Chapter Text
As the doors slid shut behind Bond and the DB5, Q stood for a while, not thinking about much except that this had been the last time he would probably see 007. The force of nature who had dominated Q’s world, and Q-Branch, for four years, was gone.
He walked back to his desk and sat down, wondering if he should go home. He had worked through the night, and had had less than twelve hours sleep the previous week. He wasn’t running on fumes any more, he was now down to the memory of fumes, and only tea by the gallon was keeping him upright. Doubtless that explained the depression that now settled over him, and the utterly ridiculous hope that those big doors would open again, and Bond would be there with the Aston Martin, declaring it was all an April Fool’s joke and how could anyone believe he would throw in his job—again—for a pretty woman nearly half his age. Again.
It wasn’t April first. And there was not a hope in hell Bond hadn’t run off to spend the rest of his life shagging his brains out, probably on the bonnet of the car Q had spent so many hours rebuilding.
Q hoped he would at least not dent the metal work.
He sighed and drank his still warm tea. He was literally too tired to go home now, and there was still so much to do cleaning up the messes left behind by Denbigh and the organisation behind him. Since that organization still existed and its reach was as yet unknown, Q could count on being worked off his skinny arse for quite a few weeks to come. And without one of MI6’s sharpest agents to help.
He rested his forehead on his desk. A micronap was all he could afford to take now. Then he had to contact his people and coax them back into the department. He hoped like hell they hadn’t already got other jobs. That might be awkward, to say the least.
His mobile’s ringer woke him. He groped for it on his desk, realising as he did so that he’d been napping for nearly an hour. “Q here.”
“It’s Eve. Bond is being airlifted to Medical. M thought you’d want to know. He’s asked you to come over here.”
Q straightened up, fully and painfully awake. “What happened?”
“Dr Swann called it in. He collapsed while driving. Head injury.”
“What? He was fine when he left here.”
“You saw him?”
“An hour ago. Fifty-three minutes ago, actually. He looked....” Fucking fantastic. “Normal.”
“Better get yourself over to Medical. I’m heading there now.”
Christ.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Central London was still in lockdown after the destruction of the old headquarters at Vauxhall, so Q had to walk across the bridge and argue with the police blocking anyone entering the exclusion zone. Showing his credentials didn’t work. A call from M did, eventually. Q was a little surprised Medical was still operating given the chaos of the previous night, but at least their building hadn’t been blown to bits. There were fewer staff than normal around the place, but at least as many security guards as usual. Tanner met him at the foyer.
“What’s going on. Bill?”
“Bond is just being taken into surgery. Subdural haematoma, they said. Something to do with several blows to the head and having two holes drilled into it which we didn’t know about.”
“What the hell?” Q stopped. “Who?”
“Blofeld. Madeleine Swann has given us the details. Blofeld was trying to turn him into a vegetable. Looks like he might have succeeded.”
“Shit.”
“My thought exactly.”
M and Eve met them at the main entrance to Medical. Both looked somewhat less sharp and well groomed than usual, but they’d had as little sleep as Q over the last week, and Q doubted Mallory had even had the benefit of an hour’s nap.
“Thank you for coming, Q.”
“No problem sir. I was still in Q-Branch.”
Eve gave Q a tired little smile. “James seems to enjoy keeping us from our beds.”
“Usually he’s trying to do the opposite,” Q said without thinking, then flushed when Eve wagged her finger at him. Of course, Bond had taken her to bed. “What do you want me to do?”
“Take over for me for a few hours,” Mallory said, “while Bill and I handle some other matters. Eve will stay here.”
“Sir. Is Bond even still an agent, technically?”
Mallory frowned at Q. “Does it matter? His injuries were caused in the service of Queen and country even if the bloody country doesn’t appreciate it.”
“No, sir, I meant...would he not be better treated in St Thomas’s?”
“Oh. Well, his resignation hasn’t been officially tendered and while the double-oh program was suspended at Denbigh’s instigation, we believe that will be rescinded. Anyway, this seemed the best option. We have a top neurosurgeon working on him.” Mallory wiped his face. “This is the last thing I thought we’d be dealing with today.”
Eve touched her boss’s arm. “Sir, Q and I will keep watch.”
“Thank you, Moneypenny. I know you two are exhausted. I just can’t trust anyone else right now.”
“Go on,” Q said. “Send tea.”
