section7mfu | Drink To Me! - PicFic 5/17/14 (Reply)

At least they had tied him to a chair he could admire. The Eames Eiffel chair was unusually comfortable in spite of being made of molded plastic, and the clever undercarriage made it very architectural and modern. Well, that was the point, was it not?

As Illya mused about architecture and modern design, his THRUSH captor was ranting in familiar fashion about how he had a formula that would make him like a god, bringing nations to their knees. He was rambling on about something else now, something to do with ...

“Ambrosia, my good man, ambrosia. Mine will be the cure for all that is wrong with the world.” Illya turned finally and looked at Thaddeus Newby, certain that the man must be stark raving mad.

“Are you speaking of the food of the gods?” Newby was impressed, the Russian had some grasp of his designs.

“Yes, yes exactly. Ambrosia... sweet nectar of the gods, and now it is mine. I really shall rule the world because my ambrosia will make me like a god in the sight of all who drink it.” A silent reverie settled over him, something that gave Illya the opportunity to work on the ropes that held his arms and feet. He had a bad feeling about this ambrosia, and anticipated that he was going to be sampling it unless he could free himself.

The chair was so light, it occurred to Kuryakin that he could probably stand up and just ram into the slightly built scientist; if he knocked him over then he would definitely have time to loosen the ropes. As Thaddeus Newby daydreamed, Illya stood and catapulted himself into the unsuspecting man. Both of them tumbled to the floor, but with the chair attached to his person, Illya should have been at a slight disadvantage. As it happened, Thaddeus knocked his head on the brick threshold with such force that it killed him, leaving Illya tied to a chair, straddling a dead man.

“Bozhe moy, some days I wonder why I did not follow my father’s career as a musician.’’ He managed to finally get his hands free and with great effort righted the chair and sat down again. Illya untied the ropes around his ankles, amazed that he had been able to accomplish this escape, until he looked again at Thaddeus Newby, dead and definitely not godlike.

“Very sorry, Thaddeus, I never intended to ... hmmm... sorry.”

And in that moment Illya Kuryakin was sorry that a man was dead. He hadn’t meant to kill him, only to get free of the chair and make an escape. Thaddeus hadn’t done anyone any real harm, at least not yet. And yet there he lay, blood pooling next to his head from the lethal impact of that brick.

Illya found his communicator and gun, then collected the ambrosia that Thaddeus had reckoned would catapult him into divine status. It remained to be seen what the labs would find, whether or not it really had any capacity to control people. Once again the tragedy of what a lust for power could produce made Illya wonder if UNCLE’s mission of protecting the world would ever turn the tide in their favor.

“We will never run out of madmen and megalomaniacs.”

He said it to no one, but he was listening to himself as he lamented the loss of life and the never ending battle to save some.