Chapter Text
IV.
Sometimes, Illya all but despairs of ever making headway on the farce that has become his carefully sanitised life under the auspices of UNCLE. Though he may grumble more than some, at the end of the day he's as whipped as any other man on the New York office's staff, most of whom could go months at a time without giving the subject of the quota a second thought. There is probably no indignity or inconvenience so great that sufficient exposure cannot eventually render it mundane, and Illya knows better than most how readily that happens. As long as the constants in his life include the right to go home at night with the quiet glow of satisfaction that comes with knowing that the world is that little bit safer for his day's work, Illya can live with the constant scrutiny of his barely-existent dating life—with the absurd mandates on his behaviour imposed by the section above, and even with Napoleon's ongoing crusade to redefine the rate at which the average American women achieves more than one orgasm per night. If he can learn to live with the regularity of rope burn and being used as a test subject for experimental pharmaceuticals, what's one more inconvenience? It all becomes, in its way, routine.
If he finds himself worrying that they themselves are starting to become predictable, it's nothing on the predictability with which THRUSH seems to go on and on hitting the same beats in their interchangeable efforts to dominate this or that part of the world. It's hardly Waverly's fault if even the forces of evil have begun to bore him.
So it's not without a sort of comfortable familiarity bordering on déjà vu that Illya finds himself accompanying Napoleon to yet another bourgeois society party, where an innocent woman from California by the name of Miss Janine Garrett (PhD pending) who is even now attempting to reconnect with an old boyfriend-who-(she insists)-was-never-really-a-boyfriend, in a choreographed effort to gauge whether his new friends have sinister things in store for the world. He and Napoleon will be almost certainly recognised if there is any serious THRUSH presence at the party, but that's largely the point—when Napoleon goes up to 'introduce' himself to Janine later, her old friend's reaction should be very telling indeed.
On meeting her a few days prior, Illya had found her open, talkative and unpretentious, if perhaps a little too convinced that any reasonable person would find the latest developments in information theory as infinitely fascinating as she did. Although Janine has apparently spent most of her last year shut in a lab in Berkley, she'd needed no assistance acquiring herself an invitation to the opening gala for the new Humbolt Institute once Napoleon and Illya had impressed upon her the value of going, and has cleaned herself up for the night's festivities like an old hand.
"It'll be something to tell Mother about, next time she talks me into taking a trip back home. Probably the only thing I've done since the start of the year she'll want to know about at all," she says, with the tired resignation of a woman who comes from old money, and has spent most of her post-graduate life doing all she can to get away from it.
Napoleon seems quite able to relate, so Illya's a little surprised he's been taking such a hands-off role with Janine on this job. Perhaps he feels she doesn't need much coaching. Indeed, by the time Napoleon makes his entrance at the party at all, fashionably late, Janine has been busily catching-up with her old friend for at least three-quarters of an hour. If she's any less comfortable than she appears on the surface, even Illya must profess himself fooled.
As his cover involves posing as a waiter, Illya has spent the evening navigating the throng with a well-laden tray, enjoying both relative invisibility and the ready made excuse to approach their newest arrivals with the offering of champagne.
"Seems to be going well," Napoleon comments, having taken no time at all to zero in on where Miss Garrett is ingratiating herself to one of THRUSH's newer hirelings. "Have I missed any highlights?"
"None yet, but the night is young." Over Napoleon's shoulder, Illya sees a man in a crooked bow tie and horn-rimmed glasses stop short at the sight of the party's newest arrival. "Don't look now, but I think you've been recognised."
Napoleon smiles. "One does go to these things to be seen, no?"
"I'll keep an eye on him. You should probably start looking out for your opening with Janine."
Napoleon shrugs. "As you say, the night is young." Napoleon sips his champagne and looks at him with an expression Illya can't immediately decipher. "You know, you could be the one to approach her."
Illya blinks at him. "Why? You're the one she's expecting."
"But she's not supposed to know me either of us. It couldn't hurt to make her confusion a little more genuine." "Napoleon Solo, reluctant to approach a woman? I never thought I'd live to see the day."
Napoleon shrugs, sheepish. "I just thought she seemed more your type than mine. I wouldn't want to get in your way." Illya looks at him in disbelief. "You know," Napoleon adds, waving a hand, "similar interests, similar frustrations, neither of you technically have PhD's..."
"Really, Napoleon? We're using that tired joke to set me up with women now?"
"It's still right there in your transfer file," Napoleon winks at him, for all that he should have realised by now how very much he's barking up the wrong tree. "She's not to know it's not genuine if you think it might help give you an in. Just pick a suitably esoteric field, and..."
