Chapter Text
Illya rumbles down a well-used dirt path deep in the forest. Sunlight filters through the leaves in rosettes of light. He’s rolled down the window, and the birds chirp & call from the branches above. As Illya approaches a clearing against the side of the mountain, he comes to a careful halt and turns off the engine.
He sighs and gingerly slips out of the car. A relieved sigh slips out of his mouth as he stretches his cramped legs. He doesn’t understand how Gaby wants to drive all the time. Even if Illya had the proper leg space in most cars, he feels more worn than he’d like to admit.
It doesn’t matter. He has a mission to do. Waverly asked one of the three of them to investigate an abandoned THRUSH lab, and Illya snatched up the opportunity to get out of their safehouse and get some fresh air.
Waverly assured Illya that it was true and well abandoned; UNCLE had been keeping close tabs on it for a good while, but a few weeks ago, all activity just… stopped. It came to a complete and total halt. Waverly wanted some confirmation it was abandoned and someone to snoop for information – and Waverly was certain no had been in or out since the abandonment.
An easy job. Considering there was little left to do here, and Napoleon & Gaby were just wrapping a few things up back at the safehouse, Illya was happy (maybe even eager) to get some fresh air and do a bit of snooping around, as Napoleon likes to say.
Illya smiles to himself as he walks around to the trunk of his car. When he told Napoleon & Gaby his plans, they both complained, and Napoleon said that, “Really, what’s a better use of your time? Poking your nose around & snooping in an abandoned lab, or spending your afternoon with your two favorite spies?”
That comment earned Napoleon a glare, but Illya’s smiling now thinking about it. Napoleon had followed up with his idea of a better use of their time (it involved a bed, the three partners, and a bottle of wine), and yes, Illya couldn’t disagree, but still, he told Waverly he would do this.
He pops open the trunk and attends to a few things. First, Illya grabs a flashlight and puts it in his pocket for now. He pats his side for his gun, and even though he knows it’s there, the confirmation is comforting. Then, he checks the CB radio to ensure it’s in working order. It takes one check to confirm, and he turns it off and slams the trunk closed.
He told Gaby & Napoleon that he’d call them in… Illya checks his watch. About an hour, and he would confirm he was fine. Gaby insisted, stating that she trusted Waverly, just not his intel (which was fair after Paris.)
Illya straightens out his coat and pulls his hat down tight against his head. If he gets done quick enough, he might even be able to help Napoleon fix dinner. That would be very lovely.
Grass crunches under his feet as Illya approaches the side of the mountain. Birds continue to warble around him as he gets a good look at something peculiar: a loading bay door.
It’s tall and rusted in one or two spots from the elements, but other than that, a very nondescript door. So nondescript it mostly blends into the natural scenery around it – mostly. He kneels to the ground to find the rolling door’s handle, but it seems to be locked. Perfect. Unsurprising but annoying.
The door is secured to the ground with a heavy padlock attached to a chain. It ties into a hook bolted into the rocky ground beneath his feet. Illya tries to tug the metal loose from the ground, but when that (unsurprisingly) doesn’t so much as budge, he sighs and reaches into one of inner jacket pockets to pull out a small set of lockpicks.
They were a gift from Napoleon, handed to Illya with the promise of a proper lockpicking lesson so they could “fix his atrocious lockpicking skills.” Illya smirks to himself as he digs the tools into the inner workings of the lock. He’d never admit it, but Napoleon did a rather fine job of teaching him.
It takes a few minutes, but the padlock clicks open, and he’s able to unhook the door from the ground. The door shudders as Illya lifts and rolls it back, watching the metal slink open.
Behind the door is a loading bay. Concrete and natural rock make up the floors and walls, but the only source of light is the sunlight streaming in. There’s a raised platform, likely where trucks unloaded, along with a door and a desk on said platform.
He walks inside and hops onto the loading platform, glancing up to find darkened light fixtures. He changes his attention and gives the wall a once over, but there’s nothing of value, so he sorts through the desk and its drawers. There’s not much to speak of, which he entirely expected, but he does find a ring keys, which he did not expect in the slightest. He pulls them out of the drawer with a pleasant jingle and places them in his coat pocket.
Illya moves back to the wall, searching for a light switch of any kind. He finds a set next to the door, but no matter how many times he flicks them, it doesn’t work. He frowns at the switch before moving to the door.
Well, doors is the right word. They’re a set of double doors, probably just large enough for lugging heaven-knows-what inside. Illya gives one of the handles a turn, but it doesn’t move. Locked, of course. Illya reaches for his lockpick, but he pauses.
