00 (Double-O)

by: Shadow Chaser

Author's Notes:

This is an extended scene to the confrontation between M, Q, and C/Max Denbigh while working within my universe.

Story:

With all that had happened, Q was surprised that they had arrived before C, or rather Max Denbigh, was aware of what had happened. However, he kept his surprise to himself as he and M ascended the stairs to Denbigh's office. To think that Denbigh was working with Blofeld as his head of intelligence and with the Nine Eyes program...Q shuddered to think of the consequences if they had not tried to delay the launch of the program and instead, let Denbigh do all of the work.

"How much time?" M asked and Q glanced at his watch.

"Not long, about twelve or so minutes," he replied as they entered his office and Q made a beeline towards the computers in the far corner.

He immediately sat down and opened his laptop. He plugged it into the all-in-one wall of monitors and computers he was sitting in front of. His hacking modules immediately came to life and started to chip away at the security surrounding the Nine Eyes program as Q opened up various command windows and started a secondary hack. He had no doubts that whatever security was in place to protect Nine Eyes would attack his own laptop, hence his attempt to tunnel through a secondary entry way in order to get shut down the program.

He glanced up as he heard M open and close several drawers on Denbigh's desk before finding what looked like a gun and began to empty it of its bullets. Looking back at his programs, he continued to type away, digging deep into the rootkits and the inner workings and codings of the program. A beep on one of the other windows alerted him that the primary hacking module had encountered resistance and was fighting off an automatic counter-hack built into the Nine Eyes program.

"Q?" M had finished searching through C's desk and out of the corner of his eye, he saw the other man approach.

"He's got counter-hacks built into Nine Eyes itself," Q murmured almost absently as he concentrated for a few seconds before a slight smile appeared on his lips. He had successfully breached one of the backdoors and started to quickly erase it. "Clever bit of programming that bastard."

The sound of footsteps from the ground floor echoed by noises of agreement and so forth made the two of them look up as they realized that C himself had arrived. M discreetly waved for him to get back to work and Q rolled his chair into the wall of monitors that made up Nine Eyes' feeds. He glanced behind him to see that Nine Eyes itself did not show any traces of hacking and so he was safe at the moment.

"...No, I don't care what you've got to do, just do it," C's voice was pinched and angry. Q peered through the small slit in between two monitors stacked on top of each other to see C walk into his office, sitting down as he angrily slapped his mobile onto the desk itself.

"Hello, Max," M started quietly, C look up, his expression in an affectation of surprise, but there was something artificial about it, as if he had been expecting them.

"M, how kind of you to join me. You do know that our scheduled meeting for your transition was supposed to have happened this afternoon, but it seems our schedules just would not sync up," C had a rather bland look upon his face and Q felt his hackles rise a little. He had seen the security footage of Sherlock's confrontation with Moriarty at the pool. He had seen it when he was studying the former 001 to help Sherlock dismantle Moriarty's network. The same devil-may-care playful insanity in Moriarty's tone was present in C's voice and it prickled at Q.

He had not had a chance to confirm that C or Max Denbigh was in fact Moriarty, mostly due to his forced isolation and M's unwillingness to have him even confront or meet the new head of the Joint Intelligence Division. And with everything that had happened with Bond, Obenhauser/Blofield, Nine Eyes, he still did not know. But just hearing the man's voice, Q might have bet some money that C was Moriarty. Still, he knew that there was technology out there that could mimic another person's voice. He also knew that it would be like Moriarty to have a posthumous plan where he did, in actuality, hire an actor to act and play him as if he was still alive.

But, Max Denbigh was a favorite of the Ministry and it meant that he cleared a lot of background checks as he rose through the ranks of the government. Q let the rootkit destroying module hack away in his secondary window as he brought up another one to look through the the Ministry's database for any traces of Denbigh being Moriarty. It was laughably easy to use M's cloned log-in to get access to what the head of MI6 read and saw.

"You almost had me fooled, Max," M started congenially, "but you've overstepped your bounds for the last time."

"I don't think so," Q peered through the slit in time to see C pull the gun out of his desk, a wide smile of triumph on his face. "Now, we know what M stands for," C said, "moron."

Q suppressed the urge to smile at the click of the emptied gun. C's expression turned from triumph to surprise. M lifted his hand up and empty it of the bullets he had taken from C's gun. "And we know what C stands for. Careless," M replied coolly.