"It was part of my undercover identity one time, Napoleon! How it made it into that file at all I have no idea." In all honesty, Illya could at least guess—the rest of his education history in that job had been true, and probably the most up-to-date copy the British UNCLE office had on hand—but Illya is far too busy seething to care about minor over-generalisations when the very idea that he could have ever found the time to finish a PhD in between his undergraduate years, naval service, and near on ten years as a professional agent is so patently ridiculous. When even one's boss has taken to making completely deadpan references to the same—in the presence of civilians, no less—it must surely be time to let the joke die. "Besides, I think by now you and I must have run through just about every esoteric field in circulation."
"What about Musical Theory?" says Napoleon, looking for all the world like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. "You could pull that one off, no trouble."
Illya gives him a look. "Thankyou, but no. I do not know whether to be touched or insulted that you think I need the assistance, if I wanted to approach Janine at all, which I don't."
"I wouldn't go so far as to say you needed it," Napoleon offers, finally somewhat apologetic. "Alright, alright. I'll approach Janine."
"We're here to assess her friend's position with THRUSH, not his reaction to competition," Illya reminds him. Napoleon just grins.
While Napoleon stops Janine on her way back from the bathroom several minutes later, Illya takes the opportunity for a closer look at the man in the crooked bow tie, who now appears to be hiding behind the canapés. If he's recognised Napoleon, he doesn't seem to have brought the fact to anyone else's notice while Illya's been watching his behaviour, and he doesn't pay Illya any attention as he approaches. Helpfully, he does empty his glass in the same period, granting Illya the perfect excuse to sidle up behind him, tray at the ready. "Another glass?"
The man in the crooked tie jumps half an inch in the air, but recovers too quickly on recognising Illya as a waiter to have recognised him as anything else. "Oh, yes, thankyou," he mutters, distracted, taking a new glass and bringing it to his lips for a sizable gulp. He sneaks another sidelong look at the corner of the room, where Napoleon is busy 'introducing' himself to Janine, and shivers, then drains his glass in a hurry and reaches for another.
"Are you alright, sir?" asks Illya, fascinated, but none the wiser.
"What? Oh, yes, yes," says the man in the crooked tie. "Oh, look at me, hiding behind the hors d'ourves like I've seen a ghost." This comes out with considerable disgust. "If my wife was here to see me..." He breaks off into a short burst of hysterical giggling, and faintly attempts to wring his hands, leading to the spillage of a certain amount of his drink. "What am I supposed to say if he sees me?"
"Someone you used to know?" Though Illya is increasingly convinced this man is no more THRUSH than he or Napoleon, the exchange is ringing warning bells in his head. He doesn't need to be an enemy agent to have been party to some occasion when Napoleon might have found it necessary to fake his own death in the past, and if there's any risk of him causing a scene, it would be best headed off at the pass.
"Knew, oh, if that isn't even the half of it!" squeaks the man in the crooked tie. "Not that we thought he was dead, not as a matter of any certainty, but when a man disappears like that, so suddenly... and especially after a night like that..." Another short, high-pitched giggle escapes the man's lips, while Illya's previous train of thought comes grinding to a halt.
"A night like...?" he echoes. Surely he must have misunderstood.
"A regular whirlwind weekend of romance," the man sighs. "Oh, why did I ever let him talk me into taking him home? Oh, who do I think I'm fooling, it isn't every day a man like that looks twice at a poor fool like me, and the mouth on him..." The man in the crooked tie blinks blearily at Illya. Only with some difficulty does he seem to find his way back to the present, his face slowly shifting into a look of dawning horror. "My god, why did I say that? I've never told anyone that before! Please say you won't tell anyone! I don't know what I'd do if this got out."
Illya looks down at the remaining contents of his serving tray with a look of dawning horror all his own.
Camouflaged among the stalks of a vase of lilies near Napoleon's table, Illya spots a carefully placed listening device of a familiar make. Peeling it gently off the side of a flower, he drops it into the water below, where it fizzes and sparks rewardingly before falling silent with the faintest of pops.
"I'd be careful what you say," he warns Napoleon, arriving at his side with a fresh glass of champagne. "The room has been bugged. Probably from several places." Illya drops the newly-deactivated bug onto the table as evidence, still damp from when he'd fished out back out of the vase. "We should be safe enough here, but there may be more around."
Napoleon raises his eyebrows and reaches for the glass. "Just when I was starting to think this was a boring party. Any theories on what they might be hoping to hear?"
"Not yet, though our avian friends seem to have stacked the deck in their favour," Illya tells him "I would go easy on the drinks—I believe they may have been drugged with some sort of truth agent."
Caught with the drink midway to his mouth, Napoleon is professional enough to curb his reaction to one sharp look in Illya's direction. Rather than abort the motion, he delicately brings the glass to his nose, which he wrinkles before returning the drink to the table. "Terrible thing to do to good champagne. Do I take it you've been hearing more than your share of indiscrete conversation around the room tonight?"
