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Bond wasn’t looking so good, but that wasn’t all together a new development. His usually neat and proper appearance had been disturbed by some fight or another, and his suit was torn and burn and cut in some places. Really, how did the man afford his (quite expensive) wardrobe constantly being destroyed like that?
Q would never understand field agents.
And Bond’s eyes looked tired, heavy dark bags alerting anyone within a glance that Bond hadn’t slept in a few days.
Again; field agents.
Still, it was a bit of shock when in the middle of returning his equipment, Bond stumbles, catches himself for a moment. In another moment, he falls again and clutches the table to stay upright.
“Oh, bollocks.” Q sighs. “What now? Bleeding internally? Broken ribs?”
Not like Bond would say. The man just closed his eyes, breathing out slowly in a way that shouldn’t fascinate Q like that.
007 sent Q a glare that would mean, in any other circumstances, Q was about to have his neck snapped.
But as the agent was clutching Q’s desk for support, he doubted it. Gave Q a bit of an edge that, well, he quite enjoyed.
Bond didn’t say anything but found his way to a chair and sat there to recover. Whatever it was wrong with him, it wasn’t something he wanted to admit easily, or even knew.
The clever boy that he is, Q put his mind to it. Bond’s appearance, how tired he was, recent from a field job, his pale skin and the way he couldn’t keep his gaze focused. Ah. Q sighs once more. “Don’t suppose you thought eating something once in a while was in order, did you?” He can’t help but roll his eyes, feeling childish at that. The feeling passes when he realizes Bond is actually, legitimately pouting at him.
“What? Oh, bugger off. I’m not your babysitter.” As much as he’d love to send the man off, he doesn’t. Instead, he digs around in his desk and tosses a granola bar to Bond. “Fine. Eat.”
Bond gives him a wary once over and finally speaks. “Not going to explode in my face, is it?”
“Yes, 007, I gave you the explosive snacks instead, just to be funny.” He can’t help letting out another long-suffering sigh of sarcasm.
Q is pleased enough when Bond starts to eat. At least then he’ll be able to walk himself out of the room. Really, he does have a job to do that doesn’t include shooting people up; not like Bond would understand the idea of that. It’s amusing in an odd way to see Bond like this; disgruntled and disheveled, eating a granola bar in Q’s office.
Q has probably already snapped a picture with his phone and sent it to Eve. ‘007 is eating all of my emergency snacks; send help’ he types below the picture. He resists the urge to tweet it; then the whole office would see, and, well, Bond does have a license to kill, after all.
With that in mind he’s quick to furnish Bond with more food. Organic cheese snack crackers in the shape of small bunnies, and an energy drink. Bond murmurs something in thanks and takes the food.
Eve’s already texted him back. ‘Q you should be scared. Also, you should take more pictures.’
“Not that it’s any of my business, Bond…” Q clears his throat. “What have you eaten in the last few days, anyway?”
“Like, five martinis and a few of those little cheese wedges.”
Jesus. Q has spent hours on end staring at a computer screen and sure, he forgets to eat sometime, but the difference is he won’t collapse in the field and bugger up the safety of the entire British government while he’s at it.
Well, okay, Q has, but that was only once, and that’s why he’s got a proper emergency snack drawer now. And a decoy emergency snack drawer, to throw people off the trail.
Q sighs audibly again, and it’s possible Bond looks similar to an admonished puppy, in some ways, and it’s possible this is way too endearing for Q to handle. He shouldn’t get attached to field agents. Even under his short tenure here, they’ve lost a few, and it’s hurt more than he’d imagined something like that could. And now Bond is here, eating his snacks and pouting at him.
Unacceptable. Simply unacceptable. This is why double-ohs shouldn’t be allowed to hang around Q branch.
“What is this shit?”
Bond is inspecting one of the brightly-colored energy drinks that Q keeps stashed. He’s not particularly fond of them but some of Q branch is. Q himself, more of a tea person. Where exactly has Bond been that’s missed the energy drink trend?
“Just drink it. It’s no decades-old Macallan, but it’ll bring your blood sugar up, at least.” Q is tapping away on his phone so he definitely doesn’t get the annoyed-yet-fond look that Bond sends him. Nope, he’s reading a text from Eve that says… well, something. He reads it properly this time. ‘007 is your new bff, Q.’
He blushes at the thought of that. Ridiculous, really- 007 does not have ‘friends’, he has ‘fellow agents’ and ‘quartermasters’ and ‘lovers from far away lands that instantly fall under the spell of his striking blue eyes.’
Only one of which Q falls under, and it’s the boring one where he gives 007 gadgets and tells him not to break them. And then 007 breaks them unapologetically, only making life much more difficult more Q. Oh, alright, it’s exciting.
Except the part where 007 always breaks everything.
Eve is having a fun time with this, at least.
