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section7mfu2017-02-11 08:54 pm
lilidelafield.livejournal.com) wrote in section7mfu2017-02-11 08:54 pm
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Writer's Choice 11th February The Lake of Tears Affair
This is Chapter One of my 28 chapter epic, but it was originally written and designed as a one off. I was inspired to add the further 27 chapters to it by a chance comment by Alynwa, but this is the original story posted on FF way back when.
“I’m sorry Mr. Solo, but you will be handling this assignment with the assistance of Agent Mark Slate. Mr. Kuryakin is indisposed and unfit for duty for a while.”
“Indisposed? Illya? Is he sick? Is he alright?”
Alexander Waverly tutted at him, but kindly.
“Mr. Solo, if Mr. Kuryakin was alright, he would not be indisposed would he? Rest assured that he will be back with us soon enough. In the meantime, you have a mission in China to complete.”
Solo nodded. He wanted more than anything to rush round to Illya’s to make sure that his partner was okay, then chided himself with a grin. Illya would be surprised, shocked and probably annoyed if Solo did come rushing round solicitously to fuss round him like a mother hen. Illya was a singularly healthy individual accept for his frequent propensity for catching colds, which he generally came down with at least once for every season of the year, sometimes more than once. Solo took the file and left for his office where Mark Slate would by now be waiting for him.
Although the flight to China was long and uneventful, the mission most assuredly was not. Solo found it slightly irksome to be deprived of his own partner. He and Illya had, like most partners, developed a very close working bond to the point where they seemed almost able to read one another’s thoughts. Certainly they could read each other like a book and were able to combine operations almost instinctively. Now, he was finding that Mark, although perfectly able and competent, lacked Illya’s instinctive responsiveness, and he found he constantly had to explain things to Mark, and give the man directions. He could not remember the last time he had had to do any of that for Illya. All the same, he was aware that this mission was not exactly a bed of roses for Mark either. His regular partner, April Dancer was currently on leave in Cincinnati, attending a family wedding. Waverly had refused her partner permission to go with her, and now Solo guessed, Mark knew why. He’d needed someone to go to China with Solo, and for once there would be no Illya available.
Mark for his part, was aware of his own shortcomings as far as the CEA was concerned. He had worked with Solo’s Russian partner himself now, and he had learned through experience exactly how valuable a partner Illya would be. He himself was a very junior agent indeed compared to Solo and Kuryakin, and not nearly as experienced in the field…. or even in fighting. He recalled watching how Illya, bruised, battered and bleeding, still half groggy from the THRUSH drugs that had been forced on him and, he suspected, still in pain and shock from whatever gratuitous forms of torture he had been subjected to; had disposed of two armed guards and effected their escape from the THRUSH stronghold where they were being held. Illya was a hard act to follow, and Mark now knew it. They completed their mission without any real disasters however, and finally settled themselves side by side into their seats for the long plane journey back to the US. Once the plane was airborne, Solo looked round at Mark and gave him a grin.
“Thanks for coming along Mark. You did a good job.”
Mark blinked in surprise. He had not believed he had done anything very sterling at all, and certainly this matter might have been finished a few days ago if Illya had been here instead of himself. He suppressed his urge to say all this however and blushed instead.
“Thanks Napoleon.”
Napoleon may have been a wise-cracking American, but he was a sensitive soul and he was instantly aware that the junior agent had something on his mind.
“Are you all right?”
“Yeah…. yeah.”
Napoleon kept gazing at him until Mark found himself explaining further.
“Sorry sir, it’s just that I was not aware that I had done anything very special except go charging off on my own and get myself into trouble. Rather than thanking me, I had expected you to give me a dressing down at the very least.”
Solo smiled.
“You’re not accustomed to these kind of assignments are you?”
“April and I are still on the baby-food variety at the moment. We’ll progress as we get more experience. The last time I was on an assignment anywhere near this one was when Illya and I got captured by THUSH. My recollection of that affair was of Illya getting all the torture and doing all the work whilst I sat around in a cozy cell for three days waiting and doing nothing to help. He even managed to get us out of there, without very much help from me.”
Solo thought he could guess what was on the younger man’s mind.
“Mark, one of these days you’ll have to join Illya and I on a job, just as observer. You don’t have to worry about being unable to follow in the great Kuryakin’s footsteps. You found out a few of his strengths when you were with him. No doubt you also encountered one or two of his faults as well, right?”
“Well…”
“Let’s see…. Illya, the king of taciturn sitting in a cell for three days with a junior agent he doesn’t know very well….an Englishman who is known for his alacrity and his loquacious nature. I know Illya, but I can imagine how it must have been for you.”
Mark stared at him, but Napoleon was grinning.
“Do you think you deserve a dressing down?”
Mark nodded reluctantly. Napoleon nodded in response.
“Very well, consider yourself reprimanded; But I still say you did a good job. You are certainly not Illya, but Illya is not you either, Mark. You have points in your favour too. Don’t sell yourself short.”
“Thanks.”
The silence was thick. Solo sensed that his companion was still not fully convinced.
“What is it that is really on your mind?”
It was a while before Mark answered him.
“April and I always do a good job. We don’t get the complex stuff just yet, but we do good. I always thought we were good at our job. That give us a year or two of experience and we could be where you two are.”
“I have no doubt of that.” Solo replied sincerely. Mark shook his head.
“Watching Illya at work the other week was an eye opener for me. First I learned how bad I am at reading people. I had Illya all wrong. He turned out to be the complete opposite of all my assumptions about him.”
Solo chuckled.
“Don’t take that hard. It took me a long time to break through that ice-cold exterior too. He has the same effect on everyone he meets.”
“Then everything he did to get us out of that cell and out of the building to say nothing of…er…our adventures on the way back to HQ. Made me realize that I still have a lot to learn.”
“That’s why Illya is number two of section two and you’re not. Illya and I had to learn it too Mark. That is why you cut your teeth on the simple jobs and every so often get sent off on a job like this with a more senior agent. Almost always it will be number One or Number two if not both. That’s how we all learned. Besides, Illya is a cut above all of us. Former Russian navy officer, KGB trained, GRU…. he speaks fourteen languages at the last count…expert in engineering, mechanics, electronics, physics, music, he plays three different musical instruments that I know of, Master at several martial arts, expert in explosives…. none of us will ever quite match up to him. Most UNCLE agents are quite ordinary people like you and me. We just fumble along doing the best we can, going out on a limb from time to time, relying on our hunches, trusting our instincts, and making sure we are there to drag our partner out of whatever hole he…or she…happens to stumble into. That’s what it’s about for all of us Mark. Welcome to the big league!”
Solo was grinning widely, and Mark found himself grinning back. They each accepted a glass of wine from the stewardess and Solo leaned back, clearly prepared to relax properly for the first time in over a week.
“So,” he asked, turning to his companion. “I can’t help being curious. You said that Illya proved to be the opposite of everything you had assumed? What did you think of my partner before you saw the error of your ways?”
“Do I have to answer that?”
“No.” he replied in a tone that clearly contradicted his word. Mark grinned reluctantly.
“Well, you have to admit it that on the surface, your partner comes across as a scientist and a bookworm. An intellectual and that is all. He never ever spoke unless he had to, and it was only ever one syllable; `yes; no; go; stop!’; he never seemed to crack a smile and for the life of me I couldn’t think how a man like that managed to qualify for section two in the first place, never mind become number two. I couldn’t for the life of me see how you managed to put up with the man. He taught me how wrong I had been to take him at face value.”
Solo nodded.
