Chapter Text
It was ridiculous, the fact that the famous James Bond took a train to get to work. Before last week, Q was sure that 007 didn’t even know how to ride a train like a normal person and not on the roof, shooting at various henchmen. And yet there he was, James bloody Bond, sitting casually sitting in Q’s favorite spot at the window, making the random young woman to his left giggling with his cheesy lines.
“I’ll send him on his next mission on the Cattle class,” Q muttered, barely managing to hold back a groan when a new wave of people got on the train, pushing him further away from his beloved seat. At least he didn’t have to see 007’s bloody smile anymore. Of course, this meant he couldn’t glare at him anymore either.
Contrary to what his colleagues thought of him – that he was a reclusive mad genius who preferred to spend his time in front of large computer screens in the underground and as far away from sunlight and anything that might resemble human interaction or the outside world – Q was fascinated by it. He liked to sit quietly in the train, at the window and simply observe the world around him.
True, he mostly got pleasure from seeing people emerged in flimsy little games, their faces scrunching up whenever they failed at a level while smirking at the fact that he could finish those games without hacking the game, but he also lived a normal life through them. Not once did he find himself listening in on various little gossips groups and imagining himself in their shoes, thinking about how he would have reacted in their place. Not that he regretted working for MI6, but on rare occasions, he wondered how it would be if his biggest problem was his boss catching him watching a random cat video on YouTube and then blocking the site – not that it would be hard for him to bypass the web filters since he himself had worked on most of them.
A little tug on his cardigan brought him out of his reverie and he suddenly found himself face to face with the bane of his existence, an annoying know-it-all smirk firmly in place on the lips that seemed to only be able to sprout lame flirting lines and bad news for his beloved technology.
“This is our stop,” the bloody agent said and Q looked around for a second before huffing and shrugging out of the agent’s hold. If he wasn’t the first on the train to secure his spot, then he will bloody well be the first in the bloody MI6 building. So what if that didn’t matter to anyone? It mattered to him.
And no, no, he wasn’t being childish. It was the principle of the thing! So what if 007 didn’t know that he was sitting in his spot? He was a spy, he should know that! Actually, now that he thought better, he had seen the agent on the same train as him a couple of months after Skyfall and there was no doubt that the agent had seen him as well. And since he always sat on in that seat, he was now without a doubt sure that the bloody pest knew what he was doing.
With that revelation, Q stopped suddenly and turned around, full glare in place. He was startled to see the older man looking at him with a small smile on his face, left hand keeping the door open for the both of them.
“Quartermaster, perhaps you shouldn’t think of your zeroes and ones so hard and watch where you are going,” 007 said amusedly. “You almost walked into five people and this door. And that was just today.”
“You’ve been sitting in my sport on purpose!” Q replied angrily, words coming out hissed, hands thrown in the air. “I’ll make these bloody doors automatic today!” The quartermaster announced loudly to the world around him, startling the security guards and 007.
That day, everyone pretty much jumped out of Q’s way, his own minions cowering in various corners of the Q Branch, fearful of their overlord’s unexplained wrath. Of course, everyone knew that 007 had accompanied the speckled man to work and everyone was sure that the agent was to blame for the anger. Still, they didn’t understand why they had to suffer the consequences of the agent’s misplaced flirting or questions regarding the younger man’s age and competence – since they were sure that James Bond wasn’t able to hold back from teasing his quartermaster no matter how many times the other promised to send him in the field with nothing but a simple paperclip and a water gun.
“Judi is in the bathroom, crying,” one of the minions whispered to the unfortunate one tasked to make Q his tea.
“What? Why? I am pretty sure he sent her to check the front doors… How can you make someone cry over that?” the other asked, holding the Q mug with shaky hands.
“He said she was too slow and that is why the doors closed on her. She has a nasty bump on her forehead and Mike from accounting – the blond guy she likes, by the way – saw that and laughed,” another minion clarified, stuffing his pockets full with muffins.
“This is Q branch, not gossip branch,” Q’s voice boomed over the speakers, causing the three minions to run back to their tasks. “And that bloody tea better be the best damn tea in the universe since it took you more than 20 minutes to make it!”
