Natalya grabbed James' wrist, looking at his watch. They were running late, of course. Q might bark at her, but she'd only ever been late one other time in her five years working for him, so she wasn't too terribly worried about it. Given the personality types that inhabited Q Branch, it was a miracle anyone showed up before noon, and she knew for a fact that some of them came and went more or less at whim, and hadn't been dismissed yet.
She drank the rest of her coffee and stacked their plates, returning to the kitchen to leave them in the sink. She refilled her coffee mug from the pot before retrieving the bottle of medication from the fridge. She had a feeling he tended to "forget" the stuff often, semi-on purpose, but when she dropped it in front of him, he took it with only momentary hesitation, washing it down with more coffee immediately. The taste must be truly unpleasant.
"Come on, then, we need to get dressed."
James caught her by the waist as she passed by him, pulling her into his lap as she tried not to let her coffee mug, still grasped in one hand, tip over. "What's the rush?"
Natalya allowed him to kiss her for a minute, distantly noting a lingering cherry-candy flavor along with the coffee they'd been sharing, confirming her suspicions about the medication's taste, before pulling away. "Later, James. I'd like to get to work at something resembling a decent time. I'm going to be late as it is. I don't know what you'll be doing today, but I'm already rushing to meet a deadline at the moment."
"Hmph. All work and no play makes Natalya a dull girl."
"You know James, sometimes dull has its advantages. The general lack of explosions, for example, and no one particularly trying to kill you at all hours. Not that our little adventure wasn't thrilling, but a girl can't live like that forever."
His face crumpled just ever so slightly, and she wondered if she'd somehow hit a nerve, but another brief kiss distracted him well enough. She needed to get showered ASAP though. She'd be showing up wearing the same clothing she'd left in the day before, and there would already be whispering about it. She mostly didn't care if people talked about it, but at least wanted to show up clean.
Moments after she'd stripped and turned on the water, she had company. James, apparently, also wanted a shower, and didn't want to wait for his turn. Well, she was already going to be late anyhow. Might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb, she thought.
Bond gave Natalya one last parting kiss, practically winking at the camera in the corner. He'd had half a mind to just drop her at the entrance and spend the day wandering London, but Natalya had given him a distinct look when he'd made to split up outside, pulling him back to her side before he could make it more than a couple of steps away. She was less overbearing than M but he couldn't shake the feeling that she was mostly hanging around to keep an eye on him, despite her obvious continued attraction to him. He didn't exactly mind all of her attention (far from it), but it was difficult to get used to having so many people hovering around him as though he were somehow fragile. He wondered if they'd ever trust him again.
Bond allowed himself to be dragged inside by Natalya and then he'd had half a mind to go with her directly down to Q Branch, but he knew M would have security keeping an eye on him. He'd just be called up anyway, and decided to save himself the humiliation of having to be fetched up by one of M's minions. He'd see Natalya again soon, he suspected, whether he wanted to or not.
Moneypenny greeted him and they traded innuendos, falling back into an old pattern finally, no more waterworks or accusations. He'd missed this. She informed M of his arrival and was sent in almost immediately.
"Yes, he's just arrived. Can you join us now? ...Good."
M put down the phone and nodded at one of the two chairs in front of her desk. This time, Bond sat without complaint. She hadn't immediately launched into a tirade over him leaving the previous day, which suited him just fine. Being chewed out by M was something else he was growing weary of lately. She didn't even appear to be in a particularly bad mood, despite his truancy. He smiled at her despite himself, and while she glanced at his moment of private humor, she didn't bother to respond to that, either.
"You seem to be almost in a good mood, M. Dare I ask?"
She glanced over his shoulder at her door, ignoring him. A few moments later it opened and Q stepped in. He looked at where Bond was already seated and frowned sharply before sitting beside him.
"Q, could you repeat what you relayed to me earlier?"
Q hesitated, his expression growing even more sour. "Several of my R&D techs in Q Branch expressed in interest in, ah, further exploring Mister Bond's... unique experience. I suppose they'll want him for a week or two, at least. Phillips is practically salivating at the idea, and I think Williamson... Well, she's already drawn up some sort of schedule to ensure everyone gets a turn, as it were, to throw him at their current projects."
