A/N: I hope you enjoy this story as much as I enjoyed writing it for you. I don't own Leverage or any of the characters, and make no money off of this. Thank you for reading, and if you feel like leaving a review and letting me know what you think, it would really mean a lot to me. A special thank you to all of those who have favorited, followed, and reviewed this story. I don't write slash. I hope you enjoy the new chapter. Thank you.

Chapter 16

Nate was getting more and more frustrated. He had two team members in the wind, with no way of tracking them. He had come downstairs for breakfast to find Eliot's phone lying on the breakfast bar. He wasn't sure what to make of that. God knows he understood the man's need to be out of pocket at times—understood it and respected it. Under other circumstances, he trusted the hitter to leave for awhile and then come back without a problem, but Eliot hadn't been himself lately. Doc was gone as well, so it was likely that she had taken him somewhere more private, and if he were honest with himself, he could understand why she wouldn't tell them they were going.

What he didn't understand was why Parker was gone, too. He knew Hardison had tracking devices in her shoes and on her person, and as much as he hated to do so, he asked the young hacker to track her. Hardison had done so, and so far, she was leading them on a merry chase, and he wasn't sure whether she was dropping tracking devices right before they reached her location as she found them, or if she was purposely misleading them. If it was the latter, he wasn't sure how he felt about that. They had come up on six of them now, having just cleared the one in her warehouse, and he knew that there were only eight, so he hoped they would find her fairly soon. They had nothing else to go on.

(0o0)

Doc watched as the hyper-vigilant man with her got out of his truck and moved toward the house. She was pleased to see that he visibly relaxed a bit as his mind recognized that he was on his own property—in his own special place. Quickly moving up the walkway, he unlocked the door, and made a circuit through the house, assuring himself that all was as it should be. Doc followed him, her face touched with a hint of amusement.

"What's so funny?" Eliot asked her with a mock glare.

Doc shook her head. "It's just good to see you come home, that's all. I'm glad you have a place like this."

As they moved back into the living room, a black pickup truck turned into the drive, and parked just behind Eliot's. Doc watched through the window as Vance got out and made his way to the door. Eliot flung it open before he could knock, ushering the large man inside.

"Don't get too comfortable," he warned, as Vance looked around him at this place that was very much Eliot's.

"Why?" Doc asked, curious.

"Because if we're gonna do this here, then I want to show you both something." Smiling, he led them through the house and out the back door. Hiking down a trail that ran through the center of the woods, he made an effort to keep the conversation light. His oldest friends laughed at his playful banter and followed him without hesitation through the woods. They walked for about fifteen minutes before she heard the sound of rushing water. After another ten minutes, the dense underbrush opened up into a clearing with a waterfall, and a natural land bridge that ran over the river behind the falls. Doc's breath caught in her throat, and she stood transfixed, staring. Eliot smiled at her reaction.

"That's lovely!" she exclaimed.

"Does it remind you of anything?" Eliot asked, then added, "You might not remember. You were rather out of it at the time, if I recall."

"I remember," Vance said. "It looks a lot like that river in Belgium. Kitty was sick and we were both injured, and we holed up in a cave behind the waterfall there to get away from the foot soldiers. It was really cold, and we couldn't risk a fire. We spent the night huddled together for warmth, drinking bad scotch and whiskey and telling corny jokes. You set my leg, and then kept running out to the waterfall and holding rags under the icy water to make compresses for her forehead, and I was worried you would go into shock."

"We stayed there for two days. By the morning of the third day, Kat's fever broke and we could leave," Eliot said.

"Yes," she agreed, dryly, "and then you went into shock while we were hiking out of there and didn't tell anybody. When you fell out on the trail, Vance and I carried you to a nearby farm's barn. The farmer brought us all the extra blankets he owned, I think."

"Yeah, and you made me drink that nasty tea that tasted like death." He grimaced thinking about it, and then growled, "Hell of a way to treat someone who had just saved your life."

She grinned. "That's what friends are for. Besides, it worked, didn't it?"

He growled something unintelligible, and then fell silent.

After a pregnant pause, she spoke again. "Well, is there a cave? Can we go inside?" she asked, still amused by his reaction to the memory.

