A Leverage: Redemption Season 3 fic in the Pardicer series
Chapter 1: Everything
Parker is done changing, as far as she's concerned. She knows what she likes, who she loves, what makes her thrill. She is learning to take breaks. She is living her best life.
Eliot is learning to take breaks, too, and how to do more of the things that make him happiest.
Hardison is… Hardison is trying. But it seems like it's actually getting harder for him to take time to have fun. Harder to have fun, when he does.
That's maybe a problem.
Today's conversation is the biggest clue that something is wrong, but it's definitely not the first. Parker has been worried about Hardison.
Maybe that's why Eliot made sure the conversation happened. He knows they need to have the conversation. Both of them.
And Hardison is good at talking about how he's feeling.
Usually.
Sometimes he feels self conscious about feeling things he thinks he shouldn't, which is silly, after all the times he reassures Eliot that Eliot is allowed to feel whatever he feels, after all the times he tells Parker the same.
And maybe there's a little bit of that, here. He doesn't want to admit that he maybe wants to retire, when that was such a hard question for the three of them the first time Eliot brought it up.
But also, Parker gets the feeling that Alec doesn't know exactly what he wants. Or what he's feeling.
It's a lot harder to say the stuff that even you haven't figured out yet.
Parker is very familiar with that.
Hardison says he doesn't wanna do this anymore. What they do. The things that are thrilling to Parker. Which… okay. This is not about Parker. It can't be. She tries not to be weird about it when she asks, to make sure she knows what he's talking about.
He says, "Yeah, it's fun with you because I love you, and I love doing stuff with you."
What makes things fun for Hardison?
Parker thought she knew. Parker thought this was fun for him. What else?
He likes dancing with Parker, and with Eliot too sometimes, but Parker thinks that isn't something he would pick for himself. It's one of a long list of things Hardison has fun doing because the other two like it so much.
What does he want to do?
Just the hacking?
She takes a moment to celebrate his hacking, in case that's what he needs to be happier.
It doesn't seem like that's the answer, though.
She keeps an eye out while they set up the rest of the heist.
While so, so much art, so many valuables, old, old paintings and older sculptures, flood into the tiny vault.
They brought it all here with a couple of words and some ones and zeroes.
It almost feels like cheating.
"I never thought I'd ever say this," Parker says, "but I think that may be too much stuff to steal."
A terrible thought hits her. What if whatever is wrong with Hardison is contagious? What if that's why this doesn't feel quite right?
"Is stealing still fun?" she asks urgently. "Tell me stealing's still fun."
"Oh, it's very fun," Hardison assures her. Then he reminds them why this particular stealing feels a little bit like they're sitting on a bomb. And they narrow down the list a little.
So they go down to the vault to do a moderate amount of theft.
Only Eliot has lost some blood today, and Parker knows what she feels like when she loses, like, maybe a third of that much blood, and it's a little bit wobbly. Eliot is looking a little bit wobbly, and if Parker can actually see it, that means he's not doing very well, actually.
And the guard is big and serious.
Then, Parker has an idea.
"You're not having fun doing my stuff or your stuff," Parker explains to Hardison. "You gotta try Eliot's stuff!"
The results of that experiment are mixed.
Why isn't Hardison having fun with the same things anymore?
After they get back to New Orleans, he tries again to explain. He tells the team he needs a break. To figure things out.
"I want to fix things," he says.
The way he explains it, Parker is reminded of the way Eliot always insists on fixing things the right way, like a car or their house in Seattle or here in the NOLA base. The way if you are always just patching the roof because there's one leak that needs to be fixed right now, you can spend all your time patching and never get around to replacing the whole roof.
But Parker doesn't know how to replace the roof on a whole town, or a whole country, or the whole world. And she doesn't think Hardison knows either, or he'd already be off somewhere doing that.
That's what's making Hardison sad.
He distracts from that by boasting, and then changes the subject to Sophie's new secret identity.
But when it's just the two of them again, he knows they need to talk about it.
"It's a feelings thing," she tells him. "I hate those."
He explains how everybody is changing. Everybody on the team is working on themselves right now.
Parker is done, though. Parker is Parker.
But maybe if everybody changes together, like, separately but together? And Parker doesn't join? Would she get left behind?
No. They wouldn't do that.
But maybe she'd miss out on something special, anyway. Someone she could be, and just hasn't given a chance.
She doesn't know who that is.
But she could try to find out.
Somehow.
"Okay. Well, six months," she says.
"Yeah," Hardison promises.
"I could think about that too," Parker decides. "Even though it makes my skull so itchy."
He reassures her that the two of them are always going to be the two of them, no matter what.