Bill grinned. “That, we can do. Sir?”
He and Mallory walked off. Eve looked at Q. “Dr Swann is waiting here.”
“Does she expect us to hold her hand or does she imagine Bond will still be able to sweep her away in a sports car for a legendary fucking?”
“That’s pretty harsh, Q.”
“But completely accurate. I suppose I’d better speak to her. Where is she?”
“Through here.”
Eve led the way to the waiting room, still frowning a little at Q’s remark. He really didn’t care. How was it possible that a medical doctor could ‘forget’ to mention to someone that the man she was with had had holes drilled into his head?
Madeleine Swann could never not look beautiful, Q supposed, but did anyone have any right to look this pretty and composed at this hour of the morning? “How is he? Can I see him?”
“He’s still in surgery. We won’t know a thing until he’s out, and probably not for some time after that. You should go home, Dr Swann.”
“I...don’t have anywhere...James was going to take me somewhere today.” She put her pretty face in her hands. “I couldn’t help him. One minute he was driving and chatting, next his words started to slur and he weaved off the road. I didn’t know what to do for him.”
“Then what is the point of you?” Eve gasped a little at Q’s words, and Madeleine’s head snapped up. “Well? You’re a doctor. You didn’t recognise he was injured?”
“He seemed fine. He was knocked out by Blofeld’s men—”
“And Blofeld added some ventilation to his skull that he hadn’t had before. Yet you didn’t see fit to mention this to any of us?”
“There wasn’t time—”
“But there was time for a fuck, wasn’t there? Last night? You and he went off for hours alone, and he only re-appeared this morning to ask for the Aston Martin. You didn’t even bother to look at his pupils?”
Madeleine stood up. “What are your qualifications, Mr Q?”
“My qualifications are that I’ve been keep that stupid sod alive for four years, and gave a flying fuck that he survived. Yours seem to be nothing more than a pretty face and round heels.”
Eve tugged at his arm. “Q, that’s enough.”
“No, it’s not. You think you’re special, doctor, because you’ve shagged the great James Bond. You’re not even the only beautiful woman in this room to do that, but unlike you, Miss Moneypenny has risked her life and her career to help the pair of you and to defeat Blofeld. She wouldn’t throw her hands up in the air and whimper if Bond was injured in her presence. She wouldn’t whine about not being able to help. She would just be bloody helping him.”
Madeleine had gone white. “I never asked for him to crash into my life.”
“No one does. But you accepted him there, he made you part of the exclusive circle of people he trusts, and you let him down. Now he could be dying for all I know. Why the hell are you here at all?”
“I love him,” she said, voice ice cold.
“Good for you. We all do. And?”
“And he asked me to go away with him.”
Q shook his head in disgust. “Terrific. I’d have given it a week if this hadn’t happened. You don’t know him. You know he’s good in bed, and brave, and more than a little insane. But you don’t know him. How can you love someone you don’t care enough to care for?”
“Dr Swann, we’ll arrange accommodation,” Eve said, stepping in front of Q and cutting him off. “Come with me, please.”
“No, James would want me here.”
“James won’t even remember your name, you stupid woman,” Q snapped. “If he remembers a bloody thing at all.”
Eve turned and glared at Q. “Back off.” She turned back to the other woman. “Please, Dr Swann?”
Madeleine let Eve take her arm and lead her to the doorway, where a young man stood there, his face frozen in shock. Tiredness and anger made Q less polite than his wont. “What do you want?”
“Sir, Mr Tanner sent tea?”
“Oh. Right. Bring it in. I’ll speak to you later, Miss Moneypenny.”
“You bet you will,” Eve muttered, shooing Madeleine through the door. The young messenger gave a mug of tea to Q, then ran out without waiting for thanks or other orders.
Q slumped into one of the armchairs. Well, that had been a nice display. He shouldn’t talk to people when he was on the verge of paranoid hysteria from lack of sleep. He sipped his tea. Somehow he doubted it would give him enough energy to get through the next five minutes, let alone the next five hours.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Two hours later, Q woke out of a light doze when he heard someone come into the waiting area. “Sir?”
He pulled his glasses down over his eyes. “Yes?”
“Mr Morris, the neurosurgeon, wants to brief you on 007’s condition.”
