Fandom: The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

Pairing: Napoleon Solo/Illya Kuryakin

Category: slash

Rating: R

Word Count: 3029

Summary: Heavy is the crown unless you have back up.

Table/Prompt: Inspired by Poems Table Prompt: The Giver of Stars by Amy Lowell

 

 

Hold your soul open for my welcoming.
Let the quiet of your spirit bathe me
With its clear and rippled coolness,
That, loose-limbed and weary, I find rest,
Outstretched upon your peace, as on a bed of ivory.

 

***

The sound of the automatic door sliding open was almost silent. He knew without looking who was entering his office by the sound and pattern of the quiet footsteps. He sat aside his pen and leaned back in the chair, stretching his arms over his head to work out the kinks in shoulders brought on by a long afternoon of paperwork. He swiveled his chair to face the empty desk beside his own where his partner had stopped. Napoleon was leaning on the empty desk that had once been his own. Illya waited, knowing Napoleon would explain himself or not as he saw fit. It was a fine excuse to stop going through the endless stack of budget requests and personnel transfers and performance reviews that had filled his day.

“Are you done for the day?” Napoleon stood, ankles crossed and hands in his pockets, head bowed and staring at the toes of his shoes or the tile floor or maybe seeing none of that.

“I can be.”

Napoleon looked up at Illya’s answer.

“I have three more days until any of this,” Illya waved a hand over the stacks of files covering his desk, “is due on the desk of my boss, so I am sure he won’t mind if I leave, it is past seven after all.” Illya smiled gently with the teasing. Napoleon seemed unusually pensive; Illya thought he might need a little humorous relief if he was showing up in his old office.

“I might be able to put in a good word for you since I am witness to your after hours dedication here, perhaps I can get you another day added to the deadline.” Napoleon tried to match Illya’s light tone. He was partially successful.

Illya stood and took his jacket off the back of his chair and shrugged into it, smiling when Napoleon reached out to brush off lint that wasn’t on the shoulder. “That would be so kind of you, to help out your old partner, Napoleon.”

Napoleon shrugged, “Only fair since I am the one who sent all that paperwork to you in the first place.”

“I should be done with it tomorrow, in any case. But thank you, nonetheless.”

Napoleon made no move toward the door so Illya leaned on his own desk, mirroring Napoleon’s earlier stance, albeit with a much more relaxed air about him.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Illya knew the answer was yes, or Napoleon wouldn’t be here.

Napoleon slid his hands back in his pockets, looking at the floor again, or whatever it was he was seeing. “We managed to stop two mass poisonings, a bombing and a violent regime change this week. But it seems that for every one thing we prevent, three more slide through.”

Illya could hear the sigh that Napoleon held back.

“We lost agents, a Section Two from LA and two Section Threes from Kansas City. I just finished writing the letters to be forwarded to their respective headquarters and then on to the families with the rest of them from their section leaders.” Napoleon reached up with one hand to rub his temples, palm over his eyes. “I hate this part of the job.”

Illya leaned off the desk and stepped closer to his partner, speaking softly, “That’s why you do it so well. When you are no longer bothered by it, it’s time to quit.”

“How did Alexander do this for so long?”

“You are just now wondering?”

“No. I’m only just now weak enough to voice the doubt.”

“You are the least weak person I know, Napoleon.”

Napoleon was quiet for several long moments, then finally looked up to meet Illya’s eyes. “Do you ever wonder how we lived through it?”

Illya only shook his head and then put a hand on Napoleon’s shoulder. “I think we’re both done for the day. There’s a glass of scotch somewhere with your name on it.”

Napoleon opened his mouth to respond when Illya’s communicator chirped. Illya took the pen out of his pocket and uncapped it. “Kuryakin here.”

“Mr. Kuryakin, it’s Deborah. Have you seen Mr. Solo?”

“Yes.”

“He left his communicator on his desk and I thought he’d left for the day but…” she trailed off, as if unsure just what she wanted to say.

“He’s not left the building yet, but will soon, send the communicator down to the garage exit, I will make sure he gets it.”

“Thank you, Mr. Kuryakin.”

“The security of Section One Number One is my job, Miss Abraham, I will be sure he is once again on the tether, okay?”

They could both hear her relief plain in the thank you she said.

Illya could see that his partner was still distracted as they made their way out through the garage. He demanded the keys from Napoleon and was not surprised that he handed them over with no protest.

He knew what Napoleon was seeing now, a million close calls, their own near death experiences through the years. Even after leaving the field, they were only a single remove from the violence, they had enemies both professional and personal. This was another thing Alexander had lived with and never spoken of, to them at least. Illya could remember hours spent in medical centers all over the world, one of them waiting for word on the other. Nights spent in hospital beds, one waiting for the other to wake, and even in hospital beds in the same room when they were both down for the count. He knew Napoleon was reliving every one of those incidents on the drive home.

Illya pulled in to the parking garage and waited for Napoleon to return from his fugue. It took several minutes. Napoleon seemed surprised when he looked up to see the grey cinder block wall filling the windscreen.

