#levot3

Eeeeeeeeeeeheeheeee I love it. I love what they’re doing with this season! Like the depth and seriousness behind the episodes thus far have made me go "ohh it's like original leverage is back!" But I didn't realize how much I still wanted to see the goofiness of leverage redemption until this one, like the dueling horror tropes? Parker in her park ranger uniform? Prime lev red! So much fun.

And ok obviously I don't need the showrunners to try and please everyone, that's not gonna result in a coherent story, but man am I digging the cheeky ambiguity of the way they're treating the polyamory situation!

I am still not sure if I have been technically jossed. Worked out an overlap on the venn diagram for Sophie's story, let's say in my fic that her story in this episode is about her trying out polyamory and finding it didn't suit her. Whereas for nate/sophie/sterling shippers she's talking about an old familiar comfortable concept.

To know if I've got a small technical issue on the pardicer front, I'll need to search my fic to figure out if they've ever used the term "polycule" as opposed to "polyamory," "life partners," "triad," other terms I know they've used. But honestly this would not be a major continuity issue in the scheme, like I have worse ones going on with Eliot's hair because I forgot one of Moreau's lines early on. Parker forgets people's names. Nudging this line towards "Wait is this a term we use" is not gonna be a hard gap to bridge.

“I’m gonna make it work,” Eliot said, returning to stirring the contents of the pan in front of him. “Someday.”

“But you make all kinds of vegetables that we do like!” Parker told him. “It doesn’t have to be…” She wrinkled her nose. “Leaves, not cooked or anything, just sitting there. We’re allowed to have things we just don’t like.”

Eliot sighed. “You are allowed,” he told her. “I just… I can’t help thinking I could make it work.”

Hardison hummed thoughtfully. “Your food is all kinds of tasty,” he told Eliot. “Most of the time. Just, like, maybe don’t hold your breath about this.”

Rolling his eyes, Eliot said, “Okay, fine, I promise I won’t die of trying to reinvent the salad.”

“Good,” said Parker, and leaned her chin on Eliot’s shoulder to peer at what was apparently cream sauce he was making. “You know I’ll try anything you make,” she said, “even if I don’t end up liking it, right?”

“Yeah, I know,” he said. “I do.” He turned to peck her on the cheek. “But, like, the harder something is to break into, the more fun the two of you have trying, right?” he asked. “It’s not always about what you get once you’re in.”

“That’s true,” Parker said.

“Yeah,” Hardison agreed. “Sometimes hacking is just about the puzzle. It’s about knowin’ you can.”

“Yeah,” Eliot agreed. “So. This is a puzzle.”

“Oh,” said Parker, her eyes widening in understanding. “You’re trying to steal our souls. With salad. Because that’s the hardest way you can think of to do it.”

Hardison snorted and hid his face behind his hand. 

“Somethin’ like that,” Eliot agreed mildly. 

“As long as you make dessert,” she told him, “I will forgive you anything you make me eat first.”

He chuckled. “I’ll keep that in mind,” he said. 

–

Eliot was always growing something new in the backyard, but this year he had a lot of new things happening. He spent every spare minute out there, weeding or watering or whatever. 

And it was extra pretty. There were always flowers somewhere, because as Eliot had explained, flowers made seeds for the next year, and also a lot of vegetables were actually fruit, and to get fruit, first you needed flowers. But this year, there seemed to be more of them. 

The thing that was most interesting was how, when he went out to work on the garden, he had that attitude that meant he was Up To Something. 

That wasn't bad, or even all that unusual, because when were any of them not up to something? But it did make the other two extremely curious. 

So they spent some time out on the back porch, trying to see what he was up to. But as far as they could tell, he was just… gardening. Like usual. 

But it was nice, actually, being out in the fresh air, all three of them, just doing their own things quietly together, Eliot weeding, Hardison on his laptop, Parker checking her rigs, all surrounded by the bright beauty that was Eliot's garden. 

And maybe that was the point. 

–

The bowls Eliot set in front of them were a riot of color. Yellow, orange, deep purple, purple-red, and only a touch, here and there, of green. 

“Ooh! You got us flowers!” Parker exclaimed.

“Yeah,” Eliot agreed, with a mischievous smile.

Hardison frowned down at his. “Okay, but why are they, like, in a bowl? In front of us? Instead of, like, in a vase in the middle of the table where flowers belong?”

“Because they’re not a bouquet,” Eliot told him. “They’re a salad.”

“I’m fine,” Eliot said, sitting down with his own bowl. “I am not dying. Okay?” He looked at the two of them. “Trust me.”

