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It's not the pain or the cold. It's that he's trapped and he can't find a way out and that's not a situation he deals with well. Eliot's not sure if there really isn't a way to get this mess off the top of him and persuade his broken leg to start working, or if maybe he's just too pain-hazy to think of it. He's biting his lip to keep quiet, though the goons left hours ago and no one else knows where he is.
His shoulder is aching dully – a through and through. Normally it wouldn't bother him much but he can't wrap it and he's lying on it just the wrong way. It's not that he wishes they had just shot him, but he's not sure leaving him alive was meant as mercy either.
Through the collapsed roof, there's a patch of night sky. It was still light, the last time he remembers looking. So he's losing time. Concussion, loss of consciousness. A falling down warehouse in the middle of nowhere, made a little more fallen with the careful application of explosives, and him stuck underneath it all. Eliot laughs. Nate was definitely right about there being something to hide.
There's a screeching sound he can't identify, until Parker comes shooting down a line and ends up dropping to the ground a foot away from him. She yells and it hurts his head and he must say something back because her face screws up but she just keeps shouting.
"Parker," he manages, "what?" Her eyes are wide and he wants to put his hands on her shoulders and tell her to breathe, Parker, breathe, it's okay.
"I found him," she's saying, again and again and he doesn't know why until she crouches down beside him and slips a comm in his ear. He'd lost his own this morning sometime, when they dragged him into the van. They'd tossed his phone and the comm and they were too well prepared for the fraud here to have been anything small.
Hardison is breathing too shallowly on the comm, "Parker, is he- look, I'm coming down there- do I need to call-?"
Eliot focuses. "Leg. Shoulder. Maybe- I don't know."
"Eliot, God, Eliot, man, I'm going to- wait. Just wait. As soon as we get you fixed up, I'm gonna kill you myself."
Another screech and a crash. Hardison hates jumping from things, he could just have waited up top. He's beside Eliot now, moving too quickly, waving his fingers in front of Eliot's face.
Eliot asks, "What happened to your hands? You okay?" The skin is scraped to pieces, grazed and bloody.
"Am I-?" Hardison's laugh sounds like it's stuck in his throat. "There's a lot of damn rubble to comb through. That's all."
"Sorry."
"Eliot, you can't just-. Hey."
"You don't have… stuff that can do that?" Eliot asks. "Find things. Without all the-?"
Hardison translates that and frowns. "Find things, yes. Comms, your cell, your car. Not you." He looks upset. Hardison hates things he can't hack.
"It's okay," Eliot says. "They think I'm dead. They must do, anyway. Or they'd have finished the job. They just left- y'know, I think I'm pissed off about that."
Parker drops back into his vision. She kisses his forehead and Eliot has no idea where she learnt a thing like that. "Stay here." He doesn't know where he's supposed to be going.
Hardison says, "Parker, are you sure that's…" but she's already skipping across towards the far wall.
She comes running back towards them and lies down over the part of Eliot not currently buried under concrete. Hardison stretches his hands over Eliot's head and this is very far from a good plan.
The explosion shakes the room and Eliot doesn't know what sound he makes but Parker whispers, "Sorry, sorry," so it must have been bad.
Light and Sophie come through the new space in the wall. She cries out and walks quickly towards him. "Oh, Eliot."
"Hey, Sophie. Think they saw through my alias."
"Well," she says, "you never listen to what I tell you. Acting takes practice."
"I try. Where's-?"
"Here," Nate says, "I'm here." He rubs one hand over his mouth, and looks at the ground beside Eliot. He looks the way he does when there isn't a plan and he wants to make them think that there is. When he's trying to reassure them that this isn't all about to go to hell. "Sophie?" Nate says, and nods his head for her to come to him.
"Don't," Eliot says. "I've got a broken leg and a bullet wound and those guys wanted me to die here slow. Still not my worst day ever. Don't go whispering."
"We could call an ambulance," Sophie says. "We've got the I.Ds, we can think of something."
Eliot says, "No. Hospital if you have to, no cops. There's still a job here and that'll just-."
"Eliot." Hardison glares down at him.
Nate sighs and goes silent. He looks around at the mess. "We can get you out. It'll hurt."
"It already hurts, Nate. Just get me the hell out of this and back home."
Nate looks across him. "Parker, we need rope to get some of that crap held up off him. Hardison, see what we've got in terms of bandages and meds. We need some way of getting him into the van without making his leg worse. Sophie-."
"I'm staying here," she says. "You keep planning." She takes Eliot's good hand carefully in both of hers and smiles at him. "We're all right here."
He blinks. "I know." It's the team thing – the benefit they hadn't tried to sell him. There's always someone to come looking for you.
Hardison swaps out his earpiece. "Don't lose this one. I don't care if they- swallow it, if you have to. Don't go off-grid."
"Wasn't exactly my…" Hardison is still glaring, so Eliot stops. Parker touches Eliot's head again, fingers gentle like she's exploring his edges. Eliot lies still.
A moment later, Hardison and Parker go running off to deal with Nate's instructions. Sophie stays sitting beside him and Nate stands, looking at the shape of the problem. Eliot remembers, belatedly, "Thanks, though. For coming. I do- you know."
Nate coughs and looks quickly at Sophie. Sophie keeps her hold on Eliot's hand and says, "We know."