"Daddy?"

Illya hummed, acknowledging that he was listening, but not tearing his thoughts away from the plan he was making in his head. He vaguely remembered how to break into the CIA base if necessary, but it was all about the little details.

"Daddy… if the CIA want be for Papa, shouldn't I go to them?"

Immediately Illya snapped out of his thoughts and turned to his son his shock, "What did you just- "

"- I don't want them to kill Papa."

There was a brief moment of silence, before Illya, slipped out of his chest, moving to his knees opposite his son, gently encouraging his son to look him in the eye.

"Do you know, how long I have wanted us to be family?" Illya asked, "Form the moment you were tiny baby, with tiny fingers reaching for the light."

Lyov was silent, eyes widening as his Dad continued.

"I remember your first steps… I wanted you to be able to run free, outside in snow, not as a training mission." Illya took a deep breath, "I wanted you to be able to wear something that wasn't grey, white or black. I wanted to go star-gazing, show you what full moon look like. I wanted to teach you how to fish, how to play ball games... I wanted you to be normal kid."

Lyov was clearly stunned by the admission, however Illya had one last thing to say.

"You are my miracle child… but the CIA won't see a child. They will only see weapon." Pulling his son into a hug, Illya took several deep breaths in order to calm down, "We will find another way to save Napoleon. I promise."

"But- "

"- no buts. It is time for bed." Illya lifted the five-year-old into his arms and headed over to the modest bed that was in the room, "We have a lot of work to do tomorrow."

When he turned to head back to his plans, Lyov cautiously spoke up. "We are going to get him back… right? Papa?"

"… No matter what my little lion. No matter what."

…..

"You're looking a little paranoid there, Sanders!"

Sanders ignored him, frowning as he read through the warrant and law-suit that Waverly had hand-delivered straight into his hands.

He still didn't know how the man and his little pretty secretary even got into his office.

Needless to say, he'd ordered a complete lock-down. No-one gets in and no-one gets out. No communication comes in or out and everyone is checked.

Napoleon Solo, of course, was finding the whole thing hilarious, especially as the number of guards around his cell was doubled.

"How much is your boss willing to defend you?" Napoleon ignored the warning hisses from the guards, "Because I can bet when this all goes to shit, and the CIA are exposed as being completely corrupt, he'll drop you like a hot potato!"

"I am the boss Solo, or did you forget that?"

"Awww…" Napoleon pouted, despite the smirk on his face, "… you know as well as I do, that you're not the boss of everything. There's always someone higher than you."

Sanders remained silent at this, muscles tensing as Napoleon started to hum the National Anthem suggestively. When the humming got louder and louder, Sanders snapped.

"This is only going to get worse for you and your little family…" he growled, "… I want you and that Russian to watch! Watch as I ruin your little family and make that brat into what he was expected to be! A weapon! To be used at our disposal!" A wicked smile then appeared on his face, "Imagine the potential Solo… A child assassin. Nobody will ever see it coming."

"Except UNCLE." Napoleon wasn't smiling anymore, but he wasn't going to let Sanders know that the words were getting to him, "Hence the reason Waverly is currently suing you and being a pain in the ass."

Sanders just smirked, glancing over at the guards who straightened up. "Grab him and bring him to my office. I have no doubt your pet Russian is coming for you… it'll be easier for you all to be in the same room, hmmm?"

Napoleon remained silent.

He didn't want to give Sanders the satisfaction of knowing that he was right.

"Agent Solo!" Waverly immediately got to his feet as the American was shoved into the room, "Are you alright?"

It wasn't hard to spot the bruises.

"Been better." As the door locked behind him, Napoleon glanced at the camera in the corner of the room. "I feel like we're not trusted."

"Hurtful isn't it."

In the blind-spot, Napoleon spotted Gaby pulling a bunch of broken devices from her pocket and crushing them either further.

'Does the camera have sound?' he signed to her, sighing when she nodded, "'Any word on my favourite Russian?'

She gave him a reassuring smile… which didn't actually help.

That smile usually meant that Peril was about to be in a whole lot of trouble.

She couldn't believe what she was seeing.

Standing in the lobby, literally a few feet away from her desk, was a sobbing child. Clearly lost, he'd stumbled into the building, tears streaming down his face as he wailed in displeasure.

He couldn't have been older than five.

"Mommy!" he cried out, the sound echoing throughout the room, "Mommy!"

Her heart panged with the sheer desperation in the child's voice, and even though she knew she wasn't technically allowed to, she couldn't help but make her way around to the front of her desk, moving to crouch in front of the poor child.

"What's wrong sweetie?" she asked, keeping an eye out for a possible frantic parent, "Are you lost?"

"I-I-I-I turned to look at the pretty flowers and then Mommy was gone!"

There was a very beautiful florist nearby, it wasn't completely unreasonable to assume that a child would become distracted.

Still… there was something off about all this.

Her instincts said no, but that deep desire within her, the desire to be a mum and have children of her own, drowned out her instincts and she found herself going back to her desk and putting up the sign that sad 'Out for Lunch', making sure the phones went straight to the secondary desk upstairs, before taking the child's hand and gently leading him back outside, knowing that it was likely that the boy's mother was looking for him outside.

But the streets outside were empty.

The child suddenly broke free, racing towards an alleyway. In her haste to try and stop him, she didn't even think about the possible dangers… not until someone grabbed her wrist and pulled her into the darkness of the alleyway.

"Good work." A blonde-haired man praised the child, who was nervously biting on his lip, "Sorry about this…" he was addressing her now, "… but we need pass."

She glanced down at the pass that was hanging around her neck. "I-I only have access to the bottom floor!" she desperately pleaded, "Storerooms and all that!"

The man smiled… if it was meant to be reassuring, it failed miserably.

"That's all I need."

…..

With the poor woman unconscious (chloroform of course, not through violence… he's not a savage), and tied up in one of the dumpsters, Illya had donned the outfit of a basic cleaner, cap pulled low over his face.

"I'm coming to! I'm coming to!"

Illya turned to his son, frowning as the child stared up at him in defiance. "No. You are not."

"But- "

"You are too young." Illya gestured at the dumpster, "You keep an eye on woman."

Just as he turned to leave, Lyov spoke up again.

"You won't fit in the vents…. You're too big."

"… You do not know that that was what I was going to do."

Lyov just smirked.

It was then that Illya realised that the KGB would probably have given Lyov the exact blueprints of the CIA building, giving him the weak spots so that one day, if the CIA ever wanted him, Lyov would be the key to their un-doing.

"Okay…" Illya whispered, "… new plan."