When you graduate summa cum laude from one the country's best universities, you expect to attract some attention. When you parlay that into a psychology doctorate a year later, you can also expect a little more than just a passing nod from some of the better practices.
I was sitting, pondering the wonderful opportunities that my future offered when this little old man wandered through the door. After listening to him for a few minutes, I was ready to toss him out on his ear, within another five minutes, I was intrigued and before half an hour had passed, I was his hook, line and sinker. Perhaps it was a mistake to give up an opportunity to work in a private practice, or perhaps UNCLE is the most private practice of them all.
My job is simple. I listen and for that I am paid a huge amount of money. Occasionally, I offer a comment, some encouragement, but mostly it's just sitting and letting people talk.
Oh, sorry, my name is Dr. Bill Wallach and I'm the head psychologist for UNCLE, an international organization that protects and aids the countries beneath its umbrella. Our agents are placed into some of the most horrific situations imaginable, asked to make decisions that no man should have to make. They confront terrible things, often with only their wits and their fists at their disposal. Some of them come back unscathed, others are damaged down to their very core. And then there are those who function, holding onto sanity with just their finger tips. My job is to make them sane and whole again. That's not always possible, of course, and I have seen a number of truly gifted men and women sacrificed in the name of world freedom and UNCLE's cause.
I don't mean to make it sound so tragic. The number of agents we have is staggering and the ones permanently scarred very small, but that is still too many in my book. So I do what I can to mend the mind the way a doctor mends the body.
That's providing that it's what the agent actually wants, of course. Some of them need a little insanity to do their job. It gives them a buffer, a pressure valve if you will. And Waverly, our big boss, lets them – he tolerates some outrageous behavior because I think he truly believes these men need to be a little crazy to do their job. Perhaps he's right. I've seen broken husks of men brought in and all they can think about is getting it together enough to head back into the field and have it happen all over again. Or maybe they all share this one giant death wish.
Take for example the leader of the pack and his trusty sidekick.
Napoleon Solo is one of the sanest insane people I have ever met. He's a walking definition of a dozen different conditions, practically being the poster child for the Cannon –Bard Theory. That's the theory that we experience emotion first and then the physical reaction to a situation. He's the embodiment of the accommodation, fluid intelligence, Heuristic, and the libido definitions. And you can get all of that just by shaking his hand.
Napoleon is our chief enforcement agent, in charge of Section Two. These are the young men, and now young women as well, who carried out the orders from Section One. They are our front line of defense, and because of that, the ones I see on a daily basis. If I'm not picking up the pieces leftover from a confrontation with THRUSH, the very worst of the bad guys in our world, I'm just doing maintenance to keep everything together. I frequently go home feeling a little like that Dutch boy at the dike, but with more holes than I have fingers to stop them up. It took awhile, but I finally understood why the job was so well paying, with so many benefits. I don't know what happened to the last guy in my position, but I suspect he has his own special room at UNCLE's retirement facility, with soft padded walls and no sharp implements.
What amazed me was that Napoleon hadn't already preceded me into that room. Before these young people are brought into the insanity of UNCLE, they are thoroughly investigated. By the time they sign on the bottom line, UNCLE knows everything there is to know about them from the moment of their conception to what they had for breakfast that morning. He'd lost his wife, he'd been through some really bad crap in Korea, he'd watched partner after partner die, and you'd think he didn't have a care in the world.
People think he has commitment issues, but he's very committed. Just not to a woman. This doesn't mean that I don't think the right person could come along and sweep him off his feet, just the opposite. For now, I think he is totally focused upon his job and that's enough for him.
And his partner, he is totally focused upon his partner. I don't mean that in the way you think I do. Napoleon has had four partners shot out from underneath him, figuratively speaking, and I think he's totally committed to keeping this one alive and breathing. He's not stupid and he knows what he's doing.
I don't know how Kuryakin feels about it. It's not for a lack of asking, mind you. Whenever Napoleon's partner is due for his quarterly exam, I always clear my calendar, knowing that it will take most of the morning or afternoon to peel away a few of the layers.
It's not that Kuryakin won't talk, he will; he'll chatter on like some crazed monkey and at the end of the session, you'll realize you know less than when you started. He will tell you everything you want to hear and nothing that he doesn't want to share. It's infuriating, it's maddening and it's completely against company policy. And yet, he knows the rules as well as I do. After a stressful mission and once a quarter, he begrudgingly presents himself in my outer office and we spend the next hour playing verbal 'duck and goose.'
So when my nurse called me and said that Kuryakin had requested to talk with me, I knew something very big was happening.
It had been a rough few months for both him and his partner, one bad assignment after another; they triumphed, but at tremendous cost. I'd met informally with Napoleon and I could see the cracks forming in what I'd thought had been the most solid relationship in the entire organization.
It was those files I requested and quickly thumbed through while I waited to see if the Russian would really show up – requesting is one thing, presenting oneself front and center very different. In one Affair, Kuryakin had nearly tortured his partner to death; in another one, he was used a bait to lure Napoleon very nearly to an untimely death. He'd been brainwashed to shoot his partner on sight, drugged and beaten into a such delusional state that Napoleon had to literally drag him out of it. No wonder the partnership was suffering.
A soft beep on my desk told me he had indeed shown up and I walked to the door to show him in.
