"Love is simply the name for the desire and pursuit of the whole."
-Plato, The Symposium

Part IV, Act I

It happens on a Monday.

Bond wakes to the sound of Q answering his phone quietly, followed by the gentle pull of a warm body away from his. He tries to keep Q beside him, but the other man huffs out a laugh and kisses the top of his head and says that he has to get ready for work. As much as Bond wants him to stay, he knows that they both have jobs to get back to, and reluctantly releases him. Bond does not get up right away and instead listens to the sound of Q going through his morning routine: using the toilet, showering, brushing his teeth, dressing with a rustle of fabric, collecting his things from the bedside. Bond hears him making tea, catches the soft murmuring of the tail end of the morning news. Then Q's footsteps come back to the bedroom and Bond smells coffee. Q sets a mug down on his bedside table and then leans over him again.

"I'll see you later," Q says, and kisses him without any regard to Bond's morning breath; he tastes like tea and mint. "I love you."

And then he's gone. Bond can still smell his aftershave and the scent of him on the sheets and pillows. He scoots over until he is on Q's side of the bed, as if he can find the last vestiges of his warmth and thinks that he has never been so happy.

Please he prays, please let this last. Don't make him suffer anymore. Let me keep my promise. Let us grow old together. Let us grow old together again and again for eternity.

He lies in the stillness for some time after that, wishing that wishes and prayers and dreams were real, because then he and Q might have a chance. But Bond knows it is childish, just like lounging about in bed all day, so he gets up. After he is showered and dressed, Bond takes up the now-cold cup of coffee and brings it with him into the kitchen. He is just about to heat up his drink when a blinding pain erupts in his chest. It's white hot and searing and so sudden that Bond starts and drops his mug. Bond does not know how to describe it, because it's worse than anything he's felt before, even being shot off a moving train and plummeting a hundred feet into thrashing water. The pain makes it hard to breathe, to see, and his vision goes dark as if someone just turned out the lights. He is vaguely aware that his knees give out and that he's on the floor, but Bond is in far too much agony to even register that there are shards of porcelain embedding themselves into his knees. The pain pulses again-a wave that expands outward from his heart like the shockwave from an epicenter of an earthquake, a bomb drop-and Bond grips at the front of his shirt, wondering if this is how it ends: instead of dying by the hands of a terrorist organisation or shot off the grid by MI6 itself, he's going to die in his own kitchen as the result of a heart attack.

There is one more stab, directly in his sternum, and then the pain stops entirely.

In the wake of it, Bond can hear his heart hammering and the rush of blood in his ears. His chest aches, but he can finally breathe and see again. Dimly, Bond recognises that his knees definitely hurt and that there's a copper tang in his mouth, most likely the result of an unconscious bite down on his tongue. His trousers are soaked with cold coffee and he's trembling like he's coming down off an adrenaline high. But Bond knows that had not been adrenaline, that had been fear, and terrible pain. He rubs at his chest, wondering why it feels like his heart has been torn to shreds.

Stiffly, Bond gets up and cleans the mess. Then he strips out of his ruined clothes goes into the bathroom to pick pieces of porcelain out of his hands and knees and shins. His chest aches as he does this and Bond wonders if he should go to Medical to get checked out, just to be safe. He is just pulling on a clean pair of trousers when his mobile rings. He knows the number and answers on the third trill.

"Good morning, Miss Moneypenny," he answers.

"Bond," she says, and her voice wavers in a way that makes the hairs on the back of Bond's neck stand up on end.

"What's happened?" he asks, hurriedly pulling on a shirt as he leaves the bedroom. She's uncharacteristically silent, and Bond feels something like dread creeping up on him. "Eve."

"It's… Q," she says, and Bond stops, swears the entire world stops because it sounds like she is trying not to cry. She breathes audibly, but Bond cannot, and he's gripping his mobile so tightly he thinks he might break it.

"What's happened?" he asks again, through a closing throat and an overwhelming sense of despair.

"There was an accident," Eve replies. "A car jumped the kerb and-" and Bond does not hear the rest. He is looking about the flat and seeing Q everywhere-the empty mug sitting at the edge of the sink, his pair of shoes by the door, a half-read book on the sofa table-and thinking that it's impossible, because they were supposed to have more time.

"No," Bond says. Q just left not even twenty minutes ago. He kissed Bond goodbye and told him he loved him. That could not be it. Bond does not realise he's crying and not breathing until he's gasping for air. Q was just there and Bond had let him go. He hadn't even opened his eyes to look at Q one last time. "No, no, no…"

"Bond, listen to me," Eve says, and her voice is stronger, strong enough that Bond latches onto it from deep within his own head. "They've brought him to St. Bart's. He's in surgery now."

