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Oliver was in a state of bewilderment- or maybe it was just shock. The MI6 building had just lost its roof- literally- so it would make perfect sense. After being cleared by medical, and narrowly escaping psych who wanted to assess everyone after such a tragic event- which, yes, it was quite traumatic, however, they did work in a fucking spy agency, so people were most likely used to death- he had been called to M’s office. The temporary office was in what may have been part of Churchill’s war bunker- the catacombs were endless, it seemed. That was beside the point, however, as he had been up for about two days at this point, so he wasn’t really up to taking in the historical significance of where he was.
M’s office had been nothing like her old one, that being rather open and light with this one looking like a cave crossed with a nineteenth century study. It had obviously just been cleaned out, but a desk had been procured form somewhere along with a chair upon which an intimidating person could sit and look down on their subordinates (Oliver was very much the subordinate in this situation).
The woman in question was very short, even for one of her age, but no one could ever see the wrinkles on her face and her grey hair and think her weak. (Oliver especially would know, hacking her file, along with a few others, had gotten him his job.) Without saying a word, she had gestured to the seat across from her, causing Oliver to scramble to sit as quickly as possible while Tanner had closed the rather ornate door behind them.
“Right,” M had said, as Tanner took the seat next to him, “this is obviously rather a large catastrophe that we would very much like to overcome quickly so that the whole world does not continue to make a mockery of the British secret service.” Oliver had been nodding along with her at this point. “So, Oliver,” she had said in a way that very much conveyed that she did not believe for one second that was his real name, “what the bloody hell happened, and how did we let it happen?”
Oliver had shuffled slightly and glanced around while contemplating how best to answer, “well, ma’am, someone hacked your computer, very easily, might I add- your cyber security is really quite abysmal- anyway, your computer was hacked by an outside source which then somehow managed to trigger a bomb in your office. This then led to some of the floor below, and most of the floor itself to be destroyed taking out the majority of Q-branch. So far, there are eight confirmed deaths, including Q and R along with-”
“Yes, yes, I know all that already.” M had then waved pressed a button on her desk and a woman had walked in carrying three cups of tea. Oliver had taken his mug, looking and feeling slightly puzzled, as he was almost certain it had been destroyed in the blast, and handed another across the desk to M. “So,” M had said, “what you are essentially saying, while trying not to offend anybody, is that this could have been easily avoided?”
“Maybe? It’s hard to tell- we could have had more defences against cyber-attacks in place to make it harder for this sort of thing to occur, or maybe we could have delayed it to give us time to evacuate,” Oliver had shaken his head, the code playing out behind his eyes, before taking a sip of tea, “we are in a better position than when I first joined MI6, but we still have quite a long way to go in terms of cybersecurity.”
M had nodded decisively and then stood, causing Oliver to rise with her- as you would with the Queen, he thought, “then that is your first assignment, Q, figure out a way of stopping these attacks and tracing them- and for heaven’s sake, don’t let it happen again.”
Oliver had started spluttering halfway through, so it took a moment for him to process and then actually formulate a response, “I’m sorry, did you… did you just call me Q?”
M had raised an eyebrow at him as Tanner opened the door, “yes, Quartermaster, call this a promotion, with the bonus being that you get to remove all traces of your fake name from the MI6 database, and any other database you find it in. Good luck.”
---
And that left Oliver- Q- where he was now a day later, after his ordered rest, looking out into a large underground space that was soon-to-be the new Q-branch. His office- because he had one of those now- was further towards the back with newly installed glass that became opaque at the click of a button. He wasn’t really planning on using it very often, so he also had a large set-up at the front of the underground area with benches at standing height. The was also a huge screen for him, and the rest of his minions, to see what the hell was going on when some 00-agent decided to do something particularly stupid.