“You know Mark, there’s a chemical that is totally benign. Its harmless in every single way, its non-reactive regardless of what you mix it with or add it to. Non-toxic, non-corrosive…and yet you let it heat up beyond a certain temperature and it explodes with a force that could destroy half of Manhattan. That’s Illya in a nutshell. He is the bookish type, he really is. He is naturally reticent and taciturn, often sulky and sullen. He reads technical journals for fun for crying out loud.” Solo gave a rueful shake of his head.
“Of course he is also one of the most interesting men I have ever worked with. His skill as a sharpshooter is second to none, and his skill with explosives is such that he was made to stay on at the training facility for over a month after graduation to teach a class.”
Mark smiled.
“If all the agents at UNCLE make the mistake I did in underestimating him so badly, it must be a very effective weapon against his enemies. There’s nothing so useful in an enemy who relaxes his guard because he thinks you’re not a threat.”
Solo turned and looked Mark in the eye.
“Illya looks like a teenage librarian, but he’s a master of disguise who can kill a man with his bare hands if he wants to. April your partner looks like a fashion model or a TV star, like a girl who’s too pretty to be brainy as well, but she came out top in almost everything at the training facility. She’s as deadly as Illya, but I’d say considerably prettier. Alexander Waverly hand-picks his people, Mark. He sees something in each of us that he can use and recruits us and trains us to use our skill to his benefit. We are all different, and we all have our own unique skills that sooner or later turn out to be invaluable. He is remarkably clever at picking out agents to pair together so that the skills they each have balance each other out.”
“In other words, if one of you has a failing, the other has a particular skill to equal things out? So what is your particular skill then, sir?” Mark asked with an impudent grin. Solo saw the twinkle but pretended to be offended.
“I’m the brains and Illya is the brawn I’ll have you know.”
“You’re the brains? And Illya with PHDs and Masters degrees? Wow, you must be a real prodigy, sir!”
Mark swallowed the last of his glass of wine and leaned back closing his eyes. Solo chuckled to himself and settled back himself for a nap.
Arriving back in New York, dropping off their luggage at home and changing their clothes after their long trip, they had to make for UNCLE HQ straight away for debriefing. Only once they had finished up their report and been in to see Mr. Waverly, was Solo free to pursue the question that had been brimming in his head for some time. Where was his partner? He and Mark had been gone for ten days, and still there was no sign that HQ had been graced with Illya’s presence at any of the intervening time. Waverly was evasive at first when Solo questioned him, but Solo could see in the older man’s eyes that he was nevertheless worried…. Or concerned at any rate. Finally, Waverly sighed.
“Very well Mr. Solo, I wanted to tell you before, but I needed you in China with your mind on your job. Mr. Kuryakin is not ill per se. He is as I told you before, indisposed.”
“Indisposed how?” Solo persisted. “Indisposed can mean he’s caught a cold, he’s dying of a fever or he’s having a fit of pique because someone has painted his office door the wrong colour.”
“Mr. Solo I very much want to answer your question, but I gave him my word that I would not reveal a word about his private life to anyone. All I can tell you is that he had a visitor a few days before you left from the Russian Ambassador with news from home. He requested immediate compassionate leave for an indefinite period of time. Under the circumstances it would have been churlish to refuse.”
“Compassionate leave? The Embassy? News from home? That could only mean bad news, like a death couldn’t it? Sir, Illya will be on his own, brooding if we leave him. I have to go to see him, try and get him to talk to me, if only to give him someone to punch. Please Mr. Waverly?”
“Go Mr. Solo, with my blessing, but keep your communicator with you at all times.”
“Yes sir. Thank you.” It was all Solo could do to walk and not run out of the building.
No one answered the door when he rang the bell, or when he knocked determinedly. There was silence from inside the Russian’s apartment, but Solo knew his friend was in there. He just had a strong feeling.
“Illya ole’ buddy, it’s me, Napoleon.”
There was a muffled reply, but it was in Russian, and Napoleon could guess that the general meaning was “Get lost!” He was determined not to be beaten.
“Come on my friend, I have a bottle of vodka…”
There was a long pause, then the door opened. Napoleon was shocked at the sight of the man who stood there. It was Illya all right, but the blond locks were greasy and standing up on end as though he was constantly running his fingers through it. His face was pale; grey, with dark circles under his eyes, with a trace of red about them, although Solo could not be sure. A blond beard sprouting from his chin showed his friend could not have shaved for at least a week, and his clothes hung loosely in folds from a frame that looked like it had lost at least twenty pounds that it could not afford to lose. Solo stepped inside and glanced quickly round.
Solo wondered briefly why a man with such a well ordered mind and a well ordered office should have such a disorderly home. It was not that Illya’s home was messy. There was not enough furniture or luxuries for it to get too messy, but the piles of books and records that his friend owned were strewn all over the place rather than piled neatly as was his wont. What caught Solo’s eye was the empty beer cans and whisky bottles that looked as if they had been thrown. He looked up at his friend, expecting him to be as sozzled as the mess in his apartment suggested, but the blue eyes that regarded him were stone cold sober. What was more, he didn’t smell boozy either.
“What are you doing here Napoleon?”
Solo raised his eyebrows.
“What do you think? No one has seen or heard from you in more than ten days, not even Mr. Waverly. You’re my partner and my best friend and I care.”
“Thanks, but I’m fine.”
Solo raised an eyebrow at that but said nothing. Illya shrugged.
“Think what you want. Go or stay it’s up to you.” Illya dropped down on the floor with his back to the wall and drew his knees up under his chin. He sat there, hugging his knees and staring into space. Solo’s heart ached for his friend. Whatever could have reduced his friend to this?
“I’m not going anywhere my friend. I’ve just come. So are you going to make me some supper or shall I ring for take -out?”
“I’m not hungry. You do what you like.”
“Got anything in?”
The blond head shook. Solo picked up the phone and ordered pizza and fries for two. That done he sat on the floor beside his friend to wait for the food to be delivered.
“So you’re not sick. No cold or fever or anything like that. I was afraid you were dying up here alone. What’s wrong Illya?”
“You telling me you don’t know? That Waverly didn’t tell you?” The tone seemed to imply the opposite and Solo shook his head.
“Of course he didn’t tell me anything. No one knows anything except that you’re indisposed. They all assumed you have the flu’ or something. Waverly simply told me that he couldn’t tell me. He said he had given you his word and that was that.”
“By that, innocently letting you know that there might well be something to tell if he had not given me his word.”
“I can tell you he is worried about you Illya. I am too. Whatever has happened has obviously knocked you for six. You’re not the man to let yourself go like this. You’re skinnier than ever, and you’re starting to look like the wild man of Borneo.”
“Very funny Napoleon.”
“What you look like is your own affair my friend, I just want to help. Please tell me what’s wrong.”
Illya shook his head and looked away.
“Don’t you trust me? Is that it?”
“No that’s not it!” Illya shouted finally. “That’s not it!”
Solo resisted the impulse to smile with pleasure.
“I know you’re a private man Illya, and you prefer to deal with things alone. But you look like you could use a little help with his one. There’s only me here. I’m your partner and your friend. Your best friend…. I hope. If I can’t help you, who can?”
“No one can help me Napoleon. Not even you. It’s something I will just have to learn to live with, like I’ve had to live with everything else.”
