InsaneJournal

WHO: Illya Kuryakin and Napoleon Solo, then Illya and Gaby Teller
WHEN: 2265.01.14
WHERE: The mess hall, then the brig
RATING: PG-13
SUMMARY: Illya finds out at breakfast that Solo and Gaby are dating. It does not go well. Then Gaby visits Illya in the brig. Things are revealed. Shit goes down.
WARNINGS: Violence, Language


Illya was the type of man who liked to keep a usual morning routine, so every morning after he did his push ups and stretches, he would meet his partners for breakfast in the mess hall. Officially it was a sort of “debrief” even if there was absolutely nothing for them to debrief on. It had basically become a tradition at this point and gave them a chance to talk and enjoy coffee before going about their days.

He stopped by to pick up Gaby on the way to the mess hall, and was surprised to find that she wasn’t in her bedroom. She usually waited for him in the mornings before heading down. His mild concern grew when he arrived at the mess hall and found Solo sitting alone at their usual table. After getting his breakfast, he sat down across from the other man.

“Gaby was not in her room this morning,” he said. “Have you seen her yet?”

Ever since they had gotten back from Risa, the trio from UNCLE had started to make it a habit to ‘debrief’ every morning over coffee and breakfast. They generally shared rather mundane updates - updates about classes they were teaching, sparring sessions they had, new things learned about the holodeck - but it lent to an atmosphere of closeness, one unlike the three of them had experienced before.

Gaby and Napoleon had, of course, grown closer back home, having had months beyond the Rome mission together. They had, also, grown closer to the Illya of the future, but Illya of the Enterprise hadn’t had that experience. But here, they grew together, into a different dynamic, but one just as treasured.
Life was good. Blissful even, if not a little boring with the lack of missions and gunfire.

But over the past few weeks, ever since returning from the pleasure planet, things had changed in another way for two of them. Napoleon had been musing over the change in his relationship with Gaby - not a relationship, but not just a mere friendship either. Something special, something in between. It was, as of now, still unlabeled, but he had stopped sleeping around despite them having agreed to see how it goes with other people. And, yet, as much as he enjoyed the company of others, he no longer sought it out, only wanted to spend his time with one person, the one person who saw through all of his charm and handsomeness.

So it wasn’t a relationship, but it was more, and Napoleon was starting to feel a bit of guilt over it. He had no regrets, would never have any regrets over his feelings for Gaby, but he did feel guilt over the fact that Illya was still in the dark. It was the reason why Gaby wasn’t in her room that morning. They had spent the evening yesterday discussing telling Illya and had agreed to finally tell him about what was happening between them.

He knew they both dreaded having this talk with the Russian, so he thought he could spare the Gaby the awkwardness of this conversation by the perfect opening Illya had just presented to him. Sipping at his coffee, he peered over to Illya over the brim of his cup and gauged his demeanor. The blond seemed like in a decent enough mood, if not for the mild concern. Napoleon took his chance.

“I have. She’s still in my room, I think,” he said, setting his coffee cup down and smooth the edge of his napkin on his lap. His breakfast sat in front of him, with his PADD nearby with the latest news from around the universe.

Illya took a sip of his coffee, then wiped his mouth with a napkin before speaking again. “Oh. Why is Gaby in your room?” He didn’t ask the question with any air of suspicion or accusation, because frankly he didn’t know that he needed to. There were any number of reasons that Gaby might be in Solo’s room, and as far as Illya knew, Solo’s interest in Gaby didn’t run beyond platonic.

Oh dear God. Was he going to have to spell this one out? Napoleon suddenly became a little more nervous. He didn't realize that this would be this difficult. “Well, she spent the night last night and didn't feel like going back before morning came.” Eyebrow raised, he further explained, “We’re seeing other, Illya.”

The thing was, Illya had been trying very hard not to jump to that conclusion, usually because when he did, Solo got defensive. Now he could see that there clearly was a reason for him to be defensive. Illya felt his blood go cold in his veins and he got deadly still. He glared at Solo across the table. “What?” His voice was quiet, but hard.

