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It’s supposed to be a normal case. In many ways it’s simpler than most. This bad guy hasn’t even bothered to bribe local politicians so once they show law enforcement the evidence of the kidnappings and shippings, he’ll be arrested quickly enough. His work is stretched over several countries so they drop some information to International Law enforcement to make sure that charges stick and his organization will be cleaned up.
All they need to do is make sure that he can’t run away.
The man’s a bruiser, but he does his best work when his victims are down- when he can torture them. He’s still hired by some governments and other organizations for his gift for “interrogation.”
It will be easy enough for Elliot to break both his legs and leave him for the police.
That’s the plan anyway.
“I’m sorry but the only signals coming from that house are for Wi-Fi and cable,” Hardison said. “He’s old school for security. Dogs and locks.”
“I can take care of the locks,” Parker says, pulling her hair into a ponytail. “If someone can distract the dogs.”
Elliot and Hardison exchange a look.
“I’ve got to get inside when she opens the door,” Elliot points out grumpily. “Unless you want to face the Scalpel Master and break his legs?”
“Come on man,” Hardison whines, “I had to scope out his computer and website for the cops. Man- I have seen things I can never unsee.”
He turns to Parker. “Come on babe- can’t we just wait for him to leave and then tackle him?”
Parker pats him on the shoulder. “Then the cops would have to wait for a warrant to search the house- rather than use the warrant to find and arrest him. Once it’s a crime scene, they can search it all they want.”
“I knew I should have stayed home for this,” Hardison grumbles. “I could have done everything from the safety of our bar and not worried about this crap.”
“But then who would carry the meat to the other end of the property to distract the dogs?” Eliot grins.
Two hours later, they’re inside. Well- Elliot is inside. Parker is at the door, taser drawn in case she needs to take down a fleeing person-seller. Alec is halfway out of the sun roof of his car- chucking raw hamburger balls away from the house while dogs scramble and howl around him.
“We’ve got a problem,” Elliot says over their communicators.
“I’m surrounded by dogs, man,” Alec said. “I can’t help you right now.”
“What’s wrong,” Parker says. “Do you need help with the target?”
“No,” Elliot tells her. “I found him. He’s down. But I also found a kid’s room. Target wasn’t living alone.”
Parker pauses. She knows that she isn’t the most normal of humans and that her first reactions are usually not right- but if she’d been staying with a criminal (and she spent most of her childhood on her own or living with criminals) and she was spooked, then she would have disappeared. And from the layout of the house- she would have-
She walks around the left side- furthest from the sounds of the dogs. She jumps and catches the edge of a window, then the drain pipe and then swings her toes to the next floor’s window and catches the edge of the roof against her palms. Pulling herself over, she makes it in time to see the skylight open, a dark head lifting out. She waits until the kid’s shadowed eyes catch on her face.
“Hi,” she says. She waits, still crouched, her hands flat against the rooftop, trying not to startle him.
The boy glances around, then pushes the window open further, grabbing the edge and pulling himself up so that his forearms rest on the roof. Easy position to fall back down from or lift himself up onto the roof, Parker notes.
“Hey,” the boy replies. He’s young-ish. Probably between fifteen and eighteen. His coloring is just left of white- possibly Middle Eastern or Asian ancestry from the olive tone and dark hair, but mixed given the green blue eyes. He has a wide mouth and his hair curls slightly. Parker can tell, even with his hands in fists, that they have calluses. Some of his fingers are bandaged.
“Are you a relative of-” Parker starts. The boy interrupts her with a snort.
“No,” he says flatly.
On the comms, Alec is asking if she found the kid.
“Okay,” Parker says. She isn’t sure how to ask the next question. What would Sofie or Nate say to a child? “Okay. You know he’s a bad man, right?”
“Yeah,” the kid says with a curl to his lips. Parker isn’t sure what that means so she continues.
“Did he hurt you?” she asks. The boy considers the question. Then he pulls himself completely up and out of the window. He’s wearing a woolen sweater and carrying a backpack. Besides the fingers, he doesn’t look damaged. His boots are high quality- the same kind that Parker wears to jump onto moving trains. Parker remains crouched to avoid startling him.
“No,” the kid says. “No victims here. I was sent to learn from him.”
Parker doesn’t move. She’s seen some ugly things in this world. Elliot has seen worse. She knows that some children have no childhoods. She’s one of them. So his bold claim, standing with feet apart as though waiting for her to rush him, doesn’t change her expression.
“The torture or the kidnapping?” she asks instead. She shows her palms to try to put him at ease (a trick of body language that Sofie had to teach her). “Because we’re here to take down the kidnapping ring.”
The boy studies her for a moment, before his posture relaxes. “I don’t know anything about any kidnappings. I was here for the torture stuff.”
