything on him at all? Has he been arrested?"

"His name and description aren't coming up on any police or hospital records. I looked before you got here. If he was, it would have had to be in the past hour or two, given the average time it takes for the records to be processed and uploading. Anything earlier, and I'd have seen it."

"So it's not the authorities, and it might just be him."

"He wouldn't just bail."

"True." Nate nodded, his face grim. "But you really don't want me running down the other possibilities right now."

"We have to get back there," Alec pointed out.

Nate's response was frustrated. "And what about the Bradshaws?"

"We come back in a day or two and salvage what we can," Sophie offered.

"No." Nate's voice was firm. "We finish the job." Glancing at the others apologetically, he continued. "Look, I know you don't like it, but here it is. Eliot is better at taking care of himself than the rest of us combined. The Bradshaws need us more right now."

"You don't know that," Parker accused.

"I know Eliot well enough that if he's gone AWOL, then he's safe. If someone's managed to get a hit out on him, we're too late already. If he's being held somewhere, well. If they can hold him, then we need to know what we're getting ourselves into before we go charging in."

Sensing the reluctant agreement of the others, he went on. "So. Tomorrow, we get out there, and we close this job down as quickly as possible. Hardison, I want you ready to alert the media. Parker, you've got the goods ready to go?"

"Yes. But-"

Nate cut her off. "We finish tomorrow. It's going to be a rush job, but we can make it work. Hardison?"

"I'm already setting up crawlers to look for him," Alec looked up from the screen. "I'll let you all know the second I know anything. And I've got a few hours to make calls."

"Who are you calling?"

"I'm still working that out," Alec admitted. "Any of you guys know his contacts?"

"There's. Us," Sophie offered lamely. "And Aimee."

"That Scottish Indian guy, ah," Nate waved his hand through the air. "Helped us out with the Mumbai videoconference last year? Donnie something or other."

"Right." Hardison added him to the list, made a note to check the call archive for his number once they all cleared out of his room.

"He doesn't know a lot of people," Parker said. "It's weird."

"You should talk," Sophie muttered, before turning to Nate. "You chased him before, right? You've got to have some insight into who might be after him."

"Only chased after him once," Nate grinned slightly, apparently fond of the memory. "There were these. Ah. Smugglers. Moving an experimental chip from one of IYS's contracts. It was a bitch to find, see. I mean. I was following them for weeks. Almost caught up with them in Israel. Missed them by minutes. Anyway." Nate shook his head, stopping an apparent tangent before it started. "It turns out that they'd fed it to a monkey just before crossing the border."

"Seriously. A monkey?"

"Ah. Yes. See, the monkey was a favorite pet of the daughter of one of the smugglers. Even went on the plane with her in a cat carrier. It wasn't until we were halfway over the ocean that I came close to figuring it out, but by the time we landed, well. I wasn't the first one there."

"Eliot stole the monkey first," Sophie guessed, grinning.

"What? No. They gave it to him. I was still stepping down from the plane when he hightailed it off the tarmac. I lost him."

Alec shrugged. "Did you ever get the chip?"

"Two months later, it turned up in Germany, and we did a sting. Me and. Ah. Sterling."

Parker made a face. "That guy is seriously creepy."

Nate cocked his head, considering. "Only because he's not on our side."

"Like I said. Creepy."

"Okay, look. We're getting off topic, here. Hardison, do your thing. Sophie and Parker? I want you thinking of anyone we've come across who might be out for payback, and getting ready for tomorrow. It's going to be an early day."

"What are you going to do?"

Nate sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. "I'm going to think."

---

The silence was getting ridiculous. Made doubly so that he knew it was on purpose. To get him to freak out, show his cards first.

It was getting harder to hold his tongue, though.

He couldn't go down, faking injury when there was no one throwing punches. He couldn't work his captors to gain sympathy if there was no one around. He couldn't recite his name, rank, or serial number for the same reason.

He was beginning to lose interest in remembering his training, but he meditated on it anyway.

It beat thinking about his empty stomach.

---

Alec could put up with a lot of things, but the realization that the information he needed just didn't exist wasn't one of them. He checked his programs one last time, made sure his phone was synched to inform him if anything came through, and forced himself to step away. Get out of the room, away from the few pieces of gear and clothing Eliot had left behind, and away from the slow-crawling panic that had been crawling over his skin for the past five hours.

Around back, behind the hotel and next to the dumpster, was a picnic table, probably meant for staff only. But at the moment, Nate was occupying it, toying with the bottle he held in his hand. Under the streetlight, the amber liquid swirled against the clear glass.

Alec knew he should leave, that no good would come of staying. But Nate wasn't so far gone that he didn't see him. "What's going on? You have anything yet?"

"Nothing." Alec sat down on the bench, running his hand over the tabletop, feeling the wood threatening to splinter. "What you were saying earlier. You straight up on that? That was the only time you ran into him?"

"He was never the target, but he was the means, more than once." Nate set the bottle down, and Alec pretended not to notice that the seal hadn't been broken, mostly because it was surprising. "Wasn't too eager to get too close, truth be told. His, ah. Rep."

"Right."

"What about you?"

"Me? Nah, man. Never met him before that first job you ran."

"But you talk to him. You've got to have some ideas."

"None that are going anywhere. I'm out, man. Straight up."

Nate pushed the bottle across the picnic table, withdrawing his hand carefully, before looking up guiltily. "I'm starting to wonder if he really just didn't decide to leave."

Alec wanted to argue that Eliot wouldn't have left one pair of hiking boots and his rattiest jeans behind, but really. They weren't the sort of thing anyone would come back for. So he nodded, instead, and looked out into the parking lot, watching the moths fluttering under the lights.

---

He wasn't sure what woke him, but it was night, apparently.

His eyes cast about the room, looking for any source of sound, and finding none but the door. There was a dim light coming in from the other side of the door, barely visible through the gate.

Another moment of staring, and the shadows rearranged themselves, revealing the silhouette of someone's head. Absolutely featureless, absolutely still. Staring at him through the grate, he was sure.

Eliot was more awake in that moment than he had since he'd arrived, but he was frozen. Unready. He took a breath, closed his eyes to listen.

When he opened them again, seconds later, the person was gone, or maybe just the light.

Eliot wasn't afraid of the dark. But he didn't like it, either.

---

Chapter 5

Man I Used to Be #3

2009-09-15T05:07:12Z

Man I Used to Be #2

2009-09-09T04:55:55Z

Title: Man I Used to Be
Rating: PG-13 for now
By: Jendavis
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.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

The crew was gathered in the living room but for Eliot, who didn't move from the dining table. As soon as Nate had their attention, he began to explain.

"See, this land has been getting bought off in bits and pieces for years. Our clients, the Bradshaws, were leasing the land beneath their ranch under an old agreement that's being grandfathered out."

"So what's our angle?" Parker puzzled at the pictures on the screen, her lip curling when she noted the horses.

"Roger DeWitt. Modern day land baron, though according to an ongoing investigation I shouldn't know about, you could call him a robber baron as well. Made his fortune in the development business. See. He goes in, loots known sites before the survey happens. The archeologists doing the excavation report back that nothing was found, and the project goes ahead smoothly, even ahead of schedule, which generally results in generous bonuses from grateful corporations."

Hardison cut in, bringing up another screen of DeWitt's financials. "And on the side, he's got a nice income selling the looted goods."

"We're going to bust him how?"

"We steal the artifacts he's already stolen, and plant them around the survey area. He won't be able to say anything about it without giving himself away."

"Hold on," Hardison interjected, his thumb pausing over the remote control. "I've seen those documentaries. Won't the archeologists know something's wrong with the dirt?"

"What the hell're you on about?" Eliot cut in.

"You know. Like how there's layers of dirt. If it looks like it's disturbed, it will give it away." Hardison was on a roll. "And what if they carbon date the stuff?"

"They won't," Nate promised, his voice self-assured. "Not as long as we're the ones finding it."

"How you propose we do that?"

"They've only put out a request for bids just this morning. There are three local companies that usually compete for this sort of thing."

Eliot sighed. "Seriously? Another collector job? This makes four in a row, man."

"Don't tell me you're missing the gunrunners already."

Eliot smiled at the wall. "They were fun."

"You're starting to sound like Parker," Hardison deadpanned, glancing over his shoulder to find Eliot sneering coldly back at him.

"Yeah!" Waving her arms, Parker seemed similarly offended. "He doesn't do it right at all!"

"Hardison? Parker?" Nate rubbed a hand over his face. "Please stop teasing Eliot."

Eliot's scowl deepened. "I'm going to kill all of you someday."

"Even me?" Sophie looked up from her notepad.

Eliot bared his teeth. "No witnesses. Sorry."

"Hang on a moment," she was ignoring him as she scanned her notes again. "If what we know is true, then haven't the Bradshaws already been using the land long enough to have destroyed the site themselves?"

"The stables and associated buildings are on this patch of land here," Nate explained, pointing out the area on the map. "The rest of it's just grazing and a few riding arenas, so there was little to no disturbance of the ground underneath for most of the area."

"I see."

"So what do you say?" Nate addressed the group.

Parker raised her hand hesitantly. "What happens if we accidentally discover a mummy or something?

"All the better."

---

The rest of the meeting was standard protocol. Getting travel arrangements made, putting aliases in place, and scanning the nearest town, Bethany, for useful contacts.

"It's a holiday weekend, flights are almost booked solid. There's a flight into Kansas City tomorrow, but there are only two open seats. There's another flight in two days going through Des Moines, but the drive times are about the same from both. Logistically speaking, it ain't pretty-"

"Splitting up is safer, and you know it," Eliot interrupted, his tone scathing. Alec bristled, ready to argue, but Nate intervened, clearing his throat.

"There's only one hotel anyway. But here's what we'll do. Sophie and I will head out tomorrow and start laying the groundwork. The rest of you fly in on Friday, and we'll meet at the hotel."

"We should figure out somethin' else. I don't like us all in the same place," Eliot said. "Attracts attention."

"Our cover can handle it," Alec said. "Quit being paranoid."

He'd probably pushed a little too far, but Eliot's voice was dead calm when he replied. "Fine."

"Okay," Nate clapped his hands together. "Hardison. Make the arrangements. The rest of you? Get your things in order. We're going to make history."

Nate rose, ignoring more than one set of rolled eyes, and the group began to scatter, Eliot cutting a dark swath through the apartment as he left. Eventually, Alec was left in front of the screens, pretending not to notice Nate looming behind him, standing beside the couch.

The man had something to say, it seemed, and Alec had a sinking suspicion that he knew what it was going to be. Nate remained silent while Alec worked, but his words, when they eventually came, were no surprise. "You got a problem with Eliot?"

"No, man." Alec glanced quickly up and away, shutting down his computer. "We're cool."

"Don't bullshit me, Hardison. I need to know that you two are on the same page."

"Oh, we are totally cool," Hardison assured him grimly, and started packing up his computer.

---

Yeah. Totally on the same page. Alec had said. Just going to take some getting used to, is all.

Oh, and by the way, I know something about Eliot and have the sneaking suspicion that I'm not supposed to live to tell the tale. What is it, you ask? You ain't gonna believe this…

Shit.

It wasn't the first time Alec had discovered something someone had wanted kept buried, not by a long shot. It wasn't even the first time it hadn't happened sitting in front of a computer.

It was, however, the first time he'd try to file it away into the sparse cabinet at the back of his head labeled not for use.

He made it out of Nate's apartment without further conversation, but he didn't start to relax until he was down the block. Nothing had been said, nothing given away. He could go home, get ready for the next job. Get on with it, find something else to think about.

So it could only be the imp of the perverse that pushed him through the door of the bar two nights in a row, especially when the second proved to be karaoke night. The caterwauling nearly knocked him on his ass before he made it past the first table.

He nodded greetings to those he knew, but there wasn't anyone in particular he was searching out. Since he didn't find anyone in particular, everything was working out, perfectly according to plan.

Like he's gonna show his face in here again. Like you want to find him in here in the first place. He shows up here, and then what? Ain't like he's just gonna want to sit around talkin' all night. It's just askin' for trouble, man, and you know it.

"Hey Alec," Shane was wiping down the bar. "What're you having?"

"Pint of Blue Moon," he decided, pulling out his wallet.

Shane nodded, eyeing him speculatively as he reached for a glass. "Just one?"

Alec blinked, giving away his confusion. "Uh, yeah."

"Thought you might be waiting on your friend from last night," Shane shrugged, tossing a coaster down under the glass and accepting the cash Alec handed over. "Definitely more interested than you were when I tried hooking you up with Anthony."

"That's because there's no accounting for your lack of taste. But no. He's just a coworker." Who's killed at least six people, and saved too many to count. Who's taken seven bullets that were meant for him and one that wasn't. Who's nervous enough around explosions that he's probably been in more than one. Who'd gotten a landline to his house the week he'd moved in, but never made any calls.

Alec remembered some conversation, back in the old office, before they'd blown it and blown town. They'd been talking about Sophie's performance on stage the night before, and Eliot had said something about it being the worst night of his life.

He'd been lying through his teeth, and they'd both known it, but he didn't defend or elaborate.

So, something else he knew about Eliot. He let people see what he wanted them to see, and nothing else. It wasn't a trait reserved only for the marks.

---

"Are you offering your services?"

"Merely information. Further direct contact would raise suspicion, and I am no fool."

"Indeed. Are you sure it is him?"

"I am without doubt."

---

Three fifths of the team was still stretching out muscles cramped from sitting in coach and driving for two hours, but all the pieces were in place.

Nate was heading in to DeWitt's office, and Sophie was waiting at the hotel. Hardison had been adamant about setting up base at a nearby library, and would be meet up later with Eliot and Parker in the hotel lobby to check into their rooms.

But for the moment, Eliot was sitting in the rental car, wishing he could get out and stretch his legs, and trying to appreciate the first ten minutes he'd had to himself since early this morning. It wasn't as easy as he'd expected, but at least now, with everyone spread out, the only communication happening was through the comms.

It was an improvement over the ride down from the airport, watching Hardison out of the corner of his eye every time he looked at or spoke to Parker. Reading her expressions in the rearview mirror and trying to figure out whether they really had a secret code between them.

As far as he could tell, Hardison had only talked about the job. He hadn't mentioned anything else, and none of Parker's strange answers seemed to be more than basic responses.

It was Parker, though, so who could tell. It had been a relief when she'd slid out of the car and across the street towards DeWitt's house.

Nate's voice came over the line. "Parker? Eliot? How you doing?"

"All clear at DeWitt's place," Eliot grumbled, already bored. "Parker's inside. Nothing out here that Hardison couldn't handle."

"Well I got a bunch of stuff here that you couldn't handle, Eliot, so you just sit out there and enjoy babysitting." Hardison's voice cut in. Apparently the library had the wireless connection he'd been complaining about needing as they'd driven into town.

Eliot could see Parker's shape through the half-open blinds as she walked through the house. "This place house is a museum, without the security or nice lighting. How am I supposed to know what to take? Also. Eliot would be a terrible babysitter. He'd scare the kids."

"Probably wouldn't let them play video games, neither," Hardison agreed.

Eliot rolled his eyes in annoyance, considered not taking the bait. "Nah, see. Wouldn't want the kids turning out to be total geeks or anything."

Eliot heard Sophie giggling softly to herself as Nate reined them in. "I'm outside DeWitt's office, so Hardison, you're point on this one."

Hardison's voice, when he spoke, was all business again. "He's been working exclusively in the region, so his collection should reflect that. Hang on, I'm looking at the historical society accessions…"

Sophie cut in. "Go for anything that's packed away."

"If it's valuable, wouldn't he be showing it off?" Hardison's voice again.

Nate's speech was suitably formal for playing a stereotypical academic. "My name is Doctor James O'Toole, I'm from KU. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice."

"DeWitt can't risk it," Sophie responded, ignoring Nate's words to DeWitt. "He's like anyone else on the black market. Can't risk having any of the locals seeing the items. He's been getting away with this long enough that he knows to keep things hidden. I'm at the college now, about to meet with Doctor Harrison."

"Right. Okay, I'll try the basement." Parker, from the sounds of it, was already elbow deep in the boxes. Eliot leaned back in his seat and scanned the driveways and front yards of DeWitt's street, again looking for potential witnesses. The house two doors down was fore sale, the realtor's name and number emblazoned across a metal sign in the front yard, decided that he was looking to buy a house, if any one asked.

Other than that, though, he just sat there and wished he had something to do, besides listen to everyone's noise and chatter. They knew as well as he did that there wouldn't be much for him to do, not during this phase. The only reason he was here something Nate had called shovel insurance. You don't keep a shovel in the back of your car, you're gonna get snowed in.

Stretching his neck, he turned his attention to the comms again, Eliot listened to Nate describing the weeklong field school the college was setting up, while Sophie explained the Department of the Interior's ongoing investigation into the deliberate destruction of archeological sites.

"Let me guess. It's that bastard DeWitt," a man's voice said, barely audible through Sophie's mic. "How can I help? We don't have an archeology department."

Sophie's voice, much more clearly, fed directly into the comms. "We've already got Doctor O'Toole, from KU in Lawrence, who's worked with us on cases like this before. If anyone from DeWitt's office contacts you asking if he works here, I simply need you to explain that he's here on loan to run a field school for a few of your students in the history and multicultural studies department."

Eliot couldn't hear what was said next, as the noise of Parker rummaging through boxes was getting in the way. "… will there actually be a field school?"

