Title: Quartermistress
Author: Vashti
Fandom: James Bond (movieverse)
Characters: James Bond, Female!Q, Eve Moneypenny
Rating: PG
Summary: Bond meets the new, female, Q. She's not impressed.
Length: ~5,540 words
Disclaimer: Only the words are mine, and that's probably up for philosophical debate. All poetry is original. Contact me if you want to use or reprint them anywhere. "It Is Well" written by Horatio Spafford. His story, and the story of this hymn, are utterly fascinating. Well worth the
Feedback: it's like air.
Author's Note: This is my first foray into James Bond fandom, and of course it's an odd little AU. I tried to make Bond vague enough to be any Bond - past, present and future - but this Moneypenny is definitely Naomie Harris'.
"I am not a female Q, James. I am Q."
Bond's eyebrows shot up even as he gave the...slender?...woman another once-over. Dressed in black from high-necked collar to hidden toes, the floor-length, full-skirted dress gave her a decidedly matronly look as it at once hid her form and emphasized how slim that form must be. Her smooth, deep cocoa face belied the story her dress told. Her stiff posture and bored expression put paid to it. With sooty black hair floating free of its pompadour and precarious topknot, she looked nothing so much as a harried Edwardian governess. If Edwardian governesses had ever gone about in narrow hipster glasses
Still and all, he was Bond. Lips tilting up at the corner, he met her eyes. "Could have fooled me."
The words seemed to elicit no reaction, as if he hadn't spoken at all. Then her chin jerked as if something fleeting but noxious had landed on her skin. Q's head tilted in Bond's direction. "Was there something you needed, 007?"
"Not this time, no. I'd heard we had a new Quartermaster...mistress..." No reaction. "...and I thought I should introduce myself."
"The Double-Oh's hardly need an introduction."
"Read the files, have you?"
"Among other things." An unfashionably thick eyebrow curved upward. "Was there anything else?"
A smile played over his lips. "Not this time."
"Then if you'll excuse me." Q pulled herself up into a straight line, giving her a full two inches over Bond, inclined her head, then turned smoothly on her invisible heel, dismissing him. A waiting minion immediately claimed her attention, handing her a tablet. Bond watched her pull a stylus from her hair. In Q Branch's bright lights, the white lace edging the narrow cuffs of her shirtwaist seemed to glow against her dark skin and black clothing. Bond watched a little longer until he began to feel like the furniture for all the attention paid him.
No one seemed to notice when he left.
The days are long
The nights are longer
She can scarcely believe
this is become her life.
So she doesn't
She doesn't go to the places
they went together
She doesn't eat the meals
he made for her until the end
She doesn't listen to the songs
that chronicle their life
She doesn't sleep in their bed.
The days are long
and the nights
they are longer
She refuses to wonder
if she will ever sleep again
Two weeks later, Bond was again in Q Branch, standing beside their Edwardian Quartermaster, watching from behind glass as a pair of junior agents demonstrated what was to be Bond's newest toy: lightweight body armor disguised as a fine Savile Row suit.
When Bond had asked where they'd found a tailor to work on what was undoubtedly very difficult material, Q had turned and looked down at him. "Savile Row." The where did you expect? had been heavily implied.
Now Bond worked at concentrating on the performance of the suit instead of the performance of the junior agents (a blond and a brunette for easy differentiation; both far too flashy for the field) or the not-a-woman by his side. Professionally, he respected the sentiment behind her opening salvo, particularly in the male dominated intelligence community. It didn't help that the respect Q Branch received was hardly consistent. The department encompassed everything from RD to MI6's IT telephone support/helpdesk.
Personally, however, her words stood somewhere between being an affront and a challenge. She was certainly the best looking Q he'd ever worked with. It would appear, however, that contrariness came standard with the position.
"So...?" she asked, half turning to him with her arms loosely crossed one over the other, and a general air of expectation.
"Perhaps some concealer, Q. The late nights are starting to show around the eyes. I'd recommend my own, but we're not quite a match."
