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“Thank you,” Gatling says to the information broker on the other end of the line. There are both more and fewer of them than one might expect, these days. This one just happens to have a grudge to settle with one of the core Leverage team, and a line of communication to the hacker with the handle, Chaos.
He proved to have far more insight into the team than most, having actually worked with them at one point, albeit not as recently as the newer Leverage International teams. Gatling would take what he could get, though.
~IiI~
“So, you’re telling me that the most important item Parker owns, is not one of her diamonds, or a lump of money, but a stuffed animal?”
Chaos’ modulated voice laughs back at him, “She can steal anything else she wants. Why would things like that hold value to her?”
Gatling can’t deny the logic of that, although thinking about logic applying to Parker’s thought process is a difficult concept to grasp at best, so he tries to ignore that part of the conversation.
“Alright, thank you for your cooperation…Chaos.”
“Yeah, yeah. Now, everything is going to be expunged, no trace of any of my record anywhere?”
Gatling sighs and relaxes in his office chair. “None that Interpol will keep, at least.”
“Good.” And with that, the hacker cuts the call, and if Gatling didn’t know better, there might be a little bit of fear in that voice.
~IiI~
“Oh ho, what evil has Chaos been cooking up now?” Hardison asks as he rubs his hands together. Hopefully it’ll be something that they can use to further push him out of the community – or even to just get a bit of a personality change, seriously, is a little humility too much to ask for?
“You’ve been a baaaaad, baaaaad boy, Chaos. Coal for you, and shame on you for talking to Interpol. You don’t do that to people, es-peci-al-ly people who’ve helped you out in the past.”
Not that the other hacker hadn’t cashed in his favor with Hardison after the team up job. Although, why the hacker needed Hardison to divert the security for that one flower shop…
(Okay, it was totally because there were dogs. The camera Chaos had had? Not subtle.)
“And you’ve been talking with Wanna-be-Evil-Parker, who still needs a better code name, but what were you talking about…”
Unfortunately, while Hardison did manage to slip a little bit of a backdoor into Chaos’ codes, it’s not big enough for him to find out what went down in that conversation without Chaos noticing immediately.
Time to call in the cavalry, as Eliot would say.
~IiI~
To be fair, the Leverage team doesn’t hate their Interpol guy. He’s not great, but he’s no Sterling, even if he does, for some inexplicable reason, want to be. There’s just not that personal connection, former maybe-friendship hostility turned semi-hatred but former friends, turned to whatever the heck is going on now, which Hardison has bets on being a fourway between Nate, Sophie, Maggie, and Sterling, if only because Eliot’s face at the mention of it was amusing.
Parker looked like she was considering asking Sophie to verify it.
(If she did, Hardison never heard about it from Sophie and that’s all he needs.)
Still, they run into Gatling every few cons, spin him around and sometimes involve him – although he’s a lot less flexible than Sterling – and it’s a little bit like a grand game of cat and mouse, but without the background of trust they all had had with Nate.
Apparently, that lack of trust is not unfounded.
~IiI~
The computer goes off that night, alarms on all of their properties going off, but there’s been a mid-level earthquake in the affected areas, so Hardison lets the alarms go off and then shuts them off, at about when most security companies would have. No need for the warehouse owners to get suspicious about the amount of security some of their houses have.
(He regrets it the next morning.)
Parker blows through the bedroom window with a wild fervor that neither Eliot nor Hardison have seen in years. She’d been gone doing a hobby job down in LA, and was set to get in last night, but she had opted to swing by her warehouse before coming back to the brewpub. But the wild that she’s got running through her right now? It’s not the kind of wild that either Eliot or Hardison miss.
“HARDISON WHERE DID HE GO!”
“Where did who go, Parker?” But Hardison pales a little, because now he knows what happened. He’s used the trick before, but there’s also got to be a hacker on the con, too, because he has failsafes in place to counteract that particular weakness in vibration and movement detection.
“MR. BUNNY! HE’S NOT IN THE WAREHOUSE WHERE I LEFT HIM. I was gonna bring him here soon, but now I can’t because he’s gone and someone thought they could steal from me.” She’s slowed down and has started unclipping herself from her harness, but there’s enough anger and other emotions making her movements jerkier than usual.