"Yes, but it will be our archeologists in attendance." Sophie began to explain the plan further, but Eliot found himself drifting off, watching the trees outside and only coming back to the conversations when he heard Hardison's voice.

He was introducing himself as Daniel Jackson, the alias he'd been way too excited about using. Eliot thought he was pushing it a little, cracking jokes about pyramids and artifacts, even if he was supposed to be an archeologist. Student. Whatever.

Wasn't the smartest thing, interacting too much. Meant someone would remember him, later. Could attach a name to a face, even if it was a fake one.

He wished Hardison would get his act in gear and do his job. Do whatever he did to keep the volume levels normal. It was bad enough when he could hear four people in his head. Adding ambient noise and extra voices wasn't helping.

Nate was apparently sweetening the deal with DeWitt, telling him that the labor was paid for and the state had signed off on the paperwork, all he needed from DeWitt was a project area. Judging by his tone, things were going well on his end.

Eliot was fairly sure that Sophie's professor said something along the lines of"...just need my voice on the line when DeWitt calls," but he couldn't be sure, not over the noise that Parker was making.

"Correct," Sophie replied. "And only until then. Once this is underway, it will be best if you maintain no public knowledge of the investigation. If it goes as we suspect, it would only result in dragging the College's name through the-"

Hardison laughed, then, the sound blocking Sophie's voice. "Right on, sister. You just do what you do, get that ancient database up and working."

From the sound of it, he was talking to the librarian. Scratch that, he was flirting. It was damned irritating. He was probably only inches away from blowing their cover, too.

Parker slammed something, a drawer, maybe, or a cabinet door, and it sounded like a gunshot going off.

It was the last straw. "Damn it, Hardison, would you stop geeking all over the librarian and fix the damn comms already?"

"Hey man, chill." Hardison said, but a few moments later, it sounded like the volume controls had been reset. Too late to really matter, anyway. Sophie was thanking Harrison, and Nate was chatting idly about some pottery he'd found north of Lawrence, but he was wrapping it up. There wasn't anything important to hear.

DeWitt was on the hook, and Harrison was in place to back their cover story, so it was time to go. He had the car running by the time Parker returned, a cardboard file box under her arms.

"We clear?" Parker shoved the box in the back of the cab.

"Didn't even have to pretend that I was looking to buy the house across the street."

"See?" She clambered up into the seat, shaking hair out of her face. "Every time there's an instant cover, there's never a need to use it. I hate that."

"You would." Pulling away from the curb, Eliot tapped into comms again. "Parker's got the goods. Leaving the DeWitt place now."

Nate grunted indistinctly, and Eliot could hear Hardison making one last pass at the librarian as he left. Something about coming back from the dead. Sophie, however, was paying attention, and responded directly. "See you back at the hotel."

Eliot finally took his comm. unit out, rubbing at his ear.

"You know where we're going?" Parker asked, making her own earpiece vanish into thin air, or possibly a pocket, as she did so.

"Yeah." He stopped himself from ranting about the stupidity of her question. She'd been in the car when Hardison had explained the directions in excruciating detail.

"Oh."

"What do you mean, oh?"

"Before. When he was giving you the directions. You didn't sound like you were listening to him. And you didn't make fun of him while he was flirting with the librarian. You were all," she waved a hand through the air vaguely. "Quiet. Mostly."

"Well it ain't like we're gonna get lost. It's just a straight shot and a left at the gas station." Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something flash across her expression, but she said nothing more, not even when he turned into the parking lot.

---

"You have Eliot Spencer's location?"

"I do, and it can be yours. For a price, of course."

"Of course. I wouldn't trust it if it were free."

---

It wasn't like Alec couldn't get a signal in the middle of the Sahara, if he wanted it, but tables at a quiet library seemed more pleasant than a sitting in a cramped rental car. Sitting for another hour with Eliot, who was just a little too stressed to be as bored as he claimed.

Alec thought the space would have done him some good, but judging by Eliot's voice when he was whining about a little noise, his mood hadn't improved since they'd parted ways.

Man needs to do a little reassessment of his priorities. Like he don't know how much worst things could be right now.

Besides, Joan, the librarian, had either been very nice, or very bored. She found his stuff for him, and laughed at his Stargate jokes, once he'd convinced her that his alias was a coincidence. Plus, she was a redhead. Had this entire late-season-Scully meets mid-series-Willow vibe goin' on. Had Eliot been there, he would have got it. Certainly wouldn't have begrudged a man.

Petulant bitch.

The others were leaving, so he finished making his copies and brought his books up to the desk, promising the librarian that if he died over the course of his excavations, he'd come back from the dead and tell her all about it.

He set off to walk the three blocks to the hotel, hooking his cell phone's earpiece into place, in case he found himself having to respond to the comms and didn't want to look like a madman, talking to himself as he headed down the street. There was one update from Nate, who was getting into his car, but the others remained silent.

It was a good sign. It meant there was nothing was going wrong, that there was nothing to worry about. But it was unsettling all the same, and he was relieved to step through the double doors to find Parker and Eliot sitting in the lounge, his backpack waiting in the pile next to theirs.

It didn't last long, though. All it took was Nate's arrival, in character, to inform them of their sleeping arrangements and hand them their room keys. Nate, as the professor, got a single room. Sophie and Parker would share a double, and he'd be crashing with Eliot.

Eliot didn't look thrilled at the news, either, his eyes darting up and away before he leaned down to grab his bag, heading up to their room on the second floor, not bothering to wait.

Sophie took one of Parker's bags, offering to show Parker the way.

"The rooms have numbers on them. I can count," Parker replied, defensively, but she moved to follow.

He leaned down to pick up his pack, weighing the stirring dread at the prospect of sharing space with Eliot against the promise of a functioning shower. Nate, though, was thankfully already running interference.

"Hardison, you got a minute? We've got DeWitt on board, and we've got the gear, but now we need to make it happen. You find what we need?"

"Yeah. Give me a bit, I can pull it together enough for a crash course." He looked out towards the front desk, just in time to see Eliot making a bee line for the door. For the moment, the room was safely empty.

Nate's eyes followed his, and his face held questions, but he spoke to the group, obviously well aware that the others were probably still on comms. "All right. Grab a shower, do whatever, and we'll meet in my room in three hours."

---

Eliot wandered the streets for a while, eventually finding a park bench to sit and watch traffic. Nodded to the girls who jogged by, but his heart wasn't in it.

It wasn't like he could take them back to the hotel, anyway, though he tried not to go too far along that line of thought. He already knew where it would lead, and who would be in the room when it got there.

Three guys walked by, talking enthusiastically about tonight's game. Wasn't starting for a few hours, but it didn't matter. While he was pretty sure he'd noted that the room had cable, Hardison had probably already commandeered the television. Claimed space in their shared territory.

He looked away when he caught himself watching the taller guy as he passed by, the wide shoulders stretching the cotton of his tee shirt. It wasn't like Eliot was going to make a pass at him, after all. He just wished he hadn't noticed in the first place. Made him feel like a perv, sitting here and ogling people.

Eliot wondered if Hardison was wondering where he'd gone. If he'd already assumed the reasons behind it. It was fairly mortifying, when he thought about it, reeking of cowardice for no good reason. If Hardison had figured it out, though, he wasn't coming on the comms to say so.

He hadn't said anything.

Eliot looked at his watch, noting the time. He had about twenty minutes to get back to talk with the others about how this was all going to play out. Maybe, if he was lucky, he wouldn't have to spend the weekend sitting on his ass.

It was enough time to stop in the café on the corner and pick up peace offerings, Nate's coffee and Sophie's tea and Parker's weird orange raspberry mocha thing. They didn't have orange soda. Eliot knew he could've just left it at that, but he found himself dodging into the convenience store across the street.

It was just liquid. Didn't mean anything.

---

Hardison grinned no more widely than usual when Eliot slid the sodas across the counter before distributing the coffees, but Eliot felt the eyes on him all the same, and wondered if he'd just made things better or worse.

He wished they'd get started already.

"Okay. We can't get access to Bradshaw's ranch until Wednesday. Slight hiccup, but manageable. That gives him a few extra days to go over the site and loot to his heart's content."

"I don't get it," Eliot shook his head. "Shouldn't we get out there to stop him?"

"Only if we want to risk spooking him. We've got time on this."

"So what do we do until then?"

"Sophie and I have some more groundwork to lay with the historical society, and Hardison's on research duty. Parker and Eliot, I want you to lay low. Hang at the hotel, watch cable. Read a book. Do whatever."

Eliot considered the days as they spread out before him, bearing entirely too many hours in a hotel room with Hardison.

"You expecting any trouble over the weekend?"

"No. DeWitt doesn't even have the sense to lock away his stolen goods. He's amateur enough not to have hired security, and not popular enough to have many friends likely to serve as backup."

"If that's the case, there's no reason for me to stick around, then, right?"

"Not especially, no." Nate's expression grew suspicious. "Why?"

"I've got work to do back home," Eliot decided, looking sharply up at Nate to forestall any protests. "Not freelancing. Just have some things around the house and some tomato plants that are threatening to take over the neighborhood."

"Can it wait?"

"It could, but I'd rather not leave it. Look. I'll head out on standby and get tickets back for Tuesday night."

"Alright. Fine," Nate decided, glancing over at Hardison, who was studiously pretending to stare at something on his laptop. "You can have a weekend pass. Parker? You want to go?"

"No. There's a quilt show Sunday." Parker happily waved the flyer that she'd picked up in the lobby. "Can you believe that I've never seen one before?"

---

Alec wasn't an idiot. It was obvious Eliot was trying to escape, but Alec caught up with him in their room. Deciding not to make it easy, he closed the door, leaning against it as he watched Eliot rummaging through his duffel bag. "What's your problem, man?"

Eliot caught his reflection in the mirror by the television, but didn't meet his eyes, looking instead at the parking lot outside the window. "Nothing's wrong."

"Right. You've been acting like you ain't here since we got here."

"There ain't no reason for me to be here on this one." Eliot took some clothing out of his bag and shoved it into one of the drawers, lightening the load he'd have to carry with him.

Alec rolled his eyes and moved past him towards the other bed, sitting down. "Whatever you need to tell yourself, fine by me."

"You looking to get yourself hit?"

Alec snorted. "And yet, I ain't the one runnin' away all scared. That's got to burn."

Eliot's chin was jutting out, defiant. "Scared of what?"

And there it is, Alec realized. He's giving you an opening.

It took him a moment to figure out how to use it. "Bein' stuck in the same room as me. Like knowin' about you means I'm suddenly planning on jumping you."

"It ain't like that." Eliot didn't turn, didn't even shake the hair out of his eyes, but his breathing was steady. Like he was tamping down the anger before it got dangerous.

Alec wanted to break the threatening silence, but after a moment, Eliot snorted, relenting. "Ain't used to people knowin' stuff about me that I didn't want them to know."

Eliot looked up, then, smirking in annoyance at his own admission and daring Alec to make something of it.

"Know what you mean." Alec dropped his hand to his side. "If it's any consolation, if I hadn't thought you were running a game on Ron, I would've left before you saw me."

"Why?"

"I go in there and blow your cover, we both know how you're going to react. Badly. And you aren't in the running for, ah, winning the world's friendliest person contest. Ain't like I expected you to take finding me there gracefully." He laughed it off, but it was apparent that the comment struck hard.

Eliot actually flinched, insulted.

"You thought I was gonna stomp you?"

Alec grinned without humor, and found himself rubbing at his once-broken wrist. "No offense, man, but it's happened before. Wasn't cool." This isn't where the conversation is supposed to go.

Eliot had noticed the action, but as his eyes moved from Alec's arm, it was obvious that he had no idea how he was supposed to respond. On top of it all, there was the beginnings of something that looked like angry concern brewing in his expression.

This really isn't the issue. Drop it.

"Don't worry about it," Alec shoved his hands into his pockets and decided to go for broke, knowing full well that if he didn't say anything now, he probably never would. "Look. I know it's like poison. But. In the unlikely event that you decide you want to talk about it, I'll listen. Otherwise, it's not my business, and I'm not going to make it anyone else's. Deal?"

Eliot sighed, eyes darting to the door as footsteps passed by in the hallway. He nodded noncommittally, but he'd heard. "I'm still leaving."

Alec shook his head, thinking back to the earlier conversation. "Gardening? For real?"

"Among other things," Eliot answered evasively, because he wasn't the kind of guy that admitted to needing time to think. "But I'll be back. And. I dunno. Maybe we'll talk about it, maybe we won't."

There were probably a thousand ways he could have replied, but he'd already gone too far, probably. "Cool." Alec stepped aside, allowing Eliot access to the door. It was only when Eliot's shoulders lost some of their tension that Alec realized that trapping him inside the room had probably made things worse than they needed to be.

Belatedly, he remembered the paper in his back pocket, which he pulled out and handed over as Eliot passed. Slowing to a halt, Eliot looked at the carefully scrawled flight reservation information for the round trip, and glanced up at Alec, surprise evident on his face.

"Thanks. I owe you."

"No problem," Alec smirked, stepping aside. "Bring back some of those insane tomatoes, and we'll call it even."

Eliot laughed, and made it halfway down the hall before calling out, over his shoulder. "You don't even eat vegetables."

"Then you can call it revenge for making you fly coach," Alec replied, and let the door fall shut.

He was already turning on the television and settling in for the night when he realized he'd forgotten to stop grinning.

---

"I am sure we can come to terms. No transfers, though. I want cash."

"Than you shall receive it. When can you get here?"

"My flight leaves in an hour. I will contact you when I land."

---

Chapter 3

Dipping my toes in the water... :)

2009-09-04T08:37:24Z

Note to self: The Slash Job

2009-08-25T06:32:08Z

So my aunt has still not mailed out my ~~fanfic'ing notebook~~ journal, so CFMWH is still in temporary limbo.

Which means, of course, in the meantime, I'm starting to dabble in Leverage!slash. :O It's the only logical response, right?

I didn't mean to! It just sort of happened. And by happened, I mean, it's happening, and by happening, I mean that somehow I took something that I thought would be quick and easy to write, and turned it into the most awkward scenario I've ever written. Go figure. At least by comparison, when I get back to CFMWH, Ronon and Jayne will seem easy. Argh.

Note to self: Quit writing stories that require plot, and just skip ahead to the good bits. :)

Raining All The Time

2009-08-20T10:44:29Z

Title: Raining All The TIme
Rating: PG-13 to be safe
By: Jendavis
Spoilers: Tiny one for "The Storm"
Pairing: John Sheppard/ Ronon Dex
Genre: Drama. In the high school sense of the word. Angst?
Warnings: None.
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: Stuck in a cave with nothing to do, Wormhole X-treme, the Pegasus version, a wardrobe malfunction of the towel variety, a secret relationship revealed, or possibly kept a secret, arts and crafts, War & Peace, shaving, getting drugged by villagers into cuddling. And it rains a lot.
A/N: Written for rubygirl29 , nomelon , and gaffsie , who all are super awesome and rad and the best enablers a girl like me could hope for (because if it was up to me, I'd still be talking about how wet rain is), and who deserve far more than 2,568 words.

Raining All The Time

John has never killed so many people in a single day. But the rain presses on, regardless, and he doesn't have the time to stop and think about it, anyway. Not with a tsunami heading their way, less than a minute out.

And then it's over, washing over them. Leaving them alive. Weir's in shock, McKay's bleeding, Teyla is furious and Ford…well. He's Ford. John doesn't begin to know how he himself is doing, but it can wait. Sora's standing there like she's expecting to be executed, and there are too many bodies that need seeing to, and the Genii made it out of there with who-knows-what, but.

Atlantis is still here. And there's work to be done.

---

It was raining when his team and Lorne's returned from Belkan, and according to the sensors, it was only going to get worse. But right then, it was the furthest thing from John's mind.

Getting his right wrist looked at, on the other hand, that was a different story, and he made his way towards the infirmary without having to be ordered first. It was stupid, he'd stepped wrong on the trail coming back to the gate, and had to admit to the others that the aftereffects of last night's sealing-the-trade-deal ceremony were affecting his concentration.

Because it was easier admitting to the alcohol than it was admitting what the alcohol had made him do. Let him do. Made him do.

Cadman promised she'd never tell a soul, but there was a smirk hanging at the edges of her mouth, sure to break free the moment John's back was turned.

And now, he was giving it the chance, and he knew it, but he really needed to get his wrist looked at.

And maybe something for the headache, as well.

---

Ronon's been ill for weeks now, enough that the rain feels good slicking down over his fever-heated skin, soaking in through his matted hair to cool his scalp. It feels like waking up, like he's regaining some sanity, a little more control, but it's not enough to stop himself from stepping wrong.

He's still mad enough that he doesn't realize the mudslide could kill him. Just feels the movement and enjoys the ride down. Forgets everything else for a moment and laughs at the thrill of it all.

---

The scientists were running a movie marathon in the common room. Ronon arrived in time to catch the beginning of something called WX: Triangulum, and wound up sitting there for two hours, staring at the screen in amused horror.

Dr. Ryan McCullough was the most annoying character on the show, but the others weren't much better. At one point, the dimwit playing Lt. Col. James Shepherd managed to hit on John's drawl, out of blind luck more than anything, and Ronon turned to point it out to John, who still wasn't sitting next to him.

Apparently there were two more episodes left, but Ronon wasn't interested any more.