He pulls out the ring of keys instead. He begins trying out different keys, and while most of them won’t even slot into the door, he does find one that’s able to turn, and the door unlocks with a muted click.
He stuffs the ring back in his pockets and places his hand on the doorknob. He has no idea what to expect behind the door, he realizes.
Waverly swore up & down the place was abandoned – but that doesn’t make him right. Illya takes a breath. Gaby & Solo know where he is. Waverly’s apparently had eyes on this place. If he doesn’t reach out to his partners in an hour’s time, they’ll come looking for him.
But an hour can mean a world of difference in their line of work.
Illya rolls his shoulders back and turns the doorknob. Hesitating for even a moment can mean a world of difference. He pulls open the door with an achy creak, and darkness swallows him as he steps inside.
The only source of light is the sunlight pouring in from the loading bay. He can’t tell how dark the rest of the lab is, though. Being built inside a mountain, he’s assuming it will be very dark if there’s no lights.
The main entryway is nothing grand. A simple, nondescript hub with a set of double doors on each of its interior walls. The floors are tiled, and the walls seem to be mostly concrete with hints of the wall’s rocky core poking through.
Curiously enough, spotted around the room in small piles are sets of wooden crates. Illya takes a few steps towards them. He lifts the lid off one crate and peers inside as best he can, but it’s difficult using only the light from the loading bay.
Still, it doesn’t look very fancy. It’s full of an assortment of boxes & bottles of soaps, detergents, and other cleaning supplies. He picks up the crate and heaves it onto the ground off the box beneath it, so he can continue investigating. If he’s only got an hour in here, he’d rather stick near the entrance while seeing if there’s anything worth UNCLE’s time.
He doubts it. THRUSH is careful about cleaning up their messes; they might love causing problems, but they love leaving without a trace even more.
He’s prying off the next lid when suddenly, the room is engulfed in darkness. His head snaps around and sees that the door has swung closed. Light peeks from underneath the crack, but it’s not nearly enough to light the room. Illya can’t even see his hand in front of his own face it’s so dark.
He quickly grabs his flashlight and switches it on before looking around the entryway. Even though the light is meager, he doesn’t see a thing beyond wooden crates and stony walls. He can only assume that the door must’ve closed on its own. He sincerely doubts someone pushed it close (…but he can’t write off the possibility, entirely.) He feels safe saying no one is going to pop out from behind crate and stab him, though.
He turns around and continues searching the box. The lid isn’t exactly easy to pry off, but it’s not really hard, either. It seems it was barely nailed in, so Illya can open it up. However, its contents are just uneventful as the soap.
He sighs and turns his attention to one of the few other piles, hoping for more success. Anything interesting or useful: documents, notes, actual chemicals, lab supplies. Something he can deliver to Waverly confidently.
He’s honestly surprised any of this stuff is even here. THRUSH is normally better about this, and it’s certainly not like detergent can’t be reused elsewhere. Then again, it’s not exactly like they can’t get this stuff anywhere else; it’s as generic as it gets.
He moves to search through the last pile, but he stops. His eyes flick to one of the sets of doors. He can always come back for the crates later. He’d probably have better luck inside the lab, anyways…
He takes a hesitant step towards the door, considering his choices, but then he commits. He walks to the leftmost set of double doors, but when he twists the knob, it doesn’t move. He tries again, but they seem to be locked as well.
With an annoyed hum, Illya fishes the keys out once more. He has to put his flashlight under his armpit while he tests keys, but he settles on the right one soon enough; the lock clicks, and the door swings open with only a small groan.
He puts away the keys and replaces them with the flashlight. The beam pours down the hall, cutting through the almost suffocating darkness. From what he can see, the hall ahead of him is long with the same nondescript tile and walls of mixed concrete and stone.
Illya presses forward and closes the door behind him with another groan and click. The air is cold and stale, sending goosebumps down his arms. It’s seemingly untouched, just like Waverly promised. It seems odd for that to be the case, though. Why leave boxes of perfectly good supplies? Wasteful isn’t a word Illya would use to describe THRUSH, typically.
His footsteps echo down the hall as he walks. The light of his flashlight bobs with each step, but it doesn’t cast shadows because there’s nothing to catch it on, not even a doorway. He hasn’t been walking long, but there ought to be…
Almost on cue, a modest doorway comes into view, and something inside his gut untwists. He veers left towards it. Luckily when he tries for the handle, the door happily swings open, no keys required.