"Surgery," Bond repeats, and something like hope warms in his hollow chest. Surgery means not dead but it can also mean not dead yet.

"It's bad," Eve replies softly, and Bond hears her swallow as she tries to steady herself, "but they're doing all they can."

"I need to… please, make sure…" Bond says, and he's not sure if the words make sense, but Eve assuages his fears.

"You're cleared." she tells him. "Go."

And he does.

Part IV, Act II

Bond waits for hours in a tiny room that smells like antiseptic. There is no one else there, which is a relief, and it allows him to pace and pull at his hair and pray to any and all Gods that will listen to save Q, to give them more time. But there are no answers, just silence, and Bond sits down in an uncomfortable plastic chair and tries to remember how to breathe.

It is the middle of the afternoon when someone finally comes, calls him a name that Bond recognises only vaguely, and leads him to a hospital room in the ICU. Q is there, hooked up to so many machines that Bond does not know where he begins and they end. The monitors show a steady heartbeat, but a machine is breathing for him. The bits of skin that Bond can see between the wires are covered in white gauze bandages. His left arm is in a severe contraption that holds his shoulder in place.

The doctor is speaking, but Bond barely hears words beyond multiple resuscitations because he is too busy looking at Q and wishing it was him instead.

"Will it hurt if I touch him?" Bond asks, once the doctor takes a breath.

"No, he's heavily sedated," he answers, and Bond immediately reaches for Q's hand. It is cold and lifeless, stabbed in every vein with needles and plastic tubing.

"Is he going to wake up?" Bond asks.

There is silence that is so deep it's deafening.

"Yes, but it will take time."

We have nothing but time.

Part IV, Act III

Q remains in the ICU for a few days before being transferred to the High Dependency Unit, which is a lot quieter and a bit more comfortable, but still just as depressing as upstairs. Bond watches as Q is unhooked from machines, then attached to new ones. Some of the bandages come off, but Q does not wake up, even as the bruises begin to fade and the cuts start to heal.

Bond rarely leaves and no one makes him.

The longest he is gone is a half an hour to an hour at a time. Mostly it is enough time to go home, take a shower, change his clothes, and come back. Bond does not care much for eating; everything that he tries to consume tastes like paper and ash in his mouth. The nurses and medical staff cast him concerned glances when they enter. Sometimes they try for conversation-they tell Bond that Q's vitals are strong, that he's making headway everyday-but most of the time, they hurry through their rounds without a word. Bond can only imagine how he must look; if it is anything like what he feels, he understands their desire to be as far from him as quickly as possible.

He ignores his mobile over the course of the week. When it rings, he does not even look at it or react, caring fuck all about what MI6 might do to him if they decided to pursue him. Moneypenny comes by once, carrying flowers, but when she sees Q, she looks so horrified that Bond asks her to leave. He cannot bear to see the look on her face, because it's telling him what he does not want to accept and will not ever accept.

The phone calls stop after that, and Bond is left in a silence punctuated by the rhythmic sound of the heart monitor and the gentle fall of rain against the window. He tries to talk to Q, but words fail him, and he can only hold onto his hand to show him that he's there and he's not leaving because we're going to grow old together.

"You should read to him."

It is raining again; Bond had been dozing in the uncomfortable chair just to the right of Q's bed. He wakes at the words and sees one of the nurses there. She's the one that always tries for conversation, the one who always smiles. She has red hair. He thinks her name is Holly.

"What?" Bond asks, voice gravelly with sleep.

"You should read to him," she says, as she replaces Q's saline bag. "I read in medical school that it helps sometimes. Besides, I'm sure he'd like to hear your voice."

"Yeah, I'll try that," Bond replies.

That afternoon, they transfer Q to a general ward that is near enough to the HCU should he need the medical attention. It is a private room, which is nice. It also has a window and Bond opens it just a crack every day even though he is not supposed to. But Bond knows that Q likes the smell of rain and can only hope that he is not too far away to enjoy it.

He brings The Symposium from home and reads from it everyday.

If Bond starts first thing in the morning, he can usually finish it by evening, even if he lingers on the lines that he knows Q loves the most. He reads until his throat hurts and then keeps reading and once all the words are spoken, he lays his head on the bed next to Q's hand and begs him wake up.

It's two Monday mornings after the accident that Q does.

