Chapter Text
Everything and everyone was against him and nothing was going right. The week had turned into a horrible one the moment Q stepped in M’s office and the door had shut right in his face. It would be very odd for an agent to be present at that meeting unless it was related to an undercover mission, Q had calmly explained to Bond on their way to MI6, right before telling him to drop him off at the train station.
“Best if we do not arrive together,” He muttered against the agent’s lips. “After all of this is done, you carry me to work in your arms if you want.” Q continued to say, trying to sweeten the deal, licking and nipping on Bond’s lips until the other man gave him and pulled him in his lap.
Bond instantly attached his lips to Q’s neck, bent on giving him a lasting mark, a warning sign to everyone that the man belonged to someone. Before things could progress any further, a cop made his presence known by knowing on his car’s window and asking them to move along, before getting so fed up with the agent’s quips and remarks that he gave him a fine.
“Send it to MI6,” Bond growled before he sped away, ignoring the glare he was receiving form a blushing Q.
Of course, the first thing Bond did after M's door had been shut in his face was to try listening in on the meeting. But Eve proved to be a fierce protector of M’s office and his privacy, instantly shooing the man out of her office. The agent went as far as to try to bribe Moneypenny with Jimmy Choo shoes and at least two dresses from whatever designer she wanted in exchange for her nimble fingers to turn on whatever she used to always be up-to-date with all the internal affairs gossips.
“I don’t think you’re being too sane right now, Bond.” Eve had said matter-of-fact, inspecting her nails and looking completely unimpressed about his offer. “And I assure you that my pay is big enough that I can buy myself those things.
“Yes, it is completely insane for me to want to know what they are planning. How silly of me to want to be sure that nothing bad happens to Q,” James whispered, taking her hand and bringing to his lips, smirking and winking. Someone was just passing by Eve’s desk and he wanted to make it look like he was there for his usual flirting and nothing more. “But your resistance to bribes soothes me.”
“My dear James,” she started saying as she leaned closer to him, aware of the pair of eyes that were trained on them. “While your loyalty is commendable, if you keep acting in a way that threatens the completing of any missions, I will personally drag you down to the psychiatrists and lock you with him in his office until he deems you sane again.” She pulled her hand back and turned her attention to her computer. “Now go down to Q Branch. R was looking for you.”
He exited her office looking extremely annoyed and every minion made sure to get out of his way, R herself being wary around him. Everyone knew better than to step on an indisposed double oh agent’s toes and while R was curious as to what exactly put him in such a horrible disposition, she liked being alive better.
The day went from bad to worse for Bond when he was informed via text by Q that he will not be returning home due to some ‘time sensitive’ projects. James glared at the text as if it had just insulted his dead relatives – or so said Eve and he really did not know from where she picked up that saying.
“Go shoot up some targets and blow some steam before you snap at someone,” she advised on her way out of the building, her work day having come to an end. “I would say go out and pick someone up, but something tells me Q wouldn’t be too happy about that and that the only person you want to show your mattress to right now is Q himself.”
He glared at the woman’s back for a moment before deciding to go out and get Q something to eat. Thirty minutes later, he walked into Q branch with Chinese takeout and headed straight for Q’s closed office. In there he found Tanner hovering behind the young man, also holding Chinese food. Bond winked at Tanner and the man glared back at him instead of greeting him.
“I got you something to eat, Quartermaster,” Bond said out loud and walked closer to Q, smiling when the young man wrapped an arm around his hips.
“I am dreadfully sorry James,” the younger man muttered, hiding his face in the agent’s stomach. “I really wanted to spend this night with you.”
“We have all the time in the world for that,” Bond assured him even though he himself was afraid that he was lying. The look that Q gave him hinted that something was up, but before he could ask anything, Tanner grabbed his arm and led him out of the office, loudly announcing that the Quartermaster didn’t have time for his jokes.
Dejected, Bond went home and crawled in his bed, sending Q a good night text before attempting to fall asleep without the aid of booze. His mind was racing and his senses were on fire, alerting him of immediate danger. He checked his apartment a few times, gun held close to him, finally managing to fall asleep on the sofa close to four AM.
Three hours later, he was called into MI6 where he was informed that he would be sent out on a mission somewhere in the Caribbean Islands by M himself – and right then and there, he was sure he was going to shoot the man. Tanner was also present for the briefing and he looked more than pleased to hear that, his smug expression only furthering Bond’s need for destruction. They were saved from his wrath by Q, who instantly started presenting him with the toys he was supposed to use –standard issued Walther, radio jammer paired off with a radio transmitter that had been altered to still work when the jammer was online and a little tablet that looked like a sheet of paper.
“Due to how dangerous and delicate this mission is, I’ll handle you personally,” Q continued to explain as they walked out of M’s office, typing away on his work phone.
He was on a private plane and sent off to Anguilla within the hour, his lips still tingling from the hungry kiss he’d given Q. He was greeted by a very lovely flight assistant who had dark hair and eyes that shifted colours from green to dark blue. She was also well endowed and had a very revealing cleavage and a short skirt that couldn’t be the proper length for a stewardess. She was all smiles and giggles as she helped him get settled in his seat, offering drinks and clumsily tripping on her own feet to land in his lap.
