She would live to regret this, long before the end of the day arrived most likely. But Lionel was exceptionally good at reading people, and if he said Bond would scarper by the end of the day if left to his own devices, Olivia had no reason to doubt him. "Get dressed and collect your laptop, Bond, we're leaving in half an hour. I know you've never cared about running late, but I do."

His eyes narrowed at her, briefly, before he rose from the table and headed upstairs. She wondered if he would immediately climb out of the window like a teenager after curfew. It was a sheer drop straight down, no trees to bridge the gap, but there were some low hedges that if he angled it right, he might not injure himself beyond repair. Although he did have that bad knee, and that would likely get him. She only hoped he remembered that little fact enough to not make the attempt.

Exactly 30 minutes later, he emerged showered, shaved, and dressed. Glancing at him, he appeared perfectly normal on the surface, no different than any other day he'd stalked the corridors of MI6, other than the fact that the suit, one her husband had retrieved from his own flat earlier, was a still a size too large on him.

The driver was waiting for them out front and the ride to Whitehall was silent and tense. She knew he was angry and frustrated, she could practically feel it coming off of him in dark waves. Lionel hadn't been wrong, she was certain of it now – he'd made plans to leave and she'd just scuppered them. Well, too damned bad, she thought. You're going to learn to live again, whether you like it or not.


Just one more day, he thought. He could slip the traces tonight, or tomorrow at the latest. He followed M through the building, expecting to be taken to her office to sit idle all day, or do mind-numbing busywork on the computer, while the grownups tended to the real work. At least he could see Moneypenny one last time, he supposed. He'd miss her, a little.

M didn't hit the button for the floor of her office in the lift, though, but rather took him down to Q branch. Stepping out of the lift, she made a beeline straight for the quartermaster himself. As usual, the man was entirely focused on something under a magnifier on the workbench. Technically he was meant to function purely in a supervisory capacity, orchestrating the rest and delegating the actual work to his underlings. But he'd apparently never quite kicked the habit of getting his own hands into things, even after being promoted.

M stood behind him and cleared her throat noisily, trying to get his attention. After he failed to respond she moved beside him, bending enough to enter his peripheral vision. "Q, if you don't mind?"

The man startled badly, dropping a pair of tweezers into his lap, then fumbling as he stood rapidly. "Yes, yes, my apologies, ma'am. What can I do for you?"

M gestured to Bond to come closer. Once he was within reach, M grabbed him by the elbow and pulled him in front of Q. "Here, Q, he's yours for the day. Stress-test whatever you're working on, if there's a way to break it or misuse it, he's bound to find it. And do keep him out of Natalya Simonova's hair during working hours, hmm? I'll be in my office if you need anything."

"Wh-what? You can't be-"

"I am dead serious, Q. He has more field experience than just about anyone else here, and you and your people have the job of designing equipment for field agents. It won't kill you to get some direct feedback. Frankly, he's been idle long enough, and he's still on the bloody payroll, and I promise you, if you let him get too bored, he's liable to blow something up, and I'll hold you accountable if he does. Make. Use. Of. Him. You have your orders, Q."

With that, M swept back to the lifts, leaving Q staring after her with a distinctly unhappy expression. Once the lift doors had shut behind her, he turned Bond, looking as though he'd just bitten into a lemon.

Bond shoved his hands into his pockets and stared back at Q impassively, then shrugged. He refused to be held responsible for any of this. At least the day ought to be somewhat interesting.


"Is there anything he hasn't managed to completely destroy?"

The young lab tech pushed her glasses up where they'd slipped down her nose. "I think the collapsible rocket launcher still works?"