Home.

Yes Napoleon.

Napoleon opened the car door and Illya followed suit. Locking the car and then walking to the elevator, they were silent, no need for words tonight.

Later, still quiet, they sat on the couch, shoulder to shoulder as they had just as many times before, after affairs successful and not so much, finishing a drink and soaking in the understanding that the silence implied.

Finally Illya stood, turned to his partner and waited. Napoleon looked up finally, his eyes no longer as much filled with the pain of the day, only a weariness.

Illya held out a hand. Napoleon wrapped his hand around Illya’s wrist and Illya mirrored him, pulling him to his feet by this warrior grip.

Bed.

Yes Illya.

And still they had no need for words.

***

Let the flickering flame of your soul play all about me,
That into my limbs may come the keenness of fire,
The life and joy of tongues of flame,
And, going out from you, tightly strung and in tune,
I may rouse the blear-eyed world,
And pour into it the beauty which you have begotten.

***

“Mr. Solo, your overseas relay is coming through now.”

“Thank you, Deborah.” Napoleon closed the dossier on his desk and smiled up at his secretary as she sat a carafe of coffee and a mug on his desk. “Am I so predictable?”

“Of course not, sir,” she said as if he had not spent every evening this week with files and paperwork and dossiers at his desk until late. She smiled the same hint of a smile she always did.

“Why don’t you go on home now, it’s Friday night somewhere in the world, enjoy it.” Napoleon leaned back in his chair, realizing as he did that he had been sitting leaned over the papers so long that his back felt frozen into a permanent curve. “And you know better than to call me sir.”

“Thank you, shall I bring you some sandwiches from the canteen before I go, sir?” The slight smile never wavered, but the light in her eyes sparkled.

“Wicked Miss Williams, no thank you.” Napoleon’s smile let her know the point was hers in the game they played.

She looked at her watch and then back to him, “Thirty more seconds.”

“Off you go then, have a good weekend. Try to stay out of trouble.”

“Unless trouble gets into me,” her smile was broader as she closed the door on his laugh.

Napoleon turned to the communications console beside his desk, watching the lights there flicker red and white, red and white, then white and green, then green lit steadily and alone. The console buzzed. He pushed a button and fitted the earpiece and attached microphone in place and leaned back in his chair, hands folded behind his head.

“That shouldn’t have taken so long.”

“The price of double encryption, my disgruntled Russian.”

“I think we need to look over the encryption protocols, anything could be happening while we wait two minutes to get a clear line.”

“I will be sure to mention that to my second as soon as he returns from lollygagging about London.”

“Hardly lollygagging, Napoleon. Gagging, well, arguments could be made.”

“That bad?”

“Not anymore. The newly minted Section One Number One will have no security breaches. London is secure.”

“Your job there is finished.”

“Thankfully.”

“I look forward to your report when you get home tomorrow.”

“You look forward to all the gossip from Mark, you mean.”

“Perhaps a little,“ Napoleon could hear the smirk in Illya’s voice.

Taking his time to sort papers into his briefcase and the locking desk drawer, Napoleon finally decided the whole thing could wait until Monday morning and locked it all away. He was far enough ahead on the paperwork that one weekend off wouldn’t upset the balance of world peace. And if world peace was reliant on budgetary justification of an extra box of paperclips or test tubes, well, world peace could hang for a day or two.

Napoleon turned in his badge at the garage checkpoint, picked up his security detail and the three of them took the elevator to the parking garage.

“I’d like to sit in front tonight.”

“And you’d like to see the chief have my guts for garters, too.” Hanson said, shaking his head.

“Teeth for cufflinks,” came a mumble from behind.

“Gentlemen, what the chief of security doesn’t know won’t hurt you.”

“You realize that he checks the camera footage weekly. Even from London.” Cochran spoke up from behind again.

“I’ve been good for a whole month, you’d think that would count for something.”

“No.” Cochran and Hanson spoke as one.

“And that is why he is such a good Chief of Security, I suppose. That will teach me to promote from within.” Napoleon smiled as the two agents checked the car with handheld sensors before opening the doors and checking again. Finally they deemed it safe and bundled him inside. They took their places in front, but left the dividing screen in the lowered position.

“So why do you check this car every night and Illya never checks our personal cars?”

Hanson was driving so Cochran turned around to answer. “He always calls down first and we check the car and then stand watch until the two of you show up.”

“So if I just called down every night before leaving, we’d speed this process up.”

“Essentially.” Cochran faced front again, checking for tails or suspicious looking pedestrians, all the things Napoleon was familiar with doing himself when driving or riding beside Illya as he drove.

“I’m sorry, gentlemen, if you had told me, I would have been happy to give you the heads up. I will do so in future.”

“It’s our job, Mr. Solo,” Hanson said, glancing briefly at Napoleon in the rear view mirror, then flicking his eyes again at the street ahead and to the side, constantly watching for threats.