Essentially, Q-branch was going to be bigger and better than ever before if he had anything to say about it. MI6 had become his home when they had taken in a rogue hacker with more skills than he’d known what to do with. Q had changed a lot, in those five years- his dress sense becoming less ‘I don’t care’ and more ‘I’m a middle-aged English professor’. Even his accent had all but disappeared, to be replaced with a generic upper-middle class southern England one. His actual name had never touched MI6 databases- it protected his mum- he was different, he was Q, now, but he was still the same person. MI6 was his responsibility.
---
It was his third official day as Q, and so far everything seemed to be going smoothly. He’d chosen his new R- the previous one having been caught in the blast along with his predecessor- and had managed to locate which of his minions made the best tea. The majority of his department was functional, and the rest would be set up and running within twelve hours- the maintenance department deserved a medal, seriously- life was looking up for Q-branch.
That is until a young woman, Eve Moneypenny, walked in. She had been a field agent- Q knew that much, having worked with her on testing new tech a few times- and she had even been up for consideration as a future 00. Or she had been before she shot 007 dead. Now she was on six months suspension to desk duty. Word had it she was the eyes and ears of Mallory, and even M herself, on occasion.
“M would like me to tell you,” she said, after accepting the mug of tea Isabelle had brought her immediately- they were so well trained already, “that it appears 007 is not actually, well, dead. He has reappeared, as it were, and will be going for full field duty assessment tomorrow. She would like you to figure out where exactly he is staying, what he’s doing, that sort of thing.”
She drained her mug, “oh, also, she would like you to be prepared to send him off rather sharply on assignment.”
Moneypenny stood and turned to go. Q said, “M does realise that the odds of Bond passing his assessments- especially the psych eval are very low, right?”
Moneypenny glanced back at him appraisingly, “who said anything about him passing? Thank you for the tea, Q, I’m sure I’ll be back.”
Q decided that Moneypenny would probably be very suited to management, after all.
---
Over the next eighteen hours Q introduced himself to both 004 and 009 over an earpiece as they were both in the middle of active missions that needed handling. He prevented three separate terrorist attacks from his computer- having a hacking background definitely came in handy in his job- and organised an assassination of a corrupt politician. He also found time to stalk Bond around London using CCTV, and write a detailed report to be sent up to M. R had looked slightly puzzled at that. He also was reminded of how much Q-branch really didn’t like 007 that much since the news of him rising from the dead was released- he had a nasty habit of lurking in a corner and shocking the jumpier minions.
Q watched as Bond managed to fail most of his tests, particularly the car-crash of the psych eval. (Q had to go digging in the paper archives to find why, exactly, Skyfall was such a trigger for the agent.) He almost keeled over at the man’s poor marksmanship skills- even Q’s was better, and he didn’t even like testing out all the guns.
However, Moneypenny, who had taken to camping out at Q-branch when she got tired of all the bureaucracy, had informed him that M had cleared 007 for active fieldwork with flying colours- her face had said otherwise- and he (Q) would be meeting with Bond tomorrow for his mission to Shanghai. Both of their expressions let the other know that this could all go wrong about a hundred different ways, but, unfortunately, they trusted M to at least pretend to know what she was doing.
---
One of the recently-out-of-prototype-stage walthers was placed in the small case, along with his own personal design of radio, made for transmitting long distances. He double-checked Bond’s handprints from the medical eval, and made sure the radio could withstand a small explosion. Q was determined to make sure that Bond would not die on his watch- he would rather like if he could maintain his streak of no agency deaths for at least a couple of months.
Moneypenny had wished him luck and told him not to take Bond too seriously- apparently he likes to mess with people- and now, he was strolling into the museum to meet with the agent, looking for all the world like one of the art students. Sometimes it annoyed him to be underestimated, however, he couldn’t deny it could be useful, especially now being one of the most powerful people in the secret service, and one of the most dangerous hackers worldwide.
Q spotted Bond sat in front of a large painting of a ship. He looked old, and not in an I-am-over-forty-ageing-is-a-thing way, in a drained-bloodshot-not-shaved-in-three-days way. Q took a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and took the seat next to Bond.
“It always makes me feel a little melancholy…”