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section7mfuTitle: The Deadly Admirer Affair, Act IX: Elusive Target
Rating: PG13
Word count: ~2500
Author: Rose of Pollux
If you prefer reading there, cross-posted to ff.net and AO3.
Napoleon was relieved once Illya was in the relative safety of their apartment. He was in bed, with the IV drip beside him (Napoleon had taken that, too, much to the consternation of the cab driver that Janet had hired), and Napoleon made sure that Illya was comfortable and tucked in before returning to the living room, where Janet was waiting.
“How is he?” she asked.
“Sleeping,” Napoleon said, with a sigh. “He needs it, though. How much do I owe you for the cab fare?”
“Oh, don’t bother about that; just let me know when he’s feeling better,” Janet replied, waving him off. “…That girl I spoke to—Mandy… She said that Illya had been attacked by someone on your side. Why?”
“I wish I knew,” Napoleon said, darkly. “If Illya knows, he hasn’t been able to tell me; he hasn’t had the strength. The poison’s done a number on him; he only started getting better since this morning—and the attacker nearly got him again later. I just hope his recovery continues to improve in spite of this setback.”
Janet gave him a sympathetic look.
“And how have you been holding up?”
“Me? Nothing’s happened to me; Illya’s the one who’s been hurt.”
“And so, again, I ask you—how have you been holding up?” she repeated.
Napoleon blinked, and gave her a wan smile.
“Do I look that bad?”
“Well, aside from the fact that you’ve got circles under your eyes that I recognize from a worry-induced all-nighter, I know how close you two are. It’s like those stories you hear about two people being so close that if something happens to one, it affects the other. I saw that with the two of you last time.”
Napoleon exhaled, but nodded.
“Yeah, you’d be right. As for how I’m doing… Well, as good as can be expected, I guess.”
Janet nodded.
“Hang in there—both of you,” she said.
“We’ll try,” Napoleon said. “Look, ah, I don’t mean to be rude, but I really should be with him right now.”
“Oh, of course; I’m outta here,” she said, heading for the door, and paused as she was halfway out. “…You know, he’s really lucky to have you.”
“…I’m lucky to have him.”
“Well, of course it’d go both ways, wouldn’t it?” she said, with an encouraging smile. “Bye.”
Napoleon said his goodbyes and locked up after she had left, and then returned to the bedroom to be by his partner’s side.
“She’s right, you know,” he said, gently brushing Illya’s hair back. “We really are lucky to have each other. …I don’t know where I’d be without you.”
Illya was mumbling in his sleep, and, at first, Napoleon thought his partner had been responding to him. But it was clear from the frightened tone of Illya’s voice that he was responding to something in his fevered dream.
“Nyet…” he squeaked, his voice still very weak. “Nyet…! Miloserdiye…!”
“…Mercy?” Napoleon translated. His heart sunk in his chest. Was Illya dreaming about his attacker?
Illya’s body was trembling, and Napoleon gently took another cold cloth and began to wipe his forehead.
“You’re going to be okay, Illya,” he whispered, encouragingly. “I’m here for you. Can you hear me?”
His partner was still trembling, but it had seemed to reduce at the sound of his voice. Illya’s head even turned slightly to face him.
“N… Napo…?”
“Yeah, that’s right,” Napoleon said. “I’m right here.”
Illya let out a quiet sigh and his expression did relax slightly. And Napoleon continued to talk to him again, taking hope that, slowly but surely, Illya was regaining his strength.
*******************************
As the hours ticked by, George tried his best not to fidget as he sat in the chair Napoleon had previously occupied. Napoleon always carried himself with confidence, after all.
Well… Almost always. Napoleon hadn’t been very confident at all a little while ago—in fact, it had been rather disconcerting to see. Napoleon was one of those people who if he was acting scared or unconfident, then everyone else had better follow suit.
George now let his shoulders slump, unsure of how to act.
“Something wrong?” Mark asked, quietly. He had the blanket up to his nose, revealing only his eyes and the blond wig that was covering his forehead with its bangs.
“Trying to figure out what Napoleon’s poise would be,” George replied, quietly. “He’s normally always calm and cool about everything, but I didn’t get that from him this time. Unless it was just me… But he really seemed shaken this time.”
“Not just you, Chum. He really is shaken by this,” Mark said. “It’s no secret how close he and Illya are. But I imagine this whole thing is bringing back some really horrible memories for him.”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you remember seven years ago—a few months after Illya had been transferred here as his partner?” Mark said. “Napoleon had gotten distracted and THRUSH had scarpered with Illya—they’d tortured him for three weeks before Napoleon found him again, still chained to a saltire.”