“It’s not my job to make yours more work, Mr. Cochran, Mr. Hanson.” Napoleon wondered if Alexander had felt as cut off from things as he sometimes did. With Illya away for the last several weeks, he began to realize that the nature of the job itself was isolation. No wonder Alexander had snuck into the field as often as he could. He wondered if he made it too easy on his agents by obeying Illya’s dictates about his movements. His security chief was vigilant, he could say that for him. Of course, Illya was more than a security chief, he wore many hats in the New York U.N.C.L.E. headquarters, as he always had. Napoleon suppressed a sigh and wondered if Illya was booked on a morning flight or for later in the day.

Napoleon opened the cabinet that held the stereo and television, spent several moments turning the channel dial and finding nothing of interest on the TV. The comedies were grating with their fake laughter and he was never home enough to follow the nighttime dramas full of oil barons cheating on their wives or getting shot by mysterious gunmen. The police stories were so far from real that he found them amusing, not at all the point of them he was sure. He did remember liking one story with a classy blonde, but he hadn’t seen her on TV for a while, perhaps she had retired from her beat.

He turned off the set and instead switched on the radio. He fiddled with the tuner until he found a station that knew golden oldies went further back than the Beatles or Buddy Holly. The mellow strains of a slow big band number flowed out of the speakers. He adjusted the volume down a little and shut the cabinet up, leaving the speakers mounted around the room to soothe him with a gentler past, one that may never have existed. To avoid the philosophical mood he felt building, he poured a drink and sought out a pounding hot shower to ease the dull ache in his neck and between his shoulder blades.

The first thing he was aware of in the dark was the familiar feel of his weapon against his palm under his pillow. The second thing he was aware of was the soft sound of his lover’s voice, a lilting hum of a song that teased at his memory, a melody he should recognize. The third thing he became aware of was shower damp bare skin against his, a warm body sliding into bed and next to him. He pulled his weapon out from under his pillow and felt for the nightstand, sitting it there out of harm’s way, then rolled to face his much missed lover.

“You used the guest bath again.”

“I didn’t want to wake you with the racket. You don’t get enough sleep when I am away.”

“I’d much rather miss sleep when you’re here.” Arms around one another now their voices remained whisper quiet, though there was no one to overhear.

Napoleon slid his cheek along his lover’s, breathing in the scent, clean and familiar and always welcome, the sensory reassurance that all was right in his world. His kiss was confirmation of that rightness, a lingering tasting of lips and tongues, exploring as if it were the first kiss and not one of countless many over their years side by side.

“Missed this,” Napoleon murmured between nibbled kisses. “Missed you, moyO sErtse,” he nipped an earlobe and then soothed with his lips the smoothness under that ear, kissing his way down neck to shoulder and collar bone, “so much.”

“And I, you, Napoleon.”

There was an urgency in his lover suddenly that took Napoleon by surprise, where their kisses had started languid and sleepy, now they were fevered, hungry and demanding. Napoleon met that hunger with his own, matching the stroking hands and sliding body with his.

Bedding was thrown back as they rolled over one another again and again, trading places and kisses and it was less a fight for dominance and more a reassertion of bone deep truth, knowledge, recognition. Belonging. Their fingers and lips and tongues blazed known trails, revisiting known sensitivities to tease and stoke the furnace of that feeling between them, the fire and drive and passion that didn’t wane, no matter the years they spent testing it.

Napoleon locked his arms around his lover and rolled them, one more time, and the moonlight streaming through the window silvered his lover’s hair and made his eyes bright against the shadows in the room. Napoleon looked up at his partner above him and wanted.

Illya’s touch gentled again, leaning in to kiss Napoleon as he had before, exploring and tasting and searching out that place on Napoleon’s neck that made him moan when sucked and the spot behind his ear that when stroked made him dig his fingers deep into the muscles of Illya’s back and the deep drinking kiss on his mouth that made him arch under Illya.

Illya slid his mouth back to Napoleon’s ear, his voice rasping with the same want he felt in his lover. “Napoleon,” he whispered, “tell me what you want.”

“You’re never to leave me again.”

Illya drew back at this unexpected answer. Napoleon reached up and wrapped one hand around his partner’s neck and drew him down to kiss and with the other hand he reached between them to stroke their cocks together, thumb spreading their shared fluids in circles that teased and flicked and started the fireburst of need in them again.

With a growl Illya started to rock against his lover as Napoleon cradled him between his knees, thrusting in counterpoint and his own voice added to the sound.

Illya held himself over his lover with one hand while the other joined Napoleon’s stroking and engulfing and sliding along the hot hard lengths of their cocks. He leaned down to Napoleon’s ear, still with a growl in his voice, demanding and inviting at once, “Come with me, come with me now, Napoleon,” and as his partner responded with a groan and an arching up, his climax fountaining over their joined hands, Illya followed him over the edge and for a moment there was nothing in any world except the sound of their pleasure given voice and the feel of the release and the slide of skin along skin and then their breathing as they lay tangled together in the aftermath, still entwined and still half hard and still teasing fingers over sensitive places, known places, their own world of places that only existed here, between them, with each other.