M opened a drawer and pulled out a legal pad that Bond recognized as the one that he and Phillips had been taking notes on the previous day while Bond had used and ultimately deconstructed several different devices. She put on a pair of reading glasses, and spent several minutes perusing it, occasionally turning over a page until she finally reached the end of the pages that contained notes.
"Some of this handwriting is not Phillips' work, Q."
Q raised an eyebrow at M, not sure where she was going with this. "The techs often work together."
"Much of this handwriting I recognize distinctly from Bond's field notes." She held the notepad out, handing it back to Q. "I'm sure you can figure out the difference. Or ought to be able to."
Q took another look at the notebook, and while he hadn't noticed the back-and-forth of the handwriting styles before, now that she had pointed it out, it seemed obvious. It wasn't something he normally cared about. As long as work got done he didn't dwell over who was doing it, but up here, of course, is where the spies lived. "Well, yes, but I fail to see the point, frankly."
"Some of the drawings are also his, and they aren't pure nonsense either. I know you and Bond don't always get along, but I think he could be an asset to Q Branch, if he's amenable to the idea."
Bond glanced askance at Q. He had a feeling he knew where this conversation was going, and hadn't decided yet how he felt about it. Q, however, looked as though he were chewing glass.
"We don't exactly have the budget-"
"That can be corrected for, I've already spoken to accounting. We'll have to shift around a few things, but it can be done. They've already assured me they can have an amended budget to you well before it's time to submit your quarterly report."
"I... see. And what position would he be in, exactly? The tech positions have rather exact qualifications."
"Various engineering and science degrees depending on the specific role, yes. I suppose languages doesn't quite cut it, but he certainly has enough practical experience with, shall we say, improvisation."
Q sighed heavily. "Don't remind me."
"Come up with a list of courses you consider utterly indispensable and if I agree with them, we'll see about finding him somewhere to enroll part-time. He's a clever boy, I'm sure he can manage passing marks."
Bond leaned back in his chair, crossing one leg over the other. "I don't suppose I get any say in this?"
M took off the reading glasses, setting them onto her desk. "I assumed if you didn't like where the conversation was headed, you'd interrupt. You've never hesitated to do so in the past. Q, you may leave. Send me that list within the next week or two please. And you can give Mister Phillips his notes back, I've finished with them."
Q stood and made his exit swiftly, grumbling to himself under his breath. M waited until the door had shut behind him before turning back to Bond.
"Is this something you could live with, at least for a time? I had considered offering you another position training new agents, but I'm not sure that would keep your mind engaged for very long. I had also considered another field position in intelligence gathering but I know you too well to think you could refrain from getting your hands dirty and just wait about for an active double-o to arrive if a situation arose. Q Branch hadn't initially occurred to me as a long-term position change, but they seem interested and I'm willing to let them have you, at least on a trial basis. You can, of course, leave MI6 entirely if you'd rather, but you already know we'll be keeping an eye on you wherever you go."
Working for Q Branch, there was an odd thought. Bond didn't immediately have an answer. "I don't want the training job, or the other one, I can tell you that for certain."
"That's as I suspected. But you're clearly intrigued by Q Branch. It doesn't surprise me, you've always liked your toys, even if you did end up breaking or losing nearly all of them. Perhaps getting involved in their creation might be suitable penance for giving Major Boothroyd so many headaches."
"If he heard you calling them 'toys' he'd have another one. Probably turning in his grave as it is. Can I think it over?"
"If you like. You can spend the next couple of weeks down there while you consider it, at the least. You cause too much trouble when left to your own devices, last week proved that much."
Bond nodded and stood, but M called to him before he could escape.
"One more thing, Bond, before you go. And I'm certain you've already picked up on this, or will very swiftly. Q Branch is somewhat notorious for its... shall we say, eccentric personalities. They aren't quite as heavily vetted by the psychologists as prospective field agents beyond what is necessary to weed out any major trouble, but it's been noted over the years that there is something of an over-representation of such phenomena as Aspergers and attention-deficit disorders. You're going to have to learn to work with such people if you are going to have any success down there."