“Ohh…” George said. “I kind of remember hearing about it… I didn’t know either of them that well at the time…”
Mark gave a nod.
“I first worked with Napoleon when he started out here in Section II as a probationary agent, and had been keeping up with him ever since. The first time I ever saw his confidence take such a severe blow was the day he realized that Illya had suffered so much because he had been too distracted to provide him with the backup he had needed. And now, Illya was attacked three times with fatal intent because Napoleon hadn’t been with him to stop it from happening. It must be some horrible sort of déjà vu Napoleon is feeling right now.”
“Well, it’s not his fault; they weren’t on a mission now,” George protested. “No one expected the threat to come from inside U.N.C.L.E.! Medical was where we thought Illya would be safe!”
“I know that, Chum. Trust me; I know. But Napoleon won’t likely see it that way. He usually stays by Illya’s side in Medical; the one time he didn’t, this happened.”
“Well, I can’t pretend that I’d know how you field agents think,” George admitted. “But if one of your partners had that happen, would you have thought the same thing?”
“…Probably,” Mark admitted. He glanced through the glass at April, as if to double-check that she was alright, and then sunk down into the pillow. “Don’t turn around; someone’s talking to the girls outside.”
George exhaled, nervously, but stayed in the same position in the chair.
Outside, Mills, the lab technician, was talking to April and Mandy.
“Kuryakin spends a lot of time in Section VIII,” Mills was saying. “All of us were wondering how he’s doing.”
“He’s stable,” April said. “That’s all we--”
She was cut off by a loud hiss; she and Mandy glanced down at Baba Yaga, who was standing with her back arched and ears flattened back.
“…Know,” April finished, the connection already clicking in her mind.
“We’ll be sure to let everyone know if there’s any--” Mandy began, and she, too, was interrupted by a hiss. “—Change.”
April’s hand was unobtrusively going for her Special, and Mandy kept Mills talking.
“You will pass on my apologies to whoever was running that analysis before George and I showed up to commandeer everything, won’t you?” she asked.
“Yeah, sure,” Mills said. “Oh, that reminds me. Miss Dancer? Mr. Dennell wanted to see you and Miss Stevenson down in the lab right away.”
“George is back in the lab?” Mandy asked, a chill going through her veins as she realized that the blatant lie had given them their guilty party.
“Yeah,” Mills lied. “He’s running Kuryakin’s blood again, and he thinks he might have found an antidote after…” He trailed off and realized that, between the cat singling him out and something he had said, he had just given himself away. He reached for his pocket.
“Mandy, get back!” April ordered.
Mandy did as she was told, both her and Baba Yaga hiding behind a file cabinet as gunfire erupted between April and Mills. Mark sprung from the bed and began to fire, as well.
Mills took one look at Mark in the blond wig and cursed, turning around and bolting down the corridor. Instructing Mandy and George to remain hidden, April and Mark took off in pursuit, instructing Security to seal off the building exit again.
But as they arrived in the tailor shop front, they saw Del Floria staring at the now-sealed door; he turned back to them and indicated the direction of the door.
“You’re looking for Mills? He stormed through here two seconds before the front door sealed!”
“No…!” April fumed. Frustrated, she ordered the door unsealed again, and she and Mark headed outside.
“There he goes!” Mark said, seeing him get into a taxi. “We’ll have to follow him.”
“Yes, but I have a bad feeling that I know exactly where he’s going,” April said, as they darted to a second taxi. She grabbed her communicator as Mark instructed their cab to follow Mills’s. “Open Channel D—get me Napoleon Solo, please.”
*******************************
Napoleon had continued to diligently look after his sleeping partner and had lost track of time. At last, though, Illya awakened, blinking as he registered the familiar room—and his partner’s face. Illya managed a wan smile, pleased that Napoleon’s efforts to get him here had succeeded.
“Napoleon…” he said, his voice weak.
“Shh. You still need to conserve your strength!” his partner instructed.
“Nyet… Must tell you…”
“You know who attacked you?” Napoleon asked.
“Nyet… Sorry…” Illya said. “But… I know why they did this.”
“Why?”
“To save you.”
“…What!?”
“Evidently, between Club Thanatopsis and now this case… I am trying to kill you… My attacker wishes to kill me… Before I finish the job.” Illya paused to catch his breath. “And you… You will be so pleased… You will reward him for exposing me as a traitor… And you will watch in satisfaction as I die.”
