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“Eliot.” Hardison’s voice was dead serious, cutting through the silence of the apartment. Eliot’s head jerked up without his approval, teeth immediately on edge. He set down the knife he was sharpening.
He didn’t like what he saw. Hardison’s eyes were wild and he was visibly sweating. And since Hardison didn’t exercise, that was a bad sign. But he did work up a sweat easy, as Eliot learned the first time they hooked up and every time since. He wasn’t used to having a bad association with Hardison looking like that.
“What’s wrong?” Eliot’s voice was like hard iron, ready and determined.
Hardison stepped closer to Eliot and placed his hands flat on the table, leaning in. Their faces were close enough to kiss so Eliot could read the determination in the angle of Hardison’s jaw.
“I need you,” Hardison paused to breathe, slightly overcome, “to kill someone for me.” Eliot felt the world slow around him.
He’d be lying if he hadn’t been expecting this to happen on some level. Relationships always start the same, at first it’s compliments and sex over tables but then it becomes a transaction, just trying to extract the most value. That’s how it had been with Moreau, and that’s how it would always be. He’d had that lesson beaten into him, tattooed down to the bone. Eliot don’t know why he had even tried again, but Hardison had this way about him. He was smart, and funny -- not that Eliot would admit it out loud -- and genuinely seemed to care about the people they helped.
Eliot had thought maybe, just maybe, Hardison had seen something human in Eliot too. But he’d been fooling himself. Eliot knew what he was. He knew what he had to offer. Eliot’s two skills were murder and food and Hardison had the palate of a child. And not a normal child, one of those children who thought cilantro tasted like soap and thought salt was too spicy.
The problem was, Eliot couldn’t turn down anyone he cared about when they needed something, even if he didn’t want to give it.
And Eliot could tell, that whatever this was, Hardison needed it.
God, for a brief moment, he’d thought Hardison was different. He eyed the knives on the table, wondering whether Hardison wanted it messy or not.
Eliot was so lost in his reverie he hadn’t noticed that Hardison had walked away until he was back, hurling a video game controller and headset onto the table.
“Here’s the deal.” Hardison had his briefing face back on, but Eliot was reeling. What was going on? “FlutterPie420 has been griefing me all day. Somehow, he’s following me and knocking me out every time I spawn.” Followed? Knocking him out? Hardison looked ok. “He’s got me figured out so I need a partner, someone he’s not expecting.” Hardison took in a breath, “I need you to get into Call of Duty and ruin this guy’s day.”
Eliot burst out laughing. Hardison looked pissed but Eliot couldn’t stop. “That’s what you want?” The relief was like palpable waves, like when the morphine goes straight into the IV and you can feel it moving through you. Little bubbles of no pain that are better than pleasure. He laughed again. Suddenly it seemed ridiculous that Hardison would ever ask him to kill -- he probably didn’t even know the weapon he had in his hands, waiting for the order. “You know video games aren’t my thing.”
“Don’t play with me. I know Call of Duty is a military recruitment tool and they train you all up to get desensitised on it. I need you to use those skills and bring me this guy’s head!” Eliot had to lean back to get away from the shouting.
All right then.
This wasn’t going to be solved rationally. Eliot was going to have to get on Hardison’s level. “All right,” he said grimly, “point me at him.”
And that’s how Parker found them three hours later, cheeto dust ground into Eliot’s shirt as he screamed, “You think you can cook a grenade and then set it off with your pistol? You think you can just do that? I invented that move.” He had, in an black books mission in what used to be Yugoslavia. Well, let’s just say it wasn’t Yugoslavia after Eliot’s team was done with it.
Parker just said, “ooh, are we playing?” and dropped down onto the couch next to him to pick up the third controller.
That’s when shit got real.