—
"You knew something was up with Hardison," Parker says to Eliot. "He talked to you about why he's sad. What did he tell you? You don't have to tell me. But I'm worried."
"Me too," says Eliot, which makes Parker even more worried.
She curls into Eliot's side, where things feel safer. Eliot slings an arm around her shoulders.
"Every time he grows up a little more," Eliot says, sighing, "the stuff that bothers him feels a little more familiar to me. And every time that happens… I worry."
"He's starting to hurt like you do?" Parker asks.
"And spend more time angry, like you do," Eliot agrees. "Yeah."
"Oof," Parker says. Hardison should be happy. He shouldn't be like them.
"And one of the things Alec and I talk about a lot, a lot," Eliot says, "is how much we wanna do, but there just isn't time for all of it. Back when I first thought about retiring, we sorta talked around it, and when the three of us got back together after, we talked about it then. How much I wanna do because I kinda wanna do everything, and that's not gonna happen. And when Alec started doing more of the big stuff and less of the smaller jobs, we talked about it again, how he was feelin' it too. And then again, when you started talkin' about retiring. You remember that."
"You had to let go of doing some stuff so you could do more other stuff," Parker sums up.
"I did. And it was so hard. And you helped. So much." Eliot shakes his head. "You helped until it hurt you. More'n once. So. Thank you."
"I wanted to," Parker tells him. "I love you. I didn't want you to hurt."
"Love you too," says Eliot, squeezing her just a little.
"And Alec has a hurt shaped like that?" Parker asks, mournful.
"Little bit," says Eliot. "It's different. With me, it was always about what I did at my lowest. I had to look forward, had to think more about what I could do. With him, it's not like that. It's always been about what he could do. And the problem is he still thinks he can do everything. Because there's nothing he can't do once he puts his mind to it."
"So he can do anything," Parker says.
"Maybe. Problem is, being able to do anything isn't the same as being able to do everything." Eliot sighs. "Doesn't stop him from trying. But there ain't a way to raise a big enough barn you can put everyone in the world inside it."
"Oh. I think I get it now," Parker says. "He wants to put a new roof on the whole world, but the world doesn't work like that, so he just has to keep patching."
"Yeah," says Eliot. "Yeah, that's a tough one."
"I need to figure out how to help him," Parker decides.
"Yeah?" Eliot asks, jostling her companionably. "He your project this time?"
"Maybe. But he wants to work on himself, alone, so I said I'd work on myself, if that's what we're all doing. Working on our own stuff."
"Yeah. He's gotta be ready, helping someone who's not ready to be helped doesn't work so well."
"That sucks."
"Yeah, it does," Eliot agrees, low and heartfelt.
Parker thinks.
"I know he wants to fix things more, fix things bigger. Like, make people help each other. Make the big governments and the big corporations better. And he's right. They should be better."
"We don't get into that stuff for a reason," Eliot says heavily. "I've been there, in the middle of big secret missions where people try to make things go their way by force. And it's messy, and it's not worth the cost." He looks at Parker. "Alec doesn't wanna be the kind of person that could run those missions. And I think he just needs some time to figure that out for himself. That there's no way to go that direction and stay… grounded. Stay fighting for the little guys." He tilts his head slightly, thoughtfully. "But… you know, if anyone can figure a way around that, it's our guy."
"Yeah," Parker agrees.
"So let's let that brain try and fix the world. If he figures it out, we help him fix the world. If he doesn't? We'll be here to help him deal with that."
"Yeah," says Parker again. "We'll be here."
Then Parker has a terrible thought.
"You know how when the oil rig burned, we almost lost ourselves?" she asks Eliot softly. "What if Alec gets lost? Like that? What if he turns into that kind of person?"
"He won't," Eliot says, sounding sure.
"But what if he does? You said he keeps getting angrier and more hurt."
"That's not… exactly right," Eliot says, grimacing a little. "I think that stuff was always there in all of us and that's why we got to be family so quick. But sometimes you just try not to think about it. And thinking about it is part of the growing. You gotta do that part, sometimes, before you can get happier."
"Yeah," Parker says, remembering therapy. "Taking the bad stuff out and poking it to see what it does."
"Something like that," Eliot says, with just the ghost of a smile.
"But are you sure Hardison won't get lost? We almost got lost."
"But we didn't."
"Because we had each other. And he's alone. He's been alone so much."
Eliot looks at her and says, "I'm sure."
"How do you know, though?" Parker insists.
"Because he's Hardison. Because his idea of watching someone suffer for fun is sending 'em embarrassing magazines or making 'em drink water with dust in it. Because the reason he's hurting is he doesn't want anyone else to hurt. Ever again."
"Yeah," Parker agrees tentatively.