Without a word, he started walking up the trail that ran behind the waterfall, and they followed him. He came down the other side, and flattened himself against the stone wall. They followed suit, and together, they inched themselves sideways behind the water at the ground level, and found themselves in a rather large cave. Eliot drew a lighter out of his pocket, and lit the lantern he had sitting in a corner. A golden glow blanketed the room. Moving toward the back of the cave, he hung the lantern on a small branch growing out of the side of the rock wall, and then sat on a rocky outcropping that looked something like a large stone chair.

"I was thinking we could test the triggers here. Once I am sitting in the "seat" part of this rock structure, I can't get out without help, and I am thinking that will be safer than doing it where I can freely leave, on land I know better than you two do." He paused, and looked at Vance, motioning him to pick up the small bag lying in a corner. Vance did so, looking slightly confused. "There's a rope in that bag—carbon fiber, with a steel cable core. You can still restrain me if you feel like I might be a danger to you."

Doc looked at him. "Are you sure? That stone seat is going to get awfully uncomfortable if you sit there for too long, and this could take awhile."

He nodded once, and she changed the subject.

"I brought along some help, too."

"What?"

She held up a syringe, and he shook his head. Before he could speak, she did. "I don't plan to use it unless you want me to do so, or unless it turns out that we have to, but I wanted to give you the choice. If you would rather not remember what happens here, there's no shame in that. It's not easy facing the deep, dark places of your psyche, and you've had to do it too many times in the last two weeks."

"No, Kat. I already told ya—knowin's better than not."

She nodded. "We'll hold off on the rope for now, too, I think."

He slid back in the seat and got as comfortable as possible on the stone chair. It was lined with moss, which helped some. Then, he closed his eyes and waited.

(0o0)

Hardison was walking next to Nate, looking down at his handheld computer screen. Sophie trailed a little behind.

"Okay, Nate, it looks like the signal is right up ahead of us."

Suddenly the signal stopped moving, and Hardison amended what he said to, "Correction. The signal is right here."

Receiving no answer, he looked over at Nate to see him pulling a tracking device out of the inside of a flower pot.

"That's the last tracking device, and there's still no Parker," Sophie said, in frustration. Nate's frustration got the better of him, and he suddenly picked up the tracking device and threw it as hard as he could. It crashed into a piece of cement edging and shattered. Hardison sputtered a bit, picking up the pieces more to keep them out of anyone else's hands than because he was really complaining, but because he was Hardison, he had to gripe a little.

"Do you know what you just broke? Do you know what you broke?"

"We can't do anything more out here. Damn it. We might as well get back to the apartment, and wait for word."

(0o0)

Vance was pacing the mouth of the cave while Doc and Eliot were working. He was close enough to be there if he was needed, but far enough away to afford his friend a little bit of privacy. Still, he could hear almost everything they were saying, but he wouldn't mention it unless Eliot did later. They had just started, and the first few words elicited no reaction. That must mean that they were either words that had been planted for the sake of confusion or they were a message of some kind. Doc made note of each.

"Evil." Eliot began straining to get out of the chair. Vance heard the commotion and hurried over just in case. "That word will no longer make you do anything out of the ordinary." Eliot slowly settled back down, and Doc made a note next to the word.

"Keys." Eliot began fighting harder. Beads of sweat broke out all over his forehead as his back arched and he tried to slide forward in the chair. Vance placed a hand on his shoulder, and it was like someone had set a caged animal free. "You will not feel the compulsion to fight when you hear this word." Doc made a note next to that word as well.

On and on it went, with Doc reading words and making notes based on Eliot's reactions. Finally, she came to the last word on the list.

"Potato." Eliot's rage erupted out of him and covered him like lava from a volcano. He began flailing his arms and practically forced himself out of the stone chair, scraping the sides of his legs and the undersides of his arms as he did so. Vance tried to hold him, but he was fighting too hard. He managed to hold Eliot long enough for Doc to get in there and do her best to remove the command from his mind. Vance wasn't what he was for nothing, and had many of the same skills Eliot had, though they all had their specialties. Not knowing what else to do when Eliot didn't immediately calm down, Vance put him to sleep.