Solo knew little enough about Kuryakin’s past, his childhood and adolescence, but he knew that nothing of his friend’s past had been easy. One of the first things Waverly had told him about his new partner that first day was that Kuryakin had had a tough past. But he had also said that the young man was tougher than he looked. And so it had proved to be. Right now though, Illya looked anything but tough. He looked frail and vulnerable, and wracked with something. Grief probably, but without knowing for sure it was anyone’s guess. To Solo’s eye, Illya looked like a man in the throes of intense grief, but denying it so ferociously that he was not aware of it. Suddenly, he was sure he was right, but how to encourage his friend to let go? Probably letting go of his private feelings was never an option for him back home. He had likely been trained from a toddler to keep his feelings and private thoughts to himself or risk being imprisoned, tortured or exiled to Siberia. How could he persuade his friend to give up the habits of a lifetime? He opened his jacket and brought out the bottle of vodka.
“Do you want to open it now or wait for the pizza?”
“I told you I’m not hungry. I suppose you want me to share this with you?”
Solo grinned.
“Only if you want to, my friend.”
Illya hoisted himself on to his feet and fetched two mugs from the kitchen. He poured out generous amounts of the liquid for each of them and handed one of the mugs to Solo.
“Here. The glasses are dirty.”
“Thanks.”
They drank in comfortable silence. Solo sensed that even if he was unable to persuade his friend to open up to him, even his mere presence would be some comfort. When the pizzas arrived, Solo paid for them, but still Illya refused to eat anything. Solo himself started on a slice of pizza in the hope that the sight and smell would stimulate some interest from his friend.
Nothing.
Presently, once they were on their second mug of the vodka, Solo sighed deeply and looked at his friend.
“So why the bearded look my friend? Trying to make yourself look older?”
“Has it worked?”
“Right now you look like you’ve aged about thirty years since I last saw you. Did you lose someone?”
He saw a fist heading towards his face, and then a roaring blackness swept him away.
Solo re-emerged slowly, like a man swimming up from the bottom of a deep pool. He found he was still sitting where he had been, but flopped aside against the edge of the bookcase. A sore spot on his right temple testified that he must have hit his head in falling. He blinked away the nausea and looked round for the owner of the fist. Illya was not in sight.
Groaning, Solo got up and found his friend in the bathroom, vomiting violently into the toilet.
“Illya!” he darted forward and crouched beside his friend, one hand resting for reassurance on Illya’s back. He stayed resolutely by his side until the spasms of sickness had finally passed, leaving Illya exhausted, flopping back against the wall, wiping his face with the back of his hand. Solo wetted his handkerchief and handed it over.
“Thanks.” Illya wiped his face with it, then grimacing, he reached out and flushed the toilet. He glanced at the hanky in his hand.
“Perhaps I should get this laundered before I give it back to you.”
Solo smiled. He nodded, rubbing his head and his jaw ruefully. The nausea was rising slightly again and he choked it down. He couldn’t start heaving himself could he? The two of them together, vomiting in unison? He couldn’t help wincing at the sore spot where his head had clearly connected with the corner of the bookcase. Illya looked chagrined.
“Sorry my friend. I haven’t lost control like that for a long time.”
“Perhaps, but maybe you needed it.”
“I hurt you badly?”
“My hurt will mend Illya. Will yours mend so easily?”
The lips pursed, and for a moment Solo thought Illya was going to close up again, but at the last moment, the blue eyes dropped. Illya shook his head, a glimmer of wetness on his cheek.
“No, my hurt will never end. It will last forever.”
The sight of his partner hurting so badly was unbearable, and try as he might, Solo was unable to prevent a tear from escaping before he hurriedly wiped it away. Illya’s sharp eyes did not miss it, however.
“You really care this much for me Napoleon? Even though you don’t know why?”
“I know you are hurting, Illya and that hurts me because I know I can’t do anything to make it go away.”
For a long moment, Illya stared at his friend, his eyes slightly red-rimmed now, his face white. Then he got up and walked slightly shakily into the next room, his bedroom. He returned with a black and white photograph in a silver frame. He handed it to Napoleon. Napoleon looked at it with interest. It was a very nice picture of Illya at the age of about fifteen, wearing the uniform of the naval school he had attended in Russia as a boy. Solo found himself smiling at the serious face in the picture.
“That’s a nice picture Illya. You haven’t changed much since this was taken.”
Illya stared at him.
“I am not in that picture Napoleon. I was the one holding the camera.”
“Say that again?”
Illya nodded, water filling his eyes and threatening to spill over.
“That is not me my friend. That is a photograph of my brother Mikhail. That was taken the last time we saw one another.”
“Twins?” Napoleon’s eyes were wide in surprise. “I never guessed you were a twin!”
Illya shook his head.
“Not twins exactly. There were ten months between us, but we were as alike as twins for all that. We looked the same, thought and said the same things, we were the same height growing up, we each knew when the other was hurting…”
Illya’s eyes dropped.
“For all the good it did us. They made sure we were separated all through school. Easier to control us you understand. We met up when we could, but we thought that as adults we could be together then. Make our own choices. The foolishness of youth.”
“But it never happened? Except for this one time?”
“The authorities, the KGB already had our futures mapped out for us. Neither of us were given any choice in the matter. Mika always told me I was wrong to cooperate and do as I was told. I always told him that he would end up getting killed if he kept on rebelling against them all the time. The authorities are stronger and they will always get their own way. People like Mika would not change a thing.”
“What happened to him Illya?”
“He joined the rebels and pleaded with me to join him. I refused. I always believed there was a better way to help the world. I’ve not heard anything more from him or about him until the Ambassador’s aide came to see me at HQ a few days ago.”
The tears fell unbidden down Illya’s face. He made no move to wipe them away this time, or to hide them.
“The KGB had acquired information that a THRUSH stronghold was operating in an old disused mine somewhere in Ukraine. Rather than inform UNCLE they prefer to clean their own backyard. The report is that they simply bombed the entrances to prevent anyone escaping and then drilled down and gassed everyone. Once they had waited long enough they reopened one of the entrances and stormed the place. Every last man and woman in the place was dead. They took pictures of every corpse and collected all the files and paperwork they could find. Mikhail was found among the dead they discovered in the laboratory.”
“A prisoner of THRUSH?”
Illya shook his head, tears pouring down his face, his hands shaking in his effort to hold back the emotion that was threatening to overwhelm him.
“Mikhail was a member of THRUSH. He has been their chief scientist at THRUSH central for three years, before they transferred him to their new base in Ukraine to head the science station there.”
Illya stared at Napoleon.
“If I had agreed to join him could I have saved him or would I have ended up being a member of THRUSH myself? Or if I could have persuaded him to come with me he could have been here at UNCLE with us?”
Solo’s heart bled at his friend’s misery.
“No, no, no my friend, life isn’t like that. You are the man you are. Even if you had somehow finished up with THRUSH, you wouldn’t have stayed with them once you learned what they’re about because you don’t believe in it.”
“But Mika is my brother Napoleon, we were as close as twins could ever be. We’re basically the same.”
Solo shook his head patiently.
“No Illya, you told me you were separated by the state and brought up apart. You may have had the same start in life and the same parents, but thereafter everything changed. We are who we are because of our experiences, things that happen to us, things we learn that mold the way we think and the way we react to things. Mikhail looked the same as you on the outside but he had learned to be a different man from you by then. The fact that you made different choices proves that. Nothing you could have done would have made any difference to the choices he made. Try not to berate yourself for failing to save him Illya. He made his own choice. He knew when he joined THRUSH that you were at the time with the KGB didn’t he? He would have known that that made you two enemies.”
Illya wiped away a fresh flood of tears almost fiercely and nodded his head.
“The KGB found a special dossier in Mika’s personal files, written in his own handwriting. I’d recognize it anywhere. A picture of me, details of how to tell the two of us apart and written in his writing underneath in large red letters `recommended for termination’, signed by Mikhail Stanislaus Kuryakin.”