She didn't so much as twitch. If Bond had not himself spoken, he'd think she was patiently awaiting his rather slow reply. She blinked eventually, but only because it was an autonomic function.
He'd wondered if the last visit was a fluke. Apparently not. "How does it hold up against bullets?"
"Glad you asked." She turned to the still fighting agents and raised a hand to the cloth-covered hollow of her throat. "Phase 2, gentlemen."
"You get to eschew womanhood and they must remain men?"
"I never said I wasn't a woman, Double-Oh-"
Hicks, the blond, chose that moment to pull out a firearm and shoot Conners, the brunette. Conners collapsed.
Bond started.
"-Seven. I said I wasn't a female Q. And so to answer your question, it doesn't."
It took Bond a moment to remember he'd asked how the suit held up against bullets. Conners was still lying prone on the other side of the protective glass.
"Don't you care that one of your agents is down?"
"Her Majesty's agents, you mean." She touched the hollow of her throat again. "Gregory, you're disturbing 007."
The brown-haired junior agent clambered to his feet. "Apologies sir, Quartermaster," came muffled through the Plexiglas barrier.
Bond raised a brow. "I thought you said the suit hold up against bullets."
"It doesn't. The super-lite bulletproof vest Mr. Connors is wearing underneath it, however, does marvelously."
"Is the other one-"
"Hicks."
"Is he wearing one as well?"
A pleased smile spread across Q's face, and Bond felt the familiar pull of attraction.
"No, he's not. Can't tell the difference, can you?"
"No protection at all? That's hardly...wise in this day and age," Bond said.
"Certainly not in this business," Q agreed with a raised brow.
"I never go into the field without protection."
Q stiffened and her eyes widened, as if she was only just now hearing their conversation. Then her expression shuttered once again, as carefully neutral as before. "Not that you ever manage to bring any of it back."
"I highly doubt Q Branch really wants any of my castoffs."
"Do try to bring the suit back, 007. At the very least."
Bond gave her a shallow bow. "I shall do my best, ma'a- Q."
Q snorted in a way that was all too familiar. Apparently, that too came with the position.
Oh God
I don't know what to do
I don't know how to be
with half my heart
drowned in earth
How it continues to beat
is a mystery
If beating were a thing to be remembered
I would have forgotten long ago
Oh God
I don't know what to do
I don't know how to be
I shouldn't have held on so tightly
I see that now
Fingers broken
thoughts broken
I am drowning in a memory of falling earth
Oh God
I don't know what to do
I don't know how to be
but I remember that you have been good to me
I have walked in places closed to my sisters and mothers
I command armies with the sound of my voice
I stood in a furnace and no one can smell the smoke
Because you are good
be good to me oh God
Oh God
I don't know
I don't know
R, Bond was curious to find, was still the same.
"She wasn't really – into being Q," Eve said while spearing a grape tomato. "I was there when M offered."
"And she didn't want it?"
"Not really, though she'd've done it if we hadn't had Q waiting in the wings." She bit the tomato off the end of her fork. Bond occupied himself with his own meal while she chewed, sure there was more to the story.
"I'm sure R could have managed if she'd had to," Eve said as soon as she'd swallowed her food.
It was clear that she'd had this conversation before, probably with Tanner, her usual lunch mate. Tanner had been busy, and as it went against Bond's personal ethos to leave a beautiful woman wanting – particularly one of Eve's distinct skill-set – he'd offered to go in the other man's place.
"She didn't think so," Eve went on, "and that could have made all the difference. She'll get there, of course. I doubt a few more years as R will hurt any. And I know Q's style. She likes to collaborate. One day R will look up and realize she's somehow been running half the Branch for a year and hadn't noticed," Eve said, grinning.
Bond's brows rose. "Q seems the type to rule with an iron fist."
"She does leave rather a strong impression, doesn't she?"
Bond snorted.
Laughing, Eve said, "Alright, out with it. How deeply did she cut your ego on her first go?"
"I'll have you know my ego is quite secure "
Eve laughed harder, fork dangling from her fingers. "Oh come off it, Bond. I promise not to bandy it round the office." She made an obvious effort to compose herself, then added, "Besides, she wouldn't like it."
