Recovery was a long and tedious affair. The blood loss meant Napoleon was still weak, wobbly on his feet, had to take iron supplements and drink a lot. The bullet wound was an added complication and he needed physical therapy. Rehab was painful and exhausting. He was light-headed most of the time and sometimes had to lean against a wall before he fell down.
Illya was always there with him, silent, supportive – and hovering. A wall of strength, letting Napoleon lean against him, and the psychic energy coming across the bond was incredible. It was sometimes the only thing that kept him going, especially throughout the grueling rehab time.
Sure, Illya scared the therapists, but he was a well of unspoken support and he had his back. In so many ways.
Napoleon wanted to be annoyed, but he was also silently tickled.
He kind of enjoyed himself - when he wasn't sleeping away half the day after breakfast, because it had tired him out. For a week after getting home it was all he had done: eat, sleep, eat, sleep, try to be up for more than an hour.
It got better after that. He got his mobility back, he could string two coherent thoughts together, and food no longer tasted bland.
Illya never changed. His pitbull of a bodyguard, the worry wart.
UNCLE*
Any kind of strenuous activity was frowned upon. Not that Napoleon had anything to give in those first days after he got home. He was too tired to even shave properly, let alone make an effort to dress in more than loose clothes that he normally wouldn't be caught dead in.
Illya gave him a sharp look just once, when he tried to put on more representable clothes and ended up dizzy, leaning against the wall, trying not to keel over.
After that, and since it was only them most of the time, he forewent the outfits.
It was actually quite nice. Leisurely. Almost too domestic to take, Napoleon mused. Illya's cooking skills were rather simple, but the food tasted really good. Napoleon enjoyed it, the calm and quiet atmosphere, though both men hadn't lost their edge.
Checking for bugs was normal and always would be. Just like checking for possible observers, tails and cameras.
It was their life.
UNCLE*UNCLE*UNCLE*UNCLE*UNCLE*UNCLE*
"Huh."
Illya looked up from his newspaper. Stretched out on the bed, all lean, long lines and muscles, he was a distracting picture most of the time, but today something else had caught Napoleon's attention. Though it had taken something quite strange for his attention to wander away from the mostly naked man.
Which was no small feat. Peril was built like a wall, tall, well-proportioned everywhere, and was an all-out attractive package.
One that belonged to Napoleon alone.
Yeah, he could be quite possessive.
And since sex was still out of the questions, aside from some kissing and touching, Napoleon was easily distracted by his Sentinel.
Except now.
"Cowboy?"
The question held a careful undercurrent, probing, ready to switch from playful to serious and battle-ready.
Napoleon's eyes never strayed from a particular spot of the carpet in their apartment.
"Do you have any pets I don't know of, Peril?"
He could almost imagine the scowl on the handsome features. "Pets?"
"Gray, black paws, really furry. Extremely so. A puffball of fur. Looks kinda like a fox."
There was a rustle of paper and then Illya was there, next to him, this irremovable fact in Solo's life. Steady and still volatile, his own anchor and also the sharpest weapon in anyone's arsenal. Ever since his near-death experience that fact had been driven home more clearly. The bond had become… more solid.
"Ah," he rumbled, eyes on the same spot.
"Ah?"
Blue eyes crinkled at the edges as Napoleon turned his head to look at him. Illya didn't look alarmed, more like genuinely, pleasantly surprised and intrigued.
"Ah," he echoed. "I thought I had hallucinated it."
"And you aren't now?" Solo asked, eyebrows climbing.
"You see it, too, Cowboy."
"Yeah." Napoleon wrinkled his brow. "Wait. When did you see it?"
"When Vinciguerra beat you with tire iron. Briefly. In the underbrush. I had thought it was… wildlife."
And the concussion hadn't helped. He had just crashed the motorbike down a hill. It had landed squarely on him and Illya's vision had been fading, graying at the edges, only his rage driving him on.
Napoleon chewed on his lower lip, then nodded. "So… it's real?"
"No."
"Huh."
"It is a spirit animal."
Napoleon blinked, looking at the fluffy fox that sat in the middle of their room, a playful glint in its eyes. If it was definitely a fox, but a truly strange one. He had never seen such a color before. The gray seemed to turn gray-blue in places. There was also a white dot on the back of each ear, only visible when those large ears turned like little radar dishes.