Q sighed heavily, wishing he'd stayed in bed that morning. M might as well have left him a bull elephant to babysit for the day. She wanted everything stress tested, and everything had been stress tested. And, for the most part, left in pieces. He looked across the room to where 007 was in rolled-up shirtsleeves, his suit jacket discarded somewhere, seated cross-legged on the floor with a toolbox and fiddling with the remains of something that Q no longer recognized. One of the techs stood over him, asking questions and taking notes. It had taken him most of the day to more or less destroy everything, but they'd just about run out of all that was in the final phases of testing. There were other prototypes about but they were still under development, and Q had no intention of letting the man anywhere near them. He was already pondering how he'd keep Q branch's R&D within budget this quarter and coming up with no workable plan now that nearly everything he'd had lined up for push to production had failed the "James Bond Test" in swift order.

007's presence had been bugging Q all morning, and not just the man's penchant for destroying everything in his line of sight. There was still the matter of the funny turn he'd had taken a while ago, just before Natalya Simonova had carted him off (and Q had some suspicions about what they'd gotten up to after, although he could prove nothing). And the various rumors that had been and were still being traded around Q Branch about the state of his health after his return and subsequent removal from the active duty roster. He didn't believe the one about terminal cancer, at any rate. 007 had lost weight and there was a distance in his eyes that hadn't been there before, but he certainly didn't look like he was actively dying.

Q knew 007 had been captured over a year ago, and, in general terms, had some idea of what must have happened to him. He'd tried not to think too hard about it, though, finding it unsettling to consider in detail. Q had a slightly sick feeling in the pit of his stomach about just why 007 had been pulled out of the field and, today at least, dumped in Q's lap by M for safekeeping. It wasn't something Q really wanted to be confronted with, not something he wanted to deal with even in small measure. He'd never exactly got on all that well with 007 from the start. His predecessor had had an odd, contradictory relationship with the agent – they'd bickered and butted heads constantly, but a warmth and mutual affection between them had been quite plain even to someone on the outside looking in. The old man had loved 007 in his own prickly, avuncular way, and had indeed been rather protective toward him, regardless of any frustrations that arose between them.

Frankly, this Q didn't quite harbor such warmth toward the man. 007 destroyed his work with reckless abandon, rarely ever returning anything at all, and what he did return was generally beyond repair and with nothing more than a flippant shrug over it, never mind an actual apology. It felt like willful disrespect for his hard work. His predecessor had told him, more than once, that conditions in the field often exceeded anything they could predict or reproduce in a laboratory setting. He'd also told him that he needed to avoid becoming too emotionally attached to the objects they sent out with agents, and remember that their real aim was to ensure the agents themselves were returned in a functional state, far moreso than the equipment.

He hadn't quite got the hang of that bit, yet.

Q approached the tech speaking animatedly to 007 just as the young man was having to lean down to help the agent off the floor due to some apparent trouble with a dodgy knee. "Well, Phillips, what have you got?" The tech grinned as he handed him a clipboard with a legal pad that contained several pages of cramped writing along with a multitude of sketches.

Phillips remained wearing that stupid grin, shifting from one foot to another like a child on Christmas morning while Q flipped through his notes. "It's been, uh, a very productive day, sir... I think. I don't suppose you could convince M to let us keep Bond for a while longer? I guess a couple weeks would be too much to ask for, but she might could spare him a few more days?"

Q cocked an eyebrow at his employee. "Are you serious? He's destroyed every single thing you've been working on for months, and you want him to stay longer?"

Phillips looked around at the bits and pieces scattered around the laboratory. "He's given us a lot of good data, sir, I've talked with the others and we'd like to... I mean, we've never had the opportunity to get an actual double-o to test things out directly in the way one might actually use them. We've already drafted a few workable improvements for several projects, Bond actually had some interesting ideas himself, it's all there in the notes if you just... Well, I know the budget is going to suffer, but this has been exceptionally useful, I really had no idea how creative these agents actually could be with these-"

Q cut him off, sighing heavily, feeling some sort of invisible barrier crumbling as surely as everything else 007 had got his hands on that day. "Yes, yes, I understand. I'll speak to M about it." Q glanced at 007, who had made it to his feet and steadied himself, but was now fidgeting oddly as he turned aside and wandered a few steps away. There was something odd going on with his shoulder, Q noted, but whatever it was, the man could probably deal with it. If not, he was perfectly able to take himself down to medical.