"So, not for my benefit?" Bond asked, eyebrows going up again.
"Not at all," Eve said, grinning.
Bond answered with a smile of his own. "You and Q are mates, then?"
"Best."
"From uni?"
"You'll have to find out."
The mirth fled Bond's expression, to be replaced by something different but equally playful.
"Please say you once shared a flat. My imagination is keen to know."
A corner of Eve's lips curled up in a dangerous smile. "Whatever you're thinking Bond..." She trailed off, eyes and smile dropping to her plate.
"What's wrong?"
When she looked up again, her smile had lost all its mischief. "I really can't say."
Bond raised a brow. "Classified?"
"Confidential."
"Ah."
Eve picked at her neglected salad.
Bond didn't bother with his food. Instead he said, "Did you know at our very first meeting, she told me she wasn't female, she was Q."
Eve looked up at him sharply. "She said that to you? Straight off?"
The consternation in Eve's voice creased Bond's brows. "Not straight off, but within the first five minutes. I have to admit," he said, reaching for his drink, "I was expecting an entirely different reaction from you."
"How did Q address you?" Eve asked, ignoring Bond's aside. "By name? By title?"
"By name, the first time, but-"
"Bond or James?"
"James-"
Eve's snatched up her mobile from where she'd placed it on the table. She didn't dial, but she held it so she could. "And what did you say to her?"
"Exactly?"
"If you can."
"What's this about, Eve?"
"Please. It's important and I need to know. I can't explain it now...I'll have to get permission first."
"From M?"
"No, actually. And now that I've probably said too much, what did you say to Q after she told you she wasn't female?"
At the very serious note in Eve's voice, Bond admitted to not remembering precisely.
"You were flirting," Eve prompted.
"Yes."
"So what would you have likely said?"
"I imagine I would have given her an appreciative once over and claimed surprise. Something like 'You could have fooled me.'"
Swearing, Eve snatched up her handbag, stuffing her mobile inside. A deft twist had her pulling the gauzy scarf draped across the back of her seat and around her neck.
"What's going on Eve?"
"M didn't want it going around in case it's nothing, but no one's heard from Q in over thirty-six hours."
Bond's eyebrows climbed. "And no one thought to start a search for our missing Quartermaster?"
Eve's expression shuttered as she said, "She's been in the middle of a project for a few months –almost from the day she joined MI6. It's not unusual for her to be out of contact. The project's over now but—"
"But everyone's got used to her disappearing. It didn't seem strange."
"Just so." Eve's jaw clenched.
Bond fished his wallet out of his jacket, and pulled out a few bills. He palmed his mobile as he moved to replace the wallet.
Eve's hand was rest on his own before it could slide fully across the table stopped him. "No James. You've been… I know where she and I'm pretty sure I know what may have happened. I only have to fetch her."
"Do you need help? You said yourself that it's been more than thirty-six hours."
"No one is going to steal MI6's Quartermaster, hold her for thirty-six hours and not taunt us with it or attempt to use her against us." Eve shook her head. "No. This is…"
"And you still can't tell me what the matter is," he said as Eve's hand left his. He watched her stand.
"No. Thank you, Bond."
"Have I done something wrong?"
A smile touched her lips, though it was small and harried. "For once your outdated sexism is just right."
"Thank you. I think."
But Eve, already well on her way out of their sun-drenched corner of the canteen, didn't hear.
She
Lies prostate
Grief and worship
Fellows in her body
Their completeness
Found within each other
And it feels as if
They will never
End
Eve pounded on the door. "Ez!"
She'd already tried knocking.
"Ez!"
She'd even phoned ahead.
"EZ!"
But nothing. No response at all.
"ESME!" One last pound on the door and half a thought towards criminal lack of nosiness in the neighbors, then Eve was rummaging blind through her purse, eyes focused, instead, on the street. It wouldn't do for someone to take a look *now*. "So help me..." she muttered to no one as she freed her lock-picking tools from their case.
A moment later she had left the sleepy street behind for the cool quiet dark of her friend's flat. Friends'. Both of them. Even if James was gone now, it was still both theirs.