Napoleon shifted a bit uncomfortably under Illya's stare. It wasn't a friendly stare, he could tell that much. Clearing his throat, he gave his own hard stare back because he wasn't about to be cowed. “We're seeing each other and seeing where it goes, comrade.” In a subtle move, he lifted his coffee off the table. Illya had a penchant for throwing tables around and this particular cup was delicious.

“Mat' ublyudka,” Illya cursed under his breath. The fork he held in his hand was clattering against his plate, so he put it down. His hand still shook. For now, Illya just stood up, unfolding his 6 foot 4 frame in front of the other man. “You are sleeping with her?! How dare you touch Gaby.”

Well, shit. He knew what happened when Illya’s hands shook like that. He had been lucky so far in that he never had to deal with the aftermath of that level of rage, but it was only a matter of time, it seemed, before he felt first hand the terror the Russian could inflict. A deep sense of sadness echoed in him that his friendship with the other man wasn’t enough to stop this confrontation from happening. He thought, just a little bit, that maybe he was almost good enough for Gaby, that since she decided to go forward in the venture with him, and that Illya could see the good in him too.

Apparently not.

“Comrade, I’m not doing anything against her will. We discussed this almost too thoroughly before we took this any place beyond friendship,” Napoleon tried to reason, clutching his coffee a little harder, trying to keep his voice steady.

Illya clenched one hand into a fist, trying at least to control himself, even if he knew he was careening off the rails. His rage was like a freight train with no breaks, and when it got to a certain point, there was no turning back.

“No,” he said. “No. We made agreement. Gaby is off limits.” It didn’t matter if he had a girlfriend. If he couldn’t have Gaby, well then he damn sure wasn’t going to sit by and let Solo have her. This was not how this was supposed to turn out.

Agreement? Napoleon furrowed his eyebrows, trying to remember if he had ever made an agreement over Gaby. He couldn’t remember any such conversation, but regardless, he knew that what Gaby had said to him earlier was true: she chose what she wanted to do and with who she wanted to do it with. Not him, not anyone else, and he respected that. “Gaby chooses what she wants to do, you know better than to think otherwise. And regardless of that, you have Rogue.” He stood, facing Illya. “Calm down, Illya. We can talk this out, there’s no reason for this to get physical.”

“You will hurt her,” Illya said in reply. “She is not a plaything.” Standing there glaring at Solo, Illya couldn’t help but get a mental image of the two of them in bed together, him kissing her and holding her. It was too much.

Illya leapt across the table, scattering plates as he grabbed at Solo. His fist connected with his eye.

And the words, perhaps, hurt more than the actual punch did. To think that Illya thought that lowly of him, that he would play with Gaby’s feelings like that...but the punch wasn’t a walk in the park either. Falling back onto the ground with the weight of Illya on top of him, he struggled to get his arms up to block any more hits. “Peril, stop!”

Illya was practically growling as he tried to get at Solo, his rage making him nearly go blind. There were hands clawing at his back, trying to pull him off, but Illya was able to shake them easily. What he wasn’t able to shake was a phaser hit to the back, rendering him suddenly stunned. He finally stopped reaching for Solo and fell over motionless.

Napoleon caught Illya as he slumped forward, aching and tired from trying to hold the man back before when he had been actively trying to kill him, but not actually wanting to hurt the man in return. And not wanting to see him hurt further, as he was stunned unconscious. His face probably didn’t look as pretty as it normally did, but he didn’t care, as he tried to get his bearings back and figure out if Illya was going to be okay.

He glared at the Starfleet officer that had stunned the other man. “It was under control, you didn’t have to do that!” And clearly, it hadn’t been under control, but he didn’t want Illya in this state either.

It most definitely hadn’t been under control. Starfleet didn’t tolerate any sort of physical violence, especially not in the mess hall. Everyone’s breakfast had been disturbed. It took two Starfleet officers to lift Illya’s limp body and carry him away down the hall to the brig. He’d be behind bars when he came to.

- - -

The brig of the Enterprise proved to be as spartan as the rest of the ship. Gaby arrived to find Illya lying prone on a bench inside a kind of well-lit pod. Instead of bars, the entrance was protected by a kind of glass that shimmered when touched. The security officers required little convincing when she asked to see him, nor did they seem particularly attentive to her while she waited for him to regain consciousness.