“Parker, we’ll get him back,” Eliot says, because yeah, this kind of thing was his job, once upon a time.
“Hardison, get on it. Parker, we’re going back to the warehouse – how much did you move to find him?” Eliot asks as he pulls on a pair of jeans, and grabs for a flannel.
Parker shakes her head. “He’s not anywhere I would have put him, I know you need it clean to try and find clues.”
“Alright. Tell me on the way what you found.”
Parker nods, tension still thrumming through her frame.
“Well, no one picked the lock, so they must have an in with the warehouse company. There was also –“
Hardison cuts her off. “Guys, you need to see this.”
“Seriously, what have you found in the last five minutes?”
Hardison doesn't rise to the bait, instead letting his voice go flat and serious. “No, it was sent to us. You both need to look at this.”
“What –“
Hardison plays the video.
“Hello, Leverage team,” their now least favorite Interpol agent says. “I’ve heard that sometimes the best way to deal with criminals is to have a little…leverage. So I currently have in my company a certain special stuffed rabbit,” the man takes the opportunity to wave one of Mr. Bunny’s paws at the camera. “He’ll be keeping me company until you three turn yourselves in, or 12 hours pass. For every hour until you turn yourselves in, Bunny gets a little cut.”
Gatling moves Mr. Bunny’s ears down, as if they were drooping, perfectly framing the small digital clock strapped to the stuffed animal’s chest. “You wouldn’t want to let him get hurt, would you, Parker?”
Parker growls, ready to see if punching through a computer screen will affect the intended victim, even if she knows it won’t.
(Besides, the Mastermind part of her brain says, Hardison needs the computers to find Mr. Bunny. He was taken at least five hours ago, which means that you just missed the thief. Because Gatling wouldn’t have held on to Mr. Bunny if he could help it, says the Grifter-Sophie in her head.)
“When did he send this?” Eliot asks, “And how did the security system do against whoever he sent?”
Hardison shakes his head. “They ran a con – a hacker set off a couple cars, made it look like an earthquake, and then hacked the other failsafes, letting the thief in to grab Mr. Bunny and make a clean getaway. Probably put him in a backpack or claimed it was a gift for a kid or something.”
Eliot looks at Parker, who’s still staring at the screen.
“We’ll get him back, Parker.”
Parker stills, takes a deep breath, and says, “Let’s go steal Mr. Bunny. We’re running the Silver Bullet.”
Eliot and Hardison exchange a look, but nod.
~IiI~
Five hours and five videos of an increasingly mutilated Mr. Bunny later, they’re standing in front of an apartment building, which Hardison has confirmed is where Gatling uses for Portland stays, armed with a variety of tools – some of which Parker insisted upon, like a pack of incredibly bright post-it notes and three bottles of superglue.
Amy, who they collected because she’s somehow managed to avoid being identified as even an accomplice in their whole Leverage business goes in first. Since she’s unknown, and Hardison’s given her an airtight alias – one he’d actually been saving for something like this, she gets in without too much difficulty. A new potential buyer, poking around the property before an appointment that had been snuck in last minute due to an unfortunate schedule change.
It gives her just enough time to set up the base for a rig, before she’s asked what she’s doing, and is pointed towards the front office.
Meanwhile, Eliot goes around, spotting the various human security measures that Gatling has in place. Hardison gives the okay once all the cameras are under his control – and the motion sensors, and a few other tricks that Gatling had clearly installed as a last minute precaution, and Eliot goes to town on the goons.
(Usually Hardison finds it entertaining to watch Eliot take on security guys who are trained to underestimate the man of more average height and with long hair, even if his scowl should be enough of a warning. But this time? This time it’s personal, and Eliot doesn’t even try to go for non-crippling blows.)
“Alright, Parker. You’re ready,” Amy says, face buried in her phone as she walks away from the apartment building.
Parker grunts, and slips into the shadows.
And that's a wrap for today.
Kudos, comments, and concrit welcome.
I'm going to go and face plant in my bed, now. Comments shall be responded to Sunday or so, because I'm busy as heck tomorrow.
~Fins