Illya tries to pack quickly, but his compulsive need for neatness prevents him from throwing everything into his suitcase the way Gaby does, the way even Napoleon has when there's been a need for it. He's gotten pretty good at folding his clothes cleanly into his bag in a timely fashion, but this time it isn't timely enough. He's in the middle of fitting his socks into the margins of space at one edge of his suitcase when Gaby enters the room in a huff, a frown on her face. She stops at the edge of Illya's bed, opposite the Russian, and folds her arms over her chest.
"I don't know what Waverly is thinking!"
Illya swallows and stares intently at his suitcase, moving the same pair of socks around the same three empty spaces as he avoids making eye contact with the tiny angry German.
"I ought to march down to his office and tell him what I think," Gaby continues. "We're finally ready to go back into the field, and he's sending you alone?"
Illya clears his throat in discomfort, still moving the socks aimlessly around the inside of his suitcase. He isn't one to lie to the people close to him. But concealing truth, well...that's not really lying, now is it. And it's just as well she direct her anger at Waverly instead of him. After all, the Brit is, technically, the one sending him alone...
"And to Moscow, no less! From the stories you've told me of Russia and your boss, you could use the backup. And I don't mean one of Waverly's obedient dime-a-dozen foot soldiers. You should be going with someone you trust. I should tell him that. I'm going to tell him that!"
Illya looks up for the first time, eyes wide, and Gaby catches the expression on his face and her own expression shifts to one of suspicion.
"What's going on with you?" she asks. "That's the first time you've even looked at me since I got here."
He'd been hoping, foolishly, that she was too busy talking to notice. "Nothing is going on," he says, turning back to the pair of socks in his hand. Gaby rounds the bed and snatches the socks from him, jamming them into one of the empty spaces before slamming the suitcase shut and staying there, leaning against it and looking up at Illya, eyes narrowed.
"You've been avoiding me, Illya. What aren't you telling me?"
Illya doesn't answer, trying to simultaneously come up with a believable lie and also decide whether or not he'll be able to deliver it convincingly enough to fool Gaby.
"Illya!" Gaby says.
He swallows again. His mouth has suddenly become very dry. "It was not Waverly's idea."
"What wasn't?"
Illya feels his shoulders slump and he lets out a long breath, looking down and somewhere to the left, his eyes suddenly attracted to a spot of something on the carpet. He sees Gaby straighten out of the corner of his eye, and there's a noticeable shift in the air.
"You're leaving, aren't you?"
Illya looks up at her in shock, and is horrified to see tears in her eyes. "What?"
"Moscow." She leans back and lets out a harsh, mirthless laugh. "I should have known. After everything, everything we've been through, everything they have put you through, you're going back to them!"
"No!" Illya cries. "No, no, I am not leaving UNCLE, Gaby. I would not...But we won't be working together in the field anymore. I spoke with Waverly and he's agreed…"
Gaby's face hasn't changed from the look of betrayal and the angry tears are still brewing. "So you're not leaving UNCLE. You're just leaving me."
"I am not leaving you."
Gaby scoffs and furiously swipes the tears away. "Right," she says. "I suppose I should have seen this coming. We were a terrible match from the very beginning."
He hadn't expected a positive response, but her words are more hurtful than anything he'd prepared himself for. It flusters him. All of his prepared words (Napoleon is dead because of me. I can't be forced to choose between my duty and the people I love, not again. I care about you Gaby, deeply, and I just want you to be safe.) leave his mind and what comes out isn't even close.
"That-that is not true," he says. "And that's not it! Don't you-don't you see?. I am just trying to protect you. I am trying to keep you safe."
Gaby stares at him for a long moment, quietly seething. She moves so suddenly and so quickly that Illya doesn't have time to brace himself before the slap comes, fast and stinging. It startles him, but he doesn't feel the heat of anger that usually comes when someone hits him. Instead, he just feels sad, and guilty, and hollow.
"I do not need you to take care of me, Illya Kuyakin!" She's glaring at him, her fists balled at her sides. "I never asked you to take care of me! You aren't doing this for me. You're doing it because you are a coward. Solo is...he is gone. He's gone and he isn't coming back. There is nothing you or I can do about that. But these last weeks, I have been losing you, too. I have been watching you pull away from me more and more. After that night in his room together, I though that you would come back to me, but I was wrong. Solo was taken from me. But you? You're leaving and it's all your doing. Your choice."