She had intended to return to her room before morning, to be there when Illya stopped by before breakfast. Prior to today, she had been careful not to spend the night in Napoleon's quarters. It was not only for the sake of keeping the change in their relationship concealed from the Russian, but she wanted to continue to keep a bit of distance, to protect herself in case things went south. But last night, Napoleon had held on to her just a bit too tightly, had stroked her hair with the most gentle of touches, and against her better judgment, she allowed herself to let go of her anxieties, at least for one night. She had awoken to the sounds of Napoleon dressing for the day, and when she opened her eyes, she was greeted with a smug grin, like the cat that swallowed the canary. She scowled at him, an expression that quickly turned into a smile of her own. She sent him off to the mess hall with a kiss and a promise that she would be along shortly.

She heard the noise even before she reached the hall––raised voices, clattering cutlery and tableware, and a shout: "Peril, stop!" She entered to see several people attempting to pull Illya away from a battered-looking Napoleon. The phaser blast came before she had the chance to intervene, and she watched helplessly as Illya slumped unconscious to the floor. She knew immediately what had happened, though why it happened was another thing. The night before, Gaby and Napoleon had agreed to come clean to Illya, but it was something they were going to do together. There was a conversation to be had, but later. She helped Napoleon to the med bay with assurances to him that she would go check on their partner in the brig.

Gaby crossed her arms over her chest when she noticed Illya begin to stir and moved closer to the window separating them. Outwardly, she appeared calm and collected. But inside, she was fuming.

Coming out of being stunned felt a lot like when you moved your arm after something heavy had been on top of it - all pins and needles. It wasn’t pain, just massive discomfort. The headache Illya felt was probably due to the fact that his head had hit the floor when he had been shot.

He felt dazed and he sat up carefully, wiping his face. Behind the glass that separated him from the rest of the ship stood the person that he least wanted to see. With a groan, Illya looked down at the ground and waited for Gaby to start in on him.

This was both the first and the last place that Gaby wanted to be. On the one hand, she was concerned for Illya, but on the other, there was the mess of a situation they were in. A confrontation was needed, no matter how much she wanted to run from it. She could tell that he expected her to lash out at him. She honestly felt like it too, but so much damage had already been caused today, that she opted for restraint. At least in that particular moment.

She glanced over at the security officers across the room, whose backs were turned to her, then lifted the hem of her skirt to reveal three small bottles tucked into the band of her stockings. She removed one and placed it inside a small, circular doorway that seemed to hover over the glass. The glass dissolved around the bottle and reformed with it on the inside of the cell. Vodka from the minibar of their cabin in Risa. Napoleon and Gaby had raided it before they left and were hoarding their spoils. Now seemed like as good a time as any to break into their supply.

Pretty much the last thing he expected Gaby to do was to raise her skirt. He watched, eyebrow cocked, as she smuggled the small bottle of vodka into his cell. Ok. If she was bearing gifts, she maybe wasn’t as pissed as he thought she was. Or she was simply having mercy on him. Illya snatched up the bottle and hid it before the Starfleet officers could see him. He would need way more than one tiny bottle, but this was a good start.

He leaned back against the wall and looked up at her, waiting for her to begin. When she didn’t, and he couldn’t take the silence anymore, Illya finally spoke first.

“Please tell him that I am sorry.”

Gaby had purposefully refrained from speaking, knowing well that that her silence would eventually get to him.

"Are you?" she asked simply after his apology. Her voice was steady, calm, almost pleasant. But her eyes burned with the anger she felt. At Illya for losing control, at Napoleon for announcing their news without her, but most of all, at herself setting this all in motion. If only she had not let her guard down with Napoleon on Risa.

“Yes,” Illya replied. He made the mistake of looking up into her eyes and seeing the anger there. That only made him feel worse. Illya sighed. “I should not have allowed myself to lose control like that. But Gaby… why him?” It wasn’t that Solo was so detestable. Illya really did like the man. But her sleeping with Solo was so close to home for him. The thought of it was like jabbing a knife directly into his chest.