"One of the guests had started early. You may remember him, in fact—he certainly remembered you." Illya lifts his chin towards where he'd left the unfortunate man in the crooked tie sitting down with a large glass of water, while Illya made a quick detour to convince one of the regular staff to organise him a cab home. He's not looking their way, fortunately—the last thing that poor man needs to see is the waiter he'd poured out his heart to talking to the very man who'd triggered his near-nervous breakdown. Illya's partner is, of course, still professional as ever, so the moment he recognises his old acquaintance manifests only in the sight of Napoleon going suddenly very still.
"Ah," he says, indistinctly.
"His wallet lists him as a Terrence Unwin, a personal secretary to an investor in this event by the name of Maurice Pike," Illya supplies.
"It would, yes," says Napoleon, who still sounds somewhat distracted. "How much did he say about...?"
"He seems to have been distressed at your sudden departure from his acquaintance, but you may be pleased to know he remembers you quite... favourably."
"Well, it was one of those operations, you know," says Napoleon, vaguely, "we were on completely the wrong track where we were, and by the time we realised... well, I was reassigned so fast there wasn't much time for proper farewells. I did feel rather bad about it after the fact, but by then there was nothing to be done."
"And Mr. Unwin?"
Napoleon gives him a sideways look. "How well did you say he remembered me?"
"Something relating to your mouth came up specifically."
Napoleon shifts his weight in the self-conscious sort of way that he really ought to have trained himself out of years ago. "I suppose I did... talk rather a lot."
"I can believe you did," says Illya, now watching Napoleon's body language with some fascination. "But perhaps you could explain to me exactly how it was you came to seduce the innocent Mr. Unwin?"
Napoleon goes very, very still, and for some long seconds, Illya gets no reply at all.
"Well," says Napoleon at last, with a slight cough, "we were working under the understanding he and Pike might be connected with a, ah, a rather sinister network of well-connected homosexual gentlemen of considerable means—a sort of old-boys club scattered along the western seaboard."
"A sinister homosexual network?" Illya repeats.
"You know the sort—it wouldn't be the first time a few members of the upper-crust with unorthodox sexual tastes formed themselves a support network of like-minded individuals. And you know how governments get nervous about that sort of thing—traditions of secrecy, circulating distrust in the establishment, everyone with blackmail material on everyone else—the potential to turn that sort of thing to criminal enterprises is obvious. We had reason to believe they might even be involved in an international trafficking operation. We needed an in."
Nothing like a good sinister homosexual conspiracy to get national security concerns all fired up. "And you thought Mr. Unwin might be a member? Tell me, how did that work out for you?" Somewhere at the very back of Illya's mind is the awareness that he's being terribly, terribly cruel to Napoleon, but any thought of taking pity on him is a thousand miles away. Illya has waited for this moment far too long.
"Well, to make a long story relatively short," says Napoleon, looking uncomfortable, and still very definitely not looking at Illya, "he wasn't."
"I'm sure he'd be very comforted to know that." On the other side of the room, Mr. Unwin is now being led to the door by the arm, happily oblivious to the intense discussion of his history and preferences going on mere yards away. "Tell me, was he married then, or is that a more recent development?"
"Married?" The look Napoleon throws at Illya has a sharpness that plainly implies he suspects he's being messed with.
"He mentioned some concern over what his wife might think of the matter," Illya tells him, with nothing but perfect honesty.
Napoleon looks sharply back at Unwin's retreating back. "Terry, married? I wonder how that came about. It doesn't sound like much of a recipe for marital bliss."
"Who are we to say? You admit your acquaintance was short."
"Illya," says Napoleon, "believe me when I tell you no part of my acquaintance with Terry Unwin—no matter how long or short it may have been—left me in any doubt which way his preferences lie."
"You might be surprised to learn how many people prove to have some flexibility to their preferences, when the right situation presents itself," says Illya, with no small personal satisfaction. "Say, for example, when their own employers send him out with orders to seduce another man."
Napoleon gives a short, defeated sigh. "Well, obviously, it's not the sort of operation you'd see passing muster nowadays, but the rules have changed since then."
"It must have been quite the trial, for such a resolutely heterosexual man as yourself."
Napoleon shrugs, and gives Illya one of those cocky smiles that don't quite seem to reach his eyes. "Well, it's not as though I don't have some idea of what a man likes in bed, you know. Not so hard to bluff your way through."
Illya can feel his eyebrows winching skywards; even now, is Napoleon really trying to pretend he's as straight as he's always pretended? "Your willingness to sublimate your natural inclinations in the name of the job is laudable indeed," he tells Napoleon, in a voice roughly as dry as his own recent sex life.
"Well, I wouldn't say it's the worst thing I've done in the name of the job." Napoleon raises his glass to Illya in a jaunty toast, and is about to take a sip before apparently thinking better of it.