"He's not gonna end up like us," Eliot says. "He loves people too much. If he ever breaks, he'll break different than we did."
Eliot has this way of saying things that isn't reassuring, which makes it feel true, so somehow it goes back to reassuring again.
"I don't think I want to know how he would break," Parker says.
"Me neither," says Eliot.
They hold each other close.
"But if he has to retire," Parker says, "if he has to go do something that isn't this, that isn't us, to be happy, then we have to let him go. Right?"
Her voice wobbles. She doesn't care. It needs to be said. Just like it needed to be said when it was Eliot taking time to figure himself out.
"…Yeah," Eliot agrees, so quiet. "But I don't think that'll happen. And I know, I know, more'n maybe anything else in this world, that he won't stop loving us."
"Yeah," Parker says, because that sounds true.
"He loves us so much," Eliot says. "Some days I think that's what'll end up breaking him." He sighs, shaking his head, but it's fond. "Smartest idiot I ever met, and loving us and being soft hearted is a prime example."
Parker is quiet, because it feels like there's more to this thought.
"He told me he doesn't like watching me get hurt because of him," Eliot says.
"He knows you're only still a hitter because you want to be, right?" Parker asks.
"Yeah. I don't think that helps."
"You do still want to be a hitter, right?" Parker checks.
Eliot grins at her. "Hurts a little more these days, but that doesn't stop it from bein' fun."
"Okay," says Parker, "because we have other people who can fight if we need someone. There's Quinn and Tara and…"
"Park," Eliot interrupts. "I'd hate to stand back and let someone else do all the fighting." Then he looks thoughtful. "Come to think of it, I wonder if teaching Alec to fight didn't make him feel like that, too."
"Huh." Parker thinks about that. "Maybe."
They're quiet for a moment.
"You gonna work on you?" Eliot asks. "Even though you're perfect already?"
Parker smiles. He doesn't flirt with her very often, because it's not her favorite game, but she appreciates it anyway. "That's what I said!" she responds, mock-indignant.
"Well," says Eliot, "you just let me know if you need any help."
Eliot is the best.
They'd be okay this time, she thinks, even if…
Well.
It won't come to that. They will figure out how to help Hardison.
Even if Parker has to remake herself to be a better machine for fixing this kind of problem.
Chapter 2: Sophie
Sophie is working on herself. Just like Eliot when he and Maria were dating, she's trying to figure out how to find the people who will see her, if she lets them, and more importantly, how to let them. How to trust people.
So Sophie asks Eliot for his perspective, about how to tell if a guy is lying to a woman he wants to date.
"I just want to go home and get some sleep," Eliot says grumpily.
Eliot admitting he needs sleep like a human person is music to Parker's ears. It means he trusts everyone on this team not to think he's weak because of it.
Unfortunately, he's not going to get to sleep in his bed very soon, because this town, Gillon, is like a little puzzle box of a trap. Corrupt cops. Bikers. Yummy pancakes. A guy who is distracting Sophie with books of poetry and an impressive list of things he's good at.
The pancakes are at the forefront of Parker's mind at the moment, but she does notice and understand why Sophie is getting feelings. Her guys are good at so many things like him, and sweet like him.
Alec hacks for good and volunteers with refugees and makes sure the Leverage teams stay safe and get their benefits and the equipment they need and plays the violin so lovely it makes Parker cry. Eliot fights for good and takes care of cars and houses and does all kinds of sports and helps veterans get jobs and teaches people to grow food and cooks food so tasty it wakes Parker up inside. And that is just the beginning with them.
So when Jack is kind to strangers in his town and helps animals heal and knows things about romantic poetry (romantic poetry is not something that speaks to Parker, but she knows Sophie likes dramatic speeches from Shakespeare and stuff like that), Parker gets it. It adds up.
It turns out he's on the town council, too.
Parker is still just a bit taken aback when Sophie introduces them all to Jack with their real names.
Sophie has been trying to trust people, and maybe the problem hasn't been her, maybe it really has been the people. Because Jack is sudden.
Like breaking glass? No. No part of this is sharp.
Like a door that was locked, swinging open.
—
Plan A is a bust, and turns out there's drug running involved. So that complicates things.
(Apparently Jack can cook, too. Almost as well as Eliot.)
And Sophie is making a new plan, and it's…
The theatrics of the council meeting, the way it's going to set up the town for a lot of hurt…
"Where's the cavalry?" Ethel asks.
"At the right moment, they'll be here," Sophie says, not really to Ethel, but over the comms, and to herself. "Probably," she adds. "Possibly." She takes a deep breath. "I trust."
Wait.
Parker recognizes this plan. From the time with the hockey.
Breanna and Ethel send out the whispers this time, the little words in the background that, in the end, if people stand up for what's right, will turn the tide.
