Illya Kuryakin pushed a stack of papers aside and hazarded another glance at the clock. The minute hand seemed frozen in place. He tried not to worry. It wasn't like this was the first time Napoleon had been late to work. No, that was a fairly common occurrence, but it wasn't like him to miss a Section Heads meeting or a debriefing with Waverly. The Old Man had been all over him this morning, determined to know where his wayward partner was. And Illya had no idea.
He'd sat through the Section Head meeting, reporting when called upon. As second in charge of the Section, he knew as well as Napoleon what was going on and what needed to be done. The other heads treated him just as they would have Napoleon, deferring to him in matters of external security and for advice in man power. But Illya didn't like it.
He opened another roster and started scanning the details of the report. Then he heard the door whisper open and he nearly shouted for joy at the sight of his very disheveled partner. Nearly, but not quite. Instead he set his face into a frown and shook his head.
"In my country, they have a saying. You look like you've been ridden hard and put away wet."
"That pretty much sums it up." Napoleon struggled to a chair and Illya's good natured tease left him. The man looked in serious distress.
"Napoleon, what happened? Were you attacked?"
"I should have been so lucky. No, last night I had a date with Maddie from Translation."
"And something occurred to you to result in this condition?"
"I took her to dinner... Del Marco's."
"Very nice."
"And dancing." Napoleon eased himself into a chair and winced.
"Of course."
"And then we went back to her place for a night cap."
"So I assumed. This sounds like a normal evening for you. What happened?"
"Have you ever made love to music?" Napoleon placed his hands over his face and rubbed.
The question caught Illya by surprise and he puzzled for a moment, but his partner was dead serious. "Not as a rule. Why?"
"Me neither, as a rule, but Maddie wanted to. Being a gentleman, of course I let her pick out the music."
"And."
"She's a big fan of Herman's Hermits."
"Of whose whats?"
"It's a British group, like the Beatles, but not much like the Beatles." Napoleon dropped his hands and sighed. "Um, Mrs. Brown, You've Got a Lovely Daughter; There's a Kind of a Hush, that sort of thing."
"Yes, I've heard those. Not exactly cutting edge..."
"Her favorite song is Henry the VII."
"Oh?"
"And she played it again and again."
"A bit tedious, but surely you had other things to concentrate upon."
"You don't understand. It's a two-minute song and each time she played it, she wanted to... um... you know..."
"Climax?" Illya made an involuntary face and patted his partner on the shoulder. "Tough beans, old man," he said in his best Cockney accent. "Send a boy in to do a man's job..."
Napoleon's response was physically impossible and Illya chuckled. After a moment, Napoleon joined in.
A week later found Napoleon hunting and pecking his way through a report, cursing his absent partner each his finger strayed to the wrong key. How the Russian made typing look so easy was a mystery to him. He'd just about had enough when the door opened and his partner limped in. The man looked like he'd been hit and dragged by a very determined truck.
"So shoe's on the other foot, eh?" Napoleon didn't need to ask to know that Illya has spent the night in the arms of the fair Maddie. "I did warn you."
"Just shoot me now."
"Can I get you anything?"
"A gun and an ice pack, in roughly that order." Illya eased down into his chair and whimpered softly.
"Better yet, I'll call Benson and get him to work you in. He'll get those kinks out."
"I don't need a massage, I need a surgeon."
"It isn't that bad, Illya. I survived, so will you. It just feels as if you won't for awhile..."
"You don't understand." Illya's voice faltered for a moment and he cleared his throat. "She's gone off Herman's Hermits, you see."
"Well that's a good thing, isn't it?"
"Now her favorite song is "Yakkity Sax..."
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