Illya narrows his eyes. Napoleon, for all his skill as a spy, is still fundamentally one of nature's method actors, and his range has always been limited. Those characters he plays best in the field are always those who are, at heart, still functionally Napoleon Solo. That he of all people could manage to lie back and think of world peace in bed with a man—let alone a man who has evidently come out of the encounter so obviously impressed—is all but unthinkable.
"Look, Illya," says Napoleon, who can hardly have missed Illya's skepticism, "at the risk of ruining your moment, do you think we could pick up this conversation again sometime we're not supposed to be working?"
Napoleon's gaze leads Illya's to where Janine's old boyfriend and his companions are standing across the room, in what appears to be rapidly heating discussion. A convenient diversion, maybe, but Napoleon does have a point.
"Alright," says Illya, "but don't think we won't be returning to it once this affair is done with."
"Perish the thought," says Napoleon, pushing to his feet.
He leaves his drink on the table.
Forty-eight hours, one gunfight, two kidnappings, a great number of hasty explanations, one brief but unpleasant stay in manacles, fourteen arrests, and one very satisfying explosion later, Illya finds himself back in his hotel room with Napoleon, sharing a bottle of unadulterated champagne and the knowledge of a job well done. In addition to the dismantling of a significant satrapy, a very recent THRUSH code book is already on its way back to New York headquarters in the hands of a special courier, along with two almost-still-working specimens of THRUSH's latest model listening devices for the lab boys to have a play with, which THRUSH had thoughtfully left for them to find in their own hotel room.
Illya and Napoleon themselves are not expected back until late the following afternoon, granting them a comfortable evening and a slow morning in which to relax before catching their flight. Somewhere in the excitement Napoleon would seem to have missed any chance he might have had with Miss Garrett, who is presently out somewhere reconnecting with her old-friend-who-may-very-soon-become-a-boyfriend (and who had been legitimately horrified by the revelation of what his new employers really wanted to do with his research)—but then, Napoleon had never seemed much invested in that one to begin with. Despite a few minor cuts and bruises and one ruined suit, the only real injury either of them can boast in the wake of this affair was the incidental damage done to Napoleon's pride. Were more of their affairs tied up so neatly, Illya would be a happy man.
So comfortable is the atmosphere, as Napoleon shares some trivial anecdote from his own university days, that Illya finds himself unexpectedly reluctant to drag the conversation back to the subject of Napoleon's past liaison with the unwitting Terry Unwin. He finds his thoughts drifting instead to that of another evening, now long years past, when he and Napoleon had shared a bottle of very similar vintage in celebration of a successful affair, back when their partnership was still new. Illya recalls the impulse that had struck him then—to reel Napoleon in by his tie and see what might happen; the conviction that had followed that there would be plenty of time later to make his own assessment of how the advance might be received. Illya would like to think he's a wiser man now than he was then, nevermind how many years the proof of Napoleon's true sexual flexibility has eluded him.
He looks over at Napoleon, lounging comfortably in the corner of the couch, his glass (empty but for the dregs) hanging loosely from his fingers, relaxed and easy in the half light of the hotel lamp, flushed with success and half a bottle of bubbly, and thinks to himself, well, why not?
Napoleon has shed his suit jacket, tie and shoes earlier in the evening, reclining on the couch now in his shirt and his socks. He watches Illya with a faint curiosity as he puts down his glass without making motion to refill it, then leans over without a word to fish Napoleon's own out of his fingers and return it to the table alongside the other. Napoleon still doesn't seem to have quite made up his mind what his partner is doing until Illya aligns his body with Napoleon's and brings their lips together. His only protest is the gentlest of sighs as Illya begins to kiss him, and with a few moments of encouragement, begins to kiss back slowly, his hand coming to rest at the small of Illya's back, and for a while Illya almost believes he could be content to do this forever.
When Illya begins on the buttons of Napoleon's shirt, the spell breaks, however briefly, as Napoleon draws carefully back from Illya's lips. While Illya takes this as his excuse to begin to work his way down Napoleon's neck, he hears Napoleon murmur, "This probably isn't a good idea, you know."
"Isn't it?" With one hand lightly exploring the dusting of hair over Napoleon's chest, his lips fixed beneath Napoleon's jaw, Napoleon's hand still curled at the small of his back, Illya feels very little obligation to play fair. "Perhaps you are right," he says, and pulls smoothly away, resting back on his heels. Napoleon watches him with a look of mild and suspicious confusion, which does not recede as Illya gets to his feet, pulling Napoleon with him.
"This would be much more comfortable in bed," he tells Napoleon's faintly flummoxed expression, then leads him the short distance through their hotel room and presses him down into the sheets of one of the hotel beds with hardly a whisper of resistance.
