theawkwardterrier:

P.S. Eliot stopping to help Hardison up when he trips running out of the warehouse, and talking to Nate about his son’s death - in episode 1, he’s already in the protector role of being invested in the team and emotionally sensitive to them. Considering the “I work alone” element they emphasize for each of the team members, I think the switch for Eliot would be most profound: Parker is still stealing when she’s doing it with other people, Hardison is still hacking and wise-cracking and being one with technology whether he’s by himself or not, but when he teams up with these people, Eliot goes from using his training for violence to acquire things or scare someone off to using it as a shield for this group, being a barrier between them and anyone who wants to get to them. Eliot is often the one most annoyed by Parker and Hardison, especially in the earlier seasons, but he has a lot of emotional awareness about himself and I think it carries over to the others on the team (and is also one of the reasons he ends up being a decent grifter).

Anyway, I really love Eliot, although his pilot hair is Messed Up.