Last time, well, Nate had made plan A, but the final play had been Parker's call.
Nate couldn't have made a plan like the one Parker had made for the job with the hockey teams. Nate couldn't trust people to be good. His believing-in-stuff part of his brain had been a little bit not okay.
And the Sophie who had married Nate, she matched him a little too well, sometimes.
But Nate isn't here anymore.
And Sophie is letting herself believe.
She's letting herself have faith in people.
She's letting herself get caught up in new love.
She's letting her soul-bird out of the cage that was staying inside the outline of a partnership with someone who can't change any more. Because he's gone. They can't change together, so Sophie has to let go of Nate, so she can change.
Parker watches as the bikers douse the diner in gasoline. She's not worried.
Neither is Sophie.
"Ethel, the plan was never about knocking out a corrupt mayor," Sophie says. "It was about trying to convince the people of this town to rise up and save it for themselves."
And that's true. This kind of plan never works unless the people they're saving can band together and stand up and do what's right.
That's how barn raisings work. That's how new roofs get built.
It can't be a one person job. It's everybody's job to change things. It's just a question of getting people to realize that they can.
And this kind of plan? The kind Parker came up with to save Marko? It doesn't just work to help one person. It saved this town.
If they keep pushing it bigger?
Parker wonders how many people it can help.
—
Parker does want to know if there's some cloning going on here. Because there are a lot of people who seem to get a lot of things done.
If she could clone her boys, then they would be able to get all the stuff done that they do now, but also rest.
But Breanna assures her that there is not, and it's just a couple of corrupt assholes who collect titles and then ignore the responsibilities that come with, and one guy who does everything that needs doing.
So Jack is a lot like her boys.
Parker makes a note to tell Sophie to try and get Jack to take a vacation. Because these types, sometimes they need to be persuaded to rest.
(Eliot sleeps in his own bed that night, dead to the world for hours and hours, with Parker as a blanket. Hardison is taking the time away that he needs. It is possible.)
Chapter 3: Hurley and Clay
Parker has a feeling this mark, Clay, is one of the complicated ones.
Parker has been keeping track of Leverage International while Hardison is on sabbatical. She knows Hurley is drinking again because he's hurting, and he's doubting himself. And he's on his way to NOLA HQ.
She turns the pieces over in her mind; they're starting to look like part of the same puzzle.
Parker remembers the White Rabbit, and Charlie Dodgson. She remembers being in a bad place because they were broken up with Eliot, Eliot was hurting, and she didn't know how to help him. She remembers Sophie trusting Parker to finish the job Sophie had started. Parker remembers being on that roof with Charlie, and the stakes being so high, and she was the only person who could cool down the mark.
And she did it. Charlie didn't die. He got better. He was one of the rare marks who could be good, with just a little nudge.
And after that, she felt better about her abilities, the other stuff in her life, too.
Sophie helped her by trusting her, and Sophie helped Nate, who drank when he was hurting. Sophie helped the mark by helping her team be the best they could be, by helping them grow.
Parker thinks about Hardison, how he is hurting right now because he wants to be able to work bigger. To do more stuff for more people without having to help each person individually, every time.
Parker thinks about working bigger.
She used to work alone, and then she worked with a team, and then she worked with all the teams, and now, because Hardison is away, finding himself, like Eliot was when they ran the White Rabbit, like Sophie was before that, Parker is in charge of all the teams.
She's good at the teams. And last year she helped Eliot. But Eliot is like her. They're mirrors and facets, they shine off each other in ways they recognize. Parker could understand what to try, to help Eliot.
Parker doesn't know how to help Hardison.
Yet.
Sophie's plan to save Gillon was borrowed from Parker, and it meant Sophie had to grow, and trust people more.
If Parker wants to grow to help Hardison,maybe she needs to borrow a plan from Sophie. From the time Sophie trusted Parker to finish the job Sophie had started. Even though the emotions stuff makes her brain so, so itchy.
She slips the address for NOLA HQ into Clay's pocket, and lets him run.
—
There's a difference between a mark who's not an immediate threat anymore, and a mark who's put in a position to stop being a threat for good.
Hurley sees the same thing in Clay that Parker did, the same thing Parker knew he would see.
A guy who made a mess, not because he was greedy, but because he had lost perspective, and took silly risks, and let things get out of hand.
Just like Hurley.
Parker had been the right person to save Charlie, all those years ago, because they both lost someone and it broke them a little, made them draw up inside themselves and keep away from other people. When Parker saved Charlie, looking at the part of herself that knew what he was feeling, it reminded her that she had people. That despite everything, she was not alone.