That was probably the last thing Illya should have said to her. "Why not him, Illya?" Gaby placed her hands on her hips and glared at him, indifferent to the misery that was written plainly on his face. She knew there were a dozen answers to that question, several of which she had dismissed when Napoleon had given them himself. If it was a matter of worth, well, Gaby was the one to decide that for herself, and she had made her decision. She would pound that into Illya's head if she had to, though the thought of having to do so only fueled her anger. Then she thought perhaps it was not an issue of worth at all, but something else entirely. Back in her time, Illya often acted as if he had some sort of claim over her, ever since their first mission. It had seemed quaint and harmless then. Given this Illya's reaction to her and Solo, it no longer did now.

“Because he is my friend,” he said before he even realized what he was saying. Illya knew there wasn’t going to be any way of getting out of this without confessing how he felt about Gaby. Putting his head back against the wall he looked up at the ceiling, anywhere but at her. “You know how I feel about you.” She’d have to be blind or stupid not to.

His statement hung in the air for a moment before Gaby could react to it. She stared at him incredulously before finally shaking her head. "Don't you dare." Of course she knew how he felt about her. Or at least how he had when they had very nearly come together in Rome. But the keywords were very nearly, and after that, they had reached an unspoken agreement not to pursue anything for the sake of their newly-formed team. But that was months of platonic (albeit tinged with tension) partnership ago. And, she realized, an entirely different Illya. It was unfair to hold this Illya accountable for the actions of the one from her time, but she could not very well erase the past several months of her experience either. "We agreed," she began, in spite of this realization, "you agreed," she added for emphasis, "to let that go." Easier said than done, of course, but that was not the point.

He could keep his feelings down for a long time, possibly forever, but in light of all of this it was hard not to. At the very least, it was an explanation for what he had done. Illya rubbed at his temples with one hand. “And you made no such agreement with Solo?” He asked. “The two of you… sleeping together, it is good for our team?”

Illya sighed again, realizing that this was probably going to go badly no matter how he approached it. “How can I just let that go so simply? I mean… how I feel.” Feelings were like aliens to him, completely weird and foreign.

"What team? Look around you.” Gaby gestured her hands wildly toward the sterile walls of the ship. "There is no U.N.C.L.E. There may never be again. There’s only us. And you–" she caught herself before she could say what she knew Illya would infer anyway. He was with Rogue, her feelings about which she had spent the last two months since her arrival burying deep in the recesses of her mind, locked away with her unwanted and unacknowledged feelings for him. “What it is with Napoleon, it was unplanned.” She hesitated for a moment. “I could have stopped it before it got this far, but I didn’t.”

With his words came a dull aching in her heart. The feeling caused her to let go of her hurt and anger briefly and really look at Illya. She knew this was not an easy thing for him to admit to himself, let alone tell her. And for a moment, she saw him as the man in that Roman hotel room, his cold fingertips grazing her thigh as he searched for her tracker. His face soft and reassuring instead of tense and inexpressive. She felt her palms begin to sweat. Who was she to ask how to let go? Suppress? Yes. Ignore? Absolutely. But confront? She had really only tried that only once before, and look where it got them. She raised the hem of her skirt again, retrieved the second bottle, and promptly opened it and took a large swallow. Security officers be damned. "I am the last person in the world to ask,” she said finally, as if that wasn’t obvious.

The fact that they might never go on a mission together again hit him almost as hard as the fact that he would probably never be with her. He was happy with Rogue, of course, but the feelings for Gaby had never quite gone away. Perhaps they never would. Illya couldn’t look at her. He stared at the floor for a moment, chewing on the inside of his cheek. He felt like crying, which was ridiculous. He didn’t cry. He got angry and smashed things, which was exactly how he had ended up in here.

Chancing to glance up, he noticed Gaby taking a swig from the bottle. “Gaby, it is 9 o’clock,” he said, as if that mattered.