The minion thanked whatever God was listening since he was saved from a rather painful mug to the head by the reason of their quartermaster’s ire entering the man’s office. Good, the agent should be the one on the receiving end of the punishment, not the people who blindly followed Q and who would do anything in their power to make the man happy. The agent should pay for turning their overlord into a tyrant.
“Quartermaster, my quartermaster, what is the matter? I could hear you shout at these poor boffins from the hallway,” the agent mockingly asked.
Q did his best to ignore the man and keep a professional air, but he couldn’t be blamed from his eye twitching slightly. “A gun, codded to your fingerprint, as usual. And a signet ring which, when placed to against a computer with Wi-Fi grants me instant access to the files on it,” Q quickly rose his finger, stopping the agent from talking. “And if you ask me for that bloody exploding pen, I’ll make sure everything you touch turns into an unusable pile of goo until the day you die.”
Of course Bond, Bond who never knew when to stop in some people’s opinion, poked Q’s nose, winking. That seemed to bring the young man’s brain to a screeching halt and when he opened his mouth to scold the agent for daring to touch him, all that came out was a sound akin to a confused mewl.
“There, there, my quartermaster. You can relax now and go back to being the fluffy, smart cloud that his minions adore for the next two weeks since I won’t be there to steal your spot in the morning. Tell me, will you miss seeing my face first thing in the morning? I know I’ll miss yours.”
The agent took a step closer and all Q managed to do was widen his eyes. He tried to take a step back or tell the agent to back off and maybe get a pair of glasses since a mark he was not, but it seemed like the rest of his body had gone on a complete lockdown and his muscles refused to obey the signals his brain sent.
“Oh, what do you know?” 007 asked softly, bringing his right hand up and resting it on Q’s shoulder. “You did manage to give me that magical touch… But I wonder what would happen if I were to touch you with my lips?”
And that was what snapped Q out of his temporary paralysis and he was quick to bend his leg and bring it up, hitting the agent in the groin. At the same time the agent doubled over in pain, the door opened and Moneypenny arrived, a handful of minions’ heads popping out from behind her.
“Bond, aren’t you causing enough trouble for your quartermaster?” She asked, eyebrows raised at the kneeling agent.
“I think 007 needs to go to medical and get glasses prescription. His age has finally caught up with his eyes and he can no longer tell who he is talking with. He had me confused with one of his desperate and lonely marks of his,” Q said calmly, walking around the agent and sitting down at his station, nimble fingers already flying over the keyboard. “Off you go, 007. And please crawl away faster than me finishing up this e-mail for human resources, unless you want to find yourself stuck in sexual harassment classes for the next five years.”
Pride wounded more than his genitals, James heaved himself back up and left the office, throwing a pained smile at Q over his shoulder, Moneypenny hot on his heels. The older man ignored the multitude of glares sent his way by the minions, but did ask the former agent if she could, perhaps, find a way to calm the Q branch down enough so that he wouldn’t be erased from the records.
“I will not blame them if they did that,” she said, laughing behind her hand once the two of them were in the elevator. “You did overstep your boundaries this time and you made their God upset.” Clicking her tongue, she leaned against the cold metal of the elevator, bobbing her head slightly to the poor excuse for a song.
“You can’t really blame me. The fire those green eyes shot my way every morning… Call me a glutton for punishment, but to be so close to them and those venom sprouting lips,” Sighing and massaging his temples, it took every ounce of control he had no to hit his head against something. “I really did not want to sexually harass him against his will.”
“It’s called sexual harassment because it is against someone’s will. Bond, I think you should really go to those classes. And if you want him to like you, why don’t you start by, oh I don’t know…Not stealing his spot on the morning train? What are you doing in that zone anyway? I am pretty sure you live on the other side of the city,” she asked, eyes narrowed in suspicion and concern for the other male.
“And he said he was mature. And that seat isn’t all that great anyway,” Bond muttered under his breath, although loud enough for Moneypenny to hear him.