“…They said that? They actually said that!?”
“When they weren’t taunting me for being afraid…” Illya trailed off, seeing a growing rage in Napoleon’s eyes. “Napoleon…”
“Listen to me,” his partner said, gently holding the sides of Illya’s face in his hands so that Illya was looking right at his face. “You just listen to me. You need to tell me everything you can that might identify your attacker.”
“It’s no use,” Illya mumbled. “They had a mask… disguised their voice…” He trailed off. “Wait…”
“You remember something?”
“Baba Yaga… She bit them on the arm…”
Napoleon reached for his communicator, but before he could even call to open the channel, his communicator started ringing.
“Solo here.”
“Napoleon? It’s April. The plan worked halfway; we drew the attacker out of hiding, but he managed to escape the building before we could seal it off. Napoleon, it’s Mills from Section VIII—and I’m pretty sure he’s headed right for your apartment.”
“Mills!?” Napoleon repeated, stunned.
“Mills…?” Illya murmured, trying to recall his own encounters with the man. But he was coming up blank.
“We’ve called for backup to get to your apartment, and Mark and I are heading there, too,” April continued. “But Mills has a bit of a lead—he kept getting the yellow lights, and we had to keep waiting at the red. He’s at least five or ten minutes ahead of us or any backup. You need to get Illya out of there!”
“Okay,” Napoleon said, trying to keep his wits about him. “Okay, I’ll think of something. But I can’t think of anything if I’m sitting here talking.”
He switched off the communicator and glanced around the room.
“Mills…” Illya murmured again. “Why would he hate me so much? I cannot recall even talking to him once…”
“He’s spoken to me a lot,” Napoleon said. “Kept bucking to be my partner before you got transferred—even kept at it after that. Obviously, he thinks he’s trying to protect me somehow.”
“That explains a lot…” Illya said, weakly.
“We can ponder over that later; right now, we need to figure out what to do if he really is coming here.”
“Of course he is coming here. This would be the first place he would look for me to finish me off…” Illya said, dryly.
“Well, he’d have to get past all of the traps on the front door; I activated those after Janet left.”
“Napoleon, he is Section VIII,” Illya murmured. “That would take him five minutes to get past.”
Napoleon exhaled, realizing that Illya had a point.
“And locking the door of the bedroom would take about thirty seconds to unlock,” he sighed, running a hand through his hair. Napoleon dashed to the window, contemplating the fire escape. “Okay, we’ll have to make a run for it through here. I’ll carry you down the fire escape; if we can make it to a taxi…”
Illya just turned his head away.
“Illya?”
“He can fire through the window,” the Russian mumbled. “He could tranquilize you and then switch to bullets in five more seconds to finish me off. Worst of all, you might get hit with an actual bullet. Napoleon… It is no use. Go and save yourself, and leave me here.”
Napoleon stared at him.
“Do you even realize what you’re saying!?”
“Of course I do,” Illya said, weakly. “But I can only hold out for so long, Napoleon. I am tired and weak, and fighting back can only do so much against someone as hate-driven as Mills. You did not hear his voice when he spoke to me, Napoleon. Mr. Waverly himself couldn’t have stopped him. And though he admires you, you couldn’t talk him out of it. He’s convinced I’ve brainwashed you. It is useless.”
“Illya, I am not leaving you!”
“Napoleon, please…! You put so much effort into keeping me alive—not just now, but during all of our missions. And I appreciate those efforts very much…” Illya winced in pain, but continued. “But not even you can save me all the time…!”
Napoleon stared at him for a single, stunned moment before his look of shock changed to a frown.
“Who says I can’t!?” he demanded. “Destiny? Fate? You don’t believe in either of those anyway, so why start this defeatist attitude now!?”
“Napoleon…!”
“You are going to keep fighting—and that’s a direct order! And I’m going to do whatever I can--”
He was cut off by an angry pounding on the main door of the apartment; he could hear the sounds of the traps being deactivated.
“He’s here…” Illya said. “Napoleon…”
“Okay… Okay; I just need to come up with a plan. Maybe the window idea will still work; even if he can deactivate those traps in five minutes, it’s still a five-minute headstart…”
Illya just weakly moaned and turned away from the window, not taking any comfort in this plan, and Napoleon realized that it was highly unlikely to work—especially since, by the sound of it, it would only take Mills two minutes to get past the traps, rather than five.
Napoleon just stood there, staring at his partner as his mind race, trying desperately to come up with a plan as the time ticked down.
