Notes: we're out of the character duo chapters and time will mostly return to a linear fashion now.

Chapter Eight: Going Through Hell

When you're going through hell, keep on goin'
Don't slow down, if you're scared don't show it
You might get out before the devil even knows you're there

When they took down Blackpole, blew up their offices, left LA, and went their separate ways Nate had thought the team was done. No more cons. No more team. No more…

But at least there would be no more L.A.

Except it wasn't the end of the team, and now they were back together, back in L.A., working *with* Sterling, getting revenge for Eliot and Tara this time around, rescuing Eliot and Sophie instead of Hardison and Parker…

"So that's the con," he told the assembled group of faces.

He hadn't intended to get Maggie involved in all this, but after finding out from Tara what was going on she had insisted on at least providing them with a home base and had taken responsibility for making sure Tara rested.

Tara was out cold when Nate got to Maggie's apartment but Maggie didn't have everything needed to keep her out for long.

Hardison had tried to be subtle when he called but Parker had been too impatient and told them they would come by to visit Maggie and help save Eliot and Sophie. By the time Hardison and Parker had called a little after noon to say they were about to board an airplane to come to L.A. Tara was awake enough to be insisting she was fine despite Maggie's pointed, not-at-all-impressed, remarks about how Tara couldn't even stand without support and she really should get back in bed before she fell and tore her stitches.

Nate had a moment where he wondered if Tara got that stubbornness from growing up around Eliot, or him from growing up around her, or if they had developed it independently and were drawn to that character trait in the other (she'd been twenty four, he reminded himself, already grown up). He wanted a drink, needed one; he'd been fighting the dread and panic and need to being doing *something* since he got word that Eliot was out of contact. He'd be fighting the shakes soon too. He didn't need to be fighting the fact that when Tara told him the details she'd been less than shy about the nature of the relationship between Eliot, Charlie, and herself, back in the day.

When Parker and Hardison arrived just before five Tara had worn herself out telling Nate how every plan he could come up with was a horrible idea and was taking a nap. Parker and Hardison's arrival woke her and it was only a matter of time before even Maggie was gently suggesting that working with Sterling was possibly a bad idea considering the feud between him and the hostages.

"We're down not one but two grifters," Nate had pointed out. "Three if you count the fact Eliot runs support for most our cons. We can't afford another Iceman fiasco and or someone being stabbed with a fork and-" He shook his head as Parker started to move to gesture. "We're conning our way into a hostile base with two members of our team hostage and no idea how many guys with guns standing against us. It's dangerous for us, Parker."

"You said it yourself," Tara put in, voice gentler than it had been most of the day. "Maggie's the most honest person you know. A con like this isn't the time to change that."

"I'm also standing right here," Maggie drawled. "Though I agree. It sounds like a white queen doesn't belong in this game." There was something distant in the hint of a grin that touched her lips before she recognized the others had stopped to stare at her. "What? I was married to Nate for fifteen years." She turned to go back to the kitchen.

"Anyway…" Nate didn't really know what to add after that.

The argument hadn't ended there but eventually they did all come to Nate's point. Their best chances were to bring Sterling in, hope he stuck to his word, and plan for the double cross.

They'd planned from there, Nate activating Eliot's tracker for just long enough for Hardison to get a read before disengaging it. The last thing they needed was for someone to figure out he had one and remove it.

The good news was Eliot was still in the city. They had his location.

The bad news was that by the time Nate was calling Sterling to tell them they were in, Parker was scouting the area and reported back the location looked like an abandoned factory of some sort, though she could tell it was designed to blend into the surroundings. She could see evidence that it had been retrofitted for increased stability and security. "And the windows are too dirty," she added. "Some should be, yeah, but they're all too dirty to see through and none of them are broken." Just by the tone Nate could tell she was wearing the face most people would make if a kid tried to blame the broken vase on a non-existent dog while holding a baseball bat.

Then the security had swept through and they'd known this was going to take some subtly. Some time.