The room he walks into isn’t small, but it feels that way THRUSH has used every available spot. Tables, cabinets, and even a lone refrigerator have been squeezed into the sizeable space, and if Illya wasn’t feeling vaguely claustrophobic before (what with being stuck under a mountain), he certainly does now. It seems they were going for “organized,” but they missed that mark about two cabinets ago.
He checks beside the doorway to see if there’s a light switch, and luckily, there is. Unluckily, it, too, doesn’t do a damn thing. Electricity must’ve been cut when they left the place which unfortunately makes sense.
He continues through the room, taking mental note of what he finds along the way. He knows the names of some of the odd machines dotting the counters, like microscopes and centrifuges. Racks of slides and test tubes, still full of various liquids, accompany them like loyal companions.
Illya hums to himself and picks up one of the slides, studying it under his flashlight. Not only does THRUSH leave crates of supplies right outside the door, but they don’t even bring valuable equipment with them? He knows none of these machines are cheap, and one slide or uncapped test tube can ruin weeks’ worth of work.
He sets the slide down and continues looking around the room. He looks through cabinets of bottled chemicals and drawers filled to the brim with pencils, goggles, and other assorted junk. Even sitting beside the sink are racks of beakers and glass containers, likely left to dry.
The fridge’s metal door handle catches the light of his flashlight, and Illya lets himself drift towards it. He grasps the cool handle and pulls it open. A curdling scent wafts out, and he wrinkles his nose and leans back.
His eyes dart around the fridge (which is warm enough to confirm that the electricity has definitely been cut) to find the culprit. It’s not the slides or test tubes that were once left to chill, but a meal of some sort wrapped in paper. It’s covered in grey-green blobs of mold, and now the thing is mostly eaten through.
Illya quickly shuts the door and steps away from the fridge. Someone even left their lunch here. Why in the world would THRUSH leave everything behind, even a sandwich?
Icy cold dread begins to drip down his spine. Not unless they were in a hurry. Not unless they couldn’t afford to wait. His eyes dart around the dark room. What could’ve happened to make them drop everything so suddenly and not come back?
He quickly paces to the door and sets his hand on it, but Illya doesn’t follow through. His hand rests there for a long moment. That’s why Waverly sent him, right? To investigate? Why would he tuck tail and run the second he became a little uncomfortable?
Illya is the KGB’s best. He’s one of UNCLE’s premiere spies. He helped stop a global nuclear war. Yes, something bad may have happened here, but he’s the one to investigate and find the cause.
Illya’s hand drops. He takes a deep breath before turning around and facing the room again. He’s done a fairly good job of searching it this far, and it’s probably in his best interest to trek deeper into the lab. He glances at his watch. He’s got about 40 minutes until he has to call in. Even if anything goes really sideways, it’ll only take Gaby or Napoleon 20, 30 minutes tops to get here – and knowing them, Gaby could cut that down to 10 minutes and would be halfway to the car if Illya is even a minute late.
He smiles to himself and shakes his head before stepping back out into the hall. He cracks the door behind him, so he can remember where he’s been, and continues further down the hall deeper into the building.
The air is still quiet and stale. He only has his footsteps and thoughts for company. Blackness nips at his heels and encroaches on the outer edges of his light. There’s been very few times he’s been in such all-encompassing darkness, and it has the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end.
He swallows tightly, but he keeps going. He comes across another door, but when he looks inside, he finds only a dusty supply closet; it’s not even worth his time to give it more than a sideways glance, so he continues on.
For just a second of a moment, he swears he can hear a click, and Illya freezes. He looks down the hall as far as he can before whipping his head around and looking behind him, but there’s nothing. It’s the same dirty tile as before. It’s just Illya. Alone.
The compound is abandoned. It was abandoned quickly and for a reason but abandoned, nonetheless. Even if something could be stalking far behind him under the cover of darkness, waiting to pounce.
Illya scoffs to himself. He’s no better than a child right now, terrified about something lurking under his bed. Under his breath, he whispers, “Get yourself together, Illya.”
He comes across another doorway as he says that, and he veers right to look inside. He pokes his head in, and when he finds something more substantial than a supply closet, Illya enters and looks around.
This room is slightly larger than the last, but it’s not crammed full, so that may be an illusion. In the middle of the room is massive, flat metal table. Curiously, some straps have been inlaid into it – two on each of the longer sides and one on each of the shorter. He steps around the table and continues investigating.
