"It'll be fine man. Nah, it's totally safe. Eliot, just watch this." Eliot grumbled to himself. He was is the gastropub kitchen scraping something florescent orange of the ceiling, after Hardison's latest food experiment a few days ago had caused an explosion. And a noxious smelling gas. And a full evacuation of the restaurant.

Sometime in between the evacuation and the HAZMAT team arriving both Parker and Hardison had jumped on a plane to go to Germany leaving the clean-up for just him. Fortunately there was no real damage and the gas had just smelled bad and wasn't harmful. That did not mean that there was not plenty of mess though. As soon as Eliot was done here, he was going to do something very violent to Hardison's gummy frogs.

LEVERAGE

Sophie opened the door to the gastropub excited to be back. She and Nate had come to town for a gallery opening that they were sponsoring, and they had been planning to have a team reunion diner. Nate was busy arranging some last minute details with their curator and Sophie had decided to see the team early. But when she walked in she was greeted not by the usual alluring smells of Eliot's cooking and the busy hustle of the pub, but by some odd chemical bouquet, an abandoned dining room, and Eliot behind the bar. She walked up and saw him very swiftly and decisively slicing the heads off of what had to be at least 20 pounds of gummy frogs.

"Um, hello Eliot." Sophie said not sure what to think.

Eliot looked up, "Hi Sophie. Hardison nearly burnt the place down again." He went back to slicing.

Sophie picked up one of the severed heads and sniffed it. She then quickly put it down and then started looking for a napkin. "I guess that explains the frogs."

Eliot cut of the last head. "Yep." He put down his knife and wiped his hands on his apron. "Not only that, but then they left for Germany." Eliot grabbed a large clear box and scrapped the beheaded frogs and their heads into it.

"Oooo, Germany. Birthplace of the pretzel." Sophie said suggestively sitting at the bar.

"Actually, pretzels were invented by an Italian monk in 610 AD." Eliot closed the box and put a large bow on top. Then he placed a note and a large red bow and top. "Why do you care about pretzels?" Eliot asked. He started walking toward the back room with the box signalling Sophie to follow.

"You know." She said. "Pretzels."

"Yeah, what about them?" Eliot placed the box at Hardison's spot on the desk. That would teach Hardison to order another experimental laser and try to cook popcorn.

"Pretzels." Sophie said emphatically. "Hardison and Parker's word for, you know."

"Um, no. I don't." Eliot replied, very confused.

"Sex, Eliot! It's their code-word for sex!" Sophie was appalled by Eliot's lack of understanding.

"What? No!" Eliot was horrified. "I mean, they're two consenting adults and all, but pretzels? Really?"

"Yes. They always look at each other with those dreamy eyes and slink off together. What else could they be doing?" Sophie said.

"Sophie." Eliot looked amusedly at her, "Have you never noticed that there are crumbs on the floor under the rafters after they do that?"

"No, why?"

"They are literally eating pretzels. They love pretzel dates." Eliot went back to clean up the bar.

"Really? How did I miss that?" Sophie was not convinced that her powers of observation could have been so off.

"Don't feel so bad. I only realised it a few months ago." Eliot stopped cleaning. "Hey, don't tell Nate though. He still has no clue."

"Oh, don't worry. It's kind of fun to know something that he doesn't." Sophie smiled at him. "Now, about some food."

LEVERAGE

Hardison and Parker were back later that day. He and Parker had a wonderful time. They stole some stuff, put some of it back, bought Eliot some fancy mustard, and some expensive beer as an apology for the popcorn fiasco.

Parker went into the kitchen searching for Eliot and fortune cookies, and Hardison went to the backroom in search of some frogs. That one thing that Hardison had not enjoyed was the lack of proper gummy frogs. Germany frogs just didn't have the correct chemical flavors.

When he got to the back, what he saw filled him with horror. A box of dead gummy frogs. Hardison stumbled forward. What kind of monster would do something like this. Hardison noticed the note on top and opened it.

Hardison,

Next time you pull a stunt like that, it'll be the orange soda.

-Eliot