Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Author Note: First scene is set during 'SPECTRE'. The rest is set after it. The fic features background Madeleine Swan/James Bond.
IN THE MARGINS
Q thought he'd been perfectly clear but there was still an incongruous rectangle of cardboard sitting on his workbench. On one side was a picture of a garish carnival, the very opposite of where Bond was, more akin to where he'd been in fact. On the other side was only Q's work address – post could quite easily find its way to the Q Branch tunnel, postcards were a more than acceptable method of alerting MI6 to trouble or success, especially as electronic communication was almost exclusively focused on for everything now. This one definitely meant trouble.
There was something about the way certain letters flicked up that made Q sure that Bond had been smirking.
Q glared at the postcard frequently as he worked, his hands flying across a couple of laptop keyboards. Bond was a menace. He had unsubstantiated ideas that he was determined to pursue despite orders from the top, despite common sense. Q typed and researched and kept the Q Branch running smoothly. He kept a very sharp eye on the news and on Bond's blood tracker. Bond was a blunt instrument but infuriatingly he'd been right before.
When Q inevitably dug up the truth Bond had been looking for, he took a deep breath, thought about telling M but headed for the Alps instead, his stomach tumbling hard at the thought of having to fly. Bond's tracker was still active. The postcard stayed on Q's workbench. Moneypenny would know what it meant.
When Bond returned, when Obhausen was arrested, when Dr Madeleine Swan waited, he visited Q for a car – of course, it was always a car or a gun. Nothing else captured Bond's interest so thoroughly. Double-Os were incredibly predictable.
Bond was still in one piece, though his idea of taking leave was always more...energetic than anyone else's. Bond was smiling slightly, a very dangerous warning. He immediately noticed the postcard, still sat on Q's desk, now propped up against a couple of manuals. Q sniffed and retrieved the remote needed for the car.
"Target practice," he stated by way of explanation.
Bond didn't look surprised; his amusement was obvious though. "I'm flattered."
He would be. He frequently took women trying to kill him as foreplay. Q handed him the car's remote.
"Enjoy your leave."
Far away from here. Bond's smile ticked up again. "I'll send you a postcard."
"Please don't."
But Bond had already remotely revved the car's engine. He was gone.
The next postcard arrived less than a month later. This time the picture was a perfect snowy mountain scene, not the Alps but a clear parallel. There was also a couple of pen marks at the bottom near the country name, as though an indecisive person had attempted writing something besides the address but had ultimately decided against it. Bond could never be described as indecisive so the marks were deliberate. A code probably.
They weren't a code used by MI-6. Of course not. Q tucked the postcard in front of the previous one and continued working on the weapon calibrations that 005 needed, thinking determinedly of less-annoying subjects.
Q had quite enjoyed his last ski trip – dry slope, in the UK, no flights required. Wouldn't that surprise 007? Q enjoyed a challenge and exercise always cleared his mind and clarified his thoughts. Moneypenny had taken photos though she'd sworn they'd never see the light of day. Q had made sure of it.
He had algorhythms running to identify any incidents that had Bond's fingerprints all over them. Dr Swan was with him but Bond's idea of relaxing, well, Q had read Dr Swan's file, he doubted she was going into this blind. If anything she was likely to have experience of packing in a hurry and travelling light.
There was no news that signalled Bond's presence. Maybe Dr Swan was a calming influence.
Q finished his calibrations and presented the weapon to 005 with very specific instructions, 005 would obey them. 005 did not send him postcards including glaringly unknown codes.
The picture on the next postcard looked like it could be Spain. Q squinted, he'd check Bond's tracker later. He had considered scanning the postcard images, for an electronic record, just in case. But he was still working daily on fortifying the MI6 systems post-C. Q was not going to give anyone any rope to hang him or 007 with.
There were pen marks again on the back of the postcard, on the part meant for cheery holiday news. Q pressed a fingertip to them and turned away.
He hummed as he worked, he could see how it made a couple of his co-workers twitch – he might have hummed before when dealing with something nuclear in the past year. But they calmed down and helped him with the submarine project instead of contacting M to say that Q was behaving unnervingly again.