Clay is different. Clay is a gambler. The kind of guy who's weak for a pretty face. The kind of guy who sees things falling apart and gets more reckless, throws more of his life at the problem. Lets things get as messy as they can possibly get because he doesn't realize he has anything left worth protecting.
The kind of guy who can learn to be better, if someone gives him a chance.
Hurley does it. Clay gets better. So does Hurley.
Parker's glad she trusted him.
But it still makes Parker itchy. Things could have gotten out of hand. There were too many moving parts. More humans means more mess means more chances that something she can't account for goes wrong along the way.
That's one of the problems with scaling this stuff up. Like Eliot said, the people who make things go their way by force, on a larger scale? Those are not the kind of people Parker wants to be like.
Those are not the kind of people Hardison wants to be like.
This is about as much as she can handle. She has a lot of people she trusts to do good work for her, more than she ever thought possible, but if she had any more, things would start to get impersonal. She wouldn't be able to guarantee that things would be done right.
People might get hurt.
They have to find another way.
Chapter 4: Parker
Parker knows herself. There are feelings that show up late or not at all, but she knows herself a lot better than she used to and knows that sometimes that is just who she is.
She knows what kind of person she is.
She is dangerous. She is not quite right. She will do anything, if she needs to.
And then there is Hardison, who has never been broken. Who does not know his own limits.
Who seems determined to push those limits as far as they will go. Like he isn't doing his share.
There's a heaviness in him lately, a sadness.
I just need to figure out how I can keep doing this.
Like he can't justify himself, as he is.
If Alec Hardison can't live with himself, after all the good he's done…
What hope do any of the rest of them have?
If he isn't good enough, what does that say about the rest of them?
One of the international teams brings a case to Parker's attention.
It makes her want to do… things. Things outside of the bounds of what she can ask the team to take part in.
Terrorize. Torture. Burn. Kill.
Things that Alec would never do.
Because he's never broken?
No.
Eliot is right. Hardison would break different. He would…
He would destroy himself with his own hands, before he ever let himself become that kind of person.
The kind of person Parker is. The kind of person Eliot used-to-be-and-would-be-again, if she asked.
Would Hardison still think she was good, if he knew her all the way? All the way down to where the worst anger burns?
Is she really… does she really want to be good? The way she insisted in the ice crevasse? Or is she just selfish, keeping Hardison and Eliot by her sides because she knows Hardison loves her more than she deserves, and Eliot would do absolutely anything for her?
If she had to make the decisions herself, not because of how the team does things, but because of who she is and what she believes, would she still be good?
That's a question. That's something she doesn't know.
Maybe should find out.
But there have to be… safeties. Checks.
There have to be people ready to stop her, if she needs to be stopped.
She takes Ramirez for a little ride.
This isn't about the con anymore. It's about her. So who is she, when she's alone with one of the worst of the worst?
She talks aloud to him, or not really to him. To herself. It won't make sense to him. But she likes to play scary crazy, she always has.
Oh, Ramirez is terrified.
She likes the terror. Maybe a little too much. It feeds the hungry anger, red and glowing, that she feels when she looks at this man. Who feeds children into his moneymaking machine and doesn't care if they get chewed up.
She thinks about the edge they're balanced on, about how easy it would be, tipping all this over the edge.
Death is for stopping people who can't be stopped any other way. She thinks she'd like to see this man die. She'd like to be certain that he's not going to hurt anybody else ever again.
She rattles the handles, to see more of that terror.
The buzzing stops.
Because Eliot switched off the grinder.
Good, good, he's here. He can judge her, stop her if she needs stopping. And witness exactly how dangerous she can be. This is as naked as she can make herself. The worst thing she can show him.
How drunk she can get on the terror that people like them inspire.
She knows he can see it. She knows he can see it all in her eyes.
She waits for his verdict.
This was the point, maybe, of the whole exercise, or at least one of them, to put her naked soul in Eliot's hands.
This has been her job to plot, from the very beginning, but, well, every con is a give and take. Every relationship, too.
It's like a dance, really. Most of their jobs are pretty choreographed, but this, this is improv, and Parker is leading.
Well.
She still lets Eliot pull her back from the brink.
The leash pulls both ways. She's never tested that before. If he needs her to stop, she will.
That's good to know. It does make her feel better about knowing all his secrets and how to hurt him worst.
Even when Eliot makes his own choice, puts down the lead, and tells her that he'll follow her anywhere. That she should make this choice.
Eliot could stop her. But he won't.
And would she ever really trust herself again, if he did?
She needs to know if she will follow through, given the choice. To kill a man like Ramirez.
So she goes back to look again at the terror she's caused.
The sweet, sweet terror.
She is not all the way good, she knows this, she will never be all the way good. Same as Eliot. They broke too badly, too long ago.