Parker nods companionably, “I hear that you can make a lot of money in that business.”
He’s still looking at her oddly so she stands up.
“We could give you a ride out?” she offers. “The police will be here soon.”
He shrugs so Parker moves around him to the edge of the roof. It’s only two floors so she jumps. A twist and fall and she’s rolling to a crouch on the grass. She glances up at the boy. He’s looking from her to the grass.
Elliot rounds the corner, hair fluffing around his face as it always does when he’s stressed. He catches sight of the kid and says, “NO! Don’t do it-”
The kid jumps.
His form is perfect. If Elliot hadn’t sprinted underneath him, the kid would have made a mirror perfect copy of Parker’s move. Instead Elliot snatches him from the air and twists so they both spill onto the grass.
“Do you want to break something?!” Elliot yells at the boy. “Don’t jump off roofs.”
“She did-” the boy complains.
“He would have been fine Elliot,” Parker says, reaching down to help the boy up. Both males look grumpy. Parker doesn’t know how to handle grumpy- but Hardison said that distractions help. “I’m driving!”
“Parker-” Elliot growls, but Parker is already sprinting to where they left the van. Elliot grabs the kid by his backpack and swings them around to follow her. “This way- hurry or she’ll make it to the driver’s seat first.”
She makes it to the driver’s seat first.
Elliot swears and jumps into the back of the van pulling the kid up behind him.
“Hold on to something,” He warns the kid.
They cling to the walls and equipment of the van as the car speeds out of the area.
“She always drive like this,” the kid asks, his expression focused as he balances himself gracefully against a wall and Hardison’s computer set up.
“Always,” Elliot grunts. Parker began driving as a getaway driver at the age of nine. “We’re working on it.”
He tries not to speak further. Parker’s driving makes him nauseous and nervous. After a few minutes, though, the boy speaks up again.
“Did you kill him?”
Elliot tries to study the kid’s expression in the light of the swinging van. He can’t tell if the boy has any feelings one way or another about the death of his teacher.
“No,” He finally says. “He’s got a warrant from Interpol that will get him into a French prison for the next forty to fifty years.”
The boy doesn’t react to this in any way that Elliot could recognize. He carefully probes to see if he can get a reaction.
“Is there a reason that he should be killed?” He asks. The boy’s eyes widen ever so slightly, in a look Elliot suspects is startled, before being erased. He pushes slightly, softly. “If you give me a good reason, I can make sure he dies.”
The boy seems to consider this, studying Elliot openly. Finally, he shakes his head. “No. He’s just a business man who deals in pain. Prison seems fine.”
The boy doesn’t look at Elliot for the rest of the ride. Elliot is grateful- he can’t concentrate when he’s this angsty over Parker’s driving.
“Coming?” He asks when the car has stilled and he can speak without puking. “I’m making soup and sandwiches.”
“You always this hospitable to kids you kidnap?” the kid asks.
Elliot pauses, looking at the kid carefully. “You always so quick to jump into the cars of strangers who beat up your roommates?”
“Teacher,” the kid corrects. His eyes are very green. Elliot notes the fall of the shirt, the accent, and the careful way the kid holds himself. It's very distinct. “And he was a monster.”
Elliot snorts. That was a slightly different take than the boy’s first definition of the man.
“You hungry?” He says, packing up.
The kid considers him with careful eyes.
“I could eat,” he says. He follows Elliot into the safe house.
. . .
Jason wasn’t certain why he followed the woman and man out of his trainers home. He was curious- certainly. But he had been planning to kill his trainer himself, so he understood why they had arrived to take the man down. Maybe it was because these people didn’t kill but were clearly not as against the idea as other good guys. (And if Jason could understand their justification for not killing a torturer and human trafficker he might understand . . . but those were two different things entirely. It was different when it was fathers, right?) Maybe he followed them because he wanted to check how completely they’d taken the man down- be certain the job was done. (Maybe it was because the man had jumped to catch him and Jason missed the feeling of being protected.)
The group’s set up was in a small motel on the third, and highest, floor. It was the type of place families and friends would use for vacations or long trips- not permanent or even long term housing by any means. The blond, white girl who had jumped from the roof- Parker or Ms. Parker- drove like a maniac on their way there, but slowed when they reached the parking lot. Elliot, the broad shouldered white man with the long brown hair, who caught Jason, had invited Jason along as casually as one would invite a friend over after a day at school. They wore no masks and seemed to be calling each other by name, which made Jason pretty certain they were government sanctioned, not vigilantes. Or maybe they were detectives or private corporate muscle for hire.
The room they led him to was small, with just two beds and a bathroom. A truly tiny table in the corner had three chairs around it, two of them straight wooden chairs and one arm chair. Parker, the girl, climbed into the arm chair immediately and curled up on top of it as comfortably as a cat would.