Illya’s blue eyes, bloodshot and rimmed with red gazed up at Napoleon.
“He knew where I was all along, Napoleon. He kept tabs on me. He knew I was working for UNCLE and he recommended my termination.”
Napoleon reached forward and wrapped his arms around Illya in a bear hug. He had no words to say that felt adequate. He felt Illya resisting at first, but Napoleon held on tightly, as much to comfort himself as to give comfort to his friend. He could feel Illya shaking all over, still trying to hold back the emotion; the grief, the anger and the betrayal.”
“It’s all right Illya.” Napoleon whispered softly. “I’m here. It’s all right. Stop fighting it, you’ll feel better for it. Come on Illya, it’s me.”
Illya tried to hold back. He thought of his mother and father, and the little ones killed before his eyes by the Nazis, he recalled how Masha had resisted the invaders with all of her strength until they had finally overpowered her, raped and beat her and left her for dead in a ditch, and finally Mika. How as little boys it had always been he and Mika against the world, before everything changed, before the war and the Nazis and the Communists had taken over their lives so completely, separating two lonely orphan boys that had clung to one another so desperately. Now one of those little boys was dead. He was never coming back. Not the little boy who had been his very best friend, nor the man whom had grown into a mortal enemy that finally ordered the assassination of his own brother. It was gone now, all of it, everyone. His final link to the most distant past that had contained grains of happiness and contentment, for even the briefest of times. He felt it all float away and pop like a soap bubble. And he had never felt so alone. Solo held on to his friend even harder as finally, after so long, Kuryakin’s iron will suddenly collapsed like a pack of cards, and the man along with it. He held him, trying to calm his friend’s violent shaking, listening with a breaking heart to the gut-wrenching, wracking sobs.
Solo was awakened suddenly as his communicator bleeped. He reached for it, reflecting as he did so that he had awakened in the past in many different and occasionally surprising places, but never before had he awakened in a bathroom. Illya too was still there, curled up in a fetal position, sleeping peacefully. Solo recalled with a rush that Illya had wept for hours last night, and Solo had shed silent tears in sympathy, his heart in pieces until finally in the early hours of the morning they had both fallen asleep from pure exhaustion. He softly got to his feet and entered the lounge, drawing his communicator pen out of his pocket as he did so.
“Napoleon Solo here.”
“Mister Solo?” It was Alexander Waverley’s voice, as expected. “Where are you and what is your situation?”
“I’m at Illya’s sir. He’s not been… uh… too well sir. I’ve been sitting up with him all night.”
“And how is Mr. Kuryakin this morning?”
“Still asleep, sir.”
“Do you need some more time off Mr. Solo?”
“I would like to make sure Illya’s all right before I leave him, sir.”
“Very well Mr. Solo. I would appreciate it if you could report in at twenty-one hundred hours.”
“Yes sir.”
Solo replaced the communicator in his pocket and looked round. Illya was standing in the doorway, looking, if it was possible, even more disheveled than last night. His face was white, and his eyes awash with tears.
“Thanks.”
“What for?”
“For being here. You’re the first person in my life not to turn and run away when things turn sour.”
“I’ll never do that, Illya. You’re my best friend. How could I?”
“Even my own brother turned against me in the end.”
Solo reached out and raised his friend’s chin with his finger.
“My grandmother used to say to me; `a friend my dear boy is the brother we choose for ourselves.’”
“I never heard that before. You believe it?”
“Yes I do. And as an adoptive brother, Illya, do you mind if I ask you something?”
“What?”
Solo pointed to the empty bottles and beer cans that still littered the small flat.
“What happened here?”
Illya glanced up and saw the litter as though noticing it for the first time.
“Oh, that was an attempt the first night to get drunk by myself and blot everything out.”
“Did it work?”
“No. I didn’t get drunk enough to forget anything, and I finished up with a mountain-sized hangover the next day, so then I had twice the cause to feel lousy.”
“Illya, you’ve been sitting here on your own all this time, trying to deal with all of this? And here I was on assignment in China picturing you in bed with measles or something. If I had known….”
“What? You’d have stayed here? Refused to go to China? Decided to come over to my home to babysit me?”
“No, but I don’t understand why you didn’t call me! I can’t imagine how I would be, sitting for ten days trying to deal with something like that all on my own. I would have gone nuts long before this.”
Illya smiled suddenly. Solo was right at that. If he had had to face this kind of trauma, he might well have gone `nuts’ by now.
“Napoleon, you have to understand, I have always been alone. I have been alone for most of my life, having to deal with all sorts of things without having anyone else to run to. I still find it a challenge getting used to relying on other people. Even you my friend. I have no problem relying on you during our missions, but with personal things… it’s hard for me. My first resort is always to go home and lock my doors. Keep everyone out. I’m sorry that means locking you out too Napoleon, but I am finding it harder than I expected trying to change the habits of a lifetime.”
“You don’t have to change anything my friend, just don’t be afraid to let me in when you need me. How are you?”
“Tired.” Illya admitted finally. “Very, very tired.”
“Didn’t you get enough sleep last night then?”
“Sleep? I spent the night on the tiles!” Kuryakin replied as he returned to the bathroom and closed the door.
Solo frowned for a moment before hauling on board what Illya had said, and chuckled appreciatively. He could do with a shower and a shave and a strong coffee. He could do something about the last thing anyway, and wandered into Illya’s kitchen to see about coffee. He was not surprised to find the refrigerator was largely empty, and the sink was full of dirty dishes. The coffee-maker was about the only clean item in the room, but there was not a grain of coffee in the place. He ransacked the cupboards searching for some kind of sustenance to feed his friend and finally found a jar of cocoa at the back of the cupboard, alongside a tin of evaporated milk. Solo took the pizzas that had been left largely uneaten the night before and popped them into the oven, and whilst they were re-heating, he washed two mugs and made some hot chocolate for them.
While he waited for Illya to emerge from the bathroom, Solo set about washing the dishes and putting some kind of order to the disorder. He had just finished when he heard Illya clearing his throat. He turned and handed his friend his mug of chocolate.
“You’re out of coffee.”
“I’m out of just about everything. Thanks.”
Illya had showered and shaved, and changed his clothes and now looked a great deal more like himself, in his trademark dark suit with the black turtleneck sweater that hid the truth of his skinny frame more successfully than he had dared to hope. He sniffed.
“What is that smell?”
“last night’s pizzas warming in the oven.”
“For breakfast?”
“Why not? Please don’t tell me you’re not hungry, Illya, because I can see you are just by looking at you, even if you don’t know it yourself.”
“It’s true I’ve not eaten a thing for a few days…Just couldn’t seem to swallow it, but for the first time I might manage a morsel.”
“…a morsel?”
“…or two!”
Napoleon sat back ten minutes later, unable to quite hide the smile of relief as his friend wolfed down the food he had refused to touch yesterday. Once the food was all gone, Kuryakin looked a lot better. He had a little colour in his cheeks for a start. He startled Solo by handing him his jacket. Solo took it automatically and looked up in some curiosity.
“What’s this? Am I leaving?”
“Yes, we both are. You told me last night that I looked like the wild man of Borneo. Well my friend, as black beards show up more distinctly than blond ones, you too are starting to look overgrown yourself. We are going to your flat so that you can shower and change your clothes, and then we have a job to go to.”
“Are you sure you’re up to it?”
“Work?” Illya shrugged uncertainly. “If I disappear, it’s possible you might find me locked in the cloakroom or something, but you have helped me to realize that I am not helping myself by sitting around here. I would be better keeping myself busy doing something, surrounded by people. Keep my mind off my own troubles for a while. So why don’t you call Mr. Waverly back and let him know we’ll be back at HQ as soon as you smell human again?”