"I'm sure I can find a way to adapt."
M spent several moments staring at him across the room, her eyes narrowing slightly. "Yes, you'll manage, I'm sure. It may not be all that far of a leap, come to think of it."
What the hell is that supposed to mean?
She dismissed him with a nod, and went back to her own work, clearly finished with him. He left, trying to figure out just how insulted he should feel.
Bond swore as he ended up sprayed in motor oil, the damn thing springing a leak again after his hand slipped and he accidentally hit something he hadn't meant to with the screwdriver. It was simple enough to fix, but still. The woman in charge of the vehicles section, a large, jovial middle-aged woman named Martha (she'd insisted on being referred to by her first name despite MI6 convention), had promised him he'd be the first to test-drive the thing (and all of its additions) if he could finish up the last few bits of the project, and he couldn't deny the prospect had been tempting. He'd worked on his own cars in the past as a hobby, preferring to do a lot of his own maintenance and repairs than trust a mechanic. There were some components, mainly the increasing number of proprietary on-board computer systems, that manufacturers insisted on making impossible to work around without going to their dealerships and charging a fortune for the privilege, which had become a hindrance in recent years, but for his own personal vehicles he preferred the classic models anyway.
MI6 had its own propriety systems and the shit the manufacturers put in were generally stripped out immediately and replaced, lest they present a security hazard among other things. The BMW currently up on the car lift didn't look much different from the last one he'd driven, although the current slate of experimental modifications he was helping to install differed somewhat. The adaptive camouflage of the last car he'd been given had gone in the bin after they'd failed to get the rest of the kinks out, and he personally didn't think anyone up in the double-o division would miss it. It didn't stand up to much abuse, and anything that didn't stand up to much abuse might as well be broken from the moment it left MI6. As he'd discovered at that lovely little ice palace weeks ago, all it took to fail was a few too many bullets, and it was not immune to someone on a motorbike accidentally ramming into it. Something as large as a car was difficult to miss even when it couldn't be easily seen. Even when functioning correctly, the slight distortion the camouflage produced made it easily visible to anyone paying a modicum of attention anyway, unless at a significant distance. They might not know precisely what they were looking at, but it was still enough of an oddity to gain as much attention as it avoided.
It was exactly the sort of thing that their current quartermaster was always entirely too enthusiastic about. The concept was very clever, the technology involved was bleeding-edge, but the actual practical use for it in the field was at best limited and at worst more of a liability than an asset. Since Major Boothroyd's retirement, Bond had been getting a creeping suspicion that the current quartermaster had possibly too many friends in other branches of military R&D and was using the double-o program as guinea pigs, but so far he couldn't prove a thing. He didn't exactly want to get even more firmly entrenched on Q's bad side if he really were going to be working for the man for any real length of time, so there was little point in challenging him on the subject.
He'd already had this conversation at length with some of the techs, at any rate – if something can't be used while you're being shot at, possibly bleeding, and maybe a bit concussed, it's basically worthless. Unnecessary touch screens were the new fad du jour, and he already fucking hated them, especially in a car. He couldn't afford to take his eyes off the road in the middle of a high-speed chase to poke at multiple layers of menus. He'd had it out with Q earlier in the day over this, as the current set-up had done away with a lot of the traditional buttons and everything – everything – had been put on a single touch screen with a lot of ridiculous menus. Rubbish, all of it. If he needed to eject someone from the passenger seat or fire a missile, the last thing he wanted to deal with was three layers of bloody touch screen menu at 100+ mph.
"There are too many features now and not enough physical space to even put that many buttons!" Q had argued.
"Then you'd damn well better start working on perfecting voice recognition and vocal command function, because that screen will get a double-o killed in record time," he'd countered. Surprisingly, Q had shut up after that, seeming to actually consider the suggestion seriously.