That one, half-hearted protest remains the single longest string of words Illya hears from him for the rest of the night, which passes with only the commentary of a series of soft sighs and deliciously satisfying moans from Napoleon's lips—interspersed by Illya's own name, whispered like a forbidden sacrament, banishing with it any doubt that Napoleon is less than fully aware of precisely who is making love to him. His hands on Illya's body fall both certain and uncertain, speaking of long experience made new again by the circumstances of company; Napoleon clutches at him as though he might evaporate if not held tightly, while Illya wonders silently that he could ever have doubted his welcome in this wonderful, ridiculous man's arms
Years of long practice at waking under strange and threatening circumstances have instilled in Illya the habit of separating dream from recollection and orienting himself upon waking before opening his eyes. There is light filtering in around the thin hotel curtains, a taste in his mouth suggestive of somewhat more than a long evening's careless drinking, and a tilt to the mattress underneath him that speaks to the weight of a second body, not far displaced from his own.
The deep warmth and satisfaction that spreads through his body on recalling just how he'd fallen asleep the night before would likely have shocked him with his own sentimentality, were Illya even a little more awake, but on the edge of sleep this seems a moment to be savoured at length.
"You're looking very smug for this hour of the morning," Napoleon mutters, from the other side of the bed, having evidently woken already.
Illya opens his eyes on his partner, and decides he has not the least inclination to pretend otherwise. "You cannot imagine why?" he teases, rolling to face Napoleon properly with his head propped upon an arm. "I did have a most satisfying evening."
Napoleon's eyes flicker to where the bed sheet falls to reveal the upper part of Illya chest, then back up again. "Did you now?" he says, and for once in his life, there's nothing in his tone to suggest he's fishing for a compliment. In the light of morning he appears wary and sober, which is perhaps not wholly unfair.
"I did indeed," says Illya, who will be fair later, when it suits him. "You see, I had opportunity to confirm a long-held theory about a good friend of mine."
"Which is?"
"That you, Napoleon, have never been so exclusive in your attraction to the opposite sex as would have your colleagues believe."
"Ah," says Napoleon. "Well. That's a little unfair of you, don't you think? It's not as though you'd ever admitted as much to me before last night, or not in so many words."
Illya raises an eyebrow. "Napoleon, if you have known me this long and never realised that my preference is very much for men, I'll have to think you a very poor spy."
Napoleon seems momentarily at a loss for an answer. "Well. In my defence, around the time you and I met, I was... noticing that around the office more than usual, and in most cases it seemed diplomatic not to notice, if you take my meaning. By the time we were better acquainted, I suppose the habit was ingrained."
"As was your habit of compensating for your attraction to men by exaggerating that for women past the bounds of all proportion?"
Napoleon gives a wry smile. "I do like women, Illya. The fact I'm not so... discriminating about my partners as some doesn't change that. Conforming to Section I's rules has never been a trial for me. Besides, I am Number 1 of Section II—I have an example to set."
"Ironic, considering that UNCLE itself is apparently quite aware of your proclivities."
"Well, as someone just reminded me, they are spies. There are personal secrets on the files about each and every one of us," says Napoleon, reasonably, but by the time his eyes have flicked to Illya and away again, some of that confidence seems to have deserted him. "What was it that gave me away? Besides events of this week, I mean."
"Other than my finely-tuned instincts?" Illya allows a warm smile to spread across his lips. "You have been flirting with me very nearly since the day we met."
The blank look Napoleon gives him is almost comical. "I have not. Have I?"
Illya raises his eyebrows.
"Well. Perhaps a little," Napoleon allows. "You never seemed to mind."
"Mind? No. But you are quite the expert in the art of mixed messages, my friend. You must realise you could have come to me at any time in our long acquaintance, and I would not have turned you down."
Napoleon shifts, uneasy. "I suppose if I'd given the matter any serious thought, I would have."
Illya lifts his head slightly. "Then why didn't you? You didn't reach your rank of chief of enforcement simply by blindly following the rules to the letter."
The question seems to catch Napoleon slightly unawares. "Well," he says, with that very particular intonation that suggests a narrowly controlled stutter, "I have always found, as a rule, that it's wiser to keep some space between my professional relationships and personal ones."
Illya frowns; Napoleon's answer makes no sense. He could count on his fingers the number of women Napoleon has seen in the last year who he'd met in any non- professional setting. Whether innocents recruited in the course of their work, femme fatales encouraged to believe he's taken the bait, or simply UNCLE secretarial staff invited out from the office foyer, Napoleon has never bothered to maintain any division between his professional and love lives; he'd hardly have the time for the both of them otherwise. Unless... "Is that your way of saying you don't trust that you could sleep with me without falling in love with me?"