She takes a deep breath, uncurling her fists and closing her eyes. When she opens them, they're cold. Hard. Her words are clipped and measured.
"I'm sorry I hit you. I understand your decision. It's fine, really. I was alone when UNCLE came to me and I was plenty effective. I can handle the field on my own. As can you, clearly. I wish you the best of luck, Agent Kuryakin, here or with the KGB or wherever you end up."
He watches her go, closing the door behind her, and he's unable to speak. His chest aches and he goes to take a step backward and stumbles instead, his back finding the wall. And then he sinks to the floor.
He wants to be angry. He wishes like hell that he were angry, or numb, or anything other than what he is.
Gaby was nearly right. His first instinct had been to go back to the KGB and not look back. He'd never felt pain like this when he worked for them. Hadn't felt much of anything, to be honest. He'd had his small pleasures-chess and reading and studying languages. And the ones he kept closer to him, like fashion and poetry. But mostly it was just the mission and the time until the next mission and that was it. No close relationships to make things messy.
To break his heart.
He'd stayed because of Gaby. And now he's pushed her away, which is the exact opposite of what he'd been trying to do except that he's an absolute kozel and the harder he tries to do the right thing the worse things turn out and the more alone he makes himself.
The desire to swallow his pride and go back is stronger than ever.
The truth is, he's not sure they'd have him. He'd betrayed the KGB when he burned the tape, and although they couldn't prove he'd ever had the tape in the first place, much less been the one who actually destroyed it, he knows that they suspect him. Even if that weren't the case, he knows that going back wouldn't give him what he's looking for, which is to get back to the old version of himself. The version of himself that didn't feel true happiness or joy or love, but which also didn't feel sadness and shame and heartbreak…That version of him is gone. Gaby and Waverly and that damned fucking American have ruined him.
He cares too much.
It's like a burn that keeps smoldering, leaving him wounded and vulnerable.
He doesn't know what to do.
So he stands. He opens his suitcase and carefully packs his socks. He will concentrate on his mission. And when he's finished, he'll wait for the next one. He'll throw himself into it and he'll readjust to working alone and maybe if he does it enough that will be the salve he needs to stop himself burning enough to go back to the man he was before (or something like him) and then he can leave and forget about his place and these people.
xxx
She walks out of the room and she doesn't look back because she knows if she does, she'll lose her resolve. She doesn't wipe her tears away, either, in case he's watching her. It makes everything blurry, but she can't let him know that she's crying. She knows she was harsher than she needed to be. Not the slap, but everything after.
He'd hurt her first.
It isn't just the leaving, but the fact that he didn't bother talking to her first. If he had, maybe she could have talked him out of it. At the very least, they could have had a good conversation. The going behind her back thing just pissed her off.
And now he's treating her like some sort of China doll. That's even worse. It's how her uncle (damn him; she hasn't spoken his name since that first mission) treated her after her father left. Not a doting concern, not the hovering, smothering kind. Instead, he distanced himself, as if being away could keep her from harm, or at least separate him from being responsible if anything did befall her.
It's exactly what Illya is doing now.
He can't wrap her in bubble wrap or lock her in a cabinet, so he's staying far away so that he can't take the blame if something happens. It's a horrible, cowardly thing to do, and selfish. And silly. He ought to know by now that Gaby's made of tougher stuff than that. And to be honest, if she is going to die on some mission (which she secretly hopes she does because she doesn't like the elderly and does not relish the idea of growing old) there's no one she would rather have by her side.
She thought he felt the same.
Evidently not.
Everything was so much easier before those two giant idiots had come crashing into her life with their bickering and spying and fashion.
She closes the door behind her as she finally reaches her room, and then flops facedown on the bed and cries and cries until she can't cry anymore and all that's left is hiccups. Once those subside, she rolls over onto her back and looks up at the ceiling.
She's used to relying on herself. That's what makes her tough, and smart. It's what had let her survive behind that fucking wall. If Illya wants to leave her, then so be it.
xxx