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The weather in London had been brewing into a grey and gloomy mass of clouds threatening to unleash a torrential downpour on its cynical citizens, each who had fleeting fancies that the stormy weather was waiting on them, biding time until they were far enough from shelter there was no hope escaping it until drenched, cold, and undeniably miserable. They were worrying in vain, however. This particular rain was waiting for one Quartermaster, clocking off after 18 hours, wanting nothing more than to reach the comfort of his own home, change, put on some dinner and likely fall asleep to a movie he’s already seen 50 times.
He had only been walking a few minutes when the first fat drops began their decent. It took moments before he could feel the cold wetness on his skin, his clothes becoming soaked as he hunched over to try and keep at least some of himself protected from the weather. He wiped his glasses, but the relentless rain made it impossible to keep his vision becoming distorted, and in a habit born of a decade of cleaning his glasses whenever there was anything streaked on them, he took his glasses off and polished them on his sleeve, replacing them only to have his vision stolen away again with a few seconds.
He groaned, taking them off again, gazing down the street. His vision wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t great without aid. He could make out shapes and colours easily enough, he wouldn’t be able to read, but the biggest problem was distance. He could see a lamppost just ahead of him, he knew it was a lamppost, but being able to walk past it without knocking against it was another thing. He had no depth perception. His eyes weren’t compatible. He was anisometropic, the left seeing clearly at a distance but being unable to focus as things got closer, and the right only being able to see with any clarity at a roughly 20 cm distance. Together, they did not co-operate, either making everything blurry, or if he tried to force them to focus, he got double vision, his brain not handling the different perceptions of the same object just giving him both.
Trying to make his way through the streets of London at 7 in the evening when it was pissing it down with rain and people were trying to speed their way to their destination or darting for cover or hunched over and not really looking where they were going, this was going to be challenging. And it went badly almost immediately.
He had reached into his bag to try and dig out his glasses case, and as soon as he did someone ploughed into him growling “watch where you’re going”, knocking him off balance and he on instinct threw his arms out to steady himself. He didn’t fall, but his glasses did. Well, shit.
He squinted at the ground, trying to calm the part of his brain that wanted to drop to his knees and desperately feel around for them. If he couldn’t find them, it wasn’t the end of the world. They had, he thought with bitter amusement, a tracking chip built into the frame, to make him easier to find as it was unlikely he would be far from them even if something happened, and if the frame was snapped it would immediately send a distress signal to Q-branch. He wasn’t sure if he found the thought of 6 receiving a distress signal and sending agents to his location only to find him searching fruitlessly for where he’d dropped his glasses funny or deathly embarrassing.
“Stand down. Situation under control. The Quartermaster is clumsy and blind as a bat.”
He cringed internally. He could have gone back into HQ where he has some pairs of contact lenses stored in case he ever needs them. His spare glasses are at his flat, and he makes a mental note to get another pair to stash in his office. Going back in though, where lights ranged from glaringly bright to too dim to make anything out, he would have to ask for help. And worse, the help would have to come from someone with clearance to get to his office. It’s not as if anyone there doesn’t know he needs glasses, but there’s a difference between knowing and seeing it. Seeing him being rendered not just fairly helpless, but useless without his glasses. The Quartermaster, head of Q-branch, the mostly level-headed leader, devastating at a computer, respected by his underlings, peers and superiors alike, reduced to needing his hand held so he didn’t walk into walls or trip over anything and everything in his way.
He had worked hard to curate an image of himself, one where people saw a competent and efficient leader they could trust, rather than his youthful exterior that neither effectually represented his ability nor experience. He was his reputation, and the thought of it being mired by something as ridiculous as dropping his glasses in the rain and having to stumble back looking like a drowned rat and having to rely on someone so completely made his stomach knot.
He wasn’t normally so consumed with people’s opinions of him; what they thought didn’t impact what he could do, so let them think what they want. But right now he probably looked as pathetic and useless as he felt.
Lost in his thoughts, still scanning the ground, he didn’t notice the moment the rain stopped falling on him. It was the pitter patter of raindrops on canvas that finally made him glance up to find an out of focus yet familiar man standing beside him, before turning to stare pointlessly at the ground again.
“Hello Bond.”
“Need help?”
“No.”
“Okay,” the agent said, but made no move to leave.
Q sighed. “I lost my glasses. I can’t see without my glasses.”
“Alright, Velma. Where did you drop them?”
“Somewhere here? Someone knocked into me and now they’ve dropped out of existence.”
Bond handed him the umbrella to hold and started looking himself, finding them on the road just off the curb side. “Ah. Found them, but it’s not good news.” He exchanged the glasses for the brolly, and Q groaned finding the glass cracked on the left lens, and completely gone on the right.
“Damn. Well, thanks Daphne. I don’t suppose…” he trailed off biting his lip.
“I thought I was Fred?”
Q snorted, turned his broken glasses in his hands. “No. Maybe Scooby, chaotic and strangely endearing. But I’m not sure anything you accomplish isn’t pure accident.”
“I like to think there’s some skill involved.”
“You are the luckiest, the canniest, and most reckless man I know, but don’t think I haven’t figured out you blow things up, including my equipment, until things fall in place.”
“So, did you want help or not?”
Q slid his glasses on his face, and when he almost immediately started feeling queasy, took them off, folding them carefully and placing them in his bag. “I don’t want help,” he said glumly.
Bond took his hand then, threading Q’s arm through his own. “Where do you want to go?”
“Home. Please take me home.”