"Or not," Tara objected when Sterling stated the days of additional prep, and the subtlety they'd need going in. The con was not entirely worked out yet, since Sterling was, as usual, throwing wrenches into the works. "We're conning our way in." Tara argued. "Con. Confidence. Sell him his dream."

The words were familiar. Back to that first job with her.

"And what is his dream?" Sterling asked, hint of a sneer in his voice.

Tara pushed herself to sit upright on the couch. "The project he keeps repeating is the one that got him kicked out of the military. Too much lost money and wasted resources and the fiasco at the end caused a scandal. He's been trying to get it right all this time, telling himself if he does they'll take him back."

"So we what? Show up as a couple of military scientists interested in his project and come to court him?" Sterling didn't bother hiding his skepticim.

And Nate saw it. So simple yet, oddly elegant. "Yes," he stated. "He's not just been involved with military science but intelligence gathering." He got up, going to the board they'd found and were using as a makeshift plans board. "Don't you see it?" Why hadn't he seen it before now? Eliot and Sophie's lives were on the line. He had to be sharp. "Kent… Kent wants to be brought back into the fold. It's not about money, it's about ego, proving they shouldn't have gotten rid of him. But more than that the more we know, the better we are, the more it means that we're there to court him." He turned back to the others, gesturing with more excitement than he'd felt all day. "We walk right up to the front door and sell him his dream."

They didn't all get it quite yet, but they would.

"Alright. Lets go steal the Department of Defense."

"Isn't that tr-" Parker started before making a face. "Have we stolen it before?"

"Department of Agriculture," Hardison answered. "Three months ago."

"Yeah," Parker said, a grin forming on her face. "With the weedwackers. That was fun."

Nate needed a drink for a lot of reasons.

But despite the reminder about the fiasco that was the Needle in a Pawnshop Job and Parker's continued insistence that they had already stolen the Department of Defense before they managed to get through the rest of the planning.

They wrapped up. Sterling headed back to meet with his team, Maggie got Tara back to bed and got blankets for everyone to camp out. Nate gave the order for everyone to get some sleep since Hardison had what prep they'd need already done and somehow…

Somehow it ended up just past midnight and Nate was in Maggie's kitchen staring down the bottle of wine that he'd found crammed into a back cupboard. White. Maggie hated white. Probably a gift. He could remember from their years living together that if Nate didn't drink the white wine someone gave them she'd dutifully hold onto it, shoved in the back of some cupboard, for three months. After that she'd take it into work and leave it there.

It had been two months since Christmas. The offending bottle was probably on it's way out soon but had escaped what he guessed was her attempts to clear the alcohol out of the apartment within the first twenty minutes of his arrival.

She'd known he was detoxing within a minute of seeing him.

Her perceptiveness was one of the reasons he'd married her.

And through all of that, every thought and more, he'd been there a while, he couldn't make himself look away.

"Nate," Maggie said from behind him. He turned, finally, only to have his eyes settle on the glass in her hand. A few inches of amber colored liquid in the bottom of it. "Nate," She repeated, a sort of apology in her voice as she pulled his attention to her face. "I…" She didn't seem to have anything to follow that, so she just handed him the glass.

For a brief moment their fingers met, memory, history, caring, and miles and miles of distance traversed in a moment but broken when she slipped her hand away.

"Tell Eliot…" She shook her head. "I'll tell him myself. When you bring him back."

Nate nodded, understanding, feeling the tight mass that had once been his insides twist a little bit more, the pressure on his lungs of panic and need and everything he couldn't afford to slow down and deal with right now because Eliot and Sophie might already be dead…

He took a drink, closing his eyes, imagining everything easing and loosening, his head clearing.

He needed his head clear for this.

Maggie left the bottle next to him and slipped out of the room.

oOo

The ironic thing was that everything went more or less according to plan. Parker should have remembered it was when things initially went according to plan that all hell inevitably broke lose.

