Stranger Than Fiction for Short Affair Challenge

[glennagirl.livejournal.com]

Prompts: shelf/white
A little bit of Halloween to go with our week of stories...
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The scene reminded Napoleon of his worst nightmares, the ones where he faced death.   Actually those weren’t the worst dreams; the worst of them were the ones where he discovered that his partner was dead.

“How is he doctor?”  What an inane question, like something out of a bad soap opera.

The response was slow in coming, as though the young ER physician was measuring his words very carefully.  That might have been due to the holstered gun Napoleon was wearing; his jacket had been used to staunch the flow of blood threatening to completely vacate Illya’s body.

“Considering ... um... well, I’ve never seen anything quite like this.’ Napoleon hadn’t asked about his prior experience, he just needed to know if Illya would live.  The other man caught a whiff of danger coming off of the impatient agent.

“He will need a few days to recuperate, um... but ... wow.  I think he’s going to be fine.  Say, how did he get that... I mean, you do know what that looks like, right?”

Napoleon wanted to punch his lights out.  Not being close to Headquarters was sometimes a real disadvantage when medical help was necessary.

Illya was white as the sheets on the gurney where he lay.  The bandage on his neck a grim reminder of how he had looked when Napoleon discovered him, stashed onto a shelf like something put away for the season.  The blood had been terrifying to see as it flowed from the wound on his neck.

The doctor was still talking and stuttering like a scared school boy in front of the class for the first time.  How to explain this to someone outside of UNCLE?  Now that he considered it, Napoleon wondered how to explain inside of UNCLE, to Mr. Waverly.

“You know doctor, sometimes people do strange things to other people.  In our line of work...’’ Napoleon had flashed his UNCLE I.D. as he yelled at the staff to hurry up and do something, to save his partner from bleeding to death.

“I’m not sure I get the connection, Mr...?”

“Solo.  Napoleon Solo.”  This would be an evening the ER staff would be talking about for a long time.

“Oh, sure... OK.  Well, that looks like someone took a bite out of his neck, and the only thing it makes me think of is ... ‘  He raised an eyebrow as though it would be somehow intimidating to the dark haired man who faced him.  Napoleon smiled, cool and calculating and suddenly scary as hell to the doctor.  He didn’t really need to know anything else except that he had saved a man’s life.

“Sometimes it’s better to not know all of the details doc, trust me on that.”

Sitting at the Russian's bedside later that evening, Napoleon had to admit that he didn’t know what had happened to his friend.  Illya was on surveilling a suspected THRUSH location, and had called to say he was going inside the building to investigate something he had seen.  He didn’t wait for back up but instead ...

“Damn it Illya, why didn’t you wait for me to get there?”

“I thought it would be fine...” Groggy but still with excellent hearing.

“Hey, what... They said you’d be out for hours.”  Illya brought his hand up to his throat, grimacing at the bandage and the memory of what had happened.

“I heard your voice, thought perhaps I should answer you.”  There was a little more color in the Russian’s face, but not enough to call it a healthy glow.

“You ought to sleep, you look like hell.”  Napoleon wanted to know what had happened, but his partner needed to rest.

“I didn’t see her coming towards me, it was ... Did you catch her?”  That caught Napoleon off guard.

“It was a woman?  How did she get you up on that shelf?  Illya, did she actually...?”

“Bite me? Yes, but she sprayed something in my face first.  It completely paralyzed me and then she ...”  He shuddered involuntarily at the memory.  It had been horrifying, something out of a bad movie.

“Illya?  I can’t believe I’m even asking this but... was she...?”  He couldn’t say it.

“A vampire?”  In spite of the pain of the encounter, something about seeing his friend squeemishly back away from the subject made Kuryakin smile.

“Don’t laugh, you nearly died and it’s due to a bite on your neck from a woman... Quit smiling, you’re making me nervous.”

Illya thought about thickening his accent to further distress Napoleon but decided against it.  He was tired, and his neck was throbbing.

“No, she was not a vampire.  Whatever she sprayed in my face was potent, however, and we need to locate her and it before she strikes again.”  Napoleon nodded his agreement, his eyes still on Illya.

“So, not a vampire... that’s good news.”

“You don’t seem convinced.  Napoleon, honestly?  You think something like vampires actually exist?”  Solo sighed at the obvious flaw in that.

“I think that THRUSH engages people who believe themselves to be something other than what they actually are.  You do remember Count Zark?”  Illya shuddered again at the memory of the bats.

“I see your point.  What do you propose we do about it then?”  Neither man liked the obvious next step.

“You are her victim, I suppose she’ll be looking for you.”

Illya laid his head back on the pillow, suddenly looking as white as he had in the ER.  The noises of a busy hospital in the background were nothing compared to the roar in his head.  Napoleon saw the fatigue before he realized a widening spot of red on the bandage around Illya's neck and then a scarlet drizzle that was growing.

“You’re bleeding... Illya, you’re...”  Napoleon ran to the door to hail down a nurse or a doctor...

“He’s bleeding, Someone get in here, he’s bleeding!” 

Profusely, Illya’s neck was spewing blood to the rhythm of his heartbeat.

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Who wants to write the next chapter?

Comments

[glennagirl.livejournal.com]

Carry on then :D This seemed like a good vehicle for more than one writer.

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Well you did set it up just right of course. "D