Q got to his feet and followed the woman out. Eve hadn’t returned, or if she had, hadn’t woken him. He doubted she was back yet. Madeleine Swann probably needed placating. M would almost certainly hear about his little temper tantrum. It was the least of his worries right at this moment.
Mr Morris met him outside the ICU, at the nurses’ station. “He’ll live,” Morris said. “There was a subacute subdural haematoma affecting the right temporal lobe and parietal, and two other smaller areas of haemorrhage over what I’ve been told was the result of torture in the last three days.”
“Prognosis?”
“Good, though there may be some deficits. Memory could be affected, both in accessing existing ones and in forming new ones. Speech, recognition, writing can all be affected, and there are often personality changes. There could be some left-sided motor control issues too.”
Q stared. Everything the doctor described would be the end of Bond’s career as any kind of agent, let alone as a double-oh. “Cure? Treatment?”
“There is no cure as such. There’s rehabilitation, of course, and the sooner started the better. He’s an older man in good condition, but I understand he has an alcohol addiction? That won’t help his recovery.”
“Right. Thank you,” Q said, meaning the opposite.
“I’ll be getting home then. I have rounds later this morning.” He gave Q a weary smile. “And I won’t even be able to tell people why I’m knackered.”
Q thanked him again and handed him off to those who dealt with visiting surgeons. He pulled out his phone and sent M and Tanner a report. Only then did it occur to him to ask if he could visit Bond.
“Not yet,” was the answer from the senior nurse on duty. Bond was sedated and on ventilation to help him heal.
“Fine,” Q said. Not that he would know what to say to a former agent who had gone from perfectly fit to possibly disabled in a matter of hours. Perhaps there was a formula for such things, a little speech M could give to say, “Sorry, your life’s been ruined, 007, don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”
He was about to head upstairs to M’s office to see if there was any fire-fighting he needed to do before his boss returned, but Eve met him at the door of Medical. She grabbed his elbow. “You’re coming with me.”
“I have work to do.”
“You have tea to drink, breakfast to eat and a conversation to have with me first, young man.”
“Eve Moneypenny, I am not a ‘young man’.” Though she was four years older than him. Didn’t look it, though.
She steered him towards the lifts. “Shut up, Q.”
Her destination was the canteen, in light operation mode because of the low staff count. Eve pulled rank and asked for two full English breakfasts and a pot of coffee to be brought to their table. “You promised me tea,” Q complained.
“Later. Right now, coffee is all that stands between you and a bloody good smack. What on earth was all that about earlier? ‘We all love James bond’? For heaven's sake.”
“I didn’t mean love love, Eve.”
“I hope not. And what was that, telling her he and I shagged? That’s off the record!”
“I’m sorry.” And he was. “I was just angry at her...her....”
“What?”
“Ownership.” Eve raised an eyebrow at him. “I let him take the DB5. It was for him. And she let him crash it. She let him crash.”
“Wow. That’s some crush.”
“On her?”
“On Bond,” she said dryly. “He doesn’t go for men.”
“And I do not have a bloody crush,” Q retorted. “But we worked together. We nearly died together. We’re a team. We brought down Denbigh, all of us. All she did was pout and look beautiful, but who was the one he ran off with?”
“Funny, I used to think you had hazel eyes.”
“What?”
“They’re looking green right now.”
“Piss off, Moneypenny. Where’s this bloody food?”
“Coming. What did the doctors say?”
“Nothing good. He’ll live. Knowing Bond, he won’t thank anyone for that.” He showed her the report he’d sent M, because the idea of telling it all over made his stomach hurt.
“Bloody hell.”
“Yes.” Their food and coffee had arrived. Strangely, Q didn’t feel like eating it.
“Sounds like it was the concussion that did the damage, not the holes.”
“The holes didn’t help.”
“It wasn’t her fault, Q.”
“Are you honestly telling me she did all she could, knowing his condition and what he’d been through?”
Eve pursed her lips. “She’s been through a lot.”
“She’s Mr White’s daughter. She’s not some blushing schoolgirl. Bond can sure pick them.”
“Meaning?”
“Settle down. I didn’t mean you. I was thinking of that Lynd woman. The crooked agent. And now this...this...female.”
“Miaow.”
“Yes, it was a bit catty.” Q stabbed a mushroom. “I’m too tired for anything better. I’m too tired full stop.”
“Me too.” She put her hand on his. “M will be back in an hour. Then we can go home for a bit and catch some kip. There’s a lot to do but we can’t do it if we’re dead on our feet.”