Sterling met them in the morning, dressed for the con, a car waiting for them outside and his own forged credentials. Nate and Parker had gone with him, a second military scientist and their assistant, and they'd gone right out to Kent's hideout and knocked on the front door.

An exchange of not-entirely-pleasantries with the guards (what looked like mostly local muscle), searches for weapons or wires, and they were being hustled inside a warehouse.

A handful of boys, all of them not much older than eighteen, if that, lingered throughout the warehouse, sparring or sitting with each other and chatting. One was already running into the back office while a couple watched with cautious eyes.

A few minutes passed before the boy who'd gone into the office reappeared, stopping in front of them and standing to attention. "Mr. Kent sends his greetings. He is unable to come to see you personally but if you provide me with your credentials I can bring them to him and he'll determine if he can make time for you."

They handed over their IDs without raising a fuss; Nate and Sterling had started in on their good cop bad cop thing and Parker had tried to not look at the kids now staring at them.

Eliot once looked like that. She wanted to see what he'd looked like back then. But she didn't. This all made her stomach hurt and a part of her really wished she was back in New York with Hardison. But they needed her to rescue Eliot and Sophie and she wanted to rescue Eliot and Sophie, and the crying in her sad angry place at all she'd found out made her really want to hurt Kent.

The boy returned and led them into the office which, it turned out, had an elevator that took them into the basement. It would have been really cool if she'd been breaking in as a thief and not as a grifter in a really itchy uniform.

She hated pencil skirts and polyester just… egh.

She was fighting the urge to mess with her skirt when they stepped out of the elevator and down a narrow hall and into an office of sorts, and she was reminded that any job that started off the way it was supposed to was going to just go badly in the end.

Kent was sat behind a desk.

Behind and to his right stood Eliot.

He wasn't tied to anything. Wasn't bound. He was dressed in his own clothes and his hair was tied back and his arms folded behind his back at parade rest his face set to stare some place to the left of the door.

Like a statue. Maybe it was a lifelike Eliot Statue? Maybe Kent was obsessed?

But it was breathing and it slowly turned to look at them. Eyes looked between them slowly, assessing them, before landing on Parker for a moment longer than the other ones. Parker told herself Eliot was trying to mentally communicate with her, or was reacting to the fact she'd worn this get up. Something other than him acknowledging in this *state* that she was the biggest threat of the three of them.

It was all Parker could do, to not break character and react.

Kent had trained Eliot. Kent had Sophie hostage. He could be using her as leverage against Eliot to make him act like… like…

"Ah, Mr. Kent. Good to meet you," Sterling started, not even glancing toward Eliot. "At the agency we've been hearing about your project for some time. Now that our sources say you've had some successes I've been able to convince my superiors to allow an investigatory team to make contact."

They made nice before Kent inquired about Nate, who made some snippy comment about Kent's little operation and got into a snark match with Sterling and really Parker had to wonder if they'd ever done it because it would explain *so* much.

Sterling "convinced" Nate to at least get enough for a full report about whether Kent was worth pursuing before writing off the whole situation, mentioning the potential and blah, blah, whatever. Parker was waiting for her opening to sneak off and find Sophie.

If they could get Sophie out safely then Eliot would bust out of there faster than The Slash.

That wasn't it. The Flash. She was rappelling with Hardison. If she was going to try to make comic book references she should probably try to get them right.

"Proof?" Kent asked, change in his tone bringing Parker's attention back to the grift. "Well I suppose I could show you my students and facilities but I have some proof right here." He looked back to Eliot. "This is Echo. He was one of my students the last time I was in L.A.. Despite some misfortune and miscalculations with that project that led to him leaving my instruction I've managed to bring him back in with little urging. Despite nearly twenty years he's retained my teaching extraordinarily well."

"We don't need Jarheads, Mr. Kent," Nate put in. "We need someone who can do covert work, act without direct supervision if needed. Someone with a mind as agile and sharp as their bodies."

