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It was cold out, and much wetter than Napoleon thought it had any right to be for the second week of January. Though considering it was also London, perhaps it shouldn't have been surprising. Napoleon beat the worst of the freezing dew off his jacket, shook his umbrella out and hooked it over his arm, and deemed himself presentable. He knocked smartly on the door.
There was a short pause and then Napoleon heard the quick march of footsteps before Gaby swung the door open. She stared at him, eyebrow arched suspiciously. “What are you doing here, Solo?”
“Hey, Gabs. Great to see you!” Napoleon rolled his eyes at her greeting and gestured past her with his suitcase. “Going to invite me in?”
Unmoved by the suggestion, Gaby merely propped a hand on her hip and leaned against her doorframe. Napoleon discreetly ran his gaze down her body. She didn’t look noticeably different than the last time he’d seen her, although the smock dress she wore was looser fitting than her normal garb. She snorted, letting him know she’d noticed him looking.
“Did Illya send you?”
“What? No.” Napoleon shook his head. “I’ve been called in for those two weeks of policy meetings at HQ, which you should know about seeing as you’re running half of them.”
Gaby looked exasperated. “I know why you’re in London. Why are you here at my flat?”
He waved his suitcase again. “I need a place to stay.”
“No.” Gaby crossed her arms. “Go stay at a hotel. Or stay with Waverley if you must.”
Napoleon made a face. “I tire of hotels in my old age. And Waverley--lovely man that he is--is far, far too British to take for long stretches at a time. He’d have me drinking tea and eating crumpets and God-save-the-Queen-ing before the day was out.”
Gaby smirked a little at that and Napoleon pressed his advantage. “And besides, you’re much more centrally located and have, as I recall, a much nicer guest bedroom.”
Gaby sighed again and straightened. “Illya really didn’t ask you to come and check on me?”
“Come on, Gaby.” Napoleon flashed her his most roguish smile. “When have I ever done something Peril asked me to do?”
“Well, that at least I believe.” Gaby's wry expression dissolved into something much more fond. She stepped back and waved him in. “All right, in you come. Try not to drip everywhere.”
Gaby fidgeted as Napoleon hung his things up, waiting until he was finished to smile at him apologetically. “You know I am glad to see you really. I’ve been in a mood lately.” She rubbed a hand across her forehead. “I think it’s just exhaustion; it’s been weeks getting these bloody meetings ready to go.”
“Hey, I know.” Napoleon tugged her closer and deposited a kiss on her cheek before he picked up his suitcase and followed the familiar length of her hallway to the back bedroom. “How is desk jockeying treating you anyway?” he asked.
“Well...” Gaby trailed after him, “it’s not field work. But at least it’s important planning operations--it doesn’t feel like they’re just keeping me busy. And I’m enjoying working with Waverley more closely. It probably would have been a natural progression for me, even without….”
They reached the guest bedroom, and Napoleon tried not to stare too hard at the small stack of boxes shoved against the wall beside something he suspected would eventually be a crib when it was assembled. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Gaby colour a little, and he quickly lifted his suitcase on to the bed and flipped it open with a flourish.
After a minute of watching him remove carefully folded items, Gaby cleared her throat deliberately. “So…have you--” she stopped and swallowed, and Napoleon looked up from his unpacking to see her twist the large watch around her wrist nervously. She started again. “Have you heard from Illya lately?”
“Not really,” Napoleon replied carefully. “Just a message drop a couple of weeks ago in the usual way. Seems to be okay, KGB keeping him busy, can’t say where he is.”
Gaby nodded. “Yes. That’s when I last heard, too.”
Napoleon turned to face her. “Does he know about...” he pointed to her middle.
Gaby nodded again. “He knows.”
Napoleon sighed. “You know he’s going to try with everything he’s got to be here, Gaby.”
“I know he will.” Gaby looked up at him, her gaze hard and unflinching. “Doesn’t mean he will be.”