C only smiled a little and shrugged as he sat back down at his desk. "Ah, well, it would have worked some other time, would it not?"

"No," M replied, "as we speak, your Nine Eyes is being dismantled-"

Q took it as his cue and peered out from the wall of monitors. He could see something akin to disapproval flicker through M's expression, but ignored it. He had only see C/Max Denbigh through the files or occasional security footage since all of C's meetings were closed-door and not available to the media due to national security. But his quick look at C in person still made him a little uneasy. C looked eerily like Moriarty, right down to his tailored jacket which was clearly Westwood to the bland unconcerned expression even as M held him at gunpoint.

He ducked back behind the wall of monitors as M continued, "You will submit yourself to New Scotland Yard when they arrive where you will be held on charges of treason and conspiracy to overthrow the lawful government-"

"Lawful, yes lawful indeed, M," C interrupted, "do you even know how much I've sacrificed for this? For all of this?"

"To pretend in a role that you are so terribly ill-suited for? Yes, Mr. Denbigh, I know how much you've sacrificed. Former MI5 freelancer agent who had a long history as a successful operative within the IRA. Yes, I know all about that. Then...I know about the obsession; that you met a certain man and that certain man gave you an inspiration to do more than you ever could. Your changes were subtle, I will give you that, but then again, everyone was distracted by the sensational news of the time – Sherlock Holmes, a fraud detective. Sherlock Holmes dead, fake genius takes his own life! Those were the headlines, but you, you had your hand in them.

"Richard Brook was such a clever name, but the news articles, the files, they could not have been produced without veracity and time spent on it. You knew, you helped, and you were ultimately Richard Brook, were you not, Mr. Denbigh? Your skills honed by the years as an undercover operative working for the very man that you admired."

"Are you that afraid to say his name?" C's expression had settled into one of coy interest.

"James Moriarty," M's tone was simple and to the point, but to Q, it felt like a gut shot. He could not help but stare through the slit in between the monitors, peripherally aware that his programs were working in concert now, the counter-hacking on Nine Eyes easily defeated as his secondary hack ate away at the rootkits and lines of programming.

"Nice man, loved to talk," C shrugged, feigning indifference, "admirable, as you so very well know. It is a pity what happened to him, but 'c'est la vie' as the French say. I'll admit that his demise gave me the opportunity to rise up like this. But you had to just ruin it, didn't you? You and...Q, isn't it?"

Q frowned behind the wall of monitors at the look C shot towards him. It was definitely unkind and almost predatory, but he resolutely focused back on the hack. "Come on, come on..." he muttered mostly to himself as he watched the programs eat the last of Nine Eyes and finally, the [SYSTEM ERADICATED] prompt appeared on the screen. "Finished," he declared as he stood up from his station. He left his laptop open to finish eliminating all of the smaller files and traces of Nine Eyes after the primary threat was eliminated. He stepped out of the protective wall of monitors that was Nine Eyes' hub as he saw M also stand up and gesture with his gun for C to move.

"Let's go," M declared as C swiveled a little in his chair to face him, "after you."

Q watched as C reluctantly got up and plodded around his desk. "Why can't you just face it, M. You don't matter any more."

"Maybe I don't," M replied, " but someone has to-"

The roar of the helicopter flying too close to the building made all of the involuntarily duck, but Q saw the moment that C made his move towards M. He took two steps towards them, but in quick succession, C kicked M in what had to be an injury sustained in the earlier crash and M went down hard. Another swift kick to M's head dazed him to the point of insensibility. In a matter of seconds, Q found himself looking down the barrel of the gun that used to belong to M.

"Now then, Q," C's smile was congenial and full of threat as Q looked past the gun towards the other man.

"I won't reactivate Nine Eyes," he said quietly, staring at C.

"No, I don't think you will," C shook his head a little, "that was just a little bit of fun. Something to occupy and distract everyone. Obenhauser, Blofield, whatever the hell he calls himself even fell for it. Your precious double-o fell for it too and that girl he's trying to save. No, none of it matters."

"Then why do this?"

"To prove something to the government," C began as distant sirens rendered the air. The sirens were coming closer and Q knew that New Scotland Yard was on their way. "You see, they train us so well, but there is always the issue of loyalty. To Queen and Country, and all of that. It gets so...boring after a while."