His predecessor had always told him Q Branch's real job was to ensure that field agents survived the mission intact. And despite superficial appearances, he wasn't sure this agent had returned in a state even remotely resembling "intact." Maybe that's why M left him here today, Q thought. Maybe 007 was meant to be some sort of object lesson on the actual stakes and priorities of his job. He ought to feel insulted, or at least condescended to, but then, maybe he also had sort of earned this, complaining to her so often.

Just a little.


"Yes, I understand."

M cut the line with the front security desk. Bond wasn't even being subtle about it, walking out of the front door bold as brass. Which meant he wasn't trying to hide his exit from her. Was it meant as a challenge of some sort? Pulling up the video feed on her laptop, she found him immediately. The exterior cameras showed him milling about on the pavement outside, as though waiting for her. He had the gall to look straight up into the camera, giving a cheeky little wave. He's worse than a child, I swear. Well, what could she do but play along, for the moment? Picking the phone up, she called Tanner.

"Have you finished that errand? Are you close? Good. Yes, he's outside... wait, no, he just got into a cab. Can you see it yet? ...Okay, just follow him and make sure he doesn't do anything idiotic." Christ alive, the man was a nuisance!

The desk phone rang again nearly the moment she'd put it down, this time with Q on the other end. After hearing what he had to say, she couldn't help but laugh at the heavy despair in the man's voice as he relayed the request from his own people. "Hell, if I can get him back, you can have him for good!"


Tanner followed Bond through London, but it soon became obvious where the man was headed, and Tanner breathed a sigh of relief as they ended up in Chelsea. Tanner was glad it wasn't the airport again, because he had less backup today and didn't really relish the notion of having to subdue and capture a double-o, especially that double-o. M hadn't told him to use force, but M hadn't exactly told him not to, either.

M had told him a little over a week ago that Bond was off the active duty roster and that it had not been determined when or even if he'd be returned to it. And that the North Koreans had damaged him more than they had originally thought. In their previous interaction at the airport, he'd noticed the agent now walked with a subtle limp and held himself more stiffly, as though in some non-trivial amount of pain, but otherwise did not seem greatly changed. He'd been kept abreast of the Graves affair, and 007 had acquitted himself excellently, as far as Tanner could tell.

But, M had been keeping him close over the last week. Tanner had his suspicions about just how close, and it had been noted by several people that Bond had been seen leaving with her at the end of the day a couple of times. Tanner was beginning to connect a few dots now. The cab deposited Bond outside of the building that contained his flat. Tanner parked nearby and rushed to follow him, catching up just in time to dart through the lift doors before they closed.

"Tanner."

"Bond."

"You aren't surprised to see me?"

"Not in the least. I have a few minor things to take care of, you can tell M I'll be in touch soon."

"If it's all the same, I think I'll stay close for the duration. M would have my head if something untoward happened."

"Suit yourself."

The lift doors opened and Tanner followed Bond down the corridor. He was only mildly surprised when Bond pulled a bent paperclip out of his pocket in lieu of a key to pick the lock on his own door before stepping inside. Tanner followed him in without asking permission, but if Bond cared, he didn't comment.

Tanner was mildly taken aback at the chaos that greeted him inside. The coffee table was strewn with an impressive collection of mostly-empty liquor bottles and an ashtray that was overflowing with cigar stubs. A few stray pieces of clothing were hanging over furniture and empty takeaway boxes were left in odd places that definitely weren't a rubbish bin. Tanner had never been in Bond's personal home, but he'd expected something less disorganized. Glancing about, he surmised that maybe it hadn't always looked like this. The furniture was of good quality and the décor subtle and masculine. It didn't look like the archetypal apathetic bachelor's pigsty and Bond was known to entertain feminine company frequently. Tanner may not have been a womanizer of Bond's caliber but even he knew that ladies generally weren't impressed with overt messiness.

