The Man From U.N.C.L.E
The Beach Affair
With a newly titled organisation to report to and a mission to Istanbul on the agenda in the near future. Travelling to Istanbul seemed to be the next logical course of action for Illya, Napoleon and Gabby. But since their deployment to Istanbul was not required right away, Mr Waverly allowed the three to remain in Rome for a short while, for some rest and relaxation as a reward for a job well done.
The trio made a trip to one of Rome's closest beaches, the beautiful Santa Marinella, via train.
Napoleon and Gaby made the most of the long, crowded commute since they had the luxury of having seats to sit down on and had plenty of things to talk about to entertain themselves. The same could be not be said for Illya, who stood during the entire trip since most of the seats were taken.
In hindsight, it would have been best if it had been Illya who had gotten a seat, since his towering frame made his head nearly reach the ceiling of the train. But Illya didn't mind waiting for the trip to end. He found the thought much more attractive, than asking Napoleon to swap his seat with him.
Once they arrived at the beach, Napoleon amused himself by chasing after Gaby and playfully tackling her. Illya, who was not fond of frolicking around the beach and making a fool of himself in front of so many beach goers, did not join them. Instead he sat on a beach chair, dressed in his usual clothes. Not having made any effort to wear more suitable clothes for a day at the beach.
A parasol provided shade for him, as he passed the time reading a book about Italian architecture to make up for the deficiency of knowledge he had exhibited in front of Gaby the other night; professional pride and another reason fuelling his motivation for doing so.
It was true that he had fumbled the history of the Spanish Steps that night with Gaby, but Illya took great satisfaction in the fact that if those steps were ever mentioned again in conversation, he would be able to talk about them with confidence after finishing the book.
"Gaby and I are going to go for a swim, will you be joining us?"
Illya's thoughts were interrupted by a question from Napoleon that was asked less out of courtesy, but more of an inquiry as to whether Illya would spoil his time with Gaby by being there.
"No thank you, I prefer to read a book." Illya rejected the invitation without even making eye contact with Napoleon, his eyes fixed on the book's words. Normally he would have found the idea to join Gaby for a swim appealing, but Napoleon's presence compelled him to do otherwise. Showing how alike Napoleon and he were in their thinking.
"Suit yourself. It's not like there's anything to show off underneath there, except for some pale skin." Napoleon joked about the complexion he believed Illya had as a result of wearing clothes that covered most of his body and placed Gaby's clothes and his own on a nearby beach towel.
This time Napoleon's comment on Illya's personal appearance was enough to make him look up from his book. For the moment Illya said nothing and stared back at Napoleon with animosity.
Such a personal jab would not go unpunished.
But Illya's stare was met with a smile from Napoleon and he walked away from Illya and joined Gaby.
An hour passed and Illya had read many pages from his book and would be able to tell anyone about the Spanish Steps of Rome and many other things with ease, while Napoleon and Gaby had swum a great distance across the beach.
From afar, Illya noticed that the two were trying to outrun each other as they raced towards the shoreline. The sight of Gaby laughing and enjoying herself making the Russian who usually hid his emotions behind a stern mask, smile.
After Gaby had beaten Napoleon to the shore, they slowed their running to a walk and started walking towards Illya. His chance for payback was coming.
"Hey Peril, learn anything much?" Napoleon asked in a teasing manner, making it clear that he found Illya's choice to occupy his time with reading amusing.
"Plenty." Illya humoured him with a good-natured reply that wouldn't arouse any suspicion.
Illya rose from the beach chair and placed his book on the chair in his place and began to walk towards the shore.
"Going for a swim?"
"Something like that."
As Illya walked right up to the edge of the water, he did not appear to make any efforts to remove his clothes before swimming. What could possibly be his intentions? Would the Russian who had torn the back of a car like the lid of a tin can swim with the weight of his pants and shirt weighing him down to make it more challenging? Was that how Russians swam?
"I'll be right back, I just have to see this." Napoleon told Gaby who was dressing herself nearby and followed after Illya, curious to see the events unfold.
But Illya did not step into the water as Napoleon had anticipated, instead he crouched down, scooped some wet sand into his hand, moulded it into a ball and clenched it firmly in his hand. He got within throwing distance of Napoleon and threw the ball at Napoleon face. Sand splattering all over his face.
He then calmly walked up to Napoleon and retorted, "I am not pale, Cowboy."
With that retort finally spoken, Illya walked past Napoleon and made his move on Gaby, "Let's go get some lunch, while Cowboy cleans himself up."