Stepping out from beneath the car, Bond tried to remove some of the motor oil from his hands and face with a shop rag that wasn't exactly clean to begin with, and ended up in worse shape than he'd started. Q-Branch had its own locker room with showers included – R&D could be exceedingly messy work – but he hadn't thought to bring a change of clothing. The coveralls he'd put on had taken the worst of it, but he could feel the oil soaking into his shirt collar beneath it. Well, Martha had warned him to ditch the shirt beforehand. He hadn't listened.
Bond went down a hallway into the locker room, looking about and finding the place otherwise empty. He felt oddly relieved, although he wasn't sure why. He'd never been the least bit shy about his own body in the past, not since he was a young teenager going through puberty (when everyone alive had the absolute right to be weird about it).
He stripped off the work coveralls, throwing them into a bin for the laundry service to pick up later and peeled off the ruined shirt, looking at the oily spots over the collar and a few more down the front. He'd got more in there than he'd thought, and the thing was absolutely ruined beyond all hope. It wasn't the most expensive shirt he owned, but he didn't buy cheap clothing as a general rule – he preferred to buy high-quality items that would last more than a few weeks before the stitching came out. It was still a bit loose on him – despite eating well lately, he'd not actually gained back much of the weight he'd lost in Korea – but he hadn't been quite ready to toss it to charity yet. Sighing, he threw it straight into a rubbish bin nearby.
Catching sight of himself in the mirror, his face, neck, and part of his chest were smeared with oil, as were his hands nearly up to the elbows. His heart skipped in his chest and he closed his eyes, trying not to let the feeling overtake him. He'd spent his captivity more or less living in his own filth, in North Korea. They'd let him bathe a grand total of three times in that fourteen month span that he could recall, in ice-cold water with poor-quality soap that barely did anything, the last time just one day before he'd been traded.
"There's washing up liquid on the shelf there."
Bond's eyes snapped open, and he saw Philips' reflection in the mirror where the man was standing behind him, peeling off a lab coat to hang in a nearby locker.
"It's hell on your skin but it'll take that motor oil right off with a bit of scrubbing. I have some lotion you can use after, if you want it. It's not too girly smelling, I promise, and it'll stop you from itching later."
"Hmm." Bond took a deep breath, refusing to react to Phillips' presence. The younger man was trying to go about his business and not to look at Bond's back, succeeding some of the time. He wanted to ask. Bond could tell he was just itching to ask. The prickling beginning on the back of his neck had him stripping the rest of his clothing off in record time and retreating into the shower in a way he hadn't done since he was about twelve.
"Well, he's not dying of terminal cancer, I think."
Natalya rolled her eyes as she sat down in the break room, overhearing the rumor mill. The most recent updates clearly hadn't reached the programming & computing section, but three of the R&D geeks were all huddled around one table over their lunches. She recognized Phillips, Williamson, and Patel. She knew Williamson & Patel well enough, but had only spoken to Phillips on occasion, finding the man intelligent but generally lacking in social graces. Which made him fit right in with his peers, naturally. Perching herself in a corner, she tried to block out their conversation, but the topic was obvious.
"I mean he seems healthy enough, but someone's definitely been chewing on him. Those scars looked pretty fresh, mostly.. poor bloke. I don't think I'd want to go back out there either."
Natalya turned to stare at them openly, setting her fork down with a clatter. "I know who you are talking about and it's none of your business. I can assure you he won't appreciate being whispered about, if he catches wind of it."
Three heads pivoted toward her in unison. She was satisfied when all three of them appeared to blush to at least some degree, and go back to their lunches in silence. Good. They ought to be at least a little ashamed.
By the end of the week, the prototype modified BMW was set up and ready to go. He still loathed the touchscreen controls, although he'd worked with a couple of the programmers (sadly none had been Natalya, and he still hadn't a clue what she actually did for MI6) to streamline it a bit, moving the more critical functions to the top level instead of being buried under a half-dozen sub-menus.
They arrived at the location they'd be testing the thing, which was on military property, adjacent to an army base. The lorry it had been loaded into backed up to the track and dropped a ramp to let her out. Q had come along with the techs, unfortunately, and was already shooting threatening looks at Bond.
"Calm down, Q, you'll get her back."