Solo reached for his communicator, hesitated, then handed it to his friend.
“Why don’t you call him? He’ll be relieved to hear your voice.”
“I’m sorry Mr. Solo, but you will be handling this assignment with the assistance of Agent Mark Slate. Mr. Kuryakin is indisposed and unfit for duty for a while.”
“Indisposed? Illya? Is he sick? Is he alright?”
Alexander Waverly tutted at him, but kindly.
“Mr. Solo, if Mr. Kuryakin was alright, he would not be indisposed would he? Rest assured that he will be back with us soon enough. In the meantime, you have a mission in China to complete.”
Solo nodded. He wanted more than anything to rush round to Illya’s to make sure that his partner was okay, then chided himself with a grin. Illya would be surprised, shocked and probably annoyed if Solo did come rushing round solicitously to fuss round him like a mother hen. Illya was a singularly healthy individual accept for his frequent propensity for catching colds, which he generally came down with at least once for every season of the year, sometimes more than once. Solo took the file and left for his office where Mark Slate would by now be waiting for him.
Although the flight to China was long and uneventful, the mission most assuredly was not. Solo found it slightly irksome to be deprived of his own partner. He and Illya had, like most partners, developed a very close working bond to the point where they seemed almost able to read one another’s thoughts. Certainly they could read each other like a book and were able to combine operations almost instinctively. Now, he was finding that Mark, although perfectly able and competent, lacked Illya’s instinctive responsiveness, and he found he constantly had to explain things to Mark, and give the man directions. He could not remember the last time he had had to do any of that for Illya. All the same, he was aware that this mission was not exactly a bed of roses for Mark either. His regular partner, April Dancer was currently on leave in Cincinnati, attending a family wedding. Waverly had refused her partner permission to go with her, and now Solo guessed, Mark knew why. He’d needed someone to go to China with Solo, and for once there would be no Illya available.
Mark for his part, was aware of his own shortcomings as far as the CEA was concerned. He had worked with Solo’s Russian partner himself now, and he had learned through experience exactly how valuable a partner Illya would be. He himself was a very junior agent indeed compared to Solo and Kuryakin, and not nearly as experienced in the field…. or even in fighting. He recalled watching how Illya, bruised, battered and bleeding, still half groggy from the THRUSH drugs that had been forced on him and, he suspected, still in pain and shock from whatever gratuitous forms of torture he had been subjected to; had disposed of two armed guards and effected their escape from the THRUSH stronghold where they were being held. Illya was a hard act to follow, and Mark now knew it. They completed their mission without any real disasters however, and finally settled themselves side by side into their seats for the long plane journey back to the US. Once the plane was airborne, Solo looked round at Mark and gave him a grin.
“Thanks for coming along Mark. You did a good job.”
Mark blinked in surprise. He had not believed he had done anything very sterling at all, and certainly this matter might have been finished a few days ago if Illya had been here instead of himself. He suppressed his urge to say all this however and blushed instead.
“Thanks Napoleon.”
Napoleon may have been a wise-cracking American, but he was a sensitive soul and he was instantly aware that the junior agent had something on his mind.
“Are you all right?”
“Yeah…. yeah.”
Napoleon kept gazing at him until Mark found himself explaining further.
“Sorry sir, it’s just that I was not aware that I had done anything very special except go charging off on my own and get myself into trouble. Rather than thanking me, I had expected you to give me a dressing down at the very least.”
Solo smiled.
“You’re not accustomed to these kind of assignments are you?”
“April and I are still on the baby-food variety at the moment. We’ll progress as we get more experience. The last time I was on an assignment anywhere near this one was when Illya and I got captured by THUSH. My recollection of that affair was of Illya getting all the torture and doing all the work whilst I sat around in a cozy cell for three days waiting and doing nothing to help. He even managed to get us out of there, without very much help from me.”
Solo thought he could guess what was on the younger man’s mind.
“Mark, one of these days you’ll have to join Illya and I on a job, just as observer. You don’t have to worry about being unable to follow in the great Kuryakin’s footsteps. You found out a few of his strengths when you were with him. No doubt you also encountered one or two of his faults as well, right?”
“Well…”
“Let’s see…. Illya, the king of taciturn sitting in a cell for three days with a junior agent he doesn’t know very well….an Englishman who is known for his alacrity and his loquacious nature. I know Illya, but I can imagine how it must have been for you.”
Mark stared at him, but Napoleon was grinning.
“Do you think you deserve a dressing down?”
Mark nodded reluctantly. Napoleon nodded in response.
“Very well, consider yourself reprimanded; But I still say you did a good job. You are certainly not Illya, but Illya is not you either, Mark. You have points in your favour too. Don’t sell yourself short.”
“Thanks.”
The silence was thick. Solo sensed that his companion was still not fully convinced.
“What is it that is really on your mind?”
It was a while before Mark answered him.
“April and I always do a good job. We don’t get the complex stuff just yet, but we do good. I always thought we were good at our job. That give us a year or two of experience and we could be where you two are.”
“I have no doubt of that.” Solo replied sincerely. Mark shook his head.
“Watching Illya at work the other week was an eye opener for me. First I learned how bad I am at reading people. I had Illya all wrong. He turned out to be the complete opposite of all my assumptions about him.”
Solo chuckled.
“Don’t take that hard. It took me a long time to break through that ice-cold exterior too. He has the same effect on everyone he meets.”
“Then everything he did to get us out of that cell and out of the building to say nothing of…er…our adventures on the way back to HQ. Made me realize that I still have a lot to learn.”
“That’s why Illya is number two of section two and you’re not. Illya and I had to learn it too Mark. That is why you cut your teeth on the simple jobs and every so often get sent off on a job like this with a more senior agent. Almost always it will be number One or Number two if not both. That’s how we all learned. Besides, Illya is a cut above all of us. Former Russian navy officer, KGB trained, GRU…. he speaks fourteen languages at the last count…expert in engineering, mechanics, electronics, physics, music, he plays three different musical instruments that I know of, Master at several martial arts, expert in explosives…. none of us will ever quite match up to him. Most UNCLE agents are quite ordinary people like you and me. We just fumble along doing the best we can, going out on a limb from time to time, relying on our hunches, trusting our instincts, and making sure we are there to drag our partner out of whatever hole he…or she…happens to stumble into. That’s what it’s about for all of us Mark. Welcome to the big league!”
Solo was grinning widely, and Mark found himself grinning back. They each accepted a glass of wine from the stewardess and Solo leaned back, clearly prepared to relax properly for the first time in over a week.
“So,” he asked, turning to his companion. “I can’t help being curious. You said that Illya proved to be the opposite of everything you had assumed? What did you think of my partner before you saw the error of your ways?”
“Do I have to answer that?”
“No.” he replied in a tone that clearly contradicted his word. Mark grinned reluctantly.
“Well, you have to admit it that on the surface, your partner comes across as a scientist and a bookworm. An intellectual and that is all. He never ever spoke unless he had to, and it was only ever one syllable; `yes; no; go; stop!’; he never seemed to crack a smile and for the life of me I couldn’t think how a man like that managed to qualify for section two in the first place, never mind become number two. I couldn’t for the life of me see how you managed to put up with the man. He taught me how wrong I had been to take him at face value.”
Solo nodded.
“You know Mark, there’s a chemical that is totally benign. Its harmless in every single way, its non-reactive regardless of what you mix it with or add it to. Non-toxic, non-corrosive…and yet you let it heat up beyond a certain temperature and it explodes with a force that could destroy half of Manhattan. That’s Illya in a nutshell. He is the bookish type, he really is. He is naturally reticent and taciturn, often sulky and sullen. He reads technical journals for fun for crying out loud.” Solo gave a rueful shake of his head.
