CHAPTER 2

Hear My Call

(The day before)

An alarm went off on Hardison's laptop and then relayed to the team's earbuds. Eliot leapt over the railing at the top of the stairs when the sound didn't cut off after a few seconds. He didn't see anyone in their living area. "Hardison!" No one answered.

A few seconds later Parker slid out of an air vent and ran to Hardison's computer. A few clicks and a password had the noise shut off. Eliot would have relaxed but he still had internal alarms going off; Parker was scared and Hardison was terrified. The pack bonds were lit up like neon signs. "Where is Hardison?" Eliot saw the frown on Parker's face as she glared at Hardison's computer.

"It looks like he's headed for the backdoor." Parker turned the screen so that Eliot could see the dot moving on the map. The dot turned the corner from NW 13th Ave onto NW Northrup St., Parker ran for the stairs and Eliot kept pace with her.

"Have you heard from Hardison?" Eliot asked as they ran down the stairs.

"He was supposed to be at an all-night gaming thing. You know, with some of his orc friends that live near here." Parker leapt the last few stairs and ran for the back door. "He had to have set it off." Parker was talking about the emergency alarm. The one that none of them had ever used.

Eliot felt a cold chill slide down his spine. Hardison had set up an emergency protocol in case one of them was in trouble and the rest of the team wasn't nearby. All they had to do was whisper the word 'Jabberwocky' or tap S.O.S.J. in morse code and an alarm would sound on all of their earbuds and coordinates would be sent to all of their phones.

It had been dark for several hours already but with the security light shining into the parking area there was no missing the SUV when they ran onto the loading dock. Eliot pushed Parker behind him just in case but nothing immediately happened. After a moment Eliot thought he might have to go to the SUV to find out what was going on. Even with his heightened vision he couldn't see into the vehicle but he was sure that was where Hardison was. There was the sound of voices but nothing clear enough for him to make out. Eliot could sense some kind of movement in the car and he heard a gasp right before the back door on the driver side opened and Hardison stumbled out. Hardison almost immediately collapsed to his knees and the SUV sped away.

Eliot was off the loading dock and catching Hardison before he could fall all the way to the ground. He slid to his knees and wrapped his arms around Hardison. Hardison slumped limply against Eliot. Scooping him up, Eliot carried Hardison to the loading dock. He could smell Hardison's blood and feel it sliding warm over his hand.

Parker's eyes were huge, and her lips were pale as she steadied Hardison when Eliot set him on the loading dock. "Hardison!" Parker cupped Hardison's cheek in her hand. "Alec, what happened?" She tried not to cry but she could feel the sting of tears in her eyes. "I'll call 911."

Eliot hopped up onto the loading dock and gently lifted Hardison into a seated position. "How long ago did they stab you?" Eliot could see two long narrow puncture wounds in Hardison's back. He was pretty sure it was a double-edged blade and had been long enough to do serious damage.

"Righ…right before… shov…outa…thcar." Hardison's words were slurred, and his hands trembled as he reached for Parker. She grabbed his hands in hers and brought them to her face. She held his hands to her chest with her left while she used her right hand to dial 911.

The line for 911 was currently ringing without answer. Parker held the phone where she would hear it if someone came on the line but her focus was on Hardison. She noticed the dark puddle forming on the cement just behind him. "They won't make it in time." She looked from the blood pooling near Hardison's hip to Eliot's yellow eyes.

Eliot shook his head. "No. The call times for emergency response have been getting longer and then after you do get the dispatcher we'll still have to wait for the ambulance to get here. If they" Eliot nodded his head at Parker's phone "answered right now it would still be at least twenty minutes until a surgeon could help him." Eliot could hear the wheezing sound in Hardison's breathing and he was pretty sure the upper puncture had pierced Hardison's diaphragm.

Hardison pulled one hand free of Parker's and held it out. Eliot slid a little to the side so he could take Hardison's hand and see his face. "I think we can get you to the Samaritan ER faster than waiting for the ambulance." Eliot started to pull away, but Hardison gripped his hand tighter and shook his head. "We can't wait." Eliot's tone was caught between a growl and a plea. He was afraid that even taking Hardison to the ER themselves wouldn't be fast enough.

"No." Hardison shook his head once before locking eyes with Eliot. "Change…me."

"You're bleeding too much." Eliot looked at the growing puddle of blood.

"Bleed todeath…eitherway." Hardison's breaths were coming more shallowly. "Takemy…chances…withyou."

"Please Eliot." Parker's plea was desperate and choked with tears. "You can save him. I know it."

Tears ran down Eliot's face but his voice was solid. "You sure?" He waited a second for Hardison's nod. He crouched in front of Hardison and kissed his forehead before leaning him back to the cement. He stood quickly pulling off his shirts and tossing them to the side. "Parker, I need you to leave. I don't want you to see this. Go to your warehouse or my cabin. Don't call Nate or Sophie. I'll call them after, but…" Eliot barked out orders as he stripped off his clothes. Snow blew across the loading dock, melting against his skin but he didn't notice. "Hurry Parker. Go!"