Bond went into a small home office set up in what would have been the flat's second bedroom if it had contained a bed, and pulled out a somewhat worn piece of paper. Tanner propped himself in the doorframe, trying not to look like he was paying too much attention to what Bond was doing, but somehow he didn't think the man cared either way. He was doing a good job of pretending Tanner didn't exist so far, at least. Tanner absentmindedly patted an object in his jacket pocket, confirming that it was still there, but he'd deal with it later.

The laptop computer on the desk that Bond logged into was not MI6 property, Tanner noted. It was a fairly standard consumer Windows PC, not the proprietary Linux-based operating system that they generally issued with field laptops. Bond searched up the name and phone number of some solicitor, which piqued Tanner's interest. Was he looking to write his will? The rumors that had escaped containment from Q Branch that Bond had terminal cancer were patently absurd, but another possibility suddenly occurred to Tanner, just now. Had M been keeping Bond on such a short chain lately for another reason? Was he was under some sort of suicide watch? Tanner looked over Bond more closely but his inspection revealed no new data. At the moment Bond appeared perfectly calm, if a bit physically uncomfortable. His shoulders were hunched up as he leaned over the desk and a muscle on the right side now had a slight arrhythmic twitch to it, which could be from any number of reasons, including something as commonplace as a pinched nerve.

There was hardly anything at the moment to indicate that the man intended to end his own life. Of course, there had been the errand he'd been sent on. The chemist wasn't one of the rotation of them typically used by MI6, but another one much further away in a specialist compounding pharmacy inside of a hospital. The bottle had Bond's name on the label, but Tanner hadn't recognized the drug in question. He didn't think it was an antidepressant, though, or at least not a commonplace one. Why it needed to be in liquid form rather than tablets was another mystery.

Picking up a phone on the desk before immediately putting it back down, Bond swore under his breath, then turned to Tanner. "Lend me your mobile, I need to make a call. I haven't had this line reconnected yet."

"You haven't got your own mobile?"

"Not anymore. Something else I need to deal with, eventually."

Tanner hesitated for a moment, several questions just on the tip of his tongue, but decided not to ask. He pulled out the MI6-issued mobile phone and used his thumbprint to unlock it before handing it to Bond, who immediately dialed without so much as a "Thank you, Tanner" but really, what could you expect from a double-o? Bond wandered over to the large window on the far side of the room, pressing the unfolded letter up against the glass. It was handwritten rather than typed, and while Tanner's eyes weren't quite sharp enough to read it from where he was still loitering in the doorway, he recognized the tight cursive handwriting from the previous MI6 Quartermaster, deceased as of eight months ago. Tanner relaxed now, surmising the matter likely had less to do with Bond's own last will and testament and more to do with Major Boothroyd's, and he stepped out of the room to leave Bond to his own business.


Twenty minutes later, Bond emerged from his home office and stood in the middle of the living room where Tanner had seated himself on the sofa to wait. He looked around the place somewhat furtively without addressing Tanner, before heading to the kitchen and coming back almost immediately with a bin bag. Five minutes later, the liquor bottles and other mess had been cleared away and a nearly-full bag was dropped next to the door, presumably to be taken to the dumpster outside on the way out. Bond sat down on the other side of the sofa and handed the mobile phone back to Tanner, still saying nothing.

Tanner sat in silence, waiting. He'd been sent by M to "keep an eye on" the wandering agent, not to interfere directly. M had probably meant to for him to watch Bond from a distance, but he knew from experience that Bond tended to pick up almost immediately when he was being trailed, so why bother with the farce of being secretive about it?

"Just out of curiosity, what exactly did she tell you to do?"

"I believe her precise words were, 'Just follow him and make sure he doesn't do anything idiotic.'"

"Hmm."

Tanner reached into his pocket and pulled out the bag with the medication, passing it to Bond. "She also had me pick up that for you, earlier. Had to go across town to get it from some specialty chemist. There were written instructions to leave out the flavor but I think they must have ignored it. Judging by the color, I think you got cherry."