"Mind your manners, or the other bottle stays with me," she retorted quickly. The distraction had given her enough time to recompose herself. Still, she appeared slightly uneasy, fidgeting with the bottle in her hands as she spoke. "For whatever it is worth, that was not how this was supposed to happen." She was reluctant to mention it again, but it needed saying. "However it happened this morning, however Solo managed to foul it up, I wanted to be the one to tell you." As she told him this, it occurred to her that she really had known the way Illya continued to feel about her. Why else would she feel the need to break the news to him as if it required a delicate hand? Damn, she was terrible at all of this emotional business, especially her own.

He gave her a look that almost dared her to come through the glass and pry the other bottle out of his cold dead hand. Illya would be downing the bottle in one sip once Gaby left.

At her words, he nodded. This was not how any of this was supposed to happen. He wasn’t supposed to punch his partner. He wasn’t supposed to be sitting in a glass cage while he admitted to Gaby that he had feelings for her. It was only 9 AM and he’d already managed to ruin an entire day.
“Are you happy with him?” Illya asked quietly.

"Yes." The answer was given without any hesitation. Although it might be difficult to go back to the way things were in light of today's events, she was happy with Napoleon. And yet she found she could not look Illya in the eye when she said it. She twisted the lid of the tiny bottle open and then closed again. Opened. Closed. "And you. You are happy with Rogue." It was a question, but she did not present it as one. She needed to hear that yes, he was, because that is what she had been telling herself since the minute she saw that girl's face light up when she spoke of him that very first day after she arrived. It is what had made it easier to continue with their previous arrangement, business as usual, while definitely not overthinking the implications of Illya striking it up with a girl who looked just like her.

While Illya was glad to hear that she was happy, there was still a tiny stab of pain to hear her say it, and so quickly. “Good. I want you to be happy, Gaby.” That was true.

At her statement, he looked up at her. “Yes. I am.” That was true too. Rogue made him very happy. She had a tendency to see the good in him, even when he had trouble seeing it in himself.

She held his gaze through the thin layer of space glass. This was much more subdued than she had anticipated. When she first arrived, she felt like the cork in a shaken bottle of champagne. Now she just felt tired. "Good," she replied, mirroring his own response. So what now? Illya was stuck in the brig for the next 24 hours according to the security team. But after that? "What is it you want from me, Illya." The words went through her mind and out of her mouth before she could brush them aside.

Despite the early hour, Illya was exhausted too. After fighting Solo and being stunned, all he really wanted to do was sleep off his remaining time in the brig. He was surprised that Gaby would ask that question, and he was sure that his face showed it. “I told you,” he said. “I want you to be happy.”

"That is for me," she criticized. Why turn back now? "What do you want from me." It was clear he had little choice but to speak up about having feelings for her. His reaction in the mess hall left no alternative. But her Illya had gone months without saying so much as a word about it except to dismiss Solo's oft-repeated attempts at pushing the two of them together. Had he been harboring feelings all that time, or had he figured out a way to move past them? She had no way of knowing. But now that she knew the feelings of this Illya, it was no longer business as usual. Was she supposed to act like it had not happened and pretend to go back to the way it was before? Things had changed irrevocably, and she needed to know what came next.

Illya sighed deeply and there was a long silence between them. He felt like he was backed into a corner and that there was no way to get out of this without hurting someone again, probably himself. “What I want from you I cannot have here, Gaby,” he said finally. “If we were home, I would want for you to try to let me be the one who would make you happy. I know I… have nothing.” He had even less here, he realized. “I am… a brute.” A brute with a brain, but the KGB didn’t recruit him because he was good at chess. “I try to solve problems with fists and make them worse. Sometimes I cannot control myself. But I would try to be a good man for you.”

He eased himself to his feet for the first time since he’d been stunned and felt a bit wobbly. Staying still for a moment, he caught his balance before starting to walk in his cell. “Here we cannot have this. So what I want from you is your friendship and trust. You and Solo and I make a good team. I do not want that to go away.” It occurred to him that besides Rogue they were the only friends he’d had since he’d been in grade school. If he had to be on this godforsaken ship, he wanted it to be as friends with them, not as enemies or strangers.

Well, she had wanted an answer. Be careful what you wish for. She felt a lump rise uncharacteristically in her throat, and she looked away, as if that would keep the tears from coming to her eyes. She could not look at him after such heartfelt words––she did not trust her ability not to cry. But when she heard him get to his feet, she looked back at him, and the tears brimmed over. She held her chin up, not wanting to draw attention to them by wiping them away.

