A continuation of sorts to yesterday

[laleia]

Title: Tentatively Titled The Present As It Came To Be
Fandom: Leverage
Rating/Pairing: PG for implied nudity, gen
Summary: Hardison was bored. Then he got busy. Now Parker and Eliot are amused.
Author's Notes: Written for lilbabiangel888



“I hate you both right now,” Hardison declared. “You,” he jabbed a finger at Parker. “You’re responsible for this,” and he gestured to himself. “And you,” here he pointed at Eliot, “I can’t believe you called her in the first place!”

“Hey,” Parker said, “I could have left the two of you to rot in prison, right? You should be hailing me as your hero.”

“I didn’t need any rescue,” Hardison grumbled. “I had everything under control.”

“Really,” Eliot drawled. “And what did your plan of action entail?”

The silence was filled with Hardison’s scowl, and Parker’s straight face as she tried to keep back her laughter. Eliot didn’t even bother to hide his amusement.

It all began with a job …

Although it’s strictly against policy to take on jobs without running it by the rest of the crew (and Nate pitches a hissy fit when he finds out), everyone does it once in a while. Oh, nothing big, of course. Everyone knows anything big goes to Nate (or goes to Hardison, who runs the numbers before passing it on to Nate), who then greenlights it or not, as the case may be.

But one- or two-man jobs are a piece of cake. I mean, why would you need to tell everyone else if righting a wrong is as simple as hacking into a computer system and signing up an asshole up for spam? Or as simple as teaching some scam artist a lesson with your fists? Or stealing the Hope Diamond and putting it back safely exactly three days later.

(Okay, maybe that last one wasn’t to right a wrong so much as prove a point …)

The point is that Hardison in particular, being somewhat of a smartass who was like a god on his computer and could part seas if commanded by Nate, had a habit in particular of dispensing justice and smiting villains via the Internet from the safety of his room. Generally, the small-scale stuff he did on the side only required 30 minutes of thought and 60 lines of code, tops. Now and again, he came across a bigger fish and then he might bring it into Nate, but then came …

… well, if we’re going with a fish metaphor, it wasn’t a big one, nor was it the small wimpy kind you’re legally obligated to throw back in the ocean. No, this fish was average-sized, on the small side but big enough he couldn’t necessarily handle it on his own.

It’s the kind of fish that grow in size each time you retell the story …

--

The thing was, this job wasn’t a simple hack-and-grab, it required actual face-to-face con action, and a little bit of sneaking around as well. Not so much he might need the whole crew, but maybe one other person to help run a distraction while he poked around, that was it.

The problem was who to ask. Nate was out of the question, of course, because of the aforementioned hissy fits. Sophie was generally too preoccupied with Nate to be reliable; also, Hardison didn’t like to admit this, but Sophie was somewhat of a diva – any job she joined instantly became All About Her, and this was Hardison’s case and he wanted it to remain that way.

Parker would be preferred (and wouldn’t that make for a cute first date? A small two-man con that they could run together; something to consider for the future since Parker wasn’t exactly a normal person and wouldn’t understand the concept of a normal date), but she was a little … volatile. With time, and with a less tricky con, this might be a good idea. But … perhaps not this time.

(Anyways. Peter Hastings, the target in question, didn’t really swing that way …)

Which left Eliot.

--

Eliot grumbled, of course, but not any more than usual and that’s how Hardison knew he was getting bored, and looked forward to some action, any action. Of course, then he found out what his role in the job would be, and his protests were a little more vocal.

Hardison had learned his weaknesses over time, however, and all it took was a few more carefully-rationed sob stories about the evils of Peter Hastings, and Eliot folded.

So while Eliot tried his hand at seducing the big, bad CEO of Hastings Refinery, Hardison employed a few of the tricks he’d picked up from Parker to sneak into Hastings’s office and checked up on the hard-copy files Hastings relied on (which, really – if the man were sane and normal and technologically up-to-date, his files would be in his computer like anybody’s should be, and Hardison could have accessed them with his laptop at home!).

And everything would have went smoothly if it hadn’t been for one thing.

(Okay, maybe two things.)

First was Eliot’s stupid battle-honed reflexes. One minute, Peter Hastings was admiring his muscles and murmuring suggestive innuendo, and the next minute, Eliot had him up against the wall, his arm pinned behind him. Which of course got Eliot thrown out.

Second was the earbud falling out of Eliot’s ear during the ensuing struggle. Hardison’s still not sure how that happened, because the earbuds are designed to stay in, but there’s a first time for everything.

This is why Hardison had little to no warning that while he was happily tapping away at the keyboard and acquiring all his useful information, two burly security-guard types were making their way up to check the main offices. He had enough warning to palm his jump-drive and slip it into a potted plant. Now that he’d done all the hacking he needed to, it wouldn’t be difficult for Parker, or even Eliot, to sneak into the building after-hours and retrieve just the jump-drive.

Unfortunately, Peter Hastings was clever enough to realize he must have taken some sort of data, and when he held up his empty hands and proclaimed that he was totally innocent, they could check, he had nothing on him, they took him at his word and completely stripped him in an attempt to see if he could possibly be hiding anything in or under his clothes.

And then, because they were evil corporate types who couldn’t get the police involved as it risked any of their dirty laundry being aired, they locked him (still naked!) in a storage closet while they ran his clothing through whatever security stuff they had, to see if he was carrying any trade secrets with him.

They’d sensed his elite hacker skills and had made sure to put him in a room with no computers, and no windows to be safe. What they hadn’t checked was to see whether the storage closet had any vents which … granted, Hardison hadn’t bothered to check either until a blonde head poked through one of them.

Of course, as grateful as Hardison had been for Parker the Rescuing Angel, he’d been less grateful when she dismissed his concerns about being naked.

“It’ll be easier for you to crawl through the vents this way,” she said, “as long as you make sure none of your dangly bits get caught up in any sharp metal bits.”

And then, before he could express concerns about what sharp metal bits his dangly bits might get caught up in, she had disappeared into the vent and he was obviously supposed to follow.

Of course, it wasn’t that simple. Apparently, she’d expected him to magically know he was to pick up the vent cover and replace it, which of course he hadn’t, so he’d had to crawl back out to retrieve it, and then he couldn’t quite get the hang of replacing it from the inside while facing away and so he dropped it two or three times and had to climb back out to retrieve the vent cover each time.

Then, Parker had to take a side detour so she could pick up the jump-drive that he’d left in the potted plant, after which there had been some crawling backwards that Hardison had not enjoyed, as he was ever concerned about his dangly bits and potential sharp metal bits and his hyper vigilance manifested more as paranoia.

Suffice to say, by the time he was outside (still naked!), free of the vent and anything that might threaten his dangly bits, he was not in the mood to be mercilessly mocked by Eliot and Parker.

“Just you wait,” he scowled. “Just wait until I get some clothes on. Then we’ll see who’s laughing.”