Bond pulled the bottle out of the bag and held it up. It looked like the kind of cough syrup he'd occasionally been given as a child, although the label had the same information as the bottle of tablets he'd choked on and spit back out like a fussy toddler the previous evening. He stared at it for a long while until he noticed that Tanner was staring as well, at him, although trying to act like he wasn't. He dropped the bottle back into the paper bag and set it on the coffee table.

An odd, conflicted feeling settled in the pit of his stomach. M's behavior over the last week had been a mass of contradictions to say the least. She'd spent most of the time insulting him. She'd also brought him into her own home, demanding nothing in return except that he stay there (which, clearly, he hadn't done). Her husband had told him that first day that she was terrified for him, and he'd scoffed at the notion. He still wasn't sold on it.

What did it matter to her, really? He was mostly useless now, except as a burnt-out object of fascination for the techs down in Q Branch, apparently. They'd flocked around him like children, asking a million questions about various past missions, about how he'd used (and broken) their precious creations, all jockeying for his attention nearly at once. He'd half expected them to each grab a limb and begin pulling in opposite directions.

"You aren't going to leave voluntarily, are you?"

"Not unless I get a call from M instructing me to do so."

"And if I decide to remain here?"

Tanner shrugged. "I suppose I'll be sleeping on this sofa tonight. Doesn't look terribly comfortable, I must say."

"It's... not the worst, actually." I nearly died on it about a week ago, he didn't add.

There was a knock at the door and Bond pulled himself to his feet. Possibly one of the neighbors. A brief shot of panic hit him in the chest at the wildly unlikely possibility that the person on the other side of the door was some assassin from North Korea, but he forcefully shoved the patently absurd intrusive thought aside, refusing to give in to another panic attack. North Korea wouldn't bother knocking. He knew where a few guns were hidden about the place, but Tanner likely had at least two on him at the moment and was known to be a decent shot despite looking like an accountant, so he didn't bother fetching one.


"Oh thank God you're here, James. M said you'd wandered off again." Moneypenny pushed her way inside before being invited, stopping again after a few steps when her eyes landed on Tanner. Natalya at least displayed some manners and greeted him, giving Bond a brief kiss on the cheek as she entered.

Tanner stood up at the entrance of the women. He looked between them, and at Bond again, before retreating and perching himself in an armchair off to the side, leaving the sofa for the recent arrivals. Natalya took Tanner's former place on the end of the sofa, but Moneypenny wasn't ready to sit yet. She took hold of Bond by the arms, looking over him. "Well, you seem healthy enough at least."

"Why wouldn't I be?"

She stared at him intently, and he managed not to sigh out loud when her eyes grew slightly damp before she blinked back the threatening tears and stepped back.

"James, you've had us all terribly worried, nobody's quite sure what your state of mind is these days, and you just up and disappear at the most random moments without telling anyone where you're going. What on Earth am I supposed to think?"

"'Penny dear, do you really think I'd go anywhere important without telling you?"

Moneypenny scowled at him. "Don't try to distract me by being charming, either, it doesn't work anymore."


Tanner now had confirmation of what he'd suspected. James Bond was, indeed, under suicide watch or something like it at the moment, and apparently Miss Moneypenny was part of it, or at least aware of the situation. Bond himself didn't appear to be terribly distressed at the moment. Tanner had known Bond for over a decade, but admittedly had only a casual friendship built on a mutual professional respect with the man. He hadn't spent any time around him outside of work, come to think of it. How does one even recognize such a thing in a man like that? Pulling his mobile back out of his jacket, Tanner retreated back to Bond's home office, away from the chatter.

"Ah, M- No, he's still at his flat... Well, he doesn't seem to be in a hurry to leave and Miss Moneypenny and Miss Simonova are here now... I haven't a clue. They just showed up at his door... Well, I can always just ask, give me a moment and I'll call you back."

Returning to the living room, Tanner found all three of them on the sofa, Bond sandwiched in between the two women and looking annoyingly pleased about the arrangement. Three heads pivoted to look at him almost in unison. "M wants to know if either of you ladies plan on remaining here. She said Bond needn't return as long as someone else is with him."

