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He didn’t ask for much, Q thought to himself as he glared at his ceiling, seriously thinking about asking M to send in an agent and deal with the noise problem. Well, okay so maybe that was asking for too much. But he generally wanted the agents to bring him his equipment back in one piece – impossible for most of the agents, especially 007 –, for the agents to return without a scratch – impossible for 007 –, for his tea to be perfect and for his night to be quiet.
He was okay with his sleep being interrupted by work. He never complained about that. When work was involved, his humble opinion was that sleep was over rated. Actually he had complained when he hadn’t been called in, even though a double-oh agent was in trouble. Things were resolved and 004 had returned with only a few scratches, but Q was still mildly upset over being left to sleep.
But a noisy neighbor at 3 in the morning who he hadn’t even met? No, no that was where he drew the line. It wasn’t even the neighbor who was being noisy. It was his female companion who was making all the noise and if the pitch of her moans and screams were anything to go by, it was the fifth different female companion that is Don Juan of a neighbor had brought with him that month.
Well wooptido for the man’s libido and charming abilities. Maybe he should become a double oh and screw for Queen and Country. He might even give 007 a run for his money. But right now, all he did was cost Q his much needed downtime.
He would have bought noise canceling headphones. Actually, he could have built noise canceling headphones. But he couldn’t wear them because that meant that there would be the high possibility of missing an important call from work, costing someone their lives. However, if he found a way to make the headphones pick up only a certain frequency which he would then program in his phone then --
“Of for the love of…She’s faking it!” He screamed on top of his lungs when a scream brought him out of his thoughts, groaning and covering his face with the pillow when the woman moaned even louder as if to spite him. What did he ever do to her? “I’m just trying to sleep here, give me a break! Stuff something in her mouth! I’m sure you know what, you pest!” He shouted again from under the pillow, searching for his phone with his other hand. “I can have you two killed, you know!”
That (mostly) empty threat seemed to stop the woman’s inhuman sounds and, after five minutes of blissful silence, Q was safe and sound in la-la-land, dreaming of silent codes and agents who brought back his equipment without as much as a scratch, phone screen
The following morning, the sleepy quartermaster was greeted by angry glares from a tall woman with dark hair and piercing green eyes and, once on the train in his favorite seat, it dawned on Q that he had met the owner of the brain trauma inducing sounds. He suddenly hoped that his neighbor would bring her by again, just so he could give her a piece of his mind – he was sure the girl was in dire need of a piece of mind no matter how small.
Moneypenny chastised him for the huge bags under his eyes when she saw him, but he was quick to defend himself. He really had tried to sleep the previous night, honestly. Well maybe not right away when he got some, since he had this nifty idea for which he felt it was a matter of life and death to at least do the base coding.
“And then my upstairs neighbor brought home a blow horn disguised as a woman and they went at it well into the morning,” he finished, resting his head on the table and trying his best not to yawn. “We should hire the man as a double-oh before the porn industry snatches him up, really,” Q continued to grumbled, freely pouting since his face was hidden from the world.
Eve couldn’t help herself from patting the poor man, but she knew he’d never try to slap her hand away - much to Bond’s confusion and jealousy. “There, there Q. The next time it happens, go talk with him. And if he laughs and slams the door in your face, I am sure that James would be more than happy to give you a hand.” She winked and tugged on a strand of hair, causing the sleepy man to jump up and look at her like an offended cat.
“Speaking of the old man,” Q said slowly, moving out of Eve’s range and trying to arrange his hair a bit. “Where is he? N gave me his mostly still functional and almost still in one piece equipment, but I haven’t seen white hair or hide of him at all today.”
Maybe James wasn’t alone in his ‘fascination’, but then again the young quartermaster worried for each and every one of his agents so him asking about the man might mean nothing. Then again, Bond was the only one to have so many nicknames from Q while the other agents were only referred by their designated codes. “You want to see James’s hide?” She grinned at him, dodging the crumpled napkin tossed at her head.
“You are also a horny old woman, Eve,” Q muttered, dashing for the elevator when he heard her getting up from the table.
“Completely uncalled for, you brat of a Quartermaster!”
***
The sounds from this digital world, he liked. He can control them. Make them louder or softer, change their tone to one that only animals could hear, or find the frequency that only certain people could hear and alert them of danger nearby – or maybe drive them nuts, depending on his mood. He couldn’t do this because he understood music the way musicians did. He understood the math behind it. And this wasn’t exactly a music piece he was working on.
He yawned and put the gadget aside once he was somewhat satisfied with the prototype, promising himself to only rest his eyes for a second before heading home. He was sure that he’d have to take a company car since he was pretty sure that it was way past the time the last train left the station. Eve would probably scold him tomorrow morning and maybe even bring M into discussion and mention a forced leave if he kept doing so much overtime without a real need for it.
“Quartermaster? Q? Quentin?”
Frowning, Q turned away from the worried voice, rubbing his nose and almost pushing the glasses completely off of his face. “Not Quentin…Go away Bond, I’m sleeping, can’t you see?”
Chuckling, Bond kneeled next to the younger man and started to shake him lightly, eventually giving up after five minutes of only grunts as the only result and simply pinching the way-too-thin-in-his-opinion shoulder.
“That is enough, Bond.” Q snapped, struggling to readjust his glasses while also holding on tighter to the ‘blanket’ that was on him. “What are you doing in my home anyway?”
“My dear Q, last night you were still unhappily shouting at your neighbor from your own apartment, so did you manage to do something so horribly wrong that got you evicted in such a short time?” The sleepy and confused glare that he received made the agent want nothing more than to pick Q up snuggle in bed with him as if he were a giant teddy bear and also almost regret that he had teased the man. Almost. “It’s 3 in the morning and you’re still in your office, quartermaster. Using my jacket as your blanket slash drooling napkin, might I add.”