She likes this power too much. Her hand on the lever. The glowing pit of rage in her soul, well fed.
She switches the machine back on, and it grinds.
She decides.
She decides that today, she likes the terror better than the certainty. She decides Ramirez should keep being afraid. And she sends him fleeing, running like the hounds of Hell are nipping at his heels. And she follows, not fast enough to catch up, but fast enough to keep his wheels spinning.
Outside, Parker watches as Ramirez takes the trail of bait she left.
She thought… she thought she would end up here. Probably. And now she knows. But knowing is maybe less comforting than she imagined. It wasn't because she thought the choice was more right.
Eliot steps up beside her.
"I wanted to keep watching him squirm," she tells Eliot. "He isn't alive because I'm better than that. He's alive because I'm not done being angry with him."
"Yeah," says Eliot, shrugging. "Well, couldn't have happened to a nicer guy."
Parker looks at him. Thinks about what she did, and why.
"I don't think it matters," she says thoughtfully, "whether we're all the way good inside, as long as what we do in the end is something useful for the world."
"Been hoping that's true," says Eliot. "Hard to believe it about me. But when it's you? Nothing else makes sense."
"I'm not better than you," she tells him. "And you know I can know that. I'm the only person in the world who can know that."
He narrows his eyes at her. "Cleaner, maybe," he counters after a moment.
"Only because I burn hotter."
"And isn't that a beautiful thing." Eliot smiles, small but bright.
Oh.
He loves her, that much?
Oh, good.
They have the worst of each other. And they are still here.
For a moment, they just look at each other.
"Hardison can't know," she tells him.
Eliot tilts his head. "He'd still love you."
"Yes," Parker agrees. "And he would burn himself out, trying to get closer."
Eliot hums. "I guess I'd be a hypocrite to say you should tell him, when I never could," he says.
"Yes."
"All right." Eliot dips his head in a nod. "So. What's the plan for Ramirez?"
"I am going to make a very personal mission out of making sure he keeps being afraid, and desperate, and helpless," Parker tells him.
"For yourself?" Eliot asks.
Parker thinks about that.
"For the world," she decides. "But I'm going to enjoy it."
Chapter 5: Hardison
Eliot follows Parker with his eyes for a moment, as they're going upstairs, and Parker thinks, then gives a little head shake. Eliot is learning to be open and not so tough-guy-ish, when it's just the three of them, but it's still sometimes easier for Hardison to talk about things he's self-conscious about when Eliot's not there.
When Hardison doesn't even duck into the server room for his laptop bag, just makes a beeline for the couch in Parker's room, Parker knows she chose right.
Parker closes her door behind her and goes to sit next to Hardison. His head is tilted back and his hand is covering his eyes.
He looks… tired.
"You don't have to," she says, "but I thought you were going to pull something up. I know you didn't prep anything, it's ok. But. You don't need a lot of prep to make anything sound exciting."
"Well I got nothing," Hardison sighs.
"Then what was that?" Parker waves her hand vaguely in the direction of the bar downstairs.
"I can't pretend when it's just you," Hardison says, peeking out from under his hand. "Gotta keep the energy up so Breanna doesn't get worried, she doesn't need to worry about me."
"Do I?" Parker asks carefully.
"Uh." Hardison winces.
"Tell me."
"I don't…"
This is sort of like how he was in the cabin that one time, about being jealous. He felt bad about having an ugly feeling. When he has, like, the least ugly feelings out of anyone Parker knows. But that makes them feel worse to him, Parker thinks.
"Alec," Parker says, gentle but still matter-of-fact. "You can't show me anything so ugly that I'd stop loving you. You have to know that."
"Yeah. But there's…" Hardison trails off, and puts his hand over his eyes again.
Parker rotates the problem and tries again.
"It's okay," she says. "I get it. I think. Like, Eliot doesn't want to tell you the thing he told me. Because it's safer for everyone if it just stays with us. And I know you have a lot of secrets in your head too. Stuff that's safer with just you. And if what you actually did for six months is one of those things, that's okay."
Hardison makes a little scowling expression, like she's asking a question that's stumped him.
"If it's a big secret, like when you were working with Harry, you can just give me a sign, okay, and I won't ask anymore."
"Park…" He lets out a huge, gusty sigh. "It's… I'm not trying to hide anything. I just don't know what to say."
Another rotation, more head-on this time.
"What did you do?" she asks. "For six months?"
"Uh. Played a lot of video games? Some other stuff." He winces again. "Nothing important."
Parker frowns. "That doesn't sound very Hardisony."
"Yeah, no it doesn't," he agrees. "Feels like something is missing. Part of me is missing. There's not some dark thing, no secret, just… nothing."