"I had an idea; what if I put my skills into this government. See what I can do to get to the heart of the government and control its actions. That the government that trained me, raised me, nurtured me, would see its son return and use the skills given back upon them," C's arm did not even waver a bit and Q dared not move a single step forward or to the side.

"Nine Eyes and the Joint Intelligence Task force," Q stated and C's smile grew wider as he nodded his head in agreement.

"But that became boring once I realized that I was about to attain it," the other man shrugged as if it was of no consequence, "it was too easy, even with Jim's help and push. Too easy and I realized why it was easy, because there was a certain person in the government, a certain person that Jim whispered to me; who held the power of the government who had deliberately let me get away with all of this.

"Jim warned me, you know. Warned me of a certain man with the last name of Holmes, who was in essence the government. But I couldn't touch him, not until the merger was complete and even then, I was warned there would be safeguards built between myself and this Mr. Holmes. He would be untouchable – he is untouchable. So is the dilemma – how do you touch an untouchable person? Surely the answer was to go after Mr. Holmes' famous brother, Sherlock. The world famous detective in the funny little hat. But no..." C shook his head again as if he was telling a story, "That would be no fun. And it would be so like copying dear old Jim. Where's the fun in that?

"The one thing I've learned in my time undercover in the IRA is that you don't go after the leader or the perceived leader, or even the one you know is behind the leader. You go after the supplies, the supplier," C continued, "and what better way than to figure out the supplier of the government, of the agents who worked for the government than to go through Obenhauser's files on a one Mr. James Bond; a double-o under the employ of MI6. After all, there has to be a quartermaster, someone to supply the agents with the license to kill with their guns and fancy equipment, right? Someone to protect Mr. Government Holmes and the government's interests itself."

"I'll not be as arrogant as to think all of this was a ruse to draw me out, Denbigh," Q could not believe what he was hearing. It was utterly mad and utterly frivolous to think that Denbigh had deliberately planned this just to meet him. It was Bond's connection to Obenhauser that was the key to all of this. C just so happened to be caught up in it-

"You're right, you're right," C laughed lightly, "but you have to admit, Q, your file is rather heavily redacted. More so than M here."

"M is a known public figure," he said dryly.

"My curiousity was piqued, you see. Why would a simple supplier, a simple quartermaster have such a redacted file? Double-o's have redacted files, as do other agents, myself included. It's protection, you see. So then why would a quartermaster be protected in such a way? I get it; double-o's with their license to kill and cause mass destruction on a rather large scale does call for some redaction, something to tamp down on the possible international crisis it may offer," C replied, "but, it is rather intriguing to find that the quartermaster of MI6's file is not only redacted, but eyes only with a clearance level that I've never heard of. The quartermaster. The supplier and one who supplies a simple army of agents and killers with the weaponry. How intriguing..."

The other man affected a wide smile of curiosity before his expression morphed into a bored expression, "I must really thank my mentor for such access. Did you know that he used to be a double-o? 001...now that's a skeleton in the closet that really should not come out. Why imagine the scandal it'll cause! James Moriarty, former MI6 agent, 001, turned Napoleon of Crime. Consulting Criminal..."

"And patron to insane groupies who are obsessed to the point of looking like him," Q said sarcastically.

"Every famous person has to have their fans," if C was bothered by the comment, he shrugged it off rather easily. "Just look at the famous Sherlock Holmes. Lots of people want to be him, some even dress and try to look like him."

Q, however, took his comment as a comfort of sorts that C was not Moriarty by any stretch. But still did not discount the man's theatricality, nor the fact that he was still a trained agent who had been undercover with the IRA. The fact that he had easily overpowered M who himself was former SAS and had been a prisoner in the IRA's hands. "Apparently it's the 'it' thing to now emulate mass murderers and criminals," he said dryly. The sirens were definitely getting louder now and Q could hear the screeching of tires nearby as the police arrived.

"Ah, the audience has arrived," C finally gestured with the gun for him to come towards him and Q narrowed his eyes but complied.

He held his hands away from his body as he slowly walked towards C who was standing by the glass window that overlooked the atrium of the building itself. He could sense a change in the air and inwardly smiled tightly. He had a feeling that whatever C was planning, it was to be sure in full view of those coming into the building. Q breathed out slowly and quietly as he walked towards C. He knew he would only have one shot by virtue of being close to the man and thus could not waste the opportunity. It was legwork he'd rather not do, but in this case, with M incapacitated, there was no one else. Tanner and Moneypenny were outside, oblivious to all that was happening, though he suspected that they would have appraised New Scotland Yard of the situation at the moment.