"I want her back in a usable condition, Bond. I still haven't forgotten what you did to the last two cars you got your paws on, and we need workable data from this thing. You've memorized the sequence of tests, correct?"
"Of course I have, Q - what do I look like, an idiot?"
Bond grinned at Q and climbed into the driver's seat before he could issue what he no doubt thought was a cutting retort, even giving a cheeky little wave to make Q scowl further. Bond cranked the engine and let it warm up for a few minutes before peeling off onto the track to take it through its paces a few times. He needed to get a feel for the engine and gears before trying any of the additions, naturally. They'd get their bloody data soon enough.
He'd missed this.
"Well in my defense, I did tell you those touchscreens were a problem. I couldn't get through three bloody layers of menu fast enough, whilst also trying to not steer off into a ditch or one of the obstacles. It's one panel bent and there's no damage to the frame or any of the mechanics or electronics, what are you complaining about?"
Q tried not to grind his teeth too much. M had insisted that Bond be allowed to do this, although her argument that he was still the best driver MI6 had hadn't been too convincing to him. He'd seen the state that cars issued to him came back in. One a few years ago had literally been cut in half. They'd brought it back in two separate crates! How do you even do that?
"Fine, Bond, but you'll be doing the repairs yourself."
Martha bounded up to the pair of them, stopping beside Bond and hanging off of his shoulder with one hand as she grinned at Q. "I think we're making some progress here, actually! The new targeting system for the missiles still needs a bit of work, though, that last one hit just slightly off-center."
"By three centimeters. That's within tolerance, I should think. But I suppose we ought to go again while we still have daylight."
"You need to stop getting so emotionally attached to your work Q," M had told him, almost word for word what Boothroyd had repeated so often to him. "Bond isn't your enemy, he's a resource you ought to be using more fully," she'd also said. Staring at the missing side panel on the passenger side of the BMW, he sighed.
The robot resembled a large spider, somewhat, if a bit more elongated. It was small enough to fit in the palm of Phillips' hand but packed some impressive surveillance equipment and the controls had a range of a couple of miles, far in excess of what he'd accomplished on a previous attempt. It could even scale vertical surfaces, although he was still working on getting it to reliably stick to a ceiling. The controls were a bit finicky, however, and seemed to get "jammed" at times, sending it skittering in one direction for a second or two after he turned the joystick in another.
It had been accidental, of course. Bond had been seated on the floor surrounded by the components of his own current project, a wrist-mounted hypodermic dart that could be used to deliver a sedative to a target. MI6 had used such devices in the past, extensively, but they had sort of gone by the wayside in the current kit, and Bond apparently wanted to make some improvements for it to be put back into rotation.
All well and good until Phillps' "spider" decided to take off on its own, running up over Bond's back and down his arm.
The resulting reaction had been immediate and dramatic. The robot had been flung off Bond's arm with such force that it had shattered against the wall, and while Phillips was vaguely upset that he'd have to put it back together, it wasn't his immediate concern. The ensuing commotion had predictably drawn a small crowd, and Phillips was feeling somewhat nauseous at the thought that he'd been the cause of such suffering, however inadvertently.
"It's just some kind of panic attack, I think." Patel stepped around Williamson and made to approach Bond where he was curled over on himself on the floor, up against the far wall, making some sort of incomprehensible noise that might have been words.
Phillips grabbed her sleeve before she could get any closer. "No, it's more than that. I don't think you should try to touch him, though, it might make it worse."
"What do we do, then? I wouldn't want him to hurt himself..." Patel backed up again, pulling at her sleeves nervously.
"What on Earth is going on here?" Q had arrived at the scene, and was peering across the room at Bond. "What the devil is wrong with him?"
"I dunno, my spider got away from me and sort of skittered up over him, and he just... freaked out?"
Another figure came through the door, pushing her way past Q. "Just leave him alone, all of you, I don't think he wants an audience for this. Shoo, all of you, out!"
Williamson and Patel left without protest. Phillips followed them, glancing back over his shoulder. "Tell him I'm sorry about this, I hadn't known he'd..."
"You couldn't have known, Phillips, and I'm sure he'll know that. Please go, for now."