Moneypenny paid him a visit though, in person, so someone had mentioned something to someone. She appeared armed with a thermos of very high-quality spiced hot chocolate, a small fruit basket and a couple of bars of luxury chocolate. She decanted everything onto Q's desk, easily traversing the tunnel's uneven surface in spiked heels.
"You're aware I'm not suffering a break-up," Q pointed out, eyeing the offerings.
Moneypenny smiled slightly and poured him a mug of hot chocolate. She sat on a stool dragged near his desk, looking unfailingly comfortable. She remained a very good field agent; it was just the field that had changed.
"You're aware you're frightening the workers," she replied, opening one of the chocolate bars.
Q gave her a look. Moneypenny could, and did, recalibrate (some would say manipulate) most of the people that marched past her to see M. Now, she snapped off a large piece of chocolate and dipped it into the cup of spiced hot chocolate that Q hadn't drunk yet.
"Gifts from your admirers."
Moneypenny didn't deny it and ate the chocolate with a flash of teeth. M was getting better at remembering her birthday as well. Q finally drank from the offered cup – the hot chocolate was as delicious as it smelled, the warm burn of flavours exactly right for the temperature-controlled Q Branch. Everyone else had left the room – another Moneypenny orchestration.
She wasn't going to be denied and if Q resisted, she'd find a way to get him drunk later and extract information that way. Q could outdrink most people but Moneypenny could sustain levels that had to approach alcohol poisoning and still looked non-the-worse the next day.
With a sigh, Q nudged the latest card towards Moneypenny. She turned it over, eyeing the pen marks and the address. A smile tugged at her lips, it looked a lot like a smirk. Of course it did; she'd recognised the handwriting at first glance. But then something changed in her expression and Moneypenny turned the card over again, the bright Spanish scene facing up like a smile.
"Maybe the code isn't from him."
Q had kept the SPECTRE octopus-engraved ring. Now he scanned it again, looking through information familiar to him. Mr White had taught his daughter a lot, M continued to offer her a job at MI6 and she continued to turn him down. She might not want to get involved in espionage but some things were engrained. Of course Bond was drawn to a woman who knew his world bone-deep but also loathed it. But did Bond know about the messages she had been sending Q?
Q read up on fragments of known SPECTRE codes. He doubted Dr Swan had used any of them, SPECTRE wasn't dead after all, MI6 had just removed the head. They'd burrow underground for a bit and reshape themselves and then slither out again. Q's hand tightened around a pen; he refused to be snooped on when he wasn't in control of the snooping. That had been part of his deal with MI6 in the first place.
So no SPECTRE codes but White and his daughter could have developed some, just for them. Dr Swan hated discussing her father so had refused to be debriefed or interviewed about him. MI6 had the contents of his secret room, an Aladdin's cave of espionage secrets. It was more than enough right now.
Another postcard arrived, featuring some sort of tropical deep-sea diving. Q was relieved to see no octopuses featured. It only took a few days before he began to see a coherent pattern in the codes, now that he had so much data to work with. He started to translate Dr Swan's messages.
He didn't make note of them or the method he'd used to translate them. He never made any official notes in fact.
He took the postcards home and pinned them up as though the pictures were there to brighten up his flat. He could see the route the two of them were taking. He watched Bond's blood tracker daily, his smile ticking up. It was good to know that someone else had the right idea too. When it came to Double-0s, to getting the best out of them - a high success and survival rate with low international incidents and a little bit of obedience - it could often be a question of leverage, especially with Bond. So how wonderful this was going to be because Q knew how not to show his entire hand, how to play the very long game. The look that would be on Bond's face as he tried to work out how Q knew what he knew, the lengths he might go to. Leverage indeed.
Q was going to save Dr Madeleine Swan some chocolate, and at least one fruit basket.
He's still favouring his right side.
He prefers coffee-flavoured ice cream.
There is an unknown scar across his left heel.
He thinks I don't know his age.
He steals the bedclothes
-the end