Jumping back as if the piece of clothing suddenly started to burn, Q stumbled and tripped on his own feet and chair, his forehead coming into contact with the table. Bond’s hands were on him in a matter of seconds, pushing his hair away from his head and twisting and turning his head around, checking to see if there was any real wound.
“Bond, Bond, I am fine, you can stop it,” Q tried to placate the agent at first, eventually sighing and going limp to make the job easier for the agent. “You have horrible bedside manners and if you break my neck, I will come back and haunt you.”
He didn’t know how, but the next time he opened his eyes, he was looking at a red light from the back seat of a car. A cold panic washed over him suddenly and he was quick to try the car’s door, kicking it with his foot when he realized it was locked. The driver also jumped at the sudden movement behind him and when Q tried to push himself away from the seat of the car and hit the man in the face with his fist, but the seatbelt held him back and he grunted in pain.
“Q, Q it is all right, it’s me, James. The menace, Bottom, 007.” He felt a hand squeeze his knee, but before he could go through another sort-of panic attack, the driver’s features came into focus and Q saw that the man was indeed his agent.
The car that was behind them honked a few times since the light had turned green somewhere between Q regretting that he didn’t have a cyanide capsule for a tooth and holding himself back from strangling the agent for scaring him half to death. But Bond was dead set on ignoring the noise and fully focusing on making sure that Q wasn’t suffering from a heart attack. He was so dead sent on making sure that he had somehow managed to fully climb in the back seat and almost completely on top of Q
“Like I said, horrible bedside manners, Bond.”
The agent opened his mouth and got ready to serve the quartermaster with the offer of showing him just how good his beside manners really were when it came to him, but the driver behind them interrupted him by honking again and then shouting something that involved the keeping of genitals in the pants and the acquiring of a room. The agent was patient when it came to being in the field – in his own way, mind you – but when he was out of it, his patience was practically nonexistent.
Before Q could grab on to Bond’s arm and keep him in place, the man had climbed out of the backseat, pulled out his gun and practically teleported to the driver’s side of the other car. Before the man could snap out of his shock, Bond had grabbed his shirt and pulled him towards his face, jamming the gun against his temple and whispering something in his ear before taking a step back and watching the car disappear into the night.
“Thank you, 007,” Q said once the other had climbed back inside the car, giving Bond an all teeth smile, the light from the traffic light reflecting on his glasses in such a way that it made the younger man look like a demon. “Now I’ll have to erase the CCTV footage and keep an eye out for a report describing a mad man in a black car waving a gun.”
“I have a high ranking MI6 official in the back seat of my unarmored car while a man who can easily go around us refuses to do so,” James said seriously, his face dissolving in amusement after only a moment. “And I couldn’t be happier to serve you and hear you thanking me, my favorite quartermaster. I am now sure that your tongue does not shrivel and fall off if you use those two words.”
“I’m your only quartermaster, Bond. Please tell me you aren’t drunk and seeing double,” Q fake pleaded, choosing to ignore 007’s little jab.
The rest of the ride was silent; Q’s eye brow slowly going up when he realized that the older man knew exactly where he lived. He was even more confused and intrigued when the agent pulled out a little remote that opened the garage doors to his apartment building and parked in the only other empty parking spot besides the one that was designated for Q.
He knew everyone in the building, having personally done the required background checks on each and every one of them. The only person who was unfamiliar with and for which he had designated R to do that was the new neighbor.
“No…” The pieces of puzzle slowly connected in the young man’s head and he was very close to losing his temper enough to actually kick the back of Bond’s seat. Well, now he understood why R had been so fast in assuring Q that his new neighbor was no threat. “You’re the one who can’t keep his genitals out of really loud ship horns.”
Confused by Q’s words and a bit surprised at the jacket that was thrown over his head, the car door missing him only by a few millimeters, Bond struggled to find the logic behind the young man’s words for a moment. When it finally dawned on him, Q had already disappeared down the parking lot, although Bond could hear faint grumbling.
“She wasn’t faking!” The agent called after Q, quickly catching up with him. ”If you give me a chance, I could personally prove to you that she wasn’t faking.” This time, he saw the leg coming from miles away, so it was easy for him to catch it before coming into contact with his groin. Carefully helping Q to keep his balance and then taking a few steps back, Bond raised his hands in a placating manner “I had no idea until last night that the walls were that thin, Qing-Nan.”
Q tilted his head and looked at Bond, abandoning planning his second attack. “I am starting to suspect that you Googled boy’s names starting with Q and printed it. Also, not my name and do I really look like a Qing-Nan to you?”
Shrugging, Bond called the elevator, carefully leaning a tiny bit closer to Q. “The meaning of the name suits you. And you also look like the kind of mystery I would love to unravel,” He said in a dead serious voice and Q lost himself in laughter, allowing the agent to pull him in the elevator and then down the hall to his apartment.
“I simply cannot believe that you manage to pick up women, James.” Finally taking a deep breath and calming himself down, Q fumbled a bit with his keys.
“Maybe they are as lame as you say that are and the women take pity on this poor handsome and scared face of mine?” Bond offered, silently pleased that he had been referred to by his first name.
Leaning against the door frame and taking the coat back, Q shook his head slowly. “You’d really settle for pity sex? God have mercy on his country should you ever face a mark that knows no pity.” Patting Bond’s head, he started to close the door. “I’ll dry clean your jacket. And please keep the noise down the next time you have a lady friend over. Good night, agent.”
Bond lingered for a moment in front of the door, hand resting over where Q had touched him, a little smile on his lips. He was royally screwed which meant that he needed to find a woman and thoroughly screw her, get the bugs out of his system and everything. But since Q needed his rest, it was better if he kept himself company this night.