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Parker might be feeling disappointed that the security system, especially once Hardison is in the system, isn’t all that difficult to break through.
Her Mastermind part tells her that it’s because this is all a trap.
Mastermind Parker is probably right.
Thief Parker doesn’t care.
Most of Parker doesn't care.
Sterling knew not to cross some lines, even when he was being Evil Nate at his creepiest, she seethes to herself, crawling around the balcony one apartment above the Wanna-be.
Parker might not know what lines not to cross with people, not initially, but most people don’t, she’s learned.
Wanna-be Evil Parker? Is not a stranger. A stranger would not know about Mr. Bunny. Parker is going to be having strong Words (and a taser) with some of the people who run the warehouse she uses, and then Eliot might take a turn, and Hardison will make it difficult for those responsible for this bit of knowledge to never get jobs with any kind of security clearance ever again, and they’ll set up something special for Chaos.
(Parker’ll make Eliot make popcorn and they’ll watch as Hardison does his hacking, and they’ll cuddle as they plan. This kind of plan will need maximum cuddling for the best ideas to be formed.)
But she’s getting ahead of herself.
“Alright, he’s got motion sensors rigged to the study, his bedroom, and the kitchen. It’s a pretty small apartment, so your best bet is probably through the bathroom window. From the floor plan, there shouldn’t be anything that’s part of the apartment underneath it, but he’s probably trapped it someway,” Hardison says in her ear.
Parker grunts a little, reorienting herself. She gets the smallest of breaks on the upper balcony, and then heads sideways to get to the window.
~IiI~
It’s not easy getting in the window, but it’s not hard, either.
The puddle of goop and a tripwire on the other hand? Amature.
The motion lasers in his bathroom – “Hardison!”
“What, babe?”
“Lazers!”
“Wait what? No, no way, he did not have them – oooh, he put them up with another company, well probably self-installed….” Hardison trails off into muttering to himself.
He says it helps him think.
Still, it’s only a few moments later that he finds something.
“Girl, I can’t turn them off, not with how he’s monitoring this system. It’s direct access only from his laptop, or from one of the higher up techs in the company he used, but I can’t spoof the IP address fast enough from here, not if you’re stuck in his bathroom.”
“Okay.” Parker murmurs.
She thinks about the set up for a minute. It’s not exactly like what she’s run through, but it’s close enough to one of the ones for a Florida heist….
“He in the room?”
“Yeah, babe, the jerk’s still in the study.”
“Make him move.”
“Oh, with pleasure. I’ve got just the drone for him.”
She’s distantly happy that Hardison is so angry on her behalf, but her thighs are getting a little tired, so she also hopes he gets the bird going soon. Or whichever whirlie he uses.
“Parker, he’s going to move in thirty seconds. If this goes well, you’re going to have a two-minute window to clear the bathroom. If it doesn’t, you’ll have forty-five seconds.
“He should move to the bedroom”
“Okay.”
“Deploying drone.”
Parker waits.
“Okay, he’s moving…go!”
She moves.
She knows how to deal with lasers, how to bend, how to move, but this isn’t a set up she’s practiced for, never fully thought out. It’s close enough that she can get through the majority of it, but that’s about it.
She doesn’t need to get through completely clean, though.
The last laser is broken with the toe of her foot, but she whirls out of the bathroom and into the bedroom, just as the mark is coming out, and she’s got her taser, and a backup.
“Parker, I’m in position,” Eliot mutters over the comms.
Parker growls, and that’s Eliot affirmation that he was heard, just as it is a distraction for Gatling. “Where. Is. He?”
“Parker, so nice of you to come!” Gatling says, arms spread. He’s in his monkey suit, as if this is just another con, as if this isn’t incredibly invasive and maybe this is how some of Parker’s previous marks have felt, but she’s not evil, and Gatling is supposed to play with them, and mostly against them, and not treat them as targets for evil, invasive, cruel schemes.
Parker makes a note to sic Tara on him. Afterwards. When he thinks he’s safe.
Sterling knows about Tara, but she hasn’t teamed up with Leverage in a long time. Parker bets that he hasn’t brought her up with this Wanna-be.
“Is the rest of your team here? Turning yourselves in? You know, you’re a few hours ahead of schedule.”
His voice is the “I’m making small talk, how’s the weather?” and it grates on Parker’s ears.
“Where is my bunny?”
He smiles at her.
“Now, let’s not be so hasty! You’re here, Spencer and Hardison can’t be that hard away, and since you’re ahead of schedule, the authorities will take a little longer to get here.”
Parker glowers at him. For some reason, this means he keeps talking.
“You know, I went through a lot of trouble to get those motion sensors set up.” He waves his arm to indicate the rooms behind him. “And the lasers. I knew that you’d probably have to come through either the living room – unlikely, given how open it is, and even if the electronics might tell you that the room was clear, there would be plenty of space to make a kill box. Spencer would veto that plan.”
With a shrug, he adds. “There’s also an upper limit to how much Hardison can do, even if what he can is very impressive. But it’s easier to block him when you know what to look for, and since the deadline was so close, it was highly unlikely he’d be able to find another hacker that would help him. So, I was pretty sure you’d come through the bathroom.”