---

It rains the day he gets back from Afghanistan, and Nancy can't pull him into their house for anything. He stands in the driveway, face held up to the sky, not even wanting to squint against the raindrops.

He just wants to stay there for a minute, remember where he is. He doesn't mean for it to become the opening salvo in the fight that ends them.

---

There wasn't anything to see outside his window except rain, and John was on stand-down with a fractured wrist and a head full of painkillers. He was out of excuses not to fight through more of War and Peace.

He was reading about the death of Prince Bolkonsky for the third or fourth time. He couldn't remember what Bolkonsky was doing before that, though. Something about the French, he was almost positive. John tossed the book aside.

This was stupid. He needed to get out of there, but flying was out, and thanks to McKay's Genii-induced electrical systems paranoia, so was the gate.

Besides, he couldn't stay cooped up in his room forever. At some point, he'd have to go out and face it. "What happens on missions, stays on missions," was a great motto, but it had never been true. Hiding out was only going to make people wonder about his state of mind, and then leap to whatever conclusions they saw fit. The trading feast at Belkan, and John's naked need laid out for all to see. Ronon's reaction.

There had to be something he could do, somewhere, to move things back towards normal.
---

He finds shelter in a small deep cave, right before the sky opens. Lies on the floor to look back out over the area below, but the wraith aren't coming. Not yet. There's no way he's lost them, though. They're just waiting. They're patient because they know they have the advantage.

But they don't seem to like the rain any more than Ronon does. It's not the first thing he learns about the wraith, but it's the first thing they have in common, apparently.

He knows he should get moving, but the rain's making the trees look stunningly green, and all he wants to do, for a while, is look. Catch his breath and sit in his cave, doing nothing. Rest, just for a moment.

---

Storms, here, didn't mean what they did once upon a time. There was no cramping in on yourself in a vain attempt to keep dry, hoping the cough that appeared that morning doesn't worsen. Here, there was shelter. Here, there were shields, and dampeners, and more than enough grounding. There was all the technology the ZPM could handle, even if it couldn't manage to handle the people.

Ronon had heard about the few cases of vertigo, of seasickness, but had to concentrate to feel the city moving slightly beneath him as he walked through its corridors towards the jumper bay. Even then, he wasn't sure he wasn't imagining it.

All the same, though. John had never looked more aware of the floor beneath his feet, walking around with a dead-numb expression on his face, but sometimes the tension pulled at the corner of his mouth.

He'd been spending a lot of time in the jumper bay, and that's where Ronon found him, tweaking controls with his uninjured hand and overseeing adjustments that didn't need to be made. He looked out at the rain, more than he looked at Ronon, watching the lightning strike across the sky like it might be worth the risk. He'd bolt, given the chance, and fly out into the storm.

It wasn't surprising, but he wished he knew if it was the city John was trying to escape, or Ronon.

He couldn't bring himself to ask though, just left the bay first, so John wouldn't have to.
---

The extraction went as planned, and they've made it out of Kabul, and now there's nothing left to worry about besides being seen. So John flies low, keeps under the radar and over the contours of the terrain below.

He can't see it, though. Not from here. It's the middle of the night, and the rain is surprisingly torrential as it washes over the windshield. But it won't last long. It never does, not even in spring.

And it doesn't matter. Between radar, GPS, forward looking infrared, and inertial navigation, the windshield may as well be obsolete. For now, the Pave's eyes are his eyes, and John knows there's no flying machine out there that he'd trust half as much.

Looks out at the rain crashing against the windshield and grins. They're almost home, and in a minute or so, he'll be able to call and report in. Everyone's made it. Everyone's safe.

---

They hadn't spoken since parting ways in the gate room, back when the rain was a novelty. If asked, John would say it was because there wasn't much interest to be found in talking about the weather.

He knew better, though. Ronon knew the deal, John had explained it to him, and John had messed that up. Shoved his naked need at him and changed the rules on him, out in front of everyone. Left him wide open, too, even though he'd been less than an arm's length away for the better part of an evening.

Far less, truth be told, and in an ideal world, he would have enjoyed the chance to lean into Ronon, touch him like he wanted. Like he'd done that night, around the fire as the Marines looked on. Ronon's skin had been hot and dry enough that John could have left marks by running a fingernail up his forearm. If he'd wanted to.

And John had wanted to. But Ronon hadn't let him, had moved to sit next to Teyla for the rest of the night. He'd looked back across the flames every so often, keeping an eye on him like he would an animal he didn't trust anymore.

Like he'd been afraid that John would ruin everything, throwing everything away like that.

---

There's a fire on the east side of town, caused by the lightning that presaged the storm. The council's up in arms, because the Chieftain declared it an emergency, even though no wraith have been seen. But the Chieftain is the only one who can delegate to the taskmasters, and the taskmasters are the only ones who can get the sleep-deprived soldiers out to haul hoses through the downpour, because there's not enough water coming down from the sky to put the fire out.

Ronon thinks it's funny, but he keeps it far from his face. The innkeeper's husband is standing right there, staring as his livelihood goes up in smoking flames, and Ronon figures he should be getting some perspective about all of this. That it's important. But it's the middle of the night, he really wants sleep, and all he has are his orders.

---

Cadman moved over, making space so Lorne could deal him in, but Ronon didn't have time to ante up before he was hearing about his boyfriend John.

Lorne was joking, and since the others were laughing, Ronon joined in. Because at the moment, he wasn't really sure that there was any truth to it, anyway. Thankfully, by the end of the first hand, the conversation had shifted towards the basket weaving class Teyla had started in the mess hall.

Apparently Parrish was beginning to get the hang of it, but Katie Brown was amazing.

Ronon tried to count cards the way McKay had shown him, though, and if it didn’t work to distract himself the way he'd hoped, at least everyone else was thrown. He walked out of there with three more bills, and a handful of coins. Useless currency.

John was supposed to be walking next to him, holding them up to the light to show the watermark, telling Ronon about places he'd never see.

John was supposed to be there.

---

For all that comes afterwards, the rain at the wedding reception is nice. Seems to wash enough of the starch out of people's clothes that they're able to move. Or maybe it's too hard to look snooty when your hair's plastered to your skull, but people are finally relaxing. The open bar probably doesn't hurt, either.

It's been pouring like this since Nancy said "I do," and Dave's already joking that it's an omen. John's new mother in law scowls at the sky like she can cow it into behaving for her daughter's wedding. But Nancy doesn't care.

She even lets him drag her out to dance in the mud.

---

John tugged the plastic over his cast, his clumsy left hand managing to tape it down to keep the water out. The shower itself took longer than he wanted it to, but he managed. It was merely a matter of letting the water fall over him, and if he closed his eyes and ignored the warmth, he could almost imagine himself standing outside, letting the sky fall onto him.

Slinging the towel around his hips, he wrapped himself against the humid chill of the bathroom, glancing in annoyance at Ancient mirrors that didn't fog up when they were supposed to. There was no detail lost to steam on the polished steel surface, and it showed his reflection too clearly.

It showed him naked and alone, and as washed out as the view outside. For all the care they'd taken to seal the city, the rain was finding a way in. Some of the gray was literal, in the stubble grown long enough to show.

Need a shave. It was a strange strategy to have to make, gauging the angles needed to approach from the left rather than the right. He never even got around to lathering his face before he sensed movement in the mirror.

Ronon wasn't looking at him yet, but he was looking at his reflection. At his hands, mostly. One holding the razor awkwardly, the other just useless.

John didn't turn, but he didn't move when Ronon came close. Just waited for the next moment to arrive.

---

Ronon's bored out of his mind, glaring out the open window, listening to his parents argue politics downstairs.

The wind changes, sending a light spray of rain over his unfinished homework. Half thinking, he swipes a sleeve over the words, but the ink doesn't run, and his report on the identification of poisonous plants remains annoyingly unmarred. Would have served the schoolman right, assigning such a pointless project. Like anyone foraged for food anywhere other than the market.

It's his first day free from parentally ordered house arrest, and it's raining too hard to enjoy it. Ronon's not sure he's going to remember anything about the plants in a week, but he knows everything there is to know about injustice.

---

John didn't look like he'd admit to wanting him there, so he didn't give him the option.

Ronon took the razor out of John's hand and set it on the counter, before picking up the shaving lotion and lathering it up over John's face, the way he'd done before. Brushed a knuckle under John's chin to get him to tilt his head, all too aware that he was forcing him to expose his throat.

But John was looking at him now, and letting him look back.

Ronon was a little stunned, maybe a little in awe, because even after days of nothing, of not knowing, of looking out and in at nothing, John was allowing him this. Letting him hold a blade to his throat. Trusting him.

One of them, at some point, would have to start talking, but not yet. It would only lead to cutting too close, drawing blood, and it would end with John flinching away.

---

The pressure doesn't ease up when the tension changes, and the rain doesn't stop when they kiss.

In a while, there will be bed and blankets and skin against skin, and the momentary stutter and stop when John's cast accidentally clocks Ronon upside the head. Laughter, then, and bodies resettling into one another.

But for the moment, there's only the brush of warm lips, and hands tentative against shoulders. A towel starts to slip from chilled hips, and when it goes, it leaves behind only the safe kind of naked.

Phht, she's at it again...

2009-08-18T07:44:44Z

Argh. I left my binder- you know, *the* binder, with all my writing and notes and lots of scribbling and stuff- at my aunt's place this weekend, and won't be getting it until it comes in the mail. While I am mildly relieved to hear that she thought it was my private journal (and I suppose it is, of a sort) and therefore has not opened it because she's a sweet lady who doesn't want to pry, it means that CFMWH's next installment is going to be held up.

Which is fine, because it means that in the meantime, I can again turn to the John/Ronon bits and bobs that are languishing on the computer, which I've been meaning to do something with. Little detail-y things that aren't stories or even scenes, just stuff I want to throw in somewhere, if that makes any sense at all. The only problem is that I don't have anything to build them around.

That's where my lovely flist comes in! Since I've had awesome luck before, I'm trying this again:

Give me something to write about. Full descriptions/ plotbunnies/ one word prompts, anything that will send my brain spinning again. I figure, even if it's the most random thing I've ever heard, the challenge will do me some good, and hey, it means there is more fic for you to read! Everyone wins!

Can't Find My Way Home #10

2009-08-14T09:40:32Z

Title: Can't Find My Way Home
Rating: PG-13 for now
By: Jendavis
Spoilers: SGA: The Last Man, FF: Serenity
Pairing: Eventual Jayne Cobb/ Ronon Dex
Genre: Crossover
Warnings: None for this chapter.
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: Timelines diverge by converging.

Previous: 1. Man of Steel 2. Keys to the World 3. Lost 4. Gone Away 5. House is Not a Home 6. Still Standing 7. I Never Told You What I Do For A Living 8. Scary Eyes 9. Before The Worst

10. Resurrection

There were a few moments where Ronon was certain Jayne was going to blow River's head off, even after he recognized her.

"Shen sheng de gao wan," Jayne snorted, dropping his aim and stalking towards her. "Ai ya, girl. I thought you was done for." Grabbing her by the arm, he jerked her slightly, her feet stumbling over the dirt as he let loose another stream of invective Ronon couldn't follow.

He figured it was best that he didn't intercede. River was looking dazed, a little cowed but not threatened. Mostly, she didn't seem to understand his reaction.

McKay was dialing the gate, and for the moment, there wasn't anything Ronon had to be doing, which gave his muscles the go-ahead to start locking up the way they always wanted to after being stunned. The base of his shoulder began to ache in earnest, then.

A few spans away, irate words apparently spent, Jayne fell silent, glaring at River like he hadn't gotten around to appreciating how easy their reunion had been.

Fair enough. Ronon didn't understand it himself.

But.

Even if she was currently too freaked out to stop staring at Kanaan like she feared what he would or wouldn't do. Teyla had made it out. They'd all made it.

The rest, they could deal with on the other side.
---

They stepped out into chaos, too many people trying to say and do too many things at once. Keller argued with Doctor Suarez about whether or not Kanaan should be sedated in his current state while others ushered Teyla towards the med tent. Zelenka was already trying to get McKay to tell him everything they'd found, already spinning theories.

Ronon was relieved, then, that it was Lorne that called him over to make his report. His role in this, at least, was simple.

"Got out there. Found Teyla. Got the data from Michael's lab, but we didn't find him. Blew up the hive, but we didn't find Michael. Don't think he was there."

Lorne nodded, but Ronon couldn't tell what he thought of the news. There was something else. "Todd?"

"He's dead." River's voice sounded distracted behind him, and he turned to find her staring after Jayne. Sensing their attention, though, she shook herself and looked up at Lorne. "I killed him," she said, but she didn't stick around to explain.

"Right. Well." Lorne considered it for a moment, before breaking out into an amused grin. "Seriously? She's the one that took him out?"

"Shut up."

For once, he decided that he'd go see the doctors about the hit he'd taken, though he knew there wasn't much he could do for it but ignore the confusion in his nerves, which sensed burning, pain, then nothing and back to burning, each in turn. It would fade on it's own in a few days. There wasn't anything he or anyone else could do about it.

He could, however, check in on Teyla and Kanaan.
---

Keller looked at his shoulder, but didn't draw blood, for once. It took Ronon a minute to realize that she had no way of running tests, and she didn't have much by way of monitors, either. Watching Keller checking Kanaan's pulse again, still clearly concerned over the sedatives they'd given Kanaan, Ronon wanted to ask her what she thought of flying blind.

But she'd answer if he asked, and he'd be responsible for making her think about everything she couldn't do.

Teyla was sitting on one of the other cots, clearly still trying to take it all in, but sometimes looking Ronon's way like the familiarity was important.

Keller was talking to him, though. "If you're really fine, than you should get out of here and let me focus on Teyla. If you need to stay," she smiled, her eyes darting away, indicating the cot where Teyla was sitting. "Hang out, get your strength up, you can, but I want you to take the painkillers."

Ronon glanced down at the proffered pills. "Don't want to waste them."

"This is what they're for. It's not a waste. Besides, there are enough supplies here for over two hundred people for six months. We're only fifty seven," she said firmly, sensing her victory as she handed him the pills and some water. "Enjoy."

He'd been wrong, he decided. Without her tools, she was still a doctor. Maybe more so.

Not soon after, his attention began to wander, and it wasn't until he heard Keller's voice talking to…someone, saying that everyone was fine, that he let something drop that he didn't know he'd been holding.

Finally, he let himself sleep. Just for a minute.
---

River paused outside the tent, rehearsing her defense and ordering her thoughts before going in to face Jayne's irritation.

Without knowing the strange language of Todd's thoughts, there was no way to fly the dart. Though he understood wraith tactics, Ronon didn't have the ability to think in their terms. Not enough to operate the only exit available. Not enough to fly a dart.

Cold green minds hissing and spitting and inhuman, the language of bugs, not man.

But the knowledge, that there would be no escape, no way back to the earth… It wouldn't have been enough to stop him. That was the only easy understanding in all of this.

Somewhere along the path of Ronon's life, he came to know that he would die fighting past hope.

It was that expectation that would have killed him.

Still might, someday.

It was hard finding words to explain it to Jayne without giving too much of Ronon away.

He's not mine to give didn't seem the right ones, but they were close.

Stop dithering and go inside.

River let go a breath and allowed herself to listen to the news spreading through the camp, everyone talking about Teyla and Kanaan. New people. Soon, she'd know them, but not yet.

She reined herself in and tried not to smile too much. Jayne was cross enough already.
---

Vera was half disassembled, her parts laid out on his cot, by the time River entered.

"You were holdin' out on us." Jayne didn't bother hiding the accusation in his tone. Wasn't like she couldn't read it herself if she wanted. "What the hell happened?"

You let me think you got yourself killed, he tried not to think.

"Todd was going to beam us into the dart, eject it from his newly taken ship, and blow it using the C4 we supplied." River sat down on her cot, taking off her boots. "The encryption, once he tortured McKay's portion of the password, would have been no problem for his computers. Once you went to assist Ronon, Todd was heading for McKay's location. I merely found him first."

It came damned close, though, and you know it.

"You knew about the two detonators?"

"Yes. McKay didn't want anyone to know. I think that's why Zelenka told me."

"Can't torture info out of a mind if it ain't there," Jayne reasoned, finally feeling like he was sussin' it out. "That what you figured?"

Or do you just not trust me?

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you. It's just. Ronon wanted to go." She looked at him square, then. Serious. "He would have gone alone, and he would have died."

You can't know that. I can't know that. He could'a gotten us all killed.

Jayne scratched at his beard. Just deal with what's in front of you.

"Look. I ain't pleased, but it ain't like that's ever changed a gorram thing in the world, so." Jayne looked away, wonderin' if the words were somethin' he'd heard Mal say, or not. They didn't sit right.

Ain't the point, Mal's voice again, for sure this time. Forgive her already an' get over it.

He tried again. "Just don't keep me in the dark like that, is all I'm sayin'. Dong le ma?"
---

Teyla wasn't normally one to resist doctors' orders, but it was her voice, tense and irritated, that woke Ronon.

"I assure you, I am fine. I have been cooped up for too long already, and the sun on my face would be a better medicine than anything you want to give me. And as you do not see fit to answer my questions, I will ask them elsewhere."

By the time Ronon was raising his head, the tent flap was falling shut again. Keller was staring after her with her hand halfway to her radio, but it fell again as she sighed.

"Want me to chase her down?"