“I’m making grilled cheese and tomato soup,” The man who the woman called Elliot said. “I’d make something more but the facilities here suck.”
Jason didn’t really know what to do with himself. He glanced around the room again. The area Elliot was using to cook was a small counter with a single sink and close to the door, against the bathroom wall. The center of the room was taken up by the beds. One of the beds was made with military precision but was covered with luggage, while the other was messy and covered with wires so he couldn’t sit there. But he also didn’t want to sit too close to the girl whose armchair sat by the windows on the other side of the room.
It was the girl who solved his dilemma, kicking a leg out from her arm chair to hit one of the wooden chairs and knock it between the beds, into the center of the room where he was least likely to be cornered or caught within arms reach of the two strangers. Jason, trying to avoid any impression of fear, slouched into it, kicking his feet out and crossing them to project confidence.
“Food will be ready in a half hour,” Elliot said, pulling his hair back in a ponytail. The counter held a crock pot and an electric skillet. He plugged both of them in, before he pulled cheese and three mason jars full of something red (presumably the tomato sauce) out of the motel’s mini-fridge. “Alec will be here by then. Any allergies?”
“No,” Jason said after a glance at the girl to confirm that he was the only one who needed to ask that. Given the shared room it was obvious that these people knew each other well enough to share sleeping space, but given that both beds had been used (hotels didn’t use military corners) they could just be coworkers. Elliot knowing her allergies indicated a closer association though. Then again, if there was a third partner his assumptions would be thrown off. “Who’s Alec?”
“My boyfriend,” Parker said the words proudly. “He was distracting the dogs. Do you need a first aid kit?”
She gestured to his hands as she spoke. Jason glanced at them again, but the bandages from the night before were holding pretty well. His trainer had decided that he couldn’t understand pain unless he experienced certain sensations himself. Given that Jason had once been beaten near death before being blown up, he had disagreed. He could, however, admit that after his trainer’s demonstration on two of his fingers, he did learn some subtleties that had escaped him during his first experience. He’d been looking forward to showing his trainer what he’d learned.
“I’m good for now,” Jason said. He wasn’t above using their kit before he left, but he also didn’t want to have to use it if it turned out to be subpar compared to the one he’d used that morning. Swapping good bandages for bad was always a waste. Parker nodded casually and went back to cuddling her arm chair. She seemed comfortable with the silence. Elliot certainly did, he seemed completely absorbed with cooking, melting butter on the skillet and pouring mason jars of what Jason assumed to be Tomato soup into the crockpot.
The awkward silence continued for five minutes and forty seconds longer. Jason counted. (It had been one of the ways he had dealt with Bruce’s interrogation silences when he wanted Jason to talk and Jason didn’t want too.) It kept Jason from talking, even if it seemed like the other two didn’t actually expect him to talk. Maybe they were waiting for this Alec?
The door swung open with a sudden, loud movement, the man who entered stumbling over the threshold. Jason jumped up startled, as the other two in the room also jumped. Jason caught Elliot swinging around, the chef’s knife in his hand suddenly looking deadly, before he relaxed and the knife was dropped onto the cutting board.
“Damn it, Hardison,” Elliot snapped, “Don’t do that!”
The newly named Hardison was catching the door with a foot to close it, his arms full of a laptop, tablet, and several cords and wires. He closed the door with another loud snap as he moved into the room.
“Hey man, I’m trying here.” He complained. Hardison was tall and thin, with black skin and loose layered clothing. Jason saw no weapons, which was odd since everyone else in the room was armed, including Jason. Hardison brushed past Jason to dump everything in his arms onto the messy bed covered with wires. He didn’t stop moving forward, momentum carrying him across the room and to Parker, who he leaned down to give a chaste kiss. She uncurled from the armchair as he approached, accepting the kiss as though it were her due, and then curled back up into the chair. Harrdison smiled at this and dropped onto the only other chair. Once settled, his eyes lit on Jason and he gave him a friendly smile. “Hey man, I’m Alec. Did I miss introductions?”
Jason wondered if Alec Hardison was his full real name or if Hardison and Alec were different pseudonyms that he used. Jason kept his tone cautious as he spoke. “Nothing to miss. There weren’t any introductions.”
Alec blinked. His voice was level, but slightly tensed as he spoke. “It’s been forty minutes since they met you and no one has done introductions?”
Jason would have explained that he got their names from context and no one asked for his, but two voices spoke up before he could open his mouth.
“He was there to train under a professional torturer,” Elliot sounded defensive. “He ain’t gonna tell us his name.”
“He’s a kid,” Parker said, speaking over Elliot, “And he’s been hurt. He absolutely won’t trust us with his name.”