To be fair, Q is not the type to have friends either. If it weren’t for Eve, who is disarmingly friendly for an ex-field agent and persistent enough to bring Q away from his laptop, there’d be no one else. Oh, sure. He has acquaintances in Q branch, people he chats with over tea and coffee. In school there was no question that he was the friendless loser, the kid with his nose in too many books or too many computers. Even the nerds disliked him; he was too smart for them.
He finds himself eyeing Bond. Maybe 007 really is friendless as well. He could surely leave Q alone right now and find someone else’s food to steal. But he’s not. He’s sitting there, occasionally remembering Q exists and making a face at him, or just looking at him like that with those scary yet lovely blue eyes of his. The knife-sharp gaze of a man who’s killed as many as he’s kissed. Even in his head, Q thinks that sound a bit dramatic.
Or maybe he’s tired, and Q wasn’t actively trying to kill or interrogate him, so here was as good as any place to collapse out of malnutrition.
“You really, ah.” He tries his hand at a lecture. Nothing better to do. “Ought to eat better. Or, rather, sometimes, perchance.”
Bond levels him that even stare again, somehow lazy and piercing at the same time. So that’s what they teach them in field agent training; how to stare people down with little to no effort at all.
Q’s stared down many a field agent but Bond is something else. He reaches for another snack- some kind of organic gummy fruit- and pushes it across the desk.
“Thanks. You have the whole market in your desk, do you?” Bond peers over to Q’s side of the desk and raises one eyebrow. It’s… surprisingly friendly with no threat of murder or pain in it. Might be a new thing for Bond, admittedly, he’s probably still getting the knack of not threatening people down.
Q smirks and grabs a snack for himself while he’s at it. “Maybe.”
From Eve, he gets: ‘Oh my god you guys are SHARING SNACKS. Have a sleepover already and get it over with.’
A sleepover with 007? Q looks up from his phone and at the agent across from him. Down again to his phone to type back, ‘I quite like being alive, thanks. A sleepover with Bond seems like it would involve lots of espionage and/or sexual advances.’ Neither of which he was interested in from Bond.
Well, maybe some espionage. Just a little bit.
‘Oh and BOTH OF THOSE THINGS WOULD BE SO TERRIBLE.’ Eve adds some emoticons for good measure and Q tucks his phone away. Enough texting about Bond. When Q has problems, Q solves problems. Bond himself, maybe not a huge problem, but when double-ohs had problems, Q had problems.
“I could design an app for your phone, that would remind you when to eat, and to find the closest restaurant or shop, or café, to you, and actually I could even make it order the food and deliver it to you, too—“ Q’s already lost in thought, scribbling down notes on a piece of scrap paper.
“Q?”
He’d have to make the program work with a variety of sources, in fact it’d be easier just to install it on his watch or something, Bond lost way too many phones, or ruined them. He seemed partial to falling off or into things and even Q’s heavy duty phones rarely withstood Bond’s field work. Maybe add it in his car, too, even if Bond hated to let MI6 near his precious automobile.
“Dammit, Q.”
He was already working out the logistics; have to find some way of making Bond actually eat the food, some way of making sure the program would work anywhere. Specify it to Bond’s tastes, of course-
“Would you like to go to dinner with me, 007?”
It comes as such a surprise to Bond, though he hides it well- he only cocks one eyebrow questioningly and lets a smirk flick over his features. It came as a surprise to Q, too. Hell, maybe it’s in Bond’s file, and maybe Eve knows, but maybe he needs it for research, too. Definitely research and not an excuse to spend more time with the charming and strangely kind James Bond.
“Dinner, Q? Thought you’d never ask.”
And Bond is finishing the rest of the god-awful lime green energy drink and standing up. He still wobbles a bit as he stands but straightens his collar, looking down at Q.
“See you in ten.”
Nothing Bond says is a question, of course; he speaks in commands and short punctuated sentences, not question marks and ellipses, but if anything were, it’d be that.
“Ten it is.” Q agrees with a smile. Hesitantly. This still might be a bad idea.
Of course, it’s more like twenty, because he’s got to lay the foundations of this program for Bond, writing code until his phone buzzes him a warning from Eve. He may have told her he’s ‘hanging out with Bond’ and she seems alarmed and confused, warning him no one just ‘hangs out’ with Bond, unless there’s a price on his head or he’s wearing a very slinky dress- but Q ignores that text and heads out to meet Bond.
Bond is late as well, and when Q sees him next, he’s in a clean suit and he looks showered and shaved as well. How he’s managed that in less than 20 minutes, well, Q figures it came with his license to kill. Must’ve.
Of course they take Bond’s car, and of course Q suggests a few more upgrades they could make to it, and for the most part, Bond doesn’t ignore them completely.
Q never has been good with field agents, but 007 is a different story.