Keller started, spinning to find him in the process of sitting up. "What? Oh." She grinned. "She's okay. Just mad at me because I wouldn't tell her what's been going on around here. Lorne's orders. What with. You know." She nodded her head in the direction of Kanaan's curtained-off bed.

"He gonna be alright?"

"He's got a lot of the wraith enzyme in his system, but it's starting to break down. It's going to be a really ugly comedown, though. So…" She brightened, then. "But on the plus side, he should be through the worst of it in time to see their son born."

"Yeah. About that?" Should've been born a season ago.

"From what Teyla says, she was put in stasis. She clammed up pretty quickly, though, when she realized I wasn't going to tell her anything about what's going on here."

"Right." Ronon looked towards the exit. "Am I good to go?"

Jennifer pulled out her annoying little flashlight and shot it into his eyes. "You know. Lorne never ordered you not to talk to her." Stepping back, she smiled, waving towards the door. "Long as it doesn't happen here, you know?"
---

It was later than he'd expected when he stepped out of the tent, the sun hanging low in the sky already.

Teyla hadn't gone far, standing a few spans away with arms crossed over her belly, her irritation apparently keeping the well-wishers at bay. "Hey."

"Ronon." She inclined her head, but did not look away from the scene she surveyed. Ronon couldn't be sure what, if anything, held her attention.

"How're you feeling?"

She regarded him warily, until she realized that he wasn't there to bring her back inside. "Anxious and uninformed. This is not the return I was expecting." A small grin finally broke through. "Not that I am ungrateful," she finished.

Ronon smirked, but there wasn't a lot of humor in it. "Yeah. Things kind of went to hell." This wasn't the sort of thing he'd want to hear about out in the open. He considered the tent, but it was too confined, too close a space, especially with River and Jayne there.

His stomach rumbled, then, and made the decision for him.

"Let's get some food, and I'll fill you in."
---

Their meal was a quiet one. Teyla's mind was elsewhere, and Ronon's didn't know where to begin.

Begin at the beginning.

"After you went missing…" He washed his food down, and started to talk.

Teyla didn't interrupt him as he told her about their search. How Sheppard had disappeared afterwards. How McKay had done what he could, how they both had, and how they both failed.

He tried to gloss over his own departure, because it would be calling it what it was. Abandonment. Teyla didn't call him on it, though. Just asked him how he managed to train a squad in such a short period of time.

He told her about that last bad fight, when a strange ship fell out of the sky and changed everything.

It was then that Teyla began to fill in the rest.

"I was woken from stasis only a few days ago. At the time, I did not understand what was happening, or how much time had passed. Only that the ship was damaged, that in order for the repairs to be made, the power to the stasis chambers had to be… rerouted?" There was a crease in her forehead that she rubbed away. It was a strange gesture, for Teyla, who normally kept her concerns far from her face.

"One of Michael's lieutenants moved me to the cell where you found me, and it was then that I saw Kanaan and realized just how long it must have been. He barely knew me. I don't know what they did to him, and truth be told, I was hoping that the Atlantis infirmary would be available to aid in that regard."

She drew a breath, shaking her head. "All they can promise me is that we will have to wait and see. Keller believes it is a modified form of the enzyme that has caused him to become so changed."

"He's going to be fine," Ronon assured her, hoping Keller wouldn't make a liar of him. "Um. Do you know why Michael put you in stasis in the first place?"

"I believe he wanted to buy more time for his research. There was a problem…"

Her hand went to her belly, but it didn't appear to be a deliberate action, and her eyes looked to him for reassurances that he couldn't honestly promise. "Keller assures me that everything is going to be all right, but nobody knows how being in stasis might affect my child, or if-" Teyla silenced herself, her earlier wariness suddenly returning as she watched Lorne and Cadman enter, approaching their table.

She was going to have to go over all of this, again, and soon.

Now, from the looks of it.

Lorne, for his part, looked reluctant enough to interrupt, but Cadman was eager to see Teyla, all abrasive energy and wide smiles. Ronon kept his glaring to a minimum as he stood. Grasped Teyla's shoulder as he crossed behind her seat, squeezed as he passed.

The gesture was probably only about as comforting as everything he'd actually said, as useful as anything else he'd done.
---

River had gone to sleep, and it sat fine by Jayne. Made it easier to look at her bare arms and shins and throat, scanning for injuries. Listening for ominous sounds in her breathing. Findin' nothing.

Jayne moved back outside, returning to the folding chair set in front of the tent. Watched, for a while, as everyone went about their business, and listened to their snatches of conversation as they passed by. Nodded to a few, here and there, but mostly, just stared off at the grass.

This was stupid, one of those times where Jayne knew he was bein' stupid.

River was fine, uninjured, and no less sane or alive than she'd been that morning. She hadn't needed Jayne worryin' about her in the first gorram place. Just.

She's the only one makes sense worryin' about.

The rest of this place, though. These folk. Makin' deals they didn't expect to win. Ruttin' idiotic is what it was.

He got it. Hell, he'd just lost everything too, but he'd had a hell of a lot distractin' him. Would probably take years to settle right in his brain, get back to normal.

These folk were in the same boat, and Jayne had no clue what their version of normal looked like. No idea how hard they'd fight for it if they found they needed to.
---

Ronon was coming back from the showers, towel slung over his shoulder. His hair was still damp and looked uncomfortably heavy. He dragged his bare feet through the grass, carrying his boots in one hand like he knew he should have them on already. It looked deliberate, like he was forcing himself to dial it down. Jayne wasn't so sure it was working.

He would have gone alone.

Jayne hadn't been meaning to think on the things River'd told him, but they kept risin' up out of nowhere.

He would have died.

Probably because he didn't get it, never really had. You decided what survival meant, and you fought for it, whether it was for gettin' paid or stayin' alive. But it was survival all the same. Kinda the ruttin' point.

Jayne snorted. He'd come out here to think about somethin' else for a spell.

Mal would have understood Ronon better. He was the same sort, liable to get a man killed over nothing but a damn noble reason.

Up close, Ronon looked a little better, like he'd recovered from his injury.

"How's the shoulder?"

"Fine."

Healed or not, it didn't make him any easier to talk to. Jayne let him pass by, and didn't watch him go inside. Just kept starin' out over the camp, tryin' not to look too close at his own irritation.
---

Things looked better in the morning.

Teyla was in the mess when he and River arrived, tearing into her breakfast and talking with McKay, who waved them over. It was Teyla, though, who spoke first.

"Hello. I do not believe we were properly introduced…" she trailed off and an amused expression crossed her features.

Jayne glanced up to see River standing next to the table, staring in horrified contemplation of Teyla's stomach.

"There's a person in there," she eventually said, looking over at Jayne like he needed the explanation.

"Ruttin' hell, River. Could ya sit down and try to be normal?" Jayne shot what he hoped was a properly apologetic look across the table. Teyla seemed to go for it.

"She is correct, after all," she said with a nod of her head, but River was still apparently hypnotized.

Please lord, he prayed. Let someone have told the moonbrain 'bout the birds and the bees.

Moonbrain was talking again. "He's going to be in the world, soon. But right now, he's not really anything. Just exists where he is." She blinked, and sat down next to Jayne, grinning brightly at Teyla. "I'm River. It's nice to meet you both."
---

Ronon caught sight of everyone eating together in the mess tent, apparently listening to McKay's rambling, and discovered he wasn't hungry. It wasn't a deliberate thing. He'd just remembered the half-completed weir was sitting out where anyone could mistake it for kindling.

When Ronon was especially lucky, he found a village that had been recently culled. Sometimes, the food in the cellars hadn't gone off yet.

This wasn't one of those times, but he was too sick, too tired, to try his luck on another world, today. It would have to do.

Most of the food stores had been left exposed to the humid air for far too long, and had already gone to the omnipresent rats. He searched as he mined the village with traps, stringing tripwires and propping heavy weights to crash over opened doors, finding a lightweight shirt that was close enough to fitting, and some soap, but no medicine that he could recognize, and no food.

Eventually, however, his borrowed house was fortified against anything that would make it past the tripwires. He would have enjoyed it more if he wasn’t so damned hungry, so tired and overheated.

It didn't matter. He'd eaten yesterday, and there was water nearby, a slow river, running south of the village. Where there was water, there was hunting.

There was also the chance to wash. Less vital, but almost as pleasant as a full stomach. It had been days since he'd been clean, and longer since he'd allowed himself to strip down fully to bathe.

The shallow stream moved slowly, surprisingly cold on his skin until he remembered that he'd probably been running this fever for weeks, now. There hadn't been much to do about it. The sickness would go away, or it wouldn't.

Upriver, skeletal hands reached out of the water, grappling at nothing. Rubbing at his eyes, he chided himself for worrying about hallucinations. He wasn't that sick.

The wraith wouldn't have bothered to dump the bodies. Most everyone had probably been culled, but there were several bodies that lay where they'd fallen in the woods. Under cover of the trees, where the darts couldn't track them so easily, the hunters had to devour their pray on the spot.

Upon closer inspection, the hands turned into branches, and he could see signs of weaving, here and there. Not quite a net, and not quite a cage, more like a funnel, forcing the fish to go through a narrow gap. Practically right into his waiting hand.

Ronon tossed a few out onto the bank and stepped out to dry, deciding that for all the rats and empty rooms, this wasn't the worst place he could be.
---

He finally managed to scare up a mallet from the supply tent, and returned to find Jayne waiting by the water.

"Hey," Jayne craned his neck to peer into the water. "What's all this?"

"Trapping fish." He didn't look up, still trying to gauge the best placement of the stakes into the riverbed.

"I don't get it,' Jayne eventually said, like it had been bothering him for a while. "Why're you skulkin' around like someone bludgeoned your puppy to death with a rollin' pin? You got your friend back. Just sayin'. If it's all 'cause of the guy who came back with her, well. Right now, he ain't lookin' like he's all-"

What the hell? "You gonna keep talking? Told you before, it's not like that."

"Then what is it like?"

"There's still plenty of problems around here." Ronon mopped the sweat off his face with his sleeve. "Teyla being back doesn't fix any of them."

"Ignorin' her sure as hell won't, and neither will skippin' meals." Jayne narrowed his eyes a little against the glare on the water, but he didn't look at Ronon. "Saw you decide not to come join us, you know."

"I wasn't." Ronon didn't so much roll his eyes as he stared at the sky until the urge to attack passed. This almost felt familiar, with one striking difference. Sheppard hadn't been a complete ass.

Those first few days on Atlantis, being dragged out for meals so Sheppard could talk him into something he wasn't sure he understood yet. Talking plainly enough, but never explaining why Ronon should hear him.

Wanting to be left alone, and not. Wanting anything at all, and finding that it's there.

"Just want to get this done. You wanna help, or just sit there, yammering like McKay?"

Jayne's reaction wasn't very surprising. His lip curled briefly over a row of oddly perfect teeth, but it slid out into an amused grin.

"What d'you need me to do?"

Ronon gave it some consideration. There was only one mallet. "Go get me something to eat, and I'll figure it out."
---

They were calling it a lab, but only for a lack of a better term. When McKay and Zelenka tossed ideas and barbs across the tent, they were Mal and Wash navigating through a meteor belt. It wasn't real anger, just frustration and not knowing and needing to know. Brittle words filling the room with eggshells that no one wanted to crush.

River, though, didn't need to walk. She just wanted to sit, and listened to them argue time and where it all went wrong. One stranger's path intersecting with space at the wrong angle and moment, too close to the sun, rippling out towards a tidal wave that could take a ship three oceans away, and five hundred years.

She knew they wouldn't understand that she understood, so she remained silent. They had moved on, anyhow, though McKay was reluctant to file it away for later study. He wanted to pick at it some more, intrigued as to what it meant, and what he could make it do.

McKay would bend time to his will, given the chance, but he didn't have the time for that right now.

Zelenka, for his part, cast occasional glances over at her in the corner, curious. His pen would hesitate over his paper, or the typing would stutter a moment, like the data wasn't in his head anymore, having been shoved out by something so simple as a girl flying a ship. Their curiosity was a leashed dog, barking at intruders and wanting their bone returned.

But there were new things, pulled from the insides of a ship that breathed and bled. Not air, and not blood, but alive, and it seemed almost silly to study something as banal as navigational data instead.

But there was necessity and priority and demand and requirements. There was a growing fear that wasn't being admitted to.

Not yet.
---

Huh. Probably the best part of the movie...

2009-08-12T00:59:17Z

Jason Momoa. In a leather skirt. At the mall. Still pimpin'.

Oh yay. Retconning. Can't wait.

2009-08-10T04:22:23Z

Working on CFMWH # 10 now, and had to check something in chapter 9. Realized I may have written myself into a corner.

*Now* I see why people finish their stories before they post them. Or use betas. And why there are so many dead WIPs floating around the internet. Argh.

But first, coffee. Then figuring out how to write my way out of this.

CFMWH #9

2009-08-05T08:51:03Z

Title: Can't Find My Way Home
Rating: PG-13 for now
By: Jendavis
Spoilers: SGA: The Last Man, FF: Serenity
Pairing: Eventual Jayne Cobb/ Ronon Dex
Genre: Crossover
Warnings: None for this chapter.
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: Timelines diverge by converging.

Previous: 1. Man of Steel 2. Keys to the World 3. Lost 4. Gone Away 5. House is Not a Home 6. Still Standing 7. I Never Told You What I Do For A Living 8. Scary Eyes

9. Before The Worst

Todd hadn't been gone through the gate a minute when Jayne broke the silence.

"She your family or your woman?" At Ronon's glare, he backpedaled, raising his hands defensively. "What? Most men ain't lookin' to make deals with devils 'less…"

"A friend. Been searching for her a while now."

"It seems awful convenient, her bein' right where he needs you."

He wished Jayne would shut up, knowing he'd have to argue his case enough when he got back to the camp, and dialed the gate. "Like I said. I trust him to cross me. Just not sure how he's gonna do it, but…"

"You're gonna cross him first," Jayne finished, watching the wormhole splashing to life and mulling it over. "Don't like it. You're not careful, you'll wind up blowin' your exit."

Ronon watched him step through the gate, biting the inside of his cheek. He's right, and you know it.

"Don't worry about the ship." River stopped at the event horizon, trailing her fingers in and out of existence distractedly. "The wraith won't kill you until you're on the ground again," she said, and stepped through.

Ronon had to wait until the gate was behind him to ask, "You were able to read him?"

Jayne's eyes were on the guards, but it was River, and what she'd say, what she might do, that he worried about. River read his expression and nodded to Ronon.

Once they'd passed beyond earshot, she explained.

"It's hard. I only get the shadows, not the lines. But he does picture your death in vivid detail. Killing you will be a proud moment for him, and he will savor it. Once he's fed on you, he plans on throwing your corpse down, watching it break on the rocks as your strength flows through him, and- what?"

She scowled at Jayne, rubbing a hand over her arm where he'd swatted her. Her eyes, though, returning to Ronon, were a little more controlled. "Sometime you will have to tell us why the wraith tell stories about you."

Ronon smirked, but ignored her curiosity. "He probably figures I'm going to hold onto the information for safe passage. He's not wrong. Just need to plan for it."

"So we are going to do this," Jayne confirmed, and raised a hand, waving Lorne and McKay over before Ronon had the chance.

Only been here a day, and he's right at home. The thought was as comforting as it was surprising. Like he'd made the right call. But it didn't change anything.

"I am," he said, making an abortive grab at Jayne's arm, bringing him up short. "This isn't your fight."

Jayne leaned towards River to whisper, "Gorram noble streak's makin' me wonder if he's got it in him to lay out a respectable deception." His grin slashed jaggedly up at Ronon, knowing he'd been heard.

For an instant, Ronon worried that River was reading him. She looked too amused not to be when she spoke. "I would think he's smart enough to avail himself of our not-inconsiderable expertise in that particular arena."

McKay, when they met at the edge of the camp, began haltingly to speak. "Ronon, I. Didn't know that you were going off to meet with Todd. I would have. You know. Come along."

Ronon snorted. This, he understood. "No worries. Wasn't a science thing. Next part is, though, if you're still offering…"
---

Jayne listened silently as Ronon described the situation to the others. Whether or not they needed Lorne's permission was unclear, but askin' outright about it would've been a problem. Besides, no one was askin' his opinion, and if he was measurin' it right, Ronon wouldn't take too kindly to anyone complicatin' the issue.

River, likewise, was silent, but had that air to her that either meant she was peekin' inside their heads, or communicatin' with grass fairies or some such. Something was amusing her, but for now, she was keepin' it to herself.

Lorne and McKay did seem to hang a little more heavily on Ronon's words when he mentioned Teyla, and from there, it went smooth. Lorne gave the go-ahead, and McKay was all eager consent, like he was makin' up for something, before he dragged Lorne off towards the lab tent.

All that seemed a big to-do over nothing, and he was about to say so. But then he got a good look at Ronon. Saw the mostly-hidden surprise and relief on his face as he watched the others walk away.

He wasn't expectin' them to go along with it. Didn't think they'd back him up.

The irritation sat under his skin, set to itchin' a little, and Jayne held his tongue.

Ain't your place to be worryin' 'bout him and his. He can look after himself just fine.
---

"I hear you're lookin' to spar," Jayne said, walking up the path and looking at Ronon's half-completed fishing weir. He'd been working on it for an hour, but it hadn't quieted his mind as much as he'd hoped.