Parker kissed Hardison tenderly at first, then fiercely. "Not goodbye. I'll see you again soon." Hardison nodded as Parker stood and started for the door that would take her into the pub's kitchen. Hardison's little office was right next to that door and there were always keys to at least one of their vehicles in there. Parker ran to the office and grabbed the first set of keys she saw. They were the keys to Eliot's truck. She figured it would be more important to Eliot for her to do what he said than, that she was taking his truck. She ran back out the door to the loading dock and let the door slam behind her. The door bounced and didn't quite close right, but Parker ignored it in her haste. She ran across the dock and jumped down next to Eliot's truck. Her feet slipped in the snow that had fallen earlier and as she caught her balance, she looked up to see that Eliot was nearly done with his change.

. ͽϿ Ѻ Ͼͼ .

It was a good thing that there was little to no traffic on the slick roads that Parker was driving to get to her warehouse. She kept wiping at the tears rolling down her face and she was less than focused on what was happening outside of the pack bonds let alone what was happening outside the truck. It wasn't until she was nearly to her warehouse that she realized she hadn't meant to leave Hardison and Eliot. She knew that they would need her later even if Eliot didn't want her to watch this part. She could go back and park on the other side of the pub and wait until she knew it was over. She started to turn at the next intersection, but she couldn't. It was almost like watching someone else drive straight through the intersection instead of turning. Parker didn't understand exactly why she couldn't make herself go back but after a second attempt she quit fighting it and continued on to her warehouse. When she was inside with the door locked behind her, she stopped to wonder how Eliot knew about her warehouse. She had been sure that no one, not even Hardison and Eliot, knew about her warehouse. Thinking of Eliot, she started to reach for the bonds with concentration instead of just catching what was bleeding through. She was able to access them with the same ease as always but instead of a roadmap that led her through what the others were feeling it felt like grabbing onto a moving train. The emotions were strong and big, and it was more than Parker knew what to do with. Parker pulled her phone out and her finger hovered over Sophie's name, but she couldn't tap it and make the call. Whatever Eliot had done when he'd given her instructions earlier, she couldn't make herself go against them. Parker slid down the door until she was sitting. She wiped tears from her cheeks but didn't try to stop them.

. ͽϿ Ѻ Ͼͼ .

Eliot had only ever seen one person changed from human to werewolf, in Nati's pack, and it had been horrific. He was relieved that Parker hadn't argued with him and had followed his directions quickly. He couldn't imagine how things would change between them if she had stayed and watched him savage Hardison. He doubted she would stay gone for long though, and he knew that Hardison didn't have time for him to pause and think this through. When Eliot had finished his change, he approached Hardison on quiet paws. He could smell Hardison's blood, and pain, and fear.

"It's okay." Hardison whispered. He had his eyes closed and Eliot was thankful for that.

He wished he could say something calming or reassuring but even if he could have spoken, there was nothing he could say that would be in anyway comforting. Eliot tried to separate himself as much as possible from what he had to do. The wolf could feel the need of a packmate in distress and answered the call with what was needed in that instance. In this moment Eliot and his wolf were nearly as separate from each other as they had been the first few times Eliot had changed all those years ago. Eliot rarely thought of his wolf as other, usually it was just another aspect of who he was but tonight the wolf felt like other.

Now he tried to take the wolf instincts and what he had learned from Nati to help with what he was doing to Hardison. He made sure to bite along the meaty parts of Hardison's arms and legs. He shuddered and whined at Hardison's screams but he knew he had to keep going. He avoided the inner arms and inside the thighs where the bigger veins and arteries were. He kept his bites along Hardison's abdomen shallow in hopes that Hardison would have a better chance of not bleeding out too quickly.

Eliot was disgusted by how instinctual it felt to tear and rend flesh even knowing it was Hardison under his claws and fangs. Hardison's heartbeat began to slow and from the growing puddle of blood around him Eliot was afraid that he had just killed a man that he loved as a brother. He could taste Hardison's blood and flesh in his mouth and he felt his bile rise. He hopped down off of the loading dock and trotted across the parking area toward the dumpster. Eliot started his shift as soon as he'd finished puking behind the dumpster.

His senses had been overwhelmed by his reaction to what he'd done to Hardison but when his shift finished the first thing to break through was the slow stuttering sound of Hardison's heartbeat. Eliot walked quickly back to where Hardison lay, not noticing the sting of snow or rough pavement on his bare feet. Hopping back onto the dock Eliot knelt beside Hardison. Hardison's face was slack, breathing almost too shallow to hear, heartbeat slow and stuttering.