"Ah," says Napoleon, caught. "Well. That's... I don't know that that's the best way to put it..."
"Isn't it?"
Napoleon stares at him for several seconds, expression unreadable, then sighs, long and deep. "Look, Illya, I know I probably had this coming—I'm not even going to try to pretend I didn't enjoy what we did last night, but you must realise this can't continue between us."
The possibility that in needling Napoleon so mercilessly he's pushed too far too fast settles on Illya like an icy cobweb. "No, I don't see that I must realise any such thing."
"The rules exist for a reason." Napoleon is once again studiously not looking at him. "How long do you think we'd be able to keep this secret, realistically? We may be professionals, but so is everyone watching us. Sooner or later we'd get careless, and either UNCLE or THRUSH would catch us at it, and I don't know which would be the greater disaster for our careers. What we do is too important to take those kinds of chances."
Illya gapes at him. He knows Napoleon far too well to argue with him when he uses that tone of voice—he has only to wait, and the world will prove the error of his judgement more emphatically than Illya could ever hope to—but the cowardice of Napoleon's logic is almost more than can be borne. "So you're saying that for the good of world peace, we must deny ourselves?"
Napoleon rolls over and makes to get out of bed. "Don't make this harder than it needs to be, Illya, please."
Illya stares at his back, stunned by the breadth of Napoleon's denial. If he thinks either of them would be able to get this particular genie back in its bottle now, he's more fool than Illya ever dreamed. He can't begin to imagine Napoleon lasting so much as a week.
Napoleon, in fact, lasts somewhat less than an hour. How much less will be lost to the ages—there's no clock in the bathroom, and Illya certainly doesn't stop to look for one as Napoleon closes the door behind the hotel maid who'd brought up their breakfast tray, and turns back to the room. Specifically, he turns back to lay his eyes on Illya, newly emerged from the bathroom and still damp and flushed from the shower, wearing nothing but a single towel slung low around his hips. Illya is entirely guilty of lounging in the doorway (after he catches the pole-axed look on Napoleon's face, if not before) and raising an eyebrow as he sees his partner swallow.
The next thing Illya knows, he's being pushed backwards and all but tackled onto the bed, where Napoleon proceeds to spend what's left of their hour furiously taking him apart with his mouth and hands, until there's nothing left of Illya but a writhing mass of need, able to communicate only in moans and barely articulate fragments of Napoleon's name. He comes with his hands clenched so tight around Napoleon's arms that he knows he's left bruises.
If Napoleon imagines for a moment that Illya is going to give him up now he's finally tasted this, he's a fool without equal.
Breakfast is well and truly cold by the time they get to it, and Illya very much in need of another shower, but he doesn't care one whit.
"Perhaps," Napoleon says, picking at his toast, "there's a case to be made that this... thing between us serves a greater purpose than I'd considered."
"Oh?" Illya is very nearly finished with his own generous continental—not nearly so appetising as it would have been fresh, though he's more than prepared to draw out the meal if Napoleon has something to say.
"Obviously, I've missed the freedom to sleep with the occasional man more than I'd recognised," Napoleon reasons. "And as long as that temptation is there, obviously it's far safer for me to get it out of my system with you, than anyone I couldn't trust to be so discreet."
Illya swallows a mouthful of eggs and keeps his eyebrows under strict control. "That would seem a very reasonable way to look at the situation."
"For which matter," Napoleon goes on, "it's hardly fair of UNCLE to expect you to have kept your natural proclivities under wraps for so long, without outlet. And it's certainly safer for you to explore those proclivities with your partner, rather than risk temptation to explore less secure avenues."
"How altruistic of you," Illya mutters. It almost doesn't matter how shamefully Napoleon is deluding himself. They've been up barely an hour or two, and already he's bargained their continuing liaison all the way to being permissible as an occasional luxury. Why waste effort arguing the point when he can simply wait, and let Napoleon do the work for him?
And there the matter lies, and could quite comfortably have lain without further re-examination for some time—excepting only one final development to arise as they pack their bags and prepare to check out of the hotel. It's only as the two of them do the obligatory last sweep for possessions accidentally left in odd corners that they make the discovery of a well-hidden THRUSH camera, secreted behind the bedroom mirror.
The return flight to New York is a sober affair. Illya is not yet ready to regret his actions over the past twelve hours, but has had to concede that he may yet find the need to, depending on how the news of their indiscretion is received.
"It's possible that with the nearest satrapy dismantled, there may be no-one still monitoring the camera feed," he suggests to Napoleon, somewhere in the second or third hour of the flight.
"It's possible," Napoleon agrees. It's the most he's said to Illya in hours.
"But we must still report the incident officially," Illya sighs, voicing what they're both thinking. "And the precise nature of the scenes the camera may have captured with it."
"Of course."