"His name is James."
There is a wicked light to Esme's eyes that makes Eve narrow hers. "What?"
"What do you mean 'What'?" Esme asks far too innocently. "I thought you wanted to know the name of yummy blond footballer 23."
"I do. But I know you! A name as simple as James wouldn't get that look to your eyes." Eve points a long finger at her friend. "What else is there? What's his surname. And dare I ask how you came to know this?"
Ignoring the last, Esme's lips curl up in a smile that would do a Cheshire cat proud. "Brown."
Eve's brows furrow. "Brown? That's a perfectly respectable name. Mum would be over the moon if I came home from uni as Mrs. Eve Brown. Dad will be in a twist but-"
"Not Mrs. Eve Brown," Esme interrupts, Cheshire cat grin returned. "Mrs. *James* Brown."
Esme had laughed at her over that for days, until James started courting her instead. Eve, it turned out, wasn't quite brilliant enough for his taste. Few women were. James had pursued her friend with patient diligence, proving his interest in Esme was far from a passing fancy, until she'd eventually agreed to a date. They'd married days after graduating.
It was tempting to call out again, but training won out over fear. Eve was not licensed to kill, but she was licensed to carry. Still, she didn't pull out her service weapon. Someone was likely to be shot by friendly fire if things were as she thought. Her fear was of an entirely different sort.
Breathing slowly and carefully, centering her mind against her tripping heartbeat, Eve stalked the first level of the comfortable flat. It felt empty. The latent hum of the electricity was loud in the late afternoon stillness.
"Esme," she said no louder than if the other woman was just around the corner.
The hallway lightened as she neared the small kitchen that opened off to the right. On the left the wall extended a bit – Esme's and James' bedroom. It opened directly onto the sitting room and beyond it was the door to the back garden.
Eve looks first at the open door of her friends' bedroom (Esme has not had a hand in the decorating, she can tell – not Gothic enough) to the open garden door, both only a few feet from where she stands in the middle of the sitting room. "I hope you got a good deal, love," she says to Esme. "This setup is absolutely daft. I thought you had an upstairs."
"We do," Esme says.
"What's up there, then? World's biggest loo?"
Esme rolls her eyes, but she is too happy to be truly annoyed. "Yes, there is a loo, but mostly it's the office and the guest bed. Well. For now."
Ignoring the last, Eve looks at her friends askance. "Office? On the second floor? And the master bed is down here? Now I'm sure this place is daft."
Esme shoots her a death glare, which Eve ignores. What was a death glare among friends? Eve had sent one skittering her way not an hour before when Esme had refused her a second scoop of ice cream.
Esme huffs. "If you must know-"
"I insist."
"-the previous owners had used this as their office, but it was too small for me and James to both work."
"So you converted the master?"
"Precisely."
Eve's face twists comically. "Have I told you lately how disgustingly cute the two of you are? Tooth-rotting fluff, the pair of you."
Esme makes a show of checking her watch. "It's been at least two hours and a half."
Eve laughs.
They'd been married three years before they could afford something better than university lodgings, helped in no small part by the sudden interest in devices Esme had patented while in lower forms and uni.
James had been incredibly proud. They all had been.
"Esme, sweetheart." Eve's voice nearly cracked on the last. She hadn't been in the house for months and months, after James was diagnosed but before he'd... Well, before.
Two more quiet strides and she was in the sitting room. It looked even more lived in than she was used to, almost as if Esme and James were both deep into their respective projects and had forgot to let in the housekeeping service. But she could see that Mauritius, their cat, was being fed and nothing smelled particularly off. Eve could just see the bin with a tied bag inside, as if ready to be taken out.
She swept her gaze about, landing last on the closed bedroom door where Esme and James had chosen to share their intimate life, and where James had chosen to die. Eve turned to the bedroom only for her foot to strike something semi-solid. She looked down.
"Esme!"
Eve dropped to her knees beside the prone body of her friend. "No. No, no, no. No!"
.
.
.
.
.
