They hustled out the door.

Then Hardison all but winced as his com unit suddenly came back online, once they finally crossed the threshold of the Seaport. "Frakkin' signal jammers," he muttered.

"Did you get mine back yet?" Parker demanded. "Lindsey stole it!"

"Not yet," Eliot said. "But I'm goin' in to meet with him, later. I'll get it back then."

"You're going in to meet with him?" Parker demanded. She hurried up to stand beside Eliot as the four of them hurried down the street away from the Seaport. "No! Bad idea!"

"That's what I thought, at first," said Faith, maintaining her position as the rear guard. "Then some new info filtered through. Courtesy of some of my gang from out of town."

"Oh, yeah?" asked Hardison.

"Oh, yeah." Faith cast a careful glance around the street. "Turns out, we might just be even more fucked then you probably thought when Wolfram and Hart blew into town. I've got game changing news, boys and girls."

"How so?" asked Parker, who still looked more fascinated than concerned.

Eliot shook his head. "Not out here," he said. "Can't afford to get distracted. Wouldn't put it past Lindsey to have a few guys on the street keeping an eye on us. We'll fill you in once we're back at Nate's place."

"And figure out where the hell we go from here," finished Faith grimly.

Parker and Hardison exchanged worried looks. Eliot and Faith went back to functioning as front and rear guards, respectively, without exchanging another word between them. The looming threat of Wolfram and Hart, which had been hanging over all their heads for days now, now seemed all the more real and all the more dangerous after everything that had happened even in the last hour.

No one said anything the rest of the trip home.

Hardison and Parker were safe. The team was back together, plus Faith. Here and now, Nate's apartment felt like the safest place on Earth. For the moment, things were peaceful.

The six of them wound up gathering around Nate's kitchen counter to deal with the next problem on the list. Faith quickly brought Hardison and Parker up to speed and paused afterwards just long enough for them to deal with the gut wrenching terror brought on by just what her news meant for them.

"Lawyers, vampires, and Slayers," gulped Hardison.

"Oh, my," finished Parker.

"The problem, once again, is that we have nothing concrete to work with," said Nate, managing with some difficulty to keep his bitterness at that fact out of his voice. He knew that Hardison and Parker had been through the ringer, but he needed them now. He needed the team, and the team needed their leader. "We know that these Slayers have dropped off the radar, we know that they're prime candidatesfor recruitment by Wolfram and Hart…"

"…but we don't actually know if Wolfram and Hart has taken that initiative," finished Sophie.

"And if they have, we don't know where they're keeping these girls or what they plan to do with 'em," added Eliot.

"So what we do know turns out to be 'jack' and 'squat'," grumbled Hardison.

Nate bit back a sigh, but he couldn't argue. "Pretty much," he said. "A fact that we need to rectify."

"Oh, yeah?" Hardison was clearly skeptical. "Is this plan anything like your last plan? Y'know, the one that got Parker and I into that mess in the first place?"

Nate froze. Sophie sucked in a breath, and Faith looked surprised. Nate knew she'd always assumed Hardison to be the one who kept his mouth shut and blindly followed orders. Even Eliot had more of an instinct to rebel against Nate's direction, provided that it didn't endanger the team.

All three of his teammates were watching Hardison with some concern, but the hacker didn't seem to notice. He was glaring at Nate instead, tense, angry, and upset. Faith was tense, looking as though she was trying to think of something to say that might diffuse the situation. Nate had never gotten around to telling her just how and why Wolfram and Hart had managed to kidnap Hardison and Parker, but she could see Hardison wasn't taking it well.

To his relief, Eliot finally stepped in.

"Yes and no," he said quietly, gazing levelly at Hardison.

"And just what the hell is that supposed to mean?!" the hacker snapped.

"Means we need to know what the hell is going on. Means we need to deal with Lindsey. Means I'm our best bet, and I'm probably the one he's interested in." He looked away from Hardison, at the rest of team and at Faith most especially, making certain he had their attention. "Means you're all still in danger, and until we figure out what he wants with me…what they want with us…there's nothing we can do about that."

Nate was grateful for Eliot's support, and decided that he could trust himself to take over the meeting again. Hardison didn't look the least bit mollified, but Nate didn't expect him to. At least he trusts Eliot. Even if he doesn't trust me right now. "Lindsey intended to use you both as bargaining chips to get Eliot to come in and speak with him. Even though you're both home safe, we're going to keep that meeting."

He reached up and carefully removed his com unit. The rest of his team stared at him blankly for a second, before comprehension dawned.

Lindsey still had Parker's com unit.

