"Wild Thing" for The Short Affair Challenge 10/7/19

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Challenge: The Short Affair

-Prompt Word 1 - Feral

-Prompt Colour – White

Title:” Wild Thing”

Author: mrua7

Word Count: Approx. 1000

It was a situation with which Napoleon Solo had never dealt before.

Crouched in front of him, hissing and snarling was a curled up ball of filth, its hair matted and full of leaves and bits of twigs.

“Easy there,” he spoke gently. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

He inched closer to it ever so slowly; the last thing he wanted was to get bitten. He had it cornered as its back was to the rear wall of the shed, though having closed the door, Napoleon had cut off its means of escape.

Grabbing a pair of heavy leather work gloves, he tried to grab hold of it, but it started growling and snapping at him. It tried to run past him and as he grabbed it, Solo was bitten in the leg.

Napoleon let out a yelp and released his grip. It retreated back against the wall.

Illya had gone to get some sort of fishing net up at the cabin to use to ensnare the creature but found the net had a rather large hole in it.

Kuryakin called to his partner as he cracked open the door to the shed and quickly slipped inside.

“It just bit me,” Napoleon complained.

“Then we have no recourse but to shoot it,” Illya said, his usual coldness in his voice.

“Illya!”

“Tsk,” the Russian clicked his tongue.”I meant with a sleep dart, do you really think I would shoot such a helpless thing?”

“Not so helpless,” Solo lifted his pant leg, revealing the nasty bite mark on his calf.

“The skin is not broken, you should be fine. Your tetanus shot is up to date, yes?”

“Of course it is.”

“Good.”

There was a sudden move and Illya quickly drew his gun and darted the snarling thing. It dropped to the floor of the shed with a soft thud.

Napoleon retrieved a blanket from the cabin, his family’s cabin in the Catskills. He’d invited Illya to spend the weekend just to get away from it all as they both needed a mental break from the city, UNCLE and their last assignment that had been a difficult one.

Solo carried the precious bundle inside and setting it on the sofa, he and Illya examined it more closely.

“Well it is a boy,” Illya announced.

“Yes, but whose boy?” Napoleon brushed the hair away from the face to see if the child looked familiar. He had very dark skin, long hooked fingernails, matted hair and calluses on his palms, elbows and knees.

Illya retrieved a washcloth from the bathroom and a bowl of warm water and they proceeded to clean the child. A little white face appeared from beneath all that dirt and grime.

“I wonder,” Napoleon said.”Could this be …”

“Who, Napoleon?”

“Years ago a toddler went missing in the woods. His family was camping and made the mistake of not keeping an eye on him. They never found him, there was no ransom note...the boy simply disappeared. It was presumed some sort of animal must have gotten him, though a body was never recovered. His name was Michael ...hmmm?”

Napoleon went to one of the book shelves, retrieving a sort of a scrapbook. It was his father’s. The senior Solo liked to keep newspaper clippings of unusual happenings in the Catskills.

As he opened it, and flipped through the pages, he finally found what he was looking for.

“Michael Kress.” He brought it over for Illya too look at as there was a photograph of the child.

“Could it be him? He asked the Russian.

“Hard to tell. The article says there was a birthmark in the shape of a crescent moon on the child’s left shoulder.”

Solo turned the boy on his side and after wiping the skin clean with the washcloth, there was the birth mark as plain as day.

“There have been a number of cases of feral children back in Soviet Union,” Illya said.” Supposedly these children lived away from human contact from a very young age, and had little or no experience of human care, social behavior or human language. Some raised by dogs, some by wolves, though I never saw any of these children first hand, and believed them to be only tales the old babushkas told.”

The local police were notified. They and a medical team took charge of the child, though once he regained consciousness, he had to be restrained as he was like a wild animal.

Weeks later Napoleon did a follow up; the parents had been located and though they were thankful their son was alive; he just wasn’t the child they remembered. He was more a creature than a little boy.

Michael Kress couldn’t go home with them, not in the condition he was in, instead he was confined to a mental institution. There the doctors would attempt to resocialize the child and educate him.

That was going to be a long road for the boy, one that might never lead him back to his human family.

A month later Solo received a telephone call from the psychiatric hospital; Michael had escaped, been hit by a truck and killed.

Napoleon was filled with guilt and self doubt, wondering if the boy would have been better off being left back in the woods.

Illya saw the sadness in his partner’s eyes and sought to console him.

“We have no way of predicting such outcomes my friend. If the boy had remained feral, things could still have happened to him. He was lucky to have survived as long as he had; the odds were stacked against him either way. What sort of life would he have had in a mental institution? He would have ended up as nothing more than a test subject, like a lab rat.”

Kuryakin was familiar with that sort of existence having been experimented on as a child while in the concentration camp just outside Kyiv. He was lucky to have survived, when so many others had not..

He shook those feelings off, instead concentrating on Napoleon.

Solo looked into the eyes of his friend; their steely blue color had softened and were filled with understanding. "You’re right, tovarisch. If you don’t mind, I’d like to be alone. I think I’ll take a walk.”

“I am here if you wish to talk,”Illya placed a hand on Solo’s shoulder.

“Thanks…”

Comments

[alynwa.livejournal.com]

Wow, imagine finding a child like that. Illya is right, they did the right thing by bringing the boy out, but sometimes things don't go according to plan or have a happy ending. It's good Napoleon has a friend to lean on, if need be.

Very entertaining!

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much! Bet you didn't expect what Napoleon found was a child. I tried to be a bit misleading in the beginning.

[alynwa.livejournal.com]

I didn't, I thought it was going to be a white cat. Good job!

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Thanks! :D

[laurose8.livejournal.com]

A good and original idea, if most sad.

Hope Napoleon doesn't mix inappropriate guilt with grief, which is most right.

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much. I think Napoleon is probably feeling both guilt and grief.

[jantojones.livejournal.com]

A tragic, but brilliant story, and I can really understand Napoleon's sense of guilt. He wasn't to know what would happen, and Illya will help him to see that.

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much. Sometimes stories can't have a happy ending, just like in real life. I'm really glad you liked it. Did you think I was writing about some sort of animal in the beginning? I was trying to be a bit misleading.

[jantojones.livejournal.com]

As an example of how my twisted mind works, I initially thought it was Illya, LOL.

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

No that makes sense. "D

[pfrye.livejournal.com]

Very good

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much!

[gevr.livejournal.com]

a good story, although a sad one.

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much! Just like in real life, not all stories can have a happy ending. At least Napoleon had his partner to see him through his guilt and grief.