The litany of negations circled her thoughts as she checked her friend's vitals. What she was saying "No" to, she refused to entertain.
There under her fingers a faint pulse. She held her blank mobile under Esme's nostrils in lieu of a mirror. Faint condensation.
Too tense to be relieved, Eve snatched up her mobile and dialed MI6. Picked up almost immediately, she quickly gave her clearance code.
"Agent Moneypenny, how may-"
"Send a medical team. Q has been incapacitated."
"Right away ma'am."
With help on the way, Eve could trouble herself to worry about her friend. "Esme...Esme...oh Esme..."
Eve and R stood together outside medical, the sound of Dr. Brand's sensible heels loud between them.
"Bet she could outrun us all in those things," R said, breaking the awkward silence.
"Have you seen the way she holds a scalpel?" Eve said. "I bet she doesn't need to."
R chuckled softly and the tension was broken. "So. Exhaustion."
"Yeah."
"I should have seen it. I'm with Q every day. I should have known something was off."
"Maybe," Eve said, eyes on the tile. "But I've been her best mate since primary school and I didn't notice." Looking up, she met R's eyes. "It was a perfect storm. You're spending more time with her these days than I am, but you don't know her well enough to tell when something's off. I do know her that well, but between starting her new position and the current state of the world, I haven't seen her enough to notice. If you're at fault, then so am I."
R was waiting for her when Eve raised her eyes. "I still feel responsible."
"Yeah. Me, too."
They were silent and still, but less tense than they had been. After a moment R shifted her weight to her back foot. "I have to go back. One shouldn't leave that many technological geniuses unsupervised for long."
Eve smiled a little. "Likely not. M's given me the afternoon so I'm going to wait here a bit – ponder if I should ring her mum or wait until Q's awake to do it herself."
R pulled a face. "Better you than me."
"You've heard the stories then?"
"One, but it was enough."
Groaning, Eve could only nod. "I can guess which. Anyway, I'll give you an update if anything changes before I leave for home."
R nodded sharply, turned on her heel and left.
When peace like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say
It is well, it is well, with my soul.
It is well
It is well
With my soul
With my soul
It is well, it is well with my soul
"Q...Q darling, even if you know the next verse, please let's not sing it lest Medical have grounds for your early discharge."
Esme, otherwise known as Q, made a soft sound of exasperation to the voice in the dark. "Sing if I want to."
"Yes, darling, you may, but the doctors can probably argue that it's detrimental to the health of their other patients."
Q snorted, then groaned.
"It hurts, I'm sure. Let me help you up and you can have some water, yeah?"
The bed began to move smoothly beneath her, but it still prompted her to open her eyes. The lights were harsh and she wasn't prepared. A hand to shade her eyes revealed a cannula that she hadn't felt but was now acutely aware of. Her skin seemed to come alive all at once.
"Eve," she said as loudly as her dry throat would allow. Surprised though she was to be found in Medical, she'd have been far more surprised if it wasn't her best mate she'd been talking to.
"Right here, love. Stop scratching. You'll pull the cannula."
"Scratching?" Q looked down at her hands. "Didn't notice." She coughed suddenly.
"Come on, you. Have a drink before one of the very scary nurses comes by and decides I've been abusing you."
"Never."
"True, but no one ever believes assassins and Double-Ohs. No one with sense, at any rate." Eve placed a covered cup beside Q's bed. "Let's get you up a little higher, darling."
Soon she had Q nearly sitting. "All right then?"
"Ready to go back to sleep."
"Water first."
Q watched as Eve brought the covered cup of water, reaching for it when she was close enough. She frowned when the other woman wouldn't let it go. "M'not a child. I can hold a cup."
"Maybe after your second nap, love, but not right now." Q would have protested except Eve very quickly added, "Do it for me, alright? You gave me- You gave us all quite a scare. I think I'm entitled to do a little coddling."
"Alright." Then she concentrated on the very difficult task of pulling water through a drinking straw.
Exhausted, she let the straw slip from her lips. "What happened? Why'm I here, Eve?"
"After your second nap, love. You're tired, remember?"