Bond sees his lashes flutter and thinks it's just his imagination, but then Q's eyes open and his heart rate jumps on the monitor. Springing up from his seat, Bond presses the button to call a nurse and leans over Q so that he is directly in his line of sight. The blood vessels in Q's right eye are damaged and bloody and the grey of both irises is as dark as brackish water. Bond is not sure if Q sees him or not, because he starts gagging around the tube down his throat and begins thrashing weakly, clawing at his throat with his functioning hand. As gently as possible, Bond restrains him so that he does not hurt himself. He wants to tell Q that it's alright, but two nurses push him aside before he can get a word out. They banish him from the room as they attend to Q, leaving Bond to pace up and down the corridor outside for what seems like hours.

When they allow him inside, Q is awake and breathing on his own for the first time in weeks. He looks pale and tired and like he might be in pain, but he sees Bond and smiles.

And Bond believes everything may be okay.

Part IV, Act IV

The weeks that follow are hard ones.

Q has another surgery for the damage done to his right leg and when he wakes, he has two pins in his knee and cannot keep food down for a few days. That same week, the doctors take Q off his pain medication to give him a weaker dose and Bond can see the misery his lover tries to hide. He barely eats because of the discomfort, and Bond tries to distract him with books and crap telly so that Q does not think about it. But between Q's leg and his sprained shoulder, Bond knows he can only do so much. He sits quietly through Q's worst spells, holding onto his hand the entire time, even when Q asks him to leave. Bond knows he does not mean it, he just does not want anyone to see him like this.

"I meant what I said, Q," he tells him. "You don't have to be lonely anymore."

The hand in his is weak, but present, and after Bond utters the words, Q's grip never wavers in his.

Part IV, Act V

"I hate this bloody cane," Q mumbles, two months later.

"It's just for a little while," Bond assures him.

"I can barely keep up with you," he says, and Bond slows his pace for the second time since their morning walk. The strain of the exercise is evident and Bond wants nothing more than to put an end to things right that moment and carry Q back to the flat. But the doctor said that Q will make a full recovery so long as he does his exercises, despite the pain. The first two weeks of physical therapy are the worst-Bond knows that first hand-but Q is doing well and moving about, perhaps more out of boredom than anything else. Being confined to bed rest for weeks was on par with torture for someone like Q, like Bond, and getting up is relief, even if it is accompanied with some soreness.

"Is that better?" he asks.

Q sighs in gratitude and takes smaller, less stressful steps.

"Sorry," he says. "Now this will take forever."

"I don't mind," Bond tells him, because he does not mind. Q smiles and hooks his arm around Bond's as he limps along.

"Maybe I should modify it. Throw some flames on the sides. So it looks like I'm going faster."

Bond laughs.

"Just build yourself a jet pack and get it over with."

"You say this sarcastically now, but I've got a lot of down time in my future and plenty of resources to make a jet pack."

"Keep it at the lab, at least. You know what jet fuel can do to the carpet."

"Careful, James, your domesticity is shining through," Q teases him, and Bond leans over to kiss his temple.

"There are worse things," he says, because there are.

They have not talked about it, too focused on other things, but they still won't buy a calendar for the kitchen or replace the broken alarm clock in the bedroom. Neither of them want to go back to measuring time again, not like that, and as Q heals and the seasons begin to change, Bond is just grateful that they are both alive. It does not take long before Q is at work, but it is a long time before Q can walk without the assistance of a cane and even longer before he can dance again. Bond is reluctant to go back into the field, even after Q has recovered almost completely from the accident.

"You love it," Q tells him.

"But I love you more," Bond replies.

Q touches his face and smiles.

"I never asked you to choose. You can have both, you know," he says.

"I could die," Bond answers, leaning down to rest his forehead gently against Q's shoulder. "I would leave you alone."

"You could also get struck by a car on your way to the grocery here in London," Q replies, with something like laughter in his voice as moves his arms round Bond's neck. "Fate's already decided everything. We can't try to change things that our out of our control."

"You're right," Bond says.

That afternoon, he puts in his letter of resignation from MI6.

"Why would you…?" Q asks, that night, when he returns home, after Bond knows he has finally heard. The weather is trying for summer, but the nights are still a bit cold. Despite this, Bond has opened all the windows and he has a record on, with a singer crooning about love. Bond crosses the room to him and kisses him fully.

"Because if I only have one day left on earth, I want it to be with you."

Q smiles without any mystery or sadness or pain and a laugh bubbles from his chest as he winds his arms round Bond's neck.

"And you said I'm a romantic."