In the corner is a cabinet, but it’s open, and some of the bottles are missing. He starts to go left around the table, but then he sees a fallen metal tray with surgical instruments strewn across the floor.
Illya gently steps closer. His light dances off the metal and confirms their medical nature – clamps, scalpels, scissors. It feels like his ribcage is too tight for his chest, and he steps over them and quickly finds what happened to the bottles. Strewn across the floor are stained patches of multicolored liquid, but they’ve entirely lost their smell. Even as Illya draws closer, he can’t find any trace of the telltale artificial chemical scent.
It sits in a puddle in front of a doorway. Illya looks to the door but then flicks his gaze behind him. He’s been stitched up often enough to know an operating table when he sees one. The straps are far from a good sign.
What was it used for? Torture by the likes of Gaby’s long dead Uncle Rudi? Human experimentation? Worse?
He turns his gaze ahead again. He doesn’t know the full picture, but he doesn’t like it. Not one bit.
He opens and walks through the door, leaving it open behind him, but he’s hit with a smell – one he doesn’t expect. Sickly sweet in a way that turns his stomach inside out. It burns his nose. He knows that smell, considering his line of work, and it sets him on edge.
Against his better judgement, Illya cautiously steps into the hall and turns left to follow the putrid scent of decay. It’s strong, too strong, and he has to cover his mouth and nose with his jacket. His shoulders are so tight he swears he can feel a knot forming as he walks.
It only takes him a few more steps before his heart skips a beat. Blood. His flashlight catches the edges of it, all dried and bright red. His throat burns from the putrid smell. He steps closer and lifts his flashlight higher.
It keeps going, coating the walls and floors in messy smears. As Illya carefully walks forward onto it, he can feel the tacky way his shoe half sticks to the floor. It makes his stomach roll when accompanied by a smell so pungent he can hardly stand it.
His eyes burn. He stops in tracks and considers turning around. Instinct is begging him to leave and find fresh air. He wants to listen, but all he can hear is a buzzing drone that sounds deafening in the silent hall. He stays stone still, instead. He doesn’t want to go forward.
But he does, anyways. He has to. He’s here to do a job, to investigate – he has to know what exactly is ahead of him.
As Illya takes a cautious few steps forward, he finds the source of the smell, and the sight is so terrible his gag reflex, which had been teasing him the whole time, kicks in suddenly & strongly. He heaves as he grapples with the horrible sight, the sound, the smell of a rotted, mangled corpse, which he certainly had not been expecting.
-
He notices a few things very quickly: most of the corpse, which is half-propped against the wall, is black or dark red, it does not have a head, it’s missing an arm, and its torso has been ripped open. God, the torso is missing several chunks of flesh and bone, not including the hole ripped down its front. The sternum is gone, and most of its ribs have been cracked open; the white bone pokes and tears through the curtains of muscle like a teasing hint of what lies beneath.
The heart and lungs are only half there. Maggots writhe inside the rotting tissue, and they’re so many and so violent it almost looks like the organs are giving a second attempt at life. There’s an almost quaking, sporadic quality to them as the maggots tunnel inside.
The tear in the chest runs all the way down to the groin. Black, eaten-away organs & viscera pour through the gap like apple filling spilling out of a fresh pie. They lay across the lap and on the floor. There’s practically nothing holding them back – the tear is too gruesomely large. The viscera shines under the beam of his flashlight, dripping and oozing some kind of dark brown liquid into the floor in pools.
And the insects… flies have descended upon the corpse like a morbid fog, dancing with the maggots as they feast on what little is left of the body. They’re certainly not responsible for most of the complete & utter carnage this body has experienced, but they’re certainly taking advantage of the situation.
What lies before him is the image of pure and utter decay: sloughing skin, flesh splitting open at the seams, and rot that takes hold of every last inch of this person’s long dead body.
Between the putrid, cloying scent assaulting his nose and the grotesque sight of the decomposing corpse before him, Illya’s stomach can’t take it. Whatever was left of his lunch comes up and out of his mouth in hot, acrid waves of vomit onto the floor.
-
Illya turns away from the sight, flashlight dropping towards the floor as his hands and shoulders quiver. He came in expecting many things, but that… that was not one of them. Not a body torn to shreds and racked with decay. Not a body left to rot in an underground lab.
His chest pounds as he tries to breath through his mouth, turning & walking away from the body. Being a spy has exposed him to some horrible things, but never anything quite like that. Even though he’s seen death, hand delivered people to grave, stumbled across fresh and starting-to-rot bodies, they are nothing like that.