Samuel smiled. "Echo. I understand you've been doing some undercover work of late. Why not give a demonstration."

Eliot looked to Kent and nodded. "Yes sir. With pleasure."

He eased out of parade rest, his posture shifting as he did the thing he'd do when he played a role in a con, where his whole body seemed to become something not-Eliot in ways Parker was only just beginning to realize but still didn't understand.

"Well, Miss, see I grew up in Kentucky," His accent thickened from just the moment before, that smile that made her insides warm as he addressed her. "A short walk away from the Tam River, least until I ended up out west here. Did some fighting in my time, undercover work, good with just 'bout everything that shoots a round or holds and edge but a good Winchester is still my favorite. Did some work for security forces but… somehow found myself in fear for my life, far from home, law men after me, just another renegade." He shook his head a little, like he was clearing it, his posture shifting again as he turned to look to Nate, his accent changing, voice softening. Closer to that job with the MMA fighter. "But with some help… well I may figure out someway outta that life and back in school here. I always figured I was just born under a bad sign but maybe …" He shrugged, looking bashful. "Look at me, yammerin'. Guess I'm just excited about the idea of another graduation day. With a little help."

He looked back to Kent who nodded, pleased.

'Tam River, Winchester…' Hardison said over the comms, obviously having heard what Eliot said. He sounded confused for a minute. "He couldn't… He's Eliot. He…"

"What is it?" Tara half growled.

Another beat and Hardison was answering. "Guys. I think Eliot was trying to pass us a message. River Tam is that character I kept saying he was like back after we found out about The Black Knight. Winchester is the last name of the main characters in Supernatural." In the background they could hear the sound of Hardison replaying Eliot's monologue. "The bit about being a renegade? There's this scene in Supernatural set to the song Renegade and he was practically quoting it… and," Hardison's voice reached a new pitch, "Born Under and Bad Sign's an episode!"

"Okay so he's trying to pass you a message using geek references because you'd realize he was making them for a reason and Kent wouldn't." Tara provided.

"I'm sorry. That's all nice and good Mr. Kent," Nate said, his pitch changing slightly to his intercom voice. "But you've shown us figures and timelines for your project... what does it mean?"

"I have no idea," Hardison replied. "Five minutes ago I would have sworn he couldn't even remember River's first name."

"How about you figure it out then?" Tara suggested.

"Working on it," Hardison responded before his voice quieted, obviously muttering to himself. "Why don't I figure it out? Why don't You figure it out."

"You're right," Kent said. "The statistics aren't convincing on their own. How about I give you a tour?" Kent stood, leading them out. Parker's hopes of slipping away died when Eliot closed rank behind them. She didn't want to get him in trouble.

"Okay. River Tam was taken in by a special academy only was experimented on and turned into a spy, human weapon, and mind reading assassin who went insane. Kick ass fighter. Like Eliot. Also the hair. Off subject. In the episode the Renegade song was featured in there was a really paranoid man, bank robbery, and shifters. Really nasty guys who could make themselves look like people. Born Under a Bad Sign's an episode where Sam's acting crazy but turns out he's possessed by Meg, a daemon, trying to get revenge by making Dean kill..."

Kent showed them down the hallway. Spaces for the boys to sleep. A medical station. He stopped a couple boys heading back up the hallway from the room at the end and introduced them as Sierra and Foxtrot before sending them on their way. "See when I take them in I give them new names. It gives them a sense of identity associated with what I do here. They're leaving behind lives filled with alcohol, homelessness, gangs, casual violence and drugs."

"Okay. What do they have in common. Uh… bad things. Things going sideways. Not helpful um… I got it!" Hardison paused, noise in the background changing. "River, shifters, Sam. They all had good guys attacking their friends, being made to attack their friends. He's trying to tell us he's not gone darkside by choice."

"Well we already knew that much," Nate said with disdain toward Kent but the obvious message loud and clear. "Shouldn't there be something in all this we don't know?"

"I'm trying but there ain't exactly a decoder ring for this." Hardison stated.