“Not like you’re more mature than he is at this point,” she quickly shot back, punching his shoulder lightly. “Stop antagonizing him, stop with the lame pick-up lines when it comes to him, apologize for being a brute and maybe, just maybe, he will become your friend.”
The elevator’s doors opened and Bond quickly vacated it, leaving Moneypenny to herself, but not before telling her that he had decided to move a few months back. “It was an accident, I swear,” he said just as the doors closed and he was pretty sure he heard the woman worryingly calling him a stalker – but he wasn’t, really. It had been an accident.
***
“One mission not going tits up, that is all I am asking of you, Bond,” Q muttered into the coms, silently thanking the minion that had refilled his mug with the elixir of life.
It was supposed to be a smile mission, but then again, most of them were. Bond was simply supposed to go to Costa Rica, pretend he was a rich bastard looking for a way to expand his illicit affairs in that zone of the globe, go to a party, shag random woman #45567987 and then get access to the main servers so Q could slowly start to deconstruct the whole operation from inside. But no, Bond had to go be Bond and now he was being chased through a forest in the middle of the night by at least twenty guards and by a very angry and insulted husband.
“How could you mix the women up, Bond?” Q asked again, redirecting a NASA satellite to get a better view of the agent and actually save him. “You really do need glasses. Make a left at the next tree and jump in that cave.”
“Thank God there is only one tree in this forest full of trees, right Q?” Bond shot back sarcastically, but still managing to find the right tree to take the left at. “And that is not the only thing you ask of me, quartermaster,” he continued to whisper in his surprisingly still working communication device. “You ask me to bring your equipment back in one piece, and I am dreadfully sorry for the gun and the ring, but at least I now know that a gun isn’t a boomerang. And, tits up as this whole mission went at least you have access to their servers. ”
Q’s fight with the migraine was instantly lost at those words and he almost hit his keyboard with his fists. “Well, imagine how horrible of me it is to ask that you bring your equipment back in one piece,” he huffed and checked the map again, waiting for the others to be far enough so he could guide the danger prone agent to a boat and to the safety of England. “And I already knew that a gun isn’t a boomerang! You know how much money the equipment costs?”
The young man didn’t even have to try too hard to imagine 007’s amused face and that made his migraine only worse. And he was pretty sure he could hear the agent fight to hold down laughter.
“You also want me to not sit in your spot,” the agent said after a few minutes of total silence, just as Q was about to direct him out of the cave. “Speaking of which, have you been sent to HR yet for anger management by your minions?”
“Excuse me?” This time Q did raise his voice, causing the few minions that had been assigned to help with the mission turn and look in his direction. “I apologized, unlike a certain brute who can’t be troubled enough not aggravate the man who pretty much holds his life in the palm of his hands. Now get out of the cave, make a left and follow the sound of the bloody river. A boat is there to take you home. Q out.”
The quartermaster closed the coms before Bond could think of a comeback and gave orders not to be disturbed unless ‘the bloody ass is seconds away from blowing up Costa Rica’. He went back to his office and set about decrypting the files and searching for the information he needed while his minions kept a close eye on the menace that was Bond.
He got lost in the lines of coding, as he was prone to do, the world around him turning into endless ones and zeros, thanking whoever brought him food and tea without really being aware of it. At one point, someone presented him with the leftovers of Bond’s equipment and patiently listened to him grumble under his breath his worries before being guided effortlessly though the empty halls of MI6 and deposited in a company car to be driven home.
The city wheezed past him, his brain deconstructing each sound and color into strings of numbers, his fingers dancing in front of him as he tried to break the code that made up the world and build it into something different, a chuckle coming from somewhere near him sounding eerily familiar.
Only when his alarm went off the following day did he realize that he had been locked inside his head for three days straight and he made a mental note to thank whoever helped him for putting up with his smell and unkempt appearance.
He was lucky to catch the train in time and he made his way to his usual spot with a little smile on his lips, only for it to completely disappear when his green eyes landed on a bandaged up Bond sitting next to his preferred spot, a rather large box resting next to him.