Alec’s eyes flickered to Jason’s hands but he leaned back, relaxing further rather than getting angry or intense or disapproving the way most people would at the sight of an injured kid.
“That’s not the point of introductions,” Alec said, rolling his eyes. His tone was not as lecture-y as the words could have sounded, more whiny, like this was an annoying trait of his companions that he’d worked on before. “You could still introduce us to him! Just so he knows who we are!”
He sighed and then gave Jason a friendly grin. “Hey, kid. So I’m Alec and these are Elliot and Parker. We help people. Do you have something we could call you?”
They were treating him like a victim, Jason realized, or maybe a source. He wasn’t sure if the other two had meant to use silence and lack of information as a weapon to unsettle Jason but if they had, then having Alec arrive with a friendly attitude and open assurance that they “helped people” would be a surefire way to immediately get a person to settle and lean on Alec. Like a good cop and bad cop routine. Jason should walk out of here now and call Talia. But he was curious.
“I’m Jay,” he offered. Jason could have given him his full real name, it was common enough and the life attached to that name was legally dead so it wouldn’t lead anywhere, but he also didn’t want any heroes getting their hands on a name he might want to use again one day and attaching it to information like “trained under a torturer and trafficker.”
Alec’s smile softened and his eyes looked far more approving than a single letter deserved. “It’s nice to meet you Jay. Is there anyone you need to call or would like us to call for you?”
Jason was saved from answering by Parker kicking out from her chair again, this time hitting Alec’s knee. He hissed and moved the chair and his legs out of her range as she spoke decisively. “No.”
Jason didn’t have time to grow concerned over that either because Elliot was speaking up as well. “Not before lunch. We’ll talk about all that after ya’ll all eat. Have you washed your hands Hardison?”
Alec grumbled (something about Parker and dogs) and got up again to head to the bathroom. Parker sort of stretched out of her chair instead of standing up like a normal person and went after him.
“You want to serve yourself kid?” Elliot offered, pulling out a stack of disposable bamboo bowls from under the counter. He set them down next to a high plate of grilled cheese. As Jason approached the counter, he backed away, keeping out of arm's reach of Jason. “Sorry the meal is so simple, the other two are real heathens about what constitutes good food.
“I’d normally be feeding them better, but since it’s the end of a long case, I let them choose what to eat. Well, mostly chose what to eat. Hardison asked for hot pockets. This was a compromise.”
“You don’t know what the word compromise means!” Alec’s voice called from the bathroom.
“Means you don’t die from that toxic crap building up in your system,” Elliot replied, not raising his voice at all. Jason had finished ladling his soup and chosen his sandwich (several right sides of the last four sandwiches and using a bowl from a third of the way down the stack). “There’s spoons by the coffee pot.”
There were and they were in individually wrapped plastic. It was clear that Elliot was careful and, more importantly, knew how to work with paranoid people. He had let Jason serve himself, control what food he chose off their plate, and what touched it. He’d sent the other two out of the room and spoke the whole time that Jason had to put his back to the rest of the room; this ensured that Jason would always know where everyone was without getting distracted. It was subtle, it was careful, and it was overwhelmingly kind. Jason snatched a spoon and moved his bowl and sandwiches to his chair.
The other two re entered the room after he sat. The three adults fussed as they put their food together; Elliot telling off Hardison when he began to eat the sandwiches before serving himself soup. Parker moved to sit first, brushing by him carefully on her way to her chair. Her bowl was filled to the brim and Jason was impressed that she didn’t spill any when she sat. Elliot stayed by the counter to eat his soup, eventually shooing Alec back to the table.
Jason waited until all of the adults had taken long drinks and taken at least a bite of sandwich before he touched the food. It was good. The sandwiches were greasy and warm, surprisingly flavorful for something cooked in an apartment. But the soup was excellent. Rich and creamy and with more basil than Jason was expecting. He hadn’t had food this good since . . .
He took a deep breath. Between the kindness and the food Jason was well on his way towards feeling soft. He hadn’t dealt with emotions this strong since before he was reborn. These were strangers. They thought he was a source or a victim. They would easily leave him behind and forget him. But it had been so long since someone was kind to Jason just for the sake of being kind. It made him . . . almost . . . angry. It made him want to cry.
He shoveled the food down in the worst attempt to eat his feelings. Luckily, Hardison seemed unable to enjoy silence and had begun asking Elliot questions about the food.
“Carrots!,” Elliot informed him with a smug grin. “And real cream. That’s what gives it the body and silky texture.”
Hardison looked at the food as though it had betrayed him. “Why would you do that? What did Tomato soup ever do to you that you felt the need to defile- yeah, I said it- DEfile it with carrots!?”
And then Elliot was off- listing vitamins and food pairing and a long rant about salt that gave Jason no clue whether he loved it or hated it. Hardison seemed to egg him on- offering affirmation as often as disagreement. Jason just kept his head down and his mouth full so he wouldn’t be asked to participate.