It looked adorable, but also surreal. Like it was fading out around the edges.
"It must be yours," Illya said casually.
"Mine?!"
The blond just shrugged.
Napoleon had no spirit animal. Never, in all his life.
Then he recalled the shadowy things that had popped in on and off lately. Ever since…
Well, fuck.
He had… a weird fox. He wasn't a Guide, but he had a spirit animal that looked unlike anything he knew from biology books or zoos.
"You are surprised?"
"Uh, kinda. I…"
"Ah, yes. Not a Guide," Peril just teased, shooting him an almost mischievous look. "Shields have them, too, or so it seems."
And Sentinels. Like Illya.
The fox suddenly yipped, though no real noise escaped him, and Napoleon saw it.
"Holy shit," he breathed.
He had only ever thought he ha seen this. Now it appeared real. Very, very real.
The darkness flowed closer, inky black and dangerous looking, but it wasn't. Napoleon had never been afraid of it.
Huge paws stepped out of the blackness, coalescing more and more into an animal.
A huge, surreal animal.
Wolfish… Wolf, he thought faintly. But one freakishly strange one. Too large, too massive, too much… simply there. With icy eyes and darkness roiling all over it, tendrils of it wafting around the thing, giving it no clear shape. It towered over the fox, which twisted its head and looked up at the monstrous thing.
It seemed unperturbed.
Actually, it looked quite content. The fox's tongue lolled and it seemed to grin at the freakish wolf.
The wolfthing glanced at the fox, almost fond, slightly exasperated, and then annoyed when the fox pushed its nose at its jaw. Those jaws opened and dagger-like teeth, too long to be real, showed.
"Yours?"
Illya looked almost contemplative. He didn't seem to be horrified by the wolfthing, nor alarmed.
"Like you, Cowboy, I never had one. I didn't believe I could have one. It looks strange."
Solo gave him a wry grin. "Must be yours then, Peril. So what do we do with them?"
"Do?"
Napoleon was at a loss somehow. He had a spirit animal. Some kind of bouncy fluff ball of a fox that snuggled up to a nightmarish creature like it was just another cuddly creature. What did one do with a spirit animal? What use was it?
The wolf gave an inaudible huff and nuzzled against the fox, which looked terribly pleased at that. It leaned against one sturdy leg, a leg that seemed to go in and out of solidity, appearing completely content.
Illya made an intrigued sound, still watching. He stood right behind Napoleon, as always not touching, but he didn't need to. His presence was like an embrace.
The wolfthing, still more surreal than a fact – unlike its Sentinel, in real life – part of it wispy and flowing, though the huge paws with their long claws looked very real.
As did the golden eyes.
Golden.
Go figure, Napoleon thought.
The wolf curled up, a too smooth move for such a huge animal to make it look natural, and the fox clambered over it, burying in the inky darkness. Its head popped out, the expression smug, and it seemed to laugh at the two men.
Cheeky little thing.
Napoleon grinned.
"So… this is what Sentinels see in their meditations?"
Illya hummed. "Never saw one before now. No meditation."
Right.
Napoleon glanced at his partner, then his eyes drifted back to the unlikely pair of animals. Their spirit animals.
He really needed to read up on some things. Or ask Sarah. Or accept that since both of them were completely out of the norm, their spirit animals were, too.
The shadowy wolfthing suddenly disappeared, the boiling mass of blackness turning into wispy tendrils, flowing like ink in water. The fox playfully snapped its jaws at the tendrils and they seemed to caress the gray animal, teasing and equally playful. The fox rolled onto its back, then did a three-sixty, and bounded around the smoky leftovers of the wolfthing.
Illya huffed a laugh and shook his head. "Is you, Cowboy. Definitely."
"This doesn't disturb you just a little bit?" Napoleon asked.
"No."
Right.
Solo stared at the display of the happily bounding fox surrounded by the dark tendrils, and suddenly even that faded away. He felt a momentary surge of alarm, then shook himself.
Not real, he reminded himself. Spirit animals.
And he needed a drink.