But James really wasn’t in the mood and did little more than smile at her and assure her that everything was okay and that no, she hadn’t slipped any type of drink on his trouser pants so there was no need for her to try to take them off and dry them. Something was definitely off about her and he was itching to pull out his gun and interrogate her.
“Mister Bond, Quimby went through so much trouble for you,” the woman whispered in his ear, stepping back to allow him to see her pout after having her thorough massage refused for a third time.
Bond almost chocked on his drink when he’d heard the name. “Tell me darling, might I personally know this Quimby? Is he, by any chance, too smart for his own good?”
The woman winked at him and giggled, shaking her head. “I was contacted by a possible relative of your darling Mister Quimby and it was he that referred to him by that name,” she continued to whisper in Bond’s ear, grazing it with her teeth as the man’s hands found their way around her waist. She asked him again if he was sure he didn’t want a massage in the back of the airplane where the bed was and this time he agreed, more than eager to find out what she had for him.
She led him to the back of the airplane were, indeed, there was another room with a bed and he sat down, a bit surprised when she sat on his lap. She made sure to leave an obvious enough trail of lipstick on his white shirt before she pushed him to lie down on the bed and then started to run her slim fingers over his chest, popping the buttons open.
“Your part of the mission is quite easy,” she whispered as she took his hands and put them on her hips. “You have to die, Mister Bond, or at least pretend to die, when that person is one the coms.” she was quick to add, feeling him tense up for a moment. She loved danger and she loved a certain amount of pain, but she loved life more and she never really wanted to find herself at the wrong end of a weapon ever again.
“You ask me to trust you and play dead while I don’t even know if you are MI6, MI5, KGB or something else, miss…?”
“Irene. Mistress Irene if you desire,” she laughed and kissed his neck before biting down and leaving behind a nasty mark, enjoying the hiss that left his lips. “I’m not an agent and I only work for myself. I assume that is a reason why I was trusted with this part of the mission. And I am not asking you to trust me, but the plans this darling Mister Quimby came up with.” She stopped then and sat up, tilting her head back. “Wonder if that family has anyone in it with a normal name, if that is his name anyway.”
James himself was lost in his mind, the puzzle pieces to –apparently- Q’s plan finally forming a picture, one that he did not like. Although not a big fan of reading the MI6 ‘guidebook’, old M had once punished him by making him sit down and listen to her recite the blood thing. And one item he remembered perfectly well was that, should the Quartermaster be deemed too stressed or distressed, he would be put on forced leave and shipped off to somewhere the psychiatrist deemed as relaxing. Anyone would be distressed to hear someone die and to know that they might have done something to cause their death, but if their enemy assumed that Q and Bond were closer than agent and Quartermaster… Hearing your friend or possible lover die was a deeply traumatizing event. Knowing that you were the one guiding him could send someone into catatonic shock. If Q was as good of an actor as Bond assumed he was, then their enemy would think kidnaping him be as easy as taking candy from a baby and completely lower their guard.
“That bloody brat made himself the bait,” he growled and tried to not take notice of the dull pain slowly forming behind his eyes, completely ignoring Irene who was trying to get him to lie on his stomach so she could give him a massage. “Why send me so far away?” He finally allowed the woman to do as she pleased with his body and she her magical fingers that knew just what zone to pinch or press of his back was making it really hard for him to remain upset with his partner.
“Don’t ask me, love. I am just repaying your lover’s possibly big brother back for saving my life a few years ago. Oh, but someone was insistent that you play with the scrabble application on one of your fancy gadgets.”
His curiosity regarding Q’s real background, name and family resurfaced again, but when he tried to get more information out of the woman, she just laughed and patted his head. “I am simply making assumptions about possible family members right now. And that is not very wise of me.” She clicked her tongue and got up, grabbing Bond’s hand.
They walked out of the room holding hands, she giggling and he grinning. The door to the cockpit closed just at that time and Bond made a mental note of that, thinking if he could somehow ask Q to do another check on the pilots. Then again, if Q had called in on outside sources and convinced M to agree to it, then the quartermaster was second-guessing every bit of official information he got.
Irene seemed to also be suspicious of the ones who were flying their plane and she was more than okay to allow the agent to ‘subtly’ feel her up while the co-pilot was present, even ecstatic when Bond sent the man away only to drag her in the back room.
Of course, once there, nothing sexual happened. Bond simply sat hunched in the bed and brooded over Q’s plan while sipping at a glass of Martini, finding a million and one ways it could backfire, while Irene giggled and moaned and made sure that they both look dishevelled. No words were exchanged between the two and when the plane landed and they shared a hungry kiss in front of the pilot and co-pilot and nothing more.
The rest of the week, James had been stuck in his hotel room playing the role of a bored rich wanker interested in ‘investing’ in an ongoing drug operation. The official mission report he got from Q claimed that the money obtained from drugs were used to fund different terrorist operations against Britain and that was what warred 007’s intervention.
During the day, James met with different drug lords that were more than happy – after doing a thorough background check on him which raised absolutely no red flags thanks to Q and his scary ability to create anything out of zeros and ones – to show off their plantations and factories, boasting about how their final product was better than anything else he might find on the market.