“Of course,” Gatling continues, but Parker’s really not paying any attention to him.
“Motion sensors are down,” Hardison says.
Then she starts counting.
“But you wouldn’t believe the amount of trouble I had to go through to convince my superiors that I could have you and your crew in a cell so they’d agree to let the local police in on this as an official capture.” Gatling shakes his head, and shrugs.
Parker takes the opening for what it is, and tases him.
He drops.
She stares at him, maybe she should tase him again. Just in case he needs a reminder of not to mess with her stuff, or her people.
“Parker, we’re good.”
“Awww, but what if he forgets.”
Eliot laughs and gently hands her the cloth bag he’d placed Mr. Bunny into. “Parker, if he can forget us after what we’re about to do, I don’t think there’s much more we could do to make him remember.”
Parker hums, but cradles the bag as Eliot gets to work on setting the scene. He doesn’t need her help, and doesn’t ask for it, allowing her to relish getting Mr. Bunny back.
It’s not something they usually have time for on a con, but…this isn’t a usual con.
A few minutes later, Eliot stands up and heads to the bedroom for another minute or two, before coming back and glaring at the Wanna-be.
“Alright, I think we’re good here. Hardison?”
“Yup, you’re good, man. Just get him out of there and try to keep him as upright as possible.”
Parker snorts a little as Eliot rolls his eyes. “Yeah, because this is my first time doing shit like this….”
“Man, it was a reminder. A re-mind-er. You don’t need to go all cave man and sling him over your shoulder like he’s some wild bear or something that you brought home to cook.”
“Man, have you ever seen a bear?” Eliot asks as he hauls the dead weight up into a sitting position. “How am I supposed to drag it over my shoulder like that?”
“Like you’re doing right now,” Parker says.
Eliot looks at her. “Parker, bears are a lot bigger than this guy. They also have claws, teeth, a bad temper if you mess with them, and a lot of muscle.”
“You could do it.”
Eliot shakes his head as he hauls the mark out the front door, making sure to make his movements as smooth as possible, so with some editing it can look like the man left of his own free will.
“I had to fight a bear once, but –”
“See! Did you cook it?”
Eliot sighs. “Do you want me to cook you bear? Venison is better.”
“What’s venison?”
“Deer.”
“Mmm, okay.”
Hardison squawks over the comms. “We’re gonna eat Bambi?”
“No, we’re gonna eat a venison,” Parker explains.
“Parker, that’s Bambi!”
“It’s a venison!”
“But, Bambi!”
“Damnit Hardison, just try a bit, okay? I’ll make you something else if you want, jeez.”
“No, no, man, you’re cooking is amazing! But just not Bambi, okay?”
Eliot sighs. “Sure, no Bambi.”
Thankfully, that’s the end of that conversation.
Hardison pulls up in a taxi, and Eliot situations Gatling in the backseat, along with his luggage. Eliot makes sure his wrists and ankles are secured with duct tape, and places a piece across the man’s mouth, too. It’d be better if they could stuff a sock into his mouth, but there’s only so much they can really be bothered to do. Besides, it’s not like he’s going far.
“We’ll meet you at the warehouse.”
“Yup. See you in a bit.”
Hardison takes off. He’ll fix the video later, while his partners have a little more evilness in store for the jerk wad who decided to make things personal.
~IiI~
Gatling wakes to a bare lightbulb clearly taken from a desk lamp.
He’d laugh at how amateur and cliché the Leverage crew was being, if Spencer didn’t have a background in things like this, if Parker wasn’t incredibly creative, if Hardison didn’t have a history of being incredibly vindictive towards those that harmed people he cared about.
“He’s awake, I can tase him again,” Parker chirps.
“Nah, Parker, you want to work him over a bit, first. You can start with the hands, but really, you have to switch it up every so often so he doesn’t quite know where you’re going to hurt. Keep ‘im off balance, he won’t be able to prepare and he’s less likely to keep resisting – it’ll wear ‘im down easier.”
Parker nods.
“First you, you want to—” Spencer hits him in the solar plexus, “knock the breath out of him so he can’t scream as loudly. We’re in a warehouse, so otherwise the sound’ll echo.”
“Right. Next, fingers?”
Spencer shrugs. “Sure.”
Parker stares at him. “One at a time, or not…one at a time or not…”
She grins.
“Neither!” And kicks him in the shin with her combat boots.
He howls, as best he’s able to.
“Hey, keep any blood on the sheet, okay? I want clean-up to be as easy as possible,” another voice calls, presumably, to Gatling’s increasingly muddled brain, belonging to Hardison.
“Man, you think this is the first time I’ve done something like this? Besides, we won’t be too rough.”
“We won’t?”
“Nah, you want to make a point, not add much more to why Interpol wants to get us. So we rough him up a bit to make a point. Plus, you want to make sure Sterling gets the message, right?”
Parker nods.
Spencer (probably, Gatling’s eyes are watering) smirks.
The rest of the time he spends in the company is very painful, until they knock him out once more.
He takes comfort from the fact that they won’t kill him (he doesn’t take comfort from the fact that the won’t kill him).
And that's a wrap!
Kudos, comments, and concrit welcome. Poke me on tumblr, I'm fins-illusion.
~Fins