For the "Letter" challenge over on network_command

Warnings: Excessive silliness

Summary: James Thurber is presumably turning in his grave...

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This is a "fusion" of The Man from UNCLE with the musical My Fair Lady and the play Pygmalion, on which the musical is based. A fusion is a kind of crossover, but instead of characters from two different story universes meeting, the plot and certain other elements of one universe are "fused" with characters from the other universe. That means that in this story the "roles" of Henry Higgins, Eliza Doolittle, Colonel Pickering etc are filled by MfU characters, which leads, pretty much by definition, to crack!fic of the first order.

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I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to aneuhaus, who put up with MONTHS of whinging about how this story didn't work, and finally took me in hand and told me exactly what did work and what didn't. Without her, it would never have been finished.


Rating : Gen

Summary: What makes you think you know who you are?

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I have a friend who has a horse, but very little time, so for the past few weeks I have been exercising him for her, mostly hacking out into glorious autum countryside. He comes from a line of Hungarian cavalry horses called furioso, and his name is Fred. Having been bred to stay calm in the middle of battle, almost nothing scares him, which means that most of the time I don't really have to concentrate on the actual riding, so I end up telling myself stories in my head. This is one of them. Dedicated to Fred, for being such an inspiration, bless his little cotton socks.

Canonically, Illya is as good at riding as he is at everything else he turns his hand to. I don't believe we ever get to see Napoleon on a horse, so I have made that bit up.

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I found princessivye's suggestion of "Linguistic difficulties in a tricky situation" for the Guess the Author challenge over on mfuwss rather inspiring. So when the Sorting Hat picked another topic, I went ahead and wrote it anyway.


Je t'aime


Summary: The language of love is universal

Warning: Pure silliness

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For theladyrose, who has a weakness for "observer commentary on the guys, especially when it's from fellow professionals." I'm pretty sure this wasn't what she had in mind, which just goes to show that you should be careful what you wish for.


The Bitch from UNCLE, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love (or at Least Like) Illya Kuryakin


Rating: Family friendly
Summary: The title says it all, really.

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For aneuhaus

Family Affairs


Summary: Napoleon really should have used condoms...


"You can come in now," said the assistant, a supercilious young woman in a skirt that left very little to the imagination. I tugged my own skirt down to just above my knees - Mom had warned me against looking too much of a slut - and went into the room.

"Name?" said the man behind the desk, without raising his eyes from his paperwork. I pouted slightly - since when does a man act like I'm not there?

"Arachne LaChien."

That got his attention all right, and even better was the way his jaw dropped open when he saw me. Then he groaned, in a strangled sort of way. It sounded almost like "Napoleon, you didn't!" but I could have misheard.

"I'm here to claim my inheritance," I said, putting on an expression of sombre respect, appropriate to the situation. "It says right here in this newspaper that half the Solo estate goes to 'Heirs of the body'."

"Heirs of the body," he repeated, eying me with something very like distaste, though there was something else underneath. There usually is, when men look at me. "Well, I hardly think we need a DNA test in your case. Are you sure you're not a clone?"

"I'm female, in case it's escaped your attention," I said, resisting the impulse to lean across the desk and scratch his face.

"I'm sorry, I'm afraid biology isn't my field." He didn't sound sorry. "A test tube baby, then?"

"My conception was entirely natural," I said smugly. "My mother was an unusually lovely young woman and my father was a red-blooded American male. Occam's razor, Mr Kuryakin. Besides, you know they spent a night together, so why the skepticism?"

"True," said Kuryakin, frowning. "But there was also the time when that unusually lovely young woman held us captive for 24 hours. She could have taken a DNA sample while I was unconscious, and done God knows what with it. I wouldn't put it past Angelique at all. She was obsessed with Napoleon."

"Does it make any difference?" I asked. "Even if I was the result of artificial fertilization - and I'm not saying I was - I still count as an heir of the body. The process is irrelevant."

I couldn't tell from his face whether he agreed or disagreed, which was disconcerting. Then he said abruptly "How long have you known Napoleon was your father?"

"Oh, forever," I said airily. "Mom never made a secret of it. She used to tell me bedtime stories about him. About you, too," I added. "You know, you're better-looking than I expected."

That almost drew a smile from him. He looked nicer when he almost smiled.

"Why did you never put in an appearance before?"

"My father wasn't dead before."

His face hardened. It made him look older. "You didn't think your father might like to see you?"

"Why should I?" I asked, with a trace of bitterness. "He never asked my mother about me."

"He didn't know you existed."

"Precisely my point. Leave the moral judgments, Mr Kuryakin, I'm here for the dough. Heirs of the body get half the Solo estate. That makes me worth close to a million, even if you don't like my mother."

The blue eyes bored into me. Damn, why hadn't Mom mentioned those eyes? It felt like they could see right into my soul. Assuming I had one, of course. Finally he spoke.

"All right, I agree that you're a legitimate heir, since there's clearly no disputing that Napoleon was your father." The blue eyes sparkled with something like malice. "That makes 253 of you so far. My lawyer will contact you when we've interviewed the remaining 67 claimants and know exactly how much you're entitled to. Goodbye, Miss LaChien. Give my regards to your mother."

Damn, but the man must be a killer poker player. I wasn't looking forward to telling Mom that maybe, if we were lucky, I'd inherited just enough to pay for her next face lift. And I could see exactly why Kuryakin had been the villain in our bedtime stories all those years ago. Still, it had been worth it just to see his face when I told him my name. And maybe, if Mom was really pissed about the money, she'd let me go back and tell him about my blue-eyed little brother...

A while back I mentioned that I like to imagine that Illya met Lord Peter Wimsey while he was at Cambridge and that it was Lord Peter who introduced him to Waverly. laughingacademy came up with the brilliant idea that Illya might have had his portrait taken by Bunter during the course of these events. This is their encounter, immediately after the successful resolution of the Incident of the Fellow in the Fellows' Garden.

Oh, and at Cambridge a "bedder" is nowadays a cleaning lady, but in the 1950s a bedder would have been male and would not only have cleaned the room, but laid the fire and made the bed and performed errands for the student he was assigned to.

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