Slowly, almost ceremonially, Eliot, Hardison, and Sophie each removed their ear buds and laid them next to Nate's. Hardison gathered them up, brought them over to the couch, and hid them under the cushions.

"We're going to keep that meeting," Nate repeated, once Hardison had taken his seat again. "but we're going to change the rules. Eliot, you're once again our bait. Be on your best behavior. Lindsey is still your brother, and as far as he's concerned that counts for something. While you're doing that…" He glanced at Parker. "…Parker will break into the building and search for information on their plans for the rogue Slayers."

"Alone?" Faith asked, raising her eyebrows. She knew the little thief was impossibly good at what she did, but she also knew that Wolfram and Hart would spare no expense on mundane or magical defenses.

"No," said Nate. "Faith, you'll go with her. Vampire, human, I don't care. If something tries to stop you or call for back up, get rid of it. No quarter."

Faith and Parker exchanged looks. There was no love lost between the two of them, and there never had been. Faith found Parker impossibly annoying, and far too nosy for her own good. Parker found Faith scary as anything, and that was really all there was to it.

But when they looked at one another, Faith tried to let it show without words that she would have Parker's back. Parker seemed to believe her.

"So basically, we're all gonna b eeven more in it than we were at the press conference," grumbled Hardison.

"Yes," said Nate simply. "And I wish I could do something about that, but I can't. None of us can. Hardison, you'll be monitoring the building's security. Smooth the way for Parker and Faith wherever you can. Stealth is our priority. We need them to think we're playing their game, until Parker has what we need, and she and Faith are out of the building."

"If all goes according to plan," he finished, "we'll come out of this with some kind of idea of what we're up against."

"And if it doesn't?" demanded Hardison.

Nate didn't say anything. He couldn't begrudge Hardison his fear; the best way to make sure it wouldn't affect the job was to let him vent here, in safety. Parker laid a hand on the hacker's shoulder, but he shook her off. "No. Nuh-uh. No way, man. This is exactly the same goddamn thing you did at the press conference, only now we're all putting our necks on the choppin' block."

"Yes, yes you are," Nate said, in a voice that was so unnaturally calm he scared himself. "Are you surprised?"

Hardison glowered at Nate, the look on his face full of a rage Nate hadn't seen since forcing Hardison to blow up his beloved Lucille. Faith took a careful step towards him, and Nate held up a hand – warning her off. He knew she was worried about dissension in the ranks, and wanted to protect him, but this needed to happen. Hardison wasn't going to escalate things into the physical.

Not yet.

He was proven right a moment later, when Hardison straightened up, shot Nate one last look of disgust, and stalked over to the spiral staircase. He stomped upstairs without another word or a backward glance, and that was that.

Parker looked as though she wanted to go after him. She made to stand, then froze and glanced uncertainly back at Nate.

"Does everyone understand their part in this?" asked Nate, directing the question to everyone but keeping his eyes on Parker.

Faith nodded. Sophie nodded. Eliot nodded, but he still didn't look happy about it. Parker nodded.

"I understand," she said, and then she ran for the spiral stairs and chased after Hardison. Nate waited until she was properly upstairs before he let out a sigh.

"You can't really blame him for that," said Eliot quietly.

Nate didn't look at him. "Call your brother," he ordered.

Parker found Hardison sitting on Nate's bed, chin in his hands, staring at the opposite wall. He'd gotten up here barely two minutes before she had, and he already had an impressive brood underway.

"Ah…hi," she said tentatively, hovering in the doorway.

"Hey," said Hardison dully.

"Are you okay?"

Her teammate shook his head. "Nah."

He didn't look angry anymore. He looked sad, defeated, tired and empty, but he didn't look angry. That made a world of difference, as far as Parker was concerned. She wasn't prepared to deal with an angry Hardison. If she was brutally honest with herself, and she was good at that, she wasn't prepared to deal with the idea of Hardison being angry at all.

But he wasn't angry now, and so she carefully entered the room and sat down next to him on the bed.

To her honest surprise, Hardison was the first to speak.

"I didn't mean…what I said down there."

Parker smiled sadly. "Yeah, you did."

Hardison sighed. "Yeah, I did," he said. "I guess what I meant was, I meant it, but I'm not gonna let it keep me out of the game. Especially not if you're going into ground zero this time. I mean, I know we're in a bad place here. I know we're going up against Wolfram and Hart and we probably don't have a chance in hell. But I've got all y'all's backs. I've got your back."

He looked up at her, and Parker saw nothing but sincerity in his eyes. She smiled at him, and this time she meant it.