"Kent's implanted Eliot with behavioural conditioning," Tara said. "Just like Charlie and the others. We didn't know if the conditioning would last the years but from what I saw with Bravo when he attacked me it still has some power." Silence on the line. "What if he's trying to warn us his conditioning is still active enough he might attack you if ordered?"

More silence.

Parker listened to the sound of Eliot's footsteps behind her. They should sound different. He had a very distinctive walk. That's what Eliot would say. It should sound different because that was *Eliot's* distinctive walk. Not…

"Damn… he really is River."

Kent led them through the last door into… what looked kinda like an arena. The room was a little more than two stories tall, there was a raised walkway along the edges with a viewing platform just above where they entered. Guards and boys stood along the walkway (No guns. Parker had only seen two guns so far. Both on the guards from outside) while six tough and ruff looking men were tied up in the center.

"This is our main training area," Kent said leading them toward the stairs to the viewing box. "The men there were local thugs who got too nosy into my business. I was going to use them as training tools but they'll serve as your demonstration as to the other skills I can teach. Echo, untie them."

Eliot broke away from the group, starting to untie the men.

"Now, please," He gestured to the foldable chairs that had been placed in the box. "Take a seat and enjoy the sight." Nate and Sterling sat down; but Parker kept to her feet, to the edge. "Michel, Andrew," Kent called out, guards along the wall looking up from their posts along the walls. "Would you help Echo. It would be good to get this moving quicker."

The guards climbed down into the arena and started to help, sawing through the ties with a long knife each had pulled out of a concealed sheath. Out of the corner of her eye, Parker saw Kent smile.

Her stomach clenched.

As the last thug was freed Kent stood up and walked to the front of the platform. "Echo," he called. "Check in."

Eliot went still, and Parker saw a flash of recognition, of horror, cross his face before it blanked and he turned to look up at Kent.

Nate and Sterling stood, coming forward.

"Echo. Kentari. Macarbe. Lupin."

Eliot's head dropped forward. The guards who had gone down to help looked up at Kent in shock.

For a moment there was stunned silence.

Then Eliot moved.

Parker was used to fast. Was used to watching Eliot fight.

Distantly she'd always known Eliot was holding back.

He wasn't holding back now.

He reached the closest guard first, dodging and ducking and striking. He got the knife from the guard and put it to deadly use. Blood spattered with each strike of the knife, and she could hear the crunch of bones breaking as the first guard went down dead before he could scream.

Then the others were on Eliot, seeing group attack as the only way of surviving this. Of taking Eliot down.

Only it was too late. By then Eliot wasn't fighting. Parker had seen fights. She knew what Eliot fighting looked like.

Now Eliot was dancing. No emotion on his face as he ducked and spun and flowed around the other fighters, moving almost too quickly to follow. His limbs moving effortlessly and seemingly without reason only that a heartbeat later there'd be a fountain of blood or a scream of pain from his victims.

Another turn, another opponent fell backwards, screaming; clutching the bloody stump of a wrist while his hand tumbled across the floor on the other side leaving an abstract trail of gore on the concrete ground.

He'd made the mistake of grabbing at Eliot's hair.

It was just seconds before another opponent went down, clutching at a slit throat. A fourth died with the knife embedded in his heart, slowing Eliot for only a moment when the blade got stuck and he had to leave it embedded in the corpse.

Parker knew later this would… she didn't know. She'd never…

But right now she was entranced, fear and adrenalin and some mixture of fear for Eliot and…

She didn't know how this would…

The fifth went down with a crushed throat. The sixth a broken neck. The seventh a blow to the head that might have only knocked him out. Maybe.

Eliot took the last one crashing to the ground, fists pounding him until he stopped moving. He rolled off the body and grabbed the knife from the corpse he'd ended up next to, throwing it to silence the screams of his last living adversary.

That last act was what got Parker, what made her back away from the railing just a little. Sure, Eliot had taken the others out with overkill but… they'd been attacking him. Sort of.