“Literally if I don’t sleep soon.” He made himself eat the mushroom and some bacon. He nibbled at the toast just to take the edge off the coffee he forced himself to drink. “Ugh.”
“It’s bad, I know. Bond hasn’t got any family, Q. Dr Swann might be all he has now.”
“Bollocks. He has us.”
“You think we’re his friends?”
“You see anyone else who qualifies?”
“We’re his co-workers. God knows I’ve had to sit through enough rants about him from you, M, and Tanner in the last couple of years.”
“You’ve ranted a bit. But who did he trust last night?”
She shook his head. “He’ll need a lot of time and help, probably in a care home.”
“Better to shoot him now.”
“Yeah.”
And Q knew she wasn’t joking.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
True to his word, Mallory was back precisely an hour later, and told Q and Eve to go home until the following morning. Q protested. “Sir, the network.”
“Is safe, and if I need you to, you can manage any problems remotely, correct?”
“Yes, but—”
“No ‘buts’, Q. Tanner has drawn my attention to just how little sleep you two have had, and that makes you more dangerous than helpful.” Mallory smiled to take the insult out of his words. “Go home, sleep. Take pills to do so if you have to. Because when you return, I will need you at full strength, the pair of you.”
“Sir. My people?”
“Already being contacted. They’ll be here when you return.”
“What about Bond, sir?” Eve asked.
“We’re sending him immediately to an MoD medical facility specialising in injured soldiers, and from there, once assessed, he’ll go to a rehabilitation centre which deals with neurological injuries. We simply can’t give him the expert care he needs right now, and with SPECTRE still active, he’ll be safer away from the obvious locations.”
“And Dr Swann?” Q asked.
“Ah, yes. She can stay where she is for now. Miss Moneypenny, that’s something for you to handle. Something else,” he added wryly. “Not our top priority right this moment.”
“No, sir. She’ll want to see Bond.”
“Too bad.” Mallory’s customary politeness was worn out by exhaustion and perhaps irritation at Swann herself. “I’m going home shortly too. Tanner will be here until three, and then one of his staff will have to hold the fort. Since we’re technically supposed to be excess to requirements, let the bloody minister sort out any messes until then.”
Q and Eve grinned back, just as angry at their treatment as M was. “Is that all?”
“Yes. And thank you. You deserve to be bloody knighted, the pair of you.”
“A card from the Queen would be nice,” Eve said.
“I’ll see what I can do. Good day.”
They went down to the car pool together. “I was hoping we could see him,” Eve said.
“I suspect 007 would prefer it this way. Not showing his weaknesses.”
“I doubt he’ll be able to hide them completely. See you tomorrow, Q.” She kissed his cheek. “Sleep well.”
“You too.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Despite fatigue so intense Q literally felt nauseated from it, he wondered if he would actually sleep with all the worries he had in his brain. In fact he didn’t even remember hitting his mattress, and though he woke a couple of times for his bladder to remove some of the tea on which he’d been surviving, he slept until eight the following morning. Far later than his usual habit, but he doubted somehow that M would tell him off for being late to work. He took the time to shower, change, feed the cats by hand and fill their automated feeder, apologise to the cats for being a bad daddy, pack an overnight back with two changes of clothing, and pick up breakfast and supplies for two meals. He foresaw another marathon session at Q-Branch, and wanted to be prepared.
He spared a thought for Bond, probably already gone to the military facility. Would Mallory tell Madeleine Swann? Would Bond want her told? And would he want visitors? What about his flat? The poor sod had only just moved again to an apartment in Chelsea because a woman who’d suddenly become notorious in a sex scandal in the same building had been compromised his previous location. Bond had remarked a few months back that it wasn’t worth him buying another place after his last one was sold because of his ‘death’. What would happen to his possessions—the ones he’d acquired after his resurrection?
Mallory would probably ask Eve to help. Given how much work they all had ahead of them, Bond’s flat, like Bond’s woman, would be low priority. So long as they didn’t evict him until he came home. If he came home.
Q shivered again, and it was nothing to do with the chill winter air. He couldn’t imagine a permanently impaired James Bond. The man had more lives than a cat, and the kind of reckless disregard that scared even other agents. The kind of reckless disregard that had finally brought him to a sudden and permanent halt, apparently.