Parker finally interrupted. “Salt is important!”
“Exactly!” Elliot said- pointing his clean spoon at her. He then glared at Hardison. “See!”
“But I’m done eating and the kid looks done too,” Parker easily moved the conversation away from salt. She had abandoned her bowl on the table and now sat up straight in her arm chair. Her eyes focused on him with a clear, direct look that made the back of Jason’s neck prickle. He was suddenly reminded that this woman had just taken out a human trafficker. Jason, who had been taking increasingly small bites of his last sandwich to lengthen its lifespan and prevent him from needing an opinion on salt, shoved the end of the crust into his mouth. “So maybe let’s have that conversation now.”
“You good to talk, Jay?” Hardison asked, turning his attention to Jason. “We have more soup if you need to eat more.”
“Or we can talk while what you’ve eaten settles and then you can have more,” Elliot offered. He was using a . . . less intense tone, which Jason suspected was as soft as he got. Jason swallowed the last of his sandwich.
“I can talk,” Jason said. He wasn’t sure what he’d learned about them, but opening up might let him ask questions.
“Is there someone we can call for you?” Parker asked promptly, her eyes trying to catch his.
Jason hesitated. He could have Talia pick him up. But she’d gotten so exasperated when he’d last had her pick him up early because he’d killed his teacher. He wasn’t looking forward to explaining what happened to this one. Talia was still hoping that he’d want to reconnect with Bruce- hanging out with vigilantes would only encourage her.
“Jay, we are here to help,” Parker continued in an easy voice. “There are people in this world, companies and governments, guardians and guards, who have all the money and all the power. And they use it to make other people do what they want. They make others suffer under their own enormous pressure. They use the full weight of their power to crush others.”
Parker smiled at him. “We provide . . . Leverage.”
That explained nothing, but it made Jason want to trust her in the weirdest way. It was the clearest warning that he’d heard not to ask questions about the hows of their work for plausible deniability reasons. That protective instinct was sweet. But Jason wasn’t a victim and he had his own power. Talia couldn’t force him to do anything- she was too emotionally tied up in him to kill him and too desperate to have him return to Bruce singing her praises to discipline him.
Jason considered for only a moment longer. He should call Talia. These people didn’t need him around bothering them. He was curious, but Talia would really- like, really not be happy if he vanished on her again.
“I got someone I should call.” He admitted.
“And do you want to go back to them?” Elliot asked. Jason blinked, and then let his amusement show. “Do you feel safe staying with them?”
“It’s not like that,” Jason said. “We’re fine. She’ll find me a new teacher and I’ll move around for a bit.”
“A teacher like the man you were living with before?” Parker asked.
“Probably not,” Jason admitted. “He was mostly done teaching me and I’m pretty good at self study.”
“What exactly are you. . . “studying” for?” Elliot asked. He seemed to be taking a more confrontational angle while Parker was being the softer touch. “That stuff is a hell of a thing for a kid to be learning.”
Well, if they wanted to know-
“I’m training to kill someone.”
Elliot snorted out a half laugh, more amused than anything. The other two didn’t make a sound, but Hardison seemed shocked and Parker looked as cool as ever. It set Jason on edge.
“Son-” Elliot started.
“DON’T CALL ME THAT!” Jason was out of his seat in a second. His veins were full of icy fire as the rage licked against his reason. There was no reason for them to be so dismissive- to laugh or ignore him- to pity him. He was going to kill Batman and there was nothing that Talia or these strangers who feed him soup could do to-
“Jay,” Parker barked. She wasn’t moving from her seat. “Killing isn’t that hard.”
Jason paused in surprise. That wasn’t really what he expected her to say and it was a near quote too. He took a breath and agreed. “Agatha Christie said that killing was easy. But I want to know-”
He hesitated because his plan was ever evolving and he still wasn’t certain what he wanted exactly.
“I want him to know- I want him to know that I killed him. That I’m the one to end him.” His voice was barely above a whisper as he finished. He was looking at the floor, couldn’t take what these strangers would think. He should get out of there. He was poison, he shouldn’t stay.
“Yeah,” Elliot said, his voice heavy. “I understand that.”
Jason glared at him. “Gonna tell me that it isn’t worth it? Two graves and that I won’t feel any better when it’s over?”
“Dead doesn’t fix the past,” Elliot told him, meeting his eyes with his own intense stare. “It just stops them from hurting people in the future. That can make some people happy.”
It would make Jason . . . satisfied. Right?
“But taking lives changes a man. You take a life and you carry that with you for the rest of you life-” Elliot stepped away from the counter, ducking his head slightly to catch Jason’s eyes. “And you know that don’t you?”