“Of course he is also one of the most interesting men I have ever worked with. His skill as a sharpshooter is second to none, and his skill with explosives is such that he was made to stay on at the training facility for over a month after graduation to teach a class.”
Mark smiled.
“If all the agents at UNCLE make the mistake I did in underestimating him so badly, it must be a very effective weapon against his enemies. There’s nothing so useful in an enemy who relaxes his guard because he thinks you’re not a threat.”
Solo turned and looked Mark in the eye.
“Illya looks like a teenage librarian, but he’s a master of disguise who can kill a man with his bare hands if he wants to. April your partner looks like a fashion model or a TV star, like a girl who’s too pretty to be brainy as well, but she came out top in almost everything at the training facility. She’s as deadly as Illya, but I’d say considerably prettier. Alexander Waverly hand-picks his people, Mark. He sees something in each of us that he can use and recruits us and trains us to use our skill to his benefit. We are all different, and we all have our own unique skills that sooner or later turn out to be invaluable. He is remarkably clever at picking out agents to pair together so that the skills they each have balance each other out.”
“In other words, if one of you has a failing, the other has a particular skill to equal things out? So what is your particular skill then, sir?” Mark asked with an impudent grin. Solo saw the twinkle but pretended to be offended.
“I’m the brains and Illya is the brawn I’ll have you know.”
“You’re the brains? And Illya with PHDs and Masters degrees? Wow, you must be a real prodigy, sir!”
Mark swallowed the last of his glass of wine and leaned back closing his eyes. Solo chuckled to himself and settled back himself for a nap.
Arriving back in New York, dropping off their luggage at home and changing their clothes after their long trip, they had to make for UNCLE HQ straight away for debriefing. Only once they had finished up their report and been in to see Mr. Waverly, was Solo free to pursue the question that had been brimming in his head for some time. Where was his partner? He and Mark had been gone for ten days, and still there was no sign that HQ had been graced with Illya’s presence at any of the intervening time. Waverly was evasive at first when Solo questioned him, but Solo could see in the older man’s eyes that he was nevertheless worried…. Or concerned at any rate. Finally, Waverly sighed.
“Very well Mr. Solo, I wanted to tell you before, but I needed you in China with your mind on your job. Mr. Kuryakin is not ill per se. He is as I told you before, indisposed.”
“Indisposed how?” Solo persisted. “Indisposed can mean he’s caught a cold, he’s dying of a fever or he’s having a fit of pique because someone has painted his office door the wrong colour.”
“Mr. Solo I very much want to answer your question, but I gave him my word that I would not reveal a word about his private life to anyone. All I can tell you is that he had a visitor a few days before you left from the Russian Ambassador with news from home. He requested immediate compassionate leave for an indefinite period of time. Under the circumstances it would have been churlish to refuse.”
“Compassionate leave? The Embassy? News from home? That could only mean bad news, like a death couldn’t it? Sir, Illya will be on his own, brooding if we leave him. I have to go to see him, try and get him to talk to me, if only to give him someone to punch. Please Mr. Waverly?”
“Go Mr. Solo, with my blessing, but keep your communicator with you at all times.”
“Yes sir. Thank you.” It was all Solo could do to walk and not run out of the building.
No one answered the door when he rang the bell, or when he knocked determinedly. There was silence from inside the Russian’s apartment, but Solo knew his friend was in there. He just had a strong feeling.
“Illya ole’ buddy, it’s me, Napoleon.”
There was a muffled reply, but it was in Russian, and Napoleon could guess that the general meaning was “Get lost!” He was determined not to be beaten.
“Come on my friend, I have a bottle of vodka…”
There was a long pause, then the door opened. Napoleon was shocked at the sight of the man who stood there. It was Illya all right, but the blond locks were greasy and standing up on end as though he was constantly running his fingers through it. His face was pale; grey, with dark circles under his eyes, with a trace of red about them, although Solo could not be sure. A blond beard sprouting from his chin showed his friend could not have shaved for at least a week, and his clothes hung loosely in folds from a frame that looked like it had lost at least twenty pounds that it could not afford to lose. Solo stepped inside and glanced quickly round.
Solo wondered briefly why a man with such a well ordered mind and a well ordered office should have such a disorderly home. It was not that Illya’s home was messy. There was not enough furniture or luxuries for it to get too messy, but the piles of books and records that his friend owned were strewn all over the place rather than piled neatly as was his wont. What caught Solo’s eye was the empty beer cans and whisky bottles that looked as if they had been thrown. He looked up at his friend, expecting him to be as sozzled as the mess in his apartment suggested, but the blue eyes that regarded him were stone cold sober. What was more, he didn’t smell boozy either.
“What are you doing here Napoleon?”
Solo raised his eyebrows.
“What do you think? No one has seen or heard from you in more than ten days, not even Mr. Waverly. You’re my partner and my best friend and I care.”
“Thanks, but I’m fine.”
Solo raised an eyebrow at that but said nothing. Illya shrugged.
“Think what you want. Go or stay it’s up to you.” Illya dropped down on the floor with his back to the wall and drew his knees up under his chin. He sat there, hugging his knees and staring into space. Solo’s heart ached for his friend. Whatever could have reduced his friend to this?
“I’m not going anywhere my friend. I’ve just come. So are you going to make me some supper or shall I ring for take -out?”
“I’m not hungry. You do what you like.”
“Got anything in?”
The blond head shook. Solo picked up the phone and ordered pizza and fries for two. That done he sat on the floor beside his friend to wait for the food to be delivered.
“So you’re not sick. No cold or fever or anything like that. I was afraid you were dying up here alone. What’s wrong Illya?”
“You telling me you don’t know? That Waverly didn’t tell you?” The tone seemed to imply the opposite and Solo shook his head.
“Of course he didn’t tell me anything. No one knows anything except that you’re indisposed. They all assumed you have the flu’ or something. Waverly simply told me that he couldn’t tell me. He said he had given you his word and that was that.”
“By that, innocently letting you know that there might well be something to tell if he had not given me his word.”
“I can tell you he is worried about you Illya. I am too. Whatever has happened has obviously knocked you for six. You’re not the man to let yourself go like this. You’re skinnier than ever, and you’re starting to look like the wild man of Borneo.”
“Very funny Napoleon.”
“What you look like is your own affair my friend, I just want to help. Please tell me what’s wrong.”
Illya shook his head and looked away.
“Don’t you trust me? Is that it?”
“No that’s not it!” Illya shouted finally. “That’s not it!”
Solo resisted the impulse to smile with pleasure.
“I know you’re a private man Illya, and you prefer to deal with things alone. But you look like you could use a little help with his one. There’s only me here. I’m your partner and your friend. Your best friend…. I hope. If I can’t help you, who can?”
“No one can help me Napoleon. Not even you. It’s something I will just have to learn to live with, like I’ve had to live with everything else.”
Solo knew little enough about Kuryakin’s past, his childhood and adolescence, but he knew that nothing of his friend’s past had been easy. One of the first things Waverly had told him about his new partner that first day was that Kuryakin had had a tough past. But he had also said that the young man was tougher than he looked. And so it had proved to be. Right now though, Illya looked anything but tough. He looked frail and vulnerable, and wracked with something. Grief probably, but without knowing for sure it was anyone’s guess. To Solo’s eye, Illya looked like a man in the throes of intense grief, but denying it so ferociously that he was not aware of it. Suddenly, he was sure he was right, but how to encourage his friend to let go? Probably letting go of his private feelings was never an option for him back home. He had likely been trained from a toddler to keep his feelings and private thoughts to himself or risk being imprisoned, tortured or exiled to Siberia. How could he persuade his friend to give up the habits of a lifetime? He opened his jacket and brought out the bottle of vodka.
