Chapter 7: Epilogue
January 2009
Alec had finally made it back home after four long months of Siberian winter.
The cold, rainy London weather felt practically like springtime to Alec as he made his way down to Q-Branch and to the cubicle of his favorite boffin.
"Hey, kid."
Danny pushed his wheelchair away from his desk and looked up at Alec. His smile was not as ebullient as before, but he still seemed glad to see him.
"006."
His arm and leg were still in casts (decorated now, with a variety of colorful nerdy drawings and well-wishes, along with a few formulas and what looked like blueprints on his arm cast), but the severe sunburns had healed, leaving unevenly-tanned skin, with scars that showed only if one looked closely.
Alec grinned and leaned on the cubicle wall. He noted that Danny's neighbor didn't quiver like he usually did, but only eavesdropped in an interested manner. Alec made a note to remedy that.
"Miss me?"
The corner of Danny's mouth quirked up. "Not a whit."
There was a shadow in his eyes that Alec didn't like, but he seemed well enough. The snark was still intact, at least.
Alec chuckled. "How's the kitten?"
Danny's eyes brightened. Good. "He's doing wonderfully. His name's Alan Turing."
"That's a mouthful," Alec groaned. "What about your plant?"
Danny wrinkled his nose and sighed. "Dead. It seems that I'm a better cat parent than a plant parent."
"Bit young to be a father, aren't you?" Alec joked. He wanted to do a bit of poking to see how his friend really was.
Danny rolled his eyes and huffed. "I'm responsible."
This made Alec raise a skeptical eyebrow at him. "Are you? Because I heard something down the grapevine about...the Lehman Brothers? And that stock market crash in September?"
Danny turned red. "I didn't cause it. I only... helped it along. It was going to happen anyway. I didn't mean to- Oh, never mind," he said, getting flustered.
Alec tilted his head, amused. "How did someone like you cause an international crisis? Or rather, help it along?"
Danny's mouth twisted. "I got bored."
"Of course you did," Alec snorted. "Very responsible of you."
Danny groaned and turned back to his desk. "Please shut up, Alec."
Alec grinned at the back of his friend's head. "Dinner?" Danny should be getting off of work soon.
"Yes," the kid said, his fingers flying on the keyboard. "Just give me a few minutes."
Alec had no trouble waiting; it was almost a magical experience, watching the code streaming out from the nimble fingers. It seemed that the cast on his arm didn't impede him at all.
When the kid rolled out of the cubicle, Alec narrowed his eyes suspiciously at his wheelchair, which looked a little different.
"What did you do to your chair?"
Danny shrugged, and ducked his head, hiding a proud smile. "I didn't do anything to the original. I designed a better version and Q had it built. Technically, I'm testing it out for use in the field."
"Does it...do anything?" Alec asked carefully.
"It transports me from one place to another, Alec," the kid said dryly, pushing the joystick forward to move himself along at a walking pace next to Alec.
"And?" Something designed by Q-Branch couldn't just do the one thing.
There. A smug smile had appeared on the boffin's face. "And it shoots lasers out of one armrest and bullets out of the other. It can also go from zero to fifty in five point three seconds. Obviously, it grips slippery surfaces, which is great in the winter, and there's a mechanism for going up and down stairs."
He opened a compartment in the armrest and pulled out a small canister. "Very strong pepper spray. New formula. It quite literally burns. They were concerned that I might get mugged on the tube."
Alec snorted. "I feel sorry for the poor bugger who decides that you're an easy target."
Danny smiled that small, self-satisfied smile that told Alec that he was really alright. "So do I. I have rockets, too. We haven't tested them in the field yet, but hypothetically, the chair should be able to fly short distances. At the very least, the rockets will set fire to whoever is standing behind the chair."
"Bloody hell."
Alec couldn't stop grinning. He was glad to be home.
. . . . .
Note:
The stock market crash of September 2008 was caused, for the most part, by the Lehman Brothers filing for bankruptcy, and not, to the best of my knowledge, a bored teenager on bed rest.