The knowledge that Napoleon doesn't blame him for this is no balm. "How serious do you think we can expect disciplinary action to be?"
Napoleon stares past him, out the window. "Well, the wonder of unwritten rules is that they tend to lack defined disciplinary procedures. But I think I can say that the possibility of dismissal for non-compliance is at least implied."
"They wouldn't dismiss us, surely. We may be technically expendable, but this is hardly a life-threatening matter. We're two of the best agents they have!"
"No," Napoleon agrees, "but they might consider... reassigning us, at least on a temporary basis."
They might consider separating us. Illya stares out the window and wonders what he'll do if his punishment is to be separated from Napoleon. Quit, in protest? Convince Napoleon to quit as well, to elope, even? The notion tastes scarcely better than the idea of having to take a new partner; leaving UNCLE over such a petty, personal issue is unthinkable.
Napoleon's hand when it falls to cover his own on the arm rest between them is a shock to Illya's system. He turns to meet Napoleon's eyes, and finds no reassurance there, only commiseration. Even the threat of separation is a fate they will, in their way, suffer together.
Illya turns his hand under Napoleon's and laces their fingers together. He squeezes once, in silent gratitude, and then lets go. It may be too late to worry about discretion now, but things can always get worse. This may be the time to show the universe he's learnt his lesson.
Illya has faced enough difficult missions in his time that he's able to face the door to their boss's office without flinching. Inside waits Mr. Waverly, the sight of whose characteristically severe features does nothing for Illya's confidence that he and Napoleon will be able talk their way out of this one.
"Ah, Mr.Solo, Mr.Kuryakin." Oblivious to Illya's raging internal state, Waverly greets them as casually as he might after any other mission. "I trust you had an uneventful flight?"
Illya exchanges a glance with Napoleon as they find their chairs. "Excruciatingly so, sir."
"I really must congratulate you gentleman on the outcome of your recent endeavour." Waverly taps out his pipe into his ash tray as he speaks, then reaches for a file in front of him. "You'll be pleased to know the code book you retrieved has arrived safely. With its help, we've already intercepted and decoded few very interesting THRUSH communications. There are two in particular that I'd like to bring to your attention before we get down to other business."
Out of the corner of his eye, Illya catches Napoleon sneaking a look his way. This is not at all how debriefings usually begin. Then again, if Waverly is so taken with the outcome of their latest mission as all this, it certainly wouldn't hurt to have it at the front of his mind before his two top agents admit their bad news.
"It seems," Waverly continues, "that some ambitious THRUSH surveillance expert had only this last week turned in a distressingly detailed summary of the romantic histories of all known agents in our New York staff. Did you know Agent Cantrell was homosexually inclined, Mr. Solo?"
The look on Napoleon's face strongly suggests that even if he had known, this would not have significantly tempered the surprise of being reminded of it, in these of all circumstances. "Ah... he is, sir?"
"No, and I'd imagine no-one else at the office did either. The details of the very few such liaisons in his personal history file are buried very deeply indeed. And yet it would appear that THRUSH has managed to uncover evidence of at least one such incident, and—reading between the lines of their own report—possibly several more we at UNCLE were unaware of. He's not the only high-ranking agent named here either, not by any means."
Waverly does not look at Illya as he says this. He does not direct so much as a flicker of a glance Illya's way, significant or otherwise. But in that moment, Illya knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he's one of the agents named in that report. There's more than enough in his history for anyone who might go looking for it.
Maybe Napoleon's in there too.
"What this enterprising young THRUSH has flagged as particularly notable," says Waverly, "is that almost none of the agents listed here have had a single homosexual encounter anywhere in their extensive surveillance records since '62. The nearest thing they're able to cite is a very short list of incidents where the agent in question had gone to such extremes of caution in arranging the event that THRUSH were forced to rely on inference to determine the assignation had actually occurred at all. The report cites this as clear evidence that the fear of discovery of any such conduct among our senior agents must be extreme." Waverly directs a brief but severe look up over his reading glasses at the greater room. "And on that point, I'm ashamed to admit that he was very much on the money."
Illya listens to all this with the strangest sense of detachment, verging even on déjà vu, even as Napoleon shoots a significant look his way. He'd almost forgotten the occasion when, half-concussed and leaking badly, he'd outlined an elaborate and largely spontaneous theory that UNCLE's scheme of overcompensation might eventually manage defeat its own purpose. Hearing now almost the very same echoed back to him on Waverly's lips is the most surreal experience in his recent memory. In other circumstances, he might well have found it perversely vindicating. Circumstances being what they are, however, a cold sense of foreboding is his only reward.
"The rest of the text," Waverly continues, "goes on to outline a number of methods THRUSH might use to capitalise on the situation, from blackmail to entrapment to the production of wholly forged material in order to convince our agents they'd been caught in the act. I'm pleased to say that there appears to be no suggestion that the work of their old friend Dr. Newgate has been remembered—that much at least appears to have wholly escaped their notice—but the implications of this report are otherwise very concerning indeed!"