The last had been out of the fight. Eliot never would…

Eliot never would. That was the Black Knight. It wasn't Eliot.

"Someone please tell me what I think just happened didn't happen," Hardison said over the comms in the dead silence that followed the screaming.

She couldn't really answer.

Eliot turned to face them without expression. Splattered with blood but unhurt. Not even scratched. He took a few steps forward to retrieve the thrown knife then started to walk, stalk, toward the stairs when Kent called out, "Echo, check in. Stand down."

Eliot gasped, pulling in air sharply, dropping the knife, metal hitting concrete echoing around the room, falling to his knees then leaning forward on his hands, body spasming like he'd been puking and there was nothing left in his stomach.

Kent turned to Nate and Sterling, both looked like they'd rather be ill than continue the con.

"Don't worry," Kent stated. "The safety's back on the gun now. He's no longer a threat." Kent turned to her. "Go on, if you'd be so kind young miss. Go to him. I promise he won't hurt you."

Parker hesitated, wondering if she should refuse. She'd just watched Eliot slaughter eight people. She was just an assistant and she was pretty sure Sophie would tell her to refuse.

But that hadn't been Eliot, and now it was Eliot and Eliot looked…

She nodded, keeping her eyes wide, hoping Kent would think she was in shock or something and this wasn't breaking character.

She climbed down the stairs, shying past the bodies in what was only kind-of-pretend horror, and reached Eliot. Back behind her and above she could hear Sterling and Nate trying to continue the con.

Eliot hadn't risen from his knees by the time she got to him. Cautious, and kind of afraid but not really, she closed the ground between them and set her hand on his shoulder.

He turned sharply to look at her and she tried to smile, the soft one. The kind she'd tried to give him in his room at his sister's house.

A look of confusion crossed his face as he slowly sat back and shook out his hair, what wasn't left tied back anyway. When he ran his hands through it, his fingers managed to reach the present she'd left for him attached to the collar of his shirt.

A paper clip.

She stood there, smiling for all she had, willing him to remember, to understand.

Forever ago she and Hardison had fled from his threats to kill them with a paperclip. She'd given him one to encourage him to kill the lady who mocked his hair.

Now she was giving him one to tell him…

To tell him this didn't change things. She still trusted him to protect her and the team and they'd get him back and everything would be okay.

Somehow.

She turned back and retreated to the viewing platform where Sterling and Nate were getting ready to get out of there and regroup. The beginnings of their farewells and arrangements for a second meeting and...

"Oh, one other detail," Kent said, right as they reached the bottom of the stairs. "I really must ask for your autograph Jim Sterling. I've never met a real life Sherlock Holmes before."

"Did he just?"

"They're gonna shoot us in the face," Parker said going very still.

"Not exactly what I had in mind," Kent responded. "Echo. Heel."

Eliot slowly got to his feet and stumbled toward them, the blood on his face smeared further than before from his attempts to wipe it off.

Parker wasn't good at expressions, but she could recognize pain. A lot of it.

"Samuel plea-" he started but Kent held up a hand silencing him.

He pulled Eliot forward, settling his hand on the back of his neck. "Echo. Tell me. Do you know these three?" Eliot closed his eyes, hands clenching into fists like he was fighting something. Pain crossed his face. Kent leaned in closer, whispering something in Eliot's ear.

"Y…Yes… I do."

Kent smiled thinly. "Tell me. Who, to you, is this Jim Sterling?"

"An enemy," Eliot answered without real hesitation.

"And the girl?"

Eliot looked up, at her, guilt on his face. "Te…team mate…" Another breath, out slow. Pain. "Sister."

Kent made a face like he was pondering the possible connection there before adding. "And our snide friend here?" He gestured to Nate.

Eliot let his head drop forward, breath coming in ragged pants for a long moment before half whispering. "Boss… he's… my boss." Kent's grip tightened. "He… He's Nathan Ford. The man I love."