He was so pale and unmoving, it hurt to even look at him. It had been a tough mission, and all three of them had finished quite banged up. Illya had seemed the one who was the least injured, only having received a blow to the head after falling. But of course, he could be deceitful – Illya always pretended he was okay, he was invulnerable. He took the blows and never complained, he took torture and things that no normal man could endure and just kept walking. But everyone had their limits.

It turned out that his head injury was worse than anticipated. Some hours later, while having a celebratory drink with Napoleon and Gaby in a hotel suite when he collapsed. All that tower of a man, falling to the floor. They waited for a couple minutes, hoping he was just exhausted and would wake up with some water and light tapping on his face. But that didn't happen. He never woke up.

Traumatic brain injury, the doctors were saying, inoperable, they were saying, there is too much scarred tissue. All their words seemed like undodgeable bullets, hitting them in the chest. It was a bad place to get hit, the doctors said, and without the proper inmediate medical care... There's nothing else we can do, they would say, we've stabilised him and are controlling his oxygen and blood pressure, but it is a precarious balance, they say. The longer he stays like that, the less chances he has of waking up again.

That's what they said. You should probably say goodbye.

Gaby had been angry at first. She had been angry with herself for not noticing, not forcing Illya to be checked by doctors like Napoleon and herself had been. Angry for not being able of protecting her partner like he had protected her so many times. It wasn't fair. Then she became angry with the men that put them in that situation. She made sure that the men who'd been put in jail had no access to deals, and got the worst conditions possible. Then she was angry at UNCLE, at Waverly and all the rest for always sending them to the worst missions, for not caring well enough about their top agent. And last of all, she was angry at Illya himself, for not saying anything, for not thinking of himself as much as he should, for collapsing like that. For scaring them.

But after a while, she realised how useless her anger was. It changed nothing whose blame it was, or what could have been done differently. Her being mad at him didn' change anything. He remained there, still, pale, unmoving. For days. And after some days absent, trying to punish whoever responsible, Gaby was at his bedside again, intertwining his big cold hand with her warm one. She was trying to hold back tears, and failing miserably.

The anger had left and had been replaced by an almost unbearable sadness. The truth of the situation hit her fully: almost certainly, Illya was going to die. He wouldn't his eyes again (those beautiful, beautiful eyes). They wouldn't hear his voice again (that beautiful, beautiful voice). He would never get old, their time together was spent. And there were so many things she hadn't said... so many moments that could have lead to something but were lost. So much time wasted in work. Now she would never get a chance to fix it.

"It can't be." Said a voice behind her. Solo. "This can't be the end of the great Illya Kuryakin. He'll wake, you'll see. I don't care what the doctors say. He's tougher than this."

While Gaby had gone through mostly anger and settled on melancholy, Napoleon had experienced denial, grief (briefly) and forced himself to hope. At first, he simply didn't believe it. Maybe it was an scheme from the heads of UNCLE to prove who-knows-what, or a plan from the KGB to test the team's loyalty to their agent. Who knew, maybe Illya was simply too tired and decided to rest. Something like that, some sort of trap, some sort of cover. Maybe a big bad was after him and he had to pretend he was dying to avoid any of his loved ones to be hurt (if Illya wasn't able to retaliate, there would be no point).

After a week he spoke to the doctors, and it was a huge mistake. Basically they told him that if hehadn't woken up by now, the chances of him doing it at all was pretty slim, almost non-existent. And so Napoleon realised the truth of the situation: he had lost his partner. He was going to die due to injuries received in the line of duty, possibly a death Kuryakin would had found worthy and fitting. A warrior's death. Well, so be it, he thought, I will miss him. He drank himself to oblivion that night and hoped this pain in his heart would pass. But it didn't.

It hurt too much, too much to even think. Illya didn't deserve this, he didn't deserve to die while the rest of them lived. Illya who'd had such a shitty life, who struggled with himself and his mind constantly, Illya with the bad childhood and the million scars, who after all the horrible things he'd gone through was still sweet and kind and caring – even had a bit of a sense of humor. He deserved the world, he deserved happiness and a million happy years. Not to waste away in a hospital and die from hurting his head on a bad fall. It couldn't be.

And Napoleon didn't want to lose the man – he'd become too important. Maybe the russian had gotten deeper under his skin, maybe Napoleon missed him when he was gone. He wasn't simply his partner, he was a good man, and a good friend. He was reliable, Napoleon knew that he could tell him anything, that he could ask fro almost anything and Illya would it for him. And to think that he could die... No. It couldn't be true. It wasn't going to be.

No matter what the doctors said, Illya was still alive, and while he was alive there was room for hope. He could still surprise everyone and wake up, and be back to normal in some months. Yes, that was what going to happen. The doctors wouldn't believe it, but when was anything Peril did believable? Tearing apart a car with his hands, throwing a motorbike at the enemy, how was that believable? It wasn't, and yet it had happened.

But Gaby was there, and she was holding Illya's lifeless hand, and she was crying silently and somehow it made everything more real. They were both going to lose an important part of their lives – never to be the same. The team would probably disappear if Illya died. Maybe they'd tried to continue, with some replacement, but it wouldn't be the same, and the memories would become too much. Napoleon and Gaby would go their separate lives, try to get over the loss, tried to forget, or at least, be okay with it.

But Napoleon didn't want to be okay with it. Neither did Gaby. The only thing they wanted was to have their Russian back, and never have to see him like this again. They kept going to hospital room, talking to him, playing games, watching and commenting tv. Waverly had asked them to come to work and although it logical and maybe healthy (a distraction from Illya's condition could be good) they both refused. Not until Illya gets better, they would, not until then.

This went on for 48 days. On the 49th, a pair of blue eyes opened again, against all odds.

The first they saw were two sets of inexplicably happy faces, blue eyes, brown eyes. Someone was hugging him and crying and saying his name with so much love. He was too tired to keep awake, but promised to wake up again soon. He had way too much to live for.

And so he did.

A/N: Feedback is love! If you liked, please leve a review!