UNCLE*
"So… I'm a fox."
Illya bit back a laugh at the expression on Solo's face. The man was clearly still struggling with the concept of a spirit animal, though the Russian thought it fit his partner perfectly. Not just because foxes were extremely smart and cunning, but also because of the playfulness it had exhibited.
Yes, Napoleon was playful.
Very much so.
The man was a thief and gambler, yes. He was a womanizer, a playboy if he needed to be, charming and suave. It was taught to agents, KGB or CIA. Illya had been on the receiving end of such lessons, but it had never been easy for him. Going through the motions, but still unnatural.
Yes, he had been taught how to bed women and men, but it didn't come easy to a man like him.
Solo… he was a natural. He didn't need lessons. This was him, the player, and he adjusted his game on the fly. There was the plan and then there was the way Napoleon executed the seduction.
A true master, fascinating to watch.
But it was a mask. All of it, except that playfulness, that love of life and its good things. That was Napoleon. That smart, witty, and playful man. Complicated, a tangle mass that Illya was slowly pulling apart and getting to know. Strong, loyal, bowing to no one, and proud.
"Are you?"
Napoleon gave him a baleful look. "That wolfthing was clearly yours, Peril. Down to a T."
"Wolfthing," he echoed, almost laughing.
"It sure as hell wasn't a real wolf!"
"Spirit animals aren't real, Cowboy."
"You're a riot."
Napoleon plopped down on the bed beside him. While they had separate bedrooms, they usually spent most of their time in just one. Illya abandoned the newspaper and studied his Shield.
The changes were almost palpable for him. The past months had cemented the fact that while he was a Sentinel without a Guide and had always been able to work perfectly fine, he had needed Napoleon Solo as his Shield to truly live.
It was a freedom that was hard to put into words. He didn't need him to pull out of zones. He needed him to let go and be human, something other than the Sentinel. His rage was still his darkness, still there, but calmer.
No touch was needed. Just the connection between them.
Touching where Napoleon was bonded to his soul. The calmness was freeing. It was a wholly new experience.
He was free.
The KGB had relinquished its hold on him, the CIA no longer possessed his partner. They were only answering to Waverly. It was just now really settling in, long after he had been told by Waverly that he was solely an U.N.C.L.E. agent now. His country wouldn't want him back because of his American Guide.
Illya felt a surge of emotions that weren't all his own and he looked into two intense, blue eyes that reflected his thoughts.
Still of two countries locked in a power struggle, but for them the struggles were no longer their priority. Their missions were different ones.
He could do this.
Perfectly.
Illya let his senses roam, taking in his partner, his Shield, felt the man's presence with him, physically as well as psychically bonded. Napoleon had fit like a missing piece, into a slot that had opened only after he had met the man.
He reached over and Napoleon easily let himself get pulled into a kiss.
"I think I love you, Cowboy."
It got him a little chuckle against their touching lips. Illya had the memory of an elephant, recalling the tiniest fragments of a conversation that had happened months ago. And it had become a teasing joke between them.
"I think I love you, too Peril," Napoleon replied.
And those words shouldn't make him tingle and warm, shouldn't launch a torrent of emotions.
"And you are a fox," Illya added.
It got him raised eyebrows.
"Perfect animal for you, Cowboy."
"Huh."
Illya smiled playfully and he thought he saw a shadow whisk around them, large and dark. Something smaller was briefly there, then both were gone again.
"Not the most… corporeal," Napoleon remarked. "Not that I want to see imaginary animals. It's… distracting."
Illya nodded. He had never seen his own before now and he doubted the wolf would be around all too often. Or the fox.
"Let's hope not," Solo murmured when he voiced those thoughts. "It would be like having two rather freaky pets."
Illya blinked, looking a little bemused, and Napoleon pulled him into another kiss, this time a little more intense, heavier, clearly wanting.
"Cowboy…" Illya warned as they separated.
"Come on," he whined. "I'm okay. Just… a little?"
The blond was clearly all there, wanting the same, but there was the worry, the concern, the apprehension, and the fear of hurting the other man.
"Illya, I'm fine," Napoleon insisted. "Really! Just… please?"
He caved. Slowly.
Because he wanted it, too.
tbc...