Rating: PG13
Word count: ~2500
Author: Rose of Pollux
If you prefer reading there, cross-posted to ff.net and AO3.
Napoleon was relieved once Illya was in the relative safety of their apartment. He was in bed, with the IV drip beside him (Napoleon had taken that, too, much to the consternation of the cab driver that Janet had hired), and Napoleon made sure that Illya was comfortable and tucked in before returning to the living room, where Janet was waiting.
“How is he?” she asked.
“Sleeping,” Napoleon said, with a sigh. “He needs it, though. How much do I owe you for the cab fare?”
“Oh, don’t bother about that; just let me know when he’s feeling better,” Janet replied, waving him off. “…That girl I spoke to—Mandy… She said that Illya had been attacked by someone on your side. Why?”
“I wish I knew,” Napoleon said, darkly. “If Illya knows, he hasn’t been able to tell me; he hasn’t had the strength. The poison’s done a number on him; he only started getting better since this morning—and the attacker nearly got him again later. I just hope his recovery continues to improve in spite of this setback.”
Janet gave him a sympathetic look.
“And how have you been holding up?”
“Me? Nothing’s happened to me; Illya’s the one who’s been hurt.”
“And so, again, I ask you—how have you been holding up?” she repeated.
Napoleon blinked, and gave her a wan smile.
“Do I look that bad?”
“Well, aside from the fact that you’ve got circles under your eyes that I recognize from a worry-induced all-nighter, I know how close you two are. It’s like those stories you hear about two people being so close that if something happens to one, it affects the other. I saw that with the two of you last time.”
Napoleon exhaled, but nodded.
“Yeah, you’d be right. As for how I’m doing… Well, as good as can be expected, I guess.”
Janet nodded.
“Hang in there—both of you,” she said.
“We’ll try,” Napoleon said. “Look, ah, I don’t mean to be rude, but I really should be with him right now.”
“Oh, of course; I’m outta here,” she said, heading for the door, and paused as she was halfway out. “…You know, he’s really lucky to have you.”
“…I’m lucky to have him.”
“Well, of course it’d go both ways, wouldn’t it?” she said, with an encouraging smile. “Bye.”
Napoleon said his goodbyes and locked up after she had left, and then returned to the bedroom to be by his partner’s side.
“She’s right, you know,” he said, gently brushing Illya’s hair back. “We really are lucky to have each other. …I don’t know where I’d be without you.”
Illya was mumbling in his sleep, and, at first, Napoleon thought his partner had been responding to him. But it was clear from the frightened tone of Illya’s voice that he was responding to something in his fevered dream.
“Nyet…” he squeaked, his voice still very weak. “Nyet…! Miloserdiye…!”
“…Mercy?” Napoleon translated. His heart sunk in his chest. Was Illya dreaming about his attacker?
Illya’s body was trembling, and Napoleon gently took another cold cloth and began to wipe his forehead.
“You’re going to be okay, Illya,” he whispered, encouragingly. “I’m here for you. Can you hear me?”
His partner was still trembling, but it had seemed to reduce at the sound of his voice. Illya’s head even turned slightly to face him.
“N… Napo…?”
“Yeah, that’s right,” Napoleon said. “I’m right here.”
Illya let out a quiet sigh and his expression did relax slightly. And Napoleon continued to talk to him again, taking hope that, slowly but surely, Illya was regaining his strength.
As the hours ticked by, George tried his best not to fidget as he sat in the chair Napoleon had previously occupied. Napoleon always carried himself with confidence, after all.
Well… Almost always. Napoleon hadn’t been very confident at all a little while ago—in fact, it had been rather disconcerting to see. Napoleon was one of those people who if he was acting scared or unconfident, then everyone else had better follow suit.
George now let his shoulders slump, unsure of how to act.
“Something wrong?” Mark asked, quietly. He had the blanket up to his nose, revealing only his eyes and the blond wig that was covering his forehead with its bangs.
“Trying to figure out what Napoleon’s poise would be,” George replied, quietly. “He’s normally always calm and cool about everything, but I didn’t get that from him this time. Unless it was just me… But he really seemed shaken this time.”
“Not just you, Chum. He really is shaken by this,” Mark said. “It’s no secret how close he and Illya are. But I imagine this whole thing is bringing back some really horrible memories for him.”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you remember seven years ago—a few months after Illya had been transferred here as his partner?” Mark said. “Napoleon had gotten distracted and THRUSH had scarpered with Illya—they’d tortured him for three weeks before Napoleon found him again, still chained to a saltire.”