Jason- Jason knew that. He didn’t think about it. They were just animals- monsters. It was no different than killing a snake before it bit you or someone else. He knew that he didn’t feel those deaths- not usually. But there were good days, when he could almost feel happy, almost feel safe and then he’d remember their faces and feel- he’d feel. And he didn’t like that feeling. So he kept his good days few and far between. He let himself feel angry, work himself into a rage, when he began to feel again. And most days he just felt cold, anyway. Just a peaceful emptiness.
“I can’t forget,” Elliot spoke clearly but quietly. “Their faces, their names if I knew them. Their eyes. I carry that with me. I always will.”
“I’m not who I was before I ended that first life. I don’t know that I can ever be that person again.” Elliot added, catching Jason’s eyes again. “But changing that path, doing something else with those skills, it’s changed me. Those lives don’t weight the same way on me. The lives I take now don’t hurt the same way the others do.
“So when you look at the person you want to kill, do you think that it will improve the world? And most importantly, do you think that you are the one who should carry that weight?”
Logically, yes. If Jason killed Bruce and replaced him with something better- as a Batman that actually was feared and stopped the crimes from being repeated- then that would be worth it wouldn’t it?
But what fell out of his mouth wasn’t logic, wasn’t sensible. It went against this last year of training.
“I don’t know.” He said, still facing Elliot, studying his eyes for a reaction. Elliot showed no satisfaction with the answer. Just the same intensity he’d shown the whole day.
“Why don’t you stay with us for a while,” He offered. “Just until you do know?”
Jason paused for a moment. But it wasn’t in thought. He actively didn’t think about his answer. There was no logic or reason involved in his whispered, “Okay.”
Today was a good day and that meant that Jason could feel something. Reason may say that Gotham and Jason deserved a better Batman. But Jason could feel. And he felt like he wanted Bruce alive. Unreasonable and pathetic though it was. He didn’t want his Dad dead.
At least, not that day. Who knew what tomorrow could bring?
….
The kid was quiet on the long way home. Parker and Hardison had both looked at Elliot as though they had questions, but neither of them said anything. In Hardison’s case, he was probably being sensitive. In Parker’s case, she probably didn’t know what she wanted to ask and would blurt out a terribly awkward question at some point before trying to rephrase it eight different ways none of which would be clearer than the first one.
Maybe if he made them all Chocolate cake when they got home they’d both accept the distraction and let it go.
They packed up easily enough, the kid’s bag still in their rented van. The drive to the airport and the drop off of the van were interrupted only by Parker and Harrdison’s insistence that they stop for snacks. At check out Elliot found that the kid had bought two books before he herded his partners to the front. Both books looked like pulp fiction. He clearly had some kind of funds and some kind of experience traveling. Once they reached the car, the boy entered his books and didn’t look up until halfway though the flight when his stomach started to rumble. Elliot tossed him some chocolate and a bag of chips and the kid vanished into his reading again.
It wasn’t until they landed and got their luggage that the kid began talking again.
“Where are we headed?” He asked Parker. “Another job?”
“Home first,” Parker informed him. “I’m drive-”
“Only I drive Lucille!” Hardison interrupted.
“You let Elliot drive!” Parker argued.
“I’d say it’s because he scares me but I’d be lyin’. It’s actually because you scare me the most and I don’t wanna die today. I just. I really don’t wanna.”
Elliot leaned over to the boy and whispered, “She learned to drive as a getaway driver. At nine.”
The boy looked only slightly surprised, nodding.
“Yeah that tracks,” He said, like that was a totally normal way to learn something. Given that he should be learning anatomy at school and not from a torturer, Elliot supposed that it would make sense to him.
“We’ll head home before we look for a new job. Got to check our info, choose the job, and get everything ready for it before we go,” Elliot informed him. “Just another half an hour before we’re home.”
Hardison drove home, because Elliot wanted to have his hands free if the kid wasn’t as passive as he appeared. But his worries were unfounded, as the kid went back to reading. He was apparently in the middle of the second of his books, having finished the first.
As they pulled into their parking lot, the kid looked up again. His voice was calm as he informed them, “I’m too young to drink.”
“We know,” Hardison informed him. “Why do you think that no one asked you for Id in getting on the plane? Nobody gonna believe that that baby face is old enough to drive.”
“We live on the second floor,” Parker explained.
“I better check the kitchen before we go up,” Elliot warned them. They’d be on their own with the kid if he tried anything, but the kitchen was close to the easiest exits so he’d be waiting with a lot of knives if trouble broke out. “See if the new hire was able to keep to the correct menu.”
Parker grabbed Hardison’s elbow and began steering him away, even as Hardison tried to argue.
