Those Who Are Found
Title: Those Who Are Found
Author: Magpie
Rating: pg-13
Genre: Werewolf!Eliot, past Eliot/OMC, hinted Nate/Eliot/Sophie, Pre-Harsion/Parker
Verse: Phases of the Moon
Summary: It's been a long few months since that night they were reminded of a time they were lost.
Notes: The last offical installation for this series (for the moment at least) there will be another sort of AU fic posted for this in a few days.
For the head-trauma square on my H/C bingo card which happens to be the LAST one.
Amazing and Awesome Banner is by she who should be praised, Hollow_Echos
“You’re exhausted man. Go with Sophie. Get some sleep. We’ll let you know the moment anything happens.” Hardison tried giving the worried werewolf a nudge toward the door, unsurprisingly without success.
Eliot open his mouth to object, or maybe just try to remind them *again* of something, but Parker interrupted. “We know. Every hour. Name, location, birthday. We’ve only done this a couple dozen times for you remember?”
Hardison gave a slight grin, trying to lighten the situation. “Well, head traumas do tend to lead to memory loss so he might not.” When Eliot didn’t even growl in annoyance Hardison sobered, glancing back toward the still figure lying on the bed. “He’s going to be alright. It was just a minor head injury. You’ve been awake since the full moon the day before yesterday. Go find Sophie. Make sure she get some sleep.”
Parker stepped forward, whispering something in Eliot’s ear and his shoulders sagged just a little. He hesitated another moment before slipping out of the room and down the stairs.
“What did you tell him?” Hardison asked, settling on a chair a little closer to the bed and lowering his voice.
“That if he didn’t go I’d tell Nate and Sophie that he wasn’t taking care of himself and they’d both blame themselves for it.” Parker answered, perching on the back of the other chair.
Hardison gave Parker a look, startled. Some days she showed hints of understanding humans a lot better than she let on. Though arguably understanding that guilting Eliot into taking care of himself because otherwise Nate and Sophie would feel bad about being hurt and having to do wrap up wasn’t normal human interaction. Especially since Eliot was a werewolf and Nate and Sophie were his alphas and that whole mess hadn’t settled into his mind even after a month.
Hardison stared at the wall just above the clock, his computer laying forgotten nearby. He always hated these all night vigils, they seemed to happen more often than was healthy for the team. Eliot was normally on the receiving end but they’d all been here at some point.
A line of work where concussions weren’t an occupational hazard normally started seeming nice right around the second hour into his shift, though in recent months Parker had started sitting with him through his shift for reasons that only made sense to her.
The company was welcome, even if they couldn’t talk much, the presence in the room kept the fears another close call like this brought up at bay.
His mind wandered back over the past few months. He was a master of not thinking about things but at times like this there seemed little choice. He found himself remembering other vigils.
One in a small town in Nowhereland Middle America where he’d stayed up half the night waiting for first Parker then eventually Eliot to wander into his room to just do something together instead of trying to go to sleep while staring at unfamiliar walls in an empty hotel room after being reminded of times when they’d lost everything and had no one, and the fear that might happen again.
Just days later, staring at the iron door of the panic room, listening, waiting, praying for some sign that things would be alright. That Eliot would pull through this fight just like all the others.
Leaving Nate to his coffee and crossword puzzle, waiting for Eliot to come down from the roof, all of them waiting for the changes to stop hurting him in ways they didn’t even fully understand.
And the long, agonizing, infuriating, wait for Eliot to say something, do *something*. Watching for bruises that weren’t from a fight, watching for that flinch and just a moment of hesitation, fear, that should never have been there.
Nate and Sophie said they couldn’t do anything until Eliot was ready to leave Jacob.
Hardison still couldn’t understand how someone so… Eliot… could let things go on like that.
Nate stirred in his sleep, mumbling something, the tone matching the one he had when things were just starting to spiral out and he was making things up as he went.
Parker moved, sliding off her chair to crouch next to the bed, arms resting inches from Nate’s head as she leaned forward. “Everything’s okay alpha, we’re all safe back at the den. Eliot’s taken care of and the job’s done.”
Hardison was about to question Parker’s use of the term that now occasionally slipped into Eliot’s speech when he was distracted or rushed, and caution Parker about startling Nate but the man was already settling.
Parker went back to her chair, giving Hardison that smile, the real one, like she’d just figured out how to crack a difficult lock.
And maybe she had.
She got up and moved her chair closer to his, actually sitting in it and leaning against his shoulder and he smiled.
There was still everything he wasn’t thinking about, and everything he didn’t understand. There were still issues to be resolved with the werewolf thing and the issues it caused and brought to light. They were still a ragtag bunch of misfits for whom concussions and far worse injuries were occupational hazards and they would have to wake Nate up in eighteen minutes to make sure their mastermind wasn’t going brain-dead.
But Parker was with him and he was starting to understand why.
And if, in eighteen minutes, when Nate woke up groggy and disoriented, asking with a hint of panic why it was them instead of Eliot waking him up Hardison repeats Parker’s assurances, slipping the word alpha into his speech Nate had the grace to pretend he doesn’t remember in the morning.
But in that one word there is acknowledgement of something.
They were more than a team. They were a family.