"What do you hope to gain from this, Denbigh?" he asked as he stopped at C's quick gesture. He could sense the other man slip behind him, the cool metal of the gun pointed not quite near his head – but close enough that he could make out the faint outline out of the corner of his eyes.

"I had hoped that perhaps you'd join me in this new Joint Intelligence Taskforce, especially with your interesting file, but now, it seems that you're just nothing but a talented hacker. So, I'll settle for chaos will follow as the government himself realizes that his supplier is gone and rebuild Nine Eyes," C said as Q's eyes tracked the entry of several people, one of whom was Mycroft who was shadowed by Anthea. To his dismay, he saw that Sherlock and his friends were among those that came in, though Tanner and Moneypenny pushed past the small crowd. But all stopped their ascent as they saw the hostage situation he was in.

"Good," Q said, "then you don't know."

That was the only cue M needed as he felt, more than saw the other man reach out to grab C by the ankle in an effort to distract him. C was startled by the action and quickly moved his gun away from Q's head and down towards M who was still lying on the ground, but it was the opening that Q needed. He immediately sprang into action, reaching into his coat pocket and pulled out the pen he had given to Sherlock back when he had first gone on his mission to dismantle Moriarty's network. Sherlock had returned the pen – intact – after he had decided to come back to the land of the living. Clicking the clicker, the point of the pen retracted into a sharpened stiletto and Q stabbed it into C's neck.

The man staggered, one hand on the knife driven deep into his neck as it bled. He choked, bringing his gun back up, but Q was faster, ducking underneath the gun itself and elbowed him hard in the ribs. C choked again and coughed, folding in on himself. Q turned into the man's instep, hammering him in the solar plexus and groin several times with brutal quick strikes, before ripping the gun away from him, the snap of broken fingers audible over the gurgles and coughs produced by C. Q flicked the safety off and pointed the gun straight at Denbigh's head. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Tanner, Anthea, and Moneypenny running up the stairs, followed quickly by Mycroft, Sherlock, and the others, seeing that the threat was being neutralized.

"But...y-you're just a-a...quartermaster... H-How..." C choked on his own spittle, blood falling from the corner of his lips as he tried to grasp the stiletto embedded into the side of his neck. His hands were slick with blood as he tried to pull the pen out without much success.

"Every double-o's file is redacted, Mr. Denbigh," Q said quietly as the others entered the room. He fired, his hands steady, his breath even as the bullet pierced C's head, and the man fell to the ground, dead. "You would not know that as you are not James Moriarty," he finished.

He lowered the gun as he heard M grunt a little behind him, standing up with some help from Tanner and Moneypenny. He could feel Mycroft's intense stare on him, and even Sherlock's incredulous shock and wondered what the latter of his two brothers would have thought of this development. Q hated field work and it was for this very reason why he hated it. No one, save for two people, knew of his status as a double-o. No one knew, because of all of the questions and dilemmas it would pose. Officially, he was the Quartermaster of MI6. Officially, and buried under so much encryption and leveled access, he was a double-o with the license to kill – except his license to kill was on a mass level of destruction. After all, hacking computers, hacking weapons systems, hacking anything and everything with the rise of computers and technology was the latest method to killing those that threatened the British government and her interests.

Q quietly placed M's gun on the glass desktop as he heard M approach, his tread a little uneven due to his injuries. "I'll be back in my office if you need me, sir," he stated respectfully as he continued to stare at C's dead body. "Tanner, would you please oblige my request and drive me back?"

"But, B-Bond-"

"007 will be fine," he had full confidence in the agent to accomplish his mission in taking down Obenhauser and also to rescue Madeline. He did not want to be in the presence of his brothers anymore, not after what had happened.

"Sir-"

"Do it," M's voice was heavy and quiet and Q appreciated the sentiment.

He smiled grimly and squared his shoulders as he turned on his heel and walked past the small crowd that had gathered by the entrance to C's office. They parted and Q saw Sherlock open his mouth, but closed it as he deftly ignored him by walking right past him. He knew he had promised his older brother that he would not disappear, not like the last time he had 'retired' from the field before popping up as the Quartermaster of MI6; but he wondered if he would have to now safeguard his own well-being by disappearing. It was not shame that drove him to do such a thing, but rather it was something he did not want to spoil his brother's perception of him. His careful cultivation of being a talented hacker and quartermaster to MI6 was all to make sure that Sherlock knew he was not alone, that there was someone who would never lie or omit something of import to him. Sherlock had no need for a brother who had a license to kill; and neither did Mycroft. Bad things would only happen in such circumstances if sentiment and secrets were compromised and Mycroft knew very well of those circumstances.