Both women spoke almost in unison, saying "I can stay." They glanced at one another across Bond, then shrugged and smiled to themselves, as though sharing some sort of inside joke.

"Well I'm no longer needed, then. Good evening, Ladies. Bond." Tanner nodded, and finally took his leave, managing not to glance back as he shut the door behind him. Whatever Bond's problem was, he hoped it sorted itself out. It wasn't any of Tanner's business, but he'd always liked the double-o well enough. MI6 would feel odd without him.


"Hmph, not a drop left in the place. A glass of wine would have been nice." Jane shut the refrigerator door.

"Good. He's had his allotment for the next three months in the space of a couple of weeks. I saw a couple of unopened bottles of ginger ale in the back of the cupboard. It might still be good, open one and find out." Natalya scowled at the useless phone in the kitchen, dropping the receiver down loudly onto the cradle, before going back to her purse on the counter to fish her mobile out. "Chinese or Indian?"

Jane made a face at her. "You always order that spicy rubbish. Get something else."

"Pizza?"

"If you must. But I'd like at least one actual vegetable involved and the tomato sauce doesn't count. You have the worst taste, you know."

"You English have no business lecturing anyone else on taste, Jane. You boil everything and think dumping salt over your food is 'seasoning' something."

"Says the woman who's country of birth is best known for cold beet soup."

"You've never had real borsch, and note that I said borsch, not borscht. And only some varieties are served cold, and those only in summer. You Westerners don't know anything of Russian cuisine."


The bag of rubbish next to the door now included an empty pizza box. Bond was stretched out over the sofa. He'd started with his head on Natalya's lap, but she'd progressively slid downward until her feet were propped on his coffee table. At least she'd had the decency to kick her shoes off before abusing his furniture, but even if she hadn't, he's not sure he'd have bothered to complain at the moment.

His own feet were perched over the opposite arm of the sofa, with Moneypenny more or less pinned under his legs, but she appeared to be content and nodding off at the moment. Bond rarely ever used the television in the corner of his living room, but 'penny had flipped it on a while ago, leaving the volume low enough to just provide a bit of white noise in the background.

At this point his head and shoulders were laying on Natalya's stomach, but she didn't seem to care, having draped one arm to rest over his chest while using the other to absentmindedly stroke his hair as though he were an oversized pet cat. Normally this sort of thing would be a prelude to something more, but he didn't have the heart to ask 'penny to leave yet and wasn't certain she'd respond too well to a suggestion she join them; he'd never actually gone to bed with 'penny, M would have had him taken out back and shot, probably (and, more critically, he suspected she really wanted and deserved something a bit more consistent than he could realistically commit to).

His life was still in the shitter, as far as he was concerned, but things could be worse, all told.


Bond woke up peacefully for the first time in recent memory, if he'd dreamed at all he couldn't recall it, but his back was bloody killing him. Something moved beneath him and he realized he was still on the sofa in more or less the same position he'd ended up in after supper. The tv was still on in the corner. He glanced at his watch and it was just past midnight. He tried to sit up and failed as sharp pain blossomed at the base of his neck and shot down his shoulder into his arm. He really needed to get up and move. An arm wedged itself under his shoulders, pushing him upward. Natalya had apparently woken as well and noticed his predicament.

As soon as he was upright, Moneypenny was moving as well, rubbing at her eyes like a child woken from a nap. "Mm... not the best idea. I don't think any of us are young enough for this sort of nonsense anymore."

Bond shrugged, cringed at the further pain it caused, and couldn't disagree with her assessment. That blasted crawling sensation started up again, and it would be only minutes before half the muscles in his back and shoulder cramped up further. The moment he began to feel slightly less dismal about his continued existence, of course this bullshit returned. The paper bag Tanner had left was still sitting on the table, taunting him. He really had no excuses left at this point, the issue with the tablets no longer applicable.