He came in quietly and sat on the edge of the couch. I didn't know why it was even in the office, came with it and it's expected, I suppose.
He clasped his hands in front of him. I noticed the knuckles of one were bruised and scabbed. He looked good, not suffering from lack of sleep or weight loss that I could tell. But there was something about him, a resignation, and a weariness of spirit.
I sat and just waited. I'd had sessions with other agents in which they spent the entire time just sitting, without saying a word. It was as if they just drew strength from making the effort to see me and I wondered if that would be the case now.
"How do you know when it's time to move on?" His voice always surprised me, especially like now when the British accent is sparring with the Russian. "And how do you find the strength to do it?"
"I don't understand."
He glanced over at my desk where the reports rested and he smiled slightly. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out which ones they were.
"Yes, sadly, you do. It's all there in black and white. In the past four months, I have placed a tremendous burden upon our partnership. I do not know if it's due to a lack of focus or ineptitude on my part."
"That German was your doppelganger, how can you attribute that to a lack of focus or ineptitude?"
"Had I been more clever, I would have been able to better avoid or anticipate the situation."
"That's anticipatory coping, Mr. Kuryakin. It has nothing to do with your intelligence. We all engage in it, but rarely is it played out as we imagine. By taking the events as they happen, you are best able to judge the proper course. It is well within reason to believe that had you attempted to mold the events into one or two scenarios, your partner would be dead now and possibly so would you…"
"Napoleon is very… tactile… now he avoids any sort of casual physicality. I never realized the importance I placed upon it until it was no more."
"Reciprocal determinism, it means…"
"I am familiar with the term, Doctor. Next you will be asking me if I have sexual fantasies with regards to my partner."
"Do you?"
"Permit me to suggest another term which you will recognize - resistance. Whether there is or not, that remains between Napoleon and me."
I smiled. "And sometimes a cigar is just a cigar."
"Pardon?"
"Nothing. You mentioned you are thinking of moving on. From UNCLE, from Section Two or from New York entirely?"
"I don't know. I am still trying to decide."
"You haven't filed the paperwork, then?"
"No."
"I want you to tell me something. When did you last take a vacation…a real honest-to-God vacation?"
"Discounting medical leave?"
"That's something only a Section Two would ask. Not counting medical leave."
"A couple of years ago, Napoleon had a… friend who needed some help."
"No, I mean, you, when did you do something just for Illya?" He started to look uncomfortable now and I struggled to keep my expression professional and not grab him by his jacket lapels and shake him. First off, that wouldn't be professional and secondly, he'd probably drop kick me into next Sunday. "I'm not asking you to recite the Magna Carta, Mr. Kuryakin."
"That I might be able to do with some degree of certainty."
"I thought as much." I reached for my pad and started to write. "I'm prescribing some down time for you."
"What?"
"I think you need to get away, some place where you can think, really consider all your options without interference and influence. Only you, Waverly and the travel agent will know where you're headed."
"Not Napoleon?"
"Especially not Napoleon. You need to get your head on straight about whether or not you two can continue to work together. That's not going to happen if he's in contact with you. I'm recommending a month, but I'm sure you can extend it if you need to."
"A month?"
"At least. And if you try to come back to work before then, I'll have you out of the field so fast your head will spin and it will be at least six months before you see any action at all."
"That's blackmail."
"I prefer to think of it as behavior modification. We psychologists have a term for everything."
"And if I agree to this? What then?"
"Up to you. If you still want to be reassigned, I'm certain that Mr. Waverly will do it. He probably won't like it, but it's a decision only you can make. .. A decision that only you shouldmake."
He stood up, slowly, and I rose with him. "Go make the arrangements with travel; I'll talk to Mr. Waverly."
"Napoleon won't like this."
"Napoleon can go to hell." He left not making a sound and I watched after him. Then I went to my desk and flipped a toggle up. "Suzie, could you come here for a moment?"
She appeared at the door, a combination of concern and curiosity on her face.
"Doctor?"
"Mr. Kuryakin was never here."
"Yes, Doctor." She frowned, but I knew I could count on her discretion.
It was about four days later when my door opened early in the morning. I looked up a bit startled because no one walked through my door without knocking. No one except a very angry looking Section Two CEA.
"Where is he?"
"Good morning, Mr. Solo. Do you have an appointment?"
"Cut the crap, Bill, where is he?"
"Who, Mr. Solo?"
"Illya!"
"You can't keep track of your own partner, Mr. Solo? That seems a bit careless of you."
"Damn it, don't play me, I'm not in the mood. I wake up in Medical and all I've been told is that he's taking vacation for a month."
"And why is that a problem, Mr. Solo?"
"Because Illya doesn't take vacations … ever! I've spent the better part of the last four months…" He stopped then and shook his head slowly. "I will find him…"
And then he was gone. Even though it was just eight o'clock in the morning, I reached into a drawer and pull out a Cuban cigar – there are times I love working for an international agency. I smelled it, taking a moment just to let the scent of the tobacco infuse my senses. Then after carefully trimming the end, I lit it and took a deep drag, replaying the scene again in my head.
Freud was wrong, you see, because sometimes a cigar, like the relationship between two people, is so much more than it first appears. Here one man is desperate to escape the other out of concern for his well being while the second man is just as anxious to hold onto him for exactly the same reason. I didn't know how this was going to play out, but I can certainly say one thing. My days are never quiet…