All he can see when closes his eyes or looks into the deep, inky black of the halls are maggots dancing in blackened flesh and organs trailing out of a fleshy chasm.
His stomach turns again, and Illya has to lower his head and screw his eyes shut to keep himself from vomiting again. His throat and nose burn enough as is from the pungent stench.
His stomach is a twisting, writhing mess of nerves. His ribcage feels more like a cage for his panicking heart than ever. The shaking that’s taken ahold of his hands has spread to his arms and shoulders. Illya swallows down a deep breath, even though he can still taste the smell on his tongue from this far away.
He needs to report this. He doesn’t know what happened here, but it must have been bad for THRUSH to leave not just some supplies, not just valuable equipment, but also an entire dead body. Rest of the lab be damned, Illya has enough pieces of the puzzle to know it’s time to cut his losses.
He’s still shaking, though. His flashlight’s beam still quivers onto the floor. He takes shallow yet steady breaths through his nose to help steady & focus himself.
Illya almost wishes Napoleon was here. Whether Illya likes it or not, Napoleon is a steady presence in his life, and a part of him wants to listen to Napoleon’s smooth voice to anchor Illya, give him something to focus on besides the twisting anxiety in his gut and the unavoidable, horrible sense of death.
Illya forces himself to straighten up. His heart is still wavering, but he’s focused. He’s present.
Then a sound cuts through the air like a gunshot.
A click.
And then another. And another.
A short series of echoing, far off clicks, like chess pieces being placed on a board, come from the far end of the hall towards the direction of the corpse. His whole spine tenses at the sound, which is too much like footsteps.
As quickly as he can without risking being heard, he darts back down the hall towards the open door he just left. He has no idea what is in here, patrolling the halls, but he doesn’t want to find out. He needs to get out, report back, regroup, do something besides stay trapped in the dark with something else.
Silent as a mouse, Illya slips into the room he came from and closes the door slowly with nothing more than a barely there click when it shuts. He puts his back flush to the wall next to the door and quickly shuts off his flashlight. He stands there and strains his ear for any other sound.
He’s not alone, here in the dark. Well, maybe he is, and the sight of that corpse has him so rattled the hallucinations have decided now is the best time to harass him... But he’s not taking any chances. Someone or something ripped a person to shreds, destroyed them beyond recognition, and then Thrush decided to leave that corpse behind.
What if it the culprit is here, haunting these very halls? And even if it’s not, something else is here. What or who? He has no clue, but he has no intentions of getting acquainted.
He keeps listening for any stray sound, something to indicate whatever he heard hasn’t really left. It’s hard over the heartbeat in his ears. Could he get to the door and slip out of here? He seemingly got in undetected; maybe he could get out the same way.
But he has to be sure no one else is here, or at least sure that they’re far enough away Illya can make a dash for the door.
Which means he has to wait it out. Which is fine, he’s had to hold his breath and wait for the coast to clear countless times. As badly as he wants out, it’s not worth the risk, not when…
The image of rotted flesh melting off bone flashes in his mind, and despite the all-consuming darkness, he screws his eyes shut instinctively.
So, he stands there, and he waits. He listens to clicking turn silent and the softness of his breaths, the quiet ticking of his watch that only now feels audible. He listens and listens for anything else to pop up.
His eyes have started to properly adjust to the dark. He can barely make heads from tails, but he can at least see the angled form of the table and toppled tray and the-
The air drops out of his lungs. His heart leaps to his throat and begins beating hard & fast, like it, too, wants to be gone.
In the open doorway across from him, in the doorway that first led him to this room, is a massive, hulking shape. Illya can’t tell what in the world it could be, but it was not there moments ago. The shape twists and raises. Raising its head maybe?
It doesn’t matter. He holds his breath as whatever thing ahead of him sniffs (which mean that must be its head raised) the air. His right hand starts to reach for his gun before he realizes he has his flashlight in hand. ‘Rookie mistake,’ he sharply chastises himself.
The head twists back down, and the shape pads into the room, following Illya’s initial path around the table. He can’t hear a single footstep. The telltale clicking is gone. They’re nearly silent, as quiet as his ticking watch…
His eyes widen and dart to his wrist but then back to the creature. It’s grown closer, and it seemingly hasn’t noticed him yet, but Illya knows that luck will run out. Another set of loud sniffs cuts through the air, and Illya’s hand, ever so slowly, starts moving towards the doorknob.
