Disclaimer: totally don't own. 3 so don't suit!
Notes: Ya I know that there are a lot of fics going around but I've watched the darn thing like a hundred times and I'm bursting at the seams so here's a multi-chapter fic about the end of season 2.3333 enjoy!
Sterling watched the helicopter fade from view with a new determination. Once this case against the Italians was through, all bets would be off and the remaining members of Nathan Ford's team would be free reign.
"So what now?" Came a breathy and ragged voice from below. The Interpol agent looked down at his witness with a blank stare, bending down to the bleeding man's level.
"We get you to a hospital, Nate." The thief couldn't believe his eyes and ears; James Sterling, the world's biggest ass, was caring?
"Careful Sterling, you're gettin' soft." Nate replied with a light slur to his voice, his tired eyes looking distant. Sterling just laughed, shaking his head with a small smirk crawling onto his face.
"Call it preservation of evidence." That gave him the opportunity to bark more orders to the men around him, catching the gaze of Agent Nevins in the process and fixing her with an icy stare. "Where the hell is that ambulance?" Reluctantly, the woman brought her walkie up from her hip, pressed the button, and asked about medical's position.
"Two minutes." Sterling nodded and rose to motion for one of the gunmen to get the cuffs off of their target. When his hand was released, it fell, dead weight, to the deck; no strength to catch it. Nate had gone dangerously pale since the helicopter had left. As his head started to bob, his eyes fluttering as he tried to stay awake; he heard sirens signaling the ambulance's approach. It wouldn't be long now.
"Hold on there, Nate." Sterling's face appeared in his line of vision, blurred at the edges with clear worry now present in the Interpol agent's eyes, his hand reaching out to lightly shake the Mastermind's shoulder. Nathan groaned, attempting to catch his breath as he squinted when pain erupted in another wave from his side. He clutched at the wound, trying to stop the blood from pumping out of his body before gentle hands of the EMT's guided him to a prone position on the deck of the Maltese Falcon. Sterling, hovering closely behind the medics, watched Nate's eyes close as he lost consciousness. A commotion of experienced urgency rippled through the pack of medics as they tried to wake their patient. As the gurney approached, they filtered an IV into his arm, and placed an oxygen mask over his face; one medic kept a stern eye on his vitals as they tried to sustain them. When they expertly moved him from the deck to the gurney, and then jogged hurriedly towards the back of the ambulance, James Sterling followed them like a hawk. He didn't want that man out of his sights for a second because one, he could easily slip from his grasp, and two because even though they were not on good terms, he respected Nate; for what he didn't know.
"Hey, where are you headed?" Nevins' irritated voice sounded from behind him as he climbed into the back of the emergency vehicle.
"Boston General." Sterling replied as the rear doors shut and the screaming siren sounded their departure…
Eliot had been staring at the same rust spot on the bottom of the floor for the entire ride in the helicopter as he strove to fight back the anger and frustration swarming through his veins. For a moment he had thought that he had collected himself, had thought that even though his fists were still clenched, the knuckles going white, he had some how gotten a hold of his self control. But he had been wrong. He had seen the way parker leaned up against Hardison as if she needed something to hold her up, her blue eyes just staring timidly in a daze towards no point in particular. The hacker on the other hand had tried to talk, had tried to start up some kind of conversation between them so that they didn't have to sit in this God-forsaken silence that ate away every nerve in their bodies. But that was just it; they craved that numb feeling, that feeling they used to get when they hadn't been a family. Now it was different, now they were bonded in a way that none of them felt ready for but equally longed. Eliot sighed, finally daring a glance in Sophie's direction, of who had been completely silent as she gazed out of the small window and into the horizon; her eyes storming with so many emotions that Eliot couldn't even contemplate what she was thinking. She was a welcome distraction for the creeping feeling of being caged and incapable that was starting to rub him in all the wrong places. He needed to move, needed to let loose the energy and aggravation that held his hands in tight balls of fury and guilt.
"We shouldn't have left." Finally, the strained and growled syllables left his mouth, burning on their way out as he spit them into the air. All of them turned to look at him, Parker having startled Hardison with her slight jolt back to reality, and Sophie with a glazed look of acceptance mingling with anger; a guise for the grief ripping through her. Eliot's face was scrunched in a determined frown. "Didn't any of you notice?" He asked again, a forced calm to the steel-edge of his voice.
"Notice what?" Parker asked incredulously, as if she would have missed something important.
"Yeah, man, what are you talking about?" Hardison had disengaged his arm from Parker and was now leaning forward, fixing a quizzical look at the hitter.
"Nate's arm." Sophie's grave voice sounded far away, like she was remembering, picturing everything over again in her mind. To that, Eliot simply nodded, glaring at the floor again as it sank into Parker and Hardison's minds.
"But, he was fine….." Parker's eyes had started to well up again, an angry look on her face as she bit back her emotions. Nate had always been her father figure, the one she trusted to keep them safe and because of that trust, he had sacrificed himself.
"No Parker, he wasn't. I should have done something…." Only now would Eliot voice his guilt to all of them where a year ago he would have hidden it away and acted out alone. Things certainly had changed between all of them. Meanwhile Hardison had taken out his phone, fiddling furiously with it as Sophie sighed, closing her eyes to gain control over her voice.
"Eliot, there was no way for all of us to get out of that. He bloody handcuffed himself to the rail and –"
"I got it!" Hardison's face was beaming as he stared at them all. Sophie was about to go on ranting but the hacker didn't give her a chance. "Boston General. Am I good, or am I good?" He winked at Parker and Eliot scowled.
"How the hell are we going to pull that off? Nate was the Mastermind, remember? Ergo, plan-maker." He leaned back and folded his arms, settling into his seat and ignoring the bruises he had received during his '13 man take-down'.
"That's the problem with you man, no faith." Sophie sensed an argument coming and intervened before it could begin by holding up her hands.
"We need to stick together on this one. First of all, we have no equipment, no place to go, no nothing. There isn't even time for a plan unless," She looked over at Eliot, an idea gleaming in her eyes.
"Unless what? Unless we pull a blind man's bluff? No, no way." He still had his frown fixed to his face, his arms tightening over his chest in defiance. Nate had specifically said to get them out of there; and that meant to not come back.
"Doesn't sound too hard." Parker's mischievous grin was plastered to her face as she looked to Hardison, who mirrored it and glanced at Eliot. He knew he was fighting a losing battle with these three and he also knew he wouldn't let them do it without him. A pregnant silence spread over them all as they stared at the hitter, waiting for his answer.
"Screw it." He said and leaned forward, cocking an eyebrow in Sophie's direction. "So what now?" Sophie actually smiled at him before leaning over her shoulder and telling the pilot to hover over the nearest building so that they could get off before she returned her attention to her team, her family and friends.
"Alright, first…."