It was primarily one of the reasons why he had sought out MI6 and M in particular to shield him from Mycroft's meddling. He sighed to himself as he realized that he would have to create new safeguards against any and all threats once more. This whole debacle with Max Denbigh proved that Moriarty and by extension Magnussen's networks were still active after everything that they had tried to do to eliminate it. The fact that Denbigh had only scratched the surface, but had not revealed anything that could compromise himself, Mycroft, or Sherlock was the silver lining. But it had also revealed that he was somehow linked to Mycroft and by extension Sherlock. And that was something Q could not allow.

He would have to cut Mycroft and Sherlock out of his life – whether it be temporary or permanent, he would have to do it again.

A few weeks later...

"It's done?"

"Yes," Q nodded solemnly to M's question as he stood in his office. "And our agreement?"

"Still in effect," M replied, "though I do wonder, if it is for the best."

"Sir?"

"If you cut yourself off like this, it'll only lead to isolation and-"

"If you are worried that I will turn like the two previous 001s, Silva and Moriarty, I cannot give you such reassurance and platitudes that you wish to hear, sir. I can only say that you know me, and you know my file. You and my brother, Mycroft, are the only two who had accessed my file and know my capabilities and my reasoning."

"Yes, 001," M folded his hands as he stared at him from across his desk, "but you have to admit, before knowing what I know now, that number was talked of outside of MI6 due to the scandals of its predecessors that made national headlines; albiet without the knowledge that either party was a double-o. Even within the Double-O program itself that there is the superstition of curses on certain positions. Chiefly, your double-o number, and also 006 for that matter."

"Alec Treveylan's betrayal was the first, sir," Q pointed out, "there needs to be a second one in order to start having the word 'curse' bandied about in my opinion, sir."

"That's not the point, 001-"

"And it's Q, sir," he interrupted and this time it seemed M was satisfied as he nodded once, tapping his fingertips together as he sat back.

"Very well, then," M replied, "but if I may make one caveat to the agreement? That your brother be allowed to contact you if there is clearly an emergency. I will continue to uphold the agreement, but if there is such a national security that requires your aide as Quartermaster, I will allow him to contact you."

Q frowned, "But nothing more. He cannot be here, I cannot be summoned to meet him-"

"Precisely. Just a simple phone call or even a text if you wish. Burner phone if you are so inclined," M continued and Q nodded.

"I'll allow it," it gave him the choice of accepting the call, but ignoring it if he wished it. "If there isn't anything else?"

"Glad to have you back with us, Q. It is reassuring to know that Denbigh was not whom we all thought he was. And so, I'm sure your supposed exile to the secret facility is now over," M smiled a little and Q nodded. He pursed his lips together in a moment of quick thought before he pulled out a pen from his pocket and placed it on M's desk. M stared at the pen for a moment, puzzlement and curiosity playing across his features.

"As a thank you present, M, for all that's happened," Q replied, "click once for its use, another click to retract the blade."

"At least it doesn't explode," M commented as he absently clicked the pen to watch the stiletto blade retract and extend.

"No, sir, that was the wristwatch I gave Bond," Q had to admit that he was a little miffed that Bond did not return the wristwatch. But judging by satellite reports and footage of the explosion that wrecked Obenhauser's lair, he gladly admitted that it had been put to good use as a weapon of mass destruction.

"Good to have you back, Q," M replied.

"Thank you, sir. It is good to be back," Q nodded before he turned on his heel and left M's office. The whole affair with Obenhauser, C, and Nine Eyes was over, but Q had a feeling that the fallout was not. It was time to for him to get back to work as Quartermaster of MI6, not as a double-o with the license to kill.

~END~

Author's Notes:

This was inspired a long time ago by a throwaway line in Skyfall in which Q says, "Well, as it is, I can do more damage on my laptop sitting in my pajamas before my first cup of Earl Grey." Got me thinking that Q could conceivably kill someone (or more than one) by hacking something vital. The only thing I can thank Spectre for is putting Q into the field (and hilariously casting Andrew Scott as C) and thus allowing me to write this.