Title: Brothers Three
Summary: The lives of three brothers intertwine in a variety of ways. When R suddenly becomes Q due to an explosion at MI6 he is forced to turn to his half-brother for help. But Sherlock Holmes has his own problems to deal with. The confluence of the lives of the three Holmes brothers through the events of Skyfall, the Reichenbach Fall and beyond in the alternating points of view of Q and John Watson.
Parings: Mostly friendship unless you happen to want to read anything in between the lines. Lestrade/OC in passing.
Warnings: Spoilers for Skyfall and Sherlock Season 2. Language. Some violence. Potential OoC moments. Shakespeare quotations taken out of context and mangled mostly as chapter titles. A dictionary might prove useful as both Q and John tend to use obscure words.
Standard Disclaimer: All characters and settings belong to their respective owners. I am merely playing with them for my own as well as your amusement.
General Notes: Unbeta'd and not Brit picked. I apologize in advance for any anachronisms, grammar errors and/or typos. I write fan fiction to excise images that get stuck in my head. I hope you enjoy the results. Author's notes, if any, will appear at the end of each chapter.
Chapter 1 - Full of Sound and Fury
It was a Wednesday. No high profile operations in progress just the normal everyday bread and butter information gathering and analysis. Normal life at MI6 HQ was 85% boredom and 15% terror. The order had come down from the Director several weeks ago to keep everything low-key and in the 99% boredom range for a while. I suspected that this state of affairs would be the status quo at least until the Director could assess how much trouble we were in with the Intelligence and Security Committee due to the recent debacle in Istanbul. What a bloody cock up that had been. Two high-profile assets lost as well as the mental stability of a damn good field agent. Not that I blamed the field agent. Being directly ordered to take a risky shot like that and ending up shooting one of our own was bound to mess with your head. Hopefully the boys and girls in Psyc could straighten her out. Note to self: look at the upgrades in progress for sniper scopes. There ought to be something we can do to help with the long range accuracy.
For once I was sitting in my official office on the 10th floor rather than my usual desk down in the R&D design bullpen. I was attempting to catch up on the mundane paperwork required to keep the Q branch running and, more importantly, with funds to buy the stuff we used to build the toys for the agents. As second in command that task was part of my job description. As my half-brother Sherlock would say B-o-r-ing.
Of course I wouldn't be a hacker worth my salt or a member of my family for that matter if I wasn't multitasking at the same time. Reviewing and approving requisition forms while watching the main server information flow in a small window and running a minor hack into New Scotland Yard's database just for fun made the paperwork somewhat tolerable.
Interesting. There was a sudden uptick in the incoming server traffic. It jumped again. I opened several new windows to see what was going on. A bunch of random information packets not related to anything coming in from multiple sources? Looks like an orchestrated denial of service attack. Ah. There was Shirley. She'd caught it too and was deflecting most of the attack while attempting to trace the packets back to origin. She had snagged a couple and routed them to George. He would be dissecting them to see if there was a virus payload or other nasty surprises. It looked like the two of them had it under control. I was just about to go back to my paperwork when suddenly we had an unauthorized spider in the system. Now where did that little bastard come from? M's computer? What? She wasn't even in the building. She should be in the car on the way back from her meeting with Mallory. She was accessing e-mail remotely and…Shit, Shit, Shit!
"Q!" I activated the micro radio transceiver set that my boss Q and I were beta testing this week. "We've got a breach from M's desktop. I'm blocking it from the server core but it would help if you could pull the plug for me." As my boss and department head he was one floor up and closer to the Director's office than I was.
"On my way R," was his reply.
I love my boss. Q is primarily an engineer and a tinkerer. Cars with ejection seats, exploding pens and the like were his pride and joy. The techy toys that all the agents, especially the 00's, love. But he also realizes the value of computers, good information and hacking which is more my specialty. In short, when he says cover your ears I do so without hesitation. When I say pull the plug he defers to my judgment.
I cut M's machine off from the rest of the network, killed the spider and headed out the door to the lift. My day was looking up. Nothing like a security breach to get out of doing paperwork.
The indicator showed that lift was on 12. Should I wait or run up the stairs? As I turned to head for the stairwell the world exploded. The blast wave blew the lift doors open and knocked me back. My brain went into overdrive. Sound then shockwave down the lift shaft. Time differential meant it was on the west end of the building. Angle of the blast wave down the shaft and the sway of the building logically indicates…the pain when my shoulder hit the corner of the wall was incredible. Sight went grey to black.
Judging from the condition of the lift lobby when I could see again I'd only been out for 30 seconds at most. I struggled to my feet with difficulty. A quick self-assessment: Right shoulder - dislocated; ribs - several cracked or bruised; miscellaneous cuts and minor burns from hot shrapnel; major headache. All in all not bad. I could still function. Tucking my thumb into the top of my trousers to stabilize the shoulder I staggered for the stairs. I knew what needed to be done next but damn it all to hell…this is NOT the way I wanted to get a promotion.
