75 Godiva Street, Saturday Afternoon

[geniuswithasmartphone]

So, everything was terrible again. Hardison was pretty sure that Tony and his TA were evil, Eliot had brought home a version of Kathy that needed babysitting a lot more than she needed to be out heroing, there were slugs pretty much everywhere, and last night Eliot had insisted they all sleep down in the panic room in the basement. Which was actually more like a 'panic suite' because Eliot had built it and he was kind of extra about things, but even so, it was a little more claustrophobic than Hardison was comfortable with. He'd found himself calculating how much air was available in their hidey hole, which wasn't something he'd done since they'd moved from Portland.

That itchy restlessness hadn't left him, even when they'd all come back upstairs for brunch. He needed to get out for a little while. Do something. Spend some time in the open air while feeling useful. So once the meal was over, Hardison grabbed for his jacket and his laptop bag. A walk across the island to the school for some quality research time would hopefully settle him.

[Open for housemates and visitors!]

Comments

[geniuswithasmartphone]

He didn't need to sneak to get out of his own house! He was a grown ass man, he could come and go as he pleased!

...Also, there was no way in hell he could outsneak anybody in the house, other than possibly Kathy, so he saw no reason to really try. Sometimes boldness worked where subterfuge would fail.

This did not seem to be one of those times.

"Dammit, Eliot!"

[whoisalicewhite]

By the time they were fifty, all of them would be saying "Damnit ___" at least once a day.

"Whoops." Parker looked outside and said, "I don't see any worms." Which meant nothing, so. "Do you want my taser?"

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"Slugs, mama," Hardison said absently. "They're slugs."

Not that taxonomy was really important right now.

"You think Eliot'll be any less panicked I go out there armed?"

[whoisalicewhite]

"Nooooo," Parker admitted. Unfortunately, Eliot had gone round the bend on this situation, and was acting like a mama bear with too many cubs. Needing eyes on everyone even though he didn't have six pairs of eyes to make that work. "But you need to be there. Do you think he'd be okay with taking us all to the library?" Ha. Ha ha.

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"I don't think the library allows for padlocks on the door, so naw," Hardison said. "I mean, I know why he's bein' like this, but..." The weight of the weird world last year hung on him differently than it did Eliot, but it was still there. "But like you said, I need to be there."

[whoisalicewhite]

"Tackling him wouldn't slow him down." He'd just try to drag Hardison back inside with Parker clinging to his back like a limpet. "...I could fake being sick. Or starting to forget things, to give you a minute to leave. But I'm pretty sure he'd completely lose it if I did."

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"Naw, we can't do that to him," Hardison said immediately. "He's brittle already. Somethin' like that could break him. We just gotta try to reason with him or somethin'."

[whoisalicewhite]

"Reason with him," Parker said, sounding very dubious. "The guy who made us sleep in Chez Fall-out Shelter last night." Well. She was pretty much out of other ideas. "I guess we can try. Since he's too paranoid to escape sneakily right now."

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"He watched us die last year," he reminded Parker quietly. "You know how he feels about what his role is. I don't think he even cared that them other us's killed him. But he watched us die an' that messed him up real good. Then he lost that Kathy again an'..."

He shook his head. "I shoulda talked to him about it more. This is on me, yo."

[whoisalicewhite]

"No it isn't," Parker insisted. "We both tried." Although she was worse at emotional-words than Hardison was. "And we didn't want to push too hard. It's not always on you when we're messed up... Maybe we should've called Sophie?" She grimaced and leaned into him, hard. "And I'm worried about you out there too. Just so you know. Be really, really careful. But I trust you to get there."

But. It was also really creepy out there.

[geniuswithasmartphone]

That trust made him melt a little and he pulled her in for a hug, needing to hold onto her for just a bit. "It's scary out there for me, too," he assured her. "My plan is to run if I see somethin' I don't like. I'm a thief, not a hero."

Again, that was Eliot.

"But...Eliot's got a Kathy safe in here. But I don't know where Raven is." Were there two Ravens? Or had his gone mad? He didn't know. "I'm worried 'bout her, too."

[whoisalicewhite]

"People need to wear name-tags," Parker complained into his chest. "So we know who to tie up and ignore. Is Raven crazy, or is she from the other Island? Or is there both?"

Even a mastermind might need a cheat-sheet for this one.

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"I'm hopin' she's from the other island, but I don't know for sure," Hardison said. "I ain't seen 'em both in the same place to tell for sure."

And like Eliot had pointed out, she was a shapeshifter, muddying the waters still further.

[whoisalicewhite]

"Argh," Parker mumbled. She pulled back a little to look at Hardison. "Call when you get there. And, call when you leave. Or maybe Eliot will want to pick you up then, we can negotiate it? And text if you figure out the Raven thing. And... Ugh, just. Tell me if there's something I can help with that isn't just trying to keep Eliot from coming unglued some more."

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"I will," Hardison promised. "An' I'mma let y'all know anything useful that we find out first thing." He paused. "Should I definitely come home?" he asked. "Or would it be better for me to hunker down at the library?"

[whoisalicewhite]

Ugh. Parker thought about that, hard. Weighed Eliot's sanity versus actual danger, and came up with, "I think you better stay, maybe. The Library's one of the safest places, you'd be with other people, you could be in Special Collections if you had to, so." Okay, that got him a bony awkwardly tight hug. "But you still gotta call."

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"I will," Hardison promised, clinging to her, awkward bones and all. "Better, I'll put in the earbuds an' not turn 'em off. Y'all will hear me breathin' when we sleep, even."

[whoisalicewhite]

"Ohwowyesplease," Parker said, giving him a fast kiss. "I wasn't going to push. But. Eliot's not the only one who'd like that."

[geniuswithasmartphone]

"Earbuds are a reasonable request," Hardison assured her. "Always. Plus, then I can keep an ear out for y'all, too. I'll work hard knowin' that you're all safe in here."