It was months Ilya was in East Germany. He figured that his job isn’t something that could be done in just weeks. He has to be patient, with his watchful eyes watching every movement, and him looking at his own notes of the target. He also went to Munich, told Volker he has some work to do across the border and he would bring him something, of course not much but Ilya would get him some dresses.

He even visited Bandera’s grave, saw some Ukrainian Nationalists mourning. He definitely wouldn’t mind doing a bit of mischievous act or even just blowing up the entire place, but he couldn’t. He would do that, but his bosses would scream at him for his behavior, he wasn’t ordered to do that.

Noting and noting, he always watched these groups tightly. He was going back home nevertheless since it’s almost a month since he went away, Volker was probably bored waiting for him to come home.

He drove back home, for a while, and when he arrived it was as usual, Volker was already sitting tight in his bed, but now he’s reading some German novels, or probably some Russian novels.

“Mein liebling,” Volker said, just putting down his books to hug Ilya and kissing him, and smiling widely as Ilya kissed him back.

“You’ve been gone for so long, weeks and all that, was the news a major news or is that a long event?” Volker asked.

“It was just a long event, kinda boring I guess, just some random things, have to cross the borders since bosses asked about West Germany and investigate events there,” Ilya tried to bluff a bit.

Volker seemed to rather not believe it, and just squinted his eyes at Ilya, with a rather concerned look now.

“I don’t really buy it, I don’t hear anything from STASI command, I can only tell you that, Herr Hahn,” Volker said, and Ilya got a bit jittery hearing Volker’s usual sweet voice turned to his usual ‘working-in-Grenztruppen’ voice.

Volker grabbed his gun and sighed. “Come on, tell me, hard way or the easy way, I love you, Hahn, but you can’t just do this to me, I can’t believe you easily, why would the Neues Deutschland* newspaper send someone to the West, what is even happening in the West?” Volker said, holding his tiny Makarov handgun tight.

“You are probably just sleeping with me. Come on, Wessi** spy, spill it,” Volker muttered.

Ilya honestly felt a bit scared, the dainty and a bit taller man than him, just suddenly can act harsh and all that stern to him.

“Well well uh, Fuchs, listen, I can’t really open it up but let’s say the Wessi has a literal need to destroy East Germany, and I have to investigate it, I do investigative journalism, here’s my Neues Deutschland papers,” Ilya panickedly said while he gave Volker his papers again, and Volker inspected it while eyeing Ilya, still suspicious about him.

“Last date of publication in Neues Deutschland?” Volker asked.

“14th November 1975, news was about the Conference of Solidarity to Chile in Athens, for front page news,” Ilya said.

“Mhm,” Volker said, still looking very much suspicious to Ilya.

“Yes, please, I have some job to do, I can’t disclose any of it,” Ilya said.

“Don’t make me call up the newspaper at almost 11 pm,” Volker said.

“Aren’t you a border guard?” Ilya jolted.

“For an East German citizen, you’re so clueless of my authority,” Volker said as he grabbed his phone, and dialed the newspaper’s number.

Ilya felt panicked about his cover being blown up, since he’s not sure if this situation was on the mind of his KGB superiors.

Volker called the office, and Ilya just felt so nervous while he’s being held at gunpoint by Volker.

As Volker closed the phone, he put his gun away and sighed.

“So, you’re really a journalist, huh? Fine, my feelings are wrong again,” Volker groaned as he sat on his bed and rested.

“So you know I don’t lie now?” Ilya said.

“Yes, and come here, I’ll make it up,” Volker said, patting on the bed and winking at Ilya.

Ilya definitely didn’t refuse, and of course he knew what would happen, another intimate time with his boyfriend.

His bosses on the other side were alerted by that phone call, noticing someone in the Neues Deutschland was questioned about Detlev Hahn.

“We were lucky we had one guy there, placing Ilya’s papers and ID, if not he’s toast,” one officer said.

“Well, Comrade General Mayor Vasilyev, we should think 10 or even 20 steps ahead for our missions. Ilya did well, but why is…he being questioned? Didn’t he manage well enough to get there? Did he pull some fucking shit again?” the other officer replied.

“Ilya…I suspect he does some fucking flirting again, that kid is so impulsive, must be some girl or a guy he seduced, and this time it is a fucking authority,” Vasilyev said.

“Is he gay?” the officer whispered.

“Well if he was? Does that correlate to anything? So long he does his job I don’t give a fuck with who he fucks with,” Vasilyev said, before smoking a pipe.

“Fine, I know you care so much for that insane bitch, he should have been in a psych ward, have you seen how insane your ‘son’ is?” the officer scoffed, while reading about Ilya’s report.

“I know he burned his ex’s car and all that, I remember Zhenya told me before that insane bastard got exiled or missing, never saw Zhenya again, that Ilya killed a rabbit by breaking its neck. He also got into a fucking plane crash and I remember that, but he works well enough in KGB that at least Zhenya was right that he is a natural born hunter,” Vasilyev said.

“So, a talented bastard,” the other officer replied, smiling cynically.

“Can be, and Ilya is one of our best assets. Like Stashynsky to Major Zorich***, I am his handler and I am proud of his work,” Vasilyev said.

The other officer just chuckled. “I hope he doesn’t defect, or try to pull shit with us, we will definitely knew what to do to that fucker,” he muttered.

“He would burn the world just to do what he is ordered, don’t underestimate him, Savenkov,” Vasilyev said.

Savenkov nodded and just left Vasilyev alone.

Vasilyev definitely knew what Ilya was probably doing to make that happen. He flirted with some authority, and got fucked up. Even though Vasilyev cared for Ilya like he does to his own son, he couldn’t let his feelings take over his clear judgment. He wished him to do well, especially given the circumstances and Ilya’s reports to him, it’s hard to assassinate the target. But he hoped nothing like this had to happen again or Ilya would be screwed up.

*Wessi: Term for West Germans, kind of derogatory. Another term is Westler or Bundis

**Neues Deutschland: East German state newspaper, still publishing until today post East Germany's annexation into BRD

***Major Zorich: A callsign/pseudonym for Aleksandr Panteleimonovich Svyatogorov, an Ukrainian KGB officer who famously handled Bohdan Stashynsky (murderer of Bandera and Rebet) besides Pavel Sudoplatov (who allegedly killed Hetman Pavlo Skoropadskyi). Also inspiration for character in "Sword and Shield" (Щит и Меч) film called Aleksandr Belov