“Ohh…” George said. “I kind of remember hearing about it… I didn’t know either of them that well at the time…”
Mark gave a nod.
“I first worked with Napoleon when he started out here in Section II as a probationary agent, and had been keeping up with him ever since. The first time I ever saw his confidence take such a severe blow was the day he realized that Illya had suffered so much because he had been too distracted to provide him with the backup he had needed. And now, Illya was attacked three times with fatal intent because Napoleon hadn’t been with him to stop it from happening. It must be some horrible sort of déjà vu Napoleon is feeling right now.”
“Well, it’s not his fault; they weren’t on a mission now,” George protested. “No one expected the threat to come from inside U.N.C.L.E.! Medical was where we thought Illya would be safe!”
“I know that, Chum. Trust me; I know. But Napoleon won’t likely see it that way. He usually stays by Illya’s side in Medical; the one time he didn’t, this happened.”
“Well, I can’t pretend that I’d know how you field agents think,” George admitted. “But if one of your partners had that happen, would you have thought the same thing?”
“…Probably,” Mark admitted. He glanced through the glass at April, as if to double-check that she was alright, and then sunk down into the pillow. “Don’t turn around; someone’s talking to the girls outside.”
George exhaled, nervously, but stayed in the same position in the chair.
Outside, Mills, the lab technician, was talking to April and Mandy.
“Kuryakin spends a lot of time in Section VIII,” Mills was saying. “All of us were wondering how he’s doing.”
“He’s stable,” April said. “That’s all we--”
She was cut off by a loud hiss; she and Mandy glanced down at Baba Yaga, who was standing with her back arched and ears flattened back.
“…Know,” April finished, the connection already clicking in her mind.
“We’ll be sure to let everyone know if there’s any--” Mandy began, and she, too, was interrupted by a hiss. “—Change.”
April’s hand was unobtrusively going for her Special, and Mandy kept Mills talking.
“You will pass on my apologies to whoever was running that analysis before George and I showed up to commandeer everything, won’t you?” she asked.
“Yeah, sure,” Mills said. “Oh, that reminds me. Miss Dancer? Mr. Dennell wanted to see you and Miss Stevenson down in the lab right away.”
“George is back in the lab?” Mandy asked, a chill going through her veins as she realized that the blatant lie had given them their guilty party.
“Yeah,” Mills lied. “He’s running Kuryakin’s blood again, and he thinks he might have found an antidote after…” He trailed off and realized that, between the cat singling him out and something he had said, he had just given himself away. He reached for his pocket.
“Mandy, get back!” April ordered.
Mandy did as she was told, both her and Baba Yaga hiding behind a file cabinet as gunfire erupted between April and Mills. Mark sprung from the bed and began to fire, as well.
Mills took one look at Mark in the blond wig and cursed, turning around and bolting down the corridor. Instructing Mandy and George to remain hidden, April and Mark took off in pursuit, instructing Security to seal off the building exit again.
But as they arrived in the tailor shop front, they saw Del Floria staring at the now-sealed door; he turned back to them and indicated the direction of the door.
“You’re looking for Mills? He stormed through here two seconds before the front door sealed!”
“No…!” April fumed. Frustrated, she ordered the door unsealed again, and she and Mark headed outside.
“There he goes!” Mark said, seeing him get into a taxi. “We’ll have to follow him.”
“Yes, but I have a bad feeling that I know exactly where he’s going,” April said, as they darted to a second taxi. She grabbed her communicator as Mark instructed their cab to follow Mills’s. “Open Channel D—get me Napoleon Solo, please.”
Napoleon had continued to diligently look after his sleeping partner and had lost track of time. At last, though, Illya awakened, blinking as he registered the familiar room—and his partner’s face. Illya managed a wan smile, pleased that Napoleon’s efforts to get him here had succeeded.
“Napoleon…” he said, his voice weak.
“Shh. You still need to conserve your strength!” his partner instructed.
“Nyet… Must tell you…”
“You know who attacked you?” Napoleon asked.
“Nyet… Sorry…” Illya said. “But… I know why they did this.”
“Why?”
“To save you.”
“…What!?”
“Evidently, between Club Thanatopsis and now this case… I am trying to kill you… My attacker wishes to kill me… Before I finish the job.” Illya paused to catch his breath. “And you… You will be so pleased… You will reward him for exposing me as a traitor… And you will watch in satisfaction as I die.”
“…They said that? They actually said that!?”