Illya dully registers that Waverly's pause at the end of this declaration might suggest some sort of reaction is expected. Napoleon coughs politely. "You, ah, mentioned a second piece of intelligence you thought noteworthy, sir?"
Waverly blinks. "Oh, yes, yes—it will surely interest you gentlemen to know that only a matter of hours after the first report would have reached THRUSH Central, they received a report from a separate surveillance team, who'd had the fortune to capture some video footage of two of our senior agents engaged in lively sexual escapades in a hotel room in California. Yourself and Mr. Kuryakin." Waverly looks calmly at the paper in his hand as he speaks. Anyone capturing video footage of this confrontation wouldn't have had the least hope of guessing the gravity of the subject from his face alone.
Illya looks at Napoleon in shock. Napoleon doesn't meet his eyes, he's staring fixedly at Mr. Waverly. "Sir, we..."
If Waverly notices Napoleon's half-hearted interruption, he makes no sign. "The report notes the agents involved as displaying a familiarity and carelessness throughout the encounter which the operator has taken to suggest that what they've captured represents only the most recent incident in a long and well-established affair. You'll be pleased to know there's some doubt as to the blackmail value of the footage; apparently both your faces are hidden for the more significant part of the action. The chief interest here was in questioning whether any previous memos to that effect had been received by Central, or perhaps accidentally excluded from the files THRUSH keeps on the two of you. They seem to consider it a matter of some considerable oversight that such a factor in your relationship could so long have been missed."
Looking up from his papers at last, Mr. Waverly takes in the thoroughly poleaxed expressions on both faces before him with a serene sort of patience that gives nothing away. "I must say, the timing of the event is serendipity itself! I think it more than likely that anyone at THRUSH Central reviewing these two reports together will have no option but to presume the earlier must represent a work of gross incompetence. How anyone they could spend so many months avidly tracking our agents for the least sign of active homosexualism and yet miss the evidence that the two top agents of our division were not only in the midst of an affair, but so unconcerned with subterfuge that they would partake in a hotel room in which they had already uncovered evidence of enemy surveillance... why, they'd be laughed out of the room! In the unlikely event that they do attempt some form of blackmail, I'm sure we can all agree that forewarned is forearmed. Once you've assured them your superiors are already quite aware of your relationship, I'm sure they'll quickly abandon any other such attempts to capitalise on the same weakness.
"It seems I must congratulate you both on one of the most well-timed acts of spontaneous counter-intelligence I can recall in over fifty years of active service. In the meantime," he adds, "I think the time has come to put our quota system to a serious review."
Illya is still trying to get his head around everything he's just heard when Napoleon finds his tongue. "Ah... you should probably know they weren't strictly correct in presuming that we, er..."
The look Waverly shoots him shuts down anything else Napoleon may have been about to say.
"Of course," says Waverly, looking vaguely off into the distance once again, "it may be prudent to schedule a repeat performance once in a while, to head off any suspicions that the incident was staged for their benefit." Here he seems to shake himself before going on. "Good work, gentlemen. Please remember I'll expect your full report on my desk on Monday. That will be all."
On the street outside Del Floria's the air is crisp and cold. Illya watches his breath crystallise into mist in the air, and wonders at the strange ways of the universe.
"Remind me never to get into a poker game with the old man," says Napoleon, wryly.
"Considering the favour he's just done the both of us," says Illya, "a few lost rounds at poker might be the least we owe to him."
"Did he really just give us permission to-"
"He may, in fact, have made it an order." Illya finds he has little desire to discuss how much Waverly knows that he isn't letting on—or thinks he knows, or perhaps doesn't want to know. They'll probably do that later anyway, once their heads have stopped spinning, but that may take a while.
"Christ," says Napoleon, with feeling. "What now?"
Illya looks at him askance. "Now? I would say we go back to your apartment, and celebrate this day's victories at our leisure."
The look Napoleon turns back on him is tinged with suspicion. "Not yours?"
Illya shrugs. "You have the larger bed."
Napoleon breathes out, a short stream of mist, and turns to Illya properly. "You don't waste time, do you? All this, is it really that simple for you?"
Illya wants to laugh at him. What could be less simple, what could be more simple, than falling for your own partner? Let alone a partner like Napoleon. He doesn't laugh though, just pauses for a moment to admire the sight of Napoleon—the infamous Casanova, the Don Juan, and a dozen other names besides—hesitating to reach for something he wants.
"On the contrary, my friend," he says, with a smile that is for Napoleon alone, "I have wasted years questioning the wisdom of making my attraction to you plain. I have as much time to make up for."