Napoleon couldn’t think of anything to say to that, and he stood, shifting his weight back and forth awkwardly, until Gaby looked down at her watch again.
“Scheiße,” she muttered, “I’ve got to leave for this antenatal clinic.”
“Anti-naval?” Napoleon’s brow wrinkled in confusion. “Is that a new task force? Should I--”
“No!” Gaby interrupted him with a quick laugh. “Natal, not naval. As in.” She touched her stomach quickly, and Napoleon blushed a little as comprehension dawned.
“Right.” He rallied himself. “Do you need someone to…go with you?”
Gaby laughed again. “No, it’s only ten minutes from here, and fathers are decidedly not welcome. One’s American partner in a top-secret international spy organization even less so, I’d imagine.”
She turned back toward her front door and Napoleon fell into step behind her. “I shouldn’t be too long. Make yourself at home, as I’ve no doubt you will. Do try to restrain yourself from going through all of my things.” She shot him a look over her shoulder and Napoleon grinned back unrepentantly, relieved to be falling back to their usual bantering rhythm. He helped her on with her coat, and then stepped back as she wound a scarf around her neck, pulled a hat over her head, and hooked her handbag over one arm. She pinned him with a familiar stare when she was through, no less piercing than usual for all that she had nearly disappeared under layers of winter wear.
“If you really want to be helpful, you could make some decent food for when I get back.”
Napoleon rolled his eyes good naturedly. “Yes dear.”
“Arschloch,” Gaby shot back with a grin, before snatching up the umbrella he’d left dripping on her mat and walking out the door.
--
Napoleon didn’t go through all Gaby’s things, managing just to content himself with flipping through her impressive--if eclectic--vinyl collection, noting how many of the records would have been banned under Nazi, then Soviet, rule. He also rifled through the pantry of her small kitchen, which seemed to feature potatoes most heavily, with cabbage as a close runner-up. “So you can’t completely take the DDR out of the girl,” he muttered to himself with a smirk, and then grabbed a knife and set himself to chopping.
Gaby came home just as he was tidying up, wiping his hands on the dish towel he’d tucked into his belt since Gaby did not seem to believe in aprons.
She finished hanging her coat and then turned to him, sniffing the air appreciatively. “You did cook.”
“Stew.” Napoleon explained with a shrug. “It won’t be ready for another hour or so though. Sorry.”
“No that’s perfect.” Gaby kicked her shoes off and groaning, pushed her hands into the small of her back and stretched. “I’m stiff through and freezing besides; I think it’s going to turn to snow out there soon. I want a bath more than anything else, if you don’t mind.”
“Not at all.” Napoleon waved her off and she brushed past him on her way to her room. He noticed her left hand then, light catching on one familiar band nestled beside a much plainer one that he hadn’t seen before.
“So," he called out, keeping his voice deliberately casual, "how did the natal task force go?”
Gaby stopped and turned back to him, puzzled, before following his gaze to her ring finger.
“Oh.” She held her hand up for his inspection. “Over twenty years since the war ended and it’s still not easy making friends with those nurses as a German. As an unmarried German I make even fewer.” She shrugged. “It’s easier to lie. Like a little mission.”
Napoleon’s mouth twisted in sympathy. “Gaby….”
She shook her head quickly. “Not your fight, Napoleon.”
Napoleon was surprised to feel a sudden stab of anger towards her surge up from inside him. He opened his mouth before he could stop himself. “You could have made him stay.”
“Could I have? Made him?” Gaby trembled, but her eyes flashed dangerously. “With what? ‘Don’t go, Illya, I’m pregnant’?” She spat the last word at him and looked briefly triumphant when he flinched. “He didn’t have much of a choice, did he? And he only would have resented me for forcing his hand to defect. Or for making it even harder for him to go.” Her hands clenched at her sides. “I didn’t want him to know and…and still have to watch him leave.”
Napoleon was shocked to see how close to tears she was, and he felt his anger begin to dissipate as quickly as it had come on.