Q’s phone rang, and in answering it and his staff member’s question, he took his mind off 007 and put it firmly onto problems he had to deal with right now. James Bond was in the hands of strangers again, but at least this time, they weren’t the enemy.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Three months later, Eve came down to Q-Branch to have tea with Q. It had become a weekly Friday afternoon custom now Q-Branch had moved back to headquarters. After the Nine Eyes mess, the loss of a double-oh agent, and the way Q, Eve, Tanner and Mallory had fought like cornered wolves to preserve the department and restore the double-oh program, relations had thawed considerably between Q-Branch and the administration. Q had had more cooperation from other departments in those three months than he’d had in the previous three years, and his people had never worked harder or more willingly to help the double-ohs well beyond their stated remit.
Eve’s visits were a signal to them that Mallory was well pleased, and it also made it easier for Q to get them to knock off on time for the weekend if at all possible. He wanted them in peak condition for the next dire threat—and there always would be another, if not from SPECTRE, then from the next organisation or movement with an agenda that threatened the United Kingdom. Q had been not so subtly reinforcing and adding to his team, and encouraging good relations with all the agents, double-ohs or not. He often wondered how Bond would have dealt with it all. He often wished he could see it happen.
Eve waved a packet of digestives around like a victory flag as she walked in. “Good woman. Kettle’s boiling.”
Eve flung herself onto the sofa. “Got some scotch to go with it?”
“In Early Grey tea? You must be joking.”
“Not today, darling. Bond’s coming back to London.”
“Really? That’s good news, surely.” Q got up to make the pot of tea—no tea bags on Friday afternoon, he’d decided weeks ago.
“Maybe, maybe not. He wants to come back to the double-oh programme.”
“Oh.” Q concentrated on adding the correct amount of tea to the pot. “Is he fit?”
“He’s being assessed already. But the reports from his therapists indicate...not.”
Q covered the pot with the tea cosy and turned around. “Bugger.”
“Yeah. And M, bless him, doesn’t want to be the one to tell him he can’t come back as an agent. He will, of course. He just hates to be that cruel.”
“Bond was going to quit anyway. With Madeleine Swann.” Who had gone back to Switzerland and been offered a place in a witness protection programme if she wanted one. Q didn’t know what she’d decided. It wasn’t of any interest to him.
“You said it yourself, they would have lasted a week. Bond probably knew that, whatever lies he told himself—and her. Q, this will break him.”
Q brought over the tray, and set about pouring the tea, while Eve put some biscuits on the plates. “Yes. But what can we do?” Guiltily he remembered that no one from the division had visited Bond while he was undergoing rehab. A card and flowers had been sent, but really, it was hardly enough for someone who had risked so much, so often, in the service of the Crown.
“I don’t know. M doesn’t know either. Other agents have accepted desk jobs but....”
“None of them were James Bond.”
“Exactly.” She sipped her tea. “Even damaged, he’s likely to be still lethal. To himself and anyone who interferes.”
“And then M will have to....”
“That’s what he’s afraid of. So am I.” She looked down at the cup in her hands.
“You care for him.”
“Of course. Not like that, you plonker. But you were right. We are friends. I miss him, like I’d miss you. But I don’t know him. And I doubt he’ll ever give anyone the chance now to do that.”
Q considered she was completely correct, but he had nothing to suggest. “When will he be here?”
“Tomorrow. M thought it might be easier if there weren’t so many people about.”
“Will you be here?”
“Yes. You?”
“Yes. God, what a mess.”
“Now you know why I wanted the scotch.”
“Now I wish I had some so I could join you.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Even on a Saturday—which was a working day for Q-Branch though only at half-strength—Q had plenty to occupy himself. He worked diligently, but couldn’t deny he had half an ear on his phone’s alerts all day, waiting for Eve to let him know Bond had arrived and gone in to see Mallory. Finally, at four, she texted. Q scooted out of his chair immediately and ran to the lift.
He needn’t have rushed, as it turned out—Bond was still talking to M. “Any word?” Q whispered.
“Nothing. No yelling either. Head’s up.” She composed herself, and Q carefully stood at her desk as if he was talking to her about paperwork. The door opened.
“Oh, hello Bond,” Q said. “Very glad to see you up and around.”
Bond gave Q one of his humourless, thin-lipped smiles. “I wouldn’t get used to it. Moneypenny, M wants to see you. Q,” he added by way of farewell.
