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It's been a long day and not exactly a glorious successful one; so, of course, the elevator gets stuck between the twelfth and thirteenth floors.
It even grinds to a halt with a screech of gears, a slight lurch, and Napoleon swears under his breath.
The lights snap off and then flicker back into dim life as though a back-up generator has spun into action somewhere.
“And now we are stuck in elevator. Fantastic.” Illya says, words edged with that vicious sarcasm which had tinged most of their early exchanges. Napoleon had thought – or maybe just hoped – that they were largely past that now. Their one-upmanship and even their disputes were now generally tinged with good humour more than anything else. He'd thought even something else, maybe, but he found himself uncharacteristically unsure.
“We'll be moving again any moment now.” Napoleon says, in his best showman's voice, as though presenting a piece of incredible ingenuity. He pauses for dramatic effect before adding, “Say, about... now.”
When nothing happens, Napoleon shrugs and says, “Always worth a try.”
Usually when he deploys this technique, he's a little more sure either of himself or of an easy escape route he can take while the other person is temporarily distracted. Sadly, there isn't much of an escape route here, for all that Illya has begun to pace up and down as though he expects to find one.
After a moment or so's impatient pacing, Illya shoves at the side of the elevator with a growl of frustration and an almost childish stamp of his foot. Unfortunately, the slight rocking of the elevator betrays the fact that Illya Kuryakin is far from a child.
“Hey,” Napoleon says, reaching to put a hand on Illya's tense shoulder. Illya still has his arms outstretched and pressed against the side of the elevator, his hands slowly clenching into fists.
Illya doesn't turn to look at him but Napoleon leans around him so that he can see that Illya has closed his eyes.
“You were the one who said we should take the elevator,” Illya grits out, as though even speaking of it pains him. “You said sixteen floors was too many after a long day. Why not relax, take elevator.” He leans in, levering himself forward so his head rests against the cool metal of the elevator. “I climb sixteen floors by now.” He exhales deep and shuddering.
And it's true, Napoleon was the one who had suggested they take the elevator and, hell, if he was being honest, he hadn't done it out of concern for Illya but simply because he'd had a long day and had hardly relished the thought of having to climb that many flights of stairs while competing with Illya's unrelenting pace. He'd been tired and he'd played it off as being smarter than Illya, more resourceful, because the elevator was the more efficient way to get back to their rooms in one piece. Nevermind the fact that his own room was two floors below Illya's.
Now, though, looking at Illya, he feels something worse than the sting of hurt pride from being wrong. He doesn't want to defend the fact that this is a one in a million or something close to it. At least from his perspective, the only other times he's been stuck in an elevator were when he'd orchestrated it himself and hit the emergency stop.
The thing that really gets him though is that he'd rather Illya was still angry, would rather see him prying the doors open with his bare hands than see him trying so hard to hold it together like this.
Illya has started counting backwards from 100, slow and steady in Russian. When he gets to eighty-four, Napoleon starts counting with him. He isn't sure why he does it but Illya doesn't stop and his voice seems to lose a touch of its edge when Napoleon joins in, perfectly in sync.
Illya shifts impatiently as they pass fifty and Napoleon can hear something jar in Illya's voice again somewhere around thirty-seven.
“Hey,” he says, between twenty-nine and twenty-eight; then after twenty-eight again, “hey.”
He puts a hand on Illya's arm then slips himself underneath it, between Illya and the elevator wall. Illya is still for a second so that Napoleon has crouch a little uneasily to fit himself under where Illya's forehead still rests against the metal siding of the elevator.
He lifts Illya's chin lightly with a hand and Illya complies, moving back a little, eyes still closed. Napoleon can feel eighteen form in Illya's throat and the swallow that follows it.
He wants to press his mouth against Illya's throat to see if seventeen feels better that way but instead he just keeps counting along.
He lets his hand come to rest at the side of Illya's neck so he can hear his pulse. He finds he's having trouble deciding if it's fast or not.
At nine, he moves the other hand up Illya's arm to his shoulder, can't quite help himself, feels the knot of tense muscle beneath it.
At six, one of Illya's arms drifts to Napoleon's shoulder. Illya's fist unclenches and Napoleon can feel Illya pinning him to the wall. He almost misses five.
At three, Illya cheats, eyes fluttering open, posture readjusting. At two, he cups Napoleon's face in his other hand.
They don't get to one.