“The right menu?” He grumped at Elliot. “You mean your boring ass menu that don’t have an ounce of imagination and pizzazz- You heard me- PIZZAZZ. Your menu like something that my Nanna gonna make on the weekend when she too busy to put in any effort.”
Elliot took a deep breath and didn’t say anything. He glanced down at the boy, who was trying to hide a smile behind his book.
“I’d be mighty grateful if you asked him for a tour and kept him out of my kitchen for a few hours.”
“I can do that,” the kid said, with a grin like pure mischief. Elliot allowed himself to grin back. Then he shooed the kid forward and they entered the building through the side door. Parker led the other two guys up the stairs, their bags bangging against the narrow walls, Hardison now whining about laser cut cheese, “Fried and cut at the same time, ha!”
Elliot waited until they’d reached the landing before opening the door, so the noise didn’t enter the dining area. But once opened the bar revealed no one there, negating his efforts.
He entered the room cautiously, waiting for one of the staff to suddenly appear from one of the booths or behind the bar. The room was unnaturally quiet for a place that should have three waiters and a hostess this near evening. He relaxed slightly when he saw their “Closed for Private Event” sign hanging on the door.
A dish clanged from the kitchen, and Elliot redirected towards the noise. Maybe the chef was alone or the event only wanted a bartender and there was a staffer in the kitchen waiting or preparing for the event. Or maybe the building had been cleared and Elliot and his people were in danger.
When the door swung open, Elliot realized it was the latter.
Talia Head, also known as Talia Al Ghul, sat at one of Elliot’s kitchen counters, drinking a glass of wine. Her red pants suit and low heels suggested she was prepared to do violence and walk away with his blood hidden in the red of her jacket.
“Mr. Spencer,” She said, her voice deceptively polite.
“Ma'am,” Elliot responded carefully. He’d been introduced to her under her birth name but since she changed it and was working in a semi-legal field it seemed impolite to call her by a name associated with an assassin death cult.
“It’s been- what, nine years?” She offered. She may have been checking if he remembered who she was.
“Closer to ten,” Elliot offers in confirmation. “Belgrade.”
“You were still working for Damien, then.” Talia says agreeably.
Elliot tenses up. Talia and Damien Moreau had been something like friends. He’d even have assumed they were lovers, if Damien hadn’t been such a sexist pig and Talia such a self respecting assassin, capable of cutting out his tongue after his first disrespectful comment.
“I visited him in prison last year,” Talia said casually, picking up her glass of wine to take another sip, her eyes on him as she did so, daring him to make a move. Elliot didn’t dare. She lowered the glass. “He’s surprisingly well for a man trapped in a dirty little cage.”
“That what you’re here about?” Elliot asked. He had a three inch blade in his belt, a wood block of kitchen knives to his left, pots hanging from a rack overhead and to his right, a marble rolling pin to the left and in front of him. Talia could kill him before he reached any of them. Talking was the best way forward, but he still took a step to the left, putting the center island all the more between them.
Talia laughed a little. “No, not at all. Damien grew too large to protect himself from everyone he ought. And a small, five man team taking him down just proves that.”
“I’m honestly surprised that you didn’t start wearing masks after that job.” She added, fingers playing on the rim of her wine glass.
“Masks invite trouble,” Elliot said. “You put them on and people want to label you and control and fight you.”
“And if we were labeled,” Elliot said, uncomfortable, but needing to make the threat, “Technically we are the villains, Ms. Al Ghul.”
Talia raised the glass to him and took a sip, an unspoken “I’ll drink to that,” ringing through the air.
“Can I ask why you’re here?” He finally broke and demanded. “I’m not for hire.”
Talia licked her lips, her perfectly lipstick wet from the wine. “Oh, I’m not here for that. I rented out the bar specifically so we could have a little chat, privat-”
She cut herself off as the sound of thundering footsteps sounded from the wall closest to the stairs to the second floor. Talia tracked them with her eyes as they went through the hall, entered the dining area, and came towards the kitchen.
If she thought that she could use the life of this kid to blackmail Elliot and his team-
The door burst open with a shouted “Talia!”
Talia rose gracefully from her stool, a real smile on her lips.
“Jason,” She said back in a warm tone. She stretched out her hand and the boy- Jason, apparently- approached so she could lay it on his shoulder. “This isn’t where I left you.”
“I saw your car from the window,” Jason informed her, a frown on his face. “Where’s your security detail?”
“My Father infiltrated it,” Talia sighed like having Ra’s Al Ghul spy on her was an inconvenience. “And Luthor’s men report back to him. It was safer, really, to travel alone.”
She brushed back his hair and the boy ducked her hand, looking for all the world like any other teenager embarrassed by his mother.
Parker and Harrdison entered the room, much more quietly than the kid, and carefully arranged themselves around them. Elliot realized that Talia’s outfit and behavior had planted herself firmly in their minds as a corporate woman and mother lowering their expectations of her physical danger to them. That wouldn’t do.