Q ran after the man, whose mobility at least didn’t seem affected. “Wait up, Bond. Perhaps you’d like to have supper? Or afternoon tea?”
“What I need now is a fucking drink.”
“Want company?”
Bond stopped, turned and growled. “Knock it off. You know what he said. You always called me 0...0....”
“Seven,” Q supplied, before realising his mistake.
Bond sneered and stalked off. Q refused to be put off, especially now he’d been caught out snooping. “Bond...James....”
Bond slammed his hand at the lift control, and the doors opened immediately. Q slid in after him, and Bond didn’t stop him, although he also didn’t acknowledge him.
“Do you have a car at the moment?”
Wrong question. Bond’s look was poisonous. Oops. “Um, I know a place and I can order us a car.”
“Why?”
“Because...I’m your friend.”
Bond’s lip curled. “Try again.”
“I am your friend. So is Eve. We want to help!”
The lift doors opened. Bond stepped out, pressing the door control as he left. “Then give me a gun so I can shoot myself.”
Q yelped as the doors started to close, but pushed them open again. “Bond. Stop! That’s an order!”
Bond raised his middle finger without even turning around. Q’s only chance of sticking with him was to...well, stick with him. He caught up with him at the carpool. “Bond, please. I just want to talk to you.”
“Three months!” Bond spat.
“I know. I’m so sorry, but it’s been insane here. Please. I’ll buy you that drink if you need one.”
Bond stopped. “Don’t make me talk.”
“I won’t.” Relieved, Q went to the car pool controller and asked for a driver for the evening, giving the directions for a pub close to his house in East Sheen that he rather liked. He didn’t know where Bond was staying but that could be sorted out later.
Bond didn’t speak as they drove to the pub, and only said, “Double Lagavulin” when Q asked what he wanted to drink. The pub wasn’t yet too busy for a late Saturday afternoon, though the big screen television was showing a football match. Bond kept his eyes on the TV most of the time, occasionally checking the room as someone new walked in. He didn’t look at Q once. Q sipped his beer and reflected that this had been one of his more spectacularly bad ideas. Only guilt, innate stubbornness, and the fact Bond hadn’t walked out kept him in his seat for the next three hours as Bond slowly drank two more scotches, and Q two more pints.
But enough was enough. After he came back from the loo, he didn’t sit down again. “Okay, I’m hungry. We could eat here, get a takeaway and eat and my place, or you could go home and sort yourself out.”
Bond finally looked at him. “Your place.”
Q raised his eyebrows in surprise. Frankly, that had been the option he’d picked as least likely. “Right. Good. Well, come along. We have several options. Do you like Chinese?”
A grunt could be taken either way, he supposed. He settled on fish and chips in the end, figuring Bond would probably sneer at what passed for foreign food here in England, but a good chippy was nothing to be ashamed of.
He called the driver and sent him home for the night. He could order another car for Bond when he was ready, and Q’s place was walking distance. Bond didn’t offer to carry the food when Q picked it up. By now, Q’s annoyance was fast overcoming his guilt, and once they had eaten, he planned to ask Bond to push off. He hadn’t signed up to be treated like shit just because Bond was cranky over no longer being a double-oh. Q hadn’t hit him in the head, after all.
He let them into the house, immediately being ambushed by Effie and Tansy. “Do you mind if I feed my cats first?”
“Go ahead.” Bond threw himself down onto an armchair, looking as bored as he had all evening.
Q dumped the food parcels on the counter and spent more time than he needed to cuddling his cats and talking nonsense to them. At least they weren’t ignoring him.
He locked them in the second bedroom, leaving a window open so they could come and go as they pleased. “Right, that’s them sorted. Do you want to eat on the couch or at the table? I don’t have any scotch, but there’s a bottle of white wine.”
No answer, until a hand on his waist made him jump. “I’m not actually hungry,” Boned growled behind his ear.
Stiff with fear, Q turned around. “Er...then what do you want?”
Bond removed Q’s glasses and put them on the counter, then took Q’s head in his hands, and kissed him. And not tentatively, not seeking permission. He plundered Q’s mouth without the smallest quarter, not permitting any objection. Not that Q felt like objecting.
Bond’s hands were at his waist, undoing his belt. “Wait! I...have a bed.”