Natalya must have followed the line of his sight, as she stood up and removed the contents of the bag, glancing at the bottle of medication. "You forgot to take this after we ate? Can you just take it now?"

He hesitated, not wanting to answer the first question and not actually knowing the correct response to the second. Natalya set the bottle on the table, pulling the leaflet out, reading through it in its entirety.

"Hmm. Says if you miss a dose, just take it as soon as you remember unless it's very close to the next one. I don't think it should matter too much." She picked the bottle up and held it out toward him, but he still couldn't bring himself to move to take it.

Why was she acting so nonchalant about this? Moneypenny barely seemed to be paying attention, either; she was mostly yawning and trying not to fall asleep on his sofa again, utterly uninterested. Neither of them seemed to care in the least that he was being put on some bloody drug.

Finally, he reached out stiffly and took the bottle. It would definitely seem odd, now, if he refused it. It was just one dose, anyway, it's not like he had to keep taking it. There was a measuring cup on the cap, and dosage information on the bottle itself. All he had to do was pour it in and throw it back. Don't be weird about this. They're worried enough already.

He managed to pour out the indicated amount and take it without gagging too much. The taste of it – very artificial cherry, Tanner had guessed correctly – wasn't the most pleasant, but at least he wasn't suddenly reminded of Her. He couldn't quite stand up straight yet, as his back seemed absolutely determined to fight him every step of the way into the kitchen. He shoved the bottle into the back of the refrigerator and rinsed out the measuring cup before pouring a glass of water to wash the taste out of his mouth. If only the damned muscle spasms would stop already, he could stop feeling like a 90 year old man.

Moneypenny pulled at his sleeve after a few minutes of staring into the sink. "Come into the bedroom, James, and take that shirt off. I'll see what I can do about your back. Is that medication supposed to help with this?"

"Theoretically."

"Sometimes it can take a few weeks for it to really start working. My aunt was on it for a while after shingles messed her up."

Bond allowed himself to be led like an invalid through his own home, his ego hurting as much as his back after being compared to 'penny's old aunt. Then just to rub it in, he needed the women's help to get the shirt off before he stretched out on his front over the duvet. Moneypenny began the massage at his shoulders, where the worst of the problem was. She proved to be less adept at it than Lionel had been, but he wasn't going to complain to her.

James Bond had two women in his bedroom at the same time and there was nothing remotely pleasant about what was going on. Ugh.

Moneypenny finished what she was doing half an hour later, and he couldn't deny he felt better than he had, at least. She gave his shoulder a friendly pat before standing. "I think I'd better head home, I don't fancy sleeping on that sofa at all. I'll see you both tomorrow, then."

The emphasis on "you both" had been deliberate, that much Bond was sure of. He heard the door shut as Moneypenny went on her way and rolled onto his back, giving Natalya an inviting look. She leaned over him, kissing him and allowing him to pull her down on top of himself.

"I think you'd better just let me be on top this time, old man. We don't want your back hurting again, after all."

Well, he wasn't stupid enough to argue with her, it would ruin the mood. He might be getting old and broken down, but he wasn't totally out yet. Besides, he liked the view well enough.


"He didn't come in with you?"

Moneypenny blinked, momentarily confused by her boss's question. "He?"

"Bond, obviously. I suppose he ran off before dawn somewhere. I'd hoped with the both of you there he might be inclined to stick around, out of embarrassment if nothing else."

"I haven't a clue, actually. I left a bit after midnight, Natalya stayed with him."

M's expression passed through several phases, landing on something just south of resigned, but said nothing more.

Moneypenny knew she ought to keep her nose out of it, but she'd always been too curious for her own sake, at least according to her mother. "I don't suppose you've seen the state of his back since he returned...?"

"I've seen it, yes."

"Has he been on that medication long? I know it can take a few weeks to really soak in, so to speak."

M's eyes narrowed at her. "Did he actually take it? In front of you?"

"Well, yes. He forgot it after we had supper but remembered a bit later in the evening."

"Hm. Maybe there's some hope for him after all."