“Do you want to open it now or wait for the pizza?”
“I told you I’m not hungry. I suppose you want me to share this with you?”
Solo grinned.
“Only if you want to, my friend.”
Illya hoisted himself on to his feet and fetched two mugs from the kitchen. He poured out generous amounts of the liquid for each of them and handed one of the mugs to Solo.
“Here. The glasses are dirty.”
“Thanks.”
They drank in comfortable silence. Solo sensed that even if he was unable to persuade his friend to open up to him, even his mere presence would be some comfort. When the pizzas arrived, Solo paid for them, but still Illya refused to eat anything. Solo himself started on a slice of pizza in the hope that the sight and smell would stimulate some interest from his friend.
Nothing.
Presently, once they were on their second mug of the vodka, Solo sighed deeply and looked at his friend.
“So why the bearded look my friend? Trying to make yourself look older?”
“Has it worked?”
“Right now you look like you’ve aged about thirty years since I last saw you. Did you lose someone?”
He saw a fist heading towards his face, and then a roaring blackness swept him away.
Solo re-emerged slowly, like a man swimming up from the bottom of a deep pool. He found he was still sitting where he had been, but flopped aside against the edge of the bookcase. A sore spot on his right temple testified that he must have hit his head in falling. He blinked away the nausea and looked round for the owner of the fist. Illya was not in sight.
Groaning, Solo got up and found his friend in the bathroom, vomiting violently into the toilet.
“Illya!” he darted forward and crouched beside his friend, one hand resting for reassurance on Illya’s back. He stayed resolutely by his side until the spasms of sickness had finally passed, leaving Illya exhausted, flopping back against the wall, wiping his face with the back of his hand. Solo wetted his handkerchief and handed it over.
“Thanks.” Illya wiped his face with it, then grimacing, he reached out and flushed the toilet. He glanced at the hanky in his hand.
“Perhaps I should get this laundered before I give it back to you.”
Solo smiled. He nodded, rubbing his head and his jaw ruefully. The nausea was rising slightly again and he choked it down. He couldn’t start heaving himself could he? The two of them together, vomiting in unison? He couldn’t help wincing at the sore spot where his head had clearly connected with the corner of the bookcase. Illya looked chagrined.
“Sorry my friend. I haven’t lost control like that for a long time.”
“Perhaps, but maybe you needed it.”
“I hurt you badly?”
“My hurt will mend Illya. Will yours mend so easily?”
The lips pursed, and for a moment Solo thought Illya was going to close up again, but at the last moment, the blue eyes dropped. Illya shook his head, a glimmer of wetness on his cheek.
“No, my hurt will never end. It will last forever.”
The sight of his partner hurting so badly was unbearable, and try as he might, Solo was unable to prevent a tear from escaping before he hurriedly wiped it away. Illya’s sharp eyes did not miss it, however.
“You really care this much for me Napoleon? Even though you don’t know why?”
“I know you are hurting, Illya and that hurts me because I know I can’t do anything to make it go away.”
For a long moment, Illya stared at his friend, his eyes slightly red-rimmed now, his face white. Then he got up and walked slightly shakily into the next room, his bedroom. He returned with a black and white photograph in a silver frame. He handed it to Napoleon. Napoleon looked at it with interest. It was a very nice picture of Illya at the age of about fifteen, wearing the uniform of the naval school he had attended in Russia as a boy. Solo found himself smiling at the serious face in the picture.
“That’s a nice picture Illya. You haven’t changed much since this was taken.”
Illya stared at him.
“I am not in that picture Napoleon. I was the one holding the camera.”
“Say that again?”
Illya nodded, water filling his eyes and threatening to spill over.
“That is not me my friend. That is a photograph of my brother Mikhail. That was taken the last time we saw one another.”
“Twins?” Napoleon’s eyes were wide in surprise. “I never guessed you were a twin!”
Illya shook his head.
“Not twins exactly. There were ten months between us, but we were as alike as twins for all that. We looked the same, thought and said the same things, we were the same height growing up, we each knew when the other was hurting…”
Illya’s eyes dropped.
“For all the good it did us. They made sure we were separated all through school. Easier to control us you understand. We met up when we could, but we thought that as adults we could be together then. Make our own choices. The foolishness of youth.”
“But it never happened? Except for this one time?”
“The authorities, the KGB already had our futures mapped out for us. Neither of us were given any choice in the matter. Mika always told me I was wrong to cooperate and do as I was told. I always told him that he would end up getting killed if he kept on rebelling against them all the time. The authorities are stronger and they will always get their own way. People like Mika would not change a thing.”
“What happened to him Illya?”
“He joined the rebels and pleaded with me to join him. I refused. I always believed there was a better way to help the world. I’ve not heard anything more from him or about him until the Ambassador’s aide came to see me at HQ a few days ago.”
The tears fell unbidden down Illya’s face. He made no move to wipe them away this time, or to hide them.
“The KGB had acquired information that a THRUSH stronghold was operating in an old disused mine somewhere in Ukraine. Rather than inform UNCLE they prefer to clean their own backyard. The report is that they simply bombed the entrances to prevent anyone escaping and then drilled down and gassed everyone. Once they had waited long enough they reopened one of the entrances and stormed the place. Every last man and woman in the place was dead. They took pictures of every corpse and collected all the files and paperwork they could find. Mikhail was found among the dead they discovered in the laboratory.”
“A prisoner of THRUSH?”
Illya shook his head, tears pouring down his face, his hands shaking in his effort to hold back the emotion that was threatening to overwhelm him.
“Mikhail was a member of THRUSH. He has been their chief scientist at THRUSH central for three years, before they transferred him to their new base in Ukraine to head the science station there.”
Illya stared at Napoleon.
“If I had agreed to join him could I have saved him or would I have ended up being a member of THRUSH myself? Or if I could have persuaded him to come with me he could have been here at UNCLE with us?”
Solo’s heart bled at his friend’s misery.
“No, no, no my friend, life isn’t like that. You are the man you are. Even if you had somehow finished up with THRUSH, you wouldn’t have stayed with them once you learned what they’re about because you don’t believe in it.”
“But Mika is my brother Napoleon, we were as close as twins could ever be. We’re basically the same.”
Solo shook his head patiently.
“No Illya, you told me you were separated by the state and brought up apart. You may have had the same start in life and the same parents, but thereafter everything changed. We are who we are because of our experiences, things that happen to us, things we learn that mold the way we think and the way we react to things. Mikhail looked the same as you on the outside but he had learned to be a different man from you by then. The fact that you made different choices proves that. Nothing you could have done would have made any difference to the choices he made. Try not to berate yourself for failing to save him Illya. He made his own choice. He knew when he joined THRUSH that you were at the time with the KGB didn’t he? He would have known that that made you two enemies.”
Illya wiped away a fresh flood of tears almost fiercely and nodded his head.
“The KGB found a special dossier in Mika’s personal files, written in his own handwriting. I’d recognize it anywhere. A picture of me, details of how to tell the two of us apart and written in his writing underneath in large red letters `recommended for termination’, signed by Mikhail Stanislaus Kuryakin.”
Illya’s blue eyes, bloodshot and rimmed with red gazed up at Napoleon.
“He knew where I was all along, Napoleon. He kept tabs on me. He knew I was working for UNCLE and he recommended my termination.”