"I do not want that either," she replied softly. It had been at the core of her concerns about pursuing anything with Napoleon in the first place. She took a step closer to the window, grateful for its separation. Had it not been there, she might have done something truly foolish like wrap her arms around him. Instead she said, "You already are a good man, Illya. What would make me happy is for you to believe that.” It was the kind of emotional honesty that she never gave. Thought, yes. But never shared.

He saw the way that her eyes shimmered and it nearly brought tears of his own. He didn’t cry, wouldn’t cry, but it was the closest he had come in a long time. Illya wished he could wipe the tears out of her eyes. He put his hand up on the glass.

“To hear you say that means very much.” If he kept looking at her, he might get choked up, so he turned his gaze to the floor. “You were special to me, ever since we met.” He’d actually watched her for a few days as part of his intelligence gathering before officially meeting her… if he wanted to consider chasing her and Solo in a car and ripping the back bumper off of it a meeting. Illya had liked her from the start though. Her confidence in doing what was mostly considered a man’s job had intrigued him.

Gaby did not expect him to take it to heart, but she hoped he would. She had called him a brute many times before in her teasing, but to hear him call himself that with such sincerity, to know that was what he actually believed, made her heart ache. She admired his strength and knew how hard he worked to control his volatile temper. She could still remember the feeling of him trembling beneath her touch those times when he was provoked. But she could still reconcile that man with the one who had carried her so gently to bed that night in Rome. She hesitated briefly, then raised her own hand up to the glass to place over his. She locked eyes with him and let her hand fall back to her side.

When he looked down towards the floor, she used that as an opportunity to quickly wipe her eyes. "Hmmm," she nodded. "Special in a 'I am tearing off a piece of your car as a keepsake' kind of way. I bet you do that for all of the secret British assets you try to keep from fleeing the country."

Even though there was a pane of glass between them, it almost seemed like he could feel Gaby’s hand touching his. It warmed and comforted him, and gave him hope that they might be able to survive this with their friendship in tact.

That comment made Illya smile for the first time all day. “Only the most beautiful,” he replied.

If their friendship did come to an end, it would not be by Gaby’s choice. It would be awkward after this, painful even, but his confession had endeared him to her even more than before. No, she was not going anywhere, and she would not let him go either, not without a fight.

She was glad to see him smile, and her own lips turned up in a small, one-sided smirk that while a smile, seemed slightly sad somehow. “I will keep that in mind the next time I am need of spare car parts.” She stared at him then, her face still frozen in a kind of half smile because she did not quite know what else to do. “I should probably...” she started to say, but did not finish the thought. Probably what? Get back to Napoleon? Give Illya some space? Go find an exit hatch and launch herself into space? “But I can come back. If you want me to.” She would understand if his answer was no.

Illya just nodded. “Yes,” he replied, agreeing even if she hadn’t said it. “I must.. Rest. Try not to ever do anything that will make them stun you.” His hand still felt tingly. “Thank you for coming, and for the gift.” Illya planned on chugging the bottle of vodka later when the guards didn’t have eyes on him. He figured he’d need it around lunch time, or being in a cell was going to drive him insane. “If you wish to come visit tonight, I would like that.”

“Thank you for figuring that one out for the rest of us.” At his mention of her gift, she retrieved the third bottle from the band of her stocking and placed it, along with her half drunk one, into the circular door that would send it through the glass. She shrugged at him, with that same half-smile still on her face. “Just in case.”

Her feelings of guilt and anger at herself had only worsened during her visit. She felt to blame for the present circumstances, so she was relieved to hear that he would still like to see her. “All right,” she nodded. “Until tonight, then.” She gave him one last lingering look, then turned to go. As she neared the exit, she stopped and turned, looking back toward Illya in the cell. She appeared to struggle with whether or not to say what had come to her mind. “For what it is worth... If we were home... I do think you could have made me happy.” And she turned and walked out the door, leaving Illya to his own thoughts and a couple tiny bottles of stolen vodka.