"River tell you that?" Ronon grimaced at unwelcome tone he heard in his voice. It's not like you can't use the distraction.

Jayne didn't notice, though, or if he did, he was ignoring it. "Yeah, right before she ran off to make friendly with the other geeks. Last I saw, they were arguin' about time travel and such. She seems to be havin' a grand ol' time."

"But you're bored."

"Always get this way, 'fore a job, when there ain't work to be done. So what d'you say? You up for it?"

Ronon regarded his pile of sticks and reeds with an appraising eye. It could wait.

"I should tell you," he said, brushing the dust and slivers from his clothes as he remembered what he'd heard in the mess. "Cadman, Lorne's second in command, already has a book going." He grinned. "It's favorin' me."

"Glad to see you ain't let your victory over River go to your head none." Jayne grinned, cocking his head to the side and giving him the once over, before following him towards the area cordoned off for training exercises. "Only means the take will be better for folk when I kick your ass."

His voice was close, when he said it, teasing. Assuming a familiarity that Ronon hadn't expected.

He's trying to psyche you out, Ronon decided, pulling his arm across his chest to stretch the muscle. Feeling it give, comfortably. That's all it is.
---

It started out slow, both of them easing into it as they took each other's measure, neither side wanting to overtax themselves too early.

Jayne was only trying to get to him, not get into his head. He was laughing at too many odd intervals for that. Even as they increased their pace, compared to sparring with River, it was relaxing.

It didn't hurt that Jayne was barely getting a punch in.

But when he did manage it, Ronon noticed. Jayne wasn't particularly quick, but he knew how to put power into a hit, and how to roll out from under one.

It wasn't until Ronon got a little too comfortable, a little too cocky, maybe, that he got a little too close.

Jayne was on him in an instant, and Ronon realized, face scraping across the dirt as he tried twisting out of Jayne's hold, that he should have seen it coming. A guy as big as Jayne wasn't likely to be the fast hitting sort.

Ronon really hated sparring grapplers. In a real fight, Jayne would be too close to see the knife sliding into his lower ribs. Easy win. But in a sparring match, all Ronon really could do was try to break out of a succession of holds, each one more annoying than the last, each one bringing him that much closer to forgetting himself.

Eventually, he was lying on his back, with Jayne using most of his weight to pin his wrists to the ground, and a shin pressed against his knees. His smirk was all Ronon could see of the world, too close to let the rest in.

Ronon snorted, but he gave.

Jayne eased up off of him, then hauled him to his feet, much to the cheers of…the entire science division. River's been talking, Ronon realized, belatedly, when he spotted her in the crowd, taking what looked to be her part of the cut.

Zelenka waylaid them on their way back to the tent, asking Jayne when he planned on challenging River, obviously eager at the prospect.

"Already know damn well she'll whip me," Jayne replied amiably. "There's only so abuse a man can take in front of an audience."

"Well, then." Zelenka shrugged, not seeming overly put out. "At least the three of you can keep one another in check." He glanced around Ronon's shoulder with a sudden smirk.

"Yeah, you all got a regular ass-kicking circle jerk going on," a soldier grumbled as he halted, shoving some crumpled bills into Zelenka's outstretched hand.
---

The camp's mood the next morning wasn't nearly as jovial as it had been during the sparring match, and it wasn't just the useless riches changin' hands that was different.

"So, what's the plan?" McKay was asking, for the tenth time, as he picked nervously at his breakfast.

Jayne rolled his eyes, caught Ronon doing likewise across the table. Figured it was his turn to answer.

"Ain't got one. Get over it." Jayne kept his voice down, though, when he said it. Truth be told, he didn't like the waitin' any more than McKay did.

There wasn't much else to say, after that, so when he finished eating, he escaped back to the tent as quickly as he could. Wanted to get some distance between himself and the tension that was settlin' down over the camp. Word had spread, and so had the worry.

River was already checking their packs like she knew what they'd need, and hell. She probably did. But whatever she knew, she weren't sharin'.

He was mighty relieved when it came time to head out to the gate. Didn't matter how it all played out. At least it would be done soon.
---

They stepped through the gate onto a dry world fightin' to keep green, but didn't have long to wait before Todd's dart came through. After the long morning, the dart's arrival was almost a relief.

Having landed, Todd made his way through the seared grass towards them with precise efficiency. He drew up short, not quite closing the circle they'd formed. There wasn't much by way of niceties to be exchanged, and he it as well as they did. He got right to it.

"During the attack, Michael's ship sustained heavy damage, caused by drones launched from Atlantis. In order to make the repairs without taxing the systems, it was necessary to maintain a low orbit above this world."

"Great," McKay rolled his eyes. "So we're going to have to let you cull us, first. This just gets better and better."

Ronon scanned their faces, and finally began to let them in on the details of his plan. "Once we're on the hive, McKay, you and River find the lab, grab the research." The two of them nodded, not at all surprised to be given the assignment. "Jayne, you plant the charges around the ship. Target the weak spots, especially the hyperdrive generator."

"Don't even know what that looks like," Jayne protested.

"Todd will help you out with that." Jayne snorted, but accepted the C4 gingerly, and Ronon turned to Todd, handing him the detonator. "You're in charge of setting it off once we're all back on the ground."

McKay managed to voice his dissent before Jayne did, but it was a close thing. "You're giving him the detonator?"

"He blows the ship before we're clear," Ronon sneered at Todd, "then he won't get what he wants."

Todd grinned, pocketing the small device, apparently more than happy with his part in the proceedings. His voice was imperious when he spoke. "And while we are carrying out these tasks, what will you be doing?"

"I'm going after Teyla."

Quan gao bu yi. If that ain't the most idiotic lack-of-a-plan I've heard today... "Goin' solo?"

Ronon fixed him with a stare that brooked no argument. "I can move faster on my own, and if she's in rough shape, I don't need anyone else slowing me down before she gets the chance." It wasn't until he stepped back that Jayne noticed how close he'd been standing. But Ronon was talking to everyone again, now. "We stay in contact, and meet up where we come in. Any questions?"

"One last thing," McKay said, handing his computer to Jayne. "Insurance. A password. I've entered a portion, and want each of you build on it." McKay glared at Todd as Jayne began to peck out his code. "You're going to need all of us alive if you want the information. Is that clear?"

"Yes," Todd replied, finally showing some irritation. It was short lived, though, and he recovered with a disturbing chuckle. "Now. You all wait here, and I will retrieve our transport."

Jayne handed the computer to River and watched him leave. Moments later, Ronon was passing the computer back to Rodney, and the dart was gliding towards them.
---

Ronon picked off two wraith before they made his position, but the third got a shot off before going down.

Before breaking cover, Ronon stilled, listening for the sound of heavy footsteps. Taking the moment to make sure his breathing was under control, he considered, not for the first time, the wisdom behind wasting resources developing better soldiers, but never training them to walk quietly.

It was one of those thoughts he tried not to linger on, if he could help it. He'd only mentioned it, once, to John Sheppard. Atlantis had been at their backs, beer had been in their hands, and no one had been around to overhear.

It wasn't superstition. He just didn't want to release something out into the universe that could return to hold a gun to his head.
---

Jayne followed Todd at a close distance, getting the next charge ready to go, and tryin' to figure how to get the detonator out of Todd's hands. Just in case he had the need to, or the chance.

Wasn't that he didn't understand the logic behind the plan. He just didn't like the plan.

Would have been a little easier if his traitorous head didn't keep showin' him pictures or River, surrounded by wraith in some dank room, all exits blocked. Lying limp in a hallway, heavy boots kicking her aside as they marched onward. Body dried up to nothin' but a frozen dead scream.

As much as he wanted to go after her, he knew he was bein' foolish.

Girl's faced reavers before and won. She's a government-trained killing machine, and a good dancer to boot.

So Jayne held his unease in check, and stuck to the plan.

The wraith weren't nothing like reavers. They were still monsters, and all that, but they weren't insane. They were organized and predictable- the two things that made the reavers so damned dangerous.

Hell, if he was bein' honest, Todd was nearer to human than some folks he knew back home.

Ain't like you never worked with someone who'd just as soon kill you.

Jayne planted another charge, at the base of the console where Todd had pointed, and tried to remember the last time his reassurances were at all reassuring.

Only seven more to go.
---

Five small tubes, already sealed in a solid looking case on the workbench, were all she'd been able to find. River packed them carefully away, before looking around again, wanting to make sure. The lab was sparse. Besides a few of the smaller instruments, which probably weren't all that important, there was nothing else worth taking.

"This is strange," McKay said to himself and not looking up when River moved to stand next to him.

"What is it?"

"I don't know. Huh." He resumed his typing for a moment, though, before letting out a satisfied sigh. He was grinning as he turned his radio on. "We're almost done here. Just a few more minutes. Where're you guys at?"

Jayne responded first. "Followin' an alien 'round, gettin' ready to blow the gorram ship that I happen to be standin' on." He sounded less than thrilled.

McKay rolled his eyes. "Yes. I Know. Strange lives we lead and all that. Ronon?"

There were three clicks on the radio, but Ronon didn't answer. River shook her head, confused, at the lack of worry on McKay's face. "Going off comms," he explained. "Three clicks. He's there, can't talk, and all's well. One, two, three." River nodded in understanding, but McKay didn't respond. His attention was once again on the data.

A frown slashed across his face. "I'm getting some strange readings… This is doesn't make any sense." Judging by the look on McKay's face, it wasn't good, but it wasn't immediately dangerous, either.

"Could the drones have caused it?" She tried to read over McKay's shoulder, but couldn't read the symbols on the screen. "Scrambled the systems?"

McKay shook his head and continued to read, so she hazarded another guess.

"Encryption?"

"Yes, but that's not the problem. Just." Wait. He dragged two fingers across the screen, bringing up another display. "Okay. I've got it all downloaded," he announced to the others, before beginning to talk his way through his thoughts as he began disconnecting the computer. He was talking to himself, but River listened anyway.

"There wouldn't be this much information if it was just the files we were expecting. It's too much data. Looks like it's been pulling telemetry from navigation, and feeding it back in." He leaned down behind the console again, the tension on the cable going briefly taut as he terminated the connection.

For an instant, River was unsure if he was making the noise she heard, or if it was coming from outside. Movement. They're coming.

"Oh, crap," McKay said, correctly translating her expression.

"I've got it," River assured him, before hefting Jayne's gun and stepping out into the corridor. She closed the door behind her.

She could still hear McKay's voice over the radio, agitated. "Shit. River-"

"Shh!" She rolled her eyes and crouched in the alcove, casting her mind out, trying to listen. She could hear the wraith nearby, listening back. Another four were coming behind them, further away. Gunshots would only bring them sooner.

But the first two were fast approaching. Another ten feet and they'd make her position, if they hadn't already.

Swallowing once, she took a breath and let it go. Choosing her first target, she shot.
---

The wraith returned fire, missing her by inches. Sparks rained down, prickling and hot, from the laboratory door's control panel as alarms began to sound. She tried to open the door, but it was stuck, sealed shut, with McKay on the other side.

Recognizing that her escape route was blown, she eased across the hallway and back, away from the oncoming footsteps. If she couldn't protect McKay, maybe she could lure the danger away.

"What's goin' on?" Ronon's voice was tense in her ear, but it was McKay that answered.

"I don't know. I'm stuck in the lab, and River's gone."

"River. You there?" Jayne's voice, finally, and River breathed a little easier, pressing the button on the radio as she surveyed the corridor.

"Can't talk. One, two three," she said, and considered tossing her radio to the side. She needed to listen for something useful, now. Couldn't afford the distraction of the wrong voices in her head.

A moment later, she heard it. The four wraith coming from up ahead were moving quickly now, spurred by the sound of gunfire. Down the hall behind her, past shrieking alarms, she could hear more, fast approaching.

She tried to listen to what wasn't there without letting it in too deeply. She could feel the sensory information, unfiltered as to meaning, but the intent was clear. All thoughts keyed in to smell blood in the water, to change course accordingly.

She was nothing more than prey, same as Jayne and the others. Simon and the rest.

She wanted to yell, to cry out, to not know fear. But she'd learned it, and she was alone on a strange ship, with sharks circling in the water.

She took a breath, focused on controlling what she could, and waited.
---

Over the gunfire, Ronon could hear the others arguing as he made his way past the pods and towards the holding cells.

He hoped his instinct was right, that Teyla and her unborn kid were more useful to him than a meal, but he wouldn't know until he saw her.

If you're wrong, there's an entire ship full of pods to search.

Excepting the alarms, there was silence in the corridor up ahead. He broke cover a little too fast, and the first blast came quicker than he'd expected.

Missed him, though. He didn't return the mistake. He kept to the wall as he crept forward, peering into empty cells and hoping he wouldn't find strange beseeching eyes looking back out at him. There just wasn't enough time.

He passed another cell, than one more. And then he saw her.

Teyla.

"Ronon!" She pushed herself up from the bed she was sitting on, and crossed the cell to stand at the entrance. She moved slower than Ronon would have liked, but as far as he could tell, it was due to the child she was carrying, rather than injury.

"Hey," he said, because he didn't know where else to begin and didn't trust himself to stop when he did. "Wanna get out of here?"

"I." For once, Teyla was lost for words, her eyes searching Ronon's face for them, but she composed herself. "Yes."

"Good." He turned towards the control panel and pulled out one of his knives, ready to disassemble the controls. He wasn't expecting Teyla's warning shout, but he spun around, ready to attack the wraith behind him.

It wasn't a wraith, though. It was a man, and he floundered in the familiarity. Kanaan.

He was opening his mouth to speak, but he hesitation cost him. Fumbling for his gun, he was unable to block the attack that came next.
---

The last of the wraith guarding the hyperdrive generator fell, and Jayne reached into his pack for the last of the C4. Todd was stationed at the door, and it seemed good a time as any to check in.

Dread sticking in his throat, Jayne tried to get River on the radio, but as before, she still wasn't responding. Instead, a strange woman's voice came on the line.

"This is Teyla, can you hear me?"

McKay responded, his voice a startled shout. "Teyla! Good to hear your voice."

"You as well. Ronon has been shot. I am in my cell, and am unable to determine if he was merely stunned, or…"

"Yes, well. Almost got myself out of here, I can't-"

"I'm on it," Jayne growled, handing over the C4 to Todd. "You got this?"

"Of course," Todd's grin was deceptively gracious. "We will reconvene in the attack bay where we arrived."

Jayne considered shooting him right there where he stood, but his feet were already carryin' him onwards.

Heading down one corridor and the next, he shot every wraith he came across and tried not to look too hard at the people in the pods lining several of the corridors. They weren't his concern.

Soon, he picked up on the trail of dead wraith that Ronon had left, and made it to the holding cells with no further incident.

Except.

Ronon was lying on the hallway floor, another inert body next to him. Drawing closer, he could see into the cell, found the woman staring at him suspiciously.

"Who are you?"

"Friend of Ronon's. Gonna get you out." He pulled Ronon across the floor a little, away from the looked at the gate. "How's this supposed to work?" Jayne asked, feeling woefully inadequate. He couldn't even tell where the gorram lock was, much less how to pick it.

"There is a control panel across the hall. If you were to number then from right to left, starting from the top, the combination is one-one-four-eight-five-seven."

Jayne pressed the digits, and looked over his shoulder to find the cell doors melting into the wall, opening.

Crouching next to Ronon, he looked up at her briefly. "You alright?"

"I am fine," she said, thankfully knowing her part in all of this. "What of Ronon?"

As if on cue, Ronon groaned, running a hand over his face. "Hate getting stunned."

"You okay?" Jayne ran a hand over his shoulder, unsure what he was supposed to be looking for.

"Fine. Where's my radio?" Ronon asked, puzzled, hand gesturing to his ear.

"Thank you for letting me borrow it," Teyla said, amusement pulling at the corners of her mouth as she removed Ronon's radio from her ear. "I was able to retrieve it when you fell."

Ronon turned his head at the sound of her voice, and Jayne turned away before he got stuck watchin' some joyful reunion scene. He still had River to think about.

"Jayne." River's voice came over the radio, then, like she'd heard him. "I'm fine."

Jayne buried his sigh of relief in an annoyed grumble. "Ruttin' hell, girl. What took you so long?"

"Fighting monsters. But I'm on my way to the rendezvous."

He heard the sound of gunfire and stunner blasts being exchanged somewhere on the ship's lower levels, too muffled to locate the exact location. When he tried to raise her on the radio again, she didn't respond.

Just have to take your chances in person. Jayne stood up, and found Ronon doing the same.

"We gotta get out of here," he was telling Teyla, trying to cover, but it was obvious that his side was bothering him. Maybe his arm, too. "Come on."

"Wait," Teyla said. "Kanaan. We must bring him with us."

"He-" Ronon began, only to be interrupted.

"He is not the enemy. He will be fine once we return to Atlantis."

Jayne turned away, when the pause hit, and scanned the area, watching for the next attack. This was a conversation he wanted no part of, and he really needed to find River, her silence makin' him right uneasy.

Ronon didn't to want to talk, either, and just grunted indistinctly. But he knelt down next to the stranger, wrestled the stunner from his hand, and began checking him quickly for other weapons.

Whatever he was doing, they didn't have the time for it, but then Jayne caught on. Ronon was trying to lift Kanaan, and his injuries were giving him trouble.

"You don't gotta do everything," Jayne decided, irritably, and helped him manhandle Kanaan into a kneeling position. From there, Jayne got him on his feet, and Ronon came up to grab his other arm.