"Mmm." Q, who was sometimes known as Esme, sighed and tried to nod her acquiescence, but she was asleep before she got that far.
Esme returned the reassuring squeeze that Eve had given her. "I didn't mean to give you a scare, love." Hearing how her best mate had found her passed out on the floor of her own home, nonresponse and pulse weak, sent a sympathetic chill through her. "I don't know what I would have done if I'd found you passed out in your flat."
"That famous Esme Brown chill would have saved the day, as it always does." Eve grinned as she rubbed her thumb across her friend's knuckles, careful to avoid the IV line still taped to the back of her hand.
"Not so chill this time."
"Ez…you're allowed to not be chill about James' passing. You loved each other quite deeply. You are, in fact, allowed to be utterly devastated."
Esme squeezed Eve's hand, partly to show she agreed and partly to stave off tears. Only one of those things happened. "I thought it would be better by now. I thought the hurting would would…would…"
"It never goes away," Eve said, rescuing her friend from trying to name something far bigger than words. "I've not lost a husband, but you know about Sadie. Martha and Gloria and I've still got each other, but none of us can take Sadie's place. We might be sisters, but we're none of us interchangeable."
Esme dashed a hand across her eyes. "Are you telling me there will never be another James William Brown?"
"Exactly so. And it's okay for that to sound like the most awful thing you've ever heard." Eve tightened her grip on her best mate's fingers. "And it's okay for that to be the worst thing you've ever heard. At least for right now."
When Esme sobbed and covered her eyes with her free hand, Eve stood and climbed onto the hospital bed with her.
Bond sat on a corner of Eve's desk, tipping her laptop closed as he did so.
"Well hello to you, too, James," she said as she looked up at him with a smile.
"What happened with Q and how long is R going to be in her place. You promised me an explanation."
Eve's eyebrows rose. "Is that genuine concern for our Quartermistress I hear, or do you miss the challenge?"
A small smile turned the hard lines of Bond's face boyish and charming. "Who says it's not both?"
Eve rolled her eyes. Plucking the hand still lying on her laptop by the wrist, she said, "Q is in Medical, resting. R will happily go back to RD as soon as she's recovered."
"So there was a spot of trouble when you found her. Nothing you couldn't handle, I take it."
"Quite," she said, reopening her laptop.
When Bond didn't move, she looked up from her screen. "You don't actually want me to announce you to M, do you? I thought you enjoyed the element of surprise and the dressing down that comes with it."
"I'm waiting for you."
Eve's eyebrows rose again. "I thought we'd agreed to limit our questionable but witty exchanges to once per day." Her eyes flicked to the time on the computer screen. "And that we'd already checked that box six hours ago."
Instead of a smile and flirty response, Bond was entirely serious. "What happened with Q?"
"I really can't say."
"Confidential?"
"Classified."
"Ah."
"You may ask her yourself, of course."
Here Bond's expression shifted once again. "But I do so adore debriefing with you."
Eve pouted, resting her chin in her upturned palm. "I'd heard you preferred debriefs with Tanner."
Bond leaned in close. "Not even close."
"You do know how to make a girl feel useful."
"Only 'useful'? I must be losing my touch."
"Well-"
"Double-Oh Seven!"
Bond and Eve turned to see M standing in the door. "Please stop encouraging fellow agents to break the fraternization rules."
Sliding off Eve's desk, Bond said, "Surely there aren't rules against being polite?"
"I was speaking to Ms. Moneypenny. But since you're here, you might as well step inside."
"Yes, before Ms. Moneypenny is any worse an influence." Bond winked in Eve's direction.
Her fingers touched his as he trailed them along the edge of her desk. "Thank you, James."
He nodded before following after M.
"Set the vase next to Moneypenny's, R. I think I've figured out that bit of code that's got Elle in a twist," Q said without looking up from the tablet and stylus in her hands.
Bond dutifully put the vase he was carrying next to the one already in the room. "And what division does L stand for?" he asked as he sat in the chair closest to Q.
Who looked up from the tablet in her lap. "It is a diminutive for Eleanor, one of my staff. What are you doing here, Bond?"