At night, after checking in with Q and his branch, he played scrabble with the tablet’s AI, which turned out to be Q himself talking to him. He hadn’t been aware of that at first, although he kept receiving letters which he could actually change into ones he wanted, but it became crystal clear he was in direct contact with Q when the PC spelled out BOTTOM, QUIMBY and QING-NAN. Of course his darling, brilliant Q would find a way to talk to him without making it obvious and with the involvement of scrabble.
The first thing Bond spelled after he became aware of Q’s idea was SAFE which Q then used to spell YES. A bit later, Bond spelled BROTHER hoping to learn more about his young partner although he was aware that this type of conversation was one that was best to have face to face. Q quickly spelled the word LATER and the scrabble tiles Bond started to get didn’t allow him to spell other words and twenty minutes later, he had lost. That meant that Q really was against talking about his family like this.
That part was his favourite part of the day without a doubt, both of them talking about how their day had went, about how the missed each other and Bond trying to describe to Q what he would do to him if he was there with him. He even made sure to reassure Q that he wouldn’t even have had the time to get terrified of flying since he would have kept him in constant pleasure on their way to the island.
Close to the end of the week, Q suddenly spelled TOMORROW in the middle of one of their pornographic talks and then won the round by spelling CEASE. The tiles then locked themselves and after the new round started with the word CARE, Q had signed off. Bond knew this meant that he was supposed to start playing dead from tomorrow and he braced himself. Not for his part of the mission, but for Q’s, mentally preparing to force himself to lie low until called upon – because he was sure that M would unofficially send him after Q.
His death came in the form of a rival drug lord attacking the plantation he was visiting. He was shot in the chest repeatedly before the police finally intervened and arrested what was left of the drug lords. He was pronounced dead on arrival and loaded in a van with fifteen other bodies.
While being smuggled out of the van by a lovely woman with short blonde hair and impeccably aim and a short blond man who held himself as if he was military, he learned that the one who had ‘killed’ him was an undercover agent from a private agency who was paying ‘Quimby’ back for a favor.
“Don’t tell me…You are also paying back someone named Quimby for something,” James stated once the man – John was his name and the woman presented herself as Mary, John’s wife and James wondered just what kind of people actually gave their real names in life threatening situations – had finished his report.
The woman giggled and covered her mouth, eyes narrowed in amusement and mirth. “We only met the young man a few days ago.” She said and patted John’s back when the man growled.
“Bloody typical of that ungrateful git too,” John started to grumble, checking his phone to make sure that they were heading the right way. “Oh, here is another one. Well of course we’re three John. Keep up with the rest of us, don’t be daft.” Mary looked up at Bond and shook her head, signaling to ignore her husband’s mumbling and enjoy the ride.
They reached a shabby looking house a couple of hours later and the two whisked him in a small room in the back that had a wobbly bed covered in moth-eaten sheets and a small, black and white TV that looked like it had a better chance to explode than actually show something.
He heard a soft knock on his door and then John entered, holding a cup of steaming tea that smelled a lot like Q’s favorite. “I’m afraid tea is all we have. But it is bloody good tea,” John excused himself as he presented the agent with the cup.
“Do you mind me asking why you and your wife are helping me, John?”
“Because I am a bloody idiot,” the man sighed and sat down on the bed, massaging his temples. “There is no other reason than that bloody git actually saying ‘please’ for once in his bloody life. I didn’t even know what we were getting into, although something tells me my wife knew instantly where we were going. She is more observant than me, you see.”
“Because she used to be a spy?” James asked and almost snorted at the glare he got from John.
“A horrible spy. Or a good spy, since you are a spy and you notice things faster than me. I see, but I do not observe, is what he constantly says.” John appeared to imitate someone, but whom, James had no idea. “But who am I kidding? The thought of being a father terrified me more than this and holding that child in my arms for the first time was scarier than digging you out from under those dead bodies.”
The two talked for a bit before Mary joined them with more tea and tales of a thin man with a great brain and a child’s heart and curiosity. They also shared tales of their daughter, John a bit worried about how she was handling their absence while Mary reassured that her godparents were more than suitable for taking care of them.
The two looked simply wonderful together, the way they made sure to always be touching each other in subtle ways, as if they needed constant reminders that the other was still there with them. They must have gone through something terrible to need to do that, James mused. He wondered if one day Q and he would be like them, like the retired army doctor and spy, running on a crazy errand across the globe because a dear friend had asked them nicely. Well, maybe if they were lucky enough to survive MI6.
He didn’t know when he had fallen asleep, but a small ding from his tablet – the only thing besides the gun he constantly kept on him – awoke him. The room was flooded in complete darkness, and he had to push away a few blankets off of him before he could move his arms and dig under his pillow for the little device.
The message he read left him feeling like he needed to empty a gun in someone's head.
Mister Bond,
Your alphabet is now only 25 letters long. Let’s see if you can win this little game with ‘Q’ in it.
Hope your trip to the afterlife was a pleasant one. I know someone who will have a hard time until he reaches it.
Send the doctor and his nurse my regards.