Hardison gaped, and made noises, and pointed at his bowl, and eventually managed to say, “That is not a salad!” He peered at Eliot. “That is a bowl of goddamn flowers! How hard did you hit your head on that last job?”

Parker picked up her fork and poked at the beheaded flowers in her dish. “Ooh, some of these are even cooked!” she said. “I’m going to try them first.”

“Those ones are squash flowers,” Eliot explained. “Cooked ‘em with the dressing and used that as the base, so it wouldn’t ruin the look of the flowers on top.”

“Are you for real with this?” Hardison asked. “Like, for real, for real?”

“Yeah,” Eliot said, glaring at him. “Just try it, okay? I grew these special for this.”

Parker bit into the squash flower. It was sweet, cooked with honey and butter and a little tang like apple juice and a bit of spice and something a little bit like vanilla, but not quite. 

“It looks like flowers and it tastes kind of like pumpkin pie and it’s a salad,” she said in consternation.

“Try it with some of the fresh ones,” Eliot urged her. 

With determination, Parker speared some of the other flowers on her fork with the rest of the squash flower, and she put them in her mouth. And she chewed on them.

“Oh, that’s good,” she said in surprise. 

Hardison gave a put-upon sigh. “If this is some kind of trick,” he said, “I am not gonna be happy.” He stuffed some flowers into his mouth, too. 

As he chewed, his eyes widened, and he slowed down, actually savoring, instead of just trying to get the food down. He hummed in approval, nodding. 

“What are these ones?” Parker asked, pointing at the orange, poofy, kind of spicy flowers. 

“Marigolds,” Eliot answered. “They do double duty because they help control bugs, and a lot of animals that like to eat stuff from my garden don’t like the smell of ‘em.”

“Why not?” Parker asked, sniffing one. “They’re really good, actually.” She tried eating it by itself. Not as good as with the sweet cooked squash flowers, but not actually bad. 

Eliot shrugged. “Not sure,” he said. “It just works.”

“This is witchcraft,” Hardison said, pointing at Eliot. “Flowers ain’t supposed to be tasty. They’re just flowers. But then you do this.” He narrowed his eyes at Eliot. “It’s dark magic, is what it is.”

“It ain’t magic,” Eliot said, shaking his head. “Just, some vegetables are fruits, some are flowers. It’s easier to get edible flowers fresh from the garden, so you don’t see a lot of ‘em in stores.”

“I can’t believe I just ate a goddamn marigold,” Hardison said, but he took another bite all the same. “What’s this one?” he asked, pointing to a big, flat, orange-yellow flower. 

“That’s nasturtium,” Eliot told him. “And then there’s pansies and red clover.” He pointed those out in his own bowl. 

“Huh,” said Hardison, nibbling on one of the clover flowers. “Okay, okay, I get it. Bunnies have a point about these, huh?”

Eliot visibly held back laughter. 

“You solved your puzzle,” Parker told him. 

Eliot grinned. “Yeah, I did, didn’t I?”

“I did not think it was possible,” Hardison said. “But I also think this is cheating.”

“Oh yeah?” Eliot asked, still smiling. “What rule did I break?”

“I dunno!” Hardison said. “I don’t know the rules of cooking!”

“Well I do,” Eliot said, standing up to go and loom over Hardison, joke-threatening. “So I’m allowed to break ‘em.”

“Is that so?” Hardison said, looking up at him. 

“Mm-hmm,” said Eliot, leaning down towards him. 

They held each other's gaze for a moment, challenge quickly turning to pure fondness, and then Hardison reached up to pull Eliot down for a kiss. 

“You're magic,” Hardison murmured, “don't you dare deny it.”

Eliot sighed, but he was smiling. 

“Did you still make dessert?” Parker asked him.

“'Course I did,” he answered, turning his soft smile on Parker. “First salad, then lasagna, then dessert.”

“Ooh, lasagna too,” she said. “You're the best.”

“Now go eat,” Hardison told him with a gentle shove back in the direction of his own seat. “Magician, feed thyself, or whatever.”

So Eliot went, laughing. 

Eliot was softest and happiest when he got to cook, when he got to feed people, but he still had that drive in him, the way they all did, to be tricky and solve puzzles and face challenges. 

To win something.

Parker didn't think she'd ever seen him smile this much. Not when he wasn't on the grift, at least. This was home, with them. This was real. 

So she ate her yummy salad, full of flowers, and then she asked, “What's the next puzzle?”

Eliot shrugged. “Dunno. Guess I'll think of something.” He winked at her.