"I've been told that I saved your life."
"You might have done."
Bond took in her deep brown skin, ashen and taut across the fine bones of her hands. Her hair braided over one shoulder and trailing down her chest appeared listless, where it had once been alive and scarcely contained. Her eyes still sparked despite the dark circles they were set in. The bed minimized her height. The medical gown robbed her of her figure.
"As a Double-Oh, I expect this is nothing new," she said, brows quirked and expression unimpressed as she pushed her thick-framed glasses up her nose.
"Are all Q cut from the same broadcloth?"
Her brows rose towards her hairline. "Of course. Just as assuredly as the Double-Ohs are."
Bond chucked. "Still Q."
"Who else would I be, Mr. Bond?"
Settling into a comfortable sprawl in the decidedly uncomfortable hospital chair, he said, "I have my theories."
She frowned at him before her expression smoothed itself out. "Isn't there something you should be shooting at?"
"There very well may be," he said, humor coloring his voice. "So, Q. Tell me a story."
One unfashionably thick eyebrow rose and Bond smiled. "What story would that be?"
"The one that would explain why Eve left me high and dry at our perfectly respectable lunch when I mentioned our first meeting. The one that would explain why no one you were missing until you had been out of contact for more than twenty-four hours. The one that kept otherwise intelligent agents from making the most basic sweep for your whereabouts."
Q was, as usual, utterly stone-faced, as if Bond hadn't spoken at all. But with so little spare flesh left on her, Bond could now see the pulse fluttering under her skin. The mostly silent machines must had warned someone, because a nurse appeared from the other side of the ward.
"Everything all right?" The question was directed at Q, but the ire landed squarely on Bond.
"I'm quite all right, Miss Wells. Thank you," Q said.
Elaine offered Bond a look to go with her annoyance, before turning back to her patient. "You're not to get so worked up, you know."
"I know."
"All right then. You'll call if you need anything, dear." The nurse didn't try to hide the order, and neither did Q try to pretend it was otherwise.
"Yes, of course."
"Mister Bond." Nurse Wells inclined her head in his direction.
He nodded back. "Elaine." He was familiar, sometimes intimately so, with all the staff in medical. Elaine Wells would flay him alive if he worsened her patient's condition. "I'm not staying long."
"See that you don't." And with that, she turned on her heel and stalked back to the nurse's station.
"I'll trade you my story for yours," Q said, eyes wide and bright with curiosity and mischief.
Bond waved a negligent hand. "Patient confidentiality and all that."
"Hmm."
Bond collected himself and stood. "I'll take my leave of you then?" He could always come back when Q's condition wasn't quite so—
"My husband. I was married," Q added as if it weren't obvious. But she was holding Bond's gaze so… "He died a few months ago. Cancer. We discovered it not long after I took the position. It progressed quickly but James, his name was also James, refused palliative care. So I cared for him. In our home."
"While running Q Branch."
Her bland look said what else more clearly than words. "James died in our home. In my arms. I've hardly been home since. Until three days ago."
"Five."
"Five days ago? Hmm. Someone's been keeping secrets. Be that as it may, there's your story."
"That's why M and Q Branch weren't surprised when you went incommunicado. You'd done it before."
"Quite."
"Why did you go home?"
Several emotions pulled at Q's lips before she said, "You."
Bond blinked. "Me?"
"You called me 'the female Q'. James used to do that. When we were first introduced he said, 'I finally get to meet the female Einstein.'"
"And what did you say?"
"'I am not a female Einstein, James. I am myself.' It was still our favorite joke even after we were married."
Bond and Q regarded each other for some time. Then he shifted on his feet and said, "Should I apologize?"
"Only if you think it would have been better to have been found collapsed in my office by my subordinates or an agent instead of my best mate."
"So you did go to uni with Eve. Tell me, were you ever flatmates?"
"Good-night, James. If you happen to see R, do send her down."
"For you, Q, anything."
[in]Fin[ite]
AN2: If it's not clear, all of the poetic interludes are Q/Esme's thoughts and feelings, including the blank section.