“Parker, Harrdison,” he said, keeping his voice soft as Talia ran her hand over the boy’s shoulder and remarked on how much he’d grown. “May I introduce Talia Head, CEO of LexCorp. Formerly Talia Al Ghul of the League of Assassins.”
Talia caught his eye and smiled that strange, warm, real smile. Then it vanished into her business face, polite smile and cool eyes. She tugged Jason around to face them.
“Jason. That is Elliot Spencer, former Commander of Task Force Delta and made famous for a particularly gruesome murder of a certain corrupt official in Myanmar.” Her voice was firm and comfortable as she listed extremely classified information to this child. “And that is Parker who walked in and out of the French National Bank with forty thousand dollars that weren't hers at the tender age of eighteen. She’s also one of the two successful grifters to perform the White Rabbit.”
“Only one,” Hardison interrupted. He glanced down bashfully when everyone looked at him, but repeated in a lower voice, “She’s the only one to perform it successfully.”
Talia tilted her head with a soft hum at the information. “You’d know best I suppose. Alec Harrdison. Cracked the Pentagon servers at the age of twelve. I’d love to see you go up against Oracle or the Calculator. There are rumors that you crushed Chaos two years ago.”
“Three,” Hardison corrected again. “And he got out of jail almost immediately so I don’t know that I’d count that.”
“Fine work in any case,” Talia said. Hardison looked flattered, in a nervous way.
“Their crew does excellent work,” Talia informed the newly named Jason, “Usually bloodless, but they are empire destroyers.”
“We’re thieves,” Hardison corrects.
“What did you steal when you arranged the death of that defense contractor, Dean Chesney, exactly?” Talia asked with some amusement.
“Who?” Parker whispered to Hardison, quietly from behind Elliot.
“Cross my heart job,” Hardison whispered back, giving Elliot the reminder he needed to remember that particular event more clearly.
“We stole back the heart he’d stolen for surgery,” Elliot said. “That’s besides the point. You’re trying to sell the kid on us. But he’s already agreed to stay for a while.”
Elliot jerked his head towards Jason as he spoke. Talia tilted her head slightly, checking Jason’s expression. Elliot assumed that Jason confirmed his story, because Talia smiles slightly at whatever she sees.
“Well then,” She says, finishing off her wine. “I’d appreciate regular phone calls, Jason.”
The teenager sighs heavily.
“If you don’t,” Talia threatens casually. “I will visit again. Just to be sure your training is continuing well.”
“Why us?” Elliot demanded. “Sure he wants to train to kill someone, but you have contacts with all of the best killers in the field. Hell- most of them work for your father. What exactly are you getting us into?”
Talia gave a smirk and seemed comfortable not speaking.
“She doesn’t want me to kill him,” Jason complained in a mutter.
“I want you to look through your plans and reconsider your goals,” Talia corrected. “These people are excellent planners. Successful and talented. You’ve already proven that if you wanted someone dead, you could do that. Before I even trained you, even, you were able to build successful bombs to deal with your problems.”
Elliot ignored Parker’s excited, “Explosives?!” from behind him. That was a problem for later, for an older Elliot.
“But real planning, with contingencies and escapes, that I need you to learn,” Talia finished.
Elliot glanced at the kid again. Jason was scrunching up his nose with distaste.
“You gonna bring any enemies down on us, kid?” Elliot asked. A desire to kill someone usually spoke to a long term problem with a powerful person, after all. Especially if it was someone that Talia knew and wasn’t killing.
The teenager rolled his eyes. “No one that knows I’m alive and cares.”
“My father is more interested in my own death than Jason’s at the moment,” Talia added. Elliot hadn’t heard that that relationship was so divided. But it made sense that a name change and a job with another, differently corrupt powerful individual, could cause or be caused by family issues. “I’ll let you know if that changes.”
Talia Head moved to the back doors, her steps graceful and silent. The gun at the small of her back hadn’t creased her coat at all.
“Do try not to kill these teachers,” Talia said, pulling open the door. The sunlight spilled over her, casting shadows and highlighting her cheekbones. “And don’t forget to call.”
“Good-bye, Talia,” Jason groaned, rolling his eyes to the ceiling. Elliot used to do the same thing to his father as a kid.
“Good-bye, Jason,” Talia said, something like relief in her voice. Elliot couldn’t see her face as she passed through the door and was gone.
“Was that really-?” Hardison asked. Elliot caught his eye and nodded. “Really?!”
Elliot nodded again, sharing a commiseratingly horrified look with his friend.
“So,” Parker sidled up next to the teenager, “You like explosions too?”
The look the men shared next was a much more dramatic form of horror.