They were a pack.
Author: Magpie
Rating: pg-13
Genre: Werewolf!Eliot, past Eliot/OMC, hinted Nate/Eliot/Sophie, Pre-Harsion/Parker
Verse: Phases of the Moon
Summary: It's been a long few months since that night they were reminded of a time they were lost.
Notes: The last offical installation for this series (for the moment at least) there will be another sort of AU fic posted for this in a few days.
For the head-trauma square on my H/C bingo card which happens to be the LAST one.
Amazing and Awesome Banner is by she who should be praised, Hollow_Echos
“You’re exhausted man. Go with Sophie. Get some sleep. We’ll let you know the moment anything happens.” Hardison tried giving the worried werewolf a nudge toward the door, unsurprisingly without success.
Eliot open his mouth to object, or maybe just try to remind them *again* of something, but Parker interrupted. “We know. Every hour. Name, location, birthday. We’ve only done this a couple dozen times for you remember?”
Hardison gave a slight grin, trying to lighten the situation. “Well, head traumas do tend to lead to memory loss so he might not.” When Eliot didn’t even growl in annoyance Hardison sobered, glancing back toward the still figure lying on the bed. “He’s going to be alright. It was just a minor head injury. You’ve been awake since the full moon the day before yesterday. Go find Sophie. Make sure she get some sleep.”
Parker stepped forward, whispering something in Eliot’s ear and his shoulders sagged just a little. He hesitated another moment before slipping out of the room and down the stairs.
“What did you tell him?” Hardison asked, settling on a chair a little closer to the bed and lowering his voice.
“That if he didn’t go I’d tell Nate and Sophie that he wasn’t taking care of himself and they’d both blame themselves for it.” Parker answered, perching on the back of the other chair.
Hardison gave Parker a look, startled. Some days she showed hints of understanding humans a lot better than she let on. Though arguably understanding that guilting Eliot into taking care of himself because otherwise Nate and Sophie would feel bad about being hurt and having to do wrap up wasn’t normal human interaction. Especially since Eliot was a werewolf and Nate and Sophie were his alphas and that whole mess hadn’t settled into his mind even after a month.
Hardison stared at the wall just above the clock, his computer laying forgotten nearby. He always hated these all night vigils, they seemed to happen more often than was healthy for the team. Eliot was normally on the receiving end but they’d all been here at some point.
A line of work where concussions weren’t an occupational hazard normally started seeming nice right around the second hour into his shift, though in recent months Parker had started sitting with him through his shift for reasons that only made sense to her.
The company was welcome, even if they couldn’t talk much, the presence in the room kept the fears another close call like this brought up at bay.
His mind wandered back over the past few months. He was a master of not thinking about things but at times like this there seemed little choice. He found himself remembering other vigils.
One in a small town in Nowhereland Middle America where he’d stayed up half the night waiting for first Parker then eventually Eliot to wander into his room to just do something together instead of trying to go to sleep while staring at unfamiliar walls in an empty hotel room after being reminded of times when they’d lost everything and had no one, and the fear that might happen again.
Just days later, staring at the iron door of the panic room, listening, waiting, praying for some sign that things would be alright. That Eliot would pull through this fight just like all the others.
Leaving Nate to his coffee and crossword puzzle, waiting for Eliot to come down from the roof, all of them waiting for the changes to stop hurting him in ways they didn’t even fully understand.
And the long, agonizing, infuriating, wait for Eliot to say something, do *something*. Watching for bruises that weren’t from a fight, watching for that flinch and just a moment of hesitation, fear, that should never have been there.
Nate and Sophie said they couldn’t do anything until Eliot was ready to leave Jacob.
Hardison still couldn’t understand how someone so… Eliot… could let things go on like that.
Nate stirred in his sleep, mumbling something, the tone matching the one he had when things were just starting to spiral out and he was making things up as he went.
Parker moved, sliding off her chair to crouch next to the bed, arms resting inches from Nate’s head as she leaned forward. “Everything’s okay alpha, we’re all safe back at the den. Eliot’s taken care of and the job’s done.”
Hardison was about to question Parker’s use of the term that now occasionally slipped into Eliot’s speech when he was distracted or rushed, and caution Parker about startling Nate but the man was already settling.
Parker went back to her chair, giving Hardison that smile, the real one, like she’d just figured out how to crack a difficult lock.
And maybe she had.
She got up and moved her chair closer to his, actually sitting in it and leaning against his shoulder and he smiled.
There was still everything he wasn’t thinking about, and everything he didn’t understand. There were still issues to be resolved with the werewolf thing and the issues it caused and brought to light. They were still a ragtag bunch of misfits for whom concussions and far worse injuries were occupational hazards and they would have to wake Nate up in eighteen minutes to make sure their mastermind wasn’t going brain-dead.
But Parker was with him and he was starting to understand why.
And if, in eighteen minutes, when Nate woke up groggy and disoriented, asking with a hint of panic why it was them instead of Eliot waking him up Hardison repeats Parker’s assurances, slipping the word alpha into his speech Nate had the grace to pretend he doesn’t remember in the morning.
But in that one word there is acknowledgement of something.
They were more than a team. They were a family.
They were a pack.