Phillips left, leaving Q behind to turn his attention on Natalya. "I don't suppose you'd be willing to explain this?"
Natalya couldn't quite keep the sneer out of her voice, although she tried. "You already know he was captured in North Korea for over a year, what the hell do you think this is about?"
"But what exactly-"
"It doesn't matter 'what, exactly,' Q. I don't even know everything that happened to him and I'm not about to demand a detailed account if he's not willing to volunteer it himself. You can try it on your own if you want, but if he hits you for your cheek, don't complain later. This really doesn't concern you at all."
Q seemed to be shocked into silence, finally, and Natalya looked across the room again noting that Bond had grown more quiet, but remained where he was. He seemed almost calm, his curved-over back rising and falling more slowly than before. She didn't know exactly how aware he was yet, if he was out of the worst of it and simply trying to recover at this point. She'd called M on her mobile from the corridor just before she'd gone inside, figuring out immediately what was happening from the noise alone. M had been in the middle of something at the time.
Natalya chanced moving a bit closer to Bond, out of arm's reach but kneeling down closer to his level, trying to get a better look at him. His forehead was practically pressed onto the floor. She was reminded of a yoga class Jane had dragged her to a few months ago, something they'd called the "child's pose," although in Bond's case his hands were clasped over the back of his neck as though to shield him from a blow, rather than stretched out in front of him. It didn't look terribly comfortable, but at least he didn't seem in any danger of injuring himself or anyone else.
"How long has he been like that?" M, finally. Natalya stood up.
"Just a few minutes, not very long." She looked over to where Q had retreated to a corner, pretending to be interested in something on a workbench. "One of Phillips' little spider robots startled him when it crawled over him, I think."
"That would do it, yes."
"He has a thing about spiders now, then?"
"Scorpions, to be specific, although I think anything with too many little legs coming into contact with his skin is enough. This isn't the first time this has happened."
"Scorpions? You know what, I really don't want to know. Although that would explain the medication for nerve pain, I suppose."
"Just about, yes."
Q cleared his throat from where he was standing in the corner. "I don't suppose there was a reason I wasn't told about any of this before he began working for me? I knew he seemed off, but I had no idea... well, frankly this seems like something critical to know. What if he'd been in the middle of testing something dangerous?"
M pursed her lips, mulling over her answer. "I simply didn't foresee a situation where it would come up. He mostly has issues at night, not during broad daylight. I was incorrect, apparently. Keep Phillips' bugs away from him, and don't bring up Korea, and he ought to mostly be fine, I should think. You'll have to pardon me if I had my concerns for his privacy, he won't be thrilled about yet more people knowing about any of this."
M walked over to Bond. She wasn't about to get down on the floor, given her age and the state of her own joints, but manged to bend enough to tentatively place a hand on his shoulder. He flinched slightly under her touch, but his back didn't seem to be cramping up as it had done last week at times. Dr. Warmflash's theory that the psychological and nerve issues exacerbated one another but were not an issue of cause-and-effect seemed to be bearing out, at least, and she filed the observation away to discuss with the doctor later. "Bond?"
He didn't respond, but she thought some of the tension in back might've eased slightly. "James..." M stood again and glanced back at Q, who was still loitering, no doubt wanting to satisfy some sort of morbid curiosity. "Q, you may return to your work."
Natalya lifted an eyebrow in question after Q had departed. "You might as well stay, Miss Simonova, you're already involved in this." Moments later, Bond finally uncurled, glancing around for reasons M could easily surmise. "They've all been told to clear off, you can come out now."
Bond glared at her, but didn't move.
"Can you stand on your own, or is that knee too angry with you for keeling on the floor like that?"
Bond grunted as he attempted to get his feet under himself unsuccessfully. Natalya and M managed to haul him upright between the two of them, getting him onto a chair nearby. "Once you can walk, I think we'd best just make an early day of it. I had a few other things to do, but they can wait until tomorrow."
Bond still seemed unable to respond verbally, but the look he gave her spoke volumes. He wasn't happy.
Two steps forward, one step back, she thought.