“When they weren’t taunting me for being afraid…” Illya trailed off, seeing a growing rage in Napoleon’s eyes. “Napoleon…”
“Listen to me,” his partner said, gently holding the sides of Illya’s face in his hands so that Illya was looking right at his face. “You just listen to me. You need to tell me everything you can that might identify your attacker.”
“It’s no use,” Illya mumbled. “They had a mask… disguised their voice…” He trailed off. “Wait…”
“You remember something?”
“Baba Yaga… She bit them on the arm…”
Napoleon reached for his communicator, but before he could even call to open the channel, his communicator started ringing.
“Solo here.”
“Napoleon? It’s April. The plan worked halfway; we drew the attacker out of hiding, but he managed to escape the building before we could seal it off. Napoleon, it’s Mills from Section VIII—and I’m pretty sure he’s headed right for your apartment.”
“Mills!?” Napoleon repeated, stunned.
“Mills…?” Illya murmured, trying to recall his own encounters with the man. But he was coming up blank.
“We’ve called for backup to get to your apartment, and Mark and I are heading there, too,” April continued. “But Mills has a bit of a lead—he kept getting the yellow lights, and we had to keep waiting at the red. He’s at least five or ten minutes ahead of us or any backup. You need to get Illya out of there!”
“Okay,” Napoleon said, trying to keep his wits about him. “Okay, I’ll think of something. But I can’t think of anything if I’m sitting here talking.”
He switched off the communicator and glanced around the room.
“Mills…” Illya murmured again. “Why would he hate me so much? I cannot recall even talking to him once…”
“He’s spoken to me a lot,” Napoleon said. “Kept bucking to be my partner before you got transferred—even kept at it after that. Obviously, he thinks he’s trying to protect me somehow.”
“That explains a lot…” Illya said, weakly.
“We can ponder over that later; right now, we need to figure out what to do if he really is coming here.”
“Of course he is coming here. This would be the first place he would look for me to finish me off…” Illya said, dryly.
“Well, he’d have to get past all of the traps on the front door; I activated those after Janet left.”
“Napoleon, he is Section VIII,” Illya murmured. “That would take him five minutes to get past.”
Napoleon exhaled, realizing that Illya had a point.
“And locking the door of the bedroom would take about thirty seconds to unlock,” he sighed, running a hand through his hair. Napoleon dashed to the window, contemplating the fire escape. “Okay, we’ll have to make a run for it through here. I’ll carry you down the fire escape; if we can make it to a taxi…”
Illya just turned his head away.
“Illya?”
“He can fire through the window,” the Russian mumbled. “He could tranquilize you and then switch to bullets in five more seconds to finish me off. Worst of all, you might get hit with an actual bullet. Napoleon… It is no use. Go and save yourself, and leave me here.”
Napoleon stared at him.
“Do you even realize what you’re saying!?”
“Of course I do,” Illya said, weakly. “But I can only hold out for so long, Napoleon. I am tired and weak, and fighting back can only do so much against someone as hate-driven as Mills. You did not hear his voice when he spoke to me, Napoleon. Mr. Waverly himself couldn’t have stopped him. And though he admires you, you couldn’t talk him out of it. He’s convinced I’ve brainwashed you. It is useless.”
“Illya, I am not leaving you!”
“Napoleon, please…! You put so much effort into keeping me alive—not just now, but during all of our missions. And I appreciate those efforts very much…” Illya winced in pain, but continued. “But not even you can save me all the time…!”
Napoleon stared at him for a single, stunned moment before his look of shock changed to a frown.
“Who says I can’t!?” he demanded. “Destiny? Fate? You don’t believe in either of those anyway, so why start this defeatist attitude now!?”
“Napoleon…!”
“You are going to keep fighting—and that’s a direct order! And I’m going to do whatever I can--”
He was cut off by an angry pounding on the main door of the apartment; he could hear the sounds of the traps being deactivated.
“He’s here…” Illya said. “Napoleon…”
“Okay… Okay; I just need to come up with a plan. Maybe the window idea will still work; even if he can deactivate those traps in five minutes, it’s still a five-minute headstart…”
Illya just weakly moaned and turned away from the window, not taking any comfort in this plan, and Napoleon realized that it was highly unlikely to work—especially since, by the sound of it, it would only take Mills two minutes to get past the traps, rather than five.
Napoleon just stood there, staring at his partner as his mind race, trying desperately to come up with a plan as the time ticked down.
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Date: 2017-03-23 11:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-03-25 03:29 am (UTC)And thanks; I am a student of the school of Georges "Hergé" Remi, who always tried to utilize cliffhangers whenever he could!