Parker narrows her eyes.
That sounds like something is wrong.
He isn't doing stuff that he likes because it isn't fun for him anymore. And he feels bad and empty. And tired even though he's been doing not much of anything.
She's heard that before.
"Wait," she says, leaning in to watch him more closely. "Alec. Are you depressed?"
He looks at her, and then brings his hands down into his lap, twiddling his thumbs and looking down at his hands.
"You know there are so many people on social media these days who are asking, like, so what if I look at the world and feel like it sucks?" he says, raising his eyebrows. "Is that a problem with me, really? Or does the world just suck right now?"
"That's a good question," Parker says. "So… what's your answer?"
"I don't know," he says, eyebrows pinching together. "Both? I'm thinking both."
Parker snuggles in close and hugs Hardison so tight. Hardison leans against her and sighs, sounding a little lighter this time.
She is not good at the emotions stuff. This is making her so itchy. She doesn't know how to fix this.
"What were you thinking about?" she asks. "All this time by yourself?"
"A lot," Hardison says, "and then nothing. Just kept going round and round, thinking about it all. Job after job after job, so many clients who need help. It's just so endless. And I want to stop it before it starts."
"Replace the whole roof," Parker offers, "instead of just patching up leaks."
"Yeah," says Hardison. "Exactly."
"Did you have any ideas about how to do that?"
"Some, but…" He shakes his head just slightly. "I can't see a way. Not without hurting a lot of people the way the guys we take down do."
"Yeah." Parker nudges him with her nose. "Like I said, consequentialism's no good. We have rules about how we do things for a reason. Otherwise we end up like the people in the Futurilogic polycule, hurting so many people and just saying 'effective altruism' like it stops the hurt from meaning anything. But I guess I understand why people go that way anyway."
"Thought about that, yeah. Going that direction. Effective altruism and all." Hardison grimaces. "Go down that rabbit hole. Ignore the things it takes to get all that power. The danger. The cost to all the workers at the bottom."
"You would never be that person," Parker says with utter confidence.
"No," he says, sighing. "But it seems like it's that, or let people get hurt because I can't help them. Or." He turns to look at her, eyes dark and intense. "Parker."
"What?" she asks.
"The people at the top? I wanna kill 'em."
His eyes don't waver. He means it, or at least he thinks he does.
"Oh, Alec," she says, and rests her forehead against his.
"It's at least a way out of this," he says. "This dilemma. They are doing so much damage. And they're too powerful for us to take on the way we do. And getting other people involved in a large scale takedown, that's off the table. So. I wanna cut out the middleman. Stop them my own damn self. No matter what it takes."
"No you don't," Parker says. "Not really. Not the way we want to, me and Eliot."
Hardison looks down. "No. You're right, I don't. I'd lose myself. I don't wanna go down that road, I've seen what it did to the best guy I know." He bites his lip. "Hurts him a lot."
"Less than it used to, but. I don't want you to have to do that kind of hurting for any time at all. And I don't want to lose that part of you either. That's a part of you that we love so much. The part that's kind. The part that feels so much that it hurts when someone else hurts."
Hardison makes a frustrated noise, leaning back in his seat again. "And so many people are hurting every day in this world."
"I see the problem," Parker admits. "But we do help. We help so much, and then you help even more."
"Not enough," he says.
"That's bullshit." Parker glares at him. "This is what we do because we are good at it and we help people. We help so so many people. If we tried to scale things up, it would break things. It would let people get hurt, the kind of people we fight for. We can't forget who we're trying to help." She gives a frustrated huff. "I told you. Doing this lets us be us."
"I know, I know," he says. "But… I don't feel right about it anymore. About standing clear of the big stuff."
Hardison is usually smarter than this.
But his brain is being mean to him right now. So. Okay.
She has to be patient. She learned that one a while ago, for Eliot.
"Do you think maybe that's your brain playing tricks on you?" she asks carefully.
"I don't wanna admit that," he says, shaking his head. "Because so many people depend on me and the work I do. The stuff I think up. It needs to be working right."
"Even the best brains are tricky sometimes," she reminds him. "Believe me. I know." She taps her own head.
He looks at her. He looks at her with big eyes that are his realization and apology looks.
"Yeah," he says, nodding. "Yeah, babe. You are so right. I know you and Eliot and pretty much everyone on the team have stuff where your brain lies to you sometimes and it doesn't make you any less good at what we do."
"And when it does, we look out for each other. Right?"
"Yeah," Hardison agrees. "Yeah, yeah. When Nate got off track we pulled him back."
"When I went against a Steranko by myself you came and found me," she reminds him. "When I was panicking because I had to wear heavy shoes you helped me calm down. You taught me it's okay to need help from your team."