Bond took his hand and dragged him along. Q pointed. “That door.” Bond pushed it open and shoved Q through it.
“On the bed then.” Bond’s eyes were hard and cold, his mouth a brutal line. Q swallowed. “Get undressed.”
“Yes. Of course.”
Bond took over his coat. Q hung up his gun and holster, stripped off his jacket and tie, and his shoes. “Just the pants.” Bond’s quiet voice brooked no argument. Hastily Q obeyed. Before he could remove his underpants, Bond was on him pinning him down, kissing him again, his hands down the front of Q’s underpants and squeezing his cock. “God yes,” Q breathed. Bond was still mostly dressed. “Fuck me.” Q fumbled at the bedside table drawer, where he had a tube of lubricant and regrettably old condoms.
Bond snatched them from him and threw them on the bed beside them. “Roll over.”
Q did so. Bond bit at his neck, rang his fingers down Q’s flanks painfully hard, before hooking them in his underpants and yanking them down to his thighs. Bond pulled him onto his hands and knees. Okay, so Bond liked it hard and rough. So did Q, occasionally. His cock didn’t mind at all, but his cock wasn’t as fussy as Q was.
Bond prepped him with two stiff fingers, quick and barely adequately, before pushing in. Q hissed, then made himself relax. Bond set up a deep, hard rhythm, changing angle sometimes to hit Q’s prostate, never pausing, and never touching Q’s cock. Q held on, loving the feel of Bond inside him but wishing he could put a hand on himself. The force of Bond’s thrust though, meant if he tried, he’d fall on his face.
It felt like Bond would keep this up all night, but at last he came with a shudder in total silence. A pause, then he reached under Q and jerked him off with swift movements, his hands rough on Q’s erection. Q came in seconds. Bond moved away from him immediately, pulling out like he was contaminated.
Q rolled onto his side, staring at the ceiling. Bond had left the room. Had he left the house?
No, he returned, his clothes back in place and all neat, to throw a washcloth at Q. Q wiped himself and the covers, and dragged his underpants back up around his hips. “Thanks.”
Bond sat on the end of the bed. “Enjoyed that?”
“Had worse,” Q said, trying to smile. “You?”
“Had better.”
Q sat up, pulled himself to the top of the bed, and reached for his glasses. Bugger, they were still in the other room. “Of course. Who am I to compete with all your women?”
“Who are you, indeed.” Bond’s lips curled in disgust. “I had a letter a couple of months ago, from Madeleine. Said she was going away. Said she had spoken to you and you had pointed out how much she had let me down, and that she realised she couldn’t be what I needed.”
“Bond, I—”
“And there I was, in hospital, without a soul who knew me or cared about me, being told by the woman I loved that you had deemed her unfit for me. And I asked myself, who the hell does Q think he is?”
“I was—”
“Prettier than her? Better in bed? Smarter...well of course you think you’re smarter. Kinder? I doubt it. And then I come back to headquarters and you’re jumping around me like a puppy, as if you hadn’t delivered the biggest kick in the guts to me, and expecting me to go for a drink with you? Because you’re my friend?” Bond got to his feet and picked up his coat. “So you got what you wanted, Q. Happy now?”
“No. Bond, I—”
But Bond walked out. Seconds later, Q heard the front door open and shut.
What the fuck have I done?
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Though it was Sunday, Q went into work. A kind of penance, perhaps, though that was a ridiculous idea. It was really because he couldn’t face the idea of his own company or more time spent self-loathing. Even the cats didn’t want to spend time with him in this mood.
At eleven Eve appeared in his office. “Saw you were in. I heard you went out with himself last night.”
Q put his head in his hands. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Which means you better talk about it. I only popped in to drop off something. Come outside with me. You don’t have anything you need to do, not really.”
Q looked at his desk, thought about arguing, then sighed. “No, I’ll just fuck it up like the rest of it.”
“Okay, now you really have to talk.”
It was a typical spring day in London—cold, damp, windy—so they took refuge in the Tate Britain’s café. They ordered tea and cake, and found a table. “What happened, Spencer?”
“I badgered him into coming out with me for a drink. He was obviously hostile but I foolishly thought that I had some power to change that.”
“So he was rude?”
“He was dismissive.” Q hung his head. “I asked him back to have supper, and he fucked me.”
“Spencer! You?”