Eliot shifted his fingernails to claws and clenching his right hand into a tight fist he let his claws pierce his palm. Clenching and relaxing his fist he kept the blood flowing from his hand into Hardison's wounds. He'd forced a blood bond onto a rogue wolf in Minnesota a few years ago and while he had a pack bond with Hardison he'd heard Abby mention more than once that 'blood is a powerful magic.' And Eliot would take anything offered to him at this point if it would make a difference for Hardison. After liberally sprinkling Hardison in his own blood Eliot slid around to cradle Hardison's head in his lap. Eliot ran his hands over Hardison's unmarred face leaving sticky blood smears on cheeks, forehead, and chin. "Oh God, don't let him die." Eliot didn't know if the words that spilled out of him were really a prayer or not but he had nothing else to cling to. Eliot closed his eyes to keep from crying.

It felt like an eternity had passed and Eliot was finally starting to notice how cold it was outside and how cold Hardison had gotten. He couldn't hear Hardison's heart beat or the shallow sound of his breathing. Eliot tilted his head back and let his cry turn to a howl.

. ͽϿ Ѻ Ͼͼ .

Parker couldn't leave her warehouse because Eliot had sent her there, but she had no desire to move any farther into this place that didn't feel like home. She rocked herself back and forth near the door while the pack bonds raged around her. Terror, pain, guilt, and remorse, trampled through the bonds. She couldn't tell what was from Eliot and what was from Hardison it was all too big, and too loud, and too much. She didn't want to feel it all so big and loud inside her skin but she was afraid to close the connection. What if this didn't work and Hardison died? What if it did work but Eliot couldn't deal with it? What if when they were both wolves they didn't want her anymore because she was a boring human? Since she wouldn't close the connection to the bonds, she tried to ignore the emotions. The same way that she had ignored the sounds of her foster mother being beaten by her foster father when she was a child hiding in the closet until it was over. Then she'd had bunny to cling to and now she had the strange bonds that tied her to the people she loved. Despite the overwhelming sensations coming from the bonds she clung to the fact that she could still feel Hardison's bond. He hadn't left yet. Yet…, what a scary word.

Eventually the emotions started to calm like the sea after a storm and Parker was relieved that the deluge of emotions had abated. She opened her eyes and pulled out her phone again. She still couldn't tap on Sophie's name and she thought about exactly what Eliot had told her. 'Don't call Nate or Sophie.' She couldn't call but looking at Sophie's picture made her feel better. Suddenly there was a terrible wave of grief and rage that thundered through the bonds. The spike of sudden burning emotion was all from Eliot. And just as suddenly it disappeared, and she couldn't feel anything. For a second, she started to panic but then she felt a trickle of something. Parker slowed her breathing like she habitually did when she was in a tight airduct. Panic would eliminate reason and spike her own adrenalin and that would block out whatever the bonds might be telling her. She couldn't find her bond to Hardison, but she tried hard not to panic. She found Eliot and the barely-there trickle of emotion became a little clearer, and then a lot clearer. Eliot was grieving. His heart was broken.

Parker wept aloud. She realized she was still staring at the blank screen of her phone and when she tilted it the screen showed Sophie's face again with the symbol inviting her to make the call, but she still couldn't. Parker threw her phone and heard it skitter into the dark. Turning she threw herself at the door and beat at it with her fists but she couldn't make herself reach for the handle. After a moment her breathing slowed and she regained better control over herself.

She stepped to the side and flipped the switches that lit up the inside of the warehouse. The open space of the floor made it clear where her phone had gone. She went to it and was surprised to see that it wasn't broken. She might not be able to call Nate or Sophie, and she couldn't leave her warehouse but that didn't mean that she couldn't take care of Eliot somehow. She slid through her contacts list until she found the number for Julio Mendoza.

A while ago Parker had managed to follow Eliot to a small store front several blocks past the 405. At first she had considered following him in even if that meant he'd notice her. But she decided that it would be more fun to see how much longer she could follow him before he caught her at it. She waited across the street for a long time and several other people had gone in but Eliot hadn't come out. Parker was about to call off her game and head home when a detail caught her attention. On one window of the store front someone had painted: 'Gospel Fellowship' with days and times underneath. Parker realized it must be some sort of church.

It had taken a little more surveillance over the next month before she was able to put together that Eliot's old military buddy at the soup kitchen was the priest at the church. Hardison had protested but eventually given in and gotten all the information he could on Julio Mendoza.

Thinking of Hardison brought tears to her eyes again as she tapped the number for the priest. "Father Julio, you should come..." Parker had to swallow hard, but she couldn't force the rest of the words she wanted to say.

"Who is this?" Julio asked.

"Eliot needs you." Parker could still feel the pain and grief coming from Eliot's bond. It made her start to cry again so she hung up. She managed the last few feet to the bed and threw herself onto it. Just when she was about to give in to the grief that was pulling at her she felt the smallest shift in the bonds.