Gaby, who had just finished dressing and looked ready to go replied cheerfully, "Sure!"
She took the hand that Illya offered to her in hers and left the beach with him, leaving the sand covered Napoleon by himself.
While Napoleon took plenty of time getting sand out of his hair and face and making his personal appearance close to immaculate as possible, Gaby and Illya walked to a local sea food restaurant.
They found an empty table outside the restaurant with a splendid view of the beach. Illya took one of the menus provided and handed one to Gaby. They both read through it without saying anything to each other. Choosing food from any restaurant's menu was difficult when there was so many choices to choose from, so much so that Gaby turned to Illya advice and asked, "What should I get?"
Illya who was busy studying the contents of the menu carefully, did not mind the intrusion. He was glad it had happened. Gaby was a very independent woman and had her own strong opinions about certain things, so to have her turn to him for advice about anything was gratifying.
"Anything you want. It's up to you." Illya gave her a small smile.
"I just don't know what I feel like at the moment." She admitted, looking embarrassed at her indecision.
Seeing the difficulty Gaby was having choosing something to order Illya suggested, "If you can't decide, we can share something."
"I like the sound of that."
"We can order the antipasto, it's a sea food platter. Good for sharing." Illya told her and signalled a waiter to take their order. He showed him the number on the menu pertaining to their order, when Napoleon suddenly showed up at their table from behind and said, "Sorry I'm late, I had business to attend to." He then asked the waiter in Italian for a bottle of wine and an order of grilled fish.
"Did you get all the sand out of your eyes?" Illya asked making Gaby snicker, as Napoleon pulled a chair from behind him from a nearby table and sat down.
"Yes, thank you for noticing." Napoleon answered in overly polite way, as a way of irritating the one responsible for getting sand on his face in the first place.
"So what have you been up to? I hope Illya hasn't been boring you." Napoleon asked Gaby.
"No, we've just been enjoying the view and each other's company." Gaby recounted the moments she was with Illya fondly.
"Well, now you have my company to enjoy." Napoleon added, which Illya thought was a very unnecessary and obnoxious thing to say.
"Great!" Gaby exclaimed, oblivious to the sarcastic 'great' that Illya had muttered under his breath.
Afterwards there was silence for a moment, a silence Napoleon broke by recalling the trip on the train.
"That train ride sure was an ordeal, I've seen trenches less packed than that carriage. We were lucky to even get a seat."
"I didn't get a seat." Illya made sure to bring that fact up.
"You didn't? Oh, I thought you did." Napoleon feigned ignorance with an innocent tone and as a result awoke an anger in Illya that made the volatile Russian clench his fist.
But before the tension could escalate any further, the waiter arrived with their food, announcing both dishes and placed both plates on the table.
"This looks delicious." Gaby remarked when she saw the huge antipasto platter filled with an assortment of vegetables, cheeses, crackers and seafood, but began to think that perhaps they had ordered too much food.
Illya nodded in agreement and helped himself to some sardines and bread from the platter. As everyone ate their respective orders, Gaby finally decided what she truly felt like eating.
"Napoleon can I share that fish with you? I didn't know what to order before and now I know what I feel like eating."
"Of course!" Napoleon answered and gave her his knife and fork, leaving Illya to eat from the generous platter by himself. Which he did with gusto, which was the Russian way…
Such ardent eating did not go unnoticed by Napoleon, to which he quipped, "You sure eat a lot for a man who was sitting down most of the day."
"I need to eat to stay strong." Illya explained, turning what could be considered an insult into a strength and an opportunity to emphasize the requirements of his sturdy physique.
But Napoleon had a counter attack to his statement, because while Illya was busy eating from the platter Gaby had already finished the fish fillet and was getting up with Napoleon to leave.
"Since you're still eating you won't mind paying the bill, will you?" Napoleon assumed and leaned in close to Gaby and said with a smile, "Let's go get some ice-cream, my treat." Making Gaby beam.
"Don't forget to leave a tip." Napoleon added before leaving, leaving Illya one step behind in their ongoing game of outdoing each other.
If you read this story, then I want to thank you because I really appreciate it.
After I finished the movie and saw the credits, the one thing I remembered quite well was a single photo of Napoleon holding Gaby in his arms. So I wanted to have a go at writing a fun story with similar cute moments like that.
This is my first story about The Man From U.N.C.L.E, so any feedback about it would be most welcome.