“Funny, that’s what he said, more or less.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Madeleine Swann told him what I said to her, and he blames me for her leaving him. Which is nothing less than the truth, actually. He fucked me and then told me I had a hide thinking I could be a substitute, then he left.”
Eve reached for his hand. “That’s horrible.”
“Yeah. You were right, and I got exactly what I deserved.” He pulled his hand away and wrapped his arms around himself. “He hates me. I can’t blame him at all.”
“I can. I’ll shoot him if I see him again.”
“No, don’t. I overstepped the mark. The worst of it was that at the start I thought he really had some kind of feelings for me, even after Madeleine and not visiting while he was being treated. I mean, why would he consider me a friend after that?”
“You’re being a bit hard on yourself. He was angry because M wouldn’t reinstate him. He’s not even finished rehab.”
“He seems fine, strangely. Apart from the unspoken fury, which is not all that new for him.”
“Just not at you.”
“No.”
“M says he’s made astonishing progress. By normal standards, he’s done really well. It’s just that double-ohs are expected to be supernormal, and he doesn’t hit that mark. Probably won’t ever do so. But if he hadn’t been a double-oh with his special abilities and training, he wouldn’t be half as well off. His brain is, and has been in the past, able to overcome injuries before. Just not enough, this time. He’s nearly at the maximum age for double-ohs. In a couple of years, M would be pushing for him to retire anyway.”
“Does he know that?”
“Probably, in his heart. He might calm down.”
Q looked at Eve. “No, I really don’t think he will. I fucked this up well and truly.”
She could only pat his hand, and be with him while he moped. They dealt in the hard cold truth, and the hard cold truth was that Bond had ample reason to hate Q. That wouldn’t change.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Q threw himself into work after that, and wouldn’t have returned home at all if it weren’t for the cats. The look on Bond’s face haunted him, and the only thing that pushed it away was coding, or working on the more dangerous prototypes. Doing either while distracted was not a long-term survival strategy, but in the short term, Q’s ability to focus was marginally better than his ability to flog himself for being an idiot. It helped that there were two serious hacking attempts by, they suspected, SPECTRE or one of their associated organisations. Q was one of the few people in the country who could have repelled the threat, a thought which didn’t give him much comfort. He sent a memo to Mallory that they needed to prioritise recruiting coders, even actual hackers, because in the future, they would be more important to the national security than explosives experts. Unfortunately, the really best people could ask what money they wanted, and HM Government wasn’t known for its generous salaries.
He staggered home on a Sunday night after the latest incursion was halted, too tired to think of anything but sleep. Even the cats would have starved if the feeder wasn’t full—which it was. It was the only thing he made sure he attended to at home, though the cats needed his presence too. Even cats had to sacrifice for Queen and country.
He let himself into the house but before he could take his coat off, there was a knock at the door. He checked the camera display. “Bond?”
“Q.”
He opened the door. Bond walked in, without waiting for an invitation.
“What do you want, Bond?”
“I thought we could fuck.”
“No.”
Bond came up close. Q smelled scotch on his breath. “Are you sure?” His voice was low and husky, and Q’s stupid cock responded. When Q didn’t answer, Bond kissed him, marginally more gently than last time.
“Why?”
“Why not? Besides, you owe me.”
Q wanted to deny that, but it was hard to think with Bond’s hands on him, under his jacket, feeling his body through his shirt. “All right.”
Bond took his hand and pulled him to the bedroom. This time Q could at least take his glasses off for himself. Bond removed his coat and jacket, then stood waiting. Q took his time, partly because his hands were shaking, partly because he really didn’t know if he wanted this or not. But he did owe Bond for what he had done to Madeleine, and if this evened out the debt, then maybe it would help Bond over his anger.
Bond urged him onto his front and pulled him up onto his hands and knees. “I don’t have—” Q said, because he’d thrown away the supplies in disgust at himself.
“I do. Keep still.”
Just like the last time, Bond rode him hard and expertly, and jerked him off to orgasm after his own. Like last time, Bond fetched a cloth and tossed it to him. Q couldn’t look at him as he cleaned up.
“Like that?” Bond asked.
“Not particularly.”
“Shame. I did.”
And with that, he left. Q pulled his knees up under his chin and wrapped his arms around himself, unable to stop shaking.
In the morning he sent a message to Eve to say he was unwell and would work from home that day. He couldn’t face anyone right then.
He didn’t tell Eve what happened either.