"Yeah," he says. "Yeah. 'Course it is."
"So." Parker tilts her head at him. "You need help."
Hardison sighs. "Maybe."
He's got himself really tied up in knots.
"Talk to me," Parker says.
"I don't know what I need." He shrugs. "Feel like I have to do something different. This, the same grind, isn't working for me anymore, not by itself. Not with the volunteering, even. But I don't know what else to try. I thought about the options and you're right, none of them seem great. So. I'm stuck." His jaw works, no words coming out for a long moment. "If I stay still, I keep feeling like this. If I take one of those paths, I get worse."
He looks over at her, sort of pleading.
"I don't know how to keep being me."
"Yeah," Parker says.
"Got no idea where to go from here." Hardison waves his hands vaguely.
Parker picks a strategy. She wants to lift the mood, and also she is genuinely excited about the stuff she figured out.
"It's good I did my work, then!" she tells Hardison. "I've been working on how to figure out how to make our work as effective as it can be, and maybe how to want to kill people a little less."
"What is in that binder?" Hardison asks, smiling again and shaking his head in wonder.
"Reasons to try for redemption," she summarizes. "Not for me. I'm perfect. But for everybody else."
Hardison's smile gets wider. "You are pretty perfect."
This is getting off track. She's supposed to be helping Hardison figure himself out.
"I didn't see that you were hurting, though," she says.
Hardison tilts his head. "Well, I just realized."
"I guess I don't think about you not knowing things or not having a way you want to do things," Parker says. "Because you're the guy who showed us the way."
"Thought that was Nate," Hardison says.
"But you made the rules. Nate started teaching us how to do crime the right way, but you helped us push back when he went too far, and you made the documentation for Leverage International." She points at him. "You literally wrote the book on how we work."
"Guess I did," he admits. "But like, the version of me that did that feels kinda far away right now." He sighs again. "I wanna read your thing, I really do," he tells her earnestly, "but like, I wanna appreciate it, and I don't know if that's gonna happen right now."
Oh.
He's hurting so much, in a way she doesn't really understand.
Parker is not good at this.
She could try explaining her new theories, about leaving room for even the worst people to grow, but Hardison doesn't seem like he's going to be able to hear it very well right now. Not while his brain is still lying to him and telling him he's not doing enough.
Parker needs another person on this job, and she might know just the one.
"I think you should talk to my therapist," she says.
Hardison blinks a couple of times.
"Huh," he says.
Parker watches him.
"You want to say no," she guesses, "but you get as annoyed as I do when Eliot says no just because. And I helped him myself, but it was hard, and none of us can help everyone."
Hardison sighs. "Parker, it's not your job to help me."
"It's only your job to make sure everyone gets help?" she asks. "You're the only person who can feel like they're not doing enough because there's still people suffering?" She turns it around on him, like Eliot did, the time in the cabin. That worked.
"No, but I…" He trails off.
"You feel it anyway," she says. Like then. Feelings are hard.
"Yeah."
"Talk to my therapist," she says.
He makes a face. Then he lets out a breath. "Well. Thinking it through on my own didn't fix things." He still looks dubious, though.
Parker snuggles up closer to him. "I love you so much," she says. "We both do. And the thing is, you're important. You know that, right?"
Hardison makes a wordless noise, looking unhappy.
"You are so important to so many people," she says, "and if you can't do the work then that's sad for so many people in the world, but that's not why you should take care of yourself. You don't need to do anything to deserve help. You wouldn't tell any of our clients that. You'd just help them because they need help." She pokes him gently in the face. "So. Right now you only have to worry about one client. You."
Hardison wrinkles his nose.
"I will sic Nana on you if you ignore this," she tries next.
"No, no, no, she does not need to know," Hardison says emphatically.
"So?"
He sighs. "Okay, I will talk to your therapist. Have a little chat. See how it goes." He still doesn't look convinced.
"Thank you," Parker says. "That would make me happy."
"Well, if it's for you." He smiles just a little. "I would do absolutely anything for you, you know that?"
"Well, I'll know it even better if you do therapy!" Parker tells him.
Hardison rolls his eyes fondly. "Fine, you win. Just for you."
She wraps her arms tight around him again. "Good," she says. "We can start with that."
He hums, and settles in, leaning against her, and she thinks he looks a little less lost.
Parker is learning to think wider, and Hardison has to learn to think narrower. It's not how they're used to operating. It's going to be difficult.
Hardison is going to have to stop thinking about everybody else so much.
Parker is going to have to trust Hardison to fix himself, and trust her therapist to help.
It's not something she can plan, it's not something she can handle herself or even oversee personally.
That's hard.
But she's growing.