Something on the creature’s head twitches, and Illya wrenches the doorknob and throws the door open on pure instinct – just as the thing lunges for him. Illya throws himself out of the door, back into the hall as he hears a snarl, followed by a loud thud and a furious howl.
As he stumbles back and into the hallway, he quickly swaps his flashlight into his left hand and dips his right into his jacket. He pulls his gun out and cocks it as he hears claws scramble against the tile.
Frantically, he shoots towards the sound of throaty growls. The gunpowder igniting flashes the hall, and he catches glimpses of a terrible, four-legged thing. He hears a pained yelp followed by a louder snarl, but the clambering footsteps never slow, and Illya…
He turns, and he runs. His shot didn’t even phase that thing enough to make it pause. Hell, he doesn’t even know where he hit it. Doesn’t exactly matter now because it’s after him, hunting him, too tight on his tail.
The horrible, rotting stench slaps Illya in the face, but he can’t care. Snarls pour out from behind him, angry, loud, & far too close. Heavy footsteps with that telltale click - that he now realizes sound just like clicking nails or talons – thud against the floor.
He breathes hard and heavy as he runs. He runs and runs, feet pounding into the ground & adrenaline coursing through vein, as baying howls erupt behind him and frantic footfalls take chase.
Illya can’t see anything. He can’t even make out the walls he knows are there. It’s pitch black. He’s blind and being hunted, and if he doesn’t get away now, he’ll become this thing’s next meal.
Illya’s body hits a wall with a hard, painful thud. His head bounces off concrete, and he sees stars as pain floods his skull. He stumbles back for a second, but then he half realizes, and his feet are already turning and sending him down another hall. His head swims at the sudden change in direction, but that’s the last of his concerns.
Claws just barely graze his coat when he hears the monster thud into the wall as well and screech. It’s ripped straight out of the pits of this creature’s soul. It sounds horrible & pained, but Illya doesn’t dwell on it. He takes the opportunity to pick up speed while its feet scramble.
Even if it’s hurt, even if it just took a nosedive into a concrete wall, it wants Illya more.
Illya’s heart pounds. His body thrums with terror. He needs to get away from this thing. Can he outrun it? There’s no way. Even now, it’s close, too close-
He needs a door. He needs it now. Even if he can’t see. Even if darkness has swallowed him and his pursuer whole.
He clicks on his flashlight with a panicked fervor, and the hallway floods with light. It already knows where he is. It’s already chasing him. He just needs a door, a wall, fucking anything between them.
There’s a door up ahead. On the right. It’s far, but he might be able to make it.
His light’s beam wildly bobs as he pushes himself. Faster. He has to go faster.
He can hear the creature’s breathing. Angry, heaving, loud.
The door’s right there. He can almost touch it. Illya stretches out his free hand for the knob. Just before he can touch it, he’s skidding to a halt. Then, the second he makes contact, he’s twisting it open and praying it’s not too late.
Pain explodes across his back, and Illya howls. He stutters, but only for a moment. He scrambles into the crack in the doorway he’s made.
He tries to slam the door shut, but that fucking thing is halfway in the door. Illya snarls and yells as he slams the door onto the creature’s neck. The monster thuds and writhes as it tries to force the door open, but Illya refuses to let that happen.
A clawed something scratches against the door, seeking any kind of purchase. Illya fights against it, the door threatening to inch open every time this thing jolts. He’s forced to drop his flashlight and use both hands and his body weight to pull it shut.
It just won’t close. The monster continues to howl and snap. It won’t fucking leave. Something angry builds deep, deep in his chest.
A clawed paw finds his leg and carves a long gash into it. Illya yells but not just out of pain – but fury. His face contorts into a snarl, and one hand lets go of the door. A scream bursts out of his chest, and he punches it right in its eye.
The animal snarls and howls as something squelches, but Illya doesn’t stop. Even as the animal thrashes harder and harder, opening the door wider with every flail, he hits. And he hits.
He miscalculates a punch, and suddenly his hand is trapped between ragged teeth. He cries out, and his knee instinctively jumps up into the soft flesh of the thing’s head (or neck, he can’t fucking see-)
It works. The monster gasps, and Illya yanks his hand back. He pulls the door again, hard, against its head, and finally, it relents and tumbles out of the door and back into the hall.
The door closing shut happens so suddenly it throws Illya off balance and tosses him to the floor, and he lands on his back. He cries out as part of his torn back makes contact with the cold concrete. He rolls off his side and clamps his teeth shut, breath hissing through them. His eyes squeeze shut tight as the open gashes throb and sting.