Trotting down the stairs to the R&D floor was not the most pleasant experience. Every step jarred the dislocated shoulder and the alarms were not helping the headache. I ignored the pain as best I could. About half way down the stairs the irony caught up to me. If what I suspected was true I'd end up being the first Quartermaster in MI6 history whose real name actually started with Q.
As I limped into the bullpen I could see that the quick release hard drives had been removed from most of the computers and everyone was busily placing the most sensitive material into either lock boxes or in some cases pockets and handbags. Shirley spotted me first.
"R" she yelled a concerned look on her face, "Where's Q?"
This had the effect of making everyone still in the room at least glance in my direction. I didn't shrug. That would hurt too much in my present condition but apparently something must have shown in my face because several people winced and looked away. Duty to Queen and Country takes many forms some requiring more sacrifice than others. This part was easy for me given the sociopathic tendencies that run rampant in my family. I squelched any emotional response to make sure the orders were clear and the job was done correctly.
"Ladies and Gentlemen," I said loudly enough to be heard over the blaring alarms, "As you have correctly surmised we are implementing protocol 47. Move as quickly as possible and I'll see you in 10 hours or so."
To their credit the staff had continued working while I spoke and most of them were now hurrying to the stairwell exit.
Shirley handed me two hard drives. "Your desk and Q's" she said choking a bit on the last word. She took a deep breath to get ahold of herself then looked me up and down.
"Dislocated?" she asked looking pointedly at my shoulder. "You'll never get through the medical cordon in that shape."
"Can't be helped I'm afraid."
She just grinned at me and before I could react she grabbed me by the arm and shoulder and wrenched. For the second time today things went grey. This time, however, I managed to stay on my feet.
"There!" she said sounding for a moment as if she were a long way off. "Come along now." She maneuvered me toward the stairwell. "We're the last of the lot."
I gingerly moved my right arm. It felt like it was back in the socket. At least I could move it now. Then I remembered. Shirley had been fire brigade before being tapped into MI6 for her hacking on the side. She snagged a trench coat on the way out the fire door and handed it to me.
"Thanks."
Getting through the cordon of emergency personnel wasn't as tricky as I had anticipated. I managed to get the trench coat on before Shirley and I exited the building. That made it easier since my scorched clothing was not as visible. Shirley wasn't carrying any data or tech so she quite sensibly gave me some cover by having hysterics all over the first set of policemen we encountered. It was quite a production. The last I saw as I slipped away was her throwing herself at a salt-and-pepper haired DI on the edge of the group. He, despite the fact that he hadn't been paying much attention to her histrionics, managed to catch her as she fainted. I had to stifle a smile. He was the best looking of the lot. Fit. Separated or recently divorced judging by what I could see. Good luck Shirley. Play your cards right and you might just be able to hole up at his place for the next few hours.
An upright demeanor, a steady stride and a few outright lies, Yes, I'm heading right over there to that ambulance to get checked out thank you, and I was clear of the cordon. A quick look around and I located the nearest CCTV camera. It was a static camera, focused on the next intersection. That would do. I walked to the intersection and crossed the street making sure I turned my head so that my face would be clear in the feed. When one's place of work is bombed it is always prudent to reassure the family that you are alive. That task complete I slipped into an alley.
My mobile vibrated in my pocket, stopped then vibrated again. I pulled it out and glanced at it. Ah, good. Texts were starting to come in from various members of Q-branch letting me know they were clear of the building and going to ground. Unfortunately, I didn't have the luxury of completely dropping off the grid. I needed to get to somewhere with decent internet access so I could check on the main servers. If the power had been cut then things were good. The emergency protocols would have been tripped and no-one but Q, Tanner, M or I would be able to get into them when they came back on line. If not, then I'd need to take the sensitive information off line and put up my "dummy" information along with a nice set of tricks and traps for any unwary hacker that attempted to take advantage of the chaos.
Now where could I go? If this was an inside job, and it must have been to get the explosives into the building, then it was highly possible that my residence as well as my fallback were compromised. A public computer would do in a pinch but a private one would be better. Hmm. My half-brother's flat mate was a blogger. He'd have a decent internet connection and most likely a good computer. If he didn't have one to begin with my half-brother would have bugged him into getting decent one just so he could nick it and use it.
His flat wasn't all that far. Well within walking distance. Mindful of the CCTV cameras I started working my way in the general direction of Regent's Park.
Author's Note: This is Kenoria's fault for introducing me to fan fiction net and making me listen to her proto-story ideas and plot musings. I must also acknowledge Lindsay Buroker, author of the Emperor's Edge series, whose books inspired me to write fan fiction for the first time ever.
Chapter title derived from Macbeth Act V, Scene 5.
I'm not going to comit to a particular update schedule but I'll attempt not to leave you hanging too long. Please read and review. Writing is, to one degree or another, a conversation between the author and the reader. I'd love to know what you think.