Napoleon reached forward and wrapped his arms around Illya in a bear hug. He had no words to say that felt adequate. He felt Illya resisting at first, but Napoleon held on tightly, as much to comfort himself as to give comfort to his friend. He could feel Illya shaking all over, still trying to hold back the emotion; the grief, the anger and the betrayal.”
“It’s all right Illya.” Napoleon whispered softly. “I’m here. It’s all right. Stop fighting it, you’ll feel better for it. Come on Illya, it’s me.”
Illya tried to hold back. He thought of his mother and father, and the little ones killed before his eyes by the Nazis, he recalled how Masha had resisted the invaders with all of her strength until they had finally overpowered her, raped and beat her and left her for dead in a ditch, and finally Mika. How as little boys it had always been he and Mika against the world, before everything changed, before the war and the Nazis and the Communists had taken over their lives so completely, separating two lonely orphan boys that had clung to one another so desperately. Now one of those little boys was dead. He was never coming back. Not the little boy who had been his very best friend, nor the man whom had grown into a mortal enemy that finally ordered the assassination of his own brother. It was gone now, all of it, everyone. His final link to the most distant past that had contained grains of happiness and contentment, for even the briefest of times. He felt it all float away and pop like a soap bubble. And he had never felt so alone. Solo held on to his friend even harder as finally, after so long, Kuryakin’s iron will suddenly collapsed like a pack of cards, and the man along with it. He held him, trying to calm his friend’s violent shaking, listening with a breaking heart to the gut-wrenching, wracking sobs.
Solo was awakened suddenly as his communicator bleeped. He reached for it, reflecting as he did so that he had awakened in the past in many different and occasionally surprising places, but never before had he awakened in a bathroom. Illya too was still there, curled up in a fetal position, sleeping peacefully. Solo recalled with a rush that Illya had wept for hours last night, and Solo had shed silent tears in sympathy, his heart in pieces until finally in the early hours of the morning they had both fallen asleep from pure exhaustion. He softly got to his feet and entered the lounge, drawing his communicator pen out of his pocket as he did so.
“Napoleon Solo here.”
“Mister Solo?” It was Alexander Waverley’s voice, as expected. “Where are you and what is your situation?”
“I’m at Illya’s sir. He’s not been… uh… too well sir. I’ve been sitting up with him all night.”
“And how is Mr. Kuryakin this morning?”
“Still asleep, sir.”
“Do you need some more time off Mr. Solo?”
“I would like to make sure Illya’s all right before I leave him, sir.”
“Very well Mr. Solo. I would appreciate it if you could report in at twenty-one hundred hours.”
“Yes sir.”
Solo replaced the communicator in his pocket and looked round. Illya was standing in the doorway, looking, if it was possible, even more disheveled than last night. His face was white, and his eyes awash with tears.
“Thanks.”
“What for?”
“For being here. You’re the first person in my life not to turn and run away when things turn sour.”
“I’ll never do that, Illya. You’re my best friend. How could I?”
“Even my own brother turned against me in the end.”
Solo reached out and raised his friend’s chin with his finger.
“My grandmother used to say to me; `a friend my dear boy is the brother we choose for ourselves.’”
“I never heard that before. You believe it?”
“Yes I do. And as an adoptive brother, Illya, do you mind if I ask you something?”
“What?”
Solo pointed to the empty bottles and beer cans that still littered the small flat.
“What happened here?”
Illya glanced up and saw the litter as though noticing it for the first time.
“Oh, that was an attempt the first night to get drunk by myself and blot everything out.”
“Did it work?”
“No. I didn’t get drunk enough to forget anything, and I finished up with a mountain-sized hangover the next day, so then I had twice the cause to feel lousy.”
“Illya, you’ve been sitting here on your own all this time, trying to deal with all of this? And here I was on assignment in China picturing you in bed with measles or something. If I had known….”
“What? You’d have stayed here? Refused to go to China? Decided to come over to my home to babysit me?”
“No, but I don’t understand why you didn’t call me! I can’t imagine how I would be, sitting for ten days trying to deal with something like that all on my own. I would have gone nuts long before this.”
Illya smiled suddenly. Solo was right at that. If he had had to face this kind of trauma, he might well have gone `nuts’ by now.
“Napoleon, you have to understand, I have always been alone. I have been alone for most of my life, having to deal with all sorts of things without having anyone else to run to. I still find it a challenge getting used to relying on other people. Even you my friend. I have no problem relying on you during our missions, but with personal things… it’s hard for me. My first resort is always to go home and lock my doors. Keep everyone out. I’m sorry that means locking you out too Napoleon, but I am finding it harder than I expected trying to change the habits of a lifetime.”
“You don’t have to change anything my friend, just don’t be afraid to let me in when you need me. How are you?”
“Tired.” Illya admitted finally. “Very, very tired.”
“Didn’t you get enough sleep last night then?”
“Sleep? I spent the night on the tiles!” Kuryakin replied as he returned to the bathroom and closed the door.
Solo frowned for a moment before hauling on board what Illya had said, and chuckled appreciatively. He could do with a shower and a shave and a strong coffee. He could do something about the last thing anyway, and wandered into Illya’s kitchen to see about coffee. He was not surprised to find the refrigerator was largely empty, and the sink was full of dirty dishes. The coffee-maker was about the only clean item in the room, but there was not a grain of coffee in the place. He ransacked the cupboards searching for some kind of sustenance to feed his friend and finally found a jar of cocoa at the back of the cupboard, alongside a tin of evaporated milk. Solo took the pizzas that had been left largely uneaten the night before and popped them into the oven, and whilst they were re-heating, he washed two mugs and made some hot chocolate for them.
While he waited for Illya to emerge from the bathroom, Solo set about washing the dishes and putting some kind of order to the disorder. He had just finished when he heard Illya clearing his throat. He turned and handed his friend his mug of chocolate.
“You’re out of coffee.”
“I’m out of just about everything. Thanks.”
Illya had showered and shaved, and changed his clothes and now looked a great deal more like himself, in his trademark dark suit with the black turtleneck sweater that hid the truth of his skinny frame more successfully than he had dared to hope. He sniffed.
“What is that smell?”
“last night’s pizzas warming in the oven.”
“For breakfast?”
“Why not? Please don’t tell me you’re not hungry, Illya, because I can see you are just by looking at you, even if you don’t know it yourself.”
“It’s true I’ve not eaten a thing for a few days…Just couldn’t seem to swallow it, but for the first time I might manage a morsel.”
“…a morsel?”
“…or two!”
Napoleon sat back ten minutes later, unable to quite hide the smile of relief as his friend wolfed down the food he had refused to touch yesterday. Once the food was all gone, Kuryakin looked a lot better. He had a little colour in his cheeks for a start. He startled Solo by handing him his jacket. Solo took it automatically and looked up in some curiosity.
“What’s this? Am I leaving?”
“Yes, we both are. You told me last night that I looked like the wild man of Borneo. Well my friend, as black beards show up more distinctly than blond ones, you too are starting to look overgrown yourself. We are going to your flat so that you can shower and change your clothes, and then we have a job to go to.”
“Are you sure you’re up to it?”
“Work?” Illya shrugged uncertainly. “If I disappear, it’s possible you might find me locked in the cloakroom or something, but you have helped me to realize that I am not helping myself by sitting around here. I would be better keeping myself busy doing something, surrounded by people. Keep my mind off my own troubles for a while. So why don’t you call Mr. Waverly back and let him know we’ll be back at HQ as soon as you smell human again?”
Solo reached for his communicator, hesitated, then handed it to his friend.
“Why don’t you call him? He’ll be relieved to hear your voice.”