“He wouldn’t have resented you.” He ran a hand through his hair in frustration. “Or hell, maybe he would have eventually, I don’t know. But it’s not like either of you are much better off now, is it?” He gestured out the window. “With him stuck behind that wall again with only a slim chance that he’ll get to see his child born. Or even grow up.”
“Perhaps not.” Gaby blinked rapidly and dropped her head, twisting her watch strap around once more until she could meet his gaze again. “But it’s done now.”
“I guess it is.” Napoleon felt himself slump in defeat. “Look, Gaby, I didn’t mean--”
“--I know. I’m not without regrets myself sometimes, and I…” She shrugged, mouth twisting in a sad little smile. “I just miss him.”
“God help me,” Napoleon smiled back at her helplessly. “So do I.”
He stepped toward her, meaning to reach out, but she stopped him with a quick gesture over her shoulder. “My bath.”
He stood back. “Of course.”
Napoleon wandered into the kitchen and dug through the drawers looking for cutlery and place settings for the table, vaguely aware of her footsteps moving back and forth and the sound of the bath beginning to fill.
“Hey Gaby?” Napoleon exited the kitchen and walked back toward the hall. “Do you actually have any napkins in this place or…?” He trailed off. Gaby had left her bedroom door open and stood framed in its centre. She had pulled her dress off and without the disguising cut of the fabric to hide it, the strong curve of her stomach was plainly visible to him. As were the hands she had pressed to it, her eyes shut tight as if concentrating on something.
Napoleon blinked, and then turned sharply on his heels before he could be caught staring. After five years of partnership he’d seen Gaby in much less without batting an eye. But this somehow seemed much more of an intrusion. He coughed. “Uh. Sorry.”
“No, uh, it’s fine. Try the drawer under the table. For napkins.”
“The drawer under the table.” Napoleon muttered. “Right.” And he marched quickly back to the kitchen.
--
After half an hour Gaby emerged from the bathroom, a pair of her favoured oversized pyjamas once again hiding her frame. Napoleon looked up from the book he was idly flipping through. “Supper’s in 15.”
“Sounds good.” Gaby sank onto the couch beside him.
Napoleon tossed the book on the coffee table, and turned his body fully toward Gaby. “So we didn’t exactly get off to the best start this time, did we?”
“No we did not.” Gaby agreed. She reached out to squeeze his wrist. “But we still have two weeks of you getting underfoot here and at U.N.C.L.E. Plenty of time to get better.”
Napoleon huffed a laugh before letting his gaze drift toward her middle once more. “I didn’t really ask before. But besides from the anti-teutonic and moralizing sentiment, how did it go?”
“Good.” Gaby played with the buttons on her pyjama shirt and then with a weary sigh rested her hands on her stomach. “All very healthy. The baby moves quite a lot now.”
“It moves?” Napoleon’s eyebrows shot toward his hairline. “Dear God.”
“Yes.” Gaby snorted in amusement at him. “If you keep being nice to me I may even let you feel it.”
“There’s a terrifying prospect if ever I heard one.” Napoleon shook his head. “And when is the Impending Peril due to arrive?”
“At the end of April. Perhaps the first week of May.”
Napoleon considered that. “Huh. A May Day baby?”
“That would be appropriate.” Gaby laughed, not bothering to hide the edge of fear in her voice, and laid her head on Napoleon’s shoulder. “Mayday Mayday Mayday.”
Napoleon wrapped his arm around her and pulled her closer to his side.
“Listen. You and me? We’ll get him back. Sooner or later we will. And…” he reached down and grasped one of her hands, “one way or the other, you’re not going to be alone in this.”
Gaby tilted her face up to look at his. “That’s a promise, is it?”
Napoleon pressed a kiss to her forehead. “The most sincere one I’ve ever made. Okay?”
Gaby nodded and slowly blew out a long, deep breath.
“Okay.”