Standing on the sidewalk in London outside a shiny business building, the two UNCLE agents were suddenly at a loss. Logic dictated that they should be heading directly back into the building to confront THRUSH. Actually, that wasn't logic, that was gut instinct which was trying hard to refute logic insisting that either THRUSH would be long gone or there would be entirely too many of them to take on by themselves. There was no guarantee that Cheri was still in the building.
Above them there was a mighty crash. They ducked instinctively as glass shards dropped to the sidewalk to the left and around them. Making sure the people around them were all right, they looked up. Halfway to the corner of the building, up on about the tenth floor a window was broken out and something on a rope dangled above them, kicking and turning until it went still. Napoleon made sure there wasn't anyone directly under the body before exchanging a look with his partner.
"Maybe it is wise not to get on her bad side," the Russian observed. They walked away from the scene. Other witnesses would tell the local police all they needed to know. Illya looked the tickets and stopped walking. "Napoleon ..."
"Hm?" He looked. "These are dated for three days from now."
They both looked back at the building. What game was she playing? Three days would give them time to find the other agents. Illya made a disgusted sound as they walked on.
MFUMFUMFUMFUMFU
Irae reported in to the London office to find the place in a quiet uproar. Solo and Kuryakin missing was not so disturbing as the disappearance of the two agents sent to retrieve them. All four were out of communication. Five minutes later, the missing New York operatives walked through the front door.
"Helena?"
"Miss Chase?"
"Hi. Mr. Waverly sent me to liaise with the London office until you were found. Damn. Short trip," she ended with a grin.
"Any trace of the two agents who found us?" Napoleon shelved his curiosity about the clerk being sent to liaise
A slender man with sandy hair worn longish, a turtle neck sweater hugging his lean torso, wandered up and shook his head. "Not a peep. What happened?"
The two men shrugged. "Left over gift from Crane's virus, apparently. We need to get this file to medical and make sure they check us out." Napoleon ignored his partner's sotto voce complaint that he was fine and medical annoyed him. "How are you and April?"
"Busy. Just back from Helsinki. Kidnapping and slavery. All taken care of. Mind you, April in harem outfit is not to be missed if you get the chance ..."
"And Mark in loincloth is laughable," his partner's voice chimed in behind them. "Medical is awaiting your arrival, gentlemen." She turned to her partner, auburn hair swinging slightly. "What happened to our agreement?" she asked sweetly.
"You didn't say anything about friends," he pointed out, his grin causing several secretarial agents in the area to forget what they were doing for a moment.
April sighed, rolled her eyes and smiled back. "All right. They're asking that we help find Oxblood and Cowl. Any ideas?"
"Someone said Blackpool, I think." Napoleon frowned. He had a hazy memory of a woman. Oxblood? No, Del. "One of them named Del?"
"Del Cowl, yes," Mark confirmed looking up from the report one of the still slightly glazed looking secretaries handed him.
April noted that things were serious as neither of the agents with a reputation for the ladies was paying any attention. "Napoleon, Illya, medical. Now. You can join us later if you get a clean bill of health. Off you go." She shooed them toward the hallway and out of the room.
"She is THRUSH," Illya grumbled as they walked down the hallway.
"Yes, she is," Napoleon agreed. "But not the general run of THRUSH heavy hitter. Wonder what the date on the other flight was."
They entered the medical section and were swept away for tests, tests and more tests while Napoleon worried at the ex-UNCLE agent's motivations and Illya wished to be somewhere else, anywhere else. Several hours later the results showed that Napoleon carried no residual viral contamination. Illya, on the other hand, worried medical. There were odd things in his bloodstream they could not identify so they let him take a look.
Napoleon wandered in to see what his partner was doing.
"Don't touch anything."
"All right." Napoleon perched on a lab stool without using his hands. "What's up?"
"Nothing."
"Illya, this is me. Your partner. Even when it's annoying, we share. We discuss. And we don't keep secrets on a mission unless we're ordered to do so."
That got a nod and a sigh. "And sometimes, even then, we do not keep them." Illya sank onto his own stool. "There is an infection. It is … it appears dormant. It does not match the virus of Dr. Crane's devising. It bears a resemblance to it, but either it has mutated or ..."
"Or you were infected with something else, something Crane didn't know about?"
The blond head bobbed. He met Napoleon's dark gaze. "I … I am ..."
"Worried?" the American supplied. He could feel the fear in his partner, but admitting that was not something either of them needed right now. "So, the upshot is that you're a carrier of a virus that no one can identify."
"Or isolate for very long." Ah. That was the worry. "It … shifts, disappears."
"Not like typhus or anything horribly infectious. So far no one else is showing any symptoms, so it is pretty much dormant. They can clear you for field."
"No."
"No?"
Another sigh and sag. "We do not know what could cause it to become active, we do not know what it does and I cannot become … Typhoid Illya." A touch of the Russian's occasionally fey humor showed at that.
"All right. What do we need to do to find out?"
"Testing. More testing. If I live long enough I may run out of samples," he ended glumly.
"No, not you. Although they might start cloning the samples. Apparently the English scientific community seems to think it's close to a breakthrough … with sheep."
Somehow that struck the Russian as funny. He snorted a laugh and smiled at his partner. "I doubt a Russian/sheep cross will work well."
"Goat," Napoleon offered. They both laughed.
"So, I'll join April and Mark on the hunt for our missing agents in Blackpool. You keep slogging away at this. Anything in the file that helps?"
"Not yet."
"You haven't looked at the file?"
"No, he hasn't," Helena Chase answered from the doorway, file in hand. "So, since no one else wants to take a look at the THRUSH file, I will. May I?" She gestured to the microscope Illya was using to stare at the virus. "Oh. Uhm … interesting." She avoided looking at either of them.
Illya caught her arm. "You recognize it?"
"I might. It looks similar to a virus that one of my instructors was trying to identify when I was an undergrad. I can see if he ever finished his study, if you'd like." She was lying. He knew it. She knew it. For the moment, Illya let it pass, any information, even if indirect, was a step forward. "I'll give him a call while I look through this." She walked out of the lab again.
"Why did she just lie to us?"