The agent smiled and waved at him with his unbandaged arm, quickly jumping to his feet and grabbing the back of Q’s cardigan, pulling him back. “Now, don’t be like this. I save you your spot, quartermaster,” 007 whispered, catching the edge of Q’s clothes with his wounded hand to keep him in place and using his good hand to pick up the box.
Q thought about pushing slapping the offending hand off of his expensive cardigan, but he didn’t hate the other enough to cause him more pain. Actually, now that he was sitting quietly in his seat, eyes glued to the world outside and totally not looking at Bond’s smiling reflection, he realized he was more annoyed at the agent being bandaged up than anything.
“This?” James asked and lifted his wounded up a bit, noticing the angry and offended glare his Q was giving it. “Actually, turned out I had slept with the boat captain’s sister a few days back and for some strange reason, she thought I was going to marry her.”
Now actually looking at 007, Q’s eyes slowly shifted to the box for a second before looking back at the agent, eyes cold. “I’ll recommend him for knighthood,” was what he finally said, causing the other man to laugh, the addition of ‘I’m being serious’ actually bringing tears of to the agent’s eyes.
“Look, Quilliam…”
“Quilliam? Where did you get that name?” Q interrupted the agent, frowning and crossing his arms over his chest.
Bond shrugged and deposited the box in the young man’s lap, patting his head with his free hand and raising his wounded one up to stop him from hitting him. Q was way too nice for his own good, the agent thought. “You look like a Quilliam to me.”
“Well you look like an ass to me so…Bottom it is then,” Q replied, actually smiling before getting distracted by the box and starting to poke at it.
“An apology,” Bond supplied, mentally giving himself a pat on the back from not making a sexual innuendo. “For doing something that might be considered sexual harassment and for ruining your toy—your equipment.”
The man actually looked apologetic and maybe Q felt inclined to accept the apology because of the broken lip, nose, and black eye that accompanied the shot arm. Or maybe that was because he was sitting in his favorite seat and the sun was out. Or maybe the planets were aligned in a certain way. Bottom line was that Q muttered “Apology accepted, James,” and the agent was all smiles all sunshine.
“What happened to Bottom?”
“He got kicked because he ruined a rather nice gesture,” Q shot back, his fingers twitching as he fought back from ripping the box open and looking inside.
“It is tea and two horrid cardigans,” Bond said, taking pity on his quartermaster who was less subtle than he thought and completely sucked at hiding his curiosity and enthusiasm. “Look, we started on the wrong foot,” he tried again. “I am sorry.”
Q smiled again, actually showing Bond his white teeth and he was getting ready to admit that, perhaps he had been childish in his anger over a seat. But just as he was about to voice that, Bond went and said “Also, if you really wanted this sit, you could have simply sat in my lap.”
“You are a horrible and eternally horny old man, Bottom.”
“Yeah, but you’re smiling,” the agent pointed out, winking. “Give me a chance and maybe you’ll see that I am not so horrible?”
The train picked that time to go into a tunnel for which Q was glad. Bond was still jumpy, as proven by the fact that the young man felt the other flinch and go for the gun which he no longer had. Q rested his hand carefully on the agent’s arm to calm him down and when the train exited the tunnel, he was greeted with a smiling Bond.
“Sure, I’ll give being your friend a shot,” Q said slowly, getting the impression for a fraction of a second that the other man seemed disappointed before being distracted by his phone. “But if you sit on my spot again…” Before accepting the call, Q made sure to pinch Bond’s leg as hard as he could, earning a flinch and a hiss, the agent muttering that perhaps he should be the one to go to HR for a the sexual harassment class.
Later that day, when Q was enjoying the tea Bind gave him, it dawned on the young man that Bond had received a very nice Aston Martin after Skyfall, a car which he had personally seen to and which he had modified to suit a double-oh agent. Headache suddenly King of Q’s brain, the quartermaster turned on MI6’s intercoms, too busy seeing red to care about proper protocol.
“James bloody Bond, what happened to the bloody expensive Aston Martin you got not even a year ago?!? I’ll cancel all your credit cards! You’ll have to sell each and every one of your bloody suits to get to work, you hear me! You are a complete menace to my budget!”