"We gotta go," Ronon instructed Teyla, handing her his gun. "This way."

Thankfully, Kanaan was too confused to resist, and began to stagger after a few steps. With Teyla following close behind them, covering their six, they made their way out. There wasn't anything left to do but hope the others were doing likewise.
---

They reached the dart bay in time to see McKay run in from the other direction, pack slung over his shoulder, carrying his computer in his hands. He pulled up short with a terrified look on his face.

"Where's River?"

"I don't know! She was guarding the door while I was working, I turn around, and she was gone. Thought she was here- there's a trail of dead wraith leading all the way back to the-"

"Shit," Jayne cut him off, and lowered Kanaan to the floor in a motion so quick it was probably a drop. He surveyed the multiple entrances, trying to guess which of the several corridors would lead to River, but there were too many to know.

So guess. Random beats nothin'.

There was a hard pull on his shoulder, yanking him back, and he found Ronon's face close to his, all frustrated resolution and near-panic. "There's no time, it's gonna blow-" he growled. Todd's dart was heading their way, culling beam already engaged.
---

When he had eyes to see again, he was in the world again, and explosions were rocking the sky above.

River outlived her brother by far less than a week, and you can't get either of them home to rest.

"I'm sorry," McKay's voice was quiet, next to him. "Todd had a dummy detonator. I set the timer on the charges from here," he waved his tablet, "as soon as I made it to the dart bay. I counted four heads, and. I didn't-" he broke off. "I'm sorry."

Teyla was kneeling next to Kanaan, her attention unwavering, but Ronon was watching the dart approach, gun once again in his hand. Jayne hefted Vera, finding that the fight hadn't left his blood yet.

The dart, once it landed, was a silhouette against the low-hanging sun, and the engine settled into silence.

Don't matter how many times you cross the double cross, Jayne thought with bitter certainty, adjusting his grip, ready to take aim. Only thing that matters is gettin' the first shot in the end.

10. Resurrection

Ficlet: High Speed Dirt

2009-08-04T05:39:15Z

Title: High Speed Dirt
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: None
Pairing: John Sheppard/ Ronon Dex
Genre: Ficlet
Warnings: None.
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: Written for the prompt "John/Ronon: Jumping out of a perfectly good airplane," requested by maab_connor over on comment_fic.

High Speed Dirt

John got like this, sometimes, when he was all fucked out and waiting on the adrenaline crash. He'd get really excited, over really bad ideas, and make sure Ronon stayed awake to hear all of them.

"Let me get this straight," Ronon yawned. "Your people jump out of perfectly good airplanes?"

"Well, it's good practice for when you have to jump out of a perfectly fucked airplane. Also. It's fun." John's shrug dislodged the pillow under his head, and he yanked it back into position.

Ronon could have left it there. Could have waited it out. He'll fall asleep eventually.

But maybe Ronon was a little sweat-stupid too. "Sounds dumb."

"Wimp."

Ronon growled against the crown of John's head, but didn't open his eyes. "What did call me?"

"I'm callin' you out." There was a tired laugh, and a tapping on Ronon's chest, a finger sliding across cooling sweat, heading down, but veering lazily off course somewhere near his hipbone.

"Whatever." Ronon shifted his weight on the bed in preparation for sleep that was too far from coming. The cool air on his skin, as the air crept in the space between them, was a revelation.

"You're really adorable when you're grumpy and unarmed, you know that?" John tugged at a dreadlock, until Ronon swatted his hand away. "Anyway. There's a class and everything, show you what you need to know."

"There's a class? Wait. No." He looked at John, hoping he was tired enough that he'd missed the question.

Too late. John opened his eyes, blearily hopeful. "I'll go with you."

"No," Ronon said, wondering if he could convinced John to talk about it in the morning.

"Fine," John sighed, too sleepy a sound to convey any irritation. "I'll go on my own," he said, and finally fell silent.

Ronon lay awake for a while, waited until John's breathing evened out. Pressed a kiss to the side of his face and decided.

Fine. I'll go with you.

CFMWH #8

2009-07-31T08:23:09Z

Title: Can't Find My Way Home
Rating: PG for now
By: Jendavis
Spoilers: SGA: The Last Man, FF: Serenity
Pairing: Eventual Jayne Cobb/ Ronon Dex
Genre: Crossover
Warnings: None for this chapter.
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: Timelines diverge by converging.

Previous: 1. Man of Steel 2. Keys to the World 3. Lost 4. Gone Away 5. House is Not a Home 6. Still Standing 7. I Never Told You What I Do For A Living

8. Scary Eyes

River was thinking about blood, and how it wasn't the spilling that always mattered.

"What's got you lookin' so down?" Jayne, clearly uncomfortable with the asking, buried the question by fidgeting more than he needed to as he set up the second cot. Straightening the sheets like it was something he was concerned with, because he knew he wouldn't- maybe couldn't- show concern elsewhere.

River smiled, wanting to assure him that everything was okay, but he didn't look up to notice. "I'm thinking that of course it's genetic. It always is. Same reason the Alliance wanted. Too small to mean anything but everything."

Jayne rocked back on his heels, pushing the cot against the back wall of the tent and talking over his shoulder. "You work with any of that weird technology when the alliance had you?"

"No. They worked on me with weird technology."

Jayne was tense again, the way he got whenever her past loomed up into the present and Simon wasn't around to mediate. I miss him too. More.

"Right. Better'n chance odds there's a connection between the genes, what the Alliance done t'you, and your bein' able to read folk?"

River blinked. She hadn't been expecting Jayne to figure even that much out. Slid a grin across her face for a moment before putting it away, and turned her head towards the tent entrance for the first time since Zelenka left. "They're interested in me."

"Their interest resemblin' the Alliance's interest?"

"Too early to know."

"Don't think they're the type to go about messin' in your head, but. What d'you know?"

Lorne is angrier than he seems and his fear of failing chokes the air from him. McKay's mind is louder than his voice. Fast chaotic noise. Hurts to listen, too much, but if you do, you hear the beginnings of everything. Every thing. Zelenka is a steady hum. Calming. Order and peace and stones set carefully on the grid. The doctor is happy in her sadness, but her wanting hurts to look at. Ronon…

"I know we need them. I don't know why they need us, yet, but I know that they do."

She looked out into what she'd decided to call the courtyard, saw Ronon striding across and out of the camp, clearly angry. His frustration was familiar, looked a lot like Jayne's did whenever Mal was holding him back. She wondered what he knew.

A few minutes later, Jayne was seated on his cot and stripping down his guns, cleaning and checking them like he needed space to think. River could give that much to him, at least.
---

Should just go take care of it. No point in waiting for the others. Not like there's really any reason to stick around here being useless. Meet up, find out what he wants, kill him before he screws you.

Ronon yanked his knives out of the side of the empty crate and backed up, a little further this time, before launching them again, one after the other. They didn't line up like he wanted.

Lorne's not stupid. He knows as well as you do that it's probably a trap. Getting yourself killed won't solve a damned thing But.

Nothing was lining up like he wanted, and this wasn't helping him think. He noticed River coming up behind him, but didn't turn to look.

"You want some help?"

"Huh?" Ronon looked from River to the knives in his hand, and back to the target again. "Think I've got it under control."

"You don't, not really. And that wasn't what I meant. Distraction, of the hitting and kicking variety."

"Uh."

"Sparring. Is that something you people do out here?"

"Yeah…" Ronon sized her up again, knowing full well that her size didn't mean anything. Between the two wraith and the two guards, he had been wondering what she was capable of…

"Well?"

Ronon grinned. "I'll go easy on you."
---

The first blow connected. River got a second punch in and skated out from under his reach. She probably would've kicked his knee out, but he was already turning, and he had the alarming feeling that she was pulling her punches.

It was really irritating.

Sliding back to circle again, his eyes never left River's. They were earnest, aware, and more amused than anyone he was about to attack should be.
---

The pace was measured, steady but fast. River fought like Teyla fought, all lithe grace and tight control. She found balance when others would have fallen.

She didn't have Teyla's center, though. No one had Teyla's center, that ability to fight so peacefully. And it made all the difference.

There was motion back in the camp. Apparently they'd begun to attract some attention.

River's eyes darted and held on the crowd just an instant too long, her attempt to block the next hit coming up a little short, but she caught herself out of the spin he'd sent her on, sliding one foot back in the dirt to steady herself.

She was off balance, and she knew it.

Ronon attacked again, his kick sweeping low enough that her only option was to take the hit, or fall over.

Or not.

He had to stop thinking about this and just fight.
---

"You goin' easy on me, or are government trained killing machines trained to fall down?" Ronon knelt down next to River, but didn't get too close, knowing full well it could be a ruse.

River was scowling up at the sky in puzzlement. "You don't think when you fight," she accused, accepting his hand and letting him pull her from the dirt.

"I'm usually too busy fighting."

"That's my point. No plans, just instinct. I can't read your head when you do that. It's an advantage."

His own certainty, that she was speaking literally, gave him pause. He scanned the tree line, then the camp, and the gathered audience. "You keeping that to yourself would have been an advantage, you know."

"I'm gaining three advantages in telling you."

"And what are they?" Out past River, he could see Jayne standing at the edge of the camp, a short distance away from the crowd. He nodded back when he saw Ronon looking. As before, he was keeping River in his sights, but wasn't coming to join them. Apparently his overprotective streak didn't extend quite that far.

Then again, it doesn't have to, he decided, fingers prodding his ribs idly at the bruise that probably hadn't formed yet.

River still hadn't answered him, though. She seemed to be waiting for eye contact. Once she had it, though, she began to explain. "One. I know how you fight. Two. I trust you to know something about me. Gives you the upper hand. The position to trust me."

Ronon didn't say anything to that. Her words sounded overconfident, but there was logic there, like McKay when he knew he was right. He had a lot of questions starting to spin, but they weren't so distracting that he'd forgotten what she'd said. He thought about asking what the other advantage was, but the words weren't fully formed when River giggled.

"Three. I'm also making you very nervous."

Ronon snorted, felt his mouth threatening to pull into a smirk. That advantage, at least, made sense. "Whatever." Rolling his shoulders, feeling the stretch there, he reminded himself that he really should be informing the others of the development.

But he also knew that he wouldn't. River wasn't wrong about that, at least. Probably isn't wrong about a lot of things.

"So what now?" he asked, wondering just how far her answers really went.

River grinned, wide. "You should fight with Jayne."
---

As they approached the edge of the camp, Ronon could feel the tension creeping up his spine as reality reasserted itself.

"I'm fine, really," River was saying, clearly having no luck evading Keller, who was cooing over her dirty hair and the scratch on her arm. Apparently it was enough for a trip back to the infirmary.

Jayne watched them leave with the same bemused expression, and waited until they'd reached the tent before speaking. "So what was that all about? Earlier?"

"Something came up. Could be bad."

"Usually is," Jayne said, putting his tools away in his pack. "You allowed to tell me what it is?"

Ronon bristled at the question. I don't ask permission, he thought irritably, but Jayne didn't sound like he was trying to needle him. Just wanted information because he might need it sometime soon.

That, Ronon could relate to.

He began to fill him in. About the wraith, and the alliances with Todd. About how they never ended well. Lorne's decision not to send anyone through, since they didn't have the tenth of the resources they had last week.

He didn't tell Jayne how much it all chafed, or how many times they'd pulled through with less. He didn't want to admit to how unreasonable he knew he was being. It wasn't as if he didn't know how bad things could get. He understood Lorne's position. He just didn't want to.

He didn't mention John Sheppard, how he would have already been out meeting it all head on, consequences be damned, because this wasn't the time or place for telling stories. He was just spelling it out. Making his report.

When he finished, though, Jayne asked, "So what's your plan?"

Ronon rubbed at his face, wondering if Jayne was psychic, too. He didn't seem the sort to admit or to advertise if he was, so it wasn't worth asking. Made more sense than thinking that he understood.

"I head through, alone, find out what he wants, and kill him."

"And most likely get yourself killed in the process."

"Hasn't happened yet," Ronon replied, eyes tired, flashing to look away.

Jayne had been taking and bucking orders for long enough, though, that he could see it. He knew when someone was losing it. Lose the will, lose the fight. He knew when someone didn't give a damn any more.

Lookin' to get himself killed. Even if he don't mean to or know it.

"Fair 'nough," Jayne forced a grin, though, and stood up. "Should probably make sure River ain't braidin' poisonous plants into your doctor's hair or some such. Gotta talk to her, get her ready."

"For what?"

"Well, it ain't like I got ethical concerns regardin' the dispatch of vampiric aliens." Jayne smirked. "And I ain't gotten myself into a stupid situation in days now. Don't want to get rusty. We're comin' with you."

"Jayne," Ronon started, the name coming out more awkwardly than he wanted, but he didn't know where to go from there.

"Look. You jus' said your people can't spare the backup. We can."

Ronon nodded, like he appreciated the offer, but still had something else lurking. "Are all of your people psychic, or just her?"
---

Jayne froze, reined in his impulse to attack and took a breath. Sat himself down again and regarded Ronon carefully. Reminded himself that Ronon wasn't the real threat. "She tell you that?"

"Yeah."

"Gorram it," Jayne shook his head, scowling. "Look. If it gets out-"

"Relax." Ronon understood the admission. "Don't think anyone else needs to know," Ronon said, though the until you prove me wrong was clear in his voice. "Things here are insane enough already."

"Thanks," Jayne said, wary. But now that it was out, and he was thinking 'bout it, it was a little bit of a relief that someone else knew. One less person he needed to worry about.

Ronon coughed, his voice gruff. "You, uh, know how it works?"

The query sounded awkward, and Jayne got the sense that Ronon didn't ask a lot of questions that weren't relevant to the fight at hand. Now, though, he sounded curious. Conversational.

"Figure we're just open books to her, but…" Jayne scratched his head. "She don't seem to like it much, tries to keep a lid on it when she can. She can listen in, though, when she wants to."

"That's got to get old," Ronon said, looking at Jayne like he was expecting something. Not reassurance, though. Just a baseline, some idea what he was supposed to think about it.

Jayne nodded, thinking. "Yeah. But." She wouldn't have known how I done her wrong. Wouldn'ta know how sorry I was, after. "It ain't all bad. Bein' known, I guess. You get used to it, and far as I know, she ain't never turned no one's thoughts against 'em."

That seemed to be enough for Ronon, and he changed the subject abruptly. "What did you do before you got here?"

With Jayne's luck, it was liable to come out anyhow. "Uh, fought, cheated, stole, drank. Made darin' escapes. Standard security." Compared to readin' minds, it ain't that much of an admission.

It also had the effect of making Ronon laugh, full out. Made Jayne feel like he'd finally said somethin' right. Like it was worth doin' it again if he could.

"You probably don't want to mention that to the others."

"No shit. What about you? Mercenary?"

Ronon frowned, though his eyes lost only a little of their humor. "Near enough."
---

Though there was still an hour before sunrise, the camp was already beginning to come to life, in fits and starts.

Ronon wished he could do likewise, but he was numb, tired. Though River and Jayne had been quiet, their very presence in the same room was enough to keep sleep from coming for most of the night. It would take some getting used to. He wondered how long, but it was futile.

Probably won't matter in a day or so.

This early in the morning, the sound of conversations in the mess tent was a quiet hum, wavering at the edge of notice, but it wouldn't last once coffee had been consumed.

He contemplated grabbing another cup himself, weighing it against the option of going for a run.

Ronon would have avoided him if he'd seen him coming, but he didn't see Lorne until he was turning away from the percolator.

"I know what you're planning," Lorne accused, quietly, but there was no malice in his tone. "Walk with me a minute."

There wasn't any point in denying or avoiding it, so Ronon followed him out of the tent, coffee in hand, and asked, conversationally, "Got a problem with it?"

"You know I don't like it. We're sitting ducks right now. The best thing I can do to protect my people is to let Pegasus think we're all gone."

"I know." And he got it, he did. Keeping a low profile wasn't even a plan, these days. It was an assumption. He wasn't going to bring anything down on the others, but Lorne probably already knew that much.

He probably did need to hear the rest of it, though. "I'm bringing Jayne and River with me."

"You sure that's a good idea?"

"No. But it is what it is. You going to stop us?"

Lorne frowned at him, humor twisting at the side of his mouth. "You don't get it, do you?"

"What?"

"I can't order our people into something like this right now. They're bearing up well, but their heads aren't in the right place for missions right now. And even if they wanted to volunteer…"

"They're soldiers. Chain of command. I get it."

"Sheppard only could make you follow orders when you wanted to, and we both know it. My people have to listen to me." Lorne talked out of the side of his mouth, like he was admitting something, either accusing or conspiring. "You don't."

He must have seen something he didn't like in Ronon's expression, because he hurried to continue. "I didn't come out here looking to argue. Just wanted to let you know that while I can't commit people, I'm still trying to watch your back. Anything you think you need, guns, C4. Just ask."

"Already got my gun," Ronon said, drinking his coffee, letting it burn his throat as he swallowed. Everything else was superfluous.
---

They stepped out onto a landscape that was quiet enough to unsettle a person. It did seem to quiet River, though. The gorram xiao gui had been bouncin' all over the place, ever since she found out they were going through the gate again.

Never mind why we're going. Never mind what's on the other side.

They had planned to arrive early, and Ronon was messing with some handheld device, scanning the area to make sure they were alone.

Jayne was keeping an eye on River, wantin' to make sure she wasn't about to start actin' up. Yesterday weren't so far away that he didn't remember. But there was no threat here.

There wasn't much of anything, truth be told. Just desert scrub and sun that would probably get uncomfortable 'fore too long. Nothin' much by way of cover, neither. Not from the sun, and not from anyone looking to attack.

River, for her part, seemed more interested in the rocks that stuck out of the arid dirt at the horizon. Figures.

He checked his guns again, not really thinking about it, and pretended not to watch Ronon as close as he was. He looked bloody-minded, the way Zoe got when she knew they were gettin' themselves into somethin' stupid.

Mal would have pulled him aside, never mind the fact there weren't no aside here, for a few words. Would've come up with somethin' along the lines of be careful. You ain't the only one goin' into this. Don't need to go in lookin' to die today, dong ma?

But Mal wasn't here, and Jayne wasn't Mal.

Then, there wasn't much else to do besides find a good place to stand ready, eyes on the gate.
---

After all the waiting, and a few moments of tension too heavy to breathe under, the appearance of the wraith himself wasn't all that climactic. He was tall, thin, and, unlike the ones that had attacked Serenity, had a face, with eyes and everything. Those eyes, though. There weren't nothin' right 'bout them.

Most importantly, the wraith had come alone. Didn't have any weapons on him, either.

From what Jayne remembered of the other night, though, he probably didn't need any. River was stone silent, standing a little closer than Jayne would've expected. Ronon, for his part, was moving forward, stepping up to Todd like he didn't care, or just didn't fear.

It all amounted to the same, probably.

It was the wraith that spoke first, though, having surveyed their faces.

"Where is John Sheppard?" His voice was gravel, the words soundin' like they'd crept up his throat over the bones of the dead. Sent a chill down Jayne's spine, if he was bein' honest about it. Hopefully, River didn't notice.

"Not here," Ronon said, clearly not in the mood for niceties. "What do you want?"

"I have some information that I think might be of use to you. I have merely come here to offer an exchange."

The wraith grinned, then, all horrid teeth. "I saw you, Ronon Dex, preparing to attack the lab of the half-breed your people call Michael. I myself was in the area working towards a similar goal. When you attracted Michael's attention, I was able to achieve my objective."

"You destroyed the lab."

"Yes. And I must thank you for keeping his troops so thoroughly occupied. While you were so engaged, I was able to follow from a distance as he made his escape. I assume you are aware of the retribution Michael brought to Atlantis?"

"Yes." Ronon grit his teeth, fingers brushing over his holster.

"I regret I did not have the capabilities at hand to prevent the attack," Todd offered, clearly enjoying Ronon's irritation. "However. That is not what I have come here to discuss. Once the darts were returning to the hive above the ruins of Atlantis, I managed to capture one of Michael's lieutenants. What I have learned from him is proving to be most intriguing. It seems that, in the wake of the destruction of his lab, Michael has ordered the halt of all research into hybrid creation."

If that was meant to impress or cow Ronon, it wasn't working. "Not surprising. He didn't have a lab anymore."

Todd scoffed. "You think that installation was the only one he maintained? Foolish."

"Okay, so why did he stop?"

"It is unclear at the moment, and not the issue at hand."

"So what is the issue?"

"His fleet continues to grow in strength, and his weapons capabilities are beginning to become a minor concern."

Ronon smiled at that, all gleeful spite. "He's kicking your ass all over the galaxy, isn't he?"

Todd rolled his eyes. "From what I understand, his new weapon, once completed, will be a larger threat to human populations than it will be to my own."

"But then you starve. Okay." Ronon paused. "So what do you want us for?"

"While his research into the hybridization process had to be spread out, in order to ensure the proper isolation of test subjects, his weapons research is centralized on his hive."

"Then ain't he riskin' blowing up his own ship?" Jayne interjected, a little startled to hear his own voice, and mildly surprised hear the wraith's laughter.

"It is no immediate threat. It seems that this weapon is of a different nature, and this is why I need your expertise," he said, turning again to Ronon. "Particularly that of your Doctor McKay, if he still lives."

Ronon nodded his head to the side, not confirming or denying. It was a move Jayne had seen Mal make hundreds of times.

But never to a heishoudang liumang like this ugly creature.

"Yes. As I assume your capabilities have become limited in recent days, I can arrange the transport necessary to infiltrate the hive, and escape, once the mission has been completed."

"Hang on. You have the means to get out there, why don't you just blow it up like you did Michael's lab?" Jayne noticed Ronon looking at him from the corner of his eye, and was mildly surprised not to find censure there.

"Because we need to know what Michael knows," Ronon hazarded a guess, talking like Todd's angle seemed clear enough, but he knew there was something he was still missing. Addressing the issue, he jutted his chin out towards Todd. "What aren't you telling us?"

"The reason why you will agree. Michael's hive does not only contain the results of his research, but a prisoner. Possibly two."

"You don't know how many?" Ronon asked, but he could feel his hopes being raised, whether he liked it or not.

"While I do understand much of the human reproductive cycles, I have never been involved in husbandry myself. I find it a... distasteful practice."

"The hell are you-" Jayne started to ask, but a sharp nudge between his ribs had him turning to find River's warning scowl.

Ronon's stance hadn't changed. He still looked ready to fight the moment the wind shifted. He stood, waiting but not hesitating, like he was waiting for it to happen, holdin' on for the excuse.

But if he was aware of Jayne's eyes on him, he didn't show it, just came out of his fugue on his own with a sharp nod.

"Be here at this time tomorrow. We'll think about it."

9. Before The Worst

A/N: Okay…finally getting to the action, next chapter, I promise! In the meantime, I've got a quick question for anyone who cares to weigh in: After looking around online a bit, it's become apparent that the SOP for dealing with the Chinese is to italicize the phrases. (I've even noticed a few stories that have glossaries, which I might compile at some point. If I'm feeling energetic.) I haven't been doing so here, but it strikes me that it might make it a little easier to parse out when reading. I'm wondering if I should start, and go through and fix those parts I've already got posted. Would that help, or does it not matter?

And there you have it: the longest statement I've ever written with regards to the use of italics.

CFMWH#7: I Never Told You What I Do For A Living

2009-07-28T08:03:39Z

Title: Can't Find My Way Home
Rating: PG for now
By: Jendavis
Spoilers: SGA: The Last Man, FF: Serenity
Pairing: Eventual Jayne Cobb/ Ronon Dex
Genre: Crossover
Warnings: None for this chapter.
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue, don't take this too seriously.
Summary: Timelines diverge by converging.

Previous: 1. Man of Steel 2. Keys to the World 3. Lost 4. Gone Away 5. House is Not a Home 6. Still Standing

7. I Never Told You What I Do For A Living

There was dirt below his feet as he ran, surveying the landscape and assigning meaning to landmarks as he passed. It was an old habit, but one that had become more useful in the recent months.

Ronon kept the camp within the horizon, though. Tomorrow, he'd stray past the camp's sightlines, but not yet. He didn't have his bearings, and his legs, if he was honest with himself, were reluctant to carry him too far out. He still didn't have the energy.

He did, however, gave the camp a wide berth. It was easier to see everyone from a distance. From here, he couldn't read the defeat on their faces the way he could when he passed too close. It kept him from thinking too hard on the fact that there were fewer than there should have been.

He ran onward, between the tree line and the river, slowing only to make note of where the banks narrowed. It would be a good place to install a fishing weir.

Even if their supplies held out, it probably wouldn't be a bad idea to start finding food sources. The gardens behind the camp had been planted as soon as they'd selected the location for the alpha site, but passing by them now, he could tell there was nothing ready for harvest. People needed to work, to regain some control over their situation. Fishing wouldn't take the ammunition that hunting would.

Deciding to run it past Lorne when he got back, he began his circuitous route back to camp. For the first time in what felt like ages, he had a plan.
---

Ronon sat himself under the shade of a large tree near the gate. Hacking the branches he'd gathered into rough stakes, he listened idly to the conversations that came over the radio. They were more rare and sporadic, now, than they'd been on Atlantis, and the constant chatter of voices in his ear weren't as annoying as they'd once been.

The security team assigned to the gate had seemed a little curious about the people Ronon had told them about, but there wasn't much for them to go on, so their conversation had petered out some time ago. Compared to the discussions on the radio, they were silent by comparison.

At least, that was the case until McKay dialed in to the open channel and heard that a couple of strangers now had their gate address. His voice was an angry hiss as he complained to Lorne.

"Less than two days ago, we lost Atlantis. In much the same fashion, I might add," McKay was saying. "And I'm sorry, but I don't see where Ronon gets to make decisions that affect the entire camp!"

"Chill, McKay," Lorne responded. "Zelenka says they're good people, and Ronon trusts them."

"Yeah, well. Don't you think that's a little strange? I mean, it took him how long to become comfortable with us? He's not exactly the outgoing type."

"We've got a security team on the gate, ready for anything. It's just two people. Tactically, it would have been better for them to attack yesterday, when they weren't outnumbered."

Ronon wanted to jump in, to argue, but he remained silent. It's not like he expected McKay to be reasonable, really, even after his apologies yesterday.

Besides. Part of him had to admit that it was a stupid move. Careless. And the argument on the radio was evidently starting to make the security team twitchy. If someone didn't step in, tempers were likely to flare, sometime soon.

Teyla could have calmed everyone down, of that, Ronon was sure. If they'd done a better job tracking Michael down, if they hadn't failed so utterly, she'd probably be doing just that right now.

If we'd found her, a lot of things would be better, now.

Instead, he forced himself to reassess the threat that Jayne and River posed. Not much of one. They seemed to be good people. River was a little unusual, but after the past few days, she had her reasons. Jayne seemed to be the soldiering type. That, he understood.

Ronon was almost finished stockpiling stakes- he'd been sitting there for a long while, now, and still there was no sign of gate activity. No sign of River or Jayne. He watched the gate for a while, as if he needed to look to be sure. He ignored the niggling thought that the wraith had might have returned and turned Jayne and River into two people he'd almost known.

And if the wraith found the address...

As if waiting for that thought to cross his mind, the gate began to initialize.
---

She'd been hummin' to herself ever since they'd put the valley behind them, but when River first saw the gate, she went silent and wide-eyed.

It wasn't like it usually was, when she looked at things and saw more to 'em than everyone else did. She was starin' because she actually hadn't seen nothin' like it before. She was awestruck. For once, Jayne could relate.

Didn't mean he didn't have to go first, though. Wasn't no chance of her goin' through otherwise, that much'd been apparent right off. Ain't a trick, he thought, over and over so River could hear, probably said it out loud, too, but he wasn't sure.

Two steps and a blink later, he was on a different planet, raising his eyes to find soldiers pointing guns at him.

Half a breath later, he spotted Ronon, signaling the others to lower their weapons, and looking, oddly enough, relieved to see him. Like maybe he'd been expectin' someone else. It wasn't an expression he was used to seein' on the face of someone who wasn't crew. Odd, but it didn't bear thinkin' on right now.

Taking a few steps forward, he looked over his shoulder to the water-that-wasn't-wet. Worst-case scenario, she wouldn't come through, and he'd have to go back for her. Irritating, but there wasn't no way 'round it.

Another moment passed, but then River stepped slowly through the gate, her head tilting this way an' that as she found the new world around her. New people, sunlight comin' in from a different direction. All of it.

Her eyes narrowed when she saw the guns, and she dropped her pack. It was all the warning she gave.

The first soldier was disarmed and falling to the ground, and by the time she attacked the second, it was the bar on Beaumonde. It was that bad day they lost Wash, all over again, and there was something he knew he should say, but he couldn't remember the words, just that they were weird. Something about chickens laughing? Was that it? Something Simon'd made him promise to remember…

He almost had it, but there was a blast, and River was falling to the ground.

Ronon lowered his gun, studying Jayne cautiously, like he might raise it again if he didn't like what he was about to hear. Didn't matter, anyway. Jayne had two guns trained on him and he knew it. "Don't do anything stupid. She's just stunned, and you damned well better hope ours are, too." At that, one of the uniformed soldiers knelt, checking the pulses of the fallen.

Jayne was relieved to find that they were alive, but he wasn't going to play it like that. Not right now, with a gun in his face. It was irritatin'.

There was a voice from his right, and he turned to see the man from yesterday. Lorne. "What the hell was that?"

Zhe zhen shi ge kuai le de jin zhan. Jayne raised his hands, allowed one of the soldiers to grab his sidearm form the holster. Pretended not to be annoyed that they found the other two as well.

"This is all a misunderstandin'. She got spooked, is all." And probably had cause to, what with your weapons pointed our way, he didn't add. "We ain't here tryin' to cause problems."

Ronon looked skeptical, like he was ready to take aim again. Jayne looked over to River, lying on the ground, and figured makin' a deal would be the fastest way out of this. "Might want to get some restraints on her 'fore she comes to. Don't know how she'll take to wakin' up with guns in her face."

Lorne and Ronon exchanged quick glances, but if there was a signal there, Jayne couldn't read it. "You're serious, aren't you?" Lorne said, pulling a bewildered face, and raised his hand to his radio. "We got three down. One stunned, we're going to need to restrain her. Two, ah, were."

"Knocked out by a girl, sir," one of the soldiers added helpfully, trying not to smirk over his gun.

"Keller, you get that?" Lorne nodded, quirking a brow in River's direction as he listened to the response. "Right."

After surveying the scene a moment longer, Lorne sighed. "Okay. Look. I'm going to assume this is all a misunderstanding, for now. We'll get yours and ours over to the infirmary, and then you're going to explain to us what that was all about."
---

Jayne carried both his pack and River's as they headed towards the camp. The two soldiers were moving under their own power by the time the medics came out, but River was bound to a field stretcher, arms and ankles tied down to the sides with thin plastic strips that were probably sturdier than they looked.

And if she wakes up, decidin' she don't like what she finds, it ain't like these're my people. Told 'em about the restraints, so it ain't like I didn't give 'em fair warning.

It wasn't the best of outcomes, but it wasn't cause for overmuch concern, neither. The restraints didn't look like much, and Jayne had to admit, it didn't actually look like anyone meant her any harm. And if they did, well, it wasn't like her instincts were likely to let them get too far.

Jayne was the only one that knew it, but he kept watch on her face, as they headed towards the camp, all the same. Lorne led him into the tent after the medics, and Ronon followed, standing near the entrance like he'd been assigned the post.

'Course, her wakin' up and killin' everyone might complicate things more'n they need to be.

If he was relieved that they let him keep her in their sights while the doctor or someone checked her out, he didn't notice it. Didn't think about it, really, until he actually looked at the doctor.

Wo de tian a.

Kaylee's face was peering up at him with distant concern in her eyes, moving a little to get his attention. "I'm sorry, are you okay?"

"I'm uh. You." Jayne blinked, but the strangeness didn't go away.

A few moments more, though, and the differences became apparent. The doctor was harder around the edges. Thinner around the mouth, like she didn't smile enough.

Uncanny, but it ain't her. Get yourself together, man.

Jayne shook his head, trying to knock his brain in its casing a little, jar it back to now, some sort of coherency.

"You look a lot like a dead friend of ours," was all his stupid brain supplied, still spinnin' too much cover with a better response.

"Oh!" The doctor started, eyes darting over in Ronon's direction, or maybe she was looking at the exit. "I'm…sorry?"

No one said anything for a long moment, and Jayne didn't need to check the other faces in the room to read their confusion.

"Well, this is ruttin' awkward," Jayne decided, scratching at his chin. It worked, at least a little bit. The doctor smiled back at him, thin-lipped and terrified, and turned her attention to River.

Lorne's voice was quiet, measured when he spoke. "She was acting normal before you came through?"

"Normal as she ever is, which ain't much. But look. She ain't. She's dangerous, but she ain't evil. Won't have you hurtin' her none over it, so's if it comes down to it, I'd just assume leave with her 'fore she wakes up." He turned, keeping his eyes steady on Lorne's face. He needed to know if it was going to be a problem.

But as usual, his timing was off. The sheets were rustling, and Jayne turned back to find River stirring. Before he could speak or move, the doctor was leaning down again towards the cot. Shit.

He sat, frozen, as River opened irritated eyes to find Kaylee's ghost leaning over her.

There was that stillness again, only this time, it wasn't just him that was hangin' on the next moment. River's reaction was going to be everything, was going to define how this all played out.

Of course, River didn't react the way he expected her to. She just blinked a few times before looking at the doctor with one eye squinted shut.

"Who are you?" she asked, and Jayne let out of a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding. It was curiosity, not frightened disbelief, shadin' her voice.

"I'm Jennifer Keller." If River had actually seen the resemblance, she wasn't showing it, and time began to move at the right pace again as the doctor continued. "You were knocked out, scared a lot of people, and I'm here to make sure you're okay. How are you feeling?"

"Tingly." Attempting to shift her position, it was then that River realized she couldn't move her arms. Jayne could sense the panic threaten to rise.

"River," he said, moving out of the chair towards the cot, wary of the others as he drew near. "It's okay. You attacked some folk. Like on Beaumonde. But they're okay, you didn't hurt anyone. They were just doing their job," he glanced up to Lorne for confirmation, too quickly to see if he actually had it. "You mind tellin' us what the hell was goin' through your head?"

"Confused. Tension, everywhere. You all." She shook her head, closing her eyes. "I'm. I shimmered through space again. It's unsettling. I." Her eyes focused again on Keller again. "I didn't hurt anyone?"

"Yes, they're fine. Headaches, but yours is going to be worse in a few minutes, I'm afraid. Sorry about that. It's a side effect of the stunner." She cast a distasteful glance towards the corner of the tent where Ronon stood.

Smart move, choosing River's side, Jayne thought.

The tent flap opened then, and the man who'd been fussin' over water filters the other day stepped through. "Lorne, what is-"

"I still don't know what's going on," Lorne cut him off, irritably, glaring expectantly at Jayne. "And I'm thinking we should get to that."

Jayne looked up from River to see four sets of eyes on him, and he sighed. Best get on with it, then.

"Uh. Okay. Well, she's a super genius, as well as a government trained killing machine who's had a ruttin' awful week," and can read your mind, he didn't add, "but she's not quite as loose in the head as she used to be."

River smiled, raising her eyebrows as if that would enable her to see everyone's faces better. "I'm also a really good dancer."

Time slowed down again, in the space before the response.

"These are the people you entrusted our gate address to?"

"Shut up, McKay," Lorne sighed, and told Keller to cut the restraints.
---

Everyone fell silent, not knowing how to proceed from there, and then they turned their attention back to Jayne.

"Look. Things are real messed up in our part of the 'verse. She was smart. Got singled out. Kidnapped and messed with. Her brother stole her back from the Alliance, got her out of there, but the damage was already done. When she's threatened, she freaks out."

Jayne wasn't sure that it was the entire truth, but it was the most expedient one.

"It was a security squad," McKay squawked.

"First time through the gate? Might've upset her." Ronon offered, only shrugging when McKay sneered, clearly thinking it was the stupidest thing he'd ever heard.

Seriously, Ronon, Jayne thought. How d'you listen to that guy all day without wantin' to beat some sense into him?

Lorne seemed to be considering it, though. Either Ronon's suggestion, or Jayne's, from the looks of it. "What alliance are you talking about?"

"The Alliance. Right. Uh." Jayne tried to figure out where to start unravelin' that ball o' twine.

"The unified government. They're a little bit fascist," River explained to the tent ceiling. Jayne figured it was near enough the truth, and let it ride.

"Lorne?" Keller gestured towards the tent entrance, and the two of them, along with McKay, walked outside to discuss whatever they needed to discuss.

Ronon stepped closer to the cot, into River's sightline. "You okay?"

"I feel different. But well. Better." She tried to shift again, her face turning away. "Thanks for stopping me."

If Jayne was surprised to hear it, Ronon looked like he'd been hit with his own stunner. His hand went up under his hair, grabbing at the back of his neck as he cocked his head. "Ah. Right. You're welcome. And. Y'know. Sorry it had to happen."

Jayne wanted to get Ronon alone, see what intel he could gather, but didn't have the time, because Keller and Lorne were coming back in.

Lorne scratched at his eyebrow like he didn't know where to begin, but wanted to end it as quickly as possible. He drew near the cot. "Look. River. You planning on attacking any more of my men?"

"I wasn't planning on attacking them the first time. It just. Washed over. I'm sorry."

"Okay, here's the deal." Lorne decided, heaving another tired sigh. "Partially because we're really nice people, but mostly because, well, we don't have the facilities to hold you, we're going to spring you. But I would take it as a kindness if you didn't pick any more fights."

"Aye aye, Captain."
---

They'd all gone to the tent where the food was and sat down, but it was clear that River was more interested in the rest of the camp than she was in eating, and Jayne wasn't the only one that noticed.

Ronon, once he was done eating, nudged Jayne while looking across at Lorne, who was starting to look irritated again.

"Want me to show her around? Figure you two gotta…" he waved his hand vaguely as he trailed off.

"Fine by me," Lorne said, and River brightened measurably, her attention suddenly zeroing in on Jayne with a hopeful look on her face.

She's askin' permission. Huh.

"Yeah, sure," Jayne said, like it was something that happened all the time, and watched her stand up, ready to follow Ronon out.

Distraction gone, Lorne seemed to relax. "Ronon's not wrong. Figure we've got a lot of ground to cover, so I'm going to just… Yeah. As you know, our base was destroyed. When Earth can't make contact, they'll have a ship come pick us up, and we'll figure out where to go from there. At the earliest, it will be a little over a month, but it could be longer. You're welcome to come back with us, if you don't feel like trying your luck here."

"Is Ronon going?"

"You'd have to ask him. You don't have to decide now, I just wanted to make sure you know the option's there."

"Shiny."

Lorne blinked, but understood the assent. "So. Ah. At the risk of sounding undiplomatic, I know your ship got hit, and that you're apparently from the future or something. But beyond that?"

"Right. Well. The ship, Serenity's her name. Owned and operated by Captain Mal Reynolds, and I run. Ran security." Ran a lot of cons on security as well, but that ain't here nor there. "She was kidnapped by the Alliance, 'til her brother went and rescued her. He was a doctor, took care of her and the rest of us."

Lorne nodded, having heard all this. "Am I to understand that she requires psychological help?"

"Probably, but I don't even know the half of what's going on with her." Jayne wished he had some other answer, some convincing lie, but there wasn't any good way 'round the truth. "She really has been getting better. Came out of the last few days like it was nothing, but maybe it ain't hit her yet. Maybe it did, earlier. But I can't honestly say."

Looking out into the center of the encampment, he could see Ronon walking slowly, apparently giving River the lead in the expedition. "Anyhow. Figure, we're here now, an' apparently there ain't no way we're gettin' home, less you all got time travel figured out?"

"No. Barely understand how the gates work, truth be told."

"Figured."

Lorne snorted. "How so?"

"If we're from the future and ain't got it, don't make no sense to think you all do."

"Fair enough." Lorne was grinning, though. It was a good sign.

"Okay. Ronon told me a little about what y'all been up against. Sounds like a hell of a lot, an' you probably got a lot of other things to worry 'bout besides two strangers with a busted up ship. Appreciate you sendin' your man out to look at it, but the fact is, we're still stuck."

Jayne took a breath. Tried to remember how Zoe handled negotiations. Wished he could remember somethin' more useful than outright beggin'.

"Our crew's dead and we're grounded. Me an' River ain't got a lot of options, but. I'm old hand with fightin', huntin', a little bit of farmin' and such." Can steal from, con and screw over anyone you want. "Odd jobs. Figure I might be able to chip in if'n you could use me. And River might not look like much, but she has a way of comin' in handy at the oddest times. You let us stay on until we get our bearings with all this, an' we'll chip in wherever you can use us."

Lorne nodded, like he'd known the proposal was coming, and had already made up his mind. "Deal," he offered his hand, and they shook on it.

Negotiations thus completed, Lorne slouched back in his seat a little, a little more at ease. More open like. Friendly. "If you don't mind me saying it, you seem to be handling all this very well."

Jayne hadn't thought about it, there just hadn't been the time. "Been to all sorts of different planets, and this ain't the only unpleasantness anyone's seen in the 'verse. This trip. Planet. It's just further out, or back or whatever. But seems to have the same people's anywhere else, for the most part."

"Most part?"

"Exceptin' the wraith. Still ain't got my head 'round them yet."

"Takes a while, believe me."

Jayne shrugged. "So, they trying to take over your planet? What's their deal?"

"They feed on humans. We're food to them. So far, they haven't been able to make it all the way out to Earth, but it's always been a concern."

Jayne considered this for a moment, thinking about all the displays at the ports, the museums and freak show containers of faked alien corpses. "Huh. Where I'm from, Earth stopped being' a concern hundreds of years back, an' we still ain't seen no aliens. Wonder why that is."

"You should ask Zelenka. Or McKay."

"That bein' the choice, I'm choosin' Zelenka. Seems…" he broke off. Probably ain't smart to go 'round insulting the folk before you know the score 'tween 'em.

Lorne laughed, though, and it was enough for Jayne to decide that he was probably a likeable enough guy. "You wouldn't be the first."
---

"So you go through the gate all the time?" They'd finished circling the settlement, and River looked to be contemplating the path leading away from the camp.

"Yeah."

She nodded, pulling a strand of wind-blown hair out of her mouth with a distasteful expression. "Aren't you worried about not arriving where you're supposed to be?"

"I'm usually more worried about not getting to the gate."

"The destination isn't as much the question as the leaving…"

If it was a question or a statement, Ronon couldn't tell, but figured it was better to agree either way. "Sure."

And there it was again. That uncomfortable suspicion that made him feel guilty for having it.

She's just strange. Not an enemy. Get over it.

There wasn't really much else to see. They'd already done one full circuit of the camp, and it Lorne hadn't come on the radio to say that he and Jayne were done talking.

Ronon, perhaps a little too late, realized that he had no idea at all what a girl like River would be interested in. There wasn't really much around by way of distraction.

"Want to go see what Zelenka's up to?"

"Yes. I would like very much to do that," she replied, mimicking Zelenka's accent perfectly. It was better than Chuck's imitation, and Ronon laughed, entertaining the notion of setting up a competition between the two of them, but-

But Chuck isn't around any more.

River seemed to sense the change in mood, and was quiet on the way over to the tent the scientists had taken over. What kind of science they were doing, he didn't bother to ask. It looked to be the usual kind, where Zelenka and McKay scribbled out each other's equations and argued.

"No, Rodney, because if you are assuming these gravitational effects on an unstable wormhole-"

"Hey," Ronon interrupted, stepping inside. "Showin' River around, you guys busy?"

"I am," McKay said. "But Zelenka keeps interrupting me."

"Consider it peer review," Zelenka replied, waving River inside. "Come in. I take it that all is now well?"

"Yeah. Keller sprung her. Lorne's talking to Jayne right now, so."

"I see," he said, edging around the worktable and talking over his shoulder at McKay, who was again busy scrawling on the whiteboard that someone had set up. "You know, Rodney, it might be of some use to talk to someone with practical time travel experience," he teased, smirking at the eye roll he couldn't have seen. "I trust nothing more than a few headaches have gone around since last I saw you?"

River nodded distractedly, apparently busy examining some of the gear laid out on the worktable, and Zelenka noticed her interest. "Ah, I see you have found…" he trailed off, glancing at Ronon warily.

It struck Ronon that maybe he shouldn't have brought her here. He'd already apparently overstepped his bounds giving them the gate address. There was a chance that Ancient technology was a topic that was similarly off limits.

Zelenka, though, with his usual casualness, made the decision for him.

"Ah, yes," he said, gingerly picking up the small device in question. The casing was open, and several wires trailed from it to another computer. "This was found, well. It doesn't matter." He removed two of the wires and pressed the casing back together loosely before handing it carefully to River.

It was only when it started to glow that Ronon recognized it as one of the personal shields they'd been trying to reverse engineer.

"Oh my," was all Zelenka said. River stared at it, her grin wide, not yet understanding what it meant.

Ronon raised a hand to his radio. "Lorne. We're in the lab, you should probably come see this."
---

"What did they do this time?" Lorne growled, leading Jayne into the tent, where he found River and the others staring at a glowing green thing.

"Nothing, yet." McKay said. "Just seems that the universe is trying to get in the way of some useful research once again."

"Shut up, McKay," was, as had become usual, Lorne's response. "So, this mean she's a carrier?"

"I'm just holding it," River answered, confused. "I haven't carried it anywhere."

"What he means is that you carry the gene that is required to operate certain pieces of technology," Zelenka explained. "First off, I need you to think about turning it off."

River gave him a quizzical glare, but the shield's green glow went quickly dark.

"Okay, good," Zelenka smiled, reaching out for the device and replacing it on the table. "Wonderful."

"You realize that you've just blown our chances of getting good readings on an uninitialized device," McKay grumbled, turning back to his whiteboard.

"But you know what this means-" Lorne started, only to be interrupted.

"Yes, yes. The force is extremely strong with this one. It's Sheppard all over again. Now, if you don't mind, how about discussing the rest of the exposition elsewhere? Some of us have work to do."

Jayne backed out of the tent and let the others pass before his curiosity got the better of him. "So. What's going on?"

"River can operate Ancient technology."

"Old stuff?"

"Ancient as in technology built by a people we call the Ancients."

"The people who built the gates," Ronon clarified. "Don't worry, it's probably a good thing."

"As long as you don't get into stuff you shouldn't," Lorne said ominously, but Zelenka, apparently of a different opinion, was still smiling excitedly.

"She can make things glow green. Cool, but so what?"

"That isn't the limit of Ancient technology," Zelenka offered. "And when we can, we should test you for the gene as well. But anyway, for example, if we found a chair-"

"What?"

"The chair. There was. It is a chair that operates several of the controls for Atlantis. Our. Yes. Well. There isn't one here, but if there was one that was operable, she would be able to fire drones just by thinking about it."

"Drones?"

"Missiles. Impressive ones, which can destroy an orbiting Wraith ship."

Jayne thought on that for a minute. "So," he began, "You're tellin' me that she can blow up ships with her brain?"

"Yes. Possibly. Essentially."

Ain't ruttin' fair, Jayne thought. She's already been able to kill people with her brain for years.

"What?" Lorne spoke so sharply that Jayne froze, sure that he'd spoken aloud. His non-telekinetic brain was spinning so hard, trying to come up with an explanation that sounded reasonable, that for a moment, he didn't realize Lorne was talking into his radio.

"Christ, it never ends," he grumbled, addressing the group this time.

"What is it?" Ronon asked, frozen but for his fingers, which wavered over the gun at his side like he was preparing to fight.

"Todd," was all Lorne growled by way of explanation. "Zelenka, I need you to find quarters for these two-"

"There's space in my tent," Ronon offered, already turning away. "Last one on the southern side, across from the armory."

"Yes, of course," Zelenka still sounded friendly, but there was a new tension there, wariness, as he gestured for Jayne and River to follow.

8. Scary Eyes

Shipping Meme Thing: grabbed from scrollgirl

2009-07-26T19:26:24Z

SGA SG1, a little Firefly, and I'm calling my SGU OTP right now. :)

"One True Pairing" ship: SGA: John Sheppard/Ronon Dex. I know, big shock.

"One True Threesome" ship: Ronon/Teyla/John, I suppose

"Canon" ship: Vala/Daniel: Because I'm halfway through season 10 right now, and Vala is the awesomest thing to happen to the series in seasons, now. Vala picking on/ flirting with/ totally-steamrolling Daniel is now my favorite part of the show.

"Not Quite Canon but Should Be" ship: Weir/ That One Dude She Went To Lunch With in "Sunday." Because, dammit, Weir was awesome, Simon was a dork, and it turns out, I've got a soft spot for obnoxious tenacity. (See above. Also, my favorite romantic comedy is 10 Things I Hate About You, so...yeah).

"If This Happens I'll Stab My Eyes Out with a Spork" ship: Keller/Ronon. Probably wouldn't have minded it if it wasn't such a triangle thing, because I really don't like the idea of someone losing out. I liked Keller with Rodney (though the balcony scene at the end was totally cloying), because it was pretty much the only time on the entire show that she seemed sure of herself, or what she wanted, rather than whining and hemming and hawing over everything.

"You Are One Sick Bastard" ship: Jack/Baal. Sorry, I just don't see it!

"I'm One Sick Bastard" ship: And yet I'll 'ship John/Todd!

"I Dabble a Little" ship: Ronon/ Jayne from Firefly. At the time being.

"It's Like a Car Crash" ship: Keller/Ronon. Because it was awkward and took up way too much of season 5. I really don't like triangles, though, and never really have, and so it was kind of a relief that she hooked up with McKay. Also; because the episode where they hook up was funny, and I liked that they hooked up in the alternate future thing in "the last man."

"Tickles My Fancy but Not Sold Quite Yet" ship:  Totally stealing scrollgirl's answer here: Ronon/Amelia. Felt kind of shoved together after all the Keller stuff, but Amelia's one of the characters I wish they'd done more with.

"Makes No Canon Sense but Why the Hell Not" ship: Woolsey/Lorne. They could have fantastic pillowtalk about Sheppard's reports. :)

"Everyone Else Loves It but I Just Don't Feel It" ship: John/Rodney: But I think it's due to overexposure more than anything else.

"Guilty Pleasure" ship: Zelenka/Anyone- seriously. Zelenka makes me happy.

"I Can't Believe I Read It and Liked It" ship: I read one story that was gen, but it focused on Parrish and Ronon. Something about Parrish starting to grow some plants that had been native to Sateda for Ronon. It was really good.

"Favourite 'Older/Younger'" ship:  Jack/Daniel

"My First 'I Could Never Abandon You'" ship: Jack/Daniel. Though I haven't read much lately, so maybe I could abandon it....hmm.

"Favourite Devotion" ship: John/Ronon. Dammit.

"Favourite Never-Met" ship: I don't get this one. Uh. Vala/Zelenka. Would be awesome.

"Favourite ~~Pervy~~ TOTAL CRACK ship: Fandom can make anything and everything pervy, depending on the writer, so I don't have an answer for that. But I do already have my SGU OTP: BEGBIE/RICHIE VALENS. It's gonna rule, trust me. Or. You know. Don't.

"Favourite Dominance Battle" ship: Daniel/Vala; The first time they meet, there is fighting, attempted hijacking, name calling, kissing, and Daniel doing that "I'm squishing your head" *pinch pinch* thing